{"post_id":"17i5nd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Whenever something socially progressive is posted about Sweden or Norway on reddit, a dozen \"that only works because they're small countries with a homogeneous population\" posts pop up, is there any scientific truth to this?","c_root_id_A":"c869dlx","c_root_id_B":"c85xuwg","created_at_utc_A":1359557683,"created_at_utc_B":1359504792,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Why do people say this? Maybe because early studies of the robustness of Nordic welfare states emphasized their social homogeneity? I'd like to see an economist or political scientist familiar with this question comment and cite some literature. Anyway, saw a few studies like this (e.g., Knudsen, T., & Rothstein, B. (1994). State building in Scandinavia. Comparative Politics, 26203-220.).  Most of the studies I found seem to support this idea. (e.g., Layte, R., Whelan, C. T., Ma\u00eetre, B., & Nolan, B. (2001). Explaining Levels of Deprivation in the European Union. Acta Sociologica (Taylor & Francis Ltd), 44(2), 105-121. doi:10.1080\/000169901300346864;   Most studies seemed to address the question of the generosity of a welfare state as a function of social diversity\/homogeneity (on different variables). I don't know what it means to say that a welfare state only \"works\" in certain kinds of societies. A better question is under what conditions is it more likely to arise and in what form? There is an old-school three-kind typology of welfare states that is based on ideology (e.g., liberal in the USA, social democratic in Denmark, etc.). Presumably someone has looked at diversity as a determinant of these outcomes, but I did not find anything on this (but I don't know this lit). See \"the three worlds of the welfare state\" here http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Welfare_state .    One aspect of this question is whether a strong welfare state can develop in more diverse place. One aspect of diversity is immigration. This cross-sectional study suggests a way in which that would be hindered. \"those who favor that welfare benefits should in the first place target the neediest, place the highest restrictions on welfare provisions for immigrants\" (abstract). People in diverse societies were less likely to think that anyone should have less-restricted access to welfare. If you can look at this article, there's a super-interesting graph showing a multi-level interaction on p. 131. This study does not say anything about the historical process of welfare state development, but it suggests a mechanism by which diversity could limit the development of the welfare state.   Reeskens, T., & van Oorschot, W. (2012). Disentangling the \u2018New Liberal Dilemma\u2019: On the relation between general welfare redistribution preferences and welfare chauvinism. International Journal Of Comparative Sociology (Sage Publications, Ltd.), 53(2), 120-139. doi:10.1177\/0020715212451987  Rehm asks \"Why are unemployment benefits more generous in some countries?\" He finds that state generosity is related to unemployment risk homogeneity. The more heterogenous the risk (as you would find in an economically unequal society or one with large disfavored minority groups, for example), the less generous the benefits. He thinks that less homogenous societies \"demand\" (through democratic institutions) less generous benefits.     Rehm, P. (2011). Social Policy by Popular Demand. World Politics, 63(2), 271-299. doi:10.1017\/S0043887111000037","human_ref_B":"I presume the phrase has roots in theory rather than empirics. Assuming that the judgement of whether a state of the world is good or bad depends on utility, and an aggregate thereof, then it is clear that a more homogeneous the population - in their preferences - the easier it is to satisfy all at once. Thus, a social planer has an easier job of enacting policies which satisfy many. This is related to work on social welfare functions and voting theory.  Take government provided health care as an example. If preferences are homogeneous, and say, people generally have similarly healthy lifestyles and value health to the same degree, it is (relatively) efficient to use government for provision. When this is not the case, many issues which the government has a hard time dealing with; some relating to different preferences on health and risk, and others relating to incentive and pricing problems.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":52891.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"17i5nd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Whenever something socially progressive is posted about Sweden or Norway on reddit, a dozen \"that only works because they're small countries with a homogeneous population\" posts pop up, is there any scientific truth to this?","c_root_id_A":"c869dlx","c_root_id_B":"c861tqq","created_at_utc_A":1359557683,"created_at_utc_B":1359517451,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Why do people say this? Maybe because early studies of the robustness of Nordic welfare states emphasized their social homogeneity? I'd like to see an economist or political scientist familiar with this question comment and cite some literature. Anyway, saw a few studies like this (e.g., Knudsen, T., & Rothstein, B. (1994). State building in Scandinavia. Comparative Politics, 26203-220.).  Most of the studies I found seem to support this idea. (e.g., Layte, R., Whelan, C. T., Ma\u00eetre, B., & Nolan, B. (2001). Explaining Levels of Deprivation in the European Union. Acta Sociologica (Taylor & Francis Ltd), 44(2), 105-121. doi:10.1080\/000169901300346864;   Most studies seemed to address the question of the generosity of a welfare state as a function of social diversity\/homogeneity (on different variables). I don't know what it means to say that a welfare state only \"works\" in certain kinds of societies. A better question is under what conditions is it more likely to arise and in what form? There is an old-school three-kind typology of welfare states that is based on ideology (e.g., liberal in the USA, social democratic in Denmark, etc.). Presumably someone has looked at diversity as a determinant of these outcomes, but I did not find anything on this (but I don't know this lit). See \"the three worlds of the welfare state\" here http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Welfare_state .    One aspect of this question is whether a strong welfare state can develop in more diverse place. One aspect of diversity is immigration. This cross-sectional study suggests a way in which that would be hindered. \"those who favor that welfare benefits should in the first place target the neediest, place the highest restrictions on welfare provisions for immigrants\" (abstract). People in diverse societies were less likely to think that anyone should have less-restricted access to welfare. If you can look at this article, there's a super-interesting graph showing a multi-level interaction on p. 131. This study does not say anything about the historical process of welfare state development, but it suggests a mechanism by which diversity could limit the development of the welfare state.   Reeskens, T., & van Oorschot, W. (2012). Disentangling the \u2018New Liberal Dilemma\u2019: On the relation between general welfare redistribution preferences and welfare chauvinism. International Journal Of Comparative Sociology (Sage Publications, Ltd.), 53(2), 120-139. doi:10.1177\/0020715212451987  Rehm asks \"Why are unemployment benefits more generous in some countries?\" He finds that state generosity is related to unemployment risk homogeneity. The more heterogenous the risk (as you would find in an economically unequal society or one with large disfavored minority groups, for example), the less generous the benefits. He thinks that less homogenous societies \"demand\" (through democratic institutions) less generous benefits.     Rehm, P. (2011). Social Policy by Popular Demand. World Politics, 63(2), 271-299. doi:10.1017\/S0043887111000037","human_ref_B":"In terms of collective action, researchers have found a mixed bag regarding group size and diversity. Generally speaking, if all things remain the same, smaller and more homogenous groups tend to cooperate more than larger and diverse groups. A good scholar who grounded her work in empirical data to read regarding this is Elinor Ostrom (Understanding Institutional Diversity is an excellent starting point). However, diversity\/homogeneity is complex. It could be identity--but all identity is socially constructed to some extent. That is, gender, race, sexuality, culture, religion, and so one exist not as Platonic ideals, but are rather created by social practices and discourses. Inequalities and differences are real, but contingent on local contexts and histories. Further, diversity includes financial and material well-being, which is a political outcome. And in this case the logic becomes circular: Norway is more egalitarian because Norwegians are more equal.  On the other hand, plenty of empirical research demonstrates large, diverse groups of people cooperating. This may be explainable due to other variables, such as: institutional rules\/norms, resource characteristics, and other incentives. For instance, the likelihood of common pool resource management follows a curvilinear path: it is rare when resources are very scarce and very abundant, yet common when resources are moderately available.   So in terms of comparing Scandinavian countries and the U.S., there are going to be important social and institutional differences between the two that make it difficult to easily transfer governance systems and strategies between the two. However, just because the U.S. is more 'diverse' does not mean the U.S. can not become more egalitarian.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":40232.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2tfqul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Is it weird that formal attire hasn't changed in about 80 years? Is that even true, or is it just my imagination? And does it have anything to do with the advent of photography and mass media? Obviously, over the years there have been changes in the thickness of lapels, tightness of fit, how many vents, how many buttons. But these changes come and go, almost cyclically it seems. But the basic deal hasn't changed at all. Big, loose suits from the 20s and 30s look basically like the big, loose suits of the 80s and 90s to me. And a time traveler from today could go back to 1964 with absolutely no problem, as far as I can tell.   See, I cannot possibly imagine that a president or a CEO could make some drastic change to the formal outfit. It would be seen as completely weird and out of protocol. Whereas I imagine that, before photography, formal dress could evolve because there wasn't really any record of how things had \"always been.\"   Is fashion slowing down? Does our longer collective memory hinder radical changes?","c_root_id_A":"cnz5nr7","c_root_id_B":"cnz28cy","created_at_utc_A":1422081512,"created_at_utc_B":1422072703,"score_A":64,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"The overall appearance of modern men's business attire hasn't changed all that much over the past century. What people think of as formal attire has, though. For example, take this picture of Ataturk from the 20s: this would be considered formal (white tie, today) evening attire. On the other hand, what we currently think of as formal or business attire was actually considered informal attire. This has largely lost traction in Western fashion, but can still be seen in diplomatic etiquette, for example. So I would say there have been changes in the dividing lines between different types of attire, but the changes in the actual garments have been a bit slower as you observe.  This Economist article mostly agrees with that train of thought. It goes back to the inception of the suit with less emphasis on the previous century, but does mention that   > By 1890 the American office worker wanted both the informality of the lounge suit, with its sporting heritage, and a snappy, modern and efficient look that its military antecedents gave it.  ...which may go a long way in explaining where the current \"epoch\" of fashion kicked off. Additionally, they also agree that the suit hasn't changed much on the outside, but the interior has drastically changed\u2014pockets for tickets, pens, and phones are all examples.  On a final note, I don't really think our long collective memory is hindering radical changes; in my opinion, fashion has always been an iterative process with a few exceptions. The Economist article notes that one of the first big steps towards the suit happened when King Charles II ordered courtiers to \"dress in simple tunics, shirts and breeches\". While this top down enforcement may happen occasionally (maybe you could draw comparisons to colonialism and the spread of Western attire?), things otherwise move pretty slowly. Our concept of formality and appropriateness may change faster than the actual clothing.","human_ref_B":"Please cite sources in top-level comments. Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8809.0,"score_ratio":9.1428571429}
{"post_id":"p34ely","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why do men commit like... all of the crimes? 70-80% is not a small number. Even with single perpetrator crimes men are in the 70 - 80% range. And this is just in general. In some categories (like serial killars and molestors) they're in the top 90%.  I've seen many men argue that women just \"get away with crimes more easily.\" But no way in this earthly hell is so many crimes unreported that molestation cases get skewed to 90+% male from 50-50. It would be the number one biggest issue in law right now. It would be a complete failure of the law system that every criminal analyst would able to pinpoint with a spear. I'm not buying that as even 10% of the explanation.  I've briefly researched this for an hour and these statistics basically hold true all over the world. The only category women are overepresended is with crimes related to prostitution (or like things cis men can't do like illegal abortions)  Why are men responsible for close to all crime? Especially violent and severe economic crimes that affects millions?","c_root_id_A":"h8ow1qw","c_root_id_B":"h8otr9q","created_at_utc_A":1628796193,"created_at_utc_B":1628795166,"score_A":84,"score_B":33,"human_ref_A":"Here is a decent bibliography of gender and crime.  This is a great question that people will debate heavily.  As a sociologist of gender I would argue that it is a combination of gender socialization (how we learn the gender rules and identities in our society), opportunity (which is shaped by the spaces and activities men and women and nonbinary folks get to access), and the ways we define and police crime.    Masculinity grants men more access to public spaces and to the opportunities to commit crimes, and encourages men to take risks, to define their self-worth on wealth and success, and to exercise power without empathy.  Femininity is defined by social and emotional connections, being an outsider or fearful in public spaces, and to avoid exercising power over others (except for children).  Because we are so much more likely to define crime as street crime, and the family as private space, men's bad behavior is more likely to be criminalized.  If we think about white collar crime or crimes against humanity, again men have so much more opportunity.  I don't think women are any more ethical than men, but they are socialized to constantly reflect on how their actions will impact others especially when their behavior will be observed by others.    ​  This is pretty oversimplified, but it is a place to start.","human_ref_B":"It's very likely the biological differences testosterone has on behavior and development: 1, 2, 3","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1027.0,"score_ratio":2.5454545455}
{"post_id":"p34ely","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why do men commit like... all of the crimes? 70-80% is not a small number. Even with single perpetrator crimes men are in the 70 - 80% range. And this is just in general. In some categories (like serial killars and molestors) they're in the top 90%.  I've seen many men argue that women just \"get away with crimes more easily.\" But no way in this earthly hell is so many crimes unreported that molestation cases get skewed to 90+% male from 50-50. It would be the number one biggest issue in law right now. It would be a complete failure of the law system that every criminal analyst would able to pinpoint with a spear. I'm not buying that as even 10% of the explanation.  I've briefly researched this for an hour and these statistics basically hold true all over the world. The only category women are overepresended is with crimes related to prostitution (or like things cis men can't do like illegal abortions)  Why are men responsible for close to all crime? Especially violent and severe economic crimes that affects millions?","c_root_id_A":"h8otr9q","c_root_id_B":"h8pk77s","created_at_utc_A":1628795166,"created_at_utc_B":1628805897,"score_A":33,"score_B":65,"human_ref_A":"It's very likely the biological differences testosterone has on behavior and development: 1, 2, 3","human_ref_B":"This is a complex topic with few strongly established answers (as far as I am concerned). Interest in female offending (more often with respect to the gender gap in offending) has increased substantially over the past few decades, but there are still many unknowns. Before continuing, I invite reading sociologist Kruttschnitt (2013) summary of what research on gender and crime has found (click here).  --- Gender & Gendered differences (socialization, criminalization, etc.) --- Broadly speaking, two popular lines of research concern gendered socialization and differential treatment according to gender. For illustration, I quote criminologist Rosemary Gartner (2011):  >**If the sexes are more alike than different in the nature of their criminal behavior and the factors associated with it, why are they so different in the levels of their offending? One important reason is sex differences in socialization practices and family supervision that encourage conventional behavior among girls and risk-taking behavior among boys** (Hagan 1988). Girls are less likely to engage in delinquent acts because they are socialized to fear risky behaviors, to develop empathy for others, to value close personal and family relationships, and to avoid aggression; and because they are likely to spend more time with family members and other girls who reinforce conventional behavior. In contrast, boys are typically encouraged to value risk-taking, to associate masculinity with physical power and control, and to prize autonomy and independence; and they are likely to spend their time with male peers who reinforce these characteristics. **Delinquent activities for boys then tend to be more rewarding and more affirming of their identities. These tendencies are reinforced as boys and girls move into adolescence and early adulthood, when women\u2019s criminal opportunities are more limited than men\u2019s, and women\u2019s family responsibilities make the costs of crime greater for them** (Steffensmeier and Allan 1996).  The second line of research is concerned with the differences in how men and women are perceived, conceptualized, and treated by society and its institutions. For instance, for crime to happen, you need opportunity (e.g. see Clarke, 2012). Men and women tend not to share the same roles, statuses, lifestyles and routine activities, therefore there are differences not only in socialization but also in crime opportunities (e.g. see historical trends below). There is also the matter of how society reacts\/responds to men and women's behaviors (e.g. with respect to the criminal justice system, see the chivalry hypothesis, the concept of judicial paternalism, and the evil woman hypothesis).  --- How the gap varies through time and space --- For a recent illustration of how the sociopolitical context matters, see Savolainen et al. (2017). Analyzing data collected by the ISRD-2, the WVS, and the GII, find that the gender gap in delinquency varies according to differences in national environments:  >The results of our analyses offer qualified evidence that **the degree of patriarchy in a society is in fact related to the gender gap in delinquency.** The results from a series of multilevel regression models showed consistent support for the hypothesis that patriarchal national environment moderates the association between gender and delinquent offending: **The average \u201cmale effect\u201d on delinquency was observed to be the largest among nations that adhere to more patriarchal gender norms and where the position of women in the social structure is the most disadvantaged.** This finding was robust in analyses aimed at examining the hypothesized interaction effect across four measures of both delinquency and patriarchy. In other words, we found a statistically significant and positive cross-level interaction effect in each of the 16 models estimated.  Also see historical research on crime which shows that the gender gap under discussion is not invariant across time. Here is the first paragraph of social historian of crime Van der Heijden's review of *Women and Crime, 1750-2000* (2016):  >**It is generally observed by criminologists that women are responsible for a smaller proportion of indictable offenses than men**: approximately 13 percent of all prosecution in Europe (Aebi et al. 2010, p. 195). **This strong gender difference in criminal behavior is generally linked to the dissimilar public lifestyles of men and women: the fact that women have less freedom and fewer opportunities may cause a lower participation by women in crime and may also lead to more lenient treatment by prosecutors** (Pollak 1950; Adler 1975; Arnot & Usborne 2003; Burke 2006; Silvestri & Crowther-Dowey 2008, p. 27). Furthermore, **scholars generally assume that the sex differences in recorded crime have been consistent across time**, stressing the continuity rather than change in men\u2019s excessive contribution to criminality (Heidensohn 1996; Burkhead 2006, p. 50; Silvestri & Crowther-Dowey 2008, pp. 26, 191). **However, historical data on early modern Europe show that in France, England, and the Netherlands, between 1600 and 1800 women played a much more prominent role in crime than they did in the twentieth century** (Farge 1974; Feeley 1991; Feeley 1994; King 2006; Spierenburg 2008, p. 117; Van der Heijden 2013; Van der Heijden 2014).  And here is part of the conclusion:  >Sociologist Steffensmeier and behavioral scientist Allan argue that scholars should distinguish between the types of offenses committed by women and the explanation for their crimes. They agree that there is variability across time in the female percentage of offending, though such changes are limited mainly to minor property offenses or less serious forms of delinquency (Steffensmeier & Allan 1996, p. 482). **Throughout the period 1600\u20132000 women were most likely to be prosecuted for simple thefts, rather than offenses involving serious violence** (D\u2019Cruze & Jackson 2009, p. 31). **Statistical data on various regions in Europe in the early modern period show that variation in female crime rates was often linked to specific circumstances such as changing moral norms and double standards of prosecutors, as well as to economic marginality and opportunities that were related to migration, family structures, and labor participation.** The data also clearly show that **women were more likely to commit crimes in urban environments than in rural areas.**  Along the same lines, here is the perspective of social historian of crime Greg Smith (2014):  >The greater representation of males among the ranks of criminal offenders is indisputable. **The gender gap has been particularly pronounced for serious violent crimes, but it appears to have decreased somewhat over time because of relatively greater reductions in male violence over the centuries.** For other types of crimes, males also generally predominate; however, historians have been at least as interested in instances where this sex difference is trivial or nonexistent because of what it tells us about variations in the roles, status, and activity patterns of men and women. **In times and places where food and shelter were difficult to come by for some, women showed themselves as willing and able as men to do what was necessary\u2014except perhaps to kill or seriously injure\u2014to survive.**  >What these general patterns and trends obscure are the occasional departures from them in some times and places or for some types of crime. **Historians have revealed a number of these deviations, but more evidence about them could enlighten our understanding of sex differences and similarities in crime.** Furthermore, greater documentation of the extent to which officially recorded crime exaggerates or understates one or the other sexes\u2019 illegal behavior would shed more light not only on the gendered nature of crime but also on the gendered nature of responses to it. For example, **what we know about women\u2019s violence against men** (Cook 2009) **or their involvement in financial or white-collar crime** (crimes for which women were rarely convicted; Palk 2006) **could be greatly enriched by looking at sources closer to the actual behaviors.**  As noted above, scholars have observed convergences in more recent years. Lauritsen et al. (2009) and Rennison (2009) have found a narrowing of the gap in violent offending in the US, and Estrada et al. (2016, 2017) also find a similar pattern in Sweden. These trends seem to be driven by male offending decreasing more than decreases in female offending (i.e. changes in men's behavior more than women's behavior). Beatton et al. (2019) analyzed both violent and property crimes, and find a narrowing of the gender gap in offending among young people in Queensland, Australia. For some of the more popular explanations for these patterns, see Lauritsen et al.'s discussion of their results (click here).  Although further research is needed\u2122, it is clear that the sociohistorical context matters in shaping the extent to which men and women differ with respect to crime.  ---  [Continues below, with regard to research on biological differences between males and females, and a conclusion]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10731.0,"score_ratio":1.9696969697}
{"post_id":"p34ely","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why do men commit like... all of the crimes? 70-80% is not a small number. Even with single perpetrator crimes men are in the 70 - 80% range. And this is just in general. In some categories (like serial killars and molestors) they're in the top 90%.  I've seen many men argue that women just \"get away with crimes more easily.\" But no way in this earthly hell is so many crimes unreported that molestation cases get skewed to 90+% male from 50-50. It would be the number one biggest issue in law right now. It would be a complete failure of the law system that every criminal analyst would able to pinpoint with a spear. I'm not buying that as even 10% of the explanation.  I've briefly researched this for an hour and these statistics basically hold true all over the world. The only category women are overepresended is with crimes related to prostitution (or like things cis men can't do like illegal abortions)  Why are men responsible for close to all crime? Especially violent and severe economic crimes that affects millions?","c_root_id_A":"h8p1w47","c_root_id_B":"h8pk77s","created_at_utc_A":1628798561,"created_at_utc_B":1628805897,"score_A":14,"score_B":65,"human_ref_A":"I find it funny that when it comes to men, all of a sudden, the top voted comment jumps immediately to biology as an answer. It seems that only when it comes to sex differences that paint men in a bad light, genes are an acceptable answer. Then again, \"it's socialisation\" as an answer also allows for breaking down the idea of sex, so that's likely to be second. Here is an article written a while ago, that goes over some of the very large discrimination against men in terms of the justice system, and how that would impact the rates you'd see in prison. I will note that you should ignore the title, as it's just meant to be a bit provocative. I think it's fairly obvious that genes do play a role though, with high testosterone linked to more aggression which can obviously lead to more violence, and this will likely be even more true in the extremes. It's some combination of men obviously being more aggressive by nature, men still being expected to provide, and the huge gender bias in perception and thus reports, arrests, sentencing, etc.","human_ref_B":"This is a complex topic with few strongly established answers (as far as I am concerned). Interest in female offending (more often with respect to the gender gap in offending) has increased substantially over the past few decades, but there are still many unknowns. Before continuing, I invite reading sociologist Kruttschnitt (2013) summary of what research on gender and crime has found (click here).  --- Gender & Gendered differences (socialization, criminalization, etc.) --- Broadly speaking, two popular lines of research concern gendered socialization and differential treatment according to gender. For illustration, I quote criminologist Rosemary Gartner (2011):  >**If the sexes are more alike than different in the nature of their criminal behavior and the factors associated with it, why are they so different in the levels of their offending? One important reason is sex differences in socialization practices and family supervision that encourage conventional behavior among girls and risk-taking behavior among boys** (Hagan 1988). Girls are less likely to engage in delinquent acts because they are socialized to fear risky behaviors, to develop empathy for others, to value close personal and family relationships, and to avoid aggression; and because they are likely to spend more time with family members and other girls who reinforce conventional behavior. In contrast, boys are typically encouraged to value risk-taking, to associate masculinity with physical power and control, and to prize autonomy and independence; and they are likely to spend their time with male peers who reinforce these characteristics. **Delinquent activities for boys then tend to be more rewarding and more affirming of their identities. These tendencies are reinforced as boys and girls move into adolescence and early adulthood, when women\u2019s criminal opportunities are more limited than men\u2019s, and women\u2019s family responsibilities make the costs of crime greater for them** (Steffensmeier and Allan 1996).  The second line of research is concerned with the differences in how men and women are perceived, conceptualized, and treated by society and its institutions. For instance, for crime to happen, you need opportunity (e.g. see Clarke, 2012). Men and women tend not to share the same roles, statuses, lifestyles and routine activities, therefore there are differences not only in socialization but also in crime opportunities (e.g. see historical trends below). There is also the matter of how society reacts\/responds to men and women's behaviors (e.g. with respect to the criminal justice system, see the chivalry hypothesis, the concept of judicial paternalism, and the evil woman hypothesis).  --- How the gap varies through time and space --- For a recent illustration of how the sociopolitical context matters, see Savolainen et al. (2017). Analyzing data collected by the ISRD-2, the WVS, and the GII, find that the gender gap in delinquency varies according to differences in national environments:  >The results of our analyses offer qualified evidence that **the degree of patriarchy in a society is in fact related to the gender gap in delinquency.** The results from a series of multilevel regression models showed consistent support for the hypothesis that patriarchal national environment moderates the association between gender and delinquent offending: **The average \u201cmale effect\u201d on delinquency was observed to be the largest among nations that adhere to more patriarchal gender norms and where the position of women in the social structure is the most disadvantaged.** This finding was robust in analyses aimed at examining the hypothesized interaction effect across four measures of both delinquency and patriarchy. In other words, we found a statistically significant and positive cross-level interaction effect in each of the 16 models estimated.  Also see historical research on crime which shows that the gender gap under discussion is not invariant across time. Here is the first paragraph of social historian of crime Van der Heijden's review of *Women and Crime, 1750-2000* (2016):  >**It is generally observed by criminologists that women are responsible for a smaller proportion of indictable offenses than men**: approximately 13 percent of all prosecution in Europe (Aebi et al. 2010, p. 195). **This strong gender difference in criminal behavior is generally linked to the dissimilar public lifestyles of men and women: the fact that women have less freedom and fewer opportunities may cause a lower participation by women in crime and may also lead to more lenient treatment by prosecutors** (Pollak 1950; Adler 1975; Arnot & Usborne 2003; Burke 2006; Silvestri & Crowther-Dowey 2008, p. 27). Furthermore, **scholars generally assume that the sex differences in recorded crime have been consistent across time**, stressing the continuity rather than change in men\u2019s excessive contribution to criminality (Heidensohn 1996; Burkhead 2006, p. 50; Silvestri & Crowther-Dowey 2008, pp. 26, 191). **However, historical data on early modern Europe show that in France, England, and the Netherlands, between 1600 and 1800 women played a much more prominent role in crime than they did in the twentieth century** (Farge 1974; Feeley 1991; Feeley 1994; King 2006; Spierenburg 2008, p. 117; Van der Heijden 2013; Van der Heijden 2014).  And here is part of the conclusion:  >Sociologist Steffensmeier and behavioral scientist Allan argue that scholars should distinguish between the types of offenses committed by women and the explanation for their crimes. They agree that there is variability across time in the female percentage of offending, though such changes are limited mainly to minor property offenses or less serious forms of delinquency (Steffensmeier & Allan 1996, p. 482). **Throughout the period 1600\u20132000 women were most likely to be prosecuted for simple thefts, rather than offenses involving serious violence** (D\u2019Cruze & Jackson 2009, p. 31). **Statistical data on various regions in Europe in the early modern period show that variation in female crime rates was often linked to specific circumstances such as changing moral norms and double standards of prosecutors, as well as to economic marginality and opportunities that were related to migration, family structures, and labor participation.** The data also clearly show that **women were more likely to commit crimes in urban environments than in rural areas.**  Along the same lines, here is the perspective of social historian of crime Greg Smith (2014):  >The greater representation of males among the ranks of criminal offenders is indisputable. **The gender gap has been particularly pronounced for serious violent crimes, but it appears to have decreased somewhat over time because of relatively greater reductions in male violence over the centuries.** For other types of crimes, males also generally predominate; however, historians have been at least as interested in instances where this sex difference is trivial or nonexistent because of what it tells us about variations in the roles, status, and activity patterns of men and women. **In times and places where food and shelter were difficult to come by for some, women showed themselves as willing and able as men to do what was necessary\u2014except perhaps to kill or seriously injure\u2014to survive.**  >What these general patterns and trends obscure are the occasional departures from them in some times and places or for some types of crime. **Historians have revealed a number of these deviations, but more evidence about them could enlighten our understanding of sex differences and similarities in crime.** Furthermore, greater documentation of the extent to which officially recorded crime exaggerates or understates one or the other sexes\u2019 illegal behavior would shed more light not only on the gendered nature of crime but also on the gendered nature of responses to it. For example, **what we know about women\u2019s violence against men** (Cook 2009) **or their involvement in financial or white-collar crime** (crimes for which women were rarely convicted; Palk 2006) **could be greatly enriched by looking at sources closer to the actual behaviors.**  As noted above, scholars have observed convergences in more recent years. Lauritsen et al. (2009) and Rennison (2009) have found a narrowing of the gap in violent offending in the US, and Estrada et al. (2016, 2017) also find a similar pattern in Sweden. These trends seem to be driven by male offending decreasing more than decreases in female offending (i.e. changes in men's behavior more than women's behavior). Beatton et al. (2019) analyzed both violent and property crimes, and find a narrowing of the gender gap in offending among young people in Queensland, Australia. For some of the more popular explanations for these patterns, see Lauritsen et al.'s discussion of their results (click here).  Although further research is needed\u2122, it is clear that the sociohistorical context matters in shaping the extent to which men and women differ with respect to crime.  ---  [Continues below, with regard to research on biological differences between males and females, and a conclusion]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7336.0,"score_ratio":4.6428571429}
{"post_id":"3og86p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are most cult leaders true believers or atheist con artists skilled at psychological manipulation?","c_root_id_A":"cvx7l9g","c_root_id_B":"cvx3ab8","created_at_utc_A":1444676007,"created_at_utc_B":1444669777,"score_A":88,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Going meta: This is an area where social science is weak. The privately held views of historical figures cannot be studied in a convincing way because all sources could hold lies or truths. There is no way to independently validate a historical person's stated opinions about internal thoughts. (Liars have incentives to be believed that can include playing complex mind games with source materials. Honest folks look just the same a as a good liar by definition, and just because one is honest about spiritual convictions, it doesn't mean one will be honest in any other aspect of life.) When no evidence can convincingly clarify any particular case, identifying social trends has a *very* soft footing to stand on.","human_ref_B":"Read Colin Wilson's *The Rogue Messiahs*.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6230.0,"score_ratio":29.3333333333}
{"post_id":"3og86p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are most cult leaders true believers or atheist con artists skilled at psychological manipulation?","c_root_id_A":"cvxccyy","c_root_id_B":"cvx3ab8","created_at_utc_A":1444682803,"created_at_utc_B":1444669777,"score_A":14,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I hope you realize you've posed a false dichotomy. You fail to recognize that the cult leader could be a theist and still not be a true believer of his\/her own cult's dogma\/doctrine.   Edit: I would presume a statement pointing out a logical error doesn't need a reference, but just in case someone isn't familiar with what a false dichotomy is here's an explanation.","human_ref_B":"Read Colin Wilson's *The Rogue Messiahs*.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13026.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"206vwa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why is it that, in general, rural areas are more 'conservative' and big cities are more 'progressive'? This is coming from a European, but I believe the same principle holds true in general in the USA as well. People living in rural areas are generally more right-winged, conservative, religious, etc. as opposed to big city folk, who tend to be more left-winged, progressive and tend to be either atheistic or more religiously diverse when compared to people living in rural areas.  I turned to google for this question, but only found either over-generalizing or plainly misinformed answers. See these, for example:  http:\/\/answers.yahoo.com\/question\/index?qid=20081225142330AA51jQc  http:\/\/www.city-data.com\/forum\/general-u-s\/662881-why-city-more-liberal-country-more.html  Why is this? Has this always been the case? Are there notable exceptions to this? Do progressive people simply flock to big cities? Or do conservatives stay in rural areas for a reason? Is this a feat typical of 'Western' culture or is it a global phenomenon? These are the types of questions I'd like to see answered and discussed.","c_root_id_A":"cg0ifho","c_root_id_B":"cg0hujy","created_at_utc_A":1394603607,"created_at_utc_B":1394601697,"score_A":73,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Well I think you're using very broad terms to capture a lot of ideologies so I'm going to try and break down a few key issues and theorize why they're different in urban vs. rural.  **Regulation\/Government Involvement vs. Independence\/Decentralization**: As a city dweller, everything your neighbors do affects you. Neighbor dumping trash into the street? You're going to smell it. Neighbor wants to knock down walls and remodel? It's probably going to affect your living space or quality of life. In cities, you're just closer to other humans so there's less live-and-let-live and more need for restrictions on what each individual can do.  Conversely, if I live out in the country, there's simply more space between me and my neighbor. If I want to build a barn there's little chance my neighbor is going to be affected. Likewise, what does some bureaucrat from the big city know about how my barn is constructed? I'm not hurting anyone by building it on my land so why should I need permits and clearance from some agency?  **Welfare**: In small communities you know your neighbors and you probably know when they're struggling. If Farmer Bob's crops failed this year the community is small enough that they might pitch in and help out. If everyone's crops fail then they're all going to pull together.   In urban communities however it's harder to tell who's in your \"community\" and therefore worthy of your aid. An average citizen can't help out every single homeless person so they look to the government to provide a social safety net.   **Experimentation vs. Tradition**: For hundreds of years (if not longer) cities were the hubs of education, art, and trade if only for efficiency purposes. It simply made more sense to have everyone come gather in one place to study or trade. Once you gather people together they can observe what their neighbor or competitor is doing and imitate it or improve on it. That means more experimentation in both economic and social norms. Additionally, history shows us that less people are \"from\" cities which means that they have less ties to any given tradition or social norm.   On the flip side, rural areas can often trace their lineage and the traditions of their ancestors back several generations. There's less incentive to shake up the social norm.   Anyway, all of these are broad generalizations and obviously subject to tons of exceptions, qualifications, and rebuttal but these are the most obvious reasons that I've read about.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/www.ted.com\/talks\/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1910.0,"score_ratio":12.1666666667}
{"post_id":"30lisl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"When did U.S. media go from helping to cover up President Kennedy's infidelity and FDR being wheelchair bound to unabashedly dishing dirt on politicians? I don't think airing dirty laundry is good or bad, it is what it is, people do it whether you like it or not. I just want to know when the etiquette started to change for American media outlets about holding back on airing dirty laundry on political figures.","c_root_id_A":"cptn00c","c_root_id_B":"cptp48z","created_at_utc_A":1427560763,"created_at_utc_B":1427565023,"score_A":43,"score_B":67,"human_ref_A":"The twin hits of the Vietnam War and the Watergate scandal did a lot to change the nature of journalism from acceptance of official dictates to looking under every rock for signs of government officials misleading or deceiving the public. The \"dirty laundry\" aspect followed later, probably because there were more journalists and journalistic outlets competing for the next big scoop.","human_ref_B":"The US media has *long* aired dirty laundry on political figures. The accusations of Thomas Jefferson fathering a child with Sally Hemings were made by journalist James T. Callender. Andrew Jackson was attacked for marrying his wife before her divorce was fully official, with one paper in 1828 asking:  >Ought a convicted adulteress and her paramour husband be placed in the highest offices of this free and Christian land?  Jackson's presidency would later be threatened by a scandal involving the wife of an appointee that was married when they first met that played out in the newspapers.  In 1884, newspapers spread the rumors about Grover Cleveland having fathered an illegitimate child. The yellow journalism of the turn of the last century loved a good scandal. In 1942, newspapers printed the scandal of Senator David Walsh visiting a brothel infiltrated by Nazi spies.  This stuff is not new. We didn't go from a docile press to a scandal-loving one. We've always had scandal-loving sheets and newspapers in the corner of one politician or the other. Sometimes the media has worked to hide real scandals, sometimes they've fomented false scandals and sometimes they have been on the ball bringing it all to light.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4260.0,"score_ratio":1.5581395349}
{"post_id":"jfxcga","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Meta] Given the immeasurable harm done by the alarming rise of questions with unproven, invalid, or ridiculous premises in this sub, could top-level comments perhaps be expanded to include \"questioning the premises\" (without any citations)? Pretty much what the post said. Questions regularly pop up which can't be validly answered as asked because they come bundled with questionable, false, or invalid premises (example [here, though it's just the most recent one I was looking at). I think it would be helpful if top-level comments without citations were to be allowed if they questioned OP's premises. This could improve the quality of questions and answers in this sub.","c_root_id_A":"g9myyqn","c_root_id_B":"g9n0wte","created_at_utc_A":1603366721,"created_at_utc_B":1603368285,"score_A":7,"score_B":35,"human_ref_A":"I fully agree with you in the matter of false premises, but wouldn\u2019t a citation to a reputable source exemplifying how the premise is wrong serve to reinforce your point? Say, someone asks why men cheat more and you link a study saying that the numbers are about equal. If you just say that the premise is false, it becomes he says, she says. Not to mention, your premises could be false, but you could still be correct in your conclusion 1  Questioning of premises, of course, should be an exercise made constantly in science, but many of the people asking questions here may not be in the sciences at all, so we may gently point them towards better premises.","human_ref_B":"The way this is handled in \/r\/askhistorians is that often the source of the common misunderstanding would be addressed, but sourced and to the quality expected.  E.g. https:\/\/old.reddit.com\/r\/AskHistorians\/comments\/75855k\/wheres_the_evidence_that_pink_was_once_a_color\/do48h2c\/  In the case of a completely unusual premise that can't easily be disproven - e.g. Why do 37-year-old-asian men always clap their hands three times on the 3rd of march? I think it would be reasonable to ask the follow-up question \"Why do you think that they do?\", which would expand the context of the question and maybe lead to an interesting dicussion.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1564.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"jfxcga","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Meta] Given the immeasurable harm done by the alarming rise of questions with unproven, invalid, or ridiculous premises in this sub, could top-level comments perhaps be expanded to include \"questioning the premises\" (without any citations)? Pretty much what the post said. Questions regularly pop up which can't be validly answered as asked because they come bundled with questionable, false, or invalid premises (example [here, though it's just the most recent one I was looking at). I think it would be helpful if top-level comments without citations were to be allowed if they questioned OP's premises. This could improve the quality of questions and answers in this sub.","c_root_id_A":"g9myxgx","c_root_id_B":"g9n0wte","created_at_utc_A":1603366691,"created_at_utc_B":1603368285,"score_A":2,"score_B":35,"human_ref_A":"mmhmm. Agreed.","human_ref_B":"The way this is handled in \/r\/askhistorians is that often the source of the common misunderstanding would be addressed, but sourced and to the quality expected.  E.g. https:\/\/old.reddit.com\/r\/AskHistorians\/comments\/75855k\/wheres_the_evidence_that_pink_was_once_a_color\/do48h2c\/  In the case of a completely unusual premise that can't easily be disproven - e.g. Why do 37-year-old-asian men always clap their hands three times on the 3rd of march? I think it would be reasonable to ask the follow-up question \"Why do you think that they do?\", which would expand the context of the question and maybe lead to an interesting dicussion.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1594.0,"score_ratio":17.5}
{"post_id":"jfxcga","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Meta] Given the immeasurable harm done by the alarming rise of questions with unproven, invalid, or ridiculous premises in this sub, could top-level comments perhaps be expanded to include \"questioning the premises\" (without any citations)? Pretty much what the post said. Questions regularly pop up which can't be validly answered as asked because they come bundled with questionable, false, or invalid premises (example [here, though it's just the most recent one I was looking at). I think it would be helpful if top-level comments without citations were to be allowed if they questioned OP's premises. This could improve the quality of questions and answers in this sub.","c_root_id_A":"g9n2t1y","c_root_id_B":"g9myyqn","created_at_utc_A":1603369690,"created_at_utc_B":1603366721,"score_A":28,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I think this is a fairly good point. Part of this process is learning how to formulate answerable questions, and at some level, we do have a meta interest in fostering scientific literacy in general.","human_ref_B":"I fully agree with you in the matter of false premises, but wouldn\u2019t a citation to a reputable source exemplifying how the premise is wrong serve to reinforce your point? Say, someone asks why men cheat more and you link a study saying that the numbers are about equal. If you just say that the premise is false, it becomes he says, she says. Not to mention, your premises could be false, but you could still be correct in your conclusion 1  Questioning of premises, of course, should be an exercise made constantly in science, but many of the people asking questions here may not be in the sciences at all, so we may gently point them towards better premises.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2969.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"jfxcga","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Meta] Given the immeasurable harm done by the alarming rise of questions with unproven, invalid, or ridiculous premises in this sub, could top-level comments perhaps be expanded to include \"questioning the premises\" (without any citations)? Pretty much what the post said. Questions regularly pop up which can't be validly answered as asked because they come bundled with questionable, false, or invalid premises (example [here, though it's just the most recent one I was looking at). I think it would be helpful if top-level comments without citations were to be allowed if they questioned OP's premises. This could improve the quality of questions and answers in this sub.","c_root_id_A":"g9myxgx","c_root_id_B":"g9n2t1y","created_at_utc_A":1603366691,"created_at_utc_B":1603369690,"score_A":2,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"mmhmm. Agreed.","human_ref_B":"I think this is a fairly good point. Part of this process is learning how to formulate answerable questions, and at some level, we do have a meta interest in fostering scientific literacy in general.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2999.0,"score_ratio":14.0}
{"post_id":"jfxcga","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Meta] Given the immeasurable harm done by the alarming rise of questions with unproven, invalid, or ridiculous premises in this sub, could top-level comments perhaps be expanded to include \"questioning the premises\" (without any citations)? Pretty much what the post said. Questions regularly pop up which can't be validly answered as asked because they come bundled with questionable, false, or invalid premises (example [here, though it's just the most recent one I was looking at). I think it would be helpful if top-level comments without citations were to be allowed if they questioned OP's premises. This could improve the quality of questions and answers in this sub.","c_root_id_A":"g9myxgx","c_root_id_B":"g9myyqn","created_at_utc_A":1603366691,"created_at_utc_B":1603366721,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"mmhmm. Agreed.","human_ref_B":"I fully agree with you in the matter of false premises, but wouldn\u2019t a citation to a reputable source exemplifying how the premise is wrong serve to reinforce your point? Say, someone asks why men cheat more and you link a study saying that the numbers are about equal. If you just say that the premise is false, it becomes he says, she says. Not to mention, your premises could be false, but you could still be correct in your conclusion 1  Questioning of premises, of course, should be an exercise made constantly in science, but many of the people asking questions here may not be in the sciences at all, so we may gently point them towards better premises.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":30.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"jfxcga","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Meta] Given the immeasurable harm done by the alarming rise of questions with unproven, invalid, or ridiculous premises in this sub, could top-level comments perhaps be expanded to include \"questioning the premises\" (without any citations)? Pretty much what the post said. Questions regularly pop up which can't be validly answered as asked because they come bundled with questionable, false, or invalid premises (example [here, though it's just the most recent one I was looking at). I think it would be helpful if top-level comments without citations were to be allowed if they questioned OP's premises. This could improve the quality of questions and answers in this sub.","c_root_id_A":"g9ptdjv","c_root_id_B":"g9myxgx","created_at_utc_A":1603418725,"created_at_utc_B":1603366691,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It's pretty easy to avoid the bot, you just need to ask a question?  Or really provide any single link: https:\/\/www.google.com\/","human_ref_B":"mmhmm. Agreed.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":52034.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1pbblp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"this is going to sound very, very naive, but if Denmark is the happiest place in the world, why aren't other countries madly trying to copy them, or at least be heavily inspired by how Denmark does things?","c_root_id_A":"cd0mxps","c_root_id_B":"cd0mxeh","created_at_utc_A":1382886966,"created_at_utc_B":1382886935,"score_A":141,"score_B":62,"human_ref_A":"You are assuming making the nation happy is the goal of every government.","human_ref_B":"According to Eric Weiner's The Geography of Bliss, the happiest countries in the world (by self reporting) are Iceland, Netherlands, Switzerland, India, Qatar, Thailand, and Bhutan, each for very different reasons.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":31.0,"score_ratio":2.2741935484}
{"post_id":"2glalv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are there any skills or abilities that correlate negatively with IQ ? There are these often thrown around clichees that intellectually gifted people are for example bad with working with their hands, lack so called practical knowledge whatever that means, or are bad with people aka the much invoked \"emotional intelligence\"  If we assume that people have limited brain power\/time to train\/resources, etc... it would make sense that high ability in some areas comes at a cost in some other areas. Or is this flawed reasoning ?  Anyway my question would whether there was ever any effort to try to explore such assumptions scientifically ?","c_root_id_A":"ckkeyhu","c_root_id_B":"ckkg19d","created_at_utc_A":1410915374,"created_at_utc_B":1410917654,"score_A":4,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"I guess my related question is: are there even any standardized, validated tools to measure skill or \"intelligence\" in other areas?","human_ref_B":"IQ already has a spotty correlation to begin with.  If we leave IQ behind and just talk about \"intelligence\" then we're getting into a huge can of worms wherein we have to define what exactly we mean by intelligence.  Psychologists who work in studying it use intelligence as an ability to learn, or as creativity, or as acquisition of knowledge, or as capacity for change...  Throw brain plasticity on top of it all and things like 'potential' start to lose meaning.   (For a quick summary of some of the theories, see here; http:\/\/psychology.about.com\/od\/cognitivepsychology\/p\/intelligence.htm    For a quick rundown on plasticity, this article serves its purpose; http:\/\/www.psychologytoday.com\/blog\/redefining-stress\/200807\/brain-plasticity-in-action-getting-smarter-and-happier)  Are you starting to see the difficulty here?  Certain brains happen to be wired such that they are better at certain things, and I would expect that there are definite correlations between specific skills (for example, someone who works as a carpenter is likely to have both good spacial abilities and concentration, someone who works in computer science is likely to have good memory and good logic)  However, these correlations definitely do NOT approach 1, I know computer scientists who are very sociable and social workers who are extremely logical.  The brain is incredibly complex and its ability to adapt is not really drawing from a pool of resources (although there was a study I read about how willpower tends to be spent from a limited pool, but not intelligence. http:\/\/www.apa.org\/helpcenter\/willpower.aspx for a basic rundown.)  Edit, fixed a few keywords and added sources  Oh, and I did find one thing that has an inverse correlation with IQ: Faith, this article has a short discussion about the research. http:\/\/arstechnica.com\/science\/2013\/08\/new-meta-analysis-checks-the-correlation-between-intelligence-and-faith\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2280.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"2glalv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are there any skills or abilities that correlate negatively with IQ ? There are these often thrown around clichees that intellectually gifted people are for example bad with working with their hands, lack so called practical knowledge whatever that means, or are bad with people aka the much invoked \"emotional intelligence\"  If we assume that people have limited brain power\/time to train\/resources, etc... it would make sense that high ability in some areas comes at a cost in some other areas. Or is this flawed reasoning ?  Anyway my question would whether there was ever any effort to try to explore such assumptions scientifically ?","c_root_id_A":"ckkwbo0","c_root_id_B":"ckkeyhu","created_at_utc_A":1410968065,"created_at_utc_B":1410915374,"score_A":8,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"For one, see Melnick, M.D., Harrison, B.R., Park, S., Benetto, L., and Tadin, D. (2013) A Strong Interactive Link between Sensory Discriminations and Intelligence. Current Biology 23, 1013\u20131017  The summary states \"High-IQ individuals, although quick at perceiving small moving objects, exhibit disproportionately large *impairments* in perceiving motion as stimulus size increases\" (their emphasis), which in various online articles has been extrapolated to infer that smart people are detail oriented, but aren't as good at seeing things right in front of their face.  There's also the notorious case, Jordan v New London, where a man was disqualified from police officer employment because he scored too high on the exam, his score being estimated to be equivalent to a 125 IQ.  Apparently they had ascertained from ??? that highly intelligent people were more likely to become bored with police work, and quit, leading to a waste of training resources.  I've also heard the reason given that \"smart people aren't as good at following orders,\" though I don't know what research there is to substantiate this.","human_ref_B":"I guess my related question is: are there even any standardized, validated tools to measure skill or \"intelligence\" in other areas?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":52691.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2glalv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are there any skills or abilities that correlate negatively with IQ ? There are these often thrown around clichees that intellectually gifted people are for example bad with working with their hands, lack so called practical knowledge whatever that means, or are bad with people aka the much invoked \"emotional intelligence\"  If we assume that people have limited brain power\/time to train\/resources, etc... it would make sense that high ability in some areas comes at a cost in some other areas. Or is this flawed reasoning ?  Anyway my question would whether there was ever any effort to try to explore such assumptions scientifically ?","c_root_id_A":"ckkwbo0","c_root_id_B":"ckks9a5","created_at_utc_A":1410968065,"created_at_utc_B":1410959184,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"For one, see Melnick, M.D., Harrison, B.R., Park, S., Benetto, L., and Tadin, D. (2013) A Strong Interactive Link between Sensory Discriminations and Intelligence. Current Biology 23, 1013\u20131017  The summary states \"High-IQ individuals, although quick at perceiving small moving objects, exhibit disproportionately large *impairments* in perceiving motion as stimulus size increases\" (their emphasis), which in various online articles has been extrapolated to infer that smart people are detail oriented, but aren't as good at seeing things right in front of their face.  There's also the notorious case, Jordan v New London, where a man was disqualified from police officer employment because he scored too high on the exam, his score being estimated to be equivalent to a 125 IQ.  Apparently they had ascertained from ??? that highly intelligent people were more likely to become bored with police work, and quit, leading to a waste of training resources.  I've also heard the reason given that \"smart people aren't as good at following orders,\" though I don't know what research there is to substantiate this.","human_ref_B":"As \/u\/Garblin said, IQ has to be taken with a grain of salt. This is a standardized tool only if it is used correctly. Use the different indices and it will be much more precise.    > clichees that intellectually gifted people are for example bad with working with their hands, lack so called practical knowledge whatever that means,  Except for savant syndrome and other similar pathology, it's not necessarily true (Pearson 2008 : the results in WAIS IV subtests doesn't demonstrate any specificity of high-ranking participant. In other words, they can be great in one subtest and average in other, or great in one subtest and great in the other. The main correlation is for subtests in the same Index).   > If we assume that people have limited brain power\/time to train\/resources, etc...   There isn't a \"limited brain power\". For example : memory (See B. Schwartz 2013). Except if you are not a healthy participant, you can train your memory and increase this ability.   The limit considering the \"time to train\" is real though. But it's the same for everyone.   > it would make sense that high ability in some areas comes at a cost in some other areas.  Plasticity of the brain is not about \"losing\" an ability to gain another, it's about developing additional connection during training (see my answer to \/u\/GOD_Over_Djinn, and look at long-term potentiation for example). In other word, you become great in the skill you train intensively, but you don't change your other skills if you use them (same level before and after training, or even higher when there is neuronal implication for other skills).  A counter-example of your question : some studies have showed that language and spatial reasoning are linked (see Levinson 2002), and not negatively correlated.   You can also read the work done in cognitive remediation (for example see Barlati 2013 for a review in schizophrenia).  Don't hesitate to ask me a question if I wasn't clear enough.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8881.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"2glalv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are there any skills or abilities that correlate negatively with IQ ? There are these often thrown around clichees that intellectually gifted people are for example bad with working with their hands, lack so called practical knowledge whatever that means, or are bad with people aka the much invoked \"emotional intelligence\"  If we assume that people have limited brain power\/time to train\/resources, etc... it would make sense that high ability in some areas comes at a cost in some other areas. Or is this flawed reasoning ?  Anyway my question would whether there was ever any effort to try to explore such assumptions scientifically ?","c_root_id_A":"ckks9a5","c_root_id_B":"ckkeyhu","created_at_utc_A":1410959184,"created_at_utc_B":1410915374,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"As \/u\/Garblin said, IQ has to be taken with a grain of salt. This is a standardized tool only if it is used correctly. Use the different indices and it will be much more precise.    > clichees that intellectually gifted people are for example bad with working with their hands, lack so called practical knowledge whatever that means,  Except for savant syndrome and other similar pathology, it's not necessarily true (Pearson 2008 : the results in WAIS IV subtests doesn't demonstrate any specificity of high-ranking participant. In other words, they can be great in one subtest and average in other, or great in one subtest and great in the other. The main correlation is for subtests in the same Index).   > If we assume that people have limited brain power\/time to train\/resources, etc...   There isn't a \"limited brain power\". For example : memory (See B. Schwartz 2013). Except if you are not a healthy participant, you can train your memory and increase this ability.   The limit considering the \"time to train\" is real though. But it's the same for everyone.   > it would make sense that high ability in some areas comes at a cost in some other areas.  Plasticity of the brain is not about \"losing\" an ability to gain another, it's about developing additional connection during training (see my answer to \/u\/GOD_Over_Djinn, and look at long-term potentiation for example). In other word, you become great in the skill you train intensively, but you don't change your other skills if you use them (same level before and after training, or even higher when there is neuronal implication for other skills).  A counter-example of your question : some studies have showed that language and spatial reasoning are linked (see Levinson 2002), and not negatively correlated.   You can also read the work done in cognitive remediation (for example see Barlati 2013 for a review in schizophrenia).  Don't hesitate to ask me a question if I wasn't clear enough.","human_ref_B":"I guess my related question is: are there even any standardized, validated tools to measure skill or \"intelligence\" in other areas?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":43810.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"a6iu9o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"What's going on in China? I've heard about concentration camps, organ harvesting, social credit, housing crisis and terrible work conditions. What are the recommended resources, preferably a good ol book, to really understand what's going on and have a detailed analysis of the most recent years?","c_root_id_A":"ebw2xw9","c_root_id_B":"ebvslep","created_at_utc_A":1544934359,"created_at_utc_B":1544924785,"score_A":32,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Problem is that China is such a controversial topic that it is more of a study subject than a \u201cjust read a book\u201d kind of topic. I\u2019ve been living in China for over 5 years now and it\u2019s often still difficult to understand people here. Nevertheless I can recommend a few good sources:  -\tThe Fall and Rise of China for a good history overview -\tder spiegel report on imprisonment in China  -\tMao: The untold story note: this is biased against Mao. View it as the most reasonable case on why Mao was bad. A far more positive case can be made as well.  Just a few that I personally enjoyed. In general I think you should try to read several news sources (American, European, and Asian for example) and just read up on what you don\u2019t understand.","human_ref_B":"\u201cBetraying Big Brother\u201d by Leta Hong-Fischer is a great analysis on gender equality under Xi and the oppressive measures taken against feminist activists.   It also demonstrates more broadly how China\u2019s authoritarian power lies in patriarchal norms and the subjection of women to second tier citizens.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9574.0,"score_ratio":3.5555555556}
{"post_id":"1rf6pk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why do huge brands like Coca-Cola need to spend billions on advertising? According to Coke's website, they spent $2.6 billion on advertising, and that was back in 2006. Why do they need to spend so much since pretty much everyone on earth is familiar with their product?","c_root_id_A":"cdmprcf","c_root_id_B":"cdmojlv","created_at_utc_A":1385402333,"created_at_utc_B":1385399453,"score_A":38,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"\/u\/Manfromporlock excellently covered of the bases in what comes to value creation which is a big part of the story from a marketing perspective. While it's implied in the post, I'd make it explicit that from a customer behavior perspective advertising not only has a psychological impact, but a cultural one too.   Basically by heavy advertising Coke maintains its status as a cultural symbol and remains embedded in people's identity construction processes (think of all the life-defining moments Coke has been a part of, and how they keep referring back to them in their ads). Coke even has primitive subcultures of consumption revolving around it, evident if you do a simple search for \"coke vs pepsi discussion\" on the net (I found a couple pages worth with just a quick glance).   Strategic management has a couple of things to add to the picture through looking at competitive advantage.   First, advertising is one way to create barriers of entry to a market, making it harder for competitors challenge you. Less competitors = more profits, or so the story often goes.   Second, heavy investment (often, but not exclusively, in advertising) makes sense if you think that in the end it'll force your competitors to exit the market, eventually allowing you to recoup your investment and more. This is one of the tenets of the Austrian economics school (named after Joseph Schumpeter), which contends companies are competing in a process of \"creative destruction\" in the marketplace.   Third, advertising even when your product is well known makes sense if one of your core competences is a strong brand (technically the relationship with the customer created through the brand, which in itself is just a resource). In other words, without maintaining their brand through heavy advertising, Coke would eventually become just another company that produces black sugarwater. Right now, they're in the business of selling an image, not a product. The difference is pretty significant when it comes to business models.","human_ref_B":"People are extremely familiar with *some* of Coca-Cola's products. But they definitely won't be familiar with the full range of products and brands sold\/supported by the Coca Cola company. You should take into account that the money spent on advertising is being divided across a variety of brands, media types, and countries, and is not focused on a specific, single product or brand.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2880.0,"score_ratio":9.5}
{"post_id":"1rf6pk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why do huge brands like Coca-Cola need to spend billions on advertising? According to Coke's website, they spent $2.6 billion on advertising, and that was back in 2006. Why do they need to spend so much since pretty much everyone on earth is familiar with their product?","c_root_id_A":"cdmojlv","c_root_id_B":"cdmri6o","created_at_utc_A":1385399453,"created_at_utc_B":1385406427,"score_A":4,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"People are extremely familiar with *some* of Coca-Cola's products. But they definitely won't be familiar with the full range of products and brands sold\/supported by the Coca Cola company. You should take into account that the money spent on advertising is being divided across a variety of brands, media types, and countries, and is not focused on a specific, single product or brand.","human_ref_B":"First, read what \/u\/Manfromporlock and \/u\/Simkin have already said. I don't want to regurgitate their excellent answers.  But, I think there is room for a much richer discussion of how corporations have come to dominate the public sphere.   Habermas and others have written extensively about the role of the public sphere in democratic societies; it is the space where parties can engage in open and reflexive discussion and debate about their shared social circumstances. I use the metaphor \"space\" because it makes the concept of the public sphere easy to grasp:  in essence, it's the part of culture where there is space or room for discussion and debate.  For self-interested reasons, corporations have a huge presence in the public sphere. They want to control the conversation, have their voices heard, drown out critical voices, and generally set the terms of the discussion to be favorable to their interests. This is known as the corporate colonization of the public sphere, or the corporate takeover of the public sphere.  Advertising and marketing is a large part of it, but it extends to things like public relations and other publicity, market research, policy papers from think tanks, outright propaganda...the list goes on and on. By having such an outsize presence in the public sphere, there is little room for contrary voices to be heard, and hardly any space for people to have a discussion or debate outside the boundaries set by corporate interests.   This applies to almost everything, from wars to the soda wars. Want to discuss climate change? The coal industry will bombard you with slogans about how coal creates jobs for honest, hard working Americans; the natural gas industry will appeal to \"farmers in Iowa\" who reduce their reliance on imported energy; etc etc. Critical voices -- such as from environmental NGOs, scientific advisory councils, or public advocacy groups -- have to work incredibly hard just to open up space to have their voices heard. This is why many engage in civil disobedience and other actions designed to garner attention, because they know the (corporate dominated) public sphere is generally not receptive to what they have to say.   Edit to add references:  The foundational treatment of this subject is of course Habermas \"The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere.\" I also recommend Sharon Beder's \"Global Spin\" and of course you can read any number of media theorists on the subject, such as Herman and Chomsky's \"Manufacturing Consent\" (in terms of news).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6974.0,"score_ratio":5.25}
{"post_id":"1rf6pk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why do huge brands like Coca-Cola need to spend billions on advertising? According to Coke's website, they spent $2.6 billion on advertising, and that was back in 2006. Why do they need to spend so much since pretty much everyone on earth is familiar with their product?","c_root_id_A":"cdmr5fg","c_root_id_B":"cdmri6o","created_at_utc_A":1385405596,"created_at_utc_B":1385406427,"score_A":2,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"In addition to the explanations provided by \/u\/Manfromporlock and \/u\/Simkin, it may be instructive to look at the different stlyes of Coca-Cola advertisements there have been over the years.   There is quite a good overview here!  In particular, I liked the analysis of the ad campaign in the 2000's for The Coke Side of Life: >The ad campaign was launched in 2006 and it\u2019s main theme centers around people drinking Coke and feeling happy and positive. You drink Coke, you feel good. The campaign has optimistic and positive vibes, and it captures the very essence of life. It encourages people to love spontaneity and to see the world in full color.","human_ref_B":"First, read what \/u\/Manfromporlock and \/u\/Simkin have already said. I don't want to regurgitate their excellent answers.  But, I think there is room for a much richer discussion of how corporations have come to dominate the public sphere.   Habermas and others have written extensively about the role of the public sphere in democratic societies; it is the space where parties can engage in open and reflexive discussion and debate about their shared social circumstances. I use the metaphor \"space\" because it makes the concept of the public sphere easy to grasp:  in essence, it's the part of culture where there is space or room for discussion and debate.  For self-interested reasons, corporations have a huge presence in the public sphere. They want to control the conversation, have their voices heard, drown out critical voices, and generally set the terms of the discussion to be favorable to their interests. This is known as the corporate colonization of the public sphere, or the corporate takeover of the public sphere.  Advertising and marketing is a large part of it, but it extends to things like public relations and other publicity, market research, policy papers from think tanks, outright propaganda...the list goes on and on. By having such an outsize presence in the public sphere, there is little room for contrary voices to be heard, and hardly any space for people to have a discussion or debate outside the boundaries set by corporate interests.   This applies to almost everything, from wars to the soda wars. Want to discuss climate change? The coal industry will bombard you with slogans about how coal creates jobs for honest, hard working Americans; the natural gas industry will appeal to \"farmers in Iowa\" who reduce their reliance on imported energy; etc etc. Critical voices -- such as from environmental NGOs, scientific advisory councils, or public advocacy groups -- have to work incredibly hard just to open up space to have their voices heard. This is why many engage in civil disobedience and other actions designed to garner attention, because they know the (corporate dominated) public sphere is generally not receptive to what they have to say.   Edit to add references:  The foundational treatment of this subject is of course Habermas \"The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere.\" I also recommend Sharon Beder's \"Global Spin\" and of course you can read any number of media theorists on the subject, such as Herman and Chomsky's \"Manufacturing Consent\" (in terms of news).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":831.0,"score_ratio":10.5}
{"post_id":"1rf6pk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why do huge brands like Coca-Cola need to spend billions on advertising? According to Coke's website, they spent $2.6 billion on advertising, and that was back in 2006. Why do they need to spend so much since pretty much everyone on earth is familiar with their product?","c_root_id_A":"cdmojlv","c_root_id_B":"cdn45v8","created_at_utc_A":1385399453,"created_at_utc_B":1385435584,"score_A":4,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"People are extremely familiar with *some* of Coca-Cola's products. But they definitely won't be familiar with the full range of products and brands sold\/supported by the Coca Cola company. You should take into account that the money spent on advertising is being divided across a variety of brands, media types, and countries, and is not focused on a specific, single product or brand.","human_ref_B":"Okay, I have a related question. Why do companies that do little business with the public or small businesses advertise? The specific things I'm thinking of are Boeing and Lockheed Martin. I don't see anything in the near future that I'll need a fighter jet or an advanced radar array? Why spend the money on advertising in those channels?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":36131.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rf6pk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why do huge brands like Coca-Cola need to spend billions on advertising? According to Coke's website, they spent $2.6 billion on advertising, and that was back in 2006. Why do they need to spend so much since pretty much everyone on earth is familiar with their product?","c_root_id_A":"cdn45v8","c_root_id_B":"cdmxarm","created_at_utc_A":1385435584,"created_at_utc_B":1385419455,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Okay, I have a related question. Why do companies that do little business with the public or small businesses advertise? The specific things I'm thinking of are Boeing and Lockheed Martin. I don't see anything in the near future that I'll need a fighter jet or an advanced radar array? Why spend the money on advertising in those channels?","human_ref_B":"Great thread, great responses throughout. I just wanted to add a link to an article from a while back from Slate here.  The article focuses on this small little upstart company making what Farhad Manjoo has dubbed \"The Greatest Hoodie Ever Made.\" The article focuses on issues that increase the cost of a regular sweatshirt that reach beyond marketing and advertising, but I think he undersells that part of the story: when you're engaged in perfect competition, your profit margins are razor-thin, and your competitors produce identical products, the cost of marketing and branding is necessarily excessive--and those costs are passed on to the consumer. (I actually think Manjoo undersells this part of this story.)  >Today, when you buy a hooded sweatshirt, most of your money is going to the retailer, the brand, and the various buyers that shuttle the garment between the two. The item itself costs very little to make\u2014a $50 hoodie at the Gap likely costs about $6 or $7 to produce at an Asian manufacturing facility.  >American Giant has found a loophole in the process. The loophole allows Winthrop to spend a lot more time and money producing his clothes than his competitors do. Among other things, he was able to hire a former industrial designer from Apple to rethink every aspect of the sweatshirt, from the way the fabric is woven to the color of the drawstrings around your neck. The particular loophole that Winthrop has found also explains why he wanted to chat with a technology reporter: It\u2019s called the Internet.  >American Giant doesn\u2019t maintain a storefront, and it doesn\u2019t deal with middlemen. By selling garments directly from its factory via the Web, American Giant can avoid the distribution costs baked into most other clothes. American Giant\u2019s basic sweatshirt sells for $59, while its full-zip hooded sweatshirt\u2014i.e., the classic hoodie\u2014goes for $79 (including shipping and free returns). That\u2019s more than you\u2019d pay for a basic hoodie at the Gap or American Apparel, but it\u2019s comparable to hoodies from Levi\u2019s, J. Crew, or Banana Republic.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16129.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1rf6pk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why do huge brands like Coca-Cola need to spend billions on advertising? According to Coke's website, they spent $2.6 billion on advertising, and that was back in 2006. Why do they need to spend so much since pretty much everyone on earth is familiar with their product?","c_root_id_A":"cdmr5fg","c_root_id_B":"cdn45v8","created_at_utc_A":1385405596,"created_at_utc_B":1385435584,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"In addition to the explanations provided by \/u\/Manfromporlock and \/u\/Simkin, it may be instructive to look at the different stlyes of Coca-Cola advertisements there have been over the years.   There is quite a good overview here!  In particular, I liked the analysis of the ad campaign in the 2000's for The Coke Side of Life: >The ad campaign was launched in 2006 and it\u2019s main theme centers around people drinking Coke and feeling happy and positive. You drink Coke, you feel good. The campaign has optimistic and positive vibes, and it captures the very essence of life. It encourages people to love spontaneity and to see the world in full color.","human_ref_B":"Okay, I have a related question. Why do companies that do little business with the public or small businesses advertise? The specific things I'm thinking of are Boeing and Lockheed Martin. I don't see anything in the near future that I'll need a fighter jet or an advanced radar array? Why spend the money on advertising in those channels?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":29988.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1rf6pk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why do huge brands like Coca-Cola need to spend billions on advertising? According to Coke's website, they spent $2.6 billion on advertising, and that was back in 2006. Why do they need to spend so much since pretty much everyone on earth is familiar with their product?","c_root_id_A":"cdmxarm","c_root_id_B":"cdmr5fg","created_at_utc_A":1385419455,"created_at_utc_B":1385405596,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Great thread, great responses throughout. I just wanted to add a link to an article from a while back from Slate here.  The article focuses on this small little upstart company making what Farhad Manjoo has dubbed \"The Greatest Hoodie Ever Made.\" The article focuses on issues that increase the cost of a regular sweatshirt that reach beyond marketing and advertising, but I think he undersells that part of the story: when you're engaged in perfect competition, your profit margins are razor-thin, and your competitors produce identical products, the cost of marketing and branding is necessarily excessive--and those costs are passed on to the consumer. (I actually think Manjoo undersells this part of this story.)  >Today, when you buy a hooded sweatshirt, most of your money is going to the retailer, the brand, and the various buyers that shuttle the garment between the two. The item itself costs very little to make\u2014a $50 hoodie at the Gap likely costs about $6 or $7 to produce at an Asian manufacturing facility.  >American Giant has found a loophole in the process. The loophole allows Winthrop to spend a lot more time and money producing his clothes than his competitors do. Among other things, he was able to hire a former industrial designer from Apple to rethink every aspect of the sweatshirt, from the way the fabric is woven to the color of the drawstrings around your neck. The particular loophole that Winthrop has found also explains why he wanted to chat with a technology reporter: It\u2019s called the Internet.  >American Giant doesn\u2019t maintain a storefront, and it doesn\u2019t deal with middlemen. By selling garments directly from its factory via the Web, American Giant can avoid the distribution costs baked into most other clothes. American Giant\u2019s basic sweatshirt sells for $59, while its full-zip hooded sweatshirt\u2014i.e., the classic hoodie\u2014goes for $79 (including shipping and free returns). That\u2019s more than you\u2019d pay for a basic hoodie at the Gap or American Apparel, but it\u2019s comparable to hoodies from Levi\u2019s, J. Crew, or Banana Republic.","human_ref_B":"In addition to the explanations provided by \/u\/Manfromporlock and \/u\/Simkin, it may be instructive to look at the different stlyes of Coca-Cola advertisements there have been over the years.   There is quite a good overview here!  In particular, I liked the analysis of the ad campaign in the 2000's for The Coke Side of Life: >The ad campaign was launched in 2006 and it\u2019s main theme centers around people drinking Coke and feeling happy and positive. You drink Coke, you feel good. The campaign has optimistic and positive vibes, and it captures the very essence of life. It encourages people to love spontaneity and to see the world in full color.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13859.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eldb7","c_root_id_B":"c9egsle","created_at_utc_A":1365888420,"created_at_utc_B":1365873161,"score_A":172,"score_B":61,"human_ref_A":"I'm a moderator at r\/AskHistorians. <*waves*> Hi!  We get questions like this occasionally. Sometimes they're innocent; sometimes they're not. But, more often than not, questions like this are the Trojan Horse of scientific racism. The racist asks an innocent-seeming question about the \"scientific\" differences between \"races\" in order to:  * Get you to support and legimitise their point of view.  * Start a discussion about scientific racism.  Be warned: these people rarely travel alone. That one racist asking that one question will attract other racists, giving their racist answers. They've used this Trojan Horse question to create a platform for their views. Suddenly, you're not just having to answer a question, you're having to discredit bad answers.  And if you start arguing or even removing those answers, the drama starts: cross-posts to right-wing and scientific racism subreddits, calls to stand against \"censorship\", brigading, invading.  I used to be of the naive opinion, as others have said here, that we should allow these questions to stand because it gives us the opportunity to refute the faulty assumptions behind these questions and to educate people - racists and novices alike - about the right way to approach these.  However, sometimes it's not about education. Sometimes it's just about keeping shit out of your subreddit. Because shit attracts flies.","human_ref_B":"I'm not convinced the question should be deleted. Isn't it our job to try to correct the problems with the questions when we answer them? People ask ignorant questions all the time on this sub, and anywhere science is concerned. This one just happened to be ignorant in an inflammatory way.  In my naive and religious youth, I asked a biology professor why she didn't teach intelligent design. I was looking for an argument, I knew what I believed about evolution (I thought it was crap...how embarrassing in retrospect). She gave me a patient, well-reasoned answer about why intelligent design was not scientific material, and then explained why scientists study evolution. If she and experts like her had dismissed my question as ignorant and biased without answering it, I would still be that person. Educating people is about meeting them where they are, not expecting them to accept what you know to be true without evidence.  At some point, it must be true that you have to stop arguing with someone who's just looking for support for their own views, and not engaging in honest inquiry. But I don't think that point is the moment they ask an inflammatory question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15259.0,"score_ratio":2.8196721311}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eldb7","c_root_id_B":"c9ehf48","created_at_utc_A":1365888420,"created_at_utc_B":1365875253,"score_A":172,"score_B":56,"human_ref_A":"I'm a moderator at r\/AskHistorians. <*waves*> Hi!  We get questions like this occasionally. Sometimes they're innocent; sometimes they're not. But, more often than not, questions like this are the Trojan Horse of scientific racism. The racist asks an innocent-seeming question about the \"scientific\" differences between \"races\" in order to:  * Get you to support and legimitise their point of view.  * Start a discussion about scientific racism.  Be warned: these people rarely travel alone. That one racist asking that one question will attract other racists, giving their racist answers. They've used this Trojan Horse question to create a platform for their views. Suddenly, you're not just having to answer a question, you're having to discredit bad answers.  And if you start arguing or even removing those answers, the drama starts: cross-posts to right-wing and scientific racism subreddits, calls to stand against \"censorship\", brigading, invading.  I used to be of the naive opinion, as others have said here, that we should allow these questions to stand because it gives us the opportunity to refute the faulty assumptions behind these questions and to educate people - racists and novices alike - about the right way to approach these.  However, sometimes it's not about education. Sometimes it's just about keeping shit out of your subreddit. Because shit attracts flies.","human_ref_B":"What is more important: humoring some racist troll's bad-faith loaded question *here*? or having a forum where our active members who aren't white don't have a debate about the extent of their genetically determined cognitive inferiority on the front page. There are many many subreddits available for racists to wax racist; that shit should not fly in any nominally academic setting.  Delete the post, ban the user, side-bar a solid explanation of the falsehood of race realism, and update policy to make clear these posts won't be tolerated.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13167.0,"score_ratio":3.0714285714}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9ehbix","c_root_id_B":"c9eldb7","created_at_utc_A":1365874923,"created_at_utc_B":1365888420,"score_A":32,"score_B":172,"human_ref_A":"Let me repost what I said about this in the modchat:  > If the question comes up honestly, it should be answered honestly. There's a large body of work on IQ in psychology, and I wouldn't be surprised to find a literature on it in microeconomics as well. We should be able to point people to those literatures. > >If it's coming from someone with a history of abusive comments, it should be removed quietly.  Let me take two issues that I think \/r\/asksocialscience should be willing and able to engage: the gender wage gap and the racial IQ gap.  If you don't control for anything, and just look at sample averages, there is a significant gender wage gap and there are significant differences in mean IQ scores across races. People can ask honest questions about these gaps - are they \"real\"? What accounts for them? And so on.  However, when you start controlling for other things (experience, job category, and education in the wage case; socioeconomic background in the IQ case) the differences narrow substantially. There is plenty of work on wage determination using an instrumental variables approach, and I *suspect* there is similar work on IQ differentials.  Aside from the economic\/statistical approach, there is a large literature on IQ and IQ testing in psychology. There are a number of reasons for the racial IQ gap that don't depend on a racial explanation - the tests themselves may be flawed, the entire difference may be driven by differences in poverty rates across racial categories, etc.  We should be able to point people to those studies.  We shouldn't necessarily remove such questions.  We should be very careful about such questions and monitor those threads especially carefully.   Obviously, anything overtly racist should not be tolerated - that goes without saying.  Nothing surprising or original here, but my two cents' worth.","human_ref_B":"I'm a moderator at r\/AskHistorians. <*waves*> Hi!  We get questions like this occasionally. Sometimes they're innocent; sometimes they're not. But, more often than not, questions like this are the Trojan Horse of scientific racism. The racist asks an innocent-seeming question about the \"scientific\" differences between \"races\" in order to:  * Get you to support and legimitise their point of view.  * Start a discussion about scientific racism.  Be warned: these people rarely travel alone. That one racist asking that one question will attract other racists, giving their racist answers. They've used this Trojan Horse question to create a platform for their views. Suddenly, you're not just having to answer a question, you're having to discredit bad answers.  And if you start arguing or even removing those answers, the drama starts: cross-posts to right-wing and scientific racism subreddits, calls to stand against \"censorship\", brigading, invading.  I used to be of the naive opinion, as others have said here, that we should allow these questions to stand because it gives us the opportunity to refute the faulty assumptions behind these questions and to educate people - racists and novices alike - about the right way to approach these.  However, sometimes it's not about education. Sometimes it's just about keeping shit out of your subreddit. Because shit attracts flies.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13497.0,"score_ratio":5.375}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eldb7","c_root_id_B":"c9egkf3","created_at_utc_A":1365888420,"created_at_utc_B":1365872379,"score_A":172,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"I'm a moderator at r\/AskHistorians. <*waves*> Hi!  We get questions like this occasionally. Sometimes they're innocent; sometimes they're not. But, more often than not, questions like this are the Trojan Horse of scientific racism. The racist asks an innocent-seeming question about the \"scientific\" differences between \"races\" in order to:  * Get you to support and legimitise their point of view.  * Start a discussion about scientific racism.  Be warned: these people rarely travel alone. That one racist asking that one question will attract other racists, giving their racist answers. They've used this Trojan Horse question to create a platform for their views. Suddenly, you're not just having to answer a question, you're having to discredit bad answers.  And if you start arguing or even removing those answers, the drama starts: cross-posts to right-wing and scientific racism subreddits, calls to stand against \"censorship\", brigading, invading.  I used to be of the naive opinion, as others have said here, that we should allow these questions to stand because it gives us the opportunity to refute the faulty assumptions behind these questions and to educate people - racists and novices alike - about the right way to approach these.  However, sometimes it's not about education. Sometimes it's just about keeping shit out of your subreddit. Because shit attracts flies.","human_ref_B":">But this wasn't the question; it was why there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works.   Hmmm.... I'm not sure I'd apply this in general. If he's looked at whatever evidence exists for differences in IQ between races (I haven't) and been satisfied, then it makes sense that he'd ask \"why\" rather than \"does this exist.\" If the evidence of a gap is readily available, it makes sense to use that as your starting point. Maybe linking to whatever source he found convincing so people would know exactly what evidence they are trying to explain.  But based on the wording of the message of his you posted, it sounds like I'm giving \/u\/xrxx way too much credit.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16041.0,"score_ratio":7.4782608696}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eldb7","c_root_id_B":"c9ehpxd","created_at_utc_A":1365888420,"created_at_utc_B":1365876233,"score_A":172,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"I'm a moderator at r\/AskHistorians. <*waves*> Hi!  We get questions like this occasionally. Sometimes they're innocent; sometimes they're not. But, more often than not, questions like this are the Trojan Horse of scientific racism. The racist asks an innocent-seeming question about the \"scientific\" differences between \"races\" in order to:  * Get you to support and legimitise their point of view.  * Start a discussion about scientific racism.  Be warned: these people rarely travel alone. That one racist asking that one question will attract other racists, giving their racist answers. They've used this Trojan Horse question to create a platform for their views. Suddenly, you're not just having to answer a question, you're having to discredit bad answers.  And if you start arguing or even removing those answers, the drama starts: cross-posts to right-wing and scientific racism subreddits, calls to stand against \"censorship\", brigading, invading.  I used to be of the naive opinion, as others have said here, that we should allow these questions to stand because it gives us the opportunity to refute the faulty assumptions behind these questions and to educate people - racists and novices alike - about the right way to approach these.  However, sometimes it's not about education. Sometimes it's just about keeping shit out of your subreddit. Because shit attracts flies.","human_ref_B":"Many of the comments here are centered around \"we can discuss these topics\", but please remember this sub isn't \"discusssocialscience\", it's *ask*socialscience. The presumption being that the question will be presented to academics or experts in particular fields and will be responded to by experts. Second tier responses to legitimate questions don't have to be as substantiated, but should still be on topic.   If you want to debate whether white people are smarter than black people, or want to convince a poster that they are socially misguided, that's fine, but this isn't the sub for it.  (edited for clarity)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12187.0,"score_ratio":10.1176470588}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eldb7","c_root_id_B":"c9egv7m","created_at_utc_A":1365888420,"created_at_utc_B":1365873410,"score_A":172,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I'm a moderator at r\/AskHistorians. <*waves*> Hi!  We get questions like this occasionally. Sometimes they're innocent; sometimes they're not. But, more often than not, questions like this are the Trojan Horse of scientific racism. The racist asks an innocent-seeming question about the \"scientific\" differences between \"races\" in order to:  * Get you to support and legimitise their point of view.  * Start a discussion about scientific racism.  Be warned: these people rarely travel alone. That one racist asking that one question will attract other racists, giving their racist answers. They've used this Trojan Horse question to create a platform for their views. Suddenly, you're not just having to answer a question, you're having to discredit bad answers.  And if you start arguing or even removing those answers, the drama starts: cross-posts to right-wing and scientific racism subreddits, calls to stand against \"censorship\", brigading, invading.  I used to be of the naive opinion, as others have said here, that we should allow these questions to stand because it gives us the opportunity to refute the faulty assumptions behind these questions and to educate people - racists and novices alike - about the right way to approach these.  However, sometimes it's not about education. Sometimes it's just about keeping shit out of your subreddit. Because shit attracts flies.","human_ref_B":"Great response, and I support the decision. But i'm curious as to why you feel the need to say, \"If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design.\"?  No smarts in the social sciences?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15010.0,"score_ratio":17.2}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eg55t","c_root_id_B":"c9eldb7","created_at_utc_A":1365870893,"created_at_utc_B":1365888420,"score_A":3,"score_B":172,"human_ref_A":"Your response is one of the best written, well reasoned descriptions of biased questions and why they should be avoided I've ever read.  I agree wholeheartedly with your reasoning for removing the question.","human_ref_B":"I'm a moderator at r\/AskHistorians. <*waves*> Hi!  We get questions like this occasionally. Sometimes they're innocent; sometimes they're not. But, more often than not, questions like this are the Trojan Horse of scientific racism. The racist asks an innocent-seeming question about the \"scientific\" differences between \"races\" in order to:  * Get you to support and legimitise their point of view.  * Start a discussion about scientific racism.  Be warned: these people rarely travel alone. That one racist asking that one question will attract other racists, giving their racist answers. They've used this Trojan Horse question to create a platform for their views. Suddenly, you're not just having to answer a question, you're having to discredit bad answers.  And if you start arguing or even removing those answers, the drama starts: cross-posts to right-wing and scientific racism subreddits, calls to stand against \"censorship\", brigading, invading.  I used to be of the naive opinion, as others have said here, that we should allow these questions to stand because it gives us the opportunity to refute the faulty assumptions behind these questions and to educate people - racists and novices alike - about the right way to approach these.  However, sometimes it's not about education. Sometimes it's just about keeping shit out of your subreddit. Because shit attracts flies.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17527.0,"score_ratio":57.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eldb7","c_root_id_B":"c9el2vz","created_at_utc_A":1365888420,"created_at_utc_B":1365887426,"score_A":172,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'm a moderator at r\/AskHistorians. <*waves*> Hi!  We get questions like this occasionally. Sometimes they're innocent; sometimes they're not. But, more often than not, questions like this are the Trojan Horse of scientific racism. The racist asks an innocent-seeming question about the \"scientific\" differences between \"races\" in order to:  * Get you to support and legimitise their point of view.  * Start a discussion about scientific racism.  Be warned: these people rarely travel alone. That one racist asking that one question will attract other racists, giving their racist answers. They've used this Trojan Horse question to create a platform for their views. Suddenly, you're not just having to answer a question, you're having to discredit bad answers.  And if you start arguing or even removing those answers, the drama starts: cross-posts to right-wing and scientific racism subreddits, calls to stand against \"censorship\", brigading, invading.  I used to be of the naive opinion, as others have said here, that we should allow these questions to stand because it gives us the opportunity to refute the faulty assumptions behind these questions and to educate people - racists and novices alike - about the right way to approach these.  However, sometimes it's not about education. Sometimes it's just about keeping shit out of your subreddit. Because shit attracts flies.","human_ref_B":"I'm currently doing research on how the internet has affected the spread of radical ideologies. This kind of censorship is heavily contributing to the growth of neo-nazi groups and racist sentiments. When slightly radical ideas perpetuated by stereotypes like \"white people are smarter than black people\" are censored rather than discussed and shot down with rhetoric, it forces the individual to seek places where they actually can discuss these kinds of things. This leads them to places like Stormfront, where they start to associate with others who have different slightly radical ideas. Eventually they assimilate to the new community and end up building an entire radical narrative built on a perception of a world that they think agrees with them but their ideas being shut down by a vast conspiracy.  These people aren't dumb, they are simply ignorant and nobody gives them the chance to learn until they stumble across a radical group that offers them the knowledge they think they are looking for. Censorship is the wrong approach. Just letting their voice be heard, even if every response is telling them they're an idiot (and in this subreddit, explaining exactly why they're an idiot), it keeps them dependent on information sources that are credible instead of seeking out radical sources just to get someone to tell them an answer. Think of it like a reverse Streissand effect.  For some good reading on the subject, Magdelena Wojcieszak and Benjamin R. Warner have excellent analyses of this phenomenon.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":994.0,"score_ratio":34.4}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eldb7","c_root_id_B":"c9ei94m","created_at_utc_A":1365888420,"created_at_utc_B":1365877896,"score_A":172,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I'm a moderator at r\/AskHistorians. <*waves*> Hi!  We get questions like this occasionally. Sometimes they're innocent; sometimes they're not. But, more often than not, questions like this are the Trojan Horse of scientific racism. The racist asks an innocent-seeming question about the \"scientific\" differences between \"races\" in order to:  * Get you to support and legimitise their point of view.  * Start a discussion about scientific racism.  Be warned: these people rarely travel alone. That one racist asking that one question will attract other racists, giving their racist answers. They've used this Trojan Horse question to create a platform for their views. Suddenly, you're not just having to answer a question, you're having to discredit bad answers.  And if you start arguing or even removing those answers, the drama starts: cross-posts to right-wing and scientific racism subreddits, calls to stand against \"censorship\", brigading, invading.  I used to be of the naive opinion, as others have said here, that we should allow these questions to stand because it gives us the opportunity to refute the faulty assumptions behind these questions and to educate people - racists and novices alike - about the right way to approach these.  However, sometimes it's not about education. Sometimes it's just about keeping shit out of your subreddit. Because shit attracts flies.","human_ref_B":"Where did the phrase \"you never see a smart black\" originate from?  I don't see it in the user's comment history, although maybe it was deleted.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10524.0,"score_ratio":43.0}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eldb7","c_root_id_B":"c9eigah","created_at_utc_A":1365888420,"created_at_utc_B":1365878552,"score_A":172,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'm a moderator at r\/AskHistorians. <*waves*> Hi!  We get questions like this occasionally. Sometimes they're innocent; sometimes they're not. But, more often than not, questions like this are the Trojan Horse of scientific racism. The racist asks an innocent-seeming question about the \"scientific\" differences between \"races\" in order to:  * Get you to support and legimitise their point of view.  * Start a discussion about scientific racism.  Be warned: these people rarely travel alone. That one racist asking that one question will attract other racists, giving their racist answers. They've used this Trojan Horse question to create a platform for their views. Suddenly, you're not just having to answer a question, you're having to discredit bad answers.  And if you start arguing or even removing those answers, the drama starts: cross-posts to right-wing and scientific racism subreddits, calls to stand against \"censorship\", brigading, invading.  I used to be of the naive opinion, as others have said here, that we should allow these questions to stand because it gives us the opportunity to refute the faulty assumptions behind these questions and to educate people - racists and novices alike - about the right way to approach these.  However, sometimes it's not about education. Sometimes it's just about keeping shit out of your subreddit. Because shit attracts flies.","human_ref_B":"While you're at it, why not ban xrxx? It's not like users like that will ever contribute anything of value anyway.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9868.0,"score_ratio":86.0}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9egkf3","c_root_id_B":"c9egsle","created_at_utc_A":1365872379,"created_at_utc_B":1365873161,"score_A":23,"score_B":61,"human_ref_A":">But this wasn't the question; it was why there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works.   Hmmm.... I'm not sure I'd apply this in general. If he's looked at whatever evidence exists for differences in IQ between races (I haven't) and been satisfied, then it makes sense that he'd ask \"why\" rather than \"does this exist.\" If the evidence of a gap is readily available, it makes sense to use that as your starting point. Maybe linking to whatever source he found convincing so people would know exactly what evidence they are trying to explain.  But based on the wording of the message of his you posted, it sounds like I'm giving \/u\/xrxx way too much credit.","human_ref_B":"I'm not convinced the question should be deleted. Isn't it our job to try to correct the problems with the questions when we answer them? People ask ignorant questions all the time on this sub, and anywhere science is concerned. This one just happened to be ignorant in an inflammatory way.  In my naive and religious youth, I asked a biology professor why she didn't teach intelligent design. I was looking for an argument, I knew what I believed about evolution (I thought it was crap...how embarrassing in retrospect). She gave me a patient, well-reasoned answer about why intelligent design was not scientific material, and then explained why scientists study evolution. If she and experts like her had dismissed my question as ignorant and biased without answering it, I would still be that person. Educating people is about meeting them where they are, not expecting them to accept what you know to be true without evidence.  At some point, it must be true that you have to stop arguing with someone who's just looking for support for their own views, and not engaging in honest inquiry. But I don't think that point is the moment they ask an inflammatory question.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":782.0,"score_ratio":2.652173913}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eg55t","c_root_id_B":"c9egsle","created_at_utc_A":1365870893,"created_at_utc_B":1365873161,"score_A":3,"score_B":61,"human_ref_A":"Your response is one of the best written, well reasoned descriptions of biased questions and why they should be avoided I've ever read.  I agree wholeheartedly with your reasoning for removing the question.","human_ref_B":"I'm not convinced the question should be deleted. Isn't it our job to try to correct the problems with the questions when we answer them? People ask ignorant questions all the time on this sub, and anywhere science is concerned. This one just happened to be ignorant in an inflammatory way.  In my naive and religious youth, I asked a biology professor why she didn't teach intelligent design. I was looking for an argument, I knew what I believed about evolution (I thought it was crap...how embarrassing in retrospect). She gave me a patient, well-reasoned answer about why intelligent design was not scientific material, and then explained why scientists study evolution. If she and experts like her had dismissed my question as ignorant and biased without answering it, I would still be that person. Educating people is about meeting them where they are, not expecting them to accept what you know to be true without evidence.  At some point, it must be true that you have to stop arguing with someone who's just looking for support for their own views, and not engaging in honest inquiry. But I don't think that point is the moment they ask an inflammatory question.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2268.0,"score_ratio":20.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9ehbix","c_root_id_B":"c9ehf48","created_at_utc_A":1365874923,"created_at_utc_B":1365875253,"score_A":32,"score_B":56,"human_ref_A":"Let me repost what I said about this in the modchat:  > If the question comes up honestly, it should be answered honestly. There's a large body of work on IQ in psychology, and I wouldn't be surprised to find a literature on it in microeconomics as well. We should be able to point people to those literatures. > >If it's coming from someone with a history of abusive comments, it should be removed quietly.  Let me take two issues that I think \/r\/asksocialscience should be willing and able to engage: the gender wage gap and the racial IQ gap.  If you don't control for anything, and just look at sample averages, there is a significant gender wage gap and there are significant differences in mean IQ scores across races. People can ask honest questions about these gaps - are they \"real\"? What accounts for them? And so on.  However, when you start controlling for other things (experience, job category, and education in the wage case; socioeconomic background in the IQ case) the differences narrow substantially. There is plenty of work on wage determination using an instrumental variables approach, and I *suspect* there is similar work on IQ differentials.  Aside from the economic\/statistical approach, there is a large literature on IQ and IQ testing in psychology. There are a number of reasons for the racial IQ gap that don't depend on a racial explanation - the tests themselves may be flawed, the entire difference may be driven by differences in poverty rates across racial categories, etc.  We should be able to point people to those studies.  We shouldn't necessarily remove such questions.  We should be very careful about such questions and monitor those threads especially carefully.   Obviously, anything overtly racist should not be tolerated - that goes without saying.  Nothing surprising or original here, but my two cents' worth.","human_ref_B":"What is more important: humoring some racist troll's bad-faith loaded question *here*? or having a forum where our active members who aren't white don't have a debate about the extent of their genetically determined cognitive inferiority on the front page. There are many many subreddits available for racists to wax racist; that shit should not fly in any nominally academic setting.  Delete the post, ban the user, side-bar a solid explanation of the falsehood of race realism, and update policy to make clear these posts won't be tolerated.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":330.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9ehf48","c_root_id_B":"c9egkf3","created_at_utc_A":1365875253,"created_at_utc_B":1365872379,"score_A":56,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"What is more important: humoring some racist troll's bad-faith loaded question *here*? or having a forum where our active members who aren't white don't have a debate about the extent of their genetically determined cognitive inferiority on the front page. There are many many subreddits available for racists to wax racist; that shit should not fly in any nominally academic setting.  Delete the post, ban the user, side-bar a solid explanation of the falsehood of race realism, and update policy to make clear these posts won't be tolerated.","human_ref_B":">But this wasn't the question; it was why there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works.   Hmmm.... I'm not sure I'd apply this in general. If he's looked at whatever evidence exists for differences in IQ between races (I haven't) and been satisfied, then it makes sense that he'd ask \"why\" rather than \"does this exist.\" If the evidence of a gap is readily available, it makes sense to use that as your starting point. Maybe linking to whatever source he found convincing so people would know exactly what evidence they are trying to explain.  But based on the wording of the message of his you posted, it sounds like I'm giving \/u\/xrxx way too much credit.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2874.0,"score_ratio":2.4347826087}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9ehf48","c_root_id_B":"c9egv7m","created_at_utc_A":1365875253,"created_at_utc_B":1365873410,"score_A":56,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"What is more important: humoring some racist troll's bad-faith loaded question *here*? or having a forum where our active members who aren't white don't have a debate about the extent of their genetically determined cognitive inferiority on the front page. There are many many subreddits available for racists to wax racist; that shit should not fly in any nominally academic setting.  Delete the post, ban the user, side-bar a solid explanation of the falsehood of race realism, and update policy to make clear these posts won't be tolerated.","human_ref_B":"Great response, and I support the decision. But i'm curious as to why you feel the need to say, \"If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design.\"?  No smarts in the social sciences?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1843.0,"score_ratio":5.6}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eg55t","c_root_id_B":"c9ehf48","created_at_utc_A":1365870893,"created_at_utc_B":1365875253,"score_A":3,"score_B":56,"human_ref_A":"Your response is one of the best written, well reasoned descriptions of biased questions and why they should be avoided I've ever read.  I agree wholeheartedly with your reasoning for removing the question.","human_ref_B":"What is more important: humoring some racist troll's bad-faith loaded question *here*? or having a forum where our active members who aren't white don't have a debate about the extent of their genetically determined cognitive inferiority on the front page. There are many many subreddits available for racists to wax racist; that shit should not fly in any nominally academic setting.  Delete the post, ban the user, side-bar a solid explanation of the falsehood of race realism, and update policy to make clear these posts won't be tolerated.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4360.0,"score_ratio":18.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9ehbix","c_root_id_B":"c9egkf3","created_at_utc_A":1365874923,"created_at_utc_B":1365872379,"score_A":32,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"Let me repost what I said about this in the modchat:  > If the question comes up honestly, it should be answered honestly. There's a large body of work on IQ in psychology, and I wouldn't be surprised to find a literature on it in microeconomics as well. We should be able to point people to those literatures. > >If it's coming from someone with a history of abusive comments, it should be removed quietly.  Let me take two issues that I think \/r\/asksocialscience should be willing and able to engage: the gender wage gap and the racial IQ gap.  If you don't control for anything, and just look at sample averages, there is a significant gender wage gap and there are significant differences in mean IQ scores across races. People can ask honest questions about these gaps - are they \"real\"? What accounts for them? And so on.  However, when you start controlling for other things (experience, job category, and education in the wage case; socioeconomic background in the IQ case) the differences narrow substantially. There is plenty of work on wage determination using an instrumental variables approach, and I *suspect* there is similar work on IQ differentials.  Aside from the economic\/statistical approach, there is a large literature on IQ and IQ testing in psychology. There are a number of reasons for the racial IQ gap that don't depend on a racial explanation - the tests themselves may be flawed, the entire difference may be driven by differences in poverty rates across racial categories, etc.  We should be able to point people to those studies.  We shouldn't necessarily remove such questions.  We should be very careful about such questions and monitor those threads especially carefully.   Obviously, anything overtly racist should not be tolerated - that goes without saying.  Nothing surprising or original here, but my two cents' worth.","human_ref_B":">But this wasn't the question; it was why there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works.   Hmmm.... I'm not sure I'd apply this in general. If he's looked at whatever evidence exists for differences in IQ between races (I haven't) and been satisfied, then it makes sense that he'd ask \"why\" rather than \"does this exist.\" If the evidence of a gap is readily available, it makes sense to use that as your starting point. Maybe linking to whatever source he found convincing so people would know exactly what evidence they are trying to explain.  But based on the wording of the message of his you posted, it sounds like I'm giving \/u\/xrxx way too much credit.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2544.0,"score_ratio":1.3913043478}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9ehbix","c_root_id_B":"c9egv7m","created_at_utc_A":1365874923,"created_at_utc_B":1365873410,"score_A":32,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Let me repost what I said about this in the modchat:  > If the question comes up honestly, it should be answered honestly. There's a large body of work on IQ in psychology, and I wouldn't be surprised to find a literature on it in microeconomics as well. We should be able to point people to those literatures. > >If it's coming from someone with a history of abusive comments, it should be removed quietly.  Let me take two issues that I think \/r\/asksocialscience should be willing and able to engage: the gender wage gap and the racial IQ gap.  If you don't control for anything, and just look at sample averages, there is a significant gender wage gap and there are significant differences in mean IQ scores across races. People can ask honest questions about these gaps - are they \"real\"? What accounts for them? And so on.  However, when you start controlling for other things (experience, job category, and education in the wage case; socioeconomic background in the IQ case) the differences narrow substantially. There is plenty of work on wage determination using an instrumental variables approach, and I *suspect* there is similar work on IQ differentials.  Aside from the economic\/statistical approach, there is a large literature on IQ and IQ testing in psychology. There are a number of reasons for the racial IQ gap that don't depend on a racial explanation - the tests themselves may be flawed, the entire difference may be driven by differences in poverty rates across racial categories, etc.  We should be able to point people to those studies.  We shouldn't necessarily remove such questions.  We should be very careful about such questions and monitor those threads especially carefully.   Obviously, anything overtly racist should not be tolerated - that goes without saying.  Nothing surprising or original here, but my two cents' worth.","human_ref_B":"Great response, and I support the decision. But i'm curious as to why you feel the need to say, \"If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design.\"?  No smarts in the social sciences?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1513.0,"score_ratio":3.2}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9ehbix","c_root_id_B":"c9eg55t","created_at_utc_A":1365874923,"created_at_utc_B":1365870893,"score_A":32,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Let me repost what I said about this in the modchat:  > If the question comes up honestly, it should be answered honestly. There's a large body of work on IQ in psychology, and I wouldn't be surprised to find a literature on it in microeconomics as well. We should be able to point people to those literatures. > >If it's coming from someone with a history of abusive comments, it should be removed quietly.  Let me take two issues that I think \/r\/asksocialscience should be willing and able to engage: the gender wage gap and the racial IQ gap.  If you don't control for anything, and just look at sample averages, there is a significant gender wage gap and there are significant differences in mean IQ scores across races. People can ask honest questions about these gaps - are they \"real\"? What accounts for them? And so on.  However, when you start controlling for other things (experience, job category, and education in the wage case; socioeconomic background in the IQ case) the differences narrow substantially. There is plenty of work on wage determination using an instrumental variables approach, and I *suspect* there is similar work on IQ differentials.  Aside from the economic\/statistical approach, there is a large literature on IQ and IQ testing in psychology. There are a number of reasons for the racial IQ gap that don't depend on a racial explanation - the tests themselves may be flawed, the entire difference may be driven by differences in poverty rates across racial categories, etc.  We should be able to point people to those studies.  We shouldn't necessarily remove such questions.  We should be very careful about such questions and monitor those threads especially carefully.   Obviously, anything overtly racist should not be tolerated - that goes without saying.  Nothing surprising or original here, but my two cents' worth.","human_ref_B":"Your response is one of the best written, well reasoned descriptions of biased questions and why they should be avoided I've ever read.  I agree wholeheartedly with your reasoning for removing the question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4030.0,"score_ratio":10.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9egkf3","c_root_id_B":"c9eg55t","created_at_utc_A":1365872379,"created_at_utc_B":1365870893,"score_A":23,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":">But this wasn't the question; it was why there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works.   Hmmm.... I'm not sure I'd apply this in general. If he's looked at whatever evidence exists for differences in IQ between races (I haven't) and been satisfied, then it makes sense that he'd ask \"why\" rather than \"does this exist.\" If the evidence of a gap is readily available, it makes sense to use that as your starting point. Maybe linking to whatever source he found convincing so people would know exactly what evidence they are trying to explain.  But based on the wording of the message of his you posted, it sounds like I'm giving \/u\/xrxx way too much credit.","human_ref_B":"Your response is one of the best written, well reasoned descriptions of biased questions and why they should be avoided I've ever read.  I agree wholeheartedly with your reasoning for removing the question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1486.0,"score_ratio":7.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9egv7m","c_root_id_B":"c9ehpxd","created_at_utc_A":1365873410,"created_at_utc_B":1365876233,"score_A":10,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Great response, and I support the decision. But i'm curious as to why you feel the need to say, \"If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design.\"?  No smarts in the social sciences?","human_ref_B":"Many of the comments here are centered around \"we can discuss these topics\", but please remember this sub isn't \"discusssocialscience\", it's *ask*socialscience. The presumption being that the question will be presented to academics or experts in particular fields and will be responded to by experts. Second tier responses to legitimate questions don't have to be as substantiated, but should still be on topic.   If you want to debate whether white people are smarter than black people, or want to convince a poster that they are socially misguided, that's fine, but this isn't the sub for it.  (edited for clarity)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2823.0,"score_ratio":1.7}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9ehpxd","c_root_id_B":"c9eg55t","created_at_utc_A":1365876233,"created_at_utc_B":1365870893,"score_A":17,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Many of the comments here are centered around \"we can discuss these topics\", but please remember this sub isn't \"discusssocialscience\", it's *ask*socialscience. The presumption being that the question will be presented to academics or experts in particular fields and will be responded to by experts. Second tier responses to legitimate questions don't have to be as substantiated, but should still be on topic.   If you want to debate whether white people are smarter than black people, or want to convince a poster that they are socially misguided, that's fine, but this isn't the sub for it.  (edited for clarity)","human_ref_B":"Your response is one of the best written, well reasoned descriptions of biased questions and why they should be avoided I've ever read.  I agree wholeheartedly with your reasoning for removing the question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5340.0,"score_ratio":5.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9egv7m","c_root_id_B":"c9eg55t","created_at_utc_A":1365873410,"created_at_utc_B":1365870893,"score_A":10,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Great response, and I support the decision. But i'm curious as to why you feel the need to say, \"If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design.\"?  No smarts in the social sciences?","human_ref_B":"Your response is one of the best written, well reasoned descriptions of biased questions and why they should be avoided I've ever read.  I agree wholeheartedly with your reasoning for removing the question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2517.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9el2vz","c_root_id_B":"c9eg55t","created_at_utc_A":1365887426,"created_at_utc_B":1365870893,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm currently doing research on how the internet has affected the spread of radical ideologies. This kind of censorship is heavily contributing to the growth of neo-nazi groups and racist sentiments. When slightly radical ideas perpetuated by stereotypes like \"white people are smarter than black people\" are censored rather than discussed and shot down with rhetoric, it forces the individual to seek places where they actually can discuss these kinds of things. This leads them to places like Stormfront, where they start to associate with others who have different slightly radical ideas. Eventually they assimilate to the new community and end up building an entire radical narrative built on a perception of a world that they think agrees with them but their ideas being shut down by a vast conspiracy.  These people aren't dumb, they are simply ignorant and nobody gives them the chance to learn until they stumble across a radical group that offers them the knowledge they think they are looking for. Censorship is the wrong approach. Just letting their voice be heard, even if every response is telling them they're an idiot (and in this subreddit, explaining exactly why they're an idiot), it keeps them dependent on information sources that are credible instead of seeking out radical sources just to get someone to tell them an answer. Think of it like a reverse Streissand effect.  For some good reading on the subject, Magdelena Wojcieszak and Benjamin R. Warner have excellent analyses of this phenomenon.","human_ref_B":"Your response is one of the best written, well reasoned descriptions of biased questions and why they should be avoided I've ever read.  I agree wholeheartedly with your reasoning for removing the question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16533.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eg55t","c_root_id_B":"c9ei94m","created_at_utc_A":1365870893,"created_at_utc_B":1365877896,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Your response is one of the best written, well reasoned descriptions of biased questions and why they should be avoided I've ever read.  I agree wholeheartedly with your reasoning for removing the question.","human_ref_B":"Where did the phrase \"you never see a smart black\" originate from?  I don't see it in the user's comment history, although maybe it was deleted.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7003.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9ei94m","c_root_id_B":"c9el2vz","created_at_utc_A":1365877896,"created_at_utc_B":1365887426,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Where did the phrase \"you never see a smart black\" originate from?  I don't see it in the user's comment history, although maybe it was deleted.","human_ref_B":"I'm currently doing research on how the internet has affected the spread of radical ideologies. This kind of censorship is heavily contributing to the growth of neo-nazi groups and racist sentiments. When slightly radical ideas perpetuated by stereotypes like \"white people are smarter than black people\" are censored rather than discussed and shot down with rhetoric, it forces the individual to seek places where they actually can discuss these kinds of things. This leads them to places like Stormfront, where they start to associate with others who have different slightly radical ideas. Eventually they assimilate to the new community and end up building an entire radical narrative built on a perception of a world that they think agrees with them but their ideas being shut down by a vast conspiracy.  These people aren't dumb, they are simply ignorant and nobody gives them the chance to learn until they stumble across a radical group that offers them the knowledge they think they are looking for. Censorship is the wrong approach. Just letting their voice be heard, even if every response is telling them they're an idiot (and in this subreddit, explaining exactly why they're an idiot), it keeps them dependent on information sources that are credible instead of seeking out radical sources just to get someone to tell them an answer. Think of it like a reverse Streissand effect.  For some good reading on the subject, Magdelena Wojcieszak and Benjamin R. Warner have excellent analyses of this phenomenon.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9530.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"1c9v0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Censorship in AskSocial Science Today user xrxx wrote me concerned that the post, \"Why do white have higher IQ than other races\" was removed by the mods. I wasn't the person who removed it, but I support the decision. Below is my response to his message. I thought it might be a productive line of discussion regarding the nature of the sub. Perhaps the other mods or community members see things differently. What is your opinion regarding the censorship of \"sensitive\" subjects? Where do you draw the line between politically correct and intellectually honest? Maybe I'm approaching things from the wrong angle. What do you think?   **User xrxx wrote:**     Hey I know you are prbly a super open-minded enlighted tolerant librul and everything but maybe you could stop censoring posts from this subreddit just because they disagree with your ideology.  **Response:**     A statement like \"you never see a smart black\" isn't a matter of politics or left or right leaning ideology.  It is a statement of fact and not opinion, and it is a demonstrably false one. It might be true that *you* have never seen a \"smart black\" because you have not been looking very hard. Perhaps you should do some reading on Nobel Laureate Sir Williams Lewis or Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Or maybe engineering and super computing are more your style? Then you should look into computational fluid dynamics and a fellow named Philip Emeagwali. Maybe your more of a statistics person (a personal favorite). Then you should check out David Blackwell. He was, after all, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, so he can't be too dull witted.   I don't mean to knock those who responded to your post, but Obama is decidedly *not* the person to cite regarding \"smart blacks\". If you want to find smarts, look at mathematics, engineering, economics, programming, and the whole rest of science and design. There are plenty of examples in all of these fields. Take your pick. If you want to pretend that you understand stellar and galactic mechanics better than N D Tyson then be my guest, but I suspect that neither of us do or probably ever will. If you have any mathematical theorems named after you, then I'd certainly be interested to discuss them, otherwise you are not quite on equal footing with Dr Blackwell.   It is important for science to be open minded. Scientists should never let things like politics or tradition limit their thinking, because you can't find answers to questions if you are afraid to ask them. In this spirit a question like \"Are there IQ differences between races\" is a perfectly legitimate one. The validity and scope of \"IQ\" is still not a completely settled question by any means.   But this wasn't the question; it was **why** there are differences. This tells me that you have already found the answer to your question and are simply looking for others to find reasons to back up your preconceptions. That's not how science works. It's inappropriate in the same way that the question \"**Why** is Spearman's Rho the best method of statistical analysis?\" is, when the correct question is \"**When** is Spearman's Rho the best method?\". The former is trying to find reasons for *their answer*. The latter is trying to find *the answer*.   I don't have any problems discussing scientific questions of a sensitive political or social nature and neither should the other mods so long as they're worth their salt. Racial inequality, gender differences, abortion, gun ownership, fiscal conservatism, social welfare, free market capitalism, so on and so forth... are all real issues that have real impact on ourselves and our society. As such, they are quite worthy of study and discussion. But that discussion has to start with the right questions. Not that they can't be questions that are controversial or that make us uncomfortable; that's perfectly fine. But they have to be honest questions looking for honest answers, and not looking for a pseudo-scientific circle jerk about conclusions we've already reached. That isn't science, it isn't how science works, and it's not what this subreddit is for.","c_root_id_A":"c9eigah","c_root_id_B":"c9el2vz","created_at_utc_A":1365878552,"created_at_utc_B":1365887426,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"While you're at it, why not ban xrxx? It's not like users like that will ever contribute anything of value anyway.","human_ref_B":"I'm currently doing research on how the internet has affected the spread of radical ideologies. This kind of censorship is heavily contributing to the growth of neo-nazi groups and racist sentiments. When slightly radical ideas perpetuated by stereotypes like \"white people are smarter than black people\" are censored rather than discussed and shot down with rhetoric, it forces the individual to seek places where they actually can discuss these kinds of things. This leads them to places like Stormfront, where they start to associate with others who have different slightly radical ideas. Eventually they assimilate to the new community and end up building an entire radical narrative built on a perception of a world that they think agrees with them but their ideas being shut down by a vast conspiracy.  These people aren't dumb, they are simply ignorant and nobody gives them the chance to learn until they stumble across a radical group that offers them the knowledge they think they are looking for. Censorship is the wrong approach. Just letting their voice be heard, even if every response is telling them they're an idiot (and in this subreddit, explaining exactly why they're an idiot), it keeps them dependent on information sources that are credible instead of seeking out radical sources just to get someone to tell them an answer. Think of it like a reverse Streissand effect.  For some good reading on the subject, Magdelena Wojcieszak and Benjamin R. Warner have excellent analyses of this phenomenon.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8874.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"5uif9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"Pew Research Center's most recent polling put Trump's approval rating at 39% (1500 polled, 95% confidence). Rasmussen Reports's polling puts his approval rating at 55% (1500 polled, 95% confidence). How are they so far apart?","c_root_id_A":"dduas4r","c_root_id_B":"ddubldv","created_at_utc_A":1487287690,"created_at_utc_B":1487288751,"score_A":10,"score_B":115,"human_ref_A":"Can you link the polls?","human_ref_B":"Rasmussen uses automated polling while Pew still uses human operators. Polling from the 2016 Election showed that people, especially Trump voters, were more likely to be honest---either by answering the question at all or by giving a more intensely pro-Trump stance---on automated polls than when a human operator was on the line. Five thirty-eight had an extensive piece on polling failures in this post-election post mortem: https:\/\/fivethirtyeight.com\/features\/the-polls-missed-trump-we-asked-pollsters-why\/  I'm not sure what \/u\/agamenticus meant specifically with respect to the sampling methodologies, but here's a more detailed answer: On top of possibly having different strategies for calling landline and mobile numbers (user bases are very different), Rasmussen and Pew feed many of the same factors, such as age, education, gender, and race into proprietary weighting algorithms to ensure that all demographic backgrounds are adequately represented. However, while the factors may look the same, the criteria for weighting those factors *may* look wildly different.  Last, and I haven't had time look into it, but Rasmussen as late as 2012 **did not** provide a Spanish-language interview option like Pew does. Voters with low-English ability are much more likely to hang up or refuse to answer if they feel like they cannot adequately understand\/answer the questions. Research (Lee and Perez 2014 in political science, Lechuga and Wiebe 2009 in healthcare research, etc) has shown that answers and attitudes can change depending on the language in which the polling is conducted, though we don't know conclusively if this connection is causal or magnitude of its effect. However, I think Pew uncritically merges the answer sets together, so that could be a confounding factor that merits further analysis.  Edited for clarity because I can't dependent clause correctly.  Edit 2: Targeted adult respondent populations also differ, as \/u\/thehollowman84 pointed out. Pew polls adults over 18, while Rasmussen polls likely voters. Polling from previous elections, especially Obama-Romney 2012, showed that determining who is a \"likely\" voter is an art unto itself and can determine the shape of the data collected for analysis.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1061.0,"score_ratio":11.5}
{"post_id":"5uif9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"Pew Research Center's most recent polling put Trump's approval rating at 39% (1500 polled, 95% confidence). Rasmussen Reports's polling puts his approval rating at 55% (1500 polled, 95% confidence). How are they so far apart?","c_root_id_A":"dduq5qd","c_root_id_B":"ddui3yz","created_at_utc_A":1487310415,"created_at_utc_B":1487297684,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I don't have an answer to your question, though I see some good stuff in other answers. I just want to point out that you're using the idea of a confidence interval in a way that suggests you don't quite understand it.  When we want to find some statistic we can't ask everyone. Instead we ask a sample of people. If we were to ask everyone we wouldn't have a confidence interval we would know that the answer we got reflected the whole population. However, when sampling it is possible that we randomly got a sample that was different from the population as a whole.   We can use what we know about the sample, like how many people were sampled and what the variation was like in the responses to the sample to create a confidence interval. What a 95% confidence interval actually tells us is that if we kept taking samples and each one had a 95% confidence interval then 95% of the confidence intervals would include the true population statistic.   This means, though, that 5%, or 1 in 20, will not. This might be part of your answer. There are way more than 20 polls conducted we expect at least 1 of them to give us an answer outside the 95% confidence interval. This also means that saying the approval rate  was 55% with a 95% confidence interval doesn't actually tell us what we want to know. 55% was the result of the sample but we need to know what the confidence interval was. Here it was give or take 2.5% for Rasmussen. So the correct way to put it was their result was a 95% confidence interval of 52.5%-57.5%.   It's also worth noting that saying how many polled doesn't really add any more information here. If more are polled the confidence interval would likely go down, and if fewer were polled it would go up.","human_ref_B":"> Rasmussen and Pew feed many of the same factors, such as age, education, gender, and race into proprietary weighting algorithms to ensure that all demographic backgrounds are adequately represented.  It's been a little while since stats but, wouldn't that mean the test is no longer random? And isn't being random a requirement of the central limit theorem?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12731.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"36bbdo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Nobel winning economist Simon Kuznets stated that there are \"four sorts of countries: developed, underdeveloped, Japan, and Argentina.\" Do you think Japan's and Argentina's economic histories unique enough to be considered so and are there any other countries you would add? Came across this quote in Why Nations Fail and found it interesting and funny (for academic writing).","c_root_id_A":"crcld8q","c_root_id_B":"crcnkd9","created_at_utc_A":1431919163,"created_at_utc_B":1431924219,"score_A":19,"score_B":40,"human_ref_A":"Could you explain what Simon Kuznets meant by this? Did he elaborate at all?","human_ref_B":"I'm away from my Zotero library and my previous papers on East Asian Development, so I will try and remember some examples I have read in the past for sources, and find some sources which convey some of the correct information (while not being ones I used in my own work). So, yea, this isn't comprehensive.  So, for context.  I believe he meant something along these lines.  Japan, had extremely rapid development post war, and in the longer term, went from under developed before Meiji restoration to beating Russia in a war in 1904. So, two times extreme development from nothing to greatness inside of a century. Can read briefly here - http:\/\/www.iun.edu\/~hisdcl\/h207_2002\/jecontakeoff.htm and more in depth here https:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=bbGlwsjW-ekC&dq and here http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/discover\/10.2307\/1566537?uid=3737800&uid=2&uid=4&sid=21106859962243  Argentina was 'wealthy' pre-WW1, and after WW1 has suffered 'a century of decline' which can be understood a bit better here - http:\/\/www.economist.com\/news\/briefing\/21596582-one-hundred-years-ago-argentina-was-future-what-went-wrong-century-decline - Argentina is not a speciality of mine, I just remember reading this article)  Basically, one was a massive rise from backwardness (Japan was kinda the little nothing kid in Asia who embraced European and American ideas and became a power that surpassed all in Asia), then attempted Asian military domination, leading to destruction but then becoming the second biggest economy in the world for very unique reasons. Argentina started strongly, and should be doing well, but constantly messes up.  On to your question.  I don't know when Kuznets said this, but it was likely before evidence of the South Korea, Singapore and Taiwanese development 'miracles' (http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/0305750X94901163), and definitely before China.  So, the Japan case isn't true anymore, but it probably was back then. And the economies of SK, Singapore, Taiwan and China have based a lot of their development policies on concepts those of Japan (http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S1049007800000671). In another way, if we're just looking at post-WW2, Germany makes sense too. Japan and Germany, the biggest losers in WW2, became the worlds 2nd and 3rd economies for much of the post-War time period.  Argentina is still constantly having problems. If we think about when he said this though, and from my understanding of the statement, I think you could see the fall of China as something slightly similar, from a position of great wealth and power to not much. The 'rise' of China had likely yet to happen when he said this, unless it was early 80s before he died (1985), when there was a lot of economic growth in small towns and cities which spurred on the 'miracle' we have seen in the last 20 years,","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5056.0,"score_ratio":2.1052631579}
{"post_id":"1ogf1c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why has Germany been able to atone for their war crimes during WWII, yet Japan still denies\/minimizes theirs? Pretty basic stuff. After the end of WWII, Germany witnessed the horror of the Holocaust, and since then they have gone above and beyond to ensure proper education of the events, and to ensure that they are never forgotten or minimized. I'm speaking, of course, of the various anti-Nazi laws that punish those who attempt to minimize the atrocities of the camps.  While Japan didn't kill anywhere near the same numbers as the Germans, they were unspeakably cruel. Unit 731 is a testament to the total depravity of parts of the Japanese military, not to mention the Rape of Nan King, and the various crimes against the Chinese. Yet the modern Japan, as far as I know, does not teach these events, or go so far as to claim that they never happened.   Why was one massively nationalistic nation able to face their crimes, while another rejected them outright?","c_root_id_A":"ccrquwo","c_root_id_B":"ccru3x8","created_at_utc_A":1381791421,"created_at_utc_B":1381800747,"score_A":12,"score_B":141,"human_ref_A":"It's worth remembering that Germans in general suffered in more ways at the end of the war than the Japanese did.  Both countries were devastated by bombing (yes, nuclear bombs in the case of the Japanese, but there was little to choose between a big conventional raid and a fission nuke).  The Germans had also suffered through actual fighting on their soil, unlike the Japanese.  And, Germans from East Prussia, Pomerania, and Silesia, areas that had been German since the Middle Ages, were ejected wholesale; the rest of Germany had to deal with the refugees (and their horror stories). Nothing comparable happened to Japan.  Speaking of horror stories, there was an almost unbelievable amount of rapes in Germany during and after the war. Estimates go up to 2 million German women raped, which is quite a lot in a country of ~70 million, and many of them were raped many times. Again, nothing comparable happened in Japan.  So the Germans really had to face the war they'd started and the anger they'd caused in a way that the Japanese never quite did--the Chinese and Koreans never crossed the sea to take revenge and the American occupation was comparatively mild.","human_ref_B":"I'm going to be drawing most of my information from Thomas Berger's \"War, Guilt and Politics\" as well as my own research looking at international relations between Japan, China and South Korea. This information will be incomplete as I'm at work and don't have the book on hand.  There are three strands of arguments that help explain the various levels of penitence, the exact names of which escape me but there's an instrumental argument (ie, politicians manipulated their stance on war to serve national or self interest), cultural (there is a distinct difference between European and East Asian ways of recalling the past) and another...which I can't remember too well. (Sorry.)  For the sake of messing with order lets start with cultural. I'm not a huge fan of this argument but it does make sense. Austrian and German culture appreciate the concept of guilt. Guilt, it is argued, is a something has trickled down through society via the medium of Christianity. Being sorry for something is often important on the way to atonement. Germany was able to show greater penitence for its past because of the Western acceptance of this guilt cultural phenomena. (China and South Korea do make plenty of arguments about Japanese lack of penitence, so there is a slight hole in that line of thinking. )  Japanese culture however values shame. So essentially you get this dichotomy of shame vs guilt. Shame culture doesn't so much require a large public apology to show atonement. Quite often and offering of compensation is often enough to show penitence. Japan did offer a struggling South Korea a substantial sum of money in the 1960 normalisation process that prescribed that South Korean citizens were no longer able to claim compensation. The Korea Republic took it, so in the minds of some Japanese politicians, this issue had been dealt with.   As for the instrumentalist argument, this is something that I used relatively extensively in my Masters thesis. For the record, I don't recall the chapters from Berger on Germany too well as it wasn't something I was overly familiar with when I started reading the book, but there were essentially external and internal forces within Europe that forced German administrators to be more penitent. I'm not sure if this is exactly from the book, but a more penitent Germany would have been more beneficial for Western Europe looking at trying to withstand Soviet influence. A powerhouse like Germany was well needed to defend against the USSR for the rest of Europe but also the USA. You couldn't have a border nation with the Eastern bloc caught in the middle of Western Europeans that hate you and Eastern bloc nations that are looking to jump you. Anyway, there was a political reason to do it.  Asia was very different for Japan. Whilst Japanese atrocities were certainly no better than what the Nazis did in Germany, the political realities were a little different. Immediately following the second world war, Japan was stripped of arms and became an occupied nation, this was only to be followed up very soon after by the war on the Korean peninsula. Suddenly Japan was needed as a forward base for American operations. Japanese police forces were rearmed and military-like entities started to emerge again. US interests in Asia and the interest in repelling the communist threat overrode the need to continue the pacification process. Japan basically went from enemy to ally in the space of 10 years. Japan also experienced exponential growth in the following decades leaving much of East Asia behind, again.  Looking China and South Korea at the time, in the 50's and 60's both were more preoccupied with rebuilding their countries than standing up and asking for apologies from the Japanese. Mao was busy with his cultural revolutions and spreading the good word through China and as I mentioned above, the RoK took a lot of money from Japan to improve it's economic growth in return for basically forgetting about what happened in World War II. Japan essentially was not bombarded in the same way that Germany was following World War II and was also somewhat vindicated when the US immediately turned to them for help in the Korean war as well as significantly investing in the Japanese economy to create a US-allied economic giant to form a pillar against the possible threats in the Asia-Pacific.   To keep going, it is so much easier to pin the war atrocities from Germany on the Nazis. When looking at the history of world war II, it was the Nazis that committed the atrocities, not 'Germany' as such. Everyone can finger Hitler when looking at the worst crimes but you can't really pin it on anyone in Japan, not in the same way.  Much debate has centred around the role of the Emperor in the way Japan conducted its foreign policy (See Hirohito and the making of Japan by Herbert Bix). The US occupying forces essentially saw it as a bad idea to implicate the Emperor in Japan's war atrocities as there was a great cult of personality surrounding him and of course much argument as to how much direct involvement he actually had. Since the Meiji restoration, the Emperor as god had been kind of central to how Japanese people imagined their country. The Emperor was the head of the Shinto religion and was able to exert influence as such. However, much of this influence could be symbolic. That is another discussion that I can come back to at another point.  What I am saying is that there was no obvious singular instigator to point to.  I would also like to add that Japanese people are generally quite pacifist these days, they don't like the idea of war, but that is not because of what they inflicted on the world but rather what war brought upon them. Hiroshima and Nagasaki are two modern disasters that both fell upon the Japanese killing hundreds of thousands of people. Add into the mix the air-raids and fire bombings and Japan was utterly devastated. This has made people fearful of war but not apologetic to the rest of world. I think, just anecdotally, that Japanese people are more insular than many other peoples I have interacted with.   As for the current situation, the Japanese government has issued no less than 49 official apologies for the war since the 1950's.  The reason there seems to be such furor about Japan's lack of atonement for the past to me seems like a lot of nationalistic chest beating on the other side of the fence the South Korean government is notorious for drumming up anti-Japanese sentiment to prop up it's approval ratings and Chinese anger also has more instrumental roots. By trying to deligitimise Japan's past, it can add further validity to it's own land claims and the like such as the Senkaku\/Diaoyu islands. Not only this, but it can also distract the public from internal issues as with South Korea.   I hope that helps your understanding a little bit, but I really do recommend reading Thomas Berger's book for a better understanding.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9326.0,"score_ratio":11.75}
{"post_id":"5r7qfa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What legal and constitutional safeguards are in place to ensure the United States could not fall into absolute dictatorship, and how foolproof are they?","c_root_id_A":"dd5nxdw","c_root_id_B":"dd6090q","created_at_utc_A":1485892071,"created_at_utc_B":1485905674,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Godel wrote a paper on the vulnerabilities of American democracy during his citizenship hearing.  In this paper he detailed a flaw in the U.S. Constitution -- a contradiction which would allow the U.S. to be turned into a dictatorship.  This story was considered apocryphal until a document was found by the widow of a witness to the event.   That said, there is no formal proof of the flaw and only speculation about what it could be.  Here is one scholar's blog post on what he thinks the contradiction or flaw could be.","human_ref_B":"There are absolutely no true legal\/constitutional safeguards preventing the United States from falling into absolutely dictatorship. By this I mean if you look at the constitution and law in the U.S., it is quite similar to a number of stable democracies worldwide. But it is also enormously similar to that of absolute dictatorships and countries that have backslid from democracy to authoritarianism. Many of the world's most oppressive countries have very good constitutions. Sure, one could argue that certain aspects of the U.S. constitution are what safeguard democracy but this clearly doesn't hold for the aforementioned cases.  What prevents the United States from falling into absolute dictatorship are its 'informal institutions.' Douglass North argues institutions are \u201cthe humanly devised constraints that structure political, economic and social interaction. They consist of both *informal constraints* (sanctions, taboos, customs, traditions, and codes of conduct), and *formal rules* (constitutions, laws, property rights).\u201d  He says both are necessary since informal constraints reinforce formal rules.  So basically, what safeguards the U.S. from slipping into authoritarianism is how Americans view documents like the constitution. Deviating too far from what is acceptable will not be tolerated. A constitution means nothing if it is not backed by the informal respect of the people and everything if it is. On a scale of 1-7, 1 being a top democracy, 7 being a top dictatorship, the U.S. is a 1. After this first week of Trump it is a 1. Maybe he could move it to a 1.5. Try to move it further and he'll be gone, either through impeachment removal or electoral removal. If many of supposed laws that should safeguard democracy were not in place, informal respect for American democracy would still serve as an effective safeguard. There isn't anything to fear, American democracy is not going anywhere in the foreseeable future.  http:\/\/www.j-bradford-delong.net\/movable_type\/refs\/Mozilla_Scrapbook3\/North_Institutions.pdf   Edit: \"there isn't anything to fear\" may have been an exaggeration :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13603.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"a1slek","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.98,"history":"Christopher Hitchens frequently claimed that allowing women to control their own reproductive cycles was the key to reducig poverty worldwide. Have any studies ever shown this? It stands to reason that this could be correct, but my understanding is that he was making this claim generally without any citations. Additionally I could see the potential that he has it backwards, and that a country coming out of poverty is more likely to make progressive advances, like reproductive rights.   Have any studies ever looked at this?","c_root_id_A":"eastytj","c_root_id_B":"easet4x","created_at_utc_A":1543600487,"created_at_utc_B":1543588990,"score_A":81,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Here is one of the largest international human rights data sites and it makes the case for this pretty soundly. This is one of the main data collections that Hans Rosling frequently used. The basic idea (of the data site) is that you look at all available records (birth rates, infant mortality rates, life expectancy, overall levels of education for the population as a whole and for specific demographics, etc) for as far back as those records go. Then, you map out correlations (for example - female education and infant mortality rates, although that is a much simpler example than one this data is used for) and, based off past records, you estimate the impact that changes in a given demographic will have. More education usually equals higher quality of life, greater political representation usually results in more egalitarian legislation (including women controlling their reproductive rights) and so on.   Here's John Green enthusiastically walking through a number of data sets from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to connect the dots that I implied with my hypothetical suggestions","human_ref_B":"Did he say why he thought this? Not that I disagree (I think its a good thing regardless) I just don't know what his reasoning is.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11497.0,"score_ratio":27.0}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4ugzb","c_root_id_B":"cl4tvx1","created_at_utc_A":1412873501,"created_at_utc_B":1412872411,"score_A":18,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Whats your opinion on Thomas Pikettys book Capital in the Twenty-First Century?","human_ref_B":"1) Why do most economists dress like flood victims?  2) Can you defend your field from the multitude of criticisms levied against it, not limited to the complexity problem, causality, and little predictive power?  3) What's up with agent-based, computational methods?  Cant you guys just solve the equations explicitly like the rest of us do?  I mean when I set up a model, I actually solve it.  I don't just plug in numbers and graph the values.  If you were on a desert island without Mathematica, would you be able to solve anything!?!?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1090.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4ugzb","c_root_id_B":"cl4sr05","created_at_utc_A":1412873501,"created_at_utc_B":1412870283,"score_A":18,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Whats your opinion on Thomas Pikettys book Capital in the Twenty-First Century?","human_ref_B":"What would you reply to a layperson that believes that its government (not necessarily the U.S. Federal or State government, to keep things generalized) should pursue the elimination of deficit at all cost, basically austerity?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3218.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4ugzb","c_root_id_B":"cl4sn69","created_at_utc_A":1412873501,"created_at_utc_B":1412870078,"score_A":18,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Whats your opinion on Thomas Pikettys book Capital in the Twenty-First Century?","human_ref_B":"This is a serious question relating to a current paper idea I have:  What is an area where macro-econometricians and people who do model calibration currently disagree on? Can you link me to any papers on this topic?  Thank you, -Helpless second year.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3423.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4sr05","c_root_id_B":"cl4tvx1","created_at_utc_A":1412870283,"created_at_utc_B":1412872411,"score_A":4,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"What would you reply to a layperson that believes that its government (not necessarily the U.S. Federal or State government, to keep things generalized) should pursue the elimination of deficit at all cost, basically austerity?","human_ref_B":"1) Why do most economists dress like flood victims?  2) Can you defend your field from the multitude of criticisms levied against it, not limited to the complexity problem, causality, and little predictive power?  3) What's up with agent-based, computational methods?  Cant you guys just solve the equations explicitly like the rest of us do?  I mean when I set up a model, I actually solve it.  I don't just plug in numbers and graph the values.  If you were on a desert island without Mathematica, would you be able to solve anything!?!?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2128.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4tvx1","c_root_id_B":"cl4sn69","created_at_utc_A":1412872411,"created_at_utc_B":1412870078,"score_A":14,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"1) Why do most economists dress like flood victims?  2) Can you defend your field from the multitude of criticisms levied against it, not limited to the complexity problem, causality, and little predictive power?  3) What's up with agent-based, computational methods?  Cant you guys just solve the equations explicitly like the rest of us do?  I mean when I set up a model, I actually solve it.  I don't just plug in numbers and graph the values.  If you were on a desert island without Mathematica, would you be able to solve anything!?!?","human_ref_B":"This is a serious question relating to a current paper idea I have:  What is an area where macro-econometricians and people who do model calibration currently disagree on? Can you link me to any papers on this topic?  Thank you, -Helpless second year.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2333.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4w5i3","c_root_id_B":"cl4sr05","created_at_utc_A":1412876645,"created_at_utc_B":1412870283,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Do you like any heterodox economic schools or borrow some of their ideas? For example, Marx and his theory of the \"crisis of overproduction\" to explain why recessions\/depressions occur in capitalist economies.","human_ref_B":"What would you reply to a layperson that believes that its government (not necessarily the U.S. Federal or State government, to keep things generalized) should pursue the elimination of deficit at all cost, basically austerity?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6362.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4vwam","c_root_id_B":"cl4w5i3","created_at_utc_A":1412876164,"created_at_utc_B":1412876645,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Hi!  I'm a recent college graduate thinking of going to grad school. I majored in English because I enjoyed it, but I'm thinking of changing my field to something a little different with hopefully more job prospects. Economics is one of the fields I was considering, so this is great timing! I think it will allow me to continue pursuing the sort of analytic thinking I already enjoy\/am good at, while making me more specialized to find higher paying employment.  1) Do you have any advice for someone considering studying this field?   2) How would you describe economics (both in practice and theory) to someone who hasn't studied it too in depth (like myself)?   3) What sort of careers could I look forward to if I decided to pursue this?   4) Is it realistic for me to jump from English Literature to Economics without any previous history in Economics?  I have a dozen more questions, but I don't want to overdo it with you. I'm honestly still in the beginning stages of research, so thanks for your help!","human_ref_B":"Do you like any heterodox economic schools or borrow some of their ideas? For example, Marx and his theory of the \"crisis of overproduction\" to explain why recessions\/depressions occur in capitalist economies.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":481.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4sn69","c_root_id_B":"cl4w5i3","created_at_utc_A":1412870078,"created_at_utc_B":1412876645,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"This is a serious question relating to a current paper idea I have:  What is an area where macro-econometricians and people who do model calibration currently disagree on? Can you link me to any papers on this topic?  Thank you, -Helpless second year.","human_ref_B":"Do you like any heterodox economic schools or borrow some of their ideas? For example, Marx and his theory of the \"crisis of overproduction\" to explain why recessions\/depressions occur in capitalist economies.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6567.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl55vpy","c_root_id_B":"cl4sr05","created_at_utc_A":1412895136,"created_at_utc_B":1412870283,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I enjoy the EconTalk podcast despite my own economic leanings being more Keynesian than Hayekian (host Russ Roberts is an avowed Hayekian).  What are some other BA+ level economics podcasts that you might recommend, especially some that might present a countervailing view to Roberts?  [I don't mean to make it sound like EconTalk is a one-sided affair.  He recently had Piketty on the show, and generally gives fair airing of all views, but his bias is obvious, and the majority of his guests tend to fall nearer to his camp than others.]","human_ref_B":"What would you reply to a layperson that believes that its government (not necessarily the U.S. Federal or State government, to keep things generalized) should pursue the elimination of deficit at all cost, basically austerity?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24853.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl55vpy","c_root_id_B":"cl4vwam","created_at_utc_A":1412895136,"created_at_utc_B":1412876164,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I enjoy the EconTalk podcast despite my own economic leanings being more Keynesian than Hayekian (host Russ Roberts is an avowed Hayekian).  What are some other BA+ level economics podcasts that you might recommend, especially some that might present a countervailing view to Roberts?  [I don't mean to make it sound like EconTalk is a one-sided affair.  He recently had Piketty on the show, and generally gives fair airing of all views, but his bias is obvious, and the majority of his guests tend to fall nearer to his camp than others.]","human_ref_B":"Hi!  I'm a recent college graduate thinking of going to grad school. I majored in English because I enjoyed it, but I'm thinking of changing my field to something a little different with hopefully more job prospects. Economics is one of the fields I was considering, so this is great timing! I think it will allow me to continue pursuing the sort of analytic thinking I already enjoy\/am good at, while making me more specialized to find higher paying employment.  1) Do you have any advice for someone considering studying this field?   2) How would you describe economics (both in practice and theory) to someone who hasn't studied it too in depth (like myself)?   3) What sort of careers could I look forward to if I decided to pursue this?   4) Is it realistic for me to jump from English Literature to Economics without any previous history in Economics?  I have a dozen more questions, but I don't want to overdo it with you. I'm honestly still in the beginning stages of research, so thanks for your help!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18972.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4y79t","c_root_id_B":"cl55vpy","created_at_utc_A":1412880467,"created_at_utc_B":1412895136,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"A couple if you don't mind.  P.S., you're my hero.  I have more than one of your posts on r\/economics saved.  :)  1.) Why do so many economists consider a little inflation a \"good thing\" at best, and \"not all that bad\" at worst?  2.) What single tool in the economist's toolbelt do you think has the greatest stimulative effect on the economy.  And a bonus if you dare:  What do you think of behavioral economics?","human_ref_B":"I enjoy the EconTalk podcast despite my own economic leanings being more Keynesian than Hayekian (host Russ Roberts is an avowed Hayekian).  What are some other BA+ level economics podcasts that you might recommend, especially some that might present a countervailing view to Roberts?  [I don't mean to make it sound like EconTalk is a one-sided affair.  He recently had Piketty on the show, and generally gives fair airing of all views, but his bias is obvious, and the majority of his guests tend to fall nearer to his camp than others.]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14669.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl55vpy","c_root_id_B":"cl4sn69","created_at_utc_A":1412895136,"created_at_utc_B":1412870078,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I enjoy the EconTalk podcast despite my own economic leanings being more Keynesian than Hayekian (host Russ Roberts is an avowed Hayekian).  What are some other BA+ level economics podcasts that you might recommend, especially some that might present a countervailing view to Roberts?  [I don't mean to make it sound like EconTalk is a one-sided affair.  He recently had Piketty on the show, and generally gives fair airing of all views, but his bias is obvious, and the majority of his guests tend to fall nearer to his camp than others.]","human_ref_B":"This is a serious question relating to a current paper idea I have:  What is an area where macro-econometricians and people who do model calibration currently disagree on? Can you link me to any papers on this topic?  Thank you, -Helpless second year.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25058.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4sr05","c_root_id_B":"cl57iu4","created_at_utc_A":1412870283,"created_at_utc_B":1412898608,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"What would you reply to a layperson that believes that its government (not necessarily the U.S. Federal or State government, to keep things generalized) should pursue the elimination of deficit at all cost, basically austerity?","human_ref_B":"In your last AMA, I asked about the public facing roles and responsibilities. I'd like to continue that conversation.  Imagine a PPF curve, where the y axis represents \"Effective communication with the public\" and the x-axis represents \"Credibility within the Economics community\". Let the curve be represented by the unit circle, such that anyone who is 1 distance from the origin is at maximum effectiveness.  In polar coordinates, where would you place:  * Paul Krugman (1998) * Paul Krugman (2014) * Greg Mankiw * Robert Lucas * Tim Harford * Tom Piketty * Justin Wolfers * Casey Mulligan * Ed Prescott * Robert Murphy * Scott Sumners * Simon Wren Lewis * Nick Rowe * Steve Keen  ?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":28325.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4sn69","c_root_id_B":"cl4sr05","created_at_utc_A":1412870078,"created_at_utc_B":1412870283,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This is a serious question relating to a current paper idea I have:  What is an area where macro-econometricians and people who do model calibration currently disagree on? Can you link me to any papers on this topic?  Thank you, -Helpless second year.","human_ref_B":"What would you reply to a layperson that believes that its government (not necessarily the U.S. Federal or State government, to keep things generalized) should pursue the elimination of deficit at all cost, basically austerity?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":205.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4vwam","c_root_id_B":"cl57iu4","created_at_utc_A":1412876164,"created_at_utc_B":1412898608,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Hi!  I'm a recent college graduate thinking of going to grad school. I majored in English because I enjoyed it, but I'm thinking of changing my field to something a little different with hopefully more job prospects. Economics is one of the fields I was considering, so this is great timing! I think it will allow me to continue pursuing the sort of analytic thinking I already enjoy\/am good at, while making me more specialized to find higher paying employment.  1) Do you have any advice for someone considering studying this field?   2) How would you describe economics (both in practice and theory) to someone who hasn't studied it too in depth (like myself)?   3) What sort of careers could I look forward to if I decided to pursue this?   4) Is it realistic for me to jump from English Literature to Economics without any previous history in Economics?  I have a dozen more questions, but I don't want to overdo it with you. I'm honestly still in the beginning stages of research, so thanks for your help!","human_ref_B":"In your last AMA, I asked about the public facing roles and responsibilities. I'd like to continue that conversation.  Imagine a PPF curve, where the y axis represents \"Effective communication with the public\" and the x-axis represents \"Credibility within the Economics community\". Let the curve be represented by the unit circle, such that anyone who is 1 distance from the origin is at maximum effectiveness.  In polar coordinates, where would you place:  * Paul Krugman (1998) * Paul Krugman (2014) * Greg Mankiw * Robert Lucas * Tim Harford * Tom Piketty * Justin Wolfers * Casey Mulligan * Ed Prescott * Robert Murphy * Scott Sumners * Simon Wren Lewis * Nick Rowe * Steve Keen  ?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22444.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4sn69","c_root_id_B":"cl4vwam","created_at_utc_A":1412870078,"created_at_utc_B":1412876164,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This is a serious question relating to a current paper idea I have:  What is an area where macro-econometricians and people who do model calibration currently disagree on? Can you link me to any papers on this topic?  Thank you, -Helpless second year.","human_ref_B":"Hi!  I'm a recent college graduate thinking of going to grad school. I majored in English because I enjoyed it, but I'm thinking of changing my field to something a little different with hopefully more job prospects. Economics is one of the fields I was considering, so this is great timing! I think it will allow me to continue pursuing the sort of analytic thinking I already enjoy\/am good at, while making me more specialized to find higher paying employment.  1) Do you have any advice for someone considering studying this field?   2) How would you describe economics (both in practice and theory) to someone who hasn't studied it too in depth (like myself)?   3) What sort of careers could I look forward to if I decided to pursue this?   4) Is it realistic for me to jump from English Literature to Economics without any previous history in Economics?  I have a dozen more questions, but I don't want to overdo it with you. I'm honestly still in the beginning stages of research, so thanks for your help!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6086.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4y79t","c_root_id_B":"cl57iu4","created_at_utc_A":1412880467,"created_at_utc_B":1412898608,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"A couple if you don't mind.  P.S., you're my hero.  I have more than one of your posts on r\/economics saved.  :)  1.) Why do so many economists consider a little inflation a \"good thing\" at best, and \"not all that bad\" at worst?  2.) What single tool in the economist's toolbelt do you think has the greatest stimulative effect on the economy.  And a bonus if you dare:  What do you think of behavioral economics?","human_ref_B":"In your last AMA, I asked about the public facing roles and responsibilities. I'd like to continue that conversation.  Imagine a PPF curve, where the y axis represents \"Effective communication with the public\" and the x-axis represents \"Credibility within the Economics community\". Let the curve be represented by the unit circle, such that anyone who is 1 distance from the origin is at maximum effectiveness.  In polar coordinates, where would you place:  * Paul Krugman (1998) * Paul Krugman (2014) * Greg Mankiw * Robert Lucas * Tim Harford * Tom Piketty * Justin Wolfers * Casey Mulligan * Ed Prescott * Robert Murphy * Scott Sumners * Simon Wren Lewis * Nick Rowe * Steve Keen  ?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18141.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl4y79t","c_root_id_B":"cl57npc","created_at_utc_A":1412880467,"created_at_utc_B":1412898895,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"A couple if you don't mind.  P.S., you're my hero.  I have more than one of your posts on r\/economics saved.  :)  1.) Why do so many economists consider a little inflation a \"good thing\" at best, and \"not all that bad\" at worst?  2.) What single tool in the economist's toolbelt do you think has the greatest stimulative effect on the economy.  And a bonus if you dare:  What do you think of behavioral economics?","human_ref_B":"**Set Up**  Imagine that   1. Austrian 2. Modern Monetary Theory 3. Paleo-Keynesian 4. Marxist  economics is true (which I'll define as \"broadly accurate, and useful for determining policy). However, Michael Woodford and his evil cabal have shut them out from publishing in journals (because they were paid off by the Fed\/Hate liberals\/were paid off by the banks).  **Questions**  1. What evidence could you point to falsify this belief? 2. How could these schools of thought effectively get the word out?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18428.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2irb90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"IAMA macroeconomist. AMA. Let's see if this gets any traction. I'm a graduate student in economics, specializing in macroeconomics, broadly defined.  I did an AMA a little over a year ago and the rules are the same this time around. Ask me about:  * Macro theory * Monetary policy * Fiscal policy * Monetary theory * Econometrics * Why macroeconomics is, indeed, a (haltingly) empirical endeavor * History of thought, schools of thought, etc * Academia * Anything else economics-y   I look forward to your questions.","c_root_id_A":"cl57iu4","c_root_id_B":"cl4sn69","created_at_utc_A":1412898608,"created_at_utc_B":1412870078,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"In your last AMA, I asked about the public facing roles and responsibilities. I'd like to continue that conversation.  Imagine a PPF curve, where the y axis represents \"Effective communication with the public\" and the x-axis represents \"Credibility within the Economics community\". Let the curve be represented by the unit circle, such that anyone who is 1 distance from the origin is at maximum effectiveness.  In polar coordinates, where would you place:  * Paul Krugman (1998) * Paul Krugman (2014) * Greg Mankiw * Robert Lucas * Tim Harford * Tom Piketty * Justin Wolfers * Casey Mulligan * Ed Prescott * Robert Murphy * Scott Sumners * Simon Wren Lewis * Nick Rowe * Steve Keen  ?","human_ref_B":"This is a serious question relating to a current paper idea I have:  What is an area where macro-econometricians and people who do model calibration currently disagree on? Can you link me to any papers on this topic?  Thank you, -Helpless second year.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":28530.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"48n8k2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Today, Vox had a big article about the influence of \"authoritarians\" in voting for Trump, based new psychological research. Do political psychologists have an analogous personality category for people who are left of center? I only hear about research on \"Right-Wing Authoritarianism\". This Vox article, called \"The Rise of American Authoritarianism\", is about the psychology of Trump voters in particular.  The article doesn't mention it specifically, but I know that this \"authoritarianism\" has since the 1980's often been called \"Right-Wing Authoritarianism\".  The article does mention that the initial idea comes from a specific set of studies conducted during the 1940's that lead to Adorno's *The Authoritarian Personality* (which is mentioned in the article) and were concerned with trying to psychologically explain the rise of Fascism.  So it's a study of the Right all the way down.  Now, I'm a sociologist not a psychologist, but the scale has always struck me as odd because it seems to assume that authoritarian was the deviation from the norm.  Yesterday, I voted in the Massachusetts Democratic primary primary, and now I wonder if there's an analogous psychological \"deviation from the norm\" in the other direction that is useful in explaining left-wing politics.  Is there a similar psychological profile that explains, say, a Bernie Sanders, or an Obama in 2008 candidate?  A hope and change meritocracy and egalitarianism candidate?  Or perhaps just a specific \"anti-authoritarianism\" personality that could be find both in left wing and libertarian movements?  The recent studies mentioned in the article think that there can be some \"activation\" of the authoritarian type\/authoritarian personality only has an increased influence on political preference under certain conditions, namely during periods of increased social change and increased threats to security.  From the Vox article:  >But both schools of thought agree on the basic causality of authoritarianism. People do not support extreme policies and strongman leaders just out of an affirmative desire for authoritarianism, but rather as a response to experiencing certain kinds of threats [i.e. social change and physical threats].  If a left-wing analogue exists and has been studied, does evidence suggest political preferences for these personality types can be \"activated\"?  If so, under what circumstances?  As a side note, there seems to be far more research into right wing political psychology than left wing political psychology, or at least, more of it that has filtered into social science more broadly--it's an interesting contrast with, say, the social movement literature which is extensively focused on left wing social movements.  I know there was an abortive attempt to look at support for \"left-wing authoritarianism\" (Stalinism and all that) that happened around when \"right-wing authoritarianism\" was coined, but that that line of research mostly fizzled.  If anyone can explain that difference, I'd also be curious. (with citations, of course, not gut feelings or posts from Heterodox Academy, showing the dominance of liberals in the social sciences--since liberals are equally dominant in both fields, that doesn't solve the puzzle of why political psychology is studying the right more closely and political sociology is studying the left more closely).  Before you go spouting off a jeremiad about \"social justice warriors\", **I'm a mod here so obviously don't post any answer that violates rule one (*All claims in top level comments must be supported by citations to relevant social science sources*),** or they'll be deleted right away.  Since this is a political thread, low quality posts and soap boxing (including loaded questions) will be deleted very quickly so that things don't get out of control.  Please, keep it civil and don't make me regret asking this question.","c_root_id_A":"d0lfkng","c_root_id_B":"d0ldzs3","created_at_utc_A":1456965659,"created_at_utc_B":1456962783,"score_A":13,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"In The Righteous Mind, Jonathan Haidt argues that American conservatives value authority, sanctity and tradition much more than American liberals. Liberals value care, fairness and liberty, while conservatives think all are important.  Its not a perfect book, but it does address your question to a certain extent. He would argue that liberals do not value authority at nearly the levels conservatives do.","human_ref_B":"No specifics, but i found it kind of odd that they would talk about \"activation\" of such tendencies. Im pretty sure these tendencies existed in a pretty big part of the population to begin with. Donald Trump as a narcissistic entertaining populist just promises easy answers. But he is even better at making fun of other candidates, while portaying himself as an outsider and selfmademan. And while I think it is interesting to note that he tries to present himself as a strong leader and picks up on peoples worries and fears - what kind of candidate in the united states republican presidential election, doesnt? What about Reagan for example. People just seem to think of him of a leadership kind of guy, which is interesting, considering the fact that he is a badmouthing narcissist.   In my opinion its analytically fruitful to simply consider him a populist instead. To be more specific, he is the result of negative politics. People dont vote for him because he is Trump. They vote for him, because  they despise the political establishment, maybe the current political system of the USA as a whole. And he presents himself as a free thinking 'unpolitical' Selfmademan. Pierre Rosanvallon, a french historian, wrote an interesting book about negative politics. Counter-Democracy - Politics in an age of distrust. In this regard, I think, Bernie might be considered a populist too. Which shows that negative politics isnt necessarily a bad thing, in my opinion. Pierre Rosanvallon distinguishes between counter-democracy and populism as \"absolute\" counter-democracy, for example. In the end, I guess, it always depends on what kind of politics and policy, one considers desirable.   I guess my point is, Trump seems more like a populist to me, authoritarianism isnt a new thing, and most certainly already prevalent in every democratic states population. Coining him as a populist, though, wasnt enough anymore, so they now try to call him an authoritarian leader instead. Which would also explain, why they focus on left movements and right authoritarianism: Most research on politics is in itself - at least in part - political. And as you said, most social scientists are liberals. Especially in this branch of research you stated. Movements are positive, while authoritarianism seems like a pathology to these people, thus its a matter of psychologiy. Of fear and other unreasonable things.   Rosanvallon seems like an interesting read if one wants to understand populism in my opinion, if that is of interest to you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2876.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"48n8k2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Today, Vox had a big article about the influence of \"authoritarians\" in voting for Trump, based new psychological research. Do political psychologists have an analogous personality category for people who are left of center? I only hear about research on \"Right-Wing Authoritarianism\". This Vox article, called \"The Rise of American Authoritarianism\", is about the psychology of Trump voters in particular.  The article doesn't mention it specifically, but I know that this \"authoritarianism\" has since the 1980's often been called \"Right-Wing Authoritarianism\".  The article does mention that the initial idea comes from a specific set of studies conducted during the 1940's that lead to Adorno's *The Authoritarian Personality* (which is mentioned in the article) and were concerned with trying to psychologically explain the rise of Fascism.  So it's a study of the Right all the way down.  Now, I'm a sociologist not a psychologist, but the scale has always struck me as odd because it seems to assume that authoritarian was the deviation from the norm.  Yesterday, I voted in the Massachusetts Democratic primary primary, and now I wonder if there's an analogous psychological \"deviation from the norm\" in the other direction that is useful in explaining left-wing politics.  Is there a similar psychological profile that explains, say, a Bernie Sanders, or an Obama in 2008 candidate?  A hope and change meritocracy and egalitarianism candidate?  Or perhaps just a specific \"anti-authoritarianism\" personality that could be find both in left wing and libertarian movements?  The recent studies mentioned in the article think that there can be some \"activation\" of the authoritarian type\/authoritarian personality only has an increased influence on political preference under certain conditions, namely during periods of increased social change and increased threats to security.  From the Vox article:  >But both schools of thought agree on the basic causality of authoritarianism. People do not support extreme policies and strongman leaders just out of an affirmative desire for authoritarianism, but rather as a response to experiencing certain kinds of threats [i.e. social change and physical threats].  If a left-wing analogue exists and has been studied, does evidence suggest political preferences for these personality types can be \"activated\"?  If so, under what circumstances?  As a side note, there seems to be far more research into right wing political psychology than left wing political psychology, or at least, more of it that has filtered into social science more broadly--it's an interesting contrast with, say, the social movement literature which is extensively focused on left wing social movements.  I know there was an abortive attempt to look at support for \"left-wing authoritarianism\" (Stalinism and all that) that happened around when \"right-wing authoritarianism\" was coined, but that that line of research mostly fizzled.  If anyone can explain that difference, I'd also be curious. (with citations, of course, not gut feelings or posts from Heterodox Academy, showing the dominance of liberals in the social sciences--since liberals are equally dominant in both fields, that doesn't solve the puzzle of why political psychology is studying the right more closely and political sociology is studying the left more closely).  Before you go spouting off a jeremiad about \"social justice warriors\", **I'm a mod here so obviously don't post any answer that violates rule one (*All claims in top level comments must be supported by citations to relevant social science sources*),** or they'll be deleted right away.  Since this is a political thread, low quality posts and soap boxing (including loaded questions) will be deleted very quickly so that things don't get out of control.  Please, keep it civil and don't make me regret asking this question.","c_root_id_A":"d0lbwpa","c_root_id_B":"d0lfkng","created_at_utc_A":1456959399,"created_at_utc_B":1456965659,"score_A":2,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"I did do some reading of Bob Altemeyer's work on authoritarianism while working on my master's degree. He said that yes, there are some left-wing authoritarians, but they're few and far between. They might be hard-core Marxists and the like.   But their presence in the U.S. is tiny.","human_ref_B":"In The Righteous Mind, Jonathan Haidt argues that American conservatives value authority, sanctity and tradition much more than American liberals. Liberals value care, fairness and liberty, while conservatives think all are important.  Its not a perfect book, but it does address your question to a certain extent. He would argue that liberals do not value authority at nearly the levels conservatives do.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6260.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"48n8k2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Today, Vox had a big article about the influence of \"authoritarians\" in voting for Trump, based new psychological research. Do political psychologists have an analogous personality category for people who are left of center? I only hear about research on \"Right-Wing Authoritarianism\". This Vox article, called \"The Rise of American Authoritarianism\", is about the psychology of Trump voters in particular.  The article doesn't mention it specifically, but I know that this \"authoritarianism\" has since the 1980's often been called \"Right-Wing Authoritarianism\".  The article does mention that the initial idea comes from a specific set of studies conducted during the 1940's that lead to Adorno's *The Authoritarian Personality* (which is mentioned in the article) and were concerned with trying to psychologically explain the rise of Fascism.  So it's a study of the Right all the way down.  Now, I'm a sociologist not a psychologist, but the scale has always struck me as odd because it seems to assume that authoritarian was the deviation from the norm.  Yesterday, I voted in the Massachusetts Democratic primary primary, and now I wonder if there's an analogous psychological \"deviation from the norm\" in the other direction that is useful in explaining left-wing politics.  Is there a similar psychological profile that explains, say, a Bernie Sanders, or an Obama in 2008 candidate?  A hope and change meritocracy and egalitarianism candidate?  Or perhaps just a specific \"anti-authoritarianism\" personality that could be find both in left wing and libertarian movements?  The recent studies mentioned in the article think that there can be some \"activation\" of the authoritarian type\/authoritarian personality only has an increased influence on political preference under certain conditions, namely during periods of increased social change and increased threats to security.  From the Vox article:  >But both schools of thought agree on the basic causality of authoritarianism. People do not support extreme policies and strongman leaders just out of an affirmative desire for authoritarianism, but rather as a response to experiencing certain kinds of threats [i.e. social change and physical threats].  If a left-wing analogue exists and has been studied, does evidence suggest political preferences for these personality types can be \"activated\"?  If so, under what circumstances?  As a side note, there seems to be far more research into right wing political psychology than left wing political psychology, or at least, more of it that has filtered into social science more broadly--it's an interesting contrast with, say, the social movement literature which is extensively focused on left wing social movements.  I know there was an abortive attempt to look at support for \"left-wing authoritarianism\" (Stalinism and all that) that happened around when \"right-wing authoritarianism\" was coined, but that that line of research mostly fizzled.  If anyone can explain that difference, I'd also be curious. (with citations, of course, not gut feelings or posts from Heterodox Academy, showing the dominance of liberals in the social sciences--since liberals are equally dominant in both fields, that doesn't solve the puzzle of why political psychology is studying the right more closely and political sociology is studying the left more closely).  Before you go spouting off a jeremiad about \"social justice warriors\", **I'm a mod here so obviously don't post any answer that violates rule one (*All claims in top level comments must be supported by citations to relevant social science sources*),** or they'll be deleted right away.  Since this is a political thread, low quality posts and soap boxing (including loaded questions) will be deleted very quickly so that things don't get out of control.  Please, keep it civil and don't make me regret asking this question.","c_root_id_A":"d0lbwpa","c_root_id_B":"d0ldzs3","created_at_utc_A":1456959399,"created_at_utc_B":1456962783,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I did do some reading of Bob Altemeyer's work on authoritarianism while working on my master's degree. He said that yes, there are some left-wing authoritarians, but they're few and far between. They might be hard-core Marxists and the like.   But their presence in the U.S. is tiny.","human_ref_B":"No specifics, but i found it kind of odd that they would talk about \"activation\" of such tendencies. Im pretty sure these tendencies existed in a pretty big part of the population to begin with. Donald Trump as a narcissistic entertaining populist just promises easy answers. But he is even better at making fun of other candidates, while portaying himself as an outsider and selfmademan. And while I think it is interesting to note that he tries to present himself as a strong leader and picks up on peoples worries and fears - what kind of candidate in the united states republican presidential election, doesnt? What about Reagan for example. People just seem to think of him of a leadership kind of guy, which is interesting, considering the fact that he is a badmouthing narcissist.   In my opinion its analytically fruitful to simply consider him a populist instead. To be more specific, he is the result of negative politics. People dont vote for him because he is Trump. They vote for him, because  they despise the political establishment, maybe the current political system of the USA as a whole. And he presents himself as a free thinking 'unpolitical' Selfmademan. Pierre Rosanvallon, a french historian, wrote an interesting book about negative politics. Counter-Democracy - Politics in an age of distrust. In this regard, I think, Bernie might be considered a populist too. Which shows that negative politics isnt necessarily a bad thing, in my opinion. Pierre Rosanvallon distinguishes between counter-democracy and populism as \"absolute\" counter-democracy, for example. In the end, I guess, it always depends on what kind of politics and policy, one considers desirable.   I guess my point is, Trump seems more like a populist to me, authoritarianism isnt a new thing, and most certainly already prevalent in every democratic states population. Coining him as a populist, though, wasnt enough anymore, so they now try to call him an authoritarian leader instead. Which would also explain, why they focus on left movements and right authoritarianism: Most research on politics is in itself - at least in part - political. And as you said, most social scientists are liberals. Especially in this branch of research you stated. Movements are positive, while authoritarianism seems like a pathology to these people, thus its a matter of psychologiy. Of fear and other unreasonable things.   Rosanvallon seems like an interesting read if one wants to understand populism in my opinion, if that is of interest to you.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3384.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"48n8k2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Today, Vox had a big article about the influence of \"authoritarians\" in voting for Trump, based new psychological research. Do political psychologists have an analogous personality category for people who are left of center? I only hear about research on \"Right-Wing Authoritarianism\". This Vox article, called \"The Rise of American Authoritarianism\", is about the psychology of Trump voters in particular.  The article doesn't mention it specifically, but I know that this \"authoritarianism\" has since the 1980's often been called \"Right-Wing Authoritarianism\".  The article does mention that the initial idea comes from a specific set of studies conducted during the 1940's that lead to Adorno's *The Authoritarian Personality* (which is mentioned in the article) and were concerned with trying to psychologically explain the rise of Fascism.  So it's a study of the Right all the way down.  Now, I'm a sociologist not a psychologist, but the scale has always struck me as odd because it seems to assume that authoritarian was the deviation from the norm.  Yesterday, I voted in the Massachusetts Democratic primary primary, and now I wonder if there's an analogous psychological \"deviation from the norm\" in the other direction that is useful in explaining left-wing politics.  Is there a similar psychological profile that explains, say, a Bernie Sanders, or an Obama in 2008 candidate?  A hope and change meritocracy and egalitarianism candidate?  Or perhaps just a specific \"anti-authoritarianism\" personality that could be find both in left wing and libertarian movements?  The recent studies mentioned in the article think that there can be some \"activation\" of the authoritarian type\/authoritarian personality only has an increased influence on political preference under certain conditions, namely during periods of increased social change and increased threats to security.  From the Vox article:  >But both schools of thought agree on the basic causality of authoritarianism. People do not support extreme policies and strongman leaders just out of an affirmative desire for authoritarianism, but rather as a response to experiencing certain kinds of threats [i.e. social change and physical threats].  If a left-wing analogue exists and has been studied, does evidence suggest political preferences for these personality types can be \"activated\"?  If so, under what circumstances?  As a side note, there seems to be far more research into right wing political psychology than left wing political psychology, or at least, more of it that has filtered into social science more broadly--it's an interesting contrast with, say, the social movement literature which is extensively focused on left wing social movements.  I know there was an abortive attempt to look at support for \"left-wing authoritarianism\" (Stalinism and all that) that happened around when \"right-wing authoritarianism\" was coined, but that that line of research mostly fizzled.  If anyone can explain that difference, I'd also be curious. (with citations, of course, not gut feelings or posts from Heterodox Academy, showing the dominance of liberals in the social sciences--since liberals are equally dominant in both fields, that doesn't solve the puzzle of why political psychology is studying the right more closely and political sociology is studying the left more closely).  Before you go spouting off a jeremiad about \"social justice warriors\", **I'm a mod here so obviously don't post any answer that violates rule one (*All claims in top level comments must be supported by citations to relevant social science sources*),** or they'll be deleted right away.  Since this is a political thread, low quality posts and soap boxing (including loaded questions) will be deleted very quickly so that things don't get out of control.  Please, keep it civil and don't make me regret asking this question.","c_root_id_A":"d0lbwpa","c_root_id_B":"d0lvw6n","created_at_utc_A":1456959399,"created_at_utc_B":1457002645,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I did do some reading of Bob Altemeyer's work on authoritarianism while working on my master's degree. He said that yes, there are some left-wing authoritarians, but they're few and far between. They might be hard-core Marxists and the like.   But their presence in the U.S. is tiny.","human_ref_B":"The center left are the most inclined towards Authoritarianism.  I actually embarrassed a researcher of \"right wing authoritarianism\" during a teleconference by comparing Ron Paul (far-right) with the agenda of the center left (Democrats like Obama). At least in the case of Paul he was calling for an end to wars overseas and the police state at home.   Similarly people have been posting \"Trump is Hitler\" images around, but particularly when compared to Hillary Clinton he is a dove.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":43246.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"48n8k2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Today, Vox had a big article about the influence of \"authoritarians\" in voting for Trump, based new psychological research. Do political psychologists have an analogous personality category for people who are left of center? I only hear about research on \"Right-Wing Authoritarianism\". This Vox article, called \"The Rise of American Authoritarianism\", is about the psychology of Trump voters in particular.  The article doesn't mention it specifically, but I know that this \"authoritarianism\" has since the 1980's often been called \"Right-Wing Authoritarianism\".  The article does mention that the initial idea comes from a specific set of studies conducted during the 1940's that lead to Adorno's *The Authoritarian Personality* (which is mentioned in the article) and were concerned with trying to psychologically explain the rise of Fascism.  So it's a study of the Right all the way down.  Now, I'm a sociologist not a psychologist, but the scale has always struck me as odd because it seems to assume that authoritarian was the deviation from the norm.  Yesterday, I voted in the Massachusetts Democratic primary primary, and now I wonder if there's an analogous psychological \"deviation from the norm\" in the other direction that is useful in explaining left-wing politics.  Is there a similar psychological profile that explains, say, a Bernie Sanders, or an Obama in 2008 candidate?  A hope and change meritocracy and egalitarianism candidate?  Or perhaps just a specific \"anti-authoritarianism\" personality that could be find both in left wing and libertarian movements?  The recent studies mentioned in the article think that there can be some \"activation\" of the authoritarian type\/authoritarian personality only has an increased influence on political preference under certain conditions, namely during periods of increased social change and increased threats to security.  From the Vox article:  >But both schools of thought agree on the basic causality of authoritarianism. People do not support extreme policies and strongman leaders just out of an affirmative desire for authoritarianism, but rather as a response to experiencing certain kinds of threats [i.e. social change and physical threats].  If a left-wing analogue exists and has been studied, does evidence suggest political preferences for these personality types can be \"activated\"?  If so, under what circumstances?  As a side note, there seems to be far more research into right wing political psychology than left wing political psychology, or at least, more of it that has filtered into social science more broadly--it's an interesting contrast with, say, the social movement literature which is extensively focused on left wing social movements.  I know there was an abortive attempt to look at support for \"left-wing authoritarianism\" (Stalinism and all that) that happened around when \"right-wing authoritarianism\" was coined, but that that line of research mostly fizzled.  If anyone can explain that difference, I'd also be curious. (with citations, of course, not gut feelings or posts from Heterodox Academy, showing the dominance of liberals in the social sciences--since liberals are equally dominant in both fields, that doesn't solve the puzzle of why political psychology is studying the right more closely and political sociology is studying the left more closely).  Before you go spouting off a jeremiad about \"social justice warriors\", **I'm a mod here so obviously don't post any answer that violates rule one (*All claims in top level comments must be supported by citations to relevant social science sources*),** or they'll be deleted right away.  Since this is a political thread, low quality posts and soap boxing (including loaded questions) will be deleted very quickly so that things don't get out of control.  Please, keep it civil and don't make me regret asking this question.","c_root_id_A":"d0m5t64","c_root_id_B":"d0lbwpa","created_at_utc_A":1457023112,"created_at_utc_B":1456959399,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"> As a side note, there seems to be far more research into right wing political psychology than left wing political psychology, or at least, more of it that has filtered into social science more broadly--it's an interesting contrast with, say, the social movement literature which is extensively focused on left wing social movements. I know there was an abortive attempt to look at support for \"left-wing authoritarianism\" (Stalinism and all that) that happened around when \"right-wing authoritarianism\" was coined, but that that line of research mostly fizzled. If anyone can explain that difference, I'd also be curious. (with citations, of course, not gut feelings or posts from Heterodox Academy, showing the dominance of liberals in the social sciences--since liberals are equally dominant in both fields, that doesn't solve the puzzle of why political psychology is studying the right more closely and political sociology is studying the left more closely).  This point can be addressed fairly easily. Political science, as we conceive of it, is an Anglo-dominated field. That doesn't mean there isn't great political science work elsewhere (Scandinavia has given us some of the best political psychology scholars, for example), it just means that the methodologies and phenomena we associate with the field come almost exclusively from institutions in the US or UK. I am under the impression this isn't entirely true for sociology, which has more of an international foothold.  Why does location matter? Because it determines access and interest. US researchers were imminently fascinated by the totalitarian natures of both Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union (interest), but they only had access to the former. Hannah Arendt could easily attend the Nuremberg trials and formulate her treatise on the \"banality of evil,\" whereas any attempt to do that type of research in the USSR would have raised the specter of Frederic Pryor's ordeal. As such, left-wing authoritarianism research fizzled.  As the Cold War continued and research on right-wing authoritarianism floundered about (due to many studies with preconceived notions and poor methodology), the United States saw the rise of left-wing counter-culture movements (aka hippies), which inspired a number of sociological research programs, with which I'm sure you're familiar. Thing is, American political scientists did little research on these groups; at this time, the field was much more concerned with rationalist and behaviorist explanations of political beings, with hippies being viewed as an outlier unworthy of study. Europeans also had to contend with a number of similar movements, in addition to pro-Communist elements, all of which would be studied by sociologists as well, thanks to the Continent's pre-occupation with political theory, rather than political science (a trend that continues today). The Frankfurt School would make some attempts at political psychology theory, but only from a philosophical, rather than empirical, perspective.  The result is a 60 year legacy of different interests in these fields which is only now breaking down, as the \"Perestroika\" movement takes hold in American political science. Left-wing authoritarianism (or other more relevant left-wing phenomena) remains understudied, thanks to this historical lack of interest and access. Meanwhile, right-wing phenomena remain relevant and have inspired further study, thanks to folks like Donald.   Recommended reading on the topic of how political trends influence what is studied:  Chomsky, N., Barsamian, D., & Zinn, H. (1997).\u00a0The cold war & the university. New York: New Press.  Monroe, K. R. (2005).\u00a0Perestroika!: The raucous rebellion in political science. Yale University Press.","human_ref_B":"I did do some reading of Bob Altemeyer's work on authoritarianism while working on my master's degree. He said that yes, there are some left-wing authoritarians, but they're few and far between. They might be hard-core Marxists and the like.   But their presence in the U.S. is tiny.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":63713.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2k0k87","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Why does it seem that people who commit shootings or bombings are hardly ever female? The Aurora shooter was a male. The shooting that happened in Norway a few years ago was a male. Jared Lee Loughner shot Gabby Giffords he was male. The Sandy Hook shooter was a male. The D.C. Snipers were male. The Boston Bombers were male. The shooting that happened in Canada today, the suspect was male. Why do females commit these acts at the same rate as males?","c_root_id_A":"clgu9br","c_root_id_B":"clgu0yu","created_at_utc_A":1414006652,"created_at_utc_B":1414006262,"score_A":111,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"This NPR article seems like as good a place as any to start.  So why is it that most American mass murderers who kill with guns are men? To help us with the question, we turn to the listserv of the Homicide Research Working Group, a clutch of writers, researchers, academics and others who explore together the facts and fallacies of murder.  Generally speaking, says Lin Huff-Corzine of the University of Central Florida, women do not kill as often as men. She and other researchers have cooperated on an upcoming article for the quarterly journal Homicide Studies, based on data from the FBI. Between 2001 and 2010, less than 8 percent of mass murder offenders in the U.S. were women, she says, adding that some of the women included in the statistics assisted in a crime but did not pull a trigger.  In part, Huff-Corzine says, \"this may be explained by women's weapons of choice even when they do want to do serious bodily harm to someone. Specifically, men are more comfortable than women when using guns, whereas women are more likely to choose knives. Guns are simply more effective than knives when killing another person. This is especially the case when three or more people are murdered.\"  And, Huff-Corzine says, \"women are comfortable with being less lethal.\"  \"It is not just mass murder offenders who are typically male,\" says Candice Batton, director of the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Nebraska, Omaha. \"The majority of all homicide perpetrators are male \u2014 approximately 90-91 percent. Research indicates that males are more likely to be violent, especially lethally violent, than females.\"  And why is that? \"There are different ideas about this,\" Batton says. \"Some research supports the idea that males are more likely than females to develop negative attributions of blame that are external in nature, that is: 'The cause ... of my problems is someone else or some force outside of me'. And this translates into anger and hostility toward others.\"  Batton says that women, on the other hand, \"are more likely to develop negative attributions of blame that are internal in nature, that is: 'The cause of my problems is some failing of my own: I didn't try hard enough, I'm not good enough.' And this, in turn, tends to translate into feelings of guilt and depression that are targeted toward oneself.\"  This article from TIME has a couple paragraphs that sums up part of the issue well.  For millennia, human society has struggled with what to do with young men\u2019s violent tendencies. Many cultures stage elaborate initiation ceremonies, presided over by older men, which help channel youthful aggression into productive social roles. But in contemporary society, we have trouble talking about the obvious: the transition from boy to man is a risky endeavor, and there can be a lot of collateral damage.  Skeptics will claim that the perpetrators of horrific acts like the Aurora shootings are such aberrations that we can hardly build public policy around their evil behavior. But it\u2019s a mistake to view mass murderers as incomprehensible freaks of nature. For example, we know that the young men who go on murderous rampages are not always sociopathic monsters but, rather, sometimes more or less \u201cregular\u201d men who suffered from crushing depression and suicidal ideation.  For more in-depth, academic research on the topic you can browse this Journalist Resource article Mass murder, shooting sprees and rampage violence: Research roundup  ^ This lists a lot of academic articles at the bottom.  Another article on the topic Hegemonic Masculinity and Mass Murderers in the United States  Or another Gender Differences in Serial Murderers  **TL;DR:**  There really isn't a simple answer to that question.  The simplest you could say is Male & Female biology is different.  We have different hormones and chemical differences that seem to make most men more prone to violence then most women.  There are also plenty of societal aspects to the issue.  Young men are much more likely to see examples of men committing violence and being rewarded for it in popular culture.  One could also argue that violence in men was naturally selected for in the thousands of years before what we would call modern society.  Being violent often would have been a benefit to survival and as such most modern men still have that capacity.  It's probably a combination of these reasons and quite a few more.","human_ref_B":">*not commit  ...in last sentence.  The vast majority of all serious violent acts (minor slaps and punches excepted, stats unclear or not collected for that) are performed by men. Shootings are no different, so the question really should be why are males more prone to significant violence (i.e., leaves permanent damage or requires professional medical attention).   FFI see http:\/\/www.fbi.gov\/about-us\/cjis\/ucr\/crime-in-the-u.s\/2012\/crime-in-the-u.s.-2012\/violent-crime\/violent-crime","labels":1,"seconds_difference":390.0,"score_ratio":4.44}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdlxu8h","c_root_id_B":"cdlzsn2","created_at_utc_A":1385315598,"created_at_utc_B":1385320247,"score_A":30,"score_B":55,"human_ref_A":"White Canadian here. I'm also bothered by it, and react poorly to comments on web\/media forums. But I think I've got a good strategy now.  1) Ask people to imagine the specifics of systemic racism. Not in an angry way.   2) State that you stand with First Nations who want to assert their legal rights, and some personal vision\/hope for how the future will look.  3) Support First Nations on an actual project, that they are directing.  I think that is an appropriate response.","human_ref_B":"Hi OP, I'm a canadian who grew up in a small town ~1500 people, which had a native reserve 6 km away, which also had ~1500 people in it. In essence, they were the same town. My elementary and high school were roughly 50% white and 50% first nations.  As many other people have mentioned, residential schools and poor treatment of first nations in the past has left their culture in a state of shock. On the reserve, alchohlism is hugely prevalent.   12 children out of my 290 person high school had fetal alcohol syndrome, and all of them were first nations.   My family owned a coffee shop right beside the liquor store in town. Every day natives would walk from the reserve, (6 km and then 6km back) to buy booze. Being a small town you knew all their names, you'd say hi as they passed every day.  Often times drunk first nations people would lie down in front of our store, because they knew we would eventually call the cops. They would then thank us for calling them a ride home. The police wouldn't throw them in the drunk tank, they knew the first nations people on first name basis as well.  Half of my friends from kindergarten to grade 12 were first nations. Compared to non-aboriginals, on average they did far worse in school. Many of them failed consecutive grades in high school and never graduated.  There were some first nations I grew up with who are attaining further education, but the ratio compared to non-aboriginals is abysmal. As white university student who comes from a low income family, it hurts me somewhat to see the opportunities my first nations friends had available but never took. They got money based on their high school grades. Their band sponsered them to go to university, often covering the entirety of tuition.  On a different note, being on the reserve is always interesting. Due to poor upkeep, and somewhat frequent floods, many houses on the reserve were in poor poor condition. Trailers that looked like they would fall apart. These were the houses given to reserve residents by the band\/government. Technically the occupants down own their houses, so it's much the same as renting, but the owner has no real incentive to keep the place nice.  However, infront of many trailers\/houses is a $50,000 SUV, a satellite dish, and you know your friend Jim just got the new Xbox one on release day.  Finally, there are separate tribal police, with their own vehicles. The RCMP, while they are legally allowed to be police on the reserve, will generally leave all reserve calls for the tribal police. Many times I have seen first nations flat out refuse to listen to the RCMP, but comply immediately when tribal police show up. It's in interesting dynamic and I'm never quite sure what to make of it.  I know this answer has no citations, which is wrong for r\/asksocialsience, and if it must be taken down then that's that. However I hope this has given you some insight as to what I grew up with.  TL;DR: Growing up with first nations is unique and interesting and highly alters an individuals perception of them due to first hand experience of aboriginal problems.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4649.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdlya2o","c_root_id_B":"cdlzsn2","created_at_utc_A":1385316688,"created_at_utc_B":1385320247,"score_A":18,"score_B":55,"human_ref_A":"Anyone that has any prejudice against First Nations should read John Ralston Saul's book A Fair Country. It really shows how instrumental they have been in building Canada and how the mythology of Canada being built by only the English and French is just that. Mythology.","human_ref_B":"Hi OP, I'm a canadian who grew up in a small town ~1500 people, which had a native reserve 6 km away, which also had ~1500 people in it. In essence, they were the same town. My elementary and high school were roughly 50% white and 50% first nations.  As many other people have mentioned, residential schools and poor treatment of first nations in the past has left their culture in a state of shock. On the reserve, alchohlism is hugely prevalent.   12 children out of my 290 person high school had fetal alcohol syndrome, and all of them were first nations.   My family owned a coffee shop right beside the liquor store in town. Every day natives would walk from the reserve, (6 km and then 6km back) to buy booze. Being a small town you knew all their names, you'd say hi as they passed every day.  Often times drunk first nations people would lie down in front of our store, because they knew we would eventually call the cops. They would then thank us for calling them a ride home. The police wouldn't throw them in the drunk tank, they knew the first nations people on first name basis as well.  Half of my friends from kindergarten to grade 12 were first nations. Compared to non-aboriginals, on average they did far worse in school. Many of them failed consecutive grades in high school and never graduated.  There were some first nations I grew up with who are attaining further education, but the ratio compared to non-aboriginals is abysmal. As white university student who comes from a low income family, it hurts me somewhat to see the opportunities my first nations friends had available but never took. They got money based on their high school grades. Their band sponsered them to go to university, often covering the entirety of tuition.  On a different note, being on the reserve is always interesting. Due to poor upkeep, and somewhat frequent floods, many houses on the reserve were in poor poor condition. Trailers that looked like they would fall apart. These were the houses given to reserve residents by the band\/government. Technically the occupants down own their houses, so it's much the same as renting, but the owner has no real incentive to keep the place nice.  However, infront of many trailers\/houses is a $50,000 SUV, a satellite dish, and you know your friend Jim just got the new Xbox one on release day.  Finally, there are separate tribal police, with their own vehicles. The RCMP, while they are legally allowed to be police on the reserve, will generally leave all reserve calls for the tribal police. Many times I have seen first nations flat out refuse to listen to the RCMP, but comply immediately when tribal police show up. It's in interesting dynamic and I'm never quite sure what to make of it.  I know this answer has no citations, which is wrong for r\/asksocialsience, and if it must be taken down then that's that. However I hope this has given you some insight as to what I grew up with.  TL;DR: Growing up with first nations is unique and interesting and highly alters an individuals perception of them due to first hand experience of aboriginal problems.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3559.0,"score_ratio":3.0555555556}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdlzsn2","c_root_id_B":"cdlwen9","created_at_utc_A":1385320247,"created_at_utc_B":1385311709,"score_A":55,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Hi OP, I'm a canadian who grew up in a small town ~1500 people, which had a native reserve 6 km away, which also had ~1500 people in it. In essence, they were the same town. My elementary and high school were roughly 50% white and 50% first nations.  As many other people have mentioned, residential schools and poor treatment of first nations in the past has left their culture in a state of shock. On the reserve, alchohlism is hugely prevalent.   12 children out of my 290 person high school had fetal alcohol syndrome, and all of them were first nations.   My family owned a coffee shop right beside the liquor store in town. Every day natives would walk from the reserve, (6 km and then 6km back) to buy booze. Being a small town you knew all their names, you'd say hi as they passed every day.  Often times drunk first nations people would lie down in front of our store, because they knew we would eventually call the cops. They would then thank us for calling them a ride home. The police wouldn't throw them in the drunk tank, they knew the first nations people on first name basis as well.  Half of my friends from kindergarten to grade 12 were first nations. Compared to non-aboriginals, on average they did far worse in school. Many of them failed consecutive grades in high school and never graduated.  There were some first nations I grew up with who are attaining further education, but the ratio compared to non-aboriginals is abysmal. As white university student who comes from a low income family, it hurts me somewhat to see the opportunities my first nations friends had available but never took. They got money based on their high school grades. Their band sponsered them to go to university, often covering the entirety of tuition.  On a different note, being on the reserve is always interesting. Due to poor upkeep, and somewhat frequent floods, many houses on the reserve were in poor poor condition. Trailers that looked like they would fall apart. These were the houses given to reserve residents by the band\/government. Technically the occupants down own their houses, so it's much the same as renting, but the owner has no real incentive to keep the place nice.  However, infront of many trailers\/houses is a $50,000 SUV, a satellite dish, and you know your friend Jim just got the new Xbox one on release day.  Finally, there are separate tribal police, with their own vehicles. The RCMP, while they are legally allowed to be police on the reserve, will generally leave all reserve calls for the tribal police. Many times I have seen first nations flat out refuse to listen to the RCMP, but comply immediately when tribal police show up. It's in interesting dynamic and I'm never quite sure what to make of it.  I know this answer has no citations, which is wrong for r\/asksocialsience, and if it must be taken down then that's that. However I hope this has given you some insight as to what I grew up with.  TL;DR: Growing up with first nations is unique and interesting and highly alters an individuals perception of them due to first hand experience of aboriginal problems.","human_ref_B":"This probably isn't the right thread to ask this, since this isn't really a science question, but one about how to deal with prejudice. That being said, if I wanted to try and get someone to empathize with First Nations people, I might point out how hard it would be if one's culture was basically destroyed and many of their people killed, and how this might lead to some behaviors that people are probably picking up on in their bigoted attitudes. I have used this tack successfully before in talking with white Americans about similar issues with Native Americans.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8538.0,"score_ratio":9.1666666667}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdlzsn2","c_root_id_B":"cdly7xa","created_at_utc_A":1385320247,"created_at_utc_B":1385316543,"score_A":55,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Hi OP, I'm a canadian who grew up in a small town ~1500 people, which had a native reserve 6 km away, which also had ~1500 people in it. In essence, they were the same town. My elementary and high school were roughly 50% white and 50% first nations.  As many other people have mentioned, residential schools and poor treatment of first nations in the past has left their culture in a state of shock. On the reserve, alchohlism is hugely prevalent.   12 children out of my 290 person high school had fetal alcohol syndrome, and all of them were first nations.   My family owned a coffee shop right beside the liquor store in town. Every day natives would walk from the reserve, (6 km and then 6km back) to buy booze. Being a small town you knew all their names, you'd say hi as they passed every day.  Often times drunk first nations people would lie down in front of our store, because they knew we would eventually call the cops. They would then thank us for calling them a ride home. The police wouldn't throw them in the drunk tank, they knew the first nations people on first name basis as well.  Half of my friends from kindergarten to grade 12 were first nations. Compared to non-aboriginals, on average they did far worse in school. Many of them failed consecutive grades in high school and never graduated.  There were some first nations I grew up with who are attaining further education, but the ratio compared to non-aboriginals is abysmal. As white university student who comes from a low income family, it hurts me somewhat to see the opportunities my first nations friends had available but never took. They got money based on their high school grades. Their band sponsered them to go to university, often covering the entirety of tuition.  On a different note, being on the reserve is always interesting. Due to poor upkeep, and somewhat frequent floods, many houses on the reserve were in poor poor condition. Trailers that looked like they would fall apart. These were the houses given to reserve residents by the band\/government. Technically the occupants down own their houses, so it's much the same as renting, but the owner has no real incentive to keep the place nice.  However, infront of many trailers\/houses is a $50,000 SUV, a satellite dish, and you know your friend Jim just got the new Xbox one on release day.  Finally, there are separate tribal police, with their own vehicles. The RCMP, while they are legally allowed to be police on the reserve, will generally leave all reserve calls for the tribal police. Many times I have seen first nations flat out refuse to listen to the RCMP, but comply immediately when tribal police show up. It's in interesting dynamic and I'm never quite sure what to make of it.  I know this answer has no citations, which is wrong for r\/asksocialsience, and if it must be taken down then that's that. However I hope this has given you some insight as to what I grew up with.  TL;DR: Growing up with first nations is unique and interesting and highly alters an individuals perception of them due to first hand experience of aboriginal problems.","human_ref_B":"I think where you need to start in regards to this issue is asking \"what do you know about the First Nations people?\" I would hazard a guess that the people who are bigoted towards them immediately think of the stereotypes: alcoholics and addicts, living on welfare, no education, lazy, etc. Stereotypes breed prejudices and the behaviour towards the affected group.   The UN's proposal for The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which allowed the rights of culture and identity (among other things) for indigenous groups, didn't even get passed until 2007! And you know what? Canada didn't approve it (at least not for another 3 years, under some pressure). So when you have the government of a colony state that doesn't fully support Aboriginal rights, some people won't be supportive as well.  There's so much more to this issue than what I've given, and I haven't really given all that much, but I too am bothered by peoples quick judgements on our aboriginal population.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3704.0,"score_ratio":18.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdlzsn2","c_root_id_B":"cdlylma","created_at_utc_A":1385320247,"created_at_utc_B":1385317448,"score_A":55,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Hi OP, I'm a canadian who grew up in a small town ~1500 people, which had a native reserve 6 km away, which also had ~1500 people in it. In essence, they were the same town. My elementary and high school were roughly 50% white and 50% first nations.  As many other people have mentioned, residential schools and poor treatment of first nations in the past has left their culture in a state of shock. On the reserve, alchohlism is hugely prevalent.   12 children out of my 290 person high school had fetal alcohol syndrome, and all of them were first nations.   My family owned a coffee shop right beside the liquor store in town. Every day natives would walk from the reserve, (6 km and then 6km back) to buy booze. Being a small town you knew all their names, you'd say hi as they passed every day.  Often times drunk first nations people would lie down in front of our store, because they knew we would eventually call the cops. They would then thank us for calling them a ride home. The police wouldn't throw them in the drunk tank, they knew the first nations people on first name basis as well.  Half of my friends from kindergarten to grade 12 were first nations. Compared to non-aboriginals, on average they did far worse in school. Many of them failed consecutive grades in high school and never graduated.  There were some first nations I grew up with who are attaining further education, but the ratio compared to non-aboriginals is abysmal. As white university student who comes from a low income family, it hurts me somewhat to see the opportunities my first nations friends had available but never took. They got money based on their high school grades. Their band sponsered them to go to university, often covering the entirety of tuition.  On a different note, being on the reserve is always interesting. Due to poor upkeep, and somewhat frequent floods, many houses on the reserve were in poor poor condition. Trailers that looked like they would fall apart. These were the houses given to reserve residents by the band\/government. Technically the occupants down own their houses, so it's much the same as renting, but the owner has no real incentive to keep the place nice.  However, infront of many trailers\/houses is a $50,000 SUV, a satellite dish, and you know your friend Jim just got the new Xbox one on release day.  Finally, there are separate tribal police, with their own vehicles. The RCMP, while they are legally allowed to be police on the reserve, will generally leave all reserve calls for the tribal police. Many times I have seen first nations flat out refuse to listen to the RCMP, but comply immediately when tribal police show up. It's in interesting dynamic and I'm never quite sure what to make of it.  I know this answer has no citations, which is wrong for r\/asksocialsience, and if it must be taken down then that's that. However I hope this has given you some insight as to what I grew up with.  TL;DR: Growing up with first nations is unique and interesting and highly alters an individuals perception of them due to first hand experience of aboriginal problems.","human_ref_B":"I have a problem with this question.  We both know that Canada is a HUGE country with different cultures (ex. quebec vs. alberta). Additionally, First Nations are not ONE culture. Think of it like Europe and all of its countries. There are some cool maps that break this down (especially languages): where there's more farmland, you have more variety of cultures, and where there's more hunter-gathering (like up north), it's mostly one culture.  Granted, while there are some similarities between cultures, Cree is not the same as an Iroquois.    So when you ask about why \"Canadians\" are \"bigoted\", you might want to ask yourself where this question is coming from. Maybe a particular group is being targeted more than another (i can't find data on this). Maybe where you live has something to do with it: I've lived in several different provinces and can say that each city had it's own issues and levels of tolerance. To quantify this with data, here's info from the Canadian Census from 2011. If you look at page 11, there's a HUGE difference between Calgary and Edmonton, and they're both dealing with Cree people.   Overall, the topic of First Nations remains a very complex issue, in part because we're dealing with several cultures that we treat as one. There's a large amount of barriers that First Peoples face, including higher incarceration rates as well as higher rates of FAS\/FASD which may be linked to the residential schools fiasco, which every Canadian I know is extremely embarassed \/ ashamed of. Then there's the several chiefs who are spending the band's federal funding in a controversial manner.  Canada is such a huge country with such variance between the people, it's impossible to say that Jacques in Quebec sees his iroquois neighbour the same way Randy in Alberta sees his Cree neighbour. I mean, let's turn it around. Ask Randy what he thinks of Jacques, and he'll go on a tirade about Quebeckers. You ask Jacques about Randy, and he'll go on a tirade about Anglophones who refuse to learn to speak French.  TL;DR asking why one multicultural group of people (as a giant whole) is bigoted against another multicultural group of people isn't really a great question as there are far too many variables. Which Canadians are bigots? Which Canadians are they bigots against?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2799.0,"score_ratio":27.5}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdlxu8h","c_root_id_B":"cdlwen9","created_at_utc_A":1385315598,"created_at_utc_B":1385311709,"score_A":30,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"White Canadian here. I'm also bothered by it, and react poorly to comments on web\/media forums. But I think I've got a good strategy now.  1) Ask people to imagine the specifics of systemic racism. Not in an angry way.   2) State that you stand with First Nations who want to assert their legal rights, and some personal vision\/hope for how the future will look.  3) Support First Nations on an actual project, that they are directing.  I think that is an appropriate response.","human_ref_B":"This probably isn't the right thread to ask this, since this isn't really a science question, but one about how to deal with prejudice. That being said, if I wanted to try and get someone to empathize with First Nations people, I might point out how hard it would be if one's culture was basically destroyed and many of their people killed, and how this might lead to some behaviors that people are probably picking up on in their bigoted attitudes. I have used this tack successfully before in talking with white Americans about similar issues with Native Americans.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3889.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdlya2o","c_root_id_B":"cdlwen9","created_at_utc_A":1385316688,"created_at_utc_B":1385311709,"score_A":18,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Anyone that has any prejudice against First Nations should read John Ralston Saul's book A Fair Country. It really shows how instrumental they have been in building Canada and how the mythology of Canada being built by only the English and French is just that. Mythology.","human_ref_B":"This probably isn't the right thread to ask this, since this isn't really a science question, but one about how to deal with prejudice. That being said, if I wanted to try and get someone to empathize with First Nations people, I might point out how hard it would be if one's culture was basically destroyed and many of their people killed, and how this might lead to some behaviors that people are probably picking up on in their bigoted attitudes. I have used this tack successfully before in talking with white Americans about similar issues with Native Americans.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4979.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdlya2o","c_root_id_B":"cdly7xa","created_at_utc_A":1385316688,"created_at_utc_B":1385316543,"score_A":18,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Anyone that has any prejudice against First Nations should read John Ralston Saul's book A Fair Country. It really shows how instrumental they have been in building Canada and how the mythology of Canada being built by only the English and French is just that. Mythology.","human_ref_B":"I think where you need to start in regards to this issue is asking \"what do you know about the First Nations people?\" I would hazard a guess that the people who are bigoted towards them immediately think of the stereotypes: alcoholics and addicts, living on welfare, no education, lazy, etc. Stereotypes breed prejudices and the behaviour towards the affected group.   The UN's proposal for The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which allowed the rights of culture and identity (among other things) for indigenous groups, didn't even get passed until 2007! And you know what? Canada didn't approve it (at least not for another 3 years, under some pressure). So when you have the government of a colony state that doesn't fully support Aboriginal rights, some people won't be supportive as well.  There's so much more to this issue than what I've given, and I haven't really given all that much, but I too am bothered by peoples quick judgements on our aboriginal population.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":145.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdlwen9","c_root_id_B":"cdm05nz","created_at_utc_A":1385311709,"created_at_utc_B":1385321066,"score_A":6,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"This probably isn't the right thread to ask this, since this isn't really a science question, but one about how to deal with prejudice. That being said, if I wanted to try and get someone to empathize with First Nations people, I might point out how hard it would be if one's culture was basically destroyed and many of their people killed, and how this might lead to some behaviors that people are probably picking up on in their bigoted attitudes. I have used this tack successfully before in talking with white Americans about similar issues with Native Americans.","human_ref_B":"Keep in mind when reading this, 40% of Canadians voted Conservative in the last federal election. These reasons go against some conservative values.   For your first question (why is this?) I have a few reasons. The first being that the Canadian government shoves a ton of money into the Native communities. However, we know that there are a lot of problems on reserves, like poor education, sexual assault, alcoholism, gambling problems, etc. People see the government spending money on a group and that same group continuously having a greater percentage of people afflicted with problems than the rest of Canada. People probably either want a different solution than throwing money at an issue or to have better enforcement of how that money is used. As well, there's a stereotype that people living on reserves is lazy and aren't keeping up with the times. People generally don't want money going to people who they think won't use the money on the right things.  Second, because of land rights, there are *a lot* of issues regarding development. You probably saw this come to a head during the Oka Crisis. First Nations and the Canadian Government (and subsequently the general population) frequently dispute over land and what should\/can be done with it.   Third, First Nations typically have lower entrance requirements for university and they have a lot of scholarships dedicated to them.  As for your second question (is there an appropriate response?), I can't really help you beyond telling you to look at some stats, see what the effects of colonialism had on them, and use that to debate your position.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9357.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdly7xa","c_root_id_B":"cdm05nz","created_at_utc_A":1385316543,"created_at_utc_B":1385321066,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I think where you need to start in regards to this issue is asking \"what do you know about the First Nations people?\" I would hazard a guess that the people who are bigoted towards them immediately think of the stereotypes: alcoholics and addicts, living on welfare, no education, lazy, etc. Stereotypes breed prejudices and the behaviour towards the affected group.   The UN's proposal for The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which allowed the rights of culture and identity (among other things) for indigenous groups, didn't even get passed until 2007! And you know what? Canada didn't approve it (at least not for another 3 years, under some pressure). So when you have the government of a colony state that doesn't fully support Aboriginal rights, some people won't be supportive as well.  There's so much more to this issue than what I've given, and I haven't really given all that much, but I too am bothered by peoples quick judgements on our aboriginal population.","human_ref_B":"Keep in mind when reading this, 40% of Canadians voted Conservative in the last federal election. These reasons go against some conservative values.   For your first question (why is this?) I have a few reasons. The first being that the Canadian government shoves a ton of money into the Native communities. However, we know that there are a lot of problems on reserves, like poor education, sexual assault, alcoholism, gambling problems, etc. People see the government spending money on a group and that same group continuously having a greater percentage of people afflicted with problems than the rest of Canada. People probably either want a different solution than throwing money at an issue or to have better enforcement of how that money is used. As well, there's a stereotype that people living on reserves is lazy and aren't keeping up with the times. People generally don't want money going to people who they think won't use the money on the right things.  Second, because of land rights, there are *a lot* of issues regarding development. You probably saw this come to a head during the Oka Crisis. First Nations and the Canadian Government (and subsequently the general population) frequently dispute over land and what should\/can be done with it.   Third, First Nations typically have lower entrance requirements for university and they have a lot of scholarships dedicated to them.  As for your second question (is there an appropriate response?), I can't really help you beyond telling you to look at some stats, see what the effects of colonialism had on them, and use that to debate your position.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4523.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1rcnpo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I live in Canada, and a lot of people seem to be bigoted against First Nations people - why is this? Also, it bothers me when people go on rants against them - is there an appropriate response?","c_root_id_A":"cdlylma","c_root_id_B":"cdm05nz","created_at_utc_A":1385317448,"created_at_utc_B":1385321066,"score_A":2,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I have a problem with this question.  We both know that Canada is a HUGE country with different cultures (ex. quebec vs. alberta). Additionally, First Nations are not ONE culture. Think of it like Europe and all of its countries. There are some cool maps that break this down (especially languages): where there's more farmland, you have more variety of cultures, and where there's more hunter-gathering (like up north), it's mostly one culture.  Granted, while there are some similarities between cultures, Cree is not the same as an Iroquois.    So when you ask about why \"Canadians\" are \"bigoted\", you might want to ask yourself where this question is coming from. Maybe a particular group is being targeted more than another (i can't find data on this). Maybe where you live has something to do with it: I've lived in several different provinces and can say that each city had it's own issues and levels of tolerance. To quantify this with data, here's info from the Canadian Census from 2011. If you look at page 11, there's a HUGE difference between Calgary and Edmonton, and they're both dealing with Cree people.   Overall, the topic of First Nations remains a very complex issue, in part because we're dealing with several cultures that we treat as one. There's a large amount of barriers that First Peoples face, including higher incarceration rates as well as higher rates of FAS\/FASD which may be linked to the residential schools fiasco, which every Canadian I know is extremely embarassed \/ ashamed of. Then there's the several chiefs who are spending the band's federal funding in a controversial manner.  Canada is such a huge country with such variance between the people, it's impossible to say that Jacques in Quebec sees his iroquois neighbour the same way Randy in Alberta sees his Cree neighbour. I mean, let's turn it around. Ask Randy what he thinks of Jacques, and he'll go on a tirade about Quebeckers. You ask Jacques about Randy, and he'll go on a tirade about Anglophones who refuse to learn to speak French.  TL;DR asking why one multicultural group of people (as a giant whole) is bigoted against another multicultural group of people isn't really a great question as there are far too many variables. Which Canadians are bigots? Which Canadians are they bigots against?","human_ref_B":"Keep in mind when reading this, 40% of Canadians voted Conservative in the last federal election. These reasons go against some conservative values.   For your first question (why is this?) I have a few reasons. The first being that the Canadian government shoves a ton of money into the Native communities. However, we know that there are a lot of problems on reserves, like poor education, sexual assault, alcoholism, gambling problems, etc. People see the government spending money on a group and that same group continuously having a greater percentage of people afflicted with problems than the rest of Canada. People probably either want a different solution than throwing money at an issue or to have better enforcement of how that money is used. As well, there's a stereotype that people living on reserves is lazy and aren't keeping up with the times. People generally don't want money going to people who they think won't use the money on the right things.  Second, because of land rights, there are *a lot* of issues regarding development. You probably saw this come to a head during the Oka Crisis. First Nations and the Canadian Government (and subsequently the general population) frequently dispute over land and what should\/can be done with it.   Third, First Nations typically have lower entrance requirements for university and they have a lot of scholarships dedicated to them.  As for your second question (is there an appropriate response?), I can't really help you beyond telling you to look at some stats, see what the effects of colonialism had on them, and use that to debate your position.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3618.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"504ejz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"In the USA, why is the south a more deeply religious culture compared to other areas? I've read a lot about how religion is deeply ingrained into southern culture, whilst other areas are religious on a more a casual basis (like believing and identifying with Christianity but not feeling the need to go to mass every Sunday or pray).  Is there a social structure that's fostered this in the south? Where's it come from? Why there?","c_root_id_A":"d71ppk2","c_root_id_B":"d71jhk6","created_at_utc_A":1472504035,"created_at_utc_B":1472496232,"score_A":18,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This archived post from \/r\/AskHistorians may be of some help.","human_ref_B":"To add to this question, when did this phenomenon begin? It seems like it might not have been present with the Virginia colony in the south vs the puritan's in New England. Could it have to do with immigration trends?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7803.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"3f1aty","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"How do academics studying feminism view the current social climate that gets ridiculed on reddit (e.g. sjw, tumblrinaction, etc.) Perhaps the views that get linked and talked about on Reddit are shared by such a small minority but perhaps they are the views that are shared by a good portion of those who study it.","c_root_id_A":"ctkijyk","c_root_id_B":"ctkrm5w","created_at_utc_A":1438192141,"created_at_utc_B":1438204386,"score_A":20,"score_B":55,"human_ref_A":"I was a STEM major who took a gender studies course for my last semester of undergrad because I was curious. The main topics covered in the class ran through and focused on:   * The international crises facing women in the developing\/recently developed world  * Changes in western  society's perceptions and expectations of gender and sexual norms in male\/female\/those who identify as otherwise.   * Rape culture and the concept of the \"patriarchy\". Big emphasis on the harm it does to men and women.   * Safe sex practices, abortion, and consent discussions  One of the last lectures talked about the discussion of feminism in social media. It basically boiled down to this: there are people out there who have in some way, felt wronged by society and have unfortunately decided to use the Internet as a way to disseminate hate and prejudice in the wider cultural discussion of feminism. At the same time, there are many, many people and organizations *actually* doing something about the real injustices  (international aid organizations, groups that help pregnant teens, groups dedicated to helping men and women when it comes to rape, counseling and therapy advocacy, and many more). The former group may be louder, but the latter group is becoming increasingly more influential. They're just not noticed as much in the general discussion because like most other things in western culture, we like to polarize social issues for the convenience of \"picking sides\".   EDIT: the main book used in the course was *Our Sexuality, 11th edition, Robert Crooks and Karla Baur, 2011*   Other books\/articles included: *Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and A World Without Rape  By Jaclyn Friedman, Jessica Valent, 2008*, *COMMITTEE ON THE ELIMINATION OF DISCRIMINATION AGAINST WOMEN, UN Human rights website*, and other sources.","human_ref_B":"(I keep procrastinating to get my flair on this darn thing, in my last year of double masters, social work and human sexuality, BS of psych)  As an academic, purported feminist, and generally annoyed person with how feminism gets portrayed;  Feminism is a big group, and for the most part the part of it that gets criticized is the small crazy minority, feel free to check out this book or this book(just like in any other thing, we criticize extremist christians, extremist animal rights, extremist cyber-security bills going through congress).  Which yea, the extreme ones are stupid and take valid points to their hyperbolic, ridiculous ends.  Most feminists want equality.  That's about it.  A lot of people who would have called themselves feminists twenty years ago would brand themselves \"equalists\" today.  I don't because I think it downplays that the problem is one of a hypermasculine society, so what we want to create that balance is the equality of masculine and feminist things *for both men and women*.  Same as how we say \"black lives matter\" and not \"all lives matter\" because duh, we know that all lives matter, the problem is that the US police force is acting like black lives don't.  So when someone says that they're an equalist, I feel like they're missing the point, women aren't being treated equally, and that's the problem we're focusing on when we say \"feminism\".  Edit; put in some hastily found sources, I'm procrastinating on a paper","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12245.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"3f1aty","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"How do academics studying feminism view the current social climate that gets ridiculed on reddit (e.g. sjw, tumblrinaction, etc.) Perhaps the views that get linked and talked about on Reddit are shared by such a small minority but perhaps they are the views that are shared by a good portion of those who study it.","c_root_id_A":"ctksdtx","c_root_id_B":"ctkijyk","created_at_utc_A":1438205506,"created_at_utc_B":1438192141,"score_A":33,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I studied with feminist scholar Andrea Press. Women and Gender studies was not my specialty but I enjoyed learning with Prof Press.   Generally she doesn't see tumblrinaction as being necessarily a representation of feminism. Rather, they are a product of the social climate, a public reaction, if you will. Online feminism is a result of actual sexism, such as abortion rights, the lack of equal representation in education accolades, objectification, and assault. (via the Chronicle of Higher Education)     >In her forthcoming book, \"Feminism LOL: Media Culture and 'Feminism on the Ground' in a Postfeminist Age,\" Press draws on focus group data and textual analysis to explore the impact of second wave feminism on current thought about a series of issues including women's body image; sexuality; the \"double standard\"; work-family balance; and reproductive rights.   from the Wikipedia page. Might want to check that out if you're really interested.","human_ref_B":"I was a STEM major who took a gender studies course for my last semester of undergrad because I was curious. The main topics covered in the class ran through and focused on:   * The international crises facing women in the developing\/recently developed world  * Changes in western  society's perceptions and expectations of gender and sexual norms in male\/female\/those who identify as otherwise.   * Rape culture and the concept of the \"patriarchy\". Big emphasis on the harm it does to men and women.   * Safe sex practices, abortion, and consent discussions  One of the last lectures talked about the discussion of feminism in social media. It basically boiled down to this: there are people out there who have in some way, felt wronged by society and have unfortunately decided to use the Internet as a way to disseminate hate and prejudice in the wider cultural discussion of feminism. At the same time, there are many, many people and organizations *actually* doing something about the real injustices  (international aid organizations, groups that help pregnant teens, groups dedicated to helping men and women when it comes to rape, counseling and therapy advocacy, and many more). The former group may be louder, but the latter group is becoming increasingly more influential. They're just not noticed as much in the general discussion because like most other things in western culture, we like to polarize social issues for the convenience of \"picking sides\".   EDIT: the main book used in the course was *Our Sexuality, 11th edition, Robert Crooks and Karla Baur, 2011*   Other books\/articles included: *Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and A World Without Rape  By Jaclyn Friedman, Jessica Valent, 2008*, *COMMITTEE ON THE ELIMINATION OF DISCRIMINATION AGAINST WOMEN, UN Human rights website*, and other sources.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13365.0,"score_ratio":1.65}
{"post_id":"gw281e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"IMPORTANT QUESTION: Where can I find resources to better educate myself about everything that's going on with the BLM movement? I know on a lot of the social media platforms people have posted helpful resources for better educating one's self about everything that relates to whats currently going on in America today. I'd consider myself pretty political informed as a 17 year old male, although I feel like my knowledge is very \"scattered\" and can be better distinguished between fact vs fiction. Because let's be honest, punditocracy in America ultimately misconstrues what really goes on behind closed doors, so just \"reading the news\" every day might serve as both a blessing and a curse. I'm not intending to discredit news platforms or anything, I'm just saying that there is more to just reading the New York Times or CNN or wherever the hell you get your information from. Please don't hesitate offer resources or ideas because I will read them regardless. Any resources include: Podcasts, books, blogs, videos, slideshows, articles, YOU NAME IT","c_root_id_A":"fsspz9b","c_root_id_B":"fssprtw","created_at_utc_A":1591223540,"created_at_utc_B":1591223436,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"If you\u2019re interested in reading about Black history and the racial wealth gap in America, I would suggest the book \u201cThe Color of Money\u201d by Mehrsa Baradaran.   https:\/\/books.google.com\/books\/about\/The_Color_of_Money.html?id=a4M4DwAAQBAJ&source=kp_book_description  It was a really eye opening read and the author explains how systematic racism, generational trauma and oppression affects Black Americans to this day.","human_ref_B":"Rather than focus on the movement itself, I'd suggest you get educated on the racial politics of the USA, of which BLM is just one element. If you want it all in one place, Ibram X Kendi's *How to be an Anti Racist* and Ijeoma Oluo's *So you want to talk about race* are both excellent entries to educating yourself. Both have wonderful audiobook formats that can be accessed for free via overdrive or libby through your local library.  For just the carceral state stuff, a good spot to start is the Netflix documentary 13th for an introduction to arguments that are further extended in the book *The New Jim Crow*. Check out the New York Times' 1619 Project, too, just because it's pretty great.  Some links to my recs so the bot doesn't hurt me:  https:\/\/smile.amazon.com\/How-Be-Antiracist-Ibram-Kendi\/  https:\/\/smile.amazon.com\/You-Want-Talk-About-Race\/  https:\/\/smile.amazon.com\/New-Jim-Crow-Incarceration-Colorblindness\/","labels":1,"seconds_difference":104.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"gw281e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"IMPORTANT QUESTION: Where can I find resources to better educate myself about everything that's going on with the BLM movement? I know on a lot of the social media platforms people have posted helpful resources for better educating one's self about everything that relates to whats currently going on in America today. I'd consider myself pretty political informed as a 17 year old male, although I feel like my knowledge is very \"scattered\" and can be better distinguished between fact vs fiction. Because let's be honest, punditocracy in America ultimately misconstrues what really goes on behind closed doors, so just \"reading the news\" every day might serve as both a blessing and a curse. I'm not intending to discredit news platforms or anything, I'm just saying that there is more to just reading the New York Times or CNN or wherever the hell you get your information from. Please don't hesitate offer resources or ideas because I will read them regardless. Any resources include: Podcasts, books, blogs, videos, slideshows, articles, YOU NAME IT","c_root_id_A":"fssvv1f","c_root_id_B":"fssztjl","created_at_utc_A":1591226552,"created_at_utc_B":1591228627,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Check out Algorithms of Oppression. And I've also started a community centered around evidence based claims to parse out the many threads all going at the same time. The focus right now is the protests and riots and you can find it here: https:\/\/god-of-honeybees-podcast.mn.co\/share\/qSZ76JhTT7BYZOQl?utm_source=manual","human_ref_B":"There's a couple good books for introductions on topics. Since this stuff basically involves 400+ years of US history there's a lot of aspects to this and they all have a lot of information and complication.   But one of the big things is understanding what red lining is and how it came about. Red lining was a federal policy (that was different than segregation but worked as a tool of segregation) that limited housing options and opportunities to non-whites. That rippled out into education (since we fund education from property taxes), in to wealth (since most wealth comes through home ownership in the US), and into policing, religion, access to credit, algorithmic discrimination and higher costs for everything from basic groceries to medical insurance rates. That book is The Color of Law.  https:\/\/www.goodreads.com\/book\/show\/32191706-the-color-of-law   There was also a writer named Thomas Kozol who was a former teacher. He taught in some of Boston's Black American neighborhoods and his work concentrates on the inequality of the education system. He has a lot of critics, some genuine and with valid arguments and many less so. These aren't academic books, they're more about the experiences of teachers and students, but they're a good place to get into that literature. He's got two books, Savage Inequalities that came out in 1991 and Shame of the Nation that came out in 2005, that are both very popular and should be at your library or available used. They're disturbing in how little has changed in the 15 year spans in which they were written.  I'd also suggest Some of My Best Friends Are Black about America's racial divides. That book is also an overview. It touches on differences in religious practice, housing discrimination, marketing, political organization and education. That book also has lots of problems, but it's a nice primer on 4 areas if you want to start researching more on the topic.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2075.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"gw281e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"IMPORTANT QUESTION: Where can I find resources to better educate myself about everything that's going on with the BLM movement? I know on a lot of the social media platforms people have posted helpful resources for better educating one's self about everything that relates to whats currently going on in America today. I'd consider myself pretty political informed as a 17 year old male, although I feel like my knowledge is very \"scattered\" and can be better distinguished between fact vs fiction. Because let's be honest, punditocracy in America ultimately misconstrues what really goes on behind closed doors, so just \"reading the news\" every day might serve as both a blessing and a curse. I'm not intending to discredit news platforms or anything, I'm just saying that there is more to just reading the New York Times or CNN or wherever the hell you get your information from. Please don't hesitate offer resources or ideas because I will read them regardless. Any resources include: Podcasts, books, blogs, videos, slideshows, articles, YOU NAME IT","c_root_id_A":"fssvv1f","c_root_id_B":"fst2duj","created_at_utc_A":1591226552,"created_at_utc_B":1591230000,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Check out Algorithms of Oppression. And I've also started a community centered around evidence based claims to parse out the many threads all going at the same time. The focus right now is the protests and riots and you can find it here: https:\/\/god-of-honeybees-podcast.mn.co\/share\/qSZ76JhTT7BYZOQl?utm_source=manual","human_ref_B":"For historical context, Stanford has the Martin Luther King, Jr. institute. They've published a lot of Dr. King's original work and created a curriculum to teach students about the struggle for freedom and equality.  A few places to get started:  * Letter from a Birmingham Jail \\[accompanying lesson material\\] * Where do we go from here?, a speech given about six months before he was assassinated","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3448.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"gw281e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"IMPORTANT QUESTION: Where can I find resources to better educate myself about everything that's going on with the BLM movement? I know on a lot of the social media platforms people have posted helpful resources for better educating one's self about everything that relates to whats currently going on in America today. I'd consider myself pretty political informed as a 17 year old male, although I feel like my knowledge is very \"scattered\" and can be better distinguished between fact vs fiction. Because let's be honest, punditocracy in America ultimately misconstrues what really goes on behind closed doors, so just \"reading the news\" every day might serve as both a blessing and a curse. I'm not intending to discredit news platforms or anything, I'm just saying that there is more to just reading the New York Times or CNN or wherever the hell you get your information from. Please don't hesitate offer resources or ideas because I will read them regardless. Any resources include: Podcasts, books, blogs, videos, slideshows, articles, YOU NAME IT","c_root_id_A":"fstbvbl","c_root_id_B":"fssvv1f","created_at_utc_A":1591235274,"created_at_utc_B":1591226552,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If you'd like a resource for multiple studies and statistics regarding police violence and data-backed policy proposals that we could implement, check out Campaign Zero. They don't have a direct link to their research page, but it has over 100 studies, articles, and reports.  If you'd like more information about the organization (because it's equally important to know who is providing you with information), check out this Vox article from 2015.","human_ref_B":"Check out Algorithms of Oppression. And I've also started a community centered around evidence based claims to parse out the many threads all going at the same time. The focus right now is the protests and riots and you can find it here: https:\/\/god-of-honeybees-podcast.mn.co\/share\/qSZ76JhTT7BYZOQl?utm_source=manual","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8722.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"gw281e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"IMPORTANT QUESTION: Where can I find resources to better educate myself about everything that's going on with the BLM movement? I know on a lot of the social media platforms people have posted helpful resources for better educating one's self about everything that relates to whats currently going on in America today. I'd consider myself pretty political informed as a 17 year old male, although I feel like my knowledge is very \"scattered\" and can be better distinguished between fact vs fiction. Because let's be honest, punditocracy in America ultimately misconstrues what really goes on behind closed doors, so just \"reading the news\" every day might serve as both a blessing and a curse. I'm not intending to discredit news platforms or anything, I'm just saying that there is more to just reading the New York Times or CNN or wherever the hell you get your information from. Please don't hesitate offer resources or ideas because I will read them regardless. Any resources include: Podcasts, books, blogs, videos, slideshows, articles, YOU NAME IT","c_root_id_A":"fstsskb","c_root_id_B":"fssvv1f","created_at_utc_A":1591245515,"created_at_utc_B":1591226552,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"For a discussion of policing in America The End of Policing by Alex Vitale, a sociologist at Brooklyn College, is free as an ebook right now. Really interesting read that gets into the history of professionalized policing and it's role in modern society.","human_ref_B":"Check out Algorithms of Oppression. And I've also started a community centered around evidence based claims to parse out the many threads all going at the same time. The focus right now is the protests and riots and you can find it here: https:\/\/god-of-honeybees-podcast.mn.co\/share\/qSZ76JhTT7BYZOQl?utm_source=manual","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18963.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgax7z0","c_root_id_B":"cgb3j73","created_at_utc_A":1395697962,"created_at_utc_B":1395710761,"score_A":7,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Freakonomics, Planet Money, and Econtalk have done wonders to educate the general public about social sciences (mostly economics obviously).","human_ref_B":"John Greene has been doing some pretty great things.  His opening speech nail's it: >\u201cYeah, about the test...  >The test will measure whether you are an informed, engaged, and productive citizen of the world, and it will take place in schools and bars and hospitals and dorm rooms and in places of worship. You will be tested on first dates, in job interviews, while watching football, and while scrolling through your Twitter feed. The test will judge your ability to think about things other than celebrity marriages, whether you\u2019ll be easily persuaded by empty political rhetoric, and whether you\u2019ll be able to place your life and your community in a broader context. The test will last your entire life, and it will be comprised of the millions of decisions that, when taken together, will make your life yours. And everything, everything, will be on it.\"  I'm also a big fan of Dan Carlin. The guy has  knack for bringing history and politics alive. Its all audio, but the way that this guy narrates is like a performance.    Both have done AMA's: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/history\/comments\/1fard6\/dan_carlin_here_from_the_hardcore_history_podcast\/ http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/IAmA\/comments\/10b8o9\/iama_1_new_york_times_bestselling_author_named","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12799.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgb3j73","c_root_id_B":"cgatjvv","created_at_utc_A":1395710761,"created_at_utc_B":1395690744,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"John Greene has been doing some pretty great things.  His opening speech nail's it: >\u201cYeah, about the test...  >The test will measure whether you are an informed, engaged, and productive citizen of the world, and it will take place in schools and bars and hospitals and dorm rooms and in places of worship. You will be tested on first dates, in job interviews, while watching football, and while scrolling through your Twitter feed. The test will judge your ability to think about things other than celebrity marriages, whether you\u2019ll be easily persuaded by empty political rhetoric, and whether you\u2019ll be able to place your life and your community in a broader context. The test will last your entire life, and it will be comprised of the millions of decisions that, when taken together, will make your life yours. And everything, everything, will be on it.\"  I'm also a big fan of Dan Carlin. The guy has  knack for bringing history and politics alive. Its all audio, but the way that this guy narrates is like a performance.    Both have done AMA's: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/history\/comments\/1fard6\/dan_carlin_here_from_the_hardcore_history_podcast\/ http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/IAmA\/comments\/10b8o9\/iama_1_new_york_times_bestselling_author_named","human_ref_B":"Brain Games if you're interested in Psychology, although it's focused a bit more on the cognitive than social side of the science.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20017.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgb3j73","c_root_id_B":"cgayhtd","created_at_utc_A":1395710761,"created_at_utc_B":1395700596,"score_A":10,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"John Greene has been doing some pretty great things.  His opening speech nail's it: >\u201cYeah, about the test...  >The test will measure whether you are an informed, engaged, and productive citizen of the world, and it will take place in schools and bars and hospitals and dorm rooms and in places of worship. You will be tested on first dates, in job interviews, while watching football, and while scrolling through your Twitter feed. The test will judge your ability to think about things other than celebrity marriages, whether you\u2019ll be easily persuaded by empty political rhetoric, and whether you\u2019ll be able to place your life and your community in a broader context. The test will last your entire life, and it will be comprised of the millions of decisions that, when taken together, will make your life yours. And everything, everything, will be on it.\"  I'm also a big fan of Dan Carlin. The guy has  knack for bringing history and politics alive. Its all audio, but the way that this guy narrates is like a performance.    Both have done AMA's: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/history\/comments\/1fard6\/dan_carlin_here_from_the_hardcore_history_podcast\/ http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/IAmA\/comments\/10b8o9\/iama_1_new_york_times_bestselling_author_named","human_ref_B":"Santa Fe Institutes Ulam Lecture Series is the best one I know about. It's interdisciplinary lectures for lay audiences by some of the most brilliant minds of our times such as Samuel Bowles, Robert May, Doyne Farmer, Brian Arthur, Geoffrey West, Murray Gell-Mann, Mark Newman.   Here's a list of past presenters and themes. Most are available on youtube  There's also a comparable series from Nanyang Technology University with many of the same people.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10165.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgb30ma","c_root_id_B":"cgb3j73","created_at_utc_A":1395709717,"created_at_utc_B":1395710761,"score_A":6,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"The Day The Universe Changed series by James Burke (1980's) was a fantastic show that picked one topic (medicine, communications, credit) per 1-hour episode and explored it's roots and spread over civilization.  Start with #1, if you like...  http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=3ZMlEaIg91g","human_ref_B":"John Greene has been doing some pretty great things.  His opening speech nail's it: >\u201cYeah, about the test...  >The test will measure whether you are an informed, engaged, and productive citizen of the world, and it will take place in schools and bars and hospitals and dorm rooms and in places of worship. You will be tested on first dates, in job interviews, while watching football, and while scrolling through your Twitter feed. The test will judge your ability to think about things other than celebrity marriages, whether you\u2019ll be easily persuaded by empty political rhetoric, and whether you\u2019ll be able to place your life and your community in a broader context. The test will last your entire life, and it will be comprised of the millions of decisions that, when taken together, will make your life yours. And everything, everything, will be on it.\"  I'm also a big fan of Dan Carlin. The guy has  knack for bringing history and politics alive. Its all audio, but the way that this guy narrates is like a performance.    Both have done AMA's: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/history\/comments\/1fard6\/dan_carlin_here_from_the_hardcore_history_podcast\/ http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/IAmA\/comments\/10b8o9\/iama_1_new_york_times_bestselling_author_named","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1044.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgb3j73","c_root_id_B":"cgb00ii","created_at_utc_A":1395710761,"created_at_utc_B":1395703708,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"John Greene has been doing some pretty great things.  His opening speech nail's it: >\u201cYeah, about the test...  >The test will measure whether you are an informed, engaged, and productive citizen of the world, and it will take place in schools and bars and hospitals and dorm rooms and in places of worship. You will be tested on first dates, in job interviews, while watching football, and while scrolling through your Twitter feed. The test will judge your ability to think about things other than celebrity marriages, whether you\u2019ll be easily persuaded by empty political rhetoric, and whether you\u2019ll be able to place your life and your community in a broader context. The test will last your entire life, and it will be comprised of the millions of decisions that, when taken together, will make your life yours. And everything, everything, will be on it.\"  I'm also a big fan of Dan Carlin. The guy has  knack for bringing history and politics alive. Its all audio, but the way that this guy narrates is like a performance.    Both have done AMA's: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/history\/comments\/1fard6\/dan_carlin_here_from_the_hardcore_history_podcast\/ http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/IAmA\/comments\/10b8o9\/iama_1_new_york_times_bestselling_author_named","human_ref_B":"What might be more helpful out of a general social science series would be connecting the many disciplines together in some way. Economics might be a hub from which the host could explain how certain other factors (disciplines) render certain behaviors. Consumer behavior in economics has psychological, sociological, anthropological, etc. considerations, so showing those connections could be a start.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7053.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgax7z0","c_root_id_B":"cgatjvv","created_at_utc_A":1395697962,"created_at_utc_B":1395690744,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Freakonomics, Planet Money, and Econtalk have done wonders to educate the general public about social sciences (mostly economics obviously).","human_ref_B":"Brain Games if you're interested in Psychology, although it's focused a bit more on the cognitive than social side of the science.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7218.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgayhtd","c_root_id_B":"cgatjvv","created_at_utc_A":1395700596,"created_at_utc_B":1395690744,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Santa Fe Institutes Ulam Lecture Series is the best one I know about. It's interdisciplinary lectures for lay audiences by some of the most brilliant minds of our times such as Samuel Bowles, Robert May, Doyne Farmer, Brian Arthur, Geoffrey West, Murray Gell-Mann, Mark Newman.   Here's a list of past presenters and themes. Most are available on youtube  There's also a comparable series from Nanyang Technology University with many of the same people.","human_ref_B":"Brain Games if you're interested in Psychology, although it's focused a bit more on the cognitive than social side of the science.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9852.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgatjvv","c_root_id_B":"cgb30ma","created_at_utc_A":1395690744,"created_at_utc_B":1395709717,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Brain Games if you're interested in Psychology, although it's focused a bit more on the cognitive than social side of the science.","human_ref_B":"The Day The Universe Changed series by James Burke (1980's) was a fantastic show that picked one topic (medicine, communications, credit) per 1-hour episode and explored it's roots and spread over civilization.  Start with #1, if you like...  http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=3ZMlEaIg91g","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18973.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgb30ma","c_root_id_B":"cgb00ii","created_at_utc_A":1395709717,"created_at_utc_B":1395703708,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The Day The Universe Changed series by James Burke (1980's) was a fantastic show that picked one topic (medicine, communications, credit) per 1-hour episode and explored it's roots and spread over civilization.  Start with #1, if you like...  http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=3ZMlEaIg91g","human_ref_B":"What might be more helpful out of a general social science series would be connecting the many disciplines together in some way. Economics might be a hub from which the host could explain how certain other factors (disciplines) render certain behaviors. Consumer behavior in economics has psychological, sociological, anthropological, etc. considerations, so showing those connections could be a start.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6009.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgb74im","c_root_id_B":"cgb3r56","created_at_utc_A":1395718179,"created_at_utc_B":1395711187,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science should simply be an extension of the \"Cosmos.\" It would explain the social and cultural evolution of humanity over the last 1 second of the cosmic calender.","human_ref_B":"Though somewhat biased towards liberalization, Free To Choose was a similar format to cosmos.  As was Commanding Heights, though not as general.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6992.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgb74im","c_root_id_B":"cgb00ii","created_at_utc_A":1395718179,"created_at_utc_B":1395703708,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science should simply be an extension of the \"Cosmos.\" It would explain the social and cultural evolution of humanity over the last 1 second of the cosmic calender.","human_ref_B":"What might be more helpful out of a general social science series would be connecting the many disciplines together in some way. Economics might be a hub from which the host could explain how certain other factors (disciplines) render certain behaviors. Consumer behavior in economics has psychological, sociological, anthropological, etc. considerations, so showing those connections could be a start.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14471.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgb4vhi","c_root_id_B":"cgb74im","created_at_utc_A":1395713370,"created_at_utc_B":1395718179,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I think this is an excellent idea!  A few people have mentioned the more popular podcasts, but I think they tend to focus on curiosities, showing people that there is so much more than meets the eye. I think a Cosmos for social science would be large enough to put things in perspective. For example, even the typical undergraduate economics curriculum focuses on dynamics and interactions as currently understood, with very little attention given to the history of economic thought. And yet, I think that much of society's development over the past 600 years has revolved around advances in economic thought, as well as periods of massive, massive mistakes.  It almost seems like it would be too negative to air a series that would by necessity have to give so much time to talking about the massive effects of the malpractice of economics and sociology, and yet Cosmos manages to talk about the foes of scientific inquiry as a central theme.","human_ref_B":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science should simply be an extension of the \"Cosmos.\" It would explain the social and cultural evolution of humanity over the last 1 second of the cosmic calender.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4809.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"21922i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"A \"Cosmos\" for social science? The currently-airing Fox series \"Cosmos\" aims to inform the public about some of the ways science has helped humans understand the universe. And, perhaps, how people can see themselves as connected to that effort.  From what you observe of the public, do you get the impression that people already see social science as a part of that same struggle (and some resulting triumph) to understand our universe? I guess this part of my question is about your impression of the public's relationship to social science.   Are there aspects of social science that the public might see some benefit from if only they had a chance to see them collected together in a series of presentations that help define the edges of social science and how it relates to them?  What might be in such a series?  Does something like this already exist? Is it just unnecessary?","c_root_id_A":"cgb00ii","c_root_id_B":"cgb3r56","created_at_utc_A":1395703708,"created_at_utc_B":1395711187,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"What might be more helpful out of a general social science series would be connecting the many disciplines together in some way. Economics might be a hub from which the host could explain how certain other factors (disciplines) render certain behaviors. Consumer behavior in economics has psychological, sociological, anthropological, etc. considerations, so showing those connections could be a start.","human_ref_B":"Though somewhat biased towards liberalization, Free To Choose was a similar format to cosmos.  As was Commanding Heights, though not as general.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7479.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1g1n6x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"How come so many actors\/actresses are Scientologists? It just seems like there are a lot of them for one profession.  List of famous Scientologists.","c_root_id_A":"cafxg76","c_root_id_B":"cafwsno","created_at_utc_A":1370879672,"created_at_utc_B":1370877827,"score_A":132,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"It's because scientology got good at recruiting them.  There is aren't Christian or Jewish \"celebrity centers\".  The first and biggest Scientologist Celebrity Centre is in Hollywood, though there are now several others.  There's even a Scientology magazine called just *Celebrity*.  Lawrence Wright's *Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief* is probably the best, most up-to-date book on the subject (there are now several good books on Scientology though)--it rose out of his pretty famous article on the screenwriter and director Paul Haggis (*Milliion Dollar Baby*, *Crash*) called \"Paul Haggis vs. the Church of Scientology\". To quote the relevant parts of the original article:  >In 1955, a year after the church\u2019s founding, an affiliated publication urged Scientologists to cultivate celebrities: \u201cIt is obvious what would happen to Scientology if prime communicators benefitting from it would mention it.\u201d At the end of the sixties, the church established its first Celebrity Centre, in Hollywood. (There are now satellites in Paris, Vienna, D\u00fcsseldorf, Munich, Florence, London, New York, Las Vegas, and Nashville.) Over the next decade, Scientology became a potent force in Hollywood. In many respects, Haggis was typical of the recruits from that era, at least among those in the entertainment business. Many of them were young and had quit school in order to follow their dreams, but they were also smart and ambitious. The actress Kirstie Alley, for example, left the University of Kansas in 1970, during her sophomore year, to get married. Scientology, she says, helped her lose her craving for cocaine. \u201cWithout Scientology, I would be dead,\u201d she has said.  >In 1975, the year that Haggis became a Scientologist, John Travolta, a high-school dropout, was making his first movie, \u201cThe Devil\u2019s Rain,\u201d in Durango, Mexico, when an actress on the set gave him a copy of \u201cDianetics.\u201d \u201cMy career immediately took off,\u201d he told a church publication. \u201cScientology put me into the big time.\u201d The testimonials of such celebrities have attracted many curious seekers. In Variety, Scientology has advertised courses promising to help aspiring actors \u201cmake it in the industry.\u201d ...]  >Many Hollywood actors were drawn into the church by a friend or by reading \u201cDianetics\u201d; a surprising number of them, though, came through the Beverly Hills Playhouse. For decades, the resident acting coach there was Milton Katselas, and he taught hundreds of future stars, including Ted Danson, Michelle Pfeiffer, and George Clooney. \u201cMost of Hollywood went through that class,\u201d Anne Archer told me. In 1974, two years after her son Tommy Davis was born, she began studying with Katselas. She was a young mother in a dissolving marriage, coming off a television series (\u201cBob & Carol & Ted & Alice\u201d) that had been cancelled after one season. Katselas had a transformative effect. She recalled discussions \u201cabout life, people, and behavior,\u201d and said that Katselas \u201csaid some things in class that were really smart.\u201d Some of the other students told her that Katselas was a Scientologist, so she began the Life Repair program at the Celebrity Centre. \u201cI went two or three times a week, probably for a couple of weeks,\u201d she said. \u201cI remember walking out of the building and walking down the street toward my car and I felt like my feet were not touching the ground. And I said to myself, \u2018My God, this is the happiest I\u2019ve ever been in my entire life. I\u2019ve finally found something that works.\u2019 \u201d She added, \u201cLife didn\u2019t seem so hard anymore. I was back in the driver\u2019s seat.\u201d  >Jim Gordon, a veteran police officer in Los Angeles, and also an aspiring actor, spent ten years at the Playhouse, starting in 1990. He told me that Scientology \u201crecruited a ton of kids out of that school.\u201d Like Scientology, the Playhouse presented a strict hierarchy of study; under Katselas\u2019s tutelage, students graduated from one level to the next. As Gordon advanced within the Playhouse, he began recognizing many students from the roles they were getting in Hollywood. \u201cYou see a lot of people you know from TV,\u201d Gordon says. He began feeling the pull of the church. \u201cWhen you started off, they weren\u2019t really pushing it, but as you progressed through the Playhouse\u2019s levels Scientology became more of a focus,\u201d he told me. After a few years, he joined. Like the courses at the Playhouse, Scientology offered actors a method that they could apply to both their lives and their careers.  >Not long after Gordon became a Scientologist, he was asked to serve as an \u201cethics officer\u201d at the Playhouse, monitoring the progress of other students and counselling those who were having trouble. He was good at pinpointing students who were struggling. \u201cIt\u2019s almost like picking out the wounded chicks,\u201d he says. He sometimes urged a student to meet with the senior ethics officer at the Playhouse, a Scientologist who often recommended courses at the Celebrity Centre. \u201cMy job was to keep the students active and make sure they were not being suppressed,\u201d Gordon says. In the rhetoric of Scientology, \u201csuppressive persons\u201d\u2014or S.P.s\u2014block an individual\u2019s spiritual progress. Implicitly, the message to the students was that success awaited them if only they could sweep away the impediments to stardom, including S.P.s. Katselas received a ten-per-cent commission from the church on the money contributed by his students.  >Katselas died in 2008, and Scientology no longer has a connection with the Beverly Hills Playhouse. Anne Archer told me that the reputation of Katselas\u2019s class as, in Gordon\u2019s words, a \u201cScientology clearinghouse\u201d is overblown. \u201cHis classes averaged about fifty or sixty people, and there would be maybe seven to ten people in it who would be Scientologists,\u201d she says. But the list of Scientologists who have studied at the Playhouse is long\u2014it includes Jenna Elfman, Giovanni Ribisi, and Jason Lee\u2014and the many prot\u00e9g\u00e9s Katselas left behind helped cement the relationship between Hollywood and the church.  The whole article is worth reading if you're interested in Scientology, as is the book (though I haven't finished the book). The short answer is because they very effectively recruiting from Hollywood, especially in the 70's when people were more likely to be \"searching\", got to people before they got famous, and provided a loving, supportive community for them while they were \"starving artists\". As Paul Haggis writes about living in a run-down hotel full of Scientologists in the early 70's, \"I had a little apartment with a kitchen I could write in,\" he recalls. \"There was a feeling of camaraderie that was something I\u2019d never experienced\u2014all these atheists looking for something to believe in, and all these loners looking for a club to join.\"  Once they begin to get famous, the perks change.    >Haggis\u2019s experience in Scientology, though, was hardly egalitarian: he accepted the privileges of the Celebrity Centre, which offers notables a private entrance, a V.I.P. lounge, separate facilities for auditing, and other perks. Indeed, much of the appeal of Scientology is the overt \u00e9litism that it promotes among its members, especially celebrities. Haggis was struck by another paradox: \u201cHere I was in this very structured organization, but I always thought of myself as a freethinker and an iconoclast.\u201d   Why they stay is a different matter.  Some people, like Tom Cruise, are obviously true believers.  Some people treat it like any other religion they half belong to.  There are lots of specific benefits for celebrity Scientologists, though.  There's a famous expose of Scientologists redoing Tom Cruise's entire car (like rip out all the dashes, replacing them with polished wood type stuff) while being paid essentially slave wages.  More perniciously, there are rumors that Scientology uses secrets to keep its celebrities in line.  The Scientological process of auditing basically involves telling someone all of your secrets.  Many celebrities have things they don't want to get out (one scientology enthusiast I talked to years ago said that it was widely believed John Travolta had homosexual experiences in the 70's he doesn't want to get out, for example).  Even without the explicit leaking of secrets, becoming a \"suppressed person\" is no joke (you may lose all your friends and if your partner is in the church, them and your children even) so, once someone is in, it would take a lot of energy to overcome the inertia of just staying in.  Read the whole Wright article on Paul Haggis though.  It's good.  If you want to know more about Scientology, generally the *Village Voice* had the best coverage for most of the past decade because one of its writers\/editors became very interested in the subject.  Breeze through their [archives, but sadly the person who wrote most of those articles, Tony Ortega, has since moved on.  Luckily, he now has a blog entirely devoted to the subject.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/www.salon.com\/2013\/02\/07\/how_scientology_ensnares_celebrities\/  A pretty good article I read earlier this year!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1845.0,"score_ratio":6.9473684211}
{"post_id":"1aoyry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Where does the 'eye-roll' gesture come from?","c_root_id_A":"c8zi8ab","c_root_id_B":"c8zl30i","created_at_utc_A":1363830388,"created_at_utc_B":1363838602,"score_A":12,"score_B":32,"human_ref_A":"A cursory google search doesn't produce anything, but it may be the social equivalent of regular body language.  Bodily actions outside our normal control that we share reflexively as a culture:  like legs shaking during nervousness\/fear.    The first time I rolled my eyes I was young and talking to my sister.  I hadn't consciously witnessed the phenomenon before, nor understood why my sister slapped me and told me 'Don't Roll Your Eyes at me!'.   Perhaps a case study of first time rolling eyes would shed light on the origin?  (in other words, redditors, share your stories?)","human_ref_B":"Desmond Morris put out a book a long time ago called \"Peoplewatching\". It meticulously goes through every gesture and body language communication cross culturally. I can't answer your question offhand, as I gave away my copy of the book, but I think you'll find what you're looking for there.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8214.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1aoyry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Where does the 'eye-roll' gesture come from?","c_root_id_A":"c8zl30i","c_root_id_B":"c8zjumx","created_at_utc_A":1363838602,"created_at_utc_B":1363834932,"score_A":32,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Desmond Morris put out a book a long time ago called \"Peoplewatching\". It meticulously goes through every gesture and body language communication cross culturally. I can't answer your question offhand, as I gave away my copy of the book, but I think you'll find what you're looking for there.","human_ref_B":"Is there even any literature to indicate when eye-rolling started, or is it a relatively recent action?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3670.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"1aoyry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Where does the 'eye-roll' gesture come from?","c_root_id_A":"c8zi8ab","c_root_id_B":"c8zscu3","created_at_utc_A":1363830388,"created_at_utc_B":1363878652,"score_A":12,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"A cursory google search doesn't produce anything, but it may be the social equivalent of regular body language.  Bodily actions outside our normal control that we share reflexively as a culture:  like legs shaking during nervousness\/fear.    The first time I rolled my eyes I was young and talking to my sister.  I hadn't consciously witnessed the phenomenon before, nor understood why my sister slapped me and told me 'Don't Roll Your Eyes at me!'.   Perhaps a case study of first time rolling eyes would shed light on the origin?  (in other words, redditors, share your stories?)","human_ref_B":"Top level comments need to either be from flaired experts or have some sources cited. Speculative or joke responses have been removed.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":48264.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1aoyry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Where does the 'eye-roll' gesture come from?","c_root_id_A":"c8zjumx","c_root_id_B":"c8zscu3","created_at_utc_A":1363834932,"created_at_utc_B":1363878652,"score_A":4,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Is there even any literature to indicate when eye-rolling started, or is it a relatively recent action?","human_ref_B":"Top level comments need to either be from flaired experts or have some sources cited. Speculative or joke responses have been removed.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":43720.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1aoyry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Where does the 'eye-roll' gesture come from?","c_root_id_A":"c8zjumx","c_root_id_B":"c8zwfv0","created_at_utc_A":1363834932,"created_at_utc_B":1363890121,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Is there even any literature to indicate when eye-rolling started, or is it a relatively recent action?","human_ref_B":"Human ethologist Irenaus Eibl-Eibesfeldt suggested that we have a natural tendency to look away from things that we don't like or that disgust us, and eye-rolling is a manifestation of that same reaction.    EDIT: Here's a recent Slate article about the very topic that quotes Eibl-Eibesfeldt: http:\/\/www.slate.com\/articles\/life\/explainer\/2013\/01\/eye_rolling_why_do_people_roll_their_eyes_when_they_re_annoyed.html","labels":0,"seconds_difference":55189.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"2vpyqs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"On Reddit, when it is brought up that Russian state media is prpoaganda, others respond with \"DAE WESTERN MEDIA IS PROPAGANDA TOO???\" How well do Western media and Russian state media fit into the propaganda model (E.S. Herman\/N. Chomsky), and how does their objectivity compare?","c_root_id_A":"cok0axx","c_root_id_B":"cokf2ay","created_at_utc_A":1423802501,"created_at_utc_B":1423846500,"score_A":9,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":">2014\t#46 \/  180\t 2013\t#32 \/  178\t 2012\t#32 \/  178\t 2011\t-\t 2010\t#20 \/  173\t 2009\t#20 \/  170\t 2008\t#36 \/  168\t 2007\t#48 \/  164\t 2006\t#53 \/  161  Did something significant happen after 2010 that made the US drop so much?","human_ref_B":"Your title would do well without the over-the-top caricature of how 'others respond'. You could have gone with \"others respond claiming western media propaganda is also problematic\". The way you put it (unnecessarily capitalizing, using hackneyed reddit phrases like DAE, and overdoing the question marks) shows us that you disagree and think the view is childish. It's not in the spirit of this sub to lead this discussion in such a way, IMO.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":43999.0,"score_ratio":1.2222222222}
{"post_id":"26ry32","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are any of Karl Marx's insights accepted by modern mainstream economists?","c_root_id_A":"chtys2y","c_root_id_B":"chtzay1","created_at_utc_A":1401371104,"created_at_utc_B":1401372526,"score_A":2,"score_B":65,"human_ref_A":"I suggest Economics as Ideology to get a better picture of where the field of economics is today. Laski, the more Marxist of the three prominent economists that would define the discipline as we know it today, \"lost\" the battle against Hayek and Keynes. Although his legacy is still around it's been diluted theoretically.","human_ref_B":"Here's a quote from Ha Joon Chang, a Cambridge economist (and author of some of the most accessible texts on the subject.)  >At the other end of the political spectrum is Karl Marx. With the collapse of communism, people have come to dismiss Marx as an irrelevance, but this is wrong. I don\u2019t have much time for Marx\u2019s utopian vision of socialism nor his labour theory of value, but his understanding of capitalism was superior in many ways to those of the self-appointed advocates of capitalism. For example, when free-market economists were mostly against limited liability companies, Marx saw it as an institution that will take capitalism on to another plane (to take it eventually to socialism, in his mistaken view). In my view, 150 years after he wrote it, his analysis of the evolution of labour regulation in Britain in Capital vol. 1 still remains one of the best on the subject. Marx also understood the centrality of the interaction between technologies (or what he called the forces of production) and institutions (or what he called the relations of production), which other economic schools have only recently started to grapple with.  http:\/\/hajoonchang.net\/economists-who-have-influenced-me\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1422.0,"score_ratio":32.5}
{"post_id":"26ry32","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are any of Karl Marx's insights accepted by modern mainstream economists?","c_root_id_A":"chu04wl","c_root_id_B":"chtys2y","created_at_utc_A":1401374581,"created_at_utc_B":1401371104,"score_A":63,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"No, because modern economists entire existence is basically a bourgeois plot to refute Marx.  That may be hyperbole, but only just so.  If you read *The Worldly Philosophers* (and I support you in doing so), it's basically his thesis.  He argues that Marx took a hatchet and a scalpel to the current lot of \"economists,\" and left them bleeding on the floor.  The capitalists basically said \"well, this won't do\" and created \"modern\" economics as a result.  I teach the history of capitalism, it's my field, and I tend to think that economics has about as much to do with the economy as political science has to do with the political (that is, not much.  Electoral politics are generally the least political thing in a society where the foundation of society, the economy, is in private, dictatorial hands.  Examining window dressing is something Americans have given far too much credit).  Most people who talk about Marx know *nothing* about Marx.  I've had talks with other professors who speak as experts after reading *The Communist Manifesto,* a throwaway text written for a wage.  In the hundreds of thousands of pages Marx wrote, a few paragraphs deal with what society would look like afterwords.  People who talk of Marx as a utopian are dead wrong, he was many things, but not that.  Americans, in particular, tend to be terrible \"Marxish Marxists.\"  There's not a strong tradition of it.  I mean, look at Rethinking Marxism, both the journal and the conference.  One can strongly juxtapose that with Historical Materialism.  Anyways,  Marx pointed out that capitalist social relationships (what we call capitalism) was created in a sea of blood, that business has a need to accumulate and compete, which engenders monopoly and collusion, that wage labour is intrinsically exploitation (note, in Marxism this is not a moral term, but one of explanation), and that capitalism is a teleological system - it has an end.  Unlimited growth is not tenable in closed systems.  As explained by my go-to friend Ellen M. Wood:  >...the distinctive and dominant characteristic of the capitalist market is not opportunity of choice, but on the contrary, compulsion. Material life and social reproduction in capitalism are universally mediated by the market, so that all individuals must in one way or another enter into the market to gain access to the means of life. This unique system of market dependence means that the dictates of the capitalist market \u2013its imperatives of competition, accumulation, profit-maximization, and increasing labour-productivity \u2013 relegate not only all economic transactions but social relations in general. As relations among human beings are mediated by the process of commodity exchange, social relations among people appear as relations among things.  Ellen Wood, *The Origins of Capitalism: A Longer View* (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1999), 7.  And this was created with tremendous violence, and this idea is at the core of Marxist thinking (along with HM, but that's a different post).  Refute it, and one gets modern economics.  One also procures heaps of terrible history, economic thinking, and what good academics call bullshit.    The Labour Theory of Value still holds.  And when people say \"hurr durr modern art is MILLIONS checkmate marxists\" I just walk away.  If someone says \"Russians killed fifty billion checkmate marxists\" I walk away.  Marx called for the abolition of the state and waged labour, not the combination into one dictatorial unit.  Russia was \"state capitalist\" by 1921 (Lenin's words, not mine).  If I have to explain historical materialism to someone, and I'm not making a wage for it, I'll better spend my time in the pub, rather than listen to the ramblings of the village idiot running around their economics department, pretending that they have an affinity with physics or maths.  So, no, not really.  Because mainstream economics are a fucking joke, and that's my professional opinion from across the quad.  I'd like to see an normative economist teach *Das Kapital,* - the masterpiece of the 19th century - and try and explain it away without looking terribly foolish.  They've been trying for over a hundred years now, and are not doing much of a better job than they were in Karl's time - they just happen to be in charge, so we get a skewed vision.","human_ref_B":"I suggest Economics as Ideology to get a better picture of where the field of economics is today. Laski, the more Marxist of the three prominent economists that would define the discipline as we know it today, \"lost\" the battle against Hayek and Keynes. Although his legacy is still around it's been diluted theoretically.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3477.0,"score_ratio":31.5}
{"post_id":"26ry32","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are any of Karl Marx's insights accepted by modern mainstream economists?","c_root_id_A":"chu0oxh","c_root_id_B":"chu6nki","created_at_utc_A":1401375904,"created_at_utc_B":1401388467,"score_A":21,"score_B":35,"human_ref_A":"Piketty's Capital in the 21 Century references Marx a fair amount and is substantially influenced by his analysis. Given Piketty's profile at the moment it's safe to say he is the mainstream if not the centre of current economic debate.   From page 19 of capital in the 21 C        >      Despite these limitations, Marx\u2019s analysis remains relevant in several respects. First,          he began with an important question (concerning the unprecedented concentration of          wealth during the Industrial Revolution) and tried to answer it with the means at          his disposal: economists today would do well to take inspiration from his example.          Even more important, the principle of infinite accumulation that Marx proposed contains          a key insight, as valid for the study of the twenty-first century as it was for the          nineteenth and in some respects more worrisome than Ricardo\u2019s principle of scarcity.          If the rates of population and productivity growth are relatively low, then accumulated          wealth naturally takes on considerable importance, especially if it grows to extreme          proportions and becomes socially destabilizing. In other words, low growth cannot          adequately counterbalance the Marxist principle of infinite accumulation: the resulting          equilibrium is not as apocalyptic as the one predicted by Marx but is nevertheless          quite disturbing. Accumulation ends at a finite level, but that level may be high          enough to be destabilizing. In particular, the very high level of private wealth that          has been attained since the 1980s and 1990s in the wealthy countries of Europe and          in Japan, measured in years of national income, directly reflects the Marxian logic.  As well Herbert Gintis and Samuel Bowles were profoundly influenced by Marx. While Gintis, and perhaps Bowles, have moved on from Marxist analysis there is no question that Marx was highly influential in forming the central questions of Behavioural and institutional economics or at least the kernel of their critique of the Walrasian paradigm. That said the Marxian methods were less useful and were superseded by more modern analytic frameworks.","human_ref_B":"Brad Delong, not a Marxist sympathizer, wrote the following:  >Marx the economist--well, Marx the economist had six big things to say, some of which are very valuable even today across more than a century and a half, and some of which are not. I would call them the three goods and the three bads:  >Marx the economist was among the very first to recognize that the fever-fits of financial crisis and depression that afflict modern market economies were not a passing phase or something that could be easily cured, but rather a deep disability of the system--as we are being reminded once again right now, this time with Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner, and Larry Summers in the Hot Seats. Marx pointed the spotlight in the right direction here. However, I don't think that his theory of business cycles and financial crises holds up. Marx thought that business cycles and financial crises were evidence of the long-term unsustainability of the system. We modern neoliberal economists view it not as a fatal lymphoma but rather like malaria: Keynesianism--or monetarism, if you prefer--gives us the tools to transform the business cycle from a life- threatening economic yellow fever of the society into the occasional night sweats and fevers: that with economic policy quinine we can manage if not banish the disease.  >Marx the economist was among the very first to get the industrial revolution right: to understand what it meant for human possibilities and the human destiny in a sense that people like Adam Smith did not. In his Politics Aristotle observed that it was not possible to run a household in a way that permitted its head enough leisure and freedom to, say, become a lover of wisdom unless the household owned slaves, and that this would be true unless and until we had instruments like \"the statues of Daedalus, or the tripods of Hephaestus, which, says the poet, 'of their own accord entered the assembly of the Gods;' if, in like manner, the shuttle would weave and the plectrum touch the lyre without a hand to guide them, chief workmen would not want servants, nor masters slaves...\" Karl Marx was among the very first to see that the industrial revolution was giving us the statues of Daedalus, the tripods of Hephaestus, looms that weave and lyres that play by themselves--and thus opens the possibility of a society in which we people can be lovers of wisdom without being supported by the labor of a mass of illiterate, brutalized, half-starved, and overworkedslaves.  >Marx the economist got a lot about the economic history of the development of modern capitalism in England right--not everything, but he is still very much worth grappling with as an economic historian of 1500-1850. Most important, I think, are his observations that the benefits of industrialization do take a long time--generations--to kick in, while the costs of redistributions and power grabs in the interest of market efficiency and the politically- powerful rising mercantile classes kick in immediately. You have to take seriously the idea that the industrial revolution did not make most or even many people better off right away. Reflect also that, as Tyler Cowen observes, capitalist systems can produce less autonomy than small scale production. Standards of living do rise from industrialization--which can undercut the cultures and networks of suppliers that make the choice of a petit bourgeois lifestyle sustainable.  >Now on to the three bads:  >Marx believed that capital is not a complement to but a substitute for labor. Thus technological progress and capital accumulation that raise average labor productivity also lower the working-class wage. Hence the market system simply could not deliver a good or half-good society but only a combination of obscene luxury and mass poverty. This is an empirical question. Marx's belief seems to me to be simply wrong.  >Marx the economist did not like the society of the cash nexus. He believed that a system that reduced people to some form of prostitution--working for wages and wages alone--was bad. He saw a society growing in which worked for money, and their real life began only when the five o\u2019clock whistle blows--and saw such an economy as an insult, delivering low utility, and also sociologically and psychologically unsustainable in the long run. Instead, he thought, people should view their jobs as expressions of their species-being: ways to gain honor or professions that they were born or designed to do or as ways to serve their fellow- human. Here, I think, Marx mistook the effects of capitalism for the effects of poverty. The demand for a world in which people do things for each other purely out of beneficence rather than out of interest and incentives leads you down a very dangerous road, for societies that try to abolish the cash nexus in favor of public- spirited benevolence do not wind up in their happy place. We neoliberal economists shrug our shoulders and say that we are in favor of a market economy but not of a market society, and that there is no reason why people cannot find jobs they like or insist on differentials that compensate them for jobs they don\u2019t.  >Marx believed that the capitalist market economy was incapable of delivering an acceptable distribution of income for anything but the briefest of historical intervals. As best as I can see, he was pushed to that position by watching the French Second Republic of 1848-1851, where the ruling class comes to prefer a charismatic mountebank for a dictator--\"Napoleon III\"--over a democracy because dictatorship promises to safeguard their property in a way that democracy will not. Hence Marx saw political democracy as only surviving for as long as the rulers could pull the wool over the workers' eyes, and then collapsing. I think that Western Europe over the past fifty years serves as a significant counterexample. It may be difficult to maintain a democratic capitalist market system with an acceptable distribution of income. But \"incapable\" is surely too strong. Beveridgism or Myrdalism--social democracy, progressive income taxes, a very large and well-established safety net, public education to a high standard, channels for upward mobility, and all the panoply of the twentieth-century social- democratic mixed-economy democratic state can banish all Marx\u2019s fears that capitalist prosperity must be accompanied by great inequality and great misery.   http:\/\/delong.typepad.com\/sdj\/2013\/05\/understanding-karl-marx-hoisted-from-the-archives-from-four-years-ago-may-day-weblogging.html  I think what deLong says Marx got right, most people would agree with today. However, I think there remains debate with what DeLong believes Marx got wrong--particularly in light of Piketty's recent book.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12563.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"26ry32","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are any of Karl Marx's insights accepted by modern mainstream economists?","c_root_id_A":"chtys2y","c_root_id_B":"chu6nki","created_at_utc_A":1401371104,"created_at_utc_B":1401388467,"score_A":2,"score_B":35,"human_ref_A":"I suggest Economics as Ideology to get a better picture of where the field of economics is today. Laski, the more Marxist of the three prominent economists that would define the discipline as we know it today, \"lost\" the battle against Hayek and Keynes. Although his legacy is still around it's been diluted theoretically.","human_ref_B":"Brad Delong, not a Marxist sympathizer, wrote the following:  >Marx the economist--well, Marx the economist had six big things to say, some of which are very valuable even today across more than a century and a half, and some of which are not. I would call them the three goods and the three bads:  >Marx the economist was among the very first to recognize that the fever-fits of financial crisis and depression that afflict modern market economies were not a passing phase or something that could be easily cured, but rather a deep disability of the system--as we are being reminded once again right now, this time with Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner, and Larry Summers in the Hot Seats. Marx pointed the spotlight in the right direction here. However, I don't think that his theory of business cycles and financial crises holds up. Marx thought that business cycles and financial crises were evidence of the long-term unsustainability of the system. We modern neoliberal economists view it not as a fatal lymphoma but rather like malaria: Keynesianism--or monetarism, if you prefer--gives us the tools to transform the business cycle from a life- threatening economic yellow fever of the society into the occasional night sweats and fevers: that with economic policy quinine we can manage if not banish the disease.  >Marx the economist was among the very first to get the industrial revolution right: to understand what it meant for human possibilities and the human destiny in a sense that people like Adam Smith did not. In his Politics Aristotle observed that it was not possible to run a household in a way that permitted its head enough leisure and freedom to, say, become a lover of wisdom unless the household owned slaves, and that this would be true unless and until we had instruments like \"the statues of Daedalus, or the tripods of Hephaestus, which, says the poet, 'of their own accord entered the assembly of the Gods;' if, in like manner, the shuttle would weave and the plectrum touch the lyre without a hand to guide them, chief workmen would not want servants, nor masters slaves...\" Karl Marx was among the very first to see that the industrial revolution was giving us the statues of Daedalus, the tripods of Hephaestus, looms that weave and lyres that play by themselves--and thus opens the possibility of a society in which we people can be lovers of wisdom without being supported by the labor of a mass of illiterate, brutalized, half-starved, and overworkedslaves.  >Marx the economist got a lot about the economic history of the development of modern capitalism in England right--not everything, but he is still very much worth grappling with as an economic historian of 1500-1850. Most important, I think, are his observations that the benefits of industrialization do take a long time--generations--to kick in, while the costs of redistributions and power grabs in the interest of market efficiency and the politically- powerful rising mercantile classes kick in immediately. You have to take seriously the idea that the industrial revolution did not make most or even many people better off right away. Reflect also that, as Tyler Cowen observes, capitalist systems can produce less autonomy than small scale production. Standards of living do rise from industrialization--which can undercut the cultures and networks of suppliers that make the choice of a petit bourgeois lifestyle sustainable.  >Now on to the three bads:  >Marx believed that capital is not a complement to but a substitute for labor. Thus technological progress and capital accumulation that raise average labor productivity also lower the working-class wage. Hence the market system simply could not deliver a good or half-good society but only a combination of obscene luxury and mass poverty. This is an empirical question. Marx's belief seems to me to be simply wrong.  >Marx the economist did not like the society of the cash nexus. He believed that a system that reduced people to some form of prostitution--working for wages and wages alone--was bad. He saw a society growing in which worked for money, and their real life began only when the five o\u2019clock whistle blows--and saw such an economy as an insult, delivering low utility, and also sociologically and psychologically unsustainable in the long run. Instead, he thought, people should view their jobs as expressions of their species-being: ways to gain honor or professions that they were born or designed to do or as ways to serve their fellow- human. Here, I think, Marx mistook the effects of capitalism for the effects of poverty. The demand for a world in which people do things for each other purely out of beneficence rather than out of interest and incentives leads you down a very dangerous road, for societies that try to abolish the cash nexus in favor of public- spirited benevolence do not wind up in their happy place. We neoliberal economists shrug our shoulders and say that we are in favor of a market economy but not of a market society, and that there is no reason why people cannot find jobs they like or insist on differentials that compensate them for jobs they don\u2019t.  >Marx believed that the capitalist market economy was incapable of delivering an acceptable distribution of income for anything but the briefest of historical intervals. As best as I can see, he was pushed to that position by watching the French Second Republic of 1848-1851, where the ruling class comes to prefer a charismatic mountebank for a dictator--\"Napoleon III\"--over a democracy because dictatorship promises to safeguard their property in a way that democracy will not. Hence Marx saw political democracy as only surviving for as long as the rulers could pull the wool over the workers' eyes, and then collapsing. I think that Western Europe over the past fifty years serves as a significant counterexample. It may be difficult to maintain a democratic capitalist market system with an acceptable distribution of income. But \"incapable\" is surely too strong. Beveridgism or Myrdalism--social democracy, progressive income taxes, a very large and well-established safety net, public education to a high standard, channels for upward mobility, and all the panoply of the twentieth-century social- democratic mixed-economy democratic state can banish all Marx\u2019s fears that capitalist prosperity must be accompanied by great inequality and great misery.   http:\/\/delong.typepad.com\/sdj\/2013\/05\/understanding-karl-marx-hoisted-from-the-archives-from-four-years-ago-may-day-weblogging.html  I think what deLong says Marx got right, most people would agree with today. However, I think there remains debate with what DeLong believes Marx got wrong--particularly in light of Piketty's recent book.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17363.0,"score_ratio":17.5}
{"post_id":"26ry32","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are any of Karl Marx's insights accepted by modern mainstream economists?","c_root_id_A":"chu6j2z","c_root_id_B":"chu6nki","created_at_utc_A":1401388215,"created_at_utc_B":1401388467,"score_A":2,"score_B":35,"human_ref_A":"Here ya go: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/List_of_Marxian_economists  I can tell you that my undergrad labor theory class included a Marxist labor model. How closely modern Marxian economics adhere's to Marx's original insights I couldn't say, just that there is serious research ongoing from a Marxist view.  Keep in mind that Adam Smith accuses traders of 'conspiring to raise prices' whenever they can, and argued for laissez faire not from an idealistic standpoint but because he thought the government ('land-owning class') would always be duped by the merchants.","human_ref_B":"Brad Delong, not a Marxist sympathizer, wrote the following:  >Marx the economist--well, Marx the economist had six big things to say, some of which are very valuable even today across more than a century and a half, and some of which are not. I would call them the three goods and the three bads:  >Marx the economist was among the very first to recognize that the fever-fits of financial crisis and depression that afflict modern market economies were not a passing phase or something that could be easily cured, but rather a deep disability of the system--as we are being reminded once again right now, this time with Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner, and Larry Summers in the Hot Seats. Marx pointed the spotlight in the right direction here. However, I don't think that his theory of business cycles and financial crises holds up. Marx thought that business cycles and financial crises were evidence of the long-term unsustainability of the system. We modern neoliberal economists view it not as a fatal lymphoma but rather like malaria: Keynesianism--or monetarism, if you prefer--gives us the tools to transform the business cycle from a life- threatening economic yellow fever of the society into the occasional night sweats and fevers: that with economic policy quinine we can manage if not banish the disease.  >Marx the economist was among the very first to get the industrial revolution right: to understand what it meant for human possibilities and the human destiny in a sense that people like Adam Smith did not. In his Politics Aristotle observed that it was not possible to run a household in a way that permitted its head enough leisure and freedom to, say, become a lover of wisdom unless the household owned slaves, and that this would be true unless and until we had instruments like \"the statues of Daedalus, or the tripods of Hephaestus, which, says the poet, 'of their own accord entered the assembly of the Gods;' if, in like manner, the shuttle would weave and the plectrum touch the lyre without a hand to guide them, chief workmen would not want servants, nor masters slaves...\" Karl Marx was among the very first to see that the industrial revolution was giving us the statues of Daedalus, the tripods of Hephaestus, looms that weave and lyres that play by themselves--and thus opens the possibility of a society in which we people can be lovers of wisdom without being supported by the labor of a mass of illiterate, brutalized, half-starved, and overworkedslaves.  >Marx the economist got a lot about the economic history of the development of modern capitalism in England right--not everything, but he is still very much worth grappling with as an economic historian of 1500-1850. Most important, I think, are his observations that the benefits of industrialization do take a long time--generations--to kick in, while the costs of redistributions and power grabs in the interest of market efficiency and the politically- powerful rising mercantile classes kick in immediately. You have to take seriously the idea that the industrial revolution did not make most or even many people better off right away. Reflect also that, as Tyler Cowen observes, capitalist systems can produce less autonomy than small scale production. Standards of living do rise from industrialization--which can undercut the cultures and networks of suppliers that make the choice of a petit bourgeois lifestyle sustainable.  >Now on to the three bads:  >Marx believed that capital is not a complement to but a substitute for labor. Thus technological progress and capital accumulation that raise average labor productivity also lower the working-class wage. Hence the market system simply could not deliver a good or half-good society but only a combination of obscene luxury and mass poverty. This is an empirical question. Marx's belief seems to me to be simply wrong.  >Marx the economist did not like the society of the cash nexus. He believed that a system that reduced people to some form of prostitution--working for wages and wages alone--was bad. He saw a society growing in which worked for money, and their real life began only when the five o\u2019clock whistle blows--and saw such an economy as an insult, delivering low utility, and also sociologically and psychologically unsustainable in the long run. Instead, he thought, people should view their jobs as expressions of their species-being: ways to gain honor or professions that they were born or designed to do or as ways to serve their fellow- human. Here, I think, Marx mistook the effects of capitalism for the effects of poverty. The demand for a world in which people do things for each other purely out of beneficence rather than out of interest and incentives leads you down a very dangerous road, for societies that try to abolish the cash nexus in favor of public- spirited benevolence do not wind up in their happy place. We neoliberal economists shrug our shoulders and say that we are in favor of a market economy but not of a market society, and that there is no reason why people cannot find jobs they like or insist on differentials that compensate them for jobs they don\u2019t.  >Marx believed that the capitalist market economy was incapable of delivering an acceptable distribution of income for anything but the briefest of historical intervals. As best as I can see, he was pushed to that position by watching the French Second Republic of 1848-1851, where the ruling class comes to prefer a charismatic mountebank for a dictator--\"Napoleon III\"--over a democracy because dictatorship promises to safeguard their property in a way that democracy will not. Hence Marx saw political democracy as only surviving for as long as the rulers could pull the wool over the workers' eyes, and then collapsing. I think that Western Europe over the past fifty years serves as a significant counterexample. It may be difficult to maintain a democratic capitalist market system with an acceptable distribution of income. But \"incapable\" is surely too strong. Beveridgism or Myrdalism--social democracy, progressive income taxes, a very large and well-established safety net, public education to a high standard, channels for upward mobility, and all the panoply of the twentieth-century social- democratic mixed-economy democratic state can banish all Marx\u2019s fears that capitalist prosperity must be accompanied by great inequality and great misery.   http:\/\/delong.typepad.com\/sdj\/2013\/05\/understanding-karl-marx-hoisted-from-the-archives-from-four-years-ago-may-day-weblogging.html  I think what deLong says Marx got right, most people would agree with today. However, I think there remains debate with what DeLong believes Marx got wrong--particularly in light of Piketty's recent book.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":252.0,"score_ratio":17.5}
{"post_id":"26ry32","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are any of Karl Marx's insights accepted by modern mainstream economists?","c_root_id_A":"chtys2y","c_root_id_B":"chu0oxh","created_at_utc_A":1401371104,"created_at_utc_B":1401375904,"score_A":2,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"I suggest Economics as Ideology to get a better picture of where the field of economics is today. Laski, the more Marxist of the three prominent economists that would define the discipline as we know it today, \"lost\" the battle against Hayek and Keynes. Although his legacy is still around it's been diluted theoretically.","human_ref_B":"Piketty's Capital in the 21 Century references Marx a fair amount and is substantially influenced by his analysis. Given Piketty's profile at the moment it's safe to say he is the mainstream if not the centre of current economic debate.   From page 19 of capital in the 21 C        >      Despite these limitations, Marx\u2019s analysis remains relevant in several respects. First,          he began with an important question (concerning the unprecedented concentration of          wealth during the Industrial Revolution) and tried to answer it with the means at          his disposal: economists today would do well to take inspiration from his example.          Even more important, the principle of infinite accumulation that Marx proposed contains          a key insight, as valid for the study of the twenty-first century as it was for the          nineteenth and in some respects more worrisome than Ricardo\u2019s principle of scarcity.          If the rates of population and productivity growth are relatively low, then accumulated          wealth naturally takes on considerable importance, especially if it grows to extreme          proportions and becomes socially destabilizing. In other words, low growth cannot          adequately counterbalance the Marxist principle of infinite accumulation: the resulting          equilibrium is not as apocalyptic as the one predicted by Marx but is nevertheless          quite disturbing. Accumulation ends at a finite level, but that level may be high          enough to be destabilizing. In particular, the very high level of private wealth that          has been attained since the 1980s and 1990s in the wealthy countries of Europe and          in Japan, measured in years of national income, directly reflects the Marxian logic.  As well Herbert Gintis and Samuel Bowles were profoundly influenced by Marx. While Gintis, and perhaps Bowles, have moved on from Marxist analysis there is no question that Marx was highly influential in forming the central questions of Behavioural and institutional economics or at least the kernel of their critique of the Walrasian paradigm. That said the Marxian methods were less useful and were superseded by more modern analytic frameworks.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4800.0,"score_ratio":10.5}
{"post_id":"1w5cqi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Do sexual fetishes exist in tribal society or are they a modern social\/cultural byproduct?","c_root_id_A":"ceyy311","c_root_id_B":"ceyzgdu","created_at_utc_A":1390701666,"created_at_utc_B":1390705213,"score_A":16,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Well, here's the Venus of Willendorf.  It's a small statue from the Paleolithic Age (Old Stone Age) of a *very* well-endowed and Rubenesque woman.  Academics believe it may have been an actual fetish (when you attribute mystical qualities to a man-made object) and perhaps represented some sort of fertility goddess.  Now, did Old Stone Age humankind fetishize things in the sort of way modern people do? Maybe, maybe not.  Could this figurine have represented either the individual or collective sexual ideals of the people\/person that made it? Maybe.  It's hard to imagine it as anything else other than a real fetish.","human_ref_B":"Try \/r\/AskAnthropology ?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3547.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"1w5cqi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Do sexual fetishes exist in tribal society or are they a modern social\/cultural byproduct?","c_root_id_A":"ceyy5jr","c_root_id_B":"ceyzgdu","created_at_utc_A":1390701848,"created_at_utc_B":1390705213,"score_A":13,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Interesting question, OP. You might try cross-posting to \/r\/AskHistorians for their perspective?","human_ref_B":"Try \/r\/AskAnthropology ?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3365.0,"score_ratio":1.3846153846}
{"post_id":"1sta2k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"How is it possible that the US government spends more per capita on healthcare than countries with free-at-the-point-of-use healthcare, such as the UK? What is the money spent on? According to these data the US has a higher per capita public health expenditure than any OECD country except Norway, many of which have free healthcare. Where does all the money go?","c_root_id_A":"ce1fdoe","c_root_id_B":"ce1jn3x","created_at_utc_A":1387003621,"created_at_utc_B":1387030875,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Is it right that the US *government* spends more money on healthcare than other countries? I knew that more is spent *in the US*, but most of it is paid by insurance companies, isn't that correct?","human_ref_B":"This video does an excellent job explaining many of the factors quite simply.   https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=qSjGouBmo0M&feature=youtube_gdata_player  I know it is not an academic source, but my colleague, who studies this problem, suggests it is one of the most encompassing pieces he has seen and uses it for his MBA class.  Edit: sources are cited in the information of the video.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":27254.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"32ce6v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"I'm interested in the 'waves' of feminism. Can someone explain to me each of the 'waves' as well as providing why they switched, the evidence for them and\/or the current most-established paradigm\/newest wave? Reddit loves to talk about feminism but I don't think many really have a good understanding of it.  I'm really curious to get a decent overview.   I know whoever answers this question will have to write quite a bit, so I thank you ahead of time.  Also, I hope other people will chime in with what they agree\/disagree with as I imagine feminism is does not necessarily follow a single paradigm.","c_root_id_A":"cqa1af0","c_root_id_B":"cq9yvp9","created_at_utc_A":1428866214,"created_at_utc_B":1428861883,"score_A":45,"score_B":32,"human_ref_A":"As lots of folks have pointed out, the idea of waves is only useful insofar as it gives a broad, yet fictional, description of the history of feminism. Linda Nicholson argues that the usfulness of the wave metaphor for contemporary feminism (therefor, the usefulness of the term \"third wave\") has elapsed.   > During the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, feminism began to expand its meaning, including not only those who supported what many now think of as a liberal understanding of feminism, but also those who took this worldview in new directions. The 1960s through the 1980s was a period of great theoretical and political creativity and activity, making possible a very broad understanding of feminism. But after that kind of creative activity began to die down in the 1990s, people began to wonder whether or not we were in a third wave of feminism. The appeal of this way of thinking was that it kept up the hope that gender activism had not really died down but merely had taken a somewhat different, more youthful and jazzier form. But when I think about what has transpired in the period from the 1990s to today, I don't think that the metaphor of a third wave is the best way to describe what has gone on.  What happened, basically, is that there are a lot of very different trajectories and projects under the heading \"feminism,\" which makes the description of \"third wave\" misleading. (I would even argue that \"second wave\" is only narrowly useful to describe new activism that took place immediately after 1919.) There is \"too much\" feminism for there to be a \"third wave.\"  And because a lot of this feminism is \"still in progress,\" trying to parse out what the \"third\" (or for some, \"fourth\") wave is not really a smart project.  A good example of the trouble that gets going with wave definitions can be seen in various attempts to highlight *the break* third wave feminism made from second wave. For some, the break occurred when feminists resisted or rejected gender\/sex essentialism. Others say it is when race and sexuality entered the feminist equation. Some say it's sex-positivity, other postmodernism. What is remarkable is how many of these things highlighted are about us, *now*, rejecting or distancing ourselves from a previous generation of feminists. The second wave, in so many words, becomes a repository for the sins of \"other\" feminists, and its role as demarcating the historical turns in feminism obscures the diversity in (crypto)feminism before and after the start of the \"third wave.\" *Before*, because it very often paints second-wave feminist all of the same stripe, and *after* because it makes it seem like those \"sins of the foremothers\" are in the past.  **Keeping all that in mind,** lol, I recommend that if you're conversing with folks over reddit (or anywhere), and they seem to make some pretty broad or confusing claims: ask for clarification. That is to say, ask *who* said *X*, *what* they think *X* means, and if its second hand, *where* they're getting their interpretation of *X*. Very often, it is in the details we will find the devils, whether fictions or real. Lots of feminists have lots of very different ideas, so know who they are and how they've articulated their selves is important to figure out what's going on.  Another thing is to pay attention to terms and arguments. I made this post (omg, 2 years ago!), In regards to the MRA term \"Patriarchy Theory\". Basically, I had noticed how much terms were twisted to fit into a particular argument being advanced by anti-feminists. In this case, \"patriarchy theory\" (serious, not a term ever used) is really a misunderstanding of what's going on in feminist discussions (it's not a \"theory\" it's a description). Terms and ideas will help you track back exactly what's going on.  Over all, it's paying attention to the *whos*, *whats*, terms, and ideas in a discussion that will better help parse what's being talked about *by* feminists and *about* feminists.","human_ref_B":"The Wikipedia article \/u\/aristotle2600 mentions is not a bad place to start. Other helpful resources include section 2.1 of this article and the stuff listed in the Other Internet Resources section of that article under the heading \"'Waves' of Feminism.\"  No matter where you get your information, keep in mind that talk of \"waves\" is always vague and it is not meant to strictly divide things: Sojourner Truth famously brought up a paradigmatically \"third wave\" issue during \"first wave\" feminism with her speech \"Ain't I a Woman?,\" \"second wave\" feminist ideals show up everywhere, including for instance in John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor Mill's essay \"The Subjection of Women\" (a \"first wave\" work, if we had to divide things up) and in various \"third wave\" feminist works, etc.  The division into three waves is mostly just meant to mark a couple of basic divisions we can make in terms of historical trends and also some basic differences in topics. Don't try to imbue the idea of waves with anything more significant than that.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4331.0,"score_ratio":1.40625}
{"post_id":"l7drj1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why are older people (65+) so opposed to marijuana legalization on average, even though they grew up in the \"hippie\/free love\" and Vietnam era? I wasn't alive at the time but it seems from the music and movies of and about the 60s and 70s, weed and other drugs were absolutely everywhere and seen as no big deal at all.  It seems very odd to me that people from that era are the *most* opposed to legalization, but that's what the graph in this study shows:  https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/8eb58810be2642b3a2c81e9da247ff80  Does anybody know why this is?","c_root_id_A":"gl8ge0w","c_root_id_B":"gl7v5bp","created_at_utc_A":1611928321,"created_at_utc_B":1611914320,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"A Pew poll shows much less of a difference in age cohorts. Your link it seems is for  65+, which lumps together boomers with older gens.  https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/fact-tank\/2019\/11\/14\/americans-support-marijuana-legalization\/  As someone who was in college 1967-1972 (Boston), my anecdotal experience agrees pretty much with the claims on this thread. The \"hippie\" lifestyle wasn't really all that prevalent, even inside college towns and urban areas associated with it in popular culture (SF, etc). The \"War on Drugs\" was in full swing, and consequences were daunting. I remember seeing billboards around Vegas in '69 that said \"Marijuana: Possession - 20 years, Sale - Life\". Police raids weren't uncommon in the student areas in Boston in the late 60's.   It was kind of amazing how fast things changed, at least in Boston, during those 5 years. There was a sea change in attitudes, culturally, politically, and even with drug use. That's not to say that things necessarily became mainstream, even in places like Boston\/SF, but things like weed use became much more popular.","human_ref_B":"Some people who supported legalization when they were younger might depart from that view as they get older -- a function of people becoming more conservative as they age.  This life change has long been debated; this source suggests there might be some truth here.  >Folk wisdom has long held that people become more politically conservative as they grow older, although several empirical studies suggest political attitudes are stable across time. Using data from the Michigan Youth-Parent Socialization Panel Study, we analyze attitudinal change over a major portion of the adult life span...Consistent with previous research but contrary to folk wisdom, our results indicate that political attitudes are remarkably stable over the long term. In contrast to previous research, however, we also find support for folk wisdom: on those occasions when political attitudes do shift across the life span, liberals are more likely to become conservatives than conservatives are to become liberals, suggesting that folk wisdom has some empirical basis even as it overstates the degree of change.  Do People Really Become More Conservative as They Age? October 2019, The Journal of Politics 82(2)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14001.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"37v2tu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If every country was cut off from the rest of the world, how would they each fare - who would be the most self-sufficient? What countries would continue to prosper; who would die off?  Considering - energy independence, food and water security, workforce, human development, etc","c_root_id_A":"crq7t05","c_root_id_B":"crq7cs8","created_at_utc_A":1433020367,"created_at_utc_B":1433019411,"score_A":94,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"While I'm sure that some places in South America might fare better, in Europe France is the only country that is agriculturally self sufficient, their high arability paired with low amount of the work force, about 4%, actually farming really helps with this. Their health system, recently ranked No. 1 by the WHO could definitely keep running, thought pharmaceutical production might be an issue. And with 59 Nuclear Reactors, making up 75% of its current power consumption they could definitely keep the lights on. In short France actually wins in this scenario.   TL;DR Vive la France!","human_ref_B":"Please cite sources for top level comments. Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":956.0,"score_ratio":5.875}
{"post_id":"1nnbax","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why are there certain dreams that are common to most humans (ie dreams of teeth falling out, being naked in public, being chased, falling, etc)?","c_root_id_A":"cckatie","c_root_id_B":"cck7zgi","created_at_utc_A":1380818418,"created_at_utc_B":1380810692,"score_A":27,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"In Carl Sagan's book \"Dragons of Eden\", he postulates the reason we all have these similar dreams is because of homosapiens evolutionary development.   We began as primates in trees, so falling from the tree could mean death. Therefor, we are inherently fearful of heights because of our ancestors aversion to falling. As for scary bugs\/animals, before modern medicine a bit from a wolf or spider could mean death. The bacteria or venom could kill without antibiotics or antivenom, so again, we are 'programed' to be fearful of these types of things.   It all relates to dreams because our brains are layered, homosapien has multiple parts to our brain, all developed and evolved over millions of years thanks to our ancient ancestors or proto humans, as they are sometimes called. Dreaming is postulated to be our brain going through various memories and\/or emotions, since we all come from the same ancestors, our experiences are all similar.   I wrote this on my phone, so apologies if it's sloppy.","human_ref_B":"I don't have a source, but I would assume it is because being chased, falling, having teeth fall out, and being naked and\/or being in public are all common things that happen to most people fairly often, depending on your stage in life. If I find a source I will post it.  EDIT:  One news article about dreams and state of research.  One PopSci article with some other links about how dreaming may be a bottom-level kind of process, like a reflex. In which case I would find it very easy to assume we would reflexively think about common scenarios - driving is very common to me, and it is essentially down to a reflex... Honestly I am surprised I don't dream about driving when it's one of the few things I like...  This is probably a question we won't be able to answer with any definitive answer for a decade, I'd guess.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7726.0,"score_ratio":2.4545454545}
{"post_id":"1wl8pq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"I often hear that poor people need to get a better education or learn relevant skills to get out of poverty, but if they all suddenly did that, would there even be enough good jobs available? Or would there just be a lot of well-trained and educated poor?","c_root_id_A":"cf3a7ek","c_root_id_B":"cf3bghy","created_at_utc_A":1391137222,"created_at_utc_B":1391140099,"score_A":7,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"For clarification, are the people you hear saying this talking about individual poor people or poor people as a collective? That seems like a possible sticking point in such a discussion.","human_ref_B":"I think there is evidence to suggest the latter.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2877.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"8cmsdr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Our society always seems to be improving on every single level yet mental health problems keep rising and suicide rates are increasing, why? Technology is improving, health care is improving, we live in one of the most peaceful periods in history and everything is at our fingertips. In the western world most of us have everything that we need and so many other things, the vast majority of us don't have to worry if we will have clean water to drink the next day and something to eat. However, mental illness is on the rise and suicide rates are increasing. Where did we go wrong?","c_root_id_A":"dxgrzac","c_root_id_B":"dxh961w","created_at_utc_A":1523903005,"created_at_utc_B":1523918929,"score_A":20,"score_B":41,"human_ref_A":"For a bit of background, Psychology Today did an overview of some metastudies on mental health in 2015. The overall trend in mental health was negative from the 1930s through early 1990s, and mixed since then. There does appear to be a correlation between economic downturns and reported incidence of mental health disorders.   But that's generally looking at a shorter timeframe than other answers here are discussing, since 1930 is well into the Industrial Revolution. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of statistical records showing rate of mental health problems in the pre-industrial era, and much of what we might now recognize as a disorder was often categorized and understood differently. (But then we have our own recent history of treating disorders as a criminal\/police matter, so I don't want to throw stones.) Even from what records we do have, there's a significant recording bias in that mostly only fairly rich and powerful folks get written about in premodern texts, which may make things seem rosier than a 1500CE survey of mental health among peasants and serfs.  As much as I want to assume that folks were generally mentally healthier 300+ years ago, I don't know that we can safely rely on that assumption.","human_ref_B":"Late psychiatrist and Holocaust-survivor Viktor Frankl referred to this as the existential vacuum:  >The existential vacuum is a widespread phenomenon of the 20th century. This is understandable; it may be due to a twofold loss which man has had to undergo since he became a truly human being. At the beginning of human history, man lost some of the basic animal instincts in which an animal\u2019s behavior is imbedded and by which it is secured. . .In addition to this, however, man has suffered another loss in his more recent development inasmuch as the traditions which buttressed his behavior [religious institutions] are now rapidly diminishing. No instinct tells him what he has to do, and no tradition tells him what he ought to do; sometimes he does not even know what he wishes to do. Instead, he either wishes to do what other people do (conformism) or he does what other people wish him to do (totalitarianism).  In response to this, Frankl developed Logotherapy, which, \u201cconsiders man as a being whose main concern consists of fulfilling a meaning and in actualizing values, rather than in the mere gratification and satisfaction of drives and instincts.\u201d  When it comes to questions like, \"How can I be unhappy when I have a home to live in and food to eat?\", Frankl stated:  >To draw an analogy: a man's suffering is similar to the behavior of a gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering is great or little. Therefore the \"size\" of human suffering is absolutely relative.  If all you've ever known is comfort, a small discomfort feels like the end of the world because it is the worst thing you've ever experienced. If you think that being a happy person means being completely blissed out 100% of the time, even the smallest negative emotion or experience will feel tragic.  Part of the issue stems from when people start to think of \"being happy\" as being in a constant state of bliss. If you define happiness in this way, any negative emotion or period of time will force you to define yourself as an unhappy person. Your happiness is fragile and easily destroyed in this state, as opposed to happiness rooted in finding meaning in the ups and downs of life (\"I lost my job but I'm going to do something about it, I'm going to change for the better, I am sad now but it won't be forever because I'm going to take action\"), which is strong and much more permanent.   Many people have also  fallen victim to the idea that others are leading more happy and fulfilling lives than them, because of what they see on social media and in others' public lives.   I highly recommend checking out Viktor Frankl's book, 'Man's Search for Meaning'.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15924.0,"score_ratio":2.05}
{"post_id":"8cmsdr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Our society always seems to be improving on every single level yet mental health problems keep rising and suicide rates are increasing, why? Technology is improving, health care is improving, we live in one of the most peaceful periods in history and everything is at our fingertips. In the western world most of us have everything that we need and so many other things, the vast majority of us don't have to worry if we will have clean water to drink the next day and something to eat. However, mental illness is on the rise and suicide rates are increasing. Where did we go wrong?","c_root_id_A":"dxgfz9p","c_root_id_B":"dxh961w","created_at_utc_A":1523892382,"created_at_utc_B":1523918929,"score_A":8,"score_B":41,"human_ref_A":"Mark Fisher deals with this in Capitalist Realism.","human_ref_B":"Late psychiatrist and Holocaust-survivor Viktor Frankl referred to this as the existential vacuum:  >The existential vacuum is a widespread phenomenon of the 20th century. This is understandable; it may be due to a twofold loss which man has had to undergo since he became a truly human being. At the beginning of human history, man lost some of the basic animal instincts in which an animal\u2019s behavior is imbedded and by which it is secured. . .In addition to this, however, man has suffered another loss in his more recent development inasmuch as the traditions which buttressed his behavior [religious institutions] are now rapidly diminishing. No instinct tells him what he has to do, and no tradition tells him what he ought to do; sometimes he does not even know what he wishes to do. Instead, he either wishes to do what other people do (conformism) or he does what other people wish him to do (totalitarianism).  In response to this, Frankl developed Logotherapy, which, \u201cconsiders man as a being whose main concern consists of fulfilling a meaning and in actualizing values, rather than in the mere gratification and satisfaction of drives and instincts.\u201d  When it comes to questions like, \"How can I be unhappy when I have a home to live in and food to eat?\", Frankl stated:  >To draw an analogy: a man's suffering is similar to the behavior of a gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering is great or little. Therefore the \"size\" of human suffering is absolutely relative.  If all you've ever known is comfort, a small discomfort feels like the end of the world because it is the worst thing you've ever experienced. If you think that being a happy person means being completely blissed out 100% of the time, even the smallest negative emotion or experience will feel tragic.  Part of the issue stems from when people start to think of \"being happy\" as being in a constant state of bliss. If you define happiness in this way, any negative emotion or period of time will force you to define yourself as an unhappy person. Your happiness is fragile and easily destroyed in this state, as opposed to happiness rooted in finding meaning in the ups and downs of life (\"I lost my job but I'm going to do something about it, I'm going to change for the better, I am sad now but it won't be forever because I'm going to take action\"), which is strong and much more permanent.   Many people have also  fallen victim to the idea that others are leading more happy and fulfilling lives than them, because of what they see on social media and in others' public lives.   I highly recommend checking out Viktor Frankl's book, 'Man's Search for Meaning'.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26547.0,"score_ratio":5.125}
{"post_id":"8cmsdr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Our society always seems to be improving on every single level yet mental health problems keep rising and suicide rates are increasing, why? Technology is improving, health care is improving, we live in one of the most peaceful periods in history and everything is at our fingertips. In the western world most of us have everything that we need and so many other things, the vast majority of us don't have to worry if we will have clean water to drink the next day and something to eat. However, mental illness is on the rise and suicide rates are increasing. Where did we go wrong?","c_root_id_A":"dxgfz9p","c_root_id_B":"dxgrzac","created_at_utc_A":1523892382,"created_at_utc_B":1523903005,"score_A":8,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"Mark Fisher deals with this in Capitalist Realism.","human_ref_B":"For a bit of background, Psychology Today did an overview of some metastudies on mental health in 2015. The overall trend in mental health was negative from the 1930s through early 1990s, and mixed since then. There does appear to be a correlation between economic downturns and reported incidence of mental health disorders.   But that's generally looking at a shorter timeframe than other answers here are discussing, since 1930 is well into the Industrial Revolution. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of statistical records showing rate of mental health problems in the pre-industrial era, and much of what we might now recognize as a disorder was often categorized and understood differently. (But then we have our own recent history of treating disorders as a criminal\/police matter, so I don't want to throw stones.) Even from what records we do have, there's a significant recording bias in that mostly only fairly rich and powerful folks get written about in premodern texts, which may make things seem rosier than a 1500CE survey of mental health among peasants and serfs.  As much as I want to assume that folks were generally mentally healthier 300+ years ago, I don't know that we can safely rely on that assumption.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10623.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"8cmsdr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Our society always seems to be improving on every single level yet mental health problems keep rising and suicide rates are increasing, why? Technology is improving, health care is improving, we live in one of the most peaceful periods in history and everything is at our fingertips. In the western world most of us have everything that we need and so many other things, the vast majority of us don't have to worry if we will have clean water to drink the next day and something to eat. However, mental illness is on the rise and suicide rates are increasing. Where did we go wrong?","c_root_id_A":"dxgfz9p","c_root_id_B":"dxh9i31","created_at_utc_A":1523892382,"created_at_utc_B":1523919275,"score_A":8,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Mark Fisher deals with this in Capitalist Realism.","human_ref_B":"You should do some reading on Beck, Baumann and Giddens work on the risk society and late modernity.   In it's most simplified form, they essentially argue that the social structures, institutions that were crucial to the preservation of society are loosing their standing, power and influence today. At the same time though the ideals and paradigms that served to maintain them remain in place. This is coupled with things like the liminality of work, wealth inequality etc leads to a situation of ontological insecurity for individuals as they try to navigate a new configuration of society based on the old model of things.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26893.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"1tn069","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What are the effects, if any, of the Santa Claus lie on childhood development? How would it compare to what Jimmy Kimmel does on Halloween when he encourages parents to tell their kids that they ate all the Halloween candy? Youtube 6:11   The Kimmel lie seems cruel, but the Santa Claus lie seems like it might hold some instuctive value for a child.  Any thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"ce9kk9i","c_root_id_B":"ce9l578","created_at_utc_A":1387932016,"created_at_utc_B":1387933929,"score_A":34,"score_B":73,"human_ref_A":"Please cite sources, everyone.","human_ref_B":"This article states that since the 'Santa Claus lie' is an unjustified one, it harms both \"parental trustworthiness\" and encourages \"ill-motivated behaviour\". It can undermine the relationship between children and parents, and this can become an issue later in the child's development.   The main argument for this lie is that it helps develop imagination and creativity through the involved belief in the idea of Santa. [This article] (http:\/\/www.slate.com\/articles\/double_x\/the_kids\/2012\/12\/the_santa_lie_is_the_big_christmas_con_hurting_our_kids.html) supports this view. It says that while it is important to keep lying to a minimum for the benefit of the parent-child relationship, this particular lie is beneficial because it promotes \"fantastical imagination\".   Overall the 'Santa Claus lie' is mostly harmless - it arguably benefits childhood development through prompting use of imagination and creativity.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1913.0,"score_ratio":2.1470588235}
{"post_id":"wothul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"By today's standards, weren't all children subject to abuse before the 1980s or so? When did kindness and compassion become commonplace? My understanding is that if we apply today's standards for what constitutes child abuse to generations past, almost *every single person* who grew up in the 1970s or earlier was physically and emotionally abused in the extreme. Nearly *all* children were beaten - often violently - by their parents, teachers, and going further back, *even complete strangers.* And it wasn't just for genuinely bad behavior, either: you could be beaten for anything. Trip over something and accidentally break an expensive vase? Your parents would pin you down, expose your buttocks, and slap you so hard that you literally wouldn't be able to sit comfortably for a week. Teachers would use the strap to whip the back of your hand for such odious offenses as subpar penmanship, slouching over, or speaking out of turn. Going back to the 1930s, many teachers even used straps that had sharp spikes in them to make children bleed. You failed a test, you got put in the dunce chair and wore a pointed hat so that everyone knew you were stupid, rather than simply a child with ADHD that went undiagnosed because the condition wasn't recognized in medical literature back then.  In other words, what you see happening to the girl in this video, which was recorded in 2004 and went viral in 2011, would not have been considered as abuse back in the old days. It would have been called \"responsible parenting\". This scene from South Park would not have been a \"joke\" in the 1940s; that was just how parents and teachers treated children. Kindness, empathy, and compassion as we know them today were barely even a thing until 50-60 years ago.  ...Or at least, that's my understanding of how things were way back when. Maybe I'm mistaken and adults treated children better than I'm led to believe? Any time I ever question whether or not my parents were abusive to me, I always feel like I'd have to be spoiled rotten to even be asking that question, because they would probably be seen as overly soft by the standards of when *they* were growing up.","c_root_id_A":"ikdt7k9","c_root_id_B":"ikdz8rf","created_at_utc_A":1660571953,"created_at_utc_B":1660574489,"score_A":29,"score_B":45,"human_ref_A":"> Nearly *all* children were beaten - often violently - by their parents, teachers, and going further back, *even complete strangers.* And it wasn't just for genuinely bad behavior, either: you could be beaten for anything. Trip over something and accidentally break an expensive vase? Your parents would pin you down, expose your buttocks, and slap you so hard that you literally wouldn't be able to sit comfortably for a week.  I'm gonna need a source for that. I have never heard of corporal punishment for mere accidents ever being considered normal.   And you gotta specify country. In my country, hitting children has been illegal since 1966 and even before that it was extremely frowned upon.","human_ref_B":"I believe your question might be better suited for r\/askhistorians, as the query is fundamentally about the history of children and their treatment. You might also consider posting in r\/askanthropology, because as I will highlight further below, there are scholars who argue that corporal punishment should not be considered a universal practice; in particular, it is uncommon among hunter-gatherer societies.  --- **The modern history of child rights and of child abuse** ---  Moving on. The contemporary awareness about what is called \"child abuse\" is often traced to the **1970s**, but the concepts of *child abuse* and *child rights*, as thought of by so called Western countries, are a bit older although still relatively recent, as illustrated by this UNICEF timeline of \"child rights\" which starts at **1924** with the adoption of the Geneva Declaration on the Rights of the Child by the League of Nations, which was drafted by social reformer Eglantyne Jebb. Concerning what lead to this event, Becker (2020) explains:  >**The first formal legal protections for children emerged in nineteenth-century Europe as a reaction to the grueling and hazardous working conditions that many children endured.** Children had long worked alongside their family members on farms or in family enterprises, but with the Industrial Revolution, many began working in factories. Children as young as five or six years old labored twelve to sixteen hours a day in deplorable conditions, received little pay, and were subjected to harsh punishment. **Social reformers began to advocate for legal restrictions, and beginning in 1802 in Britain, for the first time in Europe, laws were enacted governing child labor. Reformers also established orphanages for abandoned and destitute children and reformatories, or industrial schools, for children found begging or engaged in theft. The purpose of these institutions was not necessarily to nurture the child, but to instill obedience and to protect the child from negative influences.**  >**World War I brought new attention to the vulnerabilities of children.** Across Central and Eastern Europe, a British economic blockade contributed to unprecedented deprivation and suffering. Hundreds of thousands of people starved to death, and rates of infant and child mortality were appallingly high. **Eglantyne Jebb, a British social reformer, worked to expose the humanitarian crisis and its impact on children.**  The modern concept of \"child abuse\" - and relatedly, \"child sexual abuse\" - come from these developments, but there are two caveats. First, concerns about child maltreatment predate the 1900s, and second, there have been lulls in awareness or concern between the early 1900s and the late 1900s. According to Olafsson (2004):  >**For about 50 years between the two great waves of feminist activism and professional discovery, that is, from roughly the end of World War I until about 1970, public and policy attention to all forms of sexual violence and to child maltreatment in general was minimal. In the Victorian era, there had been strong and effective efforts to protect children from physical abuse, sexual abuse, and neglect, public attention that carried over into the early years of the 20th century and then, mysteriously, waned.** As historian George K. Behlmer (1982) has written, \u201cThere remains to be explained the curious decline of public interest in child abuse between 1920 and the early 1960\u2019s\u201d (p. 225). Child psychiatrist Lenore Terr (1990) wrote about these mid-20th century years in child psychiatry, \u201cChildhood psychic trauma was assumed to be understood while simultaneously being ignored\u201d (p. 10).  >**Child sexual abuse was never completely forgotten of course**, and there continued to be some criminal prosecutions (Myers, 2004; Olafson, 2002; Olafson et al., 1993). **For the most part, however, the professionals and the media who focused on child sexual abuse during the middle years of the 20th century minimized both its prevalence and its impact.**  And to quote Hackett (2015), referring to the World Health Organization's definition of child maltreatment:  >Nonetheless, there is now considerable support for the five subtypes of child abuse included in the above WHO definition. **The development of these core categories of child abuse is, in large part, the consequence of the long history of social workers and other professionals being confronted with ever more complex and diverse cases where children have been harmed. This has forced appraisal and reappraisal of the nature and range of abuses faced by children.** For example, **it is widely stated that awareness of child abuse in the modern era stemmed from the ground-breaking work in the 1960s of American pediatrician Henry Kempe and colleagues who outlined the term \u2018battered child syndrome\u2019** thereby bringing the issue of child physical abuse into the professional and public consciousness. However, **it was not until a decade and a half later until survivors of child sexual abuse began to raise awareness of this \u2018new\u2019 form of abuse** (Amstrong, 1978). **Awareness of emotional abuse and neglect followed yet later** (Garbarino et al., 1986). The nature of sexual abuse perpetrated by children and young people (Hackett, 2004) and the abuse of children in institutions, such as the well-documented series of cases of abuse within the global Catholic Church (Keenen, 2012), are even more recent developments.  ---  That said, it is important to distinguish the modern concepts I have described above, as defined by contemporary legal and medical institutions, and the broader attitudes toward particular manners of rearing children, and the prevalence of particular behaviors. As Hackett (2015) points out:  >While the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child sets out the rights of children to be protected from all forms of violence and abuse, as outlined earlier, it does not offer definitions of specific types of abuse or the range of behaviors that might constitute them. This too is a contested and difficult area. **Child abuse is as much as a social construct as is the concept of childhood (Corby, 2000). What are deemed to be optimal, acceptable, or abusive parenting practices vary considerably over time and across and within cultural contexts.** For example, in some jurisdictions, the use of parental corporal punishment as a means of disciplining children is viewed as harmful and is outlawed, while in other cultures, it is seen as a necessary and responsible way of raising children.  For example, in his essay on child sexual abuse in England during the Middle Ages, Kissane argues:  >Yet **simply transposing modern conceptions of child sexual abuse onto medieval society remains problematic, as the way such crimes were perceived was undoubtedly different. It is certainly significant that no form of medieval law\u2014statute, common, customary, or canon\u2014recognised \u2018child sexual abuse\u2019 as a concept, even when allowing for anachronistic terminology.** Victims were seen primarily as female victims of rape (there has yet been no discovery of individual rape cases within the judicial records involving young boys). In fact, there was often little distinction between individual cases. **Such divergences from modern thinking are made more difficult by shifting definitions of childhood and adulthood, with understandings of the human life cycle varying from place to place and over time.**  ---  [Continues next comment on corporal punishment]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2536.0,"score_ratio":1.5517241379}
{"post_id":"wothul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"By today's standards, weren't all children subject to abuse before the 1980s or so? When did kindness and compassion become commonplace? My understanding is that if we apply today's standards for what constitutes child abuse to generations past, almost *every single person* who grew up in the 1970s or earlier was physically and emotionally abused in the extreme. Nearly *all* children were beaten - often violently - by their parents, teachers, and going further back, *even complete strangers.* And it wasn't just for genuinely bad behavior, either: you could be beaten for anything. Trip over something and accidentally break an expensive vase? Your parents would pin you down, expose your buttocks, and slap you so hard that you literally wouldn't be able to sit comfortably for a week. Teachers would use the strap to whip the back of your hand for such odious offenses as subpar penmanship, slouching over, or speaking out of turn. Going back to the 1930s, many teachers even used straps that had sharp spikes in them to make children bleed. You failed a test, you got put in the dunce chair and wore a pointed hat so that everyone knew you were stupid, rather than simply a child with ADHD that went undiagnosed because the condition wasn't recognized in medical literature back then.  In other words, what you see happening to the girl in this video, which was recorded in 2004 and went viral in 2011, would not have been considered as abuse back in the old days. It would have been called \"responsible parenting\". This scene from South Park would not have been a \"joke\" in the 1940s; that was just how parents and teachers treated children. Kindness, empathy, and compassion as we know them today were barely even a thing until 50-60 years ago.  ...Or at least, that's my understanding of how things were way back when. Maybe I'm mistaken and adults treated children better than I'm led to believe? Any time I ever question whether or not my parents were abusive to me, I always feel like I'd have to be spoiled rotten to even be asking that question, because they would probably be seen as overly soft by the standards of when *they* were growing up.","c_root_id_A":"ikdjwhm","c_root_id_B":"ikdz8rf","created_at_utc_A":1660567568,"created_at_utc_B":1660574489,"score_A":16,"score_B":45,"human_ref_A":"As a follow up question - were there not massive amounts of long-term trauma in pretty much everyone then? Like what is the negative repercussions of this sort of abuse?","human_ref_B":"I believe your question might be better suited for r\/askhistorians, as the query is fundamentally about the history of children and their treatment. You might also consider posting in r\/askanthropology, because as I will highlight further below, there are scholars who argue that corporal punishment should not be considered a universal practice; in particular, it is uncommon among hunter-gatherer societies.  --- **The modern history of child rights and of child abuse** ---  Moving on. The contemporary awareness about what is called \"child abuse\" is often traced to the **1970s**, but the concepts of *child abuse* and *child rights*, as thought of by so called Western countries, are a bit older although still relatively recent, as illustrated by this UNICEF timeline of \"child rights\" which starts at **1924** with the adoption of the Geneva Declaration on the Rights of the Child by the League of Nations, which was drafted by social reformer Eglantyne Jebb. Concerning what lead to this event, Becker (2020) explains:  >**The first formal legal protections for children emerged in nineteenth-century Europe as a reaction to the grueling and hazardous working conditions that many children endured.** Children had long worked alongside their family members on farms or in family enterprises, but with the Industrial Revolution, many began working in factories. Children as young as five or six years old labored twelve to sixteen hours a day in deplorable conditions, received little pay, and were subjected to harsh punishment. **Social reformers began to advocate for legal restrictions, and beginning in 1802 in Britain, for the first time in Europe, laws were enacted governing child labor. Reformers also established orphanages for abandoned and destitute children and reformatories, or industrial schools, for children found begging or engaged in theft. The purpose of these institutions was not necessarily to nurture the child, but to instill obedience and to protect the child from negative influences.**  >**World War I brought new attention to the vulnerabilities of children.** Across Central and Eastern Europe, a British economic blockade contributed to unprecedented deprivation and suffering. Hundreds of thousands of people starved to death, and rates of infant and child mortality were appallingly high. **Eglantyne Jebb, a British social reformer, worked to expose the humanitarian crisis and its impact on children.**  The modern concept of \"child abuse\" - and relatedly, \"child sexual abuse\" - come from these developments, but there are two caveats. First, concerns about child maltreatment predate the 1900s, and second, there have been lulls in awareness or concern between the early 1900s and the late 1900s. According to Olafsson (2004):  >**For about 50 years between the two great waves of feminist activism and professional discovery, that is, from roughly the end of World War I until about 1970, public and policy attention to all forms of sexual violence and to child maltreatment in general was minimal. In the Victorian era, there had been strong and effective efforts to protect children from physical abuse, sexual abuse, and neglect, public attention that carried over into the early years of the 20th century and then, mysteriously, waned.** As historian George K. Behlmer (1982) has written, \u201cThere remains to be explained the curious decline of public interest in child abuse between 1920 and the early 1960\u2019s\u201d (p. 225). Child psychiatrist Lenore Terr (1990) wrote about these mid-20th century years in child psychiatry, \u201cChildhood psychic trauma was assumed to be understood while simultaneously being ignored\u201d (p. 10).  >**Child sexual abuse was never completely forgotten of course**, and there continued to be some criminal prosecutions (Myers, 2004; Olafson, 2002; Olafson et al., 1993). **For the most part, however, the professionals and the media who focused on child sexual abuse during the middle years of the 20th century minimized both its prevalence and its impact.**  And to quote Hackett (2015), referring to the World Health Organization's definition of child maltreatment:  >Nonetheless, there is now considerable support for the five subtypes of child abuse included in the above WHO definition. **The development of these core categories of child abuse is, in large part, the consequence of the long history of social workers and other professionals being confronted with ever more complex and diverse cases where children have been harmed. This has forced appraisal and reappraisal of the nature and range of abuses faced by children.** For example, **it is widely stated that awareness of child abuse in the modern era stemmed from the ground-breaking work in the 1960s of American pediatrician Henry Kempe and colleagues who outlined the term \u2018battered child syndrome\u2019** thereby bringing the issue of child physical abuse into the professional and public consciousness. However, **it was not until a decade and a half later until survivors of child sexual abuse began to raise awareness of this \u2018new\u2019 form of abuse** (Amstrong, 1978). **Awareness of emotional abuse and neglect followed yet later** (Garbarino et al., 1986). The nature of sexual abuse perpetrated by children and young people (Hackett, 2004) and the abuse of children in institutions, such as the well-documented series of cases of abuse within the global Catholic Church (Keenen, 2012), are even more recent developments.  ---  That said, it is important to distinguish the modern concepts I have described above, as defined by contemporary legal and medical institutions, and the broader attitudes toward particular manners of rearing children, and the prevalence of particular behaviors. As Hackett (2015) points out:  >While the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child sets out the rights of children to be protected from all forms of violence and abuse, as outlined earlier, it does not offer definitions of specific types of abuse or the range of behaviors that might constitute them. This too is a contested and difficult area. **Child abuse is as much as a social construct as is the concept of childhood (Corby, 2000). What are deemed to be optimal, acceptable, or abusive parenting practices vary considerably over time and across and within cultural contexts.** For example, in some jurisdictions, the use of parental corporal punishment as a means of disciplining children is viewed as harmful and is outlawed, while in other cultures, it is seen as a necessary and responsible way of raising children.  For example, in his essay on child sexual abuse in England during the Middle Ages, Kissane argues:  >Yet **simply transposing modern conceptions of child sexual abuse onto medieval society remains problematic, as the way such crimes were perceived was undoubtedly different. It is certainly significant that no form of medieval law\u2014statute, common, customary, or canon\u2014recognised \u2018child sexual abuse\u2019 as a concept, even when allowing for anachronistic terminology.** Victims were seen primarily as female victims of rape (there has yet been no discovery of individual rape cases within the judicial records involving young boys). In fact, there was often little distinction between individual cases. **Such divergences from modern thinking are made more difficult by shifting definitions of childhood and adulthood, with understandings of the human life cycle varying from place to place and over time.**  ---  [Continues next comment on corporal punishment]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6921.0,"score_ratio":2.8125}
{"post_id":"wothul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"By today's standards, weren't all children subject to abuse before the 1980s or so? When did kindness and compassion become commonplace? My understanding is that if we apply today's standards for what constitutes child abuse to generations past, almost *every single person* who grew up in the 1970s or earlier was physically and emotionally abused in the extreme. Nearly *all* children were beaten - often violently - by their parents, teachers, and going further back, *even complete strangers.* And it wasn't just for genuinely bad behavior, either: you could be beaten for anything. Trip over something and accidentally break an expensive vase? Your parents would pin you down, expose your buttocks, and slap you so hard that you literally wouldn't be able to sit comfortably for a week. Teachers would use the strap to whip the back of your hand for such odious offenses as subpar penmanship, slouching over, or speaking out of turn. Going back to the 1930s, many teachers even used straps that had sharp spikes in them to make children bleed. You failed a test, you got put in the dunce chair and wore a pointed hat so that everyone knew you were stupid, rather than simply a child with ADHD that went undiagnosed because the condition wasn't recognized in medical literature back then.  In other words, what you see happening to the girl in this video, which was recorded in 2004 and went viral in 2011, would not have been considered as abuse back in the old days. It would have been called \"responsible parenting\". This scene from South Park would not have been a \"joke\" in the 1940s; that was just how parents and teachers treated children. Kindness, empathy, and compassion as we know them today were barely even a thing until 50-60 years ago.  ...Or at least, that's my understanding of how things were way back when. Maybe I'm mistaken and adults treated children better than I'm led to believe? Any time I ever question whether or not my parents were abusive to me, I always feel like I'd have to be spoiled rotten to even be asking that question, because they would probably be seen as overly soft by the standards of when *they* were growing up.","c_root_id_A":"ike5omr","c_root_id_B":"ikdt7k9","created_at_utc_A":1660577122,"created_at_utc_B":1660571953,"score_A":35,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"I wouldn't go so far as to say all kids or even most kids were \"violently beaten\" until the 1980s, but physical as well as emotional abuse was much more normalized. I'm more familiar on the history of abuse as it applies to women, but the overall history is similar. My answer will mainly apply to the US and other industrialized, English-speaking countries.  For much of our history, women and children have been considered the property of their husband\/father who held the right to beat them. In Marriage, a History*,* historian Stephanie Coontz discusses a writing from the 1600s where a man is criticized for not beating his wife. The other townspeople think he's spoiling her too much. Things were even worse for children and people rarely intervened even if the abuse was severe.    In the Cultural Contradictions of Motherhood, sociologist Sharon Hays discusses more modern histories of childhood and makes the argument that people didn't really start caring about kids as people until the Victorian Era. This was when people started making elaborate toys and child coffins (before it was common for children who died to not even get a grave marker). However, how people treated their own child was still considered a private matter that others should not get involved in even if there is severe physical violence.  In the early 1900s, the US government started to care more about getting involved in child  welfare in order to have a fitter population (both for eugenics purposes and growing humanitarian movements). They began regulating child labor. People started to believe that child should have rights and treatment of children is something the government should be involved with at times.   Abuse was still considered a personal issue and it wasn't until the 70s that there were large successes in labeling physical abuse as a social problem. Women's movements worked hard to get people to recognize \"wife battering\" as a problem and the 70s is when domestic violence shelters start appearing. This is when people also begin recognizing child abuse as a problem.   So in some ways physical abuse was normalized, but that doesn't mean it happened to all children. There are plenty of people whose parents believed that physically hurting their child is harmful. Even though it was legal for most of history, many women and children ran away from abusive homes, and there were instances when other people would intervene.   But overall, many more children experienced conditions we would consider abuse today especially when considering the psychological\/emotional treatment of children. \"Good\" parenting was mostly about providing material needs.  On a personal level, I recommend the book *Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents*. It's a self help book but the author recognizes this history. She discusses how parents are often doing better than their own parents, but when the standard was so low they can still miss the mark in really important ways.   tl;dr Children were considered property until fairly recently in human history. The 70s was when you start to see recognition of abuse as a social problem. While most children were not severely beat, most did experience conditions that would be considered abusive or borderline harmful today.","human_ref_B":"> Nearly *all* children were beaten - often violently - by their parents, teachers, and going further back, *even complete strangers.* And it wasn't just for genuinely bad behavior, either: you could be beaten for anything. Trip over something and accidentally break an expensive vase? Your parents would pin you down, expose your buttocks, and slap you so hard that you literally wouldn't be able to sit comfortably for a week.  I'm gonna need a source for that. I have never heard of corporal punishment for mere accidents ever being considered normal.   And you gotta specify country. In my country, hitting children has been illegal since 1966 and even before that it was extremely frowned upon.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5169.0,"score_ratio":1.2068965517}
{"post_id":"wothul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"By today's standards, weren't all children subject to abuse before the 1980s or so? When did kindness and compassion become commonplace? My understanding is that if we apply today's standards for what constitutes child abuse to generations past, almost *every single person* who grew up in the 1970s or earlier was physically and emotionally abused in the extreme. Nearly *all* children were beaten - often violently - by their parents, teachers, and going further back, *even complete strangers.* And it wasn't just for genuinely bad behavior, either: you could be beaten for anything. Trip over something and accidentally break an expensive vase? Your parents would pin you down, expose your buttocks, and slap you so hard that you literally wouldn't be able to sit comfortably for a week. Teachers would use the strap to whip the back of your hand for such odious offenses as subpar penmanship, slouching over, or speaking out of turn. Going back to the 1930s, many teachers even used straps that had sharp spikes in them to make children bleed. You failed a test, you got put in the dunce chair and wore a pointed hat so that everyone knew you were stupid, rather than simply a child with ADHD that went undiagnosed because the condition wasn't recognized in medical literature back then.  In other words, what you see happening to the girl in this video, which was recorded in 2004 and went viral in 2011, would not have been considered as abuse back in the old days. It would have been called \"responsible parenting\". This scene from South Park would not have been a \"joke\" in the 1940s; that was just how parents and teachers treated children. Kindness, empathy, and compassion as we know them today were barely even a thing until 50-60 years ago.  ...Or at least, that's my understanding of how things were way back when. Maybe I'm mistaken and adults treated children better than I'm led to believe? Any time I ever question whether or not my parents were abusive to me, I always feel like I'd have to be spoiled rotten to even be asking that question, because they would probably be seen as overly soft by the standards of when *they* were growing up.","c_root_id_A":"ike5omr","c_root_id_B":"ikdjwhm","created_at_utc_A":1660577122,"created_at_utc_B":1660567568,"score_A":35,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"I wouldn't go so far as to say all kids or even most kids were \"violently beaten\" until the 1980s, but physical as well as emotional abuse was much more normalized. I'm more familiar on the history of abuse as it applies to women, but the overall history is similar. My answer will mainly apply to the US and other industrialized, English-speaking countries.  For much of our history, women and children have been considered the property of their husband\/father who held the right to beat them. In Marriage, a History*,* historian Stephanie Coontz discusses a writing from the 1600s where a man is criticized for not beating his wife. The other townspeople think he's spoiling her too much. Things were even worse for children and people rarely intervened even if the abuse was severe.    In the Cultural Contradictions of Motherhood, sociologist Sharon Hays discusses more modern histories of childhood and makes the argument that people didn't really start caring about kids as people until the Victorian Era. This was when people started making elaborate toys and child coffins (before it was common for children who died to not even get a grave marker). However, how people treated their own child was still considered a private matter that others should not get involved in even if there is severe physical violence.  In the early 1900s, the US government started to care more about getting involved in child  welfare in order to have a fitter population (both for eugenics purposes and growing humanitarian movements). They began regulating child labor. People started to believe that child should have rights and treatment of children is something the government should be involved with at times.   Abuse was still considered a personal issue and it wasn't until the 70s that there were large successes in labeling physical abuse as a social problem. Women's movements worked hard to get people to recognize \"wife battering\" as a problem and the 70s is when domestic violence shelters start appearing. This is when people also begin recognizing child abuse as a problem.   So in some ways physical abuse was normalized, but that doesn't mean it happened to all children. There are plenty of people whose parents believed that physically hurting their child is harmful. Even though it was legal for most of history, many women and children ran away from abusive homes, and there were instances when other people would intervene.   But overall, many more children experienced conditions we would consider abuse today especially when considering the psychological\/emotional treatment of children. \"Good\" parenting was mostly about providing material needs.  On a personal level, I recommend the book *Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents*. It's a self help book but the author recognizes this history. She discusses how parents are often doing better than their own parents, but when the standard was so low they can still miss the mark in really important ways.   tl;dr Children were considered property until fairly recently in human history. The 70s was when you start to see recognition of abuse as a social problem. While most children were not severely beat, most did experience conditions that would be considered abusive or borderline harmful today.","human_ref_B":"As a follow up question - were there not massive amounts of long-term trauma in pretty much everyone then? Like what is the negative repercussions of this sort of abuse?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9554.0,"score_ratio":2.1875}
{"post_id":"wothul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"By today's standards, weren't all children subject to abuse before the 1980s or so? When did kindness and compassion become commonplace? My understanding is that if we apply today's standards for what constitutes child abuse to generations past, almost *every single person* who grew up in the 1970s or earlier was physically and emotionally abused in the extreme. Nearly *all* children were beaten - often violently - by their parents, teachers, and going further back, *even complete strangers.* And it wasn't just for genuinely bad behavior, either: you could be beaten for anything. Trip over something and accidentally break an expensive vase? Your parents would pin you down, expose your buttocks, and slap you so hard that you literally wouldn't be able to sit comfortably for a week. Teachers would use the strap to whip the back of your hand for such odious offenses as subpar penmanship, slouching over, or speaking out of turn. Going back to the 1930s, many teachers even used straps that had sharp spikes in them to make children bleed. You failed a test, you got put in the dunce chair and wore a pointed hat so that everyone knew you were stupid, rather than simply a child with ADHD that went undiagnosed because the condition wasn't recognized in medical literature back then.  In other words, what you see happening to the girl in this video, which was recorded in 2004 and went viral in 2011, would not have been considered as abuse back in the old days. It would have been called \"responsible parenting\". This scene from South Park would not have been a \"joke\" in the 1940s; that was just how parents and teachers treated children. Kindness, empathy, and compassion as we know them today were barely even a thing until 50-60 years ago.  ...Or at least, that's my understanding of how things were way back when. Maybe I'm mistaken and adults treated children better than I'm led to believe? Any time I ever question whether or not my parents were abusive to me, I always feel like I'd have to be spoiled rotten to even be asking that question, because they would probably be seen as overly soft by the standards of when *they* were growing up.","c_root_id_A":"ikdjwhm","c_root_id_B":"ikdt7k9","created_at_utc_A":1660567568,"created_at_utc_B":1660571953,"score_A":16,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"As a follow up question - were there not massive amounts of long-term trauma in pretty much everyone then? Like what is the negative repercussions of this sort of abuse?","human_ref_B":"> Nearly *all* children were beaten - often violently - by their parents, teachers, and going further back, *even complete strangers.* And it wasn't just for genuinely bad behavior, either: you could be beaten for anything. Trip over something and accidentally break an expensive vase? Your parents would pin you down, expose your buttocks, and slap you so hard that you literally wouldn't be able to sit comfortably for a week.  I'm gonna need a source for that. I have never heard of corporal punishment for mere accidents ever being considered normal.   And you gotta specify country. In my country, hitting children has been illegal since 1966 and even before that it was extremely frowned upon.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4385.0,"score_ratio":1.8125}
{"post_id":"b7kcg7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is there any evidence that members of law enforcement lean towards the alt-right or have facist tendencies more-so than the general public?","c_root_id_A":"ejsgcvy","c_root_id_B":"ejshah0","created_at_utc_A":1554013783,"created_at_utc_B":1554015212,"score_A":21,"score_B":130,"human_ref_A":"This PBS report from 2016 links to a 2006 bulletin from the FBI noting that white supremacists were infiltrating American police departments. The bulletin has been mostly redacted since then. However, it shows there was (and perhaps still is) at least some alt-right\/fascists in law enforcement.","human_ref_B":"In 2006 the FBI investigated police forces across the US and released a bulletin warning that white supremacists were purposefully infiltrating police in order to disrupt investigations against their fellows and recruit fellow officers. (Download link for the full pdf. is included in the article below.)  https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/newshour\/amp\/nation\/fbi-white-supremacists-in-law-enforcement  There have been tons of studies done showing that police across the country have a strong pro-white and anti-poc bias. Google and you'll find dozens. Here's a few I pulled up in less than 5min:  https:\/\/www.google.com\/amp\/s\/www.pbs.org\/newshour\/amp\/nation\/fbi-white-supremacists-in-law-enforcement  https:\/\/www.google.com\/amp\/s\/amp.citizen-times.com\/amp\/2208040002  https:\/\/www.google.com\/amp\/s\/www.dailyprogress.com\/news\/local\/city\/city-police-data-again-show-more-african-americans-stopped-without\/article_e670ef32-3192-11e9-b7c6-675db3c2f609.amp.html  https:\/\/www.google.com\/amp\/s\/www.baltimoresun.com\/news\/opinion\/editorial\/bs-ed-0103-african-americans-marijuana-arrests-20190102-story,amp.html  https:\/\/www.google.com\/amp\/s\/www.vox.com\/platform\/amp\/identities\/2018\/5\/14\/17353040\/racial-disparity-marijuana-arrests-new-york-city-nypd  https:\/\/www.google.com\/amp\/s\/theconversation.com\/amp\/a-new-look-at-racial-disparities-in-police-use-of-deadly-force-98681  So, statistically police are more likely to arrest black folks for basically everything, and much more likely to use deadly force against them. (There are similarly high statistics for other groups such as indigenous Americans, Hispanic and latinx Americans, etc.)  I imagine it would be hard to compare if they are more biased than the general population by these numbers because they have more power than the general population to act on bias. I'm not sure how that would be measured, though political affiliation is easy enough.  Police are much more likely to consider officer shootings of black folks to be \"isolated incidents\" compared to the general population, which is more likely to see them as indicative of a larger problem.   https:\/\/www.pewsocialtrends.org\/2017\/01\/11\/police-views-public-views\/  According to this study police seargents, sheriffs, state troopers, and detectives are more right leaning, while police officers are split down the middle and police chiefs are very slightly left leaning.   A different study on how occupation relates to political affiliation in the US showed that most careers where the split was pretty even were not moderate, but very polarized. That may be the case with law enforcement as well, but hard to tell as this study didn't separate law enforcement and the previous study didn't show that much detail. (Although both were taken from campaign contributions.)  https:\/\/openpolicing.stanford.edu\/findings\/  Another relevant find is that police officers are three times more likely to physically abuse their children compared to the general population:  http:\/\/womenandpolicing.com\/violencefs.asp  I wasn't able to cover everything, but this should give you a good starting point for further research.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1429.0,"score_ratio":6.1904761905}
{"post_id":"b7kcg7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is there any evidence that members of law enforcement lean towards the alt-right or have facist tendencies more-so than the general public?","c_root_id_A":"ejtbbu4","c_root_id_B":"ejsgcvy","created_at_utc_A":1554050804,"created_at_utc_B":1554013783,"score_A":24,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"Rather than ask whether members of law enforcement agencies lean towards the 'alt-right' (which arguably encompasses many kinds of groups) and fascism, I would ask whether they tend to embrace right-wing attitudes, beliefs and values to a high(er) degree and whether they tend to have personality traits such as right-wing authoritarianism, and social dominance orientation (SDO).  As Sidanius and colleagues explain:  >Social dominance theory, as well as certain related models  (e.g.,  group  position and realistic  group conflict theories; e.g., Blumer,  1961; Bobo,  1988; Spitzer, 1975) would suggest police  behavior, such as that  exhibited  during  the King beating,  is not only relatively  typical of police  departments  around the country,  but is also part of a  mosaic  of  social  mechanisms  which  help  to  establish  and maintain hierarchical relationships  among different social strata in society.  They also explain the following which is of interest to the topic:  >...] SDO is conceived of reflecting one\u2019s desire  for  non-egalitarian  relationships  among  social  groups.  In other words,  SDO is  a  strongly group-oriented construct,  and,  as  such, it has been shown to be strongly  correlated  with  variables  such as racism,  xenophobia, sexism, classism, nationalism, and negative affect toward both real and minimal outgroups  (Levin,  1992; Pratto et  al., in  press;  Sidanius & Liu,  1992; Sidanius & Pratto,  1993)  Comparing members of the LAPD and of the county's Public Defenders' Office, they made the following conclusions:  >First, even when restricting  comparisons within  the  same  general  domain,  such as the  criminal justice system,  it was found that those a priori classifiable by  social dominance theory as **hierarchy attenuators (i.e., public defenders) were significantly less dominance oriented than those  classifiable as hierarchy enhancers (i.e.,  police  officers)**.  Second, hierarchy  attenuators  were  found  to be significantly  less  social-dominance oriented  than  members  of  the  general  public  (i.e., jurors).  Third,  **hierarchy enhancers [i.e. police officers] were found to be significantly more social-dominance oriented than members of the general public**. Fourth, members of the dominant ethnic group (i.e., Euro-Americans) were found to be significantly more dominance oriented than  members of the  subordinate  ethnic  group  (i.e.,  African-  and  Hispanic- Americans). In addition, **all of the above conclusions held even after controlling  for  demographic  background  variables**,  such as age,  gender, ethnicity (when appropriate), social-class identification and income.  [Haley and Sidanius summarized several findings in the literature pointing towards how police both attracts people who tend to be authoritarian and have high SDO and socializes people in that direction.  How aspiring police officers perceive trauma victims:  >Along  the  same  lines,  Liebkind  and  Er\u00e4nen(2001)  found  differences  between  nursing students and police academy students in terms of   their   attitudes   toward   fictional   trauma victims  (e.g.  refugees,  victims  of  shipwreck). In line with SDT expectations, however, these groups expressed divergent attitudes  toward  the  fictional  victims.  **Students  of the  police  academy**  (in  training  for  HE  work) expressed  **relatively  negative  attitudes  toward the  victims**,  while  nursing  students  (who  were following  an  HA  career  track)  expressed  relatively  positive  attitudes.  What career is attractive for students with higher SDO:  >As expected,  **students\u2019  levels  of  social  dominance orientation  were  positively  correlated  with their  liking  for  the  HE  careers** i.e. \"government prosecutor, **law enforcement officer, FBI agent**, and big businessperson\"] and  negatively correlated   with   their   liking   for   the   HA careers\u2014**even  after  researchers  controlled  for students\u2019  socioeconomic  status  and  level  of political  conservatism**.   And,   >Sidanius et al. (2003) found additional evidence of self-selection when they examined UCLA students\u2019 attitudes as a function of their career aspirations. In this research, the authors generated lists of careers that could be clearly designated as either \u2018HE careers\u2019 or \u2018HA careers\u2019. Among the **\u2018HE careers\u2019**, they listed: economist; financial manager; military personnel; national security officer; and **police officer** [...] As predicted, **students who were attracted to \u2018HE careers\u2019 had significantly higher than average anti-egalitarianism scores** than those who were attracted to \u2018HA careers\u2019. Even more striking was the temporal sequence of this relationship: **students\u2019 level of anti-egalitarianism was significantly predictive of their later interest\u2014up to a year or more later**\u2014in \u2018HE careers\u2019 versus \u2018HA careers\u2019.  How the police promotes certain attitudes among its members:  >As SDT would expect, this research largely suggests that **the law enforcement system (an unambiguously HE organization) breeds anti-egalitarian, authoritarian, and xenophobic attitudes among police officers**. Early work by McNamara (1967), for example, followed officers from the recruit stage through two years on the job. McNamara found that **officers\u2019 authoritarianism** (which was positively correlated with endorsement of the use of force) **increased across time.**   And this effect appears to be insidious:  >Interestingly, even when police are specifically trained in \u2018anti-racism\u2019 and in appreciation of subordinate cultures, the usual socializing effects of the police force still appear to operate. For example, when Wortley and Homel (1995) studied 412 Australian recruits who had participated in such training vis-a-vis Aborigines, they found that **despite a softening of authoritarianism during the training phase, within 12 months\u2019 time in the field recruits had nonetheless become significantly more ethnocentric and authoritarian than they were prior to training.**  Police institutions apparently also promote behaviors associated with authoritarianism and SDO:  >Importantly, research has also uncovered evidence for the process of differential success within the police force. For example, Leitner and Sedlacek (1976) found that the more \u2018racially\u2019 prejudiced police officers were, the more likely they were to receive positive performance evaluations from their supervisors.   Many studies can be found in this field of research and for different countries than the USA. For example, this [study about British police officers found similar results as described above:  >The findings suggest that the **police force attracts conservative and authoritarian personalities**, that **basic training has a temporarily liberalizing effect**, and that **continued police service results in increasingly illiberal\/intolerant attitudes** towards coloured immigration.  Likewise with this Australian study with Queensland police recruits:  >In particular, **attitudes towards gays, the treatment of sex offenders and attitudes towards youth discipline and punishment became more conservative as a result of socialisation at the police academy and on the job**. Results indicate a general move towards more conservative attitudes as a result of socialisation.  There is a lot that can be said of police culture and identification, their \"us vs. them\" mentality and their feelings of isolation, the place of values related to masculinity and heterosexuality, and how police both selects people with certain attitudes and values and promotes these attitudes and values. But generally speaking, it does appear that the police can be conceived as an institution of control which is by its nature authoritarian and hierarchy-enhancin, and its members play the coherent role. And thus it can be argued that the police is attractive to the kind of people you would expect to find among both right-wingers and radical right-wingers, and that it allows them to flourish to some extent.  As a disclaimer, this is about attitudes, values, beliefs which do not automatically and directly translate into actions. That is another big chapter. And the above does not mean police as a general concept is inevitably authoritarian, xenophobic, etc. It is more complex than that.","human_ref_B":"This PBS report from 2016 links to a 2006 bulletin from the FBI noting that white supremacists were infiltrating American police departments. The bulletin has been mostly redacted since then. However, it shows there was (and perhaps still is) at least some alt-right\/fascists in law enforcement.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":37021.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"1zt5tq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Due to the closed nature of the country over the past 60+ years, what is the prevalence of HIV\/AIDS in North Korea?","c_root_id_A":"cfwq60w","c_root_id_B":"cfwt9fu","created_at_utc_A":1394204837,"created_at_utc_B":1394212002,"score_A":33,"score_B":67,"human_ref_A":"according to official sources, north korea is aids-free and gay-free  http:\/\/connection.ebscohost.com\/c\/articles\/15907847\/north-korea-reports-zero-hiv-cases-claims-has-no-gays  i think nobody knows. but there are anecdotal reports: http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/correspondents\/s430901.htm","human_ref_B":"I'm an infectious diseases physician. It's quite possible that there is no HIV in North Korea as the country has been isolated since before the HIV epidemic began. If properly done it can be an effective way to avoid spread of disease (we do this regularly in the hospital for patient rooms).  I suspect that there are plenty of people in North Korea having unprotected sexual intercourse so once HIV establishes itself within North Korea it will be a problem (if it hasn't happened already). The little I know about North Korea would make it hard for me to believe any claims they might make about prevalence even if they are the truth. I'm especially concerned that they may not have the infrastructure in place to accurately know the prevalence of any disease that is within their population.  **Edit:** I should have mentioned that other common modes of obtaining HIV are through IV drug abuse and through the healthcare system (Blood transfusion, improper sterilization of equipment).  * CDC guidelines for isolation which includes information about HIV and patient isolation in the hospital (we do not isolate individuals with HIV for HIV alone). Notice this is very different than isolating an entire country. http:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/hicpac\/pdf\/isolation\/Isolation2007.pdf   Let's say that someone from North Korea is exposed to an individual who has HIV from another country, what are the chances they will get HIV (and then spread it within North Korea):  By exposure type per UpToDate: http:\/\/www.uptodate.com\/contents\/nonoccupational-exposure-to-hiv-in-adults?source=see_link&anchor=H9053137#H9053137 (multiple citations):   **Among Men who have sex with men:**  * Receptive anal intercourse \u2013 One transmission per 200 sex acts * Insertive anal intercourse \u2013 Six transmissions per 10,000 sex acts * Receptive oral sex \u2013 One transmission per 10,000 sex acts  **Heterosexual intercourse:**  * Receptive anal intercourse \u2013 One transmission per 200 sex acts * Receptive vaginal intercourse \u2013 One transmission per 1000 sex acts * Insertive vaginal intercourse \u2013 Five transmissions per 10,000 sex acts  * HSV infection increases sexual HIV tranmission risk by 4x   **Other exposures:**  * Needle or syringe sharing \u2013 0.67 percent per needle-sharing contact * Mucous membrane exposure to blood (eg, splash to eye) \u2013 0.1 percent per exposure * Other exposure (eg, human bite) \u2013 0.004 percent  Citations for above information:  * http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed?term=15809897 * http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed?term=15809897 * http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed?term=9091810 * http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed?term=14718321 * http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed?term=15577628 * http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed?term=10430236 * http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed?term=1403641 * http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed?term=2898067 * http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed?term=1684098 * http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed?term=8216983","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7165.0,"score_ratio":2.0303030303}
{"post_id":"atkdxn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"As the US already spends more per pupil than any other nation and yet has consistently lukewarm results, what are some promising reforms being proposed or researched that go beyond \"Just throw more money at it\"?","c_root_id_A":"eh25dnv","c_root_id_B":"eh288go","created_at_utc_A":1550871486,"created_at_utc_B":1550873454,"score_A":7,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Gallup--an organisation devoted to human potential that measures things that are hard to measure, such as excellence and how to create it--have some good stuff on education. They have a book about how to make good schools, and another about good teachers:  >Learn what great teachers do differently in Teach With Your Strengths. Discover fresh approaches to bring public schools back to life in Building Engaged Schools and learn what motivates great teachers and inspires students to tap into the considerable potential in America's classrooms.  https:\/\/www.gallup.com\/education\/227657\/improve-k-12.aspx  Another approach is to focus on the business side, which TMBC handles well with their research on managers and performance acceleration.   Gallup also have have a great book called, 'Now, Discover Your Strengths,' which is about using a research and strengths based approach to designing and running a business. This would also apply to schools, and I hear from some teachers certain areas use Gallup's selection tool for hiring, which theoretically, should give rise to better hires.   In Australia, the government is also committing to hiring better teachers, and making it harder to becoming a teacher. This is wise,since I'm sure you'll remember from school some teachers just weren't suited to the job. That's a hiring problem. Easily fixed. Unsure if their solution will be effective, but the intention is sound. People shouldn't be able to do whatever they want to do. The research shows that's a bad idea. (1 in 10 people have the right talents to be a good manager, for example. The rest are either mediocre, or bad. The more experience I have, the more I realise bad and mediocre produce similar results, ultimately. They fuck up people's lives. Not because they're bad people, but because they aren't suited to the role of management, that research shows is the most important role in an organisation. Employees already feel this, but aren't always able to trace bad work experiences back to bad management. When you know the signs, though, it's obvious)    https:\/\/www.smh.com.au\/politics\/nsw\/new-nsw-teachers-to-require-a-credit-average-superior-intelligence-20180902-p501ao.html  Jennifer Fox is also a pioneer in this field. If you check out her YouTube channel, she has some content about the 'affinities program' she designed, which was used to help students other schools didn't want (due to their poorly designed systems not being able to handle diversity) get great results and show those students can do well if you don't suck. She had some promising projects under development, but I'm not sure what happened to them. She also has a book called, 'Your child's strengths.'  Sugata Mitra, who did the famous TED Talks, also does cool stuff, but I'm not sure how applicable it is to public eduction in developed nations.   All of this can be summer up as the \"just throw good design and strengths-based approaches\" at it.","human_ref_B":"I can't contribute an answer nor references, but hope my point\/question falls into rule 3 to focus the original question...  Compared to what does the US produce lukewarm results? What other countries and across what populations? The US goes out of the way to provide a K12 education to EVERY person. So when you say lukewarm results, do those surveys compare ALL people of same age in various countries? Or only those people who are enrolled in a school? Or only those enrolled in a certain kind of school?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1968.0,"score_ratio":3.1428571429}
{"post_id":"atkdxn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"As the US already spends more per pupil than any other nation and yet has consistently lukewarm results, what are some promising reforms being proposed or researched that go beyond \"Just throw more money at it\"?","c_root_id_A":"eh1z19k","c_root_id_B":"eh288go","created_at_utc_A":1550867073,"created_at_utc_B":1550873454,"score_A":5,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"I think there's a lot of promise for college level academics in Harkness discussions and Flipped Classrooms. I think I actually like the idea of flipped classrooms the best because at the academic level, students can read and learn new concepts; the point where having a PhD would be helpful is in the application of those ideas. The higher level interactions with new ideas are the most important part and therefore the place where a teacher should be implemented.   &#x200B;  https:\/\/www.nais.org\/magazine\/independent-teacher\/fall-2008\/introducing-and-using-the-discussion-(aka-harkness\/             \\-An article on the Harkness Discussion  &#x200B;  https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/07294360.2014.934336  \\-A definition and application for the term \"Flipped Classroom\"  &#x200B;  http:\/\/www.asee.org\/file\\_server\/papers\/attachment\/file\/0003\/3259\/6219.pdf   \\-An overview of the theoretical advantages and a Meta analysis on the performance of Flipped Classrooms.","human_ref_B":"I can't contribute an answer nor references, but hope my point\/question falls into rule 3 to focus the original question...  Compared to what does the US produce lukewarm results? What other countries and across what populations? The US goes out of the way to provide a K12 education to EVERY person. So when you say lukewarm results, do those surveys compare ALL people of same age in various countries? Or only those people who are enrolled in a school? Or only those enrolled in a certain kind of school?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6381.0,"score_ratio":4.4}
{"post_id":"atkdxn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"As the US already spends more per pupil than any other nation and yet has consistently lukewarm results, what are some promising reforms being proposed or researched that go beyond \"Just throw more money at it\"?","c_root_id_A":"eh25dnv","c_root_id_B":"eh1z19k","created_at_utc_A":1550871486,"created_at_utc_B":1550867073,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Gallup--an organisation devoted to human potential that measures things that are hard to measure, such as excellence and how to create it--have some good stuff on education. They have a book about how to make good schools, and another about good teachers:  >Learn what great teachers do differently in Teach With Your Strengths. Discover fresh approaches to bring public schools back to life in Building Engaged Schools and learn what motivates great teachers and inspires students to tap into the considerable potential in America's classrooms.  https:\/\/www.gallup.com\/education\/227657\/improve-k-12.aspx  Another approach is to focus on the business side, which TMBC handles well with their research on managers and performance acceleration.   Gallup also have have a great book called, 'Now, Discover Your Strengths,' which is about using a research and strengths based approach to designing and running a business. This would also apply to schools, and I hear from some teachers certain areas use Gallup's selection tool for hiring, which theoretically, should give rise to better hires.   In Australia, the government is also committing to hiring better teachers, and making it harder to becoming a teacher. This is wise,since I'm sure you'll remember from school some teachers just weren't suited to the job. That's a hiring problem. Easily fixed. Unsure if their solution will be effective, but the intention is sound. People shouldn't be able to do whatever they want to do. The research shows that's a bad idea. (1 in 10 people have the right talents to be a good manager, for example. The rest are either mediocre, or bad. The more experience I have, the more I realise bad and mediocre produce similar results, ultimately. They fuck up people's lives. Not because they're bad people, but because they aren't suited to the role of management, that research shows is the most important role in an organisation. Employees already feel this, but aren't always able to trace bad work experiences back to bad management. When you know the signs, though, it's obvious)    https:\/\/www.smh.com.au\/politics\/nsw\/new-nsw-teachers-to-require-a-credit-average-superior-intelligence-20180902-p501ao.html  Jennifer Fox is also a pioneer in this field. If you check out her YouTube channel, she has some content about the 'affinities program' she designed, which was used to help students other schools didn't want (due to their poorly designed systems not being able to handle diversity) get great results and show those students can do well if you don't suck. She had some promising projects under development, but I'm not sure what happened to them. She also has a book called, 'Your child's strengths.'  Sugata Mitra, who did the famous TED Talks, also does cool stuff, but I'm not sure how applicable it is to public eduction in developed nations.   All of this can be summer up as the \"just throw good design and strengths-based approaches\" at it.","human_ref_B":"I think there's a lot of promise for college level academics in Harkness discussions and Flipped Classrooms. I think I actually like the idea of flipped classrooms the best because at the academic level, students can read and learn new concepts; the point where having a PhD would be helpful is in the application of those ideas. The higher level interactions with new ideas are the most important part and therefore the place where a teacher should be implemented.   &#x200B;  https:\/\/www.nais.org\/magazine\/independent-teacher\/fall-2008\/introducing-and-using-the-discussion-(aka-harkness\/             \\-An article on the Harkness Discussion  &#x200B;  https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/07294360.2014.934336  \\-A definition and application for the term \"Flipped Classroom\"  &#x200B;  http:\/\/www.asee.org\/file\\_server\/papers\/attachment\/file\/0003\/3259\/6219.pdf   \\-An overview of the theoretical advantages and a Meta analysis on the performance of Flipped Classrooms.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4413.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"6tqb48","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why does slavery seem to be the cornerstone, and a defining element of American culture, but is rarely brought up in other socio-political cultures? Now obviously you can question the very premise of the aforementioned question, but I think it is fair to say that in Irish, British, and Canadian etc socio-political debates, slavery rarely is brought up, but in the U.S there is always some talk going on about slavery.","c_root_id_A":"dlnmcur","c_root_id_B":"dlnfsmg","created_at_utc_A":1502810145,"created_at_utc_B":1502802040,"score_A":33,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Why is slavery a defining element in American culture? Simply because there are enough descendants of those slaves to matter politically, along with historical details that matter.  Canada's black population is 2.5% of the total population. Further, of that 2.5% only a minority are the descendants of slaves, most are refugees from Africa arriving in the 1970s and 1980s. And, like those refugees, those Canadians who were descended from slaves were rescued from slavery or were Loyalists already free. So, obviously, their relation to that history is very different from America.  The UK has 3% of its population identified as 'Black\/African\/Caribbean\/Black British'. Of those, many are citizens of former imperial colonies, and not descendants of slaves. Although a significant amount are the descendants of enslaved Africans.  America by contrast has 13.3% of its population being of African descent, and of those, the vast majority being descendants of slaves. However, the picture is complex, as some of these descendants of slaves intermarried or intermingled with Americans of European origin, aboriginal Americans, as well as later economic immigrants from the Caribbean (who may also be descended from slaves), and latin America. What's more, the descendants of slaves in America tend to be highly concentrated geographically, creating regions of the country where the representative percentage of the population is even higher.  Using recent DNA studies, the details of this intermingling have become clear (via The Root):  >According to Ancestry.com, the average African American is 65 percent sub-Saharan African, 29 percent European and 2 percent Native American.  >According to 23andme.com, the average African American is 75 percent sub-Saharan African, 22 percent European and only 0.6 percent Native American.   >According to Family Tree DNA.com, the average African American is 72.95 percent sub-Saharan African, 22.83 percent European and 1.7 percent Native American.  >According to National Geographic's Genographic Project, the average African American is 80 percent sub-Saharan African, 19 percent European and 1 percent Native American.  In summary, the simplest answer to your question is that there are enough people in this country who have a personal, historical, and socio-biological stake in slave descendancy, that it matters to everyone. A more complex answer is that geography, genetic admixture, and socio-polltical forces amplify the importance of this diverse, somewhat ambiguous group's representation, making it an essential constituency in the democracy and culture milieu. An example of this amplification is found in this Gallup poll which shows a gross exaggeration in the minds of Americans as to the size of the African American population.  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Black_Canadians  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Black_British#Population  https:\/\/www.census.gov\/quickfacts\/fact\/table\/US\/PST045216  https:\/\/www.theroot.com\/exactly-how-black-is-black-america-1790895185","human_ref_B":"The US became a global economic power through the use of slave power to drive cash crop industries: namely tobacco, sugar and cotton. With the invention of the cotton gin came a much higher demand for slaves in  a the South, despite abolition movements taking place in the more industrialized North. Slavery was an integral part of the American economy, particularly in the South, where the climate was ideal for these crops. American ideology and philosophy adapted to this and it became a moral imperative, for many, for the white man to shelter and provide work for his \"lesser\" black brethren. These social constructs helped imbue the institution of slavery into the fabric of American Life itself. Many actually realized the moral dilemma but argued that to free the slaves would cause more ultimate harm than good:  >We have the wolf by the ear, and we can neither hold him, nor safely let him go. Justice is in one scale, and self-preservation in the other. -Thomas Jefferson, 1820  http:\/\/www.loc.gov\/exhibits\/jefferson\/159.html  http:\/\/abolition.e2bn.org\/slavery_43.html http:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wgbh\/aia\/part4\/4h3141t.html http:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wnet\/african-americans-many-rivers-to-cross\/history\/why-was-cotton-king\/","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8105.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"15e6fy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"As someone who is tri-lingual, I have noticed there are some thoughts that are hard to express in certain languages.  How can we be sure that there are not some thoughts that cannot be expressed in any human language?","c_root_id_A":"c7lobin","c_root_id_B":"c7lo96g","created_at_utc_A":1356391005,"created_at_utc_B":1356390681,"score_A":15,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Ah, the good ol' Sapir\u2013Whorf hypothesis:  that language determines thought, rather than vice versa.  Orwell's version of the idea is most famous:  >The purpose of Newspeak was not only to provide a medium of expression for the world-view and mental habits proper to the devotees of IngSoc, but to make all other modes of thought impossible. It was intended that when Newspeak had been adopted once and for all and Oldspeak forgotten, a heretical thought -- that is, a thought diverging from the principles of IngSoc -- should be literally unthinkable, at least so far as thought is dependent on words. Its vocabulary was so constructed as to give exact and often very subtle expression  to every meaning that a Party member could properly wish to express, while excluding all other meaning and also the possibility of arriving at them by indirect methods. This was done partly by the invention of new words, but chiefly by eliminating undesirable words and stripping such words as remained of unorthodox meanings, and so far as possible of all secondary meaning whatever.  It's a really neat idea, but, as far as I know, not how language works.  Whorf's arguments have been debunked; his claims that 'the Inuit have dozens of words for snow' and that 'the Hopi understand time differently' are practically the *archetypes* for bad linguistics.  It's true that some languages do have words and make distinctions that others don't, but 'hard' and 'impossible' are not the same thing, nor is thought necessarily speech.  English speakers felt pleasure at others' discomfiture long before *schadenfreude* was borrowed to describe the feeling.  That being said, there *are* thoughts that literally cannot be described in words.  The experience of the numinous in religious ecstasy has regularly been described as indescribable; there are purely subjective experiences for which language is insufficient unless the experiencer invents his own...","human_ref_B":"First, you'd need to address what qualifies as a thought and what degree of specificity counts as expressing the thought. I'd imagine most thoughts are mentally 'verbalized', but for those that are difficult to convey, there's a linguistic theory (Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis, I think) that states that our thoughts are either limited\/influenced by the languages we speak in the strong\/weak versions.   Source: I'm not a linguist, but I did take a linguistics class once.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":324.0,"score_ratio":2.1428571429}
{"post_id":"15e6fy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"As someone who is tri-lingual, I have noticed there are some thoughts that are hard to express in certain languages.  How can we be sure that there are not some thoughts that cannot be expressed in any human language?","c_root_id_A":"c7lvf21","c_root_id_B":"c7lp4o0","created_at_utc_A":1356431459,"created_at_utc_B":1356394997,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"think of a sound we cannot vocally reproduce.","human_ref_B":"Most things *are* hard to express through any human language. Emotions, complex ideas and visual expressions are all very hard to express. But are there some ideas which are impossible to express? Well - I believe some mathermatical ideas are impossible to express in any natural language. They are too complex, so that any non-shortened form would be impossible to process for the human brain.  Are there some thing which are impossible to express whatever the medium? Yes. How about the thoughts of your best friend at any moment - or for that matter our own. They are unknowable.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":36462.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"15e6fy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"As someone who is tri-lingual, I have noticed there are some thoughts that are hard to express in certain languages.  How can we be sure that there are not some thoughts that cannot be expressed in any human language?","c_root_id_A":"c7lp6ay","c_root_id_B":"c7lvf21","created_at_utc_A":1356395238,"created_at_utc_B":1356431459,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Try \/r\/linguistics","human_ref_B":"think of a sound we cannot vocally reproduce.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":36221.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"15e6fy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"As someone who is tri-lingual, I have noticed there are some thoughts that are hard to express in certain languages.  How can we be sure that there are not some thoughts that cannot be expressed in any human language?","c_root_id_A":"c7lvf21","c_root_id_B":"c7luy3v","created_at_utc_A":1356431459,"created_at_utc_B":1356426497,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"think of a sound we cannot vocally reproduce.","human_ref_B":"Not a scientific opinion *by any means*, but as someone with Aspergers I can completely confirm there are thoughts that (I would say) are *impossible* to express in language. I tend to think conceptually, which is normal enough, but apparently I do so in such a way that is either incredibly stupid or incredibly advanced, such that many of the ideas and perceptions I have about the world are near impossible to express in any accurate way.   I would give an example, but that would make me a liar. It would also be impossible.  Like I said, not at all scientific, but I thought it might be helpful to have a firsthand account :)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4962.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"d67w4i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why is the Japanese Rising Sun flag socially acceptable in the US while the Swastika is totally unacceptable? I occasionally see the Japanese Rising Sun flag on cars, clothes, wall arts, and etc., and they are never taken negatively in the US. In my limited knowledge of history, the Japanese Rising Sun represents Imperial Japan like how the Swastika represents Nazis. I'm curious as to why the Japanese Rising Sun is socially acceptable when Imperial Japan was the that directly attacked US soil during WW2 and was the \"main\" enemy of the US. Although Japan denies, isn't it almost certain that Imperial Japan massacred and experimented on human subjects same way the Nazis did. What makes Imperial Japan more acceptable than Nazis? look https:\/\/imgur.com\/a\/KsDsrus","c_root_id_A":"f0rlcc0","c_root_id_B":"f0qqebd","created_at_utc_A":1568886654,"created_at_utc_B":1568864354,"score_A":65,"score_B":37,"human_ref_A":"I suggest framing the question in the following manner could be illuminating: why is it controversial and offensive to South Koreans, and not so to Americans? Different histories and experiences with Japan, both before, during and after the war.  ---  To oversimplify and make a long story short, after Japan was defeated, the Allies, represented by American General Douglas MacArthur, successfully occupied and reformed Japan, and the USA made a precious ally out of an enemy (as Green argued, they became the US's *closest ally in the Pacific*).  The relationship between Japan and South Korea was and is different. Japan occupied *their* territories for several years, became associated with suffering and war crimes, and their post-war relationship has been much more strained and antagonistic, regardless of aligned interests.  Also, what Japan did to the USA during the war is not comparable to what Japan did to mainland Asia. The connection between the Rising Sun flag and the imperial military forces, and between these forces and their actions both during and before the war is much stronger and provokes stronger negative emotions.  To cite recent events for an example of how the controversy is framed in Asia, the chair of the South Korean parliamentary committee for sports An Min-Suk  said:  >**\"A flag symbolizing war is not suitable for peaceful Olympic Games,\"** An said in a press conference Tuesday.  >**\"The Rising Sun flag is akin to a symbol of the devil to Asians and Koreans**, just like how the swastika is a symbol of Nazis which reminds Europeans of invasion and horror.\"  After all, people do not tend to consider all the flags used by enemy countries as akin to Nazi swastikas, or to expect countries to change flags each time they lose a war. The Nazi swastika to Europe and the US, and the Rising Sun to Koreans and other Asians, evoke certain emotions for reasons related to their *particular* experiences and what these symbols mean to them.  Show a \"swastika\" in Japan and mainland Asia and it may not not evoke the same reactions as showing it to Western Europeans and Jewish people, if they even think Nazism!  ---  While acknowledging the controversial and contentious nature of the flag in question and its continued use, I would also observe that the comparison between the Rising Sun flag and the Nazi party's - and by extension Nazi Germany's - swastika is not that neat and straightforward as you suggest, although I would not suggest that the following nuances are what most Americans have in mind when looking at a swastika (regardless of its configuration\/orientation) and at the Rising Sun;  The Rising Sun itself (not the particular flag with 16 rays) is a national symbol which has been part of Japan since before Meiji and is part of Japanese identity. The Nazi swastika does not have the same status in regard to Germany (outside Nazi rule).  Japan is often called the Land of the Rising Sun, and the current national flag is the Nisshoki (rising sun flag) or the Hinomaru (sun disk) which is, of course, a sun too:  >The flag's origins are unknown (though the radical Buddhist priest Nichiren is sometimes credited) but **the hinomaru flag dates to at least the Warring States Period of Japan's history, in the 15th and 16th centuries**. It **officially became the national flag only in 1999**, partly due the the legacy of the War. **However, it was designated the country's flag as early as 1870 by the centralizing Meiji government and became a symbol of the new Japan after the rule of the Tokugawa regime**.  ---  Contrast for example how the swastika came to be the Nazi party's symbol. For example, per Boissoneault:  >**It wasn\u2019t until 1871 that German archeologist] Schliemann achieved his dream [of finding the ancient city of Troy]**. The discovery catapulted him to fame, and with his fame came a burst of interest in all that he uncovered. The intrepid archaeologist found his Homeric city, **but he also found something else: the swastika, a symbol that would be manipulated to shape world history** [...]  >**He would go on to see the swastika everywhere, from Tibet to Paraguay to the Gold Coast of Africa. And as Schliemann\u2019s exploits grew more famous, and archaeological discoveries became a way of creating a narrative of national identity, the swastika grew more prominent.** It exploded in popularity as a symbol of good fortune, appearing on Coca-Cola products, Boy Scouts\u2019 and Girls\u2019 Club materials and even American military uniforms, reports the BBC. **But as it rose to fame, the swastika became tied into a much more volatile movement: a wave of nationalism spreading across Germany.**  For example, contemporary scholar [Sayce wrote in 1896:  >Many theories have been presented concerning the symbolism of the Swastika, its relation to ancient deities and its representation of certain qualities. In the estimation of certain writers it has been respectively the emblem of Zeus, of Baal, of the sun, of the sun-god, of the sun-chariot of Agni the fire-god, of Indra the rain-god, of the sky, the sky-god, and finally the deity of all deities, the great God, the Maker and Ruler of the Universe. It has also been held to symbolize light or the god of light, of the forked lightning, and of water. **It is believed by some to have been the oldest Aryan symbol.**  You can read the rest of the Smithsonian article about how all of this came together with German nationalism and their brand of scientific racism.  ---  It is also true, and should be acknowledged, that the particular design of the Rising Sun flag had been adopted by Meiji Japan's military in the late 1800s, and that imperial Japan is the government which ultimately invaded Asia and committed war crimes, even though different people were involved.  But, perhaps a more appropriate comparison would be between the military Rising Sun flag and the Iron Cross which is associated with Prussian, German Empire, and Nazi Empire military. The *Eisernes Kreuz* remains the Bundeswehr's symbol, but the decoration itself was retired post-war and was subject to a controversial bid for reintroduction. To quote the Anti-Defemation League:  >**The Iron Cross is a famous German military medal dating back to the 19th century. During the 1930s, the Nazi regime in Germany superimposed a swastika on the traditional medal, turning it into a Nazi symbol**. After World War II, the medal was discontinued but **neo-Nazis and other white supremacists subsequently adopted it as a hate symbol and it has been a commonly-used hate symbol ever since.**  >...] **the use of the Iron Cross in a non-racist context has greatly proliferated in the United States, to the point that an Iron Cross in isolation** (i.e., without a superimposed swastika or without other accompanying hate symbols) cannot be determined to be a hate symbol. **Care must therefore be used to correctly interpret this symbol in whatever context in which it may be found.**  One might argue that the current Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force should at least modify its flag's design to clearly distinguish it from the original Imperial Navy's flag (contrast with the [Japan Self-Defense Forces and the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force). I leave that debate to the public forum.   My point is that the issues at hand are not as simple as \"Imperial Japan committed atrocities, therefore the flag their military used is equal to Nazi swastika\".","human_ref_B":"I'm not sure if there's a social science answer for this, but as a matter of context, the Rising Sun Flag *is controversial* in some quarters.  But beyond this, it's also *a currently used symbol* of Japan (especially the JMSDF) and not simply a historical symbol that is used purely in the context of Imperial Japan.  On the other hand the swastika was explicitly a symbol of the Nazi Party rather than a historical symbol of Germany that continues to be used.  So the question should probably be framed more along the lines of asking why does the Japanese government continue to use a symbol that is widely associated with its Imperial period when Germany no longer uses Nazi symbols?  This is a more complex question that I don't have a primary source explanation for, other than anecdotal discussions with Japanese nationals, so I'll refrain from commenting given the sub.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22300.0,"score_ratio":1.7567567568}
{"post_id":"8dl8lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Is anxiety \/ depression on the rise, are we more aware of it, or are we better at diagnosing it? I've come across a lot of people suffering from and overcoming anxiety\/depression. However, most of my observations are anecdotal, on social media (facebook, reddit, twitter, ect.), and appear to be mostly the 20 - 35 age category.  I was hypothesizing that if the early tiers of Maslow's hierarchy of needs are being met, specifically the physiological, safety, and social, then I'm seeing more people having issues with the esteem level and this is correlated to the amount of anxiety\/depression I see. I'm unsure what phrase to use when looking for academic articles relating them.  **Is anxiety\/depression on the rise, are we more aware of it, or are we better at diagnosing it?**","c_root_id_A":"dxpodl8","c_root_id_B":"dxp1i8v","created_at_utc_A":1524274480,"created_at_utc_B":1524249835,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Besides downstream effects that are less sensitive to changes in awareness and screening like other replies are addressing, you could also look at known causal influences.  Specifically, adverse childhood experiences have dose-dependent effects on all kinds of long term health outcomes, including depression.  From the journal article link on that page:  https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/17478264  >The strong relationship of the ACE Score to increased utilization of psychotropic medications underscores the contribution of childhood experience to the burden of adult mental illness. Moreover, the huge economic costs associated with the use of psychotropic medications provide additional incentive to address the high prevalence and consequences of childhood traumatic stressors.  https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/12161676  >Children in alcoholic households are more likely to have adverse experiences. The risk of alcoholism and depression in adulthood increases as the number of reported adverse experiences increases regardless of parental alcohol abuse. Depression among adult children of alcoholics appears to be largely, if not solely, due to the greater likelihood of having had adverse childhood experiences in a home with alcohol-abusing parents.  https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/15488250  >The number of ACEs has a graded relationship to both lifetime and recent depressive disorders. These results suggest that exposure to ACEs is associated with increased risk of depressive disorders up to decades after their occurrence. Early recognition of childhood abuse and appropriate intervention may thus play an important role in the prevention of depressive disorders throughout the life span.  https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/12900308  >Childhood physical and sexual abuse, as well as witnessing of maternal battering, were common among the adult members of an HMO in this study. Among those reporting any maltreatment, more than one-third had experienced more than one type of maltreatment. A dose-response relation was found between the number of types of maltreatment reported and mental health scores. In addition, an emotionally abusive family environment accentuated the decrements in mental health scores. Future research examining the effects of childhood maltreatment on adult mental health should include assessments of a wide range of abusive experiences, as well as the family atmosphere in which they occur.  Here's a site that slices ACE data along various demographics and correlated factors: https:\/\/www.childtrends.org\/indicators\/adverse-experiences\/.  While I haven't found historic trends for ACEs on a quick search, you could probably cross reference data like this with instances of anxiety and depression in the same populations and get a rough idea if the numbers seem to track.","human_ref_B":"Relevant links:   https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/mmwr\/volumes\/66\/wr\/mm6630a6.htm  https:\/\/motherboard.vice.com\/en_us\/article\/mb3nbx\/study-of-teenagers-suggests-association-between-excessive-screen-time-and-depression","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24645.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5daip7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What percentage of Trump voters are facing serious economic distress? I've heard that many people voted for Trump because they are in serious economic distress due to some combination of free trade, automation, and illegal immigration. So I'm curious: what percentage of Trump voters are currently facing serious economic distress? What percentage of Trump voters are actually in very poor situations with no likelihood of improvement any time soon without some dramatic change?  I've been going over exit polls and census data, but my math isn't strong enough to even come up with a rough estimate, which is all I'm really looking for. If anyone could come up with one and explain how they did so, that would be great. I really think it's important not just to recognize that this was a factor in the election, but also to understand how big of a factor it was.","c_root_id_A":"da3d7ij","c_root_id_B":"da3cuhe","created_at_utc_A":1479334515,"created_at_utc_B":1479334061,"score_A":57,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure there's any evidence that Trump voters are in \"serious economic distress\", but I don't think that's every really been an argument here. Data, such as the big analysis John Rothwell did at Gallup (the Washington Post's write up, Rothwell's write up, actual working paper), suggest that Trump voters tend to be if anything more secure than the country as a whole. One thing to note is that Rothwell is looking primarily at data collected in the primaries. But Rothwell wasn't alone in that conclusion\u2014FiveThirtyEight also was publishing articles as the primaries were still going on with titles like \"The Mythology Of Trump\u2019s \u2018Working Class\u2019 Support\".   However, much of the qualitative reporting I've read suggests that worries by older people about their *children's* and *grandchildren's* future was at play in a lot of decisions to vote for Trump. I particularly remember this coming out of FiveThirtyEight; here's a story Farai Chideya called \"Trump\u2019s Blue Collar Base Wants More Jobs And An America Like The Past\" that gets at this. Claire Malone at FiveThirtyEight also emphasized this point repeatedly, both in her writing and in their podcast: it's often worries about the *next* generation that seems to animate Trump voter's economic anxiety, as well as worries about the well-beings of their communities in general. I remember in particular Malone reporting on how people were worried that the next generation was going to have to move away. Here it's important to keep in mind that more than half the electorate is over 45, and where Trump most overperformed both polling and previous Republicans going back to the 1980's was in the Rust Belt. It's interesting in the Chideya piece I linked to that the people who expressed these worries most concretely had sent their children or grandchildren to college, but were worried about others in the community. Economists have argued that while economic returns on college degrees have increased little, particularly over the decade since the economic crisis, they're getting to be a better investment in part because wages for those without a college degree have been steadily falling over the same period. Here's a fairly representative paper from Abel and Deitz.  Here's how their conclusion begins:  >With tuition rising, wages falling, and many college graduates struggling to find good jobs, the value of a college degree may seem to be in doubt. However, these factors alone do not determine whether a college education is a good investment. Indeed, once the full set of costs and benefits is taken into account, investing in a college education still appears to be a wise economic decision for the average person.  >**Why is this the case? The answer lies in the declining fortunes of those without a college degree**\u2014a key consideration in assessing the economic costs and benefits of obtaining a college degree. On the benefit side, although the wages of college- educated workers have stagnated since the early 2000s\u2014and even declined in the years since the Great Recession\u2014the wages of high school graduates have also been falling. As a result, the college wage premium has remained near its all-time high. On the cost side, rising college tuition has largely been off set by the declining opportunity cost of attending school, which, again, is driven by the falling wages of high school graduates.  Much has been made about how the most noteable difference between Romney vs Obama and Trump vs. Clinton is that Trump won a larger share of whites without a college degree and Clinton won a larger share of whites with a college degree. I'm not sure exactly how the final voting turned out, but it was long talked about how Trump might be the first Republican in 60 years to lose college educated whites\u2014and how it might might not matter if Trump does sufficiently well with (White) voters without a college degree.   Exit polls suggest that Trump gained in the bottom two economic categories (that is, everyone below $50,000) and those with less than a college education (see here) but a some of that could simply be due to lower black turnout. Most of these discussion focus on white voters, and I haven't seen the post-election data on just them by income. By education, however, it's clear: Clinton did ten points better than Obama in 2012 with whites with a college degree (still losing the category, but narrowly), and Trump did *fourteen* points better than Romney with whites without a college degree.   But the main thrust of what I'm saying is this: I don't think anyone is making an argument that Trump voters are primarily responding to *accute* economic distress, but rather there is a good case to be made that some appear to be responding more *chronic* socio-economic distress. Unfortunately, many of the traditional direct measures of economic optimism or pessimism (such as questions about whether the country is on the right track or the wrong track) seem to be so penetrated by partistanism as to be useless as a measure of economic outlook (that is, Republicans tend to say that the economy is doing poorly under a Democrat and vice versa in a much more pronounced way than in the past). As the above link to the exit polls show, Clinton actually won voters who say \"the economy\" is their biggest issue 52%-42%... and Trump won people who say their economic situation is worse today than four years ago 78%-19%. I'm not sure that people have found a way to measure this longer term economic pessimism with a survey instrument that wasn't deeply affected by partisan polarization, though there may well be good survey questions out there on this subject.   The exit polls, at the very least, have Clinton winning the roughly third of voters who say the next generation will have a life \"better than today\" 59% to 38%, winning the quarter who say \"about the same\" 54% to 39%, but losing the third of voters who say that life for the next generation will be \"worse than today\" 31% to 63%. Certainly some of that is driven by partisanship (that is, if you look at data going back to other years, which the above link lets you do, Democrats consistently think the economy is better under a Democratic president and Republicans consistently think the economy is better under a Republicam president), but the qualitative reporting on this election seems to suggest that these long term economic concerns (particularly for their specific communities and for the younger generations of their families) were a genuine issue that commonly came up in interviews. When Trump voters talk about economic distress, it's more likely be a long term sort of economic distress\u2014\"What kind of opportunities will my children and grandchildren have?\", \"What will kids without a college degree do around here because all the jobs are going away?\"\u2014rather than a more immediate \"How will I pay my bills this month\" sort of economic distress.","human_ref_B":"I don't know if you're going to get good answers to those questions, just because of the nature of exit polling and the somewhat vagueness of your question. \"Serious economic distress\" isn't something that can easily be determined from a poll - at least in my opinion.  What I do know is that compared to the last election, trump improved his support by 16% for those making under 30k, and by 9% for those making 30k-50k. He also improved by 14% among whites without a college degree. That's the most meaningful statistic I can find. Sorry I wasn't more helpful.  Edit: They have a \"scale by population\" button on the top of that nytimes site that kind of visually shows how much each response is weighted. I didn't see any raw numbers though.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":454.0,"score_ratio":5.1818181818}
{"post_id":"50r3fy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why are there more White Female-Black Male couples than Black Female-White Male couples? (Or at least the media portrays it this way)","c_root_id_A":"d76txbh","c_root_id_B":"d76qabh","created_at_utc_A":1472829236,"created_at_utc_B":1472823931,"score_A":13,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I like this topic since it partially falls into my field (General American and World History).  Ok first off I'm going to talk about porn!!! Yes thats not the media that you were talking about but it is a really good place to go for an example because the porn industry is part of our culture and a good place to see that some of our more unsavory steryotypes have still stuck around.  No if you go to any porn site or even to \/r\/interracial_porn most of the videos you will see will be black men with white women. But if you look at enough of them you will usually start to see a pattern. That is they usually find the smallest, whitest, blondest girl and pair her up with this large hulking black guy.   This is playing into a stereotype that was created by southern slave owners about black men. That they were all large, well endowed, sex hungry animals that would forcefully take a white woman at the first chance they got. Even the first \"major\" movie made called Birth of a Nation was about the Klan protecting some white woman from a group of blacks.   Now while the porn industry doesn't have the exact same intention as the Klan did I just point it out to show that these types of stereotypes still exist in our culture. And really titles like \"Blond chick taking Mandingo cock\" isn't helping them. But it is interesting that so many interracial video's are of small white women and large black men. And while i could go on and on about sex and identity in the porn industry its time to move on.   But those are not the only stereotypes. This is a song in Avenue Q called Everyone is a little bit racist. I like this title not becasue i think everyone is a little bit racists but becasue each culture and sub culture has its own stereotypes.   For Black Americans dating out side their race can be complicated, heck the own colour of their skin (light or dark) can make life in their own communities complicated. For a black man or woman dating a white person they can be seen as dating up\/trading up meaning that people think that black women\/men aren't good enough since they are dating outside their race. Their are other things that go with this like race traitor, etc.  Asian americans also have their own stereotypes about different races (though theirs will vary more on what generation they are and less on where they come from). Asian men and women are less likely to date Black men and women becasue of skin color and the steryotypes of Blacks not being hard working. For Asian when it comes to skin colour i don't mean it as in becasue they are Africian but becasue lighter skin is though of as more attractive in that community. While dating White men\/women comes with the same idea of \"trading up\" to some members, or of marrying into at least a better life.  Each culture and each community has their own ideas when it comes to dating inside and outside their race. But their is also a larger culture that influences many of these smaller cultures. And that is the White American culture. So for many of these groups they are dealing with the stereotypes they have grown up with in their homes as well as the ones they were seeing in the media (tv, music, porn). So their is a lot of cultural baggage that comes with interracial dating, not to mention its only been since the 70's that interracial marriage has been legal in the US (most of the US anyways) among blacks and whites (Spanish\/Mexican are considered white in this case and having an after the Korean war their were a lot of GI's coming home with Asian wives).   But this isn't really answering your question as to why. and for that I don't really have an answer. But their are some ways we can look at it.   For one it could be the idea of trying to get rid of some of the cultural baggage. Get rid of the idea of the scary black man taking all the white women or the idea of the white woman being with the black man only because he is well endowed.   IT could be the same reason the same reason that white men are usually paired with asian women when it comes to on screen interracial romance. The fact that for White men Asian women seem to be the most popular pick after women of the same race. And actually in studies its shown that for non white dating interracial that whites are usually the most popular category in America. I'm not sure if its due to population (we still do make up 65% of the nation) or our media telling us that white features are more attractive.  Also as for white guys dating black women their was something interesting i heard someone say. Basically that many black women didn't think white men would be attracted to them to begin with. And that it was the same way with white men dating black women. That for both groups they just didn't think the other would want to date them.   Disclaimer: Everything i talked about deals with culture in a whole. I like to think that who ever is dating who is doing it becasue they like the person and not due to any inherent bias or stereotype.   Forgot some sources my bad.  http:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/fact-tank\/2015\/06\/12\/interracial-marriage-who-is-marrying-out\/  https:\/\/dash.harvard.edu\/bitstream\/handle\/1\/9887633\/galinsky,hall,cuddy_gendered-races.pdf?sequence=1  https:\/\/www.psychologytoday.com\/blog\/it-s-man-s-and-woman-s-world\/201407\/understanding-interracial-relationships (while not a source in its self has some of the ones I've read before and is a good little write up)  And a text book that i don't have infront of me at the moment and cant remember. But I'll add it later today when I can find it.","human_ref_B":"The numbers are very disparate, and there is a lot of discussion about why exactly.  * 2012 Pew report http:\/\/www.pewsocialtrends.org\/2012\/02\/16\/the-rise-of-intermarriage\/2\/ * 2003 UPI report on US Census numbers http:\/\/www.upi.com\/Odd_News\/2003\/03\/14\/Interracial-marriage-gender-gap-grows\/86571047663924\/ * 1997 National Review article http:\/\/www1.udel.edu\/educ\/gottfredson\/color\/articles\/sailer.html * 1990 editorial by Arthur Hu http:\/\/www.arthurhu.com\/97\/06\/aismen.txt","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5305.0,"score_ratio":1.0833333333}
{"post_id":"1m7xkb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Is it true that fan violence is more common in European sports than in American sports because traditionally in Europe, fanbases were based around deep political, religious and ethnic divisions?","c_root_id_A":"cc6my1f","c_root_id_B":"cc6o8co","created_at_utc_A":1378955563,"created_at_utc_B":1378959292,"score_A":6,"score_B":232,"human_ref_A":"This is a great question but I would also consider crossposting to \/r\/AskHistory. They may havemore on history of sports.","human_ref_B":"Yes.  Football teams, for the most part, are what you're thinking of.  Most of the time, football teams in Europe began 'organically'. For example, England's league system is currently a 'pyramid' - Burgess Hill Albion Football Club are technically in the same set up as Manchester United, just *24* tiers lower. If the were good enough, they could make that 23. If there was a miracle, they could be in the Premier League within the lifetime of a fan. Similar things have happened where teams like Castel di Sangro - whose stadium at 8000 is larger than their population of 6000 - have made their way to Serie B, the second highest level in Italy. In comparison to most US team sports, where teams move from city to city, ~~all~~ the players and franchises are owned by a central body\\*, and rules exist to (ironically) stop real open-market competition, European football allows for far more involvement in the local community and with the fans. For instance, my wife and I own part of our local football club and my wife has been elected to the board of management. We are friendly with the players. We're not a very big club but *it's ours*, and the good days are all the better for it when you've had 99 bad days.  What has this to do with fans? Well, it has always been like this, for more than a hundred years. The biggest controversy in modern football is the fear of \"franchising\". There are clubs that are nearly 150 years old; they began often as groups of friends, groups of hobbyists, and so on. Leagues were created for the sake of playing football, not for Sports Entertainment ^^TM. The organic nature of things means that the fans have a commitment to the team, just as the team have a commitment to the fans. Many clubs are in fact owned and run by fan organisations; in Italy, it would often been a local co-operative that elects leaders. Even the biggest clubs - at least until very, very recently - would have had some deep connection with their local area.  If the (most deeply committed) fans are all from one area, it is likely that they are often part of one race, economic status or religion. This is sometimes very very opaque - Glasgow Celtic and their fans, for example, do absolutely everything in their power to play up their links to local Irish immigrants (ironically, to the detriment of actual Irish football teams). When it is this opaque, it becomes an issue when they face a team with obviously very different 'values'.  Most often, the biggest rivalries will be within a city; for example, Glasgow Celtic's main rivals are Glasgow Rangers, who (almost just because Celtic put the Irish flag in everyone's faces) put the Union flag everywhere. The clubs would have operated on strict rules in the past - Celtic being the last club to win the European Cup (today called the humorously inaccurate 'Champions League' which is neither a league nor exclusive to champions) with a group of men all born within 50 miles of the stadium, and all Catholic. The first player to move between the two clubs was in the 1980s I believe, after more than a 100 years of sharing a city.  Around Europe and South America, clubs began to represent something more than just the football or the immediate local area. Lazio, for example, are a \"right wing club\"; while St. Pauli are a \"socialist club\". Again within cities, Lazio are \"middle class\", Roma are \"working class\". In Buenos Aires, Boca Junior (the club of Maradona) represent the more working class people; River Plate (Alfredo di Stefano) represent the upper class; similarly, in Istanbul, Galatasaray are considered a middle class team while Fenerbahce are working class team. Some rivalries were created by actual divisions within a single original club - Internazionale of Milan were created when a deep fracture occurred in Milan's football club regarding whether or not international players should be signed; Fluminense of Rio de Janeiro hate Flamengo because it was a nothing club until half their players mutinied and join their local rivals.  Outside of cities, rivalries can occur because of nationalism; Real Madrid (literally, the Madrid 'Royals') represent the dominance of the kingdom of Castille within Spain, while Barcelona have always been the unofficial 'national team' of the separatist Catalan region. Derry City FC represented the largest 'Republican\/Catholic' city in Northern Ireland, and had so much trouble with the rest of their mostly Protestant\/Unionist league (particularly Linfield FC, who act like a midget version of Glasgow Rangers) that they were removed and now play in the Republic's league.  These were the origins of deep animosity between clubs and their fans. These are the baselines where there would always have been issues. However, in the 70s and 80s, a culture grew up of 'firms'. Even clubs that were previously apolitical found themselves at the centre of violence as people used them as a rallying point for groups which had very little to do with the actual football. Like gangs in the USA it was often less about who you supported than who you wanted to be friends with. They would avoid fighting 'normal' fans unless provoked; it got to the point where the fights were arranged away from the stadium so there would be less police around. It became a sport in itself, almost, with some flags and football shirts thrown in just to clarify what side you were on.  There have been *major* riots that weren't just groups of idiots kicking sods of out each other with nothing to do with sports, but not as many as you'd think. Some events are so broadly divisive that they can spark this between otherwise normal sets of fans, like the city rivalries above, or Ireland taking the lead against England in the middle of The Troubles (we, suspiciously for the supposed randomness of tie selections, have not been paired with them for a game since). But the worst stuff (and it still goes on, in countries like Netherlands and Poland, to a lesser degree and often far from the stadium) is generally the organised fighting which at this point has as much to do with football as the \"Champions League\" has to do with Champions.  \\* *The way US sports groups are organised is not universal but these characteristics are common and all leagues will have some element of it. I initially said \"all\" clubs were owned by a central body but evidently in other sports this is not true, though they are so closely contracted that it becomes almost a Catholic dogma - the teams and the league body are 'separate but indivisible'. I am sure the asker of the question is more familiar with the intimate details than I am, I am hoping my answer achieved its aim of illuminating how it has worked in the rest of the world.*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3729.0,"score_ratio":38.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80gp3s","c_root_id_B":"c80cbcn","created_at_utc_A":1358719525,"created_at_utc_B":1358705223,"score_A":44,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"Demographic Transition  Basically every country goes through 4 stages of population growth that start with high birth and death rates and ends with low birth and death rates. If more people(especially on reddit) knew about it, they would realize that their malthusian fears of overpopulation are unfounded.","human_ref_B":"Opportunity cost, sunk cost, comparative advantage.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14302.0,"score_ratio":1.5172413793}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80cjwk","c_root_id_B":"c80gp3s","created_at_utc_A":1358706007,"created_at_utc_B":1358719525,"score_A":28,"score_B":44,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Availability_heuristic  Watch a lot of TV shows with black criminals and honest cops? Well, that can affect your judgement.","human_ref_B":"Demographic Transition  Basically every country goes through 4 stages of population growth that start with high birth and death rates and ends with low birth and death rates. If more people(especially on reddit) knew about it, they would realize that their malthusian fears of overpopulation are unfounded.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13518.0,"score_ratio":1.5714285714}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80e32l","c_root_id_B":"c80gp3s","created_at_utc_A":1358711107,"created_at_utc_B":1358719525,"score_A":24,"score_B":44,"human_ref_A":"Isaiah Berlin's theory of negative and positive liberty.   In short: Negative liberty is the absence of external obstacles or constraints--freedom *from* something. Positive liberty is essentially self-determination and\/or self-realization-- freedom *to* do something.  Let's say you are an alcoholic artist. You are not being forced by any external entity to drink. So you are free from interference in the negative sense. But because of your addiction, you lack the ability to spend your time and energy doing your art, which is the one thing that fulfills you. So you are not free in the positive sense. You are not free to spend your time as you wish and you are not free to fulfill yourself through creating art.   As the example illustrates, negative freedom involves the *absence* of external coercion. Berlin identifies negative liberty as the answer to this question: \"What is the area within which the subject \u2014 a person or group of persons \u2014 is or should be left to do or be what he is able to do or be, without interference by other persons?\"   But positive freedom requires the *presence* of something that enables one to achieve self-realization and\/or autonomy. Berlin says that positive liberty can be identified with the question, \"What, or who, is the source of control or interference that can determine someone to do, or be, this rather than that?\"   This distinction between negative and positive freedom lies at the heart of fundamental disagreements over the role of government. Libertarians, for instance, are primarily concerned with negative freedom--freedom from governmental interference in the form of regulations. But many Democrats, on the other hand, are concerned with positive freedom--freedom to realize one's life goals and determine the course of one's life. Helping people achieve positive freedom may require government programs like free tutoring services for low income students.  The theory is also important to the concept of group rights vs. individual rights. Very often, systemic discrimination will mean a minority is unable to achieve positive liberty. The very poor are not being coerced to starve under bridges, so they are free in the negative sense. But they are not free in the positive sense of being able to achieve what they want with their lives.  I hope that was clear. If you're still fuzzy, the Stanford Encylopedia of Philosophy has a very good entry on the theory. You can also read Berlin's essay yourself here (pdf).","human_ref_B":"Demographic Transition  Basically every country goes through 4 stages of population growth that start with high birth and death rates and ends with low birth and death rates. If more people(especially on reddit) knew about it, they would realize that their malthusian fears of overpopulation are unfounded.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8418.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80c6gb","c_root_id_B":"c80gp3s","created_at_utc_A":1358704765,"created_at_utc_B":1358719525,"score_A":13,"score_B":44,"human_ref_A":"marx's critiques of ideology and alienation are pretty profound.","human_ref_B":"Demographic Transition  Basically every country goes through 4 stages of population growth that start with high birth and death rates and ends with low birth and death rates. If more people(especially on reddit) knew about it, they would realize that their malthusian fears of overpopulation are unfounded.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14760.0,"score_ratio":3.3846153846}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80gp3s","c_root_id_B":"c80ga8s","created_at_utc_A":1358719525,"created_at_utc_B":1358718204,"score_A":44,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Demographic Transition  Basically every country goes through 4 stages of population growth that start with high birth and death rates and ends with low birth and death rates. If more people(especially on reddit) knew about it, they would realize that their malthusian fears of overpopulation are unfounded.","human_ref_B":"Duverger's Law in political science. We'd be so much better off if people in first-past-the-post systems who wanted additional ideological options in politics worked harder to advance alternative points of view and ideological competition within major parties (through primaries, etc) than inefficiently spend their limited resources trying to create third parties which are unsustainable.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1321.0,"score_ratio":3.1428571429}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80f1k3","c_root_id_B":"c80gp3s","created_at_utc_A":1358714232,"created_at_utc_B":1358719525,"score_A":13,"score_B":44,"human_ref_A":"I've been on Reddit for years and this is probably the best question I've seen someone ask. Thank you!","human_ref_B":"Demographic Transition  Basically every country goes through 4 stages of population growth that start with high birth and death rates and ends with low birth and death rates. If more people(especially on reddit) knew about it, they would realize that their malthusian fears of overpopulation are unfounded.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5293.0,"score_ratio":3.3846153846}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80gp3s","c_root_id_B":"c80g64x","created_at_utc_A":1358719525,"created_at_utc_B":1358717838,"score_A":44,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Demographic Transition  Basically every country goes through 4 stages of population growth that start with high birth and death rates and ends with low birth and death rates. If more people(especially on reddit) knew about it, they would realize that their malthusian fears of overpopulation are unfounded.","human_ref_B":"In philosophy: The basic structure of the different positions in the free-will debate: compatibalism and incompatibalism, and the two varieties of incompatibalism, libertarianism and hard determinism.   Freedom is the most serious philosophical issue of our age, imo. It's our primary cultural value in the west, but we don't even know what freedom is. If people at least had that basic schema in hand, perhaps we could begin to have a real discussion about this thing that we all supposedly want.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1687.0,"score_ratio":4.8888888889}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80gp3s","c_root_id_B":"c80d7zm","created_at_utc_A":1358719525,"created_at_utc_B":1358708220,"score_A":44,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Demographic Transition  Basically every country goes through 4 stages of population growth that start with high birth and death rates and ends with low birth and death rates. If more people(especially on reddit) knew about it, they would realize that their malthusian fears of overpopulation are unfounded.","human_ref_B":"Computational Theory of Mind: The brain is a computer. In an abstract sense the brain works along the same engineering principles as computers (information-processing systems), in the same way the heart is a pump, the liver is a filter, etc. 99% of science is knowing how to ask the right questions, and I think this is the only way we know how to ask the right questions in psychology, and what answers to those questions should look like. Here's more: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Computational_theory_of_mind","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11305.0,"score_ratio":11.0}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80cbcn","c_root_id_B":"c80c6gb","created_at_utc_A":1358705223,"created_at_utc_B":1358704765,"score_A":29,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Opportunity cost, sunk cost, comparative advantage.","human_ref_B":"marx's critiques of ideology and alienation are pretty profound.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":458.0,"score_ratio":2.2307692308}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80cjwk","c_root_id_B":"c80c6gb","created_at_utc_A":1358706007,"created_at_utc_B":1358704765,"score_A":28,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Availability_heuristic  Watch a lot of TV shows with black criminals and honest cops? Well, that can affect your judgement.","human_ref_B":"marx's critiques of ideology and alienation are pretty profound.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1242.0,"score_ratio":2.1538461538}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80c6gb","c_root_id_B":"c80e32l","created_at_utc_A":1358704765,"created_at_utc_B":1358711107,"score_A":13,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"marx's critiques of ideology and alienation are pretty profound.","human_ref_B":"Isaiah Berlin's theory of negative and positive liberty.   In short: Negative liberty is the absence of external obstacles or constraints--freedom *from* something. Positive liberty is essentially self-determination and\/or self-realization-- freedom *to* do something.  Let's say you are an alcoholic artist. You are not being forced by any external entity to drink. So you are free from interference in the negative sense. But because of your addiction, you lack the ability to spend your time and energy doing your art, which is the one thing that fulfills you. So you are not free in the positive sense. You are not free to spend your time as you wish and you are not free to fulfill yourself through creating art.   As the example illustrates, negative freedom involves the *absence* of external coercion. Berlin identifies negative liberty as the answer to this question: \"What is the area within which the subject \u2014 a person or group of persons \u2014 is or should be left to do or be what he is able to do or be, without interference by other persons?\"   But positive freedom requires the *presence* of something that enables one to achieve self-realization and\/or autonomy. Berlin says that positive liberty can be identified with the question, \"What, or who, is the source of control or interference that can determine someone to do, or be, this rather than that?\"   This distinction between negative and positive freedom lies at the heart of fundamental disagreements over the role of government. Libertarians, for instance, are primarily concerned with negative freedom--freedom from governmental interference in the form of regulations. But many Democrats, on the other hand, are concerned with positive freedom--freedom to realize one's life goals and determine the course of one's life. Helping people achieve positive freedom may require government programs like free tutoring services for low income students.  The theory is also important to the concept of group rights vs. individual rights. Very often, systemic discrimination will mean a minority is unable to achieve positive liberty. The very poor are not being coerced to starve under bridges, so they are free in the negative sense. But they are not free in the positive sense of being able to achieve what they want with their lives.  I hope that was clear. If you're still fuzzy, the Stanford Encylopedia of Philosophy has a very good entry on the theory. You can also read Berlin's essay yourself here (pdf).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6342.0,"score_ratio":1.8461538462}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80d7zm","c_root_id_B":"c80e32l","created_at_utc_A":1358708220,"created_at_utc_B":1358711107,"score_A":4,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"Computational Theory of Mind: The brain is a computer. In an abstract sense the brain works along the same engineering principles as computers (information-processing systems), in the same way the heart is a pump, the liver is a filter, etc. 99% of science is knowing how to ask the right questions, and I think this is the only way we know how to ask the right questions in psychology, and what answers to those questions should look like. Here's more: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Computational_theory_of_mind","human_ref_B":"Isaiah Berlin's theory of negative and positive liberty.   In short: Negative liberty is the absence of external obstacles or constraints--freedom *from* something. Positive liberty is essentially self-determination and\/or self-realization-- freedom *to* do something.  Let's say you are an alcoholic artist. You are not being forced by any external entity to drink. So you are free from interference in the negative sense. But because of your addiction, you lack the ability to spend your time and energy doing your art, which is the one thing that fulfills you. So you are not free in the positive sense. You are not free to spend your time as you wish and you are not free to fulfill yourself through creating art.   As the example illustrates, negative freedom involves the *absence* of external coercion. Berlin identifies negative liberty as the answer to this question: \"What is the area within which the subject \u2014 a person or group of persons \u2014 is or should be left to do or be what he is able to do or be, without interference by other persons?\"   But positive freedom requires the *presence* of something that enables one to achieve self-realization and\/or autonomy. Berlin says that positive liberty can be identified with the question, \"What, or who, is the source of control or interference that can determine someone to do, or be, this rather than that?\"   This distinction between negative and positive freedom lies at the heart of fundamental disagreements over the role of government. Libertarians, for instance, are primarily concerned with negative freedom--freedom from governmental interference in the form of regulations. But many Democrats, on the other hand, are concerned with positive freedom--freedom to realize one's life goals and determine the course of one's life. Helping people achieve positive freedom may require government programs like free tutoring services for low income students.  The theory is also important to the concept of group rights vs. individual rights. Very often, systemic discrimination will mean a minority is unable to achieve positive liberty. The very poor are not being coerced to starve under bridges, so they are free in the negative sense. But they are not free in the positive sense of being able to achieve what they want with their lives.  I hope that was clear. If you're still fuzzy, the Stanford Encylopedia of Philosophy has a very good entry on the theory. You can also read Berlin's essay yourself here (pdf).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2887.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80mmmq","c_root_id_B":"c80c6gb","created_at_utc_A":1358737992,"created_at_utc_B":1358704765,"score_A":15,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Anthropology-I don't know if you would call it a theory exactly, but referential modeling in apes. Too many times people say chimpanzees for example are a window into the past. They're not. They are extant apes with likely adaptations similar to an ancestor directly preceding us. They are not living fossils. Their behavior now is similar, but may differ greatly and we must consider that when using primate models.   Similar, but it goes to a little biological is the term \"survival of the fittest\" a term coined by Herbert spencer and improperly used to describe evolution.","human_ref_B":"marx's critiques of ideology and alienation are pretty profound.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":33227.0,"score_ratio":1.1538461538}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80ga8s","c_root_id_B":"c80mmmq","created_at_utc_A":1358718204,"created_at_utc_B":1358737992,"score_A":14,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Duverger's Law in political science. We'd be so much better off if people in first-past-the-post systems who wanted additional ideological options in politics worked harder to advance alternative points of view and ideological competition within major parties (through primaries, etc) than inefficiently spend their limited resources trying to create third parties which are unsustainable.","human_ref_B":"Anthropology-I don't know if you would call it a theory exactly, but referential modeling in apes. Too many times people say chimpanzees for example are a window into the past. They're not. They are extant apes with likely adaptations similar to an ancestor directly preceding us. They are not living fossils. Their behavior now is similar, but may differ greatly and we must consider that when using primate models.   Similar, but it goes to a little biological is the term \"survival of the fittest\" a term coined by Herbert spencer and improperly used to describe evolution.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19788.0,"score_ratio":1.0714285714}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80mmmq","c_root_id_B":"c80f1k3","created_at_utc_A":1358737992,"created_at_utc_B":1358714232,"score_A":15,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Anthropology-I don't know if you would call it a theory exactly, but referential modeling in apes. Too many times people say chimpanzees for example are a window into the past. They're not. They are extant apes with likely adaptations similar to an ancestor directly preceding us. They are not living fossils. Their behavior now is similar, but may differ greatly and we must consider that when using primate models.   Similar, but it goes to a little biological is the term \"survival of the fittest\" a term coined by Herbert spencer and improperly used to describe evolution.","human_ref_B":"I've been on Reddit for years and this is probably the best question I've seen someone ask. Thank you!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":23760.0,"score_ratio":1.1538461538}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80mmmq","c_root_id_B":"c80g64x","created_at_utc_A":1358737992,"created_at_utc_B":1358717838,"score_A":15,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Anthropology-I don't know if you would call it a theory exactly, but referential modeling in apes. Too many times people say chimpanzees for example are a window into the past. They're not. They are extant apes with likely adaptations similar to an ancestor directly preceding us. They are not living fossils. Their behavior now is similar, but may differ greatly and we must consider that when using primate models.   Similar, but it goes to a little biological is the term \"survival of the fittest\" a term coined by Herbert spencer and improperly used to describe evolution.","human_ref_B":"In philosophy: The basic structure of the different positions in the free-will debate: compatibalism and incompatibalism, and the two varieties of incompatibalism, libertarianism and hard determinism.   Freedom is the most serious philosophical issue of our age, imo. It's our primary cultural value in the west, but we don't even know what freedom is. If people at least had that basic schema in hand, perhaps we could begin to have a real discussion about this thing that we all supposedly want.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20154.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80lxqn","c_root_id_B":"c80mmmq","created_at_utc_A":1358735925,"created_at_utc_B":1358737992,"score_A":6,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Two level game theory in political science.  Chief negotiators in a bilateral negotiation sit simultaneously at two different \"tables\":  * At the international level, they advance their vision of the national and global interest via-\u00e0-vis negotiators from other countries * At the domestic level, they advance their political coalition's interests vis-\u00e0-vis their domestic competitors, and their personal interests within their coalition  The delegations to a bilateral negotiation thus arrive with their their hands tied: they are unable to make a compromise at the international level that would not be acceptable at the domestic level.  Not only would this be against their domestic ambitions, but they would never be able to ratify the agreement anyway.  As a result, sometimes no agreement between two parties is possible, because there is no hypothetical compromise that would be acceptable to both domestic constituencies.  In such a case, it it's pointless to put pressure on either side.  Instead, you have to target their constituencies, building peace from the bottom up.  We are probably seeing this in the case of the Israelis and the Palestinians.  The problem is not that Netanyahu, Abbas, or Meshaal are too stubborn to compromise, but that any hypothetical agreement between the two (three?) sides would be rejected by the domestic constituents of one or both.  Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by radical Israelis for signing the Oslo Accords in 1993, while Yasser Arafat rejected Ehud Barak's offer in 2000 out of fear that he would suffer the same fate.  Source: Robert D. Putnam, \"Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The logic of two-level games.\" International Organization 42, no.3 (1998): 427-460.  [PDF link]","human_ref_B":"Anthropology-I don't know if you would call it a theory exactly, but referential modeling in apes. Too many times people say chimpanzees for example are a window into the past. They're not. They are extant apes with likely adaptations similar to an ancestor directly preceding us. They are not living fossils. Their behavior now is similar, but may differ greatly and we must consider that when using primate models.   Similar, but it goes to a little biological is the term \"survival of the fittest\" a term coined by Herbert spencer and improperly used to describe evolution.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2067.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80mmmq","c_root_id_B":"c80d7zm","created_at_utc_A":1358737992,"created_at_utc_B":1358708220,"score_A":15,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Anthropology-I don't know if you would call it a theory exactly, but referential modeling in apes. Too many times people say chimpanzees for example are a window into the past. They're not. They are extant apes with likely adaptations similar to an ancestor directly preceding us. They are not living fossils. Their behavior now is similar, but may differ greatly and we must consider that when using primate models.   Similar, but it goes to a little biological is the term \"survival of the fittest\" a term coined by Herbert spencer and improperly used to describe evolution.","human_ref_B":"Computational Theory of Mind: The brain is a computer. In an abstract sense the brain works along the same engineering principles as computers (information-processing systems), in the same way the heart is a pump, the liver is a filter, etc. 99% of science is knowing how to ask the right questions, and I think this is the only way we know how to ask the right questions in psychology, and what answers to those questions should look like. Here's more: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Computational_theory_of_mind","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29772.0,"score_ratio":3.75}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80mmmq","c_root_id_B":"c80j839","created_at_utc_A":1358737992,"created_at_utc_B":1358727385,"score_A":15,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Anthropology-I don't know if you would call it a theory exactly, but referential modeling in apes. Too many times people say chimpanzees for example are a window into the past. They're not. They are extant apes with likely adaptations similar to an ancestor directly preceding us. They are not living fossils. Their behavior now is similar, but may differ greatly and we must consider that when using primate models.   Similar, but it goes to a little biological is the term \"survival of the fittest\" a term coined by Herbert spencer and improperly used to describe evolution.","human_ref_B":"org theory.  there are massive and inherent dis-economies to scale.  sometimes, as with heavy industry, there are compensating economies that make up for the inherent dis-economies, but those situations are the exception, not the rule.   doing anything bigger always makes doing it harder.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10607.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80h47m","c_root_id_B":"c80mmmq","created_at_utc_A":1358720815,"created_at_utc_B":1358737992,"score_A":3,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"In sociology, I wish people would take the time to go beyond the traditional structure\/agency divide and see that there are other approaches out there, for example, Norbert Elias and figurational or process sociology.","human_ref_B":"Anthropology-I don't know if you would call it a theory exactly, but referential modeling in apes. Too many times people say chimpanzees for example are a window into the past. They're not. They are extant apes with likely adaptations similar to an ancestor directly preceding us. They are not living fossils. Their behavior now is similar, but may differ greatly and we must consider that when using primate models.   Similar, but it goes to a little biological is the term \"survival of the fittest\" a term coined by Herbert spencer and improperly used to describe evolution.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17177.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80mmmq","c_root_id_B":"c80hwt8","created_at_utc_A":1358737992,"created_at_utc_B":1358723265,"score_A":15,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Anthropology-I don't know if you would call it a theory exactly, but referential modeling in apes. Too many times people say chimpanzees for example are a window into the past. They're not. They are extant apes with likely adaptations similar to an ancestor directly preceding us. They are not living fossils. Their behavior now is similar, but may differ greatly and we must consider that when using primate models.   Similar, but it goes to a little biological is the term \"survival of the fittest\" a term coined by Herbert spencer and improperly used to describe evolution.","human_ref_B":"I teach Communication. Uncertainty Reduction theory (applicable to many fields) applies to most human interaction and is incredibly useful strategically and personally.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14727.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80ga8s","c_root_id_B":"c80c6gb","created_at_utc_A":1358718204,"created_at_utc_B":1358704765,"score_A":14,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Duverger's Law in political science. We'd be so much better off if people in first-past-the-post systems who wanted additional ideological options in politics worked harder to advance alternative points of view and ideological competition within major parties (through primaries, etc) than inefficiently spend their limited resources trying to create third parties which are unsustainable.","human_ref_B":"marx's critiques of ideology and alienation are pretty profound.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13439.0,"score_ratio":1.0769230769}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80f1k3","c_root_id_B":"c80ga8s","created_at_utc_A":1358714232,"created_at_utc_B":1358718204,"score_A":13,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"I've been on Reddit for years and this is probably the best question I've seen someone ask. Thank you!","human_ref_B":"Duverger's Law in political science. We'd be so much better off if people in first-past-the-post systems who wanted additional ideological options in politics worked harder to advance alternative points of view and ideological competition within major parties (through primaries, etc) than inefficiently spend their limited resources trying to create third parties which are unsustainable.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3972.0,"score_ratio":1.0769230769}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80g64x","c_root_id_B":"c80ga8s","created_at_utc_A":1358717838,"created_at_utc_B":1358718204,"score_A":9,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"In philosophy: The basic structure of the different positions in the free-will debate: compatibalism and incompatibalism, and the two varieties of incompatibalism, libertarianism and hard determinism.   Freedom is the most serious philosophical issue of our age, imo. It's our primary cultural value in the west, but we don't even know what freedom is. If people at least had that basic schema in hand, perhaps we could begin to have a real discussion about this thing that we all supposedly want.","human_ref_B":"Duverger's Law in political science. We'd be so much better off if people in first-past-the-post systems who wanted additional ideological options in politics worked harder to advance alternative points of view and ideological competition within major parties (through primaries, etc) than inefficiently spend their limited resources trying to create third parties which are unsustainable.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":366.0,"score_ratio":1.5555555556}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80ga8s","c_root_id_B":"c80d7zm","created_at_utc_A":1358718204,"created_at_utc_B":1358708220,"score_A":14,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Duverger's Law in political science. We'd be so much better off if people in first-past-the-post systems who wanted additional ideological options in politics worked harder to advance alternative points of view and ideological competition within major parties (through primaries, etc) than inefficiently spend their limited resources trying to create third parties which are unsustainable.","human_ref_B":"Computational Theory of Mind: The brain is a computer. In an abstract sense the brain works along the same engineering principles as computers (information-processing systems), in the same way the heart is a pump, the liver is a filter, etc. 99% of science is knowing how to ask the right questions, and I think this is the only way we know how to ask the right questions in psychology, and what answers to those questions should look like. Here's more: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Computational_theory_of_mind","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9984.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80f1k3","c_root_id_B":"c80d7zm","created_at_utc_A":1358714232,"created_at_utc_B":1358708220,"score_A":13,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I've been on Reddit for years and this is probably the best question I've seen someone ask. Thank you!","human_ref_B":"Computational Theory of Mind: The brain is a computer. In an abstract sense the brain works along the same engineering principles as computers (information-processing systems), in the same way the heart is a pump, the liver is a filter, etc. 99% of science is knowing how to ask the right questions, and I think this is the only way we know how to ask the right questions in psychology, and what answers to those questions should look like. Here's more: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Computational_theory_of_mind","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6012.0,"score_ratio":3.25}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80g64x","c_root_id_B":"c80ndx6","created_at_utc_A":1358717838,"created_at_utc_B":1358740478,"score_A":9,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"In philosophy: The basic structure of the different positions in the free-will debate: compatibalism and incompatibalism, and the two varieties of incompatibalism, libertarianism and hard determinism.   Freedom is the most serious philosophical issue of our age, imo. It's our primary cultural value in the west, but we don't even know what freedom is. If people at least had that basic schema in hand, perhaps we could begin to have a real discussion about this thing that we all supposedly want.","human_ref_B":"In anthropology, cultural relativism and the biocultural approach. Maybe not theories *per se*, but important concepts that really shape the way we (as anthropologists) think about the world. Basically, cultural relativism lets us really appreciate that different people *are* different, and that there are many ways of being human (both modern and through time) and that no single way is really right. I think that people need to appreciate human diversity in a way that so many don't. This also helps you to understand that different communities and sub-cultures within our own culture(s), or even just your next door neighbour, think differently and actually understand the world in different ways, and that there's nothing wrong with someone else thinking differently. It's just different.  Then the biocultural approach is great because it is all about saying how both our biological (namely evolution) and culture work together to create who we are. Evolutionary explanations for *everything* are so popular right now it hurts my brain (and my forehead, because of all of the headdesking). It's like people have forgotten that there is social\/cultural variation and that people do things in unique ways specific to their own culture\/society\/community. But at the same time, our biology and evolution are important and culture isn't everything. So forget this whole nature vs. nurture crap, humans are a really complex combination of both.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22640.0,"score_ratio":1.2222222222}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80lxqn","c_root_id_B":"c80ndx6","created_at_utc_A":1358735925,"created_at_utc_B":1358740478,"score_A":6,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Two level game theory in political science.  Chief negotiators in a bilateral negotiation sit simultaneously at two different \"tables\":  * At the international level, they advance their vision of the national and global interest via-\u00e0-vis negotiators from other countries * At the domestic level, they advance their political coalition's interests vis-\u00e0-vis their domestic competitors, and their personal interests within their coalition  The delegations to a bilateral negotiation thus arrive with their their hands tied: they are unable to make a compromise at the international level that would not be acceptable at the domestic level.  Not only would this be against their domestic ambitions, but they would never be able to ratify the agreement anyway.  As a result, sometimes no agreement between two parties is possible, because there is no hypothetical compromise that would be acceptable to both domestic constituencies.  In such a case, it it's pointless to put pressure on either side.  Instead, you have to target their constituencies, building peace from the bottom up.  We are probably seeing this in the case of the Israelis and the Palestinians.  The problem is not that Netanyahu, Abbas, or Meshaal are too stubborn to compromise, but that any hypothetical agreement between the two (three?) sides would be rejected by the domestic constituents of one or both.  Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by radical Israelis for signing the Oslo Accords in 1993, while Yasser Arafat rejected Ehud Barak's offer in 2000 out of fear that he would suffer the same fate.  Source: Robert D. Putnam, \"Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The logic of two-level games.\" International Organization 42, no.3 (1998): 427-460.  [PDF link]","human_ref_B":"In anthropology, cultural relativism and the biocultural approach. Maybe not theories *per se*, but important concepts that really shape the way we (as anthropologists) think about the world. Basically, cultural relativism lets us really appreciate that different people *are* different, and that there are many ways of being human (both modern and through time) and that no single way is really right. I think that people need to appreciate human diversity in a way that so many don't. This also helps you to understand that different communities and sub-cultures within our own culture(s), or even just your next door neighbour, think differently and actually understand the world in different ways, and that there's nothing wrong with someone else thinking differently. It's just different.  Then the biocultural approach is great because it is all about saying how both our biological (namely evolution) and culture work together to create who we are. Evolutionary explanations for *everything* are so popular right now it hurts my brain (and my forehead, because of all of the headdesking). It's like people have forgotten that there is social\/cultural variation and that people do things in unique ways specific to their own culture\/society\/community. But at the same time, our biology and evolution are important and culture isn't everything. So forget this whole nature vs. nurture crap, humans are a really complex combination of both.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4553.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80d7zm","c_root_id_B":"c80ndx6","created_at_utc_A":1358708220,"created_at_utc_B":1358740478,"score_A":4,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Computational Theory of Mind: The brain is a computer. In an abstract sense the brain works along the same engineering principles as computers (information-processing systems), in the same way the heart is a pump, the liver is a filter, etc. 99% of science is knowing how to ask the right questions, and I think this is the only way we know how to ask the right questions in psychology, and what answers to those questions should look like. Here's more: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Computational_theory_of_mind","human_ref_B":"In anthropology, cultural relativism and the biocultural approach. Maybe not theories *per se*, but important concepts that really shape the way we (as anthropologists) think about the world. Basically, cultural relativism lets us really appreciate that different people *are* different, and that there are many ways of being human (both modern and through time) and that no single way is really right. I think that people need to appreciate human diversity in a way that so many don't. This also helps you to understand that different communities and sub-cultures within our own culture(s), or even just your next door neighbour, think differently and actually understand the world in different ways, and that there's nothing wrong with someone else thinking differently. It's just different.  Then the biocultural approach is great because it is all about saying how both our biological (namely evolution) and culture work together to create who we are. Evolutionary explanations for *everything* are so popular right now it hurts my brain (and my forehead, because of all of the headdesking). It's like people have forgotten that there is social\/cultural variation and that people do things in unique ways specific to their own culture\/society\/community. But at the same time, our biology and evolution are important and culture isn't everything. So forget this whole nature vs. nurture crap, humans are a really complex combination of both.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":32258.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80ndx6","c_root_id_B":"c80j839","created_at_utc_A":1358740478,"created_at_utc_B":1358727385,"score_A":11,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"In anthropology, cultural relativism and the biocultural approach. Maybe not theories *per se*, but important concepts that really shape the way we (as anthropologists) think about the world. Basically, cultural relativism lets us really appreciate that different people *are* different, and that there are many ways of being human (both modern and through time) and that no single way is really right. I think that people need to appreciate human diversity in a way that so many don't. This also helps you to understand that different communities and sub-cultures within our own culture(s), or even just your next door neighbour, think differently and actually understand the world in different ways, and that there's nothing wrong with someone else thinking differently. It's just different.  Then the biocultural approach is great because it is all about saying how both our biological (namely evolution) and culture work together to create who we are. Evolutionary explanations for *everything* are so popular right now it hurts my brain (and my forehead, because of all of the headdesking). It's like people have forgotten that there is social\/cultural variation and that people do things in unique ways specific to their own culture\/society\/community. But at the same time, our biology and evolution are important and culture isn't everything. So forget this whole nature vs. nurture crap, humans are a really complex combination of both.","human_ref_B":"org theory.  there are massive and inherent dis-economies to scale.  sometimes, as with heavy industry, there are compensating economies that make up for the inherent dis-economies, but those situations are the exception, not the rule.   doing anything bigger always makes doing it harder.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13093.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80h47m","c_root_id_B":"c80ndx6","created_at_utc_A":1358720815,"created_at_utc_B":1358740478,"score_A":3,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"In sociology, I wish people would take the time to go beyond the traditional structure\/agency divide and see that there are other approaches out there, for example, Norbert Elias and figurational or process sociology.","human_ref_B":"In anthropology, cultural relativism and the biocultural approach. Maybe not theories *per se*, but important concepts that really shape the way we (as anthropologists) think about the world. Basically, cultural relativism lets us really appreciate that different people *are* different, and that there are many ways of being human (both modern and through time) and that no single way is really right. I think that people need to appreciate human diversity in a way that so many don't. This also helps you to understand that different communities and sub-cultures within our own culture(s), or even just your next door neighbour, think differently and actually understand the world in different ways, and that there's nothing wrong with someone else thinking differently. It's just different.  Then the biocultural approach is great because it is all about saying how both our biological (namely evolution) and culture work together to create who we are. Evolutionary explanations for *everything* are so popular right now it hurts my brain (and my forehead, because of all of the headdesking). It's like people have forgotten that there is social\/cultural variation and that people do things in unique ways specific to their own culture\/society\/community. But at the same time, our biology and evolution are important and culture isn't everything. So forget this whole nature vs. nurture crap, humans are a really complex combination of both.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19663.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80hwt8","c_root_id_B":"c80ndx6","created_at_utc_A":1358723265,"created_at_utc_B":1358740478,"score_A":3,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"I teach Communication. Uncertainty Reduction theory (applicable to many fields) applies to most human interaction and is incredibly useful strategically and personally.","human_ref_B":"In anthropology, cultural relativism and the biocultural approach. Maybe not theories *per se*, but important concepts that really shape the way we (as anthropologists) think about the world. Basically, cultural relativism lets us really appreciate that different people *are* different, and that there are many ways of being human (both modern and through time) and that no single way is really right. I think that people need to appreciate human diversity in a way that so many don't. This also helps you to understand that different communities and sub-cultures within our own culture(s), or even just your next door neighbour, think differently and actually understand the world in different ways, and that there's nothing wrong with someone else thinking differently. It's just different.  Then the biocultural approach is great because it is all about saying how both our biological (namely evolution) and culture work together to create who we are. Evolutionary explanations for *everything* are so popular right now it hurts my brain (and my forehead, because of all of the headdesking). It's like people have forgotten that there is social\/cultural variation and that people do things in unique ways specific to their own culture\/society\/community. But at the same time, our biology and evolution are important and culture isn't everything. So forget this whole nature vs. nurture crap, humans are a really complex combination of both.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17213.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80ocj0","c_root_id_B":"c80g64x","created_at_utc_A":1358743775,"created_at_utc_B":1358717838,"score_A":10,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Structural violence!  basic premise being that some undesirable social conditions exist outside of direct cause and effect mentality. That neither the actions of the state individual or other stakeholders directly create poor outcomes in a particular community.  Like a situation where a certain low risk population seems to have an unusually high rate of AIDS or \"the increased rates of death and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of society\". Structural violence does NOT however exonerate all from blame but instead provides a framework to understand and empathise and create policies which do not penalise those who are most vulnerable  A fuzzy concept but one which would stop a lot of bickering about how some types of people are bound to fail or are genetic 'losers'  I am just gonna go ahead and wiki link this http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Structural_violence read! learn! gain empathy! :)","human_ref_B":"In philosophy: The basic structure of the different positions in the free-will debate: compatibalism and incompatibalism, and the two varieties of incompatibalism, libertarianism and hard determinism.   Freedom is the most serious philosophical issue of our age, imo. It's our primary cultural value in the west, but we don't even know what freedom is. If people at least had that basic schema in hand, perhaps we could begin to have a real discussion about this thing that we all supposedly want.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25937.0,"score_ratio":1.1111111111}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80o59r","c_root_id_B":"c80ocj0","created_at_utc_A":1358743069,"created_at_utc_B":1358743775,"score_A":6,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"The role of net energy flows in driving growth in just about any Complex Adaptive System. Many of the qualitative models of social sciences can be quantified by looking at net energy flows through space filling networks. And since information entropy is a close analogue to thermodynamic entropy you can apply the same concepts of diffusing networks to information and knowledge problems like asymmetric information.    The basic idea is that the outcome of any competing population can be predicted by the group that organizes itself on an energy gradient to maximizes power (work per unit time) and diffuses it best through a network. And since we're dealing with populations in a network we're also dealing with altruism so we can avoid overly simplifying assumptions of individual competition. So this could be a species competition across a solar energy gradient or it could be two competing tribes on a rich area of land or it could be two firms competing to develop and maintain a distribution network. Or you could just look at it in terms of economic growth or population growth or the growth of cities. Or you could take Joseph Tainter's approach and look at how networks becoming too complex for the energy and information flows that sustain them can lead to decline and collapse.   Human macroecology and thermodynamics is to me the most important framework to look at the critical questions that we as a species are going to becoming up against in this century. Issues around climate change, resource limits, population growth, cities, economic growth (or degrowth) all have the potential for more rigorous, predictive and quantifiable models and approaches than we've traditionally in the social sciences.","human_ref_B":"Structural violence!  basic premise being that some undesirable social conditions exist outside of direct cause and effect mentality. That neither the actions of the state individual or other stakeholders directly create poor outcomes in a particular community.  Like a situation where a certain low risk population seems to have an unusually high rate of AIDS or \"the increased rates of death and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of society\". Structural violence does NOT however exonerate all from blame but instead provides a framework to understand and empathise and create policies which do not penalise those who are most vulnerable  A fuzzy concept but one which would stop a lot of bickering about how some types of people are bound to fail or are genetic 'losers'  I am just gonna go ahead and wiki link this http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Structural_violence read! learn! gain empathy! :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":706.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80ocj0","c_root_id_B":"c80lxqn","created_at_utc_A":1358743775,"created_at_utc_B":1358735925,"score_A":10,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Structural violence!  basic premise being that some undesirable social conditions exist outside of direct cause and effect mentality. That neither the actions of the state individual or other stakeholders directly create poor outcomes in a particular community.  Like a situation where a certain low risk population seems to have an unusually high rate of AIDS or \"the increased rates of death and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of society\". Structural violence does NOT however exonerate all from blame but instead provides a framework to understand and empathise and create policies which do not penalise those who are most vulnerable  A fuzzy concept but one which would stop a lot of bickering about how some types of people are bound to fail or are genetic 'losers'  I am just gonna go ahead and wiki link this http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Structural_violence read! learn! gain empathy! :)","human_ref_B":"Two level game theory in political science.  Chief negotiators in a bilateral negotiation sit simultaneously at two different \"tables\":  * At the international level, they advance their vision of the national and global interest via-\u00e0-vis negotiators from other countries * At the domestic level, they advance their political coalition's interests vis-\u00e0-vis their domestic competitors, and their personal interests within their coalition  The delegations to a bilateral negotiation thus arrive with their their hands tied: they are unable to make a compromise at the international level that would not be acceptable at the domestic level.  Not only would this be against their domestic ambitions, but they would never be able to ratify the agreement anyway.  As a result, sometimes no agreement between two parties is possible, because there is no hypothetical compromise that would be acceptable to both domestic constituencies.  In such a case, it it's pointless to put pressure on either side.  Instead, you have to target their constituencies, building peace from the bottom up.  We are probably seeing this in the case of the Israelis and the Palestinians.  The problem is not that Netanyahu, Abbas, or Meshaal are too stubborn to compromise, but that any hypothetical agreement between the two (three?) sides would be rejected by the domestic constituents of one or both.  Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by radical Israelis for signing the Oslo Accords in 1993, while Yasser Arafat rejected Ehud Barak's offer in 2000 out of fear that he would suffer the same fate.  Source: Robert D. Putnam, \"Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The logic of two-level games.\" International Organization 42, no.3 (1998): 427-460.  [PDF link]","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7850.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80d7zm","c_root_id_B":"c80ocj0","created_at_utc_A":1358708220,"created_at_utc_B":1358743775,"score_A":4,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Computational Theory of Mind: The brain is a computer. In an abstract sense the brain works along the same engineering principles as computers (information-processing systems), in the same way the heart is a pump, the liver is a filter, etc. 99% of science is knowing how to ask the right questions, and I think this is the only way we know how to ask the right questions in psychology, and what answers to those questions should look like. Here's more: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Computational_theory_of_mind","human_ref_B":"Structural violence!  basic premise being that some undesirable social conditions exist outside of direct cause and effect mentality. That neither the actions of the state individual or other stakeholders directly create poor outcomes in a particular community.  Like a situation where a certain low risk population seems to have an unusually high rate of AIDS or \"the increased rates of death and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of society\". Structural violence does NOT however exonerate all from blame but instead provides a framework to understand and empathise and create policies which do not penalise those who are most vulnerable  A fuzzy concept but one which would stop a lot of bickering about how some types of people are bound to fail or are genetic 'losers'  I am just gonna go ahead and wiki link this http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Structural_violence read! learn! gain empathy! :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":35555.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80j839","c_root_id_B":"c80ocj0","created_at_utc_A":1358727385,"created_at_utc_B":1358743775,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"org theory.  there are massive and inherent dis-economies to scale.  sometimes, as with heavy industry, there are compensating economies that make up for the inherent dis-economies, but those situations are the exception, not the rule.   doing anything bigger always makes doing it harder.","human_ref_B":"Structural violence!  basic premise being that some undesirable social conditions exist outside of direct cause and effect mentality. That neither the actions of the state individual or other stakeholders directly create poor outcomes in a particular community.  Like a situation where a certain low risk population seems to have an unusually high rate of AIDS or \"the increased rates of death and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of society\". Structural violence does NOT however exonerate all from blame but instead provides a framework to understand and empathise and create policies which do not penalise those who are most vulnerable  A fuzzy concept but one which would stop a lot of bickering about how some types of people are bound to fail or are genetic 'losers'  I am just gonna go ahead and wiki link this http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Structural_violence read! learn! gain empathy! :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16390.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80h47m","c_root_id_B":"c80ocj0","created_at_utc_A":1358720815,"created_at_utc_B":1358743775,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"In sociology, I wish people would take the time to go beyond the traditional structure\/agency divide and see that there are other approaches out there, for example, Norbert Elias and figurational or process sociology.","human_ref_B":"Structural violence!  basic premise being that some undesirable social conditions exist outside of direct cause and effect mentality. That neither the actions of the state individual or other stakeholders directly create poor outcomes in a particular community.  Like a situation where a certain low risk population seems to have an unusually high rate of AIDS or \"the increased rates of death and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of society\". Structural violence does NOT however exonerate all from blame but instead provides a framework to understand and empathise and create policies which do not penalise those who are most vulnerable  A fuzzy concept but one which would stop a lot of bickering about how some types of people are bound to fail or are genetic 'losers'  I am just gonna go ahead and wiki link this http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Structural_violence read! learn! gain empathy! :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22960.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80hwt8","c_root_id_B":"c80ocj0","created_at_utc_A":1358723265,"created_at_utc_B":1358743775,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I teach Communication. Uncertainty Reduction theory (applicable to many fields) applies to most human interaction and is incredibly useful strategically and personally.","human_ref_B":"Structural violence!  basic premise being that some undesirable social conditions exist outside of direct cause and effect mentality. That neither the actions of the state individual or other stakeholders directly create poor outcomes in a particular community.  Like a situation where a certain low risk population seems to have an unusually high rate of AIDS or \"the increased rates of death and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of society\". Structural violence does NOT however exonerate all from blame but instead provides a framework to understand and empathise and create policies which do not penalise those who are most vulnerable  A fuzzy concept but one which would stop a lot of bickering about how some types of people are bound to fail or are genetic 'losers'  I am just gonna go ahead and wiki link this http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Structural_violence read! learn! gain empathy! :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20510.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80g64x","c_root_id_B":"c80d7zm","created_at_utc_A":1358717838,"created_at_utc_B":1358708220,"score_A":9,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"In philosophy: The basic structure of the different positions in the free-will debate: compatibalism and incompatibalism, and the two varieties of incompatibalism, libertarianism and hard determinism.   Freedom is the most serious philosophical issue of our age, imo. It's our primary cultural value in the west, but we don't even know what freedom is. If people at least had that basic schema in hand, perhaps we could begin to have a real discussion about this thing that we all supposedly want.","human_ref_B":"Computational Theory of Mind: The brain is a computer. In an abstract sense the brain works along the same engineering principles as computers (information-processing systems), in the same way the heart is a pump, the liver is a filter, etc. 99% of science is knowing how to ask the right questions, and I think this is the only way we know how to ask the right questions in psychology, and what answers to those questions should look like. Here's more: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Computational_theory_of_mind","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9618.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80o59r","c_root_id_B":"c80d7zm","created_at_utc_A":1358743069,"created_at_utc_B":1358708220,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The role of net energy flows in driving growth in just about any Complex Adaptive System. Many of the qualitative models of social sciences can be quantified by looking at net energy flows through space filling networks. And since information entropy is a close analogue to thermodynamic entropy you can apply the same concepts of diffusing networks to information and knowledge problems like asymmetric information.    The basic idea is that the outcome of any competing population can be predicted by the group that organizes itself on an energy gradient to maximizes power (work per unit time) and diffuses it best through a network. And since we're dealing with populations in a network we're also dealing with altruism so we can avoid overly simplifying assumptions of individual competition. So this could be a species competition across a solar energy gradient or it could be two competing tribes on a rich area of land or it could be two firms competing to develop and maintain a distribution network. Or you could just look at it in terms of economic growth or population growth or the growth of cities. Or you could take Joseph Tainter's approach and look at how networks becoming too complex for the energy and information flows that sustain them can lead to decline and collapse.   Human macroecology and thermodynamics is to me the most important framework to look at the critical questions that we as a species are going to becoming up against in this century. Issues around climate change, resource limits, population growth, cities, economic growth (or degrowth) all have the potential for more rigorous, predictive and quantifiable models and approaches than we've traditionally in the social sciences.","human_ref_B":"Computational Theory of Mind: The brain is a computer. In an abstract sense the brain works along the same engineering principles as computers (information-processing systems), in the same way the heart is a pump, the liver is a filter, etc. 99% of science is knowing how to ask the right questions, and I think this is the only way we know how to ask the right questions in psychology, and what answers to those questions should look like. Here's more: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Computational_theory_of_mind","labels":1,"seconds_difference":34849.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80o59r","c_root_id_B":"c80j839","created_at_utc_A":1358743069,"created_at_utc_B":1358727385,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The role of net energy flows in driving growth in just about any Complex Adaptive System. Many of the qualitative models of social sciences can be quantified by looking at net energy flows through space filling networks. And since information entropy is a close analogue to thermodynamic entropy you can apply the same concepts of diffusing networks to information and knowledge problems like asymmetric information.    The basic idea is that the outcome of any competing population can be predicted by the group that organizes itself on an energy gradient to maximizes power (work per unit time) and diffuses it best through a network. And since we're dealing with populations in a network we're also dealing with altruism so we can avoid overly simplifying assumptions of individual competition. So this could be a species competition across a solar energy gradient or it could be two competing tribes on a rich area of land or it could be two firms competing to develop and maintain a distribution network. Or you could just look at it in terms of economic growth or population growth or the growth of cities. Or you could take Joseph Tainter's approach and look at how networks becoming too complex for the energy and information flows that sustain them can lead to decline and collapse.   Human macroecology and thermodynamics is to me the most important framework to look at the critical questions that we as a species are going to becoming up against in this century. Issues around climate change, resource limits, population growth, cities, economic growth (or degrowth) all have the potential for more rigorous, predictive and quantifiable models and approaches than we've traditionally in the social sciences.","human_ref_B":"org theory.  there are massive and inherent dis-economies to scale.  sometimes, as with heavy industry, there are compensating economies that make up for the inherent dis-economies, but those situations are the exception, not the rule.   doing anything bigger always makes doing it harder.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15684.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80h47m","c_root_id_B":"c80o59r","created_at_utc_A":1358720815,"created_at_utc_B":1358743069,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"In sociology, I wish people would take the time to go beyond the traditional structure\/agency divide and see that there are other approaches out there, for example, Norbert Elias and figurational or process sociology.","human_ref_B":"The role of net energy flows in driving growth in just about any Complex Adaptive System. Many of the qualitative models of social sciences can be quantified by looking at net energy flows through space filling networks. And since information entropy is a close analogue to thermodynamic entropy you can apply the same concepts of diffusing networks to information and knowledge problems like asymmetric information.    The basic idea is that the outcome of any competing population can be predicted by the group that organizes itself on an energy gradient to maximizes power (work per unit time) and diffuses it best through a network. And since we're dealing with populations in a network we're also dealing with altruism so we can avoid overly simplifying assumptions of individual competition. So this could be a species competition across a solar energy gradient or it could be two competing tribes on a rich area of land or it could be two firms competing to develop and maintain a distribution network. Or you could just look at it in terms of economic growth or population growth or the growth of cities. Or you could take Joseph Tainter's approach and look at how networks becoming too complex for the energy and information flows that sustain them can lead to decline and collapse.   Human macroecology and thermodynamics is to me the most important framework to look at the critical questions that we as a species are going to becoming up against in this century. Issues around climate change, resource limits, population growth, cities, economic growth (or degrowth) all have the potential for more rigorous, predictive and quantifiable models and approaches than we've traditionally in the social sciences.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22254.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80o59r","c_root_id_B":"c80hwt8","created_at_utc_A":1358743069,"created_at_utc_B":1358723265,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The role of net energy flows in driving growth in just about any Complex Adaptive System. Many of the qualitative models of social sciences can be quantified by looking at net energy flows through space filling networks. And since information entropy is a close analogue to thermodynamic entropy you can apply the same concepts of diffusing networks to information and knowledge problems like asymmetric information.    The basic idea is that the outcome of any competing population can be predicted by the group that organizes itself on an energy gradient to maximizes power (work per unit time) and diffuses it best through a network. And since we're dealing with populations in a network we're also dealing with altruism so we can avoid overly simplifying assumptions of individual competition. So this could be a species competition across a solar energy gradient or it could be two competing tribes on a rich area of land or it could be two firms competing to develop and maintain a distribution network. Or you could just look at it in terms of economic growth or population growth or the growth of cities. Or you could take Joseph Tainter's approach and look at how networks becoming too complex for the energy and information flows that sustain them can lead to decline and collapse.   Human macroecology and thermodynamics is to me the most important framework to look at the critical questions that we as a species are going to becoming up against in this century. Issues around climate change, resource limits, population growth, cities, economic growth (or degrowth) all have the potential for more rigorous, predictive and quantifiable models and approaches than we've traditionally in the social sciences.","human_ref_B":"I teach Communication. Uncertainty Reduction theory (applicable to many fields) applies to most human interaction and is incredibly useful strategically and personally.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":19804.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80d7zm","c_root_id_B":"c80lxqn","created_at_utc_A":1358708220,"created_at_utc_B":1358735925,"score_A":4,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Computational Theory of Mind: The brain is a computer. In an abstract sense the brain works along the same engineering principles as computers (information-processing systems), in the same way the heart is a pump, the liver is a filter, etc. 99% of science is knowing how to ask the right questions, and I think this is the only way we know how to ask the right questions in psychology, and what answers to those questions should look like. Here's more: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Computational_theory_of_mind","human_ref_B":"Two level game theory in political science.  Chief negotiators in a bilateral negotiation sit simultaneously at two different \"tables\":  * At the international level, they advance their vision of the national and global interest via-\u00e0-vis negotiators from other countries * At the domestic level, they advance their political coalition's interests vis-\u00e0-vis their domestic competitors, and their personal interests within their coalition  The delegations to a bilateral negotiation thus arrive with their their hands tied: they are unable to make a compromise at the international level that would not be acceptable at the domestic level.  Not only would this be against their domestic ambitions, but they would never be able to ratify the agreement anyway.  As a result, sometimes no agreement between two parties is possible, because there is no hypothetical compromise that would be acceptable to both domestic constituencies.  In such a case, it it's pointless to put pressure on either side.  Instead, you have to target their constituencies, building peace from the bottom up.  We are probably seeing this in the case of the Israelis and the Palestinians.  The problem is not that Netanyahu, Abbas, or Meshaal are too stubborn to compromise, but that any hypothetical agreement between the two (three?) sides would be rejected by the domestic constituents of one or both.  Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by radical Israelis for signing the Oslo Accords in 1993, while Yasser Arafat rejected Ehud Barak's offer in 2000 out of fear that he would suffer the same fate.  Source: Robert D. Putnam, \"Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The logic of two-level games.\" International Organization 42, no.3 (1998): 427-460.  [PDF link]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":27705.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80lxqn","c_root_id_B":"c80j839","created_at_utc_A":1358735925,"created_at_utc_B":1358727385,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Two level game theory in political science.  Chief negotiators in a bilateral negotiation sit simultaneously at two different \"tables\":  * At the international level, they advance their vision of the national and global interest via-\u00e0-vis negotiators from other countries * At the domestic level, they advance their political coalition's interests vis-\u00e0-vis their domestic competitors, and their personal interests within their coalition  The delegations to a bilateral negotiation thus arrive with their their hands tied: they are unable to make a compromise at the international level that would not be acceptable at the domestic level.  Not only would this be against their domestic ambitions, but they would never be able to ratify the agreement anyway.  As a result, sometimes no agreement between two parties is possible, because there is no hypothetical compromise that would be acceptable to both domestic constituencies.  In such a case, it it's pointless to put pressure on either side.  Instead, you have to target their constituencies, building peace from the bottom up.  We are probably seeing this in the case of the Israelis and the Palestinians.  The problem is not that Netanyahu, Abbas, or Meshaal are too stubborn to compromise, but that any hypothetical agreement between the two (three?) sides would be rejected by the domestic constituents of one or both.  Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by radical Israelis for signing the Oslo Accords in 1993, while Yasser Arafat rejected Ehud Barak's offer in 2000 out of fear that he would suffer the same fate.  Source: Robert D. Putnam, \"Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The logic of two-level games.\" International Organization 42, no.3 (1998): 427-460.  [PDF link]","human_ref_B":"org theory.  there are massive and inherent dis-economies to scale.  sometimes, as with heavy industry, there are compensating economies that make up for the inherent dis-economies, but those situations are the exception, not the rule.   doing anything bigger always makes doing it harder.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8540.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80h47m","c_root_id_B":"c80lxqn","created_at_utc_A":1358720815,"created_at_utc_B":1358735925,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"In sociology, I wish people would take the time to go beyond the traditional structure\/agency divide and see that there are other approaches out there, for example, Norbert Elias and figurational or process sociology.","human_ref_B":"Two level game theory in political science.  Chief negotiators in a bilateral negotiation sit simultaneously at two different \"tables\":  * At the international level, they advance their vision of the national and global interest via-\u00e0-vis negotiators from other countries * At the domestic level, they advance their political coalition's interests vis-\u00e0-vis their domestic competitors, and their personal interests within their coalition  The delegations to a bilateral negotiation thus arrive with their their hands tied: they are unable to make a compromise at the international level that would not be acceptable at the domestic level.  Not only would this be against their domestic ambitions, but they would never be able to ratify the agreement anyway.  As a result, sometimes no agreement between two parties is possible, because there is no hypothetical compromise that would be acceptable to both domestic constituencies.  In such a case, it it's pointless to put pressure on either side.  Instead, you have to target their constituencies, building peace from the bottom up.  We are probably seeing this in the case of the Israelis and the Palestinians.  The problem is not that Netanyahu, Abbas, or Meshaal are too stubborn to compromise, but that any hypothetical agreement between the two (three?) sides would be rejected by the domestic constituents of one or both.  Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by radical Israelis for signing the Oslo Accords in 1993, while Yasser Arafat rejected Ehud Barak's offer in 2000 out of fear that he would suffer the same fate.  Source: Robert D. Putnam, \"Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The logic of two-level games.\" International Organization 42, no.3 (1998): 427-460.  [PDF link]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15110.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"16xc9w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What do you think are the fundamental theories in your field that you wish everybody knew?","c_root_id_A":"c80lxqn","c_root_id_B":"c80hwt8","created_at_utc_A":1358735925,"created_at_utc_B":1358723265,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Two level game theory in political science.  Chief negotiators in a bilateral negotiation sit simultaneously at two different \"tables\":  * At the international level, they advance their vision of the national and global interest via-\u00e0-vis negotiators from other countries * At the domestic level, they advance their political coalition's interests vis-\u00e0-vis their domestic competitors, and their personal interests within their coalition  The delegations to a bilateral negotiation thus arrive with their their hands tied: they are unable to make a compromise at the international level that would not be acceptable at the domestic level.  Not only would this be against their domestic ambitions, but they would never be able to ratify the agreement anyway.  As a result, sometimes no agreement between two parties is possible, because there is no hypothetical compromise that would be acceptable to both domestic constituencies.  In such a case, it it's pointless to put pressure on either side.  Instead, you have to target their constituencies, building peace from the bottom up.  We are probably seeing this in the case of the Israelis and the Palestinians.  The problem is not that Netanyahu, Abbas, or Meshaal are too stubborn to compromise, but that any hypothetical agreement between the two (three?) sides would be rejected by the domestic constituents of one or both.  Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by radical Israelis for signing the Oslo Accords in 1993, while Yasser Arafat rejected Ehud Barak's offer in 2000 out of fear that he would suffer the same fate.  Source: Robert D. Putnam, \"Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The logic of two-level games.\" International Organization 42, no.3 (1998): 427-460.  [PDF link]","human_ref_B":"I teach Communication. Uncertainty Reduction theory (applicable to many fields) applies to most human interaction and is incredibly useful strategically and personally.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12660.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"wm0t3f","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why is this sub so dead? I've been lurking here for a little while and noticed that for 108,000 subscribers, that there isn't a lot of posts here.  And most posts get like 4-10 comments with several comments removed.  Any reason for that?  This seems like a sub that could be very interesting and should have much more engagement.","c_root_id_A":"ijwtyit","c_root_id_B":"ijwjxvx","created_at_utc_A":1660253175,"created_at_utc_B":1660249291,"score_A":81,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"The main reason is probably that the number of active experts here is actually quite small. You have to consider how broad \"social science\" is. We are talking like single digits of experts in entire fields, most browsing only very sporadically because there aren\u2019t that many posts of interest in the first place and discoverability is low. That\u2019s my sense at least.  As an aside, 100K is also not that large for a subreddit that\u2019s over 10 years old. Some large number of those subscribed accounts are likely inactive.","human_ref_B":"Petition to loosen the sub rules?   While having quality answers is great, having to use peer-reviewed sources in any answer, discourages answers and discussion.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3884.0,"score_ratio":2.7931034483}
{"post_id":"2n60ii","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why is crime such a gendered activity? Its well known that the majority of criminals are men, statistics show us that 83% of arrests in the UK are male and that men make up 94.5 percent of the prisoner population.   What's less well known is the cause of this gender disparity, my suspicion has always been that it was the result of the different way in which society socialises men and women and I was wondering if there was any evidence to confirmed or denied this theory.  I would be especially interested to see if there are any meta studies on the topic.  &nbsp;  All my source were taken from chapter 2.2 of the corston report.","c_root_id_A":"cmarmfu","c_root_id_B":"cmb2cox","created_at_utc_A":1416765237,"created_at_utc_B":1416785419,"score_A":21,"score_B":46,"human_ref_A":"Interesting article: http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/019188699400177T  Long discussion about testosterone and gender and includes a section on crime: http:\/\/fpb.case.edu\/smartcenter\/docs\/SpitCamp\/Booth%20et%20al%20Social%20Forces%202006.pdf","human_ref_B":"I unfortunately don't have time for a long involved answer. But Freda Adler, an important woman in criminological history, put forth a simple explanation for the gender differences in crime. Women have less social access than men. When she was doing her research in the 60's and 70's many or even most women still filled the role of homemaker. As access increased so did crime. Crime is a social activity like any other activity. And her theory plays out in the statistics, women are the fastest growing crime demographic.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20182.0,"score_ratio":2.1904761905}
{"post_id":"2n60ii","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why is crime such a gendered activity? Its well known that the majority of criminals are men, statistics show us that 83% of arrests in the UK are male and that men make up 94.5 percent of the prisoner population.   What's less well known is the cause of this gender disparity, my suspicion has always been that it was the result of the different way in which society socialises men and women and I was wondering if there was any evidence to confirmed or denied this theory.  I would be especially interested to see if there are any meta studies on the topic.  &nbsp;  All my source were taken from chapter 2.2 of the corston report.","c_root_id_A":"cmb2cox","c_root_id_B":"cmathhi","created_at_utc_A":1416785419,"created_at_utc_B":1416768788,"score_A":46,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"I unfortunately don't have time for a long involved answer. But Freda Adler, an important woman in criminological history, put forth a simple explanation for the gender differences in crime. Women have less social access than men. When she was doing her research in the 60's and 70's many or even most women still filled the role of homemaker. As access increased so did crime. Crime is a social activity like any other activity. And her theory plays out in the statistics, women are the fastest growing crime demographic.","human_ref_B":"Homelessness and other forms of harsh povety have been linked to a greater crime rate. \"In Britain, experts believe 20% of their \u201crough sleepers\u201d (people who are homeless) have committed a crime.\" http:\/\/www.povertyinsights.org\/2013\/08\/13\/could-ending-homelessness-reduce-crime\/     Around 88% of the homeless population are male. http:\/\/www.crisis.org.uk\/data\/files\/publications\/factfile_Full.pdf   This may be a contributing factor, hope it helps!  Not sure of your usual rules on citations specifically, saw some guys get deleted so I thought I'd give it a shot!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16631.0,"score_ratio":2.0909090909}
{"post_id":"2n60ii","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why is crime such a gendered activity? Its well known that the majority of criminals are men, statistics show us that 83% of arrests in the UK are male and that men make up 94.5 percent of the prisoner population.   What's less well known is the cause of this gender disparity, my suspicion has always been that it was the result of the different way in which society socialises men and women and I was wondering if there was any evidence to confirmed or denied this theory.  I would be especially interested to see if there are any meta studies on the topic.  &nbsp;  All my source were taken from chapter 2.2 of the corston report.","c_root_id_A":"cmaullp","c_root_id_B":"cmb2cox","created_at_utc_A":1416770811,"created_at_utc_B":1416785419,"score_A":12,"score_B":46,"human_ref_A":"Women are also far less likely to be convicted and if convicted less likely to receive a custodial sentence than men for the same crime. Further, if they do get a custodial sentence, they get on average 63% shorter sentences. Source.","human_ref_B":"I unfortunately don't have time for a long involved answer. But Freda Adler, an important woman in criminological history, put forth a simple explanation for the gender differences in crime. Women have less social access than men. When she was doing her research in the 60's and 70's many or even most women still filled the role of homemaker. As access increased so did crime. Crime is a social activity like any other activity. And her theory plays out in the statistics, women are the fastest growing crime demographic.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14608.0,"score_ratio":3.8333333333}
{"post_id":"2n60ii","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why is crime such a gendered activity? Its well known that the majority of criminals are men, statistics show us that 83% of arrests in the UK are male and that men make up 94.5 percent of the prisoner population.   What's less well known is the cause of this gender disparity, my suspicion has always been that it was the result of the different way in which society socialises men and women and I was wondering if there was any evidence to confirmed or denied this theory.  I would be especially interested to see if there are any meta studies on the topic.  &nbsp;  All my source were taken from chapter 2.2 of the corston report.","c_root_id_A":"cmarmfu","c_root_id_B":"cmathhi","created_at_utc_A":1416765237,"created_at_utc_B":1416768788,"score_A":21,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Interesting article: http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/019188699400177T  Long discussion about testosterone and gender and includes a section on crime: http:\/\/fpb.case.edu\/smartcenter\/docs\/SpitCamp\/Booth%20et%20al%20Social%20Forces%202006.pdf","human_ref_B":"Homelessness and other forms of harsh povety have been linked to a greater crime rate. \"In Britain, experts believe 20% of their \u201crough sleepers\u201d (people who are homeless) have committed a crime.\" http:\/\/www.povertyinsights.org\/2013\/08\/13\/could-ending-homelessness-reduce-crime\/     Around 88% of the homeless population are male. http:\/\/www.crisis.org.uk\/data\/files\/publications\/factfile_Full.pdf   This may be a contributing factor, hope it helps!  Not sure of your usual rules on citations specifically, saw some guys get deleted so I thought I'd give it a shot!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3551.0,"score_ratio":1.0476190476}
{"post_id":"1m67wn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.98,"history":"People often say that at least war creates jobs so it's good for the economy. However, is there any difference though from paying people to go to war vs. paying people to build roads vs. simply paying people (welfare). It would seem to me that paying people for war is akin to welfare (and perhaps even worse) for the economy.  The government spends its money on people and that 'service' is not used towards building the U.S.    Subsequently, I see paying people to do jobs within the U.S. (teachers, professors, road repair, etc.) as a much better use of tax dollars in terms of 'growing the economy'   Is there any truth to this point?","c_root_id_A":"cc6d4e0","c_root_id_B":"cc67v8i","created_at_utc_A":1378927738,"created_at_utc_B":1378913785,"score_A":12,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Bastiat's Parable of the Broken Window answers your question (conditionally) in the affirmative. If a country needs a military of capability X in order to maintain its security, then it's worth it. But maintaining unnecessary military forces is no more economically worthwhile than hiring people to dig ditches and fill them in again. It'd better to just hand out cash. That way people could at least go to school or take care of kids.  There are secondary effects, like having an ongoing weapons industry vs. not, having more or fewer trained reservists, promulgating military values more or less, etc.","human_ref_B":"I'm not a flaired user, but the question you have is discussed in depth in William Hartung's history of the Lockheed-Martin company called \"Prophets of War.\"  I'd say it is fairly well debunked in the book, though it's been too long since I read it for me to be able to accurately present his discussion of it.  It's an interesting book on the topic you present.  (EDIT - By \"debunked\" I mean that the general thrust of the talking point isn't very meaningful:  yes it is true that jobs are created, but that it isn't necessarily the case that it's \"healthy\" for the economy or that it is better than any other kind of public spending)  I would say it coheres more or less with what Krugman is saying in the link another user posted to you, but expands on the ideas in his column quite a bit because it has a lot more room for specific examples and extended exposition.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13953.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1m67wn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.98,"history":"People often say that at least war creates jobs so it's good for the economy. However, is there any difference though from paying people to go to war vs. paying people to build roads vs. simply paying people (welfare). It would seem to me that paying people for war is akin to welfare (and perhaps even worse) for the economy.  The government spends its money on people and that 'service' is not used towards building the U.S.    Subsequently, I see paying people to do jobs within the U.S. (teachers, professors, road repair, etc.) as a much better use of tax dollars in terms of 'growing the economy'   Is there any truth to this point?","c_root_id_A":"cc69hzo","c_root_id_B":"cc6d4e0","created_at_utc_A":1378918224,"created_at_utc_B":1378927738,"score_A":6,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"My rule of thumb follows your standard neokeynesian belief that under full output, government spending crowds out private,but during a glut in demand government spending augments demand. This is purely in terms of the multiplier effect.  And before anyone's shouts broken window fallacy, What we spend on is important too, but insofar as its wasteful to spend on excess military when there is low hanging fruit of poor infrastructure.","human_ref_B":"Bastiat's Parable of the Broken Window answers your question (conditionally) in the affirmative. If a country needs a military of capability X in order to maintain its security, then it's worth it. But maintaining unnecessary military forces is no more economically worthwhile than hiring people to dig ditches and fill them in again. It'd better to just hand out cash. That way people could at least go to school or take care of kids.  There are secondary effects, like having an ongoing weapons industry vs. not, having more or fewer trained reservists, promulgating military values more or less, etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9514.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1m67wn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.98,"history":"People often say that at least war creates jobs so it's good for the economy. However, is there any difference though from paying people to go to war vs. paying people to build roads vs. simply paying people (welfare). It would seem to me that paying people for war is akin to welfare (and perhaps even worse) for the economy.  The government spends its money on people and that 'service' is not used towards building the U.S.    Subsequently, I see paying people to do jobs within the U.S. (teachers, professors, road repair, etc.) as a much better use of tax dollars in terms of 'growing the economy'   Is there any truth to this point?","c_root_id_A":"cc6bgew","c_root_id_B":"cc6d4e0","created_at_utc_A":1378923429,"created_at_utc_B":1378927738,"score_A":5,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":">Have you ever witnessed the anger of the good shopkeeper, James Goodfellow, when his careless son has happened to break a pane of glass? If you have been present at such a scene, you will most assuredly bear witness to the fact that every one of the spectators, were there even thirty of them, by common consent apparently, offered the unfortunate owner this invariable consolation \u2013 \"It is an ill wind that blows nobody good. Everybody must live, and what would become of the glaziers if panes of glass were never broken?\" Now, this form of condolence contains an entire theory, which it will be well to show up in this simple case, seeing that it is precisely the same as that which, unhappily, regulates the greater part of our economical institutions. Suppose it cost six francs to repair the damage, and you say that the accident brings six francs to the glazier's trade \u2013 that it encourages that trade to the amount of six francs \u2013 I grant it; I have not a word to say against it; you reason justly. The glazier comes, performs his task, receives his six francs, rubs his hands, and, in his heart, blesses the careless child. All this is that which is seen. **But if, on the other hand, you come to the conclusion, as is too often the case, that it is a good thing to break windows, that it causes money to circulate, and that the encouragement of industry in general will be the result of it, you will oblige me to call out, \"Stop there! Your theory is confined to that which is seen; it takes no account of that which is not seen. It is not seen that as our ~~shopkeeper~~ government has spent six francs upon one thing, ~~he~~ the people cannot spend them upon another.** It is not seen that if he had not had a window to replace, he would, perhaps, have replaced his old shoes, or added another book to his library. In short, he would have employed his six francs in some way, which this accident has prevented.","human_ref_B":"Bastiat's Parable of the Broken Window answers your question (conditionally) in the affirmative. If a country needs a military of capability X in order to maintain its security, then it's worth it. But maintaining unnecessary military forces is no more economically worthwhile than hiring people to dig ditches and fill them in again. It'd better to just hand out cash. That way people could at least go to school or take care of kids.  There are secondary effects, like having an ongoing weapons industry vs. not, having more or fewer trained reservists, promulgating military values more or less, etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4309.0,"score_ratio":2.4}
{"post_id":"1m67wn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.98,"history":"People often say that at least war creates jobs so it's good for the economy. However, is there any difference though from paying people to go to war vs. paying people to build roads vs. simply paying people (welfare). It would seem to me that paying people for war is akin to welfare (and perhaps even worse) for the economy.  The government spends its money on people and that 'service' is not used towards building the U.S.    Subsequently, I see paying people to do jobs within the U.S. (teachers, professors, road repair, etc.) as a much better use of tax dollars in terms of 'growing the economy'   Is there any truth to this point?","c_root_id_A":"cc67v8i","c_root_id_B":"cc69hzo","created_at_utc_A":1378913785,"created_at_utc_B":1378918224,"score_A":4,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I'm not a flaired user, but the question you have is discussed in depth in William Hartung's history of the Lockheed-Martin company called \"Prophets of War.\"  I'd say it is fairly well debunked in the book, though it's been too long since I read it for me to be able to accurately present his discussion of it.  It's an interesting book on the topic you present.  (EDIT - By \"debunked\" I mean that the general thrust of the talking point isn't very meaningful:  yes it is true that jobs are created, but that it isn't necessarily the case that it's \"healthy\" for the economy or that it is better than any other kind of public spending)  I would say it coheres more or less with what Krugman is saying in the link another user posted to you, but expands on the ideas in his column quite a bit because it has a lot more room for specific examples and extended exposition.","human_ref_B":"My rule of thumb follows your standard neokeynesian belief that under full output, government spending crowds out private,but during a glut in demand government spending augments demand. This is purely in terms of the multiplier effect.  And before anyone's shouts broken window fallacy, What we spend on is important too, but insofar as its wasteful to spend on excess military when there is low hanging fruit of poor infrastructure.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4439.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1m67wn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.98,"history":"People often say that at least war creates jobs so it's good for the economy. However, is there any difference though from paying people to go to war vs. paying people to build roads vs. simply paying people (welfare). It would seem to me that paying people for war is akin to welfare (and perhaps even worse) for the economy.  The government spends its money on people and that 'service' is not used towards building the U.S.    Subsequently, I see paying people to do jobs within the U.S. (teachers, professors, road repair, etc.) as a much better use of tax dollars in terms of 'growing the economy'   Is there any truth to this point?","c_root_id_A":"cc6bgew","c_root_id_B":"cc67v8i","created_at_utc_A":1378923429,"created_at_utc_B":1378913785,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":">Have you ever witnessed the anger of the good shopkeeper, James Goodfellow, when his careless son has happened to break a pane of glass? If you have been present at such a scene, you will most assuredly bear witness to the fact that every one of the spectators, were there even thirty of them, by common consent apparently, offered the unfortunate owner this invariable consolation \u2013 \"It is an ill wind that blows nobody good. Everybody must live, and what would become of the glaziers if panes of glass were never broken?\" Now, this form of condolence contains an entire theory, which it will be well to show up in this simple case, seeing that it is precisely the same as that which, unhappily, regulates the greater part of our economical institutions. Suppose it cost six francs to repair the damage, and you say that the accident brings six francs to the glazier's trade \u2013 that it encourages that trade to the amount of six francs \u2013 I grant it; I have not a word to say against it; you reason justly. The glazier comes, performs his task, receives his six francs, rubs his hands, and, in his heart, blesses the careless child. All this is that which is seen. **But if, on the other hand, you come to the conclusion, as is too often the case, that it is a good thing to break windows, that it causes money to circulate, and that the encouragement of industry in general will be the result of it, you will oblige me to call out, \"Stop there! Your theory is confined to that which is seen; it takes no account of that which is not seen. It is not seen that as our ~~shopkeeper~~ government has spent six francs upon one thing, ~~he~~ the people cannot spend them upon another.** It is not seen that if he had not had a window to replace, he would, perhaps, have replaced his old shoes, or added another book to his library. In short, he would have employed his six francs in some way, which this accident has prevented.","human_ref_B":"I'm not a flaired user, but the question you have is discussed in depth in William Hartung's history of the Lockheed-Martin company called \"Prophets of War.\"  I'd say it is fairly well debunked in the book, though it's been too long since I read it for me to be able to accurately present his discussion of it.  It's an interesting book on the topic you present.  (EDIT - By \"debunked\" I mean that the general thrust of the talking point isn't very meaningful:  yes it is true that jobs are created, but that it isn't necessarily the case that it's \"healthy\" for the economy or that it is better than any other kind of public spending)  I would say it coheres more or less with what Krugman is saying in the link another user posted to you, but expands on the ideas in his column quite a bit because it has a lot more room for specific examples and extended exposition.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9644.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"cay8zcr","c_root_id_B":"cay92uc","created_at_utc_A":1373297450,"created_at_utc_B":1373297729,"score_A":5,"score_B":37,"human_ref_A":"How can you deal with IP and not patents?  Ie, what's the difference?","human_ref_B":"My understanding of music\/movie studios' stances on IP is that you don't actually buy a CD; you buy a license to play the music. You don't buy a movie; you buy a license to play the movie. Yet, I'm fairly certain that if the physical media were destroyed, lost or stolen, publishers would insist you need to buy a new physical copy, which to me implies that the media is indeed what you're buying. How come courts have allowed music and movie studios to have it both ways for so long?  Basically what I'm saying is this: if someone legitimately owns CDs or DVDs, and downloads those songs\/movies from the Internet to save time ripping them, or because they're damaged, or stolen, shouldn't they be able to use the defense, \"I did not purchase the media, but rather the license to enjoy the works contained on the media\"?  To say otherwise, to me, is like saying someone owns my Windows 7 license because they stole my Windows 7 DVD, which is ridiculous.  If you think about my arguments as if you were a judge (or IP attorney!), and add the appropriate legalese, how far off am I?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":279.0,"score_ratio":7.4}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"cay8zcr","c_root_id_B":"cay9x8x","created_at_utc_A":1373297450,"created_at_utc_B":1373300097,"score_A":5,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"How can you deal with IP and not patents?  Ie, what's the difference?","human_ref_B":"Thanks for setting up this post. What would you say are the most common misconceptions about Intellectual Property?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2647.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"cay9qil","c_root_id_B":"cay9x8x","created_at_utc_A":1373299579,"created_at_utc_B":1373300097,"score_A":5,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"John Doe have this awesome idea > for some random reason decides to share it with some stranger on the internet via email messages > this angel 'friend' actually executes the idea before the poor John say \"oh *uck\".  What this average John can do with only his e-mail records go get his well deserved slice of that delicious business?","human_ref_B":"Thanks for setting up this post. What would you say are the most common misconceptions about Intellectual Property?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":518.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"caya9cp","c_root_id_B":"cayct16","created_at_utc_A":1373300997,"created_at_utc_B":1373307550,"score_A":7,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I frequently see the phrase \"All Rights Reserved\" after copyright statements on open-source software.  I'm under the impression that it is silly for two reasons:  * \"All Rights\" are *not* being reserved.  Many or most are being conditionally granted.  * Such notices made sense only under the Buenos Aires Convention and similar copyright regimes, under which some rights would be considered implicitly granted unless you explicitly didn't grant them. Under the Berne Convention, which everybody who matters follows, there is no need for such a notice.  So, can we kill \"All Rights Reserved\"?  (And can we also do something about people who write \"Copyright (c)\" instead of \"Copyright\"?)","human_ref_B":"How do you think the proliferation of 3D printing will change how we view IP? With the waves digital media have made in that regard, it will be interesting to see the same dynamics apply to physical objects.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6553.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"cayct16","c_root_id_B":"cay8zcr","created_at_utc_A":1373307550,"created_at_utc_B":1373297450,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"How do you think the proliferation of 3D printing will change how we view IP? With the waves digital media have made in that regard, it will be interesting to see the same dynamics apply to physical objects.","human_ref_B":"How can you deal with IP and not patents?  Ie, what's the difference?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10100.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"cayct16","c_root_id_B":"cay9qil","created_at_utc_A":1373307550,"created_at_utc_B":1373299579,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"How do you think the proliferation of 3D printing will change how we view IP? With the waves digital media have made in that regard, it will be interesting to see the same dynamics apply to physical objects.","human_ref_B":"John Doe have this awesome idea > for some random reason decides to share it with some stranger on the internet via email messages > this angel 'friend' actually executes the idea before the poor John say \"oh *uck\".  What this average John can do with only his e-mail records go get his well deserved slice of that delicious business?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7971.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"cay8zcr","c_root_id_B":"caya9cp","created_at_utc_A":1373297450,"created_at_utc_B":1373300997,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"How can you deal with IP and not patents?  Ie, what's the difference?","human_ref_B":"I frequently see the phrase \"All Rights Reserved\" after copyright statements on open-source software.  I'm under the impression that it is silly for two reasons:  * \"All Rights\" are *not* being reserved.  Many or most are being conditionally granted.  * Such notices made sense only under the Buenos Aires Convention and similar copyright regimes, under which some rights would be considered implicitly granted unless you explicitly didn't grant them. Under the Berne Convention, which everybody who matters follows, there is no need for such a notice.  So, can we kill \"All Rights Reserved\"?  (And can we also do something about people who write \"Copyright (c)\" instead of \"Copyright\"?)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3547.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"caya9cp","c_root_id_B":"cay9qil","created_at_utc_A":1373300997,"created_at_utc_B":1373299579,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I frequently see the phrase \"All Rights Reserved\" after copyright statements on open-source software.  I'm under the impression that it is silly for two reasons:  * \"All Rights\" are *not* being reserved.  Many or most are being conditionally granted.  * Such notices made sense only under the Buenos Aires Convention and similar copyright regimes, under which some rights would be considered implicitly granted unless you explicitly didn't grant them. Under the Berne Convention, which everybody who matters follows, there is no need for such a notice.  So, can we kill \"All Rights Reserved\"?  (And can we also do something about people who write \"Copyright (c)\" instead of \"Copyright\"?)","human_ref_B":"John Doe have this awesome idea > for some random reason decides to share it with some stranger on the internet via email messages > this angel 'friend' actually executes the idea before the poor John say \"oh *uck\".  What this average John can do with only his e-mail records go get his well deserved slice of that delicious business?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1418.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"cayi7x4","c_root_id_B":"caye3fq","created_at_utc_A":1373321362,"created_at_utc_B":1373310821,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"What's wrong with the current IP regime?   How do you respond to criticism that too much ownership stiffles innovation?  Do you see companies buying IP in order to prevent development of alternative technologies?  What do you think about copyright trolls?","human_ref_B":"So I have a YouTube channel.   It is a brand and there are various icons\/names\/websites\/social media accounts associated with it.   Is it worth it to bother filing for a trademark on my brand? Why? How much does it cost? Per year? (US).   If I don't, what are the potential worst-case situations that could come up?   Does filing sooner rather than later matter?   (For context, my channel has 65k subscribers and is growing fairly quickly, would you recommend differently to smaller or larger entities?)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10541.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"cayi7x4","c_root_id_B":"cayerlh","created_at_utc_A":1373321362,"created_at_utc_B":1373312540,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"What's wrong with the current IP regime?   How do you respond to criticism that too much ownership stiffles innovation?  Do you see companies buying IP in order to prevent development of alternative technologies?  What do you think about copyright trolls?","human_ref_B":"Hey. Thanks for doing this AMA. I didn't take any IP in law school, but I understand how difficult it can be.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8822.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"caygtll","c_root_id_B":"cayi7x4","created_at_utc_A":1373317671,"created_at_utc_B":1373321362,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Why don't fashion designers copyright\/trademark their work? Their logos are trademarked, but not the clothing they make. Do you believe this helps or hinders the fashion industry?","human_ref_B":"What's wrong with the current IP regime?   How do you respond to criticism that too much ownership stiffles innovation?  Do you see companies buying IP in order to prevent development of alternative technologies?  What do you think about copyright trolls?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3691.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1hv7et","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I am a lawyer who specializes in intellectual property (except patents). AMA! I practice in the United States and have focused on intellectual property for most of my career. There is often a disconnect between how people view intellectual property and how it is treated under the law. Feel free to blast away with any questions about copyrights, trademarks, and the myriad of other forms of intellectual property.","c_root_id_A":"caye3fq","c_root_id_B":"cayeb2q","created_at_utc_A":1373310821,"created_at_utc_B":1373311367,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"So I have a YouTube channel.   It is a brand and there are various icons\/names\/websites\/social media accounts associated with it.   Is it worth it to bother filing for a trademark on my brand? Why? How much does it cost? Per year? (US).   If I don't, what are the potential worst-case situations that could come up?   Does filing sooner rather than later matter?   (For context, my channel has 65k subscribers and is growing fairly quickly, would you recommend differently to smaller or larger entities?)","human_ref_B":"Lets say I write and publish an essay on my own website; how do I secure its rights?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":546.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1lnjle","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"How do social sciences other than gender studies perceive modern gender concepts like \"rape culture\" and \"privilege\"? Is there academic consensus on these issues? Do the concepts cross over between differing fields, or is there significant disagreement?","c_root_id_A":"cc134cv","c_root_id_B":"cc11x8a","created_at_utc_A":1378240419,"created_at_utc_B":1378237272,"score_A":127,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Privilege is a much broader concept than just \"male privilege\".  \"White privilege\" is also common trope.  For example, Peggy McIntosh's Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack is a very common pedagogical tool (though it's certainly not cutting edge research).  Most sociologists would probably frame what other people call \"male\/white\/whatever privilege\" in terms of societal structure rather than individual \"privilege\", but the similar arguments are often there.  The winner of our big book award this year, the C. Wright Mills award, Cybelle Fox's *Three Worlds of Relief: Race, Immigration, and the American Welfare State from the Progressive Era to the New Deal*, a outstandingly empirical work of historical sociology which details how black and hispanic people were systematically disadvantaged by early 20th century social policy (for example, social workers helping to deport Hispanic immigrants and not helping to get black citizens all the benefits to which they were entitled) while the early American welfare state systematically did aid recent European immigrants, you know, the ones who \"pulled themselves up by their boot straps\".  I sort of doubt the author uses the term \"white privilege\" explicitly, and it's probably not a word I'd use to describe it, but I certainly wouldn't argue with someone calling it that.  You can read the first chapter, which I *think* lays out out the main argument of the book, here.  Privilege is still a concern in sociology, though.  In fact, the book that won the C. Wright Mills Award last year (2011) is simply called *Privilege* by Shamus Khan.  It's not really about racial or gender privilege, but \"privilege\" in a more conventional sense: socio-economic privilege (with a heavy emphasis on the socio-, obviously).  It is cutting edge research in the sense that it emphasizes how socio-economic privilege has changed in America over the last twenty years, and now is much meritocratic, in rhetoric and presentation if not necessarily in reality.  I really recommend it--unlike most path-breaking sociology books, it's actually enjoyably written.  The introductory chapter, \"Democratic Inequality\" is also available for free online (I love Princeton University Press).  It basically lays out the whole thrust of the book and, honestly, probably one of the best examples of how \"privilege\" is used today.  But I'll agree with \/u\/banjaloupe that, at least in sociology, the work on sociology of gender is very much connected to and in conversation with the gender studies literature.  That said, I think there's relatively little empirical work on \"the rape culture\" recently, and what there is, isn't considered pathbreaking.  Searching \"rape culture\" in Google Scholar and limiting my search to things since 2009, I see a couple of articles, sure, but noticeably very few of the articles have been cited.  Compare that with \"believing without belonging\", a term you might never have heard of but is the subject of an on going debate in the sociology of religion.  Once you take out the book reviews (that is, anything that says like \"Oxford University Press, 2011. Pp. viii+ 230. $99.00 (cloth).\"), you'll see that most of the articles have citations.  The big work on the so-called \"rape culture\" appears to have been done in the late 80's\/early 90's.  It's a word that today seems more popular outside the academic study of gender and sexuality than inside of it.","human_ref_B":"As far as I've ever seen, the social sciences use concepts from gender studies when dealing with gender. This is like using concepts from economics when discussing economies-- use the tools of the scholars who have thought the most about the topic.  The only thing I can think of is the concept of \"social capital\", which is slightly different from the concept of \"privilege\". But someone from gender studies would need to weigh in about the use of Bourdieu in that field or whether there's really any practical difference in usage (as in, \"social capital\" sort of stresses the behavioral aspects but then that gets accomplished as well when talking about gender performativity).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3147.0,"score_ratio":7.0555555556}
{"post_id":"1lnjle","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"How do social sciences other than gender studies perceive modern gender concepts like \"rape culture\" and \"privilege\"? Is there academic consensus on these issues? Do the concepts cross over between differing fields, or is there significant disagreement?","c_root_id_A":"cc12f4q","c_root_id_B":"cc134cv","created_at_utc_A":1378238593,"created_at_utc_B":1378240419,"score_A":5,"score_B":127,"human_ref_A":"In work psychology, we will refer to and work with the more specific issues that allegedly manifest because of these concepts (e.g. sexual harassment in the work place, glass ceiling...). I will leave you to infer the level of consensus that that suggests, though I will say I have never seen an article in my field directly refer to rape culture or privilege (with the caveat that gender issues in work psychology are not my specialty).","human_ref_B":"Privilege is a much broader concept than just \"male privilege\".  \"White privilege\" is also common trope.  For example, Peggy McIntosh's Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack is a very common pedagogical tool (though it's certainly not cutting edge research).  Most sociologists would probably frame what other people call \"male\/white\/whatever privilege\" in terms of societal structure rather than individual \"privilege\", but the similar arguments are often there.  The winner of our big book award this year, the C. Wright Mills award, Cybelle Fox's *Three Worlds of Relief: Race, Immigration, and the American Welfare State from the Progressive Era to the New Deal*, a outstandingly empirical work of historical sociology which details how black and hispanic people were systematically disadvantaged by early 20th century social policy (for example, social workers helping to deport Hispanic immigrants and not helping to get black citizens all the benefits to which they were entitled) while the early American welfare state systematically did aid recent European immigrants, you know, the ones who \"pulled themselves up by their boot straps\".  I sort of doubt the author uses the term \"white privilege\" explicitly, and it's probably not a word I'd use to describe it, but I certainly wouldn't argue with someone calling it that.  You can read the first chapter, which I *think* lays out out the main argument of the book, here.  Privilege is still a concern in sociology, though.  In fact, the book that won the C. Wright Mills Award last year (2011) is simply called *Privilege* by Shamus Khan.  It's not really about racial or gender privilege, but \"privilege\" in a more conventional sense: socio-economic privilege (with a heavy emphasis on the socio-, obviously).  It is cutting edge research in the sense that it emphasizes how socio-economic privilege has changed in America over the last twenty years, and now is much meritocratic, in rhetoric and presentation if not necessarily in reality.  I really recommend it--unlike most path-breaking sociology books, it's actually enjoyably written.  The introductory chapter, \"Democratic Inequality\" is also available for free online (I love Princeton University Press).  It basically lays out the whole thrust of the book and, honestly, probably one of the best examples of how \"privilege\" is used today.  But I'll agree with \/u\/banjaloupe that, at least in sociology, the work on sociology of gender is very much connected to and in conversation with the gender studies literature.  That said, I think there's relatively little empirical work on \"the rape culture\" recently, and what there is, isn't considered pathbreaking.  Searching \"rape culture\" in Google Scholar and limiting my search to things since 2009, I see a couple of articles, sure, but noticeably very few of the articles have been cited.  Compare that with \"believing without belonging\", a term you might never have heard of but is the subject of an on going debate in the sociology of religion.  Once you take out the book reviews (that is, anything that says like \"Oxford University Press, 2011. Pp. viii+ 230. $99.00 (cloth).\"), you'll see that most of the articles have citations.  The big work on the so-called \"rape culture\" appears to have been done in the late 80's\/early 90's.  It's a word that today seems more popular outside the academic study of gender and sexuality than inside of it.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1826.0,"score_ratio":25.4}
{"post_id":"1lnjle","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"How do social sciences other than gender studies perceive modern gender concepts like \"rape culture\" and \"privilege\"? Is there academic consensus on these issues? Do the concepts cross over between differing fields, or is there significant disagreement?","c_root_id_A":"cc14ztb","c_root_id_B":"cc12f4q","created_at_utc_A":1378245451,"created_at_utc_B":1378238593,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Well, in political science, we have the concepts of identities. There are inclusive identities like \"American\", \"Liberal\", and \"Christian\". With this kind of identity, the only qualification is the acceptance of the identity. Civic nationalities, political ideologies, and religions usually fall under this categorization. There are also exclusive identities like \"Polish\", \"Black\", and \"masculine\". These are identities that require certain physical or inherited traits and people reject those who do not have those qualities. Ethnolinguistic nationalities, race, social class (debatably), and sex usually fall under this category.  All identities are social constructs and in a sense don't really exist. Most modern identities are very recent developments with some of the oldest still in use being 500 years old (a few exceptions). There is evidence that people who hold an inclusive identity as their primary identity are better off than those who primarily identify with an exclusive identity. This can be an interpretation of \"privilege\". In America, for example, whites tend to identify primarily with \"American\" or their political beliefs, while minorities identify primarily with their race. Exceptions to both seem to prove this rule (whites that identify with race tend to be worse off, blacks that put civic nationality before race tend to be better off). This is still hotly debated though. It might be due to an inherent benefit to inclusive identities or it might be government enforced bias towards civic nationalism that causes the disparity (and historic accident that states that embrace civic national identity do better than those that embrace ethnic national identities).  Gender studies brings some interesting cases to this such as the lgbt movement trying to change gender from its traditionally exclusive nature to being inclusive. This is an ambitious task, but has been fairly successful, considering how many times a switch from exclusive to inclusive identities has failed throughout history (the Soviet Union's changing policies towards nationality is a cool case study for this). Feminism also presents an interesting case of norm entrepreneurship in its attempt to change the qualifications for exclusive identities.  Generally the schools of thought that use the \"privilege\" model tend to be more prescriptive than the descriptive nature of the \"identities\" model. This isn't a bad thing and it definitely fulfills the current norm of egalitarianism, but sometimes it's good to step back and recognize that it's all social construction.","human_ref_B":"In work psychology, we will refer to and work with the more specific issues that allegedly manifest because of these concepts (e.g. sexual harassment in the work place, glass ceiling...). I will leave you to infer the level of consensus that that suggests, though I will say I have never seen an article in my field directly refer to rape culture or privilege (with the caveat that gender issues in work psychology are not my specialty).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6858.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1lnjle","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"How do social sciences other than gender studies perceive modern gender concepts like \"rape culture\" and \"privilege\"? Is there academic consensus on these issues? Do the concepts cross over between differing fields, or is there significant disagreement?","c_root_id_A":"cc1bwtw","c_root_id_B":"cc12f4q","created_at_utc_A":1378265733,"created_at_utc_B":1378238593,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I know there is a lot of research being done specifically for how gender privilege affects Japanese society. So far it's mostly in the academic sense but there are some vocal minorities trying to kickstart a larger women's rights movement (or, in the case of lopsided divorce child custody laws, men's rights). There are a tremendous amount of hurdles to overcome for this to happen, however.  As far as rape culture goes, Japan has an interesting spin on things. On the one hand, you have \"women-only cars\" on the busiest morning commuter train lines - a direct response to the prevalence of *chikan* or \"public molesters.\" On the other hand, you still have a law system that discourages women from coming out with rape\/sexual assault accusations much more so than in the west. And don't get me started on rape-themed pornography and media and its effect on the national psyche.  As I've said, there is academic research and writing being done on these topics, and they don't differ all that much from the west. The biggest difference is in the scale and practical application of these concepts in the form of a women's rights movement.  EDIT: This is just tangentially related, but some people find it quite fascinating with regards to gender privilege. The Japanese pop media is dominated by the careful creation and curation of \"Idols.\" It is completely accepted that these *Idols* sign many of their rights away in a contract, for relatively small amounts of money. One of the most common clauses in these contracts is a \"no dating\" clause - as not to diminish the carefully crafted \"pure\" image of these sexualized idols. This is purely for business reasons (establishing dominance as well, which is tied right in). But the fear is that the hardcore fans, many of whom buy 1000s of copies of each CD released, will rally and riot against any *Idol* known to be dating.  This recently manifested in a public apology by Minami Minegishi, who shaved her head as penance and tearfully apologized in a widely-disseminated video. She also had to accept a lesser role in her pop group, AKB48 (the most successful idol group in Japanese history). Her crime? Being caught spending the night with her boyfriend. Keep in mind she was a 20 year old adult at the time.  The culture that allows such events to occur with relative normalcy is of interest to modern Japanese scholars, for sure.","human_ref_B":"In work psychology, we will refer to and work with the more specific issues that allegedly manifest because of these concepts (e.g. sexual harassment in the work place, glass ceiling...). I will leave you to infer the level of consensus that that suggests, though I will say I have never seen an article in my field directly refer to rape culture or privilege (with the caveat that gender issues in work psychology are not my specialty).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":27140.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"9xz54s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Sex trafficking and women forced into prostitution are a big problem. Are the nations that have legalized prostitution into registered brothels able to control this undesirable side trade better than countries like the U.S. where prostitution is illegal? (Prostitution is illegal everywhere in the U.S. except a small part of Nevada).  Various nations have legalized prostitution:   >In eight European countries (The Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Greece, Turkey, Hungary, and Latvia), prostitution is legal and regulated.  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Prostitution_in_Europe  Also Australia, New Zealand and more.  https:\/\/www.scoopwhoop.com\/inothernews\/countries-with-legal-prostitution\/#.lb0z4z8j8","c_root_id_A":"e9x1hm0","c_root_id_B":"e9x1m39","created_at_utc_A":1542494433,"created_at_utc_B":1542494528,"score_A":8,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"The benefits of either decriminalizing or legalizing (aspects of) prostitution is arguably a controversial topic as it also involves ethical issues concerning sex work itself (e.g. not only conservative and religious groups may support prohibition, but some feminist groups too, albeit for different reasons).  &#x200B;  Some scholars criticize legalization by suggesting that, for example, \u201clegal sex businesses provide locations where sexual harassment, sexual exploitation, and violence against women are perpetrated with impunity\u201d and that \u201c\\s\\]tate-sponsored prostitution endangers all women and children in that acts of sexual predation are normalized\u2014acts ranging from the seemingly banal (breast massage) to the lethal (snuff prostitution that includes filming of actual murders of real women and children)\u201d. Similarly, the relationship between [human trafficking and prostitution is often evoked, together with the notion that legalizing the latter contributes to the former. However, while there are studies that support this idea, the actual issue might be in the kind of model implemented.  There is likewise research suggesting that legalization can reduce sexual abuse and rape. For example: \u201cOur difference-in-difference analysis using data on the largest 25 Dutch cities between 1994 and 2011 shows that opening a legal street prostitution zone decreases registered sexual abuse and rape by about 30% to 40% in the first two year\u201d. In Rhodes Island they found that \u201cdecriminalization caused both forcible rape offenses and gonorrhea incidence to decline for the overall population. Our synthetic control model finds 824 fewer reported rape offenses (31 percent decrease)\u201d.  &#x200B;  An argument that can be made is that while legalization can make the \u201cvulnerable more vulnerable\u201d, the problem lies in how prostitution is legalized. For example, in the U.K., prostitution laws have pushed sex workers off-street. But as Hubbard and Scoular observe:  >Sex workers can still be financially exploited, injured or killed when working off-street \u2013 particularly when premises are not surveyed or acknowledged by the authorities \\\u2026\\] this apparently laissez-faire approach has delineated a private sphere of non-intervention, creating an unregulated market in which private forms of commercial sex are, by omission, sanctioned \\[\u2026\\] We hence conclude by arguing for policies that recognise that sex will always be bought and sold, and which do not seek to criminalise it or simply push it out of sight, but allow it to occur as safely, as orderly and as fairly as possible.  Another example can be found in this [Swiss study, which recognizes that \u201c\\[a\\]busive situations can develop in all sectors of this market\u201d and that \u201cthe answer cannot be either or, but needs to consider contradictory aspects\u201d, recommending that \u201cregulations should be designed to increase sex workers\u2019 protection without infringing on transparency and predictability for both sex workers and managers\u201d.  &#x200B;  I would conclude by noting that one of the ideas behind legalization is that it should allow sex workers to report crimes without fearing legal repercussions towards themselves. This means that there is a willingness to increase reporting, which would explain increases in official statistics following legalization. But this likewise depends on how each country deals with the issue and implements protections, such that for the more general case of human trafficking, there are victims that were\/are prosecuted and\/or deported because they are guilty of \"illegal immigration\", which undermines the fight against trafficking in human beings.","human_ref_B":"Finding meaningful answers to questions like this can be very difficult because the specific conditions of sex workers in one country could be very different than the conditions of sex workers in another country.  You'd have to look at factors like... What is the poverty rate of the countries in question?   Rate of addiction?  Percentage of foreign sex workers?  Where are those foreign sex workers from?  How many sex workers are there?  Regardless of legal status, how does the average citizen view sex workers?  Are there many religious fundamentalists in the country?  And... so on, and so forth.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":95.0,"score_ratio":1.375}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdvpkz","c_root_id_B":"dfdmvit","created_at_utc_A":1490425571,"created_at_utc_B":1490408962,"score_A":10,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Behavioral Science\/Economics  Thinking Fast and Slow      The Blank Slate  Predictably Irrational","human_ref_B":"Human geography and human behavior.  Weber - The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism  Habermas - Europe: The Faltering Project  Woodard - American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16609.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdrcs4","c_root_id_B":"dfdvpkz","created_at_utc_A":1490416002,"created_at_utc_B":1490425571,"score_A":8,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I'm at the crux of human geography, anthropology and media and communications. Focus on contemporary China, migration, technology, transnationalism, social media:  Wang Xinyuan: Social Media in Industrial China (open access PDF here)  Rachel Murphy: How Migrant Labour Changed Rural China  Arjen Appadurai: Modernity at Large  I think these three are interesting and accessible, particularly the first which is intentionally written to be accessible (a rarity). In order, they are good for contemporary Chinese social media and urban life (2016, part of the Danny Miller social media study), migration in China (from late 90s early 00s) that is slightly outdated but still speaks a lot of truths, and for one of my favorite books on transnational and translocal living.  The social media book is part of a series of 9 based on simultaneous studies around the world, all open access, there is a book compiling all the studies together and comparing certain findings.","human_ref_B":"Behavioral Science\/Economics  Thinking Fast and Slow      The Blank Slate  Predictably Irrational","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9569.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdvpkz","c_root_id_B":"dfdrhh0","created_at_utc_A":1490425571,"created_at_utc_B":1490416227,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Behavioral Science\/Economics  Thinking Fast and Slow      The Blank Slate  Predictably Irrational","human_ref_B":"Political science, specifically mass behavior in the US  * Achen, Christopher, and Larry M Bartels. 2016. Democracy for Realists. Princeton: Princeton University Press. * Hetherington, Marc J, and Thomas Rudolph. 2015. Why Washington Won't Work: Polarization, Political Trust, and the Governing Crisis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. * Kinder, Donald R, and Cindy D Kam. 2009. Us Against Them. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9344.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdn78k","c_root_id_B":"dfdvpkz","created_at_utc_A":1490409461,"created_at_utc_B":1490425571,"score_A":4,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Law, obviously pretty country specific, but these recommendations are applicable to any common law jurisdiction:  The Rule of Law by Tom Bingham   Is eating people wrong? Great legal cases and how they shaped the world by Allan Hutchinson  About law: An introduction by Tony Honore","human_ref_B":"Behavioral Science\/Economics  Thinking Fast and Slow      The Blank Slate  Predictably Irrational","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16110.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdvpkz","c_root_id_B":"dfdsp0c","created_at_utc_A":1490425571,"created_at_utc_B":1490418356,"score_A":10,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Behavioral Science\/Economics  Thinking Fast and Slow      The Blank Slate  Predictably Irrational","human_ref_B":"Love this question and all of the responses. I'll throw in my two cents. I'm a video editor. I can offer two of the best books on the subject:  Walter Murch - in the blink of an eye  Sculpting in Time - Andrei Tarkovsky","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7215.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdqwz8","c_root_id_B":"dfdvpkz","created_at_utc_A":1490415266,"created_at_utc_B":1490425571,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Unorthodox answer, geared toward getting people excited about linguistics rather than toward teaching its fundamentals (which can come once they care):  Crystal, D. (2008). Language play. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.  Abley, M. (2005). Spoken here: travels among threatened languages. London: Arrow Books.  Kacirk, J. (2004). The word museum: the most remarkable English ever forgotten. New York: Barnes & Noble.  These are all popular-press books. If you aren't excited to learn some linguistics after that, you're never going to be. (And if you are... well, weirdly Mark Rosenfelder's \"Language Construction Kit\" is the best non-technical intro I can think of, but I'd be more inclined to suggest Yule's \"The Study of Language\" as a real textbook.)","human_ref_B":"Behavioral Science\/Economics  Thinking Fast and Slow      The Blank Slate  Predictably Irrational","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10305.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdrchi","c_root_id_B":"dfdvpkz","created_at_utc_A":1490415987,"created_at_utc_B":1490425571,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Environmental history  Mark Fiege *Republic of Nature* - Typical stories in American History (such as Brown vs Board) but with the question \"how did nature matter\"   Diana Davis *Resurecting the Granaries of Rome* - Algerian colonial history that highlights the power of \"environmental narratives\" - or the stories we tell about nature and the power relations those create   Richard White *Organic Machine* - history of the Columbia River that undermines typical conceptions about lines between nature and artifice.","human_ref_B":"Behavioral Science\/Economics  Thinking Fast and Slow      The Blank Slate  Predictably Irrational","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9584.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdvpkz","c_root_id_B":"dfdo3u5","created_at_utc_A":1490425571,"created_at_utc_B":1490410851,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Behavioral Science\/Economics  Thinking Fast and Slow      The Blank Slate  Predictably Irrational","human_ref_B":"Edward Castronova. Synthetic Worlds  Celia Pearce. Communities of Play   Jane McGonigal. Reality is Broken","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14720.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdn78k","c_root_id_B":"dfdrcs4","created_at_utc_A":1490409461,"created_at_utc_B":1490416002,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Law, obviously pretty country specific, but these recommendations are applicable to any common law jurisdiction:  The Rule of Law by Tom Bingham   Is eating people wrong? Great legal cases and how they shaped the world by Allan Hutchinson  About law: An introduction by Tony Honore","human_ref_B":"I'm at the crux of human geography, anthropology and media and communications. Focus on contemporary China, migration, technology, transnationalism, social media:  Wang Xinyuan: Social Media in Industrial China (open access PDF here)  Rachel Murphy: How Migrant Labour Changed Rural China  Arjen Appadurai: Modernity at Large  I think these three are interesting and accessible, particularly the first which is intentionally written to be accessible (a rarity). In order, they are good for contemporary Chinese social media and urban life (2016, part of the Danny Miller social media study), migration in China (from late 90s early 00s) that is slightly outdated but still speaks a lot of truths, and for one of my favorite books on transnational and translocal living.  The social media book is part of a series of 9 based on simultaneous studies around the world, all open access, there is a book compiling all the studies together and comparing certain findings.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6541.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdqwz8","c_root_id_B":"dfdrcs4","created_at_utc_A":1490415266,"created_at_utc_B":1490416002,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Unorthodox answer, geared toward getting people excited about linguistics rather than toward teaching its fundamentals (which can come once they care):  Crystal, D. (2008). Language play. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.  Abley, M. (2005). Spoken here: travels among threatened languages. London: Arrow Books.  Kacirk, J. (2004). The word museum: the most remarkable English ever forgotten. New York: Barnes & Noble.  These are all popular-press books. If you aren't excited to learn some linguistics after that, you're never going to be. (And if you are... well, weirdly Mark Rosenfelder's \"Language Construction Kit\" is the best non-technical intro I can think of, but I'd be more inclined to suggest Yule's \"The Study of Language\" as a real textbook.)","human_ref_B":"I'm at the crux of human geography, anthropology and media and communications. Focus on contemporary China, migration, technology, transnationalism, social media:  Wang Xinyuan: Social Media in Industrial China (open access PDF here)  Rachel Murphy: How Migrant Labour Changed Rural China  Arjen Appadurai: Modernity at Large  I think these three are interesting and accessible, particularly the first which is intentionally written to be accessible (a rarity). In order, they are good for contemporary Chinese social media and urban life (2016, part of the Danny Miller social media study), migration in China (from late 90s early 00s) that is slightly outdated but still speaks a lot of truths, and for one of my favorite books on transnational and translocal living.  The social media book is part of a series of 9 based on simultaneous studies around the world, all open access, there is a book compiling all the studies together and comparing certain findings.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":736.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdrchi","c_root_id_B":"dfdrcs4","created_at_utc_A":1490415987,"created_at_utc_B":1490416002,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Environmental history  Mark Fiege *Republic of Nature* - Typical stories in American History (such as Brown vs Board) but with the question \"how did nature matter\"   Diana Davis *Resurecting the Granaries of Rome* - Algerian colonial history that highlights the power of \"environmental narratives\" - or the stories we tell about nature and the power relations those create   Richard White *Organic Machine* - history of the Columbia River that undermines typical conceptions about lines between nature and artifice.","human_ref_B":"I'm at the crux of human geography, anthropology and media and communications. Focus on contemporary China, migration, technology, transnationalism, social media:  Wang Xinyuan: Social Media in Industrial China (open access PDF here)  Rachel Murphy: How Migrant Labour Changed Rural China  Arjen Appadurai: Modernity at Large  I think these three are interesting and accessible, particularly the first which is intentionally written to be accessible (a rarity). In order, they are good for contemporary Chinese social media and urban life (2016, part of the Danny Miller social media study), migration in China (from late 90s early 00s) that is slightly outdated but still speaks a lot of truths, and for one of my favorite books on transnational and translocal living.  The social media book is part of a series of 9 based on simultaneous studies around the world, all open access, there is a book compiling all the studies together and comparing certain findings.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdrcs4","c_root_id_B":"dfdo3u5","created_at_utc_A":1490416002,"created_at_utc_B":1490410851,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'm at the crux of human geography, anthropology and media and communications. Focus on contemporary China, migration, technology, transnationalism, social media:  Wang Xinyuan: Social Media in Industrial China (open access PDF here)  Rachel Murphy: How Migrant Labour Changed Rural China  Arjen Appadurai: Modernity at Large  I think these three are interesting and accessible, particularly the first which is intentionally written to be accessible (a rarity). In order, they are good for contemporary Chinese social media and urban life (2016, part of the Danny Miller social media study), migration in China (from late 90s early 00s) that is slightly outdated but still speaks a lot of truths, and for one of my favorite books on transnational and translocal living.  The social media book is part of a series of 9 based on simultaneous studies around the world, all open access, there is a book compiling all the studies together and comparing certain findings.","human_ref_B":"Edward Castronova. Synthetic Worlds  Celia Pearce. Communities of Play   Jane McGonigal. Reality is Broken","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5151.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdrhh0","c_root_id_B":"dfe2hff","created_at_utc_A":1490416227,"created_at_utc_B":1490447820,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Political science, specifically mass behavior in the US  * Achen, Christopher, and Larry M Bartels. 2016. Democracy for Realists. Princeton: Princeton University Press. * Hetherington, Marc J, and Thomas Rudolph. 2015. Why Washington Won't Work: Polarization, Political Trust, and the Governing Crisis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. * Kinder, Donald R, and Cindy D Kam. 2009. Us Against Them. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.","human_ref_B":"Sociology\/Internet Science with a focus on feminist games studies:      The Video Game Theory Reader by Mark Wolf   Distinction by Pierre Bourdieu   A Cyborg Manifesto by Donna Haraway","labels":0,"seconds_difference":31593.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdn78k","c_root_id_B":"dfe2hff","created_at_utc_A":1490409461,"created_at_utc_B":1490447820,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Law, obviously pretty country specific, but these recommendations are applicable to any common law jurisdiction:  The Rule of Law by Tom Bingham   Is eating people wrong? Great legal cases and how they shaped the world by Allan Hutchinson  About law: An introduction by Tony Honore","human_ref_B":"Sociology\/Internet Science with a focus on feminist games studies:      The Video Game Theory Reader by Mark Wolf   Distinction by Pierre Bourdieu   A Cyborg Manifesto by Donna Haraway","labels":0,"seconds_difference":38359.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdsp0c","c_root_id_B":"dfe2hff","created_at_utc_A":1490418356,"created_at_utc_B":1490447820,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Love this question and all of the responses. I'll throw in my two cents. I'm a video editor. I can offer two of the best books on the subject:  Walter Murch - in the blink of an eye  Sculpting in Time - Andrei Tarkovsky","human_ref_B":"Sociology\/Internet Science with a focus on feminist games studies:      The Video Game Theory Reader by Mark Wolf   Distinction by Pierre Bourdieu   A Cyborg Manifesto by Donna Haraway","labels":0,"seconds_difference":29464.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfe2hff","c_root_id_B":"dfdqwz8","created_at_utc_A":1490447820,"created_at_utc_B":1490415266,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Sociology\/Internet Science with a focus on feminist games studies:      The Video Game Theory Reader by Mark Wolf   Distinction by Pierre Bourdieu   A Cyborg Manifesto by Donna Haraway","human_ref_B":"Unorthodox answer, geared toward getting people excited about linguistics rather than toward teaching its fundamentals (which can come once they care):  Crystal, D. (2008). Language play. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.  Abley, M. (2005). Spoken here: travels among threatened languages. London: Arrow Books.  Kacirk, J. (2004). The word museum: the most remarkable English ever forgotten. New York: Barnes & Noble.  These are all popular-press books. If you aren't excited to learn some linguistics after that, you're never going to be. (And if you are... well, weirdly Mark Rosenfelder's \"Language Construction Kit\" is the best non-technical intro I can think of, but I'd be more inclined to suggest Yule's \"The Study of Language\" as a real textbook.)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":32554.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdrchi","c_root_id_B":"dfe2hff","created_at_utc_A":1490415987,"created_at_utc_B":1490447820,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Environmental history  Mark Fiege *Republic of Nature* - Typical stories in American History (such as Brown vs Board) but with the question \"how did nature matter\"   Diana Davis *Resurecting the Granaries of Rome* - Algerian colonial history that highlights the power of \"environmental narratives\" - or the stories we tell about nature and the power relations those create   Richard White *Organic Machine* - history of the Columbia River that undermines typical conceptions about lines between nature and artifice.","human_ref_B":"Sociology\/Internet Science with a focus on feminist games studies:      The Video Game Theory Reader by Mark Wolf   Distinction by Pierre Bourdieu   A Cyborg Manifesto by Donna Haraway","labels":0,"seconds_difference":31833.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdzyux","c_root_id_B":"dfe2hff","created_at_utc_A":1490441055,"created_at_utc_B":1490447820,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Social Anthropology:  The Falling Sky: Words of a Yanomami Shaman, by Davi Kopenawa. A really accessible and fascinating account of a culture from the inside, with a focus on the colonial encounter, with fascinating insights on the \"West\" from an outside perspective.  On Cannibals, by Michel de Montaigne. A very early account of cultural relativism from a key 16th century thinker (and a huge influence on Levi-Strauss).  I Swear I Saw This, Drawings in Fieldwork Notebooks, Namely My Own, by Michael Taussig. A wonderfully reflective account of the activity of perception and narrative creation in the field. Taussig is really out there and absolutely refreshing.","human_ref_B":"Sociology\/Internet Science with a focus on feminist games studies:      The Video Game Theory Reader by Mark Wolf   Distinction by Pierre Bourdieu   A Cyborg Manifesto by Donna Haraway","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6765.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfe2hff","c_root_id_B":"dfdo3u5","created_at_utc_A":1490447820,"created_at_utc_B":1490410851,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Sociology\/Internet Science with a focus on feminist games studies:      The Video Game Theory Reader by Mark Wolf   Distinction by Pierre Bourdieu   A Cyborg Manifesto by Donna Haraway","human_ref_B":"Edward Castronova. Synthetic Worlds  Celia Pearce. Communities of Play   Jane McGonigal. Reality is Broken","labels":1,"seconds_difference":36969.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdzgn0","c_root_id_B":"dfe2hff","created_at_utc_A":1490438926,"created_at_utc_B":1490447820,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Global History: Great Divergence Debate  Bruce Bueno De Mesquita, Alastair Smith, The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior is Almost Always Good Politics.  Daron Acemo\u011flu, James A. Robinson, Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty.  They at least portray more or less the point of view I have come to accept.","human_ref_B":"Sociology\/Internet Science with a focus on feminist games studies:      The Video Game Theory Reader by Mark Wolf   Distinction by Pierre Bourdieu   A Cyborg Manifesto by Donna Haraway","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8894.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdn78k","c_root_id_B":"dfdrhh0","created_at_utc_A":1490409461,"created_at_utc_B":1490416227,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Law, obviously pretty country specific, but these recommendations are applicable to any common law jurisdiction:  The Rule of Law by Tom Bingham   Is eating people wrong? Great legal cases and how they shaped the world by Allan Hutchinson  About law: An introduction by Tony Honore","human_ref_B":"Political science, specifically mass behavior in the US  * Achen, Christopher, and Larry M Bartels. 2016. Democracy for Realists. Princeton: Princeton University Press. * Hetherington, Marc J, and Thomas Rudolph. 2015. Why Washington Won't Work: Polarization, Political Trust, and the Governing Crisis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. * Kinder, Donald R, and Cindy D Kam. 2009. Us Against Them. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6766.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdrhh0","c_root_id_B":"dfdqwz8","created_at_utc_A":1490416227,"created_at_utc_B":1490415266,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Political science, specifically mass behavior in the US  * Achen, Christopher, and Larry M Bartels. 2016. Democracy for Realists. Princeton: Princeton University Press. * Hetherington, Marc J, and Thomas Rudolph. 2015. Why Washington Won't Work: Polarization, Political Trust, and the Governing Crisis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. * Kinder, Donald R, and Cindy D Kam. 2009. Us Against Them. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.","human_ref_B":"Unorthodox answer, geared toward getting people excited about linguistics rather than toward teaching its fundamentals (which can come once they care):  Crystal, D. (2008). Language play. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.  Abley, M. (2005). Spoken here: travels among threatened languages. London: Arrow Books.  Kacirk, J. (2004). The word museum: the most remarkable English ever forgotten. New York: Barnes & Noble.  These are all popular-press books. If you aren't excited to learn some linguistics after that, you're never going to be. (And if you are... well, weirdly Mark Rosenfelder's \"Language Construction Kit\" is the best non-technical intro I can think of, but I'd be more inclined to suggest Yule's \"The Study of Language\" as a real textbook.)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":961.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdrhh0","c_root_id_B":"dfdrchi","created_at_utc_A":1490416227,"created_at_utc_B":1490415987,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Political science, specifically mass behavior in the US  * Achen, Christopher, and Larry M Bartels. 2016. Democracy for Realists. Princeton: Princeton University Press. * Hetherington, Marc J, and Thomas Rudolph. 2015. Why Washington Won't Work: Polarization, Political Trust, and the Governing Crisis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. * Kinder, Donald R, and Cindy D Kam. 2009. Us Against Them. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.","human_ref_B":"Environmental history  Mark Fiege *Republic of Nature* - Typical stories in American History (such as Brown vs Board) but with the question \"how did nature matter\"   Diana Davis *Resurecting the Granaries of Rome* - Algerian colonial history that highlights the power of \"environmental narratives\" - or the stories we tell about nature and the power relations those create   Richard White *Organic Machine* - history of the Columbia River that undermines typical conceptions about lines between nature and artifice.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":240.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdo3u5","c_root_id_B":"dfdrhh0","created_at_utc_A":1490410851,"created_at_utc_B":1490416227,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Edward Castronova. Synthetic Worlds  Celia Pearce. Communities of Play   Jane McGonigal. Reality is Broken","human_ref_B":"Political science, specifically mass behavior in the US  * Achen, Christopher, and Larry M Bartels. 2016. Democracy for Realists. Princeton: Princeton University Press. * Hetherington, Marc J, and Thomas Rudolph. 2015. Why Washington Won't Work: Polarization, Political Trust, and the Governing Crisis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. * Kinder, Donald R, and Cindy D Kam. 2009. Us Against Them. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5376.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdsp0c","c_root_id_B":"dfdqwz8","created_at_utc_A":1490418356,"created_at_utc_B":1490415266,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Love this question and all of the responses. I'll throw in my two cents. I'm a video editor. I can offer two of the best books on the subject:  Walter Murch - in the blink of an eye  Sculpting in Time - Andrei Tarkovsky","human_ref_B":"Unorthodox answer, geared toward getting people excited about linguistics rather than toward teaching its fundamentals (which can come once they care):  Crystal, D. (2008). Language play. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.  Abley, M. (2005). Spoken here: travels among threatened languages. London: Arrow Books.  Kacirk, J. (2004). The word museum: the most remarkable English ever forgotten. New York: Barnes & Noble.  These are all popular-press books. If you aren't excited to learn some linguistics after that, you're never going to be. (And if you are... well, weirdly Mark Rosenfelder's \"Language Construction Kit\" is the best non-technical intro I can think of, but I'd be more inclined to suggest Yule's \"The Study of Language\" as a real textbook.)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3090.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdrchi","c_root_id_B":"dfdsp0c","created_at_utc_A":1490415987,"created_at_utc_B":1490418356,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Environmental history  Mark Fiege *Republic of Nature* - Typical stories in American History (such as Brown vs Board) but with the question \"how did nature matter\"   Diana Davis *Resurecting the Granaries of Rome* - Algerian colonial history that highlights the power of \"environmental narratives\" - or the stories we tell about nature and the power relations those create   Richard White *Organic Machine* - history of the Columbia River that undermines typical conceptions about lines between nature and artifice.","human_ref_B":"Love this question and all of the responses. I'll throw in my two cents. I'm a video editor. I can offer two of the best books on the subject:  Walter Murch - in the blink of an eye  Sculpting in Time - Andrei Tarkovsky","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2369.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdsp0c","c_root_id_B":"dfdo3u5","created_at_utc_A":1490418356,"created_at_utc_B":1490410851,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Love this question and all of the responses. I'll throw in my two cents. I'm a video editor. I can offer two of the best books on the subject:  Walter Murch - in the blink of an eye  Sculpting in Time - Andrei Tarkovsky","human_ref_B":"Edward Castronova. Synthetic Worlds  Celia Pearce. Communities of Play   Jane McGonigal. Reality is Broken","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7505.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdqwz8","c_root_id_B":"dfdo3u5","created_at_utc_A":1490415266,"created_at_utc_B":1490410851,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Unorthodox answer, geared toward getting people excited about linguistics rather than toward teaching its fundamentals (which can come once they care):  Crystal, D. (2008). Language play. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.  Abley, M. (2005). Spoken here: travels among threatened languages. London: Arrow Books.  Kacirk, J. (2004). The word museum: the most remarkable English ever forgotten. New York: Barnes & Noble.  These are all popular-press books. If you aren't excited to learn some linguistics after that, you're never going to be. (And if you are... well, weirdly Mark Rosenfelder's \"Language Construction Kit\" is the best non-technical intro I can think of, but I'd be more inclined to suggest Yule's \"The Study of Language\" as a real textbook.)","human_ref_B":"Edward Castronova. Synthetic Worlds  Celia Pearce. Communities of Play   Jane McGonigal. Reality is Broken","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4415.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdrchi","c_root_id_B":"dfdo3u5","created_at_utc_A":1490415987,"created_at_utc_B":1490410851,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Environmental history  Mark Fiege *Republic of Nature* - Typical stories in American History (such as Brown vs Board) but with the question \"how did nature matter\"   Diana Davis *Resurecting the Granaries of Rome* - Algerian colonial history that highlights the power of \"environmental narratives\" - or the stories we tell about nature and the power relations those create   Richard White *Organic Machine* - history of the Columbia River that undermines typical conceptions about lines between nature and artifice.","human_ref_B":"Edward Castronova. Synthetic Worlds  Celia Pearce. Communities of Play   Jane McGonigal. Reality is Broken","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5136.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdzyux","c_root_id_B":"dfdo3u5","created_at_utc_A":1490441055,"created_at_utc_B":1490410851,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Social Anthropology:  The Falling Sky: Words of a Yanomami Shaman, by Davi Kopenawa. A really accessible and fascinating account of a culture from the inside, with a focus on the colonial encounter, with fascinating insights on the \"West\" from an outside perspective.  On Cannibals, by Michel de Montaigne. A very early account of cultural relativism from a key 16th century thinker (and a huge influence on Levi-Strauss).  I Swear I Saw This, Drawings in Fieldwork Notebooks, Namely My Own, by Michael Taussig. A wonderfully reflective account of the activity of perception and narrative creation in the field. Taussig is really out there and absolutely refreshing.","human_ref_B":"Edward Castronova. Synthetic Worlds  Celia Pearce. Communities of Play   Jane McGonigal. Reality is Broken","labels":1,"seconds_difference":30204.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"61btjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If you could recommend a maximum of 3 *accessible* books from your discipline what would they be?","c_root_id_A":"dfdzyux","c_root_id_B":"dfdzgn0","created_at_utc_A":1490441055,"created_at_utc_B":1490438926,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Social Anthropology:  The Falling Sky: Words of a Yanomami Shaman, by Davi Kopenawa. A really accessible and fascinating account of a culture from the inside, with a focus on the colonial encounter, with fascinating insights on the \"West\" from an outside perspective.  On Cannibals, by Michel de Montaigne. A very early account of cultural relativism from a key 16th century thinker (and a huge influence on Levi-Strauss).  I Swear I Saw This, Drawings in Fieldwork Notebooks, Namely My Own, by Michael Taussig. A wonderfully reflective account of the activity of perception and narrative creation in the field. Taussig is really out there and absolutely refreshing.","human_ref_B":"Global History: Great Divergence Debate  Bruce Bueno De Mesquita, Alastair Smith, The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior is Almost Always Good Politics.  Daron Acemo\u011flu, James A. Robinson, Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty.  They at least portray more or less the point of view I have come to accept.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2129.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"4ouuva","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"How is it possible that German's economy is so strong after being destroyed twice in the last century? I got struck after talking about UK's vote that Germany is one of the countries that gives the most to the EU in general, but its economy was destroyed twice by both of the big wars in the last century! Is it because of its people or something happened that I'm not aware of? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"d4fxpd5","c_root_id_B":"d4fwwhj","created_at_utc_A":1466380087,"created_at_utc_B":1466378713,"score_A":76,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Well. Regarding how they got there after the wars: Germany wasn't actually physically destroyed by WWI, but its economy was, and the Allies dismantled its industry and the Treaty of Versailles demanded enormous, draconian payments of the German state that it couldn't really afford (though Germany had imposed worse conditions on Russia in the east in 1918, so it's not like they're the only victims here). It managed to recover modestly in the mid-20s, after several political and economic catastrophies (hyperinflation, political assassinations, attempted coups and revolutions, Ruhr area occupation by France) hitting their peak in 1923, but in 1929 the financial crisis hit and sent the German economy into a tailspin again. After the democratic parties failed to keep a broad government coalition together, a quick succession of President-appointed cabinets failed to solve much until Hitler was appointed and quickly established a dictatorship. Nazi Germany financed its rearmament and infrastructure spending via massive debts in the lead-up to WWII that was to be repaid with war spoils. After WWII, Germany was totally bombed out and lay in physical and economic ruins, but was full of skilled workers that lived in higher concentration than pre-war due to the smaller borders and forced resettlement. In light of the looming US-Soviet conflict, the US decided to support the rebuilding of Europe via the Marshall plan, loans to European countries in severe economic trouble after the war. The investment (but more importantly, political and economic integration with the West and the US which was largely unharmed by the war and economically in a good position), the skilled labor, and the massive need for rebuilding all created the post-war \"economic miracle\", with cheap, high-quality German manufacturing export to the Western bloc becoming a powerful economic motor that lead Germany to renewed economic power. The idea of \"social market economy\" was also coined around this time. That's basically how Germany got to be prosperous again after WW2.   Reading on that: Ian Kershaw, Weimar. Why did German Democracy Fail?  Rebuilding Germany.   German Economic Miracle  (Sorry for not being very in-depth with sources, but they should cover some of your questions I hope. Ask \/r\/AskHistorians for properly up to date historiography!)  Obviously, a lot happened since then. Mining and heavy industry declined and the service sector grew, like in other first world economies. Notably for today, 1998 saw the third way-leaning Social Democrats (SPD) come to power, who in the 2000s introduced some reforms that were heavily criticized as being neoliberal, at a time when German unemployment was at high levels. Since then, I've seen people argue that the flexibility of the German labor market has kept unemployment low, while German industry has kept its position as being one of the most export-oriented. I'm not an economist though, so this would probably be better off answered by someone else.  **Edit:** Also, do remember that Germany is pretty big. It currently (post-reunification) has 82 million inhabitants, which is more than the UK or France.","human_ref_B":"This is literally the text book example of a capital shock used when presenting the Solow model to econ students: http:\/\/cruel.org\/econthought\/essays\/growth\/neoclass\/solowconv.html","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1374.0,"score_ratio":15.2}
{"post_id":"1lzqzy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Why do we see citizens who support the Confederacy in the US even today, and why are they not considered traitors? Asked first in \/r\/AskHistorians but they told me to come here. So here it is.  So I was just sitting in my room and I suddenly realized that in wars, the losers are typically not seen as some unsung hero. I don't see many people going around saying \"You know, the Axis lost WW2, but I still support them, so I'll put a Nazi flag on my car to show I liked those guys.\"  But in the US, I see country singers and citizens (typically of the southern states, but I see them a lot here in the southern parts of Ohio) with confederate flags. I think to myself 'guys....you LOST that war. The Union won.\" So why is the confederacy an exception to this seemingly unwritten rule of the losers not getting respect after the fact?  I am making some assumptions here, but they feel at lest decent enough to make the question warranted. Why is it that supporting the confederacy is not seen as treason by the US Government? In my head, after the Axis powers lost WWII (sorry to keep using it as an example) you would have been considered a traitor or at least an enemy of the Allies to go around saying 'YEAH! GO NAZIS!' or something. Hopefully this question still works in this sub, and isn't treading onto somewhere else.","c_root_id_A":"cc4he5q","c_root_id_B":"cc4jep0","created_at_utc_A":1378687840,"created_at_utc_B":1378693385,"score_A":18,"score_B":37,"human_ref_A":"If I could add a kind of related question...  If you compare the difference between the Confederacy after the civil war and Germany after WWII, it seems like the Germans themselves were eager to stamp out nazism and that whole chapter of their history, while you see southerners using the Confederate flag as a symbol of southern pride, for example. But how does this compare to Japan? I don't know much about it, but it seems like there is a lot more revisionism about WWII, or at least an attempt to ignore it. Is there any nostalgia for the emperor, for example? If this is true, what makes it so different from Germany?  Another question I'd like to ask, is how much of southern pride is a modern re-invention? My impression is that a lot of the revisionism of the civil war, like that it was about states' rights or the name \"the war of northern aggression,\" started more than a century after the war ended. When did people start using the Confederate flag as a symbol of southern pride? Does this mean that fifty years from now, will it be a lot more mainstream for nationalistic Germans saying that the third reich wasn't all that bad?","human_ref_B":"\/r\/askhistorians has covered this topic quite well. There is a movement in the US that would like to imagine that the facts surrounding the American Civil War are not reflected in most history books. Usually that it was a war of northern aggression that had nothing to do with the benevolent institution of slavery.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5545.0,"score_ratio":2.0555555556}
{"post_id":"1lzqzy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Why do we see citizens who support the Confederacy in the US even today, and why are they not considered traitors? Asked first in \/r\/AskHistorians but they told me to come here. So here it is.  So I was just sitting in my room and I suddenly realized that in wars, the losers are typically not seen as some unsung hero. I don't see many people going around saying \"You know, the Axis lost WW2, but I still support them, so I'll put a Nazi flag on my car to show I liked those guys.\"  But in the US, I see country singers and citizens (typically of the southern states, but I see them a lot here in the southern parts of Ohio) with confederate flags. I think to myself 'guys....you LOST that war. The Union won.\" So why is the confederacy an exception to this seemingly unwritten rule of the losers not getting respect after the fact?  I am making some assumptions here, but they feel at lest decent enough to make the question warranted. Why is it that supporting the confederacy is not seen as treason by the US Government? In my head, after the Axis powers lost WWII (sorry to keep using it as an example) you would have been considered a traitor or at least an enemy of the Allies to go around saying 'YEAH! GO NAZIS!' or something. Hopefully this question still works in this sub, and isn't treading onto somewhere else.","c_root_id_A":"cc4jycs","c_root_id_B":"cc4he5q","created_at_utc_A":1378694861,"created_at_utc_B":1378687840,"score_A":26,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Part of the reason is that Southern culture is distinct from Northern culture. And while the Confederacy may have been politically and militarily defeated, the culture that produced it remained largely intact. Indeed, federal administration was able to enact reforms during Reconstruction, but as soon as the troops left, those reforms went away.  >But foreign occupiers have always found it difficult to fundamentally change a culture. The people of Tidewater, the Deep South, and Confederate Appalachia resisted the Yankee reforms as determinedly as they could, and after Union troops withdrew in 1876, whites in the \u201creconstructed\u201d regions undid the [reform] measures. \u2026 Despite a war and a concerted occupation, Deep Southern and Tidewater culture retained their essential characters, setting the stage for future culture clashes in the century to follow.  \u2013 Colin Woodward, American Nations: A History of the 11 Rival Regional Cultures of North America, 2011","human_ref_B":"If I could add a kind of related question...  If you compare the difference between the Confederacy after the civil war and Germany after WWII, it seems like the Germans themselves were eager to stamp out nazism and that whole chapter of their history, while you see southerners using the Confederate flag as a symbol of southern pride, for example. But how does this compare to Japan? I don't know much about it, but it seems like there is a lot more revisionism about WWII, or at least an attempt to ignore it. Is there any nostalgia for the emperor, for example? If this is true, what makes it so different from Germany?  Another question I'd like to ask, is how much of southern pride is a modern re-invention? My impression is that a lot of the revisionism of the civil war, like that it was about states' rights or the name \"the war of northern aggression,\" started more than a century after the war ended. When did people start using the Confederate flag as a symbol of southern pride? Does this mean that fifty years from now, will it be a lot more mainstream for nationalistic Germans saying that the third reich wasn't all that bad?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7021.0,"score_ratio":1.4444444444}
{"post_id":"vjreqk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why is it that in the United States the poor vote right? I'm from South America and here it looks like the poor vote mostly for the left, which I think is only natural as the left is pro-poor. If Bernie Sanders was Brazilian he'd be a main candidate and would for sure get a lot of votes, but in the US he seemed to be popular only among the educated urban middle class, and the poor and the rural mostly vote Republican. Why is that so?","c_root_id_A":"idl81xo","c_root_id_B":"idlurw8","created_at_utc_A":1656094302,"created_at_utc_B":1656103391,"score_A":6,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Easy. One word: Hegemony  Gramsci (1931\/2011)  https:\/\/abahlali.org\/files\/gramsci.pdf","human_ref_B":"The premise of your question is false. Scroll down to \u201cWhat was your total family income in 2019?\u201d.  https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/interactive\/2020\/11\/03\/us\/elections\/exit-polls-president.html","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9089.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"38ffpk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Is it true that male IQ has a different distribution than female IQ? I apologize profusely if this has been hashed to death in these parts. I did a search and couldn't find anything about IQ and sex (but a lot about IQ and race).  I've heard several times now (most often on reddit) that males and females have different distributions of IQ scores. The claim is that males have more high and low scores, but females have a more normal distribution.  Putting aside issues of IQ testing, and whether it accurately measures what it claims to, is there any truth to this at all? I assumed people were blowing smoke up my ass, or trying to justify gender imbalances in positions of high status. What is the consensus in the social science literature?","c_root_id_A":"crupa35","c_root_id_B":"crup2dm","created_at_utc_A":1433371728,"created_at_utc_B":1433371346,"score_A":49,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Here is a study that includes links to loads of other studies. In table 3, the one with the consistent participants, at the age of 16 boys had an average IQ of  101.461 with an sd of 15.235 and girls had an average IQ of 99.681 with an sd of 14.085.  Girls scored better than boys at ages 7 and 11 in this group, the authors attribute this to slower intellectual maturation for boys. I would point out that the 16 year old test only included reading and math, seemingly like an old school SAT, and did not include a drawing component. The earlier tests did include a drawing component which girls scored higher on. The sd is larger at all ages for boys, but the differences are not all that great.","human_ref_B":"Not my field, but interested.    These authors seem to accept the increase in variance for male intelligence.   \"Are apparent sex differences in mean IQ scores created in part by sample restriction and increased male variance?\"Dominika Dykierta, Catharine R. Galeb, Ian J. Dearya, ,   http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0160289608000962   And the first paragraph of their introduction largely agrees with wikipedia's first paragraph.   http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sex_differences_in_intelligence#cite_note-16    Googling \"intelligence distribution by gender\" brings up plenty of further \"sourced\" results.    Whether the variances \"found\" justify anything in and of themselves is still another question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":382.0,"score_ratio":6.125}
{"post_id":"38ffpk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Is it true that male IQ has a different distribution than female IQ? I apologize profusely if this has been hashed to death in these parts. I did a search and couldn't find anything about IQ and sex (but a lot about IQ and race).  I've heard several times now (most often on reddit) that males and females have different distributions of IQ scores. The claim is that males have more high and low scores, but females have a more normal distribution.  Putting aside issues of IQ testing, and whether it accurately measures what it claims to, is there any truth to this at all? I assumed people were blowing smoke up my ass, or trying to justify gender imbalances in positions of high status. What is the consensus in the social science literature?","c_root_id_A":"crupczq","c_root_id_B":"crup2dm","created_at_utc_A":1433371870,"created_at_utc_B":1433371346,"score_A":41,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"This is limited to math testing, but claims of greater male variance are usually relying on more restricted samples as opposed to large international comparisons. An international study shows the variance is itself variable by country. See:  Jonathan M. Kane and Janet E. Mertz. Debunking Gender and Myths about Mathematics Performance. Notices of the AMS 59(1): 10-21  http:\/\/www.ams.org\/notices\/201201\/rtx120100010p.pdf","human_ref_B":"Not my field, but interested.    These authors seem to accept the increase in variance for male intelligence.   \"Are apparent sex differences in mean IQ scores created in part by sample restriction and increased male variance?\"Dominika Dykierta, Catharine R. Galeb, Ian J. Dearya, ,   http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0160289608000962   And the first paragraph of their introduction largely agrees with wikipedia's first paragraph.   http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sex_differences_in_intelligence#cite_note-16    Googling \"intelligence distribution by gender\" brings up plenty of further \"sourced\" results.    Whether the variances \"found\" justify anything in and of themselves is still another question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":524.0,"score_ratio":5.125}
{"post_id":"3fmqsp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why do Christians in the US claim to be persecuted?","c_root_id_A":"ctqe02o","c_root_id_B":"ctq5ukb","created_at_utc_A":1438638601,"created_at_utc_B":1438626600,"score_A":23,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"There's a phenomenon called hostile media effect that does a lot to explain how groups perceive media as being against them. This isn't a full explanation, but media bias is a huge part of American evangelicals' persecution complex.","human_ref_B":"Are you talking about Christians in general or specific sects of Christianity?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12001.0,"score_ratio":4.6}
{"post_id":"37yi9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Capitalism has lifted a billion people out of extreme poverty: a legitimate claim? Elsewhere on reddit, someone claimed that capitalism has done more to improve the lives of the world's poor than any other system, and provided this article when asked for evidence. It seems overly simplistic to me, but I am way too far from being an economist to really have a valid opinion.  Is this a commonly held claim among social scientists? Among economists specifically? I know economics is a field rife with divergent opinion, so I imagine there is a wide range of thoughts on something like this. What are some of the counterarguments?","c_root_id_A":"crrhadx","c_root_id_B":"crro38a","created_at_utc_A":1433127878,"created_at_utc_B":1433147669,"score_A":6,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"The article that this person is using to make this point is talking about the period from 1990 to today and seems to count China as a capitalist country.  This leaves (I guess) Cuba and North Korea as the only non-capitalist countries on earth during the time period covered.  It would be *very surprising* if two countries with a combined population of 30 million people were able to bring more people out of poverty than every other nation on earth, even if they were absolute poverty-alleving dynamos (which they aren't).  So, yeah, it might be true but it's essentially meaningless.  E: I'm not really sure what (if anything) I should cite here, if this is fine the way it is cool, if not please give me some guidance.","human_ref_B":"Technological development and industrialization have contributed.  Even  Soviet Union was able to lift people from absolute poverty trough industrialization.  Cheap energy  is another factor.   International trade. All countries benefit from international trade, capitalist or not.   China is interesting case. According to the article, China is responsible for three three-quarters of the achievement.   What has been happening in China is more complex than just capitalism:  1. Strict and brutally enforced one Child policy.  China and India had similar GDP\/capita in 70's.  Then China adopted one child policy and GDP\/capita started to grow while India's GDP growth per capita has been eaten partly by rapidly growing population. 2. Urbanization & industrialization. Chinese move into cities and many factories have been government or military owned (especially at the beginning).  Even without capitalization there would have been poverty reduction.   I suspect that free market socialism, market socialsim and other similar systems would have also reduce poverty when combined with industrialization.  All powerty reduction that happened under capitalism can't be attributed to capitalist system.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19791.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"1kemkg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is the United States of America actually an empire? The 13 colonies started out as a union, but through acquisition and invasion, they expanded to 50 states plus some territories. That sounds like an empire to me.","c_root_id_A":"cbo7zu8","c_root_id_B":"cbo8wlr","created_at_utc_A":1376569685,"created_at_utc_B":1376573583,"score_A":19,"score_B":193,"human_ref_A":"The United States of America is not an empire in terms of its own political self-management, i.e. the inner affairs, or its own political composition. It is however something which many nowadays scholars consider to be an \"Empire\" in terms of its foreign policy management and behavioral patterns as showed toward various states (mainly) across the past century. When personas the Western media like to call \"dictators\" such as Fidel Castro, or Hugo Chavez, and lot of other political figures mostly from Latin America (this is not an accident a lot of them comes from this region when you are familiar with the history and the US foreign policy toward Latin America) calls the US political figures \"imperialists\" it is not a simple remnant of the Cold War, when the west was often referred in open speeches to as a capitalist empire or a capitalist paradise with imperial tendencies. They refer to the US like this because of the often neo-colonial approach United States took toward its \"backyard\" neighbours when the US government \"smelled\" something they did not like, for instance, a social revolution which would heavily influence the profit-making elements of its society, like corporations. Hence, there you have lot of US supported covert or direct operations like in Guatemala 1954, Cuba since 1959, more specifically, since vice-president Nixon, upon his personal meeting with Fidel referred Castro to Eisenhower as a pure communist who must be approached carefully and eventually dealt with, resulting to various anti-Castro operations, like the Playa de Giron (Bay of Pigs) invasion, partially the October (Cuban) missile crisis, then, for instance, Dominican Republic 1965, Bolivian action sponsored heavily by CIA which resulted in Guevara's death, Death of President Allende of Chile in 1973, and so on. This is of course not a thing only in Latin America, for the United States also sponsored or took part in various other coup d'etats around the globe, for instance the one in Iran in 1950s when they helped the British to topple down the former government, installing a dictatorship. Latin America, in my view however suffered the most from the US neo-colonial\/imperial behavioral patterns, because of its proximity and a relative easy way of dealing with issues there. The US practically tried to control the region, calling it its \"backyard\", focusing on the prevention of intrusion of a single socialist - or something what they referred as communist elements. The only time you can say they really failed was with Cuba. Castro therefore had to face the wrath of a giant only by himself for couple of decades, his only real ally for a short time being already mentioned President Allende who eventually ended up being killed in La Moneda Presidential palace on 11 September 1973, when he fought the military coup. There were of course other small scale revolutions around Latin America, like in Nicaragua during the 1960s decade, but most of them were seriously crushed down by the US organised and sponsored coups, the ultimate point of which was to put a figurehead dependant on the US, assuring that the corporate profits will flow, something Castro put stop to in Cuba, through Che Guevara designed (co-designed) Agrarian, and other reforms, which nationalised US \"owned\" lands in Cuba, redistributing them to the people.  There might be many opinions on this and I really do not want to argue with anyone, so feel free to correct me, share your own opinions, etc.   **TL;DR: The US is an Empire in terms of the execution of its foreign policy, mostly in Latin America in latter half of the 20th century. In case of couple of countries, for instance Cuba, going even further back in time (e.g. Platt Amendment, etc.).**  Source: I've studied this, gettin an MA in American Studies in couple of weeks, writing dissertation on Cuban - Chilean relations during Allende's years...  EDIT: Sorry for not posting appropriate sources, I am currently in the process of writing my dissertation, was momentarily on Reddit and spotted this post, replying in a fast pace. I will get back to this and in fact provide more detailed sources after I finish more important things. However, I can recommend couple of good books as a start for now, all partially, or in their wholeness dealing with the issue I approached:    Gustafson, K. (2007) Hostile Intent: U.S. Covert Operations in Chile, 1964 \u2013 1974. Washington, D.C.: Potomac Books.    **THIS ONE BEING REALLY GOOD --->** Harmer, T. (2011) Allende\u2019s Chile and the inter-American Cold War. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.    Haslam, J. (2005) The Nixon Administration and the Death of Allende\u2019s Chile: A Case of Assisted Suicide. New York: Verso.    Kornbluh, P. (2003) The Pinochet File: A Declassified Dossier on Atrocity and Accountability. New York: The New Press.    Paterson, T. G. (1994) Contesting Castro: The United States and the Triumph of the Cuban Revolution. New York: Oxford University Press.    Wright, T. C. (2001) Latin America in the Era of the Cuban Revolution. Westport: Praeger.    Davis, J. (1972) Political Violence in Latin America. London: The International Institute for Strategic Studies.    Casta\u00f1eda, J. G. (1997) Compa\u00f1ero: The Life and Death of Che Guevara. Translated by Marina Casta\u00f1eda. London: Bloomsbury.","human_ref_B":"Finally a question that is central to my own work! But I would say that we need to think beyond the 50 states. Historically, this is more an instance of what is called \"settler colonialism\": settlers go out beyond the border, kill indigenous people, set up shop for trade and, eventually, get incorporated into the state. Of course American settler colonialism is historically and culturally different from South African or Israeli or Australian settler colonialism, but its not a bad classificatory term to start from.   Instead, think the US territories such Guam or semi-protectorates such as the Dominican Republic and the global American sphere of influence in places such as the Arabian peninsula or Japan. When people speak of American Imperialism, they are often referring to facts like the global network of military bases that underwrite American political influence and the functioning of the global economy.   But we have to start by asking what people mean when they say \"empire.\" There are, I think, several theories on this and because I have to go to work in 10 minutes I will only share three.   The first would be the neo-imperialism thesis. I think, analytically, this is the weakest thesis because it is more a rhetorical strategy. This is popular among scholars of the Middle East, however, and it has really blown up after the Iraq War. For example, Rashid Khalidi claimed, in 2004, that the invasion of Iraq was \"Resurrecting Empire\" and suggests that when Americans are ignoring the sovereignty of Middle Eastern nations they are just picking up where the British. But with the benefit of hindsight, we see that the US operated in Iraq very differently from the way the British did. (As one Iraqi told me: \"We always wanted independence. But we respect the British. They built bridges and roads that are still here. We cannot say the same for the US\")  The second would be the Empire with a capital \"E\" thesis of Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri. These guys claim that we need to analyze not an American empire but a network of businesses, state control, and information and surveillance technology that has become so pervasive it has acquired an agency and force of its own. The US certainly enforces this Empire, but individual states are no longer important enough to warrant being considered the center of power. Indeed, following the influence of Michel Foucault, power is dispersed through an infinite number of sites with no real center and, following Karl Marx, states really aren't that important to understanding history and politics since it is Capital that makes the world go round. My problem with this thesis is that it really doesn't leave anything else to say. You either accept it or you don't. As a social scientist, I can claim every phenomenon I observe is the outcome of \"Empire\", or I can try to find a more specific explanation. I prefer the second option.   The antithesis of the Hardt and Negri model has been advanced by John Kelly and Martha Kaplan and we can call this the World of Nation-States Model. Kelly and Kaplan take the USA's claims to support freedom, democracy, and national sovereignty seriously, arguing that the US has worked hard for decolonization after World War I. That said, what we end up getting is not absolute freedom for the oppressed, but rather a model of state power called the nation-state. Essentially, the US allows for only one form of national self-determination, the liberal nation state. While geographic areas that cannot, for whatever reason, provide their inhabitants with a sufficiently pervasive state structure become \"failed states\": fields for the continual intervention of NGO's, Counter-Insurgency operations, and global capitalism. And even when nation-states are successful, they often involve the oppression of minorities and political violence to achieve this end. Kelly and Kaplan argue that the US is not an empire, but that it has achieved its global power through a novel and new model of an international community of nation-states that play by America's rules or face the consequences.   As for my own thesis? I'm still working on it. I would only say that its hard to study Iraq and not see things that look a lot like historical imperialism, once we accept that historical imperialism was a ridiculously messy endeavor that fed on corruption and failure (see *Building the Devil's Empire: French Colonial New Orleans* by Shanon Dawdy). I also think that empire really works through a collection of persistent myths and symbols that encourage people to go off to far-flung locals and that, in fact, most of the myths and symbols of American occupations come not from European colonial efforts, but rather from our own \"cowboys and Indians\" history of settler colonialism.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3898.0,"score_ratio":10.1578947368}
{"post_id":"spdoy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Congratulations, \/r\/AskSocialScience!  You're the Subreddit of the Day for April 24th, 2012! Link to today's feature.","c_root_id_A":"c4fy9mr","c_root_id_B":"c4g1jvx","created_at_utc_A":1335270565,"created_at_utc_B":1335287217,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Science!","human_ref_B":"Does every subscriber get to choose between a medal and a cookie?  If so I choose a Peanut Butter cookie.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16652.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"spdoy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Congratulations, \/r\/AskSocialScience!  You're the Subreddit of the Day for April 24th, 2012! Link to today's feature.","c_root_id_A":"c4g1i70","c_root_id_B":"c4g1jvx","created_at_utc_A":1335287020,"created_at_utc_B":1335287217,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"cool","human_ref_B":"Does every subscriber get to choose between a medal and a cookie?  If so I choose a Peanut Butter cookie.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":197.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5jf6rv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Conservatives often argue that social welfare programs encourage single motherhood and illegitimacy by replacing the necessity of marriage with dependency on the state. What does research have to say?","c_root_id_A":"dbfoi5i","c_root_id_B":"dbgfd5f","created_at_utc_A":1482263287,"created_at_utc_B":1482302912,"score_A":30,"score_B":56,"human_ref_A":"I have a clarifying question. Are you just asking if welfare programs encourage single motherhood, or are you asking if welfare programs make marriage less of a necessity to single mothers?","human_ref_B":"This extract would seem to answer indirectly.  Finland, for instance, has one of the most extensive and comprehensive welfare systems in the world but also has one of the lowest rates of single parent homes.  In fact, the US is fairly \"low\" on its rate of dual-parent homes when compared to most of Europe, and most of Europe has far more extensive social welfare in general.  Can we definitely conclude soemthing one way or the other from this? I'd argue not.  There is a correlation between single parent homes and our enormous prison industrial complex that to me says that Conservatives are pointing at the wrong cause of the problem. Single parent homes are caused more by our locking up people than are caused by welfare being a thing.   To be blantantly political here, I think conservatives generally get it wrong on a factual basis when it comes to social issues. Blaming welfare is a way to distract from the real problems, and those real problems always seem to enrich various wealthy people and as a double whammy they can keep disenfranching voters who would otherwise vote against them in elections.  All in all, it's a hugely complex and nasty issue, but I think it merits a lot of discussion!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":39625.0,"score_ratio":1.8666666667}
{"post_id":"4fheoo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why is India so much better off than Pakistan? India ranks higher in Human Development, economy and political freedom yet the countries both share a common origin. What's the explanation behind this?","c_root_id_A":"d290jd2","c_root_id_B":"d2922i2","created_at_utc_A":1461082307,"created_at_utc_B":1461084273,"score_A":7,"score_B":55,"human_ref_A":"Top-level comments require citations. Thank you.","human_ref_B":"India has been democracy longer. There has never been military coups in India. Pakistan has had military dictatorship for long time and has suffered from political instability it created.  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Military_coups_in_Pakistan    The reason for different role of the army might be India's Prime minister Nehru who was powerful civilian leader and restrained army and creating new culture. The best source for this  is Army and Nation by Steven I. Wilkinson.  In contrast, Pakistan had more or less civilian power vacuum and political chaos after Muhammad Ali Jinnah died. First military coup happened 10 years after Jinnahs death because ruling party could not govern the country.  Pakistan had much better quality of living until early 90's. India used to have socialist and regulated economy until it opened up and reformed in early 90's and started to close the cap.  India closed the cap just as recently as  2008 (GDP\/capita) http:\/\/www.brookings.edu\/blogs\/future-development\/posts\/2015\/07\/15-income-india-pakistan-iqbal","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1966.0,"score_ratio":7.8571428571}
{"post_id":"2ke5e2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are some of the most effective actions I can take to alleviate poverty in my own area? I'm sure there a lot of national- or international-level policy choices like restructuring taxes and trade agreements and providing a guaranteed minimum income that some people might argue would be the best way to help the poor... but I'm not in a position to be making those decisions.  I do have some time to work on this and occasionally some money to give though.  Is there any research out there on what makes the biggest difference?  Working at food shelters?  Social work?  Habitat for Humanity or something similar?  Just giving money?  I'm thinking someone must have made this their life's work and has a better answer for me than I could come up with on my own.","c_root_id_A":"clkkbrc","c_root_id_B":"clkp24k","created_at_utc_A":1414361775,"created_at_utc_B":1414371177,"score_A":7,"score_B":46,"human_ref_A":"What area are you in? What is the population? Do you have a number of people in mind that need help? What are the root causes of poverty in your area? Are you interested in working on this with other people? An organization? How much time do you want to put in? Do you want to interact directly with poor people? Do you want to help people interact with existing public and private bodies that exist for the purpose of alleviating poverty? What is your motivation?","human_ref_B":"Anything that contributes to developing secure attachment in young children is going to give you tremendous return, socially speaking. This article at NIH does a nice job of summarizing what secure attachment is, how it is formed, and the individual and social costs associated with alternative (less healthy) forms of attachment: http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC2169321\/  I'm not an expert in this area, and would appreciate other's research in finding and ranking (in terms of return on investment) actions we might take that help.  Some ideas: paying for daycare for single parents (enabling them to personally recoup and spend more time with their children in a positive emotional state), or participating in a Big Brothers or Big Sisters program (http:\/\/www.bigcelebrity.org\/).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9402.0,"score_ratio":6.5714285714}
{"post_id":"1ll5ci","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Is the bystander effect universal or cultural? Or will all cultures as they advance gradually develop the bystander effect as they become more social independent?","c_root_id_A":"cc0kwzn","c_root_id_B":"cc0k495","created_at_utc_A":1378170833,"created_at_utc_B":1378168554,"score_A":11,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This is a really interesting question. I don't know the answer, but the case of Kitty Genovese is no longer considered an example of the bystander effect. http:\/\/psycnet.apa.org\/psycinfo\/2007-13085-001","human_ref_B":"Question to the psychology people out there: does the psychology literature accept that the bystander effect can be the result of *rational* decisions by well-intentioned individuals, a la the volunteer's dilemma?  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Volunteer%27s_dilemma  The reason I ask this is because there are really only two comparative statics in that model--the number of individuals in the group and the cost of reporting. Thus, if the volunteer's dilemma is the data generating process creating the bystander effect, all of the variation in it would be explained by those two pieces of information.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2279.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"mu70uq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"When did politics develop a sports-fan mentality? Especially in the USA. Just  like in sports where two opposing sides only look at facts that promote  their own views about their own teams and curse the opposing team and  have this group-mentality that their side is the best.  Politics  in the past seem to have been more civilized. Sure there were  disagreements but nowadays if you're a Democrat and say anything  pro-democratic then Republicans view you as a socialist while if you're a  Republican and say anything pro-Republican then Democrats view you as a  racist fascist. r\/politics  is a perfect example of this. Everything is extremely one-sided and you  get downvoted to oblivion if you say anything that opposes what they  believe.  When did this sports-fan mentality in politics begin or has it always been like this?  **Thanks!**  *p.s.*  *I  don't want this to come off as a \"disguised rant or agenda post\" so it  doesn't get taken down. It truly isn't. I'm sorry if it comes across  that way but I do not know how to word it otherwise.*","c_root_id_A":"gv60c6k","c_root_id_B":"gv4tgiv","created_at_utc_A":1618892131,"created_at_utc_B":1618869651,"score_A":15,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"There\u2019s a pretty substantial amount of research on this. Uncivil Agreement: How Politics Became Our Identity by Liliana Mason gets into this pretty well.   Here is a review if you\u2019re interested","human_ref_B":"Politics as a Vocation from Weber is a good read that is related here. The idea being that making politics into a job was a problem in the first place. I think this is sort of incorrect in the end, it turns out we need people focused on politics as their primary function.   This is tangentially related but when you say politics used to be more civilized, what you are looking through is the popular concept about politics. Check this book review that talks about violence in congress. Politics is arguably MORE civilized now, as crazy as that seems.  More directly to your question, I would read about the filibuster. The wikipedia page is pretty good to get the overview. In this context, the filibuster is the tool that ratchets up this divisiveness.   Ultimately, the most direct answer is social media. Here is the peer reviewed article below, in the last line of the abstract the authors say it well: \" Overall, our findings imply that social media can intensify political  competition by lowering costs of disseminating information for new  entrants to their constituents and thus may reduce the barriers to enter  politics.\"    Petrova,  Maria and Sen,  Ananya and Yildirim,  Pinar, Social Media  and Political Contributions: The Impact of New Technology on Political  Competition (May 14, 2020). Management Science, forthcoming , Available  at SSRN.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22480.0,"score_ratio":1.0714285714}
{"post_id":"fn1d50","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why is it assumed that the economy will increase over time indefinitely? I've learned in the basic business classes that it is vital to invest your money to get a decent interest on it, but I didn't realize almost all investments depend on the economy as a whole. We are generally told you average ~3% over time with these investments, but the caveat is that this is dependent on the economy going up indefinitely. And historically it has done that, but can it really be assumed that will always happen? After every crash we've bounced back, but might there come a crash where that doesn't happen? Is there a case where the economy finally hits an equilibrium, or even a steady drop for a long period of time, never to surpass a peak again? Otherwise, is there some sort of economics law that says it will always increase?  I just don't get why people put all their money into retirement savings that could dissipate from a drop in the economy that would never return. Again, historically this has worked out. But as someone beginning to build savings and looking at how high the market is now, even with this recent crash, it feels like I'm \"buying high\".","c_root_id_A":"fl7gcwi","c_root_id_B":"fl7aq83","created_at_utc_A":1584901162,"created_at_utc_B":1584897867,"score_A":21,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"The Solow model attempts to predict this at a high level. The hypothesis is that the economy requires labor (population), capital ($$) and technology.   Population increase or decrease will proportionally effect the economy.  Capital inflow and outflow will proportionally affect the economy.  Technology is the interesting one, because it allows you to a) produce more with the same capital and labor and b) it seems to only go forward. I mean, think of what would have to happen to the world to lose all the knowledge amassed in the last 200 years.   Thus, it does feel like the economy can perpetually grow even if population size stops growing.  Hopefully this is helpful and meets the forums requirements","human_ref_B":"There is nothing that guarantees that the economy will always increase, or that I will be alive to enjoy my savings.  However, we human save money. Perhaps it\u00b4s a human need to have optimism for the future. Perhaps some don\u00b4t really expect \"growth\" of our savings, but rather to \"preserve\" the value of our wealth into the future. I don\u00b4t know.  What I do know is that, contrary to popular opinion, it is **NOT** assumed by all economists that the economy will grow infinitely.  What it **IS** assumed by virtually all economists is that **for our generation**, the economy will grow, based on historical experience.  For more explanation on this, please read Noah Smith: https:\/\/noahpinionblog.blogspot.com\/2012\/11\/murphys-law.html  **Historically**, the US economy has indeed grown at a stable average of 2% *per capita* (Jones, 2016), but wealth has grown at twice the growth rate of the entire economy during the past 150 years (2017).  On the one hand, perhaps some economists do believe that, in the far future, human society will be \"satisfied\" with our consumption level and the economy will reach \"zero\" growth.  As a side note, I remember reading that back on the XVIII century, John Stuart Mill hypothesized about a growthless future, but I never really looked into it.  \\`On the other hand, perhaps other economists believe that the economy will \"grow\" infinitely, but not by exhausting more natural resources, but rather by increasing human capacity for experiencing and creating \"value\".       * Jones, C.I. (2016) \"The Facts of Economic Growth\".  https:\/\/web.stanford.edu\/\\~chadj\/facts.pdf  * Jord\u00e0,  \u00d2.; Knoll, K.; Kuvshinov, D.; Schularick, M.; Taylor, A. (2017) \"The Rate of Return on Everything, 1870\u20132015\".  https:\/\/www.frbsf.org\/economic-research\/files\/wp2017-25.pdf","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3295.0,"score_ratio":1.6153846154}
{"post_id":"2nsx7k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Why are economics degrees getting more and more focused on teaching mathematics at the expense of history and key ideologies? I'm going to be graduation next year and the only essay I've needed to write so far has been about the financial markets in the first year of my degree (this is a top 20 UK university btw) The rest of the assessments and exams have basically been mathematics with economic applications.  The main focus seems to be on simply teaching economic tools with a large majority of universities no longer feeling the need to dive into the bigger picture of economic history and ideologies.","c_root_id_A":"cmgkgzc","c_root_id_B":"cmgkfo8","created_at_utc_A":1417309893,"created_at_utc_B":1417309807,"score_A":60,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"That's because the way that professional economists now pit arguments against one another involves data. You want to argue that minimum wage is overall a net benefit? Well, here's a dataset, prove to me that what you say is true. Once you get to that stage, it's all based on is your model correct, is the sample biased, how do you correct for such-and-such.  In ye olde days we didn't have awesome, rich datasets that could answer a question. So arguments used to be mechanism-based, say, instituting a minimum wage does x and y, but we believe that because of z the effect of x outweighs the effect of y. And there was no way to really go and out measure whether that was true. So that's why we had ideologies and much more entrenched schools of thought, because it boiled down to gut feel at the end.  Most of modern microecon can be explained using a few very simple equations. Macro is... messy, in part because it's still very hard to use data due to unobservables (you can't run a randomized controlled experiment to balance those, for example).  It's a bit like the history of medicine - econ up to the 1950s was kind of like \"there's four humors and you have to balance them\", and now we've moved past that to germs and genetics. Not quite at epigenetics yet but we'll get there.","human_ref_B":"May be a good idea to cross post this to \/r\/academiceconomics","labels":1,"seconds_difference":86.0,"score_ratio":4.2857142857}
{"post_id":"1vdeco","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"How do we estimate the world's population, and how do we know those figures are anywhere near correct? I live in eastern Europe and our government is pretty good about counting people. Of course, there will be mistakes and miscounts, but when ever taxpayer has not one but *two* registration numbers, I'm pretty sure they know how many of us are around. Yet, we're a pretty tiny speck in the world's population. There are large parts of Africa and Asia without the bureaucracy so typical of Europe, North America or China. And they're the quickest growing parts... or so we believe.  I'm curious, what methods are used to get reliable counts in areas like Africa or the poorer parts of Asia? Especially those without the bureaucracy to track births and deaths. Is it counting, is it guesstimation, or...?","c_root_id_A":"cere14g","c_root_id_B":"cerey4h","created_at_utc_A":1389911198,"created_at_utc_B":1389913070,"score_A":3,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"How reliable are you talking about? Of course you can't get it down to the single's place at any moment in time. I imagine numbers would be accurate to the million's place anywhere though, just as a rough example.","human_ref_B":"Maybe a better question for \/r\/askstatistics","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1872.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"d4f35u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Is anyone \"going Mindhunter\" on mass shooters in the US? I know Mindhunter is fictional. I haven't read or researched the nonfiction source material so I have no idea how much Robert Ressler et al. contributed to the development of our modern comprehension of serial killers and the fundamental pathologies that drive them to do terrible things.  But the underlying truth is that at some point a serious effort was made to investigate, document, and understand those pathologies.  In this age of frequent mass shootings, are there similar efforts underway? And if so, have we learned anything?","c_root_id_A":"f0d2rv1","c_root_id_B":"f0cvnoe","created_at_utc_A":1568548610,"created_at_utc_B":1568545907,"score_A":65,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Profiling? Yes, there have been attempts, and Ressler is a known name. ***However***, profiling has since been *strongly* criticized:  >**Criminal profiling (CP) is the practice of predicting a criminal\u2019s personality, behavioral, and demographic characteristics based on crime scene evidence** (Douglas, Ressler,Burgess, & Hartman, 1986; Hicks & Sales, 2006). **This practice is being utilized by police agencies around the world despite no compelling scientific evidence that it is reliable, valid, or useful** (Snook, Eastwood, Gendreau, Goggin, & Cullen, 2007). This **disparity between the use and the lack of empirical support** leads one to consider the question Why do people believe CP works despite the lack of evidence? We explain this criminal profiling illusion in terms of the nature of the information about CP that is presented to the people and how they process that information.  The FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit itself has released a report underlining several of its limitations and challenging its viability:  >**While developmental information concerning a serial killer provides interesting insights, it has little utility in helping identify an unknown offender during an active serial murder investigation for a number of reasons**. First, this **developmental information provides minimal assistance in highlighting potential suspects.** Since individuals who are suspected of committing a crime do not usually divulge sensitive information concerning their childhood, especially regarding physical, emotional, or sexual abuse, these factors can remain hidden from an active law enforcement investigation. Second, there are significant legal restraints involved in gathering certain background information during an investigation, particularly those records that are safeguarded under privacy issues, such as medical and psychological records. This limits the amount of childhood history that is readily accessible. Third, it would be extremely time and manpower intensive for law enforcement personnel to obtain this information. Routinely, this information is gathered by conducting interviews of family members and acquaintances of the potential offender. This effort would be compounded in order to obtain the same information from multiple potential suspects. Fourth, **even if investigators were able to acquire these records, the information would be of limited value. This is due to the wide range of factors involved in the upbringing and development of serial killers.** All of these factors highlight the need for updated research material viewed through an investigative prism that is based upon information that would be available to law enforcement investigators working an active unsolved serial murder case.  In regard to research done by, for example, Ressler among others:  >In summary, **all of these studies have questionable reliability based upon their research construction**. They are **either based on a small sample size**; have a **lack of empirical testing across the typologies or categories**; or **the statistical measurements conducted were never published**. Moreover, **much of the information was obtained by self-report information provided directly by the offenders and not independently verified**. Therefore **the conclusions reached from these studies are arguably flawed and do not provide accurate information concerning the population of serial murderers.**  Now, this is not to say there is not scientifically rigorous and valuable research done on what are risk factors in offending, what are the characteristics of offenders, etc. Criminology is dedicated to that, together with psychologists, sociologists and other social scientists who decide to focus on crime and criminality. But there is a distinction to be made between that and *profiling* which is often considered pseudoscience. See for example Malcolm Gladwell's article for the New Yorker, where he compares criminal\/psychological profiling with what astrologists and psychics do.  ---  Regarding mass shootings:  * \"**There is no accurate or useful \"profile\" of students who engaged in targeted school violence**\" (Secret Service report on school shootings, 2002). \"In making predictions about the risk for mass shootings, **there is no consistent psychological profile or set of warning signs that can be used reliably to identify such individuals in the general population**\" (APA report on gun violence, 2013). \"**The 63 active shooters examined in this study did not appear to be uniform in any way such that they could be readily identified prior to attacking based on demographics alone**\" (FBI report on active shooters, 2018).  (I would like to stress that mass shootings, per research and experts,  is not a problem which can be solved by targeting mental illnesses or disorders.)","human_ref_B":"Yes, several people have done this and are doing it. IIRC, one researcher works for West Point (maybe?), and several others are in non-military academia.  I've seen a couple of presentations about this, and read a couple of things, a few years ago; bad of me not to cite anything right now, but I remember one thing in particular: the numbers are just stacked against the researchers. Predicting rare events is difficult; the rarer the event, the more (exponentially, I think) difficult prediction becomes.  Consider: let's say we know the majority of mass shooters are white males between 17 and 35 (note: I sort of made this up; these factors, especially the precise age range, are not from any research I have read, since I don't remember research right now). How much does that help? Let's say we've worked backward to find out the probability of being white + male + age range], given the fact that a person has committed a mass shooting. Now what? To predict the next mass shooter (or shooting), this formula basically says that all white males between 17 and 35 are going to be mass shooters. There are millions of such people in North America, and only a very few mass shootings per year. Even if the \"few\" is, say, 100 mass shootings, this model's accuracy in predicting is, say, 100 divided by 10 million. Pathetically low. Completely unusable, really.  And that's how it goes. Researchers have identified many factors that many mass shooters might have somewhat in common: demographics, psychological characteristics, family background, lifestyle, situational triggers, etc.However, very few (maybe no?) factors are 100% in common across all mass shooters  [*Edit: \/u\/Revue_of_Zero's comment ITT clarifies that there seems to be no profile in common across mass shooters], so even the \"backwards prediction\" isn't perfectly accurate; and using those factors, even if you have dozens of them, to predict who the next mass shooter will be results in very small predictive accuracy simply because mass shooters are very rare. You end up with statistical models that have 0.01% accuracy or something ridiculous like that (again, this is not the real value; my point is that the accuracy is very low).  The public perception that mass shootings are common (they aren't), coupled with an understandable lack of statistical sophistication in reasoning, results in many people assuming we should be able to predict these things somewhat accurately (we can't, AFAIK). What we could do is have a fuckton of false positives: let's say we identify every white male from 17 to 35 years old, with any history of depression or anxiety or adjustment issues, with a divorce or parental discord in their childhood, with fewer than average friends in high school, who has been rejected by a romantic interest, and who has watched more than 3 YouTube videos of the \"redpill,\" \"alt-right,\" \"survivalist,\" or \"right-wing conspiracy theory\" genres as a potential mass shooter. Great. Now we have to keep an eye on like 5 million Americans and Canadians for life, and we still don't know which 20 of those might attempt a mass shooting during their lifetimes.   This is more or less where some of the post-9\/11 paranoia like \"If you see something, say something\" and the FBI's ongoing failure to find (preferably Islamic) terrorists on US soil comes from: it's very, very hard, statistically, to predict very rare events.  *Edit*: Mod has rightly pointed out that I should not have commented without citations, so I've been googling a bit to confirm my past in-person educational experiences.  *Edit 2:* Added a reference to another commenter's much more accurate and better sourced comment.  [Berk and Sorenson \\(2019\\) articulate the large hurdles in predicting rare events in their introduction and a couple of other places in this paper, while they attempt a novel algorithmic approach to increase predictive accuracy. It appears that even prior machine learning approaches \"...still fell short of forecasting accuracy that one would ordinarily require,\" while the authors' enhanced methods offered potential avenues for future prediction, though this paper did not delve into that realm.  This introduction to a 2017 special issue of the *Journal of Peace Research* also highlights many of the problems inherent in this area.   If you start googling (well, google scholar-ing), you'll quickly see that wrapping your head around the current methods and discussions in this field requires a fairly high level of statistical education. It's not for the weak of stats. That said, the basic problem is, I think, as I have described above (though a bit more complex, and with some specifics that I have not accurately pinned down). If you or anyone else is interested in this: predicting violence and other rare events is a critical area, a bottleneck for making the world a better place. It needs dedicated, committed (and smart) researchers, and will for many years. It would be a great choice for many people's Master's or Doctoral goals.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2703.0,"score_ratio":7.2222222222}
{"post_id":"3m4ojv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Is there any credence to the idea that American pharmaceutical prices are higher because we subsidize R&D for the rest of the world? I've seen this idea pop up every once in a while in discussions of american health costs, and since this whole Martin Shkreli controvery it seems to be everywhere. I've done some research on my own, but hard numbers have proven difficult to find.","c_root_id_A":"cvc19m7","c_root_id_B":"cvc2v7v","created_at_utc_A":1443055398,"created_at_utc_B":1443058163,"score_A":33,"score_B":117,"human_ref_A":"Well Pharmaceutical companies overstated their R&D average cost to develop a new drug by a factor of 10 and spend far more on advertising than new drug development and are now researching fewer drugs than in the 1990s, so I wouldn't believe a damn word they say.   http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC2630351\/ http:\/\/www.pharmamyths.net\/files\/Biosocieties_2011_Myths_of_High_Drug_Research_Costs.pdf","human_ref_B":"I contacted Mark Pauly with this question and this was his reply:  >The economic theory describing pricing by profit maximizing firms says that prices drug firms charge to American customers would not be lower if buyers in other countries paid more (which I guess is what subsidize R&D for the rest of the world means).  The reason is that a drug firm with market power (say, because of a patent) sets its price in the American market based on what Americans are willing to pay and what it costs to  produce and distribute drugs.  R&D costs are already \u201csunk\u201d so have no influence on this price.  Just ask yourself\u2014if a company can charge $100 a pill and sell X million pills to American customers, why would it charge less if buyers in other countries paid more?  That would just mean sacrificing profits.  It is true that buyers in other countries benefit from American R&D.  But even if there was a way to make them pay more for the products that result from it (which I doubt), that would not cause firms to cut the price to Americans.  They would just invest more in R&D and invent more new products for the global market.  Edit: I wish I could comment on the reply's to this answer. Unfortunately, I'm not an economist. I would have liked it if Pauly had come here himself and  continued the conversation. But for now, I'm very thankful that he was kind enough to e-mail me back within 45 minutes and take the time to provide an answer.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2765.0,"score_ratio":3.5454545455}
{"post_id":"3m4ojv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Is there any credence to the idea that American pharmaceutical prices are higher because we subsidize R&D for the rest of the world? I've seen this idea pop up every once in a while in discussions of american health costs, and since this whole Martin Shkreli controvery it seems to be everywhere. I've done some research on my own, but hard numbers have proven difficult to find.","c_root_id_A":"cvc04kv","c_root_id_B":"cvc2v7v","created_at_utc_A":1443053370,"created_at_utc_B":1443058163,"score_A":23,"score_B":117,"human_ref_A":"The best research I have seen on the subject: http:\/\/www.dklevine.com\/general\/intellectual\/against.htm  This is a book that the published online that describes using a lot of historical cases (the steam engine for example) that patents\/intellectual monopolies don't encourage innovation. Chapter nine of their book explicitly talks about the pharmaceutical industry's unique R&D quandary and point out the flaws in the argument.  AFAIK there is no \"orthodox\" economic opinion, that most economists would agree with. The book I have linked to would definitely raise a heated conversation in most economic faculty meetings... but I haven't found as thorough a work by the other side.","human_ref_B":"I contacted Mark Pauly with this question and this was his reply:  >The economic theory describing pricing by profit maximizing firms says that prices drug firms charge to American customers would not be lower if buyers in other countries paid more (which I guess is what subsidize R&D for the rest of the world means).  The reason is that a drug firm with market power (say, because of a patent) sets its price in the American market based on what Americans are willing to pay and what it costs to  produce and distribute drugs.  R&D costs are already \u201csunk\u201d so have no influence on this price.  Just ask yourself\u2014if a company can charge $100 a pill and sell X million pills to American customers, why would it charge less if buyers in other countries paid more?  That would just mean sacrificing profits.  It is true that buyers in other countries benefit from American R&D.  But even if there was a way to make them pay more for the products that result from it (which I doubt), that would not cause firms to cut the price to Americans.  They would just invest more in R&D and invent more new products for the global market.  Edit: I wish I could comment on the reply's to this answer. Unfortunately, I'm not an economist. I would have liked it if Pauly had come here himself and  continued the conversation. But for now, I'm very thankful that he was kind enough to e-mail me back within 45 minutes and take the time to provide an answer.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4793.0,"score_ratio":5.0869565217}
{"post_id":"3m4ojv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Is there any credence to the idea that American pharmaceutical prices are higher because we subsidize R&D for the rest of the world? I've seen this idea pop up every once in a while in discussions of american health costs, and since this whole Martin Shkreli controvery it seems to be everywhere. I've done some research on my own, but hard numbers have proven difficult to find.","c_root_id_A":"cvc19m7","c_root_id_B":"cvc04kv","created_at_utc_A":1443055398,"created_at_utc_B":1443053370,"score_A":33,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"Well Pharmaceutical companies overstated their R&D average cost to develop a new drug by a factor of 10 and spend far more on advertising than new drug development and are now researching fewer drugs than in the 1990s, so I wouldn't believe a damn word they say.   http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC2630351\/ http:\/\/www.pharmamyths.net\/files\/Biosocieties_2011_Myths_of_High_Drug_Research_Costs.pdf","human_ref_B":"The best research I have seen on the subject: http:\/\/www.dklevine.com\/general\/intellectual\/against.htm  This is a book that the published online that describes using a lot of historical cases (the steam engine for example) that patents\/intellectual monopolies don't encourage innovation. Chapter nine of their book explicitly talks about the pharmaceutical industry's unique R&D quandary and point out the flaws in the argument.  AFAIK there is no \"orthodox\" economic opinion, that most economists would agree with. The book I have linked to would definitely raise a heated conversation in most economic faculty meetings... but I haven't found as thorough a work by the other side.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2028.0,"score_ratio":1.4347826087}
{"post_id":"3e1tk7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Why do countries with \"democratic\" in their name usually are not that democratic? Example:  * People's Democratic Republic of Algeria  * Democratic Republic of Kongo * Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste * Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea)  What purpose does the name serve? Do countries need some sort of PR?  I know there are countries with such name that has a more democratic tendency (per Freedom House index) like  Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, so don't mention anything about it. The question is about the countries with \"democratic\" in their name that has the tendency to not be democratic.  Of course there's lots of indicator what it means by \"democracy\" so to make things easy let's just use Freedom House index and\/or Robert Dahl's polyarchy criteria.","c_root_id_A":"ctba4sm","c_root_id_B":"ctb9s8x","created_at_utc_A":1437509452,"created_at_utc_B":1437508959,"score_A":16,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Using \"democratic republic\" or \"people's republic\" traces its history to post-WWII Marxist thought. According to Marxism, the proletariat would overthrow the bourgeoisie-dominated state and create a \"dictatorship of the proletariat\", in the form of proletariat-dominated democracy, that would rid society of the last vestiges of class and dismantle capitalism. Once this was accomplished, the state would transition into a stateless communist society. After the 1917 Russian Revolution, communist parties around the world aspired to follow the Russian model of creating local soviets, or workers' councils, that would appoint members to progressively higher councils, with progress led by a vanguard group (i.e. a communist party).  After the Second World War, the Soviet Union wanted to install loyal communist governments in the countries it occupied, but in most of them communist parties and communist rhetoric was not very popular. At the same time Western countries insisted that liberated countries have democratic forms of government. The Soviets created a model in which communist parties formed governments with other leftist parties, and these \"people's democracies\" would be on a gradual path to communism (but not as far on it as the USSR) rather than emulating an abrupt Russian-style revolution. Slowly the Soviet Union would marginalize other coalition partners so that communists would control the state, but these other leftist parties often continued to exist, even if only in name. In this way, the USSR could maintain the guise of democracy, co-opt other (sometimes more popular) leftist parties, and rationalize further involvement in these states. Many other communist movements emulated this more inclusive, less revolutionary form of communism, either with direct or indirect Soviet influence.  Of course, these states rarely lived up to liberal democratic standards of democracy, but it was a euphemistic way to keep Marxist revolutionary ideas without any of the baggage of communist rhetoric. One exception would be the Dem. Rep. of Congo under anti-communist Mobutu Sese Seko, though it was possibly to highlight Mobutu's populist message.  Sources:   Ruth Amende Rosa's \"The Soviet Theory of 'People's Democracy'\" in *World Politics*   Robert Services' *A History of Modern Russia* and *Comrades! A History of World Communism* (I would take Service's analysis with a grain of salt)","human_ref_B":"Slate says it's influenced by the Communists and connotes a move from monarchal or colonial rule.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":493.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"1awthm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Can we abstain from answering questions unless we provide a source? As a social scientist I am nothing short of appalled when I visit this subreddit. Granted, most of the questions aren't even questions, they are vague rationalizations of stereotypes or if they are they could be answered with a simple google search. But those do not really interest me right now.   What I care about is the quality, or better said, lack of quality in the answers.   My request to people who anwer questions is simple: abstain from making claims or answering questions when you do not provide a source.","c_root_id_A":"c91sxuo","c_root_id_B":"c91qggs","created_at_utc_A":1364175625,"created_at_utc_B":1364167827,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"A lack of source reference does not, by itself, render an answer incorrect.","human_ref_B":"Sure - we can all feel free to abstain from answering questions unless we provide a source as often as we'd like...  Source:  Me (and common sense)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7798.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"enanld","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why do lower income people have lower voter participation than higher income people? In the United States (and maybe some other countries), voter participation is positively correlated with income. This has raised concerns that this disparity in voter participation may be making governments more responsive to the interests of higher-income people than that of lower-income people. I'm curious as to why less-affluent people vote less than their more-affluent counterparts.","c_root_id_A":"fdy39w8","c_root_id_B":"fdyhepl","created_at_utc_A":1578775597,"created_at_utc_B":1578779816,"score_A":12,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"This is a hard question in political science. It is, as you say, well established that income and voter participation is correlated but identifying why it is is really hard. There are a lot of things that are correlated with income that we think might cause people to participate less (education, free time, political efficacy to name a few). For example, take this piece that shows that overall health seems to affect political participation. Income and health are likely related and so this is another case where income changes participation but not directly.  In general, I think the best explanation now is that income provides a variety of broadly defined resources that lead people to participate more and it is not just income itself.","human_ref_B":"There\u2019s research that indicates that the positive relationship between income and turnout doesn\u2019t hold across all countries and is conditional on other factors such as divergent preferences between rich and poor and high bureaucratic capacity.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4219.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"41eyk0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Why did youth-populated internet communities like 4chan switch their politics from being staunchly liberal (until around the Obama administration) to very conservative, often reactionary a few years later?","c_root_id_A":"cz1ugsw","c_root_id_B":"cz1vyqx","created_at_utc_A":1453061812,"created_at_utc_B":1453064063,"score_A":26,"score_B":90,"human_ref_A":"I don't have an answer, but I'd like to ask you why you think this happened. It's the first I've heard of it and I'm curious.   Edit: why you think that 4chan used to be liberal, not what you think the cause of the change was.","human_ref_B":"Also not an answer, but a question.   It was always my impression that these sites were libertarian more so than liberal or conservative. What are your reasons for thinking that sites like 4chan were liberal and then became conservative?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2251.0,"score_ratio":3.4615384615}
{"post_id":"41eyk0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Why did youth-populated internet communities like 4chan switch their politics from being staunchly liberal (until around the Obama administration) to very conservative, often reactionary a few years later?","c_root_id_A":"cz1y2zz","c_root_id_B":"cz1ugsw","created_at_utc_A":1453067199,"created_at_utc_B":1453061812,"score_A":29,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"Question: Do you think \"libertarian\" is a more appropriate word? I wouldn't say they are conservative, if that means socially conservative.","human_ref_B":"I don't have an answer, but I'd like to ask you why you think this happened. It's the first I've heard of it and I'm curious.   Edit: why you think that 4chan used to be liberal, not what you think the cause of the change was.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5387.0,"score_ratio":1.1153846154}
{"post_id":"3nfxbv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why do White Males account for 70% of all suicides? In 2013 White Males accounted for 70% of all suicides in the US. Why is this? Here's a link to some easily accessible stats. You can also build your own at various government sites. https:\/\/www.afsp.org\/understanding-suicide\/facts-and-figures","c_root_id_A":"cvodme6","c_root_id_B":"cvnr9u0","created_at_utc_A":1444003575,"created_at_utc_B":1443967651,"score_A":17,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"This comment has been overwritten by an open source script to protect this user&apos;s privacy.      If you would like to do the same, add the browser extension GreaseMonkey to Firefox and add this open source script.      Then simply click on your username on Reddit, go to the comments tab, and hit the new OVERWRITE button at the top.","human_ref_B":"If you look at the map of where black people live, they tend to live in the states with the lowest suicide rates. So that might be part of it. But according to this study:  Neeleman, Jan, Simon Wessely, and Glyn Lewis. \"Suicide acceptability in African-and white Americans: the role of religion.\" *The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease* 186.1 (1998): 12-16.  The main thing accounting for the difference is that African-Americans tend to be more religious in terms of belief and devotion, and this cuts down on suicide.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":35924.0,"score_ratio":1.0625}
{"post_id":"3nfxbv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why do White Males account for 70% of all suicides? In 2013 White Males accounted for 70% of all suicides in the US. Why is this? Here's a link to some easily accessible stats. You can also build your own at various government sites. https:\/\/www.afsp.org\/understanding-suicide\/facts-and-figures","c_root_id_A":"cvnzyan","c_root_id_B":"cvodme6","created_at_utc_A":1443982279,"created_at_utc_B":1444003575,"score_A":10,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"One of the lecturers at my Uni wrote her thesis about male suicide and masculinity. If you have access to a university library, I'd recommend checking it out \"River, J. (2014). Suicide and Hegemonic Masculinity in Australian Men\".","human_ref_B":"This comment has been overwritten by an open source script to protect this user&apos;s privacy.      If you would like to do the same, add the browser extension GreaseMonkey to Firefox and add this open source script.      Then simply click on your username on Reddit, go to the comments tab, and hit the new OVERWRITE button at the top.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21296.0,"score_ratio":1.7}
{"post_id":"2g4t0m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"The prevailing dialogue around vidoe games is that video game violence does not cause violence, but that objectification of women in media causes violence against women. This seems very suspicious to me, is this grounded in reality or is it just doublethink? I don't have any social science background whatsoever, but one of the talking points I've seen around video games is that it is dumb to relate them to violence.  Yet most of what I've heard about the portrayal of women in media is that it is a contributor to violence against women and leads people to have warped images of themselves and other women.   Is there any fundamental reason why the two are different, or why we should expect such different results?  I hope I have asked a sufficiently clear question.","c_root_id_A":"ckfn40p","c_root_id_B":"ckfoisp","created_at_utc_A":1410466731,"created_at_utc_B":1410469272,"score_A":3,"score_B":105,"human_ref_A":"Do you have any examples of where you saw either discussion? It might help the answer.","human_ref_B":"Here's a study that suggests playing violent video games has a desensitizing effect on real world violence, at least in a period of time immediately after playing a violent video game. That doesn't indicate that individuals are more likely to commit violence, though, or that the desensitizing effect is long-term. The study examined 257 college students.  Here's another study from a few years later with similar findings. The study only examined 30 teenage boys, which may not adequately represent the full spectrum of individuals who play video games (all ages, both genders).  It does suggest that there are some physiological or psychological effects to video games that we don't fully understand, even if those effects are not primarily ones that incite or encourage violent behavior.  There are some studies that tie violent video games to increased aggression. Note, though, that this isn't necessarily the same thing as saying that video games incite violence. When we hear someone say \"video games cause violence or increased aggression,\" we tend to think of someone flying off the handle and shooting up a shopping mall. The effects may be far more subtle than that.  For example, \"increased aggression\" could simply mean that an individual who plays violent video games, when presented with a triggering scenario, may respond more aggressively. Example: someone accidentally bumps into you on a crowded street and causes you to step into a puddle. If video games cause increased aggression, we may see statistical differences in the way people who play them respond to this situation than people who don't play video games. They may feel more offended or angry, they may feel more like the action was deliberate, they may curse or shout more often, or otherwise be less likely to shrug it off as a harmless mistake. Those are all emotional responses that we might classify as aggressive, but don't necessarily indicate any intention to cause violence.  That doesn't mean that everyone who plays video games will respond aggressively, or that people who don't play video games *won't* respond aggressively. But if video games cause increased aggression, it may show a statistically significant increase, for example, if we find that people who play violent video games are 17% more likely to react in those ways.  Of course, that doesn't necessarily indicate causation, either. It could be that people who are naturally more aggressive are attracted to simulated violence in video games, and therefore more likely to gravitate towards those games.  Here's a study that found that men who frequently read magazines that objectify women in their content show \"lower intentions to seek sexual consent and lower intentions to adhere to decisions about sexual consent.\" \"The study also found that exposure to women\u2019s magazines was often associated with greater intentions to refuse unwanted sexual activity.\" One criticism of a study like this is that it may not indicate that these magazines cause this behavior, but that men who are dismissive of consent are more attracted to magazines that enforce their views.  We know that dehumanizing individuals often encourages violence against them. This study found that when participants associated black individuals with apes, they were more likely to note a video of a black person being beaten as justified violence. This study also found that descriptive use of words that \"connoted bestial or subhuman\" qualities in articles about death-sentence-eligible criminal defendants was correlated with juries deciding to sentence those defendants to death.  Historically, we've seen numerous other examples of dehumanizing and objectifying behavior being correlated with violence. Nazi propaganda stressed the inferiority of Jews; in Rwanda in 1994, the Radio T\u00e9l\u00e9vision Libre des Mille Collines broadcast media labeling the Tutsi as \"cockroaches\" that should be crushed.  edit: clarity and to address issues regarding my comments on sample size","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2541.0,"score_ratio":35.0}
{"post_id":"2g4t0m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"The prevailing dialogue around vidoe games is that video game violence does not cause violence, but that objectification of women in media causes violence against women. This seems very suspicious to me, is this grounded in reality or is it just doublethink? I don't have any social science background whatsoever, but one of the talking points I've seen around video games is that it is dumb to relate them to violence.  Yet most of what I've heard about the portrayal of women in media is that it is a contributor to violence against women and leads people to have warped images of themselves and other women.   Is there any fundamental reason why the two are different, or why we should expect such different results?  I hope I have asked a sufficiently clear question.","c_root_id_A":"ckg9j9p","c_root_id_B":"ckfn40p","created_at_utc_A":1410530092,"created_at_utc_B":1410466731,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure about video games, but there's good evidence that violent movies *decrease* incidence of violent crime.  Does Movie Violence Decrease Violent Crime?  > Laboratory experiments in psychology find that media violence increases aggression in the short run. We analyze whether media violence affects violent crime in the field. We exploit variation in the violence of blockbuster movies from 1995 to 2004, and study the effect on same-day assaults. We find that violent crime decreases on days with larger theater audiences for violent movies. The effect is partly due to voluntary incapacitation: between 6PM and 12AM, a one million increase in the audience for violent movies reduces violent crime by 1.1 to 1.3 percent. After exposure to the movie, between 12AM and 6AM, violent crime is reduced by an even larger percent. This finding is explained by the self-selection of violent individuals into violent movie attendance, leading to a substitution away from more volatile activities. In particular, movie attendance appears to reduce alcohol consumption. Like the laboratory experiments, we find indirect evidence that movie violence increases violent crime; however, this effect is dominated by the reduction in crime induced by a substitution away from more dangerous activities. Overall, our estimates suggest that in the short-run violent movies deter almost 1,000 assaults on an average weekend. While our design does not allow us to estimate long-run effects, we find no evidence of medium-run effects up to three weeks after initial exposure.  It's important to figure out how these thing work in equilibrium. I'm not surprised that playing video increases aggressiveness in short-term lab experiments. But that doesn't mean that it does in real life.","human_ref_B":"Do you have any examples of where you saw either discussion? It might help the answer.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":63361.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"hasydb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"How are black confederates a thing?? So at my university, there have been protests and counter protests over a statue of a prominent figure that was also a general for the Confederate States of America. Obviously, things have gotten tense.  However, the leader of the counter protests is a black student that is also a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. He prominently posts about the battle flag, \"heritage not hate\", how the South was fighting for states' rights, and about his black ancestor that fought for the Confederacy.  My question though, is how can he and some other black Americans, become pro-Confederate? Based on my understanding (which is limited, I'll admit), black soldiers weren't really a thing in the Confederate army; they were usually just cooks or gun cleaners brought along by their owners. And there's so much more out there on how the war was about slavery and maintaining it for the southern economy. How does a black American ignore that and proudly wave the flag of a group that would have oppressed him? I apologize if this comes off as insensitive, but I just dont understand it.","c_root_id_A":"fv55kyl","c_root_id_B":"fv58qu6","created_at_utc_A":1592415356,"created_at_utc_B":1592416817,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"From our perspective, we can't actually make any assumptions on a single actor. You would have to conduct an interview to understand what led to this person coming to this conclusion before attempting to diagnose or understand. Without that context, we can only make assumptions and the sources I found mostly discuss how the concept of the black confederate soldier was a myth created by confederate sympathisers to imagine the American Revolution as more than just a war over the subjugation of black people.  Leslie Madsen-Brooks writes about this in the book, \"Writing History in the Digital Age\" in her Chapter,  *\"I Nevertheless am a Historian: Digital Historical Practice and Malpractice around Black Confederate Soldiers.\"* The book which is sort of a collection of essays which talks about the implications of information technology when researching, teaching and publishing history.  >...the historical record does not support claims that large numbers of slaves and former slaves volunteered. Quite the contrary: slaves who served the Confederate army were volunteered by their masters, and slaves on plantations collaborated actively with agents of the Union army to secure their freedom. Some historians have asserted that some African Americans \u201cpassed\u201d as white to enlist.  Others have acknowledged free and enslaved blacks' noncombatant contributions\u2014as body servants, cooks, foundry workers, and nurses\u2014to the Confederate war effort, but it appears that no academic historians have subscribed to the narrative that there were thousands of black Confederate soldiers.  Essentially, her chapter discusses how technology reproduces historical myths but also provides opportunities for debunking these myths.  She cites the Historian Kevin Levin who wrote a book, \"Searching for Black Confederates: The Civil War's Most Persistent Myth\" (2019) which goes into greater depth about the discursive foundations of the idea of the black confederate and how the myth was perpetuated. He wrote an article in 2015 for the Daily Beast,  \"*The Myth of the Black Confederate Soldier: Lost Cause Fanatics - Including a handful of African Americans- insist that thousands of blacks fought for the confederacy. Nothing in the historical record supports that claim.\"* In the article he discusses \"black confederates\" who are associated with heritage groups like the Sons of Confederate Veterans.  >All three \\black confederates mentioned in the article\\] believe that racial unrest in the modern South and the recent divide over Confederate flags and monuments is the result of failed government policies and a false view of the history of the Confederacy. In their view, it was the Confederacy's embrace of states rights and its own steps toward the recruitment of thousands of black Confederate soldiers that offered the promise of racial unity and equality. The willingness of all three to don Confederate uniforms and\/or wave the flag offers a powerful visual reminder for those who continue to embrace a Lost Cause narrative of the Civil War--a narrative that rejects the preservation of slavery as the central goal of the Confederate experiment in independence in favor of a scenario wherein loyal black soldiers stood by their masters on the battlefield...   >   >...What few people appear to be aware of is that the black Confederate narrative is a fairly recent phenomenon. The proliferation of these stories and the zeal for the black Confederate soldier expressed by many would be alien to their Confederate ancestors, who lived under a constitution strongly devoted to protecting if not extending slavery. It was not until March 1865--after a contentious debate that took place throughout the Confederacy--that the Confederate Congress passed legislation authorizing the enlistment of slaves who were first freed by their masters. Even those who finally came to support the legislation as the only alternative to defeat would have agreed with Howell Cobb: \"If slaves will make good soldiers our whole theory of slavery is wrong.\" Other than a small number that briefly trained in Richmond, Virginia, no black men served openly and there is no evidence that the Richmond recruits saw the battlefield in the final weeks of the war.  Levin seems to answer your question by saying, \"They're misinformed, misinformation has been spreading via confederate groups and the internet, along with textbooks that incorrectly cite material that includes camp slaves as enlistees. Confederate groups are desperate to find a narrative that counters the fact that thousands of black volunteers joined the Union willingly.\"  Madsen-Brooks, L (2013). \"I Nevertheless am a Historian: Digital Historical Practice and Malpractice around Black Confederate Soldiers.\" Nawrotzki, K & Dougherty, J (eds.) \"Writing History in the Digital Age\"  Levin, K. (Aug 8, 2015, updated Jun 8 2020) *The Myth of the Black Confederate Soldier: Lost Cause Fanatics - Including a handful of African Americans- insist that thousands of blacks fought for the confederacy. Nothing in the historical record supports that claim.* The Daily Beast.  [https:\/\/www.thedailybeast.com\/the-myth-of-the-black-confederate-soldier","human_ref_B":"You're right, black soldiers did not fight for the Confederacy. I'll point you to historian Kevin Levin's Searching for Black Confederates, wherein he explores the myth of the black Confederate soldier that's so popular among American conservatives. He also has a very active Twitter account, where he uses his research to engage with people about why that myth has become such a central part of modern conversations about race relations. In general, that myth, along with the states' rights myth (Southern states were plenty happy to use the federal government to curtail other states' rights in order to protect the institution of slavery), are part of an effort to sanitize the Confederate cause and allow certain constituencies to celebrate the Confederate cause without confronting the racism at its core.  I won't try to guess why that particular student decided to take up this cause, pointing instead to the other comments that do a much better job than I could explaining group vs. individual motivation. He may genuinely believe that he's fighting for a cause that he thinks his ancestors believed in. Or he might be a fiscal conservative who, due to the peculiarities of the US two-party system, finds himself going to bat for Southern social conservatives. I'd even argue, with Candace Owens as evidence, that it's perfectly possible for black people to be racist against black people.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1461.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"5c15gp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Are there any signs in the current US political climate that may indicate that the big parties will split? I am a layperson when it comes to US political analysis, but my impression is that the GOP, and the people who would vote for their candidates, in recent years have become more and more divided between what I could call a \"moderate\"\/\"establishment\" and a \"populist\" faction. Of course, this year's presidential campaign and before that, the primaries, have strengthened this view for me. To some extent, I can see the same thing for the Democrats but maybe not as much.  I understand that large parties such as these must have some internal disagreement and that factions over time will arise in one way or the other, but am I correct in thinking that the polarization - particularly within the GOP - is stronger today than it has been for a long time? By \"strong polarization\" I mean in this context the case where a party is split into two or more factions where one faction's adherents very \"cleanly\" identifies with the view of one faction, i.e. there are not many instances where a given adherent agrees with the views of one faction on some issues and the views of another faction on some other issues.  Supposing that I am right in thinking that the polarization within the GOP (and to a lesser extent the Democrats) is strong today, is there a reasonable chance that either party may fraction into two or more smaller parties? What are the historical indicators that a party is about to fraction? Apart from the polarization itself, are there other indicators that may tip the balance in favor of or against fractioning?","c_root_id_A":"d9t1ksu","c_root_id_B":"d9t2ig9","created_at_utc_A":1478711164,"created_at_utc_B":1478712300,"score_A":33,"score_B":55,"human_ref_A":"If you asked me six months ago, I would agree about the polarization within the GOP. But today it's clear that the GOP won't be doing any splitting of any kind anytime soon, not when they control the Presidency, both houses, and likely a handful of Supreme Court nominations. Though Trump is polarizing even within his own party, his power will allow for the legislature to pass all sorts of conservative measures that align with more traditional GOP views.   This article] (http:\/\/fivethirtyeight.com\/features\/when-political-parties-splinter\/) from March tackles some of your questions, and highlights the fact that past party splits were along geographic lines: The Whig party split over slavery in the mid-1800s, while Southern Democrats basically split from the party after 1948 when Northern Democrats were pro-civil rights.   I'm not sure we could have a geographic split like that today since our political conversations have become so much more nationally consistent through national partisan media, huge national campaigns, and social media. In short, we're too connected at a national level to see that kind of split. Rather, our geographies are more politically split on a rural\/urban basis, which may make it more difficult for a splinter group to gain enough local power to break off of one of the established parties.   But what about the Democrats? With a surprising and crushing defeat, the party will need to look at what went wrong. [Here is a pull-no-punches election post-mortem that highlights some serious issues for the party. There are many disenchanted people on the left who were wildly supportive of Sanders and lament the fact that the party was unwilling to move further left when the popular support for him was made clear. Does this mean a party split? That depends - if the party is willing to adjust in the face of defeat by adopting more explicitly progressive policies than probably not. But if the party establishment remains stuck in its ways, that disenchantment from the left could take the shape of starting an all new party to meet their wants.","human_ref_B":"Political scientists since at least the 1950's at least have noticed that single member district first past the post voting systems (i.e. systems where there's only one winner for the district single member districts] who needs merely to get a plurality of the votes [first past the post]) tend towards two party systems. While this is a general trend, the US has adhered to it more closely than similar systems (look at Canada and the U.K. which often are effectively three or four party systems besides SMD FPTP).   Now, that out of the way, Marquette political scientist Julia Azari [wrote about in FiveThirtyEight not too long ago that there are really only two historical examples of parties breaking up, or almost breaking up, in American history. The first was the break up of the Whigs in the 1850's that led to the Republicans and the Democrats and very quickly the Civil War. The other was the segragationist Southern Democrats repeatedly splitting off from the Democrats over issues of civil rights for blacks (she mentioned 1948 but it happened or nearly happened a few times after that as well). That's not what 2016 looks like, where there's a single issue that can move politicians from an entire region to drastic action.   Instead, what generally happens is that the parties sort of move around in relation to each other. Most political scientists and historians agree that we're in the Sixth Party system, though they're not quite in agreement when this system started (somewhere between the Voting Rights Act of 1964 and the Republican Revolution of 1994, with the entrance of both Evangelicalism as an important cleavage and small government conservatism emerging as a Republican orthodoxy emerging in with the 1980 as an important moment between those two). For more on party stances, I have a longer post here about how recent intraparty competition has moved both the Democrats and the Republicans around in terms of their positions (mainly focused on domestic policy). But it should be enough to give you a clear sense that there have always been jockeying factions in the party, and sometimes those factions are very unhappy. They can disappear from history (as many Rockefeller Republicans did) or they can switch their partisan allegiance (as many Southern Democrats gradually did between the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Zell Miller in 2004, and many of the people who became the \"Neo-Conservative\" foreign policy hawks did in the 1970's and 80's).   Parties splitting is rare in the US. Parties having factions that are jockeying for position (and at times really really disliking each other) is basically universal.   Today's GOP doesn't just have two factions, I'd say it's easy to locate at least four: the social conservatives (often religiously motivated Evangelicals, Conservative Catholics, and Mormons), the \"cultural conservatives\" (this is a term that's just coming into use this election, meaning anti-immigration, anti-global trade group who in some of the literature have been called \"racial conservatives\"), the small government absolutists (often self-identified libertarians or \"free market\" absolutists), the establishment moderates, and those are just off the top of my head. Nate Silver during the primaries argued that there were five major, overlapping categories at play (this originates I think in 2012, before the term \"cultural conservatives\" became popular or really acknowledged even): \"moderate\", \"establishment\", \"Christian Conservative\", \"Libertarian\", \"Tea Party\".   But the point is, yes, there's quite contentious differences in the current Republican Party. This may lead at some point in the future to defections even, though this is uncertain and I wouldn't say particularly likely in our polarized climate (as many have pointed out, the moderates are often the ones who lose elections in the Senate and the House). But having contentions within the party is historically quite common, it just hasn't been particularly pronounced in recent years.   A party split (in the sense of one bloc of the party actually adopting a different name and national organization) seems unlikely given how rare it's been in American history, but decades of open ideological conflict between two or more wings of a party wouldn't be tremendously surprising as that's generally been more of the norm in American politics than it has been recently.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1136.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"177jkm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"How did 'royalty' begin in the first place? Ultimately, it seems odd to me, that someone could just become a king, and then get a bunch of people to protect them.  How could this happen? In other words, if I went back in time to before the first king of an area, how could I become king (Presuming I could speak their language, but didn't come with special knowledge about how the world works, except for 'how to become king')?","c_root_id_A":"c82zllf","c_root_id_B":"c831yae","created_at_utc_A":1359065134,"created_at_utc_B":1359072034,"score_A":50,"score_B":53,"human_ref_A":"Very simple version:   One bandit leader realizes that instead of simply raiding village after village of poor farmers once and then moving on, it's actually more profitable for him to settle down and protect the village and its people in exchange for guaranteed collection of taxes from the population.  The people are happier now because they don't have to worry about losing their livelihood at the whim of some roving bandit, and the original bandit leader is happy because he gets a consistent flow of income from, as well as power\/control over his new subjects.  It's also more profitable for both parties (ideally) because the farmers, now that they have some sense of security and protection, are able to produce more crops, and thus the ruler is able to collect more from the people.  Eventually this \"ruler\" expands beyond his one village, and encompasses more and more people and land within his \"territory\".  Through time as generations pass this guy's dynasty gets accepted by the population as being their protector, ruler, and tax-collector.   So, in answer to your question, to become king you pretty much need to be the first guy to realize it makes more sense to settle down and rule rather than rove around raiding poor farmers.    Edit: Check out \"Dictatorship, Democracy, and Development\" by Mancur Olson for more detail.","human_ref_B":"Well, you can refer to the already rich field of political philosophy that already deals with monarchy. Nietzsche, Burke, Rousseau, Hobbes, Aquinas, Locke, Plato, and Aristotle are some of the more notable and influential writers on it in Western philosophy (Kongfuzi, Menzi, Hanfei, Xunzi, and Zhuxi are highly influential in Chinese statecraft if you want to pick up a translation) but the corpus on monarchy and its development is quite vast. My suggestion is to read up on some of the literature and take in their views on politics and political development as a whole, and is good holistically.   But if you don't want to read *Leviathan*, *The Social Contract*, etc. to lay the groundwork and the abstract: it highly depends on the society. The development of monarchy is highly dependent on the region in question, and how the system derives its legitimacy. Some monarchies formed their legitimacy from religion; the Caliphates, for instance, or the Egyptian dynasties. We also have noble-democratic succession of rulership, such as in the Anglo-Saxon Witenagamont. Then there's the good ol' right of conquest, and the use of force; the Mongols became rulers of large realms because their leaders were strong and charismatic, and they conquered the lands that they ruled. And then there's the meritocratic argument of Plato or Kongfuzi, etc. So essentially; if you wanted to make yourself a \"king\", it would depend on the place you wished to be \"king\" of. Becoming King of France during the High Middle Ages is an entirely different affair from then from being Emperor of China, then from being an Iroquois Chief. Where, therefore, can we find commonality in their development?  What you're asking is essentially: what makes governments, not just monarchy, legitimate? Indeed, why do we even need governments in the first place? And that is a complex question.  To that, I'd refer, broadly speaking, to the development of private property and the concept of ownership, but more importantly, to the nature of human relations and a social contract (of which an abstraction exists in even property-less societies).  There must be a reason for people to give up their \"natural\" rights in a state of nature to form a society out of anarchy. Why should we give up doing what we want whenever we want?  Well first, \"natural\" liberty is not always desirable. A person in nature is not free and guaranteed life or private property; indeed, a person in nature is constantly threatened their life or private property from other individuals who can, through force, freely take your life or private property. As Hobbes argues, this natural state of anarchy is one of the war of all against all (*bellum omnium contra omnes*). Thus, we delve into the development of the first social contract; the development of societies, clans, etc, whose purpose is to provide security, stability, and a guarantee of liberty from such violence. Moreover, it allows for cooperation between individuals. As Plato in the Republic notes, the specialization of persons and the development of economies based around such positive-sum interactions. This is evident in hunter-gatherer societies, and not just in sedentary ones; within a group, there are those who hunt, those who take care of the children, those who forage, etc, as it ensures better skills and a higher chance of survival for the group itself.  Additionally, society also develops since humans are naturally social animals, as a result of our biology\/method of procreation and the family unit it produces. From the parent-child relationship, we begin to produce a larger and larger clan, from which basic societies form around.   Thus, society thus develops through mutual cooperation and positive sum trade, through common security, stability, and the guarantee of civil liberties by trading away natural rights, as well as through the development of clannish\/familial groups.  And, with the specialization of individuals, and the development of society, who leads and governs the people? And here we get into the concept of political legitimacy, consent of the governed, and the role of the governors and the governed. Ultimately, you rule because the society you rule (or important segments of society) believe your rule is legitimate, for whatever the myriad reasons. Perhaps you are seen as an able leader, or perceived to derive your power from the supernatural. Perhaps you are charismatic, and people follow you. Perhaps you base yourself on established traditions, on clan ties, and the existing social structure. Perhaps you rely upon the rule of law and complex legal structures or societal rituals\/obligations. Perhaps you are powerful, and you coerce or persuade people into following you (but then, where does your power come from?).  However, you're asking why people will end up protecting, and follow a leader; the first leader\/king. Again, it ultimately comes down to the people themselves agreeing to make you king, and to rule. That you have legitimacy in your rule over them as part of a social contract. That rule by you is preferable to a looser confederate structure, rule by a council of elders, or any other form of government.  Well, Weber has categorized authority into a tripartite (an elegant, if oversimplified categorization, in my opinion): charismatic, traditional, and rational-legal authority. In the case you're talking about (being the first king\/ruler), you would be drawing either on your own charisma abilities, qualities, strength, and insight etc., whatever it may be, to inspire loyalty in your followers and those who would proclaim you king, or upon traditional networks: through your family and clan, through patrimonialism, and filial piety, etc.   While there are those such as Hobbes who argue that legitimacy can also be derived from the right of conquest, I disagree. Well, in the modern sense, this is not the case, but also in the abstract. Say that you are indeed powerful and are able to conquer the area; the question becomes, who are your followers and why do they follow you anyways? And, as the concept is \"might makes right\", the conquered and enslaved obviously have a right to rise up and overthrow the rulers if and when they are strong enough. Thus, conquest does not create legitimacy.   **Well, that was a monster of a post. In summary, it comes from a social contract between you and the people who follow you: that they give you their consent to be ruled, and make your rule legitimate. Also, read some of the philosophers who've discussed this. Rousseau's Social Contract, Locke's Second Treatise of Government Hobbes' Leviathan, Plato's The Republic, and Aristotle's Politics are all good starting points from western discourse.**  **EDIT: in eastern discourse, Confucianism similarly develops around such basis. The whole basis of Confucianism is filial piety and tradition, as well as the obligations of the Emperor\/lord to the people, the people to the lord, the father to the son (and vice-versa), etc, and the mandate of heaven as a concept is in many ways a social contract between heaven, the Emperor, and the people.**","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6900.0,"score_ratio":1.06}
{"post_id":"bq3h28","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"A bit of a touchy subject, but does drawn pedophilia images (i.e. loli) encourage or discourage dangerous behaviors? (real life sexual abuse) A bit of a touchy subject, but does drawn pedophilia images (i.e. loli) encourage or discourage dangerous behaviors? (real life sexual abuse)  I'm honestly really curious about this. I've seen people claim both but I'd really like to know what psychologists who study these kind of behaviors have to say on the issue; I've never found any studies on it.  https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/4l6iyf\/a_bit_of_a_touch_subject_but_does_drawn\/  I'm reposting this because it was asked previously, and upvoted, but apparently didn't get much of an answer.","c_root_id_A":"eo15q0u","c_root_id_B":"eo1re3o","created_at_utc_A":1558192147,"created_at_utc_B":1558205125,"score_A":10,"score_B":48,"human_ref_A":"also really want answers,   i want to add a question  &#x200B;  would you classify those who find cartoon images that look like children or adults with \"child like appearances and behaviour\" sexually appealing to be pedophiles?","human_ref_B":"As far as I know, there are no studies directly studying the topic, especially drawings such as those defined \"loli\". I will attempt to provide an overview of what is arguably known and comment on how it relates to the question. It is a long reply, which I will divide in two comments, because I believe such a delicate\/contentious topic requires a bit more in-depth considerations.  As a premise, studying pedophilia in itself is difficult, as they have little incentive to identify themselves even to medical doctors and therapists (because of the stigma, the amalgamation of pedophilia as a paraphilia and the criminal behavior that is child sexual abuse, fear of being outed for being a pedophile and of the social consequences, etc.). Therefore, many studies focus on child sexual abusers, which are not always pedophiles and cannot be considered at face value representative of pedophiles who do not act. Citing Seto:  >The **prevalence of pedophilia in the general population is unknown**. Epidemiological surveys with the questions that are needed to identify pedophilia\u2014particularly those having to do with persistence and intensity of sexual thoughts, fantasies, urges, arousal, or behavior involving prepubescent children\u2014have not yet been conducted. **Ever having thoughts of sex with a prepubescent child or even ever having sexual contact with a prepubescent child would not be sufficient to meet the standard diagnostic criteria for pedophilia because persistence and intensity are two key features of these definitions.**  Check the first link for a long discussion on the topic, but pedophiles are not necessarily child sexual offenders and, less obviously, child sexual offenders are not necessarily pedophiles. Citing Finkelhor:  >But **among child abusers] who are [caught], most are not pedophiles. In fact, about half of all victims are post-pubescent, ranging in age from twelve to seventeen, so that most of their offenders would not qualify as pedophiles**. Moreover about **a third of offenders against juveniles are themselves juveniles** (an even larger share of the offenders against young juveniles are juveniles). These young offenders are **also not pedophiles, but include a mixed group of generally delinquent youth and youth who engage in somewhat impulsive, developmentally transitory behavior**. Even **among adults who victimize children under thirteen**, at least **a third or more do not qualify as pedophiles**. The equation of sexual abuse with pedophilia is thus misleading.  Then there is also the question of [hebephilia, in regard to which it is debatable if can be considered a mental illness (i.e. is it a dysfunction?).  Let's step back and ask: is there a relationship between pornography and sexual abuse? This is a highly debated topic. I would suggest the consensus is that increased availability of pornography in recent decades has not contributed to increasing the rates of sexual offences internationally, however the debate is ongoing. Following year of publication:  ---  Kutchinsky studied the availability of pornography compared to the incidence of sex crimes in Denmark, especially child molestation:  >The unexpected  outcome of this  analysis is that  the high availability of hard-core pornography in Denmark was most probably the very direct cause of a  considerable  decrease  in at least one type of serious sex offense, namely, child  molestation. **Between   1965 (the first  year of the availability of hard-core pornographic pictures) and 1969 (the year of the repeal of the Penal Law ban, and of peak production), the  number of cases of this type dropped from 220 to 87**. The implication of our conclusion is that a  large number of such offenses have been avoided since the late 1960s, because potential offenders obtained sufficient  sexual satisfaction through  the use of pornography, most  probably combined with masturbation.  Diamond analyzed the incidence of sex crimes (rape) in Japan, Shanghai and the US associated with the availability of sexually explicit materials (SEM). He focused on \"Japan, a country quite different from those in the West. **In regard to pornography, in Japan the swing from prudish and restrictive to relatively permissive and nonrestrictive was dramatic. Some limited data from Shanghai and new data from the United States follow**\". He was particularly interested in Japan, because:  >Currently , not only are visuals with pubic hair and exposed genitalia present, but **available are cartoon images of hard-core sexual encounters in manga as well as in adult reading materials**. These can be pictures and stories involving bestiality, sadomasochism, necrophilia and incest; **the characters involved may be adults, children or both. Essentially, anything goes.**\"  He concluded that:  >It is certainly clear from the data reviewed, and the new data and analysis presented, that **a massive increase in available pornography in Japan, the United States and elsewhere has been correlated with a dramatic decrease in sexual crimes and most so among youngsters as perpetrators or victims**  On the topic of virtual child pornography, Malamuth and Hupin reviewed the literature on pornography and concluded the following:  >Taken together, **the two lines of independent lines of research** (one **focusing primarily on groups of offenders**, the **other primarily studying non-forensic samples with varying degrees of risk profiles**) complement each other very well by their strengths and limitations. Importantly, the two lines of research **support similar conclusions**: **exposure to nonconsenting pornography** (child or adult) **can \"whet the appetite\" or \"add fuel to the fire\" for individuals with a relatively high risk for offending** (revealed either by a previous conviction for offending or by scoring highly on risk factors for sexual aggression). On the other hand, **individuals with low known risk for sexual offending** (revealed either by lack of previous behavioral offenses or by scoring low on risk factors) **do not show any evidence of increased risk for sexual offending as a result of exposure to such pornography.**  Following their review of literature, Ferguson and Hartley concluded \"that it is time to discard the hypothesis that pornography contributes to increased sexual assault behavior\":  >Considered together, **the available data about pornography consumption and rape rates in the United States seem to rule out a causal relationship, at least with respect to pornography availability causing an increase in the incidence of rape**. One could even argue that the available research and self-reported and official statistics might provide evidence for the reverse effect; the increasing availability of pornography appears to be associated with a decline in rape.Whatever the explanation is, the fact remains that crime in general,and rape specifically, has decreased substantially for the last 20 years.Concurrently, availability of pornography has increased steadily in the last 20 years.  Returning to Diamond and colleagues, they studied the Czech Republic for the following reason:  >**Following  the effects  of  a  new  law  in  the  Czech  Republic  that  allowed pornography to a society previously having forbidden it** allowed us to **monitor the change in sex related crime that followed the change.**  They concluded:  >The most obvious and significant finding is that **since 1989, with the shift from a political system with its total ban on SEM and anything that might be considered pornographic to the present regime  and  the  wide  spread  availability  of  SEM**  in  various media from publication to films, CDs and the Internet, the incidence of reported **sex related crimes has not increased**. Perhaps **most critically, child sex-abuse, despite a brief upswing toward its pre-democracy rate, resumed a decline that had begun, for unknown reasons, in the early 1970s.** The **lesser sex related crimes of peeping and indecent exposure also dropped significantly and appears to have reached a low and steady state**. This is interesting since child sex abuse and so-called \u2018\u2018hands off\u2019 \u2019sex crimes are supposedly the most resistant to change (Marshall,2005).  In their discussion, they argue:  >Issues surrounding child pornography and child sex abuse are probably among the most contentious in the area of sex issues and crime. In this regard **we consider instructive our findings for the Czech Republic that have echoed those found in Denmark** (Kutchinsky, 1973) **and Japan** (Diamond & Uchiyama, 1999)  **that  where  so-called  child-pornography  was  readily available  without  restriction  the  incidence  of  child  sexual abuse was lower than when its availability was restricted** [...]  >We do not approve of the use of real children in the production or distribution of child pornography **but artificially produced materials might serve**.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12978.0,"score_ratio":4.8}
{"post_id":"5seya9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"What is the primary purpose of prisons? To deter crime, protect the public from criminals, punish crime, or rehabilitate criminals? I'm assuming there are many reasons, but what do social scientists say on the matter? What is the stated purpose of prison according to law, criminology, psychology, or any other discipline?  What purpose, according to the evidence, is most effectively served by prisons?  It may be a broad question, but I'd welcome any insight at all.","c_root_id_A":"ddf3j4k","c_root_id_B":"ddf0ek0","created_at_utc_A":1486421734,"created_at_utc_B":1486417901,"score_A":23,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"You may be interested in Michel Foucault's book *Discipline and Punish*","human_ref_B":"In the US, I seriously wonder how much of it is simply to create a cheap source of labor","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3833.0,"score_ratio":4.6}
{"post_id":"5seya9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"What is the primary purpose of prisons? To deter crime, protect the public from criminals, punish crime, or rehabilitate criminals? I'm assuming there are many reasons, but what do social scientists say on the matter? What is the stated purpose of prison according to law, criminology, psychology, or any other discipline?  What purpose, according to the evidence, is most effectively served by prisons?  It may be a broad question, but I'd welcome any insight at all.","c_root_id_A":"ddf48ec","c_root_id_B":"ddfqslw","created_at_utc_A":1486422636,"created_at_utc_B":1486460638,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"To maintain a prisoner class of society.","human_ref_B":"All of those purposes you cited are reasons for prisons. But ultimately, prisons are provided by the state on behalf of voters and special interests.  Voters themselves are a diverse group, so all of the justifications you listed are used in varying degrees to appeal to voters, generally depending on the composition of the electorate. Politicians often have the goal of appearing tough on crime, even if that means supporting policies that are counterproductive or excessively costly to the state (e.g. war on drugs).  Special interests here include: corrections officers, private prison companies, companies that use prison labor, etc. They won't say it explicitly, but to these special interests, the purpose of prisons is to make money.  Ultimately, your question is difficult to answer because prisons don't have a primary purpose, they have several purposes that often contradict one another. A better question you could ask is \"which purpose of prisons has the most positive effect on society per unit of cost?\".","labels":0,"seconds_difference":38002.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"5seya9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"What is the primary purpose of prisons? To deter crime, protect the public from criminals, punish crime, or rehabilitate criminals? I'm assuming there are many reasons, but what do social scientists say on the matter? What is the stated purpose of prison according to law, criminology, psychology, or any other discipline?  What purpose, according to the evidence, is most effectively served by prisons?  It may be a broad question, but I'd welcome any insight at all.","c_root_id_A":"ddf0ek0","c_root_id_B":"ddfqslw","created_at_utc_A":1486417901,"created_at_utc_B":1486460638,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"In the US, I seriously wonder how much of it is simply to create a cheap source of labor","human_ref_B":"All of those purposes you cited are reasons for prisons. But ultimately, prisons are provided by the state on behalf of voters and special interests.  Voters themselves are a diverse group, so all of the justifications you listed are used in varying degrees to appeal to voters, generally depending on the composition of the electorate. Politicians often have the goal of appearing tough on crime, even if that means supporting policies that are counterproductive or excessively costly to the state (e.g. war on drugs).  Special interests here include: corrections officers, private prison companies, companies that use prison labor, etc. They won't say it explicitly, but to these special interests, the purpose of prisons is to make money.  Ultimately, your question is difficult to answer because prisons don't have a primary purpose, they have several purposes that often contradict one another. A better question you could ask is \"which purpose of prisons has the most positive effect on society per unit of cost?\".","labels":0,"seconds_difference":42737.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"7t4968","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Back in the 1980's we were warned by many experts that violence in movies and games would make kids more violent. Since then the number of violent acts committed by minors has fallen dramatically, yet the youth have beein playing and watching more and more violent games and movies. What gives? Statistic: Number of serious violent crimes committed by youth aged between 12 and 17 years in the U.S. from 1980 to 2015 \\(in 1,000\\)   I always thought there that was some truth to the opinion that violence in games and movies would have an effect, but these stats shows no such correlation. I am sure there are more stats to both expand on and change the picture,  why is why I am posting here.  Do we have any reasonable data to show whether society overreacted back in the infant days of videogames or if there is some truth to it.  Bonus question: Has there been done any research as to whether social presence has changed violence behaviour in youths? I have seen a lot of stuff recently portraying social media, and the related fame, as a catalyst to violent attacks by minors.","c_root_id_A":"dt9pc34","c_root_id_B":"dt9qvcp","created_at_utc_A":1516971406,"created_at_utc_B":1516973774,"score_A":5,"score_B":31,"human_ref_A":"https:\/\/www.york.ac.uk\/news-and-events\/news\/2018\/research\/no-evidence-to-link-violence-and-video-games\/","human_ref_B":"What experts in the 80s were saying that?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2368.0,"score_ratio":6.2}
{"post_id":"7t4968","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Back in the 1980's we were warned by many experts that violence in movies and games would make kids more violent. Since then the number of violent acts committed by minors has fallen dramatically, yet the youth have beein playing and watching more and more violent games and movies. What gives? Statistic: Number of serious violent crimes committed by youth aged between 12 and 17 years in the U.S. from 1980 to 2015 \\(in 1,000\\)   I always thought there that was some truth to the opinion that violence in games and movies would have an effect, but these stats shows no such correlation. I am sure there are more stats to both expand on and change the picture,  why is why I am posting here.  Do we have any reasonable data to show whether society overreacted back in the infant days of videogames or if there is some truth to it.  Bonus question: Has there been done any research as to whether social presence has changed violence behaviour in youths? I have seen a lot of stuff recently portraying social media, and the related fame, as a catalyst to violent attacks by minors.","c_root_id_A":"dtao9f8","c_root_id_B":"dt9zlx8","created_at_utc_A":1517008004,"created_at_utc_B":1516983576,"score_A":9,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Actually there was far from a consensus that portrayals of violence would result in more violence in real life.  George Gerbner (Annenberg School at the University of Pennsylvania) noted that the effect of portrayals of violence in media didn't necessarily lead to increased levels of violence but *did* lead to people feeling that violence was more common than it was based on crime statistics. He called this effect the \"mean world syndrome\".  It's worth noting that although actual violent crime has fallen perceptions of violent crime has continued to follow this pattern.     When looking at the relationship between people's exposure to violent media and aggression there are very few ways to correlate this with actual crime statistics.  As I remember it, most studies that examine these media effects directly are actually gauging the capacity of media to prime aggressive behavior in individuals.  This *has* been shown to be the case.   However, it should be noted that priming is a short term effect - it is an effect that lasts minutes or at most hours as it relies upon physiological arousal and cognitive accessibility.  There is more disagreement about the longterm impact of television.  For example, in the review cited in the previous article they note that more television in childhood is associated with higher levels of violence but they fail to account for things like social class (i.e. families with less time to devote to children may use the TV as a babysitter; children may be less likely to learn social skills; etc.).   There is similiar debate surround the long-term effects of video games.  One of my professors when I was doing my PhD came down strongly on the side of video game violence was overstated.  Also see here.    TLDR:  Violent TV and movies definitely make people more likely to overestimate real world violence and almost certainly has short term priming effects.  Long-term effects are more debatable.  This same pattern probably holds for video games as well.     Source:  I'm a communication professor.","human_ref_B":"Violent crime in the US has been dropping consistently since a peak in the early nineties.  \"Since 1993, the rate of violent and serious violent victimization has declined by over 70%\"* The drop in crimes committed by children could be seen as part of that larger trend, and doesn't necessarily indicate anything about video games and their effect on crime.  With that in mind, modern research has mixed results, with some studies showing no correlation** and some studies showing a correlation.*** It's an area of open research.  \\* https:\/\/www.bjs.gov\/content\/pub\/pdf\/cv11.pdf page 15  ** https:\/\/www.york.ac.uk\/news-and-events\/news\/2018\/research\/no-evidence-to-link-violence-and-video-games\/  *** http:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1111\/1467-9280.00366","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24428.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"7t4968","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Back in the 1980's we were warned by many experts that violence in movies and games would make kids more violent. Since then the number of violent acts committed by minors has fallen dramatically, yet the youth have beein playing and watching more and more violent games and movies. What gives? Statistic: Number of serious violent crimes committed by youth aged between 12 and 17 years in the U.S. from 1980 to 2015 \\(in 1,000\\)   I always thought there that was some truth to the opinion that violence in games and movies would have an effect, but these stats shows no such correlation. I am sure there are more stats to both expand on and change the picture,  why is why I am posting here.  Do we have any reasonable data to show whether society overreacted back in the infant days of videogames or if there is some truth to it.  Bonus question: Has there been done any research as to whether social presence has changed violence behaviour in youths? I have seen a lot of stuff recently portraying social media, and the related fame, as a catalyst to violent attacks by minors.","c_root_id_A":"dt9pc34","c_root_id_B":"dtao9f8","created_at_utc_A":1516971406,"created_at_utc_B":1517008004,"score_A":5,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"https:\/\/www.york.ac.uk\/news-and-events\/news\/2018\/research\/no-evidence-to-link-violence-and-video-games\/","human_ref_B":"Actually there was far from a consensus that portrayals of violence would result in more violence in real life.  George Gerbner (Annenberg School at the University of Pennsylvania) noted that the effect of portrayals of violence in media didn't necessarily lead to increased levels of violence but *did* lead to people feeling that violence was more common than it was based on crime statistics. He called this effect the \"mean world syndrome\".  It's worth noting that although actual violent crime has fallen perceptions of violent crime has continued to follow this pattern.     When looking at the relationship between people's exposure to violent media and aggression there are very few ways to correlate this with actual crime statistics.  As I remember it, most studies that examine these media effects directly are actually gauging the capacity of media to prime aggressive behavior in individuals.  This *has* been shown to be the case.   However, it should be noted that priming is a short term effect - it is an effect that lasts minutes or at most hours as it relies upon physiological arousal and cognitive accessibility.  There is more disagreement about the longterm impact of television.  For example, in the review cited in the previous article they note that more television in childhood is associated with higher levels of violence but they fail to account for things like social class (i.e. families with less time to devote to children may use the TV as a babysitter; children may be less likely to learn social skills; etc.).   There is similiar debate surround the long-term effects of video games.  One of my professors when I was doing my PhD came down strongly on the side of video game violence was overstated.  Also see here.    TLDR:  Violent TV and movies definitely make people more likely to overestimate real world violence and almost certainly has short term priming effects.  Long-term effects are more debatable.  This same pattern probably holds for video games as well.     Source:  I'm a communication professor.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":36598.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"7t4968","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Back in the 1980's we were warned by many experts that violence in movies and games would make kids more violent. Since then the number of violent acts committed by minors has fallen dramatically, yet the youth have beein playing and watching more and more violent games and movies. What gives? Statistic: Number of serious violent crimes committed by youth aged between 12 and 17 years in the U.S. from 1980 to 2015 \\(in 1,000\\)   I always thought there that was some truth to the opinion that violence in games and movies would have an effect, but these stats shows no such correlation. I am sure there are more stats to both expand on and change the picture,  why is why I am posting here.  Do we have any reasonable data to show whether society overreacted back in the infant days of videogames or if there is some truth to it.  Bonus question: Has there been done any research as to whether social presence has changed violence behaviour in youths? I have seen a lot of stuff recently portraying social media, and the related fame, as a catalyst to violent attacks by minors.","c_root_id_A":"dt9pc34","c_root_id_B":"dt9zlx8","created_at_utc_A":1516971406,"created_at_utc_B":1516983576,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"https:\/\/www.york.ac.uk\/news-and-events\/news\/2018\/research\/no-evidence-to-link-violence-and-video-games\/","human_ref_B":"Violent crime in the US has been dropping consistently since a peak in the early nineties.  \"Since 1993, the rate of violent and serious violent victimization has declined by over 70%\"* The drop in crimes committed by children could be seen as part of that larger trend, and doesn't necessarily indicate anything about video games and their effect on crime.  With that in mind, modern research has mixed results, with some studies showing no correlation** and some studies showing a correlation.*** It's an area of open research.  \\* https:\/\/www.bjs.gov\/content\/pub\/pdf\/cv11.pdf page 15  ** https:\/\/www.york.ac.uk\/news-and-events\/news\/2018\/research\/no-evidence-to-link-violence-and-video-games\/  *** http:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1111\/1467-9280.00366","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12170.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"1975x1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"If inflation is constantly rising, but the minimum wage is not, are employers paying their workers \"less\" over time? Or am I misunderstanding this?","c_root_id_A":"c8lffrm","c_root_id_B":"c8lf96a","created_at_utc_A":1361815517,"created_at_utc_B":1361814933,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The minimum wage affects a certain number of people every year.  Currently 5.2% of hourly employees earn at or below the minimum wage.(Source)  This is up from most of the 2000s, but down from the most recent data.  If we look at data for 2002-2007, the percentage of wage employees earning at or below the minimum wage decreased every year.  (I'm using the \"Characteristics of Minimum Wage Workers\" pages, from the BLS: http:\/\/www.bls.gov\/cps\/minwage2002.htm - http:\/\/www.bls.gov\/cps\/minwage2011.htm you can just change the year in the url).    There's not enough data here to do a solid analysis, but these are the best sources I could find quickly.  What you see is fewer employees working for the minimum wage over time when it is stagnant.  This indicates that wages are increasing, and, more importantly that the minimum wage, at its current level is not a binding price floor in the vast majority of cases.","human_ref_B":"For jobs where the minimum wage is above the equilibrium value of the labor supplied, then yes. Jobs paid at equilibrium will tend to increase wages with inflation. Not always right away, there's elasticity to consider, but generally wages follow the equilibrium price of labor unless there's a law preventing that from happening (like minimum wage laws).  It's also important to consider that an increase in minimum wage can slightly increase the rate of inflation by cost-push","labels":1,"seconds_difference":584.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1975x1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"If inflation is constantly rising, but the minimum wage is not, are employers paying their workers \"less\" over time? Or am I misunderstanding this?","c_root_id_A":"c8lf96a","c_root_id_B":"c8lfrkf","created_at_utc_A":1361814933,"created_at_utc_B":1361816570,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"For jobs where the minimum wage is above the equilibrium value of the labor supplied, then yes. Jobs paid at equilibrium will tend to increase wages with inflation. Not always right away, there's elasticity to consider, but generally wages follow the equilibrium price of labor unless there's a law preventing that from happening (like minimum wage laws).  It's also important to consider that an increase in minimum wage can slightly increase the rate of inflation by cost-push","human_ref_B":"Only for those on the minimum wage margin.  How many people are stuck on that margin for extended periods of time?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1637.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1975x1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"If inflation is constantly rising, but the minimum wage is not, are employers paying their workers \"less\" over time? Or am I misunderstanding this?","c_root_id_A":"c8lf96a","c_root_id_B":"c8lnpmq","created_at_utc_A":1361814933,"created_at_utc_B":1361839444,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"For jobs where the minimum wage is above the equilibrium value of the labor supplied, then yes. Jobs paid at equilibrium will tend to increase wages with inflation. Not always right away, there's elasticity to consider, but generally wages follow the equilibrium price of labor unless there's a law preventing that from happening (like minimum wage laws).  It's also important to consider that an increase in minimum wage can slightly increase the rate of inflation by cost-push","human_ref_B":"Yes! Here are some graphs I found with Google that do a pretty good job of explaining it: http:\/\/oregonstate.edu\/instruct\/anth484\/minwage.html  As to what bearing this has on discussion of the impact of the minimum wage, the answer is that it probably dampens the impact of raising the minimum wage. You can read about that in this blog article  and the paper that it summarizes.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24511.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"bqeg7v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are there any examples of governments successfully fixing the issues faced by historically marginalised groups? I live in New Zealand and we just had some rather shocking statistics come out that said 2% of our population experiences 40% of crime. That 2% is overwhelmingly Maori or of pacific island descent. And today a report was released saying that 40% of all homeless people in NZ are of Maori descent.   Maori and pacific islanders also have far worse economic outcomes, worse health outcomes... the same story that you see play out across the globe, just about every country seems to have either an indigenous population or a minority group that has the exact same issues.   And the NZ government has pledged and is pledging hundreds of millions of dollars to fix those issues... but the money spent seems to have little impact with fixing outcomes.   So my question is... are there any examples of a government saying \"this group is experience worse outcomes by every measure, here is a solution\" and having it actually work?   The same story seems to play out across the globe but I can't find any examples of policy decisions from any government type, left-wing, right wing... that has had any tangible impact.","c_root_id_A":"eo3whcg","c_root_id_B":"eo58gry","created_at_utc_A":1558260615,"created_at_utc_B":1558292720,"score_A":7,"score_B":32,"human_ref_A":"Can you provide any links for these stats you\u2019re throwing around?","human_ref_B":"\\>Fifty years after the passage of the Civil Rights Act, it is important to acknowledge the progress that has been made in cutting poverty, particularly for African Americans. From 1966 to 2013, the share of the private-sector workforce comprised of people of color rose from 11.2 percent to 29.7 percent, and women\u2019s share grew from 31.2 percent to 48.2 percent. As Figure 3 shows, black poverty rates fell from 55 percent in 1959 to 27.2 percent in 2013, due partly to greater civil rights protections and opportunities in the labor market.  (EDIT:  A note that black poverty was 3 times the rate of all poverty in the 60s, and now it's twice the rate, which implies we could be about 2 generations away from a fairly close parity).  &#x200B;  Programs put in to reduce poverty (like social security) radically reduced poverty across the board, but had greater impacts on communities that were not building generational wealth due to racism.  Tight labor markets so that \"undesirable\" groups were hired also had outsized impacts.   Big results have also occurred with lawsuits focusing on racism in lending and purchasing houses, as this has a direct impact on building generational wealth.   Lawsuits against companies that exclude races from higher level jobs also has had a huge impact as marginalized groups that were excluded from stable jobs, and pushed into last-to-hire-first-to-fire find themselves in jobs with more stable long term employment prospects.  Of all of these items with provable impacts, social security had one of the largest results.  &#x200B;  EDIT:  I should also note that the current easy example is the Duke University child poverty\/mental health\/addiction study that included a swath of children of many ethnicities, including the Eastern Band of Cherokee.  In the middle of their study casino money came in, and mental health and addiction subsequently became much lower for their members compared to other races nearby.   The heads of the study said that what they witnessed was parents under lower stress (as a result of stable income) had the capacity to be more attentive to their children, with resulting long term gains.  They said these long term improvements in outcomes occurred for children who were under the age of puberty when the change took effect, no improvements happened in the kids about 13 years or older.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":32105.0,"score_ratio":4.5714285714}
{"post_id":"3h8dqy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why are Finland and Austria not in NATO? Finland seems to have great cause to join. They border Russia and have a historically terrible relationship.   Austria does not border Russia, but seems to have as much interest in preventing Russian aggression as the Netherlands does.","c_root_id_A":"cu55h6t","c_root_id_B":"cu5p298","created_at_utc_A":1439755824,"created_at_utc_B":1439799764,"score_A":55,"score_B":221,"human_ref_A":"In the case of Austria it had historical reasons and is now deeply engrained in Austrian culture:  Formally, the declaration (of neutrality) was promulgated voluntarily by the Republic of Austria. Politically, it was the direct consequence of the allied occupation by the Soviet Union, the United States, the United Kingdom, and France between 1945 and 1955, from which the country was freed by the Austrian State Treaty of 15 May the same year. The Soviet Union would not have agreed to the State Treaty if Austria had not committed herself to declare her neutrality after the allied forces had left the country.   The Bundesgesetzblatt containing the Federal Constitutional Law on the Neutrality of Austria. Since 1955, neutrality has become a deeply ingrained element of Austrian identity.   https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Declaration_of_Neutrality","human_ref_B":"Finland's case is complicated, and to understand it one has to begin from the 1930s.  The key reason behind the Winter War (well, aside from Stalin being a jerk) and the unpleasantness that followed was that the Soviets feared a \"hostile power\" (meaning, variously, Germany or the UK) could use Finland as a base or staging area for attacks against the Soviet Union - Leningrad in particular. This was not entirely Soviet paranoia: Finland had tacitly allowed, for example, the Royal Navy torpedo boat units to use its territory to launch surprise attacks at naval base Kronstad in Leningrad and had permitted volunteers to fight in Russian Karelia in an ill-fated Aunus expedition (it attempted to foment an anti-Soviet rebellion in Russian Karelia and annex those lands into Finland). Furthermore, Finland was known to be relatively pro-German and definitely anti-Soviet.  The Winter War was precipitated by a demand from Soviet Union to Finland: because of a threat of general war, cede control of key islands in the Gulf of Finland, a naval base, and move back the border opposing Leningrad. This would have restored the tsarist Russia's pre-1917 plans for defensive perimeter for St. Petersburg\/Leningrad, in essence. Of course, the Soviets also looked forward to annexing Finland as a soviet republic, but those bases were also fairly important. Finnish politicians asserted that Finland would not allow its territory to be used by any third party, but the Soviets didn't believe that Finland could or even would prevent Germany from doing so.   So, this led to Finland fighting (depending on how you count) one to three wars against Soviet Union and later Germany. Even though Finland retained its independence and was not occupied - the only European country fighting the Soviets that survived - the wars caused great damage and resulted to the loss of Karelia, the region bordering Leningrad, as well as those islands in the Gulf of Finland, and a \"lease\" of a military\/naval base in Porkkala, at the southernmost tip of Finland (and conveniently within artillery range from Helsinki).   Besides, Finland was forced to sign a treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance (FCMA) with the Soviets. This treaty stipulated that 1) Finland would remain neutral and not allow anyone to use its territory against the Soviet Union, and 2) in the event of war with \"Germany or any of its allies,\" Finland would defend its neutrality and if necessary \"ask\" for Red Army to \"help\" to defend Finland's territorial integrity. The Finnish negotiators managed to modify the original text so that mutual consultations were needed before the Red Army could proceed, but in effect Finland was in a position where it would, come general war, fall into the Warsaw Pact as a silent member. (Not that there were any other kinds in the WP.) I believe not one Finn had any illusions what would happen if the Red Army troops were to be permitted into the country: they wouldn't leave and the political system would inevitably follow. And aside from a small cadre of hardcore Communists (even the majority in the Communist Party wanted to retain Finland's independence), this was the end of the world scenario for the Finns.  So, Finland's foreign policy priorities #1, #2 and #3 in the Cold War were \"not permitting anything to happen that could invoke the FCMA consultations.\" In practice, this meant that Finland had to stay out from anything that smelled too Western to the Soviets (including Marshall aid), as well as to develop its armed forces so that it could present a credible deterrent against anyone who attempted to use its territory against anyone else. Accordingly, there were two sets of war plans within the Finnish army for example: the ones that were shown to most politicians, where Finland would fight against an unidentified \"yellow\" power coming from any direction but East; and the real ones under many locks and keys, where, well, I guess you get the drift. It was political tightrope act, to put it briefly.  The act was somewhat problematic because Finland was still between the Soviet and the Western blocs. The flight plans of U.S. strategic bombers, for example, would have taken them across Finnish airspace, and it is now known that Finland would have been where the Soviet air defence forces would have begun engaging Western bombers. There was, in fact, an aerial battle in 1954 where a reconnaissance bomber (RB-47) overflying military installations in the northern Kola peninsula was chased into Finnish airspace by Soviet interceptors and fired upon; although there were several reliable witnesses, the incident was hushed up in the Finnish press, because officially Finland was neutral and these things couldn't happen.   In the 1970s and early 1980s, Finnish fears about the FCMA pact led to some notable acts of self-censorship in Finland - the process is generally known as Finlandization. Finnish politicians and part of the press were afraid to say anything critical of the Soviet Union, on the pretext that it would \"endanger good relations.\" Since open criticism about the Soviet Union was very rare (and could spell trouble for one's career prospects), the criticism of the Western system and NATO might have appeared far stronger than it would have appeared in a more balanced discussion. This \"foreign policy card\" - in other words, using real or more often pretend Soviet interests as a bogeyman and\/or blunt instrument with which to bludgeon opponents - was unfortunately also seized upon and used by opportunistic politicians as a tool to enhance their own careers, and the period remains something of an embarrassment in Finland.   Nevertheless, the end result is that Finland has a strong tradition of doubting NATO and military alliances in general. Besides the mentioned negative perceptions, there are also solid reasons for not joining: unless officially-neutral Sweden joins at the same time, Finland - being accessible mainly through the Baltic Sea - is effectively isolated from NATO hinterlands and would be problematic to reinforce in time of crisis. The developments of NATO in the 1990s and 2000s have also caused many (myself included) to doubt whether the \"new NATO,\" geared as it has been for \"small wars\" instead of facing Russian mechanized divisions, would even be very capable of helping Finland even if it wanted to help. Finns still remember how the League of Nations let them down in 1939 and how the proposed British\/French relief expedition of 1940 would in reality have been a cover for the seizure of Swedish iron ore fields, and many doubt how many Germans or Americans would want to die for Finland. A famous saying often quoted in Finnish discussions about alliances goes something like this:  \"Future generations, stand here on your own soil without relying on outside help.\" (This is an engraving on the gate to 18th century island fortress Suomenlinna, \"the Gibraltar of the North\" just outside Helsinki; there is some irony in the fact that the engraving is in Swedish in a fortress that was built with French gold by the Swedes as a base against Russia.)    Finally, there is a very real perception that Russia would take offense at Finland joining NATO. It's almost certain that it would damage the commercial interests of Finland, and foreign politics would become more difficult as well. In the worst case, some fear that joining NATO would be a *casus belli* for the Russians. In this climate, it is no wonder that NATO membership never seems to gain the majority support; although many knowledgeable observers of Finnish politics say (and I believe that to be true) that if the political leadership simply stated that Finland needs to join NATO, the majority opinion would change.   The way I and most knowledgeable people in Finland see it is that NATO would probably be fairly pleased to have Finland. We have a strong land army that is specifically designed, trained and equipped to fight the Russians, and NATO Finland would greatly strengthen the defense of the Baltic republics. But the realistic prognosis is that Finland will not join unless Sweden joins also; and it's possible that Finland doesn't join even if Sweden does. (Although I doubt that.)   Sources: 15 years of actively following Finnish security policy discussions. For the FCMA treaty, see:  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Finno-Soviet_Treaty_of_1948  for the background to Winter War, see  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Background_of_the_Winter_War  (Wikipedia articles are fairly good in this regard)  The story of the RB-47 incident told by the pilot of the said plane (PDF link):  http:\/\/b-47.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Austin.pdf","labels":0,"seconds_difference":43940.0,"score_ratio":4.0181818182}
{"post_id":"1ujewb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Should dictators be offered immunity in turn for stepping down? Ignoring the moral issues, is this practical in terms of improving the situation in a nation? Does it prevent future bloodshed or backlash (that may arise from killing the dictator)? Or does it cause more turmoil as people demand justice? Are there any historical examples for either answer?  I've always found this topic really interesting. Thanks in advance to everyone who answers!  Edit: \"in return\" in the title. Sorry.","c_root_id_A":"ceiqg21","c_root_id_B":"ceirafr","created_at_utc_A":1389024449,"created_at_utc_B":1389026618,"score_A":24,"score_B":44,"human_ref_A":"This article is hugely informative - http:\/\/themonkeycage.org\/2012\/03\/21\/the-case-against-smart-sanctions\/. \"Financially integrated autocracies, especially those with high levels of inequality, are more likely to democratize than unequal financially closed autocracies.\" The theory is that if dictators are given no way out, they'll put up a bigger fight. I believe the same applies to immunity. Personally I'm a consequentialist when it comes to these things, so I'd be happy offering immunity if it meant preventing a war, even if the dictators were Hitler reincarnate.  While dictators are often portrayed as unpopular leaders who grab power and keep it by means of terror, dictators often have a huge support base within their country, and removing the dictator often means going to war against that support base. So 'removing the dictator' and 'bringing freedom' leads to a lot of bloodshed.  I find it interesting that the view that it's a bad idea to press people into a corner because they will fight back harder has been echoed across history:  \"When you surround an army, leave an outlet free. Do not press a desperate foe too hard.\" Sun Tzu, The Art of War  \"On besieging a city in order to seize it, we must not surround it on all four sides but only on three sides, thus leaving a path of escape for whomever wishes to flee to save his life.\" Sifre on Numbers","human_ref_B":"The state of the literature on this question is far from settled and part of this is due to the lack of number of cases in which a state granted a dictator immunity. My background is in large-n statistical research and I am pretty sure most of the scholarship in this area involves case study approaches to particular kinds of leadership exits. If you use scholar.google.com and search for dictator and immunity, most of the top hits discuss Noriega and the United States or Pinochet.   Quantitatively, we do know a few things. First, how you come into office tends to correlate heavily with how you leave office. The Archigos dataset captures all leader exits and entries from 1875-2004. From that, we know that if you came into office through normal means, you end up exiting through normal means about 93% of the time. However, if you came into office through irregular means or you were installed by another state, then your likelihood of having a normal exit of office drops to around 19% and 22%. The percent of those cases that are exiled are 43% and 54%, imprisoned are 18% and 22%, and those in the sample that die make up 20% and 1% (Goemans, Gleditsch, and Chiozza 2009).  The dictator is a rational actor and if they see that there likelihood of losing power ends in extreme personal costs, they are more likely to take actions that are costly to the public. This includes the obvious such as more repression and human rights abuses, but also includes externalizing their problems in the hopes of surviving. There is a host of International Relations literature often referred to as \"Gambling for Resurrection\" which comes from diversionary war theory. The quick summary is that there are domestic advantages to going to war. Going to war can allow a leader to take more repressive measures as well as stifle dissent domestically (or gain more support via the \"Rally around the Flag\" effect were a government gains short term legitimacy as people support their country during a crisis). If a leader does well or even wins the war, then the challenge(s) to their legitimacy may dwindle. Diversionary war theory typically spoke to democratic leaders, but more literature now posits that at-risk autocrats and democratizing states are subject to diversionary forces (e.g. Goemans 2000; Chiozza and Goemans 2003; Chiozza and Goemans 2004; Mansfield and Snyder 2005). Ultimately, the literature on the subject is mixed and seems to find stronger support for mixed\/transitioning regimes to be at the biggest risk for gambling for resurrection.  If you want to end the immediate threat of more costs from repression, aggressive actions by the state, and possible war, then immunity looks like a good idea. A leader may be looking at a best case scenario of exile with a worst case scenario of execution.  Democrats tend to go on speaking tours when they leave office, autocrats generally do not get such cushy lives when they leave. Given those options, they may be willing to try everything to maintain their grasp on power. Offering an autocrat the \"easy out\" over the \"just out\" may very well save more lives and bring closure to a brutal time in a country's history.  For further research, I suggest looking at Truth and Reconciliation Commissions in the Human Rights literature. They serve a similar purpose as immunity and part of the rational for offering  a non-prosecutory search for justice is to prevent reprisals, bloodshed, and further governmental instability by actions of the accused (via coup, revolution, etc.).  Additionally, Bueno de Mesquita's book *The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior is Almost Always Good Politics* almost certainly addresses this question as well as many others. I have yet to read it, but it is sitting on my shelf at the moment waiting for me to go through. He is a well known game theorist\/formal modeling and is likely discussing autocrats from their perspective.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2169.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"1ujewb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Should dictators be offered immunity in turn for stepping down? Ignoring the moral issues, is this practical in terms of improving the situation in a nation? Does it prevent future bloodshed or backlash (that may arise from killing the dictator)? Or does it cause more turmoil as people demand justice? Are there any historical examples for either answer?  I've always found this topic really interesting. Thanks in advance to everyone who answers!  Edit: \"in return\" in the title. Sorry.","c_root_id_A":"ceiqmm4","c_root_id_B":"ceirafr","created_at_utc_A":1389024940,"created_at_utc_B":1389026618,"score_A":2,"score_B":44,"human_ref_A":"Most dictators have committed too many offences against their people. Even if the new government forgives them, the people may not agree. Without a safe exit, dictators will try to continue as long as possible. Lets ignore the fact of those who go for medical treatment somewhere and are then disposed as happened with the Shah of Iran. In some ways, the medical condition makes it involuntary and they are unwanted in the country where they received treatment (it was a factor in the Iran Hostage crisis as the US was seen to be sheltering the former Shah when he only had temporary leave to remain).  They would need the promise of safe exile but probably not in a major city somewhere as this would be distasteful, if not embarrassing for the host. The dictator Idi Amin, went into exile and Saudi Arabia agreed to take him. He did attempt to return once but was intercepted in Zaire.  The thing is that if you take a dictator with a certain relationship with their people, be it Saddam Hussein, Ceau\u0219escu, Gaddafi or any one else such that have been responsible for such a repressive regime, would they have stepped down? It is quite possible to argue that they were not entirely sane so may not have done regardless, but if they did, how much could be saved in terms of lives and destruction should they go voluntarily?  Perhaps this is something that should be UN related? However, what would be unforgivable? What if they have committed\/sanctioned genocide?  So again, if there were to step down, where could they go?  After the creation of that so far unsuccessful project in Dubai, The World which was a collection of artificial islands, it occurred to me that this would be a super location for exile! Each dictator can retire to an island with their relatives\/retinue. They can live privately off their wealth their but would not be allowed to leave unless for medical purposes or to return to their homeland to face justice.","human_ref_B":"The state of the literature on this question is far from settled and part of this is due to the lack of number of cases in which a state granted a dictator immunity. My background is in large-n statistical research and I am pretty sure most of the scholarship in this area involves case study approaches to particular kinds of leadership exits. If you use scholar.google.com and search for dictator and immunity, most of the top hits discuss Noriega and the United States or Pinochet.   Quantitatively, we do know a few things. First, how you come into office tends to correlate heavily with how you leave office. The Archigos dataset captures all leader exits and entries from 1875-2004. From that, we know that if you came into office through normal means, you end up exiting through normal means about 93% of the time. However, if you came into office through irregular means or you were installed by another state, then your likelihood of having a normal exit of office drops to around 19% and 22%. The percent of those cases that are exiled are 43% and 54%, imprisoned are 18% and 22%, and those in the sample that die make up 20% and 1% (Goemans, Gleditsch, and Chiozza 2009).  The dictator is a rational actor and if they see that there likelihood of losing power ends in extreme personal costs, they are more likely to take actions that are costly to the public. This includes the obvious such as more repression and human rights abuses, but also includes externalizing their problems in the hopes of surviving. There is a host of International Relations literature often referred to as \"Gambling for Resurrection\" which comes from diversionary war theory. The quick summary is that there are domestic advantages to going to war. Going to war can allow a leader to take more repressive measures as well as stifle dissent domestically (or gain more support via the \"Rally around the Flag\" effect were a government gains short term legitimacy as people support their country during a crisis). If a leader does well or even wins the war, then the challenge(s) to their legitimacy may dwindle. Diversionary war theory typically spoke to democratic leaders, but more literature now posits that at-risk autocrats and democratizing states are subject to diversionary forces (e.g. Goemans 2000; Chiozza and Goemans 2003; Chiozza and Goemans 2004; Mansfield and Snyder 2005). Ultimately, the literature on the subject is mixed and seems to find stronger support for mixed\/transitioning regimes to be at the biggest risk for gambling for resurrection.  If you want to end the immediate threat of more costs from repression, aggressive actions by the state, and possible war, then immunity looks like a good idea. A leader may be looking at a best case scenario of exile with a worst case scenario of execution.  Democrats tend to go on speaking tours when they leave office, autocrats generally do not get such cushy lives when they leave. Given those options, they may be willing to try everything to maintain their grasp on power. Offering an autocrat the \"easy out\" over the \"just out\" may very well save more lives and bring closure to a brutal time in a country's history.  For further research, I suggest looking at Truth and Reconciliation Commissions in the Human Rights literature. They serve a similar purpose as immunity and part of the rational for offering  a non-prosecutory search for justice is to prevent reprisals, bloodshed, and further governmental instability by actions of the accused (via coup, revolution, etc.).  Additionally, Bueno de Mesquita's book *The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior is Almost Always Good Politics* almost certainly addresses this question as well as many others. I have yet to read it, but it is sitting on my shelf at the moment waiting for me to go through. He is a well known game theorist\/formal modeling and is likely discussing autocrats from their perspective.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1678.0,"score_ratio":22.0}
{"post_id":"4t5w1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why aren't there more liberals in power? In 1968, it seemed like nearly every young person was liberal. So did their views change as they grew older? If so, why?","c_root_id_A":"d5evxd5","c_root_id_B":"d5ew0sm","created_at_utc_A":1468700221,"created_at_utc_B":1468700388,"score_A":10,"score_B":102,"human_ref_A":"OP, I've recently become aware of an alternate definition of \"liberal\", and the folks in \/r\/ShitLiberalsSay would have me believe it's actually the common usage in Europe. I'm not sure how true that is, but could you clarify what you mean by Liberal?","human_ref_B":"According to this Gallup poll 47\u2105 of American voters under 30 years old supported the liberal presidential candidate, and a combined  53% supported the conservative and far right candidates running.   Nixon often spoke of the silent majority, those Americans quietly opposed to the counter-culture of the day. The results of the 1968 and 1972 elections would seem to indicate his theories had some validity.  It's possible that the liberal hippy baby boomers of the day got a lot of press, while not actually making up the majority of the under 30 population.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":167.0,"score_ratio":10.2}
{"post_id":"4t5w1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why aren't there more liberals in power? In 1968, it seemed like nearly every young person was liberal. So did their views change as they grew older? If so, why?","c_root_id_A":"d5ew81d","c_root_id_B":"d5evxd5","created_at_utc_A":1468700744,"created_at_utc_B":1468700221,"score_A":33,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"So, I'll contest your assumption that the young were uniformly liberal in the 1960s and 1970s. If we look at exit polls for Presidential elections from 1960-1980, we do see Democrats do better with the young than they did nationally, but typically only around 1-5 points better. The sole exception to this was George McGovern, who did 10 points better with under 30s than he did overall, but he still lost under 30s 48-52 to Nixon. Under 30s from 1984-2000 (with the exception of 1996), were actually *more* Republican than average, and this cohort, the Gen Xers whose first votes were for Reagan or Bush 41, are startimg to come into power, with the youngest voters of 1968 (who are now 66), slowly moving out.  Source: http:\/\/www.gallup.com\/poll\/139880\/election-polls-presidential-vote-groups.aspx","human_ref_B":"OP, I've recently become aware of an alternate definition of \"liberal\", and the folks in \/r\/ShitLiberalsSay would have me believe it's actually the common usage in Europe. I'm not sure how true that is, but could you clarify what you mean by Liberal?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":523.0,"score_ratio":3.3}
{"post_id":"1qptoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Punishing or preventing free-riders seems to be an obsession on the American political right. (\"Welfare queens,\" etc.) Is there any empirical evidence that this should be a big concern? Is there any research on how much social safety net provisions reduce incentives to be productive? Is it even the sort of question that can be answered empirically?","c_root_id_A":"cdfdng4","c_root_id_B":"cdfdnhw","created_at_utc_A":1384564831,"created_at_utc_B":1384564834,"score_A":37,"score_B":47,"human_ref_A":"According to studies mentioned here conservatives are psychologically less interested in harm prevention, and more interested in a particular vision of justice - specifically people getting what they deserve.  So the question isn't \"how big a concern is freeloading actually?\" But rather \"how powerfully do people feel about it?\"","human_ref_B":"Yes.  There is evidence that unemployment insurance encourages less employment.  There are a number of studies demonstrating a modest impact on unemployment rates and duration.  (http:\/\/www.frbsf.org\/economic-research\/publications\/economic-letter\/2010\/april\/extended-unemployment-insurance-benefits\/)  This isn't all bad.  We don't want people sticking in jobs that may be a bad match just because fear of unemployment.  It's also quite a small impact.    Third, there is likely to be a much smaller impact when unemployment is already high, and the loss in spending from unemployed most likely outweighs any incentive effect of UI.    The evidence that there is abuse in the system is well documented by agencies like SSI. It is quite low (BLS has improper payments by state here http:\/\/www.dol.gov\/dol\/maps\/map-ipia.htm). It undoubtedly would cost more to prevent this than spend on more enforcement.  Plus you increase the chance of type II error (kicking someone eligible off the program) which is more likely to be detrimental.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3.0,"score_ratio":1.2702702703}
{"post_id":"70p0zc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Have there been any studies done on online troll factories, sock puppet accounts, etc and their effect on social media? I've read some of the news coming out regarding the \"factories\" from Macedonia and Russia which were putting out fake news during the election. But there's also the well known issue of bots of all kinds plaguing Twitter, Facebook, etc for years. People buy followers, then sell accounts, etc.  I've also just begun wondering whether all these news sites which require registration to post comments aren't also being affected by some of the same things. Most people are not going to register on every single local news site they run into online. So who are the people actually registering and posting on all these small local news site comment sections? Especially since they often all sound similar. (The exception being, maybe, when people can use Facebook accounts to comment... but Facebook itself has plenty of bot account problems)","c_root_id_A":"dn5iirh","c_root_id_B":"dn5s1oi","created_at_utc_A":1505701781,"created_at_utc_B":1505719766,"score_A":6,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Good question. I found this somewhat-related article that discusses what exactly is involved in detecting bots v. humans in social networks   the rise of social bots  I'm sure there is more work on it somewhere, but it sounds like at least as of 2016 detecting bots and discovering their owners is an active area of study.","human_ref_B":"Yep: my colleagues at the Oxford Internet Institute have released A LOT of research on this topic on the past few months, via the Computational Propaganda project: http:\/\/comprop.oii.ox.ac.uk\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17985.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"3feeca","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Does the decriminalization of sex work lead to an increase in human trafficking? Amnesty International is calling for the wholesale decriminalization of sex work in its recent Draft Policy on Sex Work. This has been criticized by the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women in an open letter where they suggest that decriminalizing sex work results in an increase of human trafficking.  This letter cites one study that seems to support their argument against decriminalization.  >This paper investigates the impact of legalized prostitution on human trafficking inflows. According to economic theory, there are two opposing effects of unknown magnitude. The scale effect of legalized prostitution leads to an expansion of the prostitution market, increasing human trafficking, while the substitution effect reduces demand for trafficked women as legal prostitutes are favored over trafficked ones. Our empirical analysis for a cross-section of up to 150 countries shows that the scale effect dominates the substitution effect. On average, countries where prostitution is legal experience larger reported human trafficking inflows.  Is there a consensus on whether decriminalizing sex work increases human trafficking?","c_root_id_A":"ctoqaov","c_root_id_B":"ctofblz","created_at_utc_A":1438506447,"created_at_utc_B":1438477417,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"New Zealand decriminalized sex work in 2003 and found there had been no increase in instances of trafficking related to sex work 5 years later. You can read more about this on the New Zealand Ministry of Justice in the The Prostitution Law Review Committee report from 14 May 2008.  You might also find Sex at the Margins: Migration, Labour Markets and the Rescue Industry  by Laura Mar\u00eda Agust\u00edn interesting. I do not remember if it discusses whether or not decriminalization of sex work increases human trafficking, but it is well researched and discusses migrant sex workers and individuals who have been \"trafficked\" in an alternative light:  > This groundbreaking book explodes several myths: that selling sex is completely different from any other kind of work; that migrants who sell sex are passive victims; and that the multitude of people out to save them are without self-interest. Laura Agust\u00edn makes a passionate case against these stereotypes, arguing that the label \"trafficked\" does not accurately describe migrants` lives and that the \"rescue industry\" disempowers them. Based on extensive research among migrants who sell sex and social helpers, Sex at the Margins provides a radically different analysis. Frequently, says Agust\u00edn, migrants make rational choices to travel and work in the sex industry. Although they are treated like a marginalized group they form part of the dynamic global economy. Both powerful and controversial, this book is essential reading for all those who want to understand the increasingly important relationship between sex markets, migration and the desire for social justice.","human_ref_B":"> Is there a consensus on whether decriminalizing sex work increases human trafficking?  Short answer: yes.  Long answer: when prostitution is legalized, the increase in the number of working prostitutes tends to increase, both due to the availability of data, and because of its legality. The expansion in supply can spur an expansion of demand, and the same thing happens for demand as happened for supply: not only can we measure demand easier, but more people may demand prostitution services when they are legal.  The increase in working prostitutes results in a scaling effect of the number of women\/prostitutes trafficked into the country. However, this is somewhat offset by the fact that domestic prostitutes can legally work with relative ease and higher quality compared to imported\/trafficked prostitutes.  Economically speaking, the supply of prostitutes experiences a scaling effect (the market grows) and a substitution effect (people change their preferences in favour of legal, domestic prostitutes). This means that theoretically the total effect is ambiguous and depends on which of the two effects is greater. From what I can find, it's generally agreed that the scaling effect is larger than the substitution effect, hence trafficking increases when prostitution is legalized. This paper finds results similar to the one you posted, and looks at case examples of Sweden and Norway, which not only have prostitution as illegal, but make it criminal to buy a prostitute, with both laws being strictly enforced. The result is next to zero prostitution in either country, and very low\/zero rates of trafficking.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29030.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"3feeca","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Does the decriminalization of sex work lead to an increase in human trafficking? Amnesty International is calling for the wholesale decriminalization of sex work in its recent Draft Policy on Sex Work. This has been criticized by the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women in an open letter where they suggest that decriminalizing sex work results in an increase of human trafficking.  This letter cites one study that seems to support their argument against decriminalization.  >This paper investigates the impact of legalized prostitution on human trafficking inflows. According to economic theory, there are two opposing effects of unknown magnitude. The scale effect of legalized prostitution leads to an expansion of the prostitution market, increasing human trafficking, while the substitution effect reduces demand for trafficked women as legal prostitutes are favored over trafficked ones. Our empirical analysis for a cross-section of up to 150 countries shows that the scale effect dominates the substitution effect. On average, countries where prostitution is legal experience larger reported human trafficking inflows.  Is there a consensus on whether decriminalizing sex work increases human trafficking?","c_root_id_A":"ctoqaov","c_root_id_B":"cto6lsv","created_at_utc_A":1438506447,"created_at_utc_B":1438459370,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"New Zealand decriminalized sex work in 2003 and found there had been no increase in instances of trafficking related to sex work 5 years later. You can read more about this on the New Zealand Ministry of Justice in the The Prostitution Law Review Committee report from 14 May 2008.  You might also find Sex at the Margins: Migration, Labour Markets and the Rescue Industry  by Laura Mar\u00eda Agust\u00edn interesting. I do not remember if it discusses whether or not decriminalization of sex work increases human trafficking, but it is well researched and discusses migrant sex workers and individuals who have been \"trafficked\" in an alternative light:  > This groundbreaking book explodes several myths: that selling sex is completely different from any other kind of work; that migrants who sell sex are passive victims; and that the multitude of people out to save them are without self-interest. Laura Agust\u00edn makes a passionate case against these stereotypes, arguing that the label \"trafficked\" does not accurately describe migrants` lives and that the \"rescue industry\" disempowers them. Based on extensive research among migrants who sell sex and social helpers, Sex at the Margins provides a radically different analysis. Frequently, says Agust\u00edn, migrants make rational choices to travel and work in the sex industry. Although they are treated like a marginalized group they form part of the dynamic global economy. Both powerful and controversial, this book is essential reading for all those who want to understand the increasingly important relationship between sex markets, migration and the desire for social justice.","human_ref_B":"As far as I am aware it is as that study shows; it leads to increased human trafficking. Another good related read here looks at it a little differently. However, there are also benefits to it being decriminalised eg I have read decriminalisation will help the fight against HIV\/AIDS.  Not looking at trafficking there is so much research that looks at the various impacts of legalising or decriminalising it. I am of the opinion that it is best decriminalised.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":47077.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"23tu49","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Is the shortage of marriageable young women in Asia causing upward mobility for more woman? That is, are men in higher classes\/castes now more likely to marry women from lower classes\/castes because of gender imbalance?","c_root_id_A":"ch0n8vw","c_root_id_B":"ch0mla1","created_at_utc_A":1398321823,"created_at_utc_B":1398319172,"score_A":29,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"If I can address a couple points from China, the current situation is one where there's this idea of \"Leftover Women\" \u5269\u5973*sh\u00e8ngn\u01da*. For many young men, there's still the strong idea that the man is the breadwinner, and there's an expectation that they will have a higher status than their wife, either in education, earnings, or both. This is not new. For a woman to get a higher level of education than just university she usually knows this is going to then limit her ability to marry in the future, at least with attitudes the way that they are.  While there is a gender imbalance in China \u2014 most recently I've seen numbers of about 8 women for every 10 men \u2014 it's made worse by various other social factors such as that listed above as well as (illegal) gender selection by some pregnant women and their spouses. But an unwillingness to marry someone who *isn't* in a lower class (or at least a lower income bracket) is contributing to a *greater* number of marriageable women who are simply aren't having much success finding husbands.  Obviously it's more complex than that, but with that general situation and with women traditionally marrying away and into the husband's family, in general we may be able to remove China from the list of countries you may have in mind with the original question.","human_ref_B":"To add to this, has the need for a dowry reduced in cultures where it was previously prevalent & the gender ratio has tipped towards more men?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2651.0,"score_ratio":2.9}
{"post_id":"1w7933","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"Is hosting the Olympics economically worthwhile? Notwithstanding an outlier like Sochi, are most Olympics worthwhile for cities and countries? Seems like there's a tremendous amount of waste and long-term debt...","c_root_id_A":"cezcuve","c_root_id_B":"cezef6e","created_at_utc_A":1390758586,"created_at_utc_B":1390762365,"score_A":46,"score_B":52,"human_ref_A":"In a word? No. Hosting the games costs an enormous amount of money that the hosting city is unlikely to make back during the Olympics, and there is no economic reason to think that hosting the games will bring in the kind of tourism that the host thinks will boost the local economy.","human_ref_B":"As usual, the Economist tries to present both sides.   The cost of the Olympics are very high, and as other answers point out the costs are usually not recouped.   So why do cities still fight for it? It's often what the public wants:  >The main reason cities want to host the Olympics is that, perhaps against the odds, they are wildly popular with the voters who foot the bill. The IOC found that public support for hosting the games was around 70% in Tokyo, 76% in Madrid and 83% in Istanbul. Londoners, sometimes a cynical bunch, were in favour of the 2012 games, in spite of dissent from some quarters (including this newspaper, which recommended leaving it to Paris). At the end of last year, with the crowds departed, eight out of ten said it was worth the extraordinary cost, even as cuts to public services began to bite.    And there can be other intangible benefits:  >The Beijing games were intended to show off China\u2019s spending and organisational power. London\u2019s games were a means of bringing back to life a poor part of the capital at a speed that defied normal budgets and planning regulations.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3779.0,"score_ratio":1.1304347826}
{"post_id":"1h65rh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Young people today (Y-generation and later) spend a lot of time on their own, away from direct contact with family and friends. Is this because they are the first to have the freedom to self-impose social isolation? Has the desire always been there but people couldn't act on it?","c_root_id_A":"car7zme","c_root_id_B":"car8osg","created_at_utc_A":1372334318,"created_at_utc_B":1372338024,"score_A":31,"score_B":97,"human_ref_A":"Arguably, it was easier to live in a self-imposed isolation before industrialization because people had more of the requisite skills to live in isolation and population density\/urban sprawl was much less. Even going back a ways, Walden was achievable for Thoreau where as it wouldn't be permitted these days.  Marx would consider the increasing isolation of newer generations to be the end-game of alienation playing out (and probably commodity fetishism too, with the internet being the vanishing point of it occurring in the real world at all.)","human_ref_B":"Is gen-y *really* spending a lot of time on their own? Perhaps the medium of communication has changed from direct (as you mention) to digital.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3706.0,"score_ratio":3.1290322581}
{"post_id":"1h65rh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Young people today (Y-generation and later) spend a lot of time on their own, away from direct contact with family and friends. Is this because they are the first to have the freedom to self-impose social isolation? Has the desire always been there but people couldn't act on it?","c_root_id_A":"car8oqn","c_root_id_B":"car8osg","created_at_utc_A":1372338017,"created_at_utc_B":1372338024,"score_A":25,"score_B":97,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure I'd agree that the youth of today spend less time apart from direct contact. I really don't have time for a full analysis, but I peeked at the data from the 2005 Canadian General Social Survey, a giant survey of Canadians (the data is unfortunately limited to people with university access). It asks respondents to keep a time diary, and I don't see any statistically significant difference in the time marked as 'alone' between people under 30 and over. Obviously, it's much higher for people above their 70s.   Berry Wellman is a sociologist who has spent a lot of time looking at how the internet has affected social interaction. I believe he has found that people are moving their social interaction on-line, but that there is not a decrease in the time spent socializing nor the reported quality of the interaction    A small factoid I learned from this data set: in all of Canada, not one person surveyed between the ages of 15 and 24 spent any time on plant care.","human_ref_B":"Is gen-y *really* spending a lot of time on their own? Perhaps the medium of communication has changed from direct (as you mention) to digital.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7.0,"score_ratio":3.88}
{"post_id":"1h65rh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Young people today (Y-generation and later) spend a lot of time on their own, away from direct contact with family and friends. Is this because they are the first to have the freedom to self-impose social isolation? Has the desire always been there but people couldn't act on it?","c_root_id_A":"car8d8z","c_root_id_B":"car8osg","created_at_utc_A":1372336422,"created_at_utc_B":1372338024,"score_A":3,"score_B":97,"human_ref_A":"Are there any studies about the extent to which people prefer to avoid human interaction if they can?  For instance, at supermarket checkout lines, is it possible to determine if some people choose the self-service\/automated checkout over the checkout clerk because it doesn't require interacting with another human?  Or a bank teller vs an ATM? (obviously, studying it isn't that straightforward, since there are other differences between the two other than just human interaction or not)","human_ref_B":"Is gen-y *really* spending a lot of time on their own? Perhaps the medium of communication has changed from direct (as you mention) to digital.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1602.0,"score_ratio":32.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1h65rh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Young people today (Y-generation and later) spend a lot of time on their own, away from direct contact with family and friends. Is this because they are the first to have the freedom to self-impose social isolation? Has the desire always been there but people couldn't act on it?","c_root_id_A":"car8d8z","c_root_id_B":"car8oqn","created_at_utc_A":1372336422,"created_at_utc_B":1372338017,"score_A":3,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"Are there any studies about the extent to which people prefer to avoid human interaction if they can?  For instance, at supermarket checkout lines, is it possible to determine if some people choose the self-service\/automated checkout over the checkout clerk because it doesn't require interacting with another human?  Or a bank teller vs an ATM? (obviously, studying it isn't that straightforward, since there are other differences between the two other than just human interaction or not)","human_ref_B":"I'm not sure I'd agree that the youth of today spend less time apart from direct contact. I really don't have time for a full analysis, but I peeked at the data from the 2005 Canadian General Social Survey, a giant survey of Canadians (the data is unfortunately limited to people with university access). It asks respondents to keep a time diary, and I don't see any statistically significant difference in the time marked as 'alone' between people under 30 and over. Obviously, it's much higher for people above their 70s.   Berry Wellman is a sociologist who has spent a lot of time looking at how the internet has affected social interaction. I believe he has found that people are moving their social interaction on-line, but that there is not a decrease in the time spent socializing nor the reported quality of the interaction    A small factoid I learned from this data set: in all of Canada, not one person surveyed between the ages of 15 and 24 spent any time on plant care.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1595.0,"score_ratio":8.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1h65rh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Young people today (Y-generation and later) spend a lot of time on their own, away from direct contact with family and friends. Is this because they are the first to have the freedom to self-impose social isolation? Has the desire always been there but people couldn't act on it?","c_root_id_A":"car8d8z","c_root_id_B":"car8zg0","created_at_utc_A":1372336422,"created_at_utc_B":1372339319,"score_A":3,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Are there any studies about the extent to which people prefer to avoid human interaction if they can?  For instance, at supermarket checkout lines, is it possible to determine if some people choose the self-service\/automated checkout over the checkout clerk because it doesn't require interacting with another human?  Or a bank teller vs an ATM? (obviously, studying it isn't that straightforward, since there are other differences between the two other than just human interaction or not)","human_ref_B":"Isn't there anything empirical this could be based on? From the 1950's all the way through the 1980's, people spent many hours passively glued to their television. Remember that? Like the internet, but you weren't sharing & talking with friends.   We built up these gigantic motes of suburban sprawl between us and the real, public, social world. We were terrified to go outdoors - white flight & crime & all that. That stuff is finally changing. People are moving back to places which support social lives.   They weren't more connected - they *couldn't* be more connected. You took a 2 hour walk? thats two hours NOBODY could call you or text you. These days, thats considered selfish - kids & bosses might call!  10, 15 years ago, you couldn't even make love to your lover in student housing without putting up \"long shower\" on your AIM away message. I shudder to think how much more intrusive things have become - all those 2 person dorms now have like 4 people, living alone is a luxury virtually nobody has, all those other electronic ways to track each other through the day.  Work hours are longer. Children have more extra-circulars & internships. Emily Dickensen used to sit alone in the 19th century reading until she could hear the flys buzzing....  I would strongly suspect this is a matter of perspective. In the absense of Empirical data, I could think of dozens of metrics to show that young people today, generally, don't get as much privacy as people used to.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2897.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1h65rh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Young people today (Y-generation and later) spend a lot of time on their own, away from direct contact with family and friends. Is this because they are the first to have the freedom to self-impose social isolation? Has the desire always been there but people couldn't act on it?","c_root_id_A":"car8d8z","c_root_id_B":"car9f8s","created_at_utc_A":1372336422,"created_at_utc_B":1372340993,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Are there any studies about the extent to which people prefer to avoid human interaction if they can?  For instance, at supermarket checkout lines, is it possible to determine if some people choose the self-service\/automated checkout over the checkout clerk because it doesn't require interacting with another human?  Or a bank teller vs an ATM? (obviously, studying it isn't that straightforward, since there are other differences between the two other than just human interaction or not)","human_ref_B":"Shouldn't you provide some sources to back up your claims first of all? For one, more and more people seem to be living with their parents: In the Uk the number of people aged 20 to 34 who still live with their parents increased by 20 per cent between 1997 and 2011. Wouldn't that mean more direct contact with family? (even if it is through circumstance rather than choice)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4571.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1h65rh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Young people today (Y-generation and later) spend a lot of time on their own, away from direct contact with family and friends. Is this because they are the first to have the freedom to self-impose social isolation? Has the desire always been there but people couldn't act on it?","c_root_id_A":"carab53","c_root_id_B":"carcocx","created_at_utc_A":1372343912,"created_at_utc_B":1372350455,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Relevant xkcd.  I think you might want to reword \"social isolation\".  It seems to me that the prevalence of electronic communication through texts and social media, widely available on mobile smartphone devices, decreases social isolation rather than increases it.  Perhaps you meant physical social interation?  Or face-to-face?","human_ref_B":"It's interesting, I don't think it's true of everyone but it seems to be a trend among introverts and extroverts. I definitely don't prefer being on my own, but I do have some kind of sense while at home that it would be easier to not go outside and socialise.   I can think of a few reasons behind the trend you've noticed.  1. How much home entertainment we have now. Why leave anymore?  2. How accessible everyone feels due to social networking and mobile phones. Not seeing a friend for a few weeks doesn't require as much of a catch up and people don't feel as far away when you can talk to them with the press of a few buttons.  3. I am certain that the art of talking is dying out, I'm not sure whether its because world events have left our world with less trust and less friendliness towards strangers or because we live in a time that every joke has been heard (on the internet, joke consption goes way up). Quick witted come-backs are far more hit and miss now a days, especially the things that used to get easy laughs. What you can come up with in the time it takes to leave a comment will always be better, and people are investing their time into perfecting this instead. The pressure to 'perform' on the social stage can be too much, and staying home starts to subconsciously seem better, even if you want to see friends.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6543.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"49fteb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Should parenting classes be taught alongside sexual education classes? Would it be beneficial to society? I apologize if the title is confusing. I couldn't think of another way to phrase the question. And I apologize if this post doesn't belong in this sub.  Basically, I think that as soon as we start teaching kids about sex ed. we should teach or at least introduce some of the things that are discussed in parenting classes (for context - I have never been to any parenting classes and the search I did online as to what actually defines 'parenting classes' turned up nothing). I feel that insight into what it takes to care for a child would help reduce the number of children who become abused\/neglected.","c_root_id_A":"d0rnhbm","c_root_id_B":"d0rmvm5","created_at_utc_A":1457408618,"created_at_utc_B":1457407726,"score_A":10,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This isn't an answer, but rather a further request. If that's an issue, then perhaps (if u\/namesareirrelephant doesn't mind) it could be integrated into his\/her question.   For those responding to the subject question, I'm curious whether or not there is any research that might suggest that combining parenting classes with sex ed. could influence an adolescent's decision to engage in risky (unprotected, etc.) intercourse?   I realize I could create a separate thread, but it seems more appropriate to attach this to the OP's question since it's less work for those responding to address implications here than it would be to put up a separate asksocialscience post and have the same or other sub members dig into the same material again.   If that's inappropriate I apologize, and I won't hold it against the hard-working mods here if it warrants deletion.","human_ref_B":"As a reminder, this is \/r\/asksocialscience. As per rule one, all answers must be supported by relevant citations. It's the only way we as a mod team feel we can enforce consistent standards of quality.   For some reason, this thread has attracted a particularly high volume of answers that we've had to delete.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":892.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"49fteb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Should parenting classes be taught alongside sexual education classes? Would it be beneficial to society? I apologize if the title is confusing. I couldn't think of another way to phrase the question. And I apologize if this post doesn't belong in this sub.  Basically, I think that as soon as we start teaching kids about sex ed. we should teach or at least introduce some of the things that are discussed in parenting classes (for context - I have never been to any parenting classes and the search I did online as to what actually defines 'parenting classes' turned up nothing). I feel that insight into what it takes to care for a child would help reduce the number of children who become abused\/neglected.","c_root_id_A":"d0s9ny3","c_root_id_B":"d0rmvm5","created_at_utc_A":1457459557,"created_at_utc_B":1457407726,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"So this is a big question, as is \/u\/A0220R.   A quick google found some articles advocating for parenting classes\/education about the difficulties of parenting during sex education, but nothing super definitive (worth noting most of these focused on the issues the mother would face, not the father. And of course they're very heterocentric) :  1. The class should also educate students about the limitations that teen parenting imposes on one's life. While going to prom and other school dances is a given for many teenagers without a child, a young parent has to juggle finding a babysitter, paying for the babysitter, and how to make sure she can be reached at all times in case of an emergency.   2. CSE that is scientifically accurate, non-judgemental, agea ppropriate and gender-sensitive in a carefully phased process from the beginning of formal schooling is something that all children and young people can benefit from. Comprehensive life skills-based sexuality education helps young people to gain the knowledge and skills to make conscious, healthy and respectful choices about relationships and sexuality.   -------------------------------- so let's dig deeper:  First, I looked at sex education models. The four accepted models in this article from 2000 (old but still stands, from what I can see) are:  1. Risk Reduction - Avoiding sexual intercourse\/using contraception. (social learning and cognitive-behavioral model)  2. Postponing Sexual Involvement - Avoiding sexual intercourse by increasing knowledge and skill (social influence model)  3. Cognitive-Behavioral Prevention - Improve decision making skills regarding sexual intercourse and contraception (cognitive-behavioral)  4. AIDS Prevention Model - Spread knowledge about AIDS and skills to prevent unwanted pregnancies (health belief model, social cognitive, social influence theory)  This article also states that Social Learning models and skills\/knowledge growth makes for a more successful program (again, we're talking sex EDUCATION, not sex abstinence. There is little to no education involved in sex abstinence programs, and that doesn't work for older children).  Younger children\/teens will be more influenced by abstinence approaches, but older teens benefit more from contraception education.  So if we're deciding where comprehensive sex ed WITH parenting classes fits in, I think it fits into that risk reduction model. But it also fits in the AIDS prevention model, oddly maybe, because of the health belief model.   Core Assumptions and Statements of Health Belief Model:  The HBM is based on the understanding that a person will take a health-related action (i.e., use condoms) if that person: 1. feels that a negative health condition (i.e., HIV) can be avoided, 2. has a positive expectation that by taking a recommended action, he\/she will avoid a negative health condition (i.e., using condoms will be effective at preventing HIV), and 3. believes that he\/she can successfully take a recommended health action (i.e., he\/she can use condoms comfortably and with confidence).  While pregnancy isn't necessarily a negative health condition, it certainly is for different individuals at certain times (women when they do not want children!). And pregnancy can lead to parenting, which isn't a health condition, but it certainly has an impact on our wellness and lifestyle.   When we talk about sex education as a health-related curriculum and as a part of wellness and health, we start to see how this model works. A person feels that pregnancy can be avoided (which we know it can), that by taking an action, you will avoid a negative health condition (pregnancy), and that you can actually use contraception confidently, then we should see an uptick in contraception use. But to do this, we have to educate on the health issue, which isn't just pregnancy, but also parenting. ------- Okay, so backtrack a bit, why do teens NOT have sex? According to a survey among teens from 2006-2010:  - Top 2 responses for boys re: why they have not had sex yest - because of religious\/moral reasons or haven't met the right person. - Top 2 responses for girls re: why they have not had sex yest - because of religious\/moral reasons or *don't want to get pregnant*. - For top reason for not having sex: Only 13% of boys stated they didn't have sex because they didn't want to get a girl pregnant, vs.  18% of girls not wanting to get pregnant. This isn't a huge difference, but worth noting. (there's also a cool table, table 16, on feelings re: getting pregnant\/getting someone pregnant).  But this doesn't really tell us why getting pregnant is bad. Is it because they would be shamed? Couldn't get an abortion? Parenting is hard?  And why do teens get pregnant?  Key risk factors include living in poverty, limited maternal educational achievement, and having a mother who gave birth before the age of 20. Additional risk factors include being from a single-parent home, living in a home with frequent family conflict, early sexual activity, early use of alcohol and drugs, and low self-esteem. Lastly, a teen\u2019s race and ethnicity can be a risk factor for teen pregnancy..  We also know that many of these factors are risk factors for child abuse and mistreatment, absentee parents, and poor parenting.   So we start to see the venn diagram of pregnant teens\/parenting teens and teens who come from abusive, poor, and\/or neglectful households overlap more. This isn't to say that there is no way for a child from a chaotic home to avoid teen pregnancy, or for a child from a 'perfect' home to become pregnant. But the risk factors are incredibly similar. However, motivating boys or children who cannot become pregnant for whatever reason can be difficult. This also leaves out LGBTQ children who may not be in relationships\/plan on being in relationships or sexual encounters where pregnancy is a possibility.   So these pregnant teens may not have the best role models of healthy parenting at home. This can put them at risk of mimicking the behavior, having poor coping mechanisms, and have a lack of social support and resources. So, here, we can see how parenting classes could help teens who are pregnant OR may become pregnant learn these skills, and also recognize how maybe what they experienced at home isn't the norm or isn't safe at all.  ------------------------- TL;DR AKA WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?  Basically, there's a research gap from what I can see, that doesn't address whether parenting classes can reduce pregnancy or have a positive impact on society (when we start classes with nonpregnant youth).   However, parenting classes would fit well into a social learning model, health beliefs model, and would likely be a great part of sex education if we base it on what we already know about sex ed (the more knowledge and skill building, the better. The less fiction and fear mongering, the better).  As far as preventing pregnancy, I can't say for sure, but again, because of the comprehensive sex education models built on social learning and health beliefs models, it would likely be a good inclusion. Additionally, parenting classes for children and teens who are or could become pregnant at a young age would be a great idea since they may not have the social support and positive modeling at home required to be a good parent.","human_ref_B":"As a reminder, this is \/r\/asksocialscience. As per rule one, all answers must be supported by relevant citations. It's the only way we as a mod team feel we can enforce consistent standards of quality.   For some reason, this thread has attracted a particularly high volume of answers that we've had to delete.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":51831.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"49fteb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Should parenting classes be taught alongside sexual education classes? Would it be beneficial to society? I apologize if the title is confusing. I couldn't think of another way to phrase the question. And I apologize if this post doesn't belong in this sub.  Basically, I think that as soon as we start teaching kids about sex ed. we should teach or at least introduce some of the things that are discussed in parenting classes (for context - I have never been to any parenting classes and the search I did online as to what actually defines 'parenting classes' turned up nothing). I feel that insight into what it takes to care for a child would help reduce the number of children who become abused\/neglected.","c_root_id_A":"d0rqi6i","c_root_id_B":"d0s9ny3","created_at_utc_A":1457414064,"created_at_utc_B":1457459557,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'm curious as to why you think parenting classes, in particular, might decrease risky behaviors.  Why not accounting classes (showing the cost of living in single vs w\/kids arrangements), why not .... I dunno just speeches from single young parents ?    IMHO a decent parenting class teaches you how to be a good parent and enjoy the hard task you've undertaken.  In that way, parenting classes should make you more excited about the possibility of being a parent, not less.   If you're looking for specific research that supports low-income single parents (perhaps those who engaged in risky behavior too early?) doing a poorer job at parenting, you could look at Ronald Rohner's work with parental acceptance and some of the work surrounding SES and perceived parental rejection (he has a website, Google it) (I did some research on this if you're interested let me know and I will send it to you, from a computer not my phone ). Parental rejection is correlated with poor outcomes such as trouble with the law and alcoholism and can be a way of measuring poor parenting. This is round about, but maybe gives you some ideas on how to view your question.","human_ref_B":"So this is a big question, as is \/u\/A0220R.   A quick google found some articles advocating for parenting classes\/education about the difficulties of parenting during sex education, but nothing super definitive (worth noting most of these focused on the issues the mother would face, not the father. And of course they're very heterocentric) :  1. The class should also educate students about the limitations that teen parenting imposes on one's life. While going to prom and other school dances is a given for many teenagers without a child, a young parent has to juggle finding a babysitter, paying for the babysitter, and how to make sure she can be reached at all times in case of an emergency.   2. CSE that is scientifically accurate, non-judgemental, agea ppropriate and gender-sensitive in a carefully phased process from the beginning of formal schooling is something that all children and young people can benefit from. Comprehensive life skills-based sexuality education helps young people to gain the knowledge and skills to make conscious, healthy and respectful choices about relationships and sexuality.   -------------------------------- so let's dig deeper:  First, I looked at sex education models. The four accepted models in this article from 2000 (old but still stands, from what I can see) are:  1. Risk Reduction - Avoiding sexual intercourse\/using contraception. (social learning and cognitive-behavioral model)  2. Postponing Sexual Involvement - Avoiding sexual intercourse by increasing knowledge and skill (social influence model)  3. Cognitive-Behavioral Prevention - Improve decision making skills regarding sexual intercourse and contraception (cognitive-behavioral)  4. AIDS Prevention Model - Spread knowledge about AIDS and skills to prevent unwanted pregnancies (health belief model, social cognitive, social influence theory)  This article also states that Social Learning models and skills\/knowledge growth makes for a more successful program (again, we're talking sex EDUCATION, not sex abstinence. There is little to no education involved in sex abstinence programs, and that doesn't work for older children).  Younger children\/teens will be more influenced by abstinence approaches, but older teens benefit more from contraception education.  So if we're deciding where comprehensive sex ed WITH parenting classes fits in, I think it fits into that risk reduction model. But it also fits in the AIDS prevention model, oddly maybe, because of the health belief model.   Core Assumptions and Statements of Health Belief Model:  The HBM is based on the understanding that a person will take a health-related action (i.e., use condoms) if that person: 1. feels that a negative health condition (i.e., HIV) can be avoided, 2. has a positive expectation that by taking a recommended action, he\/she will avoid a negative health condition (i.e., using condoms will be effective at preventing HIV), and 3. believes that he\/she can successfully take a recommended health action (i.e., he\/she can use condoms comfortably and with confidence).  While pregnancy isn't necessarily a negative health condition, it certainly is for different individuals at certain times (women when they do not want children!). And pregnancy can lead to parenting, which isn't a health condition, but it certainly has an impact on our wellness and lifestyle.   When we talk about sex education as a health-related curriculum and as a part of wellness and health, we start to see how this model works. A person feels that pregnancy can be avoided (which we know it can), that by taking an action, you will avoid a negative health condition (pregnancy), and that you can actually use contraception confidently, then we should see an uptick in contraception use. But to do this, we have to educate on the health issue, which isn't just pregnancy, but also parenting. ------- Okay, so backtrack a bit, why do teens NOT have sex? According to a survey among teens from 2006-2010:  - Top 2 responses for boys re: why they have not had sex yest - because of religious\/moral reasons or haven't met the right person. - Top 2 responses for girls re: why they have not had sex yest - because of religious\/moral reasons or *don't want to get pregnant*. - For top reason for not having sex: Only 13% of boys stated they didn't have sex because they didn't want to get a girl pregnant, vs.  18% of girls not wanting to get pregnant. This isn't a huge difference, but worth noting. (there's also a cool table, table 16, on feelings re: getting pregnant\/getting someone pregnant).  But this doesn't really tell us why getting pregnant is bad. Is it because they would be shamed? Couldn't get an abortion? Parenting is hard?  And why do teens get pregnant?  Key risk factors include living in poverty, limited maternal educational achievement, and having a mother who gave birth before the age of 20. Additional risk factors include being from a single-parent home, living in a home with frequent family conflict, early sexual activity, early use of alcohol and drugs, and low self-esteem. Lastly, a teen\u2019s race and ethnicity can be a risk factor for teen pregnancy..  We also know that many of these factors are risk factors for child abuse and mistreatment, absentee parents, and poor parenting.   So we start to see the venn diagram of pregnant teens\/parenting teens and teens who come from abusive, poor, and\/or neglectful households overlap more. This isn't to say that there is no way for a child from a chaotic home to avoid teen pregnancy, or for a child from a 'perfect' home to become pregnant. But the risk factors are incredibly similar. However, motivating boys or children who cannot become pregnant for whatever reason can be difficult. This also leaves out LGBTQ children who may not be in relationships\/plan on being in relationships or sexual encounters where pregnancy is a possibility.   So these pregnant teens may not have the best role models of healthy parenting at home. This can put them at risk of mimicking the behavior, having poor coping mechanisms, and have a lack of social support and resources. So, here, we can see how parenting classes could help teens who are pregnant OR may become pregnant learn these skills, and also recognize how maybe what they experienced at home isn't the norm or isn't safe at all.  ------------------------- TL;DR AKA WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?  Basically, there's a research gap from what I can see, that doesn't address whether parenting classes can reduce pregnancy or have a positive impact on society (when we start classes with nonpregnant youth).   However, parenting classes would fit well into a social learning model, health beliefs model, and would likely be a great part of sex education if we base it on what we already know about sex ed (the more knowledge and skill building, the better. The less fiction and fear mongering, the better).  As far as preventing pregnancy, I can't say for sure, but again, because of the comprehensive sex education models built on social learning and health beliefs models, it would likely be a good inclusion. Additionally, parenting classes for children and teens who are or could become pregnant at a young age would be a great idea since they may not have the social support and positive modeling at home required to be a good parent.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":45493.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"49fteb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Should parenting classes be taught alongside sexual education classes? Would it be beneficial to society? I apologize if the title is confusing. I couldn't think of another way to phrase the question. And I apologize if this post doesn't belong in this sub.  Basically, I think that as soon as we start teaching kids about sex ed. we should teach or at least introduce some of the things that are discussed in parenting classes (for context - I have never been to any parenting classes and the search I did online as to what actually defines 'parenting classes' turned up nothing). I feel that insight into what it takes to care for a child would help reduce the number of children who become abused\/neglected.","c_root_id_A":"d0rqi6i","c_root_id_B":"d0rmvm5","created_at_utc_A":1457414064,"created_at_utc_B":1457407726,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm curious as to why you think parenting classes, in particular, might decrease risky behaviors.  Why not accounting classes (showing the cost of living in single vs w\/kids arrangements), why not .... I dunno just speeches from single young parents ?    IMHO a decent parenting class teaches you how to be a good parent and enjoy the hard task you've undertaken.  In that way, parenting classes should make you more excited about the possibility of being a parent, not less.   If you're looking for specific research that supports low-income single parents (perhaps those who engaged in risky behavior too early?) doing a poorer job at parenting, you could look at Ronald Rohner's work with parental acceptance and some of the work surrounding SES and perceived parental rejection (he has a website, Google it) (I did some research on this if you're interested let me know and I will send it to you, from a computer not my phone ). Parental rejection is correlated with poor outcomes such as trouble with the law and alcoholism and can be a way of measuring poor parenting. This is round about, but maybe gives you some ideas on how to view your question.","human_ref_B":"As a reminder, this is \/r\/asksocialscience. As per rule one, all answers must be supported by relevant citations. It's the only way we as a mod team feel we can enforce consistent standards of quality.   For some reason, this thread has attracted a particularly high volume of answers that we've had to delete.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6338.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"33d0q0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What does unemployed youth in Southern Europe do with their time? The youth unemployment rate in most countries in S. Europe has reached at least 50%. As far as I understand, this number does not include students. This leads me to the question: what do you do with your time as, say, an unemployed Spanish young person who has finished or never entered university?  I would have expected such a huge number of unemployed youth to cause a great deal of upheaval, but that doesn't appear to have happened. The crime rate is flat or down. Sure, there are protests, but they never seem to go anywhere. There doesn't seem to be an increased rate of (attempts at) entrepreneurship.  In other words, given that they don't appear to be causing any more crime, protesting enough to create any upheaval, or trying to start their own businesses, what is the huge mass of unemployed Southern European youth doing with their time?","c_root_id_A":"cqjrrh4","c_root_id_B":"cqk48l1","created_at_utc_A":1429634002,"created_at_utc_B":1429653104,"score_A":26,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"I can't offer an answer, but cross-posting this to \/r\/europe could provide some opinions on the matter, even if none of them offer hard data.","human_ref_B":"In Italy, there is a statistic that \"Kids\" receive a large amount of money from their parents to live a sort of prolonged adolescence well into their 20's (link in Italian].   I can't speak for Spain, but in Italy, there is a vast difference from North and South; according to the Italian statistics bureau ISTAT, unemployment in northern italy is equal to about 9%, whereas in southern Italy it approaches 21%.   Further, in both North and South Italy, many young people take odd jobs that are paid entirely in cash; so for the state, they are in all effect unemployed and pay no taxes, even if they are doing some kind of work (Italian article citing ISTAT estimates that say \"Black-Market\", or unregistered cash-only work, could be as high as 21% of GDP). There is also a very serious crime problem in Southern Italy, both in a sense of organized crime and petty crime. Understandably, this phenomenon wouldn't occur if everyone were employed and able to earn an honest living.   That being said, it is also worth mentioning that there is a large amount of unrest in this country. It doesn't make the international news, but hardly a week goes by without a protest, strike, or conflict between disgruntled youth and police. Just today I was inconvenienced coming home from work because there was some protest or other out in front of the seat of the province down the block from my office.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19102.0,"score_ratio":1.0769230769}
{"post_id":"1toh8n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"[META] A great big thank you to the mods and our regular contributors for creating an academic space that covers a wide range of disciplines. I just wanted to express my admiration and thanks for the mods who keep this sub running and all the contributors, both those asking and those answering, who provide content for us to chew on.   It is a really difficult job since there is an element of subjectivity in a lot of social science fields in that we can't necessarily create laboratory conditions to test our theories and there are a lot of different fields that can be relevant to a single question. The latter is also, however, a strength as we get to see different perspectives on the same question. This is one of my favorite subs and certainly one of the subs that I learn the most on so thanks to everyone who makes it happen. Happy holidays everyone!","c_root_id_A":"cea1pxq","c_root_id_B":"ceabqv9","created_at_utc_A":1388004976,"created_at_utc_B":1388037561,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Thank you all.  Happy Festivus!","human_ref_B":"Merry Christmas everyone!  Y'all might be amused to hear that I got Snowden and Vane's \"Modern Macro\", based on \/u\/Integralds frequent recommendations. My family may have been a bit weirded out.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":32585.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"1toh8n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"[META] A great big thank you to the mods and our regular contributors for creating an academic space that covers a wide range of disciplines. I just wanted to express my admiration and thanks for the mods who keep this sub running and all the contributors, both those asking and those answering, who provide content for us to chew on.   It is a really difficult job since there is an element of subjectivity in a lot of social science fields in that we can't necessarily create laboratory conditions to test our theories and there are a lot of different fields that can be relevant to a single question. The latter is also, however, a strength as we get to see different perspectives on the same question. This is one of my favorite subs and certainly one of the subs that I learn the most on so thanks to everyone who makes it happen. Happy holidays everyone!","c_root_id_A":"ceabqv9","c_root_id_B":"ceaapzi","created_at_utc_A":1388037561,"created_at_utc_B":1388034158,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Merry Christmas everyone!  Y'all might be amused to hear that I got Snowden and Vane's \"Modern Macro\", based on \/u\/Integralds frequent recommendations. My family may have been a bit weirded out.","human_ref_B":"If anyone has suggestions for how to improve the sub, feel free to get at me or the other mods.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3403.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"1toh8n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"[META] A great big thank you to the mods and our regular contributors for creating an academic space that covers a wide range of disciplines. I just wanted to express my admiration and thanks for the mods who keep this sub running and all the contributors, both those asking and those answering, who provide content for us to chew on.   It is a really difficult job since there is an element of subjectivity in a lot of social science fields in that we can't necessarily create laboratory conditions to test our theories and there are a lot of different fields that can be relevant to a single question. The latter is also, however, a strength as we get to see different perspectives on the same question. This is one of my favorite subs and certainly one of the subs that I learn the most on so thanks to everyone who makes it happen. Happy holidays everyone!","c_root_id_A":"ceabqv9","c_root_id_B":"cea6u03","created_at_utc_A":1388037561,"created_at_utc_B":1388021764,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Merry Christmas everyone!  Y'all might be amused to hear that I got Snowden and Vane's \"Modern Macro\", based on \/u\/Integralds frequent recommendations. My family may have been a bit weirded out.","human_ref_B":"Thank you, everyone! Happy holidays!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15797.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1toh8n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"[META] A great big thank you to the mods and our regular contributors for creating an academic space that covers a wide range of disciplines. I just wanted to express my admiration and thanks for the mods who keep this sub running and all the contributors, both those asking and those answering, who provide content for us to chew on.   It is a really difficult job since there is an element of subjectivity in a lot of social science fields in that we can't necessarily create laboratory conditions to test our theories and there are a lot of different fields that can be relevant to a single question. The latter is also, however, a strength as we get to see different perspectives on the same question. This is one of my favorite subs and certainly one of the subs that I learn the most on so thanks to everyone who makes it happen. Happy holidays everyone!","c_root_id_A":"cea93zl","c_root_id_B":"ceabqv9","created_at_utc_A":1388029071,"created_at_utc_B":1388037561,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Thanks! Sorry for the relative lack of modding this week -- I know I've spent much less time online than usual.","human_ref_B":"Merry Christmas everyone!  Y'all might be amused to hear that I got Snowden and Vane's \"Modern Macro\", based on \/u\/Integralds frequent recommendations. My family may have been a bit weirded out.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8490.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1toh8n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"[META] A great big thank you to the mods and our regular contributors for creating an academic space that covers a wide range of disciplines. I just wanted to express my admiration and thanks for the mods who keep this sub running and all the contributors, both those asking and those answering, who provide content for us to chew on.   It is a really difficult job since there is an element of subjectivity in a lot of social science fields in that we can't necessarily create laboratory conditions to test our theories and there are a lot of different fields that can be relevant to a single question. The latter is also, however, a strength as we get to see different perspectives on the same question. This is one of my favorite subs and certainly one of the subs that I learn the most on so thanks to everyone who makes it happen. Happy holidays everyone!","c_root_id_A":"cea1pxq","c_root_id_B":"ceaapzi","created_at_utc_A":1388004976,"created_at_utc_B":1388034158,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Thank you all.  Happy Festivus!","human_ref_B":"If anyone has suggestions for how to improve the sub, feel free to get at me or the other mods.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":29182.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"1toh8n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"[META] A great big thank you to the mods and our regular contributors for creating an academic space that covers a wide range of disciplines. I just wanted to express my admiration and thanks for the mods who keep this sub running and all the contributors, both those asking and those answering, who provide content for us to chew on.   It is a really difficult job since there is an element of subjectivity in a lot of social science fields in that we can't necessarily create laboratory conditions to test our theories and there are a lot of different fields that can be relevant to a single question. The latter is also, however, a strength as we get to see different perspectives on the same question. This is one of my favorite subs and certainly one of the subs that I learn the most on so thanks to everyone who makes it happen. Happy holidays everyone!","c_root_id_A":"ceaapzi","c_root_id_B":"cea6u03","created_at_utc_A":1388034158,"created_at_utc_B":1388021764,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"If anyone has suggestions for how to improve the sub, feel free to get at me or the other mods.","human_ref_B":"Thank you, everyone! Happy holidays!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12394.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1toh8n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"[META] A great big thank you to the mods and our regular contributors for creating an academic space that covers a wide range of disciplines. I just wanted to express my admiration and thanks for the mods who keep this sub running and all the contributors, both those asking and those answering, who provide content for us to chew on.   It is a really difficult job since there is an element of subjectivity in a lot of social science fields in that we can't necessarily create laboratory conditions to test our theories and there are a lot of different fields that can be relevant to a single question. The latter is also, however, a strength as we get to see different perspectives on the same question. This is one of my favorite subs and certainly one of the subs that I learn the most on so thanks to everyone who makes it happen. Happy holidays everyone!","c_root_id_A":"cea93zl","c_root_id_B":"ceaapzi","created_at_utc_A":1388029071,"created_at_utc_B":1388034158,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Thanks! Sorry for the relative lack of modding this week -- I know I've spent much less time online than usual.","human_ref_B":"If anyone has suggestions for how to improve the sub, feel free to get at me or the other mods.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5087.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1toh8n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"[META] A great big thank you to the mods and our regular contributors for creating an academic space that covers a wide range of disciplines. I just wanted to express my admiration and thanks for the mods who keep this sub running and all the contributors, both those asking and those answering, who provide content for us to chew on.   It is a really difficult job since there is an element of subjectivity in a lot of social science fields in that we can't necessarily create laboratory conditions to test our theories and there are a lot of different fields that can be relevant to a single question. The latter is also, however, a strength as we get to see different perspectives on the same question. This is one of my favorite subs and certainly one of the subs that I learn the most on so thanks to everyone who makes it happen. Happy holidays everyone!","c_root_id_A":"ceal30z","c_root_id_B":"cea93zl","created_at_utc_A":1388081861,"created_at_utc_B":1388029071,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Definitely one of my favorite subreddits. The only thing I can think of that would make it better for me right now is, well, if I had more to contribute personally :) Some day though. I greatly appreciate those who can and do, especially the mods. Happy holidays everyone!","human_ref_B":"Thanks! Sorry for the relative lack of modding this week -- I know I've spent much less time online than usual.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":52790.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"frc4j3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why does fascism generally involve camp, theatrics, and pageantry? The ideals of fascism seem to contradict the fanciful execution of fascist practice. Has much been written on the flamboyant aesthetics of the Nazis or the Ku Klux Klan? Why do these right-wing, male-dominated, generally heterosexual organizations usually involve aesthetic concerns that have usually been left to women and gay men?","c_root_id_A":"flvtysu","c_root_id_B":"flv1y04","created_at_utc_A":1585532055,"created_at_utc_B":1585514697,"score_A":37,"score_B":36,"human_ref_A":"Thank you for providing further details. To answer your question, I would first highlight my own reaction, and the comments made by other users: I would suggest that whether something is \"flamboyant\" or \"camp\" rests in the eye of the beholder. By which I mean, it depends on an individual's sense of esthetics, and their cultural milieu.  ---  I stress the above because the starting point should be to ask ourselves: how did German Nazis, Italian Fascists, etc. perceive these displays? What were their **function** and **how were they perceived**?  To understand these questions, we have to understand some of the common features of fascism itself. See for example Umberto Eco's attempt to circumscribe (ur-)fascism. For example:  >1. **The first feature of Ur-Fascism is the cult of tradition.** Traditionalism is of course much older than fascism. Not only was it typical of counter-revolutionary Catholic thought after the French revolution, but it was born in the late Hellenistic era, as a reaction to classical Greek rationalism. In the Mediterranean basin, people of different religions (most of them indulgently accepted by the Roman Pantheon) started dreaming of a revelation received at the dawn of human history. This revelation, according to the traditionalist mystique, had remained for a long time concealed under the veil of forgotten languages \u2013 in Egyptian hieroglyphs, in the Celtic runes, in the scrolls of the little known religions of Asia.  And see Paxton's Anatomy of Fascism, in which he explains, for example:  >In any event, **it is not the particular themes of Nazism or Italian Fascism that define the nature of the fascist phenomenon, but their function. Fascisms seek out in each national culture those themes that are best capable of mobilizing a mass movement of regeneration, unification, and purity, directed against liberal individualism and constitutionalism and against Leftist class struggle.** The **themes that appeal to fascists in one cultural tradition may seem simply silly to another**. The foggy Norse myths that stirred Norwegians or Germans sounded ridiculous in Italy, where Fascism appealed rather to a sun-drenched classical *Romanit\u00e0* ...]  >Even scholars who specialize in the quest for fascism\u2019s intellectual and cultural origins, such as George Mosse, declare that **the establishment of a \u201cmood\u201d is more important than \u201cthe search for some individual precursors.\u201d** In that sense too, **fascism is more plausibly linked to a set of \u201cmobilizing passions\u201d that shape fascist action than to a consistent and fully articulated philosophy. At bottom is a passionate nationalism** [...] These \u201cmobilizing passions,\u201d mostly taken for granted and not always overtly argued as intellectual propositions, form the emotional lava that set fascism\u2019s foundations [...]  I am quoting these parts to introduce the logic behind **aggrandizing displays meant to emphasize a certain understanding of power, masculinity and heroism with flavors differing between the different incarnations of fascism**. See for example [the origins of the Nazi Swastika, and consider the reasons why Nazi Germany was supposed to be the *Third* Reich, and what inspired Hitler's artistic vision for his empire.  ---  Concerning your example of something \"deliberately theatrical or outrageous\", consider the function of that wall paper:  >The building in the picture is Palazzo Braschi in Rome, the headquarters of the Fascist Party Federation (the local one, not the national Party headquarters). **It was not always covered up like that; this set-up was displayed for the 1934 elections, in which Italians were called to vote either for or against the Fascist representatives list. The \u201cSI SI\u2026\u201d lettering (meaning \u201cYes Yes\u2026\u201d) was propaganda for one of the two plebiscite elections held during the Fascist Regime**, where electors didn\u2019t vote for individual parties (there wasn\u2019t any but the Fascist one), neither for single candidates, but just voted **\u201cYes\u201d or \u201cNo\u201d to a single list of candidates presented by the Duce himself.**  Now consider the concept of **cult of personality**, which in Italian Fascism meant the cult of Benito Mussolini, who was called *Il Duce*. This is a title derived from the Latin word *dux*, i.e. leader. For illustration, the fascist motto was DVX MEA LVX, i.e. **The Duce is my light**. Here, I would quote Paxton again:  >**Fascism rested not upon the truth of its doctrine but upon the leader\u2019s mystical union with the historic destiny of his people, a notion related to romanticist ideas of national historic flowering and of individual artistic or spiritual genius**, though fascism otherwise denied romanticism\u2019s exaltation of unfettered personal creativity  I could go on, but I will instead assume I made my point about the role of aesthetics and performance, and the importance of understanding function. Generally speaking, Fascism was and is not about cold sterility, and displays of grandeur are a step towards achieving fascist goals (e.g. it serves to attract people and mobilize them).  ---  In regard to the Ku Klux Klan, their aesthetics should also be understood through their history, such as them shaping themselves as a Fraternal Order or a Secret Society, and the fact that the famous hooded costumes are actually the outcome of the infamous movie *Birth of a Nation* which popularized the then-defunct organization. To quote Clark:  >William Joseph Simmons is considered to be the founder of the 1915 modern Ku Klux Klan. **While recovering from a car accident, the local preacher in Georgia followed the Birth of a Nation\u2019s nationwide success. There were KKK-inspired aprons, costumes and regalia that glorified the defunct organization. Simmons seized on the film\u2019s popularity to bolster the Klan\u2019s appeal again.**  Again, there is the role of packaging, so to speak. Also see this Atlantic article by Rothman:  >**But the Klan was easily at its most popular in the United States during the 1920s, when its reach was nationwide, its members disproportionately middle class, and many of its very visible public activities geared toward festivities, pageants, and social gatherings.** In some ways, it was this superficially innocuous Klan that was the most insidious of them all. **Packaging its noxious ideology as traditional small-town values and wholesome fun, the Klan of the 1920s encouraged native-born white Americans to believe that bigotry, intimidation, harassment, and extralegal violence were all perfectly compatible with, if not central to, patriotic respectability.**","human_ref_B":"Can you provide some specific illustrations about what you would consider describable as camp or flamboyant and which is characteristic of Fascism, Nazism and\/or the Ku Klux Klan? Just to be on the same page, as I would not personally describe the arguably exaggerated and theatrical gesticulations of Hitler and Mussolini as either \"feminine\" or \"queer\", nor for instance their uniforms or parades.  ---  For my reply following clarification, see here.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17358.0,"score_ratio":1.0277777778}
{"post_id":"563p44","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"If people can self-identify as a certain gender, why can't they self-identify as a certain race? I apologize if this question isn't appropriate for this forum. I was trying to find an appropriate place to ask it. If you need me to move it elsewhere, please say so. Thanks!  Rachel Dolezal is coming to speak at a local event, and many people are up in arms about the fact that she was invited. If you aren't familiar with her, she was the head of an NAACP chapter who was \"outed\" for not being African-American. She claimed later that she \"self-identified\" as African-American and that she was \"transracial.\"   From what I've been reading from many people, it seems like that argument is not considered okay.  However, I know that gender-fluidity, nonbinary genders, and such have been commonly accepted by most people as a thing that is okay. Even people who have an XY chromosome makeup and male genitalia may \"identify as a woman\" if that is what they feel their gender is.  But in my opinion it seems like race and ethnic background is much more blended and \"fluid\" than gender. Most people are either male or female, but I know very few people who are any \"pure\" ethnic background. Most people are a blend of many different ethnic cultures and regions.  Why, then, is it not considered okay to self-identify as a race of your choosing?","c_root_id_A":"d8g8l38","c_root_id_B":"d8g4r65","created_at_utc_A":1475746695,"created_at_utc_B":1475734223,"score_A":56,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"As someone already pointed out, this is covered in one of the top posts on the sub, and its one that's been covered in the media pretty extensively.  Those sources aren't really based super heavily in social science, but they can give you a better idea of what's going on here. From how your question is phrased, it sounds like you don't have a firm grasp on how sex, gender, and transgenderism work? Between Klinefelter's syndrome, hyperandrogenism, hormones and chromosomes don't actually break down that easily into a binary.   Gender identification and hormone treatment are solutions to gender dysphoria, where people have distress relevant to the gender they were assigned at birth. There's (to my knowledge) no study or incidence of racial dysphoria. This person also makes a good point, which is that differences between men and women are hormonal\u2014they affect brain and body development and alter behavior and emotion, whereas differences between white people and black people are mostly skin color and a few diseases that are more or less common. \"Transracial\" also already means a thing\u2014it refers to people who are of a different race than their adoptive families.   I'm glad you're coming at this with questions, rather than antagonism, but I'd strongly encourage you to do some reading if you're curious on how gender (1)(2) and race (sources are oldish but relevant) are constructed in the first place. Stryker and Whittle's *Transgender Studies Reader* is long but accessible, as a text.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/44wyuq\/why_is_the_idea_of_a_female_in_a_males_body\/?st=ITXY1AC4&sh=0f316249  Already answered (and one of the top posts in the sub, too).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12472.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"563p44","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"If people can self-identify as a certain gender, why can't they self-identify as a certain race? I apologize if this question isn't appropriate for this forum. I was trying to find an appropriate place to ask it. If you need me to move it elsewhere, please say so. Thanks!  Rachel Dolezal is coming to speak at a local event, and many people are up in arms about the fact that she was invited. If you aren't familiar with her, she was the head of an NAACP chapter who was \"outed\" for not being African-American. She claimed later that she \"self-identified\" as African-American and that she was \"transracial.\"   From what I've been reading from many people, it seems like that argument is not considered okay.  However, I know that gender-fluidity, nonbinary genders, and such have been commonly accepted by most people as a thing that is okay. Even people who have an XY chromosome makeup and male genitalia may \"identify as a woman\" if that is what they feel their gender is.  But in my opinion it seems like race and ethnic background is much more blended and \"fluid\" than gender. Most people are either male or female, but I know very few people who are any \"pure\" ethnic background. Most people are a blend of many different ethnic cultures and regions.  Why, then, is it not considered okay to self-identify as a race of your choosing?","c_root_id_A":"d8g8l38","c_root_id_B":"d8g27ci","created_at_utc_A":1475746695,"created_at_utc_B":1475728406,"score_A":56,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"As someone already pointed out, this is covered in one of the top posts on the sub, and its one that's been covered in the media pretty extensively.  Those sources aren't really based super heavily in social science, but they can give you a better idea of what's going on here. From how your question is phrased, it sounds like you don't have a firm grasp on how sex, gender, and transgenderism work? Between Klinefelter's syndrome, hyperandrogenism, hormones and chromosomes don't actually break down that easily into a binary.   Gender identification and hormone treatment are solutions to gender dysphoria, where people have distress relevant to the gender they were assigned at birth. There's (to my knowledge) no study or incidence of racial dysphoria. This person also makes a good point, which is that differences between men and women are hormonal\u2014they affect brain and body development and alter behavior and emotion, whereas differences between white people and black people are mostly skin color and a few diseases that are more or less common. \"Transracial\" also already means a thing\u2014it refers to people who are of a different race than their adoptive families.   I'm glad you're coming at this with questions, rather than antagonism, but I'd strongly encourage you to do some reading if you're curious on how gender (1)(2) and race (sources are oldish but relevant) are constructed in the first place. Stryker and Whittle's *Transgender Studies Reader* is long but accessible, as a text.","human_ref_B":"You are confusing sex and gender.  http:\/\/www.med.monash.edu.au\/gendermed\/sexandgender.html","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18289.0,"score_ratio":11.2}
{"post_id":"563p44","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"If people can self-identify as a certain gender, why can't they self-identify as a certain race? I apologize if this question isn't appropriate for this forum. I was trying to find an appropriate place to ask it. If you need me to move it elsewhere, please say so. Thanks!  Rachel Dolezal is coming to speak at a local event, and many people are up in arms about the fact that she was invited. If you aren't familiar with her, she was the head of an NAACP chapter who was \"outed\" for not being African-American. She claimed later that she \"self-identified\" as African-American and that she was \"transracial.\"   From what I've been reading from many people, it seems like that argument is not considered okay.  However, I know that gender-fluidity, nonbinary genders, and such have been commonly accepted by most people as a thing that is okay. Even people who have an XY chromosome makeup and male genitalia may \"identify as a woman\" if that is what they feel their gender is.  But in my opinion it seems like race and ethnic background is much more blended and \"fluid\" than gender. Most people are either male or female, but I know very few people who are any \"pure\" ethnic background. Most people are a blend of many different ethnic cultures and regions.  Why, then, is it not considered okay to self-identify as a race of your choosing?","c_root_id_A":"d8g27ci","c_root_id_B":"d8g4r65","created_at_utc_A":1475728406,"created_at_utc_B":1475734223,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"You are confusing sex and gender.  http:\/\/www.med.monash.edu.au\/gendermed\/sexandgender.html","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/44wyuq\/why_is_the_idea_of_a_female_in_a_males_body\/?st=ITXY1AC4&sh=0f316249  Already answered (and one of the top posts in the sub, too).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5817.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"563p44","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"If people can self-identify as a certain gender, why can't they self-identify as a certain race? I apologize if this question isn't appropriate for this forum. I was trying to find an appropriate place to ask it. If you need me to move it elsewhere, please say so. Thanks!  Rachel Dolezal is coming to speak at a local event, and many people are up in arms about the fact that she was invited. If you aren't familiar with her, she was the head of an NAACP chapter who was \"outed\" for not being African-American. She claimed later that she \"self-identified\" as African-American and that she was \"transracial.\"   From what I've been reading from many people, it seems like that argument is not considered okay.  However, I know that gender-fluidity, nonbinary genders, and such have been commonly accepted by most people as a thing that is okay. Even people who have an XY chromosome makeup and male genitalia may \"identify as a woman\" if that is what they feel their gender is.  But in my opinion it seems like race and ethnic background is much more blended and \"fluid\" than gender. Most people are either male or female, but I know very few people who are any \"pure\" ethnic background. Most people are a blend of many different ethnic cultures and regions.  Why, then, is it not considered okay to self-identify as a race of your choosing?","c_root_id_A":"d8g27ci","c_root_id_B":"d8gfcor","created_at_utc_A":1475728406,"created_at_utc_B":1475762496,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"You are confusing sex and gender.  http:\/\/www.med.monash.edu.au\/gendermed\/sexandgender.html","human_ref_B":"There's some discussion of this here that IMHO is better than a lot of the stuff in the other post in this sub that everyone's linking you to.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":34090.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"2em31m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Why don't employers take advantage of the gender pay gap to hire tons of (relatively) cheap female labor?","c_root_id_A":"ck181il","c_root_id_B":"ck16r3k","created_at_utc_A":1409085326,"created_at_utc_B":1409083012,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"There's a previous discussion on this sub:  * \"Is there an economic incentive to stop discriminating?\", 63 points, 9 comments, submitted 8 months  Some economists distinguish between \"statistical discrimination\" and a \"taste for discrimination\".  \"Statistical discrimination\" occurs if black people or women's labor is *actually* less valuable, for a variety of reasons (on average, women as a whole are less skilled, less strong, whatever), and so the market value is justified (at least from a pure market standpoint).  \"Taste for discrimination\" occurs if an employer unfairly discounts someone's labor based on their own \"taste\" for one type of labor or another.  As you said, in theory, the market should correct for this.  Economists don't believe that the market is 100% one or the other, it can be some mix of the two.","human_ref_B":"Are there studies that show that women within a team are paid less than men? Meaning: if I look at a specific team in the same location at a specific company that has 3 women and 3 men all with very similar experience and doing very similar jobs that the women are paid less?  How much less?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2314.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1ijzjk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Why does the UK have more major political parties than the US, despite both using First-Past-the-Post voting?","c_root_id_A":"cb5bul7","c_root_id_B":"cb589ke","created_at_utc_A":1374167389,"created_at_utc_B":1374158232,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The Liberal Democrats, while historically large for a third party in a plurality system, didn't really become powerful until after the Iraq war. Both the Conservatives and Labour supported the war despite a significant portion of the population opposing it. This allowed the Liberal Democrats, who opposed the war to gain a major foothold. Duvergers law does not preclude this from happening, especially when the public is not given a choice in issues they care about by the main parties. However the situation is not stable. The Liberal Democrats will either take over the position as the main Left party from Labour, or fall back into the background (the latter being more likely).  Canada is another case that's a bit simpler to answer. The leadership of the three left parties doesn't understand that the only chance they have of competing with the conservatives is to merge together in a coalition. There should be two parties, but the left is failing to make rational political decisions in their own interests, possibly to maintain the power of their party leadership.","human_ref_B":"A common answer is because the US has a national district (the presidency), while the UK does not. Because the PM isn't chosen by a single national vote, Duverger's law doesn't push the country toward two parties. Because the US has an executive chosen by a single comprehensive district, we are pushed to two parties.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9157.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"bx7onr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is it true that America as an anti-intellectual bias compared to toher first world nations? How did it come about? It has always appeared to me that the USA has had a persistent anti-intellectual bias - which is still alive and well today. My question is why did it develop and remain when other nations do not seem to have it to the same extent?","c_root_id_A":"eq4oben","c_root_id_B":"eq4bf1x","created_at_utc_A":1559781426,"created_at_utc_B":1559773357,"score_A":90,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Richard Hofstadter wrote an interesting book in the 60's about how the democratization of knowledge gave weight to incorrect opinions over facts.  It stems from religion which has a bias against rational thought because it promotes questioning things that don't make sense.   It actually rewards people that steep themselves within non-rational and anti-intellectual thoughts because they are seen as trailblazers or original-thinkers not adhering to the status quo of facts backed by evidence and repeated results.   Socially, intellectuals are seen as unexciting and socially inept, which is part of the image that has been fostered in media and social culture in the US.  For this reason, we've seen a rise in conspiracy theories and boycotting of practices that keep us safe from things such as diseases, pollution, and climate change. Skepticism has been replaced with outright denial and the inability to change opinions based on newly available facts.  Even though this book is 55 years old, it's shockingly relevant as to how we got here with the trends recognized in the 60's in evangelism and business activism being more relevant today than back then.   TL;DR Intellectualism is demonized and being represented as an undesirable trait because of big business and religion which thrive under ignorance.","human_ref_B":">the USA has had a persistent anti-intellectual bias - which is still alive and well today.  Can you elaborate on this? Any reason why you think this is the case, or do you have any material about what you mean that might help create an informed response?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8069.0,"score_ratio":4.0909090909}
{"post_id":"bx7onr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is it true that America as an anti-intellectual bias compared to toher first world nations? How did it come about? It has always appeared to me that the USA has had a persistent anti-intellectual bias - which is still alive and well today. My question is why did it develop and remain when other nations do not seem to have it to the same extent?","c_root_id_A":"eq4oxoi","c_root_id_B":"eq4opvp","created_at_utc_A":1559781923,"created_at_utc_B":1559781751,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"## Fact part  You might enjoy *Anti-intellectualism in American Life* by Richard Hofstadter. It's probably more than you thought you wanted to know about this question.  ## My opinion part  The most interesting takeaway for me was that anti-intellectualism partly grew out of anti-aristocratic enlightenment thinking and protestantism. That \"take the power back\" perspective resonated strongly for me, much more strongly than the lazy and disingenuous \"dumb people hate science\" rhetoric that we're always using. I now openly call myself an \"anti-intellectual academic\". Granted, I'm not truly \"anti-intellectual\" in the common sense, but I am much more attuned to the way in which the academic mentality is unapologetically elitist and probably (and perhaps rightly) headed for the guillotine if we don't do some serious self-evaluation. Now I see it everywhere. All the posturing, the exclusionary behaviors, the shibboleths, the obsolete practices that are retained as a sort of ritual (not the real rituals, the real rituals I enjoy because they're fun, I mean the phony unspoken ones). The realization that anti-intellectualism is not only complex, but also agreeable to most people in at least some way was eye opening. Feel free to disagree with my take on that one thing, but my main point is that the book will probably change the way you see world, and maybe not in the way you would expect.  Edit: I just realized that the point of that was actually that anti-intellectualism was born of \"American\" values, many of which any American academic might share (democracy, distaste for hereditary political power, etc), without considering herself to be patriotic in the usual sense. That was how it was supposed to pertain to your original question.  Edit 2: I just reread this, and I can\u2019t help but enjoy the irony of ranting about intellectual behavior while getting sidetracked by my own ideas and forgetting the original question. \u201cMedice, cura te ipsum.\u201d  Edit 3 (wow!): I just remembered that I wrote a paper about this. My question was whether something like American anti-intellectualism arose in the iconoclastic Christian environment of Late Antique Egypt based on evidence from Coptic monastic texts. All of the same ingredients were there, but it didn\u2019t. I concluded that the American psyche possesses a unique sense of spite toward authority that wasn\u2019t paralleled. You can read it%20Anti-Intellectualism%20in%20Shenoute's%20Life.pdf) if you want (and critique). It\u2019s just a term paper so it\u2019s probably not very good, but maybe it\u2019s relevant.  Edit 4 (we're doing this): https:\/\/christiancasey.github.io\/Casey,%20Christian%20(2016)%20Anti-Intellectualism%20in%20Shenoute's%20Life.pdf","human_ref_B":"Please read Anti-intellectualism in American Life by Richard Hofstadter, even though written in 1963, (winning a Pulitzer Prize in 1964) it is still a cogent theory on so-called \"American exceptionalism\".","labels":1,"seconds_difference":172.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"8nwoti","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why do Evangelical Christians in the US tend to lean very heavily to the right? Based off of the 2nd chart on this page, the vast majority of religious groups and religious denominations in the US lean left, even other Christian groups such as Catholics and Orthodox's. So why has the evangelical branch of Christianity shifted to the right side of the political spectrum?","c_root_id_A":"e00c5t4","c_root_id_B":"dzzjzda","created_at_utc_A":1527971417,"created_at_utc_B":1527934153,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The simple part of the picture that your missing is whiteness.   White evangelicals are enormously republican.   The republican party has become the party of white outrage.   The story of the modern republican party is the story of the end of segregation. From Libertarians to Evangelicals.  African American evangelicals are enormously democrats (but less so than white are republicans).   Latino Evangelicals lean democrat.      https:\/\/fivethirtyeight.com\/features\/how-trump-and-race-are-splitting-evangelicals\/","human_ref_B":"The formation of the religious right as a political force preceded Roe v Wade, and goes back to segregation and the reaction against the ending of Jim Crow.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":37264.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"4x2rc9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I keep hearing suggestions of 'universal income', but have never understood how it would not lead to inflation that would make the universal income essentially worthless. What am I missing?","c_root_id_A":"d6c0ctf","c_root_id_B":"d6c3rv4","created_at_utc_A":1470847982,"created_at_utc_B":1470852134,"score_A":4,"score_B":66,"human_ref_A":"Post this on \/r\/basicincome, better shot at getting an enthusiastic answer there.","human_ref_B":"Many defenses of the basic income, like for instance Munger's \"One and One-Half Cheers for a Basic-Income Guarantee,\" suggest that the basic income would replace other government spending on poverty. So for instance in that paper Munger notes that the USA federal government spends about half a trillion each year on poverty programs. The suggestion is that instead of spending that money on these programs, it should just be given to poor people. So, you're not increasing the amount of money in the economy, you're just changing who it goes to.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4152.0,"score_ratio":16.5}
{"post_id":"1n9111","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Is school bullying actually worse now, or does it just seem worse due to all the publicity campaigns, etc.? Are these campaigns effective?","c_root_id_A":"ccgmg08","c_root_id_B":"ccgjr0g","created_at_utc_A":1380312404,"created_at_utc_B":1380305115,"score_A":19,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"If you are interested in learning more about this topic I would recommend the book \"Sticks and Stones: Defeating the Culture of Bullying and Rediscovering the Power of Character and Empathy\" by Emily Bazelon. She discusses several bullying case studies as well as the current research on the topic to say that we tend to mark the bullies as evil even though they are just kids, and that this is ineffective. She basically demands we look at the larger picture. She does provide several examples of campaigns against bullying that actually work, and ones that don't.","human_ref_B":"There is no evidence that overall rates of bullying have increased or decreased in recent years. There is, however, some evidence that school-wide bullying prevention and intervention efforts can be effective in reducing bullying- see Ttofi & Farrington, 2011 for a more optimistic view than that presented by [Merrell et al] (http:\/\/osbhcn.org\/files\/How%20Effective%20are%20School%20Bullying%20Intervention%20Programs,%20Merrell%20et%20all,%202008.pdf). Still, there is way more snake oil on the market than there are effective, evidence-based interventions.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7289.0,"score_ratio":2.7142857143}
{"post_id":"no8wf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"How would destroying the Death Star affect Imperial GDP in the short long and medium term?","c_root_id_A":"c3an6q0","c_root_id_B":"c3aqycp","created_at_utc_A":1324670840,"created_at_utc_B":1324699295,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Zero effect, it was a shovel-ready make work project to begin with. Social impact was also zero, people went back to watching cat videos and dreaming about bacon faster than you can say 'Alderan'.","human_ref_B":"The real question can be answered best by an EVE player who has lost a Titan.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":28455.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"no8wf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"How would destroying the Death Star affect Imperial GDP in the short long and medium term?","c_root_id_A":"c3anj53","c_root_id_B":"c3aqycp","created_at_utc_A":1324673114,"created_at_utc_B":1324699295,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would have thought there would be a number of factors to play here. Namely, the shape of the economy in question, the reliance on private industry or state run industry and the general impact of the personal grip of the empire.   From the films it is clear that the power was until the deployment of the Death Star was shaky at best and that the Empire as it stood was more a loose military threat over mostly liberal planets. From the central senate rule (that was later disbanded) it could therefore be assumed that military power was not originally meant to be a centrally controlled force that would dominate planets but more a local agreement with a central tactical force that would hold the empire together. With the rise of the Coruscant as a central planet (like in the Foundation series) the economy would be entirely made up of merchant fleets (such as the trade federation) where the day to day resources are centralized to the key imperial planets. Economically that would mean that what Coruscant spends the rest of the galaxy benefits from, though only in as much as what it extorts from taxes, tributes, trade line control etc.  So the economy and empire are loosely centrally controlled with the appearance of what could be argued to mirror the Roman Empire.  So who built the Death Star? If it was a state controlled operation with private shareholders (very likely) or a state controlled with state benefactors (unlikely). If the later 'films' were anything to go by the Empire was effectively a stealth autocratic regime that grew out of dominance of a strong military, e.g. USSR, Rome, etc. Although a lot of what appears in the later 'films' indicates a heavily corporate regime dissipating into a heavily state controlled regime. In other words the first death star would have likely have had parts made by contractors with the assembly being state while the second death star would have had an almost entirely state controlled construction, from raw materials through to the end product.   If we take these two elements at hand then what we would have is a lot of state investment into a central military product that would have made a small fortune for contractors but whose destruction would have splintered the Empire initially (as it was seen as both the controlling element and the financial capital needed) but who could, as others have pointed out, put the propaganda of he threat of the rebellion as a poignant push for more state control. There fore from that I would surmise that in the short term there would have been an Imperial deficit jump and in the medium term higher taxes and greater military restrictions would have strangled a relatively development central economy as colonies would either avoid military control and taxes or seek to move to trade less with the central planets.  That is my jumbled theory at any rate.","human_ref_B":"The real question can be answered best by an EVE player who has lost a Titan.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26181.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"4b356z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"How did people socialize before schools became mandatory and how did that change socializing? Schools make a big part of a person's life today. Children spend large chunks of their days there and most friends they meet are people from school. What were their lives like when schools weren't mandatory?  I asked this question on \/r\/AskHistorians a while ago, but no one answered, so I hope I'll get some answers or pointers to literature here. Cheers!","c_root_id_A":"d15zcrm","c_root_id_B":"d15x6y8","created_at_utc_A":1458418120,"created_at_utc_B":1458414216,"score_A":26,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"In pre-modern societies, \"childhood\" was not well defined. Children socialised in all the same places as adults, the farm, the mill, the pub.   \"Young People Crime and Justice\", by Roger Hopkins Burke (2008) gives the following:  \"Young people dressed like adults were viewed in the same way as their elders and participated fully in adult life, including the drinking of alchohol (Aries 1962; Hoyles and Evans 1989)\" p.26.  Quick edit: My spidey sense tells me that Giddens touches on this as well in *Modernity and Self Identity*, but I forget which sofa I left my copy under, so mileage may vary. If it is in there, it'll be in the first two chapters, I think, or in the index under 'sequestration of social life'.","human_ref_B":"If you are interested there is a great book called \"Hucks Raft A history of American Childhood\".  Talks about this very subject, since it was a slow process it kinda unraveled and changed over time.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3904.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"26h5ul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the Most Counterintuitive Result You Know of in Economics?","c_root_id_A":"chr3pdo","c_root_id_B":"chr3tyt","created_at_utc_A":1401066769,"created_at_utc_B":1401067101,"score_A":22,"score_B":79,"human_ref_A":"Comparative advantage. I'm still amazed it works when I check the math.","human_ref_B":"Apparently, FairTrade has no significant positive effect on the wages and working conditions of workers on FairTrade coffee farms in Ethiopia and Uganda and may even have an adverse effect. That's a fairly recent economic finding that seems counterintuitive.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":332.0,"score_ratio":3.5909090909}
{"post_id":"26h5ul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the Most Counterintuitive Result You Know of in Economics?","c_root_id_A":"chr3u6j","c_root_id_B":"chr3pdo","created_at_utc_A":1401067116,"created_at_utc_B":1401066769,"score_A":38,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Paradox of toil is a good one. In a recession at the zero lower bound, people will work more to supplement their wages, increasing the labor supply, decreasing wages, decreasing consumption.  The zero lower bound in general is fun for breaking all the rules.","human_ref_B":"Comparative advantage. I'm still amazed it works when I check the math.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":347.0,"score_ratio":1.7272727273}
{"post_id":"26h5ul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the Most Counterintuitive Result You Know of in Economics?","c_root_id_A":"chr6cs5","c_root_id_B":"chr9f9m","created_at_utc_A":1401073594,"created_at_utc_B":1401083116,"score_A":10,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Countries that have a few financial crises grow faster than those that have consistent and stable growth.","human_ref_B":"Adding additional routes to a traffic network can make the traffic flow equilibrium worse for everyone.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9522.0,"score_ratio":1.1}
{"post_id":"26h5ul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the Most Counterintuitive Result You Know of in Economics?","c_root_id_A":"chr6wqb","c_root_id_B":"chr9f9m","created_at_utc_A":1401075079,"created_at_utc_B":1401083116,"score_A":6,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"I'm far from an economist but I have taken micro and macro and have a personal interest in it, and I have to say that Baumol's Cost Disease is pretty counterintuitive at least at first. The idea that the prices of certain products will rise even though productivity as a whole is increasing is pretty incredible.","human_ref_B":"Adding additional routes to a traffic network can make the traffic flow equilibrium worse for everyone.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8037.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"26h5ul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the Most Counterintuitive Result You Know of in Economics?","c_root_id_A":"chrdg7u","c_root_id_B":"chr6wqb","created_at_utc_A":1401104556,"created_at_utc_B":1401075079,"score_A":8,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"The theory of the second best  >In welfare economics, the theory of the second best concerns what happens when one or more optimality conditions cannot be satisfied. Canadian economist Richard Lipsey and Australian economist Kelvin Lancaster showed in a 1956 paper that if one optimality condition in an economic model cannot be satisfied, it is possible that the next-best solution involves changing other variables away from the ones that are usually assumed to be optimal.[1]  >This means that in an economy with some uncorrectable market failure in one sector, actions to correct market failures in another related sector with the intent of increasing overall economic efficiency may actually decrease it. In theory, at least, it may be better to let two market imperfections cancel each other out rather than making an effort to fix either one. Thus, it may be optimal for the government to intervene in a way that is contrary to usual policy. This suggests that economists need to study the details of the situation before jumping to the theory-based conclusion that an improvement in market perfection in one area implies a global improvement in efficiency.  Perhaps it's not hugely counterintuitive per se, but it certainly runs counter to the assumptions most of us have internalised.","human_ref_B":"I'm far from an economist but I have taken micro and macro and have a personal interest in it, and I have to say that Baumol's Cost Disease is pretty counterintuitive at least at first. The idea that the prices of certain products will rise even though productivity as a whole is increasing is pretty incredible.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29477.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"26h5ul","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the Most Counterintuitive Result You Know of in Economics?","c_root_id_A":"chrdg7u","c_root_id_B":"chra4ru","created_at_utc_A":1401104556,"created_at_utc_B":1401085851,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The theory of the second best  >In welfare economics, the theory of the second best concerns what happens when one or more optimality conditions cannot be satisfied. Canadian economist Richard Lipsey and Australian economist Kelvin Lancaster showed in a 1956 paper that if one optimality condition in an economic model cannot be satisfied, it is possible that the next-best solution involves changing other variables away from the ones that are usually assumed to be optimal.[1]  >This means that in an economy with some uncorrectable market failure in one sector, actions to correct market failures in another related sector with the intent of increasing overall economic efficiency may actually decrease it. In theory, at least, it may be better to let two market imperfections cancel each other out rather than making an effort to fix either one. Thus, it may be optimal for the government to intervene in a way that is contrary to usual policy. This suggests that economists need to study the details of the situation before jumping to the theory-based conclusion that an improvement in market perfection in one area implies a global improvement in efficiency.  Perhaps it's not hugely counterintuitive per se, but it certainly runs counter to the assumptions most of us have internalised.","human_ref_B":"Immiserizing growth is pretty weird, if largely academic.  > Immiserizing growth is a theoretical situation first proposed by Jagdish Bhagwati, in 1958, where economic growth could result in a country being worse off than before the growth. If growth is heavily export biased it might lead to a fall in the terms of trade of the exporting country. In rare circumstances this fall in the terms of trade may be so large as to outweigh the gains from growth. If so, this situation would cause a country to be worse off after growth than before. This result is only valid if the growing country is able to influence world prices.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18705.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1vnxb0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What would happen if the richest 100 people worldwide suddenly gave all of their money to the poorest 4 billion? There's an article at the top of \/r\/worldnews right now where Oxfam have claimed that the \"combined wealth of the 85 richest people is equal to that of the poorest 3.5 billion\".  What would happen if the worlds richest 100 people gave *all* of their assets and wealth to the worlds poorest 4 billion? Would it make an appreciable difference in the lives of those poorest 4 billion? I'm guessing that doubling those peoples wealth when they're in the poorest 4 billion in the world wouldn't even take them out of poverty. Would food prices rise, to reflect that more people could suddenly afford food? Would the market for private jets suddenly collapse?  If 4 billion people is too many people for a noticable effect, when would we start to notice effects - 3 billion, 2 billion, 1, 0.5, 0.1?","c_root_id_A":"ceud6qj","c_root_id_B":"ceudtr5","created_at_utc_A":1390243396,"created_at_utc_B":1390244730,"score_A":13,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"If the $1 trillion of stock owned by the richest 85 were distributed to the poorest 3.5 billion each would receive $286. If they kept the stock they would receive $14 per year in dividends. They would still be poor.  Stock and other assets cannot be converted into food but only traded for food. Equal distribution of financial assets would not produce more food, shelter or any other good.  http:\/\/www.foodforthepoor.plannedgiving.org\/foodforthepoor\/articles\/13.html","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2013\/08\/18\/magazine\/is-it-nuts-to-give-to-the-poor-without-strings-attached.html?pagewanted=all  Here is a NYT article about exactly this, there was a project where $1000 was given to some extremely poor people in Africa:  \"Lots of people, in fact, used the money in productive ways. An inordinate number, it seemed, used it to replace their thatched roofs, which are not only lousy but also weirdly expensive, as they need to be patched every few months with a special kind of grass. A metal roof costs several hundred dollars, but lasts for 10 years, making it a much better investment. Omondi was among those who bought metal roofs. He also purchased a used Bajaj Boxer, an Indian-made motorcycle that he uses to ferry people around, for a small fee; he is also currently paying off a second motorcycle, which he rents out. Now Omondi makes about $6 to $9 a day in his taxi operation, several times his previous income, and he works almost every day. Several of his neighbors also used the money to start businesses\u00ad. One man bought a mill and charges villagers to grind their corn. Others became microretailers, buying goods like soap and oil at wholesale and reselling them at a markup.\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1334.0,"score_ratio":1.3076923077}
{"post_id":"dvhhmy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Is the \"Teenage goth\" phenomenon strictly a western one? In the western world (and japan as I understand it) it is common for teenagers and young adults to go through a phase that we now call \"goth\" but has probably seen a number of different variations throughout the years but with the common thread of an interest in the macabre, dark colors, sad music and poetry, rebellion, and rejection of conformity despite the subculture distilling down into something relatively uniform.  I'm aware that not everyone has a goth phase, I never had one, but my parents and grandparents all have memories of the high school goth group, as do I, and I still see them around now and while they aren't the same as I experienced when I was that age they seem very much related.  I wonder if this stage of development is seen outside of western cultures.","c_root_id_A":"f7czyyd","c_root_id_B":"f7d4uy3","created_at_utc_A":1573604098,"created_at_utc_B":1573607660,"score_A":22,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"If the question were the one in the title, then you answered yourself by citing Japan - which is not considered part of the Western world and therefore is an example of the scene being found also outside Western countries.  However, as far as I can see your actual question is about some supposed \"development stage\". There is no such thing. Goth is a subculture, not a developmental stage in a person's life. No more than any other *specific* fashion or scene are a \"developmental stage\". Infancy, puberty, etc. are developmental stages. Goth is not.","human_ref_B":"Can't address goth, but heavy metal culture is considered something of a bellwether for the economic fortunes of all nations, not just Western ones. https:\/\/duckofminerva.com\/2016\/08\/we-need-more-metal-the-political-economy-of-heavy-metal.html","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3562.0,"score_ratio":1.1363636364}
{"post_id":"89cdpe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Do people indeed turn more conservative as they age? Basically the question in the title. I haven't done any research on it myself, so feel free to educate me. I understand that a cross-sectional study is expected to show that older people tend to be more conservative, but how about longitudinal studies? Do people's political views actually change over time or is it merely the meaning of \"conservative\" or other political labels that changes? I recall reading that political beliefs stay largely pretty stable (can't source it atm, it was in one of my classes) over a lifetime which'd contradict the notion that people get more conservative with age on average.","c_root_id_A":"dwq2jju","c_root_id_B":"dwq4cdm","created_at_utc_A":1522754281,"created_at_utc_B":1522757111,"score_A":39,"score_B":66,"human_ref_A":"This article makes some attempt to look at the issue, albeit without giving really good research on your exact question.  TLDR; people tend to become more set in their ways and resistant to change as they get older","human_ref_B":"No, the general consensus is that it is that societies have progressively gotten more liberal. In countries where this is not the case we don't see the same kepler-ish conservativism age effect.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2830.0,"score_ratio":1.6923076923}
{"post_id":"89cdpe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Do people indeed turn more conservative as they age? Basically the question in the title. I haven't done any research on it myself, so feel free to educate me. I understand that a cross-sectional study is expected to show that older people tend to be more conservative, but how about longitudinal studies? Do people's political views actually change over time or is it merely the meaning of \"conservative\" or other political labels that changes? I recall reading that political beliefs stay largely pretty stable (can't source it atm, it was in one of my classes) over a lifetime which'd contradict the notion that people get more conservative with age on average.","c_root_id_A":"dwqalzs","c_root_id_B":"dwq8t25","created_at_utc_A":1522764339,"created_at_utc_B":1522762535,"score_A":12,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"One of the biggest predictors of political affiliation is the family unit\u2014which makes sense, as it\u2019s the first form of socialization (surely I don\u2019t need a reference for that?)  Here are a few links regarding political spectrum and what influences an individual\u2019s choice.   http:\/\/news.gallup.com\/poll\/14515\/teens-stay-true-parents-political-perspectives.aspx (just a Gallup poll)  https:\/\/www.eurekalert.org\/pub_releases\/2013-02\/uoe-tpi021113.php (references the PLOS One article)  This one is from 1997 but is still relevant:  https:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/profile\/Bill_Peterson\/publication\/232511137_Generativity_and_authoritarianism_Implications_for_personality_political_involvement_and_parenting\/links\/54ad3c060cf24aca1c6e448d.pdf  Finally, here  is a lovely article by NPR\u2014it might be a little more consumable. https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2016\/09\/13\/493615864\/when-it-comes-to-our-politics-family-matters","human_ref_B":"(obligatory, not a social scientist)  There is indeed a saying which says something to the effect of, \"a youth who isn't liberal has no heart and a middle aged person who is liberal has no brain\" drawing on the stereotype that liberal ideaologies more often stem from empathy than from logic. Not saying I believe this one way or the other but there is certainly reasoning for and against this.  However, even if the saying was true for people in youth and middle age it may not be true for people of more advanced age. This article from 538 shows that the supreme court justices all tend to grow more liberal over time. Perhaps this is evidence of society becoming more liberal over time, or a phenomenon solely isolated to Supreme Court Justices. But it's still interesting and surprising data.  Edit: An article from within the above cited article, which in turn gives more citations about people growing more liberal when they get older: https:\/\/economix.blogs.nytimes.com\/2012\/02\/15\/getting-more-liberal-with-age\/","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1804.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"rz3k7e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"has there been anything written on the subject of \"passion exploitation\" jobs and the potential long term effects of this practice? this is a term that i have only encountered recently on reddit so apologies if it's more of a social media buzzword than an academic term!   my understanding is that it refers to the taking advantage of employees\/volunteers in industries where the work is perceived to be fun or interesting with the worker being passionate enough to put up with poor treatment, at least in the short term. for example unreasonable workloads placed on postgraduate researchers in third level institutions because \"a life devoted to learning is a privilege\", or say the staffing of so called big cat sanctuaries entirely with teams of volunteers who are happy to forego payment to get up close and personal with lions and tigers.  i am particularly interested in whether or not there are long term effects to such practices. does the pool of candidates get exhausted when the pattern becomes more apparent to anyone considering such a role (noting high turnover or bad word of mouth etc.)? do the exploited workers show a reluctance to get fooled again so to speak and avoid pursuing jobs related to their niche interests as a result?  anything to point me in the right direction is appreciated :)","c_root_id_A":"hruhkph","c_root_id_B":"hruovdp","created_at_utc_A":1641687352,"created_at_utc_B":1641690393,"score_A":7,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"I don't know anything contemporary on this, though there are a couple books on the soc of arts and crafts that lean in that direction e.g., https:\/\/www.sup .org\/books\/title\/?id=26885 . I would encourage you to go back to theory a bit more and consider the debates around the Davis and Moore thesis of stratification, https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Davis%E2%80%93Moore_hypothesis. Among other things, they argue pleasant jobs will receive less monetary compensation.","human_ref_B":"Kim et al. (2017) use it in a similar way to you in \u201cPassion Exploitation: The Legitimization of Exploiting Other People\u2019s Passion for Work\u201d.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3041.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"40jggc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why not nationalize natural resources like oil and reinvest it for wider benefit? On the face of it, this seems like a beneficial policy to everyone but the small group of 'oligarchs' who plunder wealth from extracting natural resources and do not return it to invest in the country those resources came from (I see this narrative mentioned many times particularly for the Middle East).   What are the drawbacks of Chavez style public ownership of natural resources?","c_root_id_A":"cyvcuj7","c_root_id_B":"cyvgzs5","created_at_utc_A":1452611554,"created_at_utc_B":1452617887,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"The problem with investing large scale resources is that it can lead to the Dutch disease: Other sectors of the economy suffer due to the large (and sudden) wealth of one sector. A part of this problem is due to other sectors having difficulty competing abroad because the natural resources boom appreciates the currency of the country. Currently something like that seems to be happening in Australia, where the highly valued currency seems to have a negative impact on tourism, amongst other things.  In addition a sudden large influx in money can bloat the public sector leading to waste, or in a less developed government, corruption. Wealth is something that needs to be managed as is done in the case of Norway. Below a overview paper of the literature on the dutch disease phenomenon Corden, W. M. (1984). Booming sector and Dutch disease economics: survey and consolidation. oxford economic Papers, 359-380.","human_ref_B":"There are several reasons why nationalizing natural resources, and especially oil, might not be ideal for development:  * Countries that receive their revenue from nationalized oil are less likely to get revenue from taxes as a percentage of government revenue. There's an important link between contributions to society and having a stake in what the government does, that is, citizens are more likely to care about policies when the source of funding for those policies are coming from their taxes.  * Likewise, if social programs are funded by oil revenue and then can no longer be funded, it can lead to political instability. With oil, governments have the incentive to hide information about their revenues so that they can have less limitations on how the revenues are used. A key aspect of democracies is the ability to hold the government accountable, without transparency, this is difficult. Less democratic governments might make gasoline prices low in order to appease citizens, but this doesn't really solve these broader problems.  * Oil prices are extremely volatile, and the process of nationalization inherently decreases the stability by consolidating production. Thus, countries that are highly dependent on oil revenues are more likely to fall into \"boom and bust\" cycles. Price instability leads to uncertainty over whether or not countries should invest in that country, which can ~~help~~ edit: hurt economic development.  Source: Ross, Michael. The oil curse: how petroleum wealth shapes the development of nations. Princeton University Press, 2012. Primarily chapters 1 and 6.  * Natural resource dependence as a percentage of exports is closely linked to corruption.  Source: Fish, M. Steven. Democracy derailed in Russia: The failure of open politics. Cambridge University Press, 2005; Kolstad, Ivar, and Tina S\u00f8reide. \"Corruption in natural resource management: Implications for policy makers.\" Resources Policy 34.4 (2009): 214-226.  * Government-controlled oil increases the likelihood of separatist conflict (rebels have incentive to control land\/infrastructure\/the government in order to be able to export the oil and amass revenues)  Source: Ross, Michael L. \"What do we know about natural resources and civil war?.\" Journal of peace research 41.3 (2004): 337-356.  * \/u\/Yurien has already mentioned the problem of Dutch disease, so read his reply.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6333.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"40jggc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why not nationalize natural resources like oil and reinvest it for wider benefit? On the face of it, this seems like a beneficial policy to everyone but the small group of 'oligarchs' who plunder wealth from extracting natural resources and do not return it to invest in the country those resources came from (I see this narrative mentioned many times particularly for the Middle East).   What are the drawbacks of Chavez style public ownership of natural resources?","c_root_id_A":"cyv01cd","c_root_id_B":"cyvgzs5","created_at_utc_A":1452575731,"created_at_utc_B":1452617887,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Happened in Mexico in the 30's in L\u00e1zaro C\u00e1rdenas' term, and it went pretty badly. Started with a oil company strike demanding to cheapen concessions that ended in an ultimatum to the government, which lead to the nationalisation of oil, but not before the president addressing the nation to give all and any gold the people had to be able to pay concessions, drilling platforms and any previously existent oil infrastructure. Years went by and a state monopoly of oil was placed with non existent competitors, money laundering, state-wide corruption and money funnelling, being subsidised in its majority by the government.  https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Mexican_oil_expropriation","human_ref_B":"There are several reasons why nationalizing natural resources, and especially oil, might not be ideal for development:  * Countries that receive their revenue from nationalized oil are less likely to get revenue from taxes as a percentage of government revenue. There's an important link between contributions to society and having a stake in what the government does, that is, citizens are more likely to care about policies when the source of funding for those policies are coming from their taxes.  * Likewise, if social programs are funded by oil revenue and then can no longer be funded, it can lead to political instability. With oil, governments have the incentive to hide information about their revenues so that they can have less limitations on how the revenues are used. A key aspect of democracies is the ability to hold the government accountable, without transparency, this is difficult. Less democratic governments might make gasoline prices low in order to appease citizens, but this doesn't really solve these broader problems.  * Oil prices are extremely volatile, and the process of nationalization inherently decreases the stability by consolidating production. Thus, countries that are highly dependent on oil revenues are more likely to fall into \"boom and bust\" cycles. Price instability leads to uncertainty over whether or not countries should invest in that country, which can ~~help~~ edit: hurt economic development.  Source: Ross, Michael. The oil curse: how petroleum wealth shapes the development of nations. Princeton University Press, 2012. Primarily chapters 1 and 6.  * Natural resource dependence as a percentage of exports is closely linked to corruption.  Source: Fish, M. Steven. Democracy derailed in Russia: The failure of open politics. Cambridge University Press, 2005; Kolstad, Ivar, and Tina S\u00f8reide. \"Corruption in natural resource management: Implications for policy makers.\" Resources Policy 34.4 (2009): 214-226.  * Government-controlled oil increases the likelihood of separatist conflict (rebels have incentive to control land\/infrastructure\/the government in order to be able to export the oil and amass revenues)  Source: Ross, Michael L. \"What do we know about natural resources and civil war?.\" Journal of peace research 41.3 (2004): 337-356.  * \/u\/Yurien has already mentioned the problem of Dutch disease, so read his reply.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":42156.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"40jggc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why not nationalize natural resources like oil and reinvest it for wider benefit? On the face of it, this seems like a beneficial policy to everyone but the small group of 'oligarchs' who plunder wealth from extracting natural resources and do not return it to invest in the country those resources came from (I see this narrative mentioned many times particularly for the Middle East).   What are the drawbacks of Chavez style public ownership of natural resources?","c_root_id_A":"cyv01cd","c_root_id_B":"cyvcuj7","created_at_utc_A":1452575731,"created_at_utc_B":1452611554,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Happened in Mexico in the 30's in L\u00e1zaro C\u00e1rdenas' term, and it went pretty badly. Started with a oil company strike demanding to cheapen concessions that ended in an ultimatum to the government, which lead to the nationalisation of oil, but not before the president addressing the nation to give all and any gold the people had to be able to pay concessions, drilling platforms and any previously existent oil infrastructure. Years went by and a state monopoly of oil was placed with non existent competitors, money laundering, state-wide corruption and money funnelling, being subsidised in its majority by the government.  https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Mexican_oil_expropriation","human_ref_B":"The problem with investing large scale resources is that it can lead to the Dutch disease: Other sectors of the economy suffer due to the large (and sudden) wealth of one sector. A part of this problem is due to other sectors having difficulty competing abroad because the natural resources boom appreciates the currency of the country. Currently something like that seems to be happening in Australia, where the highly valued currency seems to have a negative impact on tourism, amongst other things.  In addition a sudden large influx in money can bloat the public sector leading to waste, or in a less developed government, corruption. Wealth is something that needs to be managed as is done in the case of Norway. Below a overview paper of the literature on the dutch disease phenomenon Corden, W. M. (1984). Booming sector and Dutch disease economics: survey and consolidation. oxford economic Papers, 359-380.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":35823.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2o6gi6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why are children so weird about food? Why do children have so many weird ideas about what is acceptable to eat? [This site]( http:\/\/twentytwowords.com\/moms-share-their-kids-most-ridiculous-eating-habits-talk-about-picky\/) lists a bunch of examples, e.g., \"will not eat a granola bar if it is broken\".   In particular, I find \"food can't touch on the plate\" to be fairly common. Is this really a thing, and if so, what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"cmkc4ov","c_root_id_B":"cmkp9vr","created_at_utc_A":1417644754,"created_at_utc_B":1417670447,"score_A":19,"score_B":33,"human_ref_A":"I don't know of anyone doing specific research on this topic, but I assume that this phenomenon exemplifies a particular stage in the process of learning. When people of all ages first start to learn something, they begin by identifying information and drawing superficial relationships between different ideas and concepts. Generally, these relationships sum as \"knowledge,\" and the knowledge we find to be meaningful is usually related to something we practice in our day-to-day activities.   Children probably draw different\u2014seemingly bizarre\u2014conclusions related to food, eating, good, and bad because 1) they may not yet have the cognitive capability to model complex relationships between different phenomena, and\/or 2) they've just experimenting with a model, or different models, for understanding their relationship to food. Your question asks for a specific cause; I don't think there is one. Rather, I think these conclusions are part of the natural process of trying to solving problems.   Sources: conclusions drawn from my recent survey of ed studies literature, constructionism theory.","human_ref_B":"This piece cites quite a few explanations, of which I've copied a few:  * \"Food patterns and dietary quality in the early years of life are usually determined by parents and other primary caretakers. Food acceptance by a child is influenced by the example set by parents and familiar adults and peers. In addition the number of exposures to unfamiliar foods influences the child\u2019s likes and dislikes. The work of Birch and colleagues indicated that *dislike* for a food may be increased when a reward is given to eat the food. Verbal praise in a social context seems to enhance a child\u2019s like for certain foods. Not only exposure, but the opportunity to taste a food enhances food acceptance.\" (emphasis added)  * \"I]f mothers use rewards, prodding or punishment to encourage eating, this may contribute to the picky eater phenomenon. Moreover, consistent food intake that is characterized by food avoidance or a limited variety of acceptable foods may result in the formation of undesirable food habits.\"  * \"This social climate, as characterized by cohesion, conflict, control, organization, and other parameters, may influence food intake of family members. Kintner, Boss, and Johnson found a significant positive relationship between dietary intake and family characteristics of cohesion and independence.\"  [Here's another somewhat relevant study  * \" Research has demonstrated that children\u2019s eating patterns are strongly influenced by characteristics of both the physical and social environment. With regard to the physical environment, children are more likely to eat foods that are available and easily accessible, and they tend to eat greater quantities when larger portions are provided. Additionally, characteristics of the social environment, including various socioeconomic and sociocultural factors such as parents\u2019 education, time constraints, and ethnicity influence the types of foods children eat. Mealtime structure is also an important factor related to children\u2019s eating patterns. Mealtime structure includes social and physical characteristics of mealtimes including whether families eat together, TV-viewing during meals, and the source of foods (e.g., restaurants, schools). Parents also play a direct role in children\u2019s eating patterns through their behaviors, attitudes, and feeding styles.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25693.0,"score_ratio":1.7368421053}
{"post_id":"anbl57","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I hear a lot of \"trendy\" names popping up in the next generation, where parents try and make up new, unique-sounding names instead of having their kid be the Michael #5 in a class. Do these name \"pioneers\" pop up every few generations, and do they usually have any meaningful influence on culture? I originally posted this at \/r\/AskHistorians and they suggested I post this here! I also realized how broad this topic is with names, so I suppose I'm mostly making this with the mindset of American\/English names that most English speakers are familiar with, to narrow it down.  I hear some certainly *unique* names in my job, like 'Brieland', 'Zaelyn', and 'Tinsley'. It got me thinking, does this kind of cycle happen every few generations, where parents want to give their children more unique names, so we get a new cycle of them? I know in pop culture there's a lot of jokes about 'old people names' too, and at work I definitely notice a trend in the names belonging to retirees.   I definitely notice with the 'trendy' names popping up in kids born in the past couple of years, there's a prominent use of and 'Y' to stand in for vowels.","c_root_id_A":"efsfvow","c_root_id_B":"efsgh4o","created_at_utc_A":1549367340,"created_at_utc_B":1549368190,"score_A":40,"score_B":58,"human_ref_A":"Not quite what you are asking but I know that a classic old study from the 1940s found men with common names were more likely to be successful than men with unique names.   More recently Eric Oliver is a political scientist who has looked at  how unique baby name choices are linked to liberal and conservative politics.","human_ref_B":"Not really an answer to your question, but there\u2019s an interesting chapter about the \u201ceconomics\u201d of names in the book Freakonomics. Their conclusion is that in generation 0 there are names that are associated with wealth and higher status. I think they talk about the 1980s where names like Ashley and Brittany belonged to the upper-middle class. Then in generation 1, people from a lower economic class would name their children Ashley, Brittany...etc in en effort to ascribe that same status to their kids. But then those names lose their \u201cvalue\u201d and the cycle continues.  Like I said, not really an answer to your question, but cool nonetheless","labels":0,"seconds_difference":850.0,"score_ratio":1.45}
{"post_id":"anbl57","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I hear a lot of \"trendy\" names popping up in the next generation, where parents try and make up new, unique-sounding names instead of having their kid be the Michael #5 in a class. Do these name \"pioneers\" pop up every few generations, and do they usually have any meaningful influence on culture? I originally posted this at \/r\/AskHistorians and they suggested I post this here! I also realized how broad this topic is with names, so I suppose I'm mostly making this with the mindset of American\/English names that most English speakers are familiar with, to narrow it down.  I hear some certainly *unique* names in my job, like 'Brieland', 'Zaelyn', and 'Tinsley'. It got me thinking, does this kind of cycle happen every few generations, where parents want to give their children more unique names, so we get a new cycle of them? I know in pop culture there's a lot of jokes about 'old people names' too, and at work I definitely notice a trend in the names belonging to retirees.   I definitely notice with the 'trendy' names popping up in kids born in the past couple of years, there's a prominent use of and 'Y' to stand in for vowels.","c_root_id_A":"efsgh4o","c_root_id_B":"efs7oqt","created_at_utc_A":1549368190,"created_at_utc_B":1549353192,"score_A":58,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"Not really an answer to your question, but there\u2019s an interesting chapter about the \u201ceconomics\u201d of names in the book Freakonomics. Their conclusion is that in generation 0 there are names that are associated with wealth and higher status. I think they talk about the 1980s where names like Ashley and Brittany belonged to the upper-middle class. Then in generation 1, people from a lower economic class would name their children Ashley, Brittany...etc in en effort to ascribe that same status to their kids. But then those names lose their \u201cvalue\u201d and the cycle continues.  Like I said, not really an answer to your question, but cool nonetheless","human_ref_B":"Tim Urban at *Wait But Why* tends to do a fair amount of good lay research and he might prove a good jumping off point for this topic.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14998.0,"score_ratio":2.1481481481}
{"post_id":"anbl57","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"I hear a lot of \"trendy\" names popping up in the next generation, where parents try and make up new, unique-sounding names instead of having their kid be the Michael #5 in a class. Do these name \"pioneers\" pop up every few generations, and do they usually have any meaningful influence on culture? I originally posted this at \/r\/AskHistorians and they suggested I post this here! I also realized how broad this topic is with names, so I suppose I'm mostly making this with the mindset of American\/English names that most English speakers are familiar with, to narrow it down.  I hear some certainly *unique* names in my job, like 'Brieland', 'Zaelyn', and 'Tinsley'. It got me thinking, does this kind of cycle happen every few generations, where parents want to give their children more unique names, so we get a new cycle of them? I know in pop culture there's a lot of jokes about 'old people names' too, and at work I definitely notice a trend in the names belonging to retirees.   I definitely notice with the 'trendy' names popping up in kids born in the past couple of years, there's a prominent use of and 'Y' to stand in for vowels.","c_root_id_A":"efsfvow","c_root_id_B":"efs7oqt","created_at_utc_A":1549367340,"created_at_utc_B":1549353192,"score_A":40,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"Not quite what you are asking but I know that a classic old study from the 1940s found men with common names were more likely to be successful than men with unique names.   More recently Eric Oliver is a political scientist who has looked at  how unique baby name choices are linked to liberal and conservative politics.","human_ref_B":"Tim Urban at *Wait But Why* tends to do a fair amount of good lay research and he might prove a good jumping off point for this topic.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14148.0,"score_ratio":1.4814814815}
{"post_id":"4gky41","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"are there any examples in modern history where a city was able to solve a \"gang problem\" ? Would love to read more on the subject as gangs are a symptom of both economic and social problems. Any examples from around the world that you can think of that have corrected these issues?","c_root_id_A":"d2iuojr","c_root_id_B":"d2ingmi","created_at_utc_A":1461725091,"created_at_utc_B":1461714843,"score_A":33,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Research analyst with hands on experience here! I work for a not-for-profit corporation that furthers the development of criminal justice programs and strategies for best practices (USA). As far as reading material goes, I could offer a variety of sources! I would start off with Klein and Maxson's book, \"Street Gang Patterns and Policies\" (https:\/\/global.oup.com\/academic\/product\/street-gang-patterns-and-policies-9780195163445?cc=us&lang=en&). This book was required reading for a course I took in grad school on gangs and offers a wealth of knowledge to help explain why many policies have been doomed to fail under a \"one size fits all\" approach (as gang\/group dynamics tend to vary widely). My colleagues and I currently assist implementation efforts for two  strategies that have gained considerable support within the field as to their effectiveness in reducing violent crime perpetrated by members of groups\/gangs. One strategy is more heavily focused on the service\/prevention aspect while the other weighs more heavily on a deterrence approach (swift, certain, severe) that leverages the group dynamic to reduce violent crime. Here are links to the strategies I refer to with linked resources to prior site evaluations: https:\/\/nnscommunities.org\/our-work\/strategy\/group-violence-intervention (focused deterrence) https:\/\/www.nationalgangcenter.gov\/comprehensive-gang-model (intervention\/prevention) I can go on all night, so PM me if you would like to know more!","human_ref_B":"You might be interested in a book called \"Hooligan: A History of Respectable Fears\".  The author directly addresses your idea of gangs as symptoms of bigger issues, and traces their existence through history (up to the 1980s when the book was written).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10248.0,"score_ratio":4.125}
{"post_id":"3enhup","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Has there been any research on the academic \/ career success of African Americans who are slave descendants in contrast to black families who immigrated here more recently? I feel like two arguments I hear from the two ends of the spectrum are \"Black people are lazy etc \/ The residual affects of slavery are a primary factor in the depressed socioeconomic state many African Americans suffer from\".  One variable that I wonder was ever measured was if there is a noticeable difference in the ability for African Americans of slave decent (us slavery specifically as I know someone from Trinidad could also have ancestors who were slaves) to move upward through education or employment at a different rate than black people who had immigrated here from other countries more recently (ex west Indian, virgin islands, African etc).   Does anyone know of theres been any research on thus topic before?","c_root_id_A":"ctgt9vs","c_root_id_B":"ctgqz3m","created_at_utc_A":1437930777,"created_at_utc_B":1437926479,"score_A":21,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I found this study  Here's an interesting quote pulled from the abstract:  > We find much to pursue in proposed future research, including the interesting paradox of higher education and greater labor force participation among African immigrants (versus both native born and all immigrants), yet greater levels of poverty and lower incomes  In these discussions, one point often brought up is that African immigrants are self-selected: they tend to be risk-takers (a trait negatively correlated with poverty), well-educated, and able to pull together enough cash to make the move. At least in theory; I have not seen numbers on this.  Another article, a little older. It points to some of the various theories for why African American students tend to not do as well in educational standards, but notes that the trend does not apply to African immigrants.","human_ref_B":"As you are finding these studies, remember that many blacks migrating from central America and Caribbean nations are ALSO only there because they are descendants of slavery. I suggest reading up a bit on the history of slavery in these nations so you can understand the full socioeconomic impacts of the practice. Did the country continue to have Jim Crow like laws that will impact career and educational attainment? We're there other forms of systematic racism that could impact their life outcomes? The history and socioeconomic conditions in each caribbean and  african country is too diverse for your study to really tell you anything other than \"yes, outcomes are different\" and \"no outcomes are not different\" because you are lumping such diverse conditions (and the impact of conditions is what you aim to study, yes?) Into one group based strictly on phenotype.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4298.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"2rce36","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"85,000 people are in prison in the UK. 81,000 of these are males. Can social sciences explain such a vast difference, or must there be a causal relationship between being male and being imprisoned? This question comes from the old adage that 'correlation does not entail causation.' Is there evidence that social sciences can explain away such an obvious correlation between being male and being in prison? If not, seeing as it is clearly true being male makes you more likely to be in prison, we can perhaps look past this and suggest being male makes you more likely to commit prison-worthy crimes, and from this to suggesting, in some way, males are inherently different to females in such a way that they are more violent, more fraudulent, etc. etc. until we come to a more normative claim that males are inherently 'badder' than females.   So, can this phenomena be explained by social sciences?  Source to statistics.","c_root_id_A":"cnexvdo","c_root_id_B":"cnevv5z","created_at_utc_A":1420444619,"created_at_utc_B":1420438380,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I suggest that you read some Michel Foucault. David Garland does a good overview of Foucault in comparison to other thinkers on penology.   The key insight from comparative penology is that the ways different countries punish is ultimately about culture.  IE, a consensus around meaning and causal theories of behavior.  Regarding your question, I'd argue that the UK is going through a period where maleness and masculine tropes are being aligned with social deviance, thus men are targeted for attention of the state.","human_ref_B":"A portion of evidence for this phenomenon may be that the male to female ratio of Antisocial Personality Disorder (i.e. sociopathy, psychopathy) is 3:1. Also, 47% of male prisoners and 21% of female prisoners have ASPD.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6239.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2pcpyq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"From my personal observation, it seems that housing prices in most major cities worldwide are rising steadily. Poor people are increasingly moving to the suburbs, and amenities are increasingly serving the upper middle class. Is something substantially changing in major cities? It seems that one by one, formerly working class neighbourhoods are very actively gentrified, attracting educated families and displacing locals to the suburbs. Will there be no place for the working class in the cities of the future?","c_root_id_A":"cmvo3s9","c_root_id_B":"cmvjqy1","created_at_utc_A":1418665899,"created_at_utc_B":1418657512,"score_A":25,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"So, I work as an Urban economist.  I study this exact thing.     The first thing to know is that work by Brueckner and others is that all you really need to understand gentrification is the age of the structure.  As structures age their teardown cost falls, and given some underlying valuation change of the area around the structure, eventually, the cost of teardown and replacement is low enough for structure renovation to be profitable.  Secondly, there does not need to be any welfare implication of people moving from high house price areas to less costly areas.   The Standard Rosen Roback model holds that we trade off 3 general items (wages, housing costs or cost of living, amenities).  Thus, moving within a city leads to lower housing costs but less amenities, and suppose wages say the same, then the consumer is just as well off.   This is where I differ from Glaeser and other colleagues (though others share my beliefs as well, so its a bit of an issue right now, the literature is not settled), they believe that there MUST BE welfare implications.  My work suggests could be the case but it isn't 100% guaranteed as they claim.  Consider this.  If amenities like great restaurants matter, why can't we just subsidize Detroit 100 million dollars and pay for Chef Ramsey to live there.  That would bring even more skilled workers to Detroit, right? Right?  No, of course it wouldn't.  Glaeser misses this point.  Sources; Brueckner (Handbook)  Glaeser (So many articles)  Black (Gay Men, San Fran)  Broxterman (City Size, Skill Intensity)  My own stuff (sorry, not linking to my repec site)","human_ref_B":"There was an article in The Economist recently pertaining to this: http:\/\/www.economist.com\/suburbs","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8387.0,"score_ratio":1.7857142857}
{"post_id":"21forj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"I am a 21 year old, all for gay marriage, yet when I heard about the new polygamy law in Kenya I got an uncanny feeling. I was wondering: How do I work? Are these feelings controlled by my social background\/culture, and if so, are they then not completely arbitrary? Nuance in text! Nuance, because I could not fit them in the actual question because of the word limit: I do not want to say that gay marriage and polygamy are in any way the same. I guess what I mean to say is: there are forms of marriage that deviate from the 'standard' man-woman marriage, and when I think about them the main thought on my mind is: people should be able to do whatever makes them happy. Still, somehow, I gut-feel differently about polygamy than about gay marriage, taking these two forms of marriage as an example because they seem to be the most actual. Now how does this work in my mind? Is it all cultural determinism, is there a biological factor that plays a role (I would assume marriage is too much of a social construct for biology to play a role but hey), or is it just my mind randomly choosing? Furthermore, what does this imply for the meaning or value of my thoughts\/feelings? I guess this discussion could go a whole lot of directions, but I was wondering what you guys thought about it and if there have been any significant studies on this (I would hope so) Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cgcxelj","c_root_id_B":"cgcr7l0","created_at_utc_A":1395885948,"created_at_utc_B":1395872379,"score_A":19,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"You can attribute your feelings to cultural bias.  They're totally expected and common.  I'm assuming you grew up in a culture where \"normal\" marriage is understood as man & woman.  Interestingly, the idea that we marry someone we love is relatively new.  This article explains some of the different ways marriage has been understood by different cultures over time.  Coontz, S. (2005). The evolution of matrimony: The changing social context of marriage. *Annals of the American Psychotherapy Association,* 8(4), 30-33.   Essentially, marriage is a social construct and therefore will be understood differently by different cultures in different contexts.  Kudos to recognizing your own cultural bias!","human_ref_B":"What does the Kenyan law say about polygyny?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13569.0,"score_ratio":1.5833333333}
{"post_id":"21forj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"I am a 21 year old, all for gay marriage, yet when I heard about the new polygamy law in Kenya I got an uncanny feeling. I was wondering: How do I work? Are these feelings controlled by my social background\/culture, and if so, are they then not completely arbitrary? Nuance in text! Nuance, because I could not fit them in the actual question because of the word limit: I do not want to say that gay marriage and polygamy are in any way the same. I guess what I mean to say is: there are forms of marriage that deviate from the 'standard' man-woman marriage, and when I think about them the main thought on my mind is: people should be able to do whatever makes them happy. Still, somehow, I gut-feel differently about polygamy than about gay marriage, taking these two forms of marriage as an example because they seem to be the most actual. Now how does this work in my mind? Is it all cultural determinism, is there a biological factor that plays a role (I would assume marriage is too much of a social construct for biology to play a role but hey), or is it just my mind randomly choosing? Furthermore, what does this imply for the meaning or value of my thoughts\/feelings? I guess this discussion could go a whole lot of directions, but I was wondering what you guys thought about it and if there have been any significant studies on this (I would hope so) Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cgcrvka","c_root_id_B":"cgcxelj","created_at_utc_A":1395873813,"created_at_utc_B":1395885948,"score_A":8,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Generally \"gut-feel\" = morality. Some morality is inherited through stories (as in conversation and mythology and any form of communication you can imagine). Often these stories, and the morality within them serve purpose. Often they are arbitrary. Often they are based on false assumptions about the world. This is what I believe, and it's mostly based on http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Social_constructionism. The most interesting part of this (for me) is renouncing or deconstructing these inherited unconscious beliefs. Example: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Indigenous_decolonization. (side note: for a research project I tried to decolonize my beliefs and assume an animist ontology. It was completely amazing. I highly recommend it).  The other option that I'm aware of is http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Evolutionary_ethics. You may be feeling the way you feel, not due to any ideas you've inherited, but due to your biology.   I'm just tossing ideas out. I'm a very amateur researcher, and am probably completely missing the context from which I took these two explanations for your \"gut-feel.\"   I did want to add though... feeling polygamy is bad is all fine and dandy until you meet two incredibly attractive people. Ones a brunette, and other is blonde. Ones athletic, and the other has beautiful body. Both are really intelligent and funny, and confident; and both have interests that complement your interests. And they both want you. They are willing to share. Actually, the love each other too. They are in love with each other, and in love with you. They are oiled up, in their underwear, with a little buzz on, inviting you stay. ... ... ... \"Sorry, polygamy is wrong?\"   Polygamy can take many forms, and we should be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.","human_ref_B":"You can attribute your feelings to cultural bias.  They're totally expected and common.  I'm assuming you grew up in a culture where \"normal\" marriage is understood as man & woman.  Interestingly, the idea that we marry someone we love is relatively new.  This article explains some of the different ways marriage has been understood by different cultures over time.  Coontz, S. (2005). The evolution of matrimony: The changing social context of marriage. *Annals of the American Psychotherapy Association,* 8(4), 30-33.   Essentially, marriage is a social construct and therefore will be understood differently by different cultures in different contexts.  Kudos to recognizing your own cultural bias!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12135.0,"score_ratio":2.375}
{"post_id":"io12kl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is \"welfare makes people lazy\" true or false? Any studies that tackles how helpful welfare really is?","c_root_id_A":"g4ay8sn","c_root_id_B":"g4bn75u","created_at_utc_A":1599455244,"created_at_utc_B":1599480242,"score_A":76,"score_B":132,"human_ref_A":"Even Charles Murray argued that welfare means testing conditions tended to punish people for working and building strong families rather than making people lazy.  It is a distinction that has largely been lost in the arguments about his work. https:\/\/www.manhattan-institute.org\/losingground  There have been numerous programs that provided unconditional funding without any strong evidence for resulting laziness, other than my laziness at not providing links right now.","human_ref_B":"When this question comes up, I find it illuminating to point out that what does unequivocally reduce desire to work is large inheritances. Over a century ago, Andrew Carnegie wrote that parents who bequeath large fortunes deaden the \u201ctalents and energies\u201d of their children. And yet, as Warren Buffett puts it, \"All these people who think that food stamps are debilitating and lead to a cycle of poverty, they're the same ones who go out and want to leave a ton of money to their kids.\"  Carnegie's statement has been borne out by research. For example, Holtz-Eakin, Joulfaian, & Rosen find support for the assertion by looking at tax return-generated data. Brown, et al find that receiving an inheritance significantly increases the probability of retirement. B\u00f8, Halvorsen and Thoresen using rich administrative data covering the entire Norwegian population, find significant reductions in labor supply for recipients of large inheritances.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24998.0,"score_ratio":1.7368421053}
{"post_id":"io12kl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is \"welfare makes people lazy\" true or false? Any studies that tackles how helpful welfare really is?","c_root_id_A":"g4bn75u","c_root_id_B":"g4b1j01","created_at_utc_A":1599480242,"created_at_utc_B":1599457881,"score_A":132,"score_B":46,"human_ref_A":"When this question comes up, I find it illuminating to point out that what does unequivocally reduce desire to work is large inheritances. Over a century ago, Andrew Carnegie wrote that parents who bequeath large fortunes deaden the \u201ctalents and energies\u201d of their children. And yet, as Warren Buffett puts it, \"All these people who think that food stamps are debilitating and lead to a cycle of poverty, they're the same ones who go out and want to leave a ton of money to their kids.\"  Carnegie's statement has been borne out by research. For example, Holtz-Eakin, Joulfaian, & Rosen find support for the assertion by looking at tax return-generated data. Brown, et al find that receiving an inheritance significantly increases the probability of retirement. B\u00f8, Halvorsen and Thoresen using rich administrative data covering the entire Norwegian population, find significant reductions in labor supply for recipients of large inheritances.","human_ref_B":"First of all, it's not a simple yes or no. Of course there will be some people who will respond to particular incentives in certain ways, and some who won't. The question is a matter of degree.   That said, here's a meta analysis finding that \"welfare\u2010to\u2010work programmes in the USA have shown small, but consistent effects in moving welfare recipients into work\".","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22361.0,"score_ratio":2.8695652174}
{"post_id":"io12kl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is \"welfare makes people lazy\" true or false? Any studies that tackles how helpful welfare really is?","c_root_id_A":"g4elxm4","c_root_id_B":"g4ejatp","created_at_utc_A":1599533402,"created_at_utc_B":1599531785,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As others have shown, overall the assessment of welfare policies tend to be positive (not negative) in regard to their effect on employment. This general observation can be made for different kinds of programs (see conditional and unconditional cash transfers).  Considering that you also ask \"Any studies that tackles how helpful welfare really is?,\" I would also note that there are multiple studies concerning welfare and social expenditure assessing its effects on other desirable outcomes, such as health, education and crime. For instance, according to a 2015 report by the Center on budget and Policy Priorities:  >**The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and Child Tax Credit (CTC)**, which go to millions of low- and moderate-income working families each year, **provide work, income, educational, and health benefits to its recipients and their children**, a substantial body of research shows.  In addition, recent ground-breaking research suggests **the income from these tax credits leads to benefits at virtually every stage of life.** For instance, **research indicates that children in families receiving the tax credits do better in school, are likelier to attend college, and can be expected to earn more as adults.**  According to Greenstein in 2016:  >Moreover, **extensive academic research has found other important benefits from key anti-poverty programs \u2014 from reduced child hunger and malnutrition and better health to various indicators of upward mobility.** A strong body of research links programs such as SNAP and the EITC to **increased educational attainment among children and to stronger employment and earnings in adulthood. Charges that these programs may reduce material hardship but do nothing to improve mobility are inconsistent with the evidence.**  Also see Shapiro et al. who directly address your question.  ---  For specific illustrations, see for example Blattman et al.'s (2014) experiment in Uganda involving unsupervised grants to incentivize self-employment:  >The results complement the growing enthusiasm for unconditional cash transfers (UCTs) to the poorest. **Existing research on UCTs mostly focuses on education and health investments in children, and finds high impacts** (Baird, McIntosh, and \u00d6zler 2011; Benhassine et al. 2013). **Recent evidence from Kenya suggests large unconditional grants are partly invested and earn high returns** (Haushofer and Shapiro 2013). YOP was not an unconditional program, screens for initiative, and likely restrains participants initial decisions. Nonetheless, the sample contains many very poor young people, and **the evidence suggests they invest the money wisely when unsupervised.** Whether such restrictions play an important role remains to be tested.  In regard to CCTs, see for example Parker and Vogl's (2018) assessment of Progresa:  >This paper provides new evidence that **the intergenerational benefits of CCTs may be as large as or larger than the current poverty effects.** We estimate the long-term effects of the Mexican program Progresa on the educational, labor market, household, and demographic outcomes of young adults who effectively grew up with the program. **The results show large effects on the next generation\u2019s completed education, work, earnings, and household economic status, particularly for women.**  Concerning welfare and crime, see for example DeFronzo and Hannon (1998), who found that **higher levels of welfare assistance were associated with lower homicide rates**, and more recently Rudolph and Starke's (2020) who concluded that:  >**The welfare state suppresses crime particularly through social support via generous unemployment benefits.**  Regarding health (and other) outcomes, see Lagarde et al.'s (2009) Cochrane systematic review:  >**Conditional cash transfer programmes have been the subject of some well\u2010designed evaluations, which strongly suggest that they could be an effective approach to improving access to preventive services.** Their replicability under different conditions \u2010 particularly in more deprived settings \u2010 is still unclear because they depend on effective primary health care and mechanisms to disburse payments.  And Pega et al.'s (2017) Cochrane systematic review:  >This body of evidence suggests that unconditional cash transfers (UCTs) may not impact a summary measure of health service use in children and adults in LMICs. **However, UCTs probably or may improve some health outcomes** (i.e. the likelihood of having had any illness, the likelihood of having been food secure, and the level of dietary diversity), one social determinant of health (i.e. **the likelihood of attending school**), **and healthcare expenditure.** The evidence on the relative effectiveness of UCTs and CCTs remains very uncertain.   Building on Pega et al.'s last comment, I will note that although there is support for CCTs producing long-term benefits (see for example Parket and Vogl's assessment for the Center for Economic Policy Research), it is not straightforward to compare CCTs and UCTs. For illustration, see \u00d6zler's article for the World Bank:  >However, **there may be immediate trade-offs between CCTs and UCTs.** The same experiment in Malawi found that UCTs substantially outperformed CCTs in improving psychological well-being and reducing teen pregnancy and child marriage rates. This empirical finding, also supported by theory, has implications for the design of cash transfer programs: CCT programs create incentives for individuals to change their behaviors by denying transfers to those who do not satisfy the conditions. However, at least some of these individuals come from vulnerable households and are equally in need of income support. UCTs to such households can improve important outcomes, even though they are not as successful in improving the desired outcomes targeted by CCTs. Hence, **while CCT programs may be more effective than UCTs in obtaining the desired behavior change, they can also undermine the social protection dimension of cash transfer programs. Comparing the overall welfare effects requires estimates of how effective CCTs are at changing behavior, as well as judgments on the importance of the desired behavior change versus other important outcomes.**  ---  It is also important to keep in mind that not all programs are cut from the same cloth and outcomes can vary, i.e. to consider design and implementation. For instance, according to Gibson et al.'s (2017) systematic review of welfare-to-work programs:  >**The effects of WtW on health are largely of a magnitude that is unlikely to have tangible impacts.** Since income and employment are hypothesised to mediate effects on health, it is possible that these negligible health impacts result from the small effects on economic outcomes. **Even where employment and income were higher for the lone parents in WtW, poverty was still high for the majority of the lone parents in many of the studies. Perhaps because of this, depression also remained very high for lone parents whether they were in WtW or not.** There is a lack of robust evidence on the health effects of WtW for lone parents outside North America.   There can be, and there is, such a thing as poorly designed\/implemented welfare programs. Consider Pavetti's critique of TANF]( https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Temporary_Assistance_for_Needy_Families):  >In today\u2019s increasingly skill-focused economy, **work-first approaches that limit TANF recipients\u2019 opportunities to increase their skills through education and training hurt their chances of finding jobs and lifting themselves out of poverty.**  Also see [this Vox article on the legacy of the 1996 welfare reform which produced TANF:  >Using data from the Survey on Income and Program Participation (SIPP), **[[Shaefer and Edin]( http:\/\/www.twodollarsaday.com\/)] found that the share of households with less than $2 per day, per person, shot up from 1996 to 2011**, from 1.7 percent of households with children to 4.3 percent. That's a 153 percent increase.  >The growth is much smaller if you throw food stamps, tax credits, and housing subsidies into the mix, but it's still an increase of more than 45 percent: from 1.1 percent of households to 1.6 percent. That just underscores Edin and Shaefer's main point, which is that **more and more families are being forced to get by without a reliable source of cash income.**  >**And cash matters. You can't pay the rent with food stamps. You can't buy clothing for your children, or refill a subway card, or pay the car bill, or refill your gas tank either. You can't eat housing subsidies (and very few of the poor get them, in any case).**  Likewise, Greenstein (see above) discusses how TANF has been reevaluated in recent years, while reaffirming the success of other safety-net programs. Rudolph and Starke found that *some* not *all* welfare state interventions have an effect on homicide rates.   ---  [Continues next comment + reference list]","human_ref_B":"There is a lot of evidence on the link between benefit rates or duration on likelihood of leaving payments - indicating a work disincentive.  But where I think it gets interesting if that requirements to look for work, and active labour market programs, while receiving welfare dramatically speed transition off payment. Kluve et al 2018 have a nice meta analysis of studies in this area. https:\/\/academic.oup.com\/jeea\/article\/16\/3\/894\/4430618   My favourite study is McVicar 2010, which looks at closing of benefit offices in northern Ireland, which meant that although requirements stayed the same monitoring of job search ceased for a period of around right months. He found substantial decreases in the exit rate from payments when monitoring was removed.  https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1111\/j.1468-0335.2008.00747.x  Does that mean people are lazy without these programs? Not necessarily, perhaps just more choosey about what jobs they take. There is some mixed evidence in this area from the effect on reservation wages and post unemployment job security.  My humble view from researching this field a lot is that most job seekers on payments genuinely want to find work, but will find it more quickly if required to look.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1617.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"51d1kl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Have their been any studies on \"Too awesome to use\" syndrom? There have been many posts on other subs on the \"Too awesome to use\" syndrom that people suffer from in games. In short, a player will find an awesome, single use, item but never use it because they believe they will need it later. The player reaches the end of the game without using the item and loses out on the benefit.  An example is the Master Ball in the original Pokemon games.  Another related, but slightly different situation. A player finds an item that they believe is rarer than it actually is. They don't use it until they realize it is not as rare, losing out on the benefit they could have received during that time.  Have there been any studies on this topic and what were the conclusions?","c_root_id_A":"d7bxt29","c_root_id_B":"d7c7gd9","created_at_utc_A":1473194692,"created_at_utc_B":1473208957,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Not that I know of. I agree that the phenomenon is almost certainly real, is probably expressed in differing strengths by different people, and is probably amenable to experimental investigation. It strikes me as a particular variant of the endowment effect related to information asymmetries and\/or loss aversion. An individual without access to the real probabilities overestimates the potential worth of an item in the late-game because she 1) assumes it to be more rare than it in fact is 2) doesn't appreciate that other items she hasn't yet encountered might be better (a form of the availability heuristic) or 3) doesn't want to feel bad having used it at an unnecessary time when it, in fact, becomes necessary later (a form of regret aversion). Couple all of that with negativity bias -- that she'll remember past instances where using & losing has turned out badly more vividly than instances where using the item was the right choice (how does she even recognize that case?) and you've got a ready-made bias against use.","human_ref_B":"The closest thing I can think of is that this is an option value problem, an accessible introduction to which is in this tongue-in-cheek but entirely formally correct paper.  It is similar to the optimal stopping problem.  I don't know if anyone has specifically applied these principles to video games.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14265.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"45ta8t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"As far as I understand it is widely accepted that college increases an individual's future income. Is there research disentangling the effect of college as signifier of capabilities vs. college as a place where one gains knowledge (\"training\")?","c_root_id_A":"d007ea3","c_root_id_B":"d0098pw","created_at_utc_A":1455502478,"created_at_utc_B":1455505736,"score_A":17,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"This comment has been overwritten by an open source script to protect this user&apos;s privacy.  It was created to help protect users from doxing, stalking, harassment, and profiling for the purposes of censorship.      If you would also like to protect yourself, add the Chrome extension TamperMonkey, or the Firefox extension GreaseMonkey and add this open source script.      Then simply click on your username on Reddit, go to the comments tab, scroll down as far as possible (hint:use RES), and hit the new OVERWRITE button at the top.","human_ref_B":"Short answer, yes.  Long answer(s):  Arrow: http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/0047272773900133  Stiglitz: http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/1804834?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents  Weiss: http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/2138394?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents  Fortin: http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/30034326  Fang: http:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1111\/j.1468-2354.2006.00409.x\/abstract  Some dudes: http:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w13951","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3258.0,"score_ratio":1.4117647059}
{"post_id":"45ta8t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"As far as I understand it is widely accepted that college increases an individual's future income. Is there research disentangling the effect of college as signifier of capabilities vs. college as a place where one gains knowledge (\"training\")?","c_root_id_A":"d00ba36","c_root_id_B":"d007ea3","created_at_utc_A":1455509662,"created_at_utc_B":1455502478,"score_A":24,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"When talking more specifically about the possible added benefit of attending an elite college, future income seems to be more related to being the type person that would be accepted (or even just apply) to an elite school. If you have a kid that is accepted into both Harvard and UMass, and they attend UMass, on average, they will make the same salary as if they attended Harvard.  This is not true for minority and first generation students which do benefit more from attending elite schools.  https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w7322  https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w17159  http:\/\/jhr.uwpress.org\/content\/49\/2\/323.short","human_ref_B":"This comment has been overwritten by an open source script to protect this user&apos;s privacy.  It was created to help protect users from doxing, stalking, harassment, and profiling for the purposes of censorship.      If you would also like to protect yourself, add the Chrome extension TamperMonkey, or the Firefox extension GreaseMonkey and add this open source script.      Then simply click on your username on Reddit, go to the comments tab, scroll down as far as possible (hint:use RES), and hit the new OVERWRITE button at the top.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7184.0,"score_ratio":1.4117647059}
{"post_id":"45ta8t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"As far as I understand it is widely accepted that college increases an individual's future income. Is there research disentangling the effect of college as signifier of capabilities vs. college as a place where one gains knowledge (\"training\")?","c_root_id_A":"d009o50","c_root_id_B":"d00ba36","created_at_utc_A":1455506523,"created_at_utc_B":1455509662,"score_A":6,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"An interesting line of reasoning for disentangling the two is to look at the effect of the number of years of schooling in college on earnings in comparison to whether a degree was received. If knowledge was the main factor there should be a big jump in earnings for every additional year of college. If the only thing that matters is a signifier of credentials then there should be very little benefit of college until you get a degree and then once that degree's in hand you have a big increase in earnings. As far as I understand the research supports a greater effect of credentialing than knowledge. Furthermore the size of the gap between  degree holders and  \"some college\"\/associates people has increased over time, see this table of data from Pew Research Polls: http:\/\/www.usnews.com\/dims4\/USNEWS\/9421a79\/2147483647\/resize\/1280x1106\/quality\/85\/?url=%2Fcmsmedia%2F8b%2F20%2F1fc1cd614cc8b6d10513712fd1a1%2F140211-pewchart-editorial.pewchart.JPG (*typos)","human_ref_B":"When talking more specifically about the possible added benefit of attending an elite college, future income seems to be more related to being the type person that would be accepted (or even just apply) to an elite school. If you have a kid that is accepted into both Harvard and UMass, and they attend UMass, on average, they will make the same salary as if they attended Harvard.  This is not true for minority and first generation students which do benefit more from attending elite schools.  https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w7322  https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w17159  http:\/\/jhr.uwpress.org\/content\/49\/2\/323.short","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3139.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"2l5d5x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"If I'm a wealthy person, the best car I can buy is only affordable to a tiny proportion of the population. On the other hand, the best smartphone I can buy is a mass-marketed product affordable to a much larger portion of the population. Why is that?","c_root_id_A":"clruu3b","c_root_id_B":"clrqdhm","created_at_utc_A":1415037694,"created_at_utc_B":1415028926,"score_A":40,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I think the phone you're looking for might be this one:  http:\/\/www.vertu.com\/gb\/en\/collections\/signature-touch\/view-collection\/vertu-for-bentley\/600358-001-01.html  The price for high-end cars is such because of a number of reasons. Firstly, they are produced in lower quantities, so you're paying for the exclusivity. iPhones and Galaxy S's, while technologically among the best on the market, are hardly in short supply. Millions of them get made and sold every day, whereas the Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport, for example, had a total run of 150. The Veyron 16.4 Super Sport World Record Edition had a run of just five.  Additionally, with most, if not all high-end luxury brands, you pay a premium for the name, regardless of whether the actual good is better quality than a cheaper alternative. A good example of this is the luxury watch market - mechanical watches feature an astounding level of craftsmanship but many need to be wound every day and have been found to be inaccurate over long time periods compared with cheaper quartz-powered models. In this instance, the name Breitling or Patek Philippe commands the 5-6 digit price tag, not the fact that it is the 'best'.  Luxury goods are a prime example of 'commodity fetishism' i.e. you don't pay the high price because the product is discernibly better performing than any others, you pay it because you want it as a marker of status and resource. Making such products available to everyone would lessen the ability of the manufacturers to provide this intangible benefit to their customers, so they sell fewer, at an astronomically high price.  Another factor is that the manufacturer has a very clear idea of the sort of clientele they want to attract. Keeping them in the hands of the very rich ensures the brand stays desirable and aspirational. For example, in 2006 Jay-Z publicly boycotted Cristal after they said they didn't want their champagne associated with rappers, as it becomes a mainstream name and therefore 'cheap'.   On the other hand, Apple\/Samsung *want* everyone to have an iPhone - there isn't the same association of class as there is with luxury goods so the idea is to make them widely available.  edit: added a couple of sources","human_ref_B":"Please keep the discussion based on social science, not opinions or anecdotes. Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8768.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"2l5d5x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"If I'm a wealthy person, the best car I can buy is only affordable to a tiny proportion of the population. On the other hand, the best smartphone I can buy is a mass-marketed product affordable to a much larger portion of the population. Why is that?","c_root_id_A":"clrvomw","c_root_id_B":"clrqdhm","created_at_utc_A":1415039322,"created_at_utc_B":1415028926,"score_A":19,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"It's a good question, and the answer is simply that those super-premium cars don't financially make sense and are highly unprofitable. From here  > Take for instance the Bugatti Veyron. It costs Bugatti\u2019s parent company Volkswagen AG nearly $5 million to make one, but the company sells a Veyron for around $2.7 million. That\u2019s a $2.3 million loss on each car, which doesn\u2019t even consider the millions the company spent in car development. So why would a company knowingly make a car only to lose millions? The answer is ego.  In general tech companies like Apple are far more profitable and healthy than typical car companies. The car industry has started to follow tech's example (Tesla, the newest major car company, is being run a lot like a tech company). As an example, we're starting to see far more standardization in the premium car industry:  > Volvo Cars chief executive Hakan Samuelsson said the trend to offer more and more choice in equipping cars was over-rated. \"There is no customer desire for all these options. The iPhone has demonstrated that you can compete by selling a good well thought out product,\" he told Reuters in an interview. \"They out-competed rivals who offered many more model variants.\"","human_ref_B":"Please keep the discussion based on social science, not opinions or anecdotes. Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10396.0,"score_ratio":3.8}
{"post_id":"261vtt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Serious question: when did pooping become taboo? Yes, some may consider this puerile, but I'm genuinely curious.  Animals poop all the time with no regard for decorum. Yet we, as a species, have developed huge, special boxes so that we may poop privately.  There are unspoken rules in bathrooms (avoid eye contact, etc) that reinforce the notion that pooping should be a very private function.    We avoid talking about it in 'proper' settings and yet many of us joke about it in more informal settings.  It's considered an offensive (or at least inappropriate) topic by many and yet it's one of the very few things that literally every human on the planet has in common with one another.  I believe every (or nearly every, at least) culture has the same basic privacy standards around pooping, so it doesn't appear to be culturally influenced, but rather something more endemic to human nature.  So -- why are we so uptight about pooping when all other living organisms on the planet seem to not give a rip?  Were we always this way?","c_root_id_A":"chmz6ms","c_root_id_B":"chn2fch","created_at_utc_A":1400621866,"created_at_utc_B":1400629172,"score_A":20,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":">I believe every (or nearly every, at least) culture has the same basic privacy standards around pooping  Not sure Kotaku counts as a source, but...   http:\/\/kotaku.com\/5987786\/why-kids-keep-crapping-in-public-in-china","human_ref_B":"I Could point you towards Norbert Elias's *The History of Manners (The Civilizing Process, Vol. 1)* in wich he does, on a typical eliasian faishon, a sociogenetic analysis of the Manners on French and German society.  Tracing black to the development of the idea of *kultur* and *civilizacion* right at the begginning of the modern era, he also finds where our actual \"good manners\" come from. By developing a society where the bonds of interdependence are much tighter and because of that, the levels of scrutiny the higher strata of society puts between themselves are much higher, starting by their manners, shitting included, of course.  He explicitly says in the book that the reacion\u00e1rio of disgust these societies developed to shitting comes from that era where \"the civilizing process\" was  pressed against the top layer of society, and adopted by the classes below them in an effort to emulate their practices, hence their power.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7306.0,"score_ratio":1.35}
{"post_id":"261vtt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Serious question: when did pooping become taboo? Yes, some may consider this puerile, but I'm genuinely curious.  Animals poop all the time with no regard for decorum. Yet we, as a species, have developed huge, special boxes so that we may poop privately.  There are unspoken rules in bathrooms (avoid eye contact, etc) that reinforce the notion that pooping should be a very private function.    We avoid talking about it in 'proper' settings and yet many of us joke about it in more informal settings.  It's considered an offensive (or at least inappropriate) topic by many and yet it's one of the very few things that literally every human on the planet has in common with one another.  I believe every (or nearly every, at least) culture has the same basic privacy standards around pooping, so it doesn't appear to be culturally influenced, but rather something more endemic to human nature.  So -- why are we so uptight about pooping when all other living organisms on the planet seem to not give a rip?  Were we always this way?","c_root_id_A":"chn1u2s","c_root_id_B":"chn2fch","created_at_utc_A":1400627818,"created_at_utc_B":1400629172,"score_A":8,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"This is an interesting question, one that I had also assumed had been taboo for a long time and universal, but the posts below provide evidence to the counter.  May I suggest Cross-posting it to \/r\/askhistory or \/r\/AskAnthropology.","human_ref_B":"I Could point you towards Norbert Elias's *The History of Manners (The Civilizing Process, Vol. 1)* in wich he does, on a typical eliasian faishon, a sociogenetic analysis of the Manners on French and German society.  Tracing black to the development of the idea of *kultur* and *civilizacion* right at the begginning of the modern era, he also finds where our actual \"good manners\" come from. By developing a society where the bonds of interdependence are much tighter and because of that, the levels of scrutiny the higher strata of society puts between themselves are much higher, starting by their manners, shitting included, of course.  He explicitly says in the book that the reacion\u00e1rio of disgust these societies developed to shitting comes from that era where \"the civilizing process\" was  pressed against the top layer of society, and adopted by the classes below them in an effort to emulate their practices, hence their power.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1354.0,"score_ratio":3.375}
{"post_id":"1bvrvb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What are some big social science theories that are being discarded in light of new data? What are the new theories?","c_root_id_A":"c9ajh9k","c_root_id_B":"c9amcqh","created_at_utc_A":1365380200,"created_at_utc_B":1365388194,"score_A":21,"score_B":57,"human_ref_A":"The past 20+ years of data has pretty much annihilated the Schumpterian and Hayekian \"recessions are good and fiscal policy to alleviate gluts in spending bad\" frictionless model of macroeconomics.","human_ref_B":"Ethical decision making has been revised from a 'cognitive' model to an 'emotional' model.  Basically, we don't really think through our morality (we can, but mostly don't).  Rather, we have gut-level immediate responses to violations of fairness, harm, impurity, etc. and then rationalize the why after the fact.   Haidt's work has really laid the ground work for this stuff.   See: Social Intuitionist Model - http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Social_intuitionism#Objections_to_Haidt.27s_model","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7994.0,"score_ratio":2.7142857143}
{"post_id":"1bvrvb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What are some big social science theories that are being discarded in light of new data? What are the new theories?","c_root_id_A":"c9aoj66","c_root_id_B":"c9anorm","created_at_utc_A":1365394179,"created_at_utc_B":1365391794,"score_A":8,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Shareholder Value Theory has taken a serious hit quite recently.  I saw a webinar a few weeks ago given by Lynn Stout who is a professor of corporate and business law at Cornell.  She has a book out called The Shareholder Value Myth, it's on my to-read list but it sounds fantastic.","human_ref_B":"I think rational choice theory is slowly starting to lose ground to behavioral economics","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2385.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1bvrvb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What are some big social science theories that are being discarded in light of new data? What are the new theories?","c_root_id_A":"c9anorm","c_root_id_B":"c9aoqad","created_at_utc_A":1365391794,"created_at_utc_B":1365394770,"score_A":6,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I think rational choice theory is slowly starting to lose ground to behavioral economics","human_ref_B":"I think the fact that the rise of violent crime in the 1970s and 1980s in the US correlates INCREDIBLY strongly with the prevalence of lead paint (which suppresses reasoning and impulse control) kind of weakens the argument of Broken Window Theory.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2976.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"eeqvpx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why do Hispanic Women have a lower maternal mortality than White and Black Women? \u201cWhile 13 white women die for every 100,000 live births, the rate for Hispanic women is even lower: 11.4.  The figure for African-American women is 42.8 for every 100,000 live births, and for Native American\/Alaska Native women, 32.5\u201d.  Link https:\/\/www.google.com\/amp\/s\/www.nytimes.com\/2019\/05\/07\/health\/pregnancy-deaths-.amp.html  If both Hispanic women and black women tend to be on the lower end of the socioeconomic scale and have similar levels of obesity (both factors are said to contribute to maternal death rate) compared to white women. Why do they have a lower maternal mortality rate than white and black women?","c_root_id_A":"fbxo6b7","c_root_id_B":"fbx4927","created_at_utc_A":1577195586,"created_at_utc_B":1577168717,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"This may be part of the overall phenomenon that epidemiologists call the Hispanic paradox:  https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC3673509\/  Tl;dr Hispanic Americans outperform White and Black Americans on a range of health indicators relating to mortality. There are some possible explanations but no one is sure why.  Possible explanations:  Populations of Hispanic Americans are a healthy subgroup of immigrants because immigration is hard  Death certificate data doesn\u2019t accurately capture ethnicity","human_ref_B":"How does one compare Hispanics with black and white people when there are black Hispanics and white Hispanics?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":26869.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"837iy2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Is marijuana illegal in most other countries because of U.S. influence? If so, how did the U.S. convince other governments to outlaw it? I know that prohibition of marijuana started around the 1930's in the US, but there is not much information as to why other countries around the globe jumped on the bandwagon. Did the US basically force other nations to comply? If so, why did other nations do so without any objections?","c_root_id_A":"dvfrg8h","c_root_id_B":"dvfpww7","created_at_utc_A":1520613381,"created_at_utc_B":1520611978,"score_A":32,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"While in no way a comprehensive answer, earlier attempts to decriminalise or legalise cannabis in Canada were abandoned, in part, because of American pressure.   From the 2004 Canadian Senate Report of the Decriminalization of Marijuana:   >Colonel Robert Maginnis, a drug policy adviser to U.S. President George W. Bush, asserted that the United States would not look kindly on changes to Canadian marijuana laws and warned that it would be forced to take action.  He stated, \u201cIt creates some law enforcement problems and I think it creates some trade problems and some perception problems, especially in the U.S., with regard to whether Canada is engaged in fighting drug use rather than contributing to drug use\u201d and \u201cWe\u2019re going to have to clamp down even stronger on our border if you liberalize and contribute to what we consider a drug tourism problem.\u201d  and  >After Canada introduced its initial marijuana bill in May 2003, John Walters, the U.S. Drug Control Policy Director, warned that if the bill passed, the result would be increased security and lengthy delays at the border.(40)  He was quoted as saying, \u201cWe don\u2019t want the border with Canada looking like the U.S.-Mexico border,\u201d(41) \u201cYou expect your friends to stop the movement of poison toward your neighbourhood\u201d and \u201cWe have to be concerned about American citizens \u2026 When you make the penalties minimal, you get more drug production, you get more drug crime.\u201d(42)  David Murray, special assistant to Mr. Walters, stated that the proposed decriminalization initiative was \u201ca matter we look upon with some concern and some regret\u201d and \u201cWe would have no choice but to respond.\u201d  Source  So in this example, the United States did not make any overt or official threats, but clearly used their considerable weight to dissuade a foreign country from liberalizing drug laws. Tightening the Canada\/US border - through which passes billions of dollars of economic activity - was a strong deterrent and delaying legalization in Canada by several decades.","human_ref_B":"This book does a great job explaining the hegemonic influence of US drug policy and how the US developed international consensus.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1403.0,"score_ratio":1.1034482759}
{"post_id":"3sjtvf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"How did protestors during the Civil Rights Movement find the time to engage in such long protests? I am curious if there was significant unemployment\/underemployment among that population. And if it's possible that there is less long-term protesting currently in the United States because of higher employment rates among those with racial\/equality\/environmental grievances.","c_root_id_A":"cwy7src","c_root_id_B":"cwyamn9","created_at_utc_A":1447367542,"created_at_utc_B":1447371957,"score_A":2,"score_B":39,"human_ref_A":"This is a great question, and I feel like a problem of today is that people DON'T have the time to do protest and be more political. Hope someone shares  reasons why the system is now this way","human_ref_B":"This is a great question that is commonly asked by social movements scholars: who is most likely to protest? You should check out the book \"Freedom Summer\" by Doug McAdam. It's about the civil rights movement and looks at why some university students spent their summer in the south helping people of color register to vote in a very hostile environment.   Originally, sociologists thought protests were caused by things like high unemployment, alienation from their community, worsening conditions, etc. This school of thought is referred to as strain and breakdown theory. As we learned more about protest and saw everyday, middle-class folks take to the streets in the 1960s, our theories changed. Scholars realized that being unemployed or living in a bad environment weren't enough to get people marching in the streets. There are lots of structural factors and individual factors that cause people to protest. I'll briefly talk about the individual factors because that seems more relevant to your question.  In general, scholars have found that younger people with a supportive social network who have extra time and resources are more likely to protest. People who are more likely to hear about a protest (because they see a sign while walking around their university campus) or know a friend who will be going are more likely o protest. These and other personal characteristics that effect the likelihood of engaging in a protest are called \"biographical availability.\" However, this doesn't give us the whole picture because there are lots of instances when people protest who have jobs, don't have time, don't have money, etc.     Social movements scholars are still trying to answer this question.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4415.0,"score_ratio":19.5}
{"post_id":"223d32","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Why don't men wear make up?","c_root_id_A":"cgj22v2","c_root_id_B":"cgizx7u","created_at_utc_A":1396536542,"created_at_utc_B":1396530907,"score_A":40,"score_B":35,"human_ref_A":"There's a lot of moving pieces in this question.  It basically draws both from the biological aspects of psychology as well as the cultural aspects of both psychology and sociology.    There's not likely to be one absolute right answer but I'd argue there are two main parts.  \/u\/bks33691 touched on one - the question of status, masculinity, etc.  The other part is more a function of evolutionary psych.  A lot of research has found that cross-culturally, a big difference between men and women, is that men seek women who are attractive, and women seek men with wealth and power.  (Both are preferable, but it's relative importance, I'm talking about) - Buss 1989 is a pretty good place to start for this.    Anyway, so what's this have to do with the question.  Well, Makeup's goal is to make someone look more youthful and more attractive, which is likely why it appeals to women more than men.  Once women started using it, it becomes ingrained into society as a 'feminine' thing.  Then it becomes emasculating for men to wear it, which just pushes it to be a more feminine thing.  I should add the caveat that this is speculation at best.  We obviously don't have the psychological research looking at how female makeup from 100s of years ago influenced attitudes.  However, it is consistent with what we know about social norms, cultural adaptation, and the stereotype literature.","human_ref_B":"Although I agree with the concern that this question is too broad, I'll give a sort of general response.  There have been periods in history where men did routinely wear cosmetics - in Ancient Egypt, men wore eyeliner. In the 1920s in Germany, androgyny was popular among young people, with men wearing makeup and women sometimes wearing trousers. Today we see men that routinely wear eyeliner (Johnny Depp, for instance) outside of a performing context.   One possible explanation for the current western trend of makeup being for women is the idea that the ideal is \"white male\", and obviously you want to emulate the ideal. For a male to make themselves feminine is to reduce their social status to that of a female. It becomes acceptable for women to emulate men (in some areas), but not for men to emulate women.  Here's a piece that's light on the science, but is interesting for the examples it gives: http:\/\/www.charlottetilbury.com\/blog\/2013\/04\/a-short-history-of-men-and-make-up\/","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5635.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"eaqxty","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.98,"history":"A lot of indicators of well-being (health, life expectancy, education, etc.) are positively correlated with income. Is there a point after which additional income ceases to make a difference? It seems that the positive correlation between income and general well-being result from greater income enabling people to afford things (better quality food, better quality healthcare, better neighborhoods, etc.) that improve their well-being. My suspicion is that there may be a certain income level at which someone can afford pretty much anything that could improve their quality of life, and thus additional income would no longer help increase it.","c_root_id_A":"fawe0rc","c_root_id_B":"fax4ce7","created_at_utc_A":1576369717,"created_at_utc_B":1576378612,"score_A":10,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Not sure if this relates in terms of well being but theres a point where extra income doesnt cause extra happiness  https:\/\/www.economicshelp.org\/blog\/12309\/concepts\/diminishing-marginal-utility-of-income-and-wealth\/","human_ref_B":"Diener has done a lot of work on this. Here is one of his papers.  Generally (to my knowledge, my work is only loosely related to well being) the effert of income on wellbeing is stronger at lower lever of income with dimminsing returns as income increases. This seems to be moderated by the wealth of others arround you.  https:\/\/link.springer.com\/article\/10.1023\/A:1014411319119","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8895.0,"score_ratio":2.2}
{"post_id":"cqqees","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Why does college seem to make people more liberal?","c_root_id_A":"ewz1mbp","c_root_id_B":"ewyjvui","created_at_utc_A":1565889909,"created_at_utc_B":1565882322,"score_A":55,"score_B":51,"human_ref_A":"This question has been asked in the past, even recently, see for example here for the most recent thread).  To summarize my previous replies, without repeating myself much, those who have researched the topic (such as Gross and Duarte et al.), tend to agree that the political demographics of college, at least in the United States, are mostly the result of self-selection, rather than it being higher education itself, or professors and their classes, *making* students more liberal.   Some authors, such as Duarte et al., have also argued that the tendency for academicians to be liberal is *also* explained by discrimination and perceptions of hostile climate, and there are reasons to agree to a certain point with the existence of these two factors, although the extent of their impact remains unclear. That said, even the Heterodox Academy concurs that, removing these two factors, college would still be likely to have more \"liberals\" than \"conservatives\" because of a difference in interests (aka self-selection).  ---  To touch upon a couple of studies I did not get into much in previous replies, Dey found that:  >...] **rather than being generally liberalizing, students entering politically liberal institutions tend to become increasingly liberal**, whereas **those attending politically conservative institutions become increasingly conservative**.  Which he explains through peer influence and socialization. I will not get into here, but it is important to keep in mind that truly changing a person's attitudes is difficult without the person having, for example, the motivation to process the message and, in a sense, persuade themselves. It is not a straightforward process (see for example the unpleasantness produced by cognitive dissonance, and the effects of reactance).  A recent study that is interesting to consider is [Campbell and Horowitz's research on sociopolitical attitudes:  >Present scholarship and folk theory assume that college makes students more \u2018\u2018liberal,\u2019\u2019 but education might be confounded with unobserved family influences. **We investigated the effect of college on political orientation, support for civil liberties,and egalitarian gender-role beliefs** [...] We found that **earning a four-year college degree has a statistically significant impact on support for civil liberties and egalitarian gender-role beliefs, but the effect of college on political orientation may be spurious owing to family background**. In other words, **college does have a statistically significant effect on some sociopolitical beliefs, even if it does not necessarily make students more \u2018\u2018liberal\u2019\u2019 in political orientation** [...]   In other words, perhaps college education may affect students' attitudes towards certain topics, but that does not mean it changes students' preexisting political orientations.   ---  In any case, the literature on the topic tends to support the importance of self-selection, and not much the notion of college having the ability to change their students' political orientation, at least as an institution or through its employees, although it is reasonable to expect that the college *experience* might reinforce preexisting beliefs or affect attitudes towards specific topics, without however changing political orientations.","human_ref_B":"This is an extract from the concluding chapter of a fascinating ebook (referring you to more detail in chapter 2):  >*Higher Education.* Moving to a broader perspective in this broadening effort, evidence we encountered in Chapter 2 shows that higher education can have a significant beneficial impact upon authoritarian followers that lasts a lifetime. It doesn\u2019t usually turn them into anti-matter versions of their former selves. But four years of undergraduate experience knocks their RWA scale scores down about 15- 20%. That\u2019s a lot when you\u2019re talking about very dogmatic people. So for this, and many other reasons, it makes sense to keep our universities alive, vibrant and accessible.13 For all their faults, they can be the bastions of democracy they were meant to be. And if you buy my interpretation that it\u2019s the experience of interacting with so many different kinds of people that mainly produces the drop in authoritarianism, then we should especially support the institutions of higher learning that create such an environment.  Free download and new introduction available here: The Authoritarians  It's a little scrappy but a fun read, with most of the more detailed technical content in lengthy notes, so you can breeze through it or check the detail, as you wish. It was written as an accessible lay summary of Altemeyer's work since WWII investigating questions like this.  It's not perfect but it is breathtakingly prescient (or post-scient, really). You frequently have to double-check it was written in 2006 and not 2016, and it was written as a warning of what we are currently living through. So while there are some  valid criticisms, I think he's worth taking seriously. He absolutely nailed what happened in the 2016 election:  >Well, aren\u2019t most people likely to trust someone who seems to agree with them? Probably, but people differ enormously in gullibility. Low RWAs are downright suspicious of someone who agrees with them when they can see ulterior motives might be at work. They pay attention to the circumstances in which the other fellow is operating. But authoritarians do not, when they like the message.  >So (to foreshadow later chapters a little) suppose you are a completely unethical, dishonest, power-hungry, dirt-bag, scum-bucket politician who will say whatever he has to say to get elected. (I apologize for putting you in this role, but it will only last for one more sentence.) Whom are you going to try to lead, high RWAs or low RWAs? Isn\u2019t it obvious? The easy-sell high RWAs will open up their arms and wallets to you if you just sing their song, however poor your credibility. Those crabby low RWAs, on the other hand, will eye you warily when your credibility is suspect because you sing their song? So the scum-bucket politicians will usually head for the right-wing authoritarians, because the RWAs hunger for social endorsement of their beliefs so much they\u2019re apt to trust anyone who tells them they\u2019re right.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7587.0,"score_ratio":1.0784313725}
{"post_id":"35bk8t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"The list of most popular baby names for 2014 came out today. Why do the popularity of boys' names stay more constant than the popularity of girls' names? The list is here. One thing I noticed when going through several years is that some names - like William, Joshua, and Daniel - remain consistently high on the list. However, for girls, the names vary radically. For instance, none of the names on the list this year were on the list a decade ago, and none of the names from the year I was born are anywhere on the list, whereas boys' names remain on the list. Why is there such a difference in the trends for boys' names and girls' names?","c_root_id_A":"cr38pxx","c_root_id_B":"cr351oh","created_at_utc_A":1431139563,"created_at_utc_B":1431132335,"score_A":41,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/livescience.com\/41070-honor-culture-baby-names.html  There is a significant number of boys that are named after their father (i.e. Jr. or II) while carrying on of the mother's name to the daughter is less common, hence there is less variation in the naming practices of males.","human_ref_B":"Just a reminder to all that top-level comments require sources. Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7228.0,"score_ratio":3.7272727273}
{"post_id":"20zyb0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Does the idea that \"there are more slaves now than anytime in history\" hold up with a consistent definition of slavery, and when comparing to overall population? I've heard several claims that there are more slaves now than anytime before. They typically explain that it works out because of counting various forms of exploitation as slavery rather than just \"traditional\" slavery, but this exploitation doesn't sound like a new thing. Do the numbers still work out to say \"more slavery today\" if we count the same sorts of exploitation throughout history as slavery as well? And if so, is it just a change in raw numbers because of the population increase? Do we have any good, consistently defined estimates of how the percentage of people enslaved has changed from the past to now?","c_root_id_A":"cg8bp23","c_root_id_B":"cg8e8r8","created_at_utc_A":1395416964,"created_at_utc_B":1395422387,"score_A":6,"score_B":53,"human_ref_A":"You might need some help from \/r\/AskHistorians.","human_ref_B":"If you're really interested in this topic more than this one fact, check out Kevin Bales' \"Disposable People\".   In it, Bales describes the shift from what he calls Old Slavery to New Slavery, old being the type that the Civil War was waged over with a master who owns his slaves entirely, and new being an extreme form of economic exploitation. Both result in the complete control of an individual's life and economic activities for one's own gain. To illustrate his point and detail the injustices faced by modern slaves, Bales picks several specific cases: sex workers in Thailand, Charcoal Oven workers in Brazil, an entire class of people in Mauritania, and field workers in India.   To answer your question, Bales estimates that there are currently around 27 million slaves in the world. During the 200 some-odd years of the African Slave trade, around 50 million people were enslaved. That *at this very moment there are more people enslaved than there were in 100 years of African slave* trade sounds to me like that fact holds up. There are however now 7 billion people compared to roughly 1 billion during the African slave trade, so proportionally, 27 million is much smaller. But I feel that human slavery is something that should be dealt with in absolute terms, not relative.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5423.0,"score_ratio":8.8333333333}
{"post_id":"20zyb0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Does the idea that \"there are more slaves now than anytime in history\" hold up with a consistent definition of slavery, and when comparing to overall population? I've heard several claims that there are more slaves now than anytime before. They typically explain that it works out because of counting various forms of exploitation as slavery rather than just \"traditional\" slavery, but this exploitation doesn't sound like a new thing. Do the numbers still work out to say \"more slavery today\" if we count the same sorts of exploitation throughout history as slavery as well? And if so, is it just a change in raw numbers because of the population increase? Do we have any good, consistently defined estimates of how the percentage of people enslaved has changed from the past to now?","c_root_id_A":"cg8f5t9","c_root_id_B":"cg8f79o","created_at_utc_A":1395424264,"created_at_utc_B":1395424346,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Here's a whole video about it.  Kind of long, but in-depth.","human_ref_B":"I found this WaPo article a good description of what is considered slavery and how that statistic isn't some watered down definition of slavery.  We do have more slaves today (that was my takeaway from the article at least).    As Congenital-Optimist pointed out, that is perhaps a smaller percentage of slaves because population has grown so much.  http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/worldviews\/wp\/2013\/10\/17\/this-map-shows-where-the-worlds-30-million-slaves-live-there-are-60000-in-the-u-s\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":82.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"lsqq4t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why is public shaming a common practice but public forgiveness isn't?","c_root_id_A":"gosukj8","c_root_id_B":"got70yc","created_at_utc_A":1614318801,"created_at_utc_B":1614329268,"score_A":5,"score_B":37,"human_ref_A":"What is your definition of forgiveness?","human_ref_B":"Shaming is commonly used as a social tool to enforce norms. Researchers suggest \u201cmorally relevant emotions [such as shame] may moderate the link between moral standards and moral decisions, and ultimately moral behavior\u201d (bracketed words added by me).   Public forgiveness doesn\u2019t have the same element of social pressure. There are probably more elements to this question though\u2014for example, perhaps it\u2019s easier for a large group of individuals to agree that someone  did something wrong than to agree on the appropriate way for the person to earn forgiveness for their action.    Citation: https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC3083636\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10467.0,"score_ratio":7.4}
{"post_id":"lsqq4t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why is public shaming a common practice but public forgiveness isn't?","c_root_id_A":"gosukj8","c_root_id_B":"gotxgif","created_at_utc_A":1614318801,"created_at_utc_B":1614349230,"score_A":5,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"What is your definition of forgiveness?","human_ref_B":"Why would forgiveness be the opposite of shaming? Wouldn't the opposite of public shaming (for a behavior found unacceptable) be public praise (for a behavior one wishes to reinforce)?  Edit: I assume they're meant to be opposites; otherwise, I just don't see how shaming and forgiveness are related in a way that makes the assumption (i.e. if shaming is common, then forgiving should be) make sense.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":30429.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"9wic7h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"A few decades ago, the psychiatric hospitals and mental hospitals were shut down and the patients moved into the community. How has that worked out for the patients and the community? Also, are there more homeless now because they would previously have been in hospitals?","c_root_id_A":"e9l4u28","c_root_id_B":"e9l2dcv","created_at_utc_A":1542067130,"created_at_utc_B":1542065024,"score_A":28,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"There are two issues with deinstitutionalization. Firstly, while there were economical benefits, the money should be spent into developing appropriate and adapted community care. However, the money saved was\/is not always reinvested to follow up the closure of psychiatric hospitals, reduction of beds and\/or the reduction of time spent in a hospital:  >\\...\\] resources from reductions in inpatient services should be invested into community services. In other words, community services are not cheaper alternatives to hospital-based services, but should be seen as part of a whole system. Therefore, the focus on inpatient bed use as a measure of efficacy needs to be considered in the context of its integral role within this system, accepting that it is the most expensive element of care.  Secondly, while advances in psychopharmacology and psychotherapy allow for most patients to live in community, there are still a minority of patients suffering from severe and\/or chronic illnesses which have difficulty integrating community and are, according to some authors, scarcely taken care of following deinstitutionalization. There is also a problem of revolving doors (shorter stays, but with multiple admissions over time). Indeed, many people suffering from severe symptoms can be found among the homeless. An example from a [Swiss (Zurich) study:  >Community sheltered accommodation in Zurich although conceptualized to prevent homelessness in the first place de facto serve as housing facilities for individuals with severe  mental illness. Individuals living in these facilities are even more impaired concerning social problems, physical health, substance abuse, and some psychiatric symptoms than patients at intake on an acute psychiatric ward. It should be a major concern of mental health policy to enable adequate mental health care for those individuals who are notable or willing to access traditional institution-based services.  It is not all grim, however. There are programs that allow to help even patients with severe mental illnesses and approaches that target homelessness as a doorway to better lives. Furthermore, whether desinstitutionalization actually contributes to the prevalence of homelessness is debated:  >Analysis  of  these  studies demonstrates  that  homelessness  and  criminality  among discharged patients occurred sporadically, and suggests that even patients who were discharged after many years in hospital did well in the community. This is in line with the evidence presented by Kunitoh, who conducted a systematic review and concluded that deinstitutionalisation was generally beneficial for the majority of discharged patients in terms of both social functioning and quality of life. It also supports findings made by Rothbard & Kuno, who analysed four cases of deinstitutionalisation in Europe and suggested that discharging long-stay patients to the community might be easier than is usually assumed. Our study reveals little evidence of negative consequences of deinstitutionalisation globally.  The answer, in the end, probably depends a lot on the context and implementation:  > In  some  countries,  efforts  to  deinstitutionalise  mental healthcare have been half-hearted, with an emphasis on closing down psychiatric beds rather than on providing comprehensive community-based services. Where bed reduction is done responsibly, either in the context of closing hospitals or \u2018down-sizing\u2019 bed numbers, it has been shown that the overall costs of community care are about the same as for the previous hospital services for such patients.","human_ref_B":"A common term for this trend is \"deinstitutionalization\". There is a pretty extensive Wikipedia article under that title.   Here is a critical review of the book *Nowhere to Go**,* both of which were published in the late 1980s. This book was influential in promoting the argument that deinstitutionalization contributed to a crisis of homelessness.   Here is an interesting *Washington Post* blog post analyzing how deinstitutionalization worked out better for populations with developmental and intellectual disabilities than for those with psychiatric illnesses.  Finally I'll quote from the abstract of an article (published in 2006) which may still reflect the consensus supported by relevant research to date:  >Although homelessness among the chronically mentally ill is closely  linked with deinstitutionalization, it is not the result of  deinstitutionalization per se but of the way deinstitutionalization has  been carried out. The lack of planning for structured living arrangements and for adequate treatment and rehabilitative services in  the community has led to many unforeseen consequences such as homelessness, the tendency for many chronic patients to become drifters, and the shunting of many of the mentally ill into the criminal justice  system. it has become clear after two decades of deinstitutionalization  that what is needed is a vast expansion of community housing and other  services and a whole revamping of the mental health system to meet the  needs of the chronically mentally ill for support and stability. In addition, mental health professionals must accept the full extent of the dependency needs of many chronic patients.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2106.0,"score_ratio":2.1538461538}
{"post_id":"9wic7h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"A few decades ago, the psychiatric hospitals and mental hospitals were shut down and the patients moved into the community. How has that worked out for the patients and the community? Also, are there more homeless now because they would previously have been in hospitals?","c_root_id_A":"e9l1u8e","c_root_id_B":"e9l4u28","created_at_utc_A":1542064553,"created_at_utc_B":1542067130,"score_A":7,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"This BBC documentary gives a pretty good overview of the closing of the asylums and some of its effects in the UK. It focuses more on what life was like in the asylum but does go over the transition from aslyum to community-based care.   https:\/\/youtu.be\/oswUssXzFlY  >Documentary which tells the fascinating and poignant story of the closure of Britain's mental asylums. In the post-war period, 150,000 people were hidden away in 120 of these vast Victorian institutions all across the country. Today, most mental patients live out in the community and the asylums have all but disappeared. Through powerful testimonies from patients, nurses and doctors, the film explores this seismic revolution and what it tells us about society's changing attitudes to mental illness over the last sixty years.   It would help to clarify what country you're interested in though.","human_ref_B":"There are two issues with deinstitutionalization. Firstly, while there were economical benefits, the money should be spent into developing appropriate and adapted community care. However, the money saved was\/is not always reinvested to follow up the closure of psychiatric hospitals, reduction of beds and\/or the reduction of time spent in a hospital:  >\\...\\] resources from reductions in inpatient services should be invested into community services. In other words, community services are not cheaper alternatives to hospital-based services, but should be seen as part of a whole system. Therefore, the focus on inpatient bed use as a measure of efficacy needs to be considered in the context of its integral role within this system, accepting that it is the most expensive element of care.  Secondly, while advances in psychopharmacology and psychotherapy allow for most patients to live in community, there are still a minority of patients suffering from severe and\/or chronic illnesses which have difficulty integrating community and are, according to some authors, scarcely taken care of following deinstitutionalization. There is also a problem of revolving doors (shorter stays, but with multiple admissions over time). Indeed, many people suffering from severe symptoms can be found among the homeless. An example from a [Swiss (Zurich) study:  >Community sheltered accommodation in Zurich although conceptualized to prevent homelessness in the first place de facto serve as housing facilities for individuals with severe  mental illness. Individuals living in these facilities are even more impaired concerning social problems, physical health, substance abuse, and some psychiatric symptoms than patients at intake on an acute psychiatric ward. It should be a major concern of mental health policy to enable adequate mental health care for those individuals who are notable or willing to access traditional institution-based services.  It is not all grim, however. There are programs that allow to help even patients with severe mental illnesses and approaches that target homelessness as a doorway to better lives. Furthermore, whether desinstitutionalization actually contributes to the prevalence of homelessness is debated:  >Analysis  of  these  studies demonstrates  that  homelessness  and  criminality  among discharged patients occurred sporadically, and suggests that even patients who were discharged after many years in hospital did well in the community. This is in line with the evidence presented by Kunitoh, who conducted a systematic review and concluded that deinstitutionalisation was generally beneficial for the majority of discharged patients in terms of both social functioning and quality of life. It also supports findings made by Rothbard & Kuno, who analysed four cases of deinstitutionalisation in Europe and suggested that discharging long-stay patients to the community might be easier than is usually assumed. Our study reveals little evidence of negative consequences of deinstitutionalisation globally.  The answer, in the end, probably depends a lot on the context and implementation:  > In  some  countries,  efforts  to  deinstitutionalise  mental healthcare have been half-hearted, with an emphasis on closing down psychiatric beds rather than on providing comprehensive community-based services. Where bed reduction is done responsibly, either in the context of closing hospitals or \u2018down-sizing\u2019 bed numbers, it has been shown that the overall costs of community care are about the same as for the previous hospital services for such patients.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2577.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"9wic7h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"A few decades ago, the psychiatric hospitals and mental hospitals were shut down and the patients moved into the community. How has that worked out for the patients and the community? Also, are there more homeless now because they would previously have been in hospitals?","c_root_id_A":"e9l1u8e","c_root_id_B":"e9l2dcv","created_at_utc_A":1542064553,"created_at_utc_B":1542065024,"score_A":7,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"This BBC documentary gives a pretty good overview of the closing of the asylums and some of its effects in the UK. It focuses more on what life was like in the asylum but does go over the transition from aslyum to community-based care.   https:\/\/youtu.be\/oswUssXzFlY  >Documentary which tells the fascinating and poignant story of the closure of Britain's mental asylums. In the post-war period, 150,000 people were hidden away in 120 of these vast Victorian institutions all across the country. Today, most mental patients live out in the community and the asylums have all but disappeared. Through powerful testimonies from patients, nurses and doctors, the film explores this seismic revolution and what it tells us about society's changing attitudes to mental illness over the last sixty years.   It would help to clarify what country you're interested in though.","human_ref_B":"A common term for this trend is \"deinstitutionalization\". There is a pretty extensive Wikipedia article under that title.   Here is a critical review of the book *Nowhere to Go**,* both of which were published in the late 1980s. This book was influential in promoting the argument that deinstitutionalization contributed to a crisis of homelessness.   Here is an interesting *Washington Post* blog post analyzing how deinstitutionalization worked out better for populations with developmental and intellectual disabilities than for those with psychiatric illnesses.  Finally I'll quote from the abstract of an article (published in 2006) which may still reflect the consensus supported by relevant research to date:  >Although homelessness among the chronically mentally ill is closely  linked with deinstitutionalization, it is not the result of  deinstitutionalization per se but of the way deinstitutionalization has  been carried out. The lack of planning for structured living arrangements and for adequate treatment and rehabilitative services in  the community has led to many unforeseen consequences such as homelessness, the tendency for many chronic patients to become drifters, and the shunting of many of the mentally ill into the criminal justice  system. it has become clear after two decades of deinstitutionalization  that what is needed is a vast expansion of community housing and other  services and a whole revamping of the mental health system to meet the  needs of the chronically mentally ill for support and stability. In addition, mental health professionals must accept the full extent of the dependency needs of many chronic patients.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":471.0,"score_ratio":1.8571428571}
{"post_id":"8uwzwi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Can someone Explain like I'm five years old what a phrase like \"masculinity is just a social construct\" means? Hey all,  Sorry if this isn't the appropriate place but I posted on the sociology sub and got taken down, so I figured here might be more appropriate. Quick background, I am a gay man, and the words \"social construct\" get thrown around a lot in LGBT circles. I am not a psych expert, but I am curious to learn more about sociology and what people mean when they use the term social construct, especially in relation to topics such as what type of people you are sexually attracted too.  An example of the above statement that I have heard is when asked \"what type of guys do you go after.\" I respond with \"I like masculine guys\" and sometimes get a response like \"That is a stupid thing to say, Masculinity is just a social construct.\" In the context of the sentence, I take it to mean that masculinity isn't real, and therefore me being attracted to masculine men is all in my head. Is this the case?  Also curious to how this works with race in relation to social construct. A statement like \"I don't find myself to be attracted to Asian facial features\" gets met with \"race is just a social construct.\" I take it to mean that all the races look the same, and therefore Asian facial features aren't real.   Is this what people mean by race being a social construct, or is it more stereotypes based on race, such as Asians can't drive, or are good at math?  Anyone care to educate me on this? Any kind of insight you can give, especially when it comes to sexual attraction, and what people could or could not find attractive in a partner.  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"e1j2gtd","c_root_id_B":"e1jjwiv","created_at_utc_A":1530318994,"created_at_utc_B":1530343486,"score_A":14,"score_B":67,"human_ref_A":"When it comes to attraction, the general consensus seems to be that we select for secondary sexual characteristics, with masculinity usually being associated with a \"large jaw and a prominent brow ridge\" as signs of dominance: https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC3130383\/   One study showed that people rate others within their population high, so some cues for attractiveness might be learned.   http:\/\/visionlab.harvard.edu\/Members\/Ken\/MCB117\/perrett.pdf   Feminie features are sometimes preferred\/Too much testosterone decreases attractiveness:   https:\/\/pdfs.semanticscholar.org\/6fa8\/1decde5ee769aa2967d7dc85d4671755288f.pdf   http:\/\/citeseerx.ist.psu.edu\/viewdoc\/download?doi=10.1.1.502.9105&rep=rep1&type=pdf  I'll probably regret commenting on it, but social constructivism is a complex beast of its own that (and I'm trying to be objective here) may or may not deserve a place in the discussion at all. The majority of it's ideas come from communication science (my field of study) and even the people they've based their theories on (like Habermas) heavily critizise them for effectively being pseudoscience that wants to be normative. The court of public debate is definitely still in session on that one, with people you've probably heard of like Jordan Peterson, Steven Pinker, Christina Hoff-Sommers and others making careers on youtube and in academia critizising postmodernism, its social construct-concept, and (as some replies here do as well) it's denial of biological reality. I'd suggest you give those guys a listen to hear some well-formulated counterpoints against Foucault's idea that sexuality is just.  Edit: typos","human_ref_B":"In sociology, the term \"social construct\" refers to behaviors that are not innate in humans, but instead are learned gradually over time. The most obvious social constructs are things like gender, which imply different roles for women and men because of how they are raised and treated as people. For example, women are told to be timid, polite, risk-averse, and tidy, while men are taught to be bold, passionate, chivalrous, and only feel anger as their emotional outlet. The argument goes that men and women are not innately different in these ways, but are taught to be different from a young age. Using your example, masculinity is a social construct because it is a learned trait of men. This means that masculinity is the most valued and accepted form of being a man, that society has indoctrinated people to value. One of the best articles to explain this is [Connell and Messerschmidt's study] (http:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1177\/0891243205278639) on hegemonic masculinity. In sum, they say:   > Hegemonic masculinity was understood as the pattern of practice (i.e., things done, not just a set of role expectations or an identity) that allowed men\u2019s dominance over women to continue.  Similarly, we are socially constructed to view race as an important identifier because of its historic precedence (ie: oppression of Black bodies and hierarchy created through whiteness). It's easy to recognize these are socially constructed if we replace race with something more trivial, like eye color. We don't readily distinguish between people with different eye colors, those with blue eyes are treated roughly the same as those with green. This shows how we *socially construct* race's importance, and it is not inherent or innate.  Many of these other responses are not actually correct. Social constructs are a very specific, sociological concept, so be careful when reading other sources that cite philosophy or psychology. These sources generally do not understand the *social* nature of social constructs (which shape the learning and understanding of people broadly), and instead feature the individuals prominently.  Happy to clarify or answer more specific questions if you've got them!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24492.0,"score_ratio":4.7857142857}
{"post_id":"8uwzwi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Can someone Explain like I'm five years old what a phrase like \"masculinity is just a social construct\" means? Hey all,  Sorry if this isn't the appropriate place but I posted on the sociology sub and got taken down, so I figured here might be more appropriate. Quick background, I am a gay man, and the words \"social construct\" get thrown around a lot in LGBT circles. I am not a psych expert, but I am curious to learn more about sociology and what people mean when they use the term social construct, especially in relation to topics such as what type of people you are sexually attracted too.  An example of the above statement that I have heard is when asked \"what type of guys do you go after.\" I respond with \"I like masculine guys\" and sometimes get a response like \"That is a stupid thing to say, Masculinity is just a social construct.\" In the context of the sentence, I take it to mean that masculinity isn't real, and therefore me being attracted to masculine men is all in my head. Is this the case?  Also curious to how this works with race in relation to social construct. A statement like \"I don't find myself to be attracted to Asian facial features\" gets met with \"race is just a social construct.\" I take it to mean that all the races look the same, and therefore Asian facial features aren't real.   Is this what people mean by race being a social construct, or is it more stereotypes based on race, such as Asians can't drive, or are good at math?  Anyone care to educate me on this? Any kind of insight you can give, especially when it comes to sexual attraction, and what people could or could not find attractive in a partner.  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"e1jjwiv","c_root_id_B":"e1j2zao","created_at_utc_A":1530343486,"created_at_utc_B":1530319584,"score_A":67,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"In sociology, the term \"social construct\" refers to behaviors that are not innate in humans, but instead are learned gradually over time. The most obvious social constructs are things like gender, which imply different roles for women and men because of how they are raised and treated as people. For example, women are told to be timid, polite, risk-averse, and tidy, while men are taught to be bold, passionate, chivalrous, and only feel anger as their emotional outlet. The argument goes that men and women are not innately different in these ways, but are taught to be different from a young age. Using your example, masculinity is a social construct because it is a learned trait of men. This means that masculinity is the most valued and accepted form of being a man, that society has indoctrinated people to value. One of the best articles to explain this is [Connell and Messerschmidt's study] (http:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1177\/0891243205278639) on hegemonic masculinity. In sum, they say:   > Hegemonic masculinity was understood as the pattern of practice (i.e., things done, not just a set of role expectations or an identity) that allowed men\u2019s dominance over women to continue.  Similarly, we are socially constructed to view race as an important identifier because of its historic precedence (ie: oppression of Black bodies and hierarchy created through whiteness). It's easy to recognize these are socially constructed if we replace race with something more trivial, like eye color. We don't readily distinguish between people with different eye colors, those with blue eyes are treated roughly the same as those with green. This shows how we *socially construct* race's importance, and it is not inherent or innate.  Many of these other responses are not actually correct. Social constructs are a very specific, sociological concept, so be careful when reading other sources that cite philosophy or psychology. These sources generally do not understand the *social* nature of social constructs (which shape the learning and understanding of people broadly), and instead feature the individuals prominently.  Happy to clarify or answer more specific questions if you've got them!","human_ref_B":"This is more of a question for philosophers. A good rundown of this topic can be found in section 1 of this article. In general, to say something is socially constructed is to say that it's up to us. Its existence or its features depend on how humans think, feel, and act. Features of rocks are not socially constructed because no matter how you think, feel, or act, a rock will have the features that it has. Money is socially constructed because a piece of paper can only be traded for goods and services if human beings treat that piece of paper in the right way.  So, if masculinity is a social construct, this means that our ideas of what men are supposed to be like, what makes a good man vs. a bad man, why men do the things they do, and so on are up to us rather than set in stone. If we changed our views on masculinity, we'd have different thoughts about how men are supposed to be, etc.  People who say \"that is a stupid thing to say, masculinity is just a social construct\" might mean all sorts of things. The people I hang out with don't say that sort of thing, and I would never say that sort of thing, so I can't really read the minds of your friends. If you provide more detail I'd be happy to try to fill out what they might mean, though.  When people say race is a social construct, they don't necessarily mean all races look the same. See section 2 of this article and the article more generally for a discussion of the topic in sophisticated terms. As for what your friends mean, it's hard to know without more details.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":23902.0,"score_ratio":9.5714285714}
{"post_id":"8uwzwi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Can someone Explain like I'm five years old what a phrase like \"masculinity is just a social construct\" means? Hey all,  Sorry if this isn't the appropriate place but I posted on the sociology sub and got taken down, so I figured here might be more appropriate. Quick background, I am a gay man, and the words \"social construct\" get thrown around a lot in LGBT circles. I am not a psych expert, but I am curious to learn more about sociology and what people mean when they use the term social construct, especially in relation to topics such as what type of people you are sexually attracted too.  An example of the above statement that I have heard is when asked \"what type of guys do you go after.\" I respond with \"I like masculine guys\" and sometimes get a response like \"That is a stupid thing to say, Masculinity is just a social construct.\" In the context of the sentence, I take it to mean that masculinity isn't real, and therefore me being attracted to masculine men is all in my head. Is this the case?  Also curious to how this works with race in relation to social construct. A statement like \"I don't find myself to be attracted to Asian facial features\" gets met with \"race is just a social construct.\" I take it to mean that all the races look the same, and therefore Asian facial features aren't real.   Is this what people mean by race being a social construct, or is it more stereotypes based on race, such as Asians can't drive, or are good at math?  Anyone care to educate me on this? Any kind of insight you can give, especially when it comes to sexual attraction, and what people could or could not find attractive in a partner.  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"e1jlbd0","c_root_id_B":"e1j2gtd","created_at_utc_A":1530346548,"created_at_utc_B":1530318994,"score_A":21,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"\/u\/greenbayjordan articulated it beautifully. However, given the nature of your question- it's also worth mentioning why masculinity is such a contentious concept within the LGBT+ community. The homophobic aspects of masculinity isolate all gay men to some degree. Those who consider themselves masculine feel the constant need to defend, assert, and prove their masculinity in a world where masculinity is heteronormative. Alternatively, many of us who were never masculine in the traditional sense were beaten with the concept over and over as children and can still face discrimination and rejection when we don't feign conformativity. Masculinity is a social construct, but moreover, it is performative. By recognizing how society has shaped our notions of identity, we can open ourselves up to experiencing wider possibilities.","human_ref_B":"When it comes to attraction, the general consensus seems to be that we select for secondary sexual characteristics, with masculinity usually being associated with a \"large jaw and a prominent brow ridge\" as signs of dominance: https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC3130383\/   One study showed that people rate others within their population high, so some cues for attractiveness might be learned.   http:\/\/visionlab.harvard.edu\/Members\/Ken\/MCB117\/perrett.pdf   Feminie features are sometimes preferred\/Too much testosterone decreases attractiveness:   https:\/\/pdfs.semanticscholar.org\/6fa8\/1decde5ee769aa2967d7dc85d4671755288f.pdf   http:\/\/citeseerx.ist.psu.edu\/viewdoc\/download?doi=10.1.1.502.9105&rep=rep1&type=pdf  I'll probably regret commenting on it, but social constructivism is a complex beast of its own that (and I'm trying to be objective here) may or may not deserve a place in the discussion at all. The majority of it's ideas come from communication science (my field of study) and even the people they've based their theories on (like Habermas) heavily critizise them for effectively being pseudoscience that wants to be normative. The court of public debate is definitely still in session on that one, with people you've probably heard of like Jordan Peterson, Steven Pinker, Christina Hoff-Sommers and others making careers on youtube and in academia critizising postmodernism, its social construct-concept, and (as some replies here do as well) it's denial of biological reality. I'd suggest you give those guys a listen to hear some well-formulated counterpoints against Foucault's idea that sexuality is just.  Edit: typos","labels":1,"seconds_difference":27554.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"8uwzwi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Can someone Explain like I'm five years old what a phrase like \"masculinity is just a social construct\" means? Hey all,  Sorry if this isn't the appropriate place but I posted on the sociology sub and got taken down, so I figured here might be more appropriate. Quick background, I am a gay man, and the words \"social construct\" get thrown around a lot in LGBT circles. I am not a psych expert, but I am curious to learn more about sociology and what people mean when they use the term social construct, especially in relation to topics such as what type of people you are sexually attracted too.  An example of the above statement that I have heard is when asked \"what type of guys do you go after.\" I respond with \"I like masculine guys\" and sometimes get a response like \"That is a stupid thing to say, Masculinity is just a social construct.\" In the context of the sentence, I take it to mean that masculinity isn't real, and therefore me being attracted to masculine men is all in my head. Is this the case?  Also curious to how this works with race in relation to social construct. A statement like \"I don't find myself to be attracted to Asian facial features\" gets met with \"race is just a social construct.\" I take it to mean that all the races look the same, and therefore Asian facial features aren't real.   Is this what people mean by race being a social construct, or is it more stereotypes based on race, such as Asians can't drive, or are good at math?  Anyone care to educate me on this? Any kind of insight you can give, especially when it comes to sexual attraction, and what people could or could not find attractive in a partner.  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"e1jlbd0","c_root_id_B":"e1j2zao","created_at_utc_A":1530346548,"created_at_utc_B":1530319584,"score_A":21,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"\/u\/greenbayjordan articulated it beautifully. However, given the nature of your question- it's also worth mentioning why masculinity is such a contentious concept within the LGBT+ community. The homophobic aspects of masculinity isolate all gay men to some degree. Those who consider themselves masculine feel the constant need to defend, assert, and prove their masculinity in a world where masculinity is heteronormative. Alternatively, many of us who were never masculine in the traditional sense were beaten with the concept over and over as children and can still face discrimination and rejection when we don't feign conformativity. Masculinity is a social construct, but moreover, it is performative. By recognizing how society has shaped our notions of identity, we can open ourselves up to experiencing wider possibilities.","human_ref_B":"This is more of a question for philosophers. A good rundown of this topic can be found in section 1 of this article. In general, to say something is socially constructed is to say that it's up to us. Its existence or its features depend on how humans think, feel, and act. Features of rocks are not socially constructed because no matter how you think, feel, or act, a rock will have the features that it has. Money is socially constructed because a piece of paper can only be traded for goods and services if human beings treat that piece of paper in the right way.  So, if masculinity is a social construct, this means that our ideas of what men are supposed to be like, what makes a good man vs. a bad man, why men do the things they do, and so on are up to us rather than set in stone. If we changed our views on masculinity, we'd have different thoughts about how men are supposed to be, etc.  People who say \"that is a stupid thing to say, masculinity is just a social construct\" might mean all sorts of things. The people I hang out with don't say that sort of thing, and I would never say that sort of thing, so I can't really read the minds of your friends. If you provide more detail I'd be happy to try to fill out what they might mean, though.  When people say race is a social construct, they don't necessarily mean all races look the same. See section 2 of this article and the article more generally for a discussion of the topic in sophisticated terms. As for what your friends mean, it's hard to know without more details.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":26964.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"2yrhtm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are there underlying reasons in sociology of religion or elsewhere for why the Supreme Court consists entirely of Catholics and Jews, two minorities which were historically underrepresented? And do Catholics over-represent in law as a field in general?","c_root_id_A":"cpd6vbb","c_root_id_B":"cpcxogy","created_at_utc_A":1426208514,"created_at_utc_B":1426192865,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Jews are disproportionately represented among the most prominent legal scholars in the United States. Brian Leiter ranks scholars based on citations here. The four most cited legal scholars in the country are Jewish (Sunstein, Chermerinsky, Epstein, Posner) and 7 of the top 11 are Jewish (Add Farber, Tushnet, & Tribe).   There could also be some Roe v. Wade implications. Jews are overwhelmingly pro-choice (93% overall, even 77% of Jewish Republicans. It's probably damn near 100% among the non-Orthodox), more so than any other religious group, including the irreligious. All three Jews on the court are liberal, and the Presidents that appointed them may have seen them as less likely to have some sort of change of heart on abortion.","human_ref_B":"Razib Khan cites a number of scholarly sources in his discussion of this issue:  * http:\/\/blogs.discovermagazine.com\/gnxp\/2010\/04\/america-2010\/#.VQH5V3zF_fs * http:\/\/blogs.discovermagazine.com\/gnxp\/2010\/04\/it-doesnt-matter-if-theres-no-protestant-on-the-supreme-court\/#.VQH5QnzF_fs","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15649.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2pv722","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Is Kwanzaa still widely celebrated? If not, what caused its decline? I just realized when watching a rerun of the Futurama Holiday Special that I have not heard anything referencing Kwanzaa for many years despite living in an area with a large black community. Is the holiday dying or is it a regional thing? What does this mean for the changing identity of American Black culture?","c_root_id_A":"cn0fn4a","c_root_id_B":"cn0equj","created_at_utc_A":1419080939,"created_at_utc_B":1419075781,"score_A":21,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"In a 2006 speech, Ron Karenga asserted that 28 million people celebrate Kwanzaa. He has always claimed it is celebrated all over the world. Lee D. Baker puts the number at 12 million. The African American Cultural Center claimed 30 million in 2009.  -Wikipedia  First page of Google Results for \"how many people celebrate Kwanzaa?\" is pretty interesting.   Is Kwanzaa Still A Thing?  Who Actually Celebrates Kwanzaa?  Confessions of a Kwanzaa dropout: Why I don\u2019t celebrate the holiday  5 Reasons Why Black People Don\u2019t Care About Kwanzaa","human_ref_B":"Was it ever highly celebrated? I did a quick look and couldn't find any statistics. Does anyone have a source?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5158.0,"score_ratio":1.9090909091}
{"post_id":"1ngoua","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Why are there so many less socially visible lesbians than gay men in the LGBT makeup? Perhaps this is a purely aesthetic observation, but i would love some insightful answers on this.  If there are nearly equal men and women in the population and being gay is not a choice, then homosexuality should be spread equally among men and women, right? But in all major cities that have a gay area like West Hollywood in LA, or Chelsea or Hells Kitchen in NYC, there are far fewer bars and clubs geared for lesbians than for gay males. Provincetown, MA has many themed weeks for their summer festivities, mostly geared to either men who love to party, (circuit party week) or men who love to eat (bear week). There is a women's week, but it is relatively poorly attended. Also, any gay rally or gay pride festival is usually composed mainly of men- certainly not an equal 50\/50 ratio. Gay AA meetings are about 95% men (trust me, i would know).   This observation came about when i went to \"Out on the Mountain\" which was Six Flags Magic Mountain's version of a gay day. As usual, most of the attendees were male. i would say about 80% men, 20% women. Which seems to be the average for any sort of gay\/lesbian ratio.   It's even more confusing when you add in all the deaths of gay men from HIV\/AIDS- which almost strictly (in the gay community) affects males. So there should be even MORE lesbians than men, right?   I'm just not sure why so many lesbians would be invisible, and why our society has structured itself to market almost strictly to the male.   Any clues??","c_root_id_A":"cciq4pz","c_root_id_B":"cciqe1m","created_at_utc_A":1380608710,"created_at_utc_B":1380610082,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":">If there are nearly equal men and women in the population and being gay is not a choice, then homosexuality should be spread equally among men and women, right?  No. Being color blind or hemophilic aren't choices either, but men are still vastly overrepresented. Getting cervical cancer isn't a choice, but cervical cancer patients are not very likely to be male.","human_ref_B":"Interesting article in the Atlantic about this: http:\/\/www.theatlanticcities.com\/arts-and-lifestyle\/2013\/08\/whats-killing-new-yorks-lesbian-bar-scene\/6444\/  The explanations offered are that:  1. Lesbians tend to get hit on by straight dudes in public spaces like bars.  2. Lesbians tend to meet each other more through private events like house parties and through mutual friends, so they don't really need a bar scene as much anyway.   3. Women tend to drink less, so lesbian bars are more likely to go out of business.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1372.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"k56wfv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"How do organised, large-scale rebellions happen? I've heard time and time again about surprisingly well-organised, large-scale rebellions against all kinds of rulers, but how exactly does that happen? How does one person or a small group of people build up a huge, secret organisation like that? It HAD to start somewhere, and I can see no problem how a group of idealistic or particularly desperate friends would band together. But how does one get from that to organised underground without being discovered? You can't just hang up a poster with your contact information or ask around, so how DO you recruit people for your cause if said cause is illegal?    Note: I am relatively new to Reddit and specifically have never been on this Subreddit before, so I would like to apologise in advance if this question is in conflict with any of the rules. I was brainstorming ideas for a D&D campaign, when this popped into my head and kept gnawing on my brain, so I tried to find the most appropriate sub to ask how these things happen irl. Apologies if this was not the right one","c_root_id_A":"ged68dv","c_root_id_B":"ged3flk","created_at_utc_A":1606915894,"created_at_utc_B":1606913899,"score_A":24,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I\u2019m on mobile so don\u2019t have access to the full text, but this here is a social psychological model of collective resistance that might answer some of your questions.   Long and short of it is that a subordinate group has to start seeing itself as a cohesive group, devise \u201ccognitive alternatives\u201d to their situation (i.e., envision a different, better, and achievable set of circumstances), and have strong leadership that can take the lead on developing the infrastructure of resistance, whatever that looks like. At a certain point they\u2019ll probably recruit outside supporters as well as they gain momentum, because they don\u2019t have the resources on their own to fight the dominant group.  The dominant group can counter the formation of subordinate group collective identity through dividing the subordinate group, fucking with their leaders, and\/or allowing leaders to become part of the dominant group in some way. It\u2019s this idea of permeability\u2014how easy is it to go from subordinate group to dominant group? If there\u2019s high permeability, subordinate group members will link their outcomes to their own actions instead of their group status, so collective identity won\u2019t form. Collective efficacy is also important. The subordinate group has to feel like their efforts will work. If the dominant group comes down hard on them for a small action, that will reduce collective efficacy.  There\u2019s lots more good stuff in there. Might not be able to help you with the large-scale part but hopefully you can use the psychological mechanisms in your campaign.  Edit: here's the full text. It's on the long side but very much worth the read!","human_ref_B":"The most enlightening study on social protest and its organisation that I've read is Roger Gould's book on the Paris Commune of 1871. He compares this to the French Revolution of 1848 and shows that it was not class consciuousness but neighborhood solidarity which mobilized people. Through this comparison and his generalizations at the end of the book, you may get some ideas.  https:\/\/press.uchicago.edu\/ucp\/books\/book\/chicago\/I\/bo3635234.html","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1995.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"k56wfv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"How do organised, large-scale rebellions happen? I've heard time and time again about surprisingly well-organised, large-scale rebellions against all kinds of rulers, but how exactly does that happen? How does one person or a small group of people build up a huge, secret organisation like that? It HAD to start somewhere, and I can see no problem how a group of idealistic or particularly desperate friends would band together. But how does one get from that to organised underground without being discovered? You can't just hang up a poster with your contact information or ask around, so how DO you recruit people for your cause if said cause is illegal?    Note: I am relatively new to Reddit and specifically have never been on this Subreddit before, so I would like to apologise in advance if this question is in conflict with any of the rules. I was brainstorming ideas for a D&D campaign, when this popped into my head and kept gnawing on my brain, so I tried to find the most appropriate sub to ask how these things happen irl. Apologies if this was not the right one","c_root_id_A":"ged3flk","c_root_id_B":"gedaf2y","created_at_utc_A":1606913899,"created_at_utc_B":1606917996,"score_A":4,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"The most enlightening study on social protest and its organisation that I've read is Roger Gould's book on the Paris Commune of 1871. He compares this to the French Revolution of 1848 and shows that it was not class consciuousness but neighborhood solidarity which mobilized people. Through this comparison and his generalizations at the end of the book, you may get some ideas.  https:\/\/press.uchicago.edu\/ucp\/books\/book\/chicago\/I\/bo3635234.html","human_ref_B":"How to pose and research this question itself is a topic of debate. How do we know why some revolutions happened (france, russia, china) and why some didn't (germany, england)? What kind of evidence is useful for determining this? and what is the best method - case studies, regression? - for locating the factors that seem to precipitate revolution?   As you can tell, this is not my area of sociology. But my entry-way was through the methodological questions.   So here are two of the most well known books on the topic and Burawoy's (long) article analyzing the difference between these two kinds of approaches. Skocpol's work has more than 10,000 citations, so it is fair to say that most people who think about how revolutions happen would consider this argument as central to their understanding (even if they ultimately diverge from it)  Skocpol, T. (1979). *States and social revolutions: A comparative analysis of France, Russia and China*. Cambridge University Press.  Trotsky, L. (2008). *History of the Russian revolution*. Haymarket Books.  Burawoy, M. (1989). Two methods in search of science. *Theory and Society*, *18*(6), 759-805.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4097.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"k56wfv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"How do organised, large-scale rebellions happen? I've heard time and time again about surprisingly well-organised, large-scale rebellions against all kinds of rulers, but how exactly does that happen? How does one person or a small group of people build up a huge, secret organisation like that? It HAD to start somewhere, and I can see no problem how a group of idealistic or particularly desperate friends would band together. But how does one get from that to organised underground without being discovered? You can't just hang up a poster with your contact information or ask around, so how DO you recruit people for your cause if said cause is illegal?    Note: I am relatively new to Reddit and specifically have never been on this Subreddit before, so I would like to apologise in advance if this question is in conflict with any of the rules. I was brainstorming ideas for a D&D campaign, when this popped into my head and kept gnawing on my brain, so I tried to find the most appropriate sub to ask how these things happen irl. Apologies if this was not the right one","c_root_id_A":"geeb524","c_root_id_B":"ged3flk","created_at_utc_A":1606933275,"created_at_utc_B":1606913899,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This is a fairly big question, so I will try to present some general points.     Charles Tilly (\"From Mobilisation to Revolution\", p54 in this PDF https:\/\/deepblue.lib.umich.edu\/bitstream\/handle\/2027.42\/50931\/156.pdf) has a really strong theoretical account of which groups are more likely to mobilise in cases of protests, revolutions, rebellions etc (which he refers to under an umbrella term \"contentious politics\"). He classifies groups among two dimensions: \"catness\" (from the word \"category\")  and \"netness\" (from the word \"network\"). Examples of categories are women, US citizens, black people, workers etc. With belonging to a category comes a feeling of identity and, potentially, distinct interests. Tilly claims that those groups that have high \"catness\" - i.e. strong identity stemming from belonging to a distinct category,- but also high \"netness\", meaning that they are interconnected on a personal level are more likely to mobilise.  A 19th-century example would be workers of a factory that live in a working-class neighbourhood and socialise in a neighbourhood pub. If they were, for example, to form a union and decide to go on strike, they would likely mobilise along pre-existing networks. Even if they don't all know each other, friends would tell friends about the union etc. and no one would have to post adverts. The key thing here is that identities and networks that allow mobilisation to happen precede the mobilisation itself, so its not like there is an underground clandestine organisation that the law-enforcement would be able to break up and it is not feasible to tell people not to go to work and pubs.     Another point is that some groups have to be less clandestine than others. Typically, when large-scale rebellions or even revolutions happen, some things tend to go wrong with the repressive apparatus and the government might not be able to suppress them in their infancy. The key idea here is elite defection and law-enforcement defection. To be effective, a government has to rely on certain elite groups (historically - aristocracy and church, currently - senior law enforcement officials, large business donors, senior politicians etc). If those groups do not get certain benefits from the government, they might be willing to support the challengers or at least perform their role rather poorly. For example, business might start donating to opposition groups, police may decide to ignore some forms of unlawful organisation etc.   Here is a paper on contemporary Russia with some examples, but elite defection is a fairly central point in study of contentious politics.  https:\/\/papers.ssrn.com\/sol3\/papers.cfm?abstract\\_id=3046900  &#x200B;  Finally, you might wonder under which conditions would some of the above happen. Someone has already pointed to Theda Skocpol's \"States and Social Revolutions\".    https:\/\/books.google.co.uk\/books\/about\/States\\_and\\_Social\\_Revolutions.html?id=so0gddc0w3UC&printsec=frontcover&source=kp\\_read\\_button&redir\\_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false  Her starting point is a contrast between two definitions of a state, the one that focuses on states maintaining a monopoly on legitimate power domestically, and the one that looks at states competing for power internationally. Then she goes on to point that when there is a tension between the two, things tend to go wrong. One example is the Russian Revolution of 1917,  where tension was due to the fact that a country with a really backward agrarian economy was stuck in a war with major industrialised powers and could not keep up.  So those situations of tension domestically and internationally would be the ones where you are more likely to see conditions for a succesful revolution, and elite and law-enforcement defections as mechanisms within that.     This is a very rough sketch, but if you read something on the topic with these ideas in mind (groups that are form both a category and network on individual level, elite and law-enforcement defection on a medium level, and states stuck in domestic and international conflicts as a bigger picture) you will see some patterns.     If you are actually going to read something, Jack Goldstone's Revolutions: A Very Short Introduction might be worth your time:  https:\/\/www.veryshortintroductions.com\/view\/10.1093\/actrade\/9780199858507.001.0001\/actrade-9780199858507-chapter-1","human_ref_B":"The most enlightening study on social protest and its organisation that I've read is Roger Gould's book on the Paris Commune of 1871. He compares this to the French Revolution of 1848 and shows that it was not class consciuousness but neighborhood solidarity which mobilized people. Through this comparison and his generalizations at the end of the book, you may get some ideas.  https:\/\/press.uchicago.edu\/ucp\/books\/book\/chicago\/I\/bo3635234.html","labels":1,"seconds_difference":19376.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"e37zof","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Roe V. Wade, The 90's crime rate, and Freakonomic's Theory I recently read Freakonomic's and the most interesting theory I encountered in that text was that the sudden decrease of crime in the 1990's was in direct correlation to the legalization of abortion in 1973 (Roe V. Wade). The idea is that the population of impoverished, uneducated youths that would have grown up to be criminals never existed because they were aborted, which in turn lead to an unexplained decrease in crime in the late 90's. It's an understandably controversial theory and many dismiss it as absurd, but I have yet to find someone willing to explain why it's absurd. I understand that you can't test for a non-event, but the idea seems plausible enough to be worth exploring. My question: is there any validity to the theory?","c_root_id_A":"f91nkjs","c_root_id_B":"f91mh98","created_at_utc_A":1574995500,"created_at_utc_B":1574994548,"score_A":54,"score_B":38,"human_ref_A":"There was an updated paper published this year which re-affirmed the conclusions of the original 2001 paper:  > Donohue and Levitt (2001) presented evidence that the legalization of abortion in the early 1970s played an important role in the crime drop of the 1990s. That paper concluded with a strong out-of-sample prediction regarding the next two decades: \u201cWhen a steady state is reached roughly twenty years from now, the impact of abortion will be roughly twice as great as the impact felt so far. Our results suggest that all else equal, legalized abortion will account for persistent declines of 1 percent a year in crime over the next two decades.\u201d Estimating parallel specifications to the original paper, but using the seventeen years of data generated after that paper was written, we find strong support for the prediction. The estimated coefficient on legalized abortion is actually larger in the latter period than it was in the initial dataset in almost all specifications. We estimate that crime fell roughly 20% between 1997 and 2014 due to legalized abortion. The cumulative impact of legalized abortion on crime is roughly 45%, accounting for a very substantial portion of the roughly 50-55% overall decline from the peak of crime in the early 1990s.   Link: https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w25863","human_ref_B":"Most Social Scientists do not find the theory to be valid.    The question has been addressed here before.  If you scroll down to u\/IamA_GIffen_Good_AMA's comment he links to an article in the Economist that explains:     >It  was a good test to attempt. But Messrs Foote and Goetz have inspected  the authors' computer code and found the controls missing. In other  words, Messrs Donohue and Levitt did not run the test they thought they  had\u2014an \u201cinadvertent but serious computer programming error\u201d, according  to Messrs Foote and Goetz   >   >Fixing  that error reduces the effect of abortion on arrests by about half,  using the original data, and two-thirds using updated numbers. But there  is more. In their flawed test, Messrs Donohue and Levitt seek to  explain arrest totals (eg, the 465 Alabamans of 18 years of age arrested  for violent crime in 1989), not arrest rates per head (ie, 6.6 arrests  per 100,000). This is unsatisfactory, because a smaller cohort will  obviously commit fewer crimes in total. Messrs Foote and Goetz, by  contrast, look at arrest rates, using passable population estimates  based on data from the Census Bureau, and discover that the impact of  abortion on arrest rates disappears entirely. \u201cI am simply not convinced  that there is a link between abortion and crime,\u201d Mr Foote says.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":952.0,"score_ratio":1.4210526316}
{"post_id":"b5b8s5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Some argue self-driving cars should be banned because of the potential harm to the job market. Has tech advancement ever been banned?","c_root_id_A":"ejdf0ty","c_root_id_B":"ejcy85a","created_at_utc_A":1553551544,"created_at_utc_B":1553540867,"score_A":41,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"In Turkey, we banned printing presses (for Muslims) in the Ottoman Empire, a ban that continued well into the 18th century. People of other religions were allowed to open and set up printing houses for themselves to distribute various books in their own languages and alphabet, but for Muslims it was banned. As a justification, it was said that it was against religion and all that, but the main material reason behind it was that there were lots and lots of people, mainly of clerical origin, who made a living by copying texts by hand. As the ulema (clerical) class had a sizable influence on the state, they remain banned for more than two centuries.  The first Muslim owned printing press was opened by Ibrahim Muteferrika in 1727.  A contextual and almost anectodal example and nowhere near universal, the gist is that if people who can potentially 'ban' a tech are also the ones who are most negatively affected by it, they will try to ban it.","human_ref_B":"On the book \"The Gene\", Siddhartha Mukherjee talks about what he calls the only (IIRC: someone with the book at hand is welcome to correct me) time science has ever announced a whole discipline off limits: making certain edits to the human genome.   Of course, the ethics here are beyond protection of livelihoods, and into more biological and ethical questions. But the idea of collectively rendering entire fields of inquiry off limits (or at least constrained by very very strict limits) seemed somewhat relevant to your question.   That being said, I understand there are those who disagree with Mukherjee's characterisation of some concepts in this book, like epigenetics. Perhaps his characterisation of the conference in question is also disputed; I'm not a biologist, just a reader.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10677.0,"score_ratio":2.1578947368}
{"post_id":"b5b8s5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Some argue self-driving cars should be banned because of the potential harm to the job market. Has tech advancement ever been banned?","c_root_id_A":"ejdf0ty","c_root_id_B":"ejct2jv","created_at_utc_A":1553551544,"created_at_utc_B":1553537360,"score_A":41,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"In Turkey, we banned printing presses (for Muslims) in the Ottoman Empire, a ban that continued well into the 18th century. People of other religions were allowed to open and set up printing houses for themselves to distribute various books in their own languages and alphabet, but for Muslims it was banned. As a justification, it was said that it was against religion and all that, but the main material reason behind it was that there were lots and lots of people, mainly of clerical origin, who made a living by copying texts by hand. As the ulema (clerical) class had a sizable influence on the state, they remain banned for more than two centuries.  The first Muslim owned printing press was opened by Ibrahim Muteferrika in 1727.  A contextual and almost anectodal example and nowhere near universal, the gist is that if people who can potentially 'ban' a tech are also the ones who are most negatively affected by it, they will try to ban it.","human_ref_B":"This is a great question for \/r\/AskHistorians","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14184.0,"score_ratio":5.125}
{"post_id":"b5b8s5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Some argue self-driving cars should be banned because of the potential harm to the job market. Has tech advancement ever been banned?","c_root_id_A":"ejcy85a","c_root_id_B":"ejct2jv","created_at_utc_A":1553540867,"created_at_utc_B":1553537360,"score_A":19,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"On the book \"The Gene\", Siddhartha Mukherjee talks about what he calls the only (IIRC: someone with the book at hand is welcome to correct me) time science has ever announced a whole discipline off limits: making certain edits to the human genome.   Of course, the ethics here are beyond protection of livelihoods, and into more biological and ethical questions. But the idea of collectively rendering entire fields of inquiry off limits (or at least constrained by very very strict limits) seemed somewhat relevant to your question.   That being said, I understand there are those who disagree with Mukherjee's characterisation of some concepts in this book, like epigenetics. Perhaps his characterisation of the conference in question is also disputed; I'm not a biologist, just a reader.","human_ref_B":"This is a great question for \/r\/AskHistorians","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3507.0,"score_ratio":2.375}
{"post_id":"afv58q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Do Childless people have higher or lower rates of depression and other mental illness?","c_root_id_A":"ee1qku8","c_root_id_B":"ee1l498","created_at_utc_A":1547475838,"created_at_utc_B":1547469894,"score_A":60,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I haven't personally read into any research on mental health and childlessness, but I have read research on happiness and childlessness.  People who choose to have children tend to be happier than those who don't, but having children makes people less happy.   > women who are voluntarily childless are likely to have a happier and more gratifying life than parents.  _  > life satisfaction peaks in anticipation of the birth of the first child but drops sharply in the first years thereafter, especially for women  _  > At least for first-world countries, Billari concludes that happier people on average have more children, for the simple reason that a basic level of happiness is a requirement for having children in such societies.^19 People preferably delay parenthood until they have, for example, a strong relationship, good housing and a fixed income, all factors that are positively correlated with happiness.^20\u201322  Mertes, H. (2017). The role of anticipated decision regret and the patient's best interest in sterilisation and medically assisted reproduction. Journal of Medical Ethics, 43(5), 314\u2013318. http:\/\/doi.org\/10.1136\/medethics-2016-103551   > \u2018parents of grown children have no better well-being than adults who never had children\u2019.of 72 female participants, those who had chosen to be childless had higher overall levels of well-being and fewer regrets than mothers.   McQueen, P. (2017). Autonomy, age and sterilisation requests. Journal of Medical Ethics, 43(5), 310\u2013313. http:\/\/doi.org\/10.1136\/medethics-2016-103664","human_ref_B":"My hunch is that there's too much subgroup differences by marital status and gender to speak about it meaningfully in a ceteris paribus context.  e.g. you might observe that the coefficient signs for childlessness are actually flipped between the two  situations: a) a single childless women vs a single mother and b) married man with child vs. married man childless.   The overall effect without simultaneously considering gender and marital status effects is probably meaningless.   Edit: it appears that the effects are only significant through interactions (as I suspected):  \"Results of multivariate analyses show no significant, direct effect of childlessness (on depression), though a marginally significant effect appears for women.\"  Koropeckyj-Cox, T. (1998). Loneliness and depression in middle and old age: Are the childless more vulnerable?.\u00a0The Journals of Gerontology Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences,\u00a053(6), S303-S312.  Obviously this is just 1 study, but my point is that when you run your interactions (with gender, age, marital status) - you'll likely have very different results between subgroups.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5944.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"4qeuh0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"It's time to be an adult and learn me some Economics. But, uh, where do I start? Basically, I'm looking for some good, unbiased (as much as possible) books to read on Economics. I'm looking to gain a better understanding of macroeconomics, but I understand that a firm understanding of will require that I understand some micro stuff, and probably some sociology. Suggestions? Also, if anyone has any good lecturers to recommend, I'm open.","c_root_id_A":"d4sgtg4","c_root_id_B":"d4shsxj","created_at_utc_A":1467204431,"created_at_utc_B":1467206302,"score_A":5,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I highly suggest this online course on Microeconomics Principles by Dr. Jos\u00e9 J. V\u00e1zquez-Cognet of University of Illinois. He bases it on Krugman's Economics textbook, so you can complement his videos by reading the Krugman text.","human_ref_B":"did you take a look at this sub's reading list in the sidebar? The textbook section there is a good start.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1871.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"4qeuh0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"It's time to be an adult and learn me some Economics. But, uh, where do I start? Basically, I'm looking for some good, unbiased (as much as possible) books to read on Economics. I'm looking to gain a better understanding of macroeconomics, but I understand that a firm understanding of will require that I understand some micro stuff, and probably some sociology. Suggestions? Also, if anyone has any good lecturers to recommend, I'm open.","c_root_id_A":"d4sgtg4","c_root_id_B":"d4skdbd","created_at_utc_A":1467204431,"created_at_utc_B":1467210400,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I highly suggest this online course on Microeconomics Principles by Dr. Jos\u00e9 J. V\u00e1zquez-Cognet of University of Illinois. He bases it on Krugman's Economics textbook, so you can complement his videos by reading the Krugman text.","human_ref_B":"Come by the \"gold sticky\" post on \/r\/badeconomics  It's a good place for these questions and there are some standard texts and sources that have been shared there in the past. It's also my sub :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5969.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"4qeuh0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"It's time to be an adult and learn me some Economics. But, uh, where do I start? Basically, I'm looking for some good, unbiased (as much as possible) books to read on Economics. I'm looking to gain a better understanding of macroeconomics, but I understand that a firm understanding of will require that I understand some micro stuff, and probably some sociology. Suggestions? Also, if anyone has any good lecturers to recommend, I'm open.","c_root_id_A":"d4srwrq","c_root_id_B":"d4skhv8","created_at_utc_A":1467219601,"created_at_utc_B":1467210583,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"My suggestions would be *Naked Economics* and the *Cartoon Introduction* series, but I see that those have already been suggested and then downvoted. I'm curious about why, as all three were textbooks for an \"Economics for Educators\" class I took. They seemed ideal for the layman. Is that not what OP was asking for?   Edit: I've got a novel idea: answering my question instead of downvoting me for asking it.","human_ref_B":"Here's an online course in basic macroeconomics using totally free materials: https:\/\/learn.saylor.org\/course\/econ102\/ There's a micro counterpart as well. These materials are put together by an educational charity, not a political think tank or campaign (you're wise to be wary of bias).  I second the recommendation of Tim Harford's books if you're not ready to dive into a formal course. However, the macro system differs between countries, so which author is best to learn from will depend which country you're in.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9018.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"2k5f9r","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Are the poorest 10% of Americans more or less politically conservative than the richest 10% of Americans? Concerning all types of conservatism (social, economic, moral, religious).","c_root_id_A":"clibfgb","c_root_id_B":"cli5gwd","created_at_utc_A":1414132638,"created_at_utc_B":1414116887,"score_A":22,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"At a simple level, we can just look at this ourselves.  Lets assume you want recent numbers.  The General Social Survey includes a lot of this information.  Luckily, it is publicly available online and you can do simple analysis right in your browser through the SDA archive at Berkeley.  Link.  So, the survey has always included income questions, but it's hard to compare this over time without doing something more sophisticated than I feel like doing right now.  However, in 2006, they introduced a new variable, RINCOM06, which classed people into one of 25 income brackets, with each bracket containing between 11.1% and 0.6% of the population for a given year.  The survey is now done every two years, so we have 06, 08, 10, 12.  The bottom four brackets (those making up to $5,000) together are 9.3% of the sample.  The top four brackets together (those making over $90,000) together are 8.3% of the sample.  So, now that we have identified the richest and poorest ~10% in the sample, we need to figure out how to measure conservatism.  I'll do the simplest, self identification along a political spectrum, and will leave the remainder as an exercise for the reader (after I show the results, I'll explain how to get them using the SDA browser interface).  The easiest variable to use here is political views, POLVIEWS, which asks based on a seven point scale \"very conservative, conservative, slightly conservative, moderate, slightly liberal, liberal, very liberal\".    Here's a imgur album of the results, edited in MS Paint for your reading ease (I have neither STATA nor any photo editing software on this computer, so everything is basic).  As you can see, the rich are more conservative than the poor.  17.0% of the poor are conservative or extremely conservative, versus 27.6% of the rich.  If we include \"slightly conservative\", it's 33.1% versus 48.1%.  The last image + description in the album should tell you all you need to know to replicate this data, and find more questions that can help get at social, economic, moral, and religious conservatism.  I'll start you off and say the standard question for religious conservatism is the variable BIBLE:   >*Which of these statements comes closest to describing your feelings about the Bible? 1. The Bible is the actual word of God and is to be taken literally, word for word. 2. The Bible is the inspired word of God but not everything in it should be taken literally, word for word. 3. The Bible is an ancient book of fables, legends, history, and moral precepts recorded by men.*    I don't happen to know if there are as standard questions for \"moral\", social, and economic conservatism. The results obviously do not include statistical significance\/margins of errors, but the GSS is a fairly large sample, especially if you're using multiple years (be careful if you're using smaller subsamples, of course.  If you know enough stats to understand significance, it's easy to run your own significance tests on the data).    For more on the history of the General Social Survey, see here.  The General Social Survey is really the \"gold standard\" for public opinion research.  It's a real gift that all this data is available online.  I encourage you all to play around with it and try to answer your own questions.","human_ref_B":"Hard to put it in exactly those terms, but I would start with Michael Hout's work:  http:\/\/scholar.google.com\/scholar?q=michael+hout+class+and+politics&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart&sa=X&ei=-LRJVJa4I8nygwTj6oKIBQ&ved=0CB0QgQMwAA His general point is that there's not really a straightforward relationship between social class and voting\/opinion patterns.  Recognize that the poorest 10% are a very diverse group--so poor rural protestants would, yes, be very conservative on those measures. More diversity of opinions, especially on economic policy and social policies, would be found in poor nonwhites (but still, look for lots of diversity in the various populations).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15751.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"x8k7sl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Books to Read Instead of Jared Diamond's Books? I've come to understand that many historians don't have a high opinion of Jared Diamond. However, the topics his books cover are of great interest to me, moreso than books about any particular time or place. I'm especially interested in books like *Collapse, Upheaval,* and *The World Until Yesterday,* which cover topics related to the characteristics that make societies resilient and successful (from a quality of life perspective). I'm also interested in The Knowledge: How to Rebuild Our World from Scratch, but am skeptical of a history book written by an astrobiologist.  Like many people, I struggle to comprehend more academically-oriented works, and lack the time or energy to engage in them. This relegates me to more easily-digestible material, which runs the risk of limiting me to \"pop history\".  Any suggestions as to books that cover these topics? I'm more interested in the sociological and anthropological aspects than the actual history of any specific era or location.","c_root_id_A":"inkj838","c_root_id_B":"iniz50n","created_at_utc_A":1662631916,"created_at_utc_B":1662597469,"score_A":17,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"You might find Why Nations Fail to be interesting. Here is a link to a talk by one of the authors summarizing its content.","human_ref_B":"You might like Ian Morris.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":34447.0,"score_ratio":1.8888888889}
{"post_id":"x8k7sl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Books to Read Instead of Jared Diamond's Books? I've come to understand that many historians don't have a high opinion of Jared Diamond. However, the topics his books cover are of great interest to me, moreso than books about any particular time or place. I'm especially interested in books like *Collapse, Upheaval,* and *The World Until Yesterday,* which cover topics related to the characteristics that make societies resilient and successful (from a quality of life perspective). I'm also interested in The Knowledge: How to Rebuild Our World from Scratch, but am skeptical of a history book written by an astrobiologist.  Like many people, I struggle to comprehend more academically-oriented works, and lack the time or energy to engage in them. This relegates me to more easily-digestible material, which runs the risk of limiting me to \"pop history\".  Any suggestions as to books that cover these topics? I'm more interested in the sociological and anthropological aspects than the actual history of any specific era or location.","c_root_id_A":"inj33pc","c_root_id_B":"inkj838","created_at_utc_A":1662599196,"created_at_utc_B":1662631916,"score_A":5,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Check out \u201cthe Dawn of Everything\u201d by The Davids Graeber and Wengrow. Really fantastic work. I\u2019m on the last chapter now.","human_ref_B":"You might find Why Nations Fail to be interesting. Here is a link to a talk by one of the authors summarizing its content.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":32720.0,"score_ratio":3.4}
{"post_id":"il7g66","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Why are conservatives obsessed with values? In a PragerU video, they claim that it's not income inequality, climate change or other political, cultural, social or economic issues that are making young people depressed, it's the loss of values and belief in their country. Why is this the conclusion they got instead of the objectively bad things happening in society?","c_root_id_A":"g3qwe02","c_root_id_B":"g3qb810","created_at_utc_A":1599069592,"created_at_utc_B":1599061358,"score_A":89,"score_B":36,"human_ref_A":"I have to get this out of the way: PragerU is a conservative think tank. It would not be an overstatement to call think tanks propaganda machines, because that's essentially their purpose: they are paid to come up with ways to influence public perception on policy issues.  The people who work for think tanks are not scientists. They're not academics.  One pertinent policy issue involves climate change. Conservative think tanks have pushed many books on climate skepticism, with the aim of infusing doubt about the reality of climate change into the minds of voters^(1):  >This study quantitatively analyses 141 English-language environmentally sceptical books published between 1972 and 2005. We find that over 92 per cent of these books, most published in the US since 1992, are linked to conservative think tanks (CTTs). Further, we analyse CTTs involved with environmental issues and find that 90 per cent of them espouse environmental scepticism. **We conclude that scepticism is a tactic of an elite-driven counter-movement designed to combat environmentalism, and that the successful use of this tactic has contributed to the weakening of US commitment to environmental protection.**  Historians Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway have explored this issue at length in their excellent book Merchants of Doubt^(2).  In Think Tanks in America^(3), sociologist Thomas Medvetz argues that their growing influence \"has ultimately undermined the value of independently produced knowledge in the United States by institutionalising a mode of intellectual practice that relegates its producers to the margins of public and political life.\"  Scientists have become less relevant in political discourse, while think-tank pundits have become increasingly influential.  Take the term \"tax relief\", for instance. That expression was born in a conservative think tank. It frames taxation as something inherently bad. Cognitive linguist George Lakoff discusses this and more in Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think^(4).  In the same book, Lakoff also suggests a reason why conservatives are \"obsessed with values,\" as you say. His argument is that liberals and conservatives rely on different types of metaphors to guide their sense of morals. Liberals rely on the \"nurturant mother\" metaphor, while conservatives rely on the \"strict father\" metaphor.  Liberals, then, will see it as natural that we should help each other and that we shouldn't put ourselves before others. We should teach our children to think for themselves rather than instruct them on what to believe. We should ensure that the world is just for everyone.  Conservatives, on the other hand, will see it as natural that we should punish those deemed to be immoral and lazy. We should instill discipline in our children and demand obedience from them. The world is just in that the good are rewarded through hard work while the bad are punished because of their flaws.  I think it also should be mentioned that Lakoff has argued that conservative think tanks must be countered with progressive think tanks. Personally, I disagree with this notion. I believe think tanks should be countered with scientists and actual experts rather than pundits.  You should this in mind when exposed to material from think tanks: it is produced by people whose job it is to manipulate public opinion. PragerU wants people to think about political issues in a way that favors conservative values. They're particularly interested in reaching young people who haven't made up their mind about politics yet. Their conclusions aren't attempts at getting at the truth: they are attempts at getting into your head.  One of their main roles is to produce memes in the Dawkinsian sense: narratives about political events and issues that spread as people discuss them. They tell politicians how to frame debates and how to answer specific questions. It's all orchestrated and organized in a disturbingly efficient manner.  So that's that. I just wanted to get that out there.  **References:**  1. Jacques, P., Dunlap, R., & Freeman, M. (2008). **The organisation of denial: Conservative think tanks and environmental scepticism**. *Environmental Politics, 17*, 349 - 385. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/09644010802055576 2. Oreskes, N., & Conway, E.M. (2010). **Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming.** 3. Medvetz, T. (2012). **Think Tanks in America**. 4. Lakoff, G. (1996). **Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think**.  \\--edit--  Added a DOI for reference 1.","human_ref_B":"You're going to want to read \"The Righteous Mind\" by Jonathan Haidt. https:\/\/righteousmind.com\/  The argument here is that there are multiple moral dimensions and that conservatives regard them all somewhat comparably and that other groups tend to favor one dimension over the others.  That's a painfully inadequate synopsis, but it may get you started.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8234.0,"score_ratio":2.4722222222}
{"post_id":"3pvbmf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"How well accepted is Freakanomics in the academic community? I've read many reviews and opinions of the book, saying that it holds little to no academic value in terms of teaching what economics actually is, but very little on the acceptance of many of the claims it makes. How do economists view it? Does it make one too many leaps of faith? Is it generally accepted as true, but sensationalized to draw a wider audience?","c_root_id_A":"cw9sffl","c_root_id_B":"cw9sr2z","created_at_utc_A":1445579738,"created_at_utc_B":1445580718,"score_A":45,"score_B":79,"human_ref_A":"A scathing critique on Freakonomics.","human_ref_B":"It's an example of cute-o-nomics, which is to say that while entertaining, the economic insights the thing offers are none. In stark contrast to Levitt's quirky approach, the good thing is there's now an entire field of economists (in the Angrist & Pischke tradition) who utilize similar econometric methods to address questions which are related to actual economics.   Angrist and Pischke JEP piece","labels":0,"seconds_difference":980.0,"score_ratio":1.7555555556}
{"post_id":"3gu452","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"How did China devalue its currency? Why is a 2% change in the yuan's value expected to have a dramatic impact on the world economy?","c_root_id_A":"cu1t6kc","c_root_id_B":"cu1n0iv","created_at_utc_A":1439488014,"created_at_utc_B":1439478823,"score_A":30,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"The impact on the world economy is various. In making the price of exports cheaper China has angered many South-East Asian countries which were beginning to replace China as source of cheap labour and commodity production. However the larger issue is that it signals the continued reliance of China's economy on exports. This reveals a serious problem for it implies China is finding it hard to transition from a medium to a high income country (notoriously difficult). It's finding it hard to stimulate the consumption of Chinese people themselves (who traditionally save 1\/3 of income compared to 1\/20 in the west) and instead reverts to it's old formula of economic growth which is export orientated. This is significant given China is indicative of the world economy in recent years being a powerhouse of world GDP growth. This year GDP growth for China however is predicted to be around 7% with some suggestion is could be as low as 4% (a rate not seen in 30 odd years). The devaluation comes in a long line of bad economic news from China; GDP growth regularly revised down, massive stock market collapse, increase corporate and state debt, large over-capacity. The devaluation could be an attempt to reverse the slow-down in growth. But given the weak demand in the west that's not certain, this has led to suggestions that this is only the beginning of a devaluation that could amount to 10% overall. The effects in the west - where demand is weak and interest rates are low - could be deflation or even recession.","human_ref_B":"Just a reminder...  > All claims in top level comments must be supported by citations to relevant social science sources. No lay speculation.  Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9191.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"13wfqe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Do homeless populations migrate south for the winter? If not, do the benefits of staying in northern cities with harsh winters outweigh the costs of travel?","c_root_id_A":"c77ums6","c_root_id_B":"c77vmlj","created_at_utc_A":1354069443,"created_at_utc_B":1354073172,"score_A":2,"score_B":30,"human_ref_A":"Some do, but not most, at least around here, in Maryland, probably more do in Minnesota or Maine (but then I've never seen any homeless people from farther north on their way south, so maybe not). Most of them are reluctant to go somewhere they aren't familiar with, so they'd rather stay put.","human_ref_B":"This is anecdotal evidence only, but I know that at least some of the homeless population stays in the wintery states (Minnesota here).  I work at a residential chemical dependency center and we have increased enrollment of homeless clients once it starts getting cold out.  I have heard similar reports from other residential centers and hospitals in the area. I think a lot of homeless people couldn't move south if they wanted, so they find other ways of managing best they can.  That said, homeless people do die here from exposure.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3729.0,"score_ratio":15.0}
{"post_id":"13wfqe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Do homeless populations migrate south for the winter? If not, do the benefits of staying in northern cities with harsh winters outweigh the costs of travel?","c_root_id_A":"c77ums6","c_root_id_B":"c77wgi3","created_at_utc_A":1354069443,"created_at_utc_B":1354076318,"score_A":2,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Some do, but not most, at least around here, in Maryland, probably more do in Minnesota or Maine (but then I've never seen any homeless people from farther north on their way south, so maybe not). Most of them are reluctant to go somewhere they aren't familiar with, so they'd rather stay put.","human_ref_B":"Crust punks and \"traveling kids\" often hop trains down south for the winter. New Orleans is the terminus of a number of Class I rail lines which they use as transport. As summer gets nearer, they tend to migrate back north to cities like Chicago, St. Louis, Detroit, et cetera.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6875.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"13wfqe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Do homeless populations migrate south for the winter? If not, do the benefits of staying in northern cities with harsh winters outweigh the costs of travel?","c_root_id_A":"c78051m","c_root_id_B":"c77x1c5","created_at_utc_A":1354100571,"created_at_utc_B":1354078667,"score_A":13,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I was homeless for most of my twenties, and in my experience, yes.  Homeless people are widely varied.  Some have deep roots in the communities where the live, and they are unlikely to migrate, unless they have other family roots somewhere.  Others are temporarily homeless and have a reason not to migrate, like the seasonal job they were laid off from will hire them back when the temperature rises.  Other homeless people are rootless, and they will readily migrate at the rumors of a job, or sometimes because a drug supply dries up, or other reasons.  Other homeless people are in a perpetual state of travel for decades.  They might go to Seattle or Portland every summer, and then to Southern California, Arizona, or New Orleans every winter. They might have a regular annual route, or they might wander aimlessly.  They might meet a significant other and alter their plans.  They might make annual pilgrimages to wherever their families are.  Some people, as an illustration, might work summers in Alaska, return to Los Angeles with pockets full of money, party it away and end up on the streets.  The solution to the problem is to return to Alaska, make more money, and repeat the disaster.  I have known lots of teenage gutter punks who have a regular route among a somewhat large community of people.  When one departs Seattle in December, she might say to another one, \"See you in Hollywood.\"  Members of her community are sure to show up there eventually.  They will all be back in Seattle before May.  Except the ones who died or went to jail.  But you might see those again in Los Angeles next year.     Among all of these different kinds of people, taken together, are a large population of people who migrate south for the winter, whether the pattern is consistent or not.","human_ref_B":"I live in Chicago and work with the homeless population.  We don't see a ton of people leave the state or city.  What we see more of is people going into public places like libraries, and people who typically refuse to sleep in a shelter will seek out a shelter or go into a drug and alcohol program or go to a hospital.  Basically, something to get out of the cold and get a meal or 2.  That said, I know rail riders will typically kind of work with the seasons.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21904.0,"score_ratio":1.4444444444}
{"post_id":"13wfqe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Do homeless populations migrate south for the winter? If not, do the benefits of staying in northern cities with harsh winters outweigh the costs of travel?","c_root_id_A":"c77ums6","c_root_id_B":"c78051m","created_at_utc_A":1354069443,"created_at_utc_B":1354100571,"score_A":2,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Some do, but not most, at least around here, in Maryland, probably more do in Minnesota or Maine (but then I've never seen any homeless people from farther north on their way south, so maybe not). Most of them are reluctant to go somewhere they aren't familiar with, so they'd rather stay put.","human_ref_B":"I was homeless for most of my twenties, and in my experience, yes.  Homeless people are widely varied.  Some have deep roots in the communities where the live, and they are unlikely to migrate, unless they have other family roots somewhere.  Others are temporarily homeless and have a reason not to migrate, like the seasonal job they were laid off from will hire them back when the temperature rises.  Other homeless people are rootless, and they will readily migrate at the rumors of a job, or sometimes because a drug supply dries up, or other reasons.  Other homeless people are in a perpetual state of travel for decades.  They might go to Seattle or Portland every summer, and then to Southern California, Arizona, or New Orleans every winter. They might have a regular annual route, or they might wander aimlessly.  They might meet a significant other and alter their plans.  They might make annual pilgrimages to wherever their families are.  Some people, as an illustration, might work summers in Alaska, return to Los Angeles with pockets full of money, party it away and end up on the streets.  The solution to the problem is to return to Alaska, make more money, and repeat the disaster.  I have known lots of teenage gutter punks who have a regular route among a somewhat large community of people.  When one departs Seattle in December, she might say to another one, \"See you in Hollywood.\"  Members of her community are sure to show up there eventually.  They will all be back in Seattle before May.  Except the ones who died or went to jail.  But you might see those again in Los Angeles next year.     Among all of these different kinds of people, taken together, are a large population of people who migrate south for the winter, whether the pattern is consistent or not.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":31128.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"13wfqe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Do homeless populations migrate south for the winter? If not, do the benefits of staying in northern cities with harsh winters outweigh the costs of travel?","c_root_id_A":"c77ums6","c_root_id_B":"c77x1c5","created_at_utc_A":1354069443,"created_at_utc_B":1354078667,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Some do, but not most, at least around here, in Maryland, probably more do in Minnesota or Maine (but then I've never seen any homeless people from farther north on their way south, so maybe not). Most of them are reluctant to go somewhere they aren't familiar with, so they'd rather stay put.","human_ref_B":"I live in Chicago and work with the homeless population.  We don't see a ton of people leave the state or city.  What we see more of is people going into public places like libraries, and people who typically refuse to sleep in a shelter will seek out a shelter or go into a drug and alcohol program or go to a hospital.  Basically, something to get out of the cold and get a meal or 2.  That said, I know rail riders will typically kind of work with the seasons.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9224.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"13wfqe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Do homeless populations migrate south for the winter? If not, do the benefits of staying in northern cities with harsh winters outweigh the costs of travel?","c_root_id_A":"c77ums6","c_root_id_B":"c781hjb","created_at_utc_A":1354069443,"created_at_utc_B":1354111388,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Some do, but not most, at least around here, in Maryland, probably more do in Minnesota or Maine (but then I've never seen any homeless people from farther north on their way south, so maybe not). Most of them are reluctant to go somewhere they aren't familiar with, so they'd rather stay put.","human_ref_B":"Some of them. Having been homeless myself in my younger years I knew quite a number of homeless people. There are most certainly locals who stay in the area all year, but there are also travelers. Although with some travelers what they're doing isn't *quite* the same as the destitute street-living that a lot of the (generally older) homeless are doing. A lot of these guys are basically low-budget professional tourists, going from town to town, staying there for a few weeks before moving on to the next place. They may have a sort of home base that they come back to, but those guys definitely usually don't stick around in colder climes in the winter. One thing I did notice is that travelers seem far less trapped than your average homeless person. For them it's less that they're stuck in a situation they can't get out of than that they're on a trip they don't ever want to stop. They're definitely a bit cheerier and they've usually got better drugs.     Anyway, the \"cost\" of travel when you're homeless is basically effort. Many people don't leave their climates for the same reason they're homeless in the first place, they're not in a place where they can muster up that kind of effort.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":41945.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"13wfqe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Do homeless populations migrate south for the winter? If not, do the benefits of staying in northern cities with harsh winters outweigh the costs of travel?","c_root_id_A":"c780dpz","c_root_id_B":"c781hjb","created_at_utc_A":1354103109,"created_at_utc_B":1354111388,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"When I lived in Anchorage, Alaska about 10 years ago, there was a case where a homeless fellow dug himself in on the grounds of the city's main library.  Somehow, he had gotten a truckload of hay bales, and he built himself a little insulated sleeping space in a wooded spot inside the urban sprawl.  Once the snow fell, his hideaway was invisible.  It frequently gets down below -10F\/-23C at night during winter, and homeless people freeze to death there every year.  He was apparently doing great, but inevitably, somebody finally noticed his comings & goings, and dimed him to the cops.  The city came and hauled away his little fort.  I understand why they had to do it, but I admired his ingenuity.","human_ref_B":"Some of them. Having been homeless myself in my younger years I knew quite a number of homeless people. There are most certainly locals who stay in the area all year, but there are also travelers. Although with some travelers what they're doing isn't *quite* the same as the destitute street-living that a lot of the (generally older) homeless are doing. A lot of these guys are basically low-budget professional tourists, going from town to town, staying there for a few weeks before moving on to the next place. They may have a sort of home base that they come back to, but those guys definitely usually don't stick around in colder climes in the winter. One thing I did notice is that travelers seem far less trapped than your average homeless person. For them it's less that they're stuck in a situation they can't get out of than that they're on a trip they don't ever want to stop. They're definitely a bit cheerier and they've usually got better drugs.     Anyway, the \"cost\" of travel when you're homeless is basically effort. Many people don't leave their climates for the same reason they're homeless in the first place, they're not in a place where they can muster up that kind of effort.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8279.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"jisief","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Is tribalism\/patriotism an inevitable part of the human condition?  Sometimes it seems that discrimination in some form or the other (like racism) can never go away. While originally, this xenophobic mindset would have helped nomadic tribes compete over one another, now it only hurts the wellbeing, economy etc on both sides.","c_root_id_A":"ga9zo06","c_root_id_B":"gaa5qm8","created_at_utc_A":1603810337,"created_at_utc_B":1603813312,"score_A":2,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"The presumption of inevitability is interesting.    I think people are more prone to assume the worst in people, or feel more hopeless about the human condition, when they haven\u2019t had access to imagining any different.  It\u2019s often (not always) a privilege to be able to conceive of a better world or a different structure.  For example, access to more education increases the ability to learn how other groups of people have decided to live.    This perspective comes from, for me, critical psychological theories about how more marginalized groups have less access to certain psychological states or phenomenon. The theory is called intimate justice but I\u2019m sure there are many concepts that describe this sort of thing. https:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/publication\/229951918_Intimate_Justice_A_Critical_Analysis_of_Sexual_Satisfaction","human_ref_B":"To begin, I would take care to establish concepts. First, I would distinguish tribalism from patriotism. In regard to **tribalism**, I prefer not to use the term for several reasons, among which the fact that I find it to be, in practice, a questionable substitute for group membership while simultaneously failing to clearly distinguish group dynamics or social processes (e.g. social identification and favoritism) and group membership itself. Furthermore, it comes with particular evaluative connotations.  For instance, the term is often used to refer to (political) partisanship. However, it also often carries strong negative connotations, e.g. it is often used in a derogatory manner (e.g. see this *The Atlantic* piece). It is also often used to convey some sort of fatalism or notion of \"human nature,\" which defeats the purpose of your query. In sum, it tends to mean a lot of things which should be kept distinct (or for which we already have clearer terms), and it tends to conflate factual statements with evaluative statements. Therefore, I will approach the query in terms of group membership, social categorization, social identity, etc.  ---  In regard to patriotism, I would acknowledge the difficulties with defining it, especially in regard to nationalism. To quote Baumeister:  >Patriotism, feeling of attachment and commitment to a country, nation, or political community. **Patriotism (love of country) and nationalism (loyalty to one\u2019s nation) are often taken to be synonymous, yet patriotism has its origins some 2,000 years prior to the rise of nationalism in the 19th century.**  And to quote Primoratz \\(2017\\):  >Discussions of both patriotism and nationalism are often marred by lack of clarity due to the failure to distinguish the two. **Many authors use the two terms interchangeably. Among those who do not, quite a few have made the distinction in ways that are not very helpful** ...]  >**To be sure, there is much overlap between country and nation, and therefore between patriotism and nationalism**; thus much that applies to one will also apply to the other. **But when a country is not ethnically homogeneous, or when a nation lacks a country of its own, the two may part ways.**  Regardless of whether or not we distinguish the two concepts (I would agree with making the distinction for multiple reasons), patriotism and\/or nationalism are not synonymous with tribalism. For example, patriotism and nationalism are rooted in particular ideologies and are themselves sets of [attitudes) and beliefs concerning country and nation, such as to what these are and how we should behave in their regard. Lastly, a distinction should be made between the concepts of patriotism and xenophobia, the former not necessarily requiring the latter.  ---  Moving on from the last points made, we can enter the topic of racism, which also provides an illustration of how particular identities, identification and dynamics that we have today cannot be said to *always* exist, and to *have to* exist. Racism as we understand it today is relatively novel, as is the concept of \"(biological) race\" itself. To understand racism, it is also important to understand the *ideology of racism.* To quote the American Anthropological Association's statement on race:  >**Historical research has shown that the idea of \"race\" has always carried more meanings than mere physical differences;** indeed, physical variations in the human species have no meaning except the social ones that humans put on them. **Today scholars in many fields argue that \"race\" as it is understood in the United States of America was a social mechanism invented during the 18th century to refer to those populations brought together in colonial America**: the English and other European settlers, the conquered Indian peoples, and those peoples of Africa brought in to provide slave labor ...]  >**Ultimately \"race\" as an ideology about human differences was subsequently spread to other areas of the world. It became a strategy for dividing, ranking, and controlling colonized people used by colonial powers everywhere. But it was not limited to the colonial situation.** In the latter part of the 19th century it was employed by Europeans to rank one another and to justify social, economic, and political inequalities among their peoples. During World War II, the Nazis under Adolf Hitler enjoined the expanded ideology of \"race\" and \"racial\" differences and took them to a logical end: the extermination of 11 million people of \"inferior races\" (e.g., Jews, Gypsies, Africans, homosexuals, and so forth) and other unspeakable brutalities of the Holocaust.  For further examples, also see the top answer to \"[Why are \"Moors\" often depicted as black in European art?\" (\/r\/AskHistorians):  >**Although it's controversial] to talk about the modern construct of \"race\" for the Middle Ages, medieval people** (Latin, Greek, Jewish, Muslim; here I will be talking about Latins given the question) **very much had the idea of different categories of people. There are two basic roots of the division medieval western Christians drew between \"white\" and \"black\": geographical and moral.** The first thing to keep in mind is that the two strands of 'racial' thought develop hand-in-hand, inseparable from each other. The second is that theories of race will never be neat packages and will always appear to have contradictions all over the place, because they are ideologies-in-practice and not scientific laws.  Also see [Rutherford (2020):  >The emergence of a scientific (or more accurately, pseudoscientific) approach to human taxonomy coincided with the growth of European empires. **Characterisation of different populations before the expansion of Europeans around the globe was more likely to be based on religion or language than skin colour, but with the birth and growth of the era of scientific revolution, pigmentation became essential to the character of humans.**  The argument here is *not* that people did not categorize and self-categorize before colonialism and scientific racism. But how people classify the world and its content is not set on stone, or \"hard-wired\" into our brains.  To quote Goodman et al. (2019):  >**To be sure, past peoples were** ***ethnocentric.*** **They frequently believed themselves culturally superior to others and sometimes exhibited the nasty habit of painting others as uncultured and brutish or savage, even to the point of justifying enslavement and killing on this basis.** Yet, as any introductory cultural anthropology text will illustrate, ethnocentric and later racial logics differed significantly. These differences are most obvious with respect to characterization of human potential and the perceived connection, or lack thereof, of cultural and physical traits. **Prior to the inception of race, people were much less likely to link cultural practices instinctively and irrevocably to physical differences, which were often attributed to distinct environmental conditions (Brace 2005). Nor were people necessarily inclined to believe that phenotypic diversity across groups represented inherent or essential \u2013 i.e., unbridgeable \u2013 differences in ability or character.**  ---  Is patriotism or racism \"inevitable?\" Insofar that these depend on other social constructions such as notions of country and race, and that their manifestations and expressions depend on ideologies and beliefs, then I would argue against a positive answer. In fact, I would even answer mu#%22Unasking%22_the_question) because the question presupposes, in my opinion, a an overly simplistic, and even overly rigid, framework of understanding human behavior.  To contextualize my answer, take into account the fact that I agree with evolutionary biologists Zuk and Spencer (2020) that \"**no trait, whether behavioral or otherwise, is caused by either genes or the environment or even by an additive combination of the two; the interaction is the important feature,**\" and that **human behavior is**, to quote biological anthropologist Agust\u00edn Fuentes, \"**naturenurtural.**\" Or as other anthropologists have put it, we are biocultural. To summarize:  >Anthropology, in contrast, emphasizes biological potential as a social possibility, and how individual plasticity reinforces social influences. **These possibilities are not always positive\u2013capacity for cruelty and social systems of vast inequalities are also part of the suite of human possibility. Human nature contains neither altruism nor cruelty: it is rather up to us to fulfill human promise.**  >>**It is high time we recognised that our humanity, far from having been set for all time as an evolutionary legacy from our hunter-gatherer past, is something that we have continually to work at,** and for which we alone must bear the responsibility.  >>-Tim Ingold, Against Human Nature (2006:280)  [Continues next comment]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2975.0,"score_ratio":10.0}
{"post_id":"4w92be","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Are the Freakonomics podcasts (and the books) factual and worth engaging in? I listen to the podcast a lot, but the most popular thing related to Freakonomics -- namely that Roe v. Wade resulted in lower crime rates -- has been constantly considered wrong, and as a result of this, I question how superficial the rest of the research is.","c_root_id_A":"d6539aa","c_root_id_B":"d65ij6k","created_at_utc_A":1470382293,"created_at_utc_B":1470413565,"score_A":13,"score_B":47,"human_ref_A":"I've subscribed to that idea that abortion can decrease crime because it makes logical sense and there is evidence to back it up. Where can I find the dissenting opinion ?","human_ref_B":"As someone currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Econcomics whose particular area of research is empirical work that is very similar methodologically to much of the work discussed in the freakonomics books, here are my thoughts.    1. The work they discuss is almost always real, compelling, well-published academic research.    2. The way the work is presented in the books is often exagerated or made to seem much more sound and conclusive than the claims made in the original papers.  If you go back and read the actual papers, the authors are generally much more reserved in the way they present their evidence.  Further, they often qualify the results as preliminary or suggestive and requiring further research.  I think the books tend to present the results as something closer to established, widely accepted facts.    3. Are the books factual and worth engaging with?  Yes - but I wouldn't go around letting them shape your entire world view.  As long as you remember to take everything your read there as interesting, preliminary results in the messy, complicated world of social science (i.e. ignore the Dubner hype), then I think the books are a good representation of academic social science research written in a way that a lay audience can understand.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":31272.0,"score_ratio":3.6153846154}
{"post_id":"4w92be","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Are the Freakonomics podcasts (and the books) factual and worth engaging in? I listen to the podcast a lot, but the most popular thing related to Freakonomics -- namely that Roe v. Wade resulted in lower crime rates -- has been constantly considered wrong, and as a result of this, I question how superficial the rest of the research is.","c_root_id_A":"d65eck0","c_root_id_B":"d65ij6k","created_at_utc_A":1470408166,"created_at_utc_B":1470413565,"score_A":4,"score_B":47,"human_ref_A":"Any recommendations to similar podcasts?  Currently subscribe to Econtalk, but always looking for new interesting conversations to eat into my commute time.","human_ref_B":"As someone currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Econcomics whose particular area of research is empirical work that is very similar methodologically to much of the work discussed in the freakonomics books, here are my thoughts.    1. The work they discuss is almost always real, compelling, well-published academic research.    2. The way the work is presented in the books is often exagerated or made to seem much more sound and conclusive than the claims made in the original papers.  If you go back and read the actual papers, the authors are generally much more reserved in the way they present their evidence.  Further, they often qualify the results as preliminary or suggestive and requiring further research.  I think the books tend to present the results as something closer to established, widely accepted facts.    3. Are the books factual and worth engaging with?  Yes - but I wouldn't go around letting them shape your entire world view.  As long as you remember to take everything your read there as interesting, preliminary results in the messy, complicated world of social science (i.e. ignore the Dubner hype), then I think the books are a good representation of academic social science research written in a way that a lay audience can understand.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5399.0,"score_ratio":11.75}
{"post_id":"4w92be","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Are the Freakonomics podcasts (and the books) factual and worth engaging in? I listen to the podcast a lot, but the most popular thing related to Freakonomics -- namely that Roe v. Wade resulted in lower crime rates -- has been constantly considered wrong, and as a result of this, I question how superficial the rest of the research is.","c_root_id_A":"d65ij6k","c_root_id_B":"d65gfml","created_at_utc_A":1470413565,"created_at_utc_B":1470410904,"score_A":47,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"As someone currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Econcomics whose particular area of research is empirical work that is very similar methodologically to much of the work discussed in the freakonomics books, here are my thoughts.    1. The work they discuss is almost always real, compelling, well-published academic research.    2. The way the work is presented in the books is often exagerated or made to seem much more sound and conclusive than the claims made in the original papers.  If you go back and read the actual papers, the authors are generally much more reserved in the way they present their evidence.  Further, they often qualify the results as preliminary or suggestive and requiring further research.  I think the books tend to present the results as something closer to established, widely accepted facts.    3. Are the books factual and worth engaging with?  Yes - but I wouldn't go around letting them shape your entire world view.  As long as you remember to take everything your read there as interesting, preliminary results in the messy, complicated world of social science (i.e. ignore the Dubner hype), then I think the books are a good representation of academic social science research written in a way that a lay audience can understand.","human_ref_B":"I read Freakonomics and Superfreakonomics when I was in high school, and they are the reason I majored in econ and went on to pursue a Ph.D. That said, I later learned about a number of things wrong with the books.   The first one is fine enough, as long as you know the issues with the abortion claim (Levitt bases his argument on a paper of his which had a coding and methodological errors). But it highlights a lot of cool research on other topics that I found interesting enough as an undergrad. E.g., the economics of acting white, Levitt's work on prison populations and crime.  Superfreakonomics was perhaps almost as controversial, namely due to its long climate change section. The article I linked covers its issues but also says what they did wasn't *that* bad, other than basing that chapter on wacky ideas and little data.   I haven't read the other two books they wrote. I haven't even heard good or bad things about them. They just seem like rehashings of the same old thing.  In sum, I'd say the Freakonomics guys tend to make stronger claims than the data warrants, and that might be bad for science. But remember what these books are: Pop science meant to get the public interested in econ and thinking about things they never thought of before. In that, Freakonomics succeeds.   My verdict: Read them at least once in your lifetime, especially if you're in high school or an undergrad. Do try to wean yourself off of taking the books too seriously once you graduate. The podcast actually has some pretty neat topics sometimes. And they are making a new game show that will be airing in NYC in September.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2661.0,"score_ratio":15.6666666667}
{"post_id":"4w92be","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Are the Freakonomics podcasts (and the books) factual and worth engaging in? I listen to the podcast a lot, but the most popular thing related to Freakonomics -- namely that Roe v. Wade resulted in lower crime rates -- has been constantly considered wrong, and as a result of this, I question how superficial the rest of the research is.","c_root_id_A":"d65ij6k","c_root_id_B":"d6598p3","created_at_utc_A":1470413565,"created_at_utc_B":1470399909,"score_A":47,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As someone currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Econcomics whose particular area of research is empirical work that is very similar methodologically to much of the work discussed in the freakonomics books, here are my thoughts.    1. The work they discuss is almost always real, compelling, well-published academic research.    2. The way the work is presented in the books is often exagerated or made to seem much more sound and conclusive than the claims made in the original papers.  If you go back and read the actual papers, the authors are generally much more reserved in the way they present their evidence.  Further, they often qualify the results as preliminary or suggestive and requiring further research.  I think the books tend to present the results as something closer to established, widely accepted facts.    3. Are the books factual and worth engaging with?  Yes - but I wouldn't go around letting them shape your entire world view.  As long as you remember to take everything your read there as interesting, preliminary results in the messy, complicated world of social science (i.e. ignore the Dubner hype), then I think the books are a good representation of academic social science research written in a way that a lay audience can understand.","human_ref_B":"Well, their research is based on studies and papers they cite in the book, and occasionally reference on the podcast, but you do have to keep in mind this is a show that needs to get produced regularly and be somewhat interesting to the average listener with or without a social science background.  I personally find their show good for the gym and book a nice read, but I wouldn't ever reference either as source material either at work or in my own research projects. Not outside of \"I heard this interesting thing...\" type water cooler talk. It's at best a pop take on research they come across, like a lighter, friendlier review journal, which means that in my opinion they are incentivized to find research that might be a stretch (to be later overturned), a small finding they're blowing out of proportion, or something that sounds a bit extreme.   Case in point - their recent re-run podcast about why we really follow the news. Honestly, it seemed like a bunch of anecdotes at best, which left me feeling like it was a waste of time.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13656.0,"score_ratio":23.5}
{"post_id":"4w92be","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Are the Freakonomics podcasts (and the books) factual and worth engaging in? I listen to the podcast a lot, but the most popular thing related to Freakonomics -- namely that Roe v. Wade resulted in lower crime rates -- has been constantly considered wrong, and as a result of this, I question how superficial the rest of the research is.","c_root_id_A":"d65eck0","c_root_id_B":"d6598p3","created_at_utc_A":1470408166,"created_at_utc_B":1470399909,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Any recommendations to similar podcasts?  Currently subscribe to Econtalk, but always looking for new interesting conversations to eat into my commute time.","human_ref_B":"Well, their research is based on studies and papers they cite in the book, and occasionally reference on the podcast, but you do have to keep in mind this is a show that needs to get produced regularly and be somewhat interesting to the average listener with or without a social science background.  I personally find their show good for the gym and book a nice read, but I wouldn't ever reference either as source material either at work or in my own research projects. Not outside of \"I heard this interesting thing...\" type water cooler talk. It's at best a pop take on research they come across, like a lighter, friendlier review journal, which means that in my opinion they are incentivized to find research that might be a stretch (to be later overturned), a small finding they're blowing out of proportion, or something that sounds a bit extreme.   Case in point - their recent re-run podcast about why we really follow the news. Honestly, it seemed like a bunch of anecdotes at best, which left me feeling like it was a waste of time.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8257.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"4w92be","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Are the Freakonomics podcasts (and the books) factual and worth engaging in? I listen to the podcast a lot, but the most popular thing related to Freakonomics -- namely that Roe v. Wade resulted in lower crime rates -- has been constantly considered wrong, and as a result of this, I question how superficial the rest of the research is.","c_root_id_A":"d65gfml","c_root_id_B":"d6598p3","created_at_utc_A":1470410904,"created_at_utc_B":1470399909,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I read Freakonomics and Superfreakonomics when I was in high school, and they are the reason I majored in econ and went on to pursue a Ph.D. That said, I later learned about a number of things wrong with the books.   The first one is fine enough, as long as you know the issues with the abortion claim (Levitt bases his argument on a paper of his which had a coding and methodological errors). But it highlights a lot of cool research on other topics that I found interesting enough as an undergrad. E.g., the economics of acting white, Levitt's work on prison populations and crime.  Superfreakonomics was perhaps almost as controversial, namely due to its long climate change section. The article I linked covers its issues but also says what they did wasn't *that* bad, other than basing that chapter on wacky ideas and little data.   I haven't read the other two books they wrote. I haven't even heard good or bad things about them. They just seem like rehashings of the same old thing.  In sum, I'd say the Freakonomics guys tend to make stronger claims than the data warrants, and that might be bad for science. But remember what these books are: Pop science meant to get the public interested in econ and thinking about things they never thought of before. In that, Freakonomics succeeds.   My verdict: Read them at least once in your lifetime, especially if you're in high school or an undergrad. Do try to wean yourself off of taking the books too seriously once you graduate. The podcast actually has some pretty neat topics sometimes. And they are making a new game show that will be airing in NYC in September.","human_ref_B":"Well, their research is based on studies and papers they cite in the book, and occasionally reference on the podcast, but you do have to keep in mind this is a show that needs to get produced regularly and be somewhat interesting to the average listener with or without a social science background.  I personally find their show good for the gym and book a nice read, but I wouldn't ever reference either as source material either at work or in my own research projects. Not outside of \"I heard this interesting thing...\" type water cooler talk. It's at best a pop take on research they come across, like a lighter, friendlier review journal, which means that in my opinion they are incentivized to find research that might be a stretch (to be later overturned), a small finding they're blowing out of proportion, or something that sounds a bit extreme.   Case in point - their recent re-run podcast about why we really follow the news. Honestly, it seemed like a bunch of anecdotes at best, which left me feeling like it was a waste of time.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10995.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"47ta4h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"There's a common trope in action movies where the badass female character's past is that she was raised by a (often widowed) father who wanted a boy, and therefore raised her like one. Does this actually reflect reality? To be specific: do women who choose traditionally male-dominated\/dangerous professions (construction, electrician, mining, car repair, test pilot, stunt double, etc, and to a lesser degree policing and military) tend to come from homes where only the father is present? Or for that matter, where they have no male siblings?  Or is this trope a bunch of BS?","c_root_id_A":"d0fpn39","c_root_id_B":"d0fq0nj","created_at_utc_A":1456574596,"created_at_utc_B":1456576172,"score_A":12,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"I don't know much about academic studies into 'badass females' but I think a pretty good contemporary example is in the women of the YPJ. They come from a very repressive and patriarchical culture. Women in Kurdistan are traditionally expected to raise 10 kids while the men are having a laugh in the teahouse, although ideas based on marxist thought have entered this society since the 1970s. Currently, joining the ranks of these fighters is still one of the few or only ways out of a life as a housewife for many Kurdish girls.","human_ref_B":"I don't know of any studies of girls without a female parent, but there is a sibling study:  > The study examined whether the sex of older siblings influences the gender role development of younger brothers and sisters of age 3 years. [...] Having an older brother was associated with more masculine and less feminine behavior in both boys and girls, whereas boys with older sisters were more feminine but not less masculine and girls with older sisters were less masculine but not more feminine.  http:\/\/www.psychometrics.cam.ac.uk\/uploads\/documents\/publications\/brothersandsisters  ETA: To paraphrase, girls without an older sibling display less feminine behaviour than those with older sisters but less masculine behaviour than those with older brothers. Younger siblings were found to have no effect. Another study shows twin siblings have a slight opposite effect (girls with twin brother are slightly more feminine than girls with a twin sister) So being an only child is more of a neutral than an effect in either direction.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1576.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"3frmj0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"What causes mental \"toughness\"? Some people can just suck it up and deal with life, recognize problems and address them.  Others cannot and never seem to learn this essential skill.  Why is this?","c_root_id_A":"ctrbusj","c_root_id_B":"ctrkeds","created_at_utc_A":1438710791,"created_at_utc_B":1438722966,"score_A":27,"score_B":34,"human_ref_A":"You should look into positive psychology research and research on character strengths. Typically, they would refer to this as \"resilience\" or \"hardiness\" in the literature.","human_ref_B":"Look at the personality trait \"neuroticism\". Those who score low on this trait are described as following:  >At the opposite end of the spectrum, individuals who score low in neuroticism are more emotionally stable and less reactive to stress. They tend to be calm, even-tempered, and less likely to feel tense or rattled","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12175.0,"score_ratio":1.2592592593}
{"post_id":"1mld0b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Living in the United States, I only read about the negative aspects of honor cultures. What are some of the positive aspects of living within an honor culture?","c_root_id_A":"ccafjbg","c_root_id_B":"ccafarr","created_at_utc_A":1379460919,"created_at_utc_B":1379460165,"score_A":10,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Having just googled honor culture, I'm confused. It seems it means a culture where people try to not offend each other...speaking as a Canadian, who also lived in the US for a few years, both countries seem to be places where people try not to offend each other. Can someone explain better by what is meant by honor culture?","human_ref_B":"This is a question, not an answer, I'm a layman and westerner.  I wonder if people (err, I'm really thinking male \"citizens\" who have full social status here) are happier?   Is living under a rigid code easier* than life in the west where we don't have a predetermined role to fill and have to find our own meaning?  *this is probably highly untrue for people on the margins, or who don't fit into\/ agree with the dominant cultural narrative.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":754.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1hmmtz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"How did Morsi get ousted? Logistically speaking? So do people just stop following his orders? (Judges, Mayors etc). Did the army just walk into his office and kick him out?","c_root_id_A":"cavve6a","c_root_id_B":"cavyuls","created_at_utc_A":1372952652,"created_at_utc_B":1372963722,"score_A":2,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I've been wondering the same thing but have no answer, sorry. I just keep thinking, if the president and his presumably loyal staff are in custody or just locked out, who has the computer passwords, who knows what keys go to what? It would seem like the government as an ongoing entity would hit a major hiccup and maybe shut down for a while until the new people in charge figure out everything the old people were doing (not just a level of skill, but just awareness of all the levers of government.)  Like, when a new president is elected in America, there's a transition team. I'd imagine there's nothing like a transition team in this case. Just starting over from scratch or from ignorance in many cases.","human_ref_B":"Could everyone cite journalistic sources in this conversation? Ideally from relevant experts.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11070.0,"score_ratio":10.0}
{"post_id":"1c8nzw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"I encounter a lot of people who think that poor people are poor by their own fault, and don't deserve welfare? Why are people so opposed to the welfare state? Where does this type of thinking come from?","c_root_id_A":"c9eeubx","c_root_id_B":"c9e9eso","created_at_utc_A":1365866108,"created_at_utc_B":1365830603,"score_A":8,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Just a quick reminder, make sure you're familiar with the subreddit rules before posting an answer:  > **Commenting**:  > There are two types of comments: top-tiered and non-top-tiered. Here is a graphic showing what is meant by these terms. Each type of comment is governed by different rules.  > **Top-Tiered Comments**:  > Should be serious responses. If the submission poses a question, serious answers; if the submission is an AMA, relevant questions. Memes, jokes, insults, or other unhelpful comments are not permitted as top-tier comments, though exceptions may be made for jokes if part of an otherwise informative comment. See Answers section for the specific rules regarding answers.  > **Non-Top-Tiered Comments**:  > These comments are less restricted, but still subject to moderation if blatantly off-topic or uncivil. Requesting sources and related follow-up questions are always appropriate.  > **Answers**:  > Good answers will be informed, comprehensive, serious, and courteous. Sources are a must for unflaired commenters and strongly desirable for experts. Good answers may often challenge assumptions implicit in the question, but should provide some guidance as to the right way to address the question. A bad answer is the opposite of the above. Dismissive, rude, incorrect, or unsourced. **Answers should keep a focus on social sciences, not opinion, anecdotes, speculation or guesses, all of which are banned**. To avoid political screeds, if you have a strong personal feeling about an issue, please consider sitting out of the top-tier comments, and making follow up comments instead. Always report bad answers!","human_ref_B":"People are opposed to the welfare state because of the perverse incentives that it offers.  People are opposed to the welfare state because they don't think that people making bad decisions should be rewarded by taking from those who make good decisions.  Assuming that the \"Just World Fallacy\" isn't true is a fallacy within itself.  All you need to do is make 3 simple choices to not be poor.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":35505.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1c8nzw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"I encounter a lot of people who think that poor people are poor by their own fault, and don't deserve welfare? Why are people so opposed to the welfare state? Where does this type of thinking come from?","c_root_id_A":"c9eegno","c_root_id_B":"c9eeubx","created_at_utc_A":1365864483,"created_at_utc_B":1365866108,"score_A":5,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"What kind of welfare are you referring to? A yearly net redistribution of income to the poor, food stamps, free healthcare for the poor, etc?","human_ref_B":"Just a quick reminder, make sure you're familiar with the subreddit rules before posting an answer:  > **Commenting**:  > There are two types of comments: top-tiered and non-top-tiered. Here is a graphic showing what is meant by these terms. Each type of comment is governed by different rules.  > **Top-Tiered Comments**:  > Should be serious responses. If the submission poses a question, serious answers; if the submission is an AMA, relevant questions. Memes, jokes, insults, or other unhelpful comments are not permitted as top-tier comments, though exceptions may be made for jokes if part of an otherwise informative comment. See Answers section for the specific rules regarding answers.  > **Non-Top-Tiered Comments**:  > These comments are less restricted, but still subject to moderation if blatantly off-topic or uncivil. Requesting sources and related follow-up questions are always appropriate.  > **Answers**:  > Good answers will be informed, comprehensive, serious, and courteous. Sources are a must for unflaired commenters and strongly desirable for experts. Good answers may often challenge assumptions implicit in the question, but should provide some guidance as to the right way to address the question. A bad answer is the opposite of the above. Dismissive, rude, incorrect, or unsourced. **Answers should keep a focus on social sciences, not opinion, anecdotes, speculation or guesses, all of which are banned**. To avoid political screeds, if you have a strong personal feeling about an issue, please consider sitting out of the top-tier comments, and making follow up comments instead. Always report bad answers!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1625.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"4r9bud","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Name of a concept? I can make fun of my family, hometown, or alma mater, but get offended when someone else does. Hi! I'm writing a paper and found this phenomenon in my data, and I'm trying to find literature about it, but I don't know what it's called.  The people in the group in question (an occupational group in this case) highly respect one another, but are also highly critical of each other and of the group generally. People who are not in the group hedge, sidestep, and hint-- they either aren't comfortable criticizing the group directly or aren't allowed to do by some social norm. I think it must be A Thing-- I see it all over-- but I don't know what it's called. Can you help? A name for the concept or field of study would be useful, and so would specific papers if any leap to mind.   Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"d4zdmu4","c_root_id_B":"d4zcmow","created_at_utc_A":1467675395,"created_at_utc_B":1467673620,"score_A":42,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"May also find these useful. There's not a specific term that I know of, but the key outcome is that criticism\/humor from an identified in-group member is understood to have specific motivations whereas those from someone outside the group are less certain and constitute a potential threat to the group's worth.  * Hornsey, M J et al. 2007. \u201cGroup-Directed Criticisms and Recommendations for Change: Why Newcomers Arouse More Resistance Than Old-Timers.\u201d Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 33(7): 1036\u201348.  * Hornsey, Matthew J et al. 2005. \u201cKeeping It in-House: How Audience Affects Responses to Group Criticism.\u201d European journal of social psychology 35(3): 291\u2013312.","human_ref_B":"Not sure about that specific phenomenon, but I would start by looking at the references related to Ingroup Favoritism and Ingroup Derogation.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1775.0,"score_ratio":1.6153846154}
{"post_id":"2zu2uj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Excepting the clergy, what are the professions or industries that have the highest percentage of workers who identify as religious, and what are the professions or industries with the smallest percentages of religious workers?","c_root_id_A":"cpml9aw","c_root_id_B":"cpmuh3v","created_at_utc_A":1426991388,"created_at_utc_B":1427023341,"score_A":14,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"I havent heard of an openly Atheist politician in America.  Im not saying they dont exist, but they are exceptionally rare.  Openly non-religious Americans are drastically under represented by their government.      As far as least religious professions go, i would believe that physicists and biologists are the, if not, near the top.  Elite scientists that are religious represent 7% of the total population of elite scientists.  Source","human_ref_B":"73% of professional philosophers accept or lean towards atheism, while only 14% accept or lean towards theism. The trend is exactly the opposite for philosophers with a concentration on philosophy of religion, so you could say that nearly all professional philosophers who do not work on philosophy of religion are atheists.   http:\/\/philpapers.org\/surveys\/results.pl","labels":0,"seconds_difference":31953.0,"score_ratio":1.7142857143}
{"post_id":"1vq0hh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What are the observable behavioral signs of lower IQ? I don't mean retardation. I mean the upper neighborhood of Forrest Gump. All I could find on google is lack of curiosity.   I am curious about the behavioral (and dispositional if you feel like answering) characteristics of people who hold 9-5 jobs, who graduate high school because they study real hard, who function in society who fall in the lower level of  IQ spectrum.  What are the bulletpoints about them in social science textbooks?","c_root_id_A":"ceuye37","c_root_id_B":"cev0hdh","created_at_utc_A":1390295538,"created_at_utc_B":1390308392,"score_A":13,"score_B":37,"human_ref_A":"This is pretty interesting... suggesting that there may be some correlation between Myers-Briggs personality types and intelligence. Obviously, both measurements are flawed, and the data is self reported. The only journal article I found in a very quick search - here - might be helpful to read.","human_ref_B":"Note: I deleted A LOT of responses.  You must cite sources in top level comments.    Please abide by this rule","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12854.0,"score_ratio":2.8461538462}
{"post_id":"gt9812","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Why do millennials\/college kids have so much anxiety\/depression? I am 23 & just out of college. Almost all of my friends have had some type of mental stuff going on.","c_root_id_A":"fsawhhj","c_root_id_B":"fsarxjr","created_at_utc_A":1590843303,"created_at_utc_B":1590839525,"score_A":38,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"There are several other threads on the topic of depression (and mental health). Here are some recent ones:  * Is the claim that humans are unhappier \\(depressed\/mentally ill\\) now than in the past stand up to scrutiny?  * If today's youth are more depressed than every then why are suicide rates falling?  * Are mental health problems really on the rise in places like the United States and Canada, or are those societies just now starting to come to terms with a problem that has existed all along? If it is the former, what is causing the rise in mental health problems?  * What are the most likely reasons for the uptick in suicide rates for both middle aged and young men?  * Why do Hispanics and Blacks have smaller suicide rates than Whites?  ---  To begin, it is important to establish whether \"millennials\/college kids have **so much** anxiety\/depression?\", taking into account that \"so much\" is fundamentally a subjective evaluation, and whether it is exclusive to them.   For the US, we can find prevalence rates on the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)'s webapge, see here for anxiety disorders and here for major depression. These are both considered **common mental disorders**, and I would highlight that according to the data presented by the NIMH, **although major disorder is more prevalent among young people, the prevalence of anxiety disorder is similar across age groups.**  If we take the WHO's \"Depression and Other Common Mental Disorders: Global Health Estimates\" we can also see that **in 2015 the US had a higher crude prevalence of depression and anxiety than many other countries, both when compared to its own region (the Americas), and to other regions (e.g. Europe).** To illustrate, the WHO estimates that in 2015, 5,9% of the US population and and 6,3% of the same population had depressive and anxiety disorders respectively. The proportion in Canada was 4,7% and 4,9% whereas it was 4,5% and 4,2% in the United Kingdom (I took Anglophone countries which share a history).  That said, for many researchers, **the prevalence of depression (and other mental health issues) is worrisome in the US because it has been remarkably increasing for several years.** However, it is important to note that several researchers have also observed that these trends have **remained stable or decreased in other countries** (such as Canada, Germany, etc.). It does not appear, therefore, to be a universal phenomenon.  ---  Concerning this increase in depression, it *does* appear to **primarily concern adolescents and young adults**. It is however worthwhile to note that besides disparities between countries, there are also **disparities within the USA**, such as according to SES and ethnicity. **Regarding the drivers, there is little which has been firmly established**. The threads I cited in the beginning of this reply concern mainly depression, and suicide, so I will expand a little bit on anxiety. According to a 2014 study by Keyes et al. regarding psychological distress (which includes anxiety disorders) in the US and Canada:  >Our data indicate that **individuals in the oldest cohorts (in the United States), as well as more recently born cohorts (in Canada), have higher psychological distress**, signaling a potential need for the promotion of treatment resources. At the same time, **overall levels of psychological distress are also increasing in the population, based on US data after 2007**, suggesting that broad macro-level mechanisms that negatively affect mental health should be measured and incorporated into ongoing surveillance efforts.  They found cohort changes, and argue the following:  >**Increases in psychological distress among younger birth cohorts in Canada now aging into their 20s could indicate a confluence of both macro-level social and environmental factors in how young adults engage with each other and with the broader environment.** We note that we did not have comparable data on birth cohorts in the United States, and available data indicate that birth cohorts of the early 1980s did not show a similar increase in psychological distress.  They suggest (but cannot test for) financial stress, negative experiences with online social media, and cohort effects in substance use. According to Bandelow and Michaelis in 2015:  >**There is no evidence that the prevalence rates of anxiety disorders] have changed in the past years. Differences in prevalence rates found in different countries and cultures may be due to differences in methodology rather than to culture-specific factors.**  ---  The difficulties should be acknowledge in comparing rates and trends, and in determining whether increases represent more people being afflicted by a given mental disorder, or more people reporting their distress, seeking treatment and\/or being diagnosed. For example, according to systematic review of reviews on the prevalence of anxiety disorders among adults by [Remes et al.:  >**Prevalence figures were heterogeneous, and this made comparison between studies difficult.** ...]  >**Reviews produced inflated prevalence estimates with the use of less robust methodologies.** Within reviews, low and variable response rates across primary studies were identified as another limitation (Somers et al. 2006; Haller et al. 2014). In one review, response rates across studies ranged from 45.9% to 99.5% (Steel et al. 2014).   As I already cited American, Canadian and German studies, I will also quote [Thorisdottir et al.'s study of depression and anxiety among Icelandic adolescents:  >**The findings may reflect genuine changes in mental health symptom burden** which is supported by other time-trend surveys of mental health among adolescents. **On the other hand, secular trends, for example greater willingness to report symptoms due to decreased social stigma, may be influencing these trends.**   And Kronstrom et al.'s study of young Finnish psychiatric inpatients:  >The **changes in the distribution of diagnoses may be due to changes in diagnostic or referral practices, or reflect true changes in the prevalence of disorders among children and adolescents in need of inpatient treatment.**   ---  It is a complex topic. There are multiple risk factors and protective factors. The variance highlighted between countries, and within the US, suggest that it is important to take into account the environment. The combination of risk and protective factors are unlikely to be distributed equally globally. The **particular cocktail of risk\/protective factors** in the US may be driving the findings illustrated above (and in the other threads cited - I am glossing over what is covered elsewhere). Consider Ruscio et al.'s 2017 cross-national study on Generalized Anxiety Disorder:  >**Although GAD was impairing in all of the countries included in the present study, it was most impairing in high-income countries.** This finding is **particularly striking when contrasted against the greater frequency and persistence of GAD in individuals with lower socioeconomic status relative to national standards.** The inverse associations with income at the individual vs national levels have been documented for many mental disorders and could reflect the influence of risk factors that vary with economic development. For example, **greater industrialization and urbanization in higher-income countries may result in fewer community supports** (eg, extended family and religious community) **to buffer the impact of stressful events or assist with role functioning.** In addition, **there may be greater demands on individuals in higher-income countries to achieve independence, occupational success, and social status in a competitive environment, increasing uncertainty and perceived pressure to meet high expectations.**  Also consider, for example, Twenge et al.'s 2010 meta-analyses finding \"large generational increases in psychopathology among American college students ...] and high school students\":  >The large changes in MMPI scores demonstrate that **there are also strong cultural influences on psychiatric symptoms \u2014 that is, an environmental influence outside of the individual family.** Over time, American culture has increasingly shifted toward an environment in which **more and more young people experience poor mental health and psychopathology, possibly due to an increased focus on money, appearance, and status rather than on community and close relationships.**  Finally, consider the results of the [APA's 2017 Stress in America survey.","human_ref_B":"I feel like a big part of this discussion has to be the potential economic prospects of the next generation, even those with college degrees. Compared to the past, far fewer adults are surpassing their parents in terms of wages, and underemployment of college grads is a serious issue. That would sure jack up depression rates- the hopelessness, the feeling of underutilization, the debt. https:\/\/www.npr.org\/sections\/thetwo-way\/2016\/12\/09\/504989751\/u-s-kids-far-less-likely-to-out-earn-their-parents-as-inequality-grows","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3778.0,"score_ratio":2.9230769231}
{"post_id":"6u7dkt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why do socialist revolutions tend to result in totalitarian dictatorships? If you look at the USSR under Stalin, China under Mao, Cuba under Castro, or even going back to the French Revolution and Robespierre, it always seems like socialist or communist revolutions result in a totalitarian strong man seizing power and causing terrible oppression and suffering to the people that live there. Why is that? Is there something fundamentally wrong with the political philosophy that lends itself to this? Or is it because these revolutions will oftentimes go too far, and try to erase the social and political systems that have maintained order in those countries for hundreds or even thousands of years (i.e. getting rid of the monarchy and religious institutions at the same time and replacing them with entirely new and untested systems and ideologies.) Or is there some other reason? Has there ever been a communist country where this didn't happen, and the government functioned reliably for a long time and the people enjoyed a high standard of living?","c_root_id_A":"dlqz0nk","c_root_id_B":"dlr4bjw","created_at_utc_A":1502974700,"created_at_utc_B":1502981270,"score_A":25,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure the assumption that socialist revolutions tend to result in totalitarian dictatorship is true. At least not in any larger extent than any other revolutions. Looking at this  list, I don't see socialist revolutions as standing out in any way.","human_ref_B":"Social scientists often draw a distinction between *political* revolutions, which seek to change the government, and *social* revolutions, which seek to more basically transform social relations.  Theda Skocpol makes this distinction in her book *States and Social Revolutions*, which continues to be the most widely cited book on revolutions.  The classic example of the former is the American Revolution, where primarily the government changed, and the later the French Revolution, where the whole social world of the *Ancien Regime* came crumbling down.  I think what you're seeing here is the checkered history of social revolutions more than anything intrinsic to socialism.  I wrote in old post:  >Social scientists sometimes separate out two different kinds of revolutions: social revolutions like the French, Russian, Turkish, Chinese, Cambodian, etc Revolutions which seek to change everything, and political revolutions like the American, the Glorious, the Jasmine, Egyptian, etc. Revolutions which seek to change politics, but not culture or social relations more broadly.  You may be interested in older posts of mine.  Here, I talk about the origin of the term \"revolution\", and how \"revolution\" didn't really mean *revolution* until the French Revolution.  Here, I short piece about the distinction between social and political revolutions, a distinction that interestingly was first proposed by Trotsky.  Here, I have a much longer bit about revolutions more generally, including an alternative typology between \"tipping point revolutions\" and \"state breakdown revolutions\", with particularly reference to the revolutions of the Arab Spring.  The thing I think that should be emphasized is that we generally ee political revolutions as good (the American Revolution, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Glorious Revolution in England) and we often see periods of rapid social change as good (the end of Jim Crow or Sexual Revolution in America, or the Quiet Revolution in Quebec), but when a political revolution seeks to usher in a rapid period of social change, be it from the left or the right, we often see massive destruction.  The conscious effort to change social relations is generally better at destroying the old order than building a new one.  Occasionally, you have ones that combine both successfully, like the Turkish Revolution, but in those cases it's often not clear how much the social changes occur outside of the big cities.  Books like *Republic of Empire*, about a small, provincial town in the Black Sea region, suggest that the social revolution was mostly restricted to places like Ankara and Istanbul.  Though Burkean Conservatism typically valorizes the existing order and seeks to stop change (think William F. Buckley's famous definition, \"A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling *Stop*, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it\"), there are \"Right Wing\" attempts at Social Revolutions that one could categorize as \"right wing\" and were equally destructive and totalitarian.  The Iranian Revolution, an attempt to instill firm religiousness in both state and society, is an obvious example.  Nikki Keddi and Theda Skocpol have a good back and forth about the Iranian Revolution does fit Skocpol's social revolution model.  Skocpol's article is called \"Rentier State and Shi'a Islam in the Iranian Revolution\", Keddi's article is simply called \"Comments on Skocpol\".  A summary of Skocpol's argument can be found [here](A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it.).  Both are mainly about the sequence that led to the revolutionaries' success, rather than the social consequences of the revolutionaries' success.  The Taliban's social revolution, or more shockingly recent, ISIS's social revolution, are other examples of religious revolutionaries coming to power and changing not just the manner of rule, but the manner of how people are allowed to relate to each other.  The fascists are another interesting of social revolution from the right.  While when we study the Nazis, we tend to think of them in terms of their murderous regime and their invasions and war-mongering, at home they also had great effects even on ethnic German life.  Shmuel Eisenstadt wrote both an article and a book about the \"multiple modernities\", about how communism, liberal democracy, and fascism all presented very different visions of modern social and political life.  My favorite book on the social effects of the Nazi social revolution is German sociologist Tilman Allert's *the Hitler Salute*.  It focuses on just how greetings changed, but uses this to delve into how the Nazis changed daily life and basic social relations.  So, in short, while political revolutions have a mixed record of long term success, social revolutions--whether from the left or the right--have a pretty poor record.  When socialist parties come to power (and willing leave power) through democratic elections (as in much of Europe), you have very different outcomes.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6570.0,"score_ratio":1.08}
{"post_id":"6u7dkt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why do socialist revolutions tend to result in totalitarian dictatorships? If you look at the USSR under Stalin, China under Mao, Cuba under Castro, or even going back to the French Revolution and Robespierre, it always seems like socialist or communist revolutions result in a totalitarian strong man seizing power and causing terrible oppression and suffering to the people that live there. Why is that? Is there something fundamentally wrong with the political philosophy that lends itself to this? Or is it because these revolutions will oftentimes go too far, and try to erase the social and political systems that have maintained order in those countries for hundreds or even thousands of years (i.e. getting rid of the monarchy and religious institutions at the same time and replacing them with entirely new and untested systems and ideologies.) Or is there some other reason? Has there ever been a communist country where this didn't happen, and the government functioned reliably for a long time and the people enjoyed a high standard of living?","c_root_id_A":"dlr4bjw","c_root_id_B":"dlqpzx9","created_at_utc_A":1502981270,"created_at_utc_B":1502954526,"score_A":27,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Social scientists often draw a distinction between *political* revolutions, which seek to change the government, and *social* revolutions, which seek to more basically transform social relations.  Theda Skocpol makes this distinction in her book *States and Social Revolutions*, which continues to be the most widely cited book on revolutions.  The classic example of the former is the American Revolution, where primarily the government changed, and the later the French Revolution, where the whole social world of the *Ancien Regime* came crumbling down.  I think what you're seeing here is the checkered history of social revolutions more than anything intrinsic to socialism.  I wrote in old post:  >Social scientists sometimes separate out two different kinds of revolutions: social revolutions like the French, Russian, Turkish, Chinese, Cambodian, etc Revolutions which seek to change everything, and political revolutions like the American, the Glorious, the Jasmine, Egyptian, etc. Revolutions which seek to change politics, but not culture or social relations more broadly.  You may be interested in older posts of mine.  Here, I talk about the origin of the term \"revolution\", and how \"revolution\" didn't really mean *revolution* until the French Revolution.  Here, I short piece about the distinction between social and political revolutions, a distinction that interestingly was first proposed by Trotsky.  Here, I have a much longer bit about revolutions more generally, including an alternative typology between \"tipping point revolutions\" and \"state breakdown revolutions\", with particularly reference to the revolutions of the Arab Spring.  The thing I think that should be emphasized is that we generally ee political revolutions as good (the American Revolution, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Glorious Revolution in England) and we often see periods of rapid social change as good (the end of Jim Crow or Sexual Revolution in America, or the Quiet Revolution in Quebec), but when a political revolution seeks to usher in a rapid period of social change, be it from the left or the right, we often see massive destruction.  The conscious effort to change social relations is generally better at destroying the old order than building a new one.  Occasionally, you have ones that combine both successfully, like the Turkish Revolution, but in those cases it's often not clear how much the social changes occur outside of the big cities.  Books like *Republic of Empire*, about a small, provincial town in the Black Sea region, suggest that the social revolution was mostly restricted to places like Ankara and Istanbul.  Though Burkean Conservatism typically valorizes the existing order and seeks to stop change (think William F. Buckley's famous definition, \"A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling *Stop*, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it\"), there are \"Right Wing\" attempts at Social Revolutions that one could categorize as \"right wing\" and were equally destructive and totalitarian.  The Iranian Revolution, an attempt to instill firm religiousness in both state and society, is an obvious example.  Nikki Keddi and Theda Skocpol have a good back and forth about the Iranian Revolution does fit Skocpol's social revolution model.  Skocpol's article is called \"Rentier State and Shi'a Islam in the Iranian Revolution\", Keddi's article is simply called \"Comments on Skocpol\".  A summary of Skocpol's argument can be found [here](A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it.).  Both are mainly about the sequence that led to the revolutionaries' success, rather than the social consequences of the revolutionaries' success.  The Taliban's social revolution, or more shockingly recent, ISIS's social revolution, are other examples of religious revolutionaries coming to power and changing not just the manner of rule, but the manner of how people are allowed to relate to each other.  The fascists are another interesting of social revolution from the right.  While when we study the Nazis, we tend to think of them in terms of their murderous regime and their invasions and war-mongering, at home they also had great effects even on ethnic German life.  Shmuel Eisenstadt wrote both an article and a book about the \"multiple modernities\", about how communism, liberal democracy, and fascism all presented very different visions of modern social and political life.  My favorite book on the social effects of the Nazi social revolution is German sociologist Tilman Allert's *the Hitler Salute*.  It focuses on just how greetings changed, but uses this to delve into how the Nazis changed daily life and basic social relations.  So, in short, while political revolutions have a mixed record of long term success, social revolutions--whether from the left or the right--have a pretty poor record.  When socialist parties come to power (and willing leave power) through democratic elections (as in much of Europe), you have very different outcomes.","human_ref_B":"Sorry if this question is too off topic but is the French Revolution really considered socialistic by anyone?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":26744.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"6u7dkt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why do socialist revolutions tend to result in totalitarian dictatorships? If you look at the USSR under Stalin, China under Mao, Cuba under Castro, or even going back to the French Revolution and Robespierre, it always seems like socialist or communist revolutions result in a totalitarian strong man seizing power and causing terrible oppression and suffering to the people that live there. Why is that? Is there something fundamentally wrong with the political philosophy that lends itself to this? Or is it because these revolutions will oftentimes go too far, and try to erase the social and political systems that have maintained order in those countries for hundreds or even thousands of years (i.e. getting rid of the monarchy and religious institutions at the same time and replacing them with entirely new and untested systems and ideologies.) Or is there some other reason? Has there ever been a communist country where this didn't happen, and the government functioned reliably for a long time and the people enjoyed a high standard of living?","c_root_id_A":"dlr4bjw","c_root_id_B":"dlr038e","created_at_utc_A":1502981270,"created_at_utc_B":1502976194,"score_A":27,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Social scientists often draw a distinction between *political* revolutions, which seek to change the government, and *social* revolutions, which seek to more basically transform social relations.  Theda Skocpol makes this distinction in her book *States and Social Revolutions*, which continues to be the most widely cited book on revolutions.  The classic example of the former is the American Revolution, where primarily the government changed, and the later the French Revolution, where the whole social world of the *Ancien Regime* came crumbling down.  I think what you're seeing here is the checkered history of social revolutions more than anything intrinsic to socialism.  I wrote in old post:  >Social scientists sometimes separate out two different kinds of revolutions: social revolutions like the French, Russian, Turkish, Chinese, Cambodian, etc Revolutions which seek to change everything, and political revolutions like the American, the Glorious, the Jasmine, Egyptian, etc. Revolutions which seek to change politics, but not culture or social relations more broadly.  You may be interested in older posts of mine.  Here, I talk about the origin of the term \"revolution\", and how \"revolution\" didn't really mean *revolution* until the French Revolution.  Here, I short piece about the distinction between social and political revolutions, a distinction that interestingly was first proposed by Trotsky.  Here, I have a much longer bit about revolutions more generally, including an alternative typology between \"tipping point revolutions\" and \"state breakdown revolutions\", with particularly reference to the revolutions of the Arab Spring.  The thing I think that should be emphasized is that we generally ee political revolutions as good (the American Revolution, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Glorious Revolution in England) and we often see periods of rapid social change as good (the end of Jim Crow or Sexual Revolution in America, or the Quiet Revolution in Quebec), but when a political revolution seeks to usher in a rapid period of social change, be it from the left or the right, we often see massive destruction.  The conscious effort to change social relations is generally better at destroying the old order than building a new one.  Occasionally, you have ones that combine both successfully, like the Turkish Revolution, but in those cases it's often not clear how much the social changes occur outside of the big cities.  Books like *Republic of Empire*, about a small, provincial town in the Black Sea region, suggest that the social revolution was mostly restricted to places like Ankara and Istanbul.  Though Burkean Conservatism typically valorizes the existing order and seeks to stop change (think William F. Buckley's famous definition, \"A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling *Stop*, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it\"), there are \"Right Wing\" attempts at Social Revolutions that one could categorize as \"right wing\" and were equally destructive and totalitarian.  The Iranian Revolution, an attempt to instill firm religiousness in both state and society, is an obvious example.  Nikki Keddi and Theda Skocpol have a good back and forth about the Iranian Revolution does fit Skocpol's social revolution model.  Skocpol's article is called \"Rentier State and Shi'a Islam in the Iranian Revolution\", Keddi's article is simply called \"Comments on Skocpol\".  A summary of Skocpol's argument can be found [here](A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it.).  Both are mainly about the sequence that led to the revolutionaries' success, rather than the social consequences of the revolutionaries' success.  The Taliban's social revolution, or more shockingly recent, ISIS's social revolution, are other examples of religious revolutionaries coming to power and changing not just the manner of rule, but the manner of how people are allowed to relate to each other.  The fascists are another interesting of social revolution from the right.  While when we study the Nazis, we tend to think of them in terms of their murderous regime and their invasions and war-mongering, at home they also had great effects even on ethnic German life.  Shmuel Eisenstadt wrote both an article and a book about the \"multiple modernities\", about how communism, liberal democracy, and fascism all presented very different visions of modern social and political life.  My favorite book on the social effects of the Nazi social revolution is German sociologist Tilman Allert's *the Hitler Salute*.  It focuses on just how greetings changed, but uses this to delve into how the Nazis changed daily life and basic social relations.  So, in short, while political revolutions have a mixed record of long term success, social revolutions--whether from the left or the right--have a pretty poor record.  When socialist parties come to power (and willing leave power) through democratic elections (as in much of Europe), you have very different outcomes.","human_ref_B":"Have any of the Communist\/Socialist revolutions in history ever **replaced** something *other* than a totalitarian dictatorship?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5076.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"6u7dkt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why do socialist revolutions tend to result in totalitarian dictatorships? If you look at the USSR under Stalin, China under Mao, Cuba under Castro, or even going back to the French Revolution and Robespierre, it always seems like socialist or communist revolutions result in a totalitarian strong man seizing power and causing terrible oppression and suffering to the people that live there. Why is that? Is there something fundamentally wrong with the political philosophy that lends itself to this? Or is it because these revolutions will oftentimes go too far, and try to erase the social and political systems that have maintained order in those countries for hundreds or even thousands of years (i.e. getting rid of the monarchy and religious institutions at the same time and replacing them with entirely new and untested systems and ideologies.) Or is there some other reason? Has there ever been a communist country where this didn't happen, and the government functioned reliably for a long time and the people enjoyed a high standard of living?","c_root_id_A":"dlr4bjw","c_root_id_B":"dlr2ndd","created_at_utc_A":1502981270,"created_at_utc_B":1502979376,"score_A":27,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Social scientists often draw a distinction between *political* revolutions, which seek to change the government, and *social* revolutions, which seek to more basically transform social relations.  Theda Skocpol makes this distinction in her book *States and Social Revolutions*, which continues to be the most widely cited book on revolutions.  The classic example of the former is the American Revolution, where primarily the government changed, and the later the French Revolution, where the whole social world of the *Ancien Regime* came crumbling down.  I think what you're seeing here is the checkered history of social revolutions more than anything intrinsic to socialism.  I wrote in old post:  >Social scientists sometimes separate out two different kinds of revolutions: social revolutions like the French, Russian, Turkish, Chinese, Cambodian, etc Revolutions which seek to change everything, and political revolutions like the American, the Glorious, the Jasmine, Egyptian, etc. Revolutions which seek to change politics, but not culture or social relations more broadly.  You may be interested in older posts of mine.  Here, I talk about the origin of the term \"revolution\", and how \"revolution\" didn't really mean *revolution* until the French Revolution.  Here, I short piece about the distinction between social and political revolutions, a distinction that interestingly was first proposed by Trotsky.  Here, I have a much longer bit about revolutions more generally, including an alternative typology between \"tipping point revolutions\" and \"state breakdown revolutions\", with particularly reference to the revolutions of the Arab Spring.  The thing I think that should be emphasized is that we generally ee political revolutions as good (the American Revolution, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Glorious Revolution in England) and we often see periods of rapid social change as good (the end of Jim Crow or Sexual Revolution in America, or the Quiet Revolution in Quebec), but when a political revolution seeks to usher in a rapid period of social change, be it from the left or the right, we often see massive destruction.  The conscious effort to change social relations is generally better at destroying the old order than building a new one.  Occasionally, you have ones that combine both successfully, like the Turkish Revolution, but in those cases it's often not clear how much the social changes occur outside of the big cities.  Books like *Republic of Empire*, about a small, provincial town in the Black Sea region, suggest that the social revolution was mostly restricted to places like Ankara and Istanbul.  Though Burkean Conservatism typically valorizes the existing order and seeks to stop change (think William F. Buckley's famous definition, \"A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling *Stop*, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it\"), there are \"Right Wing\" attempts at Social Revolutions that one could categorize as \"right wing\" and were equally destructive and totalitarian.  The Iranian Revolution, an attempt to instill firm religiousness in both state and society, is an obvious example.  Nikki Keddi and Theda Skocpol have a good back and forth about the Iranian Revolution does fit Skocpol's social revolution model.  Skocpol's article is called \"Rentier State and Shi'a Islam in the Iranian Revolution\", Keddi's article is simply called \"Comments on Skocpol\".  A summary of Skocpol's argument can be found [here](A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it.).  Both are mainly about the sequence that led to the revolutionaries' success, rather than the social consequences of the revolutionaries' success.  The Taliban's social revolution, or more shockingly recent, ISIS's social revolution, are other examples of religious revolutionaries coming to power and changing not just the manner of rule, but the manner of how people are allowed to relate to each other.  The fascists are another interesting of social revolution from the right.  While when we study the Nazis, we tend to think of them in terms of their murderous regime and their invasions and war-mongering, at home they also had great effects even on ethnic German life.  Shmuel Eisenstadt wrote both an article and a book about the \"multiple modernities\", about how communism, liberal democracy, and fascism all presented very different visions of modern social and political life.  My favorite book on the social effects of the Nazi social revolution is German sociologist Tilman Allert's *the Hitler Salute*.  It focuses on just how greetings changed, but uses this to delve into how the Nazis changed daily life and basic social relations.  So, in short, while political revolutions have a mixed record of long term success, social revolutions--whether from the left or the right--have a pretty poor record.  When socialist parties come to power (and willing leave power) through democratic elections (as in much of Europe), you have very different outcomes.","human_ref_B":"Centrally planned economies tend to create centrally powerful figures who do that planning. But that is a political science angle. What about a sociological angle?  In *An Outline of a Theory of Practice* (along with many of his other works), Pierre Bourdieu sought to resolve the inherent dichotomies in sociological study, such as how social behavior cannot be reduced to individual behavior (the sociological equivalent of the uncertainty principle). So, he looked at the individual as a member of *fields*. You might belong to the field of *Americans*, and the field of *music fans*, and the field of *consumers*, and the field of *workers*, and the field of *redditors*, etc. Each of us belong to many fields. Each field is governed by *doxa*, or a set of rules. Participants within a field compete to modify or protect the rules. They do this simply by being, it need not be a conscious effort. Participation in a field reproduces and renews the field. But what happens when the *doxa* become literal, and they become the central plan of the real economy\u2013the economy that keeps you alive? It creates a situation of desperation and paranoia for control over and protection of the doxa of the field of government. In my opinion it is that overlap of ideological fields with real economic fields which make the doxa overly important and lead to individuals and small groups in leadership positions to reduce and limit doxa, to keep things manageable within human capacity. Thus, propagandistic and authoritarian structures proliferate because social reproduction of the rigid, codified doxa is inherently necessary to do things like grow crops, and have bread to eat.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1894.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"6u7dkt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why do socialist revolutions tend to result in totalitarian dictatorships? If you look at the USSR under Stalin, China under Mao, Cuba under Castro, or even going back to the French Revolution and Robespierre, it always seems like socialist or communist revolutions result in a totalitarian strong man seizing power and causing terrible oppression and suffering to the people that live there. Why is that? Is there something fundamentally wrong with the political philosophy that lends itself to this? Or is it because these revolutions will oftentimes go too far, and try to erase the social and political systems that have maintained order in those countries for hundreds or even thousands of years (i.e. getting rid of the monarchy and religious institutions at the same time and replacing them with entirely new and untested systems and ideologies.) Or is there some other reason? Has there ever been a communist country where this didn't happen, and the government functioned reliably for a long time and the people enjoyed a high standard of living?","c_root_id_A":"dlqz0nk","c_root_id_B":"dlqpzx9","created_at_utc_A":1502974700,"created_at_utc_B":1502954526,"score_A":25,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure the assumption that socialist revolutions tend to result in totalitarian dictatorship is true. At least not in any larger extent than any other revolutions. Looking at this  list, I don't see socialist revolutions as standing out in any way.","human_ref_B":"Sorry if this question is too off topic but is the French Revolution really considered socialistic by anyone?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20174.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"55fr2u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Does buying from American companies really help the economy more than buying from foreign companies? For example, would it be more beneficial to the us economy to buy an iPhone over a Samsung Galaxy?","c_root_id_A":"d8aik7b","c_root_id_B":"d8ah7ch","created_at_utc_A":1475389543,"created_at_utc_B":1475386058,"score_A":35,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Right off the bat I'm gonna tell you there is no way to calculate which phone purchase would most benefit the US economy.  There are too many factors to consider many factors that could be argued either way.  If some could calculate everything perfectly to find out the overall benefit of purchasing one phone over another, I can guess that the benefit would be so minimal that it would not be worth the effort to actually figure it out.  In order for money to remain in the United States economy, it has many ways to be cycled back in, but I will focus on 3.  Purchasing of products used in manufacturing an item, employment of US workers, and taxes paid to the US government.    First if the purchasing of products used in the manufacturing of an item.  Since it is a smartphone that means that the majority of the products used to manufacture the phone come from all around the world, and very little of those items come from the US.  This means that of all the little parts that are manufactured for smartphones don't benefit the US in their manufacturing.  Neither company benefits the American economy on this front.  Employment of US workers would be another way for money to be retained in the US economy since American workers would pay income tax and purchase goods and services that will perpetuate the movement of money.  Since manufacturing for both phones does not take place in the US that means that neither company benefits the US from manufacturing.  Now Apple claims to have 66,000 employees in the US at of 2015.]  (https:\/\/www.reference.com\/business-finance\/many-employees-apple-b335018ef06d0da4) So that is 66,000 employees that receive paychecks and spend money in the US due to being employed.  [Samsung is a Korean company, but does maintain several divisions in the United States that employ American workers.  Samsung claims to employ 325k employees worldwide.  I can't find how many are employed in the US, but it is safe to say that it is significant.  In order to know which company benefits the US most in terms of employment, we would have to know the total amount employed by Samsung, and the total amount paid in American wages.  Wrapped up into this math is the employment derived from building store locations and other ventures that are hard to account for.  The third is taxes.  Companies have to pay US taxes even if they are not US companies, but there are a lot of loopholes that companies use.  In 2012 Apple paid about $6b in taxes to the U.S. while Samsung paid about $4b.  The problem is that I couldn't tell you the amount of taxes they are going to pay this year, and that would be knowledge needed in order to decide which phone to purchase this year.  There are also several outliers when it comes to figuring this all out.  Apple has made very little in philanthropic contributions, and until recently was know as a company that didn't give charitably.  Apple does pay a higher dividend yield to investors than Samsung, but since it is a tech company it does not have the same loyalty that companies like Pepsi or Disney have, which means lower overall stock value than the actual worth of the company.  You also have to look at the overall benefit of the world economy, because that will have a benefit on the American economy.  Since Samsung employs so many people and does a lot of charitable and environmental work, there is a great world economy benefit that allows for greater overall American exports.  In the end, it is impossible to actually calculate the benefit of purchasing either one smartphone or the other.  If one of these companies manufactured in the US then there would be a clear choice, but with things as they are it is best to just purchase the phone that tickles your fancy.","human_ref_B":"Further: does buying a 'made in the USA' product benefit the US economy more, less, or about the same as buying 'American owned'?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3485.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"4b74di","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"While a lot of prisons have attempted to restrict the prisoner's freedom (of movement, activity, etc), in Norway they have prison with a modern and comfortable facilities. Why? What makes this prison management work? You can view the photo galleries here http:\/\/content.time.com\/time\/photogallery\/0,29307,1989083,00.html It's even cozier than my apartment!  The question is, why? Doesn't prison function to limit the prisoner's movement, as a kind of punishment? My common sense would say that this is a kind of rehab so prisoners wouldn't be disoriented when they're back to the society. But as one professor told me back in my school days, common sense is, more often than not, wrong when we try to comprehend something in social science.  Anyone can enlighten me on this? Why Norway (the prison Halden, specifically) give this comfortable facilities? What kind of situation makes this kind of prison management system actually possible?","c_root_id_A":"d16pg4g","c_root_id_B":"d16yk6b","created_at_utc_A":1458482754,"created_at_utc_B":1458499475,"score_A":13,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"To add a question to this post, have there been any studies as to the effectiveness of this system and its rehabilitation centered approach as compared to the more punitive focus of other systems?","human_ref_B":"good article to read would be here: http:\/\/www.apa.org\/monitor\/julaug03\/rehab.aspx or here http:\/\/criminaljusticeonlineblog.com\/11\/rehabilitation-versus-punishment-in-the-adult-justice-system\/  Basically, Norway goes for rehabilitation, the US goes for punishment.  Rehabilitation is based in the idea that being a criminal is, in some form or another, an issue of the persons mental health.  Punishment assumes that criminals are all perfectly mentally healthy, but fully cognizant of their actions, choose to break the law anyway.  Of course, the truth is most likely between these two to a different degree for each individual, but trying to make a fair system knowing this is difficult.  Edit; Oh, and in any good rehab facility, the people there know they're there to become better, so they have no motivation to leave.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16721.0,"score_ratio":1.6923076923}
{"post_id":"4b74di","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"While a lot of prisons have attempted to restrict the prisoner's freedom (of movement, activity, etc), in Norway they have prison with a modern and comfortable facilities. Why? What makes this prison management work? You can view the photo galleries here http:\/\/content.time.com\/time\/photogallery\/0,29307,1989083,00.html It's even cozier than my apartment!  The question is, why? Doesn't prison function to limit the prisoner's movement, as a kind of punishment? My common sense would say that this is a kind of rehab so prisoners wouldn't be disoriented when they're back to the society. But as one professor told me back in my school days, common sense is, more often than not, wrong when we try to comprehend something in social science.  Anyone can enlighten me on this? Why Norway (the prison Halden, specifically) give this comfortable facilities? What kind of situation makes this kind of prison management system actually possible?","c_root_id_A":"d16yfws","c_root_id_B":"d16yk6b","created_at_utc_A":1458499269,"created_at_utc_B":1458499475,"score_A":13,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"The Norwegian prison system has it's roots in the work by the criminologist Nils Christie. https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Nils_Christie If you are intersted in it, his works will be the place to start reading.  The general idea around Halden prison, is to have prison life and routine, mimic daily life as much as possible. That include everything from architecture to furniture to time schedules to meals. To try to minimise the difficulties of readapting to civil life after release. That prison is so new, there will not be much data available yet on how it works out. (It also takes a rather high reoffending type of criminals, they are not all the same).","human_ref_B":"good article to read would be here: http:\/\/www.apa.org\/monitor\/julaug03\/rehab.aspx or here http:\/\/criminaljusticeonlineblog.com\/11\/rehabilitation-versus-punishment-in-the-adult-justice-system\/  Basically, Norway goes for rehabilitation, the US goes for punishment.  Rehabilitation is based in the idea that being a criminal is, in some form or another, an issue of the persons mental health.  Punishment assumes that criminals are all perfectly mentally healthy, but fully cognizant of their actions, choose to break the law anyway.  Of course, the truth is most likely between these two to a different degree for each individual, but trying to make a fair system knowing this is difficult.  Edit; Oh, and in any good rehab facility, the people there know they're there to become better, so they have no motivation to leave.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":206.0,"score_ratio":1.6923076923}
{"post_id":"4b74di","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"While a lot of prisons have attempted to restrict the prisoner's freedom (of movement, activity, etc), in Norway they have prison with a modern and comfortable facilities. Why? What makes this prison management work? You can view the photo galleries here http:\/\/content.time.com\/time\/photogallery\/0,29307,1989083,00.html It's even cozier than my apartment!  The question is, why? Doesn't prison function to limit the prisoner's movement, as a kind of punishment? My common sense would say that this is a kind of rehab so prisoners wouldn't be disoriented when they're back to the society. But as one professor told me back in my school days, common sense is, more often than not, wrong when we try to comprehend something in social science.  Anyone can enlighten me on this? Why Norway (the prison Halden, specifically) give this comfortable facilities? What kind of situation makes this kind of prison management system actually possible?","c_root_id_A":"d16yk6b","c_root_id_B":"d16sne0","created_at_utc_A":1458499475,"created_at_utc_B":1458489305,"score_A":22,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"good article to read would be here: http:\/\/www.apa.org\/monitor\/julaug03\/rehab.aspx or here http:\/\/criminaljusticeonlineblog.com\/11\/rehabilitation-versus-punishment-in-the-adult-justice-system\/  Basically, Norway goes for rehabilitation, the US goes for punishment.  Rehabilitation is based in the idea that being a criminal is, in some form or another, an issue of the persons mental health.  Punishment assumes that criminals are all perfectly mentally healthy, but fully cognizant of their actions, choose to break the law anyway.  Of course, the truth is most likely between these two to a different degree for each individual, but trying to make a fair system knowing this is difficult.  Edit; Oh, and in any good rehab facility, the people there know they're there to become better, so they have no motivation to leave.","human_ref_B":"Answers require citations to social science sources. Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10170.0,"score_ratio":4.4}
{"post_id":"4b74di","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"While a lot of prisons have attempted to restrict the prisoner's freedom (of movement, activity, etc), in Norway they have prison with a modern and comfortable facilities. Why? What makes this prison management work? You can view the photo galleries here http:\/\/content.time.com\/time\/photogallery\/0,29307,1989083,00.html It's even cozier than my apartment!  The question is, why? Doesn't prison function to limit the prisoner's movement, as a kind of punishment? My common sense would say that this is a kind of rehab so prisoners wouldn't be disoriented when they're back to the society. But as one professor told me back in my school days, common sense is, more often than not, wrong when we try to comprehend something in social science.  Anyone can enlighten me on this? Why Norway (the prison Halden, specifically) give this comfortable facilities? What kind of situation makes this kind of prison management system actually possible?","c_root_id_A":"d16yfws","c_root_id_B":"d16sne0","created_at_utc_A":1458499269,"created_at_utc_B":1458489305,"score_A":13,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The Norwegian prison system has it's roots in the work by the criminologist Nils Christie. https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Nils_Christie If you are intersted in it, his works will be the place to start reading.  The general idea around Halden prison, is to have prison life and routine, mimic daily life as much as possible. That include everything from architecture to furniture to time schedules to meals. To try to minimise the difficulties of readapting to civil life after release. That prison is so new, there will not be much data available yet on how it works out. (It also takes a rather high reoffending type of criminals, they are not all the same).","human_ref_B":"Answers require citations to social science sources. Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9964.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj23y6","c_root_id_B":"ctj20yz","created_at_utc_A":1438097120,"created_at_utc_B":1438097000,"score_A":56,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I would recommend learn R. It is an extremely powerful language for statistical analysis.","human_ref_B":"Python, Lisp or R would be my top recommendations, depending on your background.  Python is really flexible and fairly easy to get the hang of. Lisp is a bit tougher, but a lot of ~~people~~ mathematicians like its \"functional\" design. R is a specialized language for statistics and data science.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":120.0,"score_ratio":3.1111111111}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj23y6","c_root_id_B":"ctj1xp9","created_at_utc_A":1438097120,"created_at_utc_B":1438096866,"score_A":56,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I would recommend learn R. It is an extremely powerful language for statistical analysis.","human_ref_B":"I'm in the same boat! I decided to learn SAS because it seems to be the most prevalent","labels":1,"seconds_difference":254.0,"score_ratio":11.2}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj1xp9","c_root_id_B":"ctj20yz","created_at_utc_A":1438096866,"created_at_utc_B":1438097000,"score_A":5,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I'm in the same boat! I decided to learn SAS because it seems to be the most prevalent","human_ref_B":"Python, Lisp or R would be my top recommendations, depending on your background.  Python is really flexible and fairly easy to get the hang of. Lisp is a bit tougher, but a lot of ~~people~~ mathematicians like its \"functional\" design. R is a specialized language for statistics and data science.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":134.0,"score_ratio":3.6}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj6ehq","c_root_id_B":"ctj596z","created_at_utc_A":1438103320,"created_at_utc_B":1438101676,"score_A":12,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"R for serious statistical work. This is the 'language' of choice by the stat community. It is free, and people add useful packages as new techniques emerge.  Python is a more versatile language. This is what you should learn if you want to learn more about programming or do things besides data analysis and visualization (R does those very well). Python is also free and has enormous support with packages that can do many, many things.   Stata is very popular in economics academia.   SAS is very popular in economics industry.","human_ref_B":"Python with Numpy and Scipy. Also look into pandas.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1644.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj6ehq","c_root_id_B":"ctj65x1","created_at_utc_A":1438103320,"created_at_utc_B":1438102978,"score_A":12,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"R for serious statistical work. This is the 'language' of choice by the stat community. It is free, and people add useful packages as new techniques emerge.  Python is a more versatile language. This is what you should learn if you want to learn more about programming or do things besides data analysis and visualization (R does those very well). Python is also free and has enormous support with packages that can do many, many things.   Stata is very popular in economics academia.   SAS is very popular in economics industry.","human_ref_B":"R and\/or Python to be a smart, sellable data analyst, but if you're looking government, you're going to need Stata.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":342.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj1xp9","c_root_id_B":"ctj6ehq","created_at_utc_A":1438096866,"created_at_utc_B":1438103320,"score_A":5,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I'm in the same boat! I decided to learn SAS because it seems to be the most prevalent","human_ref_B":"R for serious statistical work. This is the 'language' of choice by the stat community. It is free, and people add useful packages as new techniques emerge.  Python is a more versatile language. This is what you should learn if you want to learn more about programming or do things besides data analysis and visualization (R does those very well). Python is also free and has enormous support with packages that can do many, many things.   Stata is very popular in economics academia.   SAS is very popular in economics industry.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6454.0,"score_ratio":2.4}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj4nkw","c_root_id_B":"ctj6ehq","created_at_utc_A":1438100809,"created_at_utc_B":1438103320,"score_A":2,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"R   If you have access through employer \/ University Stata and SPSS can be useful as well","human_ref_B":"R for serious statistical work. This is the 'language' of choice by the stat community. It is free, and people add useful packages as new techniques emerge.  Python is a more versatile language. This is what you should learn if you want to learn more about programming or do things besides data analysis and visualization (R does those very well). Python is also free and has enormous support with packages that can do many, many things.   Stata is very popular in economics academia.   SAS is very popular in economics industry.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2511.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj596z","c_root_id_B":"ctj1xp9","created_at_utc_A":1438101676,"created_at_utc_B":1438096866,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Python with Numpy and Scipy. Also look into pandas.","human_ref_B":"I'm in the same boat! I decided to learn SAS because it seems to be the most prevalent","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4810.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj4nkw","c_root_id_B":"ctj596z","created_at_utc_A":1438100809,"created_at_utc_B":1438101676,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"R   If you have access through employer \/ University Stata and SPSS can be useful as well","human_ref_B":"Python with Numpy and Scipy. Also look into pandas.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":867.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjdc2t","c_root_id_B":"ctj65x1","created_at_utc_A":1438112846,"created_at_utc_B":1438102978,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Ok, I am seeing a lot of good suggestions here but I'd like to clarify a few things.    * 1) R is an awesome tool with TONS of options and it is extremely well documented. It's also free, so you'd have full access to it and all it has to offer. Windows machines block it's true potential though since they don't allow you to unlock multi-core threading as easily.    * 2) Python is also free (I'd get the Anaconda package). As others have suggested you'll want to look at the pandas package but I'd also look at numpy and scikit-learn. The documentation for Python is lacking a bit in my opinion. It has wider application than R since it integrates with java\/websites more easily. If you really get into use the D3 visualizations to make great presentations and graphs.   * 3) SAS is widely accepted but the java utilities for trying to learn on your own are total shite and freeze CONSTANTLY and are a huge pain. ...and you'll be about $600k short of getting a full license for yourself so you're kind of stuck with the stuff they offer to .edu email address holders. It IS the standard for government, though...so if you do anything with the DOJ, FDA, CDC and the other alphabet soup club you HAVE to work in SAS. No other options.   * 4) MATLAB handles scientific studies very well and is a sort of lab-standard. I know a lot of people who use it for analyzing images from microscopes etc. I have no experience with this language personally.   * 5) SQL is a useful language but is dependent on where\/the organization you work for as it's primarily used for getting the data out of a database so you can analyze the information somewhere else i.e. SAS, R, Python etc. Many of the projects I have worked on have me receiving the data from someone else...as the SQL server is tied proprietary data they may not want me to be able to access. Knowing it won't be bad for you at all but may not be necessary.   * 6) Check out Amazon EC2 servers. I think you get ~750 hours free before you start being charged and then the hourly rates are damn near free. You can run Python, R, and I think even SAS...which will give you a lot more power to run larger datasets through. It's also good to have on a resume in case you end up with clients who may not have their own licenses or enough server power.   * 7) Look into the Kaggle competitions as that will give you data and problems to work at with known \"best\" solutions and code for comparison purposes.   * 8) Haven't seen it on here much but SPSS is used in many places and universities should have access to it. That's more or less GUI these days and is pretty straight forward.","human_ref_B":"R and\/or Python to be a smart, sellable data analyst, but if you're looking government, you're going to need Stata.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9868.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj1xp9","c_root_id_B":"ctjdc2t","created_at_utc_A":1438096866,"created_at_utc_B":1438112846,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I'm in the same boat! I decided to learn SAS because it seems to be the most prevalent","human_ref_B":"Ok, I am seeing a lot of good suggestions here but I'd like to clarify a few things.    * 1) R is an awesome tool with TONS of options and it is extremely well documented. It's also free, so you'd have full access to it and all it has to offer. Windows machines block it's true potential though since they don't allow you to unlock multi-core threading as easily.    * 2) Python is also free (I'd get the Anaconda package). As others have suggested you'll want to look at the pandas package but I'd also look at numpy and scikit-learn. The documentation for Python is lacking a bit in my opinion. It has wider application than R since it integrates with java\/websites more easily. If you really get into use the D3 visualizations to make great presentations and graphs.   * 3) SAS is widely accepted but the java utilities for trying to learn on your own are total shite and freeze CONSTANTLY and are a huge pain. ...and you'll be about $600k short of getting a full license for yourself so you're kind of stuck with the stuff they offer to .edu email address holders. It IS the standard for government, though...so if you do anything with the DOJ, FDA, CDC and the other alphabet soup club you HAVE to work in SAS. No other options.   * 4) MATLAB handles scientific studies very well and is a sort of lab-standard. I know a lot of people who use it for analyzing images from microscopes etc. I have no experience with this language personally.   * 5) SQL is a useful language but is dependent on where\/the organization you work for as it's primarily used for getting the data out of a database so you can analyze the information somewhere else i.e. SAS, R, Python etc. Many of the projects I have worked on have me receiving the data from someone else...as the SQL server is tied proprietary data they may not want me to be able to access. Knowing it won't be bad for you at all but may not be necessary.   * 6) Check out Amazon EC2 servers. I think you get ~750 hours free before you start being charged and then the hourly rates are damn near free. You can run Python, R, and I think even SAS...which will give you a lot more power to run larger datasets through. It's also good to have on a resume in case you end up with clients who may not have their own licenses or enough server power.   * 7) Look into the Kaggle competitions as that will give you data and problems to work at with known \"best\" solutions and code for comparison purposes.   * 8) Haven't seen it on here much but SPSS is used in many places and universities should have access to it. That's more or less GUI these days and is pretty straight forward.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15980.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjdc2t","c_root_id_B":"ctjao6c","created_at_utc_A":1438112846,"created_at_utc_B":1438109228,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Ok, I am seeing a lot of good suggestions here but I'd like to clarify a few things.    * 1) R is an awesome tool with TONS of options and it is extremely well documented. It's also free, so you'd have full access to it and all it has to offer. Windows machines block it's true potential though since they don't allow you to unlock multi-core threading as easily.    * 2) Python is also free (I'd get the Anaconda package). As others have suggested you'll want to look at the pandas package but I'd also look at numpy and scikit-learn. The documentation for Python is lacking a bit in my opinion. It has wider application than R since it integrates with java\/websites more easily. If you really get into use the D3 visualizations to make great presentations and graphs.   * 3) SAS is widely accepted but the java utilities for trying to learn on your own are total shite and freeze CONSTANTLY and are a huge pain. ...and you'll be about $600k short of getting a full license for yourself so you're kind of stuck with the stuff they offer to .edu email address holders. It IS the standard for government, though...so if you do anything with the DOJ, FDA, CDC and the other alphabet soup club you HAVE to work in SAS. No other options.   * 4) MATLAB handles scientific studies very well and is a sort of lab-standard. I know a lot of people who use it for analyzing images from microscopes etc. I have no experience with this language personally.   * 5) SQL is a useful language but is dependent on where\/the organization you work for as it's primarily used for getting the data out of a database so you can analyze the information somewhere else i.e. SAS, R, Python etc. Many of the projects I have worked on have me receiving the data from someone else...as the SQL server is tied proprietary data they may not want me to be able to access. Knowing it won't be bad for you at all but may not be necessary.   * 6) Check out Amazon EC2 servers. I think you get ~750 hours free before you start being charged and then the hourly rates are damn near free. You can run Python, R, and I think even SAS...which will give you a lot more power to run larger datasets through. It's also good to have on a resume in case you end up with clients who may not have their own licenses or enough server power.   * 7) Look into the Kaggle competitions as that will give you data and problems to work at with known \"best\" solutions and code for comparison purposes.   * 8) Haven't seen it on here much but SPSS is used in many places and universities should have access to it. That's more or less GUI these days and is pretty straight forward.","human_ref_B":"Honestly, before you learn R or Python or any other language, make certain you know SQL.  You don't have to learn it all, but you should be fairly conversant in SELECT statements.  Learn about inner & outer joins.  Learn about GROUP BY.  Learn about sub-queries.  I'm guessing that your degree in Econ gave you experience working in MS Excel or some other spreadsheet program.  You may want to get into a little VBA, but I should warn you about this.  Do not try to build the Sistine Chapel or the Taj Majal out of VBA.  Just learn how to do some simple forms with it.  Know how to call certain financial functions or statistical functions and know how to feed those functions ranges or arrays and also cell values.  That's it.    Always look at VBA for small projects only.  Small, one-off, short lifespan projects that don't require maintenance in the future.  I'd learn Python before learning R.  Python is like the Visual Basic of the open source world.  It's far more approachable than R, and doesn't require you to know functional programming concepts.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3618.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj4nkw","c_root_id_B":"ctjdc2t","created_at_utc_A":1438100809,"created_at_utc_B":1438112846,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"R   If you have access through employer \/ University Stata and SPSS can be useful as well","human_ref_B":"Ok, I am seeing a lot of good suggestions here but I'd like to clarify a few things.    * 1) R is an awesome tool with TONS of options and it is extremely well documented. It's also free, so you'd have full access to it and all it has to offer. Windows machines block it's true potential though since they don't allow you to unlock multi-core threading as easily.    * 2) Python is also free (I'd get the Anaconda package). As others have suggested you'll want to look at the pandas package but I'd also look at numpy and scikit-learn. The documentation for Python is lacking a bit in my opinion. It has wider application than R since it integrates with java\/websites more easily. If you really get into use the D3 visualizations to make great presentations and graphs.   * 3) SAS is widely accepted but the java utilities for trying to learn on your own are total shite and freeze CONSTANTLY and are a huge pain. ...and you'll be about $600k short of getting a full license for yourself so you're kind of stuck with the stuff they offer to .edu email address holders. It IS the standard for government, though...so if you do anything with the DOJ, FDA, CDC and the other alphabet soup club you HAVE to work in SAS. No other options.   * 4) MATLAB handles scientific studies very well and is a sort of lab-standard. I know a lot of people who use it for analyzing images from microscopes etc. I have no experience with this language personally.   * 5) SQL is a useful language but is dependent on where\/the organization you work for as it's primarily used for getting the data out of a database so you can analyze the information somewhere else i.e. SAS, R, Python etc. Many of the projects I have worked on have me receiving the data from someone else...as the SQL server is tied proprietary data they may not want me to be able to access. Knowing it won't be bad for you at all but may not be necessary.   * 6) Check out Amazon EC2 servers. I think you get ~750 hours free before you start being charged and then the hourly rates are damn near free. You can run Python, R, and I think even SAS...which will give you a lot more power to run larger datasets through. It's also good to have on a resume in case you end up with clients who may not have their own licenses or enough server power.   * 7) Look into the Kaggle competitions as that will give you data and problems to work at with known \"best\" solutions and code for comparison purposes.   * 8) Haven't seen it on here much but SPSS is used in many places and universities should have access to it. That's more or less GUI these days and is pretty straight forward.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12037.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjbij1","c_root_id_B":"ctjdc2t","created_at_utc_A":1438110364,"created_at_utc_B":1438112846,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Do you want to work in economics or in another field?  If all you want to do is economics, then I understand that STATA has captured that market.  If you want to do anyhting else at all, or just keep your options open, learn R!","human_ref_B":"Ok, I am seeing a lot of good suggestions here but I'd like to clarify a few things.    * 1) R is an awesome tool with TONS of options and it is extremely well documented. It's also free, so you'd have full access to it and all it has to offer. Windows machines block it's true potential though since they don't allow you to unlock multi-core threading as easily.    * 2) Python is also free (I'd get the Anaconda package). As others have suggested you'll want to look at the pandas package but I'd also look at numpy and scikit-learn. The documentation for Python is lacking a bit in my opinion. It has wider application than R since it integrates with java\/websites more easily. If you really get into use the D3 visualizations to make great presentations and graphs.   * 3) SAS is widely accepted but the java utilities for trying to learn on your own are total shite and freeze CONSTANTLY and are a huge pain. ...and you'll be about $600k short of getting a full license for yourself so you're kind of stuck with the stuff they offer to .edu email address holders. It IS the standard for government, though...so if you do anything with the DOJ, FDA, CDC and the other alphabet soup club you HAVE to work in SAS. No other options.   * 4) MATLAB handles scientific studies very well and is a sort of lab-standard. I know a lot of people who use it for analyzing images from microscopes etc. I have no experience with this language personally.   * 5) SQL is a useful language but is dependent on where\/the organization you work for as it's primarily used for getting the data out of a database so you can analyze the information somewhere else i.e. SAS, R, Python etc. Many of the projects I have worked on have me receiving the data from someone else...as the SQL server is tied proprietary data they may not want me to be able to access. Knowing it won't be bad for you at all but may not be necessary.   * 6) Check out Amazon EC2 servers. I think you get ~750 hours free before you start being charged and then the hourly rates are damn near free. You can run Python, R, and I think even SAS...which will give you a lot more power to run larger datasets through. It's also good to have on a resume in case you end up with clients who may not have their own licenses or enough server power.   * 7) Look into the Kaggle competitions as that will give you data and problems to work at with known \"best\" solutions and code for comparison purposes.   * 8) Haven't seen it on here much but SPSS is used in many places and universities should have access to it. That's more or less GUI these days and is pretty straight forward.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2482.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj1xp9","c_root_id_B":"ctj65x1","created_at_utc_A":1438096866,"created_at_utc_B":1438102978,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I'm in the same boat! I decided to learn SAS because it seems to be the most prevalent","human_ref_B":"R and\/or Python to be a smart, sellable data analyst, but if you're looking government, you're going to need Stata.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6112.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj4nkw","c_root_id_B":"ctj65x1","created_at_utc_A":1438100809,"created_at_utc_B":1438102978,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"R   If you have access through employer \/ University Stata and SPSS can be useful as well","human_ref_B":"R and\/or Python to be a smart, sellable data analyst, but if you're looking government, you're going to need Stata.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2169.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjao6c","c_root_id_B":"ctjdmno","created_at_utc_A":1438109228,"created_at_utc_B":1438113241,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Honestly, before you learn R or Python or any other language, make certain you know SQL.  You don't have to learn it all, but you should be fairly conversant in SELECT statements.  Learn about inner & outer joins.  Learn about GROUP BY.  Learn about sub-queries.  I'm guessing that your degree in Econ gave you experience working in MS Excel or some other spreadsheet program.  You may want to get into a little VBA, but I should warn you about this.  Do not try to build the Sistine Chapel or the Taj Majal out of VBA.  Just learn how to do some simple forms with it.  Know how to call certain financial functions or statistical functions and know how to feed those functions ranges or arrays and also cell values.  That's it.    Always look at VBA for small projects only.  Small, one-off, short lifespan projects that don't require maintenance in the future.  I'd learn Python before learning R.  Python is like the Visual Basic of the open source world.  It's far more approachable than R, and doesn't require you to know functional programming concepts.","human_ref_B":"This earlier thread may be of interest as far as data analysis for an economic context is concerned.  This comment in particular may be helpful - it breaks down the programming languages used in papers in two recent issues of *American Economic Review* (only those that made that information  available, of course).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4013.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctj4nkw","c_root_id_B":"ctjdmno","created_at_utc_A":1438100809,"created_at_utc_B":1438113241,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"R   If you have access through employer \/ University Stata and SPSS can be useful as well","human_ref_B":"This earlier thread may be of interest as far as data analysis for an economic context is concerned.  This comment in particular may be helpful - it breaks down the programming languages used in papers in two recent issues of *American Economic Review* (only those that made that information  available, of course).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12432.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjdmno","c_root_id_B":"ctjbij1","created_at_utc_A":1438113241,"created_at_utc_B":1438110364,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This earlier thread may be of interest as far as data analysis for an economic context is concerned.  This comment in particular may be helpful - it breaks down the programming languages used in papers in two recent issues of *American Economic Review* (only those that made that information  available, of course).","human_ref_B":"Do you want to work in economics or in another field?  If all you want to do is economics, then I understand that STATA has captured that market.  If you want to do anyhting else at all, or just keep your options open, learn R!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2877.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjao6c","c_root_id_B":"ctjdo2c","created_at_utc_A":1438109228,"created_at_utc_B":1438113296,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Honestly, before you learn R or Python or any other language, make certain you know SQL.  You don't have to learn it all, but you should be fairly conversant in SELECT statements.  Learn about inner & outer joins.  Learn about GROUP BY.  Learn about sub-queries.  I'm guessing that your degree in Econ gave you experience working in MS Excel or some other spreadsheet program.  You may want to get into a little VBA, but I should warn you about this.  Do not try to build the Sistine Chapel or the Taj Majal out of VBA.  Just learn how to do some simple forms with it.  Know how to call certain financial functions or statistical functions and know how to feed those functions ranges or arrays and also cell values.  That's it.    Always look at VBA for small projects only.  Small, one-off, short lifespan projects that don't require maintenance in the future.  I'd learn Python before learning R.  Python is like the Visual Basic of the open source world.  It's far more approachable than R, and doesn't require you to know functional programming concepts.","human_ref_B":"That really depends on your future career goals. Academics mostly use R for data analysis while companies are mostly transitioning their data analysis teams to python. R and python have a lot of similar data analysis libraries so you can do basically the same analysis with either one. If you want to transition to the private sector, I suggest learning python. A lot of tech companies are hiring former economists as data scientists.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4068.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjdo2c","c_root_id_B":"ctj4nkw","created_at_utc_A":1438113296,"created_at_utc_B":1438100809,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"That really depends on your future career goals. Academics mostly use R for data analysis while companies are mostly transitioning their data analysis teams to python. R and python have a lot of similar data analysis libraries so you can do basically the same analysis with either one. If you want to transition to the private sector, I suggest learning python. A lot of tech companies are hiring former economists as data scientists.","human_ref_B":"R   If you have access through employer \/ University Stata and SPSS can be useful as well","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12487.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjbij1","c_root_id_B":"ctjdo2c","created_at_utc_A":1438110364,"created_at_utc_B":1438113296,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Do you want to work in economics or in another field?  If all you want to do is economics, then I understand that STATA has captured that market.  If you want to do anyhting else at all, or just keep your options open, learn R!","human_ref_B":"That really depends on your future career goals. Academics mostly use R for data analysis while companies are mostly transitioning their data analysis teams to python. R and python have a lot of similar data analysis libraries so you can do basically the same analysis with either one. If you want to transition to the private sector, I suggest learning python. A lot of tech companies are hiring former economists as data scientists.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2932.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjao6c","c_root_id_B":"ctj4nkw","created_at_utc_A":1438109228,"created_at_utc_B":1438100809,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Honestly, before you learn R or Python or any other language, make certain you know SQL.  You don't have to learn it all, but you should be fairly conversant in SELECT statements.  Learn about inner & outer joins.  Learn about GROUP BY.  Learn about sub-queries.  I'm guessing that your degree in Econ gave you experience working in MS Excel or some other spreadsheet program.  You may want to get into a little VBA, but I should warn you about this.  Do not try to build the Sistine Chapel or the Taj Majal out of VBA.  Just learn how to do some simple forms with it.  Know how to call certain financial functions or statistical functions and know how to feed those functions ranges or arrays and also cell values.  That's it.    Always look at VBA for small projects only.  Small, one-off, short lifespan projects that don't require maintenance in the future.  I'd learn Python before learning R.  Python is like the Visual Basic of the open source world.  It's far more approachable than R, and doesn't require you to know functional programming concepts.","human_ref_B":"R   If you have access through employer \/ University Stata and SPSS can be useful as well","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8419.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjfgc6","c_root_id_B":"ctj4nkw","created_at_utc_A":1438115776,"created_at_utc_B":1438100809,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"At MIT Econ's PhD program, there's an expectation that you know Stata, but a lot more courses on focusing on R proficiency as well. It would be good to know both. Matlab won't hurt either.","human_ref_B":"R   If you have access through employer \/ University Stata and SPSS can be useful as well","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14967.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjfgc6","c_root_id_B":"ctjbij1","created_at_utc_A":1438115776,"created_at_utc_B":1438110364,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"At MIT Econ's PhD program, there's an expectation that you know Stata, but a lot more courses on focusing on R proficiency as well. It would be good to know both. Matlab won't hurt either.","human_ref_B":"Do you want to work in economics or in another field?  If all you want to do is economics, then I understand that STATA has captured that market.  If you want to do anyhting else at all, or just keep your options open, learn R!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5412.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3ewnfr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I have a degree in Economics and want to learn some programming for data analysis. What would be the best language to learn? Apologies if this is the wrong place to ask.","c_root_id_A":"ctjeuq6","c_root_id_B":"ctjfgc6","created_at_utc_A":1438114948,"created_at_utc_B":1438115776,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"MATLAB, python or R","human_ref_B":"At MIT Econ's PhD program, there's an expectation that you know Stata, but a lot more courses on focusing on R proficiency as well. It would be good to know both. Matlab won't hurt either.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":828.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"31cugt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Are there any cultures in which a man can have sex with another man, and not be considered \"homosexual\"? I was reading the book *A Trial by Jury* by D. Graham Burnett, which concerns his experience as the foreman of the jury in a murder trial.  The book itself is not relevant to my question, but rather a particular passage from it.  >Harder to interpret than these questions was the next: \"Do any of you think it is possible for a man to have sex with another man and not be gay?\"  >Several of us must have looked puzzled, because he tried to clarify: \"Do any of you think it is possible for a man to have sex with another man and not think of himself as a gay man?\"  >This made sense. The answer seemed obvious to me: sure. No one responded. I raised my hand.  >\"You think that is possible?\" he repeated, and I said I did. What made me say that? he wondered. I replied that there was plenty of evidence that different cultures at different points in history thought different ways about same-sex unions. For instance, in South America there were traditions in which it was considered exceedingly masculine to have sex with some men in some ways.   Could someone explain this to me? Does this imply that \"homosexuality\" as we know it some kind of social construct?","c_root_id_A":"cq0gt83","c_root_id_B":"cq0g8sl","created_at_utc_A":1428103243,"created_at_utc_B":1428102104,"score_A":53,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Yes, to answer your question, \"homosexuality\" as we know it is not just a social construct but a rather recent one.  I'll refer your to this thread on \/r\/AskHistorians on the (relatively) recent creation of the concept of Homosexuality: Does it make sense to talk about \"sexual orientation\" in the ancient world, given the large differences in how sexuality was approached?","human_ref_B":"Please cite social science sources for top-level comments. Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1139.0,"score_ratio":5.8888888889}
{"post_id":"31cugt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Are there any cultures in which a man can have sex with another man, and not be considered \"homosexual\"? I was reading the book *A Trial by Jury* by D. Graham Burnett, which concerns his experience as the foreman of the jury in a murder trial.  The book itself is not relevant to my question, but rather a particular passage from it.  >Harder to interpret than these questions was the next: \"Do any of you think it is possible for a man to have sex with another man and not be gay?\"  >Several of us must have looked puzzled, because he tried to clarify: \"Do any of you think it is possible for a man to have sex with another man and not think of himself as a gay man?\"  >This made sense. The answer seemed obvious to me: sure. No one responded. I raised my hand.  >\"You think that is possible?\" he repeated, and I said I did. What made me say that? he wondered. I replied that there was plenty of evidence that different cultures at different points in history thought different ways about same-sex unions. For instance, in South America there were traditions in which it was considered exceedingly masculine to have sex with some men in some ways.   Could someone explain this to me? Does this imply that \"homosexuality\" as we know it some kind of social construct?","c_root_id_A":"cq0g8sl","c_root_id_B":"cq0hh9k","created_at_utc_A":1428102104,"created_at_utc_B":1428104592,"score_A":9,"score_B":32,"human_ref_A":"Please cite social science sources for top-level comments. Thank you.","human_ref_B":"Yes, our ideas about same sex attraction are socially constructed. There are examples throughout history of men having sex with men where it was not considered \"homosexual\" behavior. There are many but I can point specifically to the early Qajar period in Iran (Persia). It was common for men to have relationships with younger men during this period and these relationships were considered completely normal and they didn't infringe upon male-female relationships. In fact, the standard of beauty in this period favored androgynous looking women.   Source: Najmabadi, Afsaneh. Women with Mustaches and Men without Beards: Gender and Sexual Anxieties of Iranian Modernity. Berkeley: U of California, 2005. Print.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2488.0,"score_ratio":3.5555555556}
{"post_id":"31cugt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Are there any cultures in which a man can have sex with another man, and not be considered \"homosexual\"? I was reading the book *A Trial by Jury* by D. Graham Burnett, which concerns his experience as the foreman of the jury in a murder trial.  The book itself is not relevant to my question, but rather a particular passage from it.  >Harder to interpret than these questions was the next: \"Do any of you think it is possible for a man to have sex with another man and not be gay?\"  >Several of us must have looked puzzled, because he tried to clarify: \"Do any of you think it is possible for a man to have sex with another man and not think of himself as a gay man?\"  >This made sense. The answer seemed obvious to me: sure. No one responded. I raised my hand.  >\"You think that is possible?\" he repeated, and I said I did. What made me say that? he wondered. I replied that there was plenty of evidence that different cultures at different points in history thought different ways about same-sex unions. For instance, in South America there were traditions in which it was considered exceedingly masculine to have sex with some men in some ways.   Could someone explain this to me? Does this imply that \"homosexuality\" as we know it some kind of social construct?","c_root_id_A":"cq0hh9k","c_root_id_B":"cq0hbyt","created_at_utc_A":1428104592,"created_at_utc_B":1428104289,"score_A":32,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Yes, our ideas about same sex attraction are socially constructed. There are examples throughout history of men having sex with men where it was not considered \"homosexual\" behavior. There are many but I can point specifically to the early Qajar period in Iran (Persia). It was common for men to have relationships with younger men during this period and these relationships were considered completely normal and they didn't infringe upon male-female relationships. In fact, the standard of beauty in this period favored androgynous looking women.   Source: Najmabadi, Afsaneh. Women with Mustaches and Men without Beards: Gender and Sexual Anxieties of Iranian Modernity. Berkeley: U of California, 2005. Print.","human_ref_B":"In short yes, gender and sexuality are socially constructed.   For initial reading into the idea of reproduction as social construct in what I assume Burnett is referencing, start with: Weismantel, Mary. \"Moche Sex Pots: Reproduction and Temporality in Ancient South America\" *American Anthropologist* 106, 3 (September 2004) pp 495-505   You can also obviously check out her bibliography for further reading on the subject. It is almost an academic cliche at this point to say that race, gender, and sexuality are all socially constructed; I don't think you will find many social scientists who would argue otherwise (though admittedly this is not my area of expertise).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":303.0,"score_ratio":5.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2p7ozq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is the West reaching some kind of \"peak education\" in which the return for studying doesn't match the cost of studying?","c_root_id_A":"cmu4cyf","c_root_id_B":"cmu5orl","created_at_utc_A":1418516075,"created_at_utc_B":1418519255,"score_A":14,"score_B":53,"human_ref_A":"In an attempt to focus this question, I'd ask you: Do you mean \"the West\" or \"America\"?","human_ref_B":"Short answer: not really.   Long answer:  According to MoneyBox (and countless other sources that confirm the same findings), there is still a large gap in lifetime earnings-minus-expenses of college graduates as opposed to high school graduates. It still, on average, convincingly pays to get a bachelor's degree.   There is a \"sizable minority\", however, for whom this is not true. This would imply that a college degree does not automatically raise a person's earning power, but that it *tends* to raise an individual's earning power, and is certainly an *opportunity* to do so if people make decisions with realistic, practical expectations. For example, the cliche of taking $120,000 in student loans to get an Education degree, where the average starting salary is $30,000-$40,000 (and stays in that range for a good while), would cripple the student's ability to start a new life as an adult. It would take them 25-30 years to pay it off, living like a poor person all the while.   It would make much more sense for some people to get an AA at a community college, go to a public University to finish their BA\/BS, work part time and leave with maybe $10-15k in student loans. That amount could be paid off in 2-3 years if they lived frugally with a goal in mind to pay off their loans.   On the other hand, someone taking out even $300k in loans to become a surgeon makes sense, because surgeons make $250-$500k\/year. They'd in a practical sense be able to pay that back in 2-3 years.   So as odious as this is to many people, simple logic (outside of sociological concerns) dictates students would be unwise to simply study whatever and whereever they wish in our current system without counting the cost first.   The issue with rising tuition is that college does indeed help people have more income, but this opportunity is becoming less and less accessible (and more risky) to the poor and middle class. And it is reducing the relative quality of life of those who make that sacrifice of time and money to pay off high amounts of loans rather than lower amounts of loans. Many question whether that extra money is being used to actually further the quality of Education. I certainly do.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3180.0,"score_ratio":3.7857142857}
{"post_id":"1pen9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"[Linguistics] Are left-handers more prevalent in societies or regions where the primary language used is read\/written right to left? As a hypothetical, is \"left-handedness\" more dominant in Kuwait, where the official language is Arabic, than the United States, where the major language used is English?","c_root_id_A":"cd1z1ch","c_root_id_B":"cd1y6uu","created_at_utc_A":1383029488,"created_at_utc_B":1383025573,"score_A":14,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"No. it's a matter of brain wiring. Because people mostly notice lefties when they're writing they  forget that writing is just a tiny part of what you use your dominant hand for. Brushing your teeth, using a fork, simply picking something up. The handedness of a child is obvious long before they learn to read or write  It's also far more complex than simply lefty and righty. It's more of a spectrum, with most people slightly mix handed  for example brushing your teeth with your left but throwing with your right. meaning fine movements with one and strong movements with the other.  This is different than ambidextrous which means using either hand for the same task with equal ability.    tl;dr language is only a tiny part of handedness   Oldfield, R.C. \"The assessment and analysis of handedness, the edinburgh inventory\" Neuropsychologia 9 97-113  http:\/\/www.eecs.yorku.ca\/course_archive\/2006-07\/W\/6329\/EdinburghInventory.html (This link isn't actually to the article but to the edinburgh inventory, which is the most popular test of where you fall on the handedness spectrum)   Spinnery, Laura \"A Left-Brain\/Right-Brain Conundrum Revisited\" TheScientist.com Science 16 August 1985: Vol. 229 no. 4714 pp. 665-668 DOI: 10.1126\/science.4023705 http:\/\/www.sciencemag.org\/content\/229\/4714\/665.abstract (Notice that their definition of left handed includes ambidextrous and just about anyone who isn't purely right handed. The purely left handed don't show much variation from pure right handers in the corpus collosum, it's the mixed handers who do, their definition of lefty is misleading. Desperately trying to find a web source for this)   Soldal Hildegunn. \"Lefthandedness\" The Guardian August 13, 2002 http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/news\/2002\/aug\/13\/netnotes.hildegunnsoldal \"Lefthanders are usually defined as people who write with their left hand. However, that does not mean that they do not use their right hand. Some people use either hand for some tasks or prefer different hands for different tasks.\" (again left-handed here means essentially means not purely right handed.)   Steven Christman has done some great research on the topic of handedness, there's bibliography here but no links to articles http:\/\/psychology.utoledo.edu\/showpage.asp?name=christman   http:\/\/www.apa.org\/monitor\/jun06\/remember.aspx an article ABOUT Christman's work. Not great but gets the idea across.    I think that should cover just about everything i said above as well as my comment below.","human_ref_B":"You might get more traction in \/r\/askhistorians. They're pretty smart","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3915.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1kzlot","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What are the long term effects of the Peace Corps on local populations? I have a friend who is joining the Peace Corps but is a little worried that their good intentions may not translate into positive long term effects. Can anyone shed some light on how much good the Peace Corps actually does in the long run?","c_root_id_A":"cbuh7tb","c_root_id_B":"cbudeis","created_at_utc_A":1377363206,"created_at_utc_B":1377347128,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"After some cursory googling I found a study carried out by Peace Corps that surveyed the respondent's opinions of Americans before\/after the Peace Corps had come to the area. [link]. The response seems to be fairly positive with the respondent's image of Americans improving after the visit.  Also Peace Corps has apparently conducted impact studies on countries which they've serviced. [link] I think that might be more what you were looking for.","human_ref_B":"Consider posting this over in \/r\/peacecorps, where there are many active and former volunteers who could speak from experience on this, some of whom have even gone back to their service countries years later. Also, tell your friend that \"doing good\" is a very subjective idea and therefore there are no proper measurements. Just tell em \"don't go nuts\" and they'll be fine.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16078.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"rcc7b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the best way to learn a language?","c_root_id_A":"c44oas5","c_root_id_B":"c44p5dl","created_at_utc_A":1332655819,"created_at_utc_B":1332663797,"score_A":11,"score_B":316,"human_ref_A":"While rote learning for a few months is important in the beginning to get the basics down, immersion really is the best way. Speak it as often as you can as much as you can with people fluent in the language. I lived in Spain for a few years. I did a six month night course and then spoke it daily with the locals, and came back fluent. My partner did the same course, but continued the 'workbook' style learning but never spoke it. While she can slowly translate a book or something easily, she can't hold a conversation.","human_ref_B":"Like others are saying here, some form of immersion is key to making the step from knowing a language (in terms of its grammar and vocabulary) to spoken fluency, but those first steps don't need to be done in immersion, and those first steps can be taken pretty quickly if you know what you're doing.  I needed to learn to speak 3-4 languages over the past few years for my job, and in the process have landed on a pretty damn good method.  It got me to C1 fluency in French in about 5 months, and I'm  currently using it with Russian (and plan on reaching C1 equivalent fluency by September).  At this point, I go in 4 stages:        Stage 1: Learn the correct pronunciation of the language.  Doing this does a few things \u2013  because I\u2019m first and foremost learning how to hear that language\u2019s sounds, my listening comprehension gets an immediate boost before I even start traditional language age learning.  Once I start vocabulary training, I retain it better because I\u2019m familiar with how words should sound and how they should be spelled.  (Correct spellings in French, for example, are much easier to remember when there\u2019s a connection between the spelling and the sound), and once I finally start speaking to native speakers, they don't switch to English for me or dumb down their language, which is awesome sauce.    Stage 2: Vocab and grammar acquisition (itself in a few stages), no English allowed  I start with a frequency list and mark off any words I can portray with pictures alone (basic nouns and verbs).  I put those in an Anki deck and learn them.  Once I have some words to play with, I start putting them together.  I use Google translate and a grammar book to start making sentences, then get everything doublechecked at lang-8.com.  Turning them into fill-in-the-blank flashcards builds the initial grammar and connecting words.  As vocab and grammar grow, I eventually move to monolingual dictionaries and writing my own definitions for more abstract words (again doublechecked at lang-8.com).  This builds on itself; the more vocab and grammar you get, the more vocab and grammar concepts you can describe in the target language.  Eventually you can cover all the words in a 2000 word frequency list and any specific vocab you need for your specific interests.    Stage 3: Listening, writing and reading work  Once I have a decent vocabulary and familiarity with grammar, I start writing essays, watching TV shows and reading books.  Every writing correction gets added to the Anki deck, which continues to build my vocab and grammar.    Stage 4: Speech  At the point where I can write 'fluently', I find some place to immerse in the language and speak all the time (literally.  No English allowed or else you won't learn the skill you're trying to learn, which is adapting to holes in your grammar or vocabulary by going around them rapidly and automatically without having to think about it).  I prefer Middlebury college, but a few weeks in the target country will work as well if you're very vigorous with sticking to the target language and not switching to English.  If you're extremely strict with yourself, your brain adapts pretty quickly and learns how to put all the info you learned in stages 1-3 together quickly enough to turn into fluent speech.    I've written a (not yet available) book on the topic and a (now available) website, at http:\/\/www.towerofbabelfish.com  Edit: I guess while I'm up here, here are some deep links for more info: * More details on the general topic above  Specific language resources: * Learn French * Learn Spanish * Learn Italian * Learn German * Learn Russian * Learn Japanese * Learn Mandarin Chinese  (Fair warning, book suggestions are Amazon affliliate links.  If you're not into that sort of thing, delete the referral code)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7978.0,"score_ratio":28.7272727273}
{"post_id":"rcc7b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the best way to learn a language?","c_root_id_A":"c44o290","c_root_id_B":"c44p5dl","created_at_utc_A":1332654080,"created_at_utc_B":1332663797,"score_A":6,"score_B":316,"human_ref_A":"I've always thought of learning a foreign language and learning mathematics to be very similar: They require tons of practice, memorization, and usage. You really just have to drill it until you literally dream of it. When that starts happening, you know it's working.","human_ref_B":"Like others are saying here, some form of immersion is key to making the step from knowing a language (in terms of its grammar and vocabulary) to spoken fluency, but those first steps don't need to be done in immersion, and those first steps can be taken pretty quickly if you know what you're doing.  I needed to learn to speak 3-4 languages over the past few years for my job, and in the process have landed on a pretty damn good method.  It got me to C1 fluency in French in about 5 months, and I'm  currently using it with Russian (and plan on reaching C1 equivalent fluency by September).  At this point, I go in 4 stages:        Stage 1: Learn the correct pronunciation of the language.  Doing this does a few things \u2013  because I\u2019m first and foremost learning how to hear that language\u2019s sounds, my listening comprehension gets an immediate boost before I even start traditional language age learning.  Once I start vocabulary training, I retain it better because I\u2019m familiar with how words should sound and how they should be spelled.  (Correct spellings in French, for example, are much easier to remember when there\u2019s a connection between the spelling and the sound), and once I finally start speaking to native speakers, they don't switch to English for me or dumb down their language, which is awesome sauce.    Stage 2: Vocab and grammar acquisition (itself in a few stages), no English allowed  I start with a frequency list and mark off any words I can portray with pictures alone (basic nouns and verbs).  I put those in an Anki deck and learn them.  Once I have some words to play with, I start putting them together.  I use Google translate and a grammar book to start making sentences, then get everything doublechecked at lang-8.com.  Turning them into fill-in-the-blank flashcards builds the initial grammar and connecting words.  As vocab and grammar grow, I eventually move to monolingual dictionaries and writing my own definitions for more abstract words (again doublechecked at lang-8.com).  This builds on itself; the more vocab and grammar you get, the more vocab and grammar concepts you can describe in the target language.  Eventually you can cover all the words in a 2000 word frequency list and any specific vocab you need for your specific interests.    Stage 3: Listening, writing and reading work  Once I have a decent vocabulary and familiarity with grammar, I start writing essays, watching TV shows and reading books.  Every writing correction gets added to the Anki deck, which continues to build my vocab and grammar.    Stage 4: Speech  At the point where I can write 'fluently', I find some place to immerse in the language and speak all the time (literally.  No English allowed or else you won't learn the skill you're trying to learn, which is adapting to holes in your grammar or vocabulary by going around them rapidly and automatically without having to think about it).  I prefer Middlebury college, but a few weeks in the target country will work as well if you're very vigorous with sticking to the target language and not switching to English.  If you're extremely strict with yourself, your brain adapts pretty quickly and learns how to put all the info you learned in stages 1-3 together quickly enough to turn into fluent speech.    I've written a (not yet available) book on the topic and a (now available) website, at http:\/\/www.towerofbabelfish.com  Edit: I guess while I'm up here, here are some deep links for more info: * More details on the general topic above  Specific language resources: * Learn French * Learn Spanish * Learn Italian * Learn German * Learn Russian * Learn Japanese * Learn Mandarin Chinese  (Fair warning, book suggestions are Amazon affliliate links.  If you're not into that sort of thing, delete the referral code)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9717.0,"score_ratio":52.6666666667}
{"post_id":"rcc7b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the best way to learn a language?","c_root_id_A":"c44oboz","c_root_id_B":"c44p5dl","created_at_utc_A":1332656017,"created_at_utc_B":1332663797,"score_A":3,"score_B":316,"human_ref_A":"Formal education + immersion.","human_ref_B":"Like others are saying here, some form of immersion is key to making the step from knowing a language (in terms of its grammar and vocabulary) to spoken fluency, but those first steps don't need to be done in immersion, and those first steps can be taken pretty quickly if you know what you're doing.  I needed to learn to speak 3-4 languages over the past few years for my job, and in the process have landed on a pretty damn good method.  It got me to C1 fluency in French in about 5 months, and I'm  currently using it with Russian (and plan on reaching C1 equivalent fluency by September).  At this point, I go in 4 stages:        Stage 1: Learn the correct pronunciation of the language.  Doing this does a few things \u2013  because I\u2019m first and foremost learning how to hear that language\u2019s sounds, my listening comprehension gets an immediate boost before I even start traditional language age learning.  Once I start vocabulary training, I retain it better because I\u2019m familiar with how words should sound and how they should be spelled.  (Correct spellings in French, for example, are much easier to remember when there\u2019s a connection between the spelling and the sound), and once I finally start speaking to native speakers, they don't switch to English for me or dumb down their language, which is awesome sauce.    Stage 2: Vocab and grammar acquisition (itself in a few stages), no English allowed  I start with a frequency list and mark off any words I can portray with pictures alone (basic nouns and verbs).  I put those in an Anki deck and learn them.  Once I have some words to play with, I start putting them together.  I use Google translate and a grammar book to start making sentences, then get everything doublechecked at lang-8.com.  Turning them into fill-in-the-blank flashcards builds the initial grammar and connecting words.  As vocab and grammar grow, I eventually move to monolingual dictionaries and writing my own definitions for more abstract words (again doublechecked at lang-8.com).  This builds on itself; the more vocab and grammar you get, the more vocab and grammar concepts you can describe in the target language.  Eventually you can cover all the words in a 2000 word frequency list and any specific vocab you need for your specific interests.    Stage 3: Listening, writing and reading work  Once I have a decent vocabulary and familiarity with grammar, I start writing essays, watching TV shows and reading books.  Every writing correction gets added to the Anki deck, which continues to build my vocab and grammar.    Stage 4: Speech  At the point where I can write 'fluently', I find some place to immerse in the language and speak all the time (literally.  No English allowed or else you won't learn the skill you're trying to learn, which is adapting to holes in your grammar or vocabulary by going around them rapidly and automatically without having to think about it).  I prefer Middlebury college, but a few weeks in the target country will work as well if you're very vigorous with sticking to the target language and not switching to English.  If you're extremely strict with yourself, your brain adapts pretty quickly and learns how to put all the info you learned in stages 1-3 together quickly enough to turn into fluent speech.    I've written a (not yet available) book on the topic and a (now available) website, at http:\/\/www.towerofbabelfish.com  Edit: I guess while I'm up here, here are some deep links for more info: * More details on the general topic above  Specific language resources: * Learn French * Learn Spanish * Learn Italian * Learn German * Learn Russian * Learn Japanese * Learn Mandarin Chinese  (Fair warning, book suggestions are Amazon affliliate links.  If you're not into that sort of thing, delete the referral code)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7780.0,"score_ratio":105.3333333333}
{"post_id":"rcc7b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the best way to learn a language?","c_root_id_A":"c44p5dl","c_root_id_B":"c44p4ej","created_at_utc_A":1332663797,"created_at_utc_B":1332663475,"score_A":316,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Like others are saying here, some form of immersion is key to making the step from knowing a language (in terms of its grammar and vocabulary) to spoken fluency, but those first steps don't need to be done in immersion, and those first steps can be taken pretty quickly if you know what you're doing.  I needed to learn to speak 3-4 languages over the past few years for my job, and in the process have landed on a pretty damn good method.  It got me to C1 fluency in French in about 5 months, and I'm  currently using it with Russian (and plan on reaching C1 equivalent fluency by September).  At this point, I go in 4 stages:        Stage 1: Learn the correct pronunciation of the language.  Doing this does a few things \u2013  because I\u2019m first and foremost learning how to hear that language\u2019s sounds, my listening comprehension gets an immediate boost before I even start traditional language age learning.  Once I start vocabulary training, I retain it better because I\u2019m familiar with how words should sound and how they should be spelled.  (Correct spellings in French, for example, are much easier to remember when there\u2019s a connection between the spelling and the sound), and once I finally start speaking to native speakers, they don't switch to English for me or dumb down their language, which is awesome sauce.    Stage 2: Vocab and grammar acquisition (itself in a few stages), no English allowed  I start with a frequency list and mark off any words I can portray with pictures alone (basic nouns and verbs).  I put those in an Anki deck and learn them.  Once I have some words to play with, I start putting them together.  I use Google translate and a grammar book to start making sentences, then get everything doublechecked at lang-8.com.  Turning them into fill-in-the-blank flashcards builds the initial grammar and connecting words.  As vocab and grammar grow, I eventually move to monolingual dictionaries and writing my own definitions for more abstract words (again doublechecked at lang-8.com).  This builds on itself; the more vocab and grammar you get, the more vocab and grammar concepts you can describe in the target language.  Eventually you can cover all the words in a 2000 word frequency list and any specific vocab you need for your specific interests.    Stage 3: Listening, writing and reading work  Once I have a decent vocabulary and familiarity with grammar, I start writing essays, watching TV shows and reading books.  Every writing correction gets added to the Anki deck, which continues to build my vocab and grammar.    Stage 4: Speech  At the point where I can write 'fluently', I find some place to immerse in the language and speak all the time (literally.  No English allowed or else you won't learn the skill you're trying to learn, which is adapting to holes in your grammar or vocabulary by going around them rapidly and automatically without having to think about it).  I prefer Middlebury college, but a few weeks in the target country will work as well if you're very vigorous with sticking to the target language and not switching to English.  If you're extremely strict with yourself, your brain adapts pretty quickly and learns how to put all the info you learned in stages 1-3 together quickly enough to turn into fluent speech.    I've written a (not yet available) book on the topic and a (now available) website, at http:\/\/www.towerofbabelfish.com  Edit: I guess while I'm up here, here are some deep links for more info: * More details on the general topic above  Specific language resources: * Learn French * Learn Spanish * Learn Italian * Learn German * Learn Russian * Learn Japanese * Learn Mandarin Chinese  (Fair warning, book suggestions are Amazon affliliate links.  If you're not into that sort of thing, delete the referral code)","human_ref_B":"Immersion is the best.  I speak 3 languages and I'm pretty good in my spanish but not good enough to actually say I speak it yet.  The more you  immerse yourself and not be afraid to use it, you will learn it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":322.0,"score_ratio":158.0}
{"post_id":"rcc7b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the best way to learn a language?","c_root_id_A":"c44oas5","c_root_id_B":"c44o290","created_at_utc_A":1332655819,"created_at_utc_B":1332654080,"score_A":11,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"While rote learning for a few months is important in the beginning to get the basics down, immersion really is the best way. Speak it as often as you can as much as you can with people fluent in the language. I lived in Spain for a few years. I did a six month night course and then spoke it daily with the locals, and came back fluent. My partner did the same course, but continued the 'workbook' style learning but never spoke it. While she can slowly translate a book or something easily, she can't hold a conversation.","human_ref_B":"I've always thought of learning a foreign language and learning mathematics to be very similar: They require tons of practice, memorization, and usage. You really just have to drill it until you literally dream of it. When that starts happening, you know it's working.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1739.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"rcc7b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What's the best way to learn a language?","c_root_id_A":"c44p6wd","c_root_id_B":"c44p4ej","created_at_utc_A":1332664310,"created_at_utc_B":1332663475,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Glad to see that no one has suggested the Pimsleur approach (yet?). In case anyone does, let me just put it bluntly: No. 10 days will gain you nothing you wouldn't gain from flipping through a phrase book. Learning a language takes practice, immersion and a metric fuck-ton of patience.","human_ref_B":"Immersion is the best.  I speak 3 languages and I'm pretty good in my spanish but not good enough to actually say I speak it yet.  The more you  immerse yourself and not be afraid to use it, you will learn it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":835.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"ixuznp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"How different are the divorce rates for couples whose parents have divorced vs couples with parents in a traditional relationship?","c_root_id_A":"g69045t","c_root_id_B":"g69q912","created_at_utc_A":1600806236,"created_at_utc_B":1600820421,"score_A":26,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"At least from some preliminary searching, it looks like children whose parents divorced are more likely to get divorced as well.","human_ref_B":"There is a body of research suggesting that \"children of divorce\" are likelier to divorce, which has been observed in the US and in other countries, although there are some exceptions. For instance, Dronkers and H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen (2008) confirmed an effect of parents' divorce on children's divorce in 17 out of 18 countries (Poland being the exception) and Laplante (2016) found an effect of parental separation on men but not women in Qu\u00e9bec. The strength of association may also vary. According to Dronkers and H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen:  >Our main interest was in cross-national differences in the intergenerational transmission of divorce. Our results show that **the association is stronger than that in the USA in six countries: Austria, Flanders, West Germany, Greece, Italy, and Switzerland.** With the exception of Flanders, this could not be explained by cross-national differences in life-course behaviours and outcomes by parents\u2019 divorce (contrary to our Hypothesis 1). The number of statistically significant differences may seem surprisingly small, given previous results (Engelhardt et al. 2002; Diekmann and Schmidhein 2004; Wagner and Wei\u00df 2006).   ---  There is also a debate on whether there is a trend in what is called the \"intergenerational transmission of divorce.\" Concerning the US context, Wolfinger (1999) argues:  >This paper shows **a substantial decline in the rate of divorce transmission for respondents interviewed between 1973 and 1996. This finding persists with controls for various sociodemographic factors and cannot be explained by decreased selection into marriage by people from divorced families.** In particular, the intergenerational transmission of divorce is not attenuated by controls on respondent's education or occupational prestige.  Same author, 2011:  >The extent to which the consequences of parental divorce have diminished over time remains unknown. **Nonetheless, using a widely respected data source\u2014the General Social Survey\u2014and a strategy that controls for period of exposure**\u2014allowing all couples 30 years to divorce\u2014**I find clear evidence of a decline in divorce transmission.** Based on completed cohorts, this analysis establishes that trends in the divorce cycle cannot be attributed to the absence of proper event history data (pace Li and Wu 2006, 2008). **In addition, the GSS shows that the effect of parental divorce on offspring marriage timing has weakened** (Wolfinger 2003b, 2005).  And in 2019:   >**The declining rate of divorce transmission between generations,** which I first identified 20 years ago, **persists through to 2018 per the General Social Survey.**  ---  Take note that his 2011 paper was in response to critique by Li and Wu (2008) who concluded on stability, and that Wolfinger's results were due to the data used, i.e.:  >Our results, like those of a number of other studies, provide evidence that children who experience the divorce of their parents are themselves more likely to divorce. But contrary to Wolnger\u2019s (1999) claim that the intergenerational transmission of divorce has declined by nearly 50%, **we find no trend in the intergenerational transmission of divorce risks, a result that mirrors the findings of McLanahan and Bumpass (1988) and Teachman (2002).** We find that **the discrepancy between these findings is due to differential exposure to the risk of divorce by successive marriage cohorts, with those married earlier having longer durations of exposure to divorce and those married later having shorter durations of exposure.**   And according to Li and Wu (2015):  >We update the trends in the intergenerational transmission of divorce to the 2000s\u2014a period of relatively low divorce rates\u2014using data from the 1973- 2010 waves of the National Survey of Family Growth, and show that **the association between parental divorce and offspring\u2019s divorce has not changed over successive marriage cohorts. We also conduct a sensitivity analysis of the General Social Survey data** and replicate Wolfinger (2011), which along with Wolfinger (1999) are the only two studies and the single dataset that documents a decline in the intergenerational transmission of divorce. **Our results show that most of the coefficients for the declining trends in the intergenerational transmission of divorce are only marginally statistically significant. We remain dubious about the claim that the intergenerational transmission of divorce has substantially declined over time.**  ---  There are also other researchers who are dubious, such as the aforementioned Dronker and H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen also failed to find a trend in their cross-national study:  >Nor do we find (linear) cohort differences, unlike Wolfinger (1999). **Small samples can mask some cross-national and cross-cohort differences. Alternatively, the intergenerational transmission of divorce may be a more stable association than previously thought.**  Also see G\u00e4hler and H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen's (2014) paper on the Swedish context:  >**Our findings deviate from two previous American studies (Wolfinger 1999; 2011), both based on General Social Survey data, and two German studies (Diekmann and Engelhardt 1999; Engelhardt, Trappe and Dronkers 2002)**, which suggest that the intergenerational transmission of divorce has decreased over time. It should be noted, however, that one of the American studies (Wolfinger 2011) covers a relatively early time period (marriages initiated 1901-1964) and that in the German studies there is either no formal test of change over time (Diekmann and Engelhardt 1999) or the change does not reach statistical significance (Engelhardt, Trappe and Dronkers 2002). Instead, **our findings accord with a number of other American studies (Amato and Cheadle 2005; Li and Wu 2008; McLanahan and Bumpass 1988; Teachman 2002) and a comparative study including eighteen countries (Dronkers and H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen 2008) showing no time trend.**  ---  Dronkers, J., & H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen, J. (2008). The intergenerational transmission of divorce in cross-national perspective: Results from the Fertility and Family Surveys. Population studies, 62(3), 273-288.  G\u00e4hler, M., & H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen, J. (2014). Intergenerational transmission of divorce\u2014the Swedish trend. Families and Societies Working Papers Series 19, Stockholm University.  Laplante, B. (2016). A matter of norms: Family background, religion, and generational change in the diffusion of first union breakdown among French-speaking Quebeckers. Demographic Research, 35, 783-812.  Li, J. C. A., & Wu, L. L. (2008). No trend in the intergenerational transmission of divorce. Demography, 45(4), 875-883.  Li, J. C. A., & Wu, L. L. (2015). Reexamining Trends in the Intergenerational Transmission of Divorce.  Wolfinger, N. H. (1999). Trends in the intergenerational transmission of divorce. Demography, 36(3), 415-420.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14185.0,"score_ratio":1.0769230769}
{"post_id":"ixuznp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"How different are the divorce rates for couples whose parents have divorced vs couples with parents in a traditional relationship?","c_root_id_A":"g69nin4","c_root_id_B":"g69q912","created_at_utc_A":1600818804,"created_at_utc_B":1600820421,"score_A":3,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"Pretty consistently transmitted, although it should be noted that divorce rates will depend on country context as well as temporal trend (Liefbrouer posits a U shape for marital stability for instance)","human_ref_B":"There is a body of research suggesting that \"children of divorce\" are likelier to divorce, which has been observed in the US and in other countries, although there are some exceptions. For instance, Dronkers and H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen (2008) confirmed an effect of parents' divorce on children's divorce in 17 out of 18 countries (Poland being the exception) and Laplante (2016) found an effect of parental separation on men but not women in Qu\u00e9bec. The strength of association may also vary. According to Dronkers and H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen:  >Our main interest was in cross-national differences in the intergenerational transmission of divorce. Our results show that **the association is stronger than that in the USA in six countries: Austria, Flanders, West Germany, Greece, Italy, and Switzerland.** With the exception of Flanders, this could not be explained by cross-national differences in life-course behaviours and outcomes by parents\u2019 divorce (contrary to our Hypothesis 1). The number of statistically significant differences may seem surprisingly small, given previous results (Engelhardt et al. 2002; Diekmann and Schmidhein 2004; Wagner and Wei\u00df 2006).   ---  There is also a debate on whether there is a trend in what is called the \"intergenerational transmission of divorce.\" Concerning the US context, Wolfinger (1999) argues:  >This paper shows **a substantial decline in the rate of divorce transmission for respondents interviewed between 1973 and 1996. This finding persists with controls for various sociodemographic factors and cannot be explained by decreased selection into marriage by people from divorced families.** In particular, the intergenerational transmission of divorce is not attenuated by controls on respondent's education or occupational prestige.  Same author, 2011:  >The extent to which the consequences of parental divorce have diminished over time remains unknown. **Nonetheless, using a widely respected data source\u2014the General Social Survey\u2014and a strategy that controls for period of exposure**\u2014allowing all couples 30 years to divorce\u2014**I find clear evidence of a decline in divorce transmission.** Based on completed cohorts, this analysis establishes that trends in the divorce cycle cannot be attributed to the absence of proper event history data (pace Li and Wu 2006, 2008). **In addition, the GSS shows that the effect of parental divorce on offspring marriage timing has weakened** (Wolfinger 2003b, 2005).  And in 2019:   >**The declining rate of divorce transmission between generations,** which I first identified 20 years ago, **persists through to 2018 per the General Social Survey.**  ---  Take note that his 2011 paper was in response to critique by Li and Wu (2008) who concluded on stability, and that Wolfinger's results were due to the data used, i.e.:  >Our results, like those of a number of other studies, provide evidence that children who experience the divorce of their parents are themselves more likely to divorce. But contrary to Wolnger\u2019s (1999) claim that the intergenerational transmission of divorce has declined by nearly 50%, **we find no trend in the intergenerational transmission of divorce risks, a result that mirrors the findings of McLanahan and Bumpass (1988) and Teachman (2002).** We find that **the discrepancy between these findings is due to differential exposure to the risk of divorce by successive marriage cohorts, with those married earlier having longer durations of exposure to divorce and those married later having shorter durations of exposure.**   And according to Li and Wu (2015):  >We update the trends in the intergenerational transmission of divorce to the 2000s\u2014a period of relatively low divorce rates\u2014using data from the 1973- 2010 waves of the National Survey of Family Growth, and show that **the association between parental divorce and offspring\u2019s divorce has not changed over successive marriage cohorts. We also conduct a sensitivity analysis of the General Social Survey data** and replicate Wolfinger (2011), which along with Wolfinger (1999) are the only two studies and the single dataset that documents a decline in the intergenerational transmission of divorce. **Our results show that most of the coefficients for the declining trends in the intergenerational transmission of divorce are only marginally statistically significant. We remain dubious about the claim that the intergenerational transmission of divorce has substantially declined over time.**  ---  There are also other researchers who are dubious, such as the aforementioned Dronker and H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen also failed to find a trend in their cross-national study:  >Nor do we find (linear) cohort differences, unlike Wolfinger (1999). **Small samples can mask some cross-national and cross-cohort differences. Alternatively, the intergenerational transmission of divorce may be a more stable association than previously thought.**  Also see G\u00e4hler and H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen's (2014) paper on the Swedish context:  >**Our findings deviate from two previous American studies (Wolfinger 1999; 2011), both based on General Social Survey data, and two German studies (Diekmann and Engelhardt 1999; Engelhardt, Trappe and Dronkers 2002)**, which suggest that the intergenerational transmission of divorce has decreased over time. It should be noted, however, that one of the American studies (Wolfinger 2011) covers a relatively early time period (marriages initiated 1901-1964) and that in the German studies there is either no formal test of change over time (Diekmann and Engelhardt 1999) or the change does not reach statistical significance (Engelhardt, Trappe and Dronkers 2002). Instead, **our findings accord with a number of other American studies (Amato and Cheadle 2005; Li and Wu 2008; McLanahan and Bumpass 1988; Teachman 2002) and a comparative study including eighteen countries (Dronkers and H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen 2008) showing no time trend.**  ---  Dronkers, J., & H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen, J. (2008). The intergenerational transmission of divorce in cross-national perspective: Results from the Fertility and Family Surveys. Population studies, 62(3), 273-288.  G\u00e4hler, M., & H\u00e4rk\u00f6nen, J. (2014). Intergenerational transmission of divorce\u2014the Swedish trend. Families and Societies Working Papers Series 19, Stockholm University.  Laplante, B. (2016). A matter of norms: Family background, religion, and generational change in the diffusion of first union breakdown among French-speaking Quebeckers. Demographic Research, 35, 783-812.  Li, J. C. A., & Wu, L. L. (2008). No trend in the intergenerational transmission of divorce. Demography, 45(4), 875-883.  Li, J. C. A., & Wu, L. L. (2015). Reexamining Trends in the Intergenerational Transmission of Divorce.  Wolfinger, N. H. (1999). Trends in the intergenerational transmission of divorce. Demography, 36(3), 415-420.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1617.0,"score_ratio":9.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2dqwri","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why are Americans more obese than in the 70's or 80's? I ask because the foods available seem mostly the same other than energy drinks. Has the food changed or the eating patterns or something else?","c_root_id_A":"cjs9s1p","c_root_id_B":"cjs9oll","created_at_utc_A":1408232925,"created_at_utc_B":1408232679,"score_A":60,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"Health economist here. I work on obesity related topics. Not really the causes of obesity, but I'm familiar with some of the literature.  I think these are good papers:  http:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w9446  http:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w8946  Basically, over the past century the largest force driving increases in bmi has been occupational shifts away from jobs that require significant physical work into jobs that are less physically demanding. However, that process had significantly slowed by the 80's, since then there have been significant technological advancements in the mass production and delivery of food (preservatives, controlled atmosphere storage and delivery, etc.). The net result of all this technological change has been an effective increase the price of caloric expenditure and a decrease in the price of caloric intake.","human_ref_B":"Increasing caloric intake.   From the first half between 1977 - 2006 caloric intake increased mainly because portion sizes increased. In the mid 90's caloric density and portion sizes stabilized, but then snacking increased. Americans started to eat snacks (food plus beverages) more often between meals.  http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC2806886\/","labels":1,"seconds_difference":246.0,"score_ratio":2.1428571429}
{"post_id":"2dqwri","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why are Americans more obese than in the 70's or 80's? I ask because the foods available seem mostly the same other than energy drinks. Has the food changed or the eating patterns or something else?","c_root_id_A":"cjsdaev","c_root_id_B":"cjskpm8","created_at_utc_A":1408241730,"created_at_utc_B":1408266454,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Government handouts to the corn industry that promotes putting high fructose corn syrup in everything","human_ref_B":"There is a great documentary series from the BBC called \"The Men Who Made us Fat\" which covers this nicely.  The basic TL;DR: Food suppliers found themselves in a situation where they were physically limited from how much food they could actually sell someone. So they needed to devise a method in which they could unload more of their product but still make a profit, even if it was just a tiny bit more profit. So they found out that they could get people to buy more food than they needed if they offered really good deals in bulk.  For instance, McDonalds was a big player in this. When they started offering their larger meals, they priced it just slightly above the normal sized meal. So let's say you only pay 15% more for the next level, but you got about 30% more food, and McDonalds makes even more profit. So most people, being rational consumers, would choose the larger option because it was such a good deal, even though there was more food than they needed. So when people sat down to eat this meal, and they ate only what they needed which was about 80% of the meal, most people thought, \"Well, it's almost finished, so I may as well finish the rest of it off instead of wasting it.\" This lead to overeating.  Then there is the issue with misleading advertising. All sorts of foods are marketed as healthy even though they aren't. Take, for instance, cereal. Cereal likes to market how much vitamins it contains, and how healthy of a meal it is by including fruits all over the boxes... Even though cereal is terrible because it's loaded with sugar and high calories.   So consumers are buying a lot of things they think are healthy, like yogurt, but are actually terrible because they are loaded with high calorie sweeteners.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24724.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"6o7nfb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Why do some people end up turning towards ideologies such as Nazism or Fascism? Recently, I've seen a bit of a growth in the popularity of Nazism and Fascism and while I still think these ideas are on the fringe (meaning I still don't think there popular ideologies) some people still find these ideologies to be appealing or make sense. I don't really get why someone would choose a rather destructive belief  system.","c_root_id_A":"dkfafx4","c_root_id_B":"dkfc3s3","created_at_utc_A":1500467961,"created_at_utc_B":1500470373,"score_A":3,"score_B":70,"human_ref_A":"I am not a social scientist, but you might want to check out the work of Bob Altemeyer.","human_ref_B":"That's a big question, one that's preoccupied many thinkers for the past 85 years or so...  Eric Hoffer's The True Believer is a classic and  a relatively straightforward introduction to the social psychology of mass movements.  Fanatical mass movements across the political spectrum tend to have a few commonalities. They tend to ascend in moments of economic and political transition, collapse or hardship. They're often based upon an us vs them rhetoric of grievance and blame--they often scapegoat a defined \"Other\" (whomever that might be--Jews, gypsies, immigrants, homosexuals), heaping society's problems at the doorstep of the Other. The movements usually have a class of \"intellectuals\" who give philosophical voice\/justification to the ideology. These justifications are often pretty thin, tendentious, and don't stand up to rigorous philosophical or scientific scrutiny.  Early recruits tend to perceive themselves as marginal, marginalized, excluded or under threat. The mass movement offers these marginal, ineffectual characters the chance to be part of something bigger, more powerful than themselves. The mass movement demands self-sacrifice of its members, and through this sacrifice, the members feel ever-more invested as a part of the powerful in-group. This is a tribalistic form of identification, insiders vs outsiders, where people's entire self identity is merged with the group identity. Because the individual fanatic, and the group, define themselves in opposition to the Other, they cannot exist without the enemy Other.   Mass movements are often, though not always, destructive. They can allow the more thuggish, sadistic or manipulative members of society an opportunity to give free reign to their passions: brutality in service of a higher, sacred cause. The ends justify the means. Fascism in particular is characterized by martial fetishim and a propensity to violence.  Because they are based around charismatic leadership and a single-issue or enemy, mass movements can tend to splinter or fragment when the leadership, enemy or issue is no longer at hand. They are most powerful in the run-up to a revolution; during and after the revolution they can fall to in-fighting over doctrines and definitions of ideological purity.  At the end of the day, your average fascist--as with most early adherents of mass movements--is a lonely, isolated, deeply insecure individual who longs for a sense of purpose, and finds the prospect of self-obliteration to be rather appealing--being reborn as part of a bigger whole.  This is part of the allure of mass movements, because, after all, who in society does not feel lonely, isolated and insecure? And who would not like to be part of a grand social project to improve humanity? It's much harder, and much lonelier, to establish a strong, independent sense of self that acknowledges doubt and personal imperfection, than it is to seek certainty and relational identity through group membership.  tl;dr: Fascism is a mass psychology that appeals to people who feel small, weak, alienated, and who might have a sadistic streak. It can thrive in moments of political and economic uncertainty.  Source: I've read a lot of Eric Hoffer and Hannah Arendt, and I think a lot about mass movements and social collapse.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2412.0,"score_ratio":23.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2b4oxv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Does changing your name have an impact on your identity, behavior, and\/or mental health? I've seen a lot of stuff recently about how your name can supposedly help define a lot of personality traits (but I've also seen the controversy and take it with a pinch of salt). So I was wondering what does changing your name by deed poll and being referred to by a different name than your entire life before, have on your feeling of identity.","c_root_id_A":"cj1sdn8","c_root_id_B":"cj1slnq","created_at_utc_A":1405780349,"created_at_utc_B":1405781051,"score_A":10,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"First, I'd like to apologize for not conforming to the sidebar rules. I tried to find sources to the anecdptal claims I'm going to make bellow that are based in my practice and experience at a legal clinic I volunteer at, but I found little to none.      Might not be exactly what are you looking for, but for transgender people, changing their names greatly affects their feeling and identity, because they face daily discrimination and harassment due to discrepancy beetween their gender identity and their name. This greatly affects seeking of healthcare and it's a source o bad feelings to all trangender people I worked with, since they have problem at banks, when receiveng phonecalls from companies and so on.      EDIT:     Found a source to the claim about healthcare access:","human_ref_B":"I remember writing a paper a few years ago entitled 'does a name render an object self-identical?' which was alluding to the power of names and naming practices to shape a subject. I am no expert on the matter so hopefully someone else can give you a better response, basically the argument is that yes, names do have an effect upon identity, through the process of 'interpellation' (as Althusser calls it). When you are called by a name and respond to it you are placed into a particular subject position, and this is an issue that Judith Butler discusses in regard to sex and gender in 'Bodies that Matter.'  Also for example, Susan Benson's study of Hausaland in West Africa shows how slaves were given new names in order to not only remove the connections they may have with their former identity, but were also denied a 'book name' that the free members of society may have had, in order to ensure that they remain in a low social position.   However, names can also be used as a disguise, which may not have an effect upon identity, I think it is important to consider whether the names are given in an assymetrical power relationship or if an individual renames themselves.  The book 'An Anthropology of Names and Naming' edited by Gabi Vom Bruck might be helpful,  https:\/\/www.cambridge.org\/asia\/catalogue\/catalogue.asp?isbn=9780521848633&ss=ind","labels":0,"seconds_difference":702.0,"score_ratio":1.7}
{"post_id":"2b4oxv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Does changing your name have an impact on your identity, behavior, and\/or mental health? I've seen a lot of stuff recently about how your name can supposedly help define a lot of personality traits (but I've also seen the controversy and take it with a pinch of salt). So I was wondering what does changing your name by deed poll and being referred to by a different name than your entire life before, have on your feeling of identity.","c_root_id_A":"cj27qhv","c_root_id_B":"cj2aiy1","created_at_utc_A":1405819865,"created_at_utc_B":1405827369,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I can't attest to changing your name with specific research, but there are many studies in consumer behavior that demonstrate how your name\/signature acts as a priming effect that makes you more likely to behave in a manner that is in line with parts of your identity that your strongly associate with and I will use the assertions of the frameworks developed in this article to demonstrate how a name change may affect certain behaviors. Essentially, your name becomes symbolic of you and all the things you actively associate with your identity. This means that if you identify as a runner, if you sign your name before you go athletic shoe shopping, then you are more likely to put more consideration in to the decision of what shoes you should purchase than if you did not sign your name. I am not aware of any studies in my field related to the changing of name and the effect on identity, but it would be very interesting. Theory would suggest that using an old name (for example a maiden name) might prime attitudes and behaviors that your strongly associate with that name (for example, stronger associations with sports played in high school or allegiance to a state where one resided as a child\/young adult) whereas your current name would prime your current identity, but also in the context of comparing it to your maiden name, potentially parts of your identity that you associate with the time which your name was changed (your hobbies, interests when you were married).  Source:http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/10.1086\/659753","human_ref_B":"This isn't academic, but my friend wrote about changing his name: http:\/\/www.unpious.com\/2013\/04\/a-raizel-by-any-other-name\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7504.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1nwvj9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Why are the prices of apples so unstable? I budget buy food and the cheapest brand of a food is very stable. But for apple prices, a different brand of apple is cheapest (per kg) every week. Why?","c_root_id_A":"ccmtozb","c_root_id_B":"ccmvfmd","created_at_utc_A":1381163718,"created_at_utc_B":1381168314,"score_A":9,"score_B":195,"human_ref_A":"Apple prices are actually far more stable than many other seasonal crops because they have a long storage life. However, when harvest season comes they do have many varieties that don't store well and so those will fall in price.","human_ref_B":"I studied Ag econ at Washington State and worked for an orchard for three years while I was working on my degree. Most of this will be Pacific North West focused, and some of this will depend on where you're located.   Apples are a unique commodity because the varieties you eat are readily apparent to the you the consumer. You can easily distinguish a granny smith from a Fuji from a gala. This is in contrast to say, soft white wheat, which has many varieties that can be grown in diverse regions and blended and milled to homogeneous standards. Furthermore, most apples, regardless of variety, are grown in a select few regions globally (the Wenatchee valley in WA as an example). Varieties in these regions will preform different given growing conditions. Depending on growing conditions in the production regions, the availability of a specific variety can vary year to year.   Some varieties of apple are much more common than others. Red and yellow delicious use to be far and away the most common, but these varieties have fallen out of favor over the last two decades as consumer preference has moved toward sweeter, crisper varieties like fugi (I can go in to more detail on that shift if your interested). You will see that varieties with the most production will have the most price stability, while new varieties with limited production will have higher prices and more volatility. New varieties will often receive promotional pricing for short periods of time to get new consumer to purchase.   It also takes a long time for farmers to respond to market conditions. If a farmer sees that demand for a variety is increasing and want to plant new trees to capitalize, it can take upwards of seven years (and as little as three) for the tree to reach production maturity. This results in a very unresponsive supply side of the market and produces a unique challenge for orchard managers.    On top of this, you have a highly concentrated distribution sector in this industry. Most production areas will only have one or two packing houses. This gives the packer a lot of price power and an ability to determine how much of what variety to allow on to the market at a given time. Different apples store for different periods of time, and distribution will reflect this. Apples are also heavy. Since the bulk of apple are produced and stored in specific regions, they are often shipped large distances, causing them to be relatively sensitive to transport costs, which can be an additional source of volatility.   On the consumer side of things, apple variety are not viewed as perfect substitutes. Different varieties have different uses, and different people have different preferences. So a change in demand for granny smiths (a common baking apple) will have relatively little effect on fujis or galas. While fujis and galas are both seen as fresh eating apples with similar characteristics will share more evidence of consumer substitution given price effects. Taste preference will change seasonably and regionally.   TLDR; think of each variety of apples as a unique commodity unto itself, with varying degrees of consumer substitution and heterogeneous production characteristics. Comparing apples to apples can sometimes feel like comparing apples to oranges.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4596.0,"score_ratio":21.6666666667}
{"post_id":"5oaxg3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Walmart's profits vs. how much their employees lean on social programs i.e. welfare? I've heard the claim before that the average Walmart \"costs\" its region ~$400,000 in taxes per year because its workers can't afford to live without the help of social programs.  So, I'm wondering how true that is, and how easy or difficult it would be for Walmart to pick up that slack (by providing better wages, insurance, etc.).","c_root_id_A":"dci8rye","c_root_id_B":"dci8kl0","created_at_utc_A":1484591928,"created_at_utc_B":1484591689,"score_A":15,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would say direct information can be a touch spotty as some of those records are not public.  From the financial side (http:\/\/finance.yahoo.com\/quote\/WMT\/key-statistics?p=WMT), there are 3,070,000,000 shares of WMT, and they pay $2 a share annual dividend, so they're paying out $6B+ in dividends each year to shareholders.  51.35% of those shares are held by \"insiders\", the largest being Walmart Enterprises LLC, and the direct Walton heirs who own a combined 20,837,323 shares earning $41,676,646 annually; and that doesn't include the Walton Enterprises, LLC which holds 1,415,891,131 shares of Walmart and almost certainly millions of shares of other organizations bringing in even more dividends, but at least receiving $2.8B annually just in Walmart dividends.  There are a variety of \"watch group\" sites that try to make sense of all of the money flow, and pose the questions you've asked as \"if you're making so much money, then why are a large percentage of employees having such a hard time with savings, receiving food stamps, having to work multiple jobs, etc.  Most of these sites have an obvious slate\/bias, but that is sort of to be expected.  I mean some searches should lead you to many of the same sites\/articles\/books, take what you wish from each.  http:\/\/www.walmartsubsidywatch.org\/   https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2013-09-12\/how-wal-mart-s-waltons-maintain-their-billionaire-fortune-taxes   https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Criticism_of_Walmart     http:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/msnbc\/walmart-government-subsidies-study  The book Nickel and Dimed (1999) has a chapter where Barbara worked at WalMart; very interesting read , but this is more from a low wage worker perspective, but it's all related in the end in my opinion.  good luck","human_ref_B":"Before determining if wal-mart is profitable enough to pay employees enough to make them ineligible for social programs, I think first question would be to see what literature estimates how much a wal-mart actually costs in terms of government benefits.  Second question would be how much more benefits wal-mart employees generate than their competitors.    That's hard.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":239.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2yjwar","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"When and why did money become a taboo subject? Hi. I'm mainly looking to see if anyone knows when money became a taboo subject to talk about (particularly salaries, but money in general is fine.) I would also be interested to know why it became taboo.  I tried searching for the question and didn't find anything. If there is something I would appreciate being pointed in the right direction. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cpae833","c_root_id_B":"cpamq4r","created_at_utc_A":1426006129,"created_at_utc_B":1426018690,"score_A":7,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Just a reminder to all that anecdotal evidence is not considered a source for answers. Thank you.","human_ref_B":"This is by no means a complete answer (I honestly think that one could write a book on this topic and *still* not come to a fully satisfying answer) but I hope that this will shed some insight into the history of the taboo and it's social causes.  The earliest academic reference I could find that tried to explain why speaking of money was a taboo was, unsurprisingly, Freud. And, even less surprisingly, he related it to anal eroticism. (As a quick aside, I'm really beginning to wonder if a cigar was *just* a cigar) 1. There is good reason to believe that the taboo persisted well before that, but it is the earliest reference I could personally find.   Without a definitive start date, some may be inclined to believe that  we've always had this taboo-- or at least some type of it. Personally, that's the attitude I went into this question with. After all, money has been around for over 4,000 years 2 and our tribal psychology invites trepidation into situations where our social standing is on the line. Indeed, some have speculated that discussions of money fall under such situations 2 since we often tie worth to income and to financial price 3.  This could reasonably lead people to conclude that it's simply inherent to human thought. Talking about money can dredge up a lot of social comparisons and expectations which could trigger that tribal instinct saying \"let's not put ourselves in a lower position on the social strata so that we're not eventually ostracized 5.\"  There's only one problem with this: If it was universal, we would expect different cultures to have a similar reticence to income. But they don't 6. Even countries as geographically proximal as Japan and China have different attitudes about money as indicated by their folklore 7.   So we are left with the idea that this is a western construction. To be clear, I definitely think that the proclivity to tie social worth with the amount of stuff one has probably dates back quiet a while as it would be a handy hint throughout much of human history. But the actual taboo seems to be western in origin.  I don't think that we'll be able to find a specific date, time, or even location to pin this origination on. However, if allowed to venture an educated guess, I would posit that they came from our coffee shops.   It's well known that coffee and tea shops were instrumental to the formulation and actualization of many western uprisings 8. These institutions looked to turn the current social status quo on its head. Inside the shops, everyone was theoretically equal. A certain code of conversation developed, largely thanks to the propagation of two magazines: The Spectator and the Tatler 9. I cannot find any direct quotes from either publication that specifically dictates that one ought not to make note of the socioeconomic differences that exist outside of the shop-- however, there is decent evidence for tacit recommendations via the emphasis on maintaining a tempered and productive conversation 9. I contend that it's difficult to have a good chat when you're being actively singled out as an impecunious peon. Such an account would work fairly well with our theoretical understanding of taboo construction. As it goes, taboos are extremely strong norms and mores that deliver intense social (and possibly even official) sanctions 10. They can develop from social rules and evolve along with the society; hence why some taboo subjects are less taboo as they used to be and others are even more forbidden. I would venture that the taboo for discussing income developed on this track. It could have started off as an expression of politeness and proper etiquette and developed more bite as western society grew more infatuated with the idea of human equality. There aren't any studies that directly prove or disprove this theory (possibly due to a dearth of literature on the topic of money 2), so take it with a grain of salt.   I would also like to recommend the book that U\/David_divaD did as well as *The Psychology of Money* by Furnham and Argyle.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12561.0,"score_ratio":2.1428571429}
{"post_id":"2yjwar","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"When and why did money become a taboo subject? Hi. I'm mainly looking to see if anyone knows when money became a taboo subject to talk about (particularly salaries, but money in general is fine.) I would also be interested to know why it became taboo.  I tried searching for the question and didn't find anything. If there is something I would appreciate being pointed in the right direction. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cpapsdg","c_root_id_B":"cpae833","created_at_utc_A":1426022991,"created_at_utc_B":1426006129,"score_A":9,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"A mod told me to ask this question in this thread:  The money taboo is big in the US. Is this because employers wanted to prevent employees from knowing how much their competitors made and asking for raises?","human_ref_B":"Just a reminder to all that anecdotal evidence is not considered a source for answers. Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16862.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"2xdj5y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Does ISIS fit into any concepts\/theories of \"state\"? Is it undergoing a process of state formation? Of course ISIS does not fit into UN's definition of \"state\", as it requires others' recognition, so that's not what I'm asking.  Here is a handy graph\/article on ISIS. If we take it very loosely, ISIS seem to fit into Weber's concept of state: the monopoly of violence and, though largely dependent on al-Baghdadi's messianic message, ISIS bureaucracy seem to be very rational (look at the link).  But that's a very loose take. Is there any conceptual framework of state that ISIS is fit into? Is it undergoing a process of state formation?  I'm curious because Madawee al-Rashid argues, albeit only briefly, that ISIS resembles the 19th century wahhabi Ikhwan (not Ikhwanul Muslim a.k.a. Muslim Brotherhood) that today become the Saudi state.","c_root_id_A":"cozazkg","c_root_id_B":"coz5wzx","created_at_utc_A":1425071033,"created_at_utc_B":1425062576,"score_A":28,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Audrey Cronin had a good article a few days ago that somewhat focused on this question. There isn't a consensus on how to define ISIS because it has certain features that most terrorist organizations do not have, and, simultaneously, relay on terrorist tactics *and* conventional military strategy . For instance, ISIS controls territory (most terrorist groups do not), has - as you pointed out - a complex bureaucracy with tens of thousands of members (most terrorist organizations had  memberships in the hundreds), and imposes some type of law in the territory that *de facto* it controls. What this means is that ISIS is a *hybrid* type of organization. It has certain aspects of a terrorist group which combines within a political framework of administration.   As you correctly pointed out, a legal definition of a state requires, among other things, other states recognition of that entity. There is however, political realties that resembles the legal definition of the state in all but its international recognition. I don't think ISIS is quite there yet (the bounderies of its territories are opaque, it does not have a permanent 'population' and so on), so I think it could be best understood as a pseudo-state or a hybrid organization that has state-like qualities.","human_ref_B":"I wish that article would go into more depth about the ISIS \"financial council.\" Does ISIS have a solid economic foundation, and who do they sell their oil to?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8457.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"2xdj5y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Does ISIS fit into any concepts\/theories of \"state\"? Is it undergoing a process of state formation? Of course ISIS does not fit into UN's definition of \"state\", as it requires others' recognition, so that's not what I'm asking.  Here is a handy graph\/article on ISIS. If we take it very loosely, ISIS seem to fit into Weber's concept of state: the monopoly of violence and, though largely dependent on al-Baghdadi's messianic message, ISIS bureaucracy seem to be very rational (look at the link).  But that's a very loose take. Is there any conceptual framework of state that ISIS is fit into? Is it undergoing a process of state formation?  I'm curious because Madawee al-Rashid argues, albeit only briefly, that ISIS resembles the 19th century wahhabi Ikhwan (not Ikhwanul Muslim a.k.a. Muslim Brotherhood) that today become the Saudi state.","c_root_id_A":"coz5wzx","c_root_id_B":"cozcypd","created_at_utc_A":1425062576,"created_at_utc_B":1425074407,"score_A":7,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I wish that article would go into more depth about the ISIS \"financial council.\" Does ISIS have a solid economic foundation, and who do they sell their oil to?","human_ref_B":"You should check these recent pieces by two IR scholars specialising in Middle East studies. The first piece examines how well IS performs at being a state in the following conventional aspects: 1) tax and labor acquisition, 2) defining and regulating citizenship, 3) providing international security and managing international relations, 4) ensuring domestic security, 5) providing social services and 6) facilitating economic growth.  * How much of a state is the Islamic State? by Quinn Mecham * Does the Islamic State believe in sovereignty? by Richard Nielsen","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11831.0,"score_ratio":1.7142857143}
{"post_id":"1ww8rm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are there any predictors of revolution?","c_root_id_A":"cf622r5","c_root_id_B":"cf5y66u","created_at_utc_A":1391451636,"created_at_utc_B":1391442467,"score_A":32,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Timur Kuran has done a lot of work on revolutions, and he argues that, for the most part, they are impossible to predict. (For instance, here, plus here). The argument is this: people have private and public political views. People only observe others' public views, and conforming to common public views produces some instrumental benefit. Private views, then, can shift without anyone knowing that they have shifted, because it only pays to express the already existing public views.   Any major shift in public views, then, necessarily has to be surprising. If people knew that some popular, hidden view was popular, then the public view would already have shifted. Any information that discloses the prevalence of the private view triggers a cascading change in the public view; therefore, if there are known predictors of revolution, then there is revolution. It might be possible, ex-post, to find indicators of a coming revolution, but if those indicators were known beforehand then the revolution would have happened earlier.   Obviously there's more to revolution than a sudden shift in people's publicly professed political views, but it is interesting nevertheless.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/motherboard.vice.com\/blog\/we-are-now-one-year-and-counting-from-global-riots-complex-systems-theorists-say--2","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9169.0,"score_ratio":6.4}
{"post_id":"1ww8rm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are there any predictors of revolution?","c_root_id_A":"cf5y66u","c_root_id_B":"cf63ieu","created_at_utc_A":1391442467,"created_at_utc_B":1391454613,"score_A":5,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/motherboard.vice.com\/blog\/we-are-now-one-year-and-counting-from-global-riots-complex-systems-theorists-say--2","human_ref_B":"Revolution is difficult to pin down because you   need a working definition of revolution that everyone agrees to.  If we agree it is a mass movement of some kind that changes society, you can learn a lot from the study of social movements, the study of democratization, and models of rational choice. Revolutions also suffer from \"N of 1\" problem -- they don't have often enough to get good comparative data. Each are idiosyncratic.   Here are some classics of democratization:  Theda Skocpol (1979) States and Social Revolution.   Argues that a crisis of the state (legitimacy\/confidence in the regime) creates the situation which can be exploited by a dominate class.   Barrington Moore (1966) Social Origin of Dictatorship and Democracy  Argues that the transition to capitalism creates an opportunity for social change. The resulting regime type (dictatorship or democracy) is determined by the presence of the bourgeoisie. Famous for the line \"no bourgeoisie no democracy.\"  Reeschmeyer, Stephens, and Stephens (1992)  Capitalist Development and Democracy  Also argue capitalism causes the demand for democracy, but it takes an alliance of the middle class (bourgeoisie) and the working class to exploit the weakness of regimes.   Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson (2006). Economic origins of dictatorship and democracy.    Argues that elites have to make concessions (taxes, power sharing, etc) to stave off revolution.  If they don't make enough there's a revolution.  From social movement theory:  Doug McAdam(1982). Political Process and the Development of Black Insurgency  Gave us \"political process\" model of social movements.  Revolutions occur (and succeed) when there's constant demand for change and there's a split in loyalties of the ruling class -- some break off and go with social movement.   McCarthy, J. D., & Zald, M. N. (1977). Resource mobilization and social movements: A partial theory. American journal of sociology, 1212-1241  The argument relies on Mancur Olson's collective action problem to argue that it takes someone willing to organize and actively acquire resources (money, physical office space, etc) to get a social movement off the ground.   This is off the top of my head so I'm certain I left out a ton of relevant material  Here's solid advice if you're serious about learning any topic-- start with the classics and move out from there.    Edit: some words","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12146.0,"score_ratio":3.8}
{"post_id":"k8hxr9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"An Apparent Paradox of Black Homeownership and Racist Housing Policy \"Why did black homeownership rates increase during the 1940's and 50's, a time when redlining and other racist policies were supposedly designed to prevent minority homeownership?\" (https:\/\/www.zillow.com\/research\/homeownership-gap-widens-19384\/)  I've seen this question used to deny that redlining (and other racist housing policies) had a meaningful impact on black wealth, and I don't currently have the social science background to know how to reconcile these phenomena.   One explanation I've seen is that private lenders had the correct market incentives to lend to higher-income black applicants (because they could pay back their loans), and thus, private interests helped increase black homeownership despite explicitly racist government policy. Is this explanation supported by the empirical data? If not, what other explanations better reconcile the increase in black homeownership with racist housing policy?   Another observation that confuses me is, since the introduction of the Fair Housing Act of 1968, racial disparities in homeownership rates don't seem to have budged much. I would really appreciate if someone could explain this phenomenon as well.","c_root_id_A":"geyozmm","c_root_id_B":"geytj6b","created_at_utc_A":1607363679,"created_at_utc_B":1607365464,"score_A":7,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"It's interesting you asked this right now. Robert Putnam's out promoting a new book right now called The Upswing that deals with a lot of these topics. The reason for the increase in home ownership basically boils down to income growth for Black Americans and alternative financing to mortgages. You get something called a landsale contract (which was still quite exploitive. Ta-Nehisi Coats goes into those in his famous Atlantic piece).   You see a lot of improvements for Black Americans during this period and it all basically boils down to the fact that they were leaving the south in record numbers. Once they got to Chicago or California or wherever, they could earn more and find people more willing to do work arounds of existing racists laws.   There were things like Eisenhauer's interstate project also that created federal jobs outside of agriculture that allowed Black Americans to find jobs that paid decently so they could afford to get out of the south.    But all of the factors like growth in education, increases in income, longer life span, higher infant survival, etc. are all highly correlated with Black immigration out of the South.   Putnam had an op-ed in the NY Times that basically summarizes his book.  https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2020\/12\/04\/opinion\/race-american-history.html  Putnam's data on homeownership: https:\/\/www.google.com\/books\/edition\/The\\_Upswing\/EbcCEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=BLACK-WHITE+HOMEOWNERSHIP+RATIO,+1900%E2%80%932017&pg=PA213&printsec=frontcover","human_ref_B":"When discussing this sort of topic, it is important to compare. How did Black homeownership increase in relationship to White homeownership, and how likely African Americans are to own a house compared to White Americans? (See the gap.)   Also, history does not just stop and reverse itself, e.g. it is often insufficient to pass laws abolishing a practice to reverse its consequences. For example, let's imagine a race between Athlete A and Athlete B who are equivalent in skills and attributes. Let's tie weights to Athlete A, making them run slower than Athlete B. Realizing that is unfair, we stop the race for a moment, remove the weights, and then let them continue...from where they respectively stopped, i.e. Athlete B further ahead than A.  ---  Therefore, per Lerner's *One home, a lifetime of impact*:  >\u201cIt\u2019s hard to close the race gap in homeownership when everything is stacked against blacks,\u201d says Bryan Greene, fair housing policy director for the National Association of Realtors (NAR). \u201c**It\u2019s myopic to look at immediate qualification standards and ignore that people are trying to overcome a century-old legacy of official disadvantage in housing and, on top of that, social dynamics and a lack of political will to fix this.**\u201d  And Helmke et al.'s 1998 report on residential discrimination:  >Despite a dramatic surge in the nation\u2019s homeownership experts continue to document discriminatory lending practices in inner cities today. **The long and infamous history of housing and lending discrimination in this country scarred the lives of millions of families seeking to realize the dreams aspirations of all Americans - to own a home. Unfortunately, such practices remain with us,** in the form of urban redlining, mortgage steering, and other discriminatory actions. **Not all families would choose to purchase a home in the city, but mortgage lending discrimination forces many urban home seekers to move to the suburbs to pursue the dream of homeownership.** The result according to a recent Harvard University study is that inner-city residents of all income levels are less likely to own a home than suburban residents of similar incomes. This is not only unfair to those families denied the opportunity to live in the home of their choice, it also unfairly limits the ability of cities to maintain the homeowner base that is so vital to the economic and social stability of urban neighborhoods.  >**Discriminatory practices, of course, are particularly problematic for minority families.**  And also Berkley and Letzing's article for the World Economic Forum:  >**While explicit \u201credlining\u201d as applied by the Home Owners\u2019 Loan Corporation (HOLC) in the 1930s may no longer be legal, its reinforcement of racial segregation and disparity has had enduring consequences.** A report published last month found that **the practice remains a major factor in the wealth gap between black and white families in the US, and that a homeowner in an area once redlined by the government has gained 52% less in personal wealth generated by property value increases over the past 40 years than a homeowner in an area with a better historical rating.**   >**In Minneapolis and St. Paul, redlining and racial covenants led to an estimated 25% of local African American families now owning their own homes, compared with 78% of white families.**  ---  Furthermore, typically redlining is understood as contributing to *segregation* and limiting *wealth*. Therefore, the question should also be in which manner did home ownership occur. Per Lerner's article:  >**Discriminatory housing policies were outlawed by the Fair Housing Act of 1968 but their effects still linger.**  >The racist housing policy of redlining assigned grade levels and color codes to neighborhoods to indicate local lenders\u2019 perceived credit risk based in large part on the residents\u2019 race and ethnicity, and it was outlawed in the 1960s. **Urban areas with a large share of black families were typically redlined, which made it nearly impossible to qualify for a mortgage. A recent study by Redfin found that the typical home in a redlined neighborhood gained $212,023 or 52 percent less than one in a \u201cgreenlined\u201d neighborhood over the past 40 years. Today, black homeowners are five times as likely to own in a formerly redlined neighborhood than a greenlined one, according to Redfin\u2019s study.**  >\u201cThis equates to homes that are worth less, have less equity and are in neighborhoods deemed less desirable due to the lingering effects of redlining,\u201d says Christensen.  Per Eligon and Gebeloff's *Affluent and Black, and Still Trapped by Segregation*:  >**The choices that black families make today are inevitably constrained by a legacy of racism that prevented their ancestors from buying quality housing and then passing down wealth that might have allowed today\u2019s generation to move into more stable communities.** And even when black households try to cross color boundaries, they are not always met with open arms: Studies have shown that white people prefer to live in communities where there are fewer black people, regardless of their income.  And Michelle Singletary's essay *Being Black lowers the value of my home: The legacy of redlining*:  >My \u201chood\u201d is idyllic, except for one thing.  >**The value of my home in Prince George\u2019s County, Md., would be significantly higher if my husband and I weren\u2019t Black \u2014 and if all our neighbors weren\u2019t Black.**  >Pick up and move our Black neighborhood of doctors, teachers, police officers and small-business owners just 20 miles west to a White subdivision with a similar economic makeup, and our homes would easily be worth 40 percent more. **This is true for other Black communities across the country, where homes can be undervalued by as much as 65 percent.**  >**This is the legacy of systemic racism that our government created and, in many ways, still isn\u2019t doing enough to eradicate.**  ---  By way of conclusion, I will emphasize what has been reiterated. the Fair Housing Act was no magic wand. Per Capps's *How the Fair Housing Act Failed Black Homeowners*:  >**Fifty years after the Fair Housing Act, the full historical weight of banks\u2019 discriminatory practices is still evident in the persistent racial segregation of communities. While discrimination in lending is illegal, disparities in lending are enormous.** According to an investigation by Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting earlier this year, **African Americans and Latinos continue to be denied mortgages at far higher rates than whites in 61 metro areas.**  And as Mock remarks: *Remember Redlining? It's Alive and Evolving* It is also important to take into account, alongside redlining, other phenomena such as racial steering, White flight, blockbusting, etc. See also such contemporary practices as digital redlining.  To tie things up, I quote historian Richard Rothstein's *Color of Law* (see here and here for interviews with Rothstein on his book):  >*De facto* segregation, we tell ourselves, has various causes. When African Americans moved into a neighborhood like Ferguson, a few racially prejudiced white families decided to leave, and then as the number of black families grew, the neighborhood deteriorated, and \u201cwhite flight\u201d followed. Real estate agents steered whites away from black neighborhoods, and blacks away from white ones. Banks discriminated with \u201credlining,\u201d refusing to give mortgages to African Americans or extracting unusually severe terms from them with subprime loans. African Americans haven\u2019t generally gotten the educations that would enable them to earn sufficient incomes to live in white suburbs, and, as a result, many remain concentrated in urban neighborhoods. Besides, black families prefer to live with one another.  >All this has some truth, but it remains a small part of the truth, submerged by a far more important one: until the last quarter of the twentieth century, racially explicit policies of federal, state, and local governments defined where whites and African Americans should live. Today\u2019s residential segregation in the North, South, Midwest, and West is not the unintended consequence of individual choices and of otherwise well-meaning law or regulation but of unhidden public policy that explicitly segregated every metropolitan area in the United States. The policy was so systematic and forceful that its effects endure to the present time. Without our government\u2019s purposeful imposition of racial segregation, the other causes\u2014private prejudice, white flight, real estate steering, bank redlining, income differences, and self-segregation\u2014still would have existed but with far less opportunity for expression. Segregation by intentional government action is not *de facto*. Rather, it is what courts call *de jure*: segregation by law and public policy.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1785.0,"score_ratio":3.7142857143}
{"post_id":"k8hxr9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"An Apparent Paradox of Black Homeownership and Racist Housing Policy \"Why did black homeownership rates increase during the 1940's and 50's, a time when redlining and other racist policies were supposedly designed to prevent minority homeownership?\" (https:\/\/www.zillow.com\/research\/homeownership-gap-widens-19384\/)  I've seen this question used to deny that redlining (and other racist housing policies) had a meaningful impact on black wealth, and I don't currently have the social science background to know how to reconcile these phenomena.   One explanation I've seen is that private lenders had the correct market incentives to lend to higher-income black applicants (because they could pay back their loans), and thus, private interests helped increase black homeownership despite explicitly racist government policy. Is this explanation supported by the empirical data? If not, what other explanations better reconcile the increase in black homeownership with racist housing policy?   Another observation that confuses me is, since the introduction of the Fair Housing Act of 1968, racial disparities in homeownership rates don't seem to have budged much. I would really appreciate if someone could explain this phenomenon as well.","c_root_id_A":"geyozmm","c_root_id_B":"geyxed2","created_at_utc_A":1607363679,"created_at_utc_B":1607366981,"score_A":7,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"It's interesting you asked this right now. Robert Putnam's out promoting a new book right now called The Upswing that deals with a lot of these topics. The reason for the increase in home ownership basically boils down to income growth for Black Americans and alternative financing to mortgages. You get something called a landsale contract (which was still quite exploitive. Ta-Nehisi Coats goes into those in his famous Atlantic piece).   You see a lot of improvements for Black Americans during this period and it all basically boils down to the fact that they were leaving the south in record numbers. Once they got to Chicago or California or wherever, they could earn more and find people more willing to do work arounds of existing racists laws.   There were things like Eisenhauer's interstate project also that created federal jobs outside of agriculture that allowed Black Americans to find jobs that paid decently so they could afford to get out of the south.    But all of the factors like growth in education, increases in income, longer life span, higher infant survival, etc. are all highly correlated with Black immigration out of the South.   Putnam had an op-ed in the NY Times that basically summarizes his book.  https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2020\/12\/04\/opinion\/race-american-history.html  Putnam's data on homeownership: https:\/\/www.google.com\/books\/edition\/The\\_Upswing\/EbcCEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=BLACK-WHITE+HOMEOWNERSHIP+RATIO,+1900%E2%80%932017&pg=PA213&printsec=frontcover","human_ref_B":"The reason is a popular misunderstanding of what redlining and New Deal era lending policies entailed, much of it perpetuated by journalists.  Here's the popular misunderstanding: HOLC, a federal government agency providing home loans, was created in the New Deal. It rated neighborhoods within cities, and black-heavy areas scored the lowest and were subsequently locked out of government lending. The consequence was low homeownership and inability to pass down home-based wealth to subsequent generations.  The problem with this narrative: HOLC was definitely racist, but not in this way. New research (see footnotes here) has actually shown that HOLC did a lot of lending to Af-Ams, and that in some areas, Af-Ams accounted for a higher percentage of HOLC loans than did whites. But they received loans on much poorer terms (high rates) and only if they lived in segregated areas. HOLC was still an instrument of racism but not in the form of total exclusion from the housing market. Rather, it aided and abetted segregation and in a highly exploitative manner.  This sort of gets replicated beyond HOLC in both the federal (FHA) and private lending markets.  You also see other forms of private lending emerge that are equally exploitative, like the practice of contract selling, where people agreed to highly onerous, contractually obligated terms that left them underwater and where they didn't even become owners.   &#x200B;  Footnotes:  https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1177\/0096144218819429  https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w28146","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3302.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"gzzjcv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why is the median income for the Black community lower than immigrant communities in USA? Taking into account that black communities are citizens from the start and know the language compared to immigrants that need to start from zero in a new country. \\based on [https:\/\/www.census.gov\/content\/dam\/Census\/library\/visualizations\/2018\/demo\/p60-263\/figure1.pdf\\]  Are there any studies specifically in this area?","c_root_id_A":"ftjig92","c_root_id_B":"ftjwtv7","created_at_utc_A":1591753962,"created_at_utc_B":1591762798,"score_A":23,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"In addition to the other responses, defacto and dejure segregation and discrimination since the Civil War play no small part. A gross oversimplification is black people were effectively segregated into neighborhoods of concentrated poverty. Segregated housing underlies many related issues (job opportunities, education, crime, health).  This is an excellent book on the subject.    https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Color-Law-Forgotten-Government-Segregated\/dp\/1631492853","human_ref_B":"If you\u2019re able to leave your country, you\u2019re normally able to do well. Think of the people who can\u2019t leave.   The way our immigration system is set up, we really do not let in a lot of unskilled people.   https:\/\/www.aila.org\/infonet\/current-immigration-laws  Refugees are rare.   There isn\u2019t enough comment boxes to explain how overtly and systemically oppressed black people are. You mentioned that they \u201cknow the language\u201d. That\u2019s a far cry from being productive with it.   I can give you a short reading list:  Behave  Drive  Savage Inequalities   Peoples History of the United States.   We put a lot of emphasis on the history of blacks in America, but not enough on the sociology. The first two will help you understand the mindset of humans given the position.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8836.0,"score_ratio":1.1304347826}
{"post_id":"gtsu93","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Evidence about the effectiveness of violent protesting. Is there any evidence regarding the effectiveness of violent protests and riots on influencing social change vs peaceful forms of protests?","c_root_id_A":"fsfirrl","c_root_id_B":"fsfckkn","created_at_utc_A":1590940005,"created_at_utc_B":1590936500,"score_A":25,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"There are some older threads in which you can find discussion on the topic:  * Do protests actually do anything?  * How effective is civil disobedience in creating social and political change?  In any discussion on the topic, and if you seek around for information on the topic, you are likely to find Chenoweth being cited (also see \/u\/prestatiedruk's own reply here). She has vulgarized her work, for example with a Tedx Talk and an article written for Vox. She also explained her findings in a recent interview published on the Harvard Gazette.  That said, considering the context in which you ask the question (i.e. the death of Georgy Floyd and the current events regarding this death), I would argue that it is important to take care in distinguishing different existing concepts such as civil resistance or disobedience, protest, demonstration), riot, etc. (I would also encourage seeking answers to, for example, how and why peaceful protests may lead to riots, and\/or why people may choose to be violent rather than peaceful, besides what behavior comparatively is more effective.)  ---  **Update**] Taking into account u\/A1B6 entirely relevant and pertinent remark to the other user, and their own input on the subject, I feel compelled to expand ~~slightly~~ more. Even more so following my hindsight evaluation that although my last paragraph was meant to incentivize critical thinking and not taking the conclusion that 'civil resistance' is \"better\" than 'violent resistance' at face value, my overall comment may still appear as if I considered it a done debate. (I was relying on users checking out the two other threads which have similar observations as those of A1B6, but I do not think I was clear on that, either.) In short, I am unsatisfied.  ---  So, first things first. It is not uncommon for discussions on violent conflicts to revolve around what is included\/excluded and definitions. For example, many [criticisms towards Steven Pinker's \"Better Angels of Our Nature\" are of this kind. In his essay reviewing four different books on the same topic, Lehoucq criticized Chenoweth and Stephan, e.g.:  >**If only the record spoke this clearly.** First, notwithstanding their Instrumental Variables solution to the problem of endogeneity (that is, whether peaceful campaigns succeed, but only in more open regimes), **their conclusion rests upon an incomplete database of peaceful protest campaigns in the twentieth century.** Missing values mean that many of their statistical models rely upon many fewer than the 323 campaigns that Chenoweth and Stephan identify in Why Civil Resistance Works. **By including numerous peaceful efforts to reform harsh dictatorships overlooked by Chenoweth and Stephan in Central America**\u2014a region rife with struggles of a peaceful and violent nature during the twentieth century\u2014**I also show that the success rate of nonviolent campaigns is not superior to the success rate of violent struggle. Indeed, the success rates of both types of campaigns are (sadly) equal.**  Chenoweth responded with a letter. In this letter, she makes several objections, among which:  >**While the first iteration of NAVCO5 omitted some historical cases**\u2014as do many inaugural datasets\u2014**the data quality have improved considerably in the past five years, with numerous cases back-coded for completion.** Importantly, **Lehoucq counts partial successes as successes, whereas Stephan and I consider them failures to maintain a strict metric of success that is comparable across cases. Furthermore, Lehoucq may have applied different inclusion criteria** to the cases he identifies as missing (see Appendix).   Following that, she argues that the aggregate statistics based on the updated data are comparable to those in *Why Civil Resistance Works*, corroborating Chenoweth and Stephan's conclusions. She then cites other works which despite using different data sources and units of analysis reach similar conclusions as theirs. I am not going into details here, because I am more interested in the debate itself and potential reasons for disagreement, and to provide context to A1B6's observations.  ---  Thus, another element to consider is the distinction between violent and nonviolent resistance which is not self-evident (reality rarely being black and white). To quote Orosco's final paragraph in his essay on 'pacifism as pathology':  >Nevertheless, **it is important to engage in such examination without relying on simplistic binaries such as violence\/nonviolence or pacifist\/revolutionary that abound in the work of both pacifists and their critics.** The history of nonviolent movements is a rich and complicated one in which millions of people have participated in numerous acts of self-determination, autonomy, and imagination toward a better world.  Conceptualization is an important step before conducting research, and there is no such thing as a definition which is universally accepted as entirely correct, with no qualification whatsoever. Also see this comment. I think it is fair to quote Chenoweth and Stephan (see the appendix to their book), who acknowledge the delimitation problem:  >Admittedly, **there are difficulties with labeling one campaign as \u201cviolent\u201d and another as \u201cnonviolent\u201d** (see Ackerman and Kruegler 1994:9). **In many cases, both nonviolent and violent campaigns exist simultaneously** among different competing campaigns, as with Palestinian campaigns. Alternatively, often some campaigns use both nonviolent and violent methods of resistance over the course of their existence, as with the ANC in South Africa. **Characterizing a campaign as violent or nonviolent simplifies a very complex constellation of resistance methods.**  ---  Of course, in order to study what they wanted to study quantitatively, they had to make decisions, which can be questioned and challenged. They chose to make a list of criteria allowing them to decide whether a campaign was 'primarily non\/violent'. The 1,000 fatalities threshold comes with the use of Correlates of War (COW) data. They used the COW together with some other sources  to make their list of violent campaigns.   Sarkees and Schafer explain that the COW uses that number to distinguish **interstate wars** because it is \"**prima facie evidence that conflict has been sustained and severe enough to qualify as war.**\" The same threshold (but for *participants*, not deaths) was applied to qualify nonviolent campaigns. Chenoweth and Lewis acknowledge:  >**This cutoff point is admittedly arbitrary. We chose it because of the precedent set by COW** (1,000 battle deaths), which is not precisely the same as participants but provides **a baseline of comparison for what we are calling \u2018major\u2019 campaigns.**   They then shared the list with other experts for validation, specifically:  >**We validated the resulting data by subjecting them to review by approximately a dozen experts in nonviolent conflict.** These experts were asked to assess whether the cases were appropriately characterized as major nonviolent conflicts, whether their outcomes had been appropriately  characterized, and whether any notable conflicts had been omitted. Where the experts suggested additional cases for inclusion, the same corroboration method was used.  ---  Note that I am neither endorsing nor criticizing their choices in this specific comment, just highlighting them\/sharing them. To conclude, I quote the following assertion Chenoweth made in response to Lehoucq, concerning her unit of analysis (i.e. the 'campaign'):  >**Stephan and I would generally argue that one-off events or those that rely on single methods like protest are wholly different phenomena than civil resistance campaigns**. Asking whether a protest worked to overthrow a dictator is like asking whether a battle worked to win a war. **Thus Lehoucq may be right that nonviolence, nonviolent protests, or attempts at \"peaceful reform\" are ineffective.** But those concepts or units are not necessarily comparable to civil resistance.","human_ref_B":"Yes. Check out Why Civil Resistance Works by Erica Chenoweth. She also summarises the key insights in a TEDx Talk you can find on YouTube. Basically her research suggests that nonviolent campaigns have a much higher likelihood of success than violent ones.   But it\u2019s not clear to what extent her work can be applied to democracies if I remember correctly.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3505.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"e8o03v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why do Hispanics and Blacks have smaller suicide rates than Whites?","c_root_id_A":"faduzpx","c_root_id_B":"fadsanz","created_at_utc_A":1575987026,"created_at_utc_B":1575984830,"score_A":41,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"The first thing to consider is that at least *part* of the disparity may be due to issues with the collected data. According to research done by Rockett and colleagues, there exists a misclassification problem which affects minority deaths. Thus Rockett et al. argue the following:  >**Data disparities might explain much of the Black-White suicide rate gap, if not the Hispanic-White gap**. Ameliorative action would extend from training in death certification to routine use of psychological autopsies in equivocal-manner-of-death cases.  This is a problem recognized by the CDC, see for example this report by Curtin and Warner:  >**Deaths for all causes for non-Hispanic AIAN, non-Hispanic API, and Hispanic persons have been shown to be misclassified to other racial and ethnic groups, resulting in underreporting** of these deaths by about 28%, 7%, and 5%, respectively ...] Although the extent and direction of misclassification of suicide deaths is unknown, **numbers and rates for these racial and ethnic groups are most likely underreported.**  ---  The rest of my answer builds upon observations made in other recent threads about the trends of suicide rates in the US (see for example [here). In their essay about deaths of despair, Case and Deaton argue the following:   >**Social upheaval may have taken different forms, on average, for African Americans. Black kin networks, though often looser, may be more extensive and more protective**, as when grandmothers care for children. **Black churches provide a traditional and continuing source of support.** As has often been noted, **blacks are no strangers to labor market deprivations, and may be more inured to the insults of the market**.  Commentary by Lleras-Muney points out the \"**importance of accounting for initial conditions**\":  >**Though blacks\u2019 changes in current income tracked that of whites, black mortality was still decreasing while white mortality was increasing, at least until 2010. But blacks, whites, and Hispanics have markedly different levels of and trends in childhood mortality**. This makes the comparisons across groups difficult to interpret, because improvements in health conditions have delayed effects.  She reviews several improvements in the early life experiences of Black people (associated, for example, with decrease infant mortality) which may have had \"long-lasting gains which] overshadow the detrimental effects of declining economic conditions\":  >[...] These **early life improvements could explain why the mortality of blacks is not falling at the same time as that of whites, despite their also being hit by deteriorating conditions in the labor market** at age 20. Interestingly, Case and Deaton\u2019s figure 2 shows that the mortality of the black population also started to rise in 2010. So **it is possible that, for blacks, adverse labor market effects are just beginning to outstrip the benefits of improved childhood conditions.**  ----  [Graham's research suggests that African-Americans - but also Hispanics - are more optimistic than White Americans, which may constitute a protective factor and may be associated with the above observations. In summary:  >My research with Sergio Pinto, meanwhile, finds that middle aged, less than college-educated white men in the U.S. are the least hopeful cohort, and, not coincidentally, are also the group that is most likely to die of deaths of despair. **In contrast, poor Blacks and Hispanics, who are objectively worse off, are much more optimistic and resilient.**  Expanding on the above, see what Graham and Pinto wrote:  >We found **marked differences in life satisfaction, hope for the future, and stress across poor blacks, Hispanics, and whites living in metropolitan areas**. Our econometric analysis included an array of widely used socioeconomic and demographic controls. These include age, gender, education, income, and employment status, as well as religion and place of residence, among other things. **Among the poor, controlling for sociodemographic factors, blacks are by far the most optimistic cohort, and are close to three times more likely to be higher up on the optimism scale than poor whites** (figure 2.1). **Poor Hispanics also fared better than poor whites although the differences are less marked**.  In fact Graham observes that:  >In contrast, **black and Hispanic people are more likely to report that their lives are better than their parents\u2019 lives**. While disadvantage and discrimination still exist, **minorities have been making gradual progress in narrowing gaps with white people in terms of their education, wages, and life expectancy**. Some of this is because of concrete gains made by those communities. But much of the improvement is due to the relative decline in the incomes and status of poor white people\u2014a trend associated with the hollowing-out of blue-collar jobs, which are decreasing in both number and stability at the same time as the market for high-skilled labor continues to prosper and grow.  In sum, Graham and Pinto argue that the disparity may be explained by the relative progress achieved by minorities (while \"accepting that challenges remain\"). Quoting them again, \"**Blacks in general have improved their status and well-being, and wage and education gaps have narrowed**\". They also argue that \"**g]aps in health status and life expectancy between blacks and whites, while still significant, have also narrowed**\", which may have contributed to off-set other factors which contribute to the observed trends in suicide among White Americans.  ---  Coming back to Case and Deaton's suggestions, also see research done on \"resilience\". See for example the following study by [Assari et al.:  >**Our study documented stronger reciprocal associations between depressive symptoms and hopelessness among Whites compared to Blacks**. Our findings are **in line with the differential effect hypothesis, which suggests ethnic groups differ for the associations that ultimately influence health and illness** (26, 46\u201349). That is, **ethnicity shapes the degree by which depressive symptoms accompany hopelessness in the general population of older adults.**  Graham and Pinto interpret their findings in the following manner:  >**Assari and colleagues highlight higher levels of \u201cresilience\u201d among blacks and other minorities as an explanation.** **Resilience**\u2014defined as maintaining health in spite of a range of psychosocial risk factors\u2014**may be higher among blacks and minorities as they have had more experience with adversity. Community and religious factors may also be at play**; a simple cross-tabulation of our data shows that blacks are the most likely of all racial groups to report that religion is important in their lives. This is corroborated by any number of accounts of the role of religion and community in African Americans\u2019 lives. **While we control for religion in our analysis, so that it is not driving the optimism scores of our respondents, there are likely a number of indirect ways in which it still affects the lives\u2014and optimism\u2014of African Americans more generally.**","human_ref_B":"It does seem that Hispanic populations in the US have lower suicide rates. Source. I'm willing to believe this goes for other people of color as well.  This was surprising to me, because usually, not being white means you are poorer (source), and being poor is associated with a much higher suicide risk (source).  One explanation I can come up with is that black and Hispanic populations are generally more religious compared to whites (source). Since religion condemns suicide, religious people may feel extra apprehensive when considering it as an option. Source.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2196.0,"score_ratio":2.1578947368}
{"post_id":"az5rgq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Who changed the definition of racism to power + prejudice... And why? In the dictionary, where laymen get their words, it\u2019s: \u201cThe belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.\u201d And \u201cDiscrimination or prejudice based on race.\u201d  I recently heard a POC say she can\u2019t be racist when she was certainly saying some bigoted stuff regardless. She said racism is \u201cscientifically defined\u201d as power + prejudice - that confused me.   Like, a poor white family in a rural trailer park doesn\u2019t have more \u201cpower\u201d than The Obama Family.   How is this new definition helpful? Seems to just burn a lot of bridges.","c_root_id_A":"ei5gr16","c_root_id_B":"ei5gcl5","created_at_utc_A":1552153030,"created_at_utc_B":1552152737,"score_A":168,"score_B":51,"human_ref_A":"the purpose of power + prejudice was to move discourse away from the idea of being racist as a personal failing, and instead focus on structural oppression and the material reality of minority groups.   Basically liberal society largely seems to have conceived racism as 'being irrartionally mean', but for people with a materialist anti-racist perspective, that definition isn't productive or insightful and the lack of material, tangible progress for black people post-civil rights made it clear that there needed to be more focus on power dynamics and historical context to combat racism.  I'd reccomend Beverly Tatum's work , her perspective is very informed and compelling imo.","human_ref_B":"That definition of racism originated in the 70s. But as I argue in that thread, I would not consider it a mainstream nor common definition of racism.  As in, the term racism *normally* refers to racial prejudice regardless of the individual's status or power, unless it is explicitly operationalized differently.  It can be argued to be useful in the context of criticizing the current system of power and to criticize Western society, as in to talk about *institutional* racism. But as I said, I would not suggest that racism is commonly defined as such, except perhaps in critical studies.   At least, it is another conceptualization of racism and to say its \"definition has changed\" is incorrect. It is conceptualized differently in some specific contexts.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":293.0,"score_ratio":3.2941176471}
{"post_id":"ary2wl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"When did Political Conservatism become interwoven with free market capitalism? Nowadays Conservatives are almost always free market capitalists pushing for less regulation. Doesn't this go against social norms, hence why is it so popular amongst Conservatives? Can one be a modern day \"Conservative\" while also being more economically\"Liberal\". That would entail Social Conservatism and economic liberalism but why is that concept not very popular, globally?","c_root_id_A":"egqi6td","c_root_id_B":"egqu3lu","created_at_utc_A":1550506485,"created_at_utc_B":1550515083,"score_A":6,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"Friendly reminder that all claims in top level comments must be supported by citations to relevant social science sources. No lay speculation.","human_ref_B":"The \"interweaving\" you're describing is called fusionism, and though it has many antecedents, its specific ideological formulation in the American context was, as with much of conservative political theory, in the pages of the National Review, specifically literary editor Frank Meyer.    Meyer rejected the label \"fusionism\" because he didn't like the implication of bringing two naturally distinct philosophies together in an unstable coalition.  As Meyer concieved it, individualism (and the free market that relied on it) and traditionalism were, within the western context, inseperably connected, and adopting one while rejecting the other would result in the conceptual abandonment of your own position.  This was a *great* tool for fledgeling Movement Conservatism, which could then justify party coalition building between religious conservatives and libertarians on grounds other than anti-communism.     Many, if not most intellectual conservatives found fusionism to be ideologically incoherent.  Meyer's formulation of a marriage between capital and communal virtue under one conservative banner prompted responses from traditionalists like Russell Kirk and L. Brent Bozell, who noted simply, and like most prior thinkers on the right, that capitalism was the most deracinating, disruptive force in the society they were trying to conserve, excepting empowered Marxism.  Individualism, they claimed, while certainly emphasized in the anglo tradition prior to capitalism, had its place of predominance merely because of the atomizing effects of market competition.     None of this did much to lessen the impact of Meyer's promise of a stable coupling of libertarian and socially conservative tendencies.  Kirk was opaque and intellectual, and other traditionalists were radical without concern for the mores of popular conservatism.  Most importantly, fusionism had the support of the pragmatic founder and editor-in-chief of the National Review, William F. Buckley, who used his position as kingmaker on the right to write fusionism into the central platform of Movement Conservatism's first great candidate, Barry Goldwater, and later its second, Ronald Reagan.    As with a lot of things in this area, the first and last word on the topic is George Nash's *The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America Since 1945*, which covers the tension, compatibility, and union of individualism\/libertarianism\/classical liberalism\/capitalism and social conservatism\/traditionalism\/communitarianism in great depth.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8598.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"ary2wl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"When did Political Conservatism become interwoven with free market capitalism? Nowadays Conservatives are almost always free market capitalists pushing for less regulation. Doesn't this go against social norms, hence why is it so popular amongst Conservatives? Can one be a modern day \"Conservative\" while also being more economically\"Liberal\". That would entail Social Conservatism and economic liberalism but why is that concept not very popular, globally?","c_root_id_A":"egqu3lu","c_root_id_B":"egqt12p","created_at_utc_A":1550515083,"created_at_utc_B":1550514314,"score_A":27,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The \"interweaving\" you're describing is called fusionism, and though it has many antecedents, its specific ideological formulation in the American context was, as with much of conservative political theory, in the pages of the National Review, specifically literary editor Frank Meyer.    Meyer rejected the label \"fusionism\" because he didn't like the implication of bringing two naturally distinct philosophies together in an unstable coalition.  As Meyer concieved it, individualism (and the free market that relied on it) and traditionalism were, within the western context, inseperably connected, and adopting one while rejecting the other would result in the conceptual abandonment of your own position.  This was a *great* tool for fledgeling Movement Conservatism, which could then justify party coalition building between religious conservatives and libertarians on grounds other than anti-communism.     Many, if not most intellectual conservatives found fusionism to be ideologically incoherent.  Meyer's formulation of a marriage between capital and communal virtue under one conservative banner prompted responses from traditionalists like Russell Kirk and L. Brent Bozell, who noted simply, and like most prior thinkers on the right, that capitalism was the most deracinating, disruptive force in the society they were trying to conserve, excepting empowered Marxism.  Individualism, they claimed, while certainly emphasized in the anglo tradition prior to capitalism, had its place of predominance merely because of the atomizing effects of market competition.     None of this did much to lessen the impact of Meyer's promise of a stable coupling of libertarian and socially conservative tendencies.  Kirk was opaque and intellectual, and other traditionalists were radical without concern for the mores of popular conservatism.  Most importantly, fusionism had the support of the pragmatic founder and editor-in-chief of the National Review, William F. Buckley, who used his position as kingmaker on the right to write fusionism into the central platform of Movement Conservatism's first great candidate, Barry Goldwater, and later its second, Ronald Reagan.    As with a lot of things in this area, the first and last word on the topic is George Nash's *The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America Since 1945*, which covers the tension, compatibility, and union of individualism\/libertarianism\/classical liberalism\/capitalism and social conservatism\/traditionalism\/communitarianism in great depth.","human_ref_B":"The merger of social conservativism and libertarianism goes by the name fusionism.  The person most responsible for fusionism is Frank Meyer, in his role as one of the editors of *The National Review*.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":769.0,"score_ratio":13.5}
{"post_id":"96lcq5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Do rich\/famous people get lighter sentences for the same crime committed by a middle-class or poor person? If so, why? It seems to be accepted as common knowledge that rich people get off with lighter sentences for the same crime.  I'd like to know if this is supported by evidence.  If this is indeed the case, why is it the case?  Is it a matter of being able to hire better lawyers?  The Halo Effect?  Does it vary?  Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"e420kuh","c_root_id_B":"e423f2s","created_at_utc_A":1534075018,"created_at_utc_B":1534079461,"score_A":14,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"This study seems to indicate that public or private counsel has little effect on court outcomes.  https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0047235210001625  In the context of asylum claims, this study found that attorney quality matters and that a poor quality attorney may be worse than no attorney, which may have implications for the interpretation of the case cited above.  https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1111\/lasr.12123  This study finds attorney experience and litigation team size to have significant effects for some types of questions before the Canadian Supreme Court.  https:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/4623378?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents  This study indicates that pre-trial publicity decreases the odds of conviction but increases the expected sentence length if convicted.  https:\/\/academic.oup.com\/joc\/article-abstract\/49\/4\/104\/4108173?redirectedFrom=fulltext  Jared Chamberlain has found some evidence that celebrity status may have some modest effects when the celebrity is a member of the jury.  https:\/\/www.albany.edu\/scj\/jcjpc\/vol17is1\/Chamberlain7_2.pdf  That same study references a study by Chamberlain on the effect that celebrity status of a defendant may have on the verdict (2005), however I can\u2019t find that study or the results.  However, you could contact Chamberlain and ask him, his contact info is in the above cited study.","human_ref_B":"There is indeed research about extra-legal factors such as socioeconomic status (SES) and whether it influences sentencing. The short answer is that there is evidence for sentencing disparities due to extra-legal factors.  Several authors have found an effect of education and income, with lower status people being more harshly penalized (examples \\[1\\] \\[2\\] \\[3\\]).  The role that socio-economic status plays might be different depending on the offense and the type of sentence. For example, D'Alessio and Stolzenberg found that SES has a greater impact on the sentencing of nonproperty offenders (such as violent crimes).  Chiricos and Waldo's (1975) study suggests that SES is not as important as legal factors (such as priors\\*) in determining the length of a prison sentence. While Chiricos and Bales (1991) do confirm that SES does not not affect the *length* of incarceration, they did find that SES predicts *being sentenced* with incarceration after sentence. Furthermore, they found that having a public defender is associated with longer periods of jail time: one can extrapolate that wealthier individuals are less likely to use a public defender rather than a private lawyer. They also found that unemployment is a factor, such that unemployed black men have an amplified risk of incarceration\\*\\*.  In sum: criminological research tends to suggest that indeed, status affects sentencing in some manner, either on the type of sentence you receive or the length of imprisonment. Why? Mix of biases (how defendants are perceived) and resources (e.g. access to a private lawyer).  And this is without getting into the rest of the process (arrest and prosecution).  ^(\\*Note: Of course, human behaviour does not happen in a vacuum and that there exists cumulative disadvantages for certain social groups. Among other factors, there is an association between disadvantages and criminality.)  ^(\\*\\*An explanation for results that are not entirely consistent concerns methodology (such as variables controlled and level of analysis)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4443.0,"score_ratio":1.2142857143}
{"post_id":"6dtddf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"I've heard that ACT, SAT scores are not good predictors of how well a person does in college. If so, what are better predictors?","c_root_id_A":"di5hjj8","c_root_id_B":"di5hq6x","created_at_utc_A":1495989535,"created_at_utc_B":1495989776,"score_A":18,"score_B":105,"human_ref_A":"Does this take into account that people with different scores go to different colleges?","human_ref_B":"The research indicates that parents' income (and the accompanying benefits) is the strongest predictor of academic success.  Social capital is often unrecognized or under emphasized in conversations about student success. Students of higher income families have access to better teachers, coaches, technology, healthcare, nutrition, parents' social and business connections, and the positive influence of other successful adults. Lower income children often lack (to an extent) access to the same benefits, which are all important factors in academic persistence and success.  Additional sources:   https:\/\/phys.org\/news\/2014-02-parental-income-strong-predictor-student.html https:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/business\/archive\/2014\/01\/economists-your-parents-are-more-important-than-ever\/283301\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":241.0,"score_ratio":5.8333333333}
{"post_id":"6dtddf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"I've heard that ACT, SAT scores are not good predictors of how well a person does in college. If so, what are better predictors?","c_root_id_A":"di5hjj8","c_root_id_B":"di5htg1","created_at_utc_A":1495989535,"created_at_utc_B":1495989893,"score_A":18,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"Does this take into account that people with different scores go to different colleges?","human_ref_B":"I listened to a podcast about a long term study of women and helicopter parents. Apparently nearly every woman with an actively involved parent (typically wealthy, upper middle class) graduated and achieved greater socio economic status.   Here's an article from the same author: https:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/education\/archive\/2016\/05\/the-partnership-between-colleges-and-helicopter-parents\/482595\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":358.0,"score_ratio":1.4444444444}
{"post_id":"5k35am","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Are economics and business students less empathetic than other students? If so, why? Hello all,  I remember a few years ago reading an article that discussed a psychological study, in which it was discovered that economics and business students were greedier and had less empathy than other students, particularly in the humanities. A quick googling shows results like this that cite this study  My question is whether these studies have been repeated or corroborated, and what the current status quo of this research is.  Thank you","c_root_id_A":"dbl50lk","c_root_id_B":"dbl0s0a","created_at_utc_A":1482603392,"created_at_utc_B":1482596525,"score_A":31,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/arielrubinstein.tau.ac.il\/papers\/74.pdf  Go to page 877 in the article.  Rubinstein presents a problem to students in different majors where they have to choose how many workers to lay off. Profit is given as a function of the number of people laid off. It is either presented as a continuous choice in the number of people to lay off. Or, using the same function, the choice is presented as a table with number laid off and profit listed. So there is only a discrete set to choose from in the second option.  I haven't reread it but if I recall Econ majors use calculus and maximize profit when given the continuous choice but factor in the worker's welfare and choose a smaller number of layoffs when presented with the discrete choice. Other majors don't change their choice as much.  Take from this what you will.","human_ref_B":"There was an anecdote in an Adam Curtis documentary involving game theory and variations of the prisoner's dilemma type experiments. According to the film, the only agents that played \"rationally\" (selfishly) were \"economists and psychopaths\".  https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/So_Long_Sucker?wprov=sfla1","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6867.0,"score_ratio":4.4285714286}
{"post_id":"5k35am","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Are economics and business students less empathetic than other students? If so, why? Hello all,  I remember a few years ago reading an article that discussed a psychological study, in which it was discovered that economics and business students were greedier and had less empathy than other students, particularly in the humanities. A quick googling shows results like this that cite this study  My question is whether these studies have been repeated or corroborated, and what the current status quo of this research is.  Thank you","c_root_id_A":"dbl53ue","c_root_id_B":"dbl0s0a","created_at_utc_A":1482603523,"created_at_utc_B":1482596525,"score_A":13,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I don't know about empathy but there have been a few studies on the issue of corruption. Can't look up the reference due vacation but there have been experiments on how in one case economist students were more likely to conduct corrupt behaviour than other type of students.   Interestingly the effect didn't increase with how long people studied meaning it was more about what kind of people attended the specific studies. I would theorise something similar could be at play here   Edit: found a source https:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/profile\/Bjoern_Frank\/publication\/222541916_Does_Economics_Make_Citizens_Corrupt\/links\/00b7d518a643ed4000000000.pdf","human_ref_B":"There was an anecdote in an Adam Curtis documentary involving game theory and variations of the prisoner's dilemma type experiments. According to the film, the only agents that played \"rationally\" (selfishly) were \"economists and psychopaths\".  https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/So_Long_Sucker?wprov=sfla1","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6998.0,"score_ratio":1.8571428571}
{"post_id":"1rhy68","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"How does a country like Cambodia adopting the US dollar as its national currency affect the money supply in the US? I was recently on holiday in Cambodia, where they use two currencies - the local riel for micro-transactions, and the US dollar for nearly everything else. The US dollar was introduced to the country when the UN was in control of the country in the early 90s.   I understand the benefits for Cambodia of having dollars as a form of currency, but I wonder how this affects monetary policy in the US. Does the Fed print off extra money specifically for the Cambodian economy? Are these extra dollars taken into account when working out the supply of US dollars?   Basically, how does it all work?!","c_root_id_A":"cdnl8pg","c_root_id_B":"cdni4x7","created_at_utc_A":1385494028,"created_at_utc_B":1385487068,"score_A":16,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"It gives US the benefit of seigniorage. The Fed doesn't print money *for* Cambodia, rather Cambodia acquires US currency by the normal method (selling goods and services for USD or FOREX used to purchase USD) and by its normal mechanisms the Fed will tend to \"replace\" that \"lost\" money with new money. Essentially the US prints money to buy Cambodian goods and services.","human_ref_B":"It's worth noting that USD is used for \"nearly everything\" in transactions that involve foreigners. If you get away from the tourist areas, people will accept USD, but the prices will always be in riel (and pegged at 4000R to 1USD).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6960.0,"score_ratio":1.4545454545}
{"post_id":"pnkypk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Why are \"old books\" still popular in social sciences? In mathematics, my background, old books do not seem to be held in particularly high regards - no one reads Newton to learn about calculus or G\u00f6del to learn about mathematical logic; those books have long been superseded (the oldest still widely used books seem to be from the 60s, or so). Similarly, I have dabbled enough in economics to know that people there generally recommend against picking up the classics of Keynes or Smith, if you wish to learn about the field. There seem to be a good reasons to neglect older books - some of the information my have simply been shown to be incorrect, and, more commonly, we have learned of better ways to present it: we can relate it to other new work that has come out in the mean time, and use more modern, established terminology and methods to teach it in ways that are more useful to students. On the other hand, this does not seem to be the case for many of the social sciences. When you look for reading lists and recommendations on sociology online, they still almost always feature the classics of Durkheim, Weber, or Marx, and the same seems to be true for political science or, even more so, philosophy.  So here is my question: am I correct in my impression that those old books are still widely used in teaching in the social sciences and, if so, why is that? Why haven't they been completely replaced by newer ones on the same topics?","c_root_id_A":"hcq52pp","c_root_id_B":"hcpx88i","created_at_utc_A":1631560170,"created_at_utc_B":1631556982,"score_A":94,"score_B":46,"human_ref_A":"Just speaking from experience in my graduate-level training in History, we don't read Durkheim, Weber, or Marx in the same way that we'd read contemporary scholarship. I don't know of any modern disciplines that take those books as up-to-date secondary source material. I think the main difference between your field and mine might just be that we still find it valuable to read those authors, as they give us a chronological sense of how contemporary work has not just been importantly influenced by their work, but has also amended it in various ways. Because same as you our oldest widely used books are from the 60s as well (and even those are starting to show age).     In 'The Function of Dogma in Scientific Research,' Thomas Kuhn argues that scientific disciplines (I imagine it applies to mathematics, too) have a unique advantage of not needing to train its students on anything but current methodology. Whereas in humanistic fields, it's more important to demonstrate to students that contemporary methods are the product of past methods, and will themselves almost assuredly produces new ones one day.","human_ref_B":"I've actually answered this very question in a different thread yesterday, which can be found here. What is basically boils down to is: they're the classics; the very first to introduce certain concepts or modes of thinking. In order to fully understand *why* different schools of sociology have developed such vastly different ways of thinking about society, you need to study the foundational works. For sociology, that's Durkheim, Marx and Weber.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3188.0,"score_ratio":2.0434782609}
{"post_id":"gy4adk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Thoughts on \"Defund the Police\" I've heard this idea brought up a lot recently and I'm wondering if there is any empirical data for or against it.","c_root_id_A":"ft8ewwe","c_root_id_B":"ft8g62l","created_at_utc_A":1591499669,"created_at_utc_B":1591500486,"score_A":16,"score_B":49,"human_ref_A":"Yes, tons. Read The End of Policing by Alex S. Vitale. It provides evidence for how policing fails at numerous social services, how reforms don\u2019t work, and why alternatives to police are superior.","human_ref_B":"This book addresses the question well.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":817.0,"score_ratio":3.0625}
{"post_id":"cclrcf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"how did girlfriend\/boyfriend become a thing and around when ?","c_root_id_A":"etnwpxb","c_root_id_B":"eto0ilk","created_at_utc_A":1563003234,"created_at_utc_B":1563007811,"score_A":6,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"What do you mean?","human_ref_B":"There\u2019s an interesting thread by \/u\/chocolatepot talking about the emergence of dating over at \/r\/askhistorians:   * What did guys do to express interest in women before telephones became widespread in the 1900s?  More similar posts from the same redditor using a different name \/u\/mimicofmodes are discussed here:   * I'm a mid-late 19th century urban teenager and I'm feeling rebellious. My parents are squares and 'the man' is keeping me down. What are my outlets? What am I wearing? Where do I go to find like minded people? Do I have music? Alcohol or drugs?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4577.0,"score_ratio":4.1666666667}
{"post_id":"5p43bu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Is there evidence that charter schools or school choice improve student outcomes? My quick attempt at searching this topic through Google scholar returned a bunch of non-peer-reviewed articles. Please don't cite these, as I really don't care what the \"Center for _______\" thinks about this issue. Just looking for quality peer-reviewed publications, and ideally some decent meta-analyses.","c_root_id_A":"dcop2ml","c_root_id_B":"dcp5poi","created_at_utc_A":1484942720,"created_at_utc_B":1484964216,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"This is sort of tricky, as it's hard to generalize charter schools.  There are some that do well (look up Eerie Lighthouse Charter in Chicago for an example).  There are also some that do absolutely awful (look up Rocketship for a joke of an organization).    Additionally, there are some districts that do a great job implementing charter schools (Boston is one, Minneapolis\/St. Paul used to be another but last I looked that was less true these days).  Some do a terrible job implementing charter schools (Chicago is a good example, there's basically no barrier to entry).    Lastly, there are some districts that do so well with their public education there is no need for charters, and they don't even get a seat at the table.  Look up Jerry Weast and Montgomery County Public Schools for an example of this.    Any meta-analysis you'll find says sometimes charters work, sometimes they don't.  I've read hundreds and then even got a lit review published on the topic.  What every article, including mine, misses is the conditions needed to implement charters so they can thrive.  So Much Reform So Little Change by Charles Payne does an OK job touching on this, as does Leading for Equity (though the message there is that charters never got off the ground because public schools became so strong).    Regardless, as someone who has worked in and studied urban education reform for 13 years now, there's no way you're going to reform urban education with out charters being part of the conversation.  They're just too powerful these days.  That said, you can absolutely use them more appropriately than districts like Detroit and Chicago have chosen to use them.  I'm basically out of research these days, but am working on 2 articles so slowly getting more involved.  I really want to do some research\/writing on how to successfully use charters as a piece of an urban ed reform as opposed to the basically all or nothing mantra we have going on right now.    Edit: Someone PM'd me for a link to some of the meta analyses.  A lot of my work was around race, socioeconomic status, and segregation, so some of my sources may be more about some of those topics.  Anyway, here's a few:  Written by the National Charter School Research Project  Executive Summary of a research project by the Civil Rights Project  Abstract from a Meta-Analysis of Charters, Public, and Religious schools.  Fascinating findings.  Click around for the full article.  There's way more out there, but these are a good starting point.  Just google something like meta analysis of charter schools and only click through the Google Scholar results and that will get you going in the right direction.","human_ref_B":"I think it\u2019s really important to recognize that Charter schools aren\u2019t a monolithic entity.  We seem to understand this intuitively in the context of private schools; no one is surprised when the country day school has higher science scores than the evangelical Christian school.  So we shouldn\u2019t be surprised when there are Charters that do both better and worse than their traditional public school counterparts.   So yes, you can find peer-reviewed, soundly conducted studies that show that Charters improve student outcomes (meaning test scores)\u2026 as well as ones that show Charters negatively impact student outcomes.  Both statements are true \u2013 it depends on the Charter.  The better question to ask from an education standpoint is why.  (I guess the better question from a social standpoint would be \u201cis it worth the cost to the educational system?\u201d but that\u2019s outside the scope of your question.)  Anyway, I\u2019ve seen a number of studies that have shown positive outcomes for KIPP \/ No Excuses-type charter schools in low-income communities.  Abdulkadiroglu and Angrist (2010) have papers all over the place about Boston\u2019s Charter and Pilot schools; a good place to start is the 2010 paper listed below.  If you don\u2019t like Boston, see Brown and Holt\u2019s 2014 paper on Arkansas.  There\u2019s also one for New York I\u2019m sure you can dig up.  You requested a meta-analysis examining this: see Cheng et. al (2015).    On the other side of the coin, NAEP data shows math and reading scores for Charter schools are lower than traditional public schools overall (see Epple).  Studies like Bifulco and Ladd (2006) found charters to have clear negative impacts.  But as some administrator once said to Helen Ladd: your studies say nothing about my schools in New York.    Which gets us back to the bigger question of why.  Remember those high-performing no excuses schools?  They have like 50% more instructional hours than the surrounding public schools.  That\u2019s a huge difference.  Likewise, Michigan has shuddered under-performing online schools that had spotty instructional hours at best.  Some Charter schools have done things that have seemed to work well.  But that\u2019s not intrinsic to being a Charter school; Fryer (2014) has a nice paper on how good ideas can be culled from charters and put into practice in public schools.    Anyway, I'm getting off topic so I hope this help you!  And sorry for the sloppy cites that follow. :)  Abdulkadiroglu, A., et.al. (2011). ACCOUNTABILITY AND FLEXIBILITY IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. Quarterly Journal of Economics. https:\/\/dspace.mit.edu\/bitstream\/handle\/1721.1\/61945\/Angrist_Accountability%20and.pdf  Bifulco, R., and Ladd, H. (2006). Impacts of Charter Schools on Student Achievement\u2026 Education Finance and Policy, v.1, 1.  Brown, K., and Holt, C. (2014). Factors influencing the improved academic success\u2026 NCPEA Ed. Leardership review of Doctorial Research v1, 2. http:\/\/files.eric.ed.gov\/fulltext\/EJ1105745.pdf  Cheng, A, et. al. (2015). EDRE Working Paper No. 2014-11. http:\/\/dx.doi.org\/10.2139\/ssrn.2652401  Epple, D., et. Al. (2015). Charter Schools: a survey\u2026 http:\/\/citeseerx.ist.psu.edu\/viewdoc\/download?doi=10.1.1.954.2641&rep=rep1&type=pdf  Fryer, R. (2014). Injecting Charter School Best Practices\u2026 Quarterly Journal of Economics. https:\/\/pdfs.semanticscholar.org\/ddbd\/43919b7487d9450aac405554621dccf09fd3.pdf","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21496.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"5m75r4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Sharing the same language and a similar culture, why have the UK and Australia dropped most of their emphasis on the role of religion in daily life whilst the US seemingly places a much higher degree of importance on it?","c_root_id_A":"dc1gj0d","c_root_id_B":"dc1ngg9","created_at_utc_A":1483639695,"created_at_utc_B":1483647336,"score_A":28,"score_B":31,"human_ref_A":"I'd bolt Canada onto this question- given that Canada has arguably the most similar history\/culture as the US.","human_ref_B":"I think the key word in your question is 'seemingly'. I would argue that religion is just as diminished in America as in the UK and AUS, but it is used as an important political symbol, and a way of identifying like-minded people who share a religious *history* rather than a super strong religious present, and thus, creates the illusion of participation.  In addition, it is important to consider that religious affiliation and general spirituality are not in a precipitous decline, but rather support and participation in mainline religious *institutions*. As has been discussed here, faith in and participation in institutions is in decline across the board\u2013religious, medical, educational, civic, and political.  Here is a fantastic survey done by Pew Research Forum on this topic:  http:\/\/www.pewforum.org\/2015\/05\/12\/americas-changing-religious-landscape\/  It is my personal theory that this decline can be attributed to two factors: the rise of the power of and enshrinement of the rights of the individual, and the Internet's ability to grant the individual access to the benefits of membership in a collective, without having any dues paid to (figuratively), or subordination to a collective. That is, the individual is largely more powerful than they were in the past. An individual, with the aid of technology, can outproduce a collective of individuals from the past. The individual not only doesn't need the group as much as in the past, but also is more powerful on their own. So, you have an empowered individual, with less loyalty to their collective or community; thus, shame, humiliation, and ostracizing, which were powerful behavioral regulatory tools the group can impose on the individual, have been defanged. And religious institutions, who are examples of this\u2013whose prime purpose was the imposition of values and regulation of behavior, having been defanged, so to speak\u2013have less relevance.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7641.0,"score_ratio":1.1071428571}
{"post_id":"5m75r4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Sharing the same language and a similar culture, why have the UK and Australia dropped most of their emphasis on the role of religion in daily life whilst the US seemingly places a much higher degree of importance on it?","c_root_id_A":"dc1ngg9","c_root_id_B":"dc1bpo4","created_at_utc_A":1483647336,"created_at_utc_B":1483634204,"score_A":31,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I think the key word in your question is 'seemingly'. I would argue that religion is just as diminished in America as in the UK and AUS, but it is used as an important political symbol, and a way of identifying like-minded people who share a religious *history* rather than a super strong religious present, and thus, creates the illusion of participation.  In addition, it is important to consider that religious affiliation and general spirituality are not in a precipitous decline, but rather support and participation in mainline religious *institutions*. As has been discussed here, faith in and participation in institutions is in decline across the board\u2013religious, medical, educational, civic, and political.  Here is a fantastic survey done by Pew Research Forum on this topic:  http:\/\/www.pewforum.org\/2015\/05\/12\/americas-changing-religious-landscape\/  It is my personal theory that this decline can be attributed to two factors: the rise of the power of and enshrinement of the rights of the individual, and the Internet's ability to grant the individual access to the benefits of membership in a collective, without having any dues paid to (figuratively), or subordination to a collective. That is, the individual is largely more powerful than they were in the past. An individual, with the aid of technology, can outproduce a collective of individuals from the past. The individual not only doesn't need the group as much as in the past, but also is more powerful on their own. So, you have an empowered individual, with less loyalty to their collective or community; thus, shame, humiliation, and ostracizing, which were powerful behavioral regulatory tools the group can impose on the individual, have been defanged. And religious institutions, who are examples of this\u2013whose prime purpose was the imposition of values and regulation of behavior, having been defanged, so to speak\u2013have less relevance.","human_ref_B":"Australia is the most urbanized out of the three, which tends to lead to less religious importance in daily life.  The UK is pretty urbanized, but does have many small towns and hamlets and I'm sure religion plays a bigger role in these less urban areas than you think. The UK is more urbanized than the US, so religion tends not to be associated with UK life, especially when most media comes out of London.  The US on the other hand has closer to a 50-50 urban rural split (trending more urban), so religion not only plays a bigger role in life to more people, but they have a louder political and cultural voice due to their numbers. The US has huge swaths of rural geography (which are many times more populated than Australia's) , which allow dominance of religious material in local media markets and local governments, which are more strongly emphasized than in the other two countries. Religion plays minimally in the lives of most people in cities like LA, NYC, Chicago, San Francisco, etc., and even less so in nationwide entertainment and media.   Why does urbanization lead to more secular lifestyles? Perhaps more focus on jobs\/money, more time at work, more social interactions with different people and ideas, more entertainment options\/less need for the socialization of the church. I'm sure you could think of additional reasons too!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13132.0,"score_ratio":5.1666666667}
{"post_id":"5m75r4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Sharing the same language and a similar culture, why have the UK and Australia dropped most of their emphasis on the role of religion in daily life whilst the US seemingly places a much higher degree of importance on it?","c_root_id_A":"dc1bpo4","c_root_id_B":"dc1gj0d","created_at_utc_A":1483634204,"created_at_utc_B":1483639695,"score_A":6,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"Australia is the most urbanized out of the three, which tends to lead to less religious importance in daily life.  The UK is pretty urbanized, but does have many small towns and hamlets and I'm sure religion plays a bigger role in these less urban areas than you think. The UK is more urbanized than the US, so religion tends not to be associated with UK life, especially when most media comes out of London.  The US on the other hand has closer to a 50-50 urban rural split (trending more urban), so religion not only plays a bigger role in life to more people, but they have a louder political and cultural voice due to their numbers. The US has huge swaths of rural geography (which are many times more populated than Australia's) , which allow dominance of religious material in local media markets and local governments, which are more strongly emphasized than in the other two countries. Religion plays minimally in the lives of most people in cities like LA, NYC, Chicago, San Francisco, etc., and even less so in nationwide entertainment and media.   Why does urbanization lead to more secular lifestyles? Perhaps more focus on jobs\/money, more time at work, more social interactions with different people and ideas, more entertainment options\/less need for the socialization of the church. I'm sure you could think of additional reasons too!","human_ref_B":"I'd bolt Canada onto this question- given that Canada has arguably the most similar history\/culture as the US.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5491.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"5m75r4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Sharing the same language and a similar culture, why have the UK and Australia dropped most of their emphasis on the role of religion in daily life whilst the US seemingly places a much higher degree of importance on it?","c_root_id_A":"dc1bpo4","c_root_id_B":"dc1vytl","created_at_utc_A":1483634204,"created_at_utc_B":1483656945,"score_A":6,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Australia is the most urbanized out of the three, which tends to lead to less religious importance in daily life.  The UK is pretty urbanized, but does have many small towns and hamlets and I'm sure religion plays a bigger role in these less urban areas than you think. The UK is more urbanized than the US, so religion tends not to be associated with UK life, especially when most media comes out of London.  The US on the other hand has closer to a 50-50 urban rural split (trending more urban), so religion not only plays a bigger role in life to more people, but they have a louder political and cultural voice due to their numbers. The US has huge swaths of rural geography (which are many times more populated than Australia's) , which allow dominance of religious material in local media markets and local governments, which are more strongly emphasized than in the other two countries. Religion plays minimally in the lives of most people in cities like LA, NYC, Chicago, San Francisco, etc., and even less so in nationwide entertainment and media.   Why does urbanization lead to more secular lifestyles? Perhaps more focus on jobs\/money, more time at work, more social interactions with different people and ideas, more entertainment options\/less need for the socialization of the church. I'm sure you could think of additional reasons too!","human_ref_B":"I have a longer post on the subject here, comparing the US to Europe more generally:   * Why did Europe become less religious over time and the US didn't?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22741.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2xbqcq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is there still a gender pay gap? After repeatedly hearing about the 23 cents (how women earn 77 cents for every dollar a man earns) made me curious.   So it appears the gap is between the average for all men and women and doesn't take into account for differences in occupations, positions, education, job tenure or hours, and once those factors are considered, the gap is nonexistant.  Another article says that male and females basically make the same amount.  However, other websites talk about how there is still a wage gap, even when controlled for job, age, race, hours and education.  This one talks about how women in STEM make less than men in the same field.  So is there still a substantial gender wage gap or not? Are there accurate data that support whether it exists (or doesn't exist)? Should the Paycheck Fairness Act be supported?","c_root_id_A":"coyrp8a","c_root_id_B":"coyr0z5","created_at_utc_A":1425025309,"created_at_utc_B":1425022779,"score_A":99,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"The report referenced in your first link finds a raw gender wage gap of 20.4 percent, which narrows to between 4.8 and 7.1 percent when controlling for as many factors as possible. To me, this is still a large gap, which we should care about and discuss.  The authors argue that there are other factors in the literature which they were unable to control for, so that the gap due to discrimination might in fact be even smaller. While that is probably true, there is also a lot of direct evidence on gender discrimination in the labor market (for example this paper by Goldin and Rouse, which shows that symphony orchestras discriminate against women, and this paper.pdf) by Neumark , Bank and, Van Nort, which shows that high-price restaurants discriminate against women when hiring). Given this direct evidence, the unexplained gender wage gap will never become zero, no matter how many control variables you throw into your regression.  Also, it's important to remember that even though a large share of the wage gap can be explained by differences in occupational choice, these choices are likely to at least to some extent be the result of discrimination in hiring. I don't know of any studies of this, so I can't say how important it might be, but it should be kept in mind when discussing these issues.  Edit: fixed third hyperlink.","human_ref_B":"If you really want to dig in to this issue, a good place to start might be the Handbook of Labor Economics chapters by Altonji and Blank (1999) and Bertrand (2010).  Edit: This paper by Claudia Goldin has a nice discussion in the introduction.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2530.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"2xbqcq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is there still a gender pay gap? After repeatedly hearing about the 23 cents (how women earn 77 cents for every dollar a man earns) made me curious.   So it appears the gap is between the average for all men and women and doesn't take into account for differences in occupations, positions, education, job tenure or hours, and once those factors are considered, the gap is nonexistant.  Another article says that male and females basically make the same amount.  However, other websites talk about how there is still a wage gap, even when controlled for job, age, race, hours and education.  This one talks about how women in STEM make less than men in the same field.  So is there still a substantial gender wage gap or not? Are there accurate data that support whether it exists (or doesn't exist)? Should the Paycheck Fairness Act be supported?","c_root_id_A":"coyxz6b","c_root_id_B":"coyr0z5","created_at_utc_A":1425048687,"created_at_utc_B":1425022779,"score_A":25,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"A few additional points to make in response\/addition to \/u\/standard_error's comment. As others have said the \"it's free choice\" argument falls flat to me. Occupational choice and preferences are tied up with pressures surrounding femininity and womanhood, such as parenting expectations that really influence those choices. The 77 cents to a dollar is true in the sense that it's in the data- the implication that it's 100% due to discrimination isn't, although an unacceptably large chunk appears to be.  I'd also note that while Consad's report finds a 5-7 cent gap after adjusting for key variables such as work experience and interrupted employment others have found that the gap does not go away in the same way. For instance, this 2003 report from the Government accountability office found that \"When we account for differences between male and female work patterns as well as other key factors, women earned, on average, 80 percent of what men earned in 2000. (Pg 2) \" In other words they found a 20 cent wage gap to still be present after accounting for all that stuff. http:\/\/www.gao.gov\/new.items\/d0435.pdf . Then again, this more recent report form the same office showed that the unexplained gap had narrowed from 24.9 cents in 1987 to 4.5 cents in 2007 (pg 63, http:\/\/www.gao.gov\/assets\/290\/287375.pdf ). Point is, findings are kind of mixed on this one depending on how we operationalize a person's employment status and which data we use.  Also important to consider is that equal hourly wages do not mean that folks are not going to be making the same amount at the end of the day. In particular you've got to take into account the hours worked, especially when we're talking about working overtime. http:\/\/asr.sagepub.com\/content\/early\/2014\/04\/02\/0003122414528936.full.pdf+html this study in the top sociology journal found that while the wage gap appeared to be narrowing, it increased by 10 cents per dollar when you accounted for if the respondent worked overtime or not. Basically, the rate of overworkers has remained the same, but over the past 30 years overwork has become more rewarded. However, the authors note that:  \" Nevertheless, overwork rests on a social foundation that is itself highly gendered: employees who work long hours can only do so with the support of other household members, usually women, who shoulder the lion\u2019s share of unpaid-work obligations (Acker 1990; Hochschild [1989] 2003; Lips 2013; Ridgeway 2011). Under this system, women are less likely than men to be able to work long hours or to enjoy the rising wage payoff to long hours. The emergence of long work hours as part of the \u201cnew normal\u201d in some occupations, the professions and management in particular, builds on and perpetuates old forms of gender inequality (Pg 22)\"  We've also got studies that look at discriminatory hiring practices by using actors with different genders and identical scripts. The Neumark study \/u\/standard_error cites for this is the classic example. Compared to male counterparts women were about 50% less likely to get an interview and 60% less likely to get a job offer at a high class restaurant http:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w5024 . These kinds of biases are what keep within-occupation gaps  alive a lot of the time.  So in other words, the wage gap is quite alive and well, albeit operating through a wide array of mechanisms.  Edit: Fixed the first GAO report link, it was a duplicate of the other GAO link. Oops.","human_ref_B":"If you really want to dig in to this issue, a good place to start might be the Handbook of Labor Economics chapters by Altonji and Blank (1999) and Bertrand (2010).  Edit: This paper by Claudia Goldin has a nice discussion in the introduction.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25908.0,"score_ratio":2.2727272727}
{"post_id":"2t4rij","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Are black Americans \"canaries in a coal mine\" in regards to economic downturns? I just read this article about the higher likelihood that black Americans will backslide into a lower economic group than their parents. This was the top comment on the article:  >For the same reason the white middle class is sliding into work-class status -- a scarcity of jobs that pay middle-class wages. It's just that blacks are the canary in the coal mine. Whatever is going to happen to white people happens to black people first.  I don't normally give any weight to the comment section of articles, especially articles about race, but this comment sounds like a plausible theory. Is it backed by any evidence?","c_root_id_A":"cnw16au","c_root_id_B":"cnw2ico","created_at_utc_A":1421849142,"created_at_utc_B":1421852100,"score_A":3,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"What would be more usefull is instead of just being the hardest hit, they were also, as the anology implies, the first hit. Does anyone have any information regarding this?","human_ref_B":"Nope.  Here's a nice interactive graphic with unemployment rates by different demographic groups, including race: http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/interactive\/2009\/11\/06\/business\/economy\/unemployment-lines.html?_r=1&  Unemployment rates are higher for the black population, but they generally parallel the movements of the rest of the US. There's no indication that things happen \"earlier\".","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2958.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1yuco4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is it true that Capitalism requires 5.5% unemployment? My sociology professor claims that capitalism must have 5.5% unemployment to function properly. The idea he summarized was that with unemployment lower than 5.5%, this would lead to massive inflation and that would decrease the value of wages of all the workers.  Economists\/sociologists of reddit, is this true? Does it have any basis? I think its an interesting theory but I'm not sold on how valid it is.  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cfnw15v","c_root_id_B":"cfny36w","created_at_utc_A":1393291319,"created_at_utc_B":1393295643,"score_A":7,"score_B":66,"human_ref_A":"There's a lot about Singapore that makes it awkward to use as an example to support theories, but I don't see why we can't use it as a counterexample to a theory like this. 1.8% unemployment, hasn't gone above 5% in over 25 years.","human_ref_B":"I can give you an undergraduate level answer, others will be able to improve and expand.  The idea you're looking for is \"Natural Rate of Unemployment\" or \"Full Employment.\"  You could look at either as a long-run Philips Curve.  Modern economists look at more than a Philips curve to think about unemployment (NAIRU is another way to think about full employment) but I can give you the intuition.    Even when the economy is in equilibrium, some people in every time period are separated from their jobs.  Maybe they moved, maybe they didn't like their boss, maybe their company folded due to mismanagement.  Although there are jobs available for these newly unemployed people, it takes time for the employer and employee to find each other and agree on compensation, benefits, etc.  Job searching has transactional costs.  So even without any cyclical or deficient-demand unemployment, we have unemployment - we call people between employers \"frictional unemployment.\"    The predicted level of unemployment in a long-run full employment society depends on the economist, society, time period, etc.  I can't say whether 5.5% is low or high, just know that economists only agree it is something larger than zero.  Frictional employment go lower than this level, but that isn't necessarily good because it may represent people staying in jobs to which they are poorly matched or overqualified or whatever.   The specific claim about inflation is related to NAIRU - \"Non Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment.\" I can do rough justice, enough to give you the intuition.  If there is very low frictional unemployment, employers may have a hard time finding qualified individuals to fill open jobs.  To fill those jobs they may need to offer a higher wage.  This will cause people in similar jobs to move to the open job for the higher wage.  Their former employers may need to raise wages to retain current employees or get new employees.  Thus wages in certain sectors rise, but unrelated to productivity.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4324.0,"score_ratio":9.4285714286}
{"post_id":"oshlba","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is \"success\" a metric of capitalist society, or is it a common feature of non-capitalist society as well? edit:  *non-capitalist societies","c_root_id_A":"h6q8n1m","c_root_id_B":"h6psfku","created_at_utc_A":1627406375,"created_at_utc_B":1627399356,"score_A":16,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"You'd have to define success, and I suspect it's not an analytically useful concept. An interesting meta-question here is when did the world \"successful\" become a euphemism for wealth or professional status. I would guess quite recently, like last century. It's a good question for a paper!  Anyway, let's assume by success you mean the symbolic tie between material wealth and social prestige. Here are some hypotheses:  Material wealth has probably always been associated with social status and prestige, but I believe that causal arrow may have been reverse in pre-capitalist societies. That is, in pre-capitalist societies, it may be that wealth flowed to those with the highest status\/most prestige. E.g. give unto Caesar what is Caesar's; tribute to local chieftans and lords; gifts and tithes to religious leaders. In these cases, a person occupied a social position with status, and others acknowledged that status by conferring wealth. To explore this, you might look into the scholarship on gift-giving in anthropology. Marcel Mauss is the place to start. He argued that local leaders (on the Troribrand islands I believe) continuously exchanged gifts with each other in order to maintain their prestige. To not *reciprocate* in the exchange would result in a major loss of prestige.   Capitalist societies, especially advanced commercial and industrial capitalists societies, allowed for the accumulation of wealth through markets (i.e. outside of \"traditional\" social heirarchies), enabling a modicum of upward mobility for capitalists. It could be that the accumulation of wealth allowed the \"nouveau riche\" to exchange economic capital for social status and prestige. I think you can find this process in transitional societies. For example, in pre-revolutionary France, the new bourgeoisie would buy aristocratic titles, which afforded them both civic rights and social status. More recently, in consumer societies, people can perform their social status through consumption. This is an argument in Bourdieu's *Distinction*, but see also Featherstone's (1990) Perspectives on Consumer Culture  One big starting point here would be Max Weber. Weber's idea of social stratification was essentially the distribution of prestige in society (check out his *Economy and Society* Vol. 1 Chapter 4 for his definitions). In *Protestant Ethic*, Weber argues that the protestant reformation led protestants (especially the American colonists) to interpret wealth and professional \"success\" (in finding one's vocation) as an external sign of one's religious status (namely being part of the \"elect\"). Weber thinks that the mental internalization of this association between wealth and spiritual virtue led people to behave in ways that added to their wealth. To simplify the argument, you could say that this eventually became detached from religion, such that wealth became a sign of someone's moral virtue, and thus a basis for conferring prestige.   Wegener (1990) summarizes the Weberian and other sociological perspectives on prestige in his review article Concepts and Measurement of Prestige.  This was a circuitous (non) answer to your question. I think you could write several books on the topic. But again, I think the most interesting part of your question is the choice of the word \"success\". That's worth thinking more about.","human_ref_B":"Success in a social science context is often measured by earnings (example). There are other measures used such as the subjective happiness scale but ultimately \"success\" is a word without a scientifically measurable meaning.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7019.0,"score_ratio":3.2}
{"post_id":"x1bpqd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Is it commonly accepted in the social sciences that cultures influence economic development? In 'The End of History and the Last Man' Francis Fukuyama argues that cultures, and the presence or lack of a 'work ethic', have\/has a significant effect on economic development. But he hardly cites any scientific sources to support this claim. So, is he right?","c_root_id_A":"imdlab1","c_root_id_B":"imeeqs1","created_at_utc_A":1661861845,"created_at_utc_B":1661874616,"score_A":11,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"There has been a lot of research on the role of trust in developing an economy. Trust - i.e., willingness to trade with people whom you don't know personally - is critical because it makes markets much freer and more efficient. It let's jobs go towards the people best qualified for a job rather than just those who know the right people.  *WEIRDest People in the World* by Henrich (2020) is one recent book that comes to mind, which talked about it. It's a pretty fun book and got a lot of attention this past year. Henrich also wrote a review paper on a more general topic in 2010, which is shorter but I haven't read.  Henrich emphasizes that the Christian Church banning incest was a major factor in why the West became such a high trust society. In incentuous (tribal) societies, which were the norm pre-Churhc, families tended to marry within. This creates strong but very limited communities that can't get much larger than 100-200 people. In non-incentual societies, people cannot rely solely on their large family and much branch out, trusting non-family members.  This is the only book that comes to mind now, but I know there is other stuff out there, e.g., research on \"tight vs. loose cultures\" may be relevant.","human_ref_B":"In Social Science it's still a debated topic, though nobody would say it's mostly culture (note that Henrich is not an evolutionary biologist not an Economist, Economic historian, Developmentalist). The idea of the work ethic comes from Weber's Protestant Ethic which by now has been mostly discredited. First, the evidence is not really there. But more importantly culture usually has some other origin. Say for example that you wanted to say that Spain is poorer than the U.S. because they work fewer hours (that's not why). Even if that was, the incentive structure, climate differences, socioeconomic institutions, etc that leads to those differences would be the real cause for the disparity in development. So \"culture\" doesn't mean anything, unless it's biologised in which case you're getting weirdly close to race science.  In social science people say different things. James Mahoney says that development in Latin America derives from colonial experience under the Spanish (with the level of colonialism and its timing determining development levels). For Chibber Korea is more developed than India because of the state's capacity to control and direct capital (which is a political\/economic class story). For Yuen Ang, China has developed mainly because of its ability to combine straight but general directives from Beijing with local flexibility at a provincial level.  Political Scientists talk a lot more about institutions\u2014 things like democracy, property rights, etc. But those are not cultural factors as they usually have some other origin like colonialism, economic structures etc.  Tl;dr There's no \"commonly accepted\" story of what causes development in the short or long run.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12771.0,"score_ratio":1.2727272727}
{"post_id":"3cetxq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"If being on a common monetary policy is a big problem for different European economies, why isn't it also a big problem for the economies of different US states? I have read a lot of opinions lately that say that the fact that very different European economies with different specializations and needs are on the same currency and under the same monetary regime is a fundamental flaw in the Euro project. However, it seems like the same thing is basically true in the United States, so I wonder why we don't see the same kind of crises and divergences there that we are seeing between the \"core\" and \"periphery\" in Europe?  Is it really true that, say, New York and Mississippi have basically the same needs in terms of monetary policy? If so, why are these more convergent than the needs of European countries?","c_root_id_A":"csuw008","c_root_id_B":"csuv98v","created_at_utc_A":1436272044,"created_at_utc_B":1436269843,"score_A":71,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"It *is* a huge problem, but the US has a fairly rational system of federal insurance and risk transfers, entitlement and infrastructure spending, etc. that mitigate the worst effects on the states that arise from using an 'external' currency.   Krugman for example writes about the 1980s Savings & Loan scandal. Thumbnail summary and full audit reports here:  >During the 1980s, the savings and loan industry experienced severe financial losses because extremely high interest rates caused institutions to pay high rates on deposits and other funds while earning low yields on their long-term loan portfolios. During this period, regulators reduced capital standards and allowed the use of alternative accounting procedures to increase reported capital levels. While these conditions were occurring, institutions were allowed to diversify their investments into potentially more profitable, but risky, activities. **The profitability of many of these activities depended heavily on continued inflation in real estate values to make them economically viable**. In many cases, diversification was accompanied by inadequate internal controls and noncompliance with laws and regulations, thus further increasing the risk of these activities.  >As a result of these factors, many institutions experienced substantial losses on their loans and investments, a condition that was made worse by an economic downturn.    Sound familiar?   Krugman points out that around 60% of the S&L losses occurred in Texas, which amounted to about $75 billion in direct federal aid to that one state. Krugman points out that this aid wasn't in the form of loans that Texas had to pay back, nor did the government assume an equity stake in exchange for the aid; instead this was just an outright transfer of capital from taxpayers to banks and their counterparties in order to bail them out of terrible high-risk investments. $75 billion at the time amounted to 25% of Texas' total GDP. Can you imagine Germany & France agreeing to simply grant 25% of Greece's pre-crisis GDP in Euros with few strings attached? Krugman remarks:   >I think you can make a strong case that if Texas had been an independent country in 1986-87 it would have experienced a huge financial and fiscal crisis.    Indeed. So why did US taxpayers & Congress agree to this massive bailout for a single state? The answer is that they didn't, or not exactly. The bailout was basically automatic, as federal depository insurance corporations and regulators like FDIC, FSLIC, FHLBB and so forth stepped in to stop the bleeding before it could spread into an even wider bank crisis and recession. Later the FTC was created to unwind the accounts of several thousand \"zombie\" banks that collapsed during the crisis.   So one answer to your question is that the US has much stronger & more effective federal insurance provisions designed to mitigate bank failures, as well as other economic (and state budget) crises. In effect, taxpayers stand behind the banks of other states, ready to bail them out should the need arise. Some point out that this backing might create a moral hazard, effectively encouraging banks to make riskier investments because they know Uncle Sam will help them out when their schemes backfire. Others respond that this is the only effective way to stop a banking & liquidity crisis before it can become a full-blown economic depression, and that in exchange for insuring the investments of private banks, taxpayers should demand more effective regulation, accounting standards and stringent lending\/investment rules.  **TL;DR -** US taxpayers are in general more willing to be generous when it comes to bailing out the state budgets and local economies of other states -- or at least the structure of federal & state government (particularly for example the power the US Senate gives to small states with low populations) give them little choice. This willingness to help, and a sense of good faith in general, is somewhat lacking in the EU.","human_ref_B":"The Eurozone can go one of two ways:   The obvious is to break up. Parts of Europe once again take on their own currency e.g. Greece.   The other side is why federations can have common currencies, fiscal union. Described in here. It means that instead of just sharing a currency, they share a budget too. It means that the spending and taxing of individual countries is moderated by a federal budget, meaning in most cases, if not all, the poorer states receive some redistribution from richer states. We may very well inadvertently see that between Greece and the EU, but obviously that's not the ideal.   I didn't really address monetary policy, but it was never going to work without some more integration between the countries, including the loss of some fiscal sovereignty.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2201.0,"score_ratio":14.2}
{"post_id":"3cetxq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"If being on a common monetary policy is a big problem for different European economies, why isn't it also a big problem for the economies of different US states? I have read a lot of opinions lately that say that the fact that very different European economies with different specializations and needs are on the same currency and under the same monetary regime is a fundamental flaw in the Euro project. However, it seems like the same thing is basically true in the United States, so I wonder why we don't see the same kind of crises and divergences there that we are seeing between the \"core\" and \"periphery\" in Europe?  Is it really true that, say, New York and Mississippi have basically the same needs in terms of monetary policy? If so, why are these more convergent than the needs of European countries?","c_root_id_A":"csuvviq","c_root_id_B":"csuw008","created_at_utc_A":1436271699,"created_at_utc_B":1436272044,"score_A":3,"score_B":71,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/Economics\/comments\/3cbb3e\/a_yes_vote_in_greece_would_have_condemned_the\/csu6r4o  I don't know how to quote another sub, sorry, but he gives a nice answer.","human_ref_B":"It *is* a huge problem, but the US has a fairly rational system of federal insurance and risk transfers, entitlement and infrastructure spending, etc. that mitigate the worst effects on the states that arise from using an 'external' currency.   Krugman for example writes about the 1980s Savings & Loan scandal. Thumbnail summary and full audit reports here:  >During the 1980s, the savings and loan industry experienced severe financial losses because extremely high interest rates caused institutions to pay high rates on deposits and other funds while earning low yields on their long-term loan portfolios. During this period, regulators reduced capital standards and allowed the use of alternative accounting procedures to increase reported capital levels. While these conditions were occurring, institutions were allowed to diversify their investments into potentially more profitable, but risky, activities. **The profitability of many of these activities depended heavily on continued inflation in real estate values to make them economically viable**. In many cases, diversification was accompanied by inadequate internal controls and noncompliance with laws and regulations, thus further increasing the risk of these activities.  >As a result of these factors, many institutions experienced substantial losses on their loans and investments, a condition that was made worse by an economic downturn.    Sound familiar?   Krugman points out that around 60% of the S&L losses occurred in Texas, which amounted to about $75 billion in direct federal aid to that one state. Krugman points out that this aid wasn't in the form of loans that Texas had to pay back, nor did the government assume an equity stake in exchange for the aid; instead this was just an outright transfer of capital from taxpayers to banks and their counterparties in order to bail them out of terrible high-risk investments. $75 billion at the time amounted to 25% of Texas' total GDP. Can you imagine Germany & France agreeing to simply grant 25% of Greece's pre-crisis GDP in Euros with few strings attached? Krugman remarks:   >I think you can make a strong case that if Texas had been an independent country in 1986-87 it would have experienced a huge financial and fiscal crisis.    Indeed. So why did US taxpayers & Congress agree to this massive bailout for a single state? The answer is that they didn't, or not exactly. The bailout was basically automatic, as federal depository insurance corporations and regulators like FDIC, FSLIC, FHLBB and so forth stepped in to stop the bleeding before it could spread into an even wider bank crisis and recession. Later the FTC was created to unwind the accounts of several thousand \"zombie\" banks that collapsed during the crisis.   So one answer to your question is that the US has much stronger & more effective federal insurance provisions designed to mitigate bank failures, as well as other economic (and state budget) crises. In effect, taxpayers stand behind the banks of other states, ready to bail them out should the need arise. Some point out that this backing might create a moral hazard, effectively encouraging banks to make riskier investments because they know Uncle Sam will help them out when their schemes backfire. Others respond that this is the only effective way to stop a banking & liquidity crisis before it can become a full-blown economic depression, and that in exchange for insuring the investments of private banks, taxpayers should demand more effective regulation, accounting standards and stringent lending\/investment rules.  **TL;DR -** US taxpayers are in general more willing to be generous when it comes to bailing out the state budgets and local economies of other states -- or at least the structure of federal & state government (particularly for example the power the US Senate gives to small states with low populations) give them little choice. This willingness to help, and a sense of good faith in general, is somewhat lacking in the EU.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":345.0,"score_ratio":23.6666666667}
{"post_id":"3cetxq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"If being on a common monetary policy is a big problem for different European economies, why isn't it also a big problem for the economies of different US states? I have read a lot of opinions lately that say that the fact that very different European economies with different specializations and needs are on the same currency and under the same monetary regime is a fundamental flaw in the Euro project. However, it seems like the same thing is basically true in the United States, so I wonder why we don't see the same kind of crises and divergences there that we are seeing between the \"core\" and \"periphery\" in Europe?  Is it really true that, say, New York and Mississippi have basically the same needs in terms of monetary policy? If so, why are these more convergent than the needs of European countries?","c_root_id_A":"csuwnuv","c_root_id_B":"csuv98v","created_at_utc_A":1436273752,"created_at_utc_B":1436269843,"score_A":22,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Arguably it is a problem -- Michigan and the rest of the rust belt might have fared somewhat better over the past quarter-century had they not been tied to currency union with the rest of the US.  On the other hand, the United States has a robust system of Federal transfers that smooth out regional fluctuations, something Europe lacks (comparatively). Here is a Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago working paper on the topic of whether the US is an optimal currency area; the author finds that there are distinct regional differences and that there might be as many as five distinct optimal currency areas within the US.","human_ref_B":"The Eurozone can go one of two ways:   The obvious is to break up. Parts of Europe once again take on their own currency e.g. Greece.   The other side is why federations can have common currencies, fiscal union. Described in here. It means that instead of just sharing a currency, they share a budget too. It means that the spending and taxing of individual countries is moderated by a federal budget, meaning in most cases, if not all, the poorer states receive some redistribution from richer states. We may very well inadvertently see that between Greece and the EU, but obviously that's not the ideal.   I didn't really address monetary policy, but it was never going to work without some more integration between the countries, including the loss of some fiscal sovereignty.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3909.0,"score_ratio":4.4}
{"post_id":"3cetxq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"If being on a common monetary policy is a big problem for different European economies, why isn't it also a big problem for the economies of different US states? I have read a lot of opinions lately that say that the fact that very different European economies with different specializations and needs are on the same currency and under the same monetary regime is a fundamental flaw in the Euro project. However, it seems like the same thing is basically true in the United States, so I wonder why we don't see the same kind of crises and divergences there that we are seeing between the \"core\" and \"periphery\" in Europe?  Is it really true that, say, New York and Mississippi have basically the same needs in terms of monetary policy? If so, why are these more convergent than the needs of European countries?","c_root_id_A":"csuvviq","c_root_id_B":"csuwnuv","created_at_utc_A":1436271699,"created_at_utc_B":1436273752,"score_A":3,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/Economics\/comments\/3cbb3e\/a_yes_vote_in_greece_would_have_condemned_the\/csu6r4o  I don't know how to quote another sub, sorry, but he gives a nice answer.","human_ref_B":"Arguably it is a problem -- Michigan and the rest of the rust belt might have fared somewhat better over the past quarter-century had they not been tied to currency union with the rest of the US.  On the other hand, the United States has a robust system of Federal transfers that smooth out regional fluctuations, something Europe lacks (comparatively). Here is a Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago working paper on the topic of whether the US is an optimal currency area; the author finds that there are distinct regional differences and that there might be as many as five distinct optimal currency areas within the US.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2053.0,"score_ratio":7.3333333333}
{"post_id":"tdrpc5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Who or what are some major social science theorist\/theories not based on western values or people? Major figures in social sciences are almost all \"western\" and most theories are informed by western values. I'm looking for social science theories or work that is outside of this more dominant way of thinking. By now, almost all people have been affected by western colonisation and culture in some way, so it might not be totally avoidable.   Edward Said's Orientalism wouldn't be something that meets the criteria of what I'm looking for as the west is an important part of the work. Anything written by someone living in or written about western societies would be outside this criteria as well.   They could be people operating outside of academia, which is a pretty westernised institution no matter where you are I think.    I know this is a bit vague, which is why I've come here as I'm not really sure where to look for this.   Any ideas or direction would be so amazing! Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"i0miu5e","c_root_id_B":"i0mec0h","created_at_utc_A":1647270923,"created_at_utc_B":1647269004,"score_A":22,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"You might like this book:  The Emergence of China: From Confucius to the Empireby E. Bruce Brooks  (Author), A. Taeko Brooks (Author)  https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/1936166755\/ref=ppx\\_yo\\_dt\\_b\\_search\\_asin\\_image?ie=UTF8&psc=1  A fact, under-appreciated in the West, was that China saw one of history's greatest political debates during the era before and during the Warring States period. Almost every idea for government was suggested at this time: guardianship, tyranny, constitutional monarchy, Enlightened monarchy, primitivism, anarchism, market liberalism, and more.  The various states competed militarily, but also they competed with styles of ideas. Some states attempted to win the loyalty of the public through generosity, other states sought to terrorize the public through harshness.  It is, of course, a very sad story, as the trend over the 500 years is towards tyranny. The most liberal and generous ideas are triumphant in the early years, but all of these ideas eventually lose out to Chin, as Chin focuses on the ruthless mass mobilization of every layer society toward the final goal of absolute victory. And of course, in the end, Chin wins, and conquers all of the other states.  This book, in particular, brings out how complete a political debate China had during those years.","human_ref_B":"Talal Asad is someone who has intriguing ideas on many issues ranging from religion to nuclear war:  https:\/\/www.scienceopen.com\/hosted-document?doi=10.13169\/arabstudquar.41.2.0197  https:\/\/youtu.be\/kfAGnxKfwOg","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1919.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"qoy84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"How different is the history of chemistry and physics taught in countries outside North America and Europe? When learning about hard sciences- particularly chemistry and physics, I have only been taught and independently read about discoveries made by Europeans and people living in North America (Western Asia just to include Russia).  I find it hard to believe that no east Asian, African, Australian, or South American physicists or chemists have made discoveries that have been relevant enough to teach at the university level or include in textbooks.   I understand colonization, rewriting of history, racism, etc. But many of these discoveries happened in the last few hundred years.  My ultimate question is for the people who grew up in continents outside Europe and USA- were you taught about other people were instrumental in our understanding of science, or was it also limited to white Europeans and a handful of North Americans?","c_root_id_A":"hjqxq9d","c_root_id_B":"hjr7m0b","created_at_utc_A":1636333289,"created_at_utc_B":1636337942,"score_A":6,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"I'm from Brazil and yes, it's also limited to white Europeans and a handful of North Americans. In high school we usually learn the basics of mechanics, electromagnetism, optics and a tiny bit of modern physics; as for chemistry, we study from the atom structure to organic chemistry, as you can check here http:\/\/portal.mec.gov.br\/seb\/arquivos\/pdf\/ciencian.pdf . Our curriculum in general is extremely white, male and eurocentric. I only heard about important Brazilian physicists, such as C\u00e9sar Lattes, in college. When you get to the point of starting academic researching then you end up getting more familiar with important Brazilian scientists. However, the main curriculum in college remains eurocentric.","human_ref_B":"There are two kinds of bias going on here related simply to time. One is that your courses are probably ignoring all scientific history prior to the European Enlightenment, if they even go back that far. Between the 5th and the 16th centuries, most scientific advancements happened outside of Europe. For example, from the 8th to the 15th century, huge advancements in mathematic and science were made in the Muslim world (Hojendijk & Sabra 2003). Basically, the developments from Classical Greece and Rome would have been lost to Europe completely if not for the Islamic scientific golden age (Saliba 2007).  On the other end, your textbooks probably don't give a good impression of the major achievements of last 30-40 years. For example, there have been about 20 Japanese Nobel Laureates in physics and chemistry, but the bulk of these have been awarded since the year 2000 (from Wikipedia). As countries outside the West and North continue to develop, we should expect to see more scientific advancements coming from their institutions. Nobel prizes tend to lag a few decades behind scientific work, so the prizes awarded to Japanese scholars today reflect the growth of Japan's research enterprise in the latter part of the 20th century. And I expect that in 20-30 years we will see many more laureates from China, India, Brazil, and other large countries outside of Europe and North America. Then in 40 years, hopefully, scientists from these places will be more well represented in textbooks.  So one basic answer is that, based on where we are situated in historical time, we have a bias toward looking at the last couple hundred years as the full record of scientific discovery. But of course, there was a long history before that and there will be a long history after us. But that's not the whole answer to your question, just one part.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4653.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"k6nn5j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is libertarianism popular in the Americas but not in the rest of the world?","c_root_id_A":"gem5poc","c_root_id_B":"gem5rii","created_at_utc_A":1607103385,"created_at_utc_B":1607103409,"score_A":38,"score_B":104,"human_ref_A":"How are you defining libertarianism, and what evidence do we have that the initial assertion is true? Posts in this sub shouldn't rely on a premise being accepted because it's \"common sense.\"","human_ref_B":"Libertarianism is not popular in the United States. Only 5% of 2020 voters were found to be more progressive on social\/cultural issues and conservative on economic issues.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24.0,"score_ratio":2.7368421053}
{"post_id":"k6nn5j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is libertarianism popular in the Americas but not in the rest of the world?","c_root_id_A":"gem5ces","c_root_id_B":"gem5rii","created_at_utc_A":1607103209,"created_at_utc_B":1607103409,"score_A":13,"score_B":104,"human_ref_A":"Do you have statistics to reflect the popularity of libertarianism?","human_ref_B":"Libertarianism is not popular in the United States. Only 5% of 2020 voters were found to be more progressive on social\/cultural issues and conservative on economic issues.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":200.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"k6nn5j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is libertarianism popular in the Americas but not in the rest of the world?","c_root_id_A":"gem5poc","c_root_id_B":"gemhx3f","created_at_utc_A":1607103385,"created_at_utc_B":1607109151,"score_A":38,"score_B":44,"human_ref_A":"How are you defining libertarianism, and what evidence do we have that the initial assertion is true? Posts in this sub shouldn't rely on a premise being accepted because it's \"common sense.\"","human_ref_B":"Depending on how you want to think about this, the answer can be really complicated or it can be fairly simple.  I don't have time for a more complicated explanation, so I'm going to give the more simple explanation, but I think it should suffice.  First, let's reiterate \/u\/Plumrose's point that libertarianism is not actually popular here.  With that, we should rephrase your question to \"why is libertarianism more popular in the US than it is in the rest of world?\"  When we put it like that, it becomes a lot easier to answer, because the answer is simply that libertarianism is an American phenomenon that was developed in the 1970s that speaks directly to a sort of bastardized, but prevalent, version of the American mythos of government.  Which is to say that it's a philosophy that on the surface seems to be a direct progeny of the founding principles of this country, and in being so, it offers a lot of positions that on their surface speak to common American intuitions (e.g. rugged individualism).  Of course, the American mythology is not a rationally consistent story founded by a people in complete agreement.  There were definitely founders that were in line with the gestalt of the libertarian movement, but there were also founders that were not (more religious groups, for example).  Moreover, libertarians tend to take only a surface level reading of classical liberalism and they leave a lot of stuff out (like that Adam Smith, who they love to quote, advocated for progressive taxes, and publicly funded education and infrastructure) that doesn't jive with the sort of free market capitalism they advocate.  Then, for myriad reasons most Americans are decidedly not libertarians, and there really isn't much of a reason for libertarianism to spread outside of America.  But at the same time, libertarianism and its neoliberal ilk have have a major influence on modern American culture and government.    This is where the question starts to get complex, and so I'm going to leave you with a book recommendation that traces the history of the libertarian movement and its ultimate impact on conservatism, and especially the influence on libertarianism by Ayn Rand.  The book is called *Goddess of the Market* by Jennifer Burns.  That is, I think, a good companion to something like David Harvey's *A Brief History of Neoliberalism*, as they paint a broad picture of how both libertarian and neoliberal strains of thought have shaped the way that Americans think.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5766.0,"score_ratio":1.1578947368}
{"post_id":"k6nn5j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is libertarianism popular in the Americas but not in the rest of the world?","c_root_id_A":"gemhx3f","c_root_id_B":"gem5ces","created_at_utc_A":1607109151,"created_at_utc_B":1607103209,"score_A":44,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Depending on how you want to think about this, the answer can be really complicated or it can be fairly simple.  I don't have time for a more complicated explanation, so I'm going to give the more simple explanation, but I think it should suffice.  First, let's reiterate \/u\/Plumrose's point that libertarianism is not actually popular here.  With that, we should rephrase your question to \"why is libertarianism more popular in the US than it is in the rest of world?\"  When we put it like that, it becomes a lot easier to answer, because the answer is simply that libertarianism is an American phenomenon that was developed in the 1970s that speaks directly to a sort of bastardized, but prevalent, version of the American mythos of government.  Which is to say that it's a philosophy that on the surface seems to be a direct progeny of the founding principles of this country, and in being so, it offers a lot of positions that on their surface speak to common American intuitions (e.g. rugged individualism).  Of course, the American mythology is not a rationally consistent story founded by a people in complete agreement.  There were definitely founders that were in line with the gestalt of the libertarian movement, but there were also founders that were not (more religious groups, for example).  Moreover, libertarians tend to take only a surface level reading of classical liberalism and they leave a lot of stuff out (like that Adam Smith, who they love to quote, advocated for progressive taxes, and publicly funded education and infrastructure) that doesn't jive with the sort of free market capitalism they advocate.  Then, for myriad reasons most Americans are decidedly not libertarians, and there really isn't much of a reason for libertarianism to spread outside of America.  But at the same time, libertarianism and its neoliberal ilk have have a major influence on modern American culture and government.    This is where the question starts to get complex, and so I'm going to leave you with a book recommendation that traces the history of the libertarian movement and its ultimate impact on conservatism, and especially the influence on libertarianism by Ayn Rand.  The book is called *Goddess of the Market* by Jennifer Burns.  That is, I think, a good companion to something like David Harvey's *A Brief History of Neoliberalism*, as they paint a broad picture of how both libertarian and neoliberal strains of thought have shaped the way that Americans think.","human_ref_B":"Do you have statistics to reflect the popularity of libertarianism?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5942.0,"score_ratio":3.3846153846}
{"post_id":"k6nn5j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is libertarianism popular in the Americas but not in the rest of the world?","c_root_id_A":"gem5ces","c_root_id_B":"gem5poc","created_at_utc_A":1607103209,"created_at_utc_B":1607103385,"score_A":13,"score_B":38,"human_ref_A":"Do you have statistics to reflect the popularity of libertarianism?","human_ref_B":"How are you defining libertarianism, and what evidence do we have that the initial assertion is true? Posts in this sub shouldn't rely on a premise being accepted because it's \"common sense.\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":176.0,"score_ratio":2.9230769231}
{"post_id":"k6nn5j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is libertarianism popular in the Americas but not in the rest of the world?","c_root_id_A":"gemmeq6","c_root_id_B":"gem5ces","created_at_utc_A":1607111311,"created_at_utc_B":1607103209,"score_A":20,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"American libertarianism and traditional libertarianism are very different ideologies. From what I've seen, most Americans who consider themselves libertarians are neocons and socially conservative neolibs. I think the book, selling free enterprise, by Elizabeth fones-wolf gives a pretty good rundown on the origins and growth of \"free market\" ideology in the usa","human_ref_B":"Do you have statistics to reflect the popularity of libertarianism?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8102.0,"score_ratio":1.5384615385}
{"post_id":"arap7c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is this true? How well respected is this Dr in his field? \"Most theft is not because people need it. There's a small category that's opportunistic, based on social and economic deprivation; that's actually pretty small. That they can fool people, and dupe them, and the rush. And that's also true for shoplifters.\"\u00a0  https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=RyszHongpf0","c_root_id_A":"eglyzmy","c_root_id_B":"eglvuxn","created_at_utc_A":1550340761,"created_at_utc_B":1550338230,"score_A":36,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The great majority of theft--and nearly every other property crime--is not based on need. Property crimes are usually for the purpose of either quick material gain or enjoyment. This is one of the most thoroughly established empirical findings in criminology. The primary determinants of property crime are not deprivation or need but low self control (a function primarily of age), unsupervised peer groups--people to show off to \/ gain approval from, and unprotected property. Gottfredson and Hirschi (1990) *A General Theory of Crime* is the seminal work on self-control. Wikstr\u00f6m, Oberwittler, Treiber, and Hardie (2012) *Breaking Rules* is a more modern work that looks at crime as the result of the confluence of individuals with low self-control and criminogenic attitudes with criminogenic *contexts*, that is unsupervised and undirected socializing near poorly protected property. While more focused on adjudicating between broken windows and the collective efficacy perspectives on neighborhood crime, I like St. Jean's (2008) *Pockets of Crime* for its interviews with robbery offenders (and other offenders). Gives a nice perspective on these actual motivations and incentives.","human_ref_B":"Related\/unrelated, what's the difference between a DMH (Doctor of Mental Health) degree and a PhD in this case? Seems that DMH isn't a degree that's offered anymore.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2531.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"x3thjx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Do Democratic presidents pass more legislation than Republican presidents? if so, then why? I was always under the impression that Democratic presidents are more successful at getting their agenda through Congress. But, I have no data to back that up. So, is this true? Do Democratic presidents ultimately sign more legislation than Republican presidents for every year that they are in office? If so, then why is that? Is it due primarily to structural factors in the Democratic and Republican parties? Or is it due primarily to the individual temperaments and skills of individual presidents? Or is it neither and due to pure historical accident that neither party has much control over?","c_root_id_A":"imscma6","c_root_id_B":"imstw9t","created_at_utc_A":1662120972,"created_at_utc_B":1662128798,"score_A":8,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"It's a slightly old research but there was an analysis of Presidents and their performance in the 80s, the promises of the campaign and what actually ended up getting legislated, but as far as I know it didn't identify a significant difference between Rs and Ds.   The simplified conclusion was that most POTUSes actually do try to fulfil their promises (the number given was about 75% of their promises) and when they don't it's usually due to the Congress disagreeing. As I said, this was in the 80s and the US political system got a lot more polarised so I'd assume this number has fallen since.  Article: https:\/\/psmag.com\/news\/presidents-usually-follow-promises-98726  Link: https:\/\/www.semanticscholar.org\/paper\/Promises-and-performance-%3A-presidential-campaigns-Krukones\/0b252d68c33e9fc136faf36462b18dec806f2b9e","human_ref_B":"This does not mention numbers by party but lists some factors in how likely a president is to get legislation they want passed.  > several factors\u2014including the presence of unified government, the president's approval ratings, and the point in a president's tenure\u2014affect the extent to which the president receives what he wants concerning legislative content  The number of bills signed seems to decrease with time in recent history which is overpowering any differences by party.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7826.0,"score_ratio":2.125}
{"post_id":"dmtiik","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Will millennials benefit the most in the next 20+ years, financially due to inheritance from baby boomers? There is often the complaint amongst millennials about how costs are so high, they'll never retire etc... but won't they be the ones that directly benefit from the inheritance of the baby boomers, who are their parents?   Making many now millenials, future baby boomer type people?","c_root_id_A":"f56tw41","c_root_id_B":"f56rrou","created_at_utc_A":1572027633,"created_at_utc_B":1572026905,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As far as I am aware, skepticism is the key word here. There have been some surveys recently both within and without the US which led their authors to conclude so-called \"millennials\" (which years-of-birth this includes varying) overestimate how much they will actually inherit. Many journalists are likewise skeptical, and some researchers have found that inheritance may not be that important.  ---  For example,   >Natixis Investment Managers surveyed 8,300 investors globally in February and March of 2017 ...] Of the 8,300 investors surveyed, 2,434 are Millennials [...]  >An online quantitative survey of 41 questions was developed and hosted by CoreData Research. **The survey is focused on individuals with US $100,000 (or Purchase Price Parity [PPP] equivalent) or more in investable assets**. In the 2017 survey, **this threshold was lowered from $200,000 in order to capture a larger pool of younger investors.**   Their report is less than optimistic:  >**Six in ten also believe part of their retirement income will even come from an inheritance**. But **the generation that started out in their parents\u2019 basement may wind up living in their kids\u2019 garage, with 51% counting on contributions from their children to help fund their retirement.**   In [another report they affirm:  >In many cases, **relying on inheritance for retirement income is not a reliable strategy as many assume that the previous generation has been effective in executing their own retirement income plans** \u2013 especially when **investors themselves rank the three biggest threats to their retirement security as long-term care and healthcare costs (27%), not saving enough (18%) and government benefits not providing enough (15%)**. **Add to this the potential effects of inflation (14%) and outliving assets (11%) and an inheritance may not be such a sure thing.**  U.S. Trust's survey of \"808 high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth households across the country\" found that:  >Consistent with previous Wealth and Worth studies, **Baby Boomers are least likely of all generations to think it\u2019s important to leave a financial inheritance to their children.**  >* **Only 57% of Baby Boomers consider it an important goal.**  According to Charles Schwab's Financial Literacy Survey of \"2,000 Americans ages 16 to 25\" in 2018:  >**More than half (53%) believe their parents will leave them an inheritance, versus the average 21% of people who actually received an inheritance of any kind between 1989 and 2007.**  ---  The above reports should be taken with a grain of salt even if their observations may appear as reasonable and\/or plausible. These are surveys done by interest groups or groups with a stake on the topic and - with the exception of Charles Swab's - targeting wealthy and very wealthy people. What about scientific research on the topic?  The 21% cited by the Charles Schwab Foundation comes from a report by Wolff and Gittleman for the Bureau of Labor Statistics:  >We found that **on average over the period from 1989 to 2007, 21 percent of American households at a given point of time received a wealth transfer and these accounted for 23 percent of their net worth. Over the lifetime, about 30 percent of households could expect to receive a wealth transfer** and these would account for close to 40 percent of their net worth near time of death. However, **there is little evidence of an inheritance \u201cboom.\u201d** In fact, **from 1989 to 2007, the share of households reporting a wealth transfer fell by 2.5 percentage points.** The average value of inheritances received among all households did increase but at a slow pace, by 10 percent, and wealth transfers as a proportion of current net worth fell sharply over this period from 29 to 19 percent or by 10 percentage points.  They identify several issues with evaluating the importance of inheritance and \"other wealth transfers ...] for current net-worth in 2007\", which includes **older people living longer** (especially if rich), which **lowers the number of bequests**, but at the same time **medical expenses may rise which means less money to be transferred**. Other issues include the **increase of charitable contributions** (which \"may be particularly characteristic of the rich\"), and the **effects of business cycles**:  > Conversely, if younger people are becoming poorer because of a business cycle downturn, then the need for a gift or inheritance may increase. However, **if their parents are also affected by the economic downturn, then the likelihood of a wealth transfer and its size may also fall.**  According to [Kuhn and R\u00edos-Pull analyzed the results of the Survey of Consumer Finances:   >Since  1989  the  SCF  has  been  conducted  as  a triennial  representative  household  survey  of  U.S. households.   The  survey  provides  detailed  and comprehensive  information  on  U.S.  households\u2019  income  and  wealth  situation  along  with  rich demographic  information.    In regard to inheritance:  >A small part of the population receives large transfers from previous generations,  but  still  they  are  not  the  bulk  of  the  very  rich.   **Three-quarters  of  the  population has  not  inherited  anything.**  On  the  other  hand,  1  percent  of  the  population  has  received  more than $1.5 million.  A very similar picture arises with respect to expected bequests.  Again, **three-quarters  of  the  population  does  not  expect  to  receive  any  bequest,  whereas  the  top  1  percent expects to receive more than $1.25 million.**  This wealth transfer alone would put the household in  the  top  10  percent  of  the  wealth  distribution  of  2013.   For  the  top  0.01  percent,  expected inheritances  amount  to  $13  million.   **Looking  at  received  and  expected  inheritances  jointly,  we find that 70 percent of households answer that they neither received any inheritance nor expected to receive any inheritance in the future**.  To conclude, I will quote the Resolution Foundation's report on inheritance which, while relatively more optimistic than the other answers above, has the following caveat:  >While  spending  more  of  one\u2019s  life  with  parents  around  is  likely  to  be  very  welcome  for  young  adults  and  probably  a  living  standards  boost  in  itself,  we  find  that  **this  parental  longevity  is  pushing  inheritances  for  millennials  beyond  the  child-rearing  age  to  just  before retirement. The most common age of inheritance is expected to be 61 for 20-35 year olds**, a **full 30 years after the age at which they will typically start having children**. While  inheriting  on  the  run-in  to  retirement  would  be  a  welcome  boost, **if  intergenerational  wealth  transfers  are  to  be  relied  upon  to  get  into  home  ownership  this  timing  is  likely  to  be  sub-optimal.**  The  security  and  lower  housing  costs  that  owning  a  home  entail  are  particularly  important  when  bringing  up  families,  and  to  the  extent  that  secure housing allows people to take risks in other areas, when building up careers and earnings potential . We have seen that **intergenerational  wealth  transfers  cannot  be  relied  upon  to  ensure  entry into home ownership for many millennials. In addition, we find that even for those who  have  this  route  into  owning  potentially  open  to  them,  the  timing  may  well  be  far  later than is desirable.**  ---  All of the above concerns the USA. The reply may not be identical elsewhere, however the same issues have been highlighted in the UK, see for example this article by the BBC:  >**As elder generations continue to struggle with retirement savings and live longer on less, millennials looking to save for retirement might want to keep courting the tried-and-true option: socking away money with lower-volatility vehicles.** The silver lining of higher interest rates in the economy is not nearly as thrilling as found wealth, sure. But aren\u2019t millennials used to taking what they can get?","human_ref_B":"disclaimer: I\u2019m going to be talking only about the US]  The Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) found that median inheritance was ~$69,000. [Link   69k is a lot of money, but far closer to \u201ca year\u2019s salary\u201d than \u201cenough you can quit your job.\u201d Put another way, it\u2019s approximately the cost of a college education at a public university. In the primary drivers of millennial financial problems are:  1. Entering the labor market at a bad time (Great Recession, affordable housing crisis, stagnant wages and extreme income inequality)  2. Debt, which is closely connected to the extreme inflation of the cost of higher education  Federal Reserve and US Census data that supports these claims.  These are not problems that are easily solved by giving every 30 year old $69,000. While that would pay off many people\u2019s student debts, it wouldn\u2019t address the more systemic problems with regards to wages or the inability to find affordable housing. For someone in a professional career, salary changes over time are typically done on a percentage basis, so starting at a lower starting salary can have lifelong impacts. The mathematics are similar to compound interest. Someone who makes 25k and sees a 3% raise each year makes 286k after ten years, but someone who starts at 35k makes 401k after ten years. That\u2019s 120k lost by the time you\u2019re 35!  More importantly, receiving 69k in the future will do nothing to prevent hardship today. Millennials range in age from about 24 to 39 and their parents are typically between the age of 50 and 70. About half of Americans are expected to each the age of 80 nowadays so unless they\u2019re an older millennial who had parents who died relatively young, they\u2019re likely to have to wait another decade or even several to see an inheritance. And at that point the money won\u2019t be nearly enough to undo decades of hardship.  Finally, 69k is not nearly enough money to retire. While it will make the difference for some people, This article that analyzes BoLS data concludes that the average retiree spends ~45k per year. So we are talking about inheriting 1-2 years\u2019 worth of money.  Yes, we can expect millennials to inherit more money than the previous generation. But not an order of magnitude more money. All of the effects I point out are so extreme that they wouldn\u2019t be close to compensated for by *doubling* the average inheritance today.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":728.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"52uwqj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is social progress linked to technological progress? At one time in America, women were consigned to the home. And for most of that time, they had little in the way of conveniences. Women washed clothes like this not even so long ago. But when the washing machine became ubiquitous, did it free up women for social change?   They cooked, they cleaned, they did laundry, they did dishes -and more. When the quality of life increased and we got the automobile, women did not immediately drive. Their right to drive came, even government laws notwithstanding, from their husbands as well. But they got the socially acceptable right roughly around the advent of the supermarket. Women needed to drive to do the marketing. And when washing machines and dishwashers and clothes dryers and other conveniences had finally *replaced the woman* in the house, women started gaining the right to careers.  Did automation replace the slave as well? Would those in favor of slavery have fought harder to regain the right had there not been a boom of progress? The overall difference in technology between world war I and world war II is vast -did that contribute to women's role in war? Did it create jobs for women that weren't there before? Would any of these rights have been granted without progress and automation? Or is that why they weren't until it became feasible to allow it?  We like to think equal rights for women and minorities came solely at the push of social progress and activism but did technological progress play a role?","c_root_id_A":"d7oo1gg","c_root_id_B":"d7o59g7","created_at_utc_A":1473989674,"created_at_utc_B":1473964152,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Historians of science and technology have noted that, not only does technological progress not equate to social progress, but that the very idea itself is quite new.  In fact, the idea has a term, which is called \"technological determinism.\"  Technological determinism is the idea that technological changes determine social changes.  Leo Marx is one of the main historians who examines this idea, but there are several others.  Let us begin with his book \"Does Technology Drive History.\"  In this book he takes a historical look at the relationship between social change and technological change and concludes that, no, technology does not drive history.  Addressing your specific question about progress, he writes an article called \"Does Improved Technology Mean Progress\" in which he, again, concludes that no it does not. (no link, so Marx, Leo. \"Does improved technology mean progress.\" Technology Review 90.1 (1987): 33-41.)  So, what is the relationship between technological and social change then?  I think the best answer comes from historians of technology Trevor Pinch and Wiebe Bijker.  Their edited volume titled \"The Social Construction of Technological Systems\" argues for what they call (no surprise given the title) \"social construction.\"  What this means is that, rather than technology driving social change, social groups drive technological change.  They utilize the historical case of the development of the bicycle to demonstrate this point.  Their argument is that innovation occurs within a particular social group in order to solve a problem experienced by that social group.  New technologies are adopted for the same reason.  Competition between new technologies, and adoption then, is not determined by the best technology because such a thing doesn't exist.  Some technologies are better for some people and worse for others.  Those technologies that dominate are the ones that solve problems for the most (or at least most influential) social groups.  Several other historians and scholars of technology have built on this with their own studies.  Ruth Schwartz Cowan shows in her book \"More Work for Mother\" that household appliances actually increased the time spent on labor by stay-at-home women.  At first, only the wealthiest women were able to afford these machines.  But these women didn't used to do the chores done by household appliances.  They hired poorer women to work in their homes.  The end result was that they now had to operate these appliances to complete these chores, which was more than they were doing before.  The working women who were displaced now needed different employment.  Rather than work in homes, where there were now far fewer jobs, they went to factories.  Women were already working and having careers, at least the poor ones were, before household appliances.  They were simply displaced and showed up in histories of employment because they moved into factories and out of homes.  In David Noble's book \"Forces of Production\" he shows how industrial automation was not the result of technological progress, but social forces.  He shows that the adoption of numerical control (NC) machines was driven by two main factors.  First, the adoption of NC machine tools (rather than the record playback method) was because managers wanted more control over machine workers.  NC machines relied less the skilled machinists, and could be operated by unskilled labor.  Second, they were adopted by military contractors, which drove adoption by others and eventually standardized the NC machine within the machining industry.  This is starting to all look very political, and political scientist Langdon Winner argues just that in his famous essay \"Do Artifacts Have Politics?\"  His answer, of course, is yes.  His general argument is that, rather than technologies driving social changes (technical progress driving social progress) that humans inevitably imbue their technologies with their politics, regardless of intent.  In this way, he strays from the social construction of technology school, because the implication is that, if technology has politics, than it must be able to influence social change, since politics influences social change.  As this idea developed, it became known as Co-production.  Thus the answer to your question is rather complicated.  Social progress and technological progress are, indeed, linked.  But rather than the way you suggest, the influence occurs both ways.  Technological progress is often associated with social regression because technologies can have politics, social progress often causes technological progress, and so too the other way around.  The important implication here, to me anyway, is that it thus becomes impossible to innovate away a social problem with a so called technological fix.  They require social changes, and social action, as well.  Edit:  Added links, but most are books or behind paywalls.  Sorry about that.","human_ref_B":"One famous example which is often cited to think that this is not true is the cotton gin. The idea goes that slavery was on the decline in the South in the United States due to its expense, until the cotton gin was invented, which made cotton plantations based on slaves profitable, and thus perpetuated slavery.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25522.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1dqrcr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"We are mostly familiar with some of the Abrahamic religion forms of extremism and intolerance highlighted in Western media. What are some other religions forms of extremism and intolerance like Buddhism, Hinduism and others?","c_root_id_A":"c9t0tni","c_root_id_B":"c9szbba","created_at_utc_A":1367789712,"created_at_utc_B":1367784916,"score_A":25,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"There have been a series of \"communal riots\" between Hindus and Muslims, most of which is Hindus attacking Muslims.  The most famous were in the aftermath of the Hindu fundamentalists destroying the Babri mosque.  There's been a cool new book recently called *Muslims in Indian Cities* that argues Muslims are being formed into American style ghettos (especially in Gujarat) because of their fears about violence.    The most famous case of Sikh extremism is likely the assassination of Indira Gandhi (which led to Hindu, anti-Sikh riots) and was part of a wider movement to establish an independent Sikh state (\"Khalistan\") in Punjab.  Indira Gandhi's assisntation was inspired because some Sikh militants were alleged to be operating in the holiest Sikh site and Gandhi ordered the Indian army to move in in force.  Buddhism, well, there was some Buddhist rhetoric in the Sri Lanka civil war, but it's hard to say whether that was an \"ethnic conflict\" or a \"religious conflict\" (it was both, but ethnicity was invoked more often than religion).  The example of Bodu Bala Sena is listed below and may prove instructive, but it cannot be divorced from ideas about making Sri Lanka into a Sinhalese (and therefore at least nominally Buddhist) nation-state.  More recently, there has been ethnic strife in Burma where Buddhists have been targeting Muslims.  For a slightly sensational take on it, here's a *Vice* article on the subject called \"Is Burma's Anti-Muslim Violence Led by Buddhist Neo-Nazis?\"  In Thailand, there has been also some nationalist conflict between the majority Thevada Buddhist Thais and various minorities, especially the Muslims in the South, though I don't know to what degree religious rhetoric is involved.  Jain extremism is like Quaker extremism: it's just really pacifistic.  Jain extremists are so worried about killing insects, etc. that they sweep in front of themselves, wear muslin over their mouths (to prevent accidental ingesting small creatures), etc.  Don't think this is something that has to do with the Jain religion; Buddhist discourse traditionally stresses the same things as Jainism does.  Rather, this is because Jains do not have their own nation-state.    As you can see from the examples above, it's hard to separate the violence of religious extremism from national violence, just as (close to home) it's hard to separate out American\/European anti-Muslim rhetoric from both Christianity and Judaism on one hand and the per-existing ideas of national belonging on the other.","human_ref_B":"You might want to read about the Naroda Patiya massacre, which was an instance of Hindu violence against Muslim civilians.  India has had a fair amount of Hindu vs. Muslim sectarian violence that probably fits your criteria.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4796.0,"score_ratio":2.2727272727}
{"post_id":"1dqrcr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"We are mostly familiar with some of the Abrahamic religion forms of extremism and intolerance highlighted in Western media. What are some other religions forms of extremism and intolerance like Buddhism, Hinduism and others?","c_root_id_A":"c9szet0","c_root_id_B":"c9t0tni","created_at_utc_A":1367785227,"created_at_utc_B":1367789712,"score_A":2,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bodu_Bala_Sena","human_ref_B":"There have been a series of \"communal riots\" between Hindus and Muslims, most of which is Hindus attacking Muslims.  The most famous were in the aftermath of the Hindu fundamentalists destroying the Babri mosque.  There's been a cool new book recently called *Muslims in Indian Cities* that argues Muslims are being formed into American style ghettos (especially in Gujarat) because of their fears about violence.    The most famous case of Sikh extremism is likely the assassination of Indira Gandhi (which led to Hindu, anti-Sikh riots) and was part of a wider movement to establish an independent Sikh state (\"Khalistan\") in Punjab.  Indira Gandhi's assisntation was inspired because some Sikh militants were alleged to be operating in the holiest Sikh site and Gandhi ordered the Indian army to move in in force.  Buddhism, well, there was some Buddhist rhetoric in the Sri Lanka civil war, but it's hard to say whether that was an \"ethnic conflict\" or a \"religious conflict\" (it was both, but ethnicity was invoked more often than religion).  The example of Bodu Bala Sena is listed below and may prove instructive, but it cannot be divorced from ideas about making Sri Lanka into a Sinhalese (and therefore at least nominally Buddhist) nation-state.  More recently, there has been ethnic strife in Burma where Buddhists have been targeting Muslims.  For a slightly sensational take on it, here's a *Vice* article on the subject called \"Is Burma's Anti-Muslim Violence Led by Buddhist Neo-Nazis?\"  In Thailand, there has been also some nationalist conflict between the majority Thevada Buddhist Thais and various minorities, especially the Muslims in the South, though I don't know to what degree religious rhetoric is involved.  Jain extremism is like Quaker extremism: it's just really pacifistic.  Jain extremists are so worried about killing insects, etc. that they sweep in front of themselves, wear muslin over their mouths (to prevent accidental ingesting small creatures), etc.  Don't think this is something that has to do with the Jain religion; Buddhist discourse traditionally stresses the same things as Jainism does.  Rather, this is because Jains do not have their own nation-state.    As you can see from the examples above, it's hard to separate the violence of religious extremism from national violence, just as (close to home) it's hard to separate out American\/European anti-Muslim rhetoric from both Christianity and Judaism on one hand and the per-existing ideas of national belonging on the other.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4485.0,"score_ratio":12.5}
{"post_id":"1dqrcr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"We are mostly familiar with some of the Abrahamic religion forms of extremism and intolerance highlighted in Western media. What are some other religions forms of extremism and intolerance like Buddhism, Hinduism and others?","c_root_id_A":"c9t1xib","c_root_id_B":"c9szbba","created_at_utc_A":1367793269,"created_at_utc_B":1367784916,"score_A":12,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"There is a lot of anti-Muslim sentiment among some Buddhists in Burma that sometimes boils over into lynch mobs and riots. In fact, there was some debate in the EU about lifting economic sanctions when the rights of these Muslims weren't being protected by the goverment. Here's the Wikipedia entry on the general sentiment:  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Persecution_of_Muslims_in_Burma  If you just google \"Buddhist Muslim Violence Burma\", you'll find a lot more recent information about it.","human_ref_B":"You might want to read about the Naroda Patiya massacre, which was an instance of Hindu violence against Muslim civilians.  India has had a fair amount of Hindu vs. Muslim sectarian violence that probably fits your criteria.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8353.0,"score_ratio":1.0909090909}
{"post_id":"1dqrcr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"We are mostly familiar with some of the Abrahamic religion forms of extremism and intolerance highlighted in Western media. What are some other religions forms of extremism and intolerance like Buddhism, Hinduism and others?","c_root_id_A":"c9t1xib","c_root_id_B":"c9szet0","created_at_utc_A":1367793269,"created_at_utc_B":1367785227,"score_A":12,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There is a lot of anti-Muslim sentiment among some Buddhists in Burma that sometimes boils over into lynch mobs and riots. In fact, there was some debate in the EU about lifting economic sanctions when the rights of these Muslims weren't being protected by the goverment. Here's the Wikipedia entry on the general sentiment:  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Persecution_of_Muslims_in_Burma  If you just google \"Buddhist Muslim Violence Burma\", you'll find a lot more recent information about it.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bodu_Bala_Sena","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8042.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1dqrcr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"We are mostly familiar with some of the Abrahamic religion forms of extremism and intolerance highlighted in Western media. What are some other religions forms of extremism and intolerance like Buddhism, Hinduism and others?","c_root_id_A":"c9tipa5","c_root_id_B":"c9szet0","created_at_utc_A":1367861176,"created_at_utc_B":1367785227,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The Buddhist Tamil Tigers invented the suicide belt, though it is hard to say if their religion has anything to do with it.  Hinduism has the caste system, a form of non-ethnic Apartheid. Society is divided in 4 classes (varnas), with priests at the top. A fifth group, are avarna - outcasts. They are considered to be 'untouchable', since their presence corrupts.   In the lead-up to independence two factions quarrelled about it. There was a group who wanted to maintain it, led by Gandhi. Opposition came from the Dalits (oppressed) themselves, in the form of Ambedkar. The British favoured doing away with it, like they put an end to sati (widow-burning). Gandhi organised various events to oppose the British. He also went on a hunger strike when Ambedkar suggested Dalits should get reserved seats in parliaments, like other minorities (Muslims, etc).  To this day people are killed because they are 'untouchables'. If they drink from a well it is eternally 'poisoned'. They're only deemed fit to collect garbage or do other dirty jobs. Some hold that even their shadow can corrupt.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bodu_Bala_Sena","labels":1,"seconds_difference":75949.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"qusxsd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I've finished \"Imagined Communities\" by Benedict Anderson, what are some further interesting reads that corresponds with his ideas, whether as a critique or a further build?","c_root_id_A":"hktanwu","c_root_id_B":"hktc79a","created_at_utc_A":1637035990,"created_at_utc_B":1637036786,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"*The Invention of Tradition* by Eric Hobsbawm.","human_ref_B":"The sort of canonical answer would be *The Invention of Tradition,* edited by Hobsbawm and Ranger. I don't think I've ever talked with someone who has taught or been taught Anderson without also reading that.  I also really like Manu Goswami's 2002 article \"Rethinking the Modular Nation Form: Toward a Socio-historical Conception of Nationalism\". I think it's a generally good overview of the shortcomings in Anderson's version of modular politics, and is more of a corollary than a critique--she generally agrees with Anderson. Goswami argues that Anderson treats the process of ideological diffusion as congruent with ideological adoption, and doesn't go far enough in assessing the social and historical path dependencies which cause nationalism to take root. She also contests the single origin of nationalism. Generally a good read from a good scholar.  Other recommendations, either scholars or useful works:  \\- Ronald Niezen on indigenism. I like his definitions, and he's a good source on what indigenism aims to do, but I disagree with how he situates it vis-a-vis nationalism.  \\- *Power in Movement: Social Movements and Contentious Politics* by Sidney Tarrow. Goes more into depth about the different forms of modular politics. Note the differences between modular political practices and modular ideologies.  \\- \"Structure and Example in Modular Political Phenomena: The Diffusion of Bulldozer\/Rose\/Orange\/Tulip Revolutions\" by Mark Beissinger  \\- \"The Aporia of Indigeneity\" by Zahir Kolia in *Interventions.* I had a bit of a love affair with this article when I was working on my undergrad thesis. I don't agree with every point of it, but I think it takes a necessary look at how political and ideological constructs like nationalism and colonialism create and compel forms of collective expression which cannot be fully conceptualized outside these ideological paradigms, with a specific look at indigeneity. It's been a while, so I don't remember much about Kolia's other work, but I just re-read the paper and it holds up.  \\- *Quebec Identity : the Challenge of Pluralism* by Maclure and Feldstein if you can't read French  \\- *R\u00e9cits Identitaires : Le Qu\u00e9bec \u00e0 l'\u00e9preuve du pluralisme* by Maclure if you can read French. It presents some very similar ideas, I just happen to have a hard copy so it's the one I turn to more often.  EDIT: OMG I can't believe I forgot to say *Orientalism* by Edward Said. Not a response to Anderson by any means (it was written first), but I think a must-read for anyone interested in ethnic politics or nationalism, and a good read for social scientists more broadly. Said very definitely changed how social scientists think about our own work and approach, I'd say for the better (if you're listening to what he's actually saying, and not using him as a straw man)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":796.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"34da7q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"The Hellenic Republic is almost exclusively referred to by its Latin name, \"Greece\", even in a formal diplomatic context. Why is the Czech Republic never referred to as \"Bohemia\"? From a technical standpoint, Bohemia should be just as correct as Greece.","c_root_id_A":"cqtnwj3","c_root_id_B":"cqtvk6l","created_at_utc_A":1430384210,"created_at_utc_B":1430405449,"score_A":4,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Because Moravia?  Source.png)","human_ref_B":"Because the Czech Republic consists of Bohemia, Silesia, and Moravia..png\/1280px-Czech_Rep._-_Bohemia,_Moravia_and_Silesia_III_(en\\).png)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21239.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"34da7q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"The Hellenic Republic is almost exclusively referred to by its Latin name, \"Greece\", even in a formal diplomatic context. Why is the Czech Republic never referred to as \"Bohemia\"? From a technical standpoint, Bohemia should be just as correct as Greece.","c_root_id_A":"cqtvk6l","c_root_id_B":"cqttwfm","created_at_utc_A":1430405449,"created_at_utc_B":1430402594,"score_A":11,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Because the Czech Republic consists of Bohemia, Silesia, and Moravia..png\/1280px-Czech_Rep._-_Bohemia,_Moravia_and_Silesia_III_(en\\).png)","human_ref_B":"It's just a matter of what \"stuck\" for English speakers in the past. People gave different names to different places. Germany, Italy, Greece, and Spain are all Latin based. France, Austria, and England aren't.   There's no \"technical standpoint\" because there are no technical rules to apply. It's all convention.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2855.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"tvxapk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"How true is the affirmation \"it's very well established that women highly value status in men\" ? I never know if this affirmation is a political meme, a \"somehow true\" fact of sociology, or \"very well established\".  Is it so easy to study this idea accurately?","c_root_id_A":"i3cfngv","c_root_id_B":"i3cig4c","created_at_utc_A":1649075848,"created_at_utc_B":1649077308,"score_A":3,"score_B":33,"human_ref_A":"Where'd you hear it? Is the wording you've quoted from a specific source that has more contextual couching?","human_ref_B":"You are likely thinking of hypergamy, which refers to the practice of marrying another person of higher status. When describing relationships involving a man and a woman, the point of reference is commonly the latter (i.e., hypergamy involves a woman marrying a higher status man).   Broadly speaking, human partnerships tend to be homogamous (i.e., to involve people with similar sociodemographic characteristics) and endogamous (i.e., to involve people pertaining to the same sociocultural group, e.g., the same ethnic group) (Rosenfeld, 2005). However, when researchers observe a difference within heterosexual heterogamous relationships, the man tends to have a higher status than the woman (on the basis of education, wealth, etc.). Before continuing, it is important to keep in mind that people do not get together in an entirely random fashion. Besides individual preferences, there are also structural and normative constraints to take into account. To quote Er\u00e1t (2021):  >As noted in the introduction, **partner selection is not an entirely random process, as persons aim to choose others based on certain preferences. From the numerous possible criteria, socioeconomic attributes** (such as income, wealth, occupation, prestige, and education) **are often emphasized because they influence the status and well-being of the individual and the couple due to the pooling of resources in a relationship** (Parsons 1942, 1955a, 1955b; South 1991; Kalmijn 1998; Bukodi 2002). This effect on status has also been noted by social stratification researchers, who identify partnerships (primarily marriages) as potential avenues of upward social mobility, recognizing that a \u2018good match\u2019 has the opportunity to substantially improve someone\u2019s status position (Sorokin 1972; Hout 1982).  But also:  >As conceptualized by Winch decades ago, partner selection is a phenomenon where an individual chooses a preferred partner from a \u201crestricted segment of the population\u201d, which he named the \u201cfield of eligibles\u201d (1958: 14; Kerckhoff 1964: 290\u2012291). Similarly, Huckfeldt posited that interaction is shaped by the social composition of the \u201crelevant environment\u201d (1983: 653). Regarding sexual partners, Laumann et al. speak in similar terms about sexual networks and their social structure (1994). **In short, partner selection is limited by the structural conditions of the so-called relationship market, which operates by the logic of numbers as the term encompasses the number and quality of potential mates whom the individual has a chance to meet** (Kalmijn 1994, 1998; Bukodi 2002; Rosenfeld 2002).  And to quote Kalmijn (1998):  >There are many theories about partner choice, and such notions provide important clues about the causes of intermarriage and homogamy. **In general, marriage patterns arise from three social forces: the preferences of individuals for resources in a partner, the influence of the social group, and the constraints of the marriage market.**  Therefore, human relationships are not just a simple function of what people \"value\" in potential partners.  ---  Relatedly, preferences and patterns can be different across different kinds of unions (e.g., marriage vs cohabitation [Blackwell & Lichter, 2000; Hamplova, 2009; Schoen & Weinick, 1993]) and for different populations around the globe. Furthermore, these patterns are not static. In fact, in recent years there have been notable shifts in the USA and in Europe. According to Esteve et al. (2016):  >Our data provided a rich source for visualizing the universal shift from male to female dominance in educational systems and its concomitant impact on educational assortative mating. **The evidence suggests that young people adapt to new demographic realities by increasingly forming unions in which wives have the educational advantage, leading to substantial declines in the historical hypergamic pattern.** Across a range of different contexts (e.g. United States, France, India, South Korea, Kenya), the norms governing marriage markets have proven flexible enough to accommodate the increasing numbers of highly educated women and, **as consequence, the numbers of women marrying down has increased steadily.**  And according to Van Bavel et al. (2018):  >Nevertheless, the pattern in the United States and Europe has been toward substantial increases in the proportions of couples in which wives have more education than their husbands: **While educational homogamy remains dominant, couples in which wives have more education than their husbands have become more prevalent than those in which husbands have more education than their wives in recent decades, not just in the West but also in non-Western countries that have experienced RGE** [reversal of the gender gap in education]. In turn, **the proportion of households where wives earn more than husbands has also increased.**  That said, it is possible that *educational* hypogamy does not equal *status* hypogamy. For illustration, see Chudnovskaya and Kashyap's (2020) study of childbearing unions in Sweden, who argue:  >An alternative possibility is that female educational hypogamy does not imply the re-ordering of the gendered power order in unions, but continued hypergamy across other status dimensions. **Women may \u2018partner down\u2019 in education but choose men who compensate with other forms of status, e.g. class background, income, or occupational prestige** (Blossfeld and Timm, 2003).  They conclude:  >The rise of educational hypogamy has been heralded as a part of the broader set of changes described as the gender revolution. Our closer examination of status inequalities within hypogamous couples lends support to a stalled gender revolution perspective. **We find that the highly educated women with the highest status pair with highly educated men** (who tend to have even higher status than the women). **Meanwhile, women who partner down tend to be relatively disadvantaged.** The trends we observe could be driven either by preferences (towards egalitarianism or women\u2019s status hypergamy) or by constraints (social norms or partner market structures).  ---  Blackwell, D. L., & Lichter, D. T. (2000). Mate selection among married and cohabiting couples. Journal of Family Issues, 21(3), 275-302.  Chudnovskaya, M., & Kashyap, R. (2020). Is the end of educational hypergamy the end of status hypergamy? Evidence from Sweden. European Sociological Review, 36(3), 351-365.  Er\u00e1t, D. (2021). Educational assortative mating and the decline of hypergamy in 27 European countries. Demographic Research, 44, 157-188.  Esteve, A., Schwartz, C. R., Van Bavel, J., Permanyer, I., Klesment, M., & Garcia, J. (2016). The end of hypergamy: Global trends and implications. Population and development review, 42(4), 615.  Hamplova, D. (2009). Educational homogamy among married and unmarried couples in Europe: Does context matter?. Journal of Family Issues, 30(1), 28-52.  Kalmijn, M. (1998). Intermarriage and homogamy: Causes, patterns, trends. Annual review of sociology, 24(1), 395-421.  Rosenfeld, M. J. (2005). A critique of exchange theory in mate selection. American Journal of Sociology, 110(5), 1284-1325.  Schoen, R., & Weinick, R. M. (1993). Partner choice in marriages and cohabitations. Journal of Marriage and Family, 55(2), 408.  Van Bavel, J., Schwartz, C. R., & Esteve, A. (2018). The reversal of the gender gap in education and its consequences for family life. Annual Review of Sociology, 44, 341-360.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1460.0,"score_ratio":11.0}
{"post_id":"88qcu6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Are preparators of mass shootings really mentally ill or is this media stereotype?","c_root_id_A":"dwn2c4w","c_root_id_B":"dwn74fm","created_at_utc_A":1522611085,"created_at_utc_B":1522616464,"score_A":3,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Follow up question: would perpetrating a mass shooting itself be sufficient evidence to diagnose mental illness?","human_ref_B":"In general, it is found that mental illness is a poor predictor. Age and gender are better predictors than mental illness. Mental illness is more associated with victimization, than perpetration.  This article offers a good short review about the topic and the implications behind linking the two concepts:  >[...] in the real world, these persons are far more likely to be assaulted by others or shot by the police than to commit violent crime themselves. In this sense, persons with mental illness might well have more to fear from \u201cus\u201d than we do from \u201cthem.\u201d And blaming persons with mental disorders for gun crime overlooks the threats posed to society by a much larger population\u2014the sane.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5379.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"wv5gst","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What\u2019s the root cause of ongoing culture war in the United States?","c_root_id_A":"ilf6zus","c_root_id_B":"ilgxy1s","created_at_utc_A":1661233414,"created_at_utc_B":1661270127,"score_A":2,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"You might enjoy *How Democracies Die* by Daniel Ziblatt and Steven Levitsky and *Why We're Polarized* by Ezra Klein.  As a tasty little bonus I'll recommend *If Then: How the Simulmatics Corporation Invented the Future* by Jill Lepore.","human_ref_B":"It's a continuation of the culture war that predated the Civil War. Same parts of the country, same \"traditionalist\" vs \"progressive\" views.   Slaves as primary economic force vs innovation as primary economic force. You can see it today in the way blue states encourage research while red states focus on maintaining the cheapest labor force possible.   https:\/\/www.journals.uchicago.edu\/doi\/10.1086\/686631","labels":0,"seconds_difference":36713.0,"score_ratio":13.0}
{"post_id":"ch2m0d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Do people with OCD tend to have more satisfaction with the decisions they've made? Hi all,   &#x200B;  As I know, for many people OCD tends to come with significant difficulty of making decisions. I've been wondering if - and pardon me if this is a silly question - there are any studies on how satisfied people with OCD tend to be with the decisions that they've made, given that indecision can come with\/inspire thoughtful reflection on all the options that are involved in making a decision. So it would seem that the time that is spent on pondering one's options is quite likely valuable and useful. Of course there are probably also considerable differences in individual practices and habits, perhaps in many cases there's just angst over a decision and not much pondering or analysis possible.   So I was wondering if you know any reasonably significant studies on this theme.   &#x200B;  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"euocpjp","c_root_id_B":"euq6zib","created_at_utc_A":1563940086,"created_at_utc_B":1563972228,"score_A":12,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"probably better suited for r\/askpsychology","human_ref_B":"Before answering the main question, I would first tackle the underlying assumption (regardless of whether or not people with OCD do or do not tend to deliberate more with decisions):  >...] given that indecision can come with\/inspire thoughtful reflection on all the options that are involved in making a decision. So it would seem that the time that is spent on pondering one's options is quite likely valuable and useful  Research actually suggests that the contrary is true. For example, [Schwartz et al. compared *maximizers* (who \"aims to maximize his or her outcomes\") and *satisficers* (who tend to accept \"good enough\"). Comparatively, they concluded that:  >Taken together, our studies suggest that **although maximizers may in general achieve better objective outcomes** than satisficers (as a result of their high standards and exhaustive search and decision procedures), **they are likely to experience these outcomes as worse subjectively** in terms of happiness, regret, satisfaction, etc.]  Other studies have corroborated these findings, and similar findings. For example, [Chen et al. studied people with higher or lower assessment tendencies:  >Unlike maximizers, whose goal is to acquire the option with the highest subjective utility, **people with high assessment tendencies endeavor to be accurate in their judgments of decision-significant aspects of the world**\u2014 to \u201cget it right\u201d so that they can make the correct choice. **To them, the more inaccurate the judgments are, the greater the likelihood of ending up with the wrong option, a highly disturbing outcome for them.**  Likewise, high assessment individuals are suffer greater distress with making decisions:  >**Decision-making can be especially stressful for individuals focused on \u201cdoing the right thing\u201d** (truth motivation) but less so for those focused on moving forward and effecting change quickly and smoothly (control motivation).  Last illustration: Park and Jeong distinguished adaptive and maladaptive perfectionists, and non-perfectionists:  >Consistent with previous research, the three groups of adaptive perfectionists, maladaptive perfectionists, and nonperfectionists were replicated in the present study\u2019s sample of South Korean college students. It was also consistent with previous findings that **maladaptive perfectionists had poorer psychological health than adaptive perfectionists and non-perfectionists**, in that **they showed lower levels of psychological well being, life satisfaction, and self-esteem as well as higher levels of depression**.  Considering that OCD is by definition maladaptive (it being a mental disorder), and if we consider that people afflicted by OCD are more indecisive and\/or have problems with making decisions, then what we *should* expect is for them to be distressed and unsatisfied by their decisions. I could stop here, but I will also briefly look at the relationship between OCD and decision-making.  ---  First things first, the diagnosis for OCD does not directly\/explicitly concern decision-making, see for example how it is defined in the ICD-11.  However, it is true that researchers have suggested a relationship between issues with decision-making, although there are some mixed results: see for example Nielen et al., Lawrence et al., Cavedini and Gorini and Sachdev and Malhi. Nielen et al. did not find that patients with OCD did worse than a group of healthy volunteers, while Cavedini and Gorini and Sachdev and Malhi did find a relationship between OCD, indecisiveness and impairment to decision-making. Discrepancies might be due to different symptomatology. Cavedini and Gorini suggest that the relationship might not hold for individuals with moderate OCD (because of weaker anxiety symptoms), and Lawrence et al. found that decision-making was impaired among patients with worse hoarding symptoms. Moving on, there are several studies regarding indecisiveness, perfectionism, and OCD symptoms:  * Frost and Shows found a **relationship between indecisiveness and obsessional thoughts and compulsive checking, and with maldaptive perfectionism and compulsive hoarding**.  * Rassin and Muris found that \"**indecisveness correlated positively with obsessive-compulsive complaints** (e.g. checking and rumination), **but negatively with life satisfaction**\".   * Boisseau et al. \"**did not find overall deficits in decision-making in** ED eating disorder] or **OCD participants in comparison to controls**\", however they did find \"**significant between-group differences in decision-making performancde on late, but not early trials**\":  >Similar to the performance of the healthy controls, **the OCD participants in this investigation showed a gradual improvement in decision-making as the task progressed. This lack of impairment in decision-making compared to controls is in contrast to some investigations (Cavedini et al., 2002) but consistent with others (Nielen et al., 2002)**. Prior investigations have shown that OCD patients with prominent hoarding symptoms are impaired in decision-making whereas OCD patients without hoarding are not (Lawrence et al., 2006). Thus, **the results seen here may be due to the exclusion of individuals with compulsive hoarding and may be partly due to the heterogeneity of OCD.**  They also studied perfectionistic traits and behaviors:  >In this investigation **the performance of OCD participants under risk conditions was positively associated with doubts about actions, suggesting that perfectionism in OCD is associated with the avoidance of risk**. Although results from this study suggest that perfectionism aids decision-making in OCD, clinical observation and extant literature suggests that OCD may be maintained by a pathological need to avoid perceived harm (Ecker & G\u00f6nner, 2008). Although future research is needed to clarify such a relationship, **it could be hypothesized that over time perfectionistic-related doubt leads to a maladaptive avoidance of risk**.  I conclude with [Samuels et al.:  >The findings indicate that doubt has important implications for understanding the nature of OCD. First, we found that the severity of doubt, as measured in this study, was distributed in the sample such that many cases were rated as severely burdened with doubt, whereas a sizeable proportion were rated as having no, or little, doubt. This suggests that **doubt may not be a core feature of all cases of OCD, but rather a frequently-occurring symptom of, or trait related to, the disorder**. However, it should be noted that the measurement of doubt in this study was based on a single item that focused on performing an activity and trusting one\u2019s senses, and that **different aspects of doubt may be involved in other cases**.  >Second, we found that **the severity of activity-related doubt was strongly related to OCD severity, global impairment, and reported response to CBT**, indicating that doubt contributes to prognosis in OCD. **Although the magnitude of the relationship between doubt and impairment was attenuated after adjustment for OCD severity, the odds of impairment remained significantly greater in those with severe or extreme doubt**. In addition, those with extreme doubt were much less likely to report a good response to CBT, even adjusting for other clinical correlates of doubt.  >Third, **although doubt was related to contamination\/cleaning and hoarding OCD symptom dimensions, the relationship was strongest for checking symptoms**, suggesting that doubt may play an especially prominent role in these symptoms. Fourth, we found that **doubt severity was strongly related to the number of \u201canxious\u201d personality disorder traits, neuroticism score, and prevalence of generalized anxiety disorder, suggesting that doubt may be a trait vulnerability related to anxious and neurotic personality characteristics.**  ---  There are several limitations to the different studies cited into which details I will not explore (such as small samples), however generally speaking, I would suggest research points to the opposite direction than your expectations. Patients with OCD afflicted by indecisiveness, severe doubt, impaired decision-making, are suffering from (relatively worse) symptoms of a mental illness that impairs functioning, and are unlikely to benefit of these symptoms in terms of psychological well-being, including satisfaction and happiness.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":32142.0,"score_ratio":1.0833333333}
{"post_id":"tbjk5z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Why do centrally planned economies tend to fail historically? (They are prone to inefficiency, surpluses and shortages, etc) For example, by the 80s the USSR had gdp per capita lower than Italy. According to this graph  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/File%3AReal_GDP_per_capitas_of_countries_relative_to_the_US%27_MDP.png for the entire existence of the USSR, its gdp per capita never rose above italy. This pattern repeats elsewhere. Before Deng's reforms the Chinese economy didn't grow that fast and was small for a country of that size. Like look at this graph: https:\/\/images.app.goo.gl\/Fmkpbv78WDDMTvtw6. That's a massive increase post central planning. India saw the same thing, slow growth when centrally planned but then they liberalized during the 80s of 90s (can't remember which).  Why does this pattern hold true? Are there examples where it doesn't? Why didn't it hold true there if there are? I mean I guess the early industrialization of the USSR does count as rapid growth, but it came at a huge cost in terms of human lives and resources right?   So, as I understand the issue it is basically this. Every resource has an associated cost in terms of resources needed to produce it and opportunity cost. A central planner cannot know the proper distribution of goods because there are no prices. Why? Because prices force individuals to calculate their own opportunity costs and budget effectively. If you think about it, when you pay for a good you exchange your dollars for the good. That means you no longer have those dollars and cannot spend them. So what paying for a good actually does it denies you the ability to buy goods in the future. So you have to prioritize what goods you want the most. And goods you want the most are the ones you are willing to defer the most future goods on. That's how prices work. Make sense?  Without prices, a central planner cannot effectively know which goods to produce where and when because he doesn't know this individual opportunity cost calculation.  You could poll citizens, but that would mean that you would have to get accurate desires from them. Since nobody needs to give up anything to request a good, you get a problem I like to call over-demand. Basically, imagine you have a market for leather. There are 20 pounds of leather in the market. It takes 2 lbs of leather to make a jacket and 1 to make shoes. There are a bunch of different ways to distribute the leather. Do I give 10 lbs to the jacket makers and 0 to the shoes? 5 lbs to the jackets an 10 to the shoe makers? You could poll people, ask them to submit summaries of what they want. But I can just put in that I want both the jacket and shoe, as I don't have to give up anything to get either. And that means you get more demand for both than you can feasibly produce. And that means you have surpluses of goods people don't need and shortages of those that are wanted. Make sense so far?  Ok, so, to solve this problem, you could have people rank their goods. But in practice this is basically impractical. Because leather can be used for a lot more than shoes and jackets. It can be used for sofas, pants, wallets, purses, bags, etc. You'd have to rank your preferences accurately for every good you'd want. And these preferences couldn't change once production began. Plus you have to rank different production methods as well, which consumers wouldn't have enough information to determine.  Is my general understanding here correct?  Would the decentralized planned models work? How would they solve this issue?  This explains the shortages and surpluses observed in centrally planned economies right? Or am I missing something?","c_root_id_A":"i08ujfl","c_root_id_B":"i08lvtm","created_at_utc_A":1647010090,"created_at_utc_B":1647006086,"score_A":42,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"The Asian tigers plus Japan basically all had some level of central planning and they were the biggest growth success stories of the 20th century. So your data seems poorly selected.  https:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/publication\/260249501_'The_Developmental_State_in_the_late_20th_Century'_Elizabeth_Thurbon_and_Linda_Weiss_March_2016_Elgar_Handbook_of_Alternative_Theories_of_Economic_Development_Edited_by_Jayati_Ghosh_Rainer_Kattel_Erik  Central planning isn\u2019t a light switch you flip on or off (nor did Deng - China still does its 5-year plans). There are degrees of it, and those degrees were essential to Asia\u2019s growth story. While African\/Latin American countries experienced decades of stagnation for doing the \u2018right thing\u2019 according to the IMF, the tigers that bucked those recommendations pulled millions of people out of poverty.","human_ref_B":"so you are definitely missing so much from your analysis.  first, it's impossible to examine what happened with the USSR economically and leave out the affects of the cold war.  second, it's impossible to examine the economy of the USSR without considering the nazi invasion and deaths of 27 million russians in the war.  that had tremendous economic impact.  additionally, the USSR wasn't out to make a profit, that wasn't their economic model.    pre-revolution, Russia's average life expectancy was 33.69 years.  by 1986 it was 65 for men and 73 for women.  in other words, life expectancy more than *doubled* despite the cold war and the nazi invasion.  in 1916, adult literacy was 56% and 21 years later, it was 75% and reached 99% in the 1970s.  during this time the USSR made many of the key first's in space exploration: 1st man, woman, space walk, space station, etc.  teh soviet union was also a leader in womens equality.  women were granted political equality day one of the founding of the ussr.  many key women's rights were developed there, such as abortion, child care, affirmative action, etc.  there's so much being left out of you analysis.  the motivations of the soviet's themselves, the impacts of the nazi invasions and the cold war, the disastrous effects of de-communization in post-soviet russia (the greatest fall in life expectancy in the history of the world for example).  additionally, anti-communism is so severe that it's very difficult to get sources that many westerners, who almost universally harbor anti-communist beliefs, would find acceptable.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4004.0,"score_ratio":2.4705882353}
{"post_id":"tbjk5z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Why do centrally planned economies tend to fail historically? (They are prone to inefficiency, surpluses and shortages, etc) For example, by the 80s the USSR had gdp per capita lower than Italy. According to this graph  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/File%3AReal_GDP_per_capitas_of_countries_relative_to_the_US%27_MDP.png for the entire existence of the USSR, its gdp per capita never rose above italy. This pattern repeats elsewhere. Before Deng's reforms the Chinese economy didn't grow that fast and was small for a country of that size. Like look at this graph: https:\/\/images.app.goo.gl\/Fmkpbv78WDDMTvtw6. That's a massive increase post central planning. India saw the same thing, slow growth when centrally planned but then they liberalized during the 80s of 90s (can't remember which).  Why does this pattern hold true? Are there examples where it doesn't? Why didn't it hold true there if there are? I mean I guess the early industrialization of the USSR does count as rapid growth, but it came at a huge cost in terms of human lives and resources right?   So, as I understand the issue it is basically this. Every resource has an associated cost in terms of resources needed to produce it and opportunity cost. A central planner cannot know the proper distribution of goods because there are no prices. Why? Because prices force individuals to calculate their own opportunity costs and budget effectively. If you think about it, when you pay for a good you exchange your dollars for the good. That means you no longer have those dollars and cannot spend them. So what paying for a good actually does it denies you the ability to buy goods in the future. So you have to prioritize what goods you want the most. And goods you want the most are the ones you are willing to defer the most future goods on. That's how prices work. Make sense?  Without prices, a central planner cannot effectively know which goods to produce where and when because he doesn't know this individual opportunity cost calculation.  You could poll citizens, but that would mean that you would have to get accurate desires from them. Since nobody needs to give up anything to request a good, you get a problem I like to call over-demand. Basically, imagine you have a market for leather. There are 20 pounds of leather in the market. It takes 2 lbs of leather to make a jacket and 1 to make shoes. There are a bunch of different ways to distribute the leather. Do I give 10 lbs to the jacket makers and 0 to the shoes? 5 lbs to the jackets an 10 to the shoe makers? You could poll people, ask them to submit summaries of what they want. But I can just put in that I want both the jacket and shoe, as I don't have to give up anything to get either. And that means you get more demand for both than you can feasibly produce. And that means you have surpluses of goods people don't need and shortages of those that are wanted. Make sense so far?  Ok, so, to solve this problem, you could have people rank their goods. But in practice this is basically impractical. Because leather can be used for a lot more than shoes and jackets. It can be used for sofas, pants, wallets, purses, bags, etc. You'd have to rank your preferences accurately for every good you'd want. And these preferences couldn't change once production began. Plus you have to rank different production methods as well, which consumers wouldn't have enough information to determine.  Is my general understanding here correct?  Would the decentralized planned models work? How would they solve this issue?  This explains the shortages and surpluses observed in centrally planned economies right? Or am I missing something?","c_root_id_A":"i09psjm","c_root_id_B":"i09eg0c","created_at_utc_A":1647022392,"created_at_utc_B":1647018074,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'd say that there's another lurking issue: the spectre of emergent class-dynamics with concentration of political power.  This was explored in depth by Djilas in *The New Class*, with partial focus on Tito and the emergent Yugoslavian system of the 20th C. (https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/New_class).  Just as market competition coupled with privately amassed capital produces a particular regime of exploitation and domination (in Marxist terms, relations of production), central planning too can cultivate novel dynamics of concentrated political and economic power, anchored not just to the bureaucratic planners, but also the inner party or others 'at the top', who set those planners in motion.    Though the intertwinement of political and economic power is more explicit than with more laissez-faire capitalist arrangements, there are significant parallels, particularly in terms of something like an exploited proletariat.  The term \"Red Bourgeoisie\" isn't *that* misleading.    And in both cases, you have continued exploitation and domination set in relation to an ideology of individual emancipation and realization of human freedom, be it the free agent set loose in an unregulated market or modern socialist citizen, free to enjoy the fruits of their collaborative labor.  But as with many ideologies, this tends to conceal basic social relations.  But I'd also say that \/u\/Evilrake's point is well taken: central planning can entail a number of different arrangements, deployed in a number of different ways, with varying levels of oligarchical control.","human_ref_B":"> Every resource has an associated cost in terms of resources needed to produce it and opportunity cost. A central planner cannot know the proper distribution of goods because there are no prices. Why? Because prices force individuals to calculate their own opportunity costs and budget effectively. If you think about it, when you pay for a good you exchange your dollars for the good. That means you no longer have those dollars and cannot spend them. So what paying for a good actually does it denies you the ability to buy goods in the future. So you have to prioritize what goods you want the most. And goods you want the most are the ones you are willing to defer the most future goods on. That's how prices work. Make sense?  That's not how prices work at all...  Like I definitely remember that explanation from my high school economics course, but it's about as true as saying that cars turn t-rex's into zoom (un-fun fact: there is absolutely 0% t-rex in gasoline).  The supply-demand model assumes perfectly selfish, perfectly rational actors with perfect information and perfect logic.  Just how many humans do you know who meet even ONE of those qualifications?  Most people care at least about their communities at large, are more emotional than rational, have poor logic skills, and thanks to constant misinformation form corps (that's literally what advertising is, an attempt to distort your information), it's impossible to have \"perfect information\".  Price isn't what a product is worth, it's whatever they think they can get people to pay.  Gasoline is a great example actually.  Supply of crude oil has only gone up for the past 30 years while consumption has trended relatively alongside it.  In spite of this, the prices have jumped all over the place no matter where you live.  Demand has remained similar to supply, but prices have not followed supply and demand *because the real world is so much more complicated than that*.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4318.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"3tmiek","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What's the real answer(s) to the Explain like I'm five years old thread about more households working more now compared to the past? The original post is here. It's been deleted, but the OP originally wrote this. My impression of the overall vibe from \/r\/badeconomics is that most of the answers are terrible. So what are some non-terrible answers? Or is the premise of the question wrong?","c_root_id_A":"cx7ur1u","c_root_id_B":"cx7xr8i","created_at_utc_A":1448099332,"created_at_utc_B":1448112341,"score_A":3,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"You might want to post this question to \/r\/AskEconomics as well","human_ref_B":"**TLD;DR:  We aren't really working much more, and we have a higher standard of living.**  First,  40 hrs to 80 hrs swing doesn't happen for most households. While more women work outside the home today than in the past, some women didn't work in 1950 and many do not today.  At the same time, fewer men work today than in 1950.  The female Labor Force Participation Rate (LFPR) was 33% in 1950, 51% in 1980 and has risen to 56% today. But, male LFPR has fallen from 86% in 1950 to 80% in 1980 to 69% today.  Here's a graph of these changes.  Sure there are more two income HH today than there were 65 years ago, but the swing isn't as extreme as 40 hr -> 80 hrs.  At the same time, each worker isn't working as many hours as they did in the past.  In 1970 average hours worked per employed person was 1912, in 2011 it was 1758.  If you look at just government employees, you can see that the trend continues back to the 1950s (Note that government employees work less on average than all workers)  Second, we are making more income.  Real Median Family Income (adjusted for inflation) was $32,064 in 1954, $57,387 in 1985 and $66,632 in 2014.  So, the typical US family makes twice what it did sixty years ago and 15% more than it did thirty years ago.  Note that the biggest change in women working outside the home came between 1954 and 1984, not between 1984 and 2014.  So, why hasn't family income grown as quickly in the last thirty years?  A lot of in comes down to fringe benefits.  A lot more of workers total compensation is coming in the form of health benefits, retirement contribution, paid leave, and other non-cash payments  than it was thirty years ago.  The total share of national income going to going to employees has been remarkably constant over time at about 65%.  Here is a NBER digest of Martin Feldstein work on the matter.  Note that both of the above considerations are complicated by home production.  Since home production isn't counted as \"work\" or as \"income\" both are going to overstate how much things have changed.  Total work (home + market) has probably actually decreased since 1950, but income + home production probably hasn't gone up by quite double.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13009.0,"score_ratio":5.3333333333}
{"post_id":"9jye90","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why does US have fewer per capita doctors as compared to Western Europe even though their income is higher in US than Europe? Shouldn't that attract more people to the profession?","c_root_id_A":"e6vq26r","c_root_id_B":"e6vvpfk","created_at_utc_A":1538264870,"created_at_utc_B":1538270904,"score_A":15,"score_B":45,"human_ref_A":"The U.S. requires more years of tertiary education than other nations for medical doctors.  &#x200B;  Country \/ Drs. per 100,000 pop. in 2014 \/ min. yrs. of tertiary ed. to Dr.  Germany \/ 4.13 \/ 6  France \/ 3.22 \/ 8  UK \/ 2.81 \/ 6  USA \/ 2.57 \/ 11  http:\/\/apps.who.int\/gho\/data\/node.main.A1444  https:\/\/www.medicalstudyguide.com\/specialisation-in-medicine-in-germany.html  https:\/\/careertrend.com\/how-6669521-become-doctor-france.html  https:\/\/study.com\/requirements\\_to\\_become\\_a\\_doctor.html  https:\/\/www.gmc-uk.org\/education\/becoming-a-doctor-in-the-uk  &#x200B;  &#x200B;","human_ref_B":"Medicine is a field with large \u201cbarriers to entry\u201d in econ parlance, so that\u2019s why the physician labor market doesn\u2019t follow the straightforward supply and demand equilibrium that you\u2019re talking about. The barriers differ in the US and Europe \u2014 as other people have pointed out, it takes more training for licensure in the US than most other places. It\u2019s not just a question of difficulty (though that\u2019s part of it) \u2014 in the US, there\u2019s actually a bottleneck in training in terms of the number of residency slots. Because effectively all residency slots in the US are massively subsidized by Medicare, there is legislative control over how many physicians are trained in each year\u2019s cohort. That number has been pretty tightly controlled for the past 20 years, in part through lobbying by the AMA and other physician interest groups (eg specialty colleges, etc.), as someone else in this thread mentions. Med school slots are also a factor, but less significant because control there is decentralized and because you can go to med school outside the US and still do residency in the US (or go to a US med school and never become a practicing physician) \u2014 residency is what matters for licensure.   A source: https:\/\/economix.blogs.nytimes.com\/2013\/12\/17\/how-medicare-subsidizes-doctor-training\/  Also sourcing from knowledge\/experience as an MD\/PhD trainee in the social sciences.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6034.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"32t1wx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Is it true that the government must run a deficit if the private sector wants to pay down its debt? (Sp - I) + Sg - CA = 0  Sp = private saving  Sg = government saving CA = current account  My professor showed us this formula while talking about the financial crisis. He said the private sector was trying to pay down its debt, which meant it was saving more than it invested (Sp - I is positive). In which case, either the current account must be positive or the government must have a deficit.   I don't understand this. What's the rationale? Also, is Sp - I negative when the private sector deleverages?? I thought saving meant **spending on something other than consumption** in the national accounts, so for example on buying bonds or capital goods. When the banks were deleveraging, they were selling off their assets and refusing to extend loans. I don't see how this translates into \"private saving\".  Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"cqezrwj","c_root_id_B":"cqeuvyr","created_at_utc_A":1429233182,"created_at_utc_B":1429224206,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Saving is income minus consumption expenditure. Private sector saving means that profits of firms, combined with income of individuals (net of taxes) minus money spent on consumption goods is positive. Now, this money has to come from somewhere - in order for their to profits and income, somebody has to have bought goods - if not consumption goods, then it must have been investment goods. Without considering government spending or interaction with other countries, that is where the equation S = I comes from.  However, if we add in the government and outside countries, the savings could be spent on something other than investment. First, let's add in the government. The government takes in money in taxes, and spends some (possibly different) amount of money. If it spends more than it takes in, it borrows from the private sector to do so, and so some of the private sector savings are used for government spending. We get the equation  Sp + Sg = I.   Finally, we add in the outside world. Other than investment goods, the profits and individual income could come from selling more goods to other countries than they do to us - in return, they owe us money. (Alternatively, we could get money from other countries from existing financial investments in those countries, or from people sending money to their family here).  Then we get Sp + Sg = I + CA  So private sector savings is simply income minus consumption expenditure, and those savings can be allocated towards investment, government spending, or financial investments abroad.   Directly addressing your question, in order for the private sector to _financially save_, by which I mean reducing debt (different from the economic concept of saving above) it needs to take in more money than it spends on consumption and investment goods. Well, where can that money come from? It can only come from either the government spending more money on goods than it takes in, or it can come from abroad.   The banks deleveraging is not an example of private sector saving per se - if a bank sells a financial asset like a bond, it either uses the money to buy a safer financial asset like a government bond, or it will pay back a loan to some other private sector entity. That is deleveraging, but not saving - on net, the private sector owes the same amount of money. The bank owes less money, but the private sector entity owns fewer financial assets.  Note that it is entirely possible for the private sector to deleverage - reduce gross outstanding debt - without actually owing less, on net.   Actual private sector saving would be like a household deciding not to buy that car after all, and instead spending the money on bonds. If everyone does this at the same time, and the government does not want to spend more money than it takes in, and nothing is happening to the current account, then the equation does not add up and something will go wrong along the way - where is this money the households are saving coming from? The equations in this post are all accounting identities, rather than economic relationships - they always hold, because the money HAS to come from somewhere.  In this sense, private sector saving has to come at the expense of government dissaving.  Most books on international economics will contain detailed treatments of this topic, I particularly like 'International Economics' by Krugman, Obstfeld and Melitz.","human_ref_B":"xpost this to r\/economics","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8976.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7aqmy5","c_root_id_B":"c7ap1h3","created_at_utc_A":1354579535,"created_at_utc_B":1354574292,"score_A":28,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"A young child once wrote to the esteemed sociologist Randall Collins to ask him what he considered to be the meaning of life, and how one should live one's life.  Dr. Collins responded with two simple imperatives:  **Never stop learning, and be kind to your fellow humans.**  Sociological insight certainly informs my worldview in innumerable ways, but I firmly believe this is the most important:  Be kind, be understanding, and try not to judge those you do not understand.  No individual has complete control over their own life, and no individual has complete control over the social processes and institutions that shape one's own worldview.  This is not to say that criminals should not be held accountable for their actions, or that Hitler was not a terrible, horrible person.  But next time you see a homeless person \"wasting\" money on booze, or a person firmly on the opposite side of the political spectrum from yourself, try to put yourself in their shoes.  There is so much human tragedy in the world; do not judge or hate the hungry thief or the Afghan insurgent - pity them, and try to do a little bit in your lifetime to make the world a better place for us all.  *tl;dr  Read the bold text above.*  edit:  I just want to be clear - what the Taliban and similar organizations do is terrible.  My brother served as an infantryman in Iraq, and I have immense respect for what he did, even if I did not support the invasion of Iraq.  That said, the solution is not to lock up every radical Muslim; the solution is to improve social institutions and the local environment in a way that discourages radicalism.  Hating an individual only distracts from this goal.","human_ref_B":"I have a degree in gender studies. Everything is gendered and can be critiqued. For the most part, I try and avoid thinking about certain topics because it becomes stressful when I feel like I can't change the way the world works.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5243.0,"score_ratio":1.5555555556}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7aprtn","c_root_id_B":"c7aqmy5","created_at_utc_A":1354576685,"created_at_utc_B":1354579535,"score_A":17,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"Economics, I've noticed the people at the top of my class are all heartless, myself included.  You get to be kinda objective and remove yourself from a lot of situations emotionally and try to look at everything in terms of cost\/benefit weighing.  It helps me be more firm with my decisions.  As far as the macro stuff it just makes me realize how undereducated EVERYONE (myself included) is on the economy and makes me want to hit my head on a wall when I watch the news as people botch economic theory and principles or quote schools of economics incorrectly.  Both liberal and conservative media are very guilty of this.  However what it comes down to is what's \"right\" in economic theory often comes down to what's popular at the moment.  Keynesianism tends to pop up every time we get a recession and neoclassicalism\/austrianism seems to appear every time things start to heat up.  It also makes me realize the value of asymmetrical knowledge in everyday life and how important it is to stay quiet on certain subjects.  Generally it just makes me nihilist and egocentric.  Seems to be the trend for anyone with above a 3.7 at my school in the econ department, though.","human_ref_B":"A young child once wrote to the esteemed sociologist Randall Collins to ask him what he considered to be the meaning of life, and how one should live one's life.  Dr. Collins responded with two simple imperatives:  **Never stop learning, and be kind to your fellow humans.**  Sociological insight certainly informs my worldview in innumerable ways, but I firmly believe this is the most important:  Be kind, be understanding, and try not to judge those you do not understand.  No individual has complete control over their own life, and no individual has complete control over the social processes and institutions that shape one's own worldview.  This is not to say that criminals should not be held accountable for their actions, or that Hitler was not a terrible, horrible person.  But next time you see a homeless person \"wasting\" money on booze, or a person firmly on the opposite side of the political spectrum from yourself, try to put yourself in their shoes.  There is so much human tragedy in the world; do not judge or hate the hungry thief or the Afghan insurgent - pity them, and try to do a little bit in your lifetime to make the world a better place for us all.  *tl;dr  Read the bold text above.*  edit:  I just want to be clear - what the Taliban and similar organizations do is terrible.  My brother served as an infantryman in Iraq, and I have immense respect for what he did, even if I did not support the invasion of Iraq.  That said, the solution is not to lock up every radical Muslim; the solution is to improve social institutions and the local environment in a way that discourages radicalism.  Hating an individual only distracts from this goal.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2850.0,"score_ratio":1.6470588235}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7ap1h3","c_root_id_B":"c7arcce","created_at_utc_A":1354574292,"created_at_utc_B":1354581916,"score_A":18,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"I have a degree in gender studies. Everything is gendered and can be critiqued. For the most part, I try and avoid thinking about certain topics because it becomes stressful when I feel like I can't change the way the world works.","human_ref_B":"Philosophy here. I find it pretty much makes you a prick unless you are careful with it.   Taking philosophy is kind of like taking the dark arts. Let me explain. Academic philosophy, even more than law, is quintessentially about rhetoric. It doesn't do any good on it's own, in that it is the least applied of all possible degrees. What you are good at is criticizing how people say what they say. Deployed gratuitously, it effectively and inevitably makes you a prick. Or more accurately, the gratuitous deployment of criticizing how what is said is said constitutes prickish-ness. See? I just did it to myself. That, I hope, illustrates the point - dialectically, no less, in the tradition of some of the historical foundations of the academy. And there, just then, again, the dark art: driving a point home past need, fetishistically galavanting about with unusual words and sentence structures.  But, and also like the dark arts, rhetoric is a weapon against itself. So, for the word-soups, bullshit, simplistic righteousness, equivocation, and all the dragons of worded skulduggery, the practitioner of philosophy has a fighting chance.  So, what is it like to be such a practitioner? You hold your tongue a lot. You hear arguments everywhere that are technically very bad. Oh, assertions of conclusions masquerading as premises, wild premises wrapped in fashionable language, unimaginative anticipation of only the most stupid objections, and turning one's own intelligence into a premise in it's own right!   Or, you hold your tongue because it's a friend, and for goodness sake, you know what he means. There's no need to split hairs. Swallow, man. Take a breath. Dude doesn't give a shit that you can revise the expression of dude's opinion into a more correct and compelling form.   But, sometimes the time is right. It is someone else who is using the dark art not as it should be. And then, well - then you know what to do. The dark arts is also the defence against the dark arts.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7624.0,"score_ratio":1.0555555556}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7aprtn","c_root_id_B":"c7arcce","created_at_utc_A":1354576685,"created_at_utc_B":1354581916,"score_A":17,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Economics, I've noticed the people at the top of my class are all heartless, myself included.  You get to be kinda objective and remove yourself from a lot of situations emotionally and try to look at everything in terms of cost\/benefit weighing.  It helps me be more firm with my decisions.  As far as the macro stuff it just makes me realize how undereducated EVERYONE (myself included) is on the economy and makes me want to hit my head on a wall when I watch the news as people botch economic theory and principles or quote schools of economics incorrectly.  Both liberal and conservative media are very guilty of this.  However what it comes down to is what's \"right\" in economic theory often comes down to what's popular at the moment.  Keynesianism tends to pop up every time we get a recession and neoclassicalism\/austrianism seems to appear every time things start to heat up.  It also makes me realize the value of asymmetrical knowledge in everyday life and how important it is to stay quiet on certain subjects.  Generally it just makes me nihilist and egocentric.  Seems to be the trend for anyone with above a 3.7 at my school in the econ department, though.","human_ref_B":"Philosophy here. I find it pretty much makes you a prick unless you are careful with it.   Taking philosophy is kind of like taking the dark arts. Let me explain. Academic philosophy, even more than law, is quintessentially about rhetoric. It doesn't do any good on it's own, in that it is the least applied of all possible degrees. What you are good at is criticizing how people say what they say. Deployed gratuitously, it effectively and inevitably makes you a prick. Or more accurately, the gratuitous deployment of criticizing how what is said is said constitutes prickish-ness. See? I just did it to myself. That, I hope, illustrates the point - dialectically, no less, in the tradition of some of the historical foundations of the academy. And there, just then, again, the dark art: driving a point home past need, fetishistically galavanting about with unusual words and sentence structures.  But, and also like the dark arts, rhetoric is a weapon against itself. So, for the word-soups, bullshit, simplistic righteousness, equivocation, and all the dragons of worded skulduggery, the practitioner of philosophy has a fighting chance.  So, what is it like to be such a practitioner? You hold your tongue a lot. You hear arguments everywhere that are technically very bad. Oh, assertions of conclusions masquerading as premises, wild premises wrapped in fashionable language, unimaginative anticipation of only the most stupid objections, and turning one's own intelligence into a premise in it's own right!   Or, you hold your tongue because it's a friend, and for goodness sake, you know what he means. There's no need to split hairs. Swallow, man. Take a breath. Dude doesn't give a shit that you can revise the expression of dude's opinion into a more correct and compelling form.   But, sometimes the time is right. It is someone else who is using the dark art not as it should be. And then, well - then you know what to do. The dark arts is also the defence against the dark arts.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5231.0,"score_ratio":1.1176470588}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7as55q","c_root_id_B":"c7av9ri","created_at_utc_A":1354584616,"created_at_utc_B":1354594723,"score_A":9,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"as an anthropologist\/archaeologist I get annoyed trying to explain that I don't dig up dinosaurs and why archaeology is important and not just useless field. I also get so sick of people saying anthropologists don't make money or land jobs and are a societal burden haha since I make way more money than any of my other friends at my age.   Specially on websites like tumblr\/buzzfeed\/any comment section ever I find that people don't understand how racism and white privileged actually works and I just have to hold my tongue whenever someone tries to claim \"reverse racism\". Similarly on reddit it's an actual burden reading comments by people who misunderstand how sexism and misogyny works and how everyone should be a feminist. Reddit tends to lean towards the he man women hater's club some of the time and it's in my best interest to just ignore it.","human_ref_B":"Since starting my theory-heavy doctoral program in cultural anthropology, I'm not sure if *my* perceptions have changed. Instead, its like I've been given a sample case of magic eye-glasses that I can chose to put on to view different phenomena in different lights. But the opportunity to put the glasses on has become very seductive.  Do I want to watch this action movie using the \"structuralist perspective on mythology\" glasses? Yes! Do I want to try to understand the crisis in higher education that I read about in the newspaper this morning through an Althussarian critique of ideology? Of course! Do I want to attend to the ritualized and affective dimensions of every single social interaction I have? Absolutely! In what ways does 4chan constitute a counter-public?   Of course I have also encountered the problem of forgetting to take the magic glasses off. I catch myself analyzing events as I encounter them, from public to the most personal ones. So yes, at least in graduate school, things are getting weird and perhaps starting to shape the way I think.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10107.0,"score_ratio":1.1111111111}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7aturw","c_root_id_B":"c7av9ri","created_at_utc_A":1354590090,"created_at_utc_B":1354594723,"score_A":4,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Education, specifically in the secondary grades.  The more I teach (and learn), the more I realize that learning is damn complicated.  Want to teach a child how to read?  Simple, right?  Nope.  There are myriads of things that your brain is doing- sight recognition, decoding, signifying, making connections, inferences, building schema...if any one of these steps goes awry, you're going to have problems.  Don't even get me started on how difficult it is to teach good writing.  First, there's the internal debate on \"what is good writing, anyway?\" and \"how much do I want to teach them formulaic structures (which some of them need) vs. how much do I let them write their way in?\"  Then you get into issues of audience and engagement.  How do I build an authentic audience for a piece of writing that is probably not that likely to be publishable?  Then the mechanics.  There are so many ways to organize and develop a strong piece of writing, and it's incredibly difficult to try to guide students into a way that works for them.  Oh, and the grading.  Ugh.  It also makes me want to scream on a daily basis.  If there's anything people feel like they are \"expert\" on it's education, and the vast majority of people who are most vocal have either no classroom experience (to get the reality of what teaching is like), no academic experience (because duh, research matters and should inform what we do), or is incredibly biased because of their own idiosyncratic experiences or their child's equally unique experiences.","human_ref_B":"Since starting my theory-heavy doctoral program in cultural anthropology, I'm not sure if *my* perceptions have changed. Instead, its like I've been given a sample case of magic eye-glasses that I can chose to put on to view different phenomena in different lights. But the opportunity to put the glasses on has become very seductive.  Do I want to watch this action movie using the \"structuralist perspective on mythology\" glasses? Yes! Do I want to try to understand the crisis in higher education that I read about in the newspaper this morning through an Althussarian critique of ideology? Of course! Do I want to attend to the ritualized and affective dimensions of every single social interaction I have? Absolutely! In what ways does 4chan constitute a counter-public?   Of course I have also encountered the problem of forgetting to take the magic glasses off. I catch myself analyzing events as I encounter them, from public to the most personal ones. So yes, at least in graduate school, things are getting weird and perhaps starting to shape the way I think.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4633.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7av9ri","c_root_id_B":"c7asgc9","created_at_utc_A":1354594723,"created_at_utc_B":1354585641,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Since starting my theory-heavy doctoral program in cultural anthropology, I'm not sure if *my* perceptions have changed. Instead, its like I've been given a sample case of magic eye-glasses that I can chose to put on to view different phenomena in different lights. But the opportunity to put the glasses on has become very seductive.  Do I want to watch this action movie using the \"structuralist perspective on mythology\" glasses? Yes! Do I want to try to understand the crisis in higher education that I read about in the newspaper this morning through an Althussarian critique of ideology? Of course! Do I want to attend to the ritualized and affective dimensions of every single social interaction I have? Absolutely! In what ways does 4chan constitute a counter-public?   Of course I have also encountered the problem of forgetting to take the magic glasses off. I catch myself analyzing events as I encounter them, from public to the most personal ones. So yes, at least in graduate school, things are getting weird and perhaps starting to shape the way I think.","human_ref_B":"I'm not ready to say I have a \"huge amount of knowledge\" about anything... but i'll say this, the more I learn, the more I appreciate and value Liberalism (in the classical sense).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9082.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7av9ri","c_root_id_B":"c7at2ny","created_at_utc_A":1354594723,"created_at_utc_B":1354587627,"score_A":10,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Since starting my theory-heavy doctoral program in cultural anthropology, I'm not sure if *my* perceptions have changed. Instead, its like I've been given a sample case of magic eye-glasses that I can chose to put on to view different phenomena in different lights. But the opportunity to put the glasses on has become very seductive.  Do I want to watch this action movie using the \"structuralist perspective on mythology\" glasses? Yes! Do I want to try to understand the crisis in higher education that I read about in the newspaper this morning through an Althussarian critique of ideology? Of course! Do I want to attend to the ritualized and affective dimensions of every single social interaction I have? Absolutely! In what ways does 4chan constitute a counter-public?   Of course I have also encountered the problem of forgetting to take the magic glasses off. I catch myself analyzing events as I encounter them, from public to the most personal ones. So yes, at least in graduate school, things are getting weird and perhaps starting to shape the way I think.","human_ref_B":"I am a former three-time Chief of Police with a M.S. in Management and Leadership from Johns Hopkins University.  My background, if anything, has taught me that there is still so much that I do not know and that everyone has something to teach.    I also know that there are so many different factors that transpire during any given event that rushing to judgement about anything is a very dangerous thing to do.  My background has given me a very analytical mindset and a propensity to be highly detail oriented.  I also believe that most people are good people and are doing the best that they are able to do.  That is my fundamental belief about any person until they prove me wrong.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7096.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7av9ri","c_root_id_B":"c7as9km","created_at_utc_A":1354594723,"created_at_utc_B":1354585025,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Since starting my theory-heavy doctoral program in cultural anthropology, I'm not sure if *my* perceptions have changed. Instead, its like I've been given a sample case of magic eye-glasses that I can chose to put on to view different phenomena in different lights. But the opportunity to put the glasses on has become very seductive.  Do I want to watch this action movie using the \"structuralist perspective on mythology\" glasses? Yes! Do I want to try to understand the crisis in higher education that I read about in the newspaper this morning through an Althussarian critique of ideology? Of course! Do I want to attend to the ritualized and affective dimensions of every single social interaction I have? Absolutely! In what ways does 4chan constitute a counter-public?   Of course I have also encountered the problem of forgetting to take the magic glasses off. I catch myself analyzing events as I encounter them, from public to the most personal ones. So yes, at least in graduate school, things are getting weird and perhaps starting to shape the way I think.","human_ref_B":"Communications, here.  I tend to regard what I know as \"common knowledge\" and not difficult, and then get tripped up when other people don't seem to pay attention to common sense.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9698.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7at2ny","c_root_id_B":"c7asgc9","created_at_utc_A":1354587627,"created_at_utc_B":1354585641,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I am a former three-time Chief of Police with a M.S. in Management and Leadership from Johns Hopkins University.  My background, if anything, has taught me that there is still so much that I do not know and that everyone has something to teach.    I also know that there are so many different factors that transpire during any given event that rushing to judgement about anything is a very dangerous thing to do.  My background has given me a very analytical mindset and a propensity to be highly detail oriented.  I also believe that most people are good people and are doing the best that they are able to do.  That is my fundamental belief about any person until they prove me wrong.","human_ref_B":"I'm not ready to say I have a \"huge amount of knowledge\" about anything... but i'll say this, the more I learn, the more I appreciate and value Liberalism (in the classical sense).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1986.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7at2ny","c_root_id_B":"c7as9km","created_at_utc_A":1354587627,"created_at_utc_B":1354585025,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I am a former three-time Chief of Police with a M.S. in Management and Leadership from Johns Hopkins University.  My background, if anything, has taught me that there is still so much that I do not know and that everyone has something to teach.    I also know that there are so many different factors that transpire during any given event that rushing to judgement about anything is a very dangerous thing to do.  My background has given me a very analytical mindset and a propensity to be highly detail oriented.  I also believe that most people are good people and are doing the best that they are able to do.  That is my fundamental belief about any person until they prove me wrong.","human_ref_B":"Communications, here.  I tend to regard what I know as \"common knowledge\" and not difficult, and then get tripped up when other people don't seem to pay attention to common sense.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2602.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"1481kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What is it like walking around with a huge amount of knowledge in your field?  How do you feel it changes your perceptions\/thoughts compared to people who do not have a through understanding of the field? How does knowing all of the information that you know affect the way in which you view and interact with the world?  A guy who has never opened a book on psychology must view interactions between people fundamentally differently than someone who has a through understanding of the field.  The same could be said about economics, philosophy, baseball, or anything.  Tell me your field and how knowing what you knew shapes the way you think.","c_root_id_A":"c7axswv","c_root_id_B":"c7aw6x9","created_at_utc_A":1354604897,"created_at_utc_B":1354597942,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Sociology here.   I sometimes have to close Reddit and take a deep breath. ESPECIALLY when racial issues are discussed.","human_ref_B":"Listening to most people's opinions about the European Union is really frustrating. Generally speaking, half are usually in favour of it and half are usually opposed to it, but few can tell me how the EU actually operates, what it \"actually\" is, or even the history \/ purpose behind the integration project.   If I hear that either the EU is some sort of immortal fascist NWO institution *or* that its collapse is imminent, I think I might just scream.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6955.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izj25nw","c_root_id_B":"iziwjyi","created_at_utc_A":1670594387,"created_at_utc_B":1670591601,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Claring question: does typos count ? :)","human_ref_B":"Clarifying question: do I need to use quotation marks?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2786.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izj25nw","c_root_id_B":"izixy40","created_at_utc_A":1670594387,"created_at_utc_B":1670592345,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Claring question: does typos count ? :)","human_ref_B":"Excited about this, thanks!  Clarifying question","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2042.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izjorql","c_root_id_B":"iziwjyi","created_at_utc_A":1670603840,"created_at_utc_B":1670591601,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"cLarifYinG QueSTION: does case matter?","human_ref_B":"Clarifying question: do I need to use quotation marks?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12239.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izjorql","c_root_id_B":"izixy40","created_at_utc_A":1670603840,"created_at_utc_B":1670592345,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"cLarifYinG QueSTION: does case matter?","human_ref_B":"Excited about this, thanks!  Clarifying question","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11495.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izj93zi","c_root_id_B":"izjorql","created_at_utc_A":1670597487,"created_at_utc_B":1670603840,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"clarifying question: I..  forgot what I had to say, actually","human_ref_B":"cLarifYinG QueSTION: does case matter?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6353.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izjorql","c_root_id_B":"izjojy6","created_at_utc_A":1670603840,"created_at_utc_B":1670603754,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"cLarifYinG QueSTION: does case matter?","human_ref_B":"\"Clarifying question:\" If the recipe calls for clarified butter, do I need to clarify?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":86.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izk1eh4","c_root_id_B":"izixy40","created_at_utc_A":1670608570,"created_at_utc_B":1670592345,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"?ti kaerb yrekcuf edocinU erom lliw :noitseuq gniyfiralC","human_ref_B":"Excited about this, thanks!  Clarifying question","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16225.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izk1eh4","c_root_id_B":"izj93zi","created_at_utc_A":1670608570,"created_at_utc_B":1670597487,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"?ti kaerb yrekcuf edocinU erom lliw :noitseuq gniyfiralC","human_ref_B":"clarifying question: I..  forgot what I had to say, actually","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11083.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izjojy6","c_root_id_B":"izk1eh4","created_at_utc_A":1670603754,"created_at_utc_B":1670608570,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"\"Clarifying question:\" If the recipe calls for clarified butter, do I need to clarify?","human_ref_B":"?ti kaerb yrekcuf edocinU erom lliw :noitseuq gniyfiralC","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4816.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izk11za","c_root_id_B":"izk1eh4","created_at_utc_A":1670608448,"created_at_utc_B":1670608570,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"C l a r i f y i n g  q u e s t i o n : Does whitespace matter?","human_ref_B":"?ti kaerb yrekcuf edocinU erom lliw :noitseuq gniyfiralC","labels":0,"seconds_difference":122.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izk180p","c_root_id_B":"izk1eh4","created_at_utc_A":1670608506,"created_at_utc_B":1670608570,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"C\u0335\u031b\u0308\u033d\u032c\u0339l\u0335\u0305\u0350\u033f\u033c\u032d\u0317a\u0335\u0342\u033f\u0345\u0327\u0321r\u0337\u034a\u034c\u0348\u0318\u032ci\u0336\u030c\u030a\u030d\u033cf\u0335\u0360\u035b\u0326y\u0338\u031a\u0346\u0344\u031e\u0347i\u0337\u030e\u033b\u0331n\u0337\u0346\u0315\u035d\u0354\u035a\u034eg\u0337\u0308\u0321\u0320\u0319 \u0337\u035d\u030a\u0320\u0321q\u0334\u030c\u033cu\u0336\u030f\u0343\u0323e\u0337\u030a\u0316s\u0338\u034b\u035at\u0334\u0341\u0320\u032e\u0332i\u0336\u033d\u0327\u0353\u0323o\u0334\u0312\u0324\u0332\u0356n\u0337\u035d\u035c\u035c\u0333:\u0334\u0313\u0310\u0314\u034e does Unicode nonsense change things up?","human_ref_B":"?ti kaerb yrekcuf edocinU erom lliw :noitseuq gniyfiralC","labels":0,"seconds_difference":64.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izk1y3e","c_root_id_B":"izixy40","created_at_utc_A":1670608765,"created_at_utc_B":1670592345,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Clarifying What happens if there's stuff between 'clarifying' and 'question'? question:","human_ref_B":"Excited about this, thanks!  Clarifying question","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16420.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izj93zi","c_root_id_B":"izk1y3e","created_at_utc_A":1670597487,"created_at_utc_B":1670608765,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"clarifying question: I..  forgot what I had to say, actually","human_ref_B":"Clarifying What happens if there's stuff between 'clarifying' and 'question'? question:","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11278.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izjojy6","c_root_id_B":"izk1y3e","created_at_utc_A":1670603754,"created_at_utc_B":1670608765,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"\"Clarifying question:\" If the recipe calls for clarified butter, do I need to clarify?","human_ref_B":"Clarifying What happens if there's stuff between 'clarifying' and 'question'? question:","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5011.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izk1y3e","c_root_id_B":"izk11za","created_at_utc_A":1670608765,"created_at_utc_B":1670608448,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Clarifying What happens if there's stuff between 'clarifying' and 'question'? question:","human_ref_B":"C l a r i f y i n g  q u e s t i o n : Does whitespace matter?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":317.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izk1y3e","c_root_id_B":"izk180p","created_at_utc_A":1670608765,"created_at_utc_B":1670608506,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Clarifying What happens if there's stuff between 'clarifying' and 'question'? question:","human_ref_B":"C\u0335\u031b\u0308\u033d\u032c\u0339l\u0335\u0305\u0350\u033f\u033c\u032d\u0317a\u0335\u0342\u033f\u0345\u0327\u0321r\u0337\u034a\u034c\u0348\u0318\u032ci\u0336\u030c\u030a\u030d\u033cf\u0335\u0360\u035b\u0326y\u0338\u031a\u0346\u0344\u031e\u0347i\u0337\u030e\u033b\u0331n\u0337\u0346\u0315\u035d\u0354\u035a\u034eg\u0337\u0308\u0321\u0320\u0319 \u0337\u035d\u030a\u0320\u0321q\u0334\u030c\u033cu\u0336\u030f\u0343\u0323e\u0337\u030a\u0316s\u0338\u034b\u035at\u0334\u0341\u0320\u032e\u0332i\u0336\u033d\u0327\u0353\u0323o\u0334\u0312\u0324\u0332\u0356n\u0337\u035d\u035c\u035c\u0333:\u0334\u0313\u0310\u0314\u034e does Unicode nonsense change things up?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":259.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zgwum5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"If you wouldn't mind, help us test a new (?) feature. Respond to this thread and lead your comment with \"Clarifying question:\" to see if the bot removes it for not containing a link.","c_root_id_A":"izk1pbn","c_root_id_B":"izk1y3e","created_at_utc_A":1670608679,"created_at_utc_B":1670608765,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"> > **Clarifying** *question*: ~~will~~ ^Reddit formatting screw it up?","human_ref_B":"Clarifying What happens if there's stuff between 'clarifying' and 'question'? question:","labels":0,"seconds_difference":86.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"144s8q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Why do black Americans marry less often than other American ethnic groups? According to this paper (page 35), in 2000, only 32% of all black American households had married couples, as compared to Whites, Hispanics, and Asians, which all were all about 50%. Why is this? Is this something to do with black culture, or are there economic reasons?","c_root_id_A":"c7a0iv7","c_root_id_B":"c79yd8h","created_at_utc_A":1354456825,"created_at_utc_B":1354436782,"score_A":15,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"It's possible that the higher rates of Black male incarceration plays a role, though it's also hard to know for sure that the incarcerated individual would've gotten married.  Bruce Western, William Julius Wilson, Kerwin Charles and others have all written about this.  https:\/\/www.russellsage.org\/sites\/all\/files\/u4\/Western_Incarceration,%20Marriage,%20%26%20Family%20Life.pdf","human_ref_B":"Generally, poverty has a rather strong correlation to marriage instability. I can't cite the source any more, but I read that a family below the poverty line is almost three times more likely to divorce than a family making the median income. Blacks tend to have higher rates of poverty than the country as a whole so that might be it, I don't know how well the study has taken that into account.  There *were* (though I stress this could be outdated) economic reasons in the past. If you are a single mother you qualify for more assistance than if you were married (or even having a man living in the house in many cases), and in the 60s and 70s in particular this had an effect on the urban poor particularly in Northern cities. I am not trying to make a racist \"black people are lazy\" comment, but it was a result that came from some of the height of the anti-urban poverty programs of the 60s and 70s that were well intentioned but had unintended consequences. In some cases the loss of benefits outweighed the meager income of having a second parent, giving an economic reason to stay single.  I have not seen studies one way or the other on weather that continued since the 70s (since the \"extremes\" of poverty have never returned to those levels) and so on such a potentially hot button issue I must stress *this may not be a factor at all anymore*.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20043.0,"score_ratio":1.3636363636}
{"post_id":"86yd67","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"[U.S. History] Why is it that African-Americans\/Latinos seem to encounter more systemic bias vs. Asian-Americans? Presumably, Asians were brought into the US as slaves\/low wage workers, but seem to have been able to break out of that mold. I use the term \"slavery\" very loosely, i.e. work in very difficult situations without adequate compensation. However, it seems that today Asian-Americans have more positive outcomes in healthcare, education, socio-economic factors versus African-Americans and Latinos. I was wondering why that was so and how they were able to overcome those systemic biases?  I am not that well versed in US History so I may be off base on some of these facts as well.","c_root_id_A":"dw8tf2p","c_root_id_B":"dw8ytao","created_at_utc_A":1521951363,"created_at_utc_B":1521960090,"score_A":8,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"Can you please cite data backing up your claims about this? It is a very complicated subject. \u201cSeem to have been\u201d is handwavy and vague.","human_ref_B":"The effects you see of Asian-Americans having better outcomes than other people of color, and sometimes even compared to white people, is partly an artifact from how the data are aggregated. Once you disaggregate by the different ethnicities and countries of origin, you see an incredible disparity between the most and least well-off Asian-Americans. Here's an article that illustrates it well, and also enables you to compare African-American and Latino outcomes to the various Asian-American subgroups.  > Presumably, Asians were brought into the US as slaves\/low wage workers  This is not a correct assumption.  There have been many waves of immigration into the US from Asian countries. Early waves came to the US as cheap labor. Some waves were comprised mainly of refugees. There have been periods of US history where Asians were basically banned from immigrating to the US. The most recent wave is actually an influx of highly educated professionals from east Asia and India pursuing higher education or employment. US immigration law evolved over time, changing the rules and quotas for who exactly could enter the country, and as a result the population of Asian immigrants also changed in meaningful ways. A Taiwanese immigrant coming to the US for a graduate STEM fellowship or a software engineering job starts their life in the US at a very different place compared to a refugee from the Vietnam war. This is partly why the very large disparities between the outcomes in different Asian-American sub-groups exist.  This isn't the whole story--the biases against Asian-Americans are also qualitatively different than those against African-Americans and Latinos--but I hope it gives you an idea why thinking that Asian-Americans are somehow \"better\" at overcoming systemic racism is flawed.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8727.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"2v0mk2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Why don't more victims of mass murder fight back? I posted this in the AskHistorians sub and I'm hoping this doesn't violate Rule 3 about requiring speculative answers, even thought I'm not sure it's possible to have concrete examples since most of the people would be dead.  ----  While reading the story of Reinhard Heydrich's assassination and the subsequent razing of Ludice, I wondered why all of the men allowed themselves to be marched to a farm and executed against a wall while their wives and children were sent to concentration camps? I'm sure there were some that fought and were killed on the spot. Obviously the German soldiers were armed, but pictures show piles of bodies with only a handful of soldiers standing there. The same would apply for other mass executions or genocides.  I'm interested in the bigger picture view of how small groups of people, armed or not, are able to control larger groups of people. Even in current situations like Boko Haram and ISIS.  There is video and pictures of people just standing there waiting their turn, essentially.","c_root_id_A":"codsu1l","c_root_id_B":"codt6mc","created_at_utc_A":1423281957,"created_at_utc_B":1423282786,"score_A":10,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Just a reminder to all that top-level comments should be supported by citations. Thank you.","human_ref_B":"Basically? The bystander effect: no one else is fighting, so I'm not going to fight. See especially the example of Axel Casian. The example of the Razing of Ludice is probably also related to Milgram's studies of conformity: people will do what someone who seems to be an authority figure tells them, even if they belief that doing this will cause someone serious injury or even death. Relatedly, is the Asch conformity experiments: people will change their opinions based on the group of people they are with.   Edit: words are hard","labels":0,"seconds_difference":829.0,"score_ratio":2.2}
{"post_id":"amziup","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Why is long hair on women considered attractive? Why is long hair on women considered attractive?   Is it cultural, or what?","c_root_id_A":"efpxgfx","c_root_id_B":"efpvw71","created_at_utc_A":1549282385,"created_at_utc_B":1549280008,"score_A":63,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"One may attempt to answer your question with evolutionary psychology, and there is some research about, for example, lustrous hair as a sign of youthfulness and long hair as a sign of health.  However, it does beg the question of whether women with longer hair are *actually* considered more attractive than women with shorter hair. This study suggests that the effect on ratings is weak.  It is also interesting to approach the topic with a historical lens. You can find many depictions of gods and heroes, kings and aristocrats, with long hair, and the length of hair has distinguished social groups. Which would suggest to me that there is an important historico-cultural aspect to the value and meaning attached to hair's length, and (putting aside whether long hair is attractive in general) that the notion of *men* having short hair and *women* having long hair is mostly cultural.","human_ref_B":"The evolutionary explanation is that it's a sign of health - if you're in very poor physical state your hair falls out. Then you have to explain why not men, though....   edit: I just realised which group this.  I am not sure evolutionary explanations are that great, but here's a reference (their argument about men is that because so many died while out doing men-business the women couldn't be so picky).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2377.0,"score_ratio":2.52}
{"post_id":"r5zo2c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why do people often believe that American cities are dying because of crime? It is clear that crime per capita is ever lower since at least a couple decades ago. Indeed, population is higher, so crime may still seem the same on flat numbers, but it is weird that so many people believe or act as if crime is far worse than ever. Indeed, other variables may make cities unlivable, such a high cost of life, but my question is on the scope of crime.  It seems that even \"liberal\" people who claim to love cities, and supposedly do not believe crime is a big problem anymore, still prefer to move into gated communities and are glad to pay private guards, \"safer\" private schools, etc.  My hypothesis is is that most people do not socialize unless they have to, and as people adopt a more virtual lifestyle, they lose trust on others physically around, so they perceive more danger even where there is none.","c_root_id_A":"hmqsfxf","c_root_id_B":"hmr1cdy","created_at_utc_A":1638324774,"created_at_utc_B":1638328779,"score_A":13,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"I'd probably point more at the rise of  consumption of social media. Studies have shown that greater levels of media consumption in general tends to skew public perception of just how much, how often, crimes occur. That latter paper suggests that large bodies of research basically paint the picture that the media at large tends to both define social conditions as problems, and influence individual perceptions of reality. While the first study (albeit smaller) suggests that social media influences people more than traditional media as far as the frequency with which crimes occur.","human_ref_B":"Crime has technically been going up recently and the trend seems to be increasing rather than decreasing as of late. Though, it is mostly due to increases in homicides.  The fear people are experiencing, however, is probably a psychological effect that people experience when being near crime. Valdes, J., Eisenstein, J., & De Choudhury, M. (2015) show that twitter users in proximity of crimes express more negative opinions than those who live in postal codes with less crime.  Other studies like Hinkle, J. C., & Weisburd, D. (2008) show that civil disorder causes people to feel unsafe and withdraw from their communities. It also states that this withdrawal can further increase crime as social cohesion dissipates.  Braga & Bond, 2008 show that you can decrease crime by decreasing disorder, specifically in the context that you clean up the neighborhood visually. Basically showing that good visual appearances promote social cohesion. While visually unappealing neighborhoods promote civil disorder.  Now, couple these psychological concepts with year long media coverage of riots and lootings, and I think you basically have a recipe for a very pessimistic America.   As people, psychologically speaking, don't like seeing or being exposed to violence, crime, or disorder. And the mere consumption of news media is significantly correlated with an increased fear of crime.  Also, I'm not a Social Scientist in anyway, so feel free to shoot down my research into this topic.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4005.0,"score_ratio":1.2307692308}
{"post_id":"29xrqs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"In a multiracial society, is it possible to measure how much whites and blacks mingle with each other in terms of things like friendship, dating, marriage etc? Could this be an indicator of how much progress the society has made in terms of fighting racism and attaining racial harmony?","c_root_id_A":"cipn4qd","c_root_id_B":"cipmqnq","created_at_utc_A":1404623278,"created_at_utc_B":1404622062,"score_A":12,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"There are definitely statistics and studies on mixed-race marriages. Here is a U.S. example and here is a Canadian one.  I don't know much about data for friendship and dating, so I'll leave those issues for others.  I did have a conversation once with the CEO of one of the world's largest dating websites, and he said his site had all sorts of data about dating patterns. I am sure that data would be insightful about mixed-race dating. The information, however, is proprietary and he did not sound keen on allowing access to his data set for academic study.","human_ref_B":"Schelling's *Micromotives and Macrobehavior* has a chapter discussing this (mostly going in the opposite direction -- racial segregation along marriage\/friendship\/locational lines).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1216.0,"score_ratio":1.7142857143}
{"post_id":"1a8i8t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"So Cardinal Bergoglio, the new Pope, is the first Jesuit Pope of all time... What is the significance of it?  How\/why would this be a 'big deal' in our times? And\/or how would this have been a big deal - let's say - 100 years ago? Also, are the Catholics afraid of Jesuits? Why have they never had a Jesuit Pope until now?    http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Jorge_Bergoglio","c_root_id_A":"c8v1kzm","c_root_id_B":"c8v9ne8","created_at_utc_A":1363205543,"created_at_utc_B":1363229621,"score_A":3,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"This is also a mystery to me.  So I'm posting just to come back to see an answer. The Jesuits have been quasi-independent for a long time, so I wonder what this means,    It's also weird to pick the name Francis when he is a Jesuit and not a Franciscan.  But what do I know?  (Not much)","human_ref_B":"Raised Catholic and studied religion a bit but not an expert.  The Jesuits are the most progressive order of the Catholic church. They run basically all Catholic schools. Some Catholics may fear that this may lead to a more liberal church. However from what what I understand, the new Pope's belief are close to Benedict's so don't expect any drastic changes.   Pope Francis has a Master's Degree in Chemistry which is in line with him being a Jesuit. (From personal experience with Jesuit priests vs non\u2013Jesuit priests\u2013>) Jesuit priests tend to be more thoughtful and more open about questioning their faith. This doesn't mean that they doubt their faith just that they are more willing to test it. They are the academics of the church.   As a side note, The Franciscan order follows the teachings of St. Francis of Assisi. Basically they try to follow a simplistic and spiritual life style. They do a lot of missionary work and follow a stick vow of poverty (renouncing personal and communal possessions).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24078.0,"score_ratio":9.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1a8i8t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"So Cardinal Bergoglio, the new Pope, is the first Jesuit Pope of all time... What is the significance of it?  How\/why would this be a 'big deal' in our times? And\/or how would this have been a big deal - let's say - 100 years ago? Also, are the Catholics afraid of Jesuits? Why have they never had a Jesuit Pope until now?    http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Jorge_Bergoglio","c_root_id_A":"c8va4ci","c_root_id_B":"c8v1kzm","created_at_utc_A":1363231100,"created_at_utc_B":1363205543,"score_A":25,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It's very difficult to lump the Jesuits together into one category. I know that a lot of jesuits are liberal, theologically speaking. But others could be very conservative. This is probably because the jesuit formation favors individual freedom. They give their novitiates freedom to pursue anything they're good at--at least this is what I know--no matter whether it is science, theology, pastoral ministry, etc. That's why their specialization can be very unique, each can have very different way of thinking and charisma.  Historically, the Jesuits were quite influencial in Vatican II. Karl Rahner, Henri de Lubac, and Hans Urs von Balthasar, for instance. Karl Rahner was a Jesuit theologian who pretty much can be said to be the Einsten of theology of the 20th century. he was ahead of his time; and his thinking, we could say, was so 'revisionist' that some labeled him a heretic. Nevertheless his contribution to theology was a lot. He was one of the leading man of the way of thinking of the Vatican II and coined the term 'Anonymous Christian', a term for basically how a non-christian can be under grace and is actually a 'christian' without knowing it. But even he was on a head-on clash with Balthasar. So we had two high-caliber Jesuit theologians with opposing views on theology, just to give an idea of how divergent they could be.  If there is anything they can be categorized under, it's their spirituality. i'm talking about their Ignatian spirituality. Their brand motto is Ad maiorem dei gloriam: For God's greater glory. This means anything, really anything, can be a field where they can 'work'. That's why you see them undertaking astronomy, for instance. This also means that anything can be used for God. You can say perhaps even a pragmatic. That's why their field of work is very vast: missionary, education, sciences, pastoral...  If you look at his coat of arms, there is the monogram IHS, a frequently used symbol of the jesuits. And with the color blue and a star, I'd expect he is quite Marian in devotion, much like John Paul II. What this all means since he is a jesuit, perhaps, doesnt matter, because they can be very diverse. But his Marian color indicates that he has piety as his foundation. He won't compromise with the teachings of the Church, for instance. Well that's all I could think of now that the new pope is a Jesuit.  There's a CNN article on the same topic by Fr. James Martin, also a Jesuit.  EDIT: Added the link","human_ref_B":"This is also a mystery to me.  So I'm posting just to come back to see an answer. The Jesuits have been quasi-independent for a long time, so I wonder what this means,    It's also weird to pick the name Francis when he is a Jesuit and not a Franciscan.  But what do I know?  (Not much)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25557.0,"score_ratio":8.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1guo3e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"How much has U.S. drug control spending increased since the 70's as a percentage of GDP? http:\/\/i.imgur.com\/FZpbb.gif I saw this GIF and thought that it could be a little misleading when considering the inflation that also occurred during this time.","c_root_id_A":"cao38pb","c_root_id_B":"cao3mdw","created_at_utc_A":1371919784,"created_at_utc_B":1371921143,"score_A":3,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I really would like this to be answered considering that both sides don't include context\/ helpful facts.","human_ref_B":"From 1981 to 2002, nominal expenditure goes from about 1.8 to 18.4 billion if you guess the values from the chart here: http:\/\/www.icsdp.org\/Libraries\/doc1\/Tools_for_Debate_-_US_Federal_Government_Data_on_Cannabis_Prohibition.sflb.ashx  This is the original source linked for your graph. I could not find a table anywhere, so i guessed the numbers by running my finger from the bars to the vertical axis on my computer screen.  Then I got GDP ~~and 2005 chained-dollar GDP~~ from here http:\/\/www.bea.gov\/national\/ (EDIT: did not use constant dollar GDP)  No easy way to post a graph.   Nominally, drug control spending increased roughly from 1.8 to 18.4 from 1981 to 2002 = about 10X, whereas as a percentage of GDP it increased only about 3X.  A=Year  B=drug control spending (guessed) (billions)  C=nominal gdp (billions)  D=drug control spending index ($\/1,000 nominal gdp, I think)       A       B       C           D     1981\t1.80\t3,126.8\t 0.58      1982\t1.90\t3,253.2\t 0.58      1983\t2.00\t3,534.6\t 0.57      1984\t2.60\t3,930.9\t 0.66      1985\t2.90\t4,217.5\t 0.69      1986\t3.00\t4,460.1\t 0.67      1987\t5.00\t4,736.4\t 1.06      1988\t4.80\t5,100.4\t 0.94      1989\t6.60\t5,482.1\t 1.20      1990\t10.0\t5,800.5\t 1.72      1991\t11.0\t5,992.1\t 1.84      1992\t12.0\t6,342.3\t 1.89      1993\t12.4\t6,667.4\t 1.86      1994\t12.5\t7,085.2\t 1.76      1995\t13.1\t7,414.7\t 1.77      1996\t13.8\t7,838.5\t 1.76      1997\t14.3\t8,332.4\t 1.72      1998\t16.0\t8,793.5\t 1.82      1999\t17.9\t9,353.5\t 1.91      2000\t18.0\t9,951.5\t 1.81      2001\t18.1\t10,286.2\t 1.76      2002\t18.4\t10,642.3\t 1.73   No science was required to construct this post.   EDIT: it's interesting to note that virtually all of the increase in this period occurred from 1986 to 1990.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1359.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1449mc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Why are workers paid an hourly wage instead of a portion of the value they add to the product?  The question comes to me as a philosophy degree holding line cook.  I watch the raw beef turn into a delicious hamburger, and yet I am compensated for my time rather than the work I put into the food.  I can think of a few bumps in the road, but no real reason why not, besides the fact that businesses profit more by treating labor as a commodity.  One of the minor problems would be figuring out how much work each employee did.  But this would be simple enough considering our ticket system for tracking orders.  You were at work from x to y and did z number of tickets totaling this much profit, and at your pay scale you get so much percentage of the profit.","c_root_id_A":"c79sf5s","c_root_id_B":"c79ssbw","created_at_utc_A":1354406287,"created_at_utc_B":1354407871,"score_A":5,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"for the most part, people don't want the risk of profit sharing.  when you profit share, all sorts of things could go wrong.  you might make amazing burgers, but the cashier guys could insult customers, or the marketing guys make shitty commercials, and the result is that you end up not making any money.  plus there is the free riding problem. in any large enterprise, your contribution to the total profit is going to be tiny no matter how hard you work, so the incentive is to slack off, but if everyone does that, you all suffer, classic prisoner's dilemma\/commons problem.","human_ref_B":"Well there's benefits to both parties from the hourly rate...  Let's make some assumptions, say you work from 10am to midnight with a 2hr break between lunch and dinner services, if you were being paid $15\/hour and, on average, sent out 15 burgers per hour. The amount from one days work is enough to keep you happy.  Now if you were paid $1 per burger you sent out, it should equate to the same wage. But, what if you were to have a busy lunch service and over the service you sent out 30 burgers for each hour. You have earnt enough during the lunch service so, apart from keeping your job, there isn't a reason for you to come back after your break, and the dinner service won't have somebody to send out burgers. (This is a massive simplification, if you hadn't guessed)  Now on the flip side, you come into work to find that a big news story has broken that says that burgers give people cancer, of the arse. This means that instead of customers ordering burgers, they are just having salads. For the rest of the week you average sending 1 burger an hour, which doesn't allow you to afford your basic needs, however the business is saving $14 an hour on their burger making labour costs  by paying you an hourly rate, you are able to make a prediction of what money is coming in, your wage is not affected by seasonal variances (if you lived in a tourist area) the business is able to forecast their outgoings and staffing levels more accurately.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1584.0,"score_ratio":3.4}
{"post_id":"1449mc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Why are workers paid an hourly wage instead of a portion of the value they add to the product?  The question comes to me as a philosophy degree holding line cook.  I watch the raw beef turn into a delicious hamburger, and yet I am compensated for my time rather than the work I put into the food.  I can think of a few bumps in the road, but no real reason why not, besides the fact that businesses profit more by treating labor as a commodity.  One of the minor problems would be figuring out how much work each employee did.  But this would be simple enough considering our ticket system for tracking orders.  You were at work from x to y and did z number of tickets totaling this much profit, and at your pay scale you get so much percentage of the profit.","c_root_id_A":"c79sf5s","c_root_id_B":"c7a15ze","created_at_utc_A":1354406287,"created_at_utc_B":1354461340,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"for the most part, people don't want the risk of profit sharing.  when you profit share, all sorts of things could go wrong.  you might make amazing burgers, but the cashier guys could insult customers, or the marketing guys make shitty commercials, and the result is that you end up not making any money.  plus there is the free riding problem. in any large enterprise, your contribution to the total profit is going to be tiny no matter how hard you work, so the incentive is to slack off, but if everyone does that, you all suffer, classic prisoner's dilemma\/commons problem.","human_ref_B":"This article, originally posted at \/r\/communism will help. It explains Marx's labour theory of value, which is exactly what you are describing here.  If you have any other questions regarding this, don't hesitate to follow up.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":55053.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"1449mc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Why are workers paid an hourly wage instead of a portion of the value they add to the product?  The question comes to me as a philosophy degree holding line cook.  I watch the raw beef turn into a delicious hamburger, and yet I am compensated for my time rather than the work I put into the food.  I can think of a few bumps in the road, but no real reason why not, besides the fact that businesses profit more by treating labor as a commodity.  One of the minor problems would be figuring out how much work each employee did.  But this would be simple enough considering our ticket system for tracking orders.  You were at work from x to y and did z number of tickets totaling this much profit, and at your pay scale you get so much percentage of the profit.","c_root_id_A":"c79tgyk","c_root_id_B":"c7a15ze","created_at_utc_A":1354411008,"created_at_utc_B":1354461340,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Completely impossible to quantify.   Not everyone adds value to the end product. Consider an in-house marketer, the IT department, or the legal department. How should you compensate people with intangible workproduct?","human_ref_B":"This article, originally posted at \/r\/communism will help. It explains Marx's labour theory of value, which is exactly what you are describing here.  If you have any other questions regarding this, don't hesitate to follow up.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":50332.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1449mc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Why are workers paid an hourly wage instead of a portion of the value they add to the product?  The question comes to me as a philosophy degree holding line cook.  I watch the raw beef turn into a delicious hamburger, and yet I am compensated for my time rather than the work I put into the food.  I can think of a few bumps in the road, but no real reason why not, besides the fact that businesses profit more by treating labor as a commodity.  One of the minor problems would be figuring out how much work each employee did.  But this would be simple enough considering our ticket system for tracking orders.  You were at work from x to y and did z number of tickets totaling this much profit, and at your pay scale you get so much percentage of the profit.","c_root_id_A":"c7a15ze","c_root_id_B":"c79uk5r","created_at_utc_A":1354461340,"created_at_utc_B":1354416186,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This article, originally posted at \/r\/communism will help. It explains Marx's labour theory of value, which is exactly what you are describing here.  If you have any other questions regarding this, don't hesitate to follow up.","human_ref_B":"Because this scheme transfers business risks to you that you have no control over.  What if there was no profit?  Would you be satisfied with no earnings?  Most people don't want entrepreneurial risk, they want security and predictability.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":45154.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1449mc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Why are workers paid an hourly wage instead of a portion of the value they add to the product?  The question comes to me as a philosophy degree holding line cook.  I watch the raw beef turn into a delicious hamburger, and yet I am compensated for my time rather than the work I put into the food.  I can think of a few bumps in the road, but no real reason why not, besides the fact that businesses profit more by treating labor as a commodity.  One of the minor problems would be figuring out how much work each employee did.  But this would be simple enough considering our ticket system for tracking orders.  You were at work from x to y and did z number of tickets totaling this much profit, and at your pay scale you get so much percentage of the profit.","c_root_id_A":"c7a15ze","c_root_id_B":"c79u1h2","created_at_utc_A":1354461340,"created_at_utc_B":1354413712,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This article, originally posted at \/r\/communism will help. It explains Marx's labour theory of value, which is exactly what you are describing here.  If you have any other questions regarding this, don't hesitate to follow up.","human_ref_B":"The problem is that corporations are afraid of empowering employees.  And\/OR going against the norm.  The fact is that once you do empower employees amazing things happen, like making shit loads of money.  And that's where the problem starts.....making shit loads of money.  Fact - Howard Schultz the previous CEO of Starbucks was the first CEO of a non publicly traded company to meet the president of the US.  Clinton was interested in what he was doing and how he was doing it.  When Starbucks first started out they made more employee millionaires in 5 years of going public than any other company in history.  You could work 20 hours back in 1995 and get stock and health care.  Part time employees were treated like full time employees and share holders of the corporation.  If you take a look at the performance of the Starbucks stock over time, the first 5 years they kicked ass.  Take a [look]http:\/\/finance.yahoo.com\/q\/hp?s=SBUX&d=11&e=2&f=2012&g=d&a=5&b=26&c=1992&z=66&y=5082  The thing that sucks is that Schultz sold out to investors (who wanted the shit load of money) and gave up the fight for the people that made the company.  Schultz actually returned to get the company back on track and it was said that he cried when visiting a Starbucks for the first time since his departure.  It's been done and with great success, the problem is that people sell out because money hungry fuck faces don't believe in taking care of the people that are making them money.  source: http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Pour-Your-Heart-Into-Starbucks\/dp\/0786883561\/ref=la_B000APBK72_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1354413280&sr=1-1","labels":1,"seconds_difference":47628.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1449mc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Why are workers paid an hourly wage instead of a portion of the value they add to the product?  The question comes to me as a philosophy degree holding line cook.  I watch the raw beef turn into a delicious hamburger, and yet I am compensated for my time rather than the work I put into the food.  I can think of a few bumps in the road, but no real reason why not, besides the fact that businesses profit more by treating labor as a commodity.  One of the minor problems would be figuring out how much work each employee did.  But this would be simple enough considering our ticket system for tracking orders.  You were at work from x to y and did z number of tickets totaling this much profit, and at your pay scale you get so much percentage of the profit.","c_root_id_A":"c79uk5r","c_root_id_B":"c79tgyk","created_at_utc_A":1354416186,"created_at_utc_B":1354411008,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Because this scheme transfers business risks to you that you have no control over.  What if there was no profit?  Would you be satisfied with no earnings?  Most people don't want entrepreneurial risk, they want security and predictability.","human_ref_B":"Completely impossible to quantify.   Not everyone adds value to the end product. Consider an in-house marketer, the IT department, or the legal department. How should you compensate people with intangible workproduct?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5178.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1449mc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Why are workers paid an hourly wage instead of a portion of the value they add to the product?  The question comes to me as a philosophy degree holding line cook.  I watch the raw beef turn into a delicious hamburger, and yet I am compensated for my time rather than the work I put into the food.  I can think of a few bumps in the road, but no real reason why not, besides the fact that businesses profit more by treating labor as a commodity.  One of the minor problems would be figuring out how much work each employee did.  But this would be simple enough considering our ticket system for tracking orders.  You were at work from x to y and did z number of tickets totaling this much profit, and at your pay scale you get so much percentage of the profit.","c_root_id_A":"c79u1h2","c_root_id_B":"c79uk5r","created_at_utc_A":1354413712,"created_at_utc_B":1354416186,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The problem is that corporations are afraid of empowering employees.  And\/OR going against the norm.  The fact is that once you do empower employees amazing things happen, like making shit loads of money.  And that's where the problem starts.....making shit loads of money.  Fact - Howard Schultz the previous CEO of Starbucks was the first CEO of a non publicly traded company to meet the president of the US.  Clinton was interested in what he was doing and how he was doing it.  When Starbucks first started out they made more employee millionaires in 5 years of going public than any other company in history.  You could work 20 hours back in 1995 and get stock and health care.  Part time employees were treated like full time employees and share holders of the corporation.  If you take a look at the performance of the Starbucks stock over time, the first 5 years they kicked ass.  Take a [look]http:\/\/finance.yahoo.com\/q\/hp?s=SBUX&d=11&e=2&f=2012&g=d&a=5&b=26&c=1992&z=66&y=5082  The thing that sucks is that Schultz sold out to investors (who wanted the shit load of money) and gave up the fight for the people that made the company.  Schultz actually returned to get the company back on track and it was said that he cried when visiting a Starbucks for the first time since his departure.  It's been done and with great success, the problem is that people sell out because money hungry fuck faces don't believe in taking care of the people that are making them money.  source: http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Pour-Your-Heart-Into-Starbucks\/dp\/0786883561\/ref=la_B000APBK72_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1354413280&sr=1-1","human_ref_B":"Because this scheme transfers business risks to you that you have no control over.  What if there was no profit?  Would you be satisfied with no earnings?  Most people don't want entrepreneurial risk, they want security and predictability.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2474.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"n2miq3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Who are the people who originally create fake news about vaccines and other health questions? Do they believe what they say? Or do they have ulterior motives? Are they social darwinists?","c_root_id_A":"gwl16jk","c_root_id_B":"gwk8m2b","created_at_utc_A":1619901877,"created_at_utc_B":1619889433,"score_A":49,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I suspect you're talking about covid vaccine disinformation, but I think looking at Andrew Wakefield is a good case study. He is, essentially, the man who revived the anti-vax movement in the United States and is the person to blame for the \"vaccines cause autism\" conspiracy you'll hear thrown around in many circles.   This article by Brian Deer for the British Medical Journal goes into more detail, but essentially -- Wakefield was a physician who forged results in several studies for financial gain. He first \"found\" a link between the MMR (Measles, Mumps, and Rubella) vaccine and Crohn's disease and claimed that people shouldn't get the combined vaccine. Coincidentally, months earlier he had patented a new measles-only vaccine.  He then published a highly controversial and, unfortunately, influential paper in 1998 that claimed the MMR vaccine was linked to autism. This is where your Jenny McCarthy's et al get this information. It has since been found that not only did Wakefield forge data in the study to make it seem like the MMR vaccine led to autism in children, but the entire time he was conducting the study at the behest of a lawyer who was attempting to sue vaccine manufacturers and was looking for a scientific standing to do so. Over two years, Wakefield made almost \u00a3500,000 to conduct this research.  So, to answer your question, while I cannot say whether or not Wakefield truly believed in his heart of heart's that what he was doing was right, what *is* clear is there is plenty of money to be made in deceiving the public and preying on the fears of grieving or scared parents.","human_ref_B":"The Internet Research Agency in Russia is a good place to start. This piece talks about influence in Africa but their influence is more widespread too: https:\/\/cyber.fsi.stanford.edu\/io\/news\/prigozhin-africa  Here\u2019s a statement from the US Treasury: https:\/\/home.treasury.gov\/news\/press-releases\/sm787  The company and the individual at the helm have been reported by other news outlets such at NYT.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12444.0,"score_ratio":4.0833333333}
{"post_id":"n2miq3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Who are the people who originally create fake news about vaccines and other health questions? Do they believe what they say? Or do they have ulterior motives? Are they social darwinists?","c_root_id_A":"gwk8m2b","c_root_id_B":"gwl6on4","created_at_utc_A":1619889433,"created_at_utc_B":1619904132,"score_A":12,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"The Internet Research Agency in Russia is a good place to start. This piece talks about influence in Africa but their influence is more widespread too: https:\/\/cyber.fsi.stanford.edu\/io\/news\/prigozhin-africa  Here\u2019s a statement from the US Treasury: https:\/\/home.treasury.gov\/news\/press-releases\/sm787  The company and the individual at the helm have been reported by other news outlets such at NYT.","human_ref_B":"There are entire professions for making pseudoscientific propaganda. I imagine it's a mix of people who really believe it and people who just do it as a job.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14699.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"8knok4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why do major cities in the US tend to be more liberal and rural areas tend to be more conservative? Is this the same in other countries as well? Every election map we see that rural and some suburban areas will always vote republican, whereas urban areas and cities always vote democrat, why is this? Why do both areas have such different political beliefs?","c_root_id_A":"dz9dxxx","c_root_id_B":"dz9bwhv","created_at_utc_A":1526774635,"created_at_utc_B":1526772128,"score_A":40,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"Probably not the best source, but it\u2019s a source: https:\/\/www.usnews.com\/news\/articles\/2016-12-08\/in-americas-rural-urban-divide-age-earnings-and-education-are-prominent  There are a ton of demographic variables related to living in the city compared to more rural areas. People are more educated (which is related to being more liberal). People are more diverse (which again is related to being more liberal). People are younger (which again is related to being more liberal). The hang up is income, you\u2019d think that wealthier people would be more conservative for tax breaks, but rural people seem to still favor fiscal conservatism in spite of their own financial standing.","human_ref_B":"re: other countries, the urban-rural divide is present in most of Europe but (from what I can tell) not as extreme as the US (where all of the 25 largest cities voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016 regardless of region).  https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/worldviews\/wp\/2016\/11\/27\/the-urban-rural-divide-isnt-just-evident-in-american-politics-its-prevalent-in-europe-too\/?utm_term=.f8151a46981c","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2507.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"jlwprn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What statistical mistakes were made in the 2016 election? From a strictly positive approach, how did they get the 2016 election predictions so wrong?","c_root_id_A":"gas6mc3","c_root_id_B":"garkdjd","created_at_utc_A":1604228785,"created_at_utc_B":1604206757,"score_A":51,"score_B":44,"human_ref_A":"I'll start with contending the claim that \"they\" got the election predictions \"so wrong\".  In my opinion, there was one top quality poll-analysis source in that election - 538 - and they had Trump at ~30%.  Getting a result you've predicted at 30% likelihood isn't \"so wrong\".  The NYT upshot model was (IMO) of only slightly lower quality and still predicted 15% chance of Trump.  Not \"so wrong\" either.  538 has an analysis of what went wrong, with links to many other aggregators.  There were two major factors:  1. Bad poll aggregation by some aggregators, with the major factor being not dealing with correlated polling errors pulling several states in the same direction. 2. Polls were systematically off.  This is not atypical^(1), and the errors are about average for the last 50 years.  They were smaller than in 2012.  ## Bad poll aggregation  For poll aggregation, the big one is not dealing with covariance between different states; that led to most of the ridiculously off estimates.  538 had the estimate of Trump winning within a typical polling error, a typical polling error happened, and Trump won.  So IMO they've not been wrong.  NYT upshot was (as far as I can tell, because I can't find full details on their model) missing a fair number of factors leading to extra variance.   In particular, they were not weighting co-variance for states as much as 538, and they were not (as far as I can tell) correcting the poll for either bias (leaning towards D or R) or for historical accuracy for that pollster.  The Princeton Election Consortium were also missing the co-variance of state groups - underestimating it by a factor of 5, they say, though it's unclear how they would even model co-variance given how they do their calculations.  Their new model seems to only have the idea of all-state co-variance rather than state groups\/demographics.  The Huffpost model used a modified average, with no look to co-varying poll errors.  It showed >98% in favor of Hillary Clinton.  Same with RealClearPolitics.   ## Polling errors and demographics  Let me explain a bit about polling and polling errors and how education comes into it.  Polling consists of selecting a panel of people to be contacted, contacting them, getting responses, and interpreting those responses.  If there was a way to select a 100% representative (or random) subset to be polled and a way to either get 100% response rate or make who responded\/not responded random, we'd have a reasonably easy task of just doing some stats on some samples.  Alas, we don't.  It's slightly difficult to select an actually random set of people to try to contact, and it is impossible to get non-respondents to be random.  They're always a biased sample that's different from responders.  And this is a big effect - response rates are less than 10%.  Pollsters compensate for this by using the census.  They add in questions to their poll that match census dimensions, and use that to scale the responses.  If the census says that for the area they're polling they should have 18% whites and they got 30%, they'll scale that down.  If they should have 56% married and they have 40%, they scale that up.  Etc.  This compensates for the difference in response rates.  The census has a lot of questions, so pollsters can't put all of those questions in the poll - it would be so annoying to answer that they'd get even lower and more biased response rates, negating the benefit.   One question many of them *didn't* put on their 2016 polls was education level.  It unfortunately turned out that education level influenced both response rate and voting direction, so omitting it gave a systematic error.  This has been changed by many pollsters in 2020.  EDIT: Replaced \"Polling errors and politics\" with \"Polling errors and demographics\", which was what I had originally intended to write.  Also fixed a couple of typos.  ^(1): Jennings, W., & Wlezien, C. (2018). Election polling errors across time and space. Nature Human Behaviour, 2(4), 276-283. PDF","human_ref_B":"Pollsters didn't account for the fact that Trump really appeals to less educated peoples.  Also, some groups didn't all get it *as* wrong as people say. For example, FiveThirtyEight predicted that Trump had a 30% chance of victory. This means that they predicted a Clinton win, but they still thought Trump had a good chance. Models don't usually predict outcomes with 100% certainty.  Here is a short, accessible YouTube video that explains this pretty well: https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=TambSayfCOE  People often claim that the issue stems from people lying about supporting Trump, but this doesn't seem to be main cause (Idk how I am supposed to format this, but citation for automod: https:\/\/academic.oup.com\/poq\/article\/82\/1\/1\/4837043)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22028.0,"score_ratio":1.1590909091}
{"post_id":"jlwprn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What statistical mistakes were made in the 2016 election? From a strictly positive approach, how did they get the 2016 election predictions so wrong?","c_root_id_A":"gas6mc3","c_root_id_B":"garwxya","created_at_utc_A":1604228785,"created_at_utc_B":1604220242,"score_A":51,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I'll start with contending the claim that \"they\" got the election predictions \"so wrong\".  In my opinion, there was one top quality poll-analysis source in that election - 538 - and they had Trump at ~30%.  Getting a result you've predicted at 30% likelihood isn't \"so wrong\".  The NYT upshot model was (IMO) of only slightly lower quality and still predicted 15% chance of Trump.  Not \"so wrong\" either.  538 has an analysis of what went wrong, with links to many other aggregators.  There were two major factors:  1. Bad poll aggregation by some aggregators, with the major factor being not dealing with correlated polling errors pulling several states in the same direction. 2. Polls were systematically off.  This is not atypical^(1), and the errors are about average for the last 50 years.  They were smaller than in 2012.  ## Bad poll aggregation  For poll aggregation, the big one is not dealing with covariance between different states; that led to most of the ridiculously off estimates.  538 had the estimate of Trump winning within a typical polling error, a typical polling error happened, and Trump won.  So IMO they've not been wrong.  NYT upshot was (as far as I can tell, because I can't find full details on their model) missing a fair number of factors leading to extra variance.   In particular, they were not weighting co-variance for states as much as 538, and they were not (as far as I can tell) correcting the poll for either bias (leaning towards D or R) or for historical accuracy for that pollster.  The Princeton Election Consortium were also missing the co-variance of state groups - underestimating it by a factor of 5, they say, though it's unclear how they would even model co-variance given how they do their calculations.  Their new model seems to only have the idea of all-state co-variance rather than state groups\/demographics.  The Huffpost model used a modified average, with no look to co-varying poll errors.  It showed >98% in favor of Hillary Clinton.  Same with RealClearPolitics.   ## Polling errors and demographics  Let me explain a bit about polling and polling errors and how education comes into it.  Polling consists of selecting a panel of people to be contacted, contacting them, getting responses, and interpreting those responses.  If there was a way to select a 100% representative (or random) subset to be polled and a way to either get 100% response rate or make who responded\/not responded random, we'd have a reasonably easy task of just doing some stats on some samples.  Alas, we don't.  It's slightly difficult to select an actually random set of people to try to contact, and it is impossible to get non-respondents to be random.  They're always a biased sample that's different from responders.  And this is a big effect - response rates are less than 10%.  Pollsters compensate for this by using the census.  They add in questions to their poll that match census dimensions, and use that to scale the responses.  If the census says that for the area they're polling they should have 18% whites and they got 30%, they'll scale that down.  If they should have 56% married and they have 40%, they scale that up.  Etc.  This compensates for the difference in response rates.  The census has a lot of questions, so pollsters can't put all of those questions in the poll - it would be so annoying to answer that they'd get even lower and more biased response rates, negating the benefit.   One question many of them *didn't* put on their 2016 polls was education level.  It unfortunately turned out that education level influenced both response rate and voting direction, so omitting it gave a systematic error.  This has been changed by many pollsters in 2020.  EDIT: Replaced \"Polling errors and politics\" with \"Polling errors and demographics\", which was what I had originally intended to write.  Also fixed a couple of typos.  ^(1): Jennings, W., & Wlezien, C. (2018). Election polling errors across time and space. Nature Human Behaviour, 2(4), 276-283. PDF","human_ref_B":"Ezra Klein just had Nate Silver (founder of FiveThirtyEight, the statistical analysis polling gods) on his podcast, and they discussed exactly that.  https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/episode\/4KRRk0hR6QengH1HsXyAi4?si=EPwbUoesR0GfFe059L_SzA  It\u2019s an hour long podcast, so there more nuance than my overarching takeaways, but basically:  1. people in 2016 poorly predicted the behavior of undecided voters.  2. They failed to correct for the sampling bias.  Old white lady with a college degree is much more likely to answer a phone poll than a young Hispanic man.   3.  Reduced sample size in certain states.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8543.0,"score_ratio":4.25}
{"post_id":"3bcpfk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"How did smoking go from being socially accepted to so socially stigmatized in a little over a decade? I'm honestly dumbfounded by this. And just for the sake of the question, let's limit this to Canada and parts of the United States.  In the 90s, it was normal to smoke in the office here, by the late 90s\/early 2000s, if you went to a hospitality object, the assumption was that you would smell smoke. People did look down upon smokers, but not like today.   How is it that in around a decade (and a decade when it was known it was unhealthy for you for 40 years) to now, it has managed to grab so much negative energy? What contributed to this? Have any studies been done on this?  Disclaimer: I'm saying limit this to Canada and parts of the USA because when I travel to my homecountry and other parts of Europe, smoking is about as normal as having a beer at lunch.","c_root_id_A":"csledm8","c_root_id_B":"csl7w5b","created_at_utc_A":1435500415,"created_at_utc_B":1435473219,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You might want to take a look at \"Learning to smoke\" by Jason Hughes. It's an analysis of the history of smoking from its beginnings to the present which also takes a look at your question in this broader framework. (It's award winning and published by one of the best publishers for the social sciences).  Here is the abstract:  > Why do people smoke? Taking a unique approach to this question, Jason Hughes moves beyond the usual focus on biological addiction to demonstrate how sociocultural and personal understandings of smoking crucially affect the way people experience it. Hughes begins by tracing the transformations of tobacco and its use over time, from its role as a hallucinogen in Native American shamanistic ritual to its use as a prophylactic against the plague and a cure for cancer by early Europeans, and finally to the current view of smoking as a global pandemic. He then analyzes tobacco from the perspective of the individual user, exploring how its consumption relates to issues of identity and life changes. Comparing sociocultural and personal experiences, Hughes ultimately asks what the patterns of tobacco use mean for the clinical treatment of smokers and for public policy on smoking. Pointing the way, then, to a more learned and sophisticated understanding of tobacco use, this study should prove to be valuable reading for anyone interested in the history of smoking and the sociology of addiction.  Full citation: Hughes, J. (2003). Learning to smoke: Tobacco use in the west. University of Chicago Press.","human_ref_B":"Are you talking about laws or voluntary smoking disallowing in non-smoking venues? Or people's behavior elsewhere?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":27196.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"3bcpfk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"How did smoking go from being socially accepted to so socially stigmatized in a little over a decade? I'm honestly dumbfounded by this. And just for the sake of the question, let's limit this to Canada and parts of the United States.  In the 90s, it was normal to smoke in the office here, by the late 90s\/early 2000s, if you went to a hospitality object, the assumption was that you would smell smoke. People did look down upon smokers, but not like today.   How is it that in around a decade (and a decade when it was known it was unhealthy for you for 40 years) to now, it has managed to grab so much negative energy? What contributed to this? Have any studies been done on this?  Disclaimer: I'm saying limit this to Canada and parts of the USA because when I travel to my homecountry and other parts of Europe, smoking is about as normal as having a beer at lunch.","c_root_id_A":"cslh5mv","c_root_id_B":"csl7w5b","created_at_utc_A":1435507180,"created_at_utc_B":1435473219,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It is probably worth noting that doctors and government officials had problems with tobacco almost as soon as it was introduced. Many its negative effects were immediately apparent, but it was also incredibly profitable. The English colonies were struggling to justify their existence, so despite how bad it was, there were extensive efforts to sell it. The result was a massive and wealthy agricultural complex.  I know your primary interest is in the past few decades, but it is useful to keep in mind that while popular support for banning smoking is recent, the effort to make that happen is very old.","human_ref_B":"Are you talking about laws or voluntary smoking disallowing in non-smoking venues? Or people's behavior elsewhere?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":33961.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1ddfj3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"When and why did black American names diverge from white American names to the extent they are different today? I graduated from high school in the early 2000s from a school that was approximately 20% black and 70% white (rest were Asian, Hispanic, Pacific Islander, or mixed race).  The school was in the lower midwest, approximately 10 miles from the Mississippi River and 100 miles down river from the closest city, St. Louis.  The following is a sampling of some of the names of my black classmates and kids a few years older and younger:    * Benisha and Venisha (sisters) * Shacairy * DeAndre * Lashonda  * Juwan * LaWonda * Clatrice * Patrice * Iyesha  * LaQuansa  There were kids with typical white names, but they were the exception.  Boys tended to have more typically \"white\" names, but often had what I think to as retro-names . . . Fred, Marvin, Carl, Maurice.  I always figured this was how black American naming had always been until I met their parents who had what would be considered standard white American names (Emma, Michael, Martin, Gary).  I have read that the civil rights movement and black nationalism helped to spark this change, but I am interested in knowing more, and want to know exactly why and how this change happened so quickly (within 10 years or so).  Now that I have moved from my hometown to a much more affluent part of the country, I notice much less of a distinction, maybe geography and economics plays a role.  Disclaimer: I know that any question about race is always a difficult one to put forward and to answer.  I do not mean any offense.  I was able to pull the sampling by looking at my town's facebook page and do not in anyway mean to convey that I think those names are \"wrong\".","c_root_id_A":"c9pft0j","c_root_id_B":"c9pdclh","created_at_utc_A":1367298984,"created_at_utc_B":1367291535,"score_A":29,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Black Nationalism in the 1950s sought to reconstruct African culture in the African American community. One of the core concepts of the reconstruction was the adoption of Arabic names (many Black Nationalists associated Islam with \"being African\") to distance themselves from the white population. The educated elites in the Black Nationalist movement tried to spread the ideology among a mostly uneducated population. Thus, the Arabic-root names started having non-standard spelling. Because the movement was mostly grassroots with relatively few educated elites in charge, the ideas spread through word of mouth and you end up with a lot of names that really don't have an Arabic root, but \"sound Arabic\". There is also an element of French influence in African-American names due to the history of French Creole influence on American Black culture (the La-\/Le-. Sha-, and De-). This likewise went through a transformation due to word-of-mouth.  This kind of behavior is common among Nationalist movements. British Nationalism advocated Hebrew and Latin names over Celtic and Germanic names in the 1600s. German Nationalism advocated a strict spelling code on approved German names in the 1800s. French Nationalists did the same as the Germans a century earlier.","human_ref_B":"I recall Freakonomics talking about this. I think they said that it came from the black power movement. Blacks wanted to be unique and stand out from whites, so they starting coming up with creative names. Previous to this blacks had 'white' names.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7449.0,"score_ratio":7.25}
{"post_id":"som3pr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Does the gender wage gap still exist nowadays? I saw one earlier from 7 years ago and I wanted to ask if the answer would be the same on the same question 7 years after.","c_root_id_A":"hwa7zy6","c_root_id_B":"hwa7cxv","created_at_utc_A":1644444046,"created_at_utc_B":1644443805,"score_A":33,"score_B":30,"human_ref_A":"You may also want to read the Gender Wage Gap FAQ.","human_ref_B":"Yes, it does. In the OECD, all countries except Colombia, Luxemburg, and Costa Rica had positive gender wage gaps (measured as the ratio of median full-time earnings between men and women) in 2020. For the other countries, the gap ranged from 3% (Bulgaria) to 31.5% (Korea).  Source: OECD.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":241.0,"score_ratio":1.1}
{"post_id":"2znwv3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Did oil companies profit from the Iraq War?","c_root_id_A":"cpkufqq","c_root_id_B":"cpkth7z","created_at_utc_A":1426843755,"created_at_utc_B":1426839066,"score_A":8,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I think this is a very hard question, and it would be helpful if you specified it.  * what oil companies? * The price of oil did go up, but that doesn't mean they made more profit. * And if indeed you can show that oil companies on average increased their profit, it's going to be hard to actually say it was because of the Iraq War. It could be higher demand, emerging markets etc. A correlation does not imply a causation.  * The US army and it's allies went into war with a huge amount of vechicles etc, that require oil derived products. Which the army had to buy from oil companies. So it stands to reason some oil companies profited from it, but I'm guessing that's not the way you're meaning it? The same way food companies profited from it, because soldiers have to eat.","human_ref_B":"I can't find too much about it that gives specifics except this widely circulated article. I'm trying to track down the financial times report to which they refer, if anyone finds it first, please post it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4689.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"eclqy3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Does income\/wealth inequality harm the rich? Intuitively, it would seem that the rich would benefit from increased inequality since an even larger amount of wealth would be concentrated in their hands than there would otherwise. Additionally, they would probably have more power relative to less affluent groups than they would in a more equal society. However, I've heard some sources claim that inequality can be harmful to them, perhaps even offsetting whatever benefits they may reap from greater income, wealth, and power.","c_root_id_A":"fbemh6l","c_root_id_B":"fbe0tew","created_at_utc_A":1576788977,"created_at_utc_B":1576775673,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"A 2017 UN report notes \"the OECD, the World Bank, and the IMF have acknowledged that extreme inequalities in wealth and income are economically inefficient and socially damaging,\" and ties systemic failures in reforms (in the U.S.) to these effects. Oxfam cites similar findings in a 2013 briefing describing extreme wealth and inequality as \"politically corrosive,\" \"environmentally destructive,\" \"socially divisive,\" and \"economically inefficient.\" The briefing outlines how wealth consolidation and the tendency of economic gains to go to capital instead of wages can depress demand and limit global spending power, and cites work claiming to establish that \"richer people are happier and healthier if they live in more equal societies.\"   There is some (anecdotal) existential anxiety among elites *(non-paywall link)* that the centralization of ownership and economic value of technological increases in productive efficiency could stoke a criticality of public unrest. Some point to possible futures in which near-total automation of human labor and a lack of alternative means to access basic resources like shelter, food, and healthcare render such an inequitable system unsustainable, placing them under threat of revolutionary upheaval. Others are mobilizing their concentrated wealth to prepare for insurrection or catastrophe potentially driven by the negative externalities of inequality.","human_ref_B":"See also: https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Spirit_Level_(book)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13304.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"xgh6t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Every time I check detailed ratings-by-age group on IMDB, the younger audiences almost always have given higher ratings to a film.  Why? First, are these statistics even accurate?  Second, I don't get this.  Why does this happen?  It seems the older people are, the worse rating they give the movies.  Is it just simply due to younger crowds having a lower exposure to movies.  There are too many instances to properly show complete proof here, but I will give some examples:  Oceans Eleven (1960)  Margin Call (2011)  Inception (2010)","c_root_id_A":"c5m7m6m","c_root_id_B":"c5m7qj0","created_at_utc_A":1343765021,"created_at_utc_B":1343765448,"score_A":5,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Yeah, as young people would not have seen a large range of movies, they do not have as many other films to compare and contrast as they determine their chosen rating.","human_ref_B":"Had this discussion with my 17 yo nephew.  I watched 'Avatar' and saw a rather poorly integrated remake of 'Dances with Wolves' and 'FernGully', along with bits of pieces of any number of bland, unoriginal storylines.  He saw an awesomely original story that moved him.   To me it was a cliche and not well integrated.  To him it was wildly original and AWESOME!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":427.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"xgh6t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Every time I check detailed ratings-by-age group on IMDB, the younger audiences almost always have given higher ratings to a film.  Why? First, are these statistics even accurate?  Second, I don't get this.  Why does this happen?  It seems the older people are, the worse rating they give the movies.  Is it just simply due to younger crowds having a lower exposure to movies.  There are too many instances to properly show complete proof here, but I will give some examples:  Oceans Eleven (1960)  Margin Call (2011)  Inception (2010)","c_root_id_A":"c5m7qj0","c_root_id_B":"c5m7prd","created_at_utc_A":1343765448,"created_at_utc_B":1343765376,"score_A":15,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Had this discussion with my 17 yo nephew.  I watched 'Avatar' and saw a rather poorly integrated remake of 'Dances with Wolves' and 'FernGully', along with bits of pieces of any number of bland, unoriginal storylines.  He saw an awesomely original story that moved him.   To me it was a cliche and not well integrated.  To him it was wildly original and AWESOME!","human_ref_B":"I wonder if the bright folks in \/r\/movies might have an insight on this as well. :)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":72.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"1ow3ss","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Judit Polgar, Hungarian chess Grandmaster, was apparently raised by her parents as an experiment to prove that children could make exceptional achievements if trained in a specialist subject from a very early age. Where there conclusive results of this and has it been done elsewhere?","c_root_id_A":"ccw9iop","c_root_id_B":"ccwa8d1","created_at_utc_A":1382357630,"created_at_utc_B":1382361051,"score_A":16,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select \u2013 doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors. I am going beyond my facts and I admit it, but so have the advocates of the contrary and they have been doing it for many thousands of years.  -John Watson  This is the classic nature versus nurture debate, and most people would argue that nature and nurture both matter.","human_ref_B":"Studies are quite consistent that by far the single biggest predictor of whether someone becomes a highly skilled chess player is how much time they spend playing chess - and this is true even for kids whose parents forced them to play, so it's not just a case of people who are naturally talented choosing to play more. What's true for chess isn't necessarily true of other fields, though.  Notably, Judit has two sisters who went through the same training, and she isn't the one who seemed most talented as a young child - just the one who played most.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3421.0,"score_ratio":1.6875}
{"post_id":"2jh332","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Why is it that in groups humans are so naturally passive(Bystander effect), yet individually humans are usually very aggressive?(If you see a homeless man you want to give him a dollar)","c_root_id_A":"clbs53v","c_root_id_B":"clbtnig","created_at_utc_A":1413517378,"created_at_utc_B":1413521342,"score_A":6,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"Well, you answered your own question.  It's the bystander effect at work.  When you're alone, you can't assume that someone else will take care of it.  When you're in a group, you can tell yourself someone else will deal with it.  Another term that is used is to describe the effect is \"diffusion of responsibility.\"    http:\/\/www.intropsych.com\/ch15_social\/diffusion_of_responsibility.html","human_ref_B":"In the instance that something terrible is happening in public (say, an assault), individuals tend to diffuse their personal responsibility for the situation to those around them; the bigger the crowd, the more culpability is dispersed. That being said, groups are constructs which can and often do facilitate violence far beyond what individuals are naturally inclined to engage in.  The same abstraction that allows individuals to shirk responsibility for intervening in the bystander effect also facilitates violence in groups. By identifying with and contributing to the collective, individuals can ascribe culpability to the institution and its members; ergo, the individual achieves a degree of anonymity (Grossman, 1996). This makes it much easier to rationalize ones actions and absolve one's self of guilt.  Moreover, within groups individuals feel compelled to support their comrades, particularly when their failure to do so would identify them as the weak link. This is a cornerstone of military strategy; artillery units, for example, are much more likely to fire at the enemy in earnest because the individuals must work together (Grossman, 1996). Knowing that others depend on you and are watching is often enough to override our natural (and strong) disposition to avoid killing.  Additionally, when we do experience situations that we don't understand and feel as if our lives have spun out of control, groups provide an opportunity to regain potency, order, and meaning. They are much more manageable, provide a sense of identity, and serve as a catalyst through which an individual member can exert power. Naturally, groupthink begins to creep up and overcome reason, posing a threat to peaceful resolutions to conflict (Fuji, 2009).  TL;DR: Groups  can act as a catalyst for violence by natural tendency to construct a framework which focuses, galvanizes and reifies aggression by way of cyclical reinforcement.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3964.0,"score_ratio":4.8333333333}
{"post_id":"tq7hjx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Is Alfie Kohn's view that competition is bad for society in all its forms still the accepted one? I recently read Alfie Kohn's *No contest* book about competition being inherently immoral\/bad. I was wondering if this is a widely accepted opinion or more contentious. I found it pretty generalising to paint all competition in whatever form as intrinsically destructive.  The notion of competing for positions or in sports seems productive or at least benign.  \"One of the most controversial features of our society is competition. It is condemned by Marxists, championed by capitalists, deemed a necessary evil in education, and is necessary to and dramatized in sport. Alfie Kohn argues that competition is bad both psychologically and morally. As he sees it, competition is a vice, the very antithesis of cooperation - a virtue.21 For him, competition is intrinsically immoral it is selfish and egoistic; it involves treating others as means or as obstacles thwarting one's victory. Further, the consequences of competition are harmful; in aiming for success, competitors view their opponents as enemies, and focus on winning by whatever means possible. Sports may not hold a monopoly on the 'win at all costs syndrome' nor on the harmful effects of competition, but because competition is dramatized and exaggerated in sport, where it is publicly reinforced and approved, the characteristics of competition are best seen in sport.","c_root_id_A":"i2i0mhf","c_root_id_B":"i2hlft6","created_at_utc_A":1648510368,"created_at_utc_B":1648502932,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"To add to my other answer, in competitive sports there's an inherent tension: the competitive sports player always wants to win, but most people aren't interested in a competition that they can easily win, and virtually no audiences. The ideal sports outcome is just, just beating the other team.   Therefore a number of sports are organised in ways so as to level the playing field. For example, the English Premier redistributes some of the revenue from broadcasting sales to some of its lower performing teams. The USA's NBA has a draft system for new players that aims to favour the poorer performing  teams from last season. In boxing, there's numerous weight classes. In golf, there's a system of handicaps so players of different skill levels can still play against each other and have it be exciting for both parties.  Conversely, if competition in sports resulted in \"competitors view their opponents as enemies, and focus on winning by whatever means possible\", I'd expect to see full-grown experienced adults regularly playing matches against three-year olds and playing to win. And of course, there'd never be cases of sports players colluding in match fixing.   See Spectator Demand, Uncertainty of Results, and Public Interest, Adam Cox, https:\/\/econpapers.repec.org\/article\/saejospec\/v_3a19_3ay_3a2018_3ai_3a1_3ap_3a3-30.htm  Managing legitimacy and uncertainty in professional team sport: the NBA's draft lottery, Soebbing, Brian P., Daniel S Mason https:\/\/www.ingentaconnect.com\/content\/mcb\/135\/2009\/00000015\/F0020003\/art00005","human_ref_B":"This is odd, as competition typically goes along with cooperation. This is obvious in team sports, but also applies in business: most businesses involve multiple people co-operating, not just internally but with suppliers and buyers.  There is quite a body of literature on markets and trust, the link below has a recent (2020) summary. To summarise: countries with higher GDP per capita tend to have higher interpersonal trust levels and market exchanges can both engender trust and distrust depending on context.   https:\/\/journals.plos.org\/plosone\/article?id=10.1371\/journal.pone.0232704, Market interactions, trust and reciprocity, by Ginny Seung Choi,\u00a0Virgil Henry Storr  The other question is of course what is Kohn is comparing to. Kohn may say Marxists condemn competition but there's plenty of examples of self-declared Marxists being in competition with others: the Bolshevists didn't win the Russian Civil War by a policy of pure ~~competition~~[cooperation], for example, and their subsequent politics were very competitive, often fatally so.  [EDIT: wording]","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7436.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"m2oxaq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Besides Japan, in what other modern cultures is hugging not a thing at all, for pretty much everyone? It's always bizarre, to me, to see Japanese people meet old friends and family they haven't seen for a long time, and be clearly happy to see each other, but not feel moved to physically touch each other at all. I've heard it said that the Japanese are the most touch-averse culture on earth, but then again, there are a lot of uninformed superlative \"facts\" about that nation that get bandied about, that have no data to back them up.  I will say this, though: to this Anglo-American who has traveled extensively throughout Eastern Europe, Asia, and all of North America, the Japanese are certainly the most noticeably touch-averse people *I've* encountered. I've heard it said that the British, Finns, Koreans, and people from the Indian subcontinent described as decidedly non-touching cultures. I've met and observed a lot of people of all of these nationalities. And while all of them certainly touch and embrace much less than my culture, I *have* seen people from all of these places spontaneously hug or touch. All of these peoples seem to observe fairly strict rules about when it can happen and who can touch whom, and one won't be faulted for erring on the side of never touching anyone. But none of them have taken the aversion to any deliberate physical human contact to the level the Japanese have, in my observation. But this is only one man's experience.  Can anyone recommend me some literature about \"touching cultures\" versus \"non-touching cultures\", and what a culture's place on this gamut tends to correlate with?","c_root_id_A":"gqkkjcf","c_root_id_B":"gqkm3be","created_at_utc_A":1615469913,"created_at_utc_B":1615470775,"score_A":15,"score_B":68,"human_ref_A":"You may find this a good read: Cross-cultural similarity in relationship specific social touchingcross cultural touching  I would also suggest trying to find a book relating to haptic communication or nonverbal communication. It doesn't look like there are many studies on how different cultures communicate but there are plenty of articles and I'm willing to bet there are books too. If you can read Japanese or can find a good translation I would also assume there are Japanese writers who have written on the subject.","human_ref_B":"I'll just add that those kinds of things aren't necessarily invariant within cultures.  For example, in Japanese families children often share a bed with their parents for a longer time (you can check out this book by Diana Adis Tahhan for more on the topic).  Some might characterize that as a greater level of physical intimacy than in, say, the United States.  Furthermore gender oftentimes plays a role- in some cultural spheres in the United States, men don't display physical affection to their male children.  I would just caution against any sweeping claims about touching\/non-touching cultures, because while cultures may differ in terms of how circumscribed touching is, those will necessarily vary situationally\/idiosyncratically\/across the lifespan etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":862.0,"score_ratio":4.5333333333}
{"post_id":"13cu6z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Is there any evidence to suggest that there is an increase in illegal (aka \"back alley\") abortions when  laws are enacted that restrict access to abortions?  I've often heard arguments that if abortion ever becomes illegal, women will seek out abortions through illegal and unsafe means. Is there any evidence to suggest this is the case in states that severely restrict women's access to safe and legal abortions?","c_root_id_A":"c72t5yp","c_root_id_B":"c72t2bw","created_at_utc_A":1353172641,"created_at_utc_B":1353172148,"score_A":101,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Yes, there is.   The wikipedia article on unsafe abortion is a good start, but here are a few choice references.  Abortion rates are not lower in countries where abortion is illegal. If anything, the correlation is in the opposite direction, as countries with restrictive abortion laws tend to also be opposed to birth control. Please see this article for details and citations to the primary literature.  The 2012 article titled \"Induced abortion: incidence and trends worldwide from 1995 to 2008\"61786-8\/abstract) in the well-regarded medical journal \"The Lancet\" has plenty of recent data on worldwide trends in legal and illegal abortions. I'm happy to send you the full text article if you are unable to access it.  Women in a country with little or no legal access to abortion don't say \"Oh, I guess I'll just have the baby then,\" but find some way to get the fetus out of them. This results in women getting unsafe abortions, which means many women die. See this article in the British Medical Bulletin (again, let me know if you can't access the full text) for more details about the mortality rates in unsafe abortions.  Sadly, these facts aren't always enough to convince anti-choice advocates of the need for legalized abortion. If you equate an unborn human with a person, they see abortion as murder of a person, and a women dying during an abortion attempt as a mother who dies while trying to kill her child. See this recent debate I had with such an individual for exactly this point of view.","human_ref_B":"There is one recent study that I know of that touches on this topic:  http:\/\/www.thelancet.com\/journals\/lancet\/article\/PIIS0140-6736(11)61786-8\/fulltext#article_upsell","labels":1,"seconds_difference":493.0,"score_ratio":10.1}
{"post_id":"13cu6z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Is there any evidence to suggest that there is an increase in illegal (aka \"back alley\") abortions when  laws are enacted that restrict access to abortions?  I've often heard arguments that if abortion ever becomes illegal, women will seek out abortions through illegal and unsafe means. Is there any evidence to suggest this is the case in states that severely restrict women's access to safe and legal abortions?","c_root_id_A":"c72wqgp","c_root_id_B":"c72t2bw","created_at_utc_A":1353188626,"created_at_utc_B":1353172148,"score_A":13,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I recommend you watch 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days. Great movie shows what happend in Communist Romania when abortions were illegal, toghether with every form of contraception (pills, condoms etc.)  http:\/\/www.imdb.com\/title\/tt1032846\/","human_ref_B":"There is one recent study that I know of that touches on this topic:  http:\/\/www.thelancet.com\/journals\/lancet\/article\/PIIS0140-6736(11)61786-8\/fulltext#article_upsell","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16478.0,"score_ratio":1.3}
{"post_id":"12k2yk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"If I took one trillion US dollars of cash and burnt it, what would be the effect on the US economy?","c_root_id_A":"c6vpwbm","c_root_id_B":"c6vszex","created_at_utc_A":1351930004,"created_at_utc_B":1351957665,"score_A":17,"score_B":49,"human_ref_A":"depends how you got the money","human_ref_B":"For one thing, it'd be really hard to acquire $1T in physical dollar bills - there aren't that many of them.  Let's tone it down. Suppose you destroyed 10% of the money stock (edit: say, M1). Then what?  1. **Scenario 1.** You gather the money overnight by waving a magic wand and taking 10% of every individual's cash holdings. Bernanke is asleep, and doesn't notice. You don't tell anyone what you're going to do beforehand. **Result: Recession.** Everyone wakes up with a reduction in cash holdings, wishes to re-accumulate cash so they reduce demand for goods and services. Upward-sloping aggregate supply, due to sticky prices, leads this change in NGDP to cause a decline in both output and inflation.  2. **Scenario 2.** You gather the money overnight by waving a magic wand and taking 10% of every individual's cash holdings. Bernanke is awake, and you don't tell anyone beforehand. **Result: nothing happens.** In the morning, AD drops as in scenario 1. However, this time Bernanke's awake. He sees the drop in AD and increases the money stock by 10%, exactly offsetting your action. Wages, prices, output, employment, etc are unchanged, assuming he gives proportional transfers. If he doesn't, there are small changes in the composition of GDP but again, no aggregate drop in GDP.  3. **Scenario 3.** You gather the money overnight by waving a magic wand and taking 10% of every individual's cash holdings. Bernanke could be asleep or awake, it doesn't matter, because this time you told everyone one year beforehand that you'd do this. Individuals and firms have had a year to prepare. **Result: in the morning, all firms cut prices by 10%, no recession.** The price level drops, real GDP is unchanged, and there is no recession.  4. **Scenario 4.** This time you don't do it proportionally, you take a random X% of currency from individuals, equalling 10% of the currency stock in aggregate. Again Ben is asleep and again you don't tell anyone. **Result: Same as 1, but this time there are consequences for the distribution of wealth.** Edit: depending on who you hit hard, the recession could be worse than 1. If you take away money from credit-constrained individuals, you'll get debt-deleveraging effects.  There are a total of 8 scenarios, but they're similar to the four described.  Let me know if you want more details. I happen to be an expert on this subject.   Edit: ooh, I thought of a nifty one.  **Scenario 5.** This time you don't have a magic wand. This time, you're Steve Jobs and you now hold 10% of the currency stock because you sold people stuff they wanted. *Now* you burn the money. Result: I think all that happens is that the price level falls. I'll have to think about it.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":27661.0,"score_ratio":2.8823529412}
{"post_id":"12k2yk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"If I took one trillion US dollars of cash and burnt it, what would be the effect on the US economy?","c_root_id_A":"c6vsyi8","c_root_id_B":"c6vszex","created_at_utc_A":1351957545,"created_at_utc_B":1351957665,"score_A":2,"score_B":49,"human_ref_A":"Money is an asset. More liquid the asset, more money like it is. When asset values drop, it has similar effect to the economy as if you were burning money.   Something very much like that happened when the housing bubble busted. Huge number of financial assets suddenly lost their value in very short time. Housing assets, retirement assets, savings and investment assets  and pension assets dropped total $8.3 trillion. Many people cried inflation when Fed started to pump money to the economy, but they did not take into account the huge \"burning of wealth\" that happened.","human_ref_B":"For one thing, it'd be really hard to acquire $1T in physical dollar bills - there aren't that many of them.  Let's tone it down. Suppose you destroyed 10% of the money stock (edit: say, M1). Then what?  1. **Scenario 1.** You gather the money overnight by waving a magic wand and taking 10% of every individual's cash holdings. Bernanke is asleep, and doesn't notice. You don't tell anyone what you're going to do beforehand. **Result: Recession.** Everyone wakes up with a reduction in cash holdings, wishes to re-accumulate cash so they reduce demand for goods and services. Upward-sloping aggregate supply, due to sticky prices, leads this change in NGDP to cause a decline in both output and inflation.  2. **Scenario 2.** You gather the money overnight by waving a magic wand and taking 10% of every individual's cash holdings. Bernanke is awake, and you don't tell anyone beforehand. **Result: nothing happens.** In the morning, AD drops as in scenario 1. However, this time Bernanke's awake. He sees the drop in AD and increases the money stock by 10%, exactly offsetting your action. Wages, prices, output, employment, etc are unchanged, assuming he gives proportional transfers. If he doesn't, there are small changes in the composition of GDP but again, no aggregate drop in GDP.  3. **Scenario 3.** You gather the money overnight by waving a magic wand and taking 10% of every individual's cash holdings. Bernanke could be asleep or awake, it doesn't matter, because this time you told everyone one year beforehand that you'd do this. Individuals and firms have had a year to prepare. **Result: in the morning, all firms cut prices by 10%, no recession.** The price level drops, real GDP is unchanged, and there is no recession.  4. **Scenario 4.** This time you don't do it proportionally, you take a random X% of currency from individuals, equalling 10% of the currency stock in aggregate. Again Ben is asleep and again you don't tell anyone. **Result: Same as 1, but this time there are consequences for the distribution of wealth.** Edit: depending on who you hit hard, the recession could be worse than 1. If you take away money from credit-constrained individuals, you'll get debt-deleveraging effects.  There are a total of 8 scenarios, but they're similar to the four described.  Let me know if you want more details. I happen to be an expert on this subject.   Edit: ooh, I thought of a nifty one.  **Scenario 5.** This time you don't have a magic wand. This time, you're Steve Jobs and you now hold 10% of the currency stock because you sold people stuff they wanted. *Now* you burn the money. Result: I think all that happens is that the price level falls. I'll have to think about it.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":120.0,"score_ratio":24.5}
{"post_id":"3hsi8j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What does a strong U.S. dollar have to do with the Federal Reserve changing the interest rates? I read an article in the *Wall Street Journal* about China devaluing its currency and how that puts upward pressure on the dollar (I would like to know why this is the case). The article went on to say how a strong U.S. dollar could also be exacerbated by the Fed raising interest rates, but I do not know why this is. I know a strong dollar hurts exports, but that can only be a piece of the puzzle.","c_root_id_A":"cuabkog","c_root_id_B":"cua9dul","created_at_utc_A":1440130421,"created_at_utc_B":1440125798,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The short answer is that if you have two accounts that provide equal returns and interest rates rise in one country, then more people want to invest in that country.  As people need dollars to invest in US accounts, that puts upward pressure on the dollar.    The more mathematical version uses [interest rate parity] (https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Interest_rate_parity#Approximation).  In logs with perfect asset substitutability,   R$=RY + {Ee($\/Y)-Es($\/Y)}\/Es($\/Y)   * R$ is the interest rate on $ assets * RY is the interest rate on Yuan assets * Ee($\/Y) is the expected $\/Y spot rate * Es($\/Y) is the current spot rate  In equilibrium, this equation means that if you have two assets, a $ asset and a Yuan asset, and they're perfect substitutes, then the US interest rate (the left hand side) should equal the Yuan interest rate (first term on the right side) plus expected depreciation of the $ (the second term on the right side, keep in mind that is Es($\/Y) goes up, that's an depreciation of the $).  If this equation holds, the two asset returns are equal to one another.  Let's assume both the Fed and China's central bank actively defend their interest rates and expectations are held fixed in the short run.  Start from equilibrium where IP holds.  If the Fed raises the interest rate (R$) then the left hand side is now greater than the right hand side.  Asset returns are greater in the US and everyone rushes to put their money in the US.  As demand for US dollars rises, that appreciates the $ which will bring Es($\/Y) down and raise the right hand side.  This will occur until the two sides of the equation are equal again where returns are equal and there's no obvious advantage to be in $ assets or in Yuan assets.","human_ref_B":"This question has also been asked here","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4623.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"ons2q4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is there a \u201cGender Equality Personality Paradox\u201d where \u201csex differences in personality are larger in more gender equal countries\u201d? Also, does social role theory fail to explain this paradox as well as the evolutionary perspective? **CLAIM 1:** There exists a Gender Equality Personality Pardox.  **CLAIM 2:** There is far stronger evidential support for explaining this paradox through an evolutionary perspective rather than through a social role theory perspective.   ___  The following are studies (across multiple countries, multiple cultures, and using massive sample sizes) that have found that, across cultures, as gender equality increases, gender differences in personality increase, not decrease:  1. https:\/\/sci-hub.do\/https:\/\/science.sciencemag.org\/content\/362\/6412\/eaas9899  2. https:\/\/sci-hub.do\/https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/18179326\/  3. https:\/\/sci-hub.do\/https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/19824299\/  4. https:\/\/sci-hub.do\/https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1002\/ijop.12529  Here is an excerpt from the fourth cross-cultural study:   >**Sex differences in personality are larger in more gender equal countries.** This surprising finding has consistently been found in research examining cross-country differences in personality (Costa, Terracciano, & Mccrae, 2001; McCrae & Terracciano, 2005; Schmitt, Realo, Voracek, & Allik, 2008). **Social role theory** (e.g., Wood & Eagly, 2002) **struggles to account for this trend.** This is because the pressure on divergent social roles should be lowest in more gender equal countries, thereby decreasing, rather than increasing, personality differences (Schmitt et al., 2008). Evolutionary perspectives (e.g., Schmitt et al., 2017) provide alternative accounts. These suggest that some sex differences are innate and have evolved to optimise the different roles carried out by men and women in our ancestral past. For example, male strengths and interests such as physical dispositions may be associated with protecting family and building homesteads, while female strengths and interests such as nurturing may be associated with caretaking of offspring and the elderly (Lippa, 2010).   Finally, conclusions \u2013 which can be found here: https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1002\/ijop.12265 \u2013 are drawn by researchers on what these findings mean for the social role theory of gender differences:    >As noted earlier, social role theory posits gender differences in personality will be smaller in nations with more egalitarian gender roles, gender socialization and sociopolitical gender equity. Investigations of Big Five traits evaluating this prediction have found, **in almost every instance,** the observed cross-cultural patterns of gender differences in personality **strongly disconfirm social role theory.**   I only came across one study that found a \u201cspurious correlation\u201d between gender equality and gender personality differences:  https:\/\/sci-hub.se\/10.1007\/s11199-019-01097-x  Their abstract says:   > [...] contradicting both evolutionary and biosocial assumptions, we find no evidence that gender equality causes gender differences in values. We argue that there is a need to explore alternative explanations to the observed cross-sectional association between gender equality and personality differences, as well as gender convergence in personality over time.  The discussion section states:   >**It is more likely that there exist confounding factors that relate both to gender equality and personality development.** We believe this conclusion is the most serious contribution of our findings, and consequently we encourage future research to focus on such aspects. For example, a recent study byKaiser (2019) indicates that cultural individualism, food consumption, and historical levels of pathogen prevalence may besuch confounding factors.  All things considered, it appears to me that there is far stronger evidential support for explaining this paradox through an evolutionary perspective rather than through a social role theory perspective.   ####What to believe?","c_root_id_A":"h5vpkiz","c_root_id_B":"h5w7exv","created_at_utc_A":1626792488,"created_at_utc_B":1626799942,"score_A":4,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Apologies if this is a tangent and or rule breaker, but you may be interested in studies on the effects of testosterone on personality, e.g. https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41386-018-0220-8 and also how gender behavior may affect testosterone https:\/\/www.pnas.org\/content\/112\/45\/13805","human_ref_B":"**Premises** ---  *Claim 1:* You might firmly replicate the same results using the same methodology with large sample sizes, but interpretation is a supplementary step, and apparently robust findings may not mean what people think they mean. Depending on the theoretical framework and the framing, what seems surprising might not  be. To quote Weir concerning the related topic of Gender Equality Paradox in STEM:  >**In itself, the observation that women go into STEM fields more often in Tunisia and Egypt than in Finland is not a new finding.** For example, **sociologist Maria Charles**, featured in a GenderSci Lab Q&A in an upcoming post, **describes her decades of analysis of how occupational preferences and gender beliefs vary across time and space** and has even written a prize-winning paper on the subject, published in 2009. **Charles interprets the variation she uncovers as reflecting how stereotypical cultural norms and gender essentialist beliefs are entrenched even within societies with an outward commitment to gender parity.** As this simple example of an alternative interpretation of the same data demonstrates, **the Gender Equality Paradox is only a paradox if you start with particular assumptions.**   *Claim 2:* Which leads us to remarking that although theories associated with Evolutionary Psychology and Social Role Theory are two popular explanations for sex\/gender differences in the division of labor and in psychological traits, there are actually multiple theories for these (e.g. see here and here). Also, these are not the only two plausible alternatives to explaining research finding so-called Gender Equality Paradoxes.  This is less specific to this topic, but I have noticed ITT the use of terms such as \"innate\" (or equivalents such as \"inherent\"). This term also crops up in many documents I might cite. However, I strongly discourage this practice. Innate is fundamentally a folk concept - even when employed by scientists - which has dozens of meanings and functions like a black box. Let us say, clearly, that particular biological differences explain particular sex\/gender differences - wherever such relationships are established - instead of employing terms such as \"innate\" or \"inherent.\"   --- **Paradox?** ---  Concerning the first claim specifically, the observations I shared with you elsewhere are relevant also here. For instance, what do the indicators used by these researchers capture?   We should not take for granted that countries scoring higher on \"Gender Equality\" indices are also countries with weaker gender-related constructs (e.g. gender norms). Consider the fact that studies about \"Gender Paradoxes\" tend to be cross-sectional, and that these high ranking countries tend to share other characteristics (potential confounding factors). This *Ars Technica* article has multiple relevant observations, among which:  >**But what if more sexist societies**\u2014ones with bigger differences in how people think about and treat men and women\u2014**were the ones where women had a bigger and earlier impetus to start campaigning for their rights?** Rights and social equality might anti-correlate in this case, confusing any analysis. **Data on whether the differences increase as countries climb the ranks of gender equality would be useful in teasing those two possibilities apart.**  >**There could be something else underlying the pattern: cultural history.** In Falk and Hermle\u2019s analysis, \u201cCroatia, Serbia, and] Bosnia and Herzegovina are treated as if these countries evolved independently from one another,\u201d says Se\u00e1n Roberts, a researcher with an interest in how traits pattern across different cultures. In the same vein, Mac Giolla and Kajonius treat Norway, Sweden, and Finland as if they were entirely separate, he explains. \u201cThese countries share a close history, and so unsurprisingly they have very similar gender differences and gender-equality scores.\u201d  Connolly et al. (2019) is notable for having a longitudinal design, and failing to find  \"an observable link across time between changes in gender equality and gender differences in personality.\"  --- Gender Equality? ---  These \"Gender Equality indexes\" tend not to be designed to inform us on *how* parity has been achieved. For example, one area of debate concerns health and survival outcomes, and what should be scored and how (these questions apply general to the construction of these indexes). For illustration, see Klasen's (2006) assessment of the [GDI:  >Two particular problems appear in the life expectancy component. First, **while it is (roughly) true that females, if treated equally as males, will outlive them by some three to seven years, it is not necessarily obvious that one should assume such a biological disadvantage for males should simply be ignored in a human development measure. Whether one should treat this biological advantage of females as \u2018\u2018normal\u2019\u2019 largely depends on how one defines inequality.**  I will avoid going through all the conceptual problems he identifies, I just want to raise the hood briefly to make a point. With respect to how parity can be achieved, you can find relatively equal lifespans both in lower-income countries where both men and women have shorter lives, and higher-income countries where both live longer.   Rwanda provides an interesting case. Today, the country ranks highly in the Global Gender Gap Report, but Rwandan women also suffer much gender-based violence. To quote *The Guardian*:  >**However, in spite of its impressive report card on female political empowerment, Rwanda is far from being a safe place for women. The country with a population of 11 million \u2013 52% of which is female \u2013 continues to have one of the highest incidences of gender-based and domestic violence in Africa.** According to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), one in every three Rwandan women has experienced or continues to experience violence at the hands of her male relatives \u2013 mainly father and husband. Estimates released by Rwanda's Gender Desk in 2011 showed that up to 93% of the victims of physical and psychological abuse were women.  It has among the highest female labour force participation rates, but it is at least partially due to the need to replace hundreds of thousands of men slaughtered a couple of decades ago. To quote a NPR article on the topic:  >**Following 100 days of slaughter in 1994, Rwandan society was left in chaos. The death toll was between 800,000 and 1 million.** Many suspected perpetrators were arrested or fled the country. Records show that **immediately following the genocide, Rwanda's population of 5.5 million to 6 million was 60 to 70 percent female. Most of these women had never been educated or raised with the expectations of a career. In pre-genocide Rwanda, it was almost unheard of for women to own land or take a job outside the home.**  >**The genocide changed all that.** The war led to Rwanda's \"Rosie the Riveter\" moment: **It opened the workplace to Rwandan women just as World War II had opened it to American women.**  The point is, as pertinently remarked in the aforementioned *Ars Technica* article:  >**The Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI)] looks at progress on measures like economic participation and political empowerment, but it isn\u2019t able to capture wobblier human factors like cultural beliefs and stereotyping.** This is illustrated by looking at **Rwanda, which has made enormous strides in political representation of women while making little progress in changes to traditional gender roles; it currently ranks sixth on the index.** And there\u2019s evidence of greater gender stereotyping in precisely those countries that come out on top of this ranking, which could be a result of older and more entrenched cultural ideas, a cultural backlash, or something else entirely.  [Edit: Adjustments made to clarify or expand on some points.]  [\\[Conclusion + ref list next comment\\]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7454.0,"score_ratio":4.25}
{"post_id":"5g5y0j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are there any scientific studies out there that indicate the reliability of various mainstream news outlets? Any correlations? Any theoretical frameworks for thinking about accuracy in the MSM? I heard a while ago about a study purporting to show that FOX News watchers were less informed about the world than people who didn't watch the news, but I never actually read the study itself, and IIRC it was only based on correlations. Do you know of any studies that scientifically approach the question of measuring the accuracy of different media outlets?","c_root_id_A":"dapvszc","c_root_id_B":"dapujl6","created_at_utc_A":1480722362,"created_at_utc_B":1480720514,"score_A":14,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"While I think this is a legitimate question in general, given the ongoing rhetoric surrounding the media in political circles (as evidenced by Fox News in particular), by asking the question, the battle has, to some extent, already been lost.  While there is certainly no shortage of evidence suggesting a greater number of journalists are liberal in their personal preferences, I have never seen any convincing, neutral or systematic evidence that there are massive, invisible ideological biases in mainstream news coverage. The charge that that bias exists does, however, serve a specific ideological need. Moreover, there are any number of cultural, sensational and economic blindspots and sources of bias in media coverage that don't elicit 1\/1000th the handwringing that accompanies the endless drumbeat of ideological media bias, despite the fact that those sources of bias probably have more empirical basis in reality and very few powerful watchdogs forcing the media to stay honest.  I think empirical study is not going to offer you the answers you're looking for with this question because measuring the ideological center of gravity over time is very, very difficult. It would probably be a trivial exercise to demonstrate that the consumers of, say, BBC world service or PBS Newshour are systematically better informed about current events than Fox News viewers or MSNBC but establishing a causal channel there would be very tricky. Are they better informed *because* they watch those sources or do people that are better informed self-select into them?  To me, the more salient question would be not is there bias or not but rather, is there any amount of bias (or lack thereof) that could restore the ongoing faithlessness in the institutions of modern society? If I could wave a magic wand and create a perfectly neutral media source, would it be possible to convince people with an ideological stake in continuing the ongoing media bias narrative to trust it? At the risk of sounding nihilistic, I would personally tend to doubt it.","human_ref_B":"The most frequent type of study I have seen is of the type of testing regular viewers of different news outlets on various facts, eg, Ignorance, Partisanship Drive False Beliefs about Obama, Iraq.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1848.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"b9773u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What does more modern research (post 2010) say about video-games being good\/bad for the brain? Are violent video-games still viewed as something that increases aggression?","c_root_id_A":"ek2px4v","c_root_id_B":"ek37ztc","created_at_utc_A":1554346240,"created_at_utc_B":1554369114,"score_A":27,"score_B":30,"human_ref_A":"On the aggression question, see this 2014 meta-analysis, N=36,965  #Video Games Do Affect Social Outcomes: A Meta-Analytic Review of the Effects of Violent and Prosocial Video Game Play  >Whether video game play affects social behavior is a topic of debate. Many argue that aggression and helping are affected by video game play, whereas this stance is disputed by others. The present research provides a meta-analytical test of the idea that depending on their content, video games do affect social outcomes. Data from 98 independent studies with 36,965 participants revealed that for both violent video games and prosocial video games, there was a significant association with social outcomes. Whereas violent video games increase aggression and aggression-related variables and decrease prosocial outcomes, prosocial video games have the opposite effects. These effects were reliable across experimental, correlational, and longitudinal studies, indicating that video game exposure causally affects social outcomes and that there are both short- and long-term effects.","human_ref_B":"Because this is a widely debated topic both within and without academia, I believe that the question should be replied with more than just citing an article *even* if it is a meta-analysis (there have been many with different conclusions depending on the criteria used and interpretations).  For an example of the ongoing debate, see the APA. According to their resolution published in 2015](https:\/\/www.apa.org\/about\/policy\/violent-video-games ), there is an association between aggression and video game exposure, but also noted the issue with terminology and interpretation:  >The **violent video game literature uses a variety of terms and definitions in considering aggression and aggressive outcomes**, sometimes using \"violence\" and \"aggression\" interchangeably, or using \"aggression\" to represent the full range of aggressive outcomes studied, including multiple types and severity levels of associated behavior, cognitions, emotions, and neural processes. This **breadth of coverage but lack of precision in terminology has contributed to some debate about the effects** of violent video game use. In part, the numerous ways that violence and aggression have been considered stem from the multidisciplinary nature of the field [...]  >Thus, **all violence, including lethal violence, is aggression, but not all aggression is violence**. This distinction is **important for understanding this research literature**, which has not focused on lethal violence as an outcome. Insufficient research has examined whether violent video game use causes lethal violence. The **distinction is also important for considering the implications of the research and for interpreting popular press accounts** of the research and its **applicability to societal events.**  On 2017, the [Media Psychology and Technology division of the APA had such things as the following to state:  >Journalists and policy makers do their constituencies a disservice in cases where they link acts of real-world violence with the perpetrators\u2019 exposure to violent video games or other violent media. There\u2019s **little scientific evidence to support the connection, and it may distract us from addressing those issues that we know contribute to real-world violence.**  >A wide body of research has examined the **impact of violent video games on relatively minor acts of aggression,** such as the administration of unwanted hot sauce to make food too spicy, making someone put his or her hand in freezing ice water or bursts of white noise in laboratory experiments. These studies have **resulted in mixed outcomes**, some reporting evidence for significant effects, and others do not ...]  > We note that **even among the members of APA Division 46 Society for Media Psychology and Technology, opinions regarding the impact of media violence on aggression differ considerably**.  It would be entirely reasonable for a scholar to argue that some links between violent media and aggression may exist, just as it is also reasonable for a scholar to argue that links between violent media and aggression do not exist.  For an example of how the issue is not straightforward, contrast the [2014 meta-analysis](https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1177\/0146167213520459 ) with [Ferguson's 2015 meta-analysis which found that:   >Overall, **results from 101 studies suggest that video game influences** on increased aggression (r = .06), reduced prosocial behavior (r = .04), reduced academic performance (r = \u2212.01), depressive symptoms (r = .04), and attention deficit symptoms (r = .03) **are minimal**.   Furuya-Kanamori and Doi re-analyzed Ferguson's data and confirmed his meta-analysis.  Greitemeyer and M\u00fcgge's meta-analysis is also worth reading with the same nuance the authors demonstrate in their conclusions:  >Of course, **one can dispute whether an effect of r =.19 between violent video game exposure and aggressive behavior is of societal concern**. On one hand, **aggressive behavior is multidetermined**, with violent video game exposure being one source among many others (and some of them having a stronger influence than do violent video games). On the other hand, even small effects (and the effect of violent video games is small to medium in its effect size) can have a negative impact on societal level when many people are exposed to it (which certainly applies to violent video games). Thus, **in our view, violent video game play should be regarded as a risk factor** for aggressive behavior.  It is also interesting to highlight the fact they recognize, for example:  >...] **cooperatively playing a violent video game in a team** (relative to playing the same video game alone) **counteracts the negative effects of violent video game play on cooperative behavior** (Greitemeyer, Traut-Mattausch, & Osswald, 2012) and empathy (Greitemeyer, 2013).  The above is an example of how complex it is to talk about video games and what it affects, and how they may counter-act themselves, and whether effects are not only significant but also meaningful.  To cite a more recent meta-analysis by authors challenging Ferguson, [Prescott, Sargent and Hull analyzed prospective studies measuring overt physical aggression (although I would note that it is not obvious which behaviors exactly are included in such a category). They found \"**a modest effect size of \u22480.11 when additional covariates were not included**\". As they comment, Ferguson would consider such effects quite small if not meaningless, nevertheless they also argue for a different point of view: *the question remains*.  For example, \"**Cohen (1969, p23) describes an effect size of 0.2 as 'small'** and gives to illustrate it the example that the difference between the heights of 15 year old and 16 year old girls in the US corresponds to an effect of this size.\" but \"**Cohen does acknowledge the danger of using terms like 'small', 'medium' and 'large' out of context.**\"  Now, if one takes into consideration how violence has been declining in Western countries, those same countries in which the video game industry has been growing increasingly fast, and how video games are becoming more and more mainstream, one has to carefully ponder about the impact of video games on real life violent behavior at least as a whole.  Last comment regarding Prescott and colleagues' meta-analysis, they found differences for ethnicity, suggesting an effect of culture. One should question why violent video games might have the (relatively) largest effects on White participants, intermediate for Asians and none for Hispanics. This requires to further nuance any impact violent video games might have even if one finds an (arguably weak) effect. At least, it is not a direct effect and it depends on other factors.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22874.0,"score_ratio":1.1111111111}
{"post_id":"b9773u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What does more modern research (post 2010) say about video-games being good\/bad for the brain? Are violent video-games still viewed as something that increases aggression?","c_root_id_A":"ek37ztc","c_root_id_B":"ek35uni","created_at_utc_A":1554369114,"created_at_utc_B":1554365258,"score_A":30,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Because this is a widely debated topic both within and without academia, I believe that the question should be replied with more than just citing an article *even* if it is a meta-analysis (there have been many with different conclusions depending on the criteria used and interpretations).  For an example of the ongoing debate, see the APA. According to their resolution published in 2015](https:\/\/www.apa.org\/about\/policy\/violent-video-games ), there is an association between aggression and video game exposure, but also noted the issue with terminology and interpretation:  >The **violent video game literature uses a variety of terms and definitions in considering aggression and aggressive outcomes**, sometimes using \"violence\" and \"aggression\" interchangeably, or using \"aggression\" to represent the full range of aggressive outcomes studied, including multiple types and severity levels of associated behavior, cognitions, emotions, and neural processes. This **breadth of coverage but lack of precision in terminology has contributed to some debate about the effects** of violent video game use. In part, the numerous ways that violence and aggression have been considered stem from the multidisciplinary nature of the field [...]  >Thus, **all violence, including lethal violence, is aggression, but not all aggression is violence**. This distinction is **important for understanding this research literature**, which has not focused on lethal violence as an outcome. Insufficient research has examined whether violent video game use causes lethal violence. The **distinction is also important for considering the implications of the research and for interpreting popular press accounts** of the research and its **applicability to societal events.**  On 2017, the [Media Psychology and Technology division of the APA had such things as the following to state:  >Journalists and policy makers do their constituencies a disservice in cases where they link acts of real-world violence with the perpetrators\u2019 exposure to violent video games or other violent media. There\u2019s **little scientific evidence to support the connection, and it may distract us from addressing those issues that we know contribute to real-world violence.**  >A wide body of research has examined the **impact of violent video games on relatively minor acts of aggression,** such as the administration of unwanted hot sauce to make food too spicy, making someone put his or her hand in freezing ice water or bursts of white noise in laboratory experiments. These studies have **resulted in mixed outcomes**, some reporting evidence for significant effects, and others do not ...]  > We note that **even among the members of APA Division 46 Society for Media Psychology and Technology, opinions regarding the impact of media violence on aggression differ considerably**.  It would be entirely reasonable for a scholar to argue that some links between violent media and aggression may exist, just as it is also reasonable for a scholar to argue that links between violent media and aggression do not exist.  For an example of how the issue is not straightforward, contrast the [2014 meta-analysis](https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1177\/0146167213520459 ) with [Ferguson's 2015 meta-analysis which found that:   >Overall, **results from 101 studies suggest that video game influences** on increased aggression (r = .06), reduced prosocial behavior (r = .04), reduced academic performance (r = \u2212.01), depressive symptoms (r = .04), and attention deficit symptoms (r = .03) **are minimal**.   Furuya-Kanamori and Doi re-analyzed Ferguson's data and confirmed his meta-analysis.  Greitemeyer and M\u00fcgge's meta-analysis is also worth reading with the same nuance the authors demonstrate in their conclusions:  >Of course, **one can dispute whether an effect of r =.19 between violent video game exposure and aggressive behavior is of societal concern**. On one hand, **aggressive behavior is multidetermined**, with violent video game exposure being one source among many others (and some of them having a stronger influence than do violent video games). On the other hand, even small effects (and the effect of violent video games is small to medium in its effect size) can have a negative impact on societal level when many people are exposed to it (which certainly applies to violent video games). Thus, **in our view, violent video game play should be regarded as a risk factor** for aggressive behavior.  It is also interesting to highlight the fact they recognize, for example:  >...] **cooperatively playing a violent video game in a team** (relative to playing the same video game alone) **counteracts the negative effects of violent video game play on cooperative behavior** (Greitemeyer, Traut-Mattausch, & Osswald, 2012) and empathy (Greitemeyer, 2013).  The above is an example of how complex it is to talk about video games and what it affects, and how they may counter-act themselves, and whether effects are not only significant but also meaningful.  To cite a more recent meta-analysis by authors challenging Ferguson, [Prescott, Sargent and Hull analyzed prospective studies measuring overt physical aggression (although I would note that it is not obvious which behaviors exactly are included in such a category). They found \"**a modest effect size of \u22480.11 when additional covariates were not included**\". As they comment, Ferguson would consider such effects quite small if not meaningless, nevertheless they also argue for a different point of view: *the question remains*.  For example, \"**Cohen (1969, p23) describes an effect size of 0.2 as 'small'** and gives to illustrate it the example that the difference between the heights of 15 year old and 16 year old girls in the US corresponds to an effect of this size.\" but \"**Cohen does acknowledge the danger of using terms like 'small', 'medium' and 'large' out of context.**\"  Now, if one takes into consideration how violence has been declining in Western countries, those same countries in which the video game industry has been growing increasingly fast, and how video games are becoming more and more mainstream, one has to carefully ponder about the impact of video games on real life violent behavior at least as a whole.  Last comment regarding Prescott and colleagues' meta-analysis, they found differences for ethnicity, suggesting an effect of culture. One should question why violent video games might have the (relatively) largest effects on White participants, intermediate for Asians and none for Hispanics. This requires to further nuance any impact violent video games might have even if one finds an (arguably weak) effect. At least, it is not a direct effect and it depends on other factors.","human_ref_B":"these seem good articles  Both articles deal with long term frequent use of this media, I picked these as the dates of publications were  recent.     https:\/\/www.sciencedaily.com\/releases\/2018\/03\/180314102008.htm     https:\/\/www.sciencedaily.com\/releases\/2017\/03\/170308081057.htm     This article I also found interesting. It gives a list of articles with both opinions. However I didn't read any of the articles it refers to. I did find the conclusion paragraph at the end was interesting. A general summing up.  http:\/\/www.techaddiction.ca\/effects_of_violent_video_games.html","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3856.0,"score_ratio":10.0}
{"post_id":"1aho4f","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"I hope this is the right place to ask this question:  Why aren't more people worried about what's going in in Korea and the global implications?  Or am I missing something?","c_root_id_A":"c8xnpsp","c_root_id_B":"c8xi4yo","created_at_utc_A":1363582299,"created_at_utc_B":1363564091,"score_A":12,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"North Korea is in a state of what is known as \"regime survival.\" Their main goal is ensuring that the current regime stays in power with the sub-goal of unifying the Korean peninsula under that regime.  To do this, they have to periodically issue threats and flex muscle. In other words, doing things like developing nukes and amassing large amounts of troops and weapons facing Seoul. This keeps them credible and dangerous enough to keep them with a seat at the negotiating table. They issue periodic threats, involved nations' diplomats address the situation, and the North Korean regime maintains the status quo, thus achieving their original goal.  They are fully aware that any serious strike issued towards South Korea, the US, Japan, or anywhere else for that matter, would only likely end in a viking funeral for the North Korean regime. In other words, *actually* going through with their threats is counter-productive to their goals.  This is a relatively well understood strategy by those in the know, which is why it isn't made into such a huge deal. The diplomats do their job and stave off yet another conflict. Wash, rinse, repeat.  Regular folks who are uneducated on these matters will get upset - I mean, the idea of a nuclear attack is downright scary! - but until proven otherwise, they are merely overreacting.  I hope that answers your question.","human_ref_B":"I'm no expert, so I'll leave a more detailed answer to others. But I suspect most people (and the political establishments in Washington, Seoul, Tokyo, and Beijing) are simply used to North Korean rhetoric.  North Korea is known for bizarrely hyperbolic threats -- in 2011 they threatened to turn the South Korean presidential palace into a \"sea of fire\".   Their state news organ, KCNA, routinely uses inflammatory language. Most articles praise the North and its Dear Leader, or castigate the \"imperialist aggressors\" in Seoul and Washington.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18208.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"jzb03","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why does everything I see\/hear about China's economy predict almost nothing but unbridled growth?  Is there no dissent in the ranks on this? Everything I have seen for the past oh...decade, has spoken of nothing but the oncoming deluge of the Chinese economy.  Talk of how they will triple their GDP by 2025, talk of surpassing the U.S. in technology and innovation.  How they will militarily surpass the West.  How the 21st century will be \"The Chinese Century.\"  As I read all this, I can't help but notice there are no major dissenting voices in the crowd.  I can't help but remember all the talk of how Japan would be ruling the world by now in the 1980's.  Just to be clear, I'm not bringing this up out of some fit of American Jingoism, I just can't help but see this as some sort of group mentality.  I just want to know if any credible counter arguments are out there.","c_root_id_A":"c2gbo1p","c_root_id_B":"c2gbrwc","created_at_utc_A":1314734767,"created_at_utc_B":1314735574,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"There's an interesting documentary by the BBC called India vs China.  Despite the title, it was certainly an interesting programme which highlights many of the issues some people have with the future of the Chinese economy.","human_ref_B":"Funny you should say this; I've seen lots of criticism of this perspective from the left and from the free market 'right', just not much from the Keynesian-Neoclassical centre.  Those following the synthesis view (i.e. most respected economists) have confidence in Chinese growth because the govt. is willing and able to step in with huge spending stimuli at any point, and able to run huge trade surpluses, and generate massive sovereign wealth. Also, there are plenty of extremely worthwhile capital projects for them to invest in, that they haven't done already (unlike the USA, UK, Germany, Japan etc.); think of all the worthwhile infrastructure they can invest in which has already been put in place in 'the West'.  I have to go right now, but I will find some links to critiques of the mainstream view from the 'right' and the left.  Disclosure: second year economics undergraduate at Oxford University, UK","labels":0,"seconds_difference":807.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"jzb03","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why does everything I see\/hear about China's economy predict almost nothing but unbridled growth?  Is there no dissent in the ranks on this? Everything I have seen for the past oh...decade, has spoken of nothing but the oncoming deluge of the Chinese economy.  Talk of how they will triple their GDP by 2025, talk of surpassing the U.S. in technology and innovation.  How they will militarily surpass the West.  How the 21st century will be \"The Chinese Century.\"  As I read all this, I can't help but notice there are no major dissenting voices in the crowd.  I can't help but remember all the talk of how Japan would be ruling the world by now in the 1980's.  Just to be clear, I'm not bringing this up out of some fit of American Jingoism, I just can't help but see this as some sort of group mentality.  I just want to know if any credible counter arguments are out there.","c_root_id_A":"c2gbnqs","c_root_id_B":"c2gbrwc","created_at_utc_A":1314734696,"created_at_utc_B":1314735574,"score_A":2,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"A. Japan only ruled in technology. They have not enough land, people, or resources to become a true world power. China has more land, more people, and more resources then any other country. Them getting their shit together was inevitable.   B. think about this... 55 cents of every US Dollar goes to China, another 13 cents to India. Because we make nothing and send all manufacturing over seas for lower wages and greedy profit, we import everything.   C. They are leading the world right now in growth and infrastructure. In the past decade they have built the worlds largest hydro electric dam with another three in development, they have built the largest bridge over land, water, and through mountains regions, they are pushing money into education, scence, and green technology. Basically...they are doing everything we should, but won't.","human_ref_B":"Funny you should say this; I've seen lots of criticism of this perspective from the left and from the free market 'right', just not much from the Keynesian-Neoclassical centre.  Those following the synthesis view (i.e. most respected economists) have confidence in Chinese growth because the govt. is willing and able to step in with huge spending stimuli at any point, and able to run huge trade surpluses, and generate massive sovereign wealth. Also, there are plenty of extremely worthwhile capital projects for them to invest in, that they haven't done already (unlike the USA, UK, Germany, Japan etc.); think of all the worthwhile infrastructure they can invest in which has already been put in place in 'the West'.  I have to go right now, but I will find some links to critiques of the mainstream view from the 'right' and the left.  Disclosure: second year economics undergraduate at Oxford University, UK","labels":0,"seconds_difference":878.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"jzb03","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why does everything I see\/hear about China's economy predict almost nothing but unbridled growth?  Is there no dissent in the ranks on this? Everything I have seen for the past oh...decade, has spoken of nothing but the oncoming deluge of the Chinese economy.  Talk of how they will triple their GDP by 2025, talk of surpassing the U.S. in technology and innovation.  How they will militarily surpass the West.  How the 21st century will be \"The Chinese Century.\"  As I read all this, I can't help but notice there are no major dissenting voices in the crowd.  I can't help but remember all the talk of how Japan would be ruling the world by now in the 1980's.  Just to be clear, I'm not bringing this up out of some fit of American Jingoism, I just can't help but see this as some sort of group mentality.  I just want to know if any credible counter arguments are out there.","c_root_id_A":"c2gbo1p","c_root_id_B":"c2gciel","created_at_utc_A":1314734767,"created_at_utc_B":1314741198,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"There's an interesting documentary by the BBC called India vs China.  Despite the title, it was certainly an interesting programme which highlights many of the issues some people have with the future of the Chinese economy.","human_ref_B":"Many economists, analysts, and investors are worried about China.  They're having problems with inflation, their banks are thought to be doing badly, Chinese real estate is thought to be in a bubble, and there is good reason to be skeptical that their growth figures are real.  The state is starting to inhibit growth, and many are skeptical about the effectiveness of directed growth.  Its local goverments have been hiding their debt levels, and the coming disproportionately male-dominated demographics is thought to be more destabilizing than the west's aging demographics.    Now their problems are different than those of the West, and probably less severe.  Plus, they've got lots of room to grow - with a billion+ people, many of them still impoverished.  And they've got tons of money, which is easy when you're running a huge trade surplus and have a minimal social\/health safety net.  But it isn't all sunshine & roses.   EDIT: Added sources from the economist, which is a mite more reliable than the sources cited below.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6431.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"jzb03","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why does everything I see\/hear about China's economy predict almost nothing but unbridled growth?  Is there no dissent in the ranks on this? Everything I have seen for the past oh...decade, has spoken of nothing but the oncoming deluge of the Chinese economy.  Talk of how they will triple their GDP by 2025, talk of surpassing the U.S. in technology and innovation.  How they will militarily surpass the West.  How the 21st century will be \"The Chinese Century.\"  As I read all this, I can't help but notice there are no major dissenting voices in the crowd.  I can't help but remember all the talk of how Japan would be ruling the world by now in the 1980's.  Just to be clear, I'm not bringing this up out of some fit of American Jingoism, I just can't help but see this as some sort of group mentality.  I just want to know if any credible counter arguments are out there.","c_root_id_A":"c2gciel","c_root_id_B":"c2gbvc5","created_at_utc_A":1314741198,"created_at_utc_B":1314736278,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Many economists, analysts, and investors are worried about China.  They're having problems with inflation, their banks are thought to be doing badly, Chinese real estate is thought to be in a bubble, and there is good reason to be skeptical that their growth figures are real.  The state is starting to inhibit growth, and many are skeptical about the effectiveness of directed growth.  Its local goverments have been hiding their debt levels, and the coming disproportionately male-dominated demographics is thought to be more destabilizing than the west's aging demographics.    Now their problems are different than those of the West, and probably less severe.  Plus, they've got lots of room to grow - with a billion+ people, many of them still impoverished.  And they've got tons of money, which is easy when you're running a huge trade surplus and have a minimal social\/health safety net.  But it isn't all sunshine & roses.   EDIT: Added sources from the economist, which is a mite more reliable than the sources cited below.","human_ref_B":"A key point about these forecasts is that it's practically (maybe even theoretically) impossible to predict when the break in trend is going to happen. Therefore most reasonable people either say that they don't know what's going to happen or that the situation is going to say the same for the foreseeable future - or that the growth rate is going to remain roughly constant.  Also, everybody understands that the odds of the situation saying the same for the next two decades are rather weak and that a significant event that completely changes the picture is almost certain to happen at some point.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4920.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"jzb03","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why does everything I see\/hear about China's economy predict almost nothing but unbridled growth?  Is there no dissent in the ranks on this? Everything I have seen for the past oh...decade, has spoken of nothing but the oncoming deluge of the Chinese economy.  Talk of how they will triple their GDP by 2025, talk of surpassing the U.S. in technology and innovation.  How they will militarily surpass the West.  How the 21st century will be \"The Chinese Century.\"  As I read all this, I can't help but notice there are no major dissenting voices in the crowd.  I can't help but remember all the talk of how Japan would be ruling the world by now in the 1980's.  Just to be clear, I'm not bringing this up out of some fit of American Jingoism, I just can't help but see this as some sort of group mentality.  I just want to know if any credible counter arguments are out there.","c_root_id_A":"c2gciel","c_root_id_B":"c2gbnqs","created_at_utc_A":1314741198,"created_at_utc_B":1314734696,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Many economists, analysts, and investors are worried about China.  They're having problems with inflation, their banks are thought to be doing badly, Chinese real estate is thought to be in a bubble, and there is good reason to be skeptical that their growth figures are real.  The state is starting to inhibit growth, and many are skeptical about the effectiveness of directed growth.  Its local goverments have been hiding their debt levels, and the coming disproportionately male-dominated demographics is thought to be more destabilizing than the west's aging demographics.    Now their problems are different than those of the West, and probably less severe.  Plus, they've got lots of room to grow - with a billion+ people, many of them still impoverished.  And they've got tons of money, which is easy when you're running a huge trade surplus and have a minimal social\/health safety net.  But it isn't all sunshine & roses.   EDIT: Added sources from the economist, which is a mite more reliable than the sources cited below.","human_ref_B":"A. Japan only ruled in technology. They have not enough land, people, or resources to become a true world power. China has more land, more people, and more resources then any other country. Them getting their shit together was inevitable.   B. think about this... 55 cents of every US Dollar goes to China, another 13 cents to India. Because we make nothing and send all manufacturing over seas for lower wages and greedy profit, we import everything.   C. They are leading the world right now in growth and infrastructure. In the past decade they have built the worlds largest hydro electric dam with another three in development, they have built the largest bridge over land, water, and through mountains regions, they are pushing money into education, scence, and green technology. Basically...they are doing everything we should, but won't.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6502.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"jzb03","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why does everything I see\/hear about China's economy predict almost nothing but unbridled growth?  Is there no dissent in the ranks on this? Everything I have seen for the past oh...decade, has spoken of nothing but the oncoming deluge of the Chinese economy.  Talk of how they will triple their GDP by 2025, talk of surpassing the U.S. in technology and innovation.  How they will militarily surpass the West.  How the 21st century will be \"The Chinese Century.\"  As I read all this, I can't help but notice there are no major dissenting voices in the crowd.  I can't help but remember all the talk of how Japan would be ruling the world by now in the 1980's.  Just to be clear, I'm not bringing this up out of some fit of American Jingoism, I just can't help but see this as some sort of group mentality.  I just want to know if any credible counter arguments are out there.","c_root_id_A":"c2gbo1p","c_root_id_B":"c2gbnqs","created_at_utc_A":1314734767,"created_at_utc_B":1314734696,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There's an interesting documentary by the BBC called India vs China.  Despite the title, it was certainly an interesting programme which highlights many of the issues some people have with the future of the Chinese economy.","human_ref_B":"A. Japan only ruled in technology. They have not enough land, people, or resources to become a true world power. China has more land, more people, and more resources then any other country. Them getting their shit together was inevitable.   B. think about this... 55 cents of every US Dollar goes to China, another 13 cents to India. Because we make nothing and send all manufacturing over seas for lower wages and greedy profit, we import everything.   C. They are leading the world right now in growth and infrastructure. In the past decade they have built the worlds largest hydro electric dam with another three in development, they have built the largest bridge over land, water, and through mountains regions, they are pushing money into education, scence, and green technology. Basically...they are doing everything we should, but won't.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":71.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"jzb03","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why does everything I see\/hear about China's economy predict almost nothing but unbridled growth?  Is there no dissent in the ranks on this? Everything I have seen for the past oh...decade, has spoken of nothing but the oncoming deluge of the Chinese economy.  Talk of how they will triple their GDP by 2025, talk of surpassing the U.S. in technology and innovation.  How they will militarily surpass the West.  How the 21st century will be \"The Chinese Century.\"  As I read all this, I can't help but notice there are no major dissenting voices in the crowd.  I can't help but remember all the talk of how Japan would be ruling the world by now in the 1980's.  Just to be clear, I'm not bringing this up out of some fit of American Jingoism, I just can't help but see this as some sort of group mentality.  I just want to know if any credible counter arguments are out there.","c_root_id_A":"c2gbvc5","c_root_id_B":"c2gbnqs","created_at_utc_A":1314736278,"created_at_utc_B":1314734696,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"A key point about these forecasts is that it's practically (maybe even theoretically) impossible to predict when the break in trend is going to happen. Therefore most reasonable people either say that they don't know what's going to happen or that the situation is going to say the same for the foreseeable future - or that the growth rate is going to remain roughly constant.  Also, everybody understands that the odds of the situation saying the same for the next two decades are rather weak and that a significant event that completely changes the picture is almost certain to happen at some point.","human_ref_B":"A. Japan only ruled in technology. They have not enough land, people, or resources to become a true world power. China has more land, more people, and more resources then any other country. Them getting their shit together was inevitable.   B. think about this... 55 cents of every US Dollar goes to China, another 13 cents to India. Because we make nothing and send all manufacturing over seas for lower wages and greedy profit, we import everything.   C. They are leading the world right now in growth and infrastructure. In the past decade they have built the worlds largest hydro electric dam with another three in development, they have built the largest bridge over land, water, and through mountains regions, they are pushing money into education, scence, and green technology. Basically...they are doing everything we should, but won't.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1582.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"habi1r","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What remains of Freud that is valuable? Specifically, is there any evidence that psychoanalytic treatment methods work to ameliorate the effects of mental illness?","c_root_id_A":"fv359zq","c_root_id_B":"fv32k6y","created_at_utc_A":1592364775,"created_at_utc_B":1592363087,"score_A":19,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"A monumental amount remains.   Here's a summary from 20 years ago but which still holds good:  Drew Westen, The Scientific Legacy of Sigmund Freud: Toward a Psychodynamically Informed Psychological Science (1998)   Moreover, psychoanalysis as both a clinical technique and a theory of the human mind has evolved a tremendous amount since Freud. Much of what is his remains, but psychoanalysis is far more than just Freud. For an overview, see a book like Greenberg and Mitchell, Object Relations in Psychoanalytic Theory \\(1983)  As far as the effectiveness of psychoanalysis and derived therapies, there is a lot of empirical evidence. One relevant overview is:  Jonathan Shedler, The Efficacy of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy (2010)%20Efficacy%20of%20Psychodynamic%20Psychotherapy.pdf)  As Nobel laureate and biologist Eric Kandel notes, \"P]sychoanalysis still represents the most coherent and intellectually satisfying view of the mind.\"  [Biology and the Future of Psychoanalysis: A New Intellectual Framework for Psychiatry Revisited (1999)","human_ref_B":"Psychoanalysis (rooted in Freud) is actually making a comeback and has been vindicated in recent years in a number of studies showing it provides significant relief of symptoms for depression in the long term.   A major study showed that, in the long term, it is actually more effective than cognitive behavioral therapy, which has long been the poster child for evidence-based treatment in the US (not sure with other countries).    Many doubters of psychoanalysis and Freud have been made to eat crow in recent years. But, obviously, the field has moved beyond Freud. He was wrong about a number of things. That said, his foundations remain important.       https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/full\/10.1002\/wps.20267   Edit: Full disclosure: psychology is not my field. But it's something I've always been interested in and tried to keep abreast of.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1688.0,"score_ratio":3.8}
{"post_id":"fd5cv7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Is there any research about how the stages of psychosocial development are affected by periods of unwanted seclusion from society (e.g. chronic physical or mental illness, jail time, unemployment)? I've been reading about Erikson's theory of psychosocial development (caveat: I'm a total beginner in this subject and I appreciate that his definition is by no means definitive).  Anecdotally, I'm in my late twenties and I've 'lost' a good few years of my life to severe mental illness (now stablised) and chronic health problems (ongoing). This has led to a pervading sense of guilt and shame for not being on the same level (career, autonomy) as my peer group, which I'm now working on in therapy.  I was wondering - from both a personal and an intellectual angle - whether anybody has written about similar unwanted disruptions to one's life path and the effect this has on identity and self-esteem. Anything meta on why we have a concept of a 'life path' in the first place would also be very welcome.  Thanks in advance!","c_root_id_A":"fjg3tta","c_root_id_B":"fjfqn6k","created_at_utc_A":1583310233,"created_at_utc_B":1583297696,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"The other commenter is right about Erikson not being sound, but that doesn\u2019t mean there aren\u2019t developmental ramifications for seclusion in childhood. One of my professors specializes in childhood homelessness and as a result got very into the idea of social isolation and childhood loneliness on childhood development. The subject of childhood loneliness + development seems to yield a lot of results if you enter it into a campus database, and one author my professor has mentioned is Paige Blossom, who wrote \u201cEffects of Loneliness on Human Development\u201d https:\/\/files.eric.ed.gov\/fulltext\/EJ1017425.pdf  I know this isn\u2019t quite what you\u2019re looking for, but on the subject of a life path, the book The Defining Decade by Meg Jay has helped a lot personally with my having a similar issue.","human_ref_B":"Eriksons's theory is not a particularly good point to evaluate from, as the less you are like a white european\/american male born at about the same time as Erik himself (so, the less like him you are), the less the theory holds up.  His later assertions that stages occur \"throughout the lifetime\" really just speak to the weakness of the theory in that he has to blur all of the lines until it's no longer stages and more of a few semi-universal struggles many people face and which happened to be highlighted in his own life at about those ages and in about that order.  I've never seen much support for his theory beyond his conceptualization of adolescence, but even then the support I have seen has been pretty restricted to adolescence.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12537.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"5tbiat","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why was homosexuality considered to be a mental illness for many years? In 1973 homosexuality was removed from the list of disorders in the DSM.  But, why for many years before that was homosexuality considered a mental disorder?    On that logic, then, if this was considered an illness, how were people \"treated\" for being gay?  What finally caused the professionals of that time to remove homosexuality as a mental disorder?  Certainly the debate behind that move was fascinating.  Thanks for any insight.","c_root_id_A":"ddlqkh4","c_root_id_B":"ddlrxir","created_at_utc_A":1486788553,"created_at_utc_B":1486791355,"score_A":6,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"> 1\\. All claims in top level comments must be supported by citations to relevant social science sources. No lay speculation.  > 5\\. Discussion must be based on social science findings and research, not opinions, anecdotes, or personal politics.","human_ref_B":"A few reasons are:  Evelyn Hooker wrote an article in 1957 claiming that the people defining these terms seemed to have both an interest in defining sexual deviance and a distaste for homosexuality. In it, she also claims that these same people only interact professionally with homosexual people in mental asylums. These people then went on to treat them therapy, sometimes with electricity and in a few cases brain surgery. Obviously this left many these people \"uncured\" and probably worse off.  Alfred Kinsey wrote two massive books *The Sexuality of Human Males* and *The Sexuality of Human Females* that challenged psychiatrists' (etc.) ideas about homosexuality.   Here's a newer resource by Angela Perone  that goes over this history. She also talks about the continued implications of defining sexual preferences as personal disorders. If it's acceptable for certain \"sexual disorders\" to be treated once they are diagnosed, according to the people that diagnose them, then people with sexual disorders will have an easier time to get help with them; for meds, surgery, etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2802.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"w4gzn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is there evidence to suggest that some early humans exhibited signs of what would later be recognized as mental illness?","c_root_id_A":"c5a5ond","c_root_id_B":"c5a7qdu","created_at_utc_A":1341577803,"created_at_utc_B":1341588862,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"That is part of the arguement presented in the Evolution of Consciousness http:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Julian_Jaynes#section_3  I am not sure about how widely Jaynes' interpretation is accepted, but my impression is that it is  bit of a fringe theory and very hard to prove.","human_ref_B":"This question has every bit as much to do with what we classify as mental illness as it does with the behavior of early humans.  I'm a cultural anthropologist, and find living humans more interesting than dead ones, so the latter is not something I can speak to with authority.  As to the classification of mental illness, these are socially constructed.  This is not to say that there are no \"real\" mental illnesses, but rather, that we define mental illness relative to a socially constructed \"norm\".  Homosexuality is the first example that comes to mind.  Condoned or condemned with wide variation between societies, it was officially recognized as a mental illness for quite a long time- the WHO didn't declassify it as such until 1990.  These norms change over time and culture, and what we would consider normative today is almost certainly wildly divergent from how early humans conceived it.    The point is, to answer this question, we must first define what we mean by \"mental illness\", or by whose standards we are defining them.  If we're talking about today's standards, no early humans could function in modern society, and if one magically appeared on the street, we'd label them as developmentally disabled at a minimum.  I'll say again that archaeology isn't my field, but I'd be surprised to learn that we have any evidence that would indicate how (or if) early humans defined mental illness at all.  Whether we today would apply these labels to people in the past isn't a very telling question for the above reasons.  Did early humans have any such labels to apply to themselves?  How did THEY define mental illness and how does it differ from our understanding from it today?  THAT might be an interesting inquiry, but again, I don't know if we have the archaeological evidence to answer it.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11059.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"w4gzn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is there evidence to suggest that some early humans exhibited signs of what would later be recognized as mental illness?","c_root_id_A":"c5a5ond","c_root_id_B":"c5a6lxo","created_at_utc_A":1341577803,"created_at_utc_B":1341583707,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"That is part of the arguement presented in the Evolution of Consciousness http:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Julian_Jaynes#section_3  I am not sure about how widely Jaynes' interpretation is accepted, but my impression is that it is  bit of a fringe theory and very hard to prove.","human_ref_B":"How early? I know that there are skulls from roughly 5000 BCE that have holes in them, thought to be a treatment for mental illness called trepanning. At the time it would have been thought to be the work of an evil spirit and the hole was a way for the spirit to escape. A surprising number of the people survived the surgery. They also used it for severe headaches\/migraines, which sometimes did relieve symptoms since it reduced pressure. It was a procedure used commonly until modern medicine came around.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5904.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1qyr4h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why is prostitution illegal in the US? Throughout the world, is more common for it to be legal or illegal?","c_root_id_A":"cdhy98l","c_root_id_B":"cdi00gj","created_at_utc_A":1384871262,"created_at_utc_B":1384876278,"score_A":6,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Why is it illegal? Because none of our elected officials support it. Example  The Economist writes about the topic frequently. Here's a debate they had a few years ago.","human_ref_B":"I recommend you check out two books which will help answer this question. (1) Intimate Matters by D'Emilio and Freedman and (2) Sex For Sale: Prostitution, Pornography, and the Sex Industry edited by Weitzer. This will help you understand the history of why it is illegal.  The TL;DR version of these books is that it hasn't always been illegal, and there are small pockets of space in the USA where it is legal (most notably rural Nevada). Over time our view of prostitution has changed from \"necessary evil\" to \"completely unacceptable.\" We no longer view men as unable to control their urges. At one point in our history, according to D'Emilio and Freedman, it was tacitly acceptable for men to go to prostitutes. This was viewed as better than them engaging with premarital sex with other women. Now we equate prostitutes with human trafficking (a completely understandable view that is true in many many cases). Because of this it is no longer acceptable culturally.   Today, in a few areas of rural Nevada, it is possible to go to houses which are for prostitutes. They have many strict laws policing the women's lives, and screening men. They are only female prostitute homes.  There is a shift in America towards a *decriminalization* of prostitution. There are three stances of legality that a state can take: legalize, criminalize (to make illegal) or decriminalize. In most places the stance is criminalization. This means if a woman or man engages in prostitution, they will be arrested, charged, and prosecuted. We are shifting towards decriminalization, which means that women\/men who are prostitutes will not be arrested because there is no crime. Rather they will receive assistance to escape from prostitution. In many cases the purchaser of sex will still be prosecuted, or be mandated to attend a \"John School.\" This model is receiving greater support from policy makers, and is already being implemented in some areas (although not codified into law). This model is predicated on the assumption that all prostitutes are forced into prostitution and would like to receive help, if it were offered. Legalization implies government control and regulation, and only exists in Nevada (and then only in limited amounts).  Worldwide, it is more likely for prostitution to be illegal. There are some countries in the Netherlands with state-regulated prostitution (legalized prostitution).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5016.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"o41a3h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"Has there been studies about the workplace politics, about the type of factions and cliques that develop within corporation and other large institutions?","c_root_id_A":"h2f1lq6","c_root_id_B":"h2f4sqb","created_at_utc_A":1624187494,"created_at_utc_B":1624190179,"score_A":7,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Methinks the work of Oliver James might be of interest to you. Prof James' training is in clinical psychology, but I think he could be called a political scientist also, because his work directly concerns how individuals affect the behavior of others in group settings.  It's always been fairly clear to me that politics is an emergent property of psychology, and at least a basic understanding of one is necessary for a full understanding of the other, in both directions. Psychology is the science of human behavior, and psychologists ask \"Why do people do what they do?\"; Politics is the science and praxis of group behavior, and political scientists ask \"Why do *groups of* people do what they do?\", and equally as interestingly, \"Why do people *in groups* do what they do when they're *in groups*?\" Relational psychology and micropolitics are one and the same field of enquiry.  From my reading of James, factions and cliques in human institutions naturally form when members share an aim (including a shared interpretation of the institution's overarching aim), which is not shared unanimously within the institution. Factions and cliques are an emergent property of the natural variation in individual members' reasons for choosing membership. The formation and perpetuation of cliques is normal and should be expected and anticipated. It's only inherently problematic to the institution, when the shared aim of the clique is incompatible with, or destructive towards, the larger institution's collective aim and mission statement.","human_ref_B":"One of the books that have been most influential on my studies is Gideon Kunda's \"Engineering Culture: Control and Commitment in a High-Tech Corporation\", where he explores the culture of a high-tech corporation in the 90's to explore what it means to work there.  It gives a really interesting look into how a large tech company actually works as a social world, where ideology is diffused and practices are formed. To your question he goes into the different categories of employees at the company, and how they have different values and the ways in which they themselves try to differentiate themselves from one another. It's a book that feels very *real* and makes the organisation almost come alive. If you want to understand what it feels to be part of different factions in a corporation, I think this could be a very good choice!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2685.0,"score_ratio":2.4285714286}
{"post_id":"542u2j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Currently, \"identity\" politics and a general importance of identity is the paradigm through which academia works and subjects are studied. What was the paradigm before this, and what caused it to shift? Sorry if it's not the right subreddit, or if I explained poorly, but it's been a very pressing question as a University student.","c_root_id_A":"d7ylci6","c_root_id_B":"d7ym7fd","created_at_utc_A":1474615270,"created_at_utc_B":1474618221,"score_A":6,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"I'm sorry, could you be more specific? I'm not sure what you mean by 'identity politics' or which discipline you're approaching it from. While the role of identity (especially cultural identity) was a big part of my undergraduate degree, I don't think I would go so far as to say it dominates academia. I've even had ethnographers tell me it's old hat and largely irrelevant!","human_ref_B":"So first a note: obviously, \"identity politics\" only is relevant to some parts of the humanities and social sciences.  While I think parts of it are too relevant to sociology and anthropology, identity and history and contingency are often not treated seriously enough in fields like economics and psychology.  Further, the dominant thinking about identity in sociology (and political science and to a lesser degree anthropology) on the sort of \"cutting edge\" is very different from identity politics writ large, the identity politics of social movements.  This has been a major analytic shift, and it starts really with a sociologist named Rogers Brubaker, and can be traced back to two very important articles \"Beyond 'Identity'\" (PDF, with the historian Frederick Cooper) and \"Ethnicity without Groups\" (PDF), both collected in his book *Ethnicity without Groups*.  His most basic point is that a lot of the identity we tend to common sense think of as \"groups\" are really \"categories\".  Blackness and whiteness are not \"groups\" in any common sense of the word, but rather social categories.  People are \"identified\" into these categories (by themselves and by others) and these categories then lead to things like self-understandings and other-understandings as members of these categories  And these categories have changing borders--Barack Obama is definitely Black in the 21st Century United States, but he'd definitely *not* be Black in 21st Century Brazil or the 19th Century United States, where he'd be classed as \"Brown\" or \"Mulatto\", respectively.  Same category name, based on different sets of salient attributes.  This understanding can be extended to a lot of things--North Carolina's infamous bathroom bill, which seeks to exclude transgender people from the bathrooms associated trans* identity\/sense of self, is a bill that seeks to legislate the boundaries of the category of gender in a different way from transgender people and their allies (and a lot of other people who just accept that transgender is \"a thing\").    But you asked about historical trajectory, which is a rather different perspective.  As is hopefully somewhat clear from above, the actual academics can be rather different from the folk understandings of social movements.  I can't say about wider society, really, but I can give a little about the academics.    I love this little bit from Marshall Sahlins's *Waiting for Foucault, Still* (PDF).  The core of the pamphlet was written in 1993 (ancient history) and was gradually expanded until it appeared in this form in 2002.  This was probably from the later part of that period, or possibly just revised in the later part of that period, since *Deep Trout* was published in 2000.  I'll quote the whole chapter in Sahlins, but first I need to explain Thomas Kuhn's theory of paradigm shifts.  Kuhn argues that science operates based on \"paradigms\" where work in one paradigm is \"incommensurable\" (sort of \"untranslatable\") into the others.  The Aristotelean universe gives ways to the Copernican universe, the Copernican universe gives way to the Einsteinian universe, the Einsteinian universe gives way to the quantum universe, etc.  Not everyone agrees with Kuhn's theory (now, at best people probably adhere to a weak form of his there, which is of major shifts without the incommensurability), but it's important to understand what Sahlins writes below about paradigm shifts in the social sciences.  And beyond that, it's important also important to know what paradigm Sahlins thinks anthropology is in (or rather leaving) at the moment he's writing.  He calls the old paradigm \"Foucauldian-Gramscian-Nietzschean obsession with power[...] following Gramsci and Foucault, the current neo-functionalism of power seems even more complete: as if everything that could be relevant to power were power.\"  From there, everything is seen as either \"hegemonic\"\/\"dominant\" (this is bad) or \"counter-hegemonic\"\/\"resistant\" (this is good).  Sahlins goes through several examples (20-3) he marks as particularly trivial and not actually about power, hegemony, or resistance.   He ends that section by saying:  >\u201cA hyper-inflation of significance\u201d would be another way of describing the new functionalism, translating the apparently trivial into the fatefully political by a rhetoric that typically reads like a dictionary of trendy names and concepts, many of them French, a veritable La Ruse of postmodernism. Of course the effect, rather than amplifying the significance of Neapolitan nicknames or Vietnamese pronouns, is to trivialize such terms as \u201cdomination,\u201d \u201cresistance,\u201d \u201ccolonization,\u201d even \u201cviolence\u201d and \u201cpower.\u201d Deprived of real-political reference, these words become pure values, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing\u2026but the speaker.  (continued below)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2951.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"irqqyd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What are terms or concepts associated with the idea of, \"people all acting towards the same goal because they have common incentives, not necessarily because there is an explicit conspiracy\" There seems to be a new popular wave of conspiracy theorizing in popular politics and I am struggling to find a concise way of describing and explaining the concept of, \"just because all these major institutions acted towards the same goals doesn't mean that they are making backroom shady deals with each other to coordinate, they all share common incentives and would make those choices even without any coordination\".  It is like *\"as if\" conspiracy*. To the outside observer their behavior is indistinguishable from an actual conspiracy, and the consequences of their actions may be just as damaging as those of the conspiracy you are imagining, but nonetheless there is no reason to believe that there was much or any coordination. It isn't some small boardroom of elites that are coordinating the import of all these immigrants you oppose, for example, the real explanation is that businesses big and small all across the country are each individually incentivized to support liberal immigration policies, and each independently lobbies their representatives for these policies.","c_root_id_A":"g52p2fq","c_root_id_B":"g52usbx","created_at_utc_A":1599987574,"created_at_utc_B":1599989791,"score_A":9,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"You might be interested in Durkheim's Organic Solidarity\/06%3A_Social_Groups_and_Organization\/6.06%3A_Social_Structure_in_the_Global_Perspective\/6.6A%3A_Durkheim\u2019s_Mechanical_and_Organic_Solidarity)","human_ref_B":"In economics, an example of this is Paul Sweezey's \"kinked demand schedule\", which explains why oligopolistic markets tend to hover around the same price even without direct collusion between the firms.   https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Kinked_demand  In sociology, I think this fits with Durkheim's concept of organic solidarity. It's also present in a lot of Marxist writing - the bourgeoisie and state aren't necessarily in direct conspiracy to act against workers, but the structure of capitalist society pushes them to take that role if they wish to maintain their own wealth & power.  This can take different forms, 'orthodox Marxism' often uses direct incentive or even functionalist arguments for this, but there's also some Marxist writing that examines it in terms of the shared upbringings and overlapping social circles influencing the consciousness of the powerful (e.g. Miliband's State in a Capitalist Society).   It additionally tallies with some organisational sociology work, e.g. Michels iron law of oligarchy or Joreen's invisible hierarchies & tyranny of structurelessness.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2217.0,"score_ratio":2.2222222222}
{"post_id":"irqqyd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What are terms or concepts associated with the idea of, \"people all acting towards the same goal because they have common incentives, not necessarily because there is an explicit conspiracy\" There seems to be a new popular wave of conspiracy theorizing in popular politics and I am struggling to find a concise way of describing and explaining the concept of, \"just because all these major institutions acted towards the same goals doesn't mean that they are making backroom shady deals with each other to coordinate, they all share common incentives and would make those choices even without any coordination\".  It is like *\"as if\" conspiracy*. To the outside observer their behavior is indistinguishable from an actual conspiracy, and the consequences of their actions may be just as damaging as those of the conspiracy you are imagining, but nonetheless there is no reason to believe that there was much or any coordination. It isn't some small boardroom of elites that are coordinating the import of all these immigrants you oppose, for example, the real explanation is that businesses big and small all across the country are each individually incentivized to support liberal immigration policies, and each independently lobbies their representatives for these policies.","c_root_id_A":"g52s533","c_root_id_B":"g52usbx","created_at_utc_A":1599988753,"created_at_utc_B":1599989791,"score_A":8,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"You could start with Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith's Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) - a pretty popular\/mainstream model that looks at how institutions and actors with similar interests tend to work together as a group as a result of their shared interests. The relevant sub-part within the broader ACF model is the concept that, rather than some central cabal or secret society being necessarily behind things, groups of like-minded actors seeking to make or change policy naturally clump together and work together effectively even in the absence of any leadership or even identification as a singular cause. They then in turn work against other, similarly formed 'advocacy coalitions' that have differing viewpoints, and who may or may not actually identify themselves as being a part of such a group. When groups have common values, beliefs and hoped-for outcomes, they naturally tend to align without necessarily having a need for central organisation - or even awareness of the extent to which they are working as a part of a broader group. Does a single fish know the dimensions or behaviour of the school in which it swims? It doesn't have to - as the fish are all going in the same direction(s) by nature.  The ACF was originally published as a symposium issue of Policy Sciences. It was revised somewhat in 1993 as a result of six case studies solicited by the authors. Their early research dealt primarily with U.S. energy and environmental policy, the authors' fields of expertise.  As a summary of it beyond my snapshot, here's a good explanation, from the first source listed below:  \"The ACF depicts the policy process as adversarial competition where actors form and maintain coalitions, engage in analytical debates with the potential for learning, and advocate for their preferred policy problems and alternatives.\"  \\...\\]  \"The ACF argues that policy-relevant beliefs are a principal motivator of individual behavior within policy subsystems. Policy-relevant beliefs include a mixture of normative beliefs (such as value systems or beliefs regarding appropriate roles of government in decision-making) and positive or empirically grounded beliefs (such as the likely impacts of a particular policy choice).\"  The first couple pages of the first source sets it out nicely.  Sources:  Adam Douglas Henry, Karin Ingold, Daniel Nohrstedt & Christopher M. Weible (2014) *Policy Change in Comparative Contexts: Applying the Advocacy Coalition Framework Outside of Western Europe and North America*, Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice, 16:4, 299-312, DOI: 10.1080\/13876988.2014.941200  P. Sabatier, Christopher M. Weible (2007) *The advocacy coalition framework: Innovations and clarifications,* Chapter 7 of Theories of the Policy Process, Second Edition, Avalon Publishing [https:\/\/collectivememory.fsv.cuni.cz\/CVKP-29-version1-priloha\\_2\\_FF.pdf  Sabatier, P.A. *An advocacy coalition framework of policy change and the role of policy-oriented learning therein.* Policy Sci 21, 129\u2013168 (1988). https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1007\/BF00136406  (apologies for sources formatting, it's Sunday night)","human_ref_B":"In economics, an example of this is Paul Sweezey's \"kinked demand schedule\", which explains why oligopolistic markets tend to hover around the same price even without direct collusion between the firms.   https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Kinked_demand  In sociology, I think this fits with Durkheim's concept of organic solidarity. It's also present in a lot of Marxist writing - the bourgeoisie and state aren't necessarily in direct conspiracy to act against workers, but the structure of capitalist society pushes them to take that role if they wish to maintain their own wealth & power.  This can take different forms, 'orthodox Marxism' often uses direct incentive or even functionalist arguments for this, but there's also some Marxist writing that examines it in terms of the shared upbringings and overlapping social circles influencing the consciousness of the powerful (e.g. Miliband's State in a Capitalist Society).   It additionally tallies with some organisational sociology work, e.g. Michels iron law of oligarchy or Joreen's invisible hierarchies & tyranny of structurelessness.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1038.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"ydaiqg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is China more authoritarian than Vietnam? What political developments led to China becoming more authoritarian than Vietnam?  Vietnam has access to Western sites while China blocks most, China cares about policing the internet more than Vietnam, and China cares about policing cultural works than Vietnam. Yes, Vietnamese movies have some serious censorship but at least they can still make ghost movies and homosexual relationship content.  Why does the Chinese government interfere in the social lives of Chinese people more than the Vietnamese government?  If it\u2019s a case of losing authority? Why is the Vietnamese government more prone to make decisions that risk their authority than the Chinese government is?","c_root_id_A":"its8q2j","c_root_id_B":"itrv8r3","created_at_utc_A":1666737467,"created_at_utc_B":1666731794,"score_A":32,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Bro. Whoever is reporting this as an unanswerable social science question, to the extent that that's true, that's a problem with social science, and not the question. In an age where authoritarianism is on the rise globally, it's a pretty daggum important historical and sociological question.","human_ref_B":"I\u2019d recommend you contact the author here and ask for a copy of her dissertation, would likely give you a thorough answer.  https:\/\/fsi.stanford.edu\/events\/responsiveness-shadow-repression-vietnam-and-china-compared  For a more casual answer, with more conjecture, see this thread  https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/VietNam\/comments\/vasya7\/is_vietnam_more_liberal_than_china_if_so_why\/  I think an important point is that once you start repressing, you often need to lean into it to maintain control. China has the power, money, administrative size, and control to do this. Vietnam does not, at the moment, but they have started cracking down more   https:\/\/qz.com\/22160\/vietnam-is-becoming-more-repressive-to-cosy-up-to-china-that-is-an-economic-policy-mis-step\/amp","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5673.0,"score_ratio":2.4615384615}
{"post_id":"rs5k24","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Why do the majority of Americans say US race relations are bad? Why do the majority of Americans say US race relations are bad?  From 2001 to 2013, around 60-70% of whites and blacks said US race relations are good. In 2021, just 33% of blacks and 43% of whites say it is good.  What happened? Americans in 2021 have never been less racist right?  https:\/\/news.gallup.com\/poll\/354638\/approval-interracial-marriage-new-high.aspx  I remember hearing a theory that it was Black Lives Matter's creation in 2013 that caused the decline in good race relations. That cannot possibly be supported by evidence right?   Is there a better explanation?","c_root_id_A":"hqmp5g1","c_root_id_B":"hqmxsrq","created_at_utc_A":1640917159,"created_at_utc_B":1640921175,"score_A":3,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"I agree that access to social media has helped (or hurt?) different views.  Another factor in today's climate is the role of infotainment media.  And it's not relevant as to which media source you may watch...Fox, MSNBC, etc.  You get a 'narrative' that fits the majority of their demographic.  The days of having engaging challenging opinions I'm afraid are gone.  Far too many Americans want to be steadfast in their 'angry' beliefs as opposed to having any sort of meaningful dialogue.  https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/social-trends\/2016\/06\/27\/on-views-of-race-and-inequality-blacks-and-whites-are-worlds-apart\/","human_ref_B":"Given the sample set of the last 2 decades I think we can take an examination of factors unrelated to social media as well. I'll try to keep it to this particular timeline and avoid the obviously undocumented issues of racial violence during reconstruction, Jim Crow and the civil rights movement.  Focusing in on 2001 as well a study done in Idaho noted that Non-White Idahoans were 3 times more likely to be victims of hate crimes and feel the perception that they were under threat. For instance in 2016 it was noted that 'reported' violence against Muslims was higher than even 2001. Of specific events and instances that could influence actions of racial violence and feelings of race relations being worse another study noted that hate crimes increased after political rallies specifically in 2016 and beyond. We can see this trend of increasing hatecrimes in this chart prepared by Statista. I must note that their 2020 data is wrong and has not been corrected I'll share the correct numbers for 2020 below, I used this reference as sharing this data visually isn't easily done. Each bullet point will link back to the FBI data source and report It is also very important to note that the FBI data only covers about 250-265 million people as included in their methodology so this is all very likely underreported.  * 2001 - 9,730 hate crimes rank - 1 * 2002 - 7,459 hate crimes * 2003 - 7489 hate crimes * 2004 - 7,649 hate crimes * 2005 - 7,163 hate crimes * 2006 - 7,772 hate crimes * 2007 - 7,621 hate crimes * 2008 -  7,783 hate crimes * 2009 - 6,598 hate crimes * 2010 - 6,628 hate crimes * 2011 - 6,222 hate crimes * 2012 - 6,708 hate crimes \\- addendum has missing data used to compile final number * 2013 - 5,928 hate crimes * 2014 - 5,479 hate crimes \\- rank 20 * 2015 - 5,850 hate crimes \\- rank 19 * 2016 - 6,121 hate crimes * 2017 -  7,175 hate crimes * 2018 - 7,120 hate crimes * 2019 -  7,314 hate crimes * 2020 - 8,052 hate crimes rank - 2  Alongside the actual **direct** increase in numbers of hate crimes observed by law enforcement officials.  The incidents being more visible could potentially influence perceptions and fear particularly alongside the number of reports and rise of social media and the ability of this to be recorded and shared more widely.  Edit: Discussing the conditions and doing a close analysis of if Black Lives Matter caused Race Relations to worsen would be an entirely different question. If you want to dive deeper most victims of the hate crimes detailed above identify as Black or African American.  I study public administration and public policy.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4016.0,"score_ratio":7.6666666667}
{"post_id":"rs5k24","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Why do the majority of Americans say US race relations are bad? Why do the majority of Americans say US race relations are bad?  From 2001 to 2013, around 60-70% of whites and blacks said US race relations are good. In 2021, just 33% of blacks and 43% of whites say it is good.  What happened? Americans in 2021 have never been less racist right?  https:\/\/news.gallup.com\/poll\/354638\/approval-interracial-marriage-new-high.aspx  I remember hearing a theory that it was Black Lives Matter's creation in 2013 that caused the decline in good race relations. That cannot possibly be supported by evidence right?   Is there a better explanation?","c_root_id_A":"hqmp5g1","c_root_id_B":"hqp28v0","created_at_utc_A":1640917159,"created_at_utc_B":1640967634,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I agree that access to social media has helped (or hurt?) different views.  Another factor in today's climate is the role of infotainment media.  And it's not relevant as to which media source you may watch...Fox, MSNBC, etc.  You get a 'narrative' that fits the majority of their demographic.  The days of having engaging challenging opinions I'm afraid are gone.  Far too many Americans want to be steadfast in their 'angry' beliefs as opposed to having any sort of meaningful dialogue.  https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/social-trends\/2016\/06\/27\/on-views-of-race-and-inequality-blacks-and-whites-are-worlds-apart\/","human_ref_B":">Why do the majority of Americans say US race relations are bad?  TLDR: Racism has gone mainstream among Conservatives.  That is because race relations have gotten worse.  The turning points are birtherism, the end of racism, propaganda, Trump and rebranding racism.  I've put the relevant quotes and links at the bottom for easy reference.  With birtherism, racism became acceptable to mainstream Conservatives, but not overtly racist enough to be repellent.  Birtherism, Benghazi and QAnon: Why Conspiracy Theories Pose a Threat to American Democracy.    With Obama's presidency, racism was declared to be over among many.  Racism In America Is Over  SHELBY COUNTY, ALABAMA v. HOLDER, ATTORNEY GENERAL, ET AL.  With Trump's election, propaganda has proven to the a useful tool.  Russia uses propaganda via social media to anger people in the US.  Internet troll confession: \u201cWe provoke a new level of aggression in our victims\u201d  It is my understanding this is done with the purpose of increasing discord in the US.  Russian documents reveal desire to sow racial discord \u2014 and violence \u2014 in the U.S.  With Trump's presidency the US leadership became friendly to radical overt racists which made racism more mainstream among Conservatives and attacked anti-racism programs.  President Donald Trump On Charlottesville: You Had Very Fine People, On Both Sides | CNBC  Trump Expands Ban On Racial Sensitivity Training To Federal Contractors  Racism was rebranded to parental rights, protecting children, anti-CRT, anti-1619 project, anti-woke, anti-BLM, etc. The Anti\u2013Critical Race Theory Movement Will Profoundly Affect Public Education  Now racism is much more mainstream and anti-racism efforts are resisted.  From Birtherism, Benghazi and QAnon: Why Conspiracy Theories Pose  a Threat to American Democracy  \"Racism in America and The Beginning of The Birther movement-  Birther claims against Obama were completely unfounded, as President Obama proved his citizenship through providing his birth certificate to the public, which clearly stated he was born in Hawaii (Silverleib, 2011). ***The accusation that President Obama was born outside of the U.S. is an example of xenophobia and racism that accompanies the birther conspiracy theory.*** A second example similar to this comes again from current President Donald Trump, who told multiple congresswomen of color to \u201cgo back to where they came from\u201d when these women were, in fact, American citizens (Quilantan & Cohen, 2019). This mimics birtherism because it is again an example of someone publicly questioning where an individual is from in order to demean them. These types of conspiracy theories shed light on the larger problem of racism in the United States, which is rooted in the history of our nation.\"  Racism In America Is Over  \"Yes, I mean it. ***This is a time when we can afford to let the past be the past.*** Obama's election showed us that we can, and his call for action requires that we do.\"  SHELBY COUNTY, ALABAMA v. HOLDER, ATTORNEY GENERAL, ET AL.  \"(3) Nearly 50 years later, ***things have changed dramatically.***  Largely because of the Voting Rights Act, \u201cv]oter turnout and registration rates\u201d in covered jurisdictions \u201cnow approach parity. Blatantly discriminatory evasions of federal decrees are rare. And minority candidates hold office at unprecedented levels.\u201d Northwest Austin, supra, at 202. The tests and devices that blocked ballot access have been forbidden nationwide for over 40 years. Yet the Act has not eased \u00a75\u2019s restrictions or narrowed the scope of \u00a74\u2019s coverage formula along the way. Instead those extraordinary and unprecedented features have been reauthorized as if nothing has changed, and they have grown even stronger. Because \u00a75 applies only to those jurisdictions singled out by \u00a74, the Court turns to consider that provision.\"  [Internet troll confession: \u201cWe provoke a new level of aggression in our victims\u201d  I think the title clearly communicates the point.  The Anti\u2013Critical Race Theory Movement Will Profoundly Affect Public Education  \"Democrats have not successfully countered this disinformation campaign nor accurately reflected on its history.  Indeed, in response to ***charges of reverse racism and the subversion of parent rights and parental say,*** Democrats argued that none of the things criticized by Republicans are actually part of CRT.\"  I hope that helps.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":50475.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"kok07w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why do you think Americans developed an 'Ethnic identity\" as opposed to a \"State\/territorial\" identity similar to Europeans? In America, I've seen people get grouped into large heritage groups like the white community, the black community, and the Latin community. If a white person were to travel from the East to the West coast, he would see other whites as fellow white\/fellow Americans. The same with a black person going from the East coast to the South. I've noticed people will say this is \"Our people.\"  Meanwhile, I have seen in Europe people have a strong sense of nationhood where land and language matters a lot more to them. Moreover, even countries that use the same language(England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland) will see themselves as part of a different nation or \"peoplehood.'  After the American Revolution, I remember reading that if a state wanted to pass some unfavorable laws to the people living there. The people would threaten to leave for another state, and eventually, they went for a western state. Historically, there has been a trend of moving westward.   &#x200B;  What do you guys think?","c_root_id_A":"ghs8uj1","c_root_id_B":"ghs9dp4","created_at_utc_A":1609552512,"created_at_utc_B":1609552807,"score_A":18,"score_B":45,"human_ref_A":"> American Anthropological Association states that \"the 'racial' worldview was invented to assign some groups to perpetual low status, while others were permitted access to privilege, power, and wealth. The tragedy in the United States has been that the policies and practices stemming from this worldview succeeded all too well in constructing unequal populations among Europeans, Native Americans, and peoples of African descent.\"  > https:\/\/nmaahc.si.edu\/learn\/talking-about-race\/topics\/race-and-racial-identity  In America I think this has a lot to do with the long tail of Antebellum slavery where explicit exceptions were carved out to our \"All men are created equal\" philosophy in order to exploit black people for free labor. Eventually large swaths of the country became economically dependent on slavery and developed a culture that accommodates and to this day justifies systemic racism. We fought a war over it and a strong argument can be made that many of today's social problems are a direct consequence of the failure of reconstruction. Even after slavery ended the socioeconomic classism and racism continued as \"white culture\" and the social mobility it represented was not accessible to many people. (Literal mobility, too. There literally used to be travel books for when black people went on road trips so they'd know which towns were safe to stop in.) These groups have been kept separate so long that they developed distinct cultures.  Some once-vilified cultures have been integrated into \"white culture,\" such as Jews, Irish, Italians, and some wealthy Latinos, (I was surprised when I learned how genetically diverse Latin America is.) They were once heavily discriminated against and today not so much. They didn't have centuries of forced exclusion and poverty here and they have been more accepted as perceived financial inequalities vanish and they became considered part of the majority. It appears acceptance largely coincided with public perceptions of economic prosperity for each group.  As I see it most of our issues are economic but we have this myth in America that anyone can be rich if they apply themselves, so many people prefer to blame race or culture rather than systemic inequality so as not to cause cognitive dissonance. I think it's no surprise that these are the groups that stand out to you as they are the groups most economically left behind:  > Across almost all cities, Blacks and Hispanics are consistently the populations demonstrating the least economic strength. In order to close the economic equity gap, special attention will have to be directed towards those populations.  > https:\/\/socialequity.duke.edu\/portfolio-item\/city-economic-equity-rankings-analysis-of-21-u-s-cities\/  TL;DR: Impermeable socioeconomic classism in a society that pretends to be a meritocracy and isn't, leading to distinct cultural\/racial groups.","human_ref_B":"We should discuss your premise before addressing any other part of your query. **There is, in fact, such a thing as an American national identity** (which is what you probably mean by \"'state\/territorial identity\") and reports of its death tend to be greatly exaggerated. To quote part of the conclusion to Schildkraut's review of literature on \"National Identity in the United States\" (2011):  >The desire to produce empirical insights into public opinion about American identity has taken on new urgency in the past decade as the demographic consequences of mass immigration are being realized in cities and towns in all corners of the nation. At present, politicians, commentators, activists, and scholars in the United States are not only concerned with whether patriotism promotes civic engagement and\/or xenophobia, but also with whether levels of patriotism vary systematically across ethnic groups and across immigrant generations. Likewise, they seek answers on whether immigrants and their descendents come to think of themselves as American, and if not, whether anyone should care. **The early results suggest that American identity is doing just fine. Levels of patriotism are high and vary little across ethnic or immigrant background. Most Americans of all backgrounds think of themselves as American as opposed to thinking of themselves as members of an ethnic or national-origin group.** And for those who prioritize a non-American identity, the level of trust in American institutions, political participation, and sense of obligation to the national community are largely unaffected. The emerging consensus in this research agenda is that interested parties should orient their concerns toward the extent to which non-Whites, immigrants, and their descendents feel that their ethnic group is discriminated against in American society. Such perceptions are far more consequential than whether a person thinks of himself as American or as Dominican.  That established, it is important to stress that **people can, and do, have** ***multiple*** **social identities**, which can be more or less salient in different contexts and moments. In short, the same individual can have a class identity, an ethnic identity, *and* a national identity (*and* many more group or collective identities such as librarian, Marvel fan, etc.). To quote Schildkraut (2014) in regard to the status of \"American identity\":  >**There is an increasing recognition among scholars that American identity, along with all other national identities, is not necessarily unique relative to other types of collective identities with regard to its attitudinal dynamics. Group identities are largely considered to be social in nature, deriving their power from contexts and from the extent to which people consider their group based memberships to be an important part of how they conceive of themselves as individuals.** This theoretical approach to collective identities is known as social identity theory (Tajfel 1982, Tajfel & Turner 1986, Spears 2011). **In this perspective, one\u2019s national identity is viewed as a social identity, which refers to the part of a person\u2019s sense of self that derives from his or her membership in a particular group and the value or meaning that he or she attaches to such membership** (Tajfel 1982).   ---  In comparison to Europe, it is true that there are differences and nuances in the manner in which people identify themselves and others, which can be attributed to sociocultural and historical differences. However, **there is also an issue of language, or rather the meaning given to different kinds of social identities and the labels employed (e.g. what \"ethnicity\" and \"nationality\" mean in the US, and in Europe)**. I elaborate on this in my reply to the following older thread: \"Chinese-speakers in Indonesia and Malaysia generally identify themselves as ethnically Chinese. Do German-speakers in Austria, Switzerland, France, and Belgium consider themselves to be ethnically German?\"   As I explain in that thread, one has to take care not to overgeneralize. **There are differences** ***between*** **so-called Western and Eastern European countries, and there are also differences** ***within*** **these two sociopolitical regions.** The manner in which French identities are construed is not the same to how British, Swiss, Spanish or Italian identities are construed. I believe it is illustrative to compare France and Italy, and their respective national cultures. For illustration, **take the conceptualization of** ***French unity*** highlighted by Trevor Noah's spat with the French Ambassador:  * Trevor Noah\u2019s feud with France over race, identity, and Africa, explained (*Vox* article)  * Trevor Noah is right. People can be both French and African (*The Conversation* article)  **And contrast it with the idea of** ***campanilismo or Italian regionalism\/provincialism***. Also see this blog post and this opinion piece written by Italians. (Also take note of the concept of an European identity, and of multiplicity of identities in the latter piece.)  ---  P.S. As to the place and history of ethnic (ethnoracial) identities in the US, or rather racialized identities, you should look into colonialism, scientific racism, and the history of the US in relation to these practices and ideas. See the following sources of information for some primers:  * AAA Statement on Race (American Anthropological Association)  * RACE - The Power of an Illusion (PBS)  * * Also see the official website of the broadcast   * RACE - Are We So Different? (AAA)  Relatedly, in regard to the notion of \"White Americans\" specifically, I suggest also looking into the historical (past *and* present) complexities of conceptualizing \"Whiteness\" itself in the US context (and beyond). See for example *Ozawa v. United States* and *United States v. Bhagat Singh Thind*.  For elaboration, see this and this comment, which concern Middle Eastern and North African people, and Jewish people respectively.   ---  Schildkraut, D. J. (2014). Boundaries of American identity: evolving understandings of \u201cUs\u201d. Annual review of political science, 17.  Schildkraut, D. J. (2011). National identity in the United States. In Handbook of identity theory and research (pp. 845-865). Springer, New York, NY.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":295.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2ddwf7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Why do African Americans suffer from a higher rate of poverty and incarceration compared to other minorities such as Asians and Hispanics?","c_root_id_A":"cjonndn","c_root_id_B":"cjoliid","created_at_utc_A":1407894287,"created_at_utc_B":1407889678,"score_A":87,"score_B":49,"human_ref_A":"Quite simply because other minorities never faced focused, sustained disinvestment (through redlining and community dislocation) in their communities in the way that black communities did.   If you want details of how this played out in the real world there is a very detailed analysis of what happened in Portland, OR from 1940-2000 called Bleeding Albina by Dr. Gibson in the Portland State Urban Studies department.","human_ref_B":"You asked almost the exact same question last year. Are you looking for something more specific that wasn't addressed in that thread?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4609.0,"score_ratio":1.7755102041}
{"post_id":"26b7rr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why are psychics and mediums more popular with women than men in the U.S.? I'm not sure if the trend applies outside of America, but certainly in the country psychics and mediums rely on a dominantly female clientele. Has any research been done into this phenomenon?","c_root_id_A":"chpfq7l","c_root_id_B":"chpgdkn","created_at_utc_A":1400870095,"created_at_utc_B":1400871503,"score_A":11,"score_B":37,"human_ref_A":"What source did you use to find out that psychics and mediums are more popular with women than men in the U.S.?","human_ref_B":"Women are more likely to be religious and spiritual  >[Women] are more likely to express a greater interest in religion, have a stronger personal religious commitment, and attend church more frequently. Moreover, this appears to hold true over the life course and regardless of the type of religious organization or belief system (e.g., cult, sect, or church affiliation; *belief in astrology, magic, spirits, and so on*). (Citations omitted, emphasis mine)  More women believe in spiritual and supernatural phenomenon and so are more likely to frequent psychics and mediums. I cannot speculate as to why women are more likely than men to believe this.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1408.0,"score_ratio":3.3636363636}
{"post_id":"n144zc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"When did the concept of mindfulness and eastern spirituality notions began to be spread throughout western societies? I see a constant marketing of mindfulness, guided meditation, awareness workshops, zen theory and general notions\/precepts of eastern spirituality being applied to a growing field of organizational practices, psychology, counseling, corporations, self-help industry, daily lives, etc... of which I'm not sure it resembles any said practices in contemporary eastern societies as a counterpart to this field I mentioned and the value the West puts on this practices.  So I wonder: Is this a trend? If so, how and when it began to start? I can only imagine it had something to do about the New Age counterculture movement, but to which extent?   Thanks in advance!","c_root_id_A":"gwamapm","c_root_id_B":"gwal3oj","created_at_utc_A":1619703524,"created_at_utc_B":1619702940,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Yes, it is a huge trend in clinical psychology - specially within the third wave of behaviourism.  Check here for more info about how mindfulness is used:  https:\/\/positivepsychology.com\/what-is-mindfulness\/  And check here to see some criticisms againts the commodification of traditional eartern spirituality:  https:\/\/www.palgrave.com\/gp\/book\/9781137370396","human_ref_B":"Eugen Herrigel wrote Zen and the Art of Archery in 1948.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":584.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"1nzxaj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Considering Japan's size, the devastation caused to it during WWII and it's small population, how has Japan stayed at the top of the world economy? When did it become an economic powerhouse? Not sure if this should be posted in \/r\/AskHistorians or somewhere else.  Though it's rich in natural resources, how has Japan stayed so powerful as an economic powerhouse? It's currently the third largest economy in the world, second place being taken by China's recent industrial revolution. Japan's been ravaged by nuclear war and the recent Fukushima Daiichi disaster, yet remains as one of the top dogs - how is this considering its very small size and lack of natural resources? When did it become an economic powerhouse in the first place?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"ccnve51","c_root_id_B":"ccnyidf","created_at_utc_A":1381281494,"created_at_utc_B":1381290079,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"In terms of population, Japan is larger than any European country.","human_ref_B":"\"Though it's rich in natural resources\"  \"lack of natural resources\"  Did you really type those two phrases in the same paragraph?  To clarify, your second assertion was correct, they do not have abundant natural resources.  To answer your question, the most important reason Japan was able to rebound from WW2 economically speaking was actually US support, and other than a couple missteps, they have been able to keep the momentum going. The cultural norms surrounding lifetime employment and the corporate family are actually fascinating.  I would highly recommend this textbook: \"J. Barkley Rosser, Jr. and Marina V. Rosser. Comparative Economics in a Transforming World Economy\" if you want to learn more about Japan's evolution in the world economy.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8585.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"vc124","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"How did Argentina stop being one of the world's top economic powers and become a \"third world\" country? From what I understand, Argentina used to be an economic power in the beginning of the 20th century, but then just fell into recession or something and became a \"developing world\" country","c_root_id_A":"c53bn54","c_root_id_B":"c538fq3","created_at_utc_A":1340233298,"created_at_utc_B":1340221091,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Adding to everything said before, I should note that Argentina has never followed a stable economic plan, and given the number of military coups, stability was something we've never had.  During the last dictatorship, ultra liberal economic policies were adopted, and that model was used until 2001, when everything went to hell. This liberal model destroyed almost every good thing we had, the 90s left our country in a terrible state.  So, to summarise, lack of  political stability has played a big part in the \"developing\" of our country.","human_ref_B":"Characterizing Argentina as a \"third world\" country is erroneous. It's an emerging market much the same caliber as South Korea, or it's neighbor Brazil. Its growth is roughly in line with that of the other countries nearby.  These days Argentina's doing quite well for itself, now that it's decoupled the peso from the dollar, which it should have done a long time ago.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12207.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"vc124","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"How did Argentina stop being one of the world's top economic powers and become a \"third world\" country? From what I understand, Argentina used to be an economic power in the beginning of the 20th century, but then just fell into recession or something and became a \"developing world\" country","c_root_id_A":"c53bvu9","c_root_id_B":"c538fq3","created_at_utc_A":1340234335,"created_at_utc_B":1340221091,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"IMF sure helped in that process","human_ref_B":"Characterizing Argentina as a \"third world\" country is erroneous. It's an emerging market much the same caliber as South Korea, or it's neighbor Brazil. Its growth is roughly in line with that of the other countries nearby.  These days Argentina's doing quite well for itself, now that it's decoupled the peso from the dollar, which it should have done a long time ago.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13244.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"vc124","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"How did Argentina stop being one of the world's top economic powers and become a \"third world\" country? From what I understand, Argentina used to be an economic power in the beginning of the 20th century, but then just fell into recession or something and became a \"developing world\" country","c_root_id_A":"c53bn54","c_root_id_B":"c539nsi","created_at_utc_A":1340233298,"created_at_utc_B":1340225415,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Adding to everything said before, I should note that Argentina has never followed a stable economic plan, and given the number of military coups, stability was something we've never had.  During the last dictatorship, ultra liberal economic policies were adopted, and that model was used until 2001, when everything went to hell. This liberal model destroyed almost every good thing we had, the 90s left our country in a terrible state.  So, to summarise, lack of  political stability has played a big part in the \"developing\" of our country.","human_ref_B":"Great question. I'd like to see this asked in economics maybe or askhistory.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7883.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"vc124","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"How did Argentina stop being one of the world's top economic powers and become a \"third world\" country? From what I understand, Argentina used to be an economic power in the beginning of the 20th century, but then just fell into recession or something and became a \"developing world\" country","c_root_id_A":"c539nsi","c_root_id_B":"c53bvu9","created_at_utc_A":1340225415,"created_at_utc_B":1340234335,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Great question. I'd like to see this asked in economics maybe or askhistory.","human_ref_B":"IMF sure helped in that process","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8920.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1kbrx2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Some UK police officers do not carry firearms and are trained to de-escalate situations. How successful is this strategy and why don't more countries use this model? I was just thinking about the Toronto police and how they recently shot some guy on a bus with a knife, multiple times, as well as their behavior at the G20 meeting","c_root_id_A":"cbne8gd","c_root_id_B":"cbnd74j","created_at_utc_A":1376460600,"created_at_utc_B":1376456844,"score_A":47,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"I don't have the time to look into broader studies, but what I can gather so far is that u\/credible_threat is onto the right idea.  It would appear to me that the UK doesn't necessarily need armed police officers because of generally low rates of crime, esp. homicide at 1.2\/100k in 2012 (vs. Canada at 1.6 and US at 4.6) **[1] (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate)**. Of these homicides, few are committed with a gun, with the UK coming in a 0.04\/100K (vs. Canada 0.5, and US at 10.3) **[2] (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate)**. So there may not be a perception of a lot of guns causing problems that would require guns to combat them.  Further, another factor would probably be how often police feel outgunned. In the UK there were only 3 police officers killed by firearms in England and Wales in the span between 2000 and 2011 **[3] (https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/uploads\/system\/uploads\/attachment_data\/file\/116483\/hosb0212.pdf)**. Compare this to the US where in 2012 alone, 43 law enforcement officers were killed with a firearm **[4] (http:\/\/www.fbi.gov\/news\/pressrel\/press-releases\/fbi-releases-2012-preliminary-statistics-for-law-enforcement-officers-killed-in-the-line-of-duty)**. Indeed, a 2006 poll of the Police Federation (which is, as far as I can tell, the union representing many lower level police officers) found 82% of them in favor of keeping the routine ban on **[5] (http:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/magazine-19641398)**.  Finally, another consideration is that this is a political decision and not an empirical one. Given the UK's long tradition of firearm restrictions **[6] (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Gun_politics_in_the_United_Kingdom#Gun_control_legislation_in_the_United_Kingdom)**, it would seem as an electorate they are far more comfortable with strong restrictions on firearms. When it comes to police though it seems that public opinion is largely split **[7] (http:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/magazine-19641398)**, so maybe there's some room to move there. Finally, as policy makers, we'd also have to consider the enormous costs that this change would bring. We'd have to buy the firearms, buy them regularly due to use and defects, ditto ammo, continually train officers, handle the increased load that shooting inquiries would take, and probably have to pay more for insurance due to a whole new avenue for lawsuits, etc.","human_ref_B":"The United Kingdom is made up of four constituent countries: England, Scotland, Wales (which make up Great Britain) and Northern Ireland. In Northern Ireland, all police officers carry firearms. In the rest of the United Kingdom, police officers do not carry firearms, except in special circumstances. This originates from the formation of the Metropolitan Police Service in the 19th century, when police were not armed, partly to counter public fears and objections over armed enforcers as this had been previously seen due to the British Army maintaining order when needed. The arming of police in Great Britain is a perennial topic of debate.   What else could they do other than try to de-escalate? What do they then do if they can't?  I don't know about the Toronto incident but let's say they didn't have guns and were attacked by a guy with a knife or if the guy attacked passengers. They could have been killed. I'm sure they tried to talk the guy down prior to shooting that is their job.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3756.0,"score_ratio":3.3571428571}
{"post_id":"yfddr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"I know many democrats are disappointed in Obama.  Can someone who's paid more attention than myself explain why?  Other than closing Gitmo, what did he promise to do that he hasn't done?","c_root_id_A":"c5v2fgs","c_root_id_B":"c5v1z57","created_at_utc_A":1345303641,"created_at_utc_B":1345301191,"score_A":17,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"He renewed the Patriot Act.  He signed the NDAA into law.  He promised to end the two wars we were involved in when he took office. He did exactly the opposite.  His actions, with regard to civil liberties and the War On Terror\u00a9, have been just as authoritarian and right-wing as his predecessor's.","human_ref_B":"I wish he fought harder against the patriot act renewal.  I wish he had took a stand on the Bush era tax cuts.  I used to be pissed at his stance on gay marriage, but he came around.  I wish he had gone super liberal on his Supreme court appointees, but that may have cause Kennedy to dig in his heels.  And I guess Sotomayor and Kagen are not bad at all.  I wish he had condemned waterboarding very strongly and made it a court marshal offense.  When he couldn't close down Gitmo, he should have made it very clear that he was then going to revise how prisoners were treated.  I wish he had found a better way to spend the stimulus money - he really dropped the ball there - more of that could have made it into the hands of individuals, and he could have done that by employing more people.  But all of that said, he still has done some pretty amazing stuff in the face of unmoveable opposition (Bin Laden, Health Care bill, changing his stance on Doma).  And voting for Romney is going to roll back a great deal of those changes.  My hope is in term 2 he will have the will to push really hard on this stuff, and to call out the Republican's when they oppose everything.  We shall see.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2450.0,"score_ratio":2.125}
{"post_id":"yfddr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"I know many democrats are disappointed in Obama.  Can someone who's paid more attention than myself explain why?  Other than closing Gitmo, what did he promise to do that he hasn't done?","c_root_id_A":"c5v3l2l","c_root_id_B":"c5v4akg","created_at_utc_A":1345308861,"created_at_utc_B":1345312004,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Some of the things I'm disappointed in are how he's failed to bring accountability\/transparency to government (didn't prosecute Bush admin. for torture, etc., waged secret drone wars in Yemen, Somalia, etc., classifying official legal interpretation of NDAA detention stipulation), has increasing the the power of the executive branch in unprecedented ways (\"due process != judicial process\" => assassinate U.S. citizens at his sole discretion), he didn't push for an adequate stimulus; all the Keynesian economists were saying his proposal was too small for the crisis at hand, but he never even tried to make it bigger, he didn't push for the public option (I'll never forgive him for that most of all), he let BP off with a slap on the wrist, he didn't nationalize GM, he didn't break up the banks or put any serious reforms in place as a condition on TARP, he didn't prosecute any high-level bankers (don't give me that \"the problem is what they did wasn't illegal at the time\" crap, they got Al Capone on tax evasion, they could have thrown the book at these bankers for millions of counts of robo-signing, or *something*), he didn't stand by unions, he let states' and cities' financials precipitate insane cuts to services rather than bailing *them* out, he negotiated on the debt ceiling, and that's all I can think of off the top of my head.  It's not so much that he broke promises, although he did do that, as that he's just a bad president.","human_ref_B":"My frustration with Obama stems more from issues on which voters don't actually have a choice.  Our economic recovery, for example, is one of these issues.  The only options on the table seem to be, broadly speaking, lower the floor of social services, or skim off a little bit of fat from the top.  There's no addressing the actors and policies responsible for the financial collapse, there's no (serious) call for greater regulation to prevent a recurrence, there's absolutely no real punishment for white collar crime.  If a child steals a dozen cookies, and you take one of them away, they aren't learning a lesson.  If a corporation makes 50 million dollars off illegal or risky practices at the expense of others, and you fine them 2 million dollars, guess what they're probably going to do again in the future?  There's a tremendous debate to be had about whether capitalism is the right course, or what \"properly functioning capitalism\" looks like.  I have my own ideas, but one could certainly argue that what we're doing now leaves a lot of room for improvement.  Because of all the money in politics, it doesn't seem change will come from within the system until there is serious reform.  We will continue to have a system that, broadly speaking, benefits the already wealthy at the expense of the rest of us.  A few other such issues:  -American imperialism  -The expansion of the police state  -The War on Drugs  -The War on Terror  -Continued erosion of civil liberties   I don't feel either of the major parties offer any real choice on any of these subjects, and I don't believe the election of a third party candidate, even one pretending to belong to a major party, is even remotely feasible under our current electoral system.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3143.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"yfddr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"I know many democrats are disappointed in Obama.  Can someone who's paid more attention than myself explain why?  Other than closing Gitmo, what did he promise to do that he hasn't done?","c_root_id_A":"c5v3gs9","c_root_id_B":"c5v4akg","created_at_utc_A":1345308338,"created_at_utc_B":1345312004,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Simply put, Obama was the most charismatic campaigner since Clinton-  No, let me rephrase that. Since Kennedy. He was also among the youngest after 8 years of a doddering old man, and the first Black president, which is also a big deal in the States.  His entire campaign was framed as \"Political Revolution\"- a vote for him was a vote for shaking up the system, for cleaning out the corruption, nepotism and lobbyism that has crippled your nation's capital.  And when he got in, he did the safe thing: bailed out the banks and manufacturing industry, tried to make nice with people who hate his ideals, and generally went the 'old white man' approach that every president has gone since the 60's.  The Republicans are loving this, and want him re-elected. Why do you think they fielded such lame ducks on the ballot? They're getting everyone they demand, they control your Congress, and every day he's in office, Obama is slitting his own political throat without them having to lift a finger.","human_ref_B":"My frustration with Obama stems more from issues on which voters don't actually have a choice.  Our economic recovery, for example, is one of these issues.  The only options on the table seem to be, broadly speaking, lower the floor of social services, or skim off a little bit of fat from the top.  There's no addressing the actors and policies responsible for the financial collapse, there's no (serious) call for greater regulation to prevent a recurrence, there's absolutely no real punishment for white collar crime.  If a child steals a dozen cookies, and you take one of them away, they aren't learning a lesson.  If a corporation makes 50 million dollars off illegal or risky practices at the expense of others, and you fine them 2 million dollars, guess what they're probably going to do again in the future?  There's a tremendous debate to be had about whether capitalism is the right course, or what \"properly functioning capitalism\" looks like.  I have my own ideas, but one could certainly argue that what we're doing now leaves a lot of room for improvement.  Because of all the money in politics, it doesn't seem change will come from within the system until there is serious reform.  We will continue to have a system that, broadly speaking, benefits the already wealthy at the expense of the rest of us.  A few other such issues:  -American imperialism  -The expansion of the police state  -The War on Drugs  -The War on Terror  -Continued erosion of civil liberties   I don't feel either of the major parties offer any real choice on any of these subjects, and I don't believe the election of a third party candidate, even one pretending to belong to a major party, is even remotely feasible under our current electoral system.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3666.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"yfddr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"I know many democrats are disappointed in Obama.  Can someone who's paid more attention than myself explain why?  Other than closing Gitmo, what did he promise to do that he hasn't done?","c_root_id_A":"c5v3gs9","c_root_id_B":"c5v3l2l","created_at_utc_A":1345308338,"created_at_utc_B":1345308861,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Simply put, Obama was the most charismatic campaigner since Clinton-  No, let me rephrase that. Since Kennedy. He was also among the youngest after 8 years of a doddering old man, and the first Black president, which is also a big deal in the States.  His entire campaign was framed as \"Political Revolution\"- a vote for him was a vote for shaking up the system, for cleaning out the corruption, nepotism and lobbyism that has crippled your nation's capital.  And when he got in, he did the safe thing: bailed out the banks and manufacturing industry, tried to make nice with people who hate his ideals, and generally went the 'old white man' approach that every president has gone since the 60's.  The Republicans are loving this, and want him re-elected. Why do you think they fielded such lame ducks on the ballot? They're getting everyone they demand, they control your Congress, and every day he's in office, Obama is slitting his own political throat without them having to lift a finger.","human_ref_B":"Some of the things I'm disappointed in are how he's failed to bring accountability\/transparency to government (didn't prosecute Bush admin. for torture, etc., waged secret drone wars in Yemen, Somalia, etc., classifying official legal interpretation of NDAA detention stipulation), has increasing the the power of the executive branch in unprecedented ways (\"due process != judicial process\" => assassinate U.S. citizens at his sole discretion), he didn't push for an adequate stimulus; all the Keynesian economists were saying his proposal was too small for the crisis at hand, but he never even tried to make it bigger, he didn't push for the public option (I'll never forgive him for that most of all), he let BP off with a slap on the wrist, he didn't nationalize GM, he didn't break up the banks or put any serious reforms in place as a condition on TARP, he didn't prosecute any high-level bankers (don't give me that \"the problem is what they did wasn't illegal at the time\" crap, they got Al Capone on tax evasion, they could have thrown the book at these bankers for millions of counts of robo-signing, or *something*), he didn't stand by unions, he let states' and cities' financials precipitate insane cuts to services rather than bailing *them* out, he negotiated on the debt ceiling, and that's all I can think of off the top of my head.  It's not so much that he broke promises, although he did do that, as that he's just a bad president.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":523.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"18tqkm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Could someone explain the whole Chinese cyber espionage situation? Is they U.S. truly doing everything it can to stop this? Why don't more people care about it? Does it really hurt our economic competitiveness? Also, on the flip side, does the U.S. steal proprietary information from other countries?","c_root_id_A":"c8hwuk1","c_root_id_B":"c8hwopj","created_at_utc_A":1361296777,"created_at_utc_B":1361296300,"score_A":43,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"There's not really an easy way to answer these questions. On one hand - yes, high-level policymakers are aware of the issues and are concerned. On the other, a lot of the policy that needs to get made in order to improve our national cybersecurity posture has been subjected to a lot of partisan bickering.   The recent Executive Order from the Obama administration tackles a big chunk of the problem: information sharing between government agencies. Previously, a lot of legal walls between siloed information centers in government kept threat information from being thoroughly digested by various stakeholders across government. The Cyber EO has kicked off the process to rectify this. Similarly, the EO has started a process to create information sharing from the US government to the private sector - which controls 85% of our critical infrastructure (power, water, financial systems, etc.). Through providing better threat intel, as well as offering technical support services, there is a lot of promise that the US government will actually improve national cybersecurity over substantially over the next few years.  But why hasn't this happened sooner? Well, it could have happened last summer in Congress, but the bill (originally written by Joe Lieberman and Susan Collins) was killed by aggressive GOP and private-sector opponents who wanted this activity to be housed in the military (read: the NSA) rather than the DHS (a civilian agency). Similarly, the still-unresolved question about how the government might source threat information from the private sector to improve its understanding of the vulnerability landscape is going to cause a lot of trouble. This is what the once-dead-now-alive-again bill CISPA tries to tackle - but IMHO, very badly.  In terms of public outcry, it is hard to get people impassioned about the issue. There is still a public impression that technical\/cyber issues aren't about \"them\" - they're about white guys with glasses in basements. There has been major reluctance for a long time from many legislators to engage on this issue because it requires a lot of education to form an intelligent opinion - and very few staffers who support legislators have expertise in this area. This is changing rapidly, but it has put us behind the ball. one thing Congress and the US government has done is make some very smart investments in the future - programs like the NSF's Scholarship for Service are bringing a number of young, technically-sophisticated new employees into government to tackle a lot of the unresolved issues.  China is by no means the only player in this space. A previous member of the National Security Council said this summer that no-one is talking about what the Russians are doing because, \"they're much better at not getting caught.\" Now, this is up for debate, but these tools are out there - and everyone who has the ability is taking advantage of them. This includes the United States. Now, to what extent, and with what kind of cooperation with the private sector? Hopefully that doesn't become public information any time soon.   The question about economic competitiveness is a tough one - because it is really hard to measure in the short term. One good example is what was known as Operation Nightdragon, in which Chinese hackers obtained proprietary emails from American companies about bidding for oil and gas contracts in Africa, and provided that info to their Chinese equivalents - allowing Chinese state-sponsored companies to undercut the American's offers and secure the contracts.   EDIT: I talked about some of these issues in my AMA a while back.  EDIT2: typos and fixed link in last para","human_ref_B":"On the flip side, Echelon.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":477.0,"score_ratio":14.3333333333}
{"post_id":"18tqkm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Could someone explain the whole Chinese cyber espionage situation? Is they U.S. truly doing everything it can to stop this? Why don't more people care about it? Does it really hurt our economic competitiveness? Also, on the flip side, does the U.S. steal proprietary information from other countries?","c_root_id_A":"c8hwopj","c_root_id_B":"c8hypdj","created_at_utc_A":1361296300,"created_at_utc_B":1361302081,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"On the flip side, Echelon.","human_ref_B":"First, some resources:    A Washington Post article announced that Panetta moved for the expansion of the Defense Department's Cyber Command right before he left. Of course the Pentagon was quick to deny.  A week ago, Obama signed an executive order outlining plans for more cyber security (a copy of the order is at the end of the article).  Just today, the White House said they are taking cyber espionage with China seriously.    So if you are worried about the US government's response to any real or perceived cyber security threats, some good Americans in Washington and the Pentagon in particular have you covered.    A quick Google search will give you more information than you have time for.    So to answer your questions:   1.   It would be better if you read up on the situation yourself (from several sources) instead of taking any one person's explanation.  To be clear, China is not the only cyber threat, though they appear to be the most potent.    2.  Take a look at the articles above.  Cyber is a new form of warfare where it is not clear what constitutes an 'attack' worthy of retaliation.  How do we know where the attack came from?  Who was responsible?  Was it state sanctioned?  As you can imagine, there is much room for plausible deniability from any sovereign state.  The US is just now taking the necessary steps to defend ourselves.  Is it enough?  Time will tell.  3.  Not many people understand cyber security and the threats therein.  Additionally, cyber attacks are usually discrete and targeted.  Not quite the same impact as some portray.    4.  That is difficult to say.  But any credible national security threat is a threat to our economic competitiveness and prosperity.  Imagine if someone hacked the New York Stock Exchange and disrupted activity for just a day.  What monetary impact would that have?  What non-monetary impact to trust and confidence would that have?    And as always, BE SKEPTICAL.  Always Think Again and know that sometimes threats are more inflated than real.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5781.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"uomhny","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What's something that isn't money that would motivate people to work (produce goods and services) and get an education? Just a simple question. I was thinking about rebuilding the economic system at 2 in the morning and was wondering why we can't just make ressources and redistribute them instead of trading them through money. Like there could be a bunch of people evaluating what are the needs of people and the determine how much we need then ask the population to do it, and how to make people give a shit. I know nothing about this.  Also I don't know what subreddit to post that in","c_root_id_A":"i8glsnh","c_root_id_B":"i8gue6k","created_at_utc_A":1652454971,"created_at_utc_B":1652458401,"score_A":4,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"In answer to your top line question, Desi and Ryan did formative research on motivation to work. Daniel Pink's much ballyhooed work in my opinion largely repackages this and presents essentially the same concepts of non-monetary motivation in a format more easily consumed by the casual reader.  All of them (and plenty of others) present the finding that money is actually a fairly poor motivator for work.   In response to your other points, this has existed and does exist.   >there could be a bunch of people evaluating what are the needs of people and the determine how much we need then ask the population to do it, and how to make people give a shit.  This is exactly what the Soviet government initially sought to do. There a loads of examples of nation states that have tried this, and intentional communities that do it. I'd recommend reading *Animal Farm* for a quick and entertaining read about how it usually works out as a form of government.","human_ref_B":"Others have of course discussed communism, which includes many different permutations with different incentive and societal structures.   One you might find interesting is participatory economics (https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Participatory_economics) and participatory planning (https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Participatory_planning) mechanisms. Predominantly forwarded by Albert and Hahnel.  The idea is to find a kind of middle ground between capitalists market incentives and planned economies using communal participation. Basically, a planned economy using democratic principles. It views communities as composed of consumers and producers. Both (potentially the same person) must make a series of proposals as to what they need in terms of resource allocation. Through sequential proposal, revision, and evaluation phases, distribution of resources is supposed to find a kind of equalibrium or \"good enough\" for all parties. Supposedly, done on some routine frequency (e.g. annually).  Obviously, it is quite wonky and probably unworkable as proposed. But an interesting idea to think through.   The main source would be https:\/\/press.princeton.edu\/books\/ebook\/9780691216003\/the-political-economy-of-participatory-economics","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3430.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"uomhny","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What's something that isn't money that would motivate people to work (produce goods and services) and get an education? Just a simple question. I was thinking about rebuilding the economic system at 2 in the morning and was wondering why we can't just make ressources and redistribute them instead of trading them through money. Like there could be a bunch of people evaluating what are the needs of people and the determine how much we need then ask the population to do it, and how to make people give a shit. I know nothing about this.  Also I don't know what subreddit to post that in","c_root_id_A":"i8hgc0c","c_root_id_B":"i8hrouj","created_at_utc_A":1652467182,"created_at_utc_B":1652471950,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Also, when you think about management of common resources, I think Elinor Ostrom's work on Governing the Commons, which got her the Nobel prize in economics, might be very relevant.  The TL;DR version, as I understand it, is that systems to manage and allocate common resources have existed in many places and times, but cannot be improvised, it requires certain conditions and a certain culture.  https:\/\/www.science.org\/doi\/abs\/10.1126\/science.1091015","human_ref_B":"Your question assumes that money motivates people to work in our current system. But that isn't true.   Lots of things motivate people to work, like the ability to learn new skills, master existing skills, and serve a useful purpose. But money isn't one of them. https:\/\/www.entrepreneur.com\/article\/300155   Money isn't for motivating people to work at all. Its for facilitating exchange, savings, and credit, in other words, it serves as a common unit of account, a store of value, and a standard of deferred payment. https:\/\/opentextbc.ca\/principlesofeconomics\/chapter\/27-1-defining-money-by-its-functions\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4768.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"14nrhn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Economists: Is it tenable to believe that the United States could eschew Social Security and other security blankets in lieu of investing in a diverse investment portfolio, given that it is possible to lose your entire life's savings in the event of a market crash? Hi, first time posting in r\/asksocialscience! I apologise if I messed anything up.   My girlfriend and I got into a discussion last night about the role of Social Security in the future of the United States. She argued that something must be present in order for people to be caught if they fail economically. I suggested that it's downsides outweigh the risks. I suppose it sort of boils down to whether you think this type of safety net is the government's responsibility to create, but I am under the impression that if people were to take the money they are forced to invest in Social Security, and instead were to save and eventually invest, they would generally be better off than if they put it into Social Security. Of course, this assumes a couple of things:  1. People in general will make more money investing in a private portfolio (stocks, mutual funds, gold assets, etc.) than if they were to put it in a government security blanket program, i.e., social security.  2. People in general do not lose money in the stock market. Or, differently phrased, that people do not end up with more money by not investing in the stock market.  3. Social Security does not raise or return more money to investors than private investments do.  To what extent am I correct? Is there enough historical evidence to support the claim that private investments will return more money to people than relying on security blankets?","c_root_id_A":"c7etik1","c_root_id_B":"c7etnuh","created_at_utc_A":1355239119,"created_at_utc_B":1355239719,"score_A":5,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"This is not my area of expertise, so feel free to ignore my flair]   >*it is possible to lose your entire life's savings in the event of a market crash?*  [That's not really true -- even during the huge crash in 2008, the stock market lost about 50% of its value, not 100%. You won't lose your \"entire life savings\" unless you place all your money in one stock or something equally dumb. In addition, if people invest optimally, they should reduce their risk as they near retirement age by moving money from stocks to bonds, which are less volatile, thus lowering the probability of taking large losses close to their age of retirement.  However, I think the main problem replacing SS with private accounts is that most people are terrible at investing. They don't save enough and they don't know what to do with the money they do save. As noted by other comments, SS does a good job of reducing elderly poverty. If it were left to people to make their own choices, many would struggle to provide for themselves in their old age.","human_ref_B":"I'm in actuarial consulting (pension fund math) and I have an econ degree.   The purest distillation of your question is that to invest in stocks and such, people have to forgo the payroll tax. This increases the national debt but increases private wealth by the same amount. It also shifts us into a riskier, more rewarding financial position. While we'll *usually* be better off than if we had done the normal social security, there's a chance will be worse off.  ------------  However, I would bet your policy recommendation is founded in beliefs about social security's drawbacks, and they aren't as simple as that. They aren't just limited to \"as a nation, our investment position is too conservative\/low risk\/low reward.\" I'll do a second, much longer post to explain why SS is such a flashpoint.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":600.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"3a1mam","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What would happen to health insurance companies in the US if the government instituted a national health insurance program? I noticed that all the Democratic candidates for the US 2016 presidential run support a single payer national health care system. Unfortunately, the largest health insurance company in the US, United Healthcare, is in my home state of Minnesota. United Healthcare has 18,000 employees in the Minneapolis\/St. Paul area, $122 billion in revenue, and $5.6 billion in yearly net income. A decent chuck of that money passes through the state, making UHC arguably a cornerstone of our state economy.   Physicians for a National Health Program mention in their FAQ that many administration workers would have to be retrained, but they don't touch on the potential regional economic issues that could arise. I know this is kind of an open ended question, but do economists have theories concerning regional economic impacts during the implementation of a national healthcare system?","c_root_id_A":"cs8kv1m","c_root_id_B":"cs8kl0v","created_at_utc_A":1434476448,"created_at_utc_B":1434476054,"score_A":13,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"*edit*: I get that what I'm saying does not make single payer healthcare look very good, but if you're going to downvote this, please actually provide some facts supporting your point.   Most people overlook this, but Medicare and Medicaid already have over 40% of the payer market. They're not a monopsony yet, but they're getting close to it.   And at the same time, most Medicare and Medicaid plans are actually privately managed (eg Medicare Advantage). Most people who are happy with their Medicare plans are using privately managed plans, though they often don't realize it. It's fairly rare to see someone on straight Medicare or Medicaid, because quite frankly the coverage and provider availability is awful. Most people on regular Medicare plans don't actually see the doctor with them. If you look at the breakdown of hospital patients, Medicare Advantage vastly outweighs other Medicare patients. Again, this is looking at the actual plan *usage*; looking at Medicare eligibility is not very meaningful as it is available to all people who meet the criteria provided by law.   I seriously doubt that the US would ever adopt a single payer system that does not outsource the management of these plans to private insurers like this. The insurers wouldn't like it, and most importantly, the *patients* wouldn't like it.    Also, keep in mind that this would have a drastic impact on the healthcare system at large, because Medicare does not actually reimburse all of the direct costs it incurs. In 2008 it fell short by 9% which means that this cost gets passed on to private insurers. Before someone comments that healthcare is \"overpriced\", I'm talking about the *actual upstream costs*, not factoring in any overhead or markup for profit.   It's very easy for people to wave their hands around the aggregate numbers and say that too much money is being spent, but it's very hard to find places to actually cut those expenses while still creating a sustainable business model. Medicare does not count as a sustainable business model, because if all payers paid the same rates that Medicare does, all providers would immediately go out of business. (And it's easy to say that they need to cut their expenses, but the bulk of their expenses are determined upstream - hospitals *could* control them, then they wouldn't be losing money right now, which most hospitals in the US are.","human_ref_B":"The US spends $465 per capita on healthcare administration. The OECD average is $66. So you'd expect a drop of about $127 billion per year in spending switching to a single-payer model. That would equal significant lay-offs, probably enough to cause a recession.  But in the long term the economy would recover to a higher level because all of that spending is deadweight loss.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":394.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"3a1mam","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What would happen to health insurance companies in the US if the government instituted a national health insurance program? I noticed that all the Democratic candidates for the US 2016 presidential run support a single payer national health care system. Unfortunately, the largest health insurance company in the US, United Healthcare, is in my home state of Minnesota. United Healthcare has 18,000 employees in the Minneapolis\/St. Paul area, $122 billion in revenue, and $5.6 billion in yearly net income. A decent chuck of that money passes through the state, making UHC arguably a cornerstone of our state economy.   Physicians for a National Health Program mention in their FAQ that many administration workers would have to be retrained, but they don't touch on the potential regional economic issues that could arise. I know this is kind of an open ended question, but do economists have theories concerning regional economic impacts during the implementation of a national healthcare system?","c_root_id_A":"cs8op2j","c_root_id_B":"cs8kl0v","created_at_utc_A":1434482043,"created_at_utc_B":1434476054,"score_A":12,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I guess it would also depend on the specifics of the single-payer system. Canada apparently bans private insurance for hospital and many care services. The UK, however, does not. Around 10% of Britons have private insurance, even though the UK has the NHS (source). I can easily see the US making Medicare\\Medicaid as the single payer system, but leaving the door open for private insurance for people who want it. In that case, private companies might get a bit smaller. Or stay the same size, if the government opts to have private companies administer the single-payer plan.","human_ref_B":"The US spends $465 per capita on healthcare administration. The OECD average is $66. So you'd expect a drop of about $127 billion per year in spending switching to a single-payer model. That would equal significant lay-offs, probably enough to cause a recession.  But in the long term the economy would recover to a higher level because all of that spending is deadweight loss.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5989.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1b27p6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Development economists, what are must read papers\/books for a good introduction to economic development. Like the title states, I am very interested in learning more about economic development, and specifically international development. I took a graduate level course on it so I am somewhat familiar with the subject, but I am thinking about specializing in it when I get my PhD and I would appreciate any feedback on books\/papers that are important in the field. I have already read several books on the subject (listed below). Please let me know any readings that are important\/interesting in development economics.  Books Read: The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists' Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics  - Easterly The Other Path - de Soto Guns, Germs and Steel - Diamond The Price of a Dream: The Story of the Grameen Bank - Bornstein Why Nations Fail - Acemoglu and Robinson   Books owned that I have yet to read: The White Man's Burden - Easterly Dead Aid - Moyo Introduction to Modern Economic Growth - Acemoglu","c_root_id_A":"c92yyw7","c_root_id_B":"c930h00","created_at_utc_A":1364335580,"created_at_utc_B":1364339888,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"During my minor on Globalisation and Development in university, I had a textbook called *The Dynamics of socio-economic Development* by Adam Szirmai, which I found to be quite insightful.","human_ref_B":"I think you've got a great start.  I'd also recommend that you take a look at Rodney's \"How Europe Underdeveloped Africa\" and Gunder-Frank's \"Development: Lodestar or Illusion?\" Fanon's \"the Wretched of the Earth\" provides an interesting framework to understand 'development' and the first few chapters of Schumacher's \"Small is Beautiful\" are great.  I'd also recommend Samir Amin's work.   Additionally, \"The Arusha Declaration,\" written by the first president of Tanzania, Julius Nyerere, gives interesting insights into the political motivations\/foundations of alternative development politices.   All the works\/authors that I've recommended provide a critique of traditional notions of 'development,' so bear that in mind.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4308.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1b27p6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Development economists, what are must read papers\/books for a good introduction to economic development. Like the title states, I am very interested in learning more about economic development, and specifically international development. I took a graduate level course on it so I am somewhat familiar with the subject, but I am thinking about specializing in it when I get my PhD and I would appreciate any feedback on books\/papers that are important in the field. I have already read several books on the subject (listed below). Please let me know any readings that are important\/interesting in development economics.  Books Read: The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists' Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics  - Easterly The Other Path - de Soto Guns, Germs and Steel - Diamond The Price of a Dream: The Story of the Grameen Bank - Bornstein Why Nations Fail - Acemoglu and Robinson   Books owned that I have yet to read: The White Man's Burden - Easterly Dead Aid - Moyo Introduction to Modern Economic Growth - Acemoglu","c_root_id_A":"c934qmi","c_root_id_B":"c92yyw7","created_at_utc_A":1364352420,"created_at_utc_B":1364335580,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You may add  1. Sachs, \"The End of Poverty\" 2. Collier, \"The Bottom Billion\" 3. de Soto, \"The Mystery of Capital\" 4. Clark, \"A Farewell to Alms\" 5. Landes, \"The Wealth and Poverty of Nations\"  De Soto, Sachs, and Collier are essential contrasts to Easterly.  Landes and Clark are essential counterpoints to Diamond.  You might also like Yunus' books - \"Creating a World without Poverty\" and \"Banker to the Poor.\"  A further general book to get your brain thinking is Sen's \"Development as Freedom.\"  Development economists are spoiled for good pop-econ books. If only other subdisciplines were so lucky.","human_ref_B":"During my minor on Globalisation and Development in university, I had a textbook called *The Dynamics of socio-economic Development* by Adam Szirmai, which I found to be quite insightful.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16840.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1b27p6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Development economists, what are must read papers\/books for a good introduction to economic development. Like the title states, I am very interested in learning more about economic development, and specifically international development. I took a graduate level course on it so I am somewhat familiar with the subject, but I am thinking about specializing in it when I get my PhD and I would appreciate any feedback on books\/papers that are important in the field. I have already read several books on the subject (listed below). Please let me know any readings that are important\/interesting in development economics.  Books Read: The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists' Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics  - Easterly The Other Path - de Soto Guns, Germs and Steel - Diamond The Price of a Dream: The Story of the Grameen Bank - Bornstein Why Nations Fail - Acemoglu and Robinson   Books owned that I have yet to read: The White Man's Burden - Easterly Dead Aid - Moyo Introduction to Modern Economic Growth - Acemoglu","c_root_id_A":"c934qmi","c_root_id_B":"c934ph6","created_at_utc_A":1364352420,"created_at_utc_B":1364352325,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You may add  1. Sachs, \"The End of Poverty\" 2. Collier, \"The Bottom Billion\" 3. de Soto, \"The Mystery of Capital\" 4. Clark, \"A Farewell to Alms\" 5. Landes, \"The Wealth and Poverty of Nations\"  De Soto, Sachs, and Collier are essential contrasts to Easterly.  Landes and Clark are essential counterpoints to Diamond.  You might also like Yunus' books - \"Creating a World without Poverty\" and \"Banker to the Poor.\"  A further general book to get your brain thinking is Sen's \"Development as Freedom.\"  Development economists are spoiled for good pop-econ books. If only other subdisciplines were so lucky.","human_ref_B":"Dead Aid - Dambisa Moyo  A thorough taking-down of international aid to Africa &amp; why it stifles instead of encourages development. A controversial book, but certainly worth a read.  Edit: just saw this was already on your list, missed it the first time I read the post","labels":1,"seconds_difference":95.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"4t0fxz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Does anyone know or have sources explaining - Why Chicago Specifically has high amounts of violence? I already understand the war on drugs\/poverty issue, just want to know if there's more context Title.  I understand why conditions enabled Detroit to happen, but I want to specifically understand why it happened in Chicago. What is the root of it, etc...","c_root_id_A":"d5dwyjr","c_root_id_B":"d5e0tsf","created_at_utc_A":1468622336,"created_at_utc_B":1468628948,"score_A":18,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"High violence compared to where?    If you look at this chart:  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/List_of_United_States_cities_by_crime_rate_(2014) and sort by violent crime, Chicago is high but not much different than Albuquerque, Las Vegas or Houston.    And there are plenty of cities higher, including a higher homicide rate:  Memphis, Oakland (CA), St. Louis, Baltimore, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Atlanta, Nashville, Philadelphia, Newark, and that's just my picking the cities that I'm not surprised to see higher than Chicago.","human_ref_B":"I just wanted to make this statement:  http:\/\/chicago.cbslocal.com\/2015\/10\/22\/violent-crime-statistics-for-every-city-in-america\/  Please understand the per capita, there are many, many, other cities that are more violent and dangerous than Chicago. Keep this in mind when discussion this. Chicago gets a lot of press coverage, but most of what you hear are isolated to a few neighborhood. That being said, Chicago is a big city, so it will have big city problems.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6612.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"gyp63z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is there any source backing the statement of \u201c40% of cops are domestic abusers\u201d This has been said so many times and I just want to have a source to back it, preferably a reliable one if there is.","c_root_id_A":"ftbuf8x","c_root_id_B":"ftc66jg","created_at_utc_A":1591582229,"created_at_utc_B":1591590035,"score_A":13,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"My impression is that most of it is coming from the sources cited here.","human_ref_B":"I explained the origins of that number in detail here: Is the claim that 40% of police commit domestic abuse trustworthy? If not, what's a better statistic? (You will also find information on other estimates, the caveats with affirming that \"40% of police officers are domestic abusers\", etc.)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7806.0,"score_ratio":1.3846153846}
{"post_id":"gyp63z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is there any source backing the statement of \u201c40% of cops are domestic abusers\u201d This has been said so many times and I just want to have a source to back it, preferably a reliable one if there is.","c_root_id_A":"ftc66jg","c_root_id_B":"ftbwclu","created_at_utc_A":1591590035,"created_at_utc_B":1591583439,"score_A":18,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I explained the origins of that number in detail here: Is the claim that 40% of police commit domestic abuse trustworthy? If not, what's a better statistic? (You will also find information on other estimates, the caveats with affirming that \"40% of police officers are domestic abusers\", etc.)","human_ref_B":"Yes, there are at least two.  But in both studies 40% is the high end of the estimate.  They are also both old studies.  Here are the studies:  Johnson, L.B. (1991).\u00a0On the front lines: Police stress and family well-being. Hearing before the Select Committee on Children, Youth, and Families House of Representatives: 102 Congress First Session May 20 (p. 32-48). Washington DC: US Government Printing Office.  Neidig, P.H., Russell, H.E. & Seng, A.F. (1992). Interspousal aggression in law enforcement families: A preliminary investigation.\u00a0Police Studies, Vol. 15 (1), p. 30-38.  Other studies show a lower rate (around 25%), but it's important to remember that this lower rate is still 2-4 times the rate of IPV in the general population.  Feltgen, J. (October, 1996). Domestic violence: When the abuser is a police officer.\u00a0The Police Chief, p. 42-49.  Lott, L.D. (November, 1995). Deadly secrets: Violence in the police family.\u00a0FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, p. 12-16.  Oehme, K., et al. (2011). Protecting Lives, Careers, and Public Confidence: Florida's efforts to prevent officer-involved domestic violence. Family Court Review 84, 85.  Further, there have been numerous news reports on police departments overlooking, sidelining, or ignoring police IPV. These are two of the more significant:  Police departments fail to arrest policemen for wife abuse (November 15, 1998).\u00a0The Boston Globe.  Levinson, A. (June 29, 1997). Abusers behind a badge.\u00a0Arizona Republic.  The best newer book on the topic is:  Roslin, A. (2017). Police Wife: The Secret Epidemic of Police Domestic Violence. Sugar Hill Books.  Alex Roslin is a journalist who works with the victims of police IPV, not the officers or the departments.  He concurs with the rate of roughly 25%, although it varies widely by department and some departments have a much higher rate than others.  He also finds that female police officers are more likely to physically abuse their partners than male police officers, although there are many more male officers than female officers.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6596.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"eepvvz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What explains the findings of studies that indicate higher rates of domestic abuse among LGBT couples? I very recently came upon an article about a study that purported that a staggering half of the gay couples studied had experienced abuse in the past year. Are there any studies that contradict this or show the stats to be flawed?  https:\/\/www.webmd.com\/mental-health\/news\/20180716\/study-nearly-half-of-gay-men-face-domestic-violence","c_root_id_A":"fbw1i4h","c_root_id_B":"fbw5aes","created_at_utc_A":1577139181,"created_at_utc_B":1577141296,"score_A":12,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"A ~~meta analysis~~  systematic review of studies on gay domestic violence avoids conclusions about the cause:  https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC4046894\/  >Conclusion   >   >The emergent evidence reviewed here demonstrates that IPV \u2013 psychological, physical, and sexual \u2013 occurs in male-male partnerships at alarming rates. Despite the use of multiple recall periods, varied definitions of partner violence, and diverse populations recruited through various sampling methodologies, all 28 studies included in this review documented rates of IPV that were similar to or higher than rates of IPV observed in populations of women (WHO, 2002). Currently, there is insufficient evidence to conclude much beyond this documented high rate of IPV among MSM. The limitations of the studies reviewed here hamper generalizability and make claims of causality imprudent, especially given the cross-sectional nature of all studies reviewed.  This is obviously a hypothesis, but the cultural norm of not hitting women not applying in these circumstances is likely a factor. I suppose a way to test this would be to compare the DV prevalence in the US gay population to heterosexual DV prevalence in cultures that lack that norm.","human_ref_B":"Well, that is *one* study rather than *multiple*. I will get into others, but let's begin with the paper in question Suarez et al. studied 160 *male\/male* couples (therefore it cannot be representative of \"LGBT couples\" in general) from Atlanta, Boston, and Chicago. They acknowledge:  >This study\u2019s main limitations are in its sample size and the cross-sectional nature of the survey. **The final included sample, comprised 160 male couples (320 individuals), was by no means a wholly representative sample of all male same-sex couples.**   Results: Nearly (but less than) half of the 320 participants (45.6%) reported having experienced *some sort* of intimate partner violence (IPV) in the last years. The most common type being emotional:  >In the past year, **45.6% of participants reported experiencing IPV of any kind** (146\/320), with **9.7% reporting physical IPV** (31\/320); **6.8%, controlling IPV** (22\/320); **20.3%, monitoring IPV** (65\/320); and **33.6%, emotional IPV** (108\/320).  I would note that Stephenson told reporters: \"**If you just looked at physical and sexual violence in male couples, it's about 25 to 30 percent, roughly the same as women**\". There is a matter of knowing what what are the apples (to compare apples to apples), but his observation is correct (see for example data collected by the CDC).   ---  Regarding explanations for their findings, they provide several which are summarized in the article you shared. One explanation they suggest is minority stress and its correlates:  >**The effects of minority stress on MSM in particular may include experiences of discrimination, internalized homophobia, and expectations of rejection, all of which have been associated with poor physical and behavioral health outcomes, including increased substance use disorders** (Hatzenbuehler et al., 2008). **Internalized homophobia**, a measure of internalized stigma and a factor in minority stress (Edwards & Sylaska, 2013; Hatzenbuehler et al., 2008), **was reported by respondents in this study at both the individual and dyadic levels and appeared to play an important role** in understanding the high prevalence of violence observed in this sample. **The stress created by this internalized stigma, coupled with other behaviors such as drug and alcohol use** (which may also be exacerbated by minority stress factors), **may have significant effects on IPV risk.**  These are not new ideas. For illustration, see Carvalho et al.:  >Among 581 men and lesbians, approximately one-quarter reported IPV victimization and almost 10% reported IPV perpetration. **When demographic variables of age, sex of participant, and relationship status were controlled, victims of IPV reported greater expectations of prejudice and discrimination**, yet were more open about their sexual orientation. **Similarly, expectations of prejudice and discrimination were related to IPV perpetration.**  Concerning minority stress, they explain:  >**Meyer\u2019s (2003) minority stress model is based on the notion that members of a stigmatized group experience additional, unique stressors**. This model includes both internalized stressors (e.g., openness\/concealment,perceived discrimination, and internalized homophobia) and externalized stressors (e.g., actual experiences of violence,discrimination, and harassment). **Sexual minority stressors have been associated with negative mental health outcomes** (Hatzenbuehler2009;Meyer2003)  ---  OK, as stated, that's one study. What do reviews of the topic find? Before moving forward keep in the mind the following: there are not-so-many studies on the topic, and what exists tends to have methodological issues which limit conclusions (see for example Murray and Mobley).   Finneran and Stephenson conducted a systematic review in 2012 concluded that:  >...] **all 28 studies included in this review documented rates of IPV that were similar to or higher than the rates of IPV observed in populations of women** (WHO, 2002). Currently, **there is insufficient evidence to conclude much beyond this** documented high rate of IPV among MSM. The **limitations of the studies reviewed here hamper generalizability and make claims of causality imprudent**, especially given the cross-sectional nature of all studies reviewed.  Another review by [Edwards et al. identified several shared risk factors for victimization. To focus on those specific to LGB couples:  >...]  **four studies have examined factors unique to LGB individuals, under the umbrella of sexual minority stress, as correlates of IPV victimization** [...]  >Taken together, these results perhaps suggest that discrimination (which is based on the feelings\/beliefs of others)related to sexual orientation does not relate to IPV victimization,**but rather victimization is related to the individual\u2019s own feelings regarding their orientation** (i.e., internalized homophobia and stigma conscientiousness). In other words, **it appears that one\u2019s own feelings regarding one\u2019s orientation are more strongly linked to victimization than the feelings of others.** It is important to keep in mind that these are largely cross-sectional relationships.  Regarding perpetration, same thing. For specific risk factors:  >**Because LGB individuals often report more psychological distress, substance use, and other risk factors than heterosexual individuals, this could explain why LGB individuals have higher rates of IPV perpetration** than heterosexual individuals; that is, the rates are higher because LGB individuals are generally experiencing more and greater levels of risk factors than heterosexual individuals [...]  Regarding \"[v]ariables that are unique to LGB individuals and their risk for perpetrating\", they highlight the **relationship between internalized minority stressors and perpetration**, whereas externalized minority stressors do not appear to be relevant. \"Furthermore, Balsam and Szymanski (2005) found that the relationship between internalized homophobia and past-year IPV was fully mediated by relationship quality.\"  As with the previous review, the authors stress the limitations of several studies, and what conclusions can be made.  ---  A more recent review by [Roll\u00e8 et al. in 2018 states:  >Understanding LGB IPV prevalence and related factors may be difficult because of the silence that has historically existed around violence in the LGB community. **Research has revealed that in the LGB community, several common fears became an obstacle for a public discussion on the phenomenon.**   Identified issues include **stigmatization from the LGB community itself** (\"contributing to building additional oppression and social marginalization\"), **aversion by the feminist community to discuss the phenomenon**, and:   >Furthermore, **culturally created ideologies regarding masculinity and femininity [which] may discourage IPV victims from openly discussing their experience**. **This happens when the perceived stigma reinforces their own stereotype that homosexual men are less masculine than heterosexual men, or the one that lesbian IPV is harmless** (because women are not physically strong and dangerous) (Ristock and Timbang, 2005).  Other issues follow the same line of logic concerning **stigmatization and processes which dissuade victims from reporting abuse** (e.g. \"Many LGB individuals experienced additional victimization and homophobia when they reported the abuse to police\"), and perceptions about LBG individuals, LBG relationships, IPV, e.g.:  >Bunker Rohrbaug (2006) indicated that **one of the most pervasive and alarming myth was considering violence as a mutual conflict, particularly when the violence occurred in a gay couple, because men \u201cfight equally,\u201d** as they are assumed to have comparable physical strength. **This myth was legitimized by the societal attitude with regard to tolerating violence expressions between men, expressions that were considered admissible and often normalized as a means of dispute resolution or because of greater congruence between violence and male roles** (Baker et al., 2013).  Minority stress again:  >These findings suggest that **the connection between discrimination about sexual orientation** (based on other people emotions and beliefs) **and IPV is not completely clear, but that a relation between victimization and individual feelings regarding one\u2019s own sexual orientation [...] exists** (Edwards et al., 2015).  Once again, the authors stress the limitations about available research:  >**The literature on LGB IPV is recent and limited compared to the one on heterosexual IPV**. However, a growing body of empirical research does exist, thereby offering important observations and considerations regarding LGB IPV [...]   >**Despite the myth that IPV is only an issue in heterosexual relationships, its occurrence among LGB couples was demonstrated to be comparable to or higher than heterosexual cases** (Messinger, 2011; Kelley et al., 2012; Barrett and St.Pierre, 2013; Breiding et al., 2013). **While similarities between heterosexual and LGB IPV** (such as general patterns, types, outcomes, cycle of violence and use of substances) **were found** (McLaughlin and Rozee, 2001; Buford et al., 2007; Cain et al., 2008; Hequembourg et al., 2008), **unique features and dynamics were present in LGB IPV, which were implicated in identifying and treating IPV among the community** (Merrill and Wolfe, 2000; Carvalho et al., 2011; Bowen and Nowinsky, 2012; Gill et al., 2013).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2115.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"36ukak","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is pro-war sentiment passed on to children to the extent that the mass death of soldiers in WWII is partly responsible for the relative unpopularity of war among citizens in recent times? It seems like right up until the Second World War war has been glorified, something for young boys to dream about. But nowadays (maybe less so in the US) that doesn't seem to be the case. Is this just due to things like the horrors of WWII changing peoples perspectives and increased international cooperation, or is there evidence that the death of soldiers, many of whom would have glorified and dreamed of war, killed off the kind of people who would pass that sentiment down to the next generations?","c_root_id_A":"crhglbe","c_root_id_B":"crhggus","created_at_utc_A":1432305275,"created_at_utc_B":1432305060,"score_A":15,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Political scientist Ronald Inglehart didn't think so. He applied Maslow's hierarchy of needs to political socialization. Children socialized in an environment of scarcity were thought to grow up with traditional views valuing law and order, safety and security -- basically all the stuff on the bottom half of Maslow's chart. This reflected pretty much every generation before the baby boomers. But Ingelhart noted something different about children born after WW2. They valued more abstract concepts like equality, environmental concerns, and well, peace -- the stuff on the higher end of the chart. This led to a shift to what he called postmaterialist values. He uses this to explain the shift in values we saw in the 60s through today.   He tested this hypothesis and it turned out that the countries with the highest formative economic conditions had the highest rankings for postmaterialist values. Moreover, subsequent research found that postmaterialist values conformed to fluctuations in economic conditions (Clarke et al).   As for this:  >is there evidence that the death of soldiers, many of whom would have glorified and dreamed of war, killed off the kind of people who would pass that sentiment down to the next generations?  Well, there were very bloody and costly wars before, and that had never happened anywhere as far an I know. Maybe someone else does.   Personally (if anyone actually gives a shit what I think) I agree with the general observations of Inglehart, but take some issue with the theoretical foundation. he never tests the psychological foundation of his theory. There are limitations to using aggregate level data.   Ronald Inglehart 1971: The Silent Revolution in Post-Industrial Societies. In: American Political Science Review 65: 991-1017.  1997: Modernization and Postmodernization, Princeton University Press  Clarke, Harold, et al. 1999. The Effect of Economic Priorities on the Measurement of Value Change. In: American Political Science Review 93: 637-647  Edit: typo. I may edit more typos. I make a lot of typos. And his name is Ronald, not Robert.","human_ref_B":"Perhaps you should first post, \"has the \"popularity\" of war, however that is defined, been empirically documented as declining?\"  Even your initial conclusion may have a lot of different factors, including age, demographics, country of origin, relative education and socio-economic standing, which may influence that answer.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":215.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1cfr7m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"can someone explain like I'm five, the extreme individualism that is part of the United State's culture?","c_root_id_A":"c9g3wmf","c_root_id_B":"c9g3hw3","created_at_utc_A":1366087251,"created_at_utc_B":1366085952,"score_A":31,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Much of what you refer to as the \"individualism\" streak in the US is the product of a long series of historical factors - many of which I am not nearly expert enough to really give justice to. I would suggest you go check out \/r\/AskHistorians with a question akin to the following:  *How have culture ethos like \"The Protestant Wind\" and \"Manifest Destiny\" impacted modern perspectives on individualism in America?*  If it is Individualism in general you're interested in, there are a wide variety of interesting thinkers out there from many cultures. I tend to find the old Anarchists\/Individualists more interesting that, for example, modern Libertarians - here's two good ones:  * \"The Ego and its Own\" - Max Stirner (free) (Amazon)  * \"Anarchism and Other Essays\" - Emma Goldman (free) (Amazon)","human_ref_B":"Is there any evidence that the US has relatively high \"individualism\" compared to similar states?  What is this \"US culture\" you are referring to? The US is one of the most expansive countries on the globe, possibly the most diverse.  Do you consider Italian American, Latin American, American-Jewish, Indian-American, Southern-Evangelicals, Muslim American, etc... to be individualistic relative to other ethnic\/religious cultural groups? I suspect not.  Are you speaking specifically about high-protestant Americans (think: White Anglo-Saxon Protestants [WASPs])?  --------------  I suspect the questions you want to ask are:   **[History]** *Why have families, and society generally, moved away from the extended-family model and towards a (more individualistic and mobile) \"nuclear\" model?*  And...  **[Sociology\/Behavioral Economics]** *Why does the average age of \"family starting\" seem to be trending older over time?*  -----------------------  Those trend are, *actually,* more demonstrable and universal.  I'm not a Historian but, I recall that western families (particularly in the US, for geographic reasons) began to adopt a more individualistic (read: smaller\/tighter) nuclear family model following the dawn of the industrial era. It became necessary at this time for families to become more mobile. Families during the Industrial Era (and today) were much more likely to need to move across the country for work. As a result families were uprooted and extended family groups divided geographically. Less local family support therefore meant that nuclear families needed to be more self-reliant then previously in history. And partially as a result, (low-income) women began slowly trickling into the workforce....  Additionally, and this is just speculation, but I imagine the trend towards extending the \"young-adult period\" of an individuals life by extending the normal level of education attained and postponing the mean marriage age may possibly be playing a hand in whatever trend you are observing. This could be best elaborated on by a sociologist or possibly a behavioral economist and not myself unfortunately.  I hope my answer at least gets, you closer to a more detailed response.  *edits: sorry, I kept compulsively formatting my comment*","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1299.0,"score_ratio":2.5833333333}
{"post_id":"1jrdvb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"can someone 'explain like I'm five' the Cycle of Poverty and how it affects people's individual lives?","c_root_id_A":"cbhna06","c_root_id_B":"cbhws28","created_at_utc_A":1375742536,"created_at_utc_B":1375771177,"score_A":6,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I think in addition to these other answers that you have been given this diagram could help. Note that it is a circle, with no beginning or end, it can start or end at any point. diagram","human_ref_B":"So the cycle of poverty goes like this:  You are born to a poor family. This means that both of your parents work, and both begun working in low-paid jobs early on.  It's likely that your parents didn't finish high school, or if they did it was because they managed to scrape through.  As a child, growing up you have less contact with your parents due to them working long hours. Developmentally this has a  negative impact on you in emotional and social ways. Also, your family is living hand-to-mouth, so there is often a lot of stress. Money which might normally go towards having a holiday goes towards paying off the credit card or to fixing up the car instead. Often in these situations, due to the higher levels of stress, violence and abuse can occur more frequently.  You attend grade school like everyone else, but you cannot afford to go on trips with the other kids. You also don't have the newest toys etc. so at times your peers exclude you. You begin to get harassed at school. No one at home wants to hear about it because they are all too tired and stressed out - and so are the teachers in your school because it is a chronically underfunded public school.  You struggle through and become used to being harassed and ignored, both at home and at school. This takes a toll on your school work, however your parents don't realize that there are issues that affect your education so instead they accuse you of being lazy. The teachers try but their efforts don\u2019t make a difference, so they begin treating you as a lazy student. The report cards also reinforce this. You begin to realize that no matter how hard you try at school, you won\u2019t be able to keep up. You begin to disengage from school.  You are interested in learning the guitar and have a chance to play one. You really enjoy it. You beg your parents for guitar lessons and they allow it, on the condition that your grades stay about a C average. You agree and your engagement at school increases and you find a group of students that you get along with. You take to guitar well and this boost in your confidence flows through your work and social life. Things are looking pretty good. Your grades are even improving.  Then, your dad\u2019s hours at work get cut back. Your family has to tighten its purse strings. You compromise and continue your guitar lessons on the agreement that you will no longer buy any lunches at school. You don\u2019t care. You just want to play the guitar.  Your school work goes better and things are going along despite the challenges until your sibling gets sick and has to be admitted to hospital. Your dad keeps working as much as he can, but your mom now spends time at the hospital to support your sibling, meaning there is less money coming into the household. The hospital bill is big. Your parents take out another loan to pay it back. Even though your grades have improved substantially, your family can\u2019t afford to pay for guitar lessons. You are heartbroken. Your parents don\u2019t seem to handle the stress well, and  they end up fighting a lot. Home sucks. School sucks. You don\u2019t care about your grades anymore - and why would you? Maybe some tutoring would help your grades - but your parents can\u2019t even afford guitar lessons, let alone tutoring.   Eventually when you are a year away from graduating, your parents split up. It\u2019s ugly. Your dad breaks things and your mom storms out. Your dad is a wreck, and you have to pick up the pieces. Shopping, cooking, homework... it gets too much. You don\u2019t finish high school. Your expectations for relationships have been informed by what you learned at home. You get a job and get out of home as soon as possible because your dad has become alcoholic, and you barely see your mom any more. You work for a few years, meet a person who seems nice and is \u2018on your level\u2019. They don\u2019t make a lot of cash, but they seem like a good match for you. You get married. You don\u2019t have a great deal of health literacy because your parents didn\u2019t either and your schooling wasn\u2019t that great when you did manage to pay attention in health class. You and your SO have a surprise - you are expecting a child. You don\u2019t know if you want to have a child, but even so it\u2019s not easy to get an abortion in your state and travelling to the next state over is out of the question.   So you and your partner have a child together.  Your child is born to a poor family. You and your partner both work in low-paid jobs.  You didn't finish high school, your partner barely managed to scrape through.  Growing up, your child has less contact with you due to working long hours. This has a developmental impact on your child.  The cycle begins again.  *(Please note that not every poor family is an abusive one. Not every poor child is unable to make it through school. Not every poor child is unable to make a better life for themselves. This is just a story to help explain how the cycle of poverty can affect people.)*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":28641.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1jrdvb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"can someone 'explain like I'm five' the Cycle of Poverty and how it affects people's individual lives?","c_root_id_A":"cbhr97q","c_root_id_B":"cbhws28","created_at_utc_A":1375753517,"created_at_utc_B":1375771177,"score_A":4,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Poor people can only afford homes in poor communities and due to lack of education, have lots of children to divide their already limited resources among. Since schools are funded by property taxes, these poor communities receive inadequate education and the children are indoctrinated by their peers into a kind of poverty subculture rather than the standard civil society. Crime rates rise due to both necessity and drug abuse, which scare off those who can afford to live elsewhere who would otherwise be able to contribute to the community and break the cycle.","human_ref_B":"So the cycle of poverty goes like this:  You are born to a poor family. This means that both of your parents work, and both begun working in low-paid jobs early on.  It's likely that your parents didn't finish high school, or if they did it was because they managed to scrape through.  As a child, growing up you have less contact with your parents due to them working long hours. Developmentally this has a  negative impact on you in emotional and social ways. Also, your family is living hand-to-mouth, so there is often a lot of stress. Money which might normally go towards having a holiday goes towards paying off the credit card or to fixing up the car instead. Often in these situations, due to the higher levels of stress, violence and abuse can occur more frequently.  You attend grade school like everyone else, but you cannot afford to go on trips with the other kids. You also don't have the newest toys etc. so at times your peers exclude you. You begin to get harassed at school. No one at home wants to hear about it because they are all too tired and stressed out - and so are the teachers in your school because it is a chronically underfunded public school.  You struggle through and become used to being harassed and ignored, both at home and at school. This takes a toll on your school work, however your parents don't realize that there are issues that affect your education so instead they accuse you of being lazy. The teachers try but their efforts don\u2019t make a difference, so they begin treating you as a lazy student. The report cards also reinforce this. You begin to realize that no matter how hard you try at school, you won\u2019t be able to keep up. You begin to disengage from school.  You are interested in learning the guitar and have a chance to play one. You really enjoy it. You beg your parents for guitar lessons and they allow it, on the condition that your grades stay about a C average. You agree and your engagement at school increases and you find a group of students that you get along with. You take to guitar well and this boost in your confidence flows through your work and social life. Things are looking pretty good. Your grades are even improving.  Then, your dad\u2019s hours at work get cut back. Your family has to tighten its purse strings. You compromise and continue your guitar lessons on the agreement that you will no longer buy any lunches at school. You don\u2019t care. You just want to play the guitar.  Your school work goes better and things are going along despite the challenges until your sibling gets sick and has to be admitted to hospital. Your dad keeps working as much as he can, but your mom now spends time at the hospital to support your sibling, meaning there is less money coming into the household. The hospital bill is big. Your parents take out another loan to pay it back. Even though your grades have improved substantially, your family can\u2019t afford to pay for guitar lessons. You are heartbroken. Your parents don\u2019t seem to handle the stress well, and  they end up fighting a lot. Home sucks. School sucks. You don\u2019t care about your grades anymore - and why would you? Maybe some tutoring would help your grades - but your parents can\u2019t even afford guitar lessons, let alone tutoring.   Eventually when you are a year away from graduating, your parents split up. It\u2019s ugly. Your dad breaks things and your mom storms out. Your dad is a wreck, and you have to pick up the pieces. Shopping, cooking, homework... it gets too much. You don\u2019t finish high school. Your expectations for relationships have been informed by what you learned at home. You get a job and get out of home as soon as possible because your dad has become alcoholic, and you barely see your mom any more. You work for a few years, meet a person who seems nice and is \u2018on your level\u2019. They don\u2019t make a lot of cash, but they seem like a good match for you. You get married. You don\u2019t have a great deal of health literacy because your parents didn\u2019t either and your schooling wasn\u2019t that great when you did manage to pay attention in health class. You and your SO have a surprise - you are expecting a child. You don\u2019t know if you want to have a child, but even so it\u2019s not easy to get an abortion in your state and travelling to the next state over is out of the question.   So you and your partner have a child together.  Your child is born to a poor family. You and your partner both work in low-paid jobs.  You didn't finish high school, your partner barely managed to scrape through.  Growing up, your child has less contact with you due to working long hours. This has a developmental impact on your child.  The cycle begins again.  *(Please note that not every poor family is an abusive one. Not every poor child is unable to make it through school. Not every poor child is unable to make a better life for themselves. This is just a story to help explain how the cycle of poverty can affect people.)*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17660.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"1jrdvb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"can someone 'explain like I'm five' the Cycle of Poverty and how it affects people's individual lives?","c_root_id_A":"cbhupk5","c_root_id_B":"cbhws28","created_at_utc_A":1375763308,"created_at_utc_B":1375771177,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I think Kaushik Basu's explanation of the \"vicious circle of poverty\" is really good. A lot of economists consider the vicious circle of poverty and a low-level equilibrium trap to be the same thing, where equilibrium refers to the tendency of an economy to stay in one place, low-level referring to underdevelopment or poverty, and trap referring to the fact that a country can climb out of it. It's also a circle because there are forces operating that reinforce each other, mainly that if someone earns a low income, they have a limited capacity to save, which leads to capital scarcity, which reinforces low incomes.","human_ref_B":"So the cycle of poverty goes like this:  You are born to a poor family. This means that both of your parents work, and both begun working in low-paid jobs early on.  It's likely that your parents didn't finish high school, or if they did it was because they managed to scrape through.  As a child, growing up you have less contact with your parents due to them working long hours. Developmentally this has a  negative impact on you in emotional and social ways. Also, your family is living hand-to-mouth, so there is often a lot of stress. Money which might normally go towards having a holiday goes towards paying off the credit card or to fixing up the car instead. Often in these situations, due to the higher levels of stress, violence and abuse can occur more frequently.  You attend grade school like everyone else, but you cannot afford to go on trips with the other kids. You also don't have the newest toys etc. so at times your peers exclude you. You begin to get harassed at school. No one at home wants to hear about it because they are all too tired and stressed out - and so are the teachers in your school because it is a chronically underfunded public school.  You struggle through and become used to being harassed and ignored, both at home and at school. This takes a toll on your school work, however your parents don't realize that there are issues that affect your education so instead they accuse you of being lazy. The teachers try but their efforts don\u2019t make a difference, so they begin treating you as a lazy student. The report cards also reinforce this. You begin to realize that no matter how hard you try at school, you won\u2019t be able to keep up. You begin to disengage from school.  You are interested in learning the guitar and have a chance to play one. You really enjoy it. You beg your parents for guitar lessons and they allow it, on the condition that your grades stay about a C average. You agree and your engagement at school increases and you find a group of students that you get along with. You take to guitar well and this boost in your confidence flows through your work and social life. Things are looking pretty good. Your grades are even improving.  Then, your dad\u2019s hours at work get cut back. Your family has to tighten its purse strings. You compromise and continue your guitar lessons on the agreement that you will no longer buy any lunches at school. You don\u2019t care. You just want to play the guitar.  Your school work goes better and things are going along despite the challenges until your sibling gets sick and has to be admitted to hospital. Your dad keeps working as much as he can, but your mom now spends time at the hospital to support your sibling, meaning there is less money coming into the household. The hospital bill is big. Your parents take out another loan to pay it back. Even though your grades have improved substantially, your family can\u2019t afford to pay for guitar lessons. You are heartbroken. Your parents don\u2019t seem to handle the stress well, and  they end up fighting a lot. Home sucks. School sucks. You don\u2019t care about your grades anymore - and why would you? Maybe some tutoring would help your grades - but your parents can\u2019t even afford guitar lessons, let alone tutoring.   Eventually when you are a year away from graduating, your parents split up. It\u2019s ugly. Your dad breaks things and your mom storms out. Your dad is a wreck, and you have to pick up the pieces. Shopping, cooking, homework... it gets too much. You don\u2019t finish high school. Your expectations for relationships have been informed by what you learned at home. You get a job and get out of home as soon as possible because your dad has become alcoholic, and you barely see your mom any more. You work for a few years, meet a person who seems nice and is \u2018on your level\u2019. They don\u2019t make a lot of cash, but they seem like a good match for you. You get married. You don\u2019t have a great deal of health literacy because your parents didn\u2019t either and your schooling wasn\u2019t that great when you did manage to pay attention in health class. You and your SO have a surprise - you are expecting a child. You don\u2019t know if you want to have a child, but even so it\u2019s not easy to get an abortion in your state and travelling to the next state over is out of the question.   So you and your partner have a child together.  Your child is born to a poor family. You and your partner both work in low-paid jobs.  You didn't finish high school, your partner barely managed to scrape through.  Growing up, your child has less contact with you due to working long hours. This has a developmental impact on your child.  The cycle begins again.  *(Please note that not every poor family is an abusive one. Not every poor child is unable to make it through school. Not every poor child is unable to make a better life for themselves. This is just a story to help explain how the cycle of poverty can affect people.)*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7869.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"11hf5m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Economics student here. One thing I do not understand is how a bond is different from a loan. Can someone explain this to me?","c_root_id_A":"c6mk1jk","c_root_id_B":"c6mixbt","created_at_utc_A":1350266783,"created_at_utc_B":1350262397,"score_A":12,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Nothing at all separates a bond process from a loan process, including the payment plans, because bonds and loans both can have any kind of structure to them. It is commonly used as a debt instrument for companies or governments to raise money. But a bond can be thought of exactly as a loan, because it really is the same thing.","human_ref_B":"Loan: I give you money, you pay me back over time with interest (to compensate for my lost ability to use that money)  Bond: You pay the face value for a bond. Every period you earn a little interest on the bond. At end of bond's life, you are paid back the face value.  A bond is sort of like a reverse-loan","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4386.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"11hf5m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Economics student here. One thing I do not understand is how a bond is different from a loan. Can someone explain this to me?","c_root_id_A":"c6mk1jk","c_root_id_B":"c6miff7","created_at_utc_A":1350266783,"created_at_utc_B":1350260383,"score_A":12,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Nothing at all separates a bond process from a loan process, including the payment plans, because bonds and loans both can have any kind of structure to them. It is commonly used as a debt instrument for companies or governments to raise money. But a bond can be thought of exactly as a loan, because it really is the same thing.","human_ref_B":"IIRC a bond is a kind of loan where the lender can sell on their right to repayment.  eg X issues a ten year bond to Y. Y pays X $100 in exchange. 5 years later Y gets worried about X's ability to pay. He sells the bond to Z. Z holds the bond until the ten year payment period is up and receives $100 from X at that time.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6400.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"11hf5m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Economics student here. One thing I do not understand is how a bond is different from a loan. Can someone explain this to me?","c_root_id_A":"c6mixbt","c_root_id_B":"c6miff7","created_at_utc_A":1350262397,"created_at_utc_B":1350260383,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Loan: I give you money, you pay me back over time with interest (to compensate for my lost ability to use that money)  Bond: You pay the face value for a bond. Every period you earn a little interest on the bond. At end of bond's life, you are paid back the face value.  A bond is sort of like a reverse-loan","human_ref_B":"IIRC a bond is a kind of loan where the lender can sell on their right to repayment.  eg X issues a ten year bond to Y. Y pays X $100 in exchange. 5 years later Y gets worried about X's ability to pay. He sells the bond to Z. Z holds the bond until the ten year payment period is up and receives $100 from X at that time.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2014.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"yb18f9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"have there ever been any actual documented cases of kids getting poisoned Halloween candy? As far as I can tell, it started as a myth parents told their kids so that the parents would take all the good candy when the parents were \"inspecting\" the candy, and gave all the kids the bad candy. Parents just never clued their kids in on the joke, and the kids believed the myth into adulthood. Those kids grew up and told their kids and so on, not knowing the truth. As far as I know I've never heard of any cases of kids actually getting poisoned candy on Halloween","c_root_id_A":"iteduzf","c_root_id_B":"itesvcp","created_at_utc_A":1666484963,"created_at_utc_B":1666492291,"score_A":33,"score_B":54,"human_ref_A":"At the risk of this being deleted. Here is a link to the Snopes page debunking this myth... snopes link  I don't think there would be any peer reviewed sources to prove a negative...best we can hope for is journalism","human_ref_B":"My wife and I had the same question. Last night I found https:\/\/gizmodo.com\/has-anyone-ever-actually-poisoned-or-put-razors-in-hall-1454295786 which links to a University of Delaware criminology professor\u2019s research:  https:\/\/udspace.udel.edu\/handle\/19716\/726  The author, Joel Best, summarizes his research:  > Since 1985, I have been interviewed by hundreds of reporters from television, radio, magazines, newspapers, and websites. They often ask whether I have updated my research. Therefore, I am posting both my original data, supplemented by my efforts to bring the research up to date. I also list all of the cases that have come to my attention in which children\u2019s deaths were initially attributed to Halloween sadism (in each of those cases, follow-up stories offered a different interpretation), and I am including discussions of the medical literature\u2019s treatment of Halloween sadism, and of the Internet\u2019s impact on reporting. > > A basic logical principle is that one cannot prove a negative. Therefore, I can never prove that no child has been killed by a Halloween sadist. I can simply note that such a death probably would be a major news story, yet I can\u2019t find any evidence of such a story being covered by major media.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7328.0,"score_ratio":1.6363636364}
{"post_id":"3bo65g","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Is there a good counterpart to Zinns people's history of U.S.? I'm currently reading Howard Zinns a people's history of the U.S. And I'm looking for a conservative counterpart to read with it. Any ideas?","c_root_id_A":"cso1gep","c_root_id_B":"csnzvjv","created_at_utc_A":1435701572,"created_at_utc_B":1435699092,"score_A":34,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I think Zinn's work is supposed to be a counterpart itself, a sort of response to orthodox\/mainstream historical work. It's been awhile since I've read it, but he might even call out some other works or historians... So, maybe check those out?","human_ref_B":"I'm not going to endorse it as \"good\", but A Patriot's History of the United States was written as a direct response, and has similar length.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2480.0,"score_ratio":2.8333333333}
{"post_id":"3bo65g","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Is there a good counterpart to Zinns people's history of U.S.? I'm currently reading Howard Zinns a people's history of the U.S. And I'm looking for a conservative counterpart to read with it. Any ideas?","c_root_id_A":"cso1gep","c_root_id_B":"cso16w0","created_at_utc_A":1435701572,"created_at_utc_B":1435701146,"score_A":34,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I think Zinn's work is supposed to be a counterpart itself, a sort of response to orthodox\/mainstream historical work. It's been awhile since I've read it, but he might even call out some other works or historians... So, maybe check those out?","human_ref_B":"Hijacking a bit here on a slight tangent:  What's a good complement to Kissinger's Diplomacy?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":426.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"3bo65g","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Is there a good counterpart to Zinns people's history of U.S.? I'm currently reading Howard Zinns a people's history of the U.S. And I'm looking for a conservative counterpart to read with it. Any ideas?","c_root_id_A":"cso16w0","c_root_id_B":"csodgky","created_at_utc_A":1435701146,"created_at_utc_B":1435725539,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Hijacking a bit here on a slight tangent:  What's a good complement to Kissinger's Diplomacy?","human_ref_B":"Check out *The American Pageant*. It's not exactly egregious, but it represents the kind of historical tradition that Zinn saw himself as rebelling against. First published in 1956, it glosses over certain human rights atrocities in a way that was common of the era. I doubt any malice was intended in its creation, but most modern students might be surprised with the neutral language used to describe the conditions of slavery, or the scant descriptions of the microbial genocide of Native Americans.   In addition, it tends to have a mildly Carlyle-like \"great man\" view of history, focusing much of its wordcount on the actions of presidents and a few generals. In the civil war discussion, actions taken by the United States military or federal government may be unilaterally attributed to Abraham Lincoln, while anything done by any Confederate is associated with Jefferson Davis. The book also includes a good amount of personal details and anecdotes about the Presidents and their families (such as Rachel Jackson's first marriage or Aaron Burr's wild attempt to conquer Mexico) that are very engaging but not necessarily relevant to an overall understanding of American history. While I'd argue that \"fun facts\" can be very important, many AP or IB history instructors would consider them to be a distraction from the major ideas that must be taught.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24393.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"qds6kg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"I feel like materialism has colonized lots of people. I know colonialism is when a stronger country takes over a weaker one. I know materialism is not a country. Is there a better way to describe my thought? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hhom3kt","c_root_id_B":"hhoqmig","created_at_utc_A":1634945806,"created_at_utc_B":1634948137,"score_A":13,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"Colonialism, or \"being colonized,\" is a phrasing that has been extremely diluted by public use, in my opinion. There are key differences between colonialism & imperialism, for example, along the lines of intergroup domination AND presence of permanent settlers.  So it isn't just \"when a stronger country takes over a weaker one.\" The nature of that takeover, how it happens, & its immediate consequences do matter in whether something is colonialism or not. It might seem like I'm splitting hairs here, but precision in the words we use is important for cueing what we can expect.  I understand that using this term might be in the hopes of conveying how extensive materialism's influence has been. Perhaps people in Psychology can weigh in further on appropriate terminology. As a Political Scientist, I think that \"materialism has strongly influenced how people think\" is what I suggest.  Here is a longer article discussing the discourse about how we define colonialism & related terms.  Horvath, Ronald J. \"A definition of colonialism.\" Current anthropology 13, no. 1 (1972): 45-57.","human_ref_B":"You might want to explore the Frankfurt school theories on mass culture and mass society.  This article suggest a very invasive idea of culture. If you see materialism as a post-modern idea, we can perfectly understand you suggestion of an \"invasive\" cultural phenomenon.  Another interesting read for you, connecting you to post modernism, can be Liquid Times, by Bauman.   Quoting from the review:   \"One cannot help but feel incredibly pessimistic after reading Bauman\u2019s work. It is as if hegemonic control has penetrated so far into the hearts and minds of the populace that the huge effort required for people to reassert localised, communitarian politics against global capitalist hegemonic power is simply too much to ever hope for.\"  Otherwise, no one forbids you from trying to justify your own definitions. As long as someone else can agree with your ideas there is nothing wrong with creating new concepts.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2331.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"qds6kg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"I feel like materialism has colonized lots of people. I know colonialism is when a stronger country takes over a weaker one. I know materialism is not a country. Is there a better way to describe my thought? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hhoqmig","c_root_id_B":"hhokcno","created_at_utc_A":1634948137,"created_at_utc_B":1634944919,"score_A":26,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"You might want to explore the Frankfurt school theories on mass culture and mass society.  This article suggest a very invasive idea of culture. If you see materialism as a post-modern idea, we can perfectly understand you suggestion of an \"invasive\" cultural phenomenon.  Another interesting read for you, connecting you to post modernism, can be Liquid Times, by Bauman.   Quoting from the review:   \"One cannot help but feel incredibly pessimistic after reading Bauman\u2019s work. It is as if hegemonic control has penetrated so far into the hearts and minds of the populace that the huge effort required for people to reassert localised, communitarian politics against global capitalist hegemonic power is simply too much to ever hope for.\"  Otherwise, no one forbids you from trying to justify your own definitions. As long as someone else can agree with your ideas there is nothing wrong with creating new concepts.","human_ref_B":"There are several definitions of materialism, which one are you using?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3218.0,"score_ratio":2.3636363636}
{"post_id":"qds6kg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"I feel like materialism has colonized lots of people. I know colonialism is when a stronger country takes over a weaker one. I know materialism is not a country. Is there a better way to describe my thought? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hhoqmig","c_root_id_B":"hhol93t","created_at_utc_A":1634948137,"created_at_utc_B":1634945379,"score_A":26,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"You might want to explore the Frankfurt school theories on mass culture and mass society.  This article suggest a very invasive idea of culture. If you see materialism as a post-modern idea, we can perfectly understand you suggestion of an \"invasive\" cultural phenomenon.  Another interesting read for you, connecting you to post modernism, can be Liquid Times, by Bauman.   Quoting from the review:   \"One cannot help but feel incredibly pessimistic after reading Bauman\u2019s work. It is as if hegemonic control has penetrated so far into the hearts and minds of the populace that the huge effort required for people to reassert localised, communitarian politics against global capitalist hegemonic power is simply too much to ever hope for.\"  Otherwise, no one forbids you from trying to justify your own definitions. As long as someone else can agree with your ideas there is nothing wrong with creating new concepts.","human_ref_B":"Within the field of phenomenology and even sociological formulations of phenomenology there is a lot of this style. For example, Husserl and Heidegger both explained how certain mathematical or mechanical approaches to the world have escaped their application within a closed set of practices and instead have impregnated how everyday people live and think, with the world being approached as a mathematical grid (Husserl) or a mechanical world of inputs and outputs (Heidegger). Also been critiqued from some Marxist traditions, such as Lukacs, who saw how factory work life changed how people think outside of the factory through a process of r\u00e9ification. Marx also describes how the commodity form changes the world through imposing equivalence and transferability among objects. Hope this helps. (The word materialism is also interpreted quite different in different traditions so you might want to describe in more words what you mean here)   Husserl 1954, The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology, trans. D. Carr. Evanston: Northwestern University Press  book Might be a good place to start.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2758.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"qds6kg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"I feel like materialism has colonized lots of people. I know colonialism is when a stronger country takes over a weaker one. I know materialism is not a country. Is there a better way to describe my thought? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hhoq0vz","c_root_id_B":"hhoqmig","created_at_utc_A":1634947834,"created_at_utc_B":1634948137,"score_A":2,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"That is less a social science question than it is a philosophy question. You might want r\/askphilosophy.","human_ref_B":"You might want to explore the Frankfurt school theories on mass culture and mass society.  This article suggest a very invasive idea of culture. If you see materialism as a post-modern idea, we can perfectly understand you suggestion of an \"invasive\" cultural phenomenon.  Another interesting read for you, connecting you to post modernism, can be Liquid Times, by Bauman.   Quoting from the review:   \"One cannot help but feel incredibly pessimistic after reading Bauman\u2019s work. It is as if hegemonic control has penetrated so far into the hearts and minds of the populace that the huge effort required for people to reassert localised, communitarian politics against global capitalist hegemonic power is simply too much to ever hope for.\"  Otherwise, no one forbids you from trying to justify your own definitions. As long as someone else can agree with your ideas there is nothing wrong with creating new concepts.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":303.0,"score_ratio":13.0}
{"post_id":"qds6kg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"I feel like materialism has colonized lots of people. I know colonialism is when a stronger country takes over a weaker one. I know materialism is not a country. Is there a better way to describe my thought? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hhom3kt","c_root_id_B":"hhokcno","created_at_utc_A":1634945806,"created_at_utc_B":1634944919,"score_A":13,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Colonialism, or \"being colonized,\" is a phrasing that has been extremely diluted by public use, in my opinion. There are key differences between colonialism & imperialism, for example, along the lines of intergroup domination AND presence of permanent settlers.  So it isn't just \"when a stronger country takes over a weaker one.\" The nature of that takeover, how it happens, & its immediate consequences do matter in whether something is colonialism or not. It might seem like I'm splitting hairs here, but precision in the words we use is important for cueing what we can expect.  I understand that using this term might be in the hopes of conveying how extensive materialism's influence has been. Perhaps people in Psychology can weigh in further on appropriate terminology. As a Political Scientist, I think that \"materialism has strongly influenced how people think\" is what I suggest.  Here is a longer article discussing the discourse about how we define colonialism & related terms.  Horvath, Ronald J. \"A definition of colonialism.\" Current anthropology 13, no. 1 (1972): 45-57.","human_ref_B":"There are several definitions of materialism, which one are you using?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":887.0,"score_ratio":1.1818181818}
{"post_id":"qds6kg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"I feel like materialism has colonized lots of people. I know colonialism is when a stronger country takes over a weaker one. I know materialism is not a country. Is there a better way to describe my thought? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hhol93t","c_root_id_B":"hhom3kt","created_at_utc_A":1634945379,"created_at_utc_B":1634945806,"score_A":4,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Within the field of phenomenology and even sociological formulations of phenomenology there is a lot of this style. For example, Husserl and Heidegger both explained how certain mathematical or mechanical approaches to the world have escaped their application within a closed set of practices and instead have impregnated how everyday people live and think, with the world being approached as a mathematical grid (Husserl) or a mechanical world of inputs and outputs (Heidegger). Also been critiqued from some Marxist traditions, such as Lukacs, who saw how factory work life changed how people think outside of the factory through a process of r\u00e9ification. Marx also describes how the commodity form changes the world through imposing equivalence and transferability among objects. Hope this helps. (The word materialism is also interpreted quite different in different traditions so you might want to describe in more words what you mean here)   Husserl 1954, The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology, trans. D. Carr. Evanston: Northwestern University Press  book Might be a good place to start.","human_ref_B":"Colonialism, or \"being colonized,\" is a phrasing that has been extremely diluted by public use, in my opinion. There are key differences between colonialism & imperialism, for example, along the lines of intergroup domination AND presence of permanent settlers.  So it isn't just \"when a stronger country takes over a weaker one.\" The nature of that takeover, how it happens, & its immediate consequences do matter in whether something is colonialism or not. It might seem like I'm splitting hairs here, but precision in the words we use is important for cueing what we can expect.  I understand that using this term might be in the hopes of conveying how extensive materialism's influence has been. Perhaps people in Psychology can weigh in further on appropriate terminology. As a Political Scientist, I think that \"materialism has strongly influenced how people think\" is what I suggest.  Here is a longer article discussing the discourse about how we define colonialism & related terms.  Horvath, Ronald J. \"A definition of colonialism.\" Current anthropology 13, no. 1 (1972): 45-57.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":427.0,"score_ratio":3.25}
{"post_id":"sivqp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Reddit Academics - how much of this post by a Redditor, which bashes Blacks and Latinos based on \"facts\", is actually true? Original post in question  This is a massive post on reddit claiming to provide evidence for superiority of Whites and the criminality\/anti-sociality of Blacks\/Latinos. It received 53 upvotes earlier today. As a recent graduate of psychology, I look at this post and know it wasn't compiled by somebody literate in methods and statistics. I have my deep suspicions about the actual content of this post - which  user John1234321nhoJ uses frequently.  However, I do not want my personal judgments to cause bias. Furthermore, I am in no way an expert on methods, statistics, validity, reliability, or source credibility with a simple BS in Psychology. **Can somebody who really knows their stuff review this post and provide your analysis?**","c_root_id_A":"c4eexg7","c_root_id_B":"c4ee6x2","created_at_utc_A":1334891794,"created_at_utc_B":1334888066,"score_A":47,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":">Can facts be racist?  Yes.  So can the system that produces them.  Let's start right off the bat by establishing that.  I am an anthropologist.  My discipline has quite it's share of dirty laundry.  We've got a legacy of colonialism and racism to overcome, but we hang our dirty laundry out to dry.  We were all about phrenology for a while, all of that pseudo-scientific nonsense about the difference in brains and determining criminology from physiology and measuring the skull with calipers.  That was science at the time, those were facts.  Were they racist?  Hell yeah.  And don't get me started on anthropology's role in eugenics.  Like I said, we have some dirty laundry, but we do better now.  Anyway, on to the content of the post.  Many of these \"facts\" are regarding the arrest rate and crime rate among minorities.  This one is a cinch.  We all know not every criminal is caught, and we all know that not everyone incarcerated is a criminal.  We know that the definition of \"crime\" is socially constructed.  If I illegally remove money from a bank, I'm a bank robber.  If a bank illegally removes money from me, their executive gets a several million dollar bonus that year, even if they get caught.    There's also plenty of evidence of police racism.  Let's take a recent high profile example, the scandalous stop-and-frisk practices by the NYPD.  An excerpt:      In 2011, 685,724 New Yorkers were stopped by the police.     605,328 were totally innocent (88 percent).     350,743 were black (53 percent).     223,740 were Latino (34 percent).     61,805 were white (9 percent).     341,581 were aged 14-24 (51 percent).  All the years reported look like that, and the story is the same with the vast majority of urban police departments.  I really don't feel like taking the time to go through every statistic and \"fact\" individually, so I'll just stop here and in conclusion point out that yes, a racist system will produce racist statistics regarding its operation.  A lot of this has to do with a legacy of racism that leads to poverty among minorities, if you want to know more, start with white flight on wikipedia and bounce around.  Also take the same research tactic to the prison-industrial complex  to learn more about how putting people in prison has become big business, and an end in and of itself.  Another thing I don't care to take the time to dissect one by one is the poster's poor understanding of statistics.  If you don't know the difference between correlation and causation, google it.  The poster sure didn't.  Even the correlations are shaky at best if you look at the statistics.  The post also focuses on whether crime is black-on-white or white-on-black, ignoring the tragic reality that the majority of crime is really black-on-black.  It occurs within communities, among people that know each other, and is much better explained by poverty than race.  (Poverty that, need I remind you, is largely the result of a racist system.  The \"Culture of poverty\" theory, which essentially blames the victim by linking lack of success to the culture of the poor, is worth addressing.  It's bunk.  If you want to form your own opinion, here you go.)  Finally, let's get to the racist pseudo-science.  IQs are not a decent measure of anything, that has already been addressed in this thread adequately.  Physiology of the black brain as an indicator of criminality?  Come ON, man.  As I've said above, phrenology went out of style over a century ago.  [edit-added]  Also, studies have shown that there are more genetic similarities between any given members of different races than between members of the same race.  (2 white people are *less* genetically similar than a black and a white person).  Any assertions about genetics playing a causal role here is bunk.  I don't have the study handy, but if someone googles it and finds it, let me know.  So to answer OP's original question (without going into any \"truth is subjective\" bullshit), not much.  If you want more, the commentors in that thread did a great job picking apart some of the individual arguments.  If you have any questions for me, or any desire for me to try and dissect a specific point or argument that's been made, feel free to ask.  This is not my area of expertise (activism and revolutionary movements, and digital culture\/communities are), but I'm reasonably knowledgeable about it, as are most anthropologists worth their salt.  *TL:DR, I frequently say \"I'll stop here\", \"Finally,\" or \"in conclusion\", and am lying.*","human_ref_B":"It doesn't need analysis, it completely ignores the social situation which people have been born into as a result of historical processes.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3728.0,"score_ratio":2.4736842105}
{"post_id":"sivqp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Reddit Academics - how much of this post by a Redditor, which bashes Blacks and Latinos based on \"facts\", is actually true? Original post in question  This is a massive post on reddit claiming to provide evidence for superiority of Whites and the criminality\/anti-sociality of Blacks\/Latinos. It received 53 upvotes earlier today. As a recent graduate of psychology, I look at this post and know it wasn't compiled by somebody literate in methods and statistics. I have my deep suspicions about the actual content of this post - which  user John1234321nhoJ uses frequently.  However, I do not want my personal judgments to cause bias. Furthermore, I am in no way an expert on methods, statistics, validity, reliability, or source credibility with a simple BS in Psychology. **Can somebody who really knows their stuff review this post and provide your analysis?**","c_root_id_A":"c4eexg7","c_root_id_B":"c4ee9dr","created_at_utc_A":1334891794,"created_at_utc_B":1334888397,"score_A":47,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":">Can facts be racist?  Yes.  So can the system that produces them.  Let's start right off the bat by establishing that.  I am an anthropologist.  My discipline has quite it's share of dirty laundry.  We've got a legacy of colonialism and racism to overcome, but we hang our dirty laundry out to dry.  We were all about phrenology for a while, all of that pseudo-scientific nonsense about the difference in brains and determining criminology from physiology and measuring the skull with calipers.  That was science at the time, those were facts.  Were they racist?  Hell yeah.  And don't get me started on anthropology's role in eugenics.  Like I said, we have some dirty laundry, but we do better now.  Anyway, on to the content of the post.  Many of these \"facts\" are regarding the arrest rate and crime rate among minorities.  This one is a cinch.  We all know not every criminal is caught, and we all know that not everyone incarcerated is a criminal.  We know that the definition of \"crime\" is socially constructed.  If I illegally remove money from a bank, I'm a bank robber.  If a bank illegally removes money from me, their executive gets a several million dollar bonus that year, even if they get caught.    There's also plenty of evidence of police racism.  Let's take a recent high profile example, the scandalous stop-and-frisk practices by the NYPD.  An excerpt:      In 2011, 685,724 New Yorkers were stopped by the police.     605,328 were totally innocent (88 percent).     350,743 were black (53 percent).     223,740 were Latino (34 percent).     61,805 were white (9 percent).     341,581 were aged 14-24 (51 percent).  All the years reported look like that, and the story is the same with the vast majority of urban police departments.  I really don't feel like taking the time to go through every statistic and \"fact\" individually, so I'll just stop here and in conclusion point out that yes, a racist system will produce racist statistics regarding its operation.  A lot of this has to do with a legacy of racism that leads to poverty among minorities, if you want to know more, start with white flight on wikipedia and bounce around.  Also take the same research tactic to the prison-industrial complex  to learn more about how putting people in prison has become big business, and an end in and of itself.  Another thing I don't care to take the time to dissect one by one is the poster's poor understanding of statistics.  If you don't know the difference between correlation and causation, google it.  The poster sure didn't.  Even the correlations are shaky at best if you look at the statistics.  The post also focuses on whether crime is black-on-white or white-on-black, ignoring the tragic reality that the majority of crime is really black-on-black.  It occurs within communities, among people that know each other, and is much better explained by poverty than race.  (Poverty that, need I remind you, is largely the result of a racist system.  The \"Culture of poverty\" theory, which essentially blames the victim by linking lack of success to the culture of the poor, is worth addressing.  It's bunk.  If you want to form your own opinion, here you go.)  Finally, let's get to the racist pseudo-science.  IQs are not a decent measure of anything, that has already been addressed in this thread adequately.  Physiology of the black brain as an indicator of criminality?  Come ON, man.  As I've said above, phrenology went out of style over a century ago.  [edit-added]  Also, studies have shown that there are more genetic similarities between any given members of different races than between members of the same race.  (2 white people are *less* genetically similar than a black and a white person).  Any assertions about genetics playing a causal role here is bunk.  I don't have the study handy, but if someone googles it and finds it, let me know.  So to answer OP's original question (without going into any \"truth is subjective\" bullshit), not much.  If you want more, the commentors in that thread did a great job picking apart some of the individual arguments.  If you have any questions for me, or any desire for me to try and dissect a specific point or argument that's been made, feel free to ask.  This is not my area of expertise (activism and revolutionary movements, and digital culture\/communities are), but I'm reasonably knowledgeable about it, as are most anthropologists worth their salt.  *TL:DR, I frequently say \"I'll stop here\", \"Finally,\" or \"in conclusion\", and am lying.*","human_ref_B":"Not worth anyone's time debunking this shit if you ask me. The problem empirical studies of society always struggle with is trying to tease out relationships and causalities. It's not as simple as compiling a bunch of means and concluding Oh, group A's mean is higher than group B's, therefore being a member of group A means you are likelier to be X.  A lot of the figures he threw out there, as others have pointed out in that thread, are just as likely to be caused by institutional factors (arrest rates are likely to be influenced by police officers' prejudices). Some of them, like the figures on gang involvement, could well have more to do with urban poverty rates than race.  Also, I'm not an expert on genetics, but you shouldn't have to be one to know that the notion that blacks are genetically inclined to commit criminal behaviours has zero foundation in science.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3397.0,"score_ratio":6.7142857143}
{"post_id":"sivqp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Reddit Academics - how much of this post by a Redditor, which bashes Blacks and Latinos based on \"facts\", is actually true? Original post in question  This is a massive post on reddit claiming to provide evidence for superiority of Whites and the criminality\/anti-sociality of Blacks\/Latinos. It received 53 upvotes earlier today. As a recent graduate of psychology, I look at this post and know it wasn't compiled by somebody literate in methods and statistics. I have my deep suspicions about the actual content of this post - which  user John1234321nhoJ uses frequently.  However, I do not want my personal judgments to cause bias. Furthermore, I am in no way an expert on methods, statistics, validity, reliability, or source credibility with a simple BS in Psychology. **Can somebody who really knows their stuff review this post and provide your analysis?**","c_root_id_A":"c4eem6j","c_root_id_B":"c4eexg7","created_at_utc_A":1334890195,"created_at_utc_B":1334891794,"score_A":3,"score_B":47,"human_ref_A":"The fact he ignores and downvotes any criticism of his argument shows there is no point in wasting time trying to show him how he is wrong. He claims he is just representing \"facts\" and facts aren't bias, which is completely untrue as how you choose to report \"facts\" can be biased. Statistics are very easy to manipulate and bias.","human_ref_B":">Can facts be racist?  Yes.  So can the system that produces them.  Let's start right off the bat by establishing that.  I am an anthropologist.  My discipline has quite it's share of dirty laundry.  We've got a legacy of colonialism and racism to overcome, but we hang our dirty laundry out to dry.  We were all about phrenology for a while, all of that pseudo-scientific nonsense about the difference in brains and determining criminology from physiology and measuring the skull with calipers.  That was science at the time, those were facts.  Were they racist?  Hell yeah.  And don't get me started on anthropology's role in eugenics.  Like I said, we have some dirty laundry, but we do better now.  Anyway, on to the content of the post.  Many of these \"facts\" are regarding the arrest rate and crime rate among minorities.  This one is a cinch.  We all know not every criminal is caught, and we all know that not everyone incarcerated is a criminal.  We know that the definition of \"crime\" is socially constructed.  If I illegally remove money from a bank, I'm a bank robber.  If a bank illegally removes money from me, their executive gets a several million dollar bonus that year, even if they get caught.    There's also plenty of evidence of police racism.  Let's take a recent high profile example, the scandalous stop-and-frisk practices by the NYPD.  An excerpt:      In 2011, 685,724 New Yorkers were stopped by the police.     605,328 were totally innocent (88 percent).     350,743 were black (53 percent).     223,740 were Latino (34 percent).     61,805 were white (9 percent).     341,581 were aged 14-24 (51 percent).  All the years reported look like that, and the story is the same with the vast majority of urban police departments.  I really don't feel like taking the time to go through every statistic and \"fact\" individually, so I'll just stop here and in conclusion point out that yes, a racist system will produce racist statistics regarding its operation.  A lot of this has to do with a legacy of racism that leads to poverty among minorities, if you want to know more, start with white flight on wikipedia and bounce around.  Also take the same research tactic to the prison-industrial complex  to learn more about how putting people in prison has become big business, and an end in and of itself.  Another thing I don't care to take the time to dissect one by one is the poster's poor understanding of statistics.  If you don't know the difference between correlation and causation, google it.  The poster sure didn't.  Even the correlations are shaky at best if you look at the statistics.  The post also focuses on whether crime is black-on-white or white-on-black, ignoring the tragic reality that the majority of crime is really black-on-black.  It occurs within communities, among people that know each other, and is much better explained by poverty than race.  (Poverty that, need I remind you, is largely the result of a racist system.  The \"Culture of poverty\" theory, which essentially blames the victim by linking lack of success to the culture of the poor, is worth addressing.  It's bunk.  If you want to form your own opinion, here you go.)  Finally, let's get to the racist pseudo-science.  IQs are not a decent measure of anything, that has already been addressed in this thread adequately.  Physiology of the black brain as an indicator of criminality?  Come ON, man.  As I've said above, phrenology went out of style over a century ago.  [edit-added]  Also, studies have shown that there are more genetic similarities between any given members of different races than between members of the same race.  (2 white people are *less* genetically similar than a black and a white person).  Any assertions about genetics playing a causal role here is bunk.  I don't have the study handy, but if someone googles it and finds it, let me know.  So to answer OP's original question (without going into any \"truth is subjective\" bullshit), not much.  If you want more, the commentors in that thread did a great job picking apart some of the individual arguments.  If you have any questions for me, or any desire for me to try and dissect a specific point or argument that's been made, feel free to ask.  This is not my area of expertise (activism and revolutionary movements, and digital culture\/communities are), but I'm reasonably knowledgeable about it, as are most anthropologists worth their salt.  *TL:DR, I frequently say \"I'll stop here\", \"Finally,\" or \"in conclusion\", and am lying.*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1599.0,"score_ratio":15.6666666667}
{"post_id":"sivqp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Reddit Academics - how much of this post by a Redditor, which bashes Blacks and Latinos based on \"facts\", is actually true? Original post in question  This is a massive post on reddit claiming to provide evidence for superiority of Whites and the criminality\/anti-sociality of Blacks\/Latinos. It received 53 upvotes earlier today. As a recent graduate of psychology, I look at this post and know it wasn't compiled by somebody literate in methods and statistics. I have my deep suspicions about the actual content of this post - which  user John1234321nhoJ uses frequently.  However, I do not want my personal judgments to cause bias. Furthermore, I am in no way an expert on methods, statistics, validity, reliability, or source credibility with a simple BS in Psychology. **Can somebody who really knows their stuff review this post and provide your analysis?**","c_root_id_A":"c4ee9dr","c_root_id_B":"c4ega18","created_at_utc_A":1334888397,"created_at_utc_B":1334899355,"score_A":7,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Not worth anyone's time debunking this shit if you ask me. The problem empirical studies of society always struggle with is trying to tease out relationships and causalities. It's not as simple as compiling a bunch of means and concluding Oh, group A's mean is higher than group B's, therefore being a member of group A means you are likelier to be X.  A lot of the figures he threw out there, as others have pointed out in that thread, are just as likely to be caused by institutional factors (arrest rates are likely to be influenced by police officers' prejudices). Some of them, like the figures on gang involvement, could well have more to do with urban poverty rates than race.  Also, I'm not an expert on genetics, but you shouldn't have to be one to know that the notion that blacks are genetically inclined to commit criminal behaviours has zero foundation in science.","human_ref_B":"I just like to point out that this guy obviously has an agenda. If you look back through his user history he has posted this same post multiple times in different threads. He isn't on Reddit to share a different viewpoint and engage in a substantive discussion. I'd be immediately skeptical of someone who acts in such a manner even if it wasn't about such a polarizing issue as race, in the same manner you would be skeptical of a health study that is published by a cigarette company. I will admit that I don't know enough to comment about the validity of his statistics or his sources, plus I didn't bother to read the post after seeing his obviously misguided and bigoted TL;DR.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10958.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"sivqp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Reddit Academics - how much of this post by a Redditor, which bashes Blacks and Latinos based on \"facts\", is actually true? Original post in question  This is a massive post on reddit claiming to provide evidence for superiority of Whites and the criminality\/anti-sociality of Blacks\/Latinos. It received 53 upvotes earlier today. As a recent graduate of psychology, I look at this post and know it wasn't compiled by somebody literate in methods and statistics. I have my deep suspicions about the actual content of this post - which  user John1234321nhoJ uses frequently.  However, I do not want my personal judgments to cause bias. Furthermore, I am in no way an expert on methods, statistics, validity, reliability, or source credibility with a simple BS in Psychology. **Can somebody who really knows their stuff review this post and provide your analysis?**","c_root_id_A":"c4ega18","c_root_id_B":"c4eem6j","created_at_utc_A":1334899355,"created_at_utc_B":1334890195,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I just like to point out that this guy obviously has an agenda. If you look back through his user history he has posted this same post multiple times in different threads. He isn't on Reddit to share a different viewpoint and engage in a substantive discussion. I'd be immediately skeptical of someone who acts in such a manner even if it wasn't about such a polarizing issue as race, in the same manner you would be skeptical of a health study that is published by a cigarette company. I will admit that I don't know enough to comment about the validity of his statistics or his sources, plus I didn't bother to read the post after seeing his obviously misguided and bigoted TL;DR.","human_ref_B":"The fact he ignores and downvotes any criticism of his argument shows there is no point in wasting time trying to show him how he is wrong. He claims he is just representing \"facts\" and facts aren't bias, which is completely untrue as how you choose to report \"facts\" can be biased. Statistics are very easy to manipulate and bias.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9160.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"sivqp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Reddit Academics - how much of this post by a Redditor, which bashes Blacks and Latinos based on \"facts\", is actually true? Original post in question  This is a massive post on reddit claiming to provide evidence for superiority of Whites and the criminality\/anti-sociality of Blacks\/Latinos. It received 53 upvotes earlier today. As a recent graduate of psychology, I look at this post and know it wasn't compiled by somebody literate in methods and statistics. I have my deep suspicions about the actual content of this post - which  user John1234321nhoJ uses frequently.  However, I do not want my personal judgments to cause bias. Furthermore, I am in no way an expert on methods, statistics, validity, reliability, or source credibility with a simple BS in Psychology. **Can somebody who really knows their stuff review this post and provide your analysis?**","c_root_id_A":"c4eem6j","c_root_id_B":"c4eggxv","created_at_utc_A":1334890195,"created_at_utc_B":1334900666,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"The fact he ignores and downvotes any criticism of his argument shows there is no point in wasting time trying to show him how he is wrong. He claims he is just representing \"facts\" and facts aren't bias, which is completely untrue as how you choose to report \"facts\" can be biased. Statistics are very easy to manipulate and bias.","human_ref_B":"To start, the OP links to specific cases of black-on-white crimes, then asserts, \"if you want to have a discussion about these things you need to do so scientifically and not emotionally.\" The OP begins with sensationalism then tries to deride opposing viewpoints as sensational.  Now, onto the OP's \"science.\"  > On average, murder arrest rates for blacks are 12 times greater than for whites. 1  Look at the citation. The website lists the average black-white ratio of homicide arrests in *various cities through four decades.* OP gets the 12:1 ratio from an note giving an arbitrary example of how to read the chart. Not only that, but the latest information is for \"the 1990's,\" which is old data. Is there a racial disparity in homicide arrests? Yes, but it is not a 12:1 ratio, and there are tons of factors that play into this statistic which will be addressed countering his other \"facts.\"  > For men in their early thirties, African-Americans are about 7 times more likely to have a prison record than whites.  I will get bored with repeating myself here very quickly. These kinds of statistics are cited in an attempt to show that there is a racial disparity in crimes, which the OP could easily just cite the demographics of American prisons and compare those to the demographics of America. The statistics he cites are not all backed up with citations, and the citations the OP uses are bunk anyhow. I trust you, the reader, to see what I mean and find the rest of these types of \"statistics\" with your critical eye; you do not need a PhD to do this.  > Men of African descent are proven to be more prone to rape and\/or murder: Humans have a so called \"Androgen receptor\". This receptor is in our cells, it binds to testosterone. The gene coding for this receptor has a repeating element of the three letters CAG. In some men, this repeating element is shorter than in others. It has been found that men who are guilty of committing rape or murder, or both, have a significantly shorter number of these CAG repeats than normal men 1 People from different ethnic backgrounds differ in the average number of CAG repeats that they carry in their genes as explained in these studies: [2] 3 THe studies show that males of African descent have on average the lowest number of CAG repeats in their Androgen receptor.  I thought this would be more interesting, but I'm getting bored. Read the abstract of the OP's first citation and compare that to the statement the OP makes based on that information.  One study that finds an association between two very specific things is not grounds to make the huge, sweeping claim that something else has been \"proven.\"    Yep. Bored. Really, you will not find a PhD answer to this because this post doesn't deserve a PhD answer. It is full of false information and misused\/misinterpreted studies. Be smart. Check citations if they are provided, and be critical about *how* the OP presents their \"facts.\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10471.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"m6svsa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Are there fewer children in foster-care since same-sex marriage and adoption have been legalized?","c_root_id_A":"gr7z0ct","c_root_id_B":"gr7xl0o","created_at_utc_A":1615974402,"created_at_utc_B":1615972873,"score_A":51,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Reposting because I forgot the links the first time:    I do not have studies to answer your question directly, but I wanted to provide some context for whatever anyone else will find. There is a flaw in your question: you assume that same-sex marriage was needed for wide-spread adoption by same-sex couples. That isn't the case. Adoption by same-sex couples was not uncommon even in the 1990s and earlier; they just often weren't \"out\" about it during the process (which will likely affect any statistical data from those periods).    Adoption by same-sex couples was permitted even when marriage was not, although it definitely varied by state. There are a few interesting law review articles on adoption by same-sex couples prior to legalization of same-sex marriage (some of these are paywalled via HeinOnline):   * Vanessa A. Lavely, The Path to Recognition of Same-Sex Marriage: Reconciling the Inconsistencies between Marriage and Adoption Cases, 55 UCLA L. Rev. 247 \\(2007-2008\\)   * Timothy E. Lin, Social Norms and Judicial Decisionmaking: Examining the Role of Narratives in Same-Sex Adoption Cases, 99 Colum. L. Rev. 739 \\(1999\\)   * Same-Sex Adoption: An Alternative Approach to Gay Marriage in New York, 62 Brook. L. Rev. 399 (1996)   * Annette R. Appell, The Endurance of Biological Connection: Heteronormativity, Same-Sex Parenting and the Lessons of Adoption, 22 BYU J. Pub. L. 289 \\(2007-2008\\)    I worked at an adoption law firm for several years leading up to the Obergefell v. Hodges decision in 2015. Although I do not have an article to cite on it, I know that several states imposed more severe restrictions to curb same-sex adoption as the political fights over same-sex marriage increased. The restrictions ranged from limiting birth certificates to list one male and one female maximum, to disqualifying same-sex couples from participating in foster-to-adopt programs, to outright prohibiting adoption by same-sex couples. The usual loophole we were able to exploit was that one person could still adopt, and then the couple would move to another state where it was legal to do a second-parent adoption. We came up with a lot of creative ways to make it work, but it was a huge hassle.  I expect that during the years of about 2005 to 2015, any statistical data on the issue will show rapid and dramatic fluctuations for numbers of same-sex adoptions. On one hand, it likely increased in the states that legalized same-sex marriage and had growing social acceptance of adoption by same sex couples; but in other states, it became more difficult to due increasing restrictions.    Post 2015, I expect that there would be growth in number of adoptions generally, but it still took a lot of time for those adoption restrictions to be lifted. We still had clients that could not adopt from certain states. Legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide did not have an immediate or direct effect on the hurdles for adoption.    You may also want to compare statistics of whether same-sex couples are more or less likely to participate in foster-adopt programs than heterosexual couples or single individuals. High-income couples typically do not adopt foster children, and in my experience, most (not all) of our same-sex couple clients were very high earners. High-income couples often adopt through private agencies (which involve direct placement by the birth parents, often at or shortly after birth), either domestically or internationally. That trend very well could have changed as adoption restrictions were lifted and social acceptance changed; as same-sex couples and marriage become more accepted, then lower-income and middle-income couples are better able to navigate and succeed in the foster-adopt systems.","human_ref_B":"Where in foster care? In America religious charities do not have to adopt to same sex couples. Or anyone. They have the right to discriminate. Most kids are in religious charities. And remember, this is the right to blatantly discriminate, not bullshit like \"at will\" states where if you can't prove why you were rejected or fired or denied or whatever--as in they actually said \"I'm being bigoted\"--then it didn't happen and it's legal.  https:\/\/www.lambdalegal.org\/blog\/20200818_religious-exemptions-child-welfare-report","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1529.0,"score_ratio":5.1}
{"post_id":"1r8p1z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Not sure if this is the right place for this question, but why is it that some people are against 'political correctness'?","c_root_id_A":"cdkqckx","c_root_id_B":"cdkrc6u","created_at_utc_A":1385155534,"created_at_utc_B":1385157895,"score_A":5,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"I think Rhodesian writer Alexander McCall Smith says it best,  >Do I shock you? I think I do. That\u2019s the problem these days \u2013 nobody speaks their mind. No, don\u2019t smile. They really don\u2019t. We\u2019ve been browbeaten into conformity by all sorts of people who tell us what we can and cannot say. Haven\u2019t you noticed it? The tyranny of political correctness. Don\u2019t pass any judgement on anything. Don\u2019t open your trap in case you offend somebody or other.","human_ref_B":"The negatives of political correctness are really just a correlation to the positives of non-political correctness, if you think about it.  In one, it is mandated that certain phrases are not to be uttered in order to not marginalize certain groups. In the other, any phrase is allowed, but at the expense of the peace of mind of certain groups.  Either one is a tyranny in a sense. In one, people are not allowed to speak their minds. In another, people are not allowed respite from verbal abuse.  I don't think there is a benefit to either case. They both equally suck. I do feel that ultimately protected free speech is better than ultimately restricted free speech. Mod mentality in speech form is easier to deal with than oppression of truths. Ultimately I am trying to explain the \"speech\" aspect of it - I have no sources for \"affirmative action\" or whatever socio-political aspects there are beyond the US Constitutional aspect of things, and philosophy of human rights. If you are in another country, the above concepts may or may not apply to your community\/culture\/ideals.  The only sources I have are not academic, in the journal entry sense, but academic in the sense of they are scholars in some manner:  Penn Jillette: Why Tolerance Is Condescending - Big Think  Steven Pinker on Taboos, Political Correctness, and Dissent  George Carlin on political correctness  I believe ultimately the debate between the poles of thought control vs free speech is an awkward one at best. People should be better. Will they really be better if we just make them not say certain things? They will still say them in private company of those who believe them. But on the other hand, if 90% of a population harasses or hurts others through rhetoric or verbal assault, that can do actual damage to people. I think some people are simply against it out of not wanting to hide their true selves - and I think that is perfectly acceptable. If you are a black\/hispanic\/jewish person, would you want to knowingly enter a KKK member's business? Wouldn't it be better if they were allowed to say what they want, so you could know to not frequent their establishment?  That last point is my argument I always use. If someone hates me for arbitrary reasons, I'd like to know so I can not support them. And I can't do that if we all have to watch what we say. If we said what we really thought, we would come to terms with our differences sooner... Perhaps.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2361.0,"score_ratio":5.6}
{"post_id":"16w6gb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Has there ever been a time in history when a major industry in a county suddenly collapses. Example inside For example: An oil rich middle eastern country quickly runs out of oil. Oil represents a major part of many middle eastern countries. I'm trying to imagine a scenario in which a country like Saudi Arabia not being able to sell oil because of extremely low demand (because of technology) . Or won't be able to pump out any oil because of supply.  I'm trying to imagine what it would be like by using history. Because after all, history does repeat itself.","c_root_id_A":"c7zxavy","c_root_id_B":"c7zx4c4","created_at_utc_A":1358631484,"created_at_utc_B":1358630823,"score_A":31,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"the best example i can think of is nauru, a tiny island country that was almost entirely dependent on exporting phosphate until they ran out. the economy declined pretty badly along with the phosphate industry, and in recent years they've tried, with marginal success, to reinvent themselves as a tax haven. http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Nauru#Economy http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Phosphate_mining_in_Nauru","human_ref_B":"Hmm. On a smaller scale you have the Japanese fishing industry, Kodak, or the replacement of metal for plastics. However I know of none on the scale of an entire country being dependent on a single resource to the point of it decimating the country without it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":661.0,"score_ratio":10.3333333333}
{"post_id":"16w6gb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Has there ever been a time in history when a major industry in a county suddenly collapses. Example inside For example: An oil rich middle eastern country quickly runs out of oil. Oil represents a major part of many middle eastern countries. I'm trying to imagine a scenario in which a country like Saudi Arabia not being able to sell oil because of extremely low demand (because of technology) . Or won't be able to pump out any oil because of supply.  I'm trying to imagine what it would be like by using history. Because after all, history does repeat itself.","c_root_id_A":"c7zy122","c_root_id_B":"c7zy8e0","created_at_utc_A":1358634224,"created_at_utc_B":1358634995,"score_A":4,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Egypt and Tunisia have pretty much reached the end stage of the Export Land Model. Their declining domestic production was met with rising domestic consumption. No more net oil exports, really.","human_ref_B":"The Ruhr area in Germany used to be a major coal-mining industrial centre in Europe. As it has become too expensive to mine for coal and cheaper competition from Asia has taken its toll, the re-organisation of cities such as Essen has been breathtaking (see for example this 2007 article called [\"End of an Industrial Era: Germany to Close its Coal Mines\"] (http:\/\/www.spiegel.de\/international\/end-of-an-industrial-era-germany-to-close-its-coal-mines-a-463172.html))","labels":0,"seconds_difference":771.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"16w6gb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Has there ever been a time in history when a major industry in a county suddenly collapses. Example inside For example: An oil rich middle eastern country quickly runs out of oil. Oil represents a major part of many middle eastern countries. I'm trying to imagine a scenario in which a country like Saudi Arabia not being able to sell oil because of extremely low demand (because of technology) . Or won't be able to pump out any oil because of supply.  I'm trying to imagine what it would be like by using history. Because after all, history does repeat itself.","c_root_id_A":"c7zx4c4","c_root_id_B":"c7zy8e0","created_at_utc_A":1358630823,"created_at_utc_B":1358634995,"score_A":3,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Hmm. On a smaller scale you have the Japanese fishing industry, Kodak, or the replacement of metal for plastics. However I know of none on the scale of an entire country being dependent on a single resource to the point of it decimating the country without it.","human_ref_B":"The Ruhr area in Germany used to be a major coal-mining industrial centre in Europe. As it has become too expensive to mine for coal and cheaper competition from Asia has taken its toll, the re-organisation of cities such as Essen has been breathtaking (see for example this 2007 article called [\"End of an Industrial Era: Germany to Close its Coal Mines\"] (http:\/\/www.spiegel.de\/international\/end-of-an-industrial-era-germany-to-close-its-coal-mines-a-463172.html))","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4172.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16w6gb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Has there ever been a time in history when a major industry in a county suddenly collapses. Example inside For example: An oil rich middle eastern country quickly runs out of oil. Oil represents a major part of many middle eastern countries. I'm trying to imagine a scenario in which a country like Saudi Arabia not being able to sell oil because of extremely low demand (because of technology) . Or won't be able to pump out any oil because of supply.  I'm trying to imagine what it would be like by using history. Because after all, history does repeat itself.","c_root_id_A":"c7zy122","c_root_id_B":"c7zz0za","created_at_utc_A":1358634224,"created_at_utc_B":1358637946,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Egypt and Tunisia have pretty much reached the end stage of the Export Land Model. Their declining domestic production was met with rising domestic consumption. No more net oil exports, really.","human_ref_B":"This happened to Hawai'i back when it was an independent kingdom several times.  The first occurrence was the sandalwood trade, which started in 1790 and then collapsed in 1830.  This was followed by whaling, which petered out in 1860 with the discovery of petroleum in Pennsylvania.  By then, Hawai'i was on to its next industry, sugar cane, which eventually lead to the downfall of the Kingdom itself, as sugar cane plantation owners, eager to decrease duties on their exports to the US, overthrew the Kingdom so that they could join the US as a territory.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3722.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"16w6gb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Has there ever been a time in history when a major industry in a county suddenly collapses. Example inside For example: An oil rich middle eastern country quickly runs out of oil. Oil represents a major part of many middle eastern countries. I'm trying to imagine a scenario in which a country like Saudi Arabia not being able to sell oil because of extremely low demand (because of technology) . Or won't be able to pump out any oil because of supply.  I'm trying to imagine what it would be like by using history. Because after all, history does repeat itself.","c_root_id_A":"c7zz0za","c_root_id_B":"c7zx4c4","created_at_utc_A":1358637946,"created_at_utc_B":1358630823,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This happened to Hawai'i back when it was an independent kingdom several times.  The first occurrence was the sandalwood trade, which started in 1790 and then collapsed in 1830.  This was followed by whaling, which petered out in 1860 with the discovery of petroleum in Pennsylvania.  By then, Hawai'i was on to its next industry, sugar cane, which eventually lead to the downfall of the Kingdom itself, as sugar cane plantation owners, eager to decrease duties on their exports to the US, overthrew the Kingdom so that they could join the US as a territory.","human_ref_B":"Hmm. On a smaller scale you have the Japanese fishing industry, Kodak, or the replacement of metal for plastics. However I know of none on the scale of an entire country being dependent on a single resource to the point of it decimating the country without it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7123.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16w6gb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Has there ever been a time in history when a major industry in a county suddenly collapses. Example inside For example: An oil rich middle eastern country quickly runs out of oil. Oil represents a major part of many middle eastern countries. I'm trying to imagine a scenario in which a country like Saudi Arabia not being able to sell oil because of extremely low demand (because of technology) . Or won't be able to pump out any oil because of supply.  I'm trying to imagine what it would be like by using history. Because after all, history does repeat itself.","c_root_id_A":"c7zyxh6","c_root_id_B":"c7zz0za","created_at_utc_A":1358637586,"created_at_utc_B":1358637946,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Dutch_disease  This wiki describes a known economic phenomenon (Dutch Disease) which is pretty much what you want to look at regarding the depletion of natural resource revenue when there is no backup industries to step into place there. Many examples when you follow through the link","human_ref_B":"This happened to Hawai'i back when it was an independent kingdom several times.  The first occurrence was the sandalwood trade, which started in 1790 and then collapsed in 1830.  This was followed by whaling, which petered out in 1860 with the discovery of petroleum in Pennsylvania.  By then, Hawai'i was on to its next industry, sugar cane, which eventually lead to the downfall of the Kingdom itself, as sugar cane plantation owners, eager to decrease duties on their exports to the US, overthrew the Kingdom so that they could join the US as a territory.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":360.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16w6gb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Has there ever been a time in history when a major industry in a county suddenly collapses. Example inside For example: An oil rich middle eastern country quickly runs out of oil. Oil represents a major part of many middle eastern countries. I'm trying to imagine a scenario in which a country like Saudi Arabia not being able to sell oil because of extremely low demand (because of technology) . Or won't be able to pump out any oil because of supply.  I'm trying to imagine what it would be like by using history. Because after all, history does repeat itself.","c_root_id_A":"c7zy122","c_root_id_B":"c7zx4c4","created_at_utc_A":1358634224,"created_at_utc_B":1358630823,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Egypt and Tunisia have pretty much reached the end stage of the Export Land Model. Their declining domestic production was met with rising domestic consumption. No more net oil exports, really.","human_ref_B":"Hmm. On a smaller scale you have the Japanese fishing industry, Kodak, or the replacement of metal for plastics. However I know of none on the scale of an entire country being dependent on a single resource to the point of it decimating the country without it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3401.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1vbfln","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why has there not been a sustained militant movement in the American Indian community? Obviously there is the Wounded Knee incident in the 70's (not that that was intended as an act of militancy) but beyond that, there doesn't seem to be anything. What is different about the American Indian experience as opposed to say, the Basque or Chechen experience?","c_root_id_A":"ceqla1f","c_root_id_B":"ceqmmgb","created_at_utc_A":1389831087,"created_at_utc_B":1389833965,"score_A":11,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"Would like to throw in one of my favorite 'local lore' bits - the nineteen-month Occupation of Alcatraz between 1969 and 1971.","human_ref_B":"It may not be as \"active\" as the Basque or Chechen cases, but the American Indian Movement has been around for almost fifty years.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2878.0,"score_ratio":1.8181818182}
{"post_id":"1vbfln","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why has there not been a sustained militant movement in the American Indian community? Obviously there is the Wounded Knee incident in the 70's (not that that was intended as an act of militancy) but beyond that, there doesn't seem to be anything. What is different about the American Indian experience as opposed to say, the Basque or Chechen experience?","c_root_id_A":"ceqslbd","c_root_id_B":"ceqwh05","created_at_utc_A":1389847104,"created_at_utc_B":1389859487,"score_A":7,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"You might want to take a look at Gord Hill's 500 Years of Resistance.","human_ref_B":"Native Americans are currently fighting to reclaim agency in the US and Canada. The most prominent organization, a spinoff of Occupy, is the Idle No More movement, which conducts nonviolent protests and things like native dance flashmobs to raise awareness.  As to why they're employing different methods than Basque or Chechnya, I'm not entirely sure, but I'll venture a guess. Native Americans have been met with systematic violence and oppression, in many cases leading to severe cases of alcoholism and stigmas from the general public. Before organizing into any sort of militant force, they'd need to overcome many of those problems. The small NA population that exists in the US & Canada right now would be absolutely decimated by the police and military of the countries they'd be resisting; better, I think, to gain agency through Native education and empowerment than violence.  I'm happy to hear others' views on this. As a non-Native American, my perspective comes only from conversations and independent research.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12383.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"j7qq7z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Why is there a stigma against teenage girls dating boys? I was just watching TV and saw a commercial in which parents hire a sports announcer to follow around their daughter while she goes on a date to stop her from having anything other than an incredibly awkward experience. I've also heard a lot of \"jokes\" about dads scaring off potential boyfriends, or saying things like \"you can have a boyfriend when you're 30\", etc. Why is there this kind of stigma against young girls dating boys? Why is there not a stigma against young boys dating girls (when obviously you can't have a girl dating a boy without a boy dating a girl)?","c_root_id_A":"g8770b7","c_root_id_B":"g87cf6t","created_at_utc_A":1602233786,"created_at_utc_B":1602239959,"score_A":35,"score_B":59,"human_ref_A":"Presumably, you\u2019re just talking about the US? (This sounds very specific to maybe even a single, albeit large, subculture in that country.)","human_ref_B":"You're just missing the teen pregnancy joke. The joke in that commercial or in sitcoms or memes that have to do with parents stifling a teen girl's romantic prospects is that teen boys are all trying to bang their daughter and they will go to any lengths to not let her get pregnant or lose her virginity. The trope derives from a sexist double standard that an unwed woman's virginity is a matter of purity and denotes her value to a prospective husband, particularly within American Christian culture where we have things like purity balls.   Teen boys, however, largely avoid that same level of protectiveness and stigma within American culture. >Results suggest that the association between lifetime sexual partnerships and peer status varies significantly by gender, such that greater numbers of sexual partners are\u00a0positively\u00a0correlated with boys\u2019 peer acceptance, but\u00a0negatively\u00a0correlated with girls\u2019 peer acceptance.<   Then there's just the pregnancy thing, which for people who have vaginas is more of an immediate concern for them and their family. If you have a daughter and she gets pregnant you're pretty much now tasked with raising a baby. If your son gets a girl pregnant your family absolutely should be as supportive as possible through whatever decisions are made, but there are cultural biases that pregnancy prevention and pregnancies are disproportionately the responsibility of the woman over the man . This often engenders a lesser feeling of responsibility from the boy and his family. After all, a girl who is pregnant is just pregnant. The parents of a boy who has impregnated someone can very easily say, \"our sweet boy would never do that! She's lying!\" and not have it catch up to them until if or when a paternity test is done.   TL;DR: It's just a joke about the protectiveness and anxiety parents feel about the potential for their teen daughter to get pregnant and mess up her life (and theirs by extension,) possibly with additional attitudes about virginity and virtue thrown in there.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6173.0,"score_ratio":1.6857142857}
{"post_id":"j7qq7z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Why is there a stigma against teenage girls dating boys? I was just watching TV and saw a commercial in which parents hire a sports announcer to follow around their daughter while she goes on a date to stop her from having anything other than an incredibly awkward experience. I've also heard a lot of \"jokes\" about dads scaring off potential boyfriends, or saying things like \"you can have a boyfriend when you're 30\", etc. Why is there this kind of stigma against young girls dating boys? Why is there not a stigma against young boys dating girls (when obviously you can't have a girl dating a boy without a boy dating a girl)?","c_root_id_A":"g877ueu","c_root_id_B":"g87cf6t","created_at_utc_A":1602234768,"created_at_utc_B":1602239959,"score_A":23,"score_B":59,"human_ref_A":"One issue is that sexuality is more potentially dangerous for girls. For example, girls are more likely to be victims of intimate partner violence. From 1994 to 2010, approximately 4 in 5 victims of intimate partner violence were female.  Source: This Bureau of Justice Statistics special report investigated intimate partner violence trends between 1994 and 2010.","human_ref_B":"You're just missing the teen pregnancy joke. The joke in that commercial or in sitcoms or memes that have to do with parents stifling a teen girl's romantic prospects is that teen boys are all trying to bang their daughter and they will go to any lengths to not let her get pregnant or lose her virginity. The trope derives from a sexist double standard that an unwed woman's virginity is a matter of purity and denotes her value to a prospective husband, particularly within American Christian culture where we have things like purity balls.   Teen boys, however, largely avoid that same level of protectiveness and stigma within American culture. >Results suggest that the association between lifetime sexual partnerships and peer status varies significantly by gender, such that greater numbers of sexual partners are\u00a0positively\u00a0correlated with boys\u2019 peer acceptance, but\u00a0negatively\u00a0correlated with girls\u2019 peer acceptance.<   Then there's just the pregnancy thing, which for people who have vaginas is more of an immediate concern for them and their family. If you have a daughter and she gets pregnant you're pretty much now tasked with raising a baby. If your son gets a girl pregnant your family absolutely should be as supportive as possible through whatever decisions are made, but there are cultural biases that pregnancy prevention and pregnancies are disproportionately the responsibility of the woman over the man . This often engenders a lesser feeling of responsibility from the boy and his family. After all, a girl who is pregnant is just pregnant. The parents of a boy who has impregnated someone can very easily say, \"our sweet boy would never do that! She's lying!\" and not have it catch up to them until if or when a paternity test is done.   TL;DR: It's just a joke about the protectiveness and anxiety parents feel about the potential for their teen daughter to get pregnant and mess up her life (and theirs by extension,) possibly with additional attitudes about virginity and virtue thrown in there.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5191.0,"score_ratio":2.5652173913}
{"post_id":"19brn4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Seems like there is a lot of pessimism about the future. What facts, trends, or changes in social behavior make you feel optimistic about the future? Preferably your answer would be the most encouraging fact\/trend\/change that you have studied personally. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8mky80","c_root_id_B":"c8mkx6x","created_at_utc_A":1361974989,"created_at_utc_B":1361974860,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I agree more or less with Steven Pinker: the world is still a pretty brutal and ugly place, but it's the best it has ever been and the trends suggest it's just going to continue to get better in the future in terms of quality of life and especially in terms of violence.   His TED talk is pretty good. http:\/\/www.ted.com\/talks\/steven_pinker_on_the_myth_of_violence.html  That being said, some aspects of Western development seem to be going in the wrong direction: corporations wield untold amounts of power over people and their governments, for example, but those problems are not insurmountable.","human_ref_B":"Health care costs have risen more slowly over the past 3 years than expected.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":129.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"19brn4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Seems like there is a lot of pessimism about the future. What facts, trends, or changes in social behavior make you feel optimistic about the future? Preferably your answer would be the most encouraging fact\/trend\/change that you have studied personally. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8mlemt","c_root_id_B":"c8mkx6x","created_at_utc_A":1361976895,"created_at_utc_B":1361974860,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The growing importance and availability of information makes me optimistic. If everything is out in the open, there can be no corruption - not in business, not in government.  This frightens the hell out of the people who utilize 'favors' in order to get things done. It also frightens the hell out of privacy advocates. It frightens egotists - people who think that they're more important to the world than others.  We're already starting to identify poor science and research that have informed 'conventional wisdom' to this point. Finding errors that were perpetuated due to egos.  Things are changing. For the better, IMO.","human_ref_B":"Health care costs have risen more slowly over the past 3 years than expected.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2035.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"19brn4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Seems like there is a lot of pessimism about the future. What facts, trends, or changes in social behavior make you feel optimistic about the future? Preferably your answer would be the most encouraging fact\/trend\/change that you have studied personally. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8mkx6x","c_root_id_B":"c8mpjhh","created_at_utc_A":1361974860,"created_at_utc_B":1361989986,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Health care costs have risen more slowly over the past 3 years than expected.","human_ref_B":"The fact that a kid in danger in the wilds of Africa can be seen by millions of people and those people can take instant action from their smartphones to gather to assist said kid would be an example of why I feel optimistic.  This era is *impossibly* empowered, to the point where we're no longer asking if something *can* be done; today's challenges revolve around what *should* be done.  That's a huge change.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15126.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"19brn4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Seems like there is a lot of pessimism about the future. What facts, trends, or changes in social behavior make you feel optimistic about the future? Preferably your answer would be the most encouraging fact\/trend\/change that you have studied personally. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8mkx6x","c_root_id_B":"c8mq849","created_at_utc_A":1361974860,"created_at_utc_B":1361991931,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Health care costs have risen more slowly over the past 3 years than expected.","human_ref_B":"the growing coop movement.    workplace democracy is an important institution which can address many of the social problems today such as growing income inequality, unemployment, corruption by money in politics, capital flight, uneven global development and on and on.    the democracy at work folks have a pretty good video that explains the premise.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17071.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"18phha","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Economics] How have women entering the workforce in increasing numbers the past 50 years affected the economy? I see two main effects, the increase in labor supply lead to an increase in productivity, GDP, etc., while also meaning with an increase in supply, average wages would decline since there are more available workers. I realize the more people working does cause more jobs to be created, but I'm not sure that is at a 1 to 1 ratio.    I don't have any data or studies to back this up, I'm wondering what research is out there. It seems to me that back in the 1950s, the nuclear family ideal of a man working and providing for his wife who took care of the kids was more than enough money. That seems to be much less true today.  This is based off of [a Reddit comment","c_root_id_A":"c8gw548","c_root_id_B":"c8gvba2","created_at_utc_A":1361143949,"created_at_utc_B":1361140984,"score_A":11,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You're right about the labor supply effects, but remember that the increase in household income also led to increased demand. So quantity [of generic widgets] certainly increased, but we can't say what happened to price.","human_ref_B":"Why didn't taxes get cut as more women joined the workforce?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2965.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"3eiy6j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"How different would the modern economy be if women had never joined the workforce?","c_root_id_A":"ctfohf2","c_root_id_B":"ctfme1q","created_at_utc_A":1437833157,"created_at_utc_B":1437826765,"score_A":24,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"I don't really have an answer to your question, but I would rephrase by suggesting that different groups of women have moved in and out of (different sectors of) \"the labor force\" over time. It's an older source, but Margolis' Mothers and Such looks at women's roles in the US from colonial times through the 20th century. The idea of women being housewives is a relatively recent (19th century) notion in our society and was mainly restricted to middle class women not working outside the home as the economy transformed from primarily agrarian to industrial. Urban women of lesser means worked outside the home during this period, and in an agrarian setting both men and women worked the farm, albeit often with ideals as to who should be engaged in which tasks. The book itself provides an interesting look as to why we have this idea\/ideal that women take care of children and the home while men earn money outside the home (and that we often think this was the way it always was for everyone, even though it really wasn't). Basically, women never really left the workforce, but there was a period during which it was (relatively) socially unacceptable for middle class women to work outside the home.","human_ref_B":"Please umm, provide cites in top level comments","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6392.0,"score_ratio":1.8461538462}
{"post_id":"3eiy6j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"How different would the modern economy be if women had never joined the workforce?","c_root_id_A":"ctfmsz8","c_root_id_B":"ctfohf2","created_at_utc_A":1437828223,"created_at_utc_B":1437833157,"score_A":4,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/1mnrk9\/to_what_extent_did_the_womens_rights_movement\/  I asked a somewhat similar question here. You may find some insight if not a direct answer to your question.","human_ref_B":"I don't really have an answer to your question, but I would rephrase by suggesting that different groups of women have moved in and out of (different sectors of) \"the labor force\" over time. It's an older source, but Margolis' Mothers and Such looks at women's roles in the US from colonial times through the 20th century. The idea of women being housewives is a relatively recent (19th century) notion in our society and was mainly restricted to middle class women not working outside the home as the economy transformed from primarily agrarian to industrial. Urban women of lesser means worked outside the home during this period, and in an agrarian setting both men and women worked the farm, albeit often with ideals as to who should be engaged in which tasks. The book itself provides an interesting look as to why we have this idea\/ideal that women take care of children and the home while men earn money outside the home (and that we often think this was the way it always was for everyone, even though it really wasn't). Basically, women never really left the workforce, but there was a period during which it was (relatively) socially unacceptable for middle class women to work outside the home.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4934.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"6qjmym","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Do changing social attitudes towards transsexual people have an impact on the portion of the population that identifies as homosexual? In a given social environment where it's more socially acceptable to identify as homosexual than as transsexual, I might expect that the share of the population that identifies as homosexual could take a slight dip as acceptance of trans people rises.  That is, some portion of people who identify as cis homosexuals may start identifying as trans heterosexuals as that becomes a socially\/legally viable option. (Along with a presumably smaller portion of cis heterosexuals switching to identifying as trans homosexuals.)  Is there any data to confirm or deny this model?","c_root_id_A":"dkyhnk1","c_root_id_B":"dkybfkb","created_at_utc_A":1501488894,"created_at_utc_B":1501475323,"score_A":124,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Probably not, at least in the U.S. and likely similar countries.   The GSS (ping: \/u\/vintage2017) has only been asking questions about LGB self-identification since *2008*, and they haven't yet added questions about the T in LGBT. They are generally very reluctant to add new questions before they nail the wording, and because it would mean taking away an old question. Here's a good article about the history and future of the GSS from the UChicago alumni magazine:   >Once in a while, new questions are added to the core. It\u2019s rare, though, Smith says, because for every new question, an old one must be taken out to preserve the survey\u2019s length. Plus, writing questions that will hold up year after year, decade after decade, is hard. The terminology gets outdated, or the concepts cease to be relevant. Sometimes it\u2019s hard to make questions narrow and precise enough. In the 1990s, Smith and his staff wanted to get at the issue of comparable worth by looking at pay rates for men and women. But the problem was, so many occupations were largely segregated\u2014construction workers, secretaries, nurses\u2014that it became difficult to isolate gender as a variable. In the end, Smith gave up. \u201cWe came up with some questions, we tested them, and the majority of them failed completely.\u201d   >When new questions concern technology, writing them is even harder. \u201cThe questions we asked in the early 2000s about web and Internet use we\u2019ve had to drop because they\u2019re already too dated in terms of the terminology,\u201d Smith says. \u201cThere was one we had, and the only example we could give to convey to people what we meant was \u2018Blackberry.\u2019 That was basically the device that defined this emerging market. And now there\u2019s a 50-50 chance that Blackberry won\u2019t even be around by the end of the next few years.\u201d  >He\u2019s wary of latching onto the newest term: smartphone. \u201cMaybe \u2018smartphone\u2019 is going to last, and maybe it won\u2019t,\u201d he says. \u201cI mean, we could ask something like, \u2018Do you have a device which could contact the Internet?\u2019 And that would be pretty stable. The problem is, no one thinks in that kind of terminology. They think, smartphone, Wi-Fi-connected laptop, tablet.\u201d In cases like this, he says, it can take several survey questions to nail down the answer to a single idea. \u201cAnd you\u2019re still less certain that you\u2019re measuring the same thing over time.\u201d  Anyway, here's a rather detailed look at the answers to the LGB question in the GSS (with brief ancillary discussions about Gallup's similar question). They talk about several interesting things, but the one I want to focus on is that, even just between 2008 and 2016, we've seen tremendous growth in the self-identified LGB population among almost all groups in almost all regions. Now, much of this growth has been driven by a tremendous rise in bisexual women, but gay men, lesbian women, and bisexual men have all risen as well. Gay men, for instance, were 1.4% of the weighted sample in 2008 and 2.4% of the sample in 2016.  Trans\\* people, on the other hand, constitute a much smaller proportion of than most people think. This recently published estimate, twice as high as previous estimates, puts the number at 1.4 million people currently living as trans\\* in the U.S. Now, in some ways that's a lower bound estimate, because it looks at people who've already changed their papers, but that's still only 0.6% of the population. Even if all those people changed were previous LGB and changed their papers in the period 2008-2016, it still wouldn't equal the growth in the LGB population in that same period.   A few things to note. First, obviously there is some, for lack of a better word, substitution going on. Alison Bechdel, MacArthur Genius, creator of the Bechdel test, author of the comic strip *Dykes to Watch Out For*, and the memoir *Fun Home* (now a hit musical!), seems to say that she may have transitioned to being a transman if she had been born today. On the other hand, Caitlyn Jenner, the most famous transwoman in the world, was obviously in series of heterosexual relationship before she transitioned (Jenner even began hormone therapy in the 1990's before her relationship with Kris Kardashian, but stopped to continue that relationship). Not all people who transition would necessarily have been LGB before. Studies into this, especially one she that argue there are different kinds of trans\\*, have been quite controversial. See the intense debate around Bailey's *the Man who would be Queen*, as the most prominent example, as it was based on \"Blanchard's typology of transsexualism\", a typology rejected by much of the transgender community. I don't know of many other attempts to come up with statistics of trans\\* people and their sexuality, but it's widely acknowledged that trans people end up liking either or both genders, and that also many self-identify as asexual.   So we do see some people who might have been trans in a different situation end up as LGB (or heterosexual), but the numbers are generally so small that they don't likely won't reduce the overall numbers of LGB people in the future as that number is also rising, seemingly faster than the number of trans\\* people. One of the interesting pieces of the GSS data is that you see such clear generational differences (not just in bisexuality, but in lesbian and gay identity as well). Lesbian and gay is about 1% of those 65+ and about 3% of those 18-35 (some of the reduction in older cohorts is likely do to the AIDS epidemic, but not even close to all of it). When this question was added to the GSS, gay marriage had only been legally recognized for four years in Massachusetts (go Red Sox) and even the Democratic candidates for presidents that year did not endorse same-sex marriage. Only in 2015, near the end of the survey period, did gay marriage become legal nationwide. Most people seem to assume that the increase in the number of self-identified LGB people, especially in younger generations, is largely driven by an increase in societal acceptance of homosexual relationships. I think the best summary of this rapid change is from Randall Monroe of XKCD (obviously, same-sex marriage isn't the same as increased tolerance, but it's probably a decent proxy) in this graph which he titles in the mouse-over text:   >People often say that same-sex marriage now [2014] is like interracial marriage in the 60s. But in terms of public opinion, same-sex marriage now is like interracial marriage in the 90s, when it had already been legal nationwide for 30 years.  The data just seem to suggest that the number of people identifying as LGB is growing considerably faster than the number of people who identify as trans\\*,even without getting into the controversial and data poor question of the demographics of trans\\* sexual-orientation before and after transition.","human_ref_B":"Does GSS cover the topic of transgenderism?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13571.0,"score_ratio":62.0}
{"post_id":"3j34ji","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"IAmA person with substantial knowledge about Islam and human rights! AMA! I have a master's degree in human rights and international politics and two bachelor's degrees, one in philosophy and the other in religious studies with a focus on religious conflict. My research background is in conflict resolution, specifically with regards to Islam in Europe. I've previously published research on the death of Theo van Gogh, and my master's dissertation was on the Jyllands-Posten controversy, focusing specifically on the perceived incompatibility of rights. One thing that I'm particularly interested in - and particularly interested in talking about - is the current system of human rights and how it was developed with one particular set of values - namely, western-style, individual-centric values - and how it might integrate other systems of values, like Islamic ones or Asian ones.  I'm happy to answer any questions about human rights, how human rights were developed, Islamic human rights, conflict resolution, and Islam in the west. AMA!","c_root_id_A":"culw2ug","c_root_id_B":"cum6reu","created_at_utc_A":1441034683,"created_at_utc_B":1441050915,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Sorry if this is stretching your recommended topics, but what are Islamic viewpoints on right to die for medical patients? Specifically through inaction (declining treatment).","human_ref_B":"Is execution by immolation permissible in any version of Islam?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16232.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"3j34ji","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"IAmA person with substantial knowledge about Islam and human rights! AMA! I have a master's degree in human rights and international politics and two bachelor's degrees, one in philosophy and the other in religious studies with a focus on religious conflict. My research background is in conflict resolution, specifically with regards to Islam in Europe. I've previously published research on the death of Theo van Gogh, and my master's dissertation was on the Jyllands-Posten controversy, focusing specifically on the perceived incompatibility of rights. One thing that I'm particularly interested in - and particularly interested in talking about - is the current system of human rights and how it was developed with one particular set of values - namely, western-style, individual-centric values - and how it might integrate other systems of values, like Islamic ones or Asian ones.  I'm happy to answer any questions about human rights, how human rights were developed, Islamic human rights, conflict resolution, and Islam in the west. AMA!","c_root_id_A":"cumknhp","c_root_id_B":"culw2ug","created_at_utc_A":1441073171,"created_at_utc_B":1441034683,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"What can you tell me about LGBT* rights in Islamic communities?  As a gay man, I'm interested but a little ignorant. I think the current narrative is that Islam simply isn't a safe space for gender and sexual minorities.","human_ref_B":"Sorry if this is stretching your recommended topics, but what are Islamic viewpoints on right to die for medical patients? Specifically through inaction (declining treatment).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":38488.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"3j34ji","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"IAmA person with substantial knowledge about Islam and human rights! AMA! I have a master's degree in human rights and international politics and two bachelor's degrees, one in philosophy and the other in religious studies with a focus on religious conflict. My research background is in conflict resolution, specifically with regards to Islam in Europe. I've previously published research on the death of Theo van Gogh, and my master's dissertation was on the Jyllands-Posten controversy, focusing specifically on the perceived incompatibility of rights. One thing that I'm particularly interested in - and particularly interested in talking about - is the current system of human rights and how it was developed with one particular set of values - namely, western-style, individual-centric values - and how it might integrate other systems of values, like Islamic ones or Asian ones.  I'm happy to answer any questions about human rights, how human rights were developed, Islamic human rights, conflict resolution, and Islam in the west. AMA!","c_root_id_A":"cumjco6","c_root_id_B":"cumknhp","created_at_utc_A":1441071007,"created_at_utc_B":1441073171,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"What is the true Islamic outlook on the Jewish nation?  Specifically, what is the Islamic viewpoint of the Jewish \"birthright\" to the land of Israel. I've heard conflicting opinions, obviously, many saying the Jews have no right to the land and a minority claiming that the Koran deliberately states that Allah gave Israel to the Jews.   Thanks!","human_ref_B":"What can you tell me about LGBT* rights in Islamic communities?  As a gay man, I'm interested but a little ignorant. I think the current narrative is that Islam simply isn't a safe space for gender and sexual minorities.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2164.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"3j34ji","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"IAmA person with substantial knowledge about Islam and human rights! AMA! I have a master's degree in human rights and international politics and two bachelor's degrees, one in philosophy and the other in religious studies with a focus on religious conflict. My research background is in conflict resolution, specifically with regards to Islam in Europe. I've previously published research on the death of Theo van Gogh, and my master's dissertation was on the Jyllands-Posten controversy, focusing specifically on the perceived incompatibility of rights. One thing that I'm particularly interested in - and particularly interested in talking about - is the current system of human rights and how it was developed with one particular set of values - namely, western-style, individual-centric values - and how it might integrate other systems of values, like Islamic ones or Asian ones.  I'm happy to answer any questions about human rights, how human rights were developed, Islamic human rights, conflict resolution, and Islam in the west. AMA!","c_root_id_A":"cumff9q","c_root_id_B":"cumjco6","created_at_utc_A":1441064426,"created_at_utc_B":1441071007,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"At one time I considered majoring in philosophy.  I am at a stand-still as far as college goes right now, but I wonder what would you have to say about majoring in it.  What kind of person is right for a philosophy major?","human_ref_B":"What is the true Islamic outlook on the Jewish nation?  Specifically, what is the Islamic viewpoint of the Jewish \"birthright\" to the land of Israel. I've heard conflicting opinions, obviously, many saying the Jews have no right to the land and a minority claiming that the Koran deliberately states that Allah gave Israel to the Jews.   Thanks!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6581.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"3j34ji","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"IAmA person with substantial knowledge about Islam and human rights! AMA! I have a master's degree in human rights and international politics and two bachelor's degrees, one in philosophy and the other in religious studies with a focus on religious conflict. My research background is in conflict resolution, specifically with regards to Islam in Europe. I've previously published research on the death of Theo van Gogh, and my master's dissertation was on the Jyllands-Posten controversy, focusing specifically on the perceived incompatibility of rights. One thing that I'm particularly interested in - and particularly interested in talking about - is the current system of human rights and how it was developed with one particular set of values - namely, western-style, individual-centric values - and how it might integrate other systems of values, like Islamic ones or Asian ones.  I'm happy to answer any questions about human rights, how human rights were developed, Islamic human rights, conflict resolution, and Islam in the west. AMA!","c_root_id_A":"cumff9q","c_root_id_B":"cumknhp","created_at_utc_A":1441064426,"created_at_utc_B":1441073171,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"At one time I considered majoring in philosophy.  I am at a stand-still as far as college goes right now, but I wonder what would you have to say about majoring in it.  What kind of person is right for a philosophy major?","human_ref_B":"What can you tell me about LGBT* rights in Islamic communities?  As a gay man, I'm interested but a little ignorant. I think the current narrative is that Islam simply isn't a safe space for gender and sexual minorities.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8745.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"3j34ji","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"IAmA person with substantial knowledge about Islam and human rights! AMA! I have a master's degree in human rights and international politics and two bachelor's degrees, one in philosophy and the other in religious studies with a focus on religious conflict. My research background is in conflict resolution, specifically with regards to Islam in Europe. I've previously published research on the death of Theo van Gogh, and my master's dissertation was on the Jyllands-Posten controversy, focusing specifically on the perceived incompatibility of rights. One thing that I'm particularly interested in - and particularly interested in talking about - is the current system of human rights and how it was developed with one particular set of values - namely, western-style, individual-centric values - and how it might integrate other systems of values, like Islamic ones or Asian ones.  I'm happy to answer any questions about human rights, how human rights were developed, Islamic human rights, conflict resolution, and Islam in the west. AMA!","c_root_id_A":"cumff9q","c_root_id_B":"cumxv52","created_at_utc_A":1441064426,"created_at_utc_B":1441110712,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"At one time I considered majoring in philosophy.  I am at a stand-still as far as college goes right now, but I wonder what would you have to say about majoring in it.  What kind of person is right for a philosophy major?","human_ref_B":"Could you describe the ideas of Islamic Marxism and the likes of Ali Shariati, and their basis in scripture? And maybe talk about Islamic Socialism more generally?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":46286.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"udsorv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why doesn't the gap between Black and White men exist for Black and White Women? So it seems like even when taking income into account, black men aren't as economically successful as white men. A common conservative point is to note that this doesn't exist for black and white women controlling for income. My question is why is there no gap between black and white women while there is one for black and white men?","c_root_id_A":"i6iz905","c_root_id_B":"i6j07qc","created_at_utc_A":1651149902,"created_at_utc_B":1651150385,"score_A":52,"score_B":132,"human_ref_A":"That talking point is false. The gender wage gap is also stratified by race, with Black and Latina women continuing to earn significantly less than white women. See a chart of women's median income by race here, from the US Department of Labor.","human_ref_B":"Harvard professor Jim Sidanius and Co. have done some good research on this--not just in terms of the racial\/gender outcome of Blacks in the US, but for out-group (read: racial minority) men in multiple industrialized countries. This is what lead to their Social Dominance Theory.  Essentially **The worst outcomes in a society will generally be held by outgroup men--out-grouped usually in terms of their race--as opposed to outgroup women.** The combination of outgroup male's maleness and minority status makes the in-group perceive them as more of a threat than their female counterparts, leading to more discrimination in job hiring, the criminal justice system, education, risk of homelessness, child mortality, etc.  This is in contrast with the popular \"Double Jeopardy\" theory, which holds that minority women have to bear the burden of both racism and sexism, while their male counterparts have the \"privilege\" of only having to deal with the former. The empirical, survey, and archival evidence used by Sidanius and co. shows that in actuality, the Womanhood of minority women in many ways *prevents* them from receiving as much discrimination and poorer outcomes as their male counterparts.  For example, black women are sentenced more leniently than even white men--and at about the same as white women. As I'm sure we all know, black men aren't so lucky.  In the famous 2005 Bertrand and Mullainthan study \"Are Emily and Greg more employable than Lakisha and Jamal?\" which studied labor market discrimination, it was found that applications with white-sounding names were much more likely to receive a callback than those with black-sounding ones. Not really surprising. What was interesting, was that applications with Black *female* sounding names had a significantly higher callback rate than equally-credentialed applications with Black *male* names. For whatever reason, *Lakisha was seen as being more employable than Jamal, even though Jamal should have supposedly had an advantage over her because of his maleness.* I guess you could just look at this discrepancy in terms of filling diversity quotas: Lakisha checks off two boxes, Jamal only checks off one.  Evidence like this supports one of the implications of Social Dominace theory, which is that *intersectionality is not additive*, meaning that you can't just assign a positive or negative value to a set of group classifications (+1 for white, male, heterosexual, etc.; -1 for non-white, female, non-hetero, etc.) and whoever ends up with the highest score is the most privileged in any situation, and the lowest is the least. Although black males would \"score higher\" than black females in this system, the real-world data doesn't reflect this.   TL;DR: Minority males will be both the primary perpetrators and victims of arbitrary-set discrimination (the arbitrary set being their race\/ethnicity). Minority men will be treated like minority men; minority women will mostly be treated like...women. If things improve for women, things will improve for minority women. It's a whole different story for minority males.   Sidanius did a short lecture going through all this a few years ago prior to his death. I'd highly recommend that you watch all of it to understand the underlying framework of the theory--and look into his work in more depth--but the discrepancies that you asked about are addressed starting at 21:49. It shows that additional education is rewarded much more in the job market for minority women than it is for men, and other things related to income.  Hope this helps.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":483.0,"score_ratio":2.5384615385}
{"post_id":"udsorv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why doesn't the gap between Black and White men exist for Black and White Women? So it seems like even when taking income into account, black men aren't as economically successful as white men. A common conservative point is to note that this doesn't exist for black and white women controlling for income. My question is why is there no gap between black and white women while there is one for black and white men?","c_root_id_A":"i6j07qc","c_root_id_B":"i6izdjc","created_at_utc_A":1651150385,"created_at_utc_B":1651149966,"score_A":132,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"Harvard professor Jim Sidanius and Co. have done some good research on this--not just in terms of the racial\/gender outcome of Blacks in the US, but for out-group (read: racial minority) men in multiple industrialized countries. This is what lead to their Social Dominance Theory.  Essentially **The worst outcomes in a society will generally be held by outgroup men--out-grouped usually in terms of their race--as opposed to outgroup women.** The combination of outgroup male's maleness and minority status makes the in-group perceive them as more of a threat than their female counterparts, leading to more discrimination in job hiring, the criminal justice system, education, risk of homelessness, child mortality, etc.  This is in contrast with the popular \"Double Jeopardy\" theory, which holds that minority women have to bear the burden of both racism and sexism, while their male counterparts have the \"privilege\" of only having to deal with the former. The empirical, survey, and archival evidence used by Sidanius and co. shows that in actuality, the Womanhood of minority women in many ways *prevents* them from receiving as much discrimination and poorer outcomes as their male counterparts.  For example, black women are sentenced more leniently than even white men--and at about the same as white women. As I'm sure we all know, black men aren't so lucky.  In the famous 2005 Bertrand and Mullainthan study \"Are Emily and Greg more employable than Lakisha and Jamal?\" which studied labor market discrimination, it was found that applications with white-sounding names were much more likely to receive a callback than those with black-sounding ones. Not really surprising. What was interesting, was that applications with Black *female* sounding names had a significantly higher callback rate than equally-credentialed applications with Black *male* names. For whatever reason, *Lakisha was seen as being more employable than Jamal, even though Jamal should have supposedly had an advantage over her because of his maleness.* I guess you could just look at this discrepancy in terms of filling diversity quotas: Lakisha checks off two boxes, Jamal only checks off one.  Evidence like this supports one of the implications of Social Dominace theory, which is that *intersectionality is not additive*, meaning that you can't just assign a positive or negative value to a set of group classifications (+1 for white, male, heterosexual, etc.; -1 for non-white, female, non-hetero, etc.) and whoever ends up with the highest score is the most privileged in any situation, and the lowest is the least. Although black males would \"score higher\" than black females in this system, the real-world data doesn't reflect this.   TL;DR: Minority males will be both the primary perpetrators and victims of arbitrary-set discrimination (the arbitrary set being their race\/ethnicity). Minority men will be treated like minority men; minority women will mostly be treated like...women. If things improve for women, things will improve for minority women. It's a whole different story for minority males.   Sidanius did a short lecture going through all this a few years ago prior to his death. I'd highly recommend that you watch all of it to understand the underlying framework of the theory--and look into his work in more depth--but the discrepancies that you asked about are addressed starting at 21:49. It shows that additional education is rewarded much more in the job market for minority women than it is for men, and other things related to income.  Hope this helps.","human_ref_B":"One factor is incarceration.  The effect of incarceration on wealth is huge, and the effect is exacerbated by being a Black man: Even white men who have spent time incarcerated accumulate wealth faster than Black men who have never experienced incarceration. https:\/\/scholar.google.com\/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C22&q=effect+of+prison+on+wealth&btnG=#d=gs_qabs&t=1651148577574&u=%23p%3DxwtYwJL6-v4J  One of the reasons may be that Black men with a record are much less likely to be called back after a job interview than white men with a record. In other words, interviewers are more likely to give white men the benefit of the doubt than Black men. https:\/\/www.journals.uchicago.edu\/doi\/full\/10.1086\/374403?casa_token=FQs7-am3pF0AAAAA:ZJUqM0pwXuoKzp54J2pCBMCU-lTTF8SW3SQs0X5kvyDJu8CQIjsOW6Ha9Xer8EQyz2LtJjpJr46n  Black men are also 7 times as likely to be incarcerated as white men. In comparison, Black women are 3.5 times as likely to be incarcerated as white women, and all women are less likely to be incarcerated than men, with Black women having similar rates of incarceration to white men. https:\/\/nij.ojp.gov\/media\/image\/19511  Black men also receive longer sentences for the same crimes in comparison to white men. All women receive shorter sentences than white men, but Black women also receive longer sentences than white women. That is to say, these increased rates of incarceration for Black men are likely due at least in part to racism, and affect Black men more than Black women due to sexism. https:\/\/www.ussc.gov\/research\/research-reports\/demographic-differences-sentencing","labels":1,"seconds_difference":419.0,"score_ratio":5.7391304348}
{"post_id":"1gn98v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Why does Britain not have the same culture of mass protest that we see in countries such as Spain, Brazil etc?","c_root_id_A":"calv7lb","c_root_id_B":"calv9o3","created_at_utc_A":1371641115,"created_at_utc_B":1371641510,"score_A":33,"score_B":46,"human_ref_A":"I'm sorry,  but wasnt Britain swept by riots and looting not too long ago?","human_ref_B":"Some recent examples of large protest in the U.K within the last few years. Numbers taken from Wikipedia  2011 London anti-cuts protest: Various sources estimated that the demonstration was attended by between 250,000 and 500,000 people.  The 2010 British student protests:  Approximately 30,000 to 52,000 protesters attended the demonstration on the streets of central London.  February 15, 2003 anti-war protest: Police estimated attendance as well in excess of 750,000 people and the BBC estimated that around a million attended.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":395.0,"score_ratio":1.3939393939}
{"post_id":"1gn98v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Why does Britain not have the same culture of mass protest that we see in countries such as Spain, Brazil etc?","c_root_id_A":"calyh6j","c_root_id_B":"calwt33","created_at_utc_A":1371654613,"created_at_utc_B":1371649170,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This is really a question for AskHistorians, but I'll help as much as I can. You have to bear in mind the English had their revolution early, and a tenacious upper class managed to hold on to power ever since, mostly by reforming just enough to keep people satisfied. That said we have had major riots every decade since WW2, so it may be overstating our stability.","human_ref_B":"Wasn't there just a huge riot?  And Britain was quite (in)famous for its civil unrest in the 70s-80s.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5443.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1gn98v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Why does Britain not have the same culture of mass protest that we see in countries such as Spain, Brazil etc?","c_root_id_A":"cam1dzk","c_root_id_B":"calwt33","created_at_utc_A":1371661991,"created_at_utc_B":1371649170,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As a Brazilian, I can't stress enough how wrong this question regards my country. Yes, the protests are legitimate, are needed and gathered thousands all over the world. But it was also the first time we got our asses off our chairs, closed Facebook for 5 min and actually went to the streets.  In Brazil the actual idea is that Europe is much more politically active than our country. In Europe people talk about politics during a family dinner and 65 year olds go to the streets with the teens. People are overall more educated and because of that, more aware of their rights, of the reality of their country and of their options as citizens.   I am living in the UK and I believe having better conditions here than in Brazil is not what makes someone more or less prone to take the streets, mainly because it doesn't matter if my problem is \"more urgent\" than yours comparatively, to each respective country their problems can be equally important even if they \"absolutely\" are not.  Ultimately, I guess it comes down to a bunch of factors like how upset people are (Brazilian government has been trolling us real hard for way too long), how educated and how democratic the country is, as well as how culturally these manifestations are perceived. I could write more, but my cellphone battery is dying right now, so probably will finish later.","human_ref_B":"Wasn't there just a huge riot?  And Britain was quite (in)famous for its civil unrest in the 70s-80s.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12821.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"yxejo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"If one of our primary goals as human beings is to improve our efficiency so we don't have to work as hard, why is creating jobs such a big priority?","c_root_id_A":"c5zofiu","c_root_id_B":"c5zt601","created_at_utc_A":1346110018,"created_at_utc_B":1346128982,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Creating jobs is a big priority because most income, especially for the lower classes, is earned by working. So if you want your share of production you must work to earn it.","human_ref_B":"Actually a huge proportion of economic wellbeing happens (in the long run) when jobs are destroyed by efficiency.   It is only through efficiency at basic tasks necessary for life (agriculture, for example) that effort is conserved to be dedicated to more entertaining outcomes.   Any time a job is lost through efficiency, people (in the future) win. Short-term disruptions can be very painful and socially unsettling, of course.  But there is no point where there is nothing left to do.   The most devastating and disruptive force to affect employment patterns in the century or so was the tractor.  150 years ago around 80% of folks worked in agriculture.  Now its about 1.5%.  So thats 78.5% of jobs lost proportionally.  Most redditors are, historically speaking, un-employed, out-competed dirt farmers.  They have to get other jobs now like computer science and education, etc.   The term job is very weighted and complicated to balance out. But from a long-run social perspective, jobs are chores.  The easier and faster we can get basic chores done, the more time there is to screw around or find cooler things to do.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18964.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"yxejo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"If one of our primary goals as human beings is to improve our efficiency so we don't have to work as hard, why is creating jobs such a big priority?","c_root_id_A":"c5zqa5c","c_root_id_B":"c5zt601","created_at_utc_A":1346117419,"created_at_utc_B":1346128982,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I think it's a case of a micro and macro clashing.  On a micro level, creating jobs is ideal, because everyone needs to work to generate income for them and\/or their family.  However, once they get in their job improved efficiency is ideal so you can produce the maximum amount of work which will amount to job security.  Especially in cases where you have a set amount of work each week and are a salaried employee, it has to feel great to get a large salary for 35-40 hours a week.    On a macro level, companies also want efficiency, which means getting the least amount of workers to do the maximum amount of work while putting them all on salary (so no overtime).  So, if you have 8 workers working 35 hours a week your workers are very efficient and you can afford to cut one salary.  This saves your company that one salary, and your output doesn't skip a beat.  Samuel Huntington writes a bit about micro and macro level systems clashing and what the potential outcomes are.    Anyway, that's a fairly simplified answer, but I think you see where the clash comes in.  Politicians publicly side with the micro, because they vote, but policy wise seem to side with the macro, because they fund campaigns.  Kind of a rhetoric vs. application debate.  Anyway, obviously this is a somewhat simplified answer with some generalizations, but I think you get the main point.","human_ref_B":"Actually a huge proportion of economic wellbeing happens (in the long run) when jobs are destroyed by efficiency.   It is only through efficiency at basic tasks necessary for life (agriculture, for example) that effort is conserved to be dedicated to more entertaining outcomes.   Any time a job is lost through efficiency, people (in the future) win. Short-term disruptions can be very painful and socially unsettling, of course.  But there is no point where there is nothing left to do.   The most devastating and disruptive force to affect employment patterns in the century or so was the tractor.  150 years ago around 80% of folks worked in agriculture.  Now its about 1.5%.  So thats 78.5% of jobs lost proportionally.  Most redditors are, historically speaking, un-employed, out-competed dirt farmers.  They have to get other jobs now like computer science and education, etc.   The term job is very weighted and complicated to balance out. But from a long-run social perspective, jobs are chores.  The easier and faster we can get basic chores done, the more time there is to screw around or find cooler things to do.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11563.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"yxejo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"If one of our primary goals as human beings is to improve our efficiency so we don't have to work as hard, why is creating jobs such a big priority?","c_root_id_A":"c5zq2qv","c_root_id_B":"c5zt601","created_at_utc_A":1346116621,"created_at_utc_B":1346128982,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Because \"creating jobs\" is a very easy and convenient cover for politicians to do a wide range of things, like protectionism, stimulus spending, subsidies, etc.","human_ref_B":"Actually a huge proportion of economic wellbeing happens (in the long run) when jobs are destroyed by efficiency.   It is only through efficiency at basic tasks necessary for life (agriculture, for example) that effort is conserved to be dedicated to more entertaining outcomes.   Any time a job is lost through efficiency, people (in the future) win. Short-term disruptions can be very painful and socially unsettling, of course.  But there is no point where there is nothing left to do.   The most devastating and disruptive force to affect employment patterns in the century or so was the tractor.  150 years ago around 80% of folks worked in agriculture.  Now its about 1.5%.  So thats 78.5% of jobs lost proportionally.  Most redditors are, historically speaking, un-employed, out-competed dirt farmers.  They have to get other jobs now like computer science and education, etc.   The term job is very weighted and complicated to balance out. But from a long-run social perspective, jobs are chores.  The easier and faster we can get basic chores done, the more time there is to screw around or find cooler things to do.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12361.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"yxejo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"If one of our primary goals as human beings is to improve our efficiency so we don't have to work as hard, why is creating jobs such a big priority?","c_root_id_A":"c5zqa5c","c_root_id_B":"c5zq2qv","created_at_utc_A":1346117419,"created_at_utc_B":1346116621,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I think it's a case of a micro and macro clashing.  On a micro level, creating jobs is ideal, because everyone needs to work to generate income for them and\/or their family.  However, once they get in their job improved efficiency is ideal so you can produce the maximum amount of work which will amount to job security.  Especially in cases where you have a set amount of work each week and are a salaried employee, it has to feel great to get a large salary for 35-40 hours a week.    On a macro level, companies also want efficiency, which means getting the least amount of workers to do the maximum amount of work while putting them all on salary (so no overtime).  So, if you have 8 workers working 35 hours a week your workers are very efficient and you can afford to cut one salary.  This saves your company that one salary, and your output doesn't skip a beat.  Samuel Huntington writes a bit about micro and macro level systems clashing and what the potential outcomes are.    Anyway, that's a fairly simplified answer, but I think you see where the clash comes in.  Politicians publicly side with the micro, because they vote, but policy wise seem to side with the macro, because they fund campaigns.  Kind of a rhetoric vs. application debate.  Anyway, obviously this is a somewhat simplified answer with some generalizations, but I think you get the main point.","human_ref_B":"Because \"creating jobs\" is a very easy and convenient cover for politicians to do a wide range of things, like protectionism, stimulus spending, subsidies, etc.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":798.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"bhlvfe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Right wing populism and climate change scepticism\/denial - any literature on that? I found this paper which seems tangentially related:  https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1002\/acp.3301  Any more literature on why right wingers seem to be more prone to disbelieving climate change experts?","c_root_id_A":"eluluzp","c_root_id_B":"elts1ju","created_at_utc_A":1556301327,"created_at_utc_B":1556283471,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Here is a paper discussing the links between conservative think tanks and books denying climate change:  https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC3787818\/","human_ref_B":"There's not that much, though this study might be close to what you're looking for:  https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/23251042.2018.1488516      It only explores climate change denial in one country (Norway) though.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17856.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"bhlvfe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Right wing populism and climate change scepticism\/denial - any literature on that? I found this paper which seems tangentially related:  https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1002\/acp.3301  Any more literature on why right wingers seem to be more prone to disbelieving climate change experts?","c_root_id_A":"eluluzp","c_root_id_B":"elu5bla","created_at_utc_A":1556301327,"created_at_utc_B":1556291831,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Here is a paper discussing the links between conservative think tanks and books denying climate change:  https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC3787818\/","human_ref_B":"As far as I know there's gonna be a book out on that subject this or next year. Relevant papers:  1, 2, 3, 4","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9496.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"bhlvfe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Right wing populism and climate change scepticism\/denial - any literature on that? I found this paper which seems tangentially related:  https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1002\/acp.3301  Any more literature on why right wingers seem to be more prone to disbelieving climate change experts?","c_root_id_A":"elvweae","c_root_id_B":"elu5bla","created_at_utc_A":1556332046,"created_at_utc_B":1556291831,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As others have pointed out, political orientation (e.g. on a left\/right or liberal\/conservative scale) is generally fairly strongly related to belief in climate change (and other aspects of denial), with more conservative people being more likely to be deniers. This relationship holds fairly well across time and across developed countries.  There hasn't been much specifically on right wing populism and climate change. It would be interesting to find out if denial of climate change is even more prevalent among supporters of (radical) right-wing populist parties, or if it's just a case that they tend to be more conservative, so are therefore more likely to be deniers.  There are also a (probably fairly small) number of \"eco-fascists\", i.e. people who accept that climate change is happening (along with other environmental problems), and want a strong leader to take action to stop it. This fits into the fascist view that everything must be subservient to the nation, including corporations.  Some refs related to climate change opinion and political ideology \/ political partisanship:  * http:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/full\/10.1080\/09644016.2015.1090371 * http:\/\/www.nature.com\/doifinder\/10.1038\/nclimate2943 * http:\/\/linkinghub.elsevier.com\/retrieve\/pii\/S0191886914003596","human_ref_B":"As far as I know there's gonna be a book out on that subject this or next year. Relevant papers:  1, 2, 3, 4","labels":1,"seconds_difference":40215.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2gajyk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.67,"history":"Why is the destruction of the Twin Towers in New York City remembered so much more than other terrorist incidents? This includes inside America: why is 9\/11 given so much more status than the (for instance) Oklahoma bombings?  And this includes the wider Western World: in the UK, 9\/11 seems to hold just as much, if not more weight, than the 7\/7 bombings.  In what was was 9\/11 exceptional? Is the historical and emotional weight it is given (\"we will never forget\") proportional to how exceptional it is?","c_root_id_A":"ckh9b5w","c_root_id_B":"ckhemel","created_at_utc_A":1410627655,"created_at_utc_B":1410639763,"score_A":16,"score_B":48,"human_ref_A":"Please keep the discussion based on social science and cite sources in top-level comments. Thank you.","human_ref_B":"There are probably a few contributing factors: how recent the event is, the death toll, degree of damage, media coverage of the event, notability of the target.  The Oklahoma City Bombing killed 168 people and injured 680 others. It caused an estimated $652 million dollars in damage. It occurred 6 years prior to 9\/11, and targeted the Alfred P. Murrah Federal building, which, while it may have been a landmark for citizens of Oklahoma City, was largely unknown to citizens outside of that area. The remains of the building were demolished a month after the attacks.  9\/11 killed 2,996, caused over 6,000 injuries, and an estimated $10 billion in damage. They targeted the twin towers of the World Trade Center, a major landmark that every tourist to New York City and even people who've never been there recognize -- look at any given movie set in NYC prior to 2001. There's almost certainly a shot of the two towers at some point in the film. They also targeted the Pentagon, 229 miles away, which influences the localized effect of the attacks.  The 7\/7 London bombings killed 52 people and injured about 700. The attacks took place on the London Underground and on a bus in Tavistock Square in 2005.  Pearl Harbor was a military attack in 1941, so it has some inherent qualities that separate it from the other attacks mentioned here, but it's an event with a lot of historical significance, and it's much older than the others, so I think it's worth mentioning. 2,403 Americans were killed and 1,178 others were wounded.  So, we can examine some differences between these attacks that might contribute to the historical memorability or significance of the attacks.  First, death toll. Of our four examples, Pearl Harbor is the only attack that comes close to 9\/11's casualty count. The composition of the population of victims may be a contributing factor as well. 316 foreign nationals from 84 countries were killed in 9\/11; they account for almost 10% of those killed. By contrast, the other attacks mentioned predominantly killed citizens of the country in which the attack happened. This may influence the international impact of the attack. Interestingly, more British citizens were killed in the 9\/11 attacks than during the 7\/7 bombings, despite not occurring on British soil.  Second, media coverage. This study found that exposure to the 9\/11 attacks was a significant factor in the amount of emotional distress people reported afterwards, more than degree of loss experienced. Consider the types of media coverage we saw during 9\/11 - eyewitness video of the planes actually striking the buildings in a fiery explosion, eyewitness video of people leaping to their deaths from the windows, video of people running from the rolling wall cloud of smoke and debris as the towers fall. By contrast, we have little video of the OKC bombing that occurs during the attacks. There may be some unreleased security camera footage that show the bombing as it happens, but most of our footage shows only the aftermath -- the shredded hulk of the Murrah building.  Third, economic impact. This study examined the macroeconomic impact of 9\/11 (and even compares it to other terrorist attacks, including OKC). The 9\/11 attacks strongly correlate with a *national* decrease in US GDP growth and an increase in unemployment, at least in the immediate aftermath of the attacks. With other terrorist attacks, we tend to see more localized effects -- OKC bombing, for example, might have affected the economy of Oklahoma City or even of the state of Oklahoma itself, but had little effect on the national economy.  Fourth, recency. The 7\/7 bombings occurred in 2005, making them the most recent, but this seems to be less of a factor than the factors mentioned above -- they may be memorable to citizens of the UK and most especially to Londoners, but I doubt it had much global impact. To my knowledge, no studies have been done on the global recognition of the 7\/7 bombings.  However, me might look at recency in events with similar casualty counts and media coverage, such as between 9\/11 and Pearl Harbor. Pearl Harbor occurred in 1941. The youngest people alive who experienced it as it happened (even as infants) are 73 years old this year. By contrast, the youngest people alive who were alive (even as infants) during 9\/11 are 13 years old. 6% of people alive today in the US remember Pearl Harbor as it happened;  by contrast, 80% of the people alive today in the US remember 9\/11 as it happened. US Census data. This may be a contributing factor in the attention given to 9\/11 over other attacks.  Fifth, total destruction. OKC and the 9\/11 attacks on the World Trade Center totally destroyed their targets. The 7\/7 bombings damaged some trains and may have caused some infrastructure damage to the tunnels, but ultimately did not destroy the London Underground, and from my research, it appears that the routes affected by the bombings are still in use today. Notably, the 9\/11 attack on the Pentagon tends to be de-emphasized in memorial media; it did not destroy the Pentagon, the Pentagon was not converted into a memorial site like the OKC site and 9\/11 Ground Zero and death tolls at the Pentagon were lower than other targets affected by the attack.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12108.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"2gajyk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.67,"history":"Why is the destruction of the Twin Towers in New York City remembered so much more than other terrorist incidents? This includes inside America: why is 9\/11 given so much more status than the (for instance) Oklahoma bombings?  And this includes the wider Western World: in the UK, 9\/11 seems to hold just as much, if not more weight, than the 7\/7 bombings.  In what was was 9\/11 exceptional? Is the historical and emotional weight it is given (\"we will never forget\") proportional to how exceptional it is?","c_root_id_A":"ckhemel","c_root_id_B":"ckhe70p","created_at_utc_A":1410639763,"created_at_utc_B":1410638757,"score_A":48,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"There are probably a few contributing factors: how recent the event is, the death toll, degree of damage, media coverage of the event, notability of the target.  The Oklahoma City Bombing killed 168 people and injured 680 others. It caused an estimated $652 million dollars in damage. It occurred 6 years prior to 9\/11, and targeted the Alfred P. Murrah Federal building, which, while it may have been a landmark for citizens of Oklahoma City, was largely unknown to citizens outside of that area. The remains of the building were demolished a month after the attacks.  9\/11 killed 2,996, caused over 6,000 injuries, and an estimated $10 billion in damage. They targeted the twin towers of the World Trade Center, a major landmark that every tourist to New York City and even people who've never been there recognize -- look at any given movie set in NYC prior to 2001. There's almost certainly a shot of the two towers at some point in the film. They also targeted the Pentagon, 229 miles away, which influences the localized effect of the attacks.  The 7\/7 London bombings killed 52 people and injured about 700. The attacks took place on the London Underground and on a bus in Tavistock Square in 2005.  Pearl Harbor was a military attack in 1941, so it has some inherent qualities that separate it from the other attacks mentioned here, but it's an event with a lot of historical significance, and it's much older than the others, so I think it's worth mentioning. 2,403 Americans were killed and 1,178 others were wounded.  So, we can examine some differences between these attacks that might contribute to the historical memorability or significance of the attacks.  First, death toll. Of our four examples, Pearl Harbor is the only attack that comes close to 9\/11's casualty count. The composition of the population of victims may be a contributing factor as well. 316 foreign nationals from 84 countries were killed in 9\/11; they account for almost 10% of those killed. By contrast, the other attacks mentioned predominantly killed citizens of the country in which the attack happened. This may influence the international impact of the attack. Interestingly, more British citizens were killed in the 9\/11 attacks than during the 7\/7 bombings, despite not occurring on British soil.  Second, media coverage. This study found that exposure to the 9\/11 attacks was a significant factor in the amount of emotional distress people reported afterwards, more than degree of loss experienced. Consider the types of media coverage we saw during 9\/11 - eyewitness video of the planes actually striking the buildings in a fiery explosion, eyewitness video of people leaping to their deaths from the windows, video of people running from the rolling wall cloud of smoke and debris as the towers fall. By contrast, we have little video of the OKC bombing that occurs during the attacks. There may be some unreleased security camera footage that show the bombing as it happens, but most of our footage shows only the aftermath -- the shredded hulk of the Murrah building.  Third, economic impact. This study examined the macroeconomic impact of 9\/11 (and even compares it to other terrorist attacks, including OKC). The 9\/11 attacks strongly correlate with a *national* decrease in US GDP growth and an increase in unemployment, at least in the immediate aftermath of the attacks. With other terrorist attacks, we tend to see more localized effects -- OKC bombing, for example, might have affected the economy of Oklahoma City or even of the state of Oklahoma itself, but had little effect on the national economy.  Fourth, recency. The 7\/7 bombings occurred in 2005, making them the most recent, but this seems to be less of a factor than the factors mentioned above -- they may be memorable to citizens of the UK and most especially to Londoners, but I doubt it had much global impact. To my knowledge, no studies have been done on the global recognition of the 7\/7 bombings.  However, me might look at recency in events with similar casualty counts and media coverage, such as between 9\/11 and Pearl Harbor. Pearl Harbor occurred in 1941. The youngest people alive who experienced it as it happened (even as infants) are 73 years old this year. By contrast, the youngest people alive who were alive (even as infants) during 9\/11 are 13 years old. 6% of people alive today in the US remember Pearl Harbor as it happened;  by contrast, 80% of the people alive today in the US remember 9\/11 as it happened. US Census data. This may be a contributing factor in the attention given to 9\/11 over other attacks.  Fifth, total destruction. OKC and the 9\/11 attacks on the World Trade Center totally destroyed their targets. The 7\/7 bombings damaged some trains and may have caused some infrastructure damage to the tunnels, but ultimately did not destroy the London Underground, and from my research, it appears that the routes affected by the bombings are still in use today. Notably, the 9\/11 attack on the Pentagon tends to be de-emphasized in memorial media; it did not destroy the Pentagon, the Pentagon was not converted into a memorial site like the OKC site and 9\/11 Ground Zero and death tolls at the Pentagon were lower than other targets affected by the attack.","human_ref_B":"The main thing to remember about 9\/11 in comparison to the Oklahoma bombings and the 7\/7 bombings in London, is the media spectacle that surrounded 9\/11.   9\/11 occurred in the most important and the most heavily mediated city in the western world. So there wasn't a shortage of footage, from the second the first plane hit the first tower you had news organisations recording the events, broadcasting them worldwide to millions of people. Everything stopped and for 3 days it was 24 hour news showing and discussing the events. It was surreal, it was more like a movie than real life, and people tuned in for this, because it felt like they were there. Where as the London bombings weren't as visible, yes there was media coverage but all but one explosion happened in the London Underground. There was no live or direct media footage of it occurring, so we had to depend on low quality phone video and this took time to reach news agencies.   You couple this with the symbolism involved with attacking the Twin Towers and the Pentagon. The Twin Towers symbolised Global Capitalism while the Pentagon was an icon of American Military power. Al Qaeda were  aware these events were going to be heavily mediated that's why they choose these targets, it was to achieve the purpose of terrorism, to spread fear. That's one of the reasons why it's remembered so much more than other terrorist attacks because it achieved its goal of fear. For the days that followed the citizens of the western world were afraid, it showed that no one was safe, if New York could be attacked then so too could Paris, Berlin and London.   Sorry I had to cut this short, I just don't have the time. However if you're looking for information you should read my source, I'm sure you could find a copy somewhere.  Douglas Kellner. 9\/11, Spectacles of Terror, and Media Manipulation: A Critique of Jihadist and Bush Media Politics. Routledge 2006.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1006.0,"score_ratio":5.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdq7ywr","c_root_id_B":"cdq7ek6","created_at_utc_A":1385822389,"created_at_utc_B":1385819285,"score_A":50,"score_B":34,"human_ref_A":"Talking grad school here; I could do undergrad too in a different post if there's interest.  I don't exactly know what neoclassical economics is. I mean, I know what *I* mean when I say neoclassical, but I think it's good to first figure out what we're talking about.  I think of neoclassical economics as a bundle of papers that grew out of the research of the 1950s and 1960s, including:  1. Micro theory: Debreu's Theory of Value and Mas-Colell's textbook. Debreu's little book covers the essence of \"neoclassical general equilibrium,\" which is the usual thing of \"a bunch of small individuals and firms maximize utility and profit, taking prices as given, and markets clear, and markets are Pareto optimal.\" Mas-Colell's book covers all of the core in microeconomic theory: supply, demand, partial equilibrium, general equilibrium, game theory, social choice, information econ.  2. Growth theory: Solow's 1956 growth article started off modern growth theory; the modern retelling is probably best exemplified by Mankiw, Romer, and Weil.     I dunno if endogenous growth theory counts as \"neoclassical\" or not. Depends on the context. Expanding-variety and quality-ladder models of growth are core models, but they break from the solidly neoclassical elements I describe below.  Turning from papers to concepts, I'd say that I associate the following bundle of concepts with \"neoclassical economics:\"  1. frictionless competitive markets 2. Production functions that are smooth, increasing, constant returns to scale, and exhibit diminishing marginal returns in each individual argument. All the things you need to get nice interior, unique solutions to the math. 3. Individuals who maximize utility subject to a budget constraint; utility functions which are smooth, increasing in each argument, and exhibit diminishing marginal returns in each argument. Individual utility depends only on individuals' own consumption, leisure, etc. No externalities in utility. 4. Exogenous growth a la Solow and Ramsey. 5. I have no idea what a \"neoclassical model of business cycles\" means. That isn't language I'm familiar with.  Okay.  That's basically the stuff you learn in the 8-15 weeks of the first year of grad school. You have to know this stuff in order to appreciate and understand the stuff that comes after.  But the list above is not the end-all be-all of economics.  We quickly move on to discussing imperfect competition, information asymmetries, game theory, social choice theory, etc, in micro.  We move on to discussing Lucasan, real, and new Keynesian theories of the business cycle in macro.  We learn statistics and econometrics. I guess neoclassical econometrics is the standard asymptotics?  We use imperfect competition as the baseline microstructure of macroeconomics, in part because there is a lot of evidence that perfectly competitive markets aren't a good model for the macroeconomy.  Industrial Organization is an entire subfield dedicated to the study of oligopoly and imperfect competition models.  Labor economics and macro-labor study more realistic models of labor-market interactions, which have their own peculiar properties.   Etc.  We don't teach anything in your OP because those theories don't do as good of a job as our current bundle of frontier theories. I don't know if New Keynesian macro counts as \"neoclassical\" or not at this juncture, which is why we should perhaps define terms.","human_ref_B":"This isn't true when you talk about graduate schools.  This is true for undergraduate programs because its ease of instruction of \"how economists think\".  It's easy to discuss and develop basic concepts like supply\/demand, MC=MR, etc.  Please understand, the models you learn about in undergraduate study are almost always too laden with assumptions which don't hold in reality.  Economists do not use those models albeit in exceptionally rare circumstances.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3104.0,"score_ratio":1.4705882353}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdq66om","c_root_id_B":"cdq7ywr","created_at_utc_A":1385809937,"created_at_utc_B":1385822389,"score_A":4,"score_B":50,"human_ref_A":"I recommend you ask r\/economics too, they would be happy to defend neo-classical thought and give you reasons.","human_ref_B":"Talking grad school here; I could do undergrad too in a different post if there's interest.  I don't exactly know what neoclassical economics is. I mean, I know what *I* mean when I say neoclassical, but I think it's good to first figure out what we're talking about.  I think of neoclassical economics as a bundle of papers that grew out of the research of the 1950s and 1960s, including:  1. Micro theory: Debreu's Theory of Value and Mas-Colell's textbook. Debreu's little book covers the essence of \"neoclassical general equilibrium,\" which is the usual thing of \"a bunch of small individuals and firms maximize utility and profit, taking prices as given, and markets clear, and markets are Pareto optimal.\" Mas-Colell's book covers all of the core in microeconomic theory: supply, demand, partial equilibrium, general equilibrium, game theory, social choice, information econ.  2. Growth theory: Solow's 1956 growth article started off modern growth theory; the modern retelling is probably best exemplified by Mankiw, Romer, and Weil.     I dunno if endogenous growth theory counts as \"neoclassical\" or not. Depends on the context. Expanding-variety and quality-ladder models of growth are core models, but they break from the solidly neoclassical elements I describe below.  Turning from papers to concepts, I'd say that I associate the following bundle of concepts with \"neoclassical economics:\"  1. frictionless competitive markets 2. Production functions that are smooth, increasing, constant returns to scale, and exhibit diminishing marginal returns in each individual argument. All the things you need to get nice interior, unique solutions to the math. 3. Individuals who maximize utility subject to a budget constraint; utility functions which are smooth, increasing in each argument, and exhibit diminishing marginal returns in each argument. Individual utility depends only on individuals' own consumption, leisure, etc. No externalities in utility. 4. Exogenous growth a la Solow and Ramsey. 5. I have no idea what a \"neoclassical model of business cycles\" means. That isn't language I'm familiar with.  Okay.  That's basically the stuff you learn in the 8-15 weeks of the first year of grad school. You have to know this stuff in order to appreciate and understand the stuff that comes after.  But the list above is not the end-all be-all of economics.  We quickly move on to discussing imperfect competition, information asymmetries, game theory, social choice theory, etc, in micro.  We move on to discussing Lucasan, real, and new Keynesian theories of the business cycle in macro.  We learn statistics and econometrics. I guess neoclassical econometrics is the standard asymptotics?  We use imperfect competition as the baseline microstructure of macroeconomics, in part because there is a lot of evidence that perfectly competitive markets aren't a good model for the macroeconomy.  Industrial Organization is an entire subfield dedicated to the study of oligopoly and imperfect competition models.  Labor economics and macro-labor study more realistic models of labor-market interactions, which have their own peculiar properties.   Etc.  We don't teach anything in your OP because those theories don't do as good of a job as our current bundle of frontier theories. I don't know if New Keynesian macro counts as \"neoclassical\" or not at this juncture, which is why we should perhaps define terms.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12452.0,"score_ratio":12.5}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdq7ywr","c_root_id_B":"cdq7i2r","created_at_utc_A":1385822389,"created_at_utc_B":1385819867,"score_A":50,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Talking grad school here; I could do undergrad too in a different post if there's interest.  I don't exactly know what neoclassical economics is. I mean, I know what *I* mean when I say neoclassical, but I think it's good to first figure out what we're talking about.  I think of neoclassical economics as a bundle of papers that grew out of the research of the 1950s and 1960s, including:  1. Micro theory: Debreu's Theory of Value and Mas-Colell's textbook. Debreu's little book covers the essence of \"neoclassical general equilibrium,\" which is the usual thing of \"a bunch of small individuals and firms maximize utility and profit, taking prices as given, and markets clear, and markets are Pareto optimal.\" Mas-Colell's book covers all of the core in microeconomic theory: supply, demand, partial equilibrium, general equilibrium, game theory, social choice, information econ.  2. Growth theory: Solow's 1956 growth article started off modern growth theory; the modern retelling is probably best exemplified by Mankiw, Romer, and Weil.     I dunno if endogenous growth theory counts as \"neoclassical\" or not. Depends on the context. Expanding-variety and quality-ladder models of growth are core models, but they break from the solidly neoclassical elements I describe below.  Turning from papers to concepts, I'd say that I associate the following bundle of concepts with \"neoclassical economics:\"  1. frictionless competitive markets 2. Production functions that are smooth, increasing, constant returns to scale, and exhibit diminishing marginal returns in each individual argument. All the things you need to get nice interior, unique solutions to the math. 3. Individuals who maximize utility subject to a budget constraint; utility functions which are smooth, increasing in each argument, and exhibit diminishing marginal returns in each argument. Individual utility depends only on individuals' own consumption, leisure, etc. No externalities in utility. 4. Exogenous growth a la Solow and Ramsey. 5. I have no idea what a \"neoclassical model of business cycles\" means. That isn't language I'm familiar with.  Okay.  That's basically the stuff you learn in the 8-15 weeks of the first year of grad school. You have to know this stuff in order to appreciate and understand the stuff that comes after.  But the list above is not the end-all be-all of economics.  We quickly move on to discussing imperfect competition, information asymmetries, game theory, social choice theory, etc, in micro.  We move on to discussing Lucasan, real, and new Keynesian theories of the business cycle in macro.  We learn statistics and econometrics. I guess neoclassical econometrics is the standard asymptotics?  We use imperfect competition as the baseline microstructure of macroeconomics, in part because there is a lot of evidence that perfectly competitive markets aren't a good model for the macroeconomy.  Industrial Organization is an entire subfield dedicated to the study of oligopoly and imperfect competition models.  Labor economics and macro-labor study more realistic models of labor-market interactions, which have their own peculiar properties.   Etc.  We don't teach anything in your OP because those theories don't do as good of a job as our current bundle of frontier theories. I don't know if New Keynesian macro counts as \"neoclassical\" or not at this juncture, which is why we should perhaps define terms.","human_ref_B":"It's the ideology, stupid.  Bourdieu wrote many interesting things and also a very enlightening book on how the dominant modes of economical thinking are highly dependent on various, mostly inexplicit and highly ideological, assumptions. It's called *Les structures sociales de l'\u00e9conomie* and translated as *The social structures of the economy*. A quick Google search will yield various more and less critical summaries etc.   If you can read French you should also check out Dumont, L. (1977), *Homo \u00e6qualis*, vol. I: *Gen\u00e8se et \u00e9panouissement de l\u2019id\u00e9ologie \u00e9conomique* and Baudrillard, J. (1970), *La soci\u00e9t\u00e9 de consommation. Ses mythes, ses structures*. I believe this last one by Baudrillard is also translated to English.  A lot of Marxists have, of course, also pondered this topic. A good starting place is Marx and Engels' *Die deutsche Ideologie* (*The German Ideology*). The most thorough contemporary but \"orthodox\" Marxist conceptualisation of the bourgeois ideology which supports the actually existing political economy, probably is G. Luk\u00e1cs' *Zur Ontologie des gesellschaftlichen Seins* (On the Ontology of Social Being), part 2, chapter 3, *Das Ideelle und die Ideologie* (of which the first, and most important, section is called *Das Ideelle in der \u00d6konomie*).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2522.0,"score_ratio":12.5}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdq7ywr","c_root_id_B":"cdq7ohd","created_at_utc_A":1385822389,"created_at_utc_B":1385820869,"score_A":50,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Talking grad school here; I could do undergrad too in a different post if there's interest.  I don't exactly know what neoclassical economics is. I mean, I know what *I* mean when I say neoclassical, but I think it's good to first figure out what we're talking about.  I think of neoclassical economics as a bundle of papers that grew out of the research of the 1950s and 1960s, including:  1. Micro theory: Debreu's Theory of Value and Mas-Colell's textbook. Debreu's little book covers the essence of \"neoclassical general equilibrium,\" which is the usual thing of \"a bunch of small individuals and firms maximize utility and profit, taking prices as given, and markets clear, and markets are Pareto optimal.\" Mas-Colell's book covers all of the core in microeconomic theory: supply, demand, partial equilibrium, general equilibrium, game theory, social choice, information econ.  2. Growth theory: Solow's 1956 growth article started off modern growth theory; the modern retelling is probably best exemplified by Mankiw, Romer, and Weil.     I dunno if endogenous growth theory counts as \"neoclassical\" or not. Depends on the context. Expanding-variety and quality-ladder models of growth are core models, but they break from the solidly neoclassical elements I describe below.  Turning from papers to concepts, I'd say that I associate the following bundle of concepts with \"neoclassical economics:\"  1. frictionless competitive markets 2. Production functions that are smooth, increasing, constant returns to scale, and exhibit diminishing marginal returns in each individual argument. All the things you need to get nice interior, unique solutions to the math. 3. Individuals who maximize utility subject to a budget constraint; utility functions which are smooth, increasing in each argument, and exhibit diminishing marginal returns in each argument. Individual utility depends only on individuals' own consumption, leisure, etc. No externalities in utility. 4. Exogenous growth a la Solow and Ramsey. 5. I have no idea what a \"neoclassical model of business cycles\" means. That isn't language I'm familiar with.  Okay.  That's basically the stuff you learn in the 8-15 weeks of the first year of grad school. You have to know this stuff in order to appreciate and understand the stuff that comes after.  But the list above is not the end-all be-all of economics.  We quickly move on to discussing imperfect competition, information asymmetries, game theory, social choice theory, etc, in micro.  We move on to discussing Lucasan, real, and new Keynesian theories of the business cycle in macro.  We learn statistics and econometrics. I guess neoclassical econometrics is the standard asymptotics?  We use imperfect competition as the baseline microstructure of macroeconomics, in part because there is a lot of evidence that perfectly competitive markets aren't a good model for the macroeconomy.  Industrial Organization is an entire subfield dedicated to the study of oligopoly and imperfect competition models.  Labor economics and macro-labor study more realistic models of labor-market interactions, which have their own peculiar properties.   Etc.  We don't teach anything in your OP because those theories don't do as good of a job as our current bundle of frontier theories. I don't know if New Keynesian macro counts as \"neoclassical\" or not at this juncture, which is why we should perhaps define terms.","human_ref_B":"Universities *do* teach other schools. It's just that neo-classical economics is the ***baseline*** by which other theories are judged by. It's the model that represents the \"perfect\" world. We know that in reality many of the assumptions aren't true, so we try to come up with other models like new keynesian, that takes into account different assumptions.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1520.0,"score_ratio":16.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdq7ek6","c_root_id_B":"cdq66om","created_at_utc_A":1385819285,"created_at_utc_B":1385809937,"score_A":34,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This isn't true when you talk about graduate schools.  This is true for undergraduate programs because its ease of instruction of \"how economists think\".  It's easy to discuss and develop basic concepts like supply\/demand, MC=MR, etc.  Please understand, the models you learn about in undergraduate study are almost always too laden with assumptions which don't hold in reality.  Economists do not use those models albeit in exceptionally rare circumstances.","human_ref_B":"I recommend you ask r\/economics too, they would be happy to defend neo-classical thought and give you reasons.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9348.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdqd5lq","c_root_id_B":"cdq66om","created_at_utc_A":1385838752,"created_at_utc_B":1385809937,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"OP is in luck. Just this week (yesterday I think) Industrial and Corporate Change published a very interesting article about how various heterodox critiques of neo-classical economics have been sidelined within the literature and classroom.   One of the co-authors of the article is Richard Nelson, one of the founding fathers of evolutionary economics. EE is a heterodox approach to economics that focuses on the role of path-dependency, institutions (laws, systems of markets, cultural outlooks), and firm behaviour on economic development. It rejects the idea of stable equilibria and focuses on dynamic change over time in economic structures. One of the interesting things about EE is that while it's very popular in Europe, it's almost impossible to find any evolutionary economists amongst faculty in economics department in the US.   There is a lot to be said for the role of the power of major journals (AER, JPE, QJE) as gate keepers. To get faculty jobs, economists have to produce research that can get published in major journals; if the journals tend to accept neo-classical informed papers, faculty members who write from this perspective will tend to get hired. They teach neo-classical material and produce grad students who also carry out neo-classical research.   I don't have a good explanation of why neo-classical economics is so prominent in the US and Canada while  heterodox approaches are more common in Europe. I've always been disappointed that there's never been a good ethnographic or sociological examination of the modern economics department at an R1.","human_ref_B":"I recommend you ask r\/economics too, they would be happy to defend neo-classical thought and give you reasons.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":28815.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdq7i2r","c_root_id_B":"cdqd5lq","created_at_utc_A":1385819867,"created_at_utc_B":1385838752,"score_A":4,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"It's the ideology, stupid.  Bourdieu wrote many interesting things and also a very enlightening book on how the dominant modes of economical thinking are highly dependent on various, mostly inexplicit and highly ideological, assumptions. It's called *Les structures sociales de l'\u00e9conomie* and translated as *The social structures of the economy*. A quick Google search will yield various more and less critical summaries etc.   If you can read French you should also check out Dumont, L. (1977), *Homo \u00e6qualis*, vol. I: *Gen\u00e8se et \u00e9panouissement de l\u2019id\u00e9ologie \u00e9conomique* and Baudrillard, J. (1970), *La soci\u00e9t\u00e9 de consommation. Ses mythes, ses structures*. I believe this last one by Baudrillard is also translated to English.  A lot of Marxists have, of course, also pondered this topic. A good starting place is Marx and Engels' *Die deutsche Ideologie* (*The German Ideology*). The most thorough contemporary but \"orthodox\" Marxist conceptualisation of the bourgeois ideology which supports the actually existing political economy, probably is G. Luk\u00e1cs' *Zur Ontologie des gesellschaftlichen Seins* (On the Ontology of Social Being), part 2, chapter 3, *Das Ideelle und die Ideologie* (of which the first, and most important, section is called *Das Ideelle in der \u00d6konomie*).","human_ref_B":"OP is in luck. Just this week (yesterday I think) Industrial and Corporate Change published a very interesting article about how various heterodox critiques of neo-classical economics have been sidelined within the literature and classroom.   One of the co-authors of the article is Richard Nelson, one of the founding fathers of evolutionary economics. EE is a heterodox approach to economics that focuses on the role of path-dependency, institutions (laws, systems of markets, cultural outlooks), and firm behaviour on economic development. It rejects the idea of stable equilibria and focuses on dynamic change over time in economic structures. One of the interesting things about EE is that while it's very popular in Europe, it's almost impossible to find any evolutionary economists amongst faculty in economics department in the US.   There is a lot to be said for the role of the power of major journals (AER, JPE, QJE) as gate keepers. To get faculty jobs, economists have to produce research that can get published in major journals; if the journals tend to accept neo-classical informed papers, faculty members who write from this perspective will tend to get hired. They teach neo-classical material and produce grad students who also carry out neo-classical research.   I don't have a good explanation of why neo-classical economics is so prominent in the US and Canada while  heterodox approaches are more common in Europe. I've always been disappointed that there's never been a good ethnographic or sociological examination of the modern economics department at an R1.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18885.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdqd5lq","c_root_id_B":"cdq7ohd","created_at_utc_A":1385838752,"created_at_utc_B":1385820869,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"OP is in luck. Just this week (yesterday I think) Industrial and Corporate Change published a very interesting article about how various heterodox critiques of neo-classical economics have been sidelined within the literature and classroom.   One of the co-authors of the article is Richard Nelson, one of the founding fathers of evolutionary economics. EE is a heterodox approach to economics that focuses on the role of path-dependency, institutions (laws, systems of markets, cultural outlooks), and firm behaviour on economic development. It rejects the idea of stable equilibria and focuses on dynamic change over time in economic structures. One of the interesting things about EE is that while it's very popular in Europe, it's almost impossible to find any evolutionary economists amongst faculty in economics department in the US.   There is a lot to be said for the role of the power of major journals (AER, JPE, QJE) as gate keepers. To get faculty jobs, economists have to produce research that can get published in major journals; if the journals tend to accept neo-classical informed papers, faculty members who write from this perspective will tend to get hired. They teach neo-classical material and produce grad students who also carry out neo-classical research.   I don't have a good explanation of why neo-classical economics is so prominent in the US and Canada while  heterodox approaches are more common in Europe. I've always been disappointed that there's never been a good ethnographic or sociological examination of the modern economics department at an R1.","human_ref_B":"Universities *do* teach other schools. It's just that neo-classical economics is the ***baseline*** by which other theories are judged by. It's the model that represents the \"perfect\" world. We know that in reality many of the assumptions aren't true, so we try to come up with other models like new keynesian, that takes into account different assumptions.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17883.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdq66om","c_root_id_B":"cdqfrb2","created_at_utc_A":1385809937,"created_at_utc_B":1385845700,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I recommend you ask r\/economics too, they would be happy to defend neo-classical thought and give you reasons.","human_ref_B":"\/u\/Jericho_Hill, u\/Integralds, and \/u\/MYGODWHATHAVEIDONE have hit the most important points.  I'll just add that, as a behavioral economist, neoclassical economics is still a fantastically useful framework for thinking through problems.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":35763.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdqfrb2","c_root_id_B":"cdq7i2r","created_at_utc_A":1385845700,"created_at_utc_B":1385819867,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"\/u\/Jericho_Hill, u\/Integralds, and \/u\/MYGODWHATHAVEIDONE have hit the most important points.  I'll just add that, as a behavioral economist, neoclassical economics is still a fantastically useful framework for thinking through problems.","human_ref_B":"It's the ideology, stupid.  Bourdieu wrote many interesting things and also a very enlightening book on how the dominant modes of economical thinking are highly dependent on various, mostly inexplicit and highly ideological, assumptions. It's called *Les structures sociales de l'\u00e9conomie* and translated as *The social structures of the economy*. A quick Google search will yield various more and less critical summaries etc.   If you can read French you should also check out Dumont, L. (1977), *Homo \u00e6qualis*, vol. I: *Gen\u00e8se et \u00e9panouissement de l\u2019id\u00e9ologie \u00e9conomique* and Baudrillard, J. (1970), *La soci\u00e9t\u00e9 de consommation. Ses mythes, ses structures*. I believe this last one by Baudrillard is also translated to English.  A lot of Marxists have, of course, also pondered this topic. A good starting place is Marx and Engels' *Die deutsche Ideologie* (*The German Ideology*). The most thorough contemporary but \"orthodox\" Marxist conceptualisation of the bourgeois ideology which supports the actually existing political economy, probably is G. Luk\u00e1cs' *Zur Ontologie des gesellschaftlichen Seins* (On the Ontology of Social Being), part 2, chapter 3, *Das Ideelle und die Ideologie* (of which the first, and most important, section is called *Das Ideelle in der \u00d6konomie*).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25833.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"1rrn7y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Economics] Why is neoclassical economics the dominant school of economic thought even though empirical evidence doesn't support many of its assumptions and conclusions? Why don't universities teach other frameworks such as Post-Keynesian, Marxian\/Neo-Marxian, Institutional, Neo-Ricardian, etc.?","c_root_id_A":"cdqfrb2","c_root_id_B":"cdq7ohd","created_at_utc_A":1385845700,"created_at_utc_B":1385820869,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"\/u\/Jericho_Hill, u\/Integralds, and \/u\/MYGODWHATHAVEIDONE have hit the most important points.  I'll just add that, as a behavioral economist, neoclassical economics is still a fantastically useful framework for thinking through problems.","human_ref_B":"Universities *do* teach other schools. It's just that neo-classical economics is the ***baseline*** by which other theories are judged by. It's the model that represents the \"perfect\" world. We know that in reality many of the assumptions aren't true, so we try to come up with other models like new keynesian, that takes into account different assumptions.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24831.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"22qr3g","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"All political philosophy aside, is Basic Income actually affordable or economically viable in any way now, or in the foreseeable future?","c_root_id_A":"cgpszsk","c_root_id_B":"cgpt09v","created_at_utc_A":1397226878,"created_at_utc_B":1397226912,"score_A":4,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"You should know questions about basic income are among the most frequently asked and have been well answered in the past.","human_ref_B":"We've had a few threads on basic income before -- example here.   See this comment by \/u\/jmartkdr (copy and pasted below):  ---  According to this website approximately 22% of the US fed budget goes to Social Security, and another 12% goes to 'safety net programs.' These are the programs that would most likely be replaced by UBI.   Estimated total cost of these two (34% of total spending) is about $1.1 trillion. At $10k per year per adult(230M) and $5k per year per child (86M)source, UBI would cost $2.73 trillion, or about $1.6 trillion more than we spend now on such programs.   Some money might come from states, which each have their own safety net programs that would become redundant. States overall spend about $250 billion source. This would reduce the amount needed to $1.35 trillion. If all of that came from new federal taxes, that would be about a 33% increase overall.  There is no consensus on where that extra money would come from, but no one that I've seen has proposed cutting education. Most people advocating UBI also advocate universal healthcare, so any monies going to Medicare\/Medicade\/CHIP now would be redirected to some US version of the UK's NHS. Most proposals call for tax reform (especially cutting corporate tax loopholes) but there would need to be significant increases in revenue, which would have other economic consequences.   EDIT: a thought: without raising taxes or cutting revenue and only redirecting funds from existing programs, adults would receive about $5000 and children $2500 per year. Not enough to live on.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":34.0,"score_ratio":3.25}
{"post_id":"3nq1oe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"How accurate are these claims contra claims of global poverty reduction? What is the general consensus around the issue, if any? The article in question.  As a Marxist, I frequently run into arguments that capitalism \u201cworks\u201d, and one of the most frequent pieces of evidence in support of this claim is poverty reduction, in a variety of geographic scales and timelines.  If we restrict ourselves to 1980 and on, what kind of evidence is there for and against this claim? Is there a general consensus around the extent to which free-market-oriented policies reduce poverty? How much water do the criticisms presented in the above article hold?  If you are feeling more ambitious: what kind of views are there on the claim that \u201ccapitalism\u201d is the cause of poverty reduction over the long term (100+ years)? Can we even conceptualize of capitalism as being in this kind of cause-effect relationship? What kind of problems might there be with this claim?","c_root_id_A":"cvqlxy9","c_root_id_B":"cvqrjfx","created_at_utc_A":1444169302,"created_at_utc_B":1444178971,"score_A":4,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Does your Marxian worldview hinge on whether or not capitalism provides material benefits?","human_ref_B":"I would highly recommend the book Rethinking Capitalist Development: Primitive Accumulation, Governmentality, and Post-Colonial Capitalism, by the late Indian economist Kalyan Sanyal. I just finished it for a class, and it is an incredibly interesting attempt to theorize the relationship between capital, development, and poverty in the post-colonial context.   This review offers a nice summary of the book's argument and points out some of its flaws, but if you're at all interested I really recommend reading the whole book.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9669.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"cahqyq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Is this statement basically accurate: \"The reason nudity is sexual is that it's only used in a sexual context in many places, especially the USA.\" Before I posted, I searched *nudity* in AskSocialScience.  I read through some material, but  did not find an exact answer.  Here's the full quote from a discussion on another sub on nudist colonies:  >The reason nudity is sexual is that it's only used in a sexual context in many places (especially the USA. If everyone goes nude all the time, seeing someone nude in itself is not arousing.  Did not humans evolve to be *visually attracted* to the opposite sex  (or what ever is appropriate for LGBT perspectives), with these feeling regularly extending to outright lust?   (Visual attraction has been documented in numerous animals.) With the attraction being much stronger in males toward women than vice versa (hence the widespread interest in girlie magazine and watching strippers.)  And clothing, aside from protection against the elements and a display of beauty\/handsomeness, also serves to help limit situations of men becoming overly aroused\/aggressive towards women?  (crudely put)  Muslim's cultures' strong prohibitions against women revealing themselves seems to be a strong example of this.  And don't we see similar prohibitions worldwide, perhaps more notably in Asian cultures, where nudist colonies are more rare.  And allied to this perspective is the concept of *modesty,* which is more evident in women than among men.  Is this all simply learned behavior?  Or is it at some level inherent to human nature?","c_root_id_A":"et936h5","c_root_id_B":"et8uprp","created_at_utc_A":1562583829,"created_at_utc_B":1562571080,"score_A":33,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"So, in both your OP and in comments throughout the thread it appears that you are framing sexual attraction between men and women as an essentially biological fact. This is, to some extent, true (men and women have been fucking each other for millennia).    However, this does not necessarily have any relation to how much skin is on display. Anthropologically speaking, it doesn\u2019t hold more or less true for cultures which esteem modesty. There are many peoples historically which take and took a distinctly \u2018clothing optional\u2019 approach. This does not erase sexual attraction between genders.       Ultimately, sexuality *is* socially constructed as well as biological. A titillating photo of Marilyn Monroe with her skirt blowing up is sexy in part because she was beautiful but also because of social context. In the US, nudity has LONG been framed as predominantly sexual. This can be explicitly linked to the Hayes code and resulting iterations of censorship law in film and TV (In the US, nudity is much more strictly controlled in media than violence, gore, and gunfire). Going further back, we can point to a distinct Puritan influence which took a similar view on women\u2019s modesty and men\u2019s rapaciousness as much of modern Islam.   I could go on and on, but my biggest recommendation is to look into the social construction of sexuality, and get past the idea that \u2018 man+woman=sex\u2019, \u2018men are more sexually attracted to women than vice versa,\u2019 and \u2018a naked lady is a sexy lady\u2019 are somehow biological imperatives.  *Edit:*   Sources:   Foucault: The History of Sexuality    Bourdieu: Masculine Domination   Bourdieu: Distinction   Goffman: The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life   Butler: Gender Trouble   Greer: The Female Eunuch   Funke: The Gender Delusion","human_ref_B":">Did not humans evolve to be visually attracted to the opposite sex (or what ever is appropriate for LGBT perspectives), with these feeling regularly extending to outright lust?   Can you clarify whether this question is supposed to have anything to do with nudity? As far as I can tell this is an entirely separate question, right? Whether or not people are attracted to others on the basis of sight doesn't have anything to do with nudity one way or another, correct?  >With the attraction being much stronger in males toward women than vice versa (hence the widespread interest in girlie magazine and watching strippers.)  Similarly for this question, right? (You phrase it as if it's a settled fact, but I think it would be more sensible to imagine that you're asking whether you're correct about this.) This doesn't have anything to do with nudity, right?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12749.0,"score_ratio":3.3}
{"post_id":"27ggt5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"In the event of a home invasion, is there any evidence to support the claim that private gun ownership increases the chances that the home owner will fend off the attack?","c_root_id_A":"ci0vj6c","c_root_id_B":"ci0xmcg","created_at_utc_A":1402078876,"created_at_utc_B":1402083210,"score_A":7,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"I think the question OP really meant is \"does gun ownership reduce crime?\" One of the few major studies done on this would be this one by Hardvard Law School. I think this is a good summary (672):  > In sum, though many nations with widespread gun ownership have much lower murder rates than nations that severely restrict gun ownership, **it would be simplistic to assume that at all times and in all places widespread gun ownership depresses violence by deterring many criminals into nonconfrontation crime**. There  is evidence that it does so in the United States, where defensive gun ownership is a substantial socio\u2010cultural phenomenon.  But the more plausible explanation for many nations having widespread gun ownership with low violence is that these nations never had high murder and violence rates and so never had occasion to enact severe anti\u2010gun laws. On the other hand, in nations that have experienced high and rising violent crime rates, the legislative reaction has generally been to enact increasingly severe antigun laws. This is futile, for reducing gun ownership by the law\u2010abiding citizenry\u2014the only ones who obey gun laws - does not reduce violence or murder. **The result is that high crime nations that ban guns to reduce crime end up having both high crime and stringent gun laws, while it appears that low crime nations that do not significantly restrict guns continue to have low violence rates**.  > **Thus both sides of the gun prohibition debate are likely wrong in viewing the availability of guns as a major factor in the  incidence of murder in any particular society**. Though many people may still cling to that belief, the historical, geographic, and demographic evidence explored in this Article provides a clear admonishment. Whether gun availability is viewed as a cause or as a mere coincidence, the long term macrocosmic evidence is that gun ownership spread widely throughout societies consistently correlates with stable or declining murder rates. Whether causative or not, the consistent international pattern is that more guns equal less murder and other violent crime. Even if one is inclined to think that gun availability is an important factor, the available international  data cannot be squared with the mantra that more guns equal more death and fewer guns equal less death. Rather, if firearms availability does matter, the data consistently show that the way it matters is that more guns equal less violent crime.    And in response to \/u\/vinylapps, whose post seem to only assume the US (671-672):  >Ironically, to detail the American evidence for widespread defensive gun ownership\u2019s deterrent value is also to raise questions about how applicable that evidence would be even to the other nations that have widespread gun ownership but low violence. **There are no data for foreign nations comparable to the American data just discussed**. Without such data, we cannot know whether millions of Norwegians own handguns and carry them for protection, thereby deterring Norwegian criminals from committing violent crimes. Nor can we know whether guns are commonly kept for defense in German homes and stores, thus preventing German criminals from robbing them.  Basically, gun controls may have some (probably minor) impact in increasing crime, but the rate is very low","human_ref_B":"There's little systematic review of this, because home invasion is a relatively spectacular\/unusual thing. So one direct study found 3 cases where the victim had a gun, not enough to make a conclusion either way. Kellermann, Arthur L., et al. \"Weapon involvement in home invasion crimes.\" Jama 273.22 (1995): 1759-1762.  Another study found that burglary is not deterred by higher proportions of guns in the community--Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. \"Guns and burglary.\" Evaluating gun policy (2003): 74-120.  So, no, there is no direct evidence in support of the question you ask. Just extrapolations based on fairly unrelated data.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4334.0,"score_ratio":1.5714285714}
{"post_id":"tu8g78","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Do most people show resistence to admitting their mistakes and accepting consequences of it ? Are there better ways than shaming to achieve conciliation ?","c_root_id_A":"i34nyw3","c_root_id_B":"i3472wj","created_at_utc_A":1648920199,"created_at_utc_B":1648912734,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You might be interested in *The Enigma of Reason* by Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber. It's an academic book, but readable and interesting if you take it slow. Mercier and Sperber point out all the ways that human beings are *terrible* at reasoning. Much worse than you might expect. That includes you, too, so stay humble. (Also me.)  Recognizing you made a mistake requires correct reasoning. If you're under emotional pressure, because your mistake causes painful consequence, or embarrassment, or both, the pressure is going to further disrupt your feeble reasoning processes.  Mercier and Sperber ask an interesting question: If human beings are so bad at reasoning, why did human beings evolve the ability to reason at all? They offer a number of reasons, but at the moment, I will mention only one.  They say the purpose of reasoning is not to get it right, in the objective sense. Evolution would have no way of knowing when we are \"right\" in the objective sense anyway. Instead, the purpose of reasoning is to make us good at arguing and persuading so we can gain status among our peers.  Mercier and Sperber give many fascinating examples of how often people are demonstrably wrong, on a vast variety of topics, but it's a hard read.  Ultimately, many kinds of cognitive bias interfere with logical reasoning. If you're interested in the topic, you could try *Thinking Fast and Slow* by Daniel Kahneman or *You Are Not So Smart,* by David McRaney.  Often, when people resist admitting their mistakes, they are \"certain\" they are right, despite much evidence to the contrary. You might like to read *On Being Certain,* by Robert Burton, a neurologist. It's a small book, easy and entertaining, but deadly serious. Being \"certain,\" is a subjective mental status that arises from specific neurological regions. Some people \"feel certain\" about various odd things during a seizure. Electrical stimulation of certain brain regions causes the \"feeling of certainty.\" Feeling certain is not a logical or factual conclusion, odd as that may seem.  By the way, r\/confidentlyIncorrect might amuse you  Edit: This question is going to come up, so I might as well answer it now: Mercier and Sperber state (with plenty of evidence) that human beings do reason logically, under certain circumstances. Put a small group of people together, with a problem to solve, or a plan to make. Give the group a strong motive to get the answer right. (There must also be a clear correct answer available.) Typically, several individuals will suggest wrong answers, often confidently, but others will point out their mistakes. When the correct answer is suggested, others will try to find fault with it. Eventually, the group will agree that they have found the right answer. This is how we were able to put a person on the moon. This is why democracies get it right more often than dictatorships.","human_ref_B":"To answer a question about mistakes and consequences, is ultimately a question about judgement, and cognition. The realisation of a faulty judgement and according adjustment is meta cognition. Numerous behavioural and cognitive theories produces a decent template of what constitutes a faulty judgement. Economists, and advocates of rational choice theory often appeal to Bayesian updating as a normative model of judgement. using Bayesian updating, individuals make a prediction about the world(a judgement) and then verify or falsify it according to existing evidence. The probability that their judgement is correct should change according to the evidence provided, and they should become more or less sure of that judgement as the evidence is presented to them. However numerous studies show that human behaviour does not fit Bayesian updating. Dunning-Krugerdk is the most famous study, which shows that individuals that most people display overconfidence in their judgement. Those that are more capable at what they are judging tend to br slightly less overconfident and tend towards accuracy, and those who are very competent tend to be underconfident. What's interesting is that even when individuals are shown they are wrong about their predictions they maintain the same level of misprediction. Accordingly human judgements do not follow a Bayesian model of prediction. Why that is the case is explained by numerous behavioural economic theories(read agner on judgement biases), cognitive theories and neuroscientific theories. I'll upload them if I have the time later.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7465.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"3mvo3p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"\"Designed Ignorance?\" Has anyone studied the concept of an organization being organized such that the people at the top in the organization are insulated from certain information if ignorance is beneficial for some reason? Since I don't know of a term, I've decided to call it \"designed ignorance.\" Here's some examples to make what I mean clearer:  An escort service where the owner books the escorts, but is unaware of any specific prostitution occurring.  McDonald's Corporation licenses franchises and the franchisees are responsible for following environmental, labor, and other laws.  Volkswagen benefited (for a while) from emissions fraud without the CEO's knowledge (supposedly).  I'd be interested in studies where the mechanism of how inconvenient facts are kept from key people was deliberate or arose organically.","c_root_id_A":"cvin9ji","c_root_id_B":"cvintie","created_at_utc_A":1443566412,"created_at_utc_B":1443567350,"score_A":4,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"In economics, it's an important issue in mechanism design. Tirole has a seminal paper on arms length relationships but it's also broadly a part of delegation mechanisms.","human_ref_B":"Compartmentalisation of information is a common feature in clandestine organisations, such as terrorist\/insurgent groups [1] or even state intelligence agencies. [2]   [1]http:\/\/jcr.sagepub.com\/content\/51\/1\/33.short   [2] For an interesting example of where this can go wrong, check out Mark Mazzetti's book *Way of the Knife*, where he talks about why the CIA might have sought to hire contractors in order to do its 'dirty work'","labels":0,"seconds_difference":938.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"3mvo3p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"\"Designed Ignorance?\" Has anyone studied the concept of an organization being organized such that the people at the top in the organization are insulated from certain information if ignorance is beneficial for some reason? Since I don't know of a term, I've decided to call it \"designed ignorance.\" Here's some examples to make what I mean clearer:  An escort service where the owner books the escorts, but is unaware of any specific prostitution occurring.  McDonald's Corporation licenses franchises and the franchisees are responsible for following environmental, labor, and other laws.  Volkswagen benefited (for a while) from emissions fraud without the CEO's knowledge (supposedly).  I'd be interested in studies where the mechanism of how inconvenient facts are kept from key people was deliberate or arose organically.","c_root_id_A":"cvisoe2","c_root_id_B":"cviv14q","created_at_utc_A":1443575943,"created_at_utc_B":1443580122,"score_A":5,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I study attitudes toward and knowledge about natural methods of abortion. Through this I learned about agnotology--the study of the systematic deprivation of knowledge from people over time. Culturally-induced ignorance helps ensure skills or knowledge once prized but now threatening to the ruling or dominant class die out. It's fascinating. Best of luck with your work.","human_ref_B":"This might be a good question for \/r\/askhistorians- In 1948 the Truman administration:  >...directed CIA to conduct \u201ccovert\u201d rather than merely \u201cpsychological\u201d operations, defining them as all activities \u201cwhich are conducted or sponsored by this Government against hostile foreign states or groups or in support of friendly foreign states or groups but which are so planned and executed that any US Government responsibility for them is not evident to unauthorized persons and that if uncovered the US Government can plausibly disclaim any responsibility for them.\u201d  source  The term used today is \"plausible deniability.\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4179.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"3mvo3p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"\"Designed Ignorance?\" Has anyone studied the concept of an organization being organized such that the people at the top in the organization are insulated from certain information if ignorance is beneficial for some reason? Since I don't know of a term, I've decided to call it \"designed ignorance.\" Here's some examples to make what I mean clearer:  An escort service where the owner books the escorts, but is unaware of any specific prostitution occurring.  McDonald's Corporation licenses franchises and the franchisees are responsible for following environmental, labor, and other laws.  Volkswagen benefited (for a while) from emissions fraud without the CEO's knowledge (supposedly).  I'd be interested in studies where the mechanism of how inconvenient facts are kept from key people was deliberate or arose organically.","c_root_id_A":"cviv14q","c_root_id_B":"cvin9ji","created_at_utc_A":1443580122,"created_at_utc_B":1443566412,"score_A":9,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This might be a good question for \/r\/askhistorians- In 1948 the Truman administration:  >...directed CIA to conduct \u201ccovert\u201d rather than merely \u201cpsychological\u201d operations, defining them as all activities \u201cwhich are conducted or sponsored by this Government against hostile foreign states or groups or in support of friendly foreign states or groups but which are so planned and executed that any US Government responsibility for them is not evident to unauthorized persons and that if uncovered the US Government can plausibly disclaim any responsibility for them.\u201d  source  The term used today is \"plausible deniability.\"","human_ref_B":"In economics, it's an important issue in mechanism design. Tirole has a seminal paper on arms length relationships but it's also broadly a part of delegation mechanisms.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13710.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"3mvo3p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"\"Designed Ignorance?\" Has anyone studied the concept of an organization being organized such that the people at the top in the organization are insulated from certain information if ignorance is beneficial for some reason? Since I don't know of a term, I've decided to call it \"designed ignorance.\" Here's some examples to make what I mean clearer:  An escort service where the owner books the escorts, but is unaware of any specific prostitution occurring.  McDonald's Corporation licenses franchises and the franchisees are responsible for following environmental, labor, and other laws.  Volkswagen benefited (for a while) from emissions fraud without the CEO's knowledge (supposedly).  I'd be interested in studies where the mechanism of how inconvenient facts are kept from key people was deliberate or arose organically.","c_root_id_A":"cvisoe2","c_root_id_B":"cvin9ji","created_at_utc_A":1443575943,"created_at_utc_B":1443566412,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I study attitudes toward and knowledge about natural methods of abortion. Through this I learned about agnotology--the study of the systematic deprivation of knowledge from people over time. Culturally-induced ignorance helps ensure skills or knowledge once prized but now threatening to the ruling or dominant class die out. It's fascinating. Best of luck with your work.","human_ref_B":"In economics, it's an important issue in mechanism design. Tirole has a seminal paper on arms length relationships but it's also broadly a part of delegation mechanisms.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9531.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"2ka8ha","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What led to the period of Scientific Revolution? I tried searching on Google for the answers, but they all talk about how some kind of discovery or invention led to it. However, I am interested in understanding what actually caused the social changes, that enabled such a thing to happen during that particular moment in history.   My understanding is that during that time, the farmers were capable of providing the basic needs of the people, and that allowed the richer people (who didn't have to worry about sustenance as the farmers provided it for them) had the free time, to explore the scientific field. Of course I am not saying that only rich people were capable of being part of the scientific revolution, but the general idea is that people who had the free time, and didn't worry about sustenance, are the people who were capable of exploring new fields.    From my POV, I believe that most of the general population, while struggling with their day-to-day struggles to survive, didn't have the free time or the resources to explore science.    Am I wrong? Please if you can, source your arguments, because I want to understand the history, rather than debate an opinion. I understand there will be speculation involved as its hard to study this, but I just want to know if it is a reasonable argument for that time period.   ----------- So far I have got these arguments to support it from other subs:  * Engel's Law * Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs * Works of Thomas Kuhn  So if you have more ideas to either share or refute it, I am interested in learning them. I haven't yet got an argument against it, and so I am leaning towards it being true.","c_root_id_A":"cljjvt2","c_root_id_B":"cljeksr","created_at_utc_A":1414263287,"created_at_utc_B":1414250639,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"\/u\/elprophet gives you a pretty good start. Kuhn's *Structure of Scientific Revolutions* is also very good, and I recommend that you read it if you haven't yet. I want to come at this from a slightly different direction though.  First, the scientific revolution will always be hard to pin down in part because \"science\" meant something different in early modern Europe than it does today. The term was rarely applied to the kind of inquiries we now consider fundamental to the scientific revolution. So our application of the term \"science\" is based on a modern conception of what science means, and is an attempt to figure out when actions that later became seen as \"scientific\" first began to be adopted by communities of thinkers.  With that caveat out of the way, let's turn to what the scientific revolution was. This is a subject of debate among scholars, including debate whether the term is useful at all. I'm going to keep it for now.  Let's take on part of your current understanding: >My understanding is that during that time, the farmers were capable of providing the basic needs of the people, and that allowed the richer people (who didn't have to worry about sustenance as the farmers provided it for them) had the free time, to explore the scientific field.  It's true that science was being pursued largely by elites. What's not true is that the seventeenth century (where I'm going to locate the scientific revolution) was a time of plenty or of peace. In fact, historians have viewed the seventeenth century as so disastrous for Europe that they spent a lot of effort trying to explain the seventeenth-century crisis. So, rather than suddenly getting lots of extra time to pursue new ways of building knowledge, elites had been doing that for centuries.  This is where I join up with \/u\/elprophet. She points out that intellectuals were producing new knowledge throughout the medieval period. They just viewed textual knowledge as more legitimate than experiential knowledge. So what's the big change that makes the scientific revolution a revolution? I argue that it's twofold. First, the acceptance of experiential knowledge (experiments, observations) as a legitimate form of knowledge. Second, the focus on experiments and observations themselves as the objects of reporting. What I mean by that is that Galileo, for example, used his experiments as bits of evidence in long, disputational essays. He and his Aristotelian rivals were throwing rhetorical bombs in the form of entire books. Why isn't that science? Because an important part of science is having a community with coherent norms of reporting that allow them to produce knowledge more quickly than could a set of individuals. To understand what I'm talking about here, check out Kuhn's description of normal science.  Ok, to wrap this up: what caused these changes? Who knows? I have my own ideas based on my research, but I'll offer you a more conventional take instead. In the seventeenth century, there was a flood of objects -- especially plants -- from the new world (think chocolate, corn, tomatoes, potatoes). These were objects that *could not* be understood by recourse to ancient texts... the ancients had never encountered these things! So experiential knowledge necessarily had to fill that gap. I have my concerns, because I haven't seen anyone show much of a connection between the botany\/taxonomy boom and the work being done with telescopes, barometers, and vacuum pumps. Were these (mostly Italian and English) experimental tools really legitimated by (mostly Spanish -- and mostly secret!) botany? I'm not sure.  Finally, if you want to understand the scientific revolution, I recommend these two books to start with:  A Social History of Truth: Civility and Science in Seventeenth-Century England by Steven Shapin  Galileo, Courtier: The Practice of Science in the Culture of Absolutism by Mario Biagioli","human_ref_B":"The Scientific Revolution is, I think, a mild misnomer - with the exception of the year 1543. Throughout the millennia or so after the fall of the Roman empire, western thinking generally held that the \"ancients\", the Greeks and Romans, had known everything there was and were never wrong. Aristotle, especially, had made easily falsifiable statements (a heavier object falls faster) that were accepted as fact.  That's not to say there was no progress in the middle ages - Pythagoras could solve quadratic formulae, but not cubic (third-degree roots). That problem has consistent progress throughout the world, but not completely solved until 1530. In 1543, we have the publication of De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium, \"on the orbits of heavenly bodies\" by Copernicus, demonstrating a heliocentric model, and De humani corporis fabrica, \"on the fabric of the human body\" by Andreus Vesalius, demonstrating the heart, and not the liver, was the core of the circulatory system (an easy mistake - the liver has a *ton* of blood vessels of rather large size, whereas the heart has only a handful). That both these works were published in the same year, in the same region (northern Italy), and both overturned long-held understandings of the world with a more factually correct model, is grounds to state 1543 is the start of the scientific revolution.  Vesalius was from Belgium, but lectured in Padua & northern Italy. Copernicus studied in Italy for many years on a couple occasions before returning to Poland. Why was northern Italy so... \"enlightened\"? This is a bit harder, but will pretty much always come down to trade. While Galileo worked a century later, a component of his income was building telescopes for Venice and her merchants for their shipping needs.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12648.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2ka8ha","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What led to the period of Scientific Revolution? I tried searching on Google for the answers, but they all talk about how some kind of discovery or invention led to it. However, I am interested in understanding what actually caused the social changes, that enabled such a thing to happen during that particular moment in history.   My understanding is that during that time, the farmers were capable of providing the basic needs of the people, and that allowed the richer people (who didn't have to worry about sustenance as the farmers provided it for them) had the free time, to explore the scientific field. Of course I am not saying that only rich people were capable of being part of the scientific revolution, but the general idea is that people who had the free time, and didn't worry about sustenance, are the people who were capable of exploring new fields.    From my POV, I believe that most of the general population, while struggling with their day-to-day struggles to survive, didn't have the free time or the resources to explore science.    Am I wrong? Please if you can, source your arguments, because I want to understand the history, rather than debate an opinion. I understand there will be speculation involved as its hard to study this, but I just want to know if it is a reasonable argument for that time period.   ----------- So far I have got these arguments to support it from other subs:  * Engel's Law * Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs * Works of Thomas Kuhn  So if you have more ideas to either share or refute it, I am interested in learning them. I haven't yet got an argument against it, and so I am leaning towards it being true.","c_root_id_A":"cljjvt2","c_root_id_B":"clji1d8","created_at_utc_A":1414263287,"created_at_utc_B":1414258944,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"\/u\/elprophet gives you a pretty good start. Kuhn's *Structure of Scientific Revolutions* is also very good, and I recommend that you read it if you haven't yet. I want to come at this from a slightly different direction though.  First, the scientific revolution will always be hard to pin down in part because \"science\" meant something different in early modern Europe than it does today. The term was rarely applied to the kind of inquiries we now consider fundamental to the scientific revolution. So our application of the term \"science\" is based on a modern conception of what science means, and is an attempt to figure out when actions that later became seen as \"scientific\" first began to be adopted by communities of thinkers.  With that caveat out of the way, let's turn to what the scientific revolution was. This is a subject of debate among scholars, including debate whether the term is useful at all. I'm going to keep it for now.  Let's take on part of your current understanding: >My understanding is that during that time, the farmers were capable of providing the basic needs of the people, and that allowed the richer people (who didn't have to worry about sustenance as the farmers provided it for them) had the free time, to explore the scientific field.  It's true that science was being pursued largely by elites. What's not true is that the seventeenth century (where I'm going to locate the scientific revolution) was a time of plenty or of peace. In fact, historians have viewed the seventeenth century as so disastrous for Europe that they spent a lot of effort trying to explain the seventeenth-century crisis. So, rather than suddenly getting lots of extra time to pursue new ways of building knowledge, elites had been doing that for centuries.  This is where I join up with \/u\/elprophet. She points out that intellectuals were producing new knowledge throughout the medieval period. They just viewed textual knowledge as more legitimate than experiential knowledge. So what's the big change that makes the scientific revolution a revolution? I argue that it's twofold. First, the acceptance of experiential knowledge (experiments, observations) as a legitimate form of knowledge. Second, the focus on experiments and observations themselves as the objects of reporting. What I mean by that is that Galileo, for example, used his experiments as bits of evidence in long, disputational essays. He and his Aristotelian rivals were throwing rhetorical bombs in the form of entire books. Why isn't that science? Because an important part of science is having a community with coherent norms of reporting that allow them to produce knowledge more quickly than could a set of individuals. To understand what I'm talking about here, check out Kuhn's description of normal science.  Ok, to wrap this up: what caused these changes? Who knows? I have my own ideas based on my research, but I'll offer you a more conventional take instead. In the seventeenth century, there was a flood of objects -- especially plants -- from the new world (think chocolate, corn, tomatoes, potatoes). These were objects that *could not* be understood by recourse to ancient texts... the ancients had never encountered these things! So experiential knowledge necessarily had to fill that gap. I have my concerns, because I haven't seen anyone show much of a connection between the botany\/taxonomy boom and the work being done with telescopes, barometers, and vacuum pumps. Were these (mostly Italian and English) experimental tools really legitimated by (mostly Spanish -- and mostly secret!) botany? I'm not sure.  Finally, if you want to understand the scientific revolution, I recommend these two books to start with:  A Social History of Truth: Civility and Science in Seventeenth-Century England by Steven Shapin  Galileo, Courtier: The Practice of Science in the Culture of Absolutism by Mario Biagioli","human_ref_B":"Joel Mokyr, *Gifts of Athena,* has arguments that you will find interesting.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4343.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"8oiv66","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Please point me in the direction of academic work arguing for and against \"Gender Critical\" Feminism. I can only find articles and blog posts which do not have an academic tone and are typically fraught with condescension and insults. I fall squarely in the camp which would say that transmen and transwomen are \"real\" men\/women, but I don't think that the concerns expressed by Radical Feminists and Gender Critical Feminists is as easy to dismiss as calling them TERFs. So, can you please provide me with some academic sources which both defend and criticize the gender critical position? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"e03srhy","c_root_id_B":"e03tl7a","created_at_utc_A":1528136369,"created_at_utc_B":1528137079,"score_A":13,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"Cordelia Fine is an academic who writes from a neuroscientific gender critical perspective.","human_ref_B":"Philosophy professor Rebecca Tuvel wrote a famous and controversial paper called \"In Defence of Transracialism\" that discussed the idea of \"identifying\" as a man\/woman, and whether the same logic that supports it (if you agree with it) would also support other types of self-identification such as religion, gender, and species","labels":0,"seconds_difference":710.0,"score_ratio":1.6153846154}
{"post_id":"8oiv66","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Please point me in the direction of academic work arguing for and against \"Gender Critical\" Feminism. I can only find articles and blog posts which do not have an academic tone and are typically fraught with condescension and insults. I fall squarely in the camp which would say that transmen and transwomen are \"real\" men\/women, but I don't think that the concerns expressed by Radical Feminists and Gender Critical Feminists is as easy to dismiss as calling them TERFs. So, can you please provide me with some academic sources which both defend and criticize the gender critical position? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"e04e79z","c_root_id_B":"e046qsx","created_at_utc_A":1528156410,"created_at_utc_B":1528148826,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Paul B. Preciado and his famous, difficult, controversial, iconoclast *Countersexual manifesto* talks about gender as another form of biopolitic control of the body, following (and criticizing) Focault's steps. He's pretty much one of the more radical on the gender spectrum. Not exactly the kind of critic you may be looking for, but I found it one of the most challenging reads I've encountered on the topic of gender. His following book, \"Testo Yonqui\" is another must-read.  Another book that challenges perceptions, although in a completely different tone is *Sexing the Body*, by Anne Fausto-Sterling. You could say it's a book that deals with supposedly \"biologic\" perceptions and challenges them as social constructs (or at least interpretations), by the perspective of an actual professor of biology which deals with gender, focusing on the particular case of intersex bodies.  Maybe this are not exactly what you're looking for, but TERFs sometimes don't consider things that these books talk about, so if you're going to read them (and by all means do so) you'll have a boarder knowledge of the subject","human_ref_B":"When you find what you're looking for, I hope you'll respond with the result the next time we get this question on \/r\/explainbothsides","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7584.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"9noxmp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is this study accurately portraying evidence of corruption in academic journals or is it using the nature of qualitative research to create or exaggerate the problem? To summarize, this article is about a study where 20 fake articles were submitted to journals to test their validity and 7 of the articles were accepted. The journals that accepted the articles were: *Gender, Place, and Culture*, *Fat Studies, Sexuality & Culture, Sex Roles, Hypatia, Journal of Poetry Therapy,* and *Affilia.* All of the articles use methods like literary analysis, application of theory, observation, and interviews as opposed to more replicable methods, but if you did not look at the actual article you wouldn't know the method since their point stems from the questions being asked in the studies.   &#x200B;  Here are some of the presented theses with the links to the articles attached:  >That dog parks are rape-condoning spaces and a place of rampant canine rape culture and systemic oppression against \u201cthe oppressed dog\u201d through which human attitudes to both problems can be measured. This provides insight into training men out of the sexual violence and bigotry to which they are prone. link  &#x200B;  >That it is only oppressive cultural norms which make society regard the building of muscle rather than fat admirable and that bodybuilding and activism on behalf of the fat could be benefited by including fat bodies displayed in non-competitive ways. link  &#x200B;  >That it is suspicious that men rarely anally self-penetrate using sex toys, and that this is probably due to fear of being thought homosexual (\u201chomohysteria\u201d) and bigotry against trans people (transphobia). (It combines these ideas into a novel concept \u201ctranshysteria,\u201d which was suggested by one of the paper\u2019s peer reviewers.) Encouraging them to engage in receptive penetrative anal eroticism will decrease transphobia and increase feminist values. link  &#x200B;  >That men frequent \u201cbreasturants\u201d like Hooters because they are nostalgic for patriarchal dominance and enjoy being able to order attractive women around. The environment that breastaurants provide for facilitating this encourages men to identify sexual objectification and sexual conquest, along with masculine toughness and male dominance, with \u201cauthentic masculinity.\u201d The data are clearly nonsense and conclusions drawn from it are unwarranted by it. (NB. One reviewer did raise concerns about the rigor of the data) link  &#x200B;  At the end one of the conclusions made was:  >Based on our data, there is a problem occurring with knowledge production within fields that have been corrupted by grievance studies arising from critical constructivism and radical skepticism. Among the problems are how topics like race, gender, sexuality, society, and culture are researched.  As well as:  >Worse, the problem of corrupt scholarship has already leaked heavily into other fields like education, social work, media, psychology, and sociology, among others\u2014and it openly aims to continue spreading.  And:  >Our recommendation begins by calling upon all major universities to begin a thorough review of these areas of study (gender studies, critical race theory, postcolonial theory, and other \u201ctheory\u201d-based fields in the humanities and reaching into the social sciences, especially including sociology and anthropology), in order to separate **knowledge-producing disciplines and scholars** from those generating constructivist sophistry.  &#x200B;  I bolded the part that I want to ask about, because I felt like this implied that the research itself being done similarly to how they described their fake methods (interviews, observation, etc.) are not a valid forms of research. I wanted to ask this sub, because this study did imply corruption in the social sciences and wanted to know if my concerns are valid or not.   &#x200B;  Their other point was about journals checking the validity of submitters, which seemed like a good point. I thought I should include that.","c_root_id_A":"e7nzmj1","c_root_id_B":"e7nxdu5","created_at_utc_A":1539387856,"created_at_utc_B":1539385394,"score_A":35,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Just to add another link to the collection from \/u\/anthrowill this one from Slate is very thorough: What the \u201cGrievance Studies\u201d Hoax Actually Reveals.  What the Slate article is a bit too polite to say directly is that the hoax 'actually reveals' that these researchers are really poor thinkers. They had no control group (despite poor journal practices being a pervasive problem affecting multiple fields, they faked data and used clickbait titles (tapping into a general weakness of journals and PR departments alike), and had to up their game in the course of doing this 'study' because their early efforts weren't getting published.  It's just a high effort version of Lindsay and Boghossian's previous attempt where they submitted an article multiple times and ended up publishing it in a predatory pay-to-play journal and embarrassed only themselves.  They haven't yet learnt enough to stop embarrassing themselves. This is unwarranted arrogance masquerading as science.","human_ref_B":"There are major problems with their claims (which is not a study and is more like journalism). Here are a few criticisms of their piece:  https:\/\/www.buzzfeednews.com\/article\/virginiahughes\/grievance-studies-sokal-hoax  https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/outlook\/2018\/10\/04\/paper-that-would-never-have-gotten-past-peer-review-criticizes-academy-film\/  https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=vzw\\_4rY\\_BoE&feature=youtu.be  https:\/\/slate.com\/technology\/2018\/10\/grievance-studies-hoax-not-academic-scandal.html  https:\/\/freethoughtblogs.com\/reprobate\/2018\/10\/06\/this-isnt-incompetence\/  &#x200B;","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2462.0,"score_ratio":2.1875}
{"post_id":"s5aafw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"How do twins studies separate shared and non shared environmental factors? Hi everyone, I have been reading some research around the biological perspective and I\u2019m a little confused as to how twin studies control for environmental factors. I am familiar with twin studies looking at twins raised together and apart under the assumption (albeit the questioned assumption) that the former share an environment while the latter doesn\u2019t. I\u2019m also aware of the motivations behind looking at MZ and DZ twins, again under the questioned assumption that the only thing that differs between them is genetics. What is confusing me is how such studies in some cases (work on anorexia), when failing to reduce all variation to genetics , attribute the remaining variation to non-shared environmental factors like being bullied and having low self evaluation. Twin studies  around  anorexia  specifically have shown shared  environmental factors to be largely absent. However, I\u2019m confused as to:  1. How they separate shared and non-shared factors? 2. What implications this has on the nature \/ nurture debate? 3. Whether the questioned assumptions around MZ\/DZ twins sharing an environment and separated twins not sharing an environment could skew theses results, account for non-shared environmental factors but reducing shared environmental factors to genetics?","c_root_id_A":"hsw3agw","c_root_id_B":"hswtpce","created_at_utc_A":1642333757,"created_at_utc_B":1642348254,"score_A":2,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Thanks for your question to \/r\/AskSocialScience. All posters, please remember that this subreddit requires peer-reviewed, cited sources (Please see Rule 1 and 3). All posts that do not have citations will be removed by AutoMod.  *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](\/message\/compose\/?to=\/r\/AskSocialScience) if you have any questions or concerns.*","human_ref_B":"When discussing twin studies, it is important first of all to be clear on what they attempt to estimate: heritability which - not to be confused with hereditary, inherited or even \\(in\\)heritable - is a commonly misunderstood if not misrepresented concept.  **What is heritability?** ---  First of all, heritability is about the variance in a given trait within a given population (which is situated in a given time and place) and not about the processes involved in the development of human traits (more on this later): \"So, a heritability of 0.7 does not mean that a trait is 70% caused by genetic factors; it means that 70% of the variability in the trait in a population is due to genetic differences among people.\" Philosopher of mind Ned Block]( https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ned_Block) can help us [understand the distinction:  >**Genetic determination is a matter of what causes a characteristic**: number of toes is genetically determined because our genes cause us to have five toes. **Heritability, by contrast, is a matter of what causes differences in a characteristic**: heritability of number of toes is a matter of the extent to which genetic differences cause variation in number of toes (that some cats have five toes, and some have six). **Heritability is, therefore, defined as a fraction: it is** ***the ratio of genetically caused variation to total variation*** (including both environmental and genetic variation). **Genetic determination, by contrast, is an informal and intuitive notion which lacks quantitative definition, and depends on the idea of a normal environment.** A characteristic could be said to be genetically determined if it is coded in and caused by the genes and bound to develop in a normal environment. Consequently, whereas genetic determination in a single person makes sense - my brown hair color is genetically determined - **heritability makes sense only relative to a population in which individuals differ from one another - you can't ask \"What's the heritability of my IQ?\"**  In fact, as behavioral geneticist Eric Turkheimer remarked, summarizing a recent paper about the multiple ways in which these genotype-phenotype associations can be biased or inflated:  >The authors show that **correlations between genotype and phenotype (ie, heritability) can arise from at least 4 sources** (there are more). **Actual genetic causation is only one, and may not be the largest.**  Also see philosopher of biology Jonathan Kaplan's guide on heritability, from which I quote:  >Note first that heritability is not a measure of \u201chow genetic\u201d a trait is. **For heritability to make any sense at all as a statistic, the trait in question must vary in the population in question. So for humans, the heritability of \u201chead number\u201d is undefined \u2013 there is (almost) no variation in head-number for living humans (there are a vanishingly few conjoined twins that may count as exceptions**; note that two-headedness is rather more common, albeit still rare, in for example snakes). Similarly, the ability to speak Jarawan among the Jawaran population also has an undefined heritability, because virtually all Jawarans speak the language. **Since heritability is a measure of what is associated with variation in the trait, and not a measure of what causes the trait, the heritability of finger number in humans is essentially zero, and the vast majority of variation in finger number is environmental** (traumatic amputations are the primary cause!).  And this blog by Turkheimer on why all of our traits are in principle heritable and how it does not mean what many people think it means. All of this will be important moving on.  ---  **How do twin researchers estimate heritability and separate shared and nonshared factors?** ---  The field known as behavioral genetics (BG) is known for attempting to estimate the heritabilities of human traits with twin studies. Basically, monozygotic (identical) twins are compared to same-sex dizygotic (fraternal) twins under some fundamental assumptions (Knopik et al., 2017):  * MZ twins are more alike than DZ twins  * Both MZ and DZ twins differ only in genetic relatedness, i.e. the family environment experienced by both sets is similar (the 'equal environments assumption')  * All genetic effects are additive  The terms \"shared\" and \"nonshared\" environmental factors can also be misleading. In principle, what behaviorial geneticists have in mind are shared and nonshared *family* factors (your mileage may vary on whether this is clear and explicit in the language used by twin researchers). To quote Robert Plomin and Denise Daniels (2011):  >The two major designs of human behavioral genetics - the adoption design and the twin design - were developed to circumvent the problem of conflating genetic and environmental influences in studies of family members who share heredity and family environments. By doing so, **these designs partition environmental variance into two components: one shared by members of a family and the other consisting of the remainder of the environmental variance, which is referred to as nonshared environment.**  However, to quote criminologists Burt and Simons's (2014) critique of the use of heritability in the field of biosocial criminology:  >The twin study separates phenotypic variation into three components: additive genetic (h), shared environment (c), and unshared environment (e). The unshared environment also includes model error. Notably, the terms \u201cshared\u201d and \u201cunshared\u201d environment do not correspond directly to common sense interpretations. **The so-called shared environment consists of all nongenetic influences that make twins similar to each other, whereas \u201cunshared\u201d environmental influences consist of all nongenetic factors that make twins different** (Plomin, 2011; Suhay and Kalmoe, 2010). Whether \u201cshared\u201d and \u201cunshared\u201d environments are actually shared is not at issue; instead, **they refer to \u201c\u2018effects\u2019 rather than \u2018events\u2019\u201d that twins experience** (Plomin, 2011: 582). **Scholars frequently have failed to describe clearly what is meant by these terms, and others have made inappropriate conclusions about the insignificance of parental or community factors based on shared environment estimates** (Harris, 1998; Rowe, 1994). It is important to remember that, **in general, twin studies** ***do not actually measure*** **the shared or unshared environments; rather, these parameters are estimated based only on concordance rates or correlations between MZ and DZ twins.**  ---  **Are there substantive issues with the estimates produced by twin research?** ---  The above should address your first question. Concerning your third question, the twin design is an increasingly controversial method and there is plenty of critique of both its assumptions and the use of heritability by behavioral geneticists. Quoting Burt and Simons again:  >Aside from their methodological pitfalls, **an equally serious problem with heritability studies is the notion that genetic and environmental effects can be partitioned into separate additive influences in the first place** (assumption #4). Obviously, **an estimation of heritability requires that one can in fact separate genetic from environmental influences on behavior. Reality is not so simple** ...]  I will not dwell on the methodological issues with twin research, but for an overview of the debate over twin studies, [this document by Jinkinson Smith has plenty of information in an accessible format.  A major contemporary critic of twin studies is Jay Joseph, who is simultaneously highly controversial among behavioral geneticists (and those who rely on their work) and often cited by other critics and skeptics of BG. You can find much of his critique on Mad in America) (e.g., see here for his dissection of twin method assumptions).  **[Continues in a nested comment]**","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14497.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"17zlbl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Can someone who has studied economics explain how it has changed and shaped you view of the world?","c_root_id_A":"c8ad5rf","c_root_id_B":"c8ab8gv","created_at_utc_A":1360164341,"created_at_utc_B":1360154529,"score_A":13,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Incentives matter.  This comes up in public policy a lot. Some guy proposes a tax on X and thinks, well everyone is just going to sit there and pay up. Nope, people will start doing less of X and more of Y.  When you make something cheaper or easier, people do more of it.  When you make something expensive or harder, people do less of it.","human_ref_B":"It has definitely changed my view, but the effect has changed with time. Initially, after studying models of agents making decisions under constraints, I started to view myself (and others) in this light. You can get quite a lot of insight from assuming that others are always trying to improve their station in some way. In this time I became a little more mercenary but also probably improved my decision making skills. Macro gave me a framework to think about news I couldn't understand previously. I read more widely, but put too much stock in the simple models I was studying, developing some pretty flawed views about, to give one example, how unemployment works.  After some time, I've chilled out, and after making some models of my own, I have come to see models for what they are- useful metaphors and platforms for discussion. If I am confused by something I read or encounter, I try to view it through lens of some model that I've seen, or think about it analytically, trying to identify who's making decisions, what they want and what constraints they are under.  The biggest effect economics has had on my view of the world is though learning statistics and econometrics. Learning about what they can (and can't!) tell us about populations has made me far more critical of what I read. It has also changed my politics by encouraging me to check my beliefs with data- many controversies about, for example, whether immigrants and natives compete for jobs, are questions that can be resolved in this way.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9812.0,"score_ratio":1.3}
{"post_id":"17zlbl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Can someone who has studied economics explain how it has changed and shaped you view of the world?","c_root_id_A":"c8aca92","c_root_id_B":"c8ad5rf","created_at_utc_A":1360160701,"created_at_utc_B":1360164341,"score_A":6,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Studying economics has left me utterly floored by how little the people in power actually know about managing a large economic system. The things some of them say simply leaves me floored.","human_ref_B":"Incentives matter.  This comes up in public policy a lot. Some guy proposes a tax on X and thinks, well everyone is just going to sit there and pay up. Nope, people will start doing less of X and more of Y.  When you make something cheaper or easier, people do more of it.  When you make something expensive or harder, people do less of it.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3640.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"17zlbl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Can someone who has studied economics explain how it has changed and shaped you view of the world?","c_root_id_A":"c8aezir","c_root_id_B":"c8aintv","created_at_utc_A":1360170965,"created_at_utc_B":1360181366,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"For me it's that I actually evaluate between different decisions like I am detached from myself.   Opportunity costs, sunken costs of switching the lane at the supermarket after having stood there for a while and how high the probability is that the other line is faster.","human_ref_B":"There are all sorts of analyses that I can do off the top of my head since studying economics, but my favorite and most valuable critical thinking skill that I have gained is the ability to tell a story in context.  When you can look at what is happening in the world, relate it to what has been happening, and make a prediction about what will happen based on what happened last time the circumstances arose, things that used to be a huge deal become minor factors in a bigger story and things that I would have never thought twice about before become major story elements.  Its liberating because the world becomes a series of calculated probabilities. There is peace in understanding economics, we no longer act or think in fear, but in long term sequences.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10401.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"17zlbl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Can someone who has studied economics explain how it has changed and shaped you view of the world?","c_root_id_A":"c8aintv","c_root_id_B":"c8aidzh","created_at_utc_A":1360181366,"created_at_utc_B":1360180638,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There are all sorts of analyses that I can do off the top of my head since studying economics, but my favorite and most valuable critical thinking skill that I have gained is the ability to tell a story in context.  When you can look at what is happening in the world, relate it to what has been happening, and make a prediction about what will happen based on what happened last time the circumstances arose, things that used to be a huge deal become minor factors in a bigger story and things that I would have never thought twice about before become major story elements.  Its liberating because the world becomes a series of calculated probabilities. There is peace in understanding economics, we no longer act or think in fear, but in long term sequences.","human_ref_B":"While I haven't formally studied economics, I have a deep interest in the subject. I guess the two most important things it has taught me is opportunity cost and sunk costs.  Now that I understand opportunity cost, my bullshit meter is going off pretty much all the time when I hear a politician speak. \"This construction, paid for by the government, will create thousands of new jobs and stimulate the economy!\" I think to myself \"But how many jobs won't be created and what areas of the economy won't be stimulated because the government took away resources from other parts of the economy to pay for this?\"  In terms of sunk costs, it really dawned on me when I was drunk (like most of my epiphanies). We were about to leave the pub, but my friend still had a drink in her hand. She was feeling ill and obviously didn't want it, but she still forced herself to chug it down \"because I didn't want to waste it\". This got me thinking: why engage in a utility-diminishing behaviour (drinking when you're ill) in order to get the value of something that you have already paid for? The drink's value doesn't rest on how much money you paid for it before, but how it can affect your current utility, and in this case, you would be better off not finishing it. Regardless of whatever action you take, you're never going to get the money back, so it's irrational to consider it when making a decision about whether you should drink the rest or not.   Once I figured this out, it really made me realise just how much we engage in irrational behaviour because we worry about sunk costs. My father has kept bread rolls in the freezer for two years and refuses to throw them out because he considers it wasteful, yet, it's unlikely that we will ever eat them. We keep old broken crap lying around for the same reason.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":728.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2j7632","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Why does ISIS want to be as publicly hated as possible? (posting horrific videos etc)... It seems like they are trying to invite a war they can not win (against USA etc)...What is the reasoning??","c_root_id_A":"cl95ck9","c_root_id_B":"cl91sh3","created_at_utc_A":1413295884,"created_at_utc_B":1413283546,"score_A":47,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"It's important to realise that ISIS's media strategy is actually quite diverse and sophisticated. We really are the primary audience for some of their videos, and they are attentive to how we receive them. This is why it's so important to be strict about not sharing around the execution stuff; I post regular warnings on twitter and Facebook every time another one of them comes out. And the propaganda role these videos play is in some ways analogous to a sexy recruitment poster rather than an attempt to spread a specific claim or substantive ideological position. ISIS aesthetics are a big part of what attracts foreign recruits. Well, that and battlefield victory.    Moreover, most of ISIS's horrible videos are directed at their own constituents. Here is a helpful PVG article on this http:\/\/politicalviolenceataglance.org\/2014\/09\/11\/why-isis-wants-its-brutality-to-be-public\/  Another somewhat helpful article on how the videos also help to bolster internal morale http:\/\/m.theatlantic.com\/international\/archive\/2014\/09\/isis-jihadist-propaganda-videos-porn\/380117\/  For those videos that are directed at a foreign audience, one helpful editorial featuring a good quote from John Horgan highlights their theatrical role, which both entices Western recruits to the fight and goads us into intervening sloppily: http:\/\/news.nationalpost.com\/2014\/09\/02\/terrorism-as-theatre-isis-beheading-videos-aimed-at-capturing-attention-of-obsessed-western-audience\/ oh and another, though maybe take what Max Abrahms says with a grain of salt http:\/\/www.ibtimes.com\/why-do-people-join-isis-psychology-terrorist-1680444#.VApUnSRANrQ.twitter  Finally, since you may be interested, a nice Foreign Affairs article on ISIS's strategy in general: http:\/\/www.foreignaffairs.com\/articles\/141976\/william-mccants\/state-of-confusion    *Note: this was originally posted as a reply to another comment, which has since been removed. I have lightly edited it.","human_ref_B":"I don't have time atm to write an extensive reply but you should check out Andrew H. Kydd and Barbara F. Walter's \"The Strategies of Terrorism\" which does a great job of summarizing what all terrorist groups are essentially up to. Note that the authors overestimate the effectiveness of terrorism though. Here's a summary of terrorist strategies. All of them clearly apply to ISIS.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12338.0,"score_ratio":9.4}
{"post_id":"w3xz1q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Is there a textbook that explains the connections between personal narcissism and political authoritarianism? Narcissistic families are often characterized by abusive use of control and authority over children. Authoritarian societies are characterized by abusive use of control and authority over citizens.   In some cases it seems that the most narcissistic psychopaths are promoted to the tops of dominance hierarchies in authoritarian situations. Further, it seems that mildly narcissistic people are likely to be promoted if they cause no problems for the dominant persons in authority.   Thus it seems that a vicious cycle exists in which dysfunctional societies produce citizens that are prone to narcissistic behaviors, and narcissistic individuals tend to make their societies dysfunctional.  I imagine this connection is so obvious that many textbooks have been written about it. I would greatly appreciate citations to some undergraduate-level or graduate-level textbooks, or perhaps some journal articles. Thanks in advance.","c_root_id_A":"igz55xz","c_root_id_B":"igzfaio","created_at_utc_A":1658356398,"created_at_utc_B":1658361185,"score_A":4,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Here are some scholarly papers that you can find on google scholar that address this type of stuff:  Zeigler-hill et al 2019 keyword:pursuit of status  Zeigler-hill & besser 2021 workplace outcomes   Roy et Al 2021 key word psychopathic tendencies and right wing authoritarianism   That may not cover all of it but it is a good jumping off point. You may want to look at collective narcissism as well, that\u2019s more general authoritarianism not necessarily workplace.   To better understand poor workplace behaviors I\u2019d open the net to not just only narcissism but also psychopathy and Machiavellian behaviors. For that, see Dan N Jones on google scholar","human_ref_B":"The Authoritarians is a very useful (free) ebook which you would find interesting on this question. It was written by Bob Altemeyer at the suggestion of John Dean, who used Altemeyer's research into authoritarianism as the basis of *Conservatives Without Conscience*.  Altemeyer developed the Right Wing Authoritarian scale, which attempts to identify authoritarian *followers* (those who want a strong leader who will make rules for them to follow and force others to follow). It turns out you need Social Dominance Orientation to work out who they will end up following.  For a quick preview of the ideas in the book, search for \"global change game\" in the text, and when you finish the report of the first game (based on dividing people by their authoritarianism), search for the next mention to read the report of a game where they manipulated whether or not the authoritarians were given socially dominant leaders.  Unsurprisingly, the book has received a great deal of attention in the last six years (it was published in 2006 but you often have to stop and check it wasn't really written in 2016). There are a bunch of updated forewords on the site, and now a published version of the book, and another book. So it isn't quite as easy to access the original (scrappy pdf) as it used to be but the epub version looks to be an OK download.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4787.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"142unx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Where can I find a good debate on Austrian, Chicago, and Keynesian economic theories? I want to learn but there is so much bias out there.  I am trying to learn more about economics. I am trying to keep an open mind even though I have a heavy preconceived bias toward Keynesian economics because I am a liberal. I was just reading about Say's Law and I am reading \"The General Theory of Employment Interest, and Money.\"   I do not find that Say's Law conflicts with either of the three schools becuase production is a wealth creating element in each school. My interpretation was that Keynes was concerned with the wages of workers and how if they received a low real wage they would not be able to afford goods.   I feel that while there are differences between each school, they are not as great as they are made out to be. Each are free market, and each have an emphasis of the importance of production and consumption.","c_root_id_A":"c79f9rf","c_root_id_B":"c79f3o1","created_at_utc_A":1354328730,"created_at_utc_B":1354327962,"score_A":15,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Every day on r\/economics.  More seriously, check out Krugman's The Hangover Theory and here's a response from the Mises review.  I doubt you're going to find much scholarly literature out there. Chicago and Keynesian schools have more or less reconciled right now - everyone basically is using the same methods and models, they just disagree on the coefficients. The Austrian viewpoint is basically incommensurable from mainstream economics. It's like arguing whether economics or sociology is \"correct\".","human_ref_B":"If you want a primer, the recent BBC series masters of money was good.  Nicholas wapshott's book keynes\/Hayek: the clash that defined modern economics  They are accessible and easy to understand.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":768.0,"score_ratio":2.1428571429}
{"post_id":"1f9ypm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is it true that prior to WWII men in the western world were not expected to be monogamous? Dan Savage says this. I'm curious as to it's truth value and I would like a source.","c_root_id_A":"ca8bfhb","c_root_id_B":"ca8blnm","created_at_utc_A":1369856584,"created_at_utc_B":1369857031,"score_A":10,"score_B":60,"human_ref_A":"You might want to try \/r\/AskHistorians as well.  I know they have several people who specializing in family and sexuality in a variety different eras (from classical times up through the Victorian era at least).  If you do, provide a link!","human_ref_B":"A general point about Dan Savage, he's prone to hyperbole and reactionary statements and he doesn't really deny this, it's his schtick. Approach him like you would The Daily Show (but more so), an entertaining source of infotainment, but not a source from which to quote facts.  As to your question, no it's not literally true. And anytime someone makes a pity blanket statement about a fundamental aspect of social life assume it's leaving out more nuance than it includes (including this one).  All that being said, to give you some kind of answer. In the USA the relative acceptableness of husbands' infidelity to wives' infidelity could probably be said to have been greater than today. Meaning that the acceptance for a husband cheating was greater than the wife.   For example, there was perception of \"the unwritten law\" * where people thought if a man caught his wife with another man he could kill that man and get off for temporary insanity (someone else will have to report how effective this defense actually was, but people thought this was true).  And you could get away with saying that there was a general perception that if a man were unfaithful a wife should probably be a little understanding provided it was infrequent and he was discrete. So, there were quite serious disparities between how the sexes were treated. And, it's these perceptions to which Dan Savage is referring.   But, there was no carte blanche, and different regions and groups within regions, and individuals within groups would all have had widely differing tolerances, just like today.  * A concept so foreign to the digital age that it doesn't even have a Wikipedia entry. The best I could find is this pdf of The Virginia Law Register from 1908. Although, it does have this gem from the bottom of page 1.  > For example, a father pursues the seducer of his daughter and, after searching several days or hours, comes up with him and kills him. Undoubtedly, under the common law the father is guilty of murder in the first or second degree, according as there has, or has not, been \"cooling time.\" The man is brought to trial. Not one jury in a hundred would fail to acquit.  Was the man justified in what he did? Not one man in a thousand would hesitate to answer in the affirmative. Was not the jury, then, justified in finding a verdict of acquittal? That is another question.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":447.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1t81nm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Can someone please explain the Coase theorem to me? Really struggling with it. This is from the page on Coase's article 'The Problem of Social Cost': \"Coase argued that if we lived in a world without transaction costs, people would bargain with one another to produce the most efficient distribution of resources, regardless of the initial allocation. This is superior to allocation through litigation. Coase used the example of a nuisance case named Sturges v Bridgman, where a noisy sweetmaker and a quiet doctor were neighbours and went to court to see who should have to move. Coase said that regardless of whether the judge ruled that the sweetmaker had to stop using his machinery, or that the doctor had to put up with it, they could strike a mutually beneficial bargain about who moves that reaches the same outcome of resource distribution.\"  How would the sweetmaker and the doctor reach a mutually beneficial agreement without resorting to litigation if both are asserting their property rights?","c_root_id_A":"ce5e6no","c_root_id_B":"ce5edww","created_at_utc_A":1387438477,"created_at_utc_B":1387439405,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"It's best to read Demsetz and others to really get an understanding. But the issue Coase raises is that externalities are reciprocal. To say X imposes an externality on Y is due to property rights and with rights changed we would see ya impose an externality on X.   The location of the candy maker means their noise imposes a cost on the neighbor - assuming the candy maker has a right to make noise. Though if the doctor had the right to quiet, it is his exercising of that property right that imposes a burden on the candy maker (lost profits from quieting the machines). Courts could establish the rights one way or the other and the externality would simply switch parties.   The real issue is that both and neither impose externalities. For if they could negotiate a remedy on there own after the court made a ruling, regardless of the ruling they could reach an agreement. And that agreement would be efficient assuming the cost of negotiating (transaction costs) are low.   The reason externalities exist is precisely because parties can't always cost least bargain. And therefore the courts should select remedies that makes for the least cost of bargaining. When we see externalities, transaction costs are necessarily high.   I think McCloskey writes a nice discussion of it http:\/\/www.deirdremccloskey.com\/docs\/pdf\/Article_306.pdf","human_ref_B":"Suppose my roommate farts (my real roommate is actually awesome and does not fart in my presence).  He likes farting, but his farting imposes a negative externality on me because I like clean air.  There are two possibilities for the valuation and two possibilities for the property rights:  Suppose my roommate values farting **more** than I value clean air.  Say he values farting at $40 and I value clean air at $10.  The efficient outcome is for my roommate to continue farting.  If my roommate has property rights to fart, I'm not going to pay $40 for him to stop.  This is efficient.  If I have property rights to clean air, we'll agree that my roommate pays me between $10 and $40 to fart.  This is also efficient.  Suppose my roommate values farting **less** than I value clean air.  Say he values farting at $20 and I value clean air at $30.  The efficient outcome is for my roommate to not fart.  If my roommate has property rights to fart, I will pay him between $20 and $30 to get him to stop.  This is efficient.  If I have property rights to clean air, then my roommate will not pay $30 for the privilege to fart.  This is also efficient.  We can see in each of these cases, the efficient outcome is reached regardless of who has the initial property rights.  This is all contingent on low transaction costs.  In this example, it's probably not too hard to write a contract.  If there were 1000 roommates, half of whom fart and half of whom like clean air, it might be very difficult to get everyone together to negotiate a contract and not have people hold out for better deals or otherwise mess things up.  If it's taboo to talk about farting, again we might not be able to write a contract to get to the efficient outcome.  Sorry about the example, it's almost 3AM and I might not be exercising the best judgment :).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":928.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"p5krh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Can someone explain to me how social status *works* ? I'm from a small town, didn't watch much TV, my friends were all around the same income level and we all had the same stuff so I never really noticed social classes. I've since moved to the city and I feel like there is something *huge* that I am missing out on. Like the whole idea of networking I just started to figure out this year. And obviously there are huge differences in what people decide to do career-wise just based on where they grew up, rather than the actual opportunites. Or something. Can someone sort of give me a framework to think about these things?","c_root_id_A":"c3msiyi","c_root_id_B":"c3mrv2x","created_at_utc_A":1328100660,"created_at_utc_B":1328090449,"score_A":17,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There are a couple of different ways of thinking about this.  The classic one goes back to Max Weber, who suggested that your status was based on a combination of factors - your wealth, which is obvious, your 'prestige', which is more or less like the honor or esteem people have for you (as an adjunct professor, I make less money than the guy who picks up my trash, but because I'm a college professor, that career is seen as more prestigious and respectable than garbage collector), and power, your ability to get things done.  There are people who are very connected and can pull strings to get things done, even though they may be relatively poor or lack respect (a small-town preacher, for instance).  Your social status is a combination of those factors.  People who come from more prestigious backgrounds expect their kids to follow in those backgrounds, and they expect the treatment commensurate with that status level.  Another way of thinking about it is cultural capital, which is the idea that there are certain social survival skills that are valued in society.  These include things like cultural knowledge (both in the sense of etiquette and facts), language (proper accent, diction and grammar), and behavioral patterns, all of which are transmitted from parents to children (as well as from other important people and institutions, like a finishing school).  The ability to talk one-on-one with your doctor or a police officer or some other authority figure is a learned skill, and it's a form of cultural capital.    Basically, the place where you grew up is a box, and your opportunities are largely (but not entirely) defined by the contents of that box.  If you grew up in a neighborhood full of white collar middle management people with college degrees, it's going to be expected that you go to college and get at least a four year degree so you can work a white collar job.  Becoming a hedge fund manager seems unlikely, as does becoming a long-haul trucker.  If you grew up in a farming community where most people work in agriculture or skilled trades to support the agricultural community (auto repair, electrical, etc.) then there isn't that assumption about college - maybe you go to the local vo-tech and learn to fix tractors or style hair, but a Ph.D isn't really something that's considered.  On the other-other hand, if you grew up a Vanderbilt or a Rockefeller or similar, in a world where everyone in your family attended prestigious private schools, and you regularly take trips to your vacation homes, and your only encounters with skilled laborers is when they come to your house to fix something, getting a vo-tech degree in auto repair is beyond the pale.  You go get an advanced degree and you maintain the family fortune.  All of these things come back to cultural capital - at the end of the day, objectively speaking, garbage collector or diesel mechanic are no better or worse vocations than college professor or independently wealthy heir (in fact, you could argue that they are actually more important to a functioning society), but the cultural values and expectations associated with these upper-class positions are held in much higher esteem than those of the working class.  Knowing how to network and how to negotiate the world of powerful people is a skill that is learned by being around powerful people.  this reproduces the existing class system because no matter how rich a Bill Gates or a Jay-Z gets, those guys are still \"new money\" to the Pierponts and such, and they lack the necessary cultural capital to really fit in amongst the ultra-elite of society.  Does that make sense?  I feel like I rambled a little bit.","human_ref_B":"The following is a broad brush-strokes vision of class. It is a set of ideas to get the ball rolling.  Some Americans, like people in the country I come from, pride themselves on coming from a country that doesn't have class; this isn't true.  I'm going to use a term here \"Middle class\". Normally, when people use this term, they mean somebody who is not actually on the bones of their arse, nor actually loaded, but class works a little differently to that. Class is not about how much money you have, although the two things are related.  As a general rule, if you went to school and it was assumed you would go to college or university, or do womething equivalent, you were probably middle-class. Your parents probably went to college or something equivalent as well. If you went to a school where everybody was going to go to college, then it is a middle class school.   If you are middle-class, you will probably dress and and speak a little differently to the working classes. When they dress up, you probably see it as slightly tacky. Because you experienced a better education, you probably have a bigger vocabulary and a more 'correct' grammar; these things form the bedrock of your sense of humour and how you express yourself, and you are used to talking to people who share these traits, and share understandings of social relations, dating, raising children, what work is, and how it is done.  If you are middle class, you probably have been raised with the expectation that you should ask questions when you don't understand, express your ideas and raise your concerns, question authority, and speak out when things aren't right.  The same does not necessarily follow for working class people. Working with around the health and education sectors it becomes apparent that middle class parents are  much more likely to make a lot of noise and fight for their children, right or wrong, because that is what they were raised to do. Moreover, teachers and doctors are definitively middle-class, recognise their own, and (consciously or otherwise) respond to it as such.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10211.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"p5krh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Can someone explain to me how social status *works* ? I'm from a small town, didn't watch much TV, my friends were all around the same income level and we all had the same stuff so I never really noticed social classes. I've since moved to the city and I feel like there is something *huge* that I am missing out on. Like the whole idea of networking I just started to figure out this year. And obviously there are huge differences in what people decide to do career-wise just based on where they grew up, rather than the actual opportunites. Or something. Can someone sort of give me a framework to think about these things?","c_root_id_A":"c3mu69i","c_root_id_B":"c3mrv2x","created_at_utc_A":1328113210,"created_at_utc_B":1328090449,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Your social status depends entirely on your ability to confer social status to others. The trick is convincing people you have that ability.  The easiest way is with money and status goods. More difficult ways include setting up asymmetrical power relationships, personal loyalty\/kinship ties, group association and conspicuous philanthropy.","human_ref_B":"The following is a broad brush-strokes vision of class. It is a set of ideas to get the ball rolling.  Some Americans, like people in the country I come from, pride themselves on coming from a country that doesn't have class; this isn't true.  I'm going to use a term here \"Middle class\". Normally, when people use this term, they mean somebody who is not actually on the bones of their arse, nor actually loaded, but class works a little differently to that. Class is not about how much money you have, although the two things are related.  As a general rule, if you went to school and it was assumed you would go to college or university, or do womething equivalent, you were probably middle-class. Your parents probably went to college or something equivalent as well. If you went to a school where everybody was going to go to college, then it is a middle class school.   If you are middle-class, you will probably dress and and speak a little differently to the working classes. When they dress up, you probably see it as slightly tacky. Because you experienced a better education, you probably have a bigger vocabulary and a more 'correct' grammar; these things form the bedrock of your sense of humour and how you express yourself, and you are used to talking to people who share these traits, and share understandings of social relations, dating, raising children, what work is, and how it is done.  If you are middle class, you probably have been raised with the expectation that you should ask questions when you don't understand, express your ideas and raise your concerns, question authority, and speak out when things aren't right.  The same does not necessarily follow for working class people. Working with around the health and education sectors it becomes apparent that middle class parents are  much more likely to make a lot of noise and fight for their children, right or wrong, because that is what they were raised to do. Moreover, teachers and doctors are definitively middle-class, recognise their own, and (consciously or otherwise) respond to it as such.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22761.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"vkn7s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is there any empirical evidence that disprove the Holocaust happening? If not, then why are there so many people that believe that it was a massive lie?(Reposted from r\/AskHistorians) I have encountered this more times than I care admit. I believe it is mostly caused by my occupation. There are people who have PhD's. These ideas and information are coming from people that have been formally educated. I am just not sure how to take one's blatant disregard for the truth. I am not saying all of history was recalled accurately, not even close.","c_root_id_A":"c55dgq5","c_root_id_B":"c55azsw","created_at_utc_A":1340645826,"created_at_utc_B":1340635908,"score_A":34,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Not my area really, but if you press a lot of these people about their facts, it comes down to more of a numbers game, which is that they believe the common figures, i.e. 6 million Jews, are way over blown. Holocaust denial also falls into line with the kind of people that believe there is some sort of over-arching Jewish conspiracy, and they see the Holocaust as one part of this factitious puzzle. However, even the numbers game falls apart because unlike other genocides and tin pot dictators, the Nazi's kept records on EVERYTHING.","human_ref_B":"What's your occupation?  This is certainly not within my area of expertise, but only a fool would disbelieve in the Holocaust.  That said, there are a lot of proven facts\/ideas where millions of people still do not believe in the truth - the Holocaust, evolution, Islamic Obama, the moon landing, etc.  It is very easy to believe what one wants to believe, especially when that person is surrounded by people with similar beliefs.  This has become even easier with partisan media and the internet - see echo chambers#How_it_works).  edit:  I am not really sure why this comment is so unpopular.  The answer to the question \"is there any historical truth that the Holocaust might not have happened\" is clearly no.  I would not use the term bigoted in a sociology paper, but this is the internet, and I am okay with saying that holocaust deniers tend to be bigoted, or at the least very misguided, individuals.  Since the historical answer is that the Holocaust did occur, the question becomes \"why do some individuals believe it didn't happen?\"  Here my answer is the same:  many individuals are drawn to ideas that adhere to their own world view.  Just like history stands by the Holocaust, science stands by the theory of evolution, but millions \"do not believe\" in evolution because it clashes with their worldview, because they have never studied the subject rigorously, and because they place themselves within echo chambers of like-minded individuals.  As edward2020 points out, confirmation bias will make it seem like more people deny the holocaust because you remember the few individuals who do deny it, and you forget the vast majority who take acceptance of the holocaust for granted.  edit2:  A relevant quote from the wiki page: >Most Holocaust denial claims imply, or openly state, that the Holocaust is a hoax arising out of a deliberate Jewish conspiracy to advance the interest of Jews at the expense of other peoples.[8] For this reason, Holocaust denial is generally considered to be an antisemitic[9] conspiracy theory.[10]   Why do people believe in any conspiracy theory?  For the reasons I discussed above.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9918.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"vkn7s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is there any empirical evidence that disprove the Holocaust happening? If not, then why are there so many people that believe that it was a massive lie?(Reposted from r\/AskHistorians) I have encountered this more times than I care admit. I believe it is mostly caused by my occupation. There are people who have PhD's. These ideas and information are coming from people that have been formally educated. I am just not sure how to take one's blatant disregard for the truth. I am not saying all of history was recalled accurately, not even close.","c_root_id_A":"c55b35g","c_root_id_B":"c55dgq5","created_at_utc_A":1340636337,"created_at_utc_B":1340645826,"score_A":12,"score_B":34,"human_ref_A":"One reason people believe things like that is because of confirmation bias. http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Confirmation_bias","human_ref_B":"Not my area really, but if you press a lot of these people about their facts, it comes down to more of a numbers game, which is that they believe the common figures, i.e. 6 million Jews, are way over blown. Holocaust denial also falls into line with the kind of people that believe there is some sort of over-arching Jewish conspiracy, and they see the Holocaust as one part of this factitious puzzle. However, even the numbers game falls apart because unlike other genocides and tin pot dictators, the Nazi's kept records on EVERYTHING.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9489.0,"score_ratio":2.8333333333}
{"post_id":"vkn7s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is there any empirical evidence that disprove the Holocaust happening? If not, then why are there so many people that believe that it was a massive lie?(Reposted from r\/AskHistorians) I have encountered this more times than I care admit. I believe it is mostly caused by my occupation. There are people who have PhD's. These ideas and information are coming from people that have been formally educated. I am just not sure how to take one's blatant disregard for the truth. I am not saying all of history was recalled accurately, not even close.","c_root_id_A":"c55dgq5","c_root_id_B":"c55bxlc","created_at_utc_A":1340645826,"created_at_utc_B":1340639973,"score_A":34,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Not my area really, but if you press a lot of these people about their facts, it comes down to more of a numbers game, which is that they believe the common figures, i.e. 6 million Jews, are way over blown. Holocaust denial also falls into line with the kind of people that believe there is some sort of over-arching Jewish conspiracy, and they see the Holocaust as one part of this factitious puzzle. However, even the numbers game falls apart because unlike other genocides and tin pot dictators, the Nazi's kept records on EVERYTHING.","human_ref_B":"Honestly, the only people I met who denied the holocaust were a few super-nationalistic Palestinians hoodlums (out of many who believed in the holocaust) and the reason why they deny it is pretty clear. I really don't think this is prevalent, but people still get so worked up at the mention of the holocaust that they might tend to notice these few people who deny it for whatever reason. I don't really think that there's an issue here, that being said I don't have the same experiences as you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5853.0,"score_ratio":17.0}
{"post_id":"vkn7s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is there any empirical evidence that disprove the Holocaust happening? If not, then why are there so many people that believe that it was a massive lie?(Reposted from r\/AskHistorians) I have encountered this more times than I care admit. I believe it is mostly caused by my occupation. There are people who have PhD's. These ideas and information are coming from people that have been formally educated. I am just not sure how to take one's blatant disregard for the truth. I am not saying all of history was recalled accurately, not even close.","c_root_id_A":"c55fhaq","c_root_id_B":"c55bxlc","created_at_utc_A":1340653246,"created_at_utc_B":1340639973,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":">I have encountered this more times than I care admit  Where specifically (On the internet or real life, if so what was the context\/site)? I've yet to come across a single open Holocaust denier","human_ref_B":"Honestly, the only people I met who denied the holocaust were a few super-nationalistic Palestinians hoodlums (out of many who believed in the holocaust) and the reason why they deny it is pretty clear. I really don't think this is prevalent, but people still get so worked up at the mention of the holocaust that they might tend to notice these few people who deny it for whatever reason. I don't really think that there's an issue here, that being said I don't have the same experiences as you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13273.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"vkn7s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is there any empirical evidence that disprove the Holocaust happening? If not, then why are there so many people that believe that it was a massive lie?(Reposted from r\/AskHistorians) I have encountered this more times than I care admit. I believe it is mostly caused by my occupation. There are people who have PhD's. These ideas and information are coming from people that have been formally educated. I am just not sure how to take one's blatant disregard for the truth. I am not saying all of history was recalled accurately, not even close.","c_root_id_A":"c55fhaq","c_root_id_B":"c55fb3n","created_at_utc_A":1340653246,"created_at_utc_B":1340652605,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":">I have encountered this more times than I care admit  Where specifically (On the internet or real life, if so what was the context\/site)? I've yet to come across a single open Holocaust denier","human_ref_B":"Hmm, well, just like conspiracy theories, this idea can be made quite persuasive if you carefully select evidence. It's not that they are blatantly disregarding truth, it's just that they have a different idea of truth. If you go onto any decent conspiracy website, you will find quite persuasive arguments that it would take an expert to refute. For example, I still don't have answers to some of the claims made by 9\/11 truthers, and I probably wouldn't have enough knowledge to address them until I had something equivalent to a Ph.D.   As laymen, we simply lack the ability to discern the truth, so we trust authorities. If something shakes our trust in these authorities, then we can no longer use that and we are susceptible to manipulation and errors in judgment. I suspect that this is even more possible among the highly educated, since they themselves are authorities and often make a living out of disagreeing with other authorities. They are perfectly aware that paradigms shift and that truth is more elusive than it appears. And, as experts, they have more faith in their own judgment, even when they shouldn't (let's say because it's outside of their field).  tl;dr: It's not about truth, it's about who to trust.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":641.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"vkn7s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is there any empirical evidence that disprove the Holocaust happening? If not, then why are there so many people that believe that it was a massive lie?(Reposted from r\/AskHistorians) I have encountered this more times than I care admit. I believe it is mostly caused by my occupation. There are people who have PhD's. These ideas and information are coming from people that have been formally educated. I am just not sure how to take one's blatant disregard for the truth. I am not saying all of history was recalled accurately, not even close.","c_root_id_A":"c55fhaq","c_root_id_B":"c55fdu6","created_at_utc_A":1340653246,"created_at_utc_B":1340652890,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":">I have encountered this more times than I care admit  Where specifically (On the internet or real life, if so what was the context\/site)? I've yet to come across a single open Holocaust denier","human_ref_B":"I'm also interested in what holocaust deniers actually say: do they say \"it never happened\/numbers exaggerated\" or do they say \"someone else killed the jews\"?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":356.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"vkn7s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is there any empirical evidence that disprove the Holocaust happening? If not, then why are there so many people that believe that it was a massive lie?(Reposted from r\/AskHistorians) I have encountered this more times than I care admit. I believe it is mostly caused by my occupation. There are people who have PhD's. These ideas and information are coming from people that have been formally educated. I am just not sure how to take one's blatant disregard for the truth. I am not saying all of history was recalled accurately, not even close.","c_root_id_A":"c55fb3n","c_root_id_B":"c55bxlc","created_at_utc_A":1340652605,"created_at_utc_B":1340639973,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Hmm, well, just like conspiracy theories, this idea can be made quite persuasive if you carefully select evidence. It's not that they are blatantly disregarding truth, it's just that they have a different idea of truth. If you go onto any decent conspiracy website, you will find quite persuasive arguments that it would take an expert to refute. For example, I still don't have answers to some of the claims made by 9\/11 truthers, and I probably wouldn't have enough knowledge to address them until I had something equivalent to a Ph.D.   As laymen, we simply lack the ability to discern the truth, so we trust authorities. If something shakes our trust in these authorities, then we can no longer use that and we are susceptible to manipulation and errors in judgment. I suspect that this is even more possible among the highly educated, since they themselves are authorities and often make a living out of disagreeing with other authorities. They are perfectly aware that paradigms shift and that truth is more elusive than it appears. And, as experts, they have more faith in their own judgment, even when they shouldn't (let's say because it's outside of their field).  tl;dr: It's not about truth, it's about who to trust.","human_ref_B":"Honestly, the only people I met who denied the holocaust were a few super-nationalistic Palestinians hoodlums (out of many who believed in the holocaust) and the reason why they deny it is pretty clear. I really don't think this is prevalent, but people still get so worked up at the mention of the holocaust that they might tend to notice these few people who deny it for whatever reason. I don't really think that there's an issue here, that being said I don't have the same experiences as you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12632.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"l5cdr6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"I see the social sciences get a bad rep when it comes to reliability and predictive capabilities, how relevant are those criticisms really? So, I guess this is quite common around reddit. I see some people discredit social research as if it is useless due to things like overal lower correlation and a lesser ability to quantify specific phenomena. I can kind of understand that, my work is in chemistry which really relies on these things but I don't know if it is fair to compare exact sciences to social sciences to begin with.","c_root_id_A":"gktnxgr","c_root_id_B":"gku6ope","created_at_utc_A":1611669819,"created_at_utc_B":1611678629,"score_A":15,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Another way to think about it is that these criticisms are criticisms of the world. It IS complicated! We know.   Pointing out all the ways in which social life fails to conform to the standards of a laboratory is thus quite a pointless exercise and not actually relevant to what we do.   The only question that matters is whether we can better employ the tools that do exist to study social life under possible conditions. Arguments along those lines are always welcome. Arguments simply pointing out how little we can know with certainty are less welcome because again they are banal and we know all this much better than our critics.   Consider the pandemic. Which government policies were best? The naive view is that we could have hammered out a foolproof plan ahead of time and all done the same thing. We all have the same incentives and same preferences (to not die of plague). But every level of government in every inch of the world negotiated the policies slightly differently. Frustrating! But that\u2019s life. So... how can we study it?   Anyway, these arguments often coalesce around notions of \u201cphysics envy\u201d. See [https:\/\/link.springer.com\/article\/10.1007\/BF00903487] as an example.","human_ref_B":"I believe that to respond to your query in a critical and thoughtful manner, it is necessary to contextualize and circumscribe the criticisms you speak of.  As a premise, I am convinced that there is a valuable debate that can be had regarding the sciences, and the place of the behavioral and social sciences within the sciences. In fact, such debates do take place, but rarely in public places, such as the Internet or on the pages of newspapers and blogs.  From my perspective, at the heart of these debates lies questions about the philosophy of science and about how to conceptualize science. The problem is that many who engage in these debates tend to perpetuate old debates about the pecking order of different scientific fields. The most notorious approach is arguably to distinguish \"hard\" and \"soft\" science. Often, these debates involve simplistic perspectives about science, and\/or ignorance about the social sciences. (It also often involves being unclear on the relationship between biology and social sciences, between which the borders are permeable, and glossing  over the medical sciences.) In my experience, if we take the bulk of popular criticism together, it tends to be inconsistent or incoherent, and\/or to involve implicit assumptions which are taken for granted (such as regarding what is science, and scientific).  Before moving on: I am also considering your uncertainty regarding comparing 'exact sciences' to 'social sciences'.  ---  To situate the debate, I would begin by demonstrating the popularity of \"dunking on soft sciences\" with TvTropes. Per its page on the trope \"Hard on Soft Science\":  >**Many \"hard\" Science Fiction authors, trained as they are in the hard sciences, tend to take digs at the softer sciences in their works.** The reasons for this vary, but **the most common criticism is that it's much harder to perform repeatable experiments. Scientists strive towards empiricism and the \"scientific method\", and many humanities or social sciences are trying to study things that cannot easily be studied strictly and subjected to experimentation, which makes writers feel justified in considering them as \"pseudoscience\".**  >**This happens outside of science fiction as well. Often, scientist characters in non-Science Fiction shows will disrespect the softer sciences when they have to deal with them.** In real life, **common targets are Psychology** (see below), **Psychiatry** (often portrayed as the medical equivalent of the Church of Happyology, which is ironic considering that church's own attitude towards it), **Economics** (\"The Dismal Science\"), **Linguistics** (except by some, c.f. Sheldon Cooper), &c.. Some can have a grudging respect for economics and political science, the two that tell if they will get any money for rockets and particle accelerators, but psychology, sociology and the like are Acceptable Targets.  >Think of it as an interdisciplinary Take That!. **How much the rivalry is Serious Business, and how much friendly banter, depends on the people involved. It's still an influential conflict that not only has spawned new theories and schools, but became a full blown \"war\" during the 90's.** The standard comeback from soft scientists is that their subject is more \"applicable\" or more relevant to life and society at large (e.g.: as hit and miss as psychology can be, even biologists admit that neurological or even pharmacological solutions to mood disorders should only be a last resort). Another reaction is that these complaints come from those for whom science has been fetishized by, usually non-scientists, thus missing the point entirely and cheapening both.   In the real world, take for example mathematician Serge Lang's campaign against political scientist Samuel Huntington's nomination to National Academy of Sciences. A famous quote by Lang that is often repeated by those who seek to criticize the social sciences is whether Huntington had a \"social-frustration meter,\" which is meant to highlight the absurdity of the social sciences. In response, Jared Diamond wrote an opinion piece titled \"Soft sciences are often harder than hard sciences\", in which he argues:  >**Soft sciences are often harder than hard sciences. Lang's wrath discussed such operationalized concepts as economic well-being, political instability, and social and economic modernization. Physicists have to resort to very indirect** (albeit accurate) **operationalizing in order to ''measure'' electrons. But the task of operationalizing is inevitably more difficult and less exact in the soft sciences, because there are so many uncontrolled variables.** ...]  >**Unfortunately, operationalizing lends itself to ridicule in the social sciences, because the concepts being studied tend to be familiar ones that all of us fancy we're experts on.** Anybody, scientist or no, feels entitled to spout forth on politics or psychology, and to heap scorn on what scholars in those fields write. In contrast, consider the opening sentences of Lang's paper Diophantine Approximation on Abelian Varieties with Complex Multiplication: ''Let A be an abelian variety defined over a number field K. We suppose that A is embedded in projective space. Let AK be the group of points on A rational over K.'' How many people feel entitled to ridicule these statements while touting their own opinions about abelian varieties?   >**No political scientist at NAS has challenged a mathematical candidate by asking''How does he measure things like 'many'? Does he have a many-meter?'' Such questions would bring gales of laughter over the questioner's utter ignorance of mathematics. It seems to me that Lang's question ''How does Huntington measure things like social frustration?'' betrays an equal ignorance of how the social sciences make measurements.**   >**The ingrained labels ''soft science'' and ''hard science'' could be replaced by hard (i.e., difficult) science and easy science, respectively.** Ecology and psychology and the social sciences are much more difficult and, to some of us, intellectually more challenging than mathematics and chemistry.  (Also see [conceptualization and operationalization to understand what he is talking about.)  ---  This debate predates Lang and Huntington, and persists beyond. See for example the 2012 Nature editorial, \"A different agenda\"  >**The social sciences are an easy target for this type of attack because they are less cluttered with technical terminology and so seem easier for the layperson to assess.** As social scientist Duncan Watts at Microsoft Research in New York City has pointed out: \u201c**Everyone has experience being human, and so the vast majority of findings in social science coincide with something that we have either experienced or can imagine experiencing.**\u201d This means that **the Flakes of this world have little trouble proclaiming such findings obvious or insignificant.**  >**Part of the blame must lie with the practice of labelling the social sciences as soft, which too readily translates as meaning woolly or soft-headed. Because they deal with systems that are highly complex, adaptive and not rigorously rule-bound, the social sciences are among the most difficult of disciplines, both methodologically and intellectually. They suffer because their findings do sometimes seem obvious. Yet, equally, the common-sense answer can prove to be false when subjected to scrutiny.** There are countless examples of this, from economics to traffic planning. This is one reason that the social sciences probably unnerve some politicians, some of whom are used to making decisions based not on evidence but on intuition, wishful thinking and with an eye on the polls.  And to quote Zaki's opinion piece:  >More broadly, **Gutting succumbs to an old stereotype: believing that there is a bright line between \"hard\" natural sciences -- which produce real information -- and \"soft\" social sciences, which do not. Such arguments reveal a misunderstanding of science's increasingly integrated nature.** For example, in recent years, entirely new fields have spawned from collaborations between theoretical physics and sociology and between neurobiology and psychology.   ---  [Continues next comment]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8810.0,"score_ratio":1.0666666667}
{"post_id":"urns6b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"Why is it that women and children get the priority to safety during crisis evacuation?","c_root_id_A":"i91junk","c_root_id_B":"i921mbi","created_at_utc_A":1652853299,"created_at_utc_B":1652868946,"score_A":16,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Male expendability. It's a brute biological fact that gestation is the rate-limiting step for mammalian reproduction. When a population of mammals is decimated, every fertile female is needed to replenish it. Only one male is needed. As a result, women's lives are far more biologically valuable than men's. This is why men compete with each other, push themselves to perform, conspicuously take pain without complaint, and vie with each other for status. Unlike women, men need to justify their existence and earn the privilege of reproducing.  Source: Block, Walter E. *The Case for Discrimination*. Auburn, Alabama: Ludwig von Mises Institute, 2010. Chapter 11: \"Another Role for Women\", pp.32-35.","human_ref_B":"To the best of my knowledge, there are no codified evacuation plans that emphasize that old trope.  The general methodology in the movement phase of evacuation is to get everyone out as quickly as possible.  Leaving room for emergency services (trained personnel) to move in the opposite direction if necessary. While taking consideration of personal abilities.  Such as visual alerts for the hearing impaired and devices to accommodate ambulatory issues.  The Sea Scout Sea Promise was one example that had used that wording at one time, but was revised to read, \"let those less able come first.\"  The Sea Scouts attribute the original wording to the sinking of the troop transport HMS Birkenhead in 1852.  A loss of one off the long lifeboats due to rushing resulted the the soldiers standing back until the civilians were loaded.  The survivors were estimated to be 7 women, 13 children, and 1 civilian man, and 113 army personnel, but the rolls were lost with the ship.  The sinking off the RMS Titanic in 1912 popularized the phrase with Second Officer Lightoller's instance on excluding men on lifeboats loading on one's side of the ship.  First Officer Murdoch did not make this exclusion on the opposite side.  Subsequent studies of shipwrecks have not shown a disproportional survival rate of women and men; records of children are sporadic.  In essence, this idea of chivalry at sea is a myth.    There is some credence to the idea of the crew and captain going down with the ship.  Mostly due to their training contributing to a higher survival rate than untrained people ending up in the water.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15647.0,"score_ratio":1.375}
{"post_id":"874ar5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.66,"history":"Why are attitudes towards LGBT people in the third world so profoundly different to those in the developed world?","c_root_id_A":"dwa2upf","c_root_id_B":"dwa7br6","created_at_utc_A":1522017472,"created_at_utc_B":1522022287,"score_A":4,"score_B":43,"human_ref_A":"Do you mind expanding on your question? How are these attitudes \"profoundly\" different? Are you suggesting that non-hetero couples are accepted in the West, but not elsewhere? Or that transexuals are common in Iran and Thailand, but not in the United States? As stated, your question is quite vague, and leaves much to speculation.","human_ref_B":"This question is flawed.  One only need look to large segments of US society to see that LGBT people are hardly treated fairly or well by many people, and thought poorly of by even more.   You're setting up a false dichotomy where a spectrum exists.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4815.0,"score_ratio":10.75}
{"post_id":"4lgveo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why does the native birthrate go below sustainment (2.1) in most developed countries? Reading around, it seems that in many developed countries the birth rate is below sustainability, and in cases where it's near it (2.1) it's being elevated by immigrant births, for example hispanics in the U.S. Why is that?  In the event a source is necessary: http:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/currentevents\/2012\/10\/16\/warning-bell-for-developed-countries-declining-birth-rates\/#2ab251661ea5","c_root_id_A":"d3n7bud","c_root_id_B":"d3nbqxl","created_at_utc_A":1464461374,"created_at_utc_B":1464469158,"score_A":13,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"Children appear to be an inferior good.  *edit: added source*","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/tv.nrk.no\/program\/KOID27002813\/hans-rosling-om-befolkningseksplosjonen  Hans Rosling talks about the population growth in an easy to understand way with pretty graphs. It's been a while since I've seen it, but your question should be \"why are people having more than 2 children?\", most people are satisfied with 1-2.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7784.0,"score_ratio":1.5384615385}
{"post_id":"gjylzc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Are there any Left Wing books that are responses\/equivelant or Critiques to Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom and Hayek's The Road To Serfdom? The title say's it all really.  I'm planning to read some more Economics  books. Those two are considered quite influential and important so I was wondering are there any critiques or equivelants books that I could read along with the two?  Thanks","c_root_id_A":"fqny1l7","c_root_id_B":"fqo0vad","created_at_utc_A":1589503666,"created_at_utc_B":1589505282,"score_A":2,"score_B":30,"human_ref_A":"This is more of a tangential suggestion, but historian Kim Phillips Fein wrote a book called \u201cInvisible Hands: the Businessmen\u2019s Crusade Against the New Deal\u201d - it frames a long view of free-marketers and their ascendency in American politics and policy.   Again, not a challenge or rebuttal, but a great treatment of the political packaging of these ideas over the 20th century. Cheers.","human_ref_B":"Galbraith's *The Affluent Society* is often mentioned as a counterpoint to Friedman. (For example, see Galbraith and Friedman: Two Versions of Economic Reality William Breit or Who Will Cast a Longer Shadow on the 21st Century: Friedman or Galbraith?)  However, IMO, both are a bit dated now. For a more contemporary statement of left-wing thinking and concerns, I would prefer *Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few* by Robert Reich.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1616.0,"score_ratio":15.0}
{"post_id":"gjylzc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Are there any Left Wing books that are responses\/equivelant or Critiques to Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom and Hayek's The Road To Serfdom? The title say's it all really.  I'm planning to read some more Economics  books. Those two are considered quite influential and important so I was wondering are there any critiques or equivelants books that I could read along with the two?  Thanks","c_root_id_A":"fqpm0i7","c_root_id_B":"fqny1l7","created_at_utc_A":1589549474,"created_at_utc_B":1589503666,"score_A":11,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Karl Polyani's The Great Transformation) can be seen as a very nice responce to The Road to Serfdom, even if I doubt it was meant to be. It shows how the relationship between economy and society was inverted around the time of the industrial revolution, calling into question Adam Smith's basic assumption that capitalism is the nature state of human existance.","human_ref_B":"This is more of a tangential suggestion, but historian Kim Phillips Fein wrote a book called \u201cInvisible Hands: the Businessmen\u2019s Crusade Against the New Deal\u201d - it frames a long view of free-marketers and their ascendency in American politics and policy.   Again, not a challenge or rebuttal, but a great treatment of the political packaging of these ideas over the 20th century. Cheers.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":45808.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"gjylzc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Are there any Left Wing books that are responses\/equivelant or Critiques to Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom and Hayek's The Road To Serfdom? The title say's it all really.  I'm planning to read some more Economics  books. Those two are considered quite influential and important so I was wondering are there any critiques or equivelants books that I could read along with the two?  Thanks","c_root_id_A":"fqs4elc","c_root_id_B":"fqny1l7","created_at_utc_A":1589598268,"created_at_utc_B":1589503666,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I would recommend reading David Harvey. His book *The Limits of Capital* is probably the biggest equivalent work, but his book *A Brief History of Neoliberalism* directly addresses the arguments made by Friedman and Hayek  &#x200B;  Sources:  https:\/\/www.penguinrandomhouse.com\/books\/232883\/the-limits-to-capital-by-david-harvey\/  https:\/\/global.oup.com\/academic\/product\/a-brief-history-of-neoliberalism-9780199283279?cc=us&lang=en&","human_ref_B":"This is more of a tangential suggestion, but historian Kim Phillips Fein wrote a book called \u201cInvisible Hands: the Businessmen\u2019s Crusade Against the New Deal\u201d - it frames a long view of free-marketers and their ascendency in American politics and policy.   Again, not a challenge or rebuttal, but a great treatment of the political packaging of these ideas over the 20th century. Cheers.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":94602.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"16p5q3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is there a neurology\/psychology based explanation of why almost all music is in common (4\/4) time?","c_root_id_A":"c7yehzz","c_root_id_B":"c7yel9c","created_at_utc_A":1358400233,"created_at_utc_B":1358400548,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This is something we explored in my evolution of human behavior course last semester. The tempo and production of music directly relates to our culture and evolutionary history. Someone was right when they said non western music isn't the same. Chinese and eastern music sounds very off key and out of line for us, but it is due to language differences. However, when individuals who produced music differently came together they were able to use their own styles to produce a cohesive song.  Music produced in groups has been shown to align brainwaves and increase social bonds. Even subtle  physiological changes occur just from extending a note or shortening a note. In one study, when exposed to multiple types of music never heard before and asked about their emotions individuals descriptions matched cross culturally.    Many primates such as Gibbons are known to \"sing\" together to mark their territory and increase social bonds. Orangutans also use \"long calls\" to accomplish similar territorial goals. These songs each have their own structure, tempo and rules. Yet, individuals modify their songs. So it may very well be that music has an evolutionary path. I believe data proves a more primitive vocalization system dependent upon tonal recognition and song modification similar to African Grey's and other primates is where language got its origins and that human language is simply a highly evolved rhythmic communication system.","human_ref_B":">\"From a meta-analysis of studies of brain-damaged patients with lesions localized in various regions of the brain, it was suggested that the \"rhythmic component ... of an auditory image cannot be activated without recruiting neural systems known to be involved in motor activity, expecially those involved in the planning of motor sequences\" (Carroll-Phelan 1994; see also Peretz 1993). Such neuropsychological data have allowed hypotheses about the induction of a sense of beat or pulse in terms of the so-called sensorimotor loop, which includes the posterior parietal lobe, pre-motor cortex, cerebro-cerebellum, and basal ganglia. In the sensorimotor perspective, a perceived beat is literally an imagined movement; it seems to involve the same neural facilities as motor activity, most notably motor-sequence planning. (Todd 1997) Hence, the act of listening to music involves the same mental processes that generate bodily motion.\"  So following from the hypothesis that our listening of music involves recruiting our motor activity regions we could ask what are the embodied rhythms that we most commonly experience? Walking, running, dancing, basically everything we do on two legs (assuming we have both of them and they work) are all 2 limit rhythms (2\/4, 4\/4). So the bodily activities that we have to activate to listen to music are most common in our daily lives are also in 4\/4 and are most likely more neurologically connected than more complex rhythms. Part of the reason higher prime complex rhythms (like 7\/8, 11\/8, 13\/8, ect) when played straight might feel like cats in washing machines to us is that very few of our motor activities are in cycling groups of 7, 11, 13, 17, 19 etc.  Also there's been a fair amount of quibbling about on this thread about the commonality of 4\/4 time. Many musical phenomenons follow Zipf distributions, which are the long tailed distributions that are defined by power law functions. 'Zipf's law states that given some corpus of natural language utterances, the frequency of any word is inversely proportional to its rank in the frequency table. Thus the most frequent word will occur approximately twice as often as the second most frequent word, three times as often as the third most frequent word, etc.' I strongly suspect that time signature is in that grouping, although I've only found one paper that has some strong evidence that in a corpus of 48 million bar length patterns from 48,176 pieces of music rhythmic analysis 4\/4 time accounts for 4,305,516 or 90.3% of the total. 3\/4, the next highest rank distribution, by contrast accounts for 3.9%. In any case we can say that in certain corpuses of music we find 4\/4 is overwhelmingly common and given the dominance of western music right now a cross cultural meta analysis would almost certainly find the same results.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":315.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"16p5q3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is there a neurology\/psychology based explanation of why almost all music is in common (4\/4) time?","c_root_id_A":"c7ye2wa","c_root_id_B":"c7yel9c","created_at_utc_A":1358398861,"created_at_utc_B":1358400548,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I think for everyone who doesn't understand complex time signatures and  music theory, it's just the easiest to comprehend.","human_ref_B":">\"From a meta-analysis of studies of brain-damaged patients with lesions localized in various regions of the brain, it was suggested that the \"rhythmic component ... of an auditory image cannot be activated without recruiting neural systems known to be involved in motor activity, expecially those involved in the planning of motor sequences\" (Carroll-Phelan 1994; see also Peretz 1993). Such neuropsychological data have allowed hypotheses about the induction of a sense of beat or pulse in terms of the so-called sensorimotor loop, which includes the posterior parietal lobe, pre-motor cortex, cerebro-cerebellum, and basal ganglia. In the sensorimotor perspective, a perceived beat is literally an imagined movement; it seems to involve the same neural facilities as motor activity, most notably motor-sequence planning. (Todd 1997) Hence, the act of listening to music involves the same mental processes that generate bodily motion.\"  So following from the hypothesis that our listening of music involves recruiting our motor activity regions we could ask what are the embodied rhythms that we most commonly experience? Walking, running, dancing, basically everything we do on two legs (assuming we have both of them and they work) are all 2 limit rhythms (2\/4, 4\/4). So the bodily activities that we have to activate to listen to music are most common in our daily lives are also in 4\/4 and are most likely more neurologically connected than more complex rhythms. Part of the reason higher prime complex rhythms (like 7\/8, 11\/8, 13\/8, ect) when played straight might feel like cats in washing machines to us is that very few of our motor activities are in cycling groups of 7, 11, 13, 17, 19 etc.  Also there's been a fair amount of quibbling about on this thread about the commonality of 4\/4 time. Many musical phenomenons follow Zipf distributions, which are the long tailed distributions that are defined by power law functions. 'Zipf's law states that given some corpus of natural language utterances, the frequency of any word is inversely proportional to its rank in the frequency table. Thus the most frequent word will occur approximately twice as often as the second most frequent word, three times as often as the third most frequent word, etc.' I strongly suspect that time signature is in that grouping, although I've only found one paper that has some strong evidence that in a corpus of 48 million bar length patterns from 48,176 pieces of music rhythmic analysis 4\/4 time accounts for 4,305,516 or 90.3% of the total. 3\/4, the next highest rank distribution, by contrast accounts for 3.9%. In any case we can say that in certain corpuses of music we find 4\/4 is overwhelmingly common and given the dominance of western music right now a cross cultural meta analysis would almost certainly find the same results.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1687.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"16p5q3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is there a neurology\/psychology based explanation of why almost all music is in common (4\/4) time?","c_root_id_A":"c7ye2wa","c_root_id_B":"c7yehzz","created_at_utc_A":1358398861,"created_at_utc_B":1358400233,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I think for everyone who doesn't understand complex time signatures and  music theory, it's just the easiest to comprehend.","human_ref_B":"This is something we explored in my evolution of human behavior course last semester. The tempo and production of music directly relates to our culture and evolutionary history. Someone was right when they said non western music isn't the same. Chinese and eastern music sounds very off key and out of line for us, but it is due to language differences. However, when individuals who produced music differently came together they were able to use their own styles to produce a cohesive song.  Music produced in groups has been shown to align brainwaves and increase social bonds. Even subtle  physiological changes occur just from extending a note or shortening a note. In one study, when exposed to multiple types of music never heard before and asked about their emotions individuals descriptions matched cross culturally.    Many primates such as Gibbons are known to \"sing\" together to mark their territory and increase social bonds. Orangutans also use \"long calls\" to accomplish similar territorial goals. These songs each have their own structure, tempo and rules. Yet, individuals modify their songs. So it may very well be that music has an evolutionary path. I believe data proves a more primitive vocalization system dependent upon tonal recognition and song modification similar to African Grey's and other primates is where language got its origins and that human language is simply a highly evolved rhythmic communication system.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1372.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"c6xebv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Where does Prejudice + Power come from People often use the prejudice + power definition as a way to define racism. Where does this definition come from and why is it good or useful?  (And what are alternatives to it?)","c_root_id_A":"esbxevg","c_root_id_B":"esbp95c","created_at_utc_A":1561814796,"created_at_utc_B":1561804844,"score_A":11,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"As the other user has correctly pointed out, this is a recurrent question. Quite understandably, considering how widespread it has become on the Internet, and thus it has become part of popular science.  However, I do have some reservations about many of the responses given in the past, as they often appear to be partial. A complete answer to your question and to similar questions should clearly highlight that how racism is defined and operationalized depends on several factors, including: field\/discipline, subfield\/discipline, specific theoretical perspectives, the specific object and goal of a study, the specific scholar. I would also suggest the usefulness of understanding the recent history of racism as a scientific object. There is no widespread consensus that racism equals power plus prejudice in the social sciences, at least not like the Internet makes it appear.  For illustration, if you take a psychological or social psychological study about racism, it is likely that racism is either explicitly or implicitly construed as racial prejudice. In which case, the concept of 'power' (which can also have several definitions) is neither a necessary condition nor a sufficient condition. An important and influential researcher in this context is Gordon Allport, author of The Nature of Prejudice. But let's go in order.   ---  Many authors concur that our contemporary understanding of racism began in the 1930s. According to Banton \"the concept of racism dates only from the 1930\" even though there are \"practices in earlier centuries that some historians] consider racist\". Before, there was what is called [scientific racism, the belief that *scientifically* there exist different human races. In that period, racism was particularly meaningful in the context of Nazism, as Nazi authors were invested in developing these ideas. As Webster et al. explain:  >Nonetheless, we acknowledge that **\u201cprejudice\u201d generally became synonymous with racial and ethnic prejudices in the 1930s as the study of \u201crace psychology\u201d** (studies that investigated and maintained white superiority) **evolved into studies on race prejudice** (Samelson, 1978), that is, **until other group prejudices were astutely examined starting in the 1950s** (e.g., religious, gender, and sexual prejudices; see Allport, 1954\/1979, for early discussions on this work).  Gordon Allport is an influential author, at least for psychologists. His book on The Nature of Prejudice is an important text in the history of the study of -isms and prejudice. His definition of racial or ethnic prejudice follows:  >A]n antipathy based upon a faulty and and inflexible generalization. It may be felt or expressed. It may be directed toward a group as a whole, or toward an individual because he is a member of that group.  And racists \"seem to be people who, out of their own anxieties, have manufactured the demon of race\". Earlier in the book, he shares these illustrations of prejudice:  >In Rhodesia, a white truck driver passed a group of idle natives and muttered, \"They're lazy brutes\". A few hours later he saw natives heaving two-hundred pounds sacks of grain onto a truck, singing in rythm to their work. \"Savages,\" he grumbled. \"What do you expect?\".  >In one of the West Indies it was customary at one time for natives to hold their noses conspicuously whenever they passed an American on the street. And in England, during the war, it was said, \"The only trouble with Yanks is that they are over-paid, over-sexed, and over here.\"  ---  Therefore, prejudice can go in all directions and the definition of prejudice is not exclusive to certain social groups (higher social status, wealthier, etc.). It is understood, at least in psychology, that prejudice underlies -isms. Allport was not making an argument that racism is separate from racial (or ethnic) prejudice. To illustrate, I quote [Dion:  >**Prejudice** (i.e., **biased and usually negative attitudes toward social groups and their members**), **racism** (a **negatively oriented prejudice toward certain groups seen as biologically different and inferior** to one\u2019s own), and discrimination (unfair behavior or unequal treatment accorded others on the basis of their group membership or possession of an arbitrary trait, such as skin color) have been favored topics of research and theorizing for many years by psychologists\u2014especially social and personality psychologists\u2014around the world. Of these three concepts, prejudice is perhaps the most central and important. **Prejudice underlies racism and is also believed to motivate acts of discrimination.**   To conclude, I quote Renfrow and Howard:  >There has also been some backlash, with members of majority categories sometimes asserting a reverse sexism (toward men), reverse racism (toward Whites), and\/or reverse ethnocentrism (toward, say, Anglos). **It is certainly the case that any human being learns biases as a part of the cultures and societies in which we are raised and live**. Women can be sexist; **people of color can be racist**. Indeed, one might argue that **any member of contemporary U.S. society is sexist, racist, and ethnocentric, also able-ist, age-ist, and so forth, because it would be virtually impossible not to be**. Social power relations structure how these biases are expressed and what influences they may or may not have. But individuals have agency; they \u2013 we \u2013 can actively become conscious of and work against such prejudicial stereotypes and identities (Devine, 1989)  >**It is a social psychological truism that names and language matter.** As Richards ( 1997 ) notes, because language provides the terms in which we understand the social world, language is also a key arena in which attempts to alter those understandings are fought. **The terms used to describe the social systems we focus on in this chapter have at times been the focus of intense struggles. We attempt to use the terms preferred by the people and groups to which they refer, where that is ascertainable. It is important to note, however, that there is often considerable slippage**. \u201cWhite\u201d is a misnomer, but \u201cCaucasian\u201d is no better. \u201cBlack\u201d has different connotations in the U.S. than in, for example, Brazil. \u201cStraight\u201d meant something quite different in the 1950s than it does now. We simply ask the reader to be aware of the insufficiencies of language.  ---  Racism defined as power plus prejudice came several years after the evolution of racism as an object of study concerning racial and ethnic prejudices, in a period of time characterized by societal upheaval (e.g. the Civil Rights Movement in the USA). As far as I am aware, it is agreed that this concept appeared around the 1970s in the context of scholarship on anti-racist education: Patricia Bidol introduced the notion in her book about racist awareness and Judy Katz popularized the concept in her book about White Awareness in which she explicitly defines racism in the following manner:  >**It is important to push for the understanding that racism is** ***prejudice plus power*** **and that, therefore, Third World people cannot be racist against Whites in the United States.** Third World people **can be prejudiced against Whites**, but clearly they **do not have the power to enforce** that prejudice. Although participants may not at this point totally accept this view or feel comfortable with it, it is important to establish the concept as a working definition.","human_ref_B":"This comes up pretty often. Some places to start:  https:\/\/reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/10pky7\/sociological_definition_of_racismsexism\/?st=jqxj0dd7&sh=19c6483a  https:\/\/reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/40iwvr\/i_see_many_argue_its_impossible_to_be_racist\/?st=jqxj0eqb&sh=de92d274  https:\/\/reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/2to4re\/is_prejudice_power_racism_given_preference_or\/?st=jqxj0gbw&sh=9f59c8af  https:\/\/reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/3j8wl6\/is_there_any_literature_on_the_existence_or_lack\/?st=jqxj0hzi&sh=ddf55d34  https:\/\/reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/1kq6e6\/racism_prejudice_power_is_this_a_legitimate\/?st=jqxj0iyf&sh=9416c34e  https:\/\/reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/3smkja\/why_cant_black_people_be_racist\/?st=jqxj0kj9&sh=141f5246  https:\/\/reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/1cl6rs\/im_not_sure_if_this_belongs_here_but_can_other\/?st=jqxj0mdo&sh=ff206317  https:\/\/reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/1l2gwp\/what_are_the_sociological_definitions_of_racism\/?st=jqxj0rhf&sh=a8a3679b  https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/ag5jq5\/when_where_and_how_did_the_only_white_people_can\/?st=jrcu9fho&sh=24c78f8c  https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/az5rgq\/who_changed_the_definition_of_racism_to_power\/?st=jxhe9rda&sh=0c677c7d","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9952.0,"score_ratio":1.1}
{"post_id":"xdbax9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Is there evidence harsh sentences (including the death penalty) deter certain crimes (not murder)? Does research exist? People say the death penalty doesn't deter murder (US states with death pen don't have lower murder rates) and that for some crimes (eg murder, rape) perpetrators aren't thinking rationally enough to be stopped by the potential punishment, and that perpetrators don't believe they will be caught anyway. I also see people say capital punishment and other harsh punishments don't reduce the overall crime rate, but how much can it be used to change what types of crimes are committed?  What about armed robbery? Is there evidence that the death penalty or a more serious sentence for using a gun can shift people from armed robbery to unarmed robbery or other forms of theft? Some legal systems have a higher sentence for robbery when a gun is involved - does this deter the involvement of firearms during crimes?  Indonesia, China, Vietnam, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia and some other countries sometimes use the death penalty for drug trafficking. Has this reduced drug trafficking or shifted the methods used by drug traffickers?  Is there any difference in effect depending on what other societal factors are present? Like a society that doesn't have as much social problems and lack of opportunity (richer countries with relatively broad, effective safety nets and social mobility) compared to societies that are developing and have less equality, equality of opportunity, more absolute poverty, more corruption?  I imagine the answer is yes on some level, since obviously things being illegal vs legal deters crime that was previously done in a relaxed manner from being done so openly, such as when previously legal drugs are made illegal, future drug sales become more secretive, even if societal attitude to the crime hasn't actually changed (so it's definitely about the risk of punishment and not due to other factors like societal shaming). But to what extent, I don't know.","c_root_id_A":"iobxvoe","c_root_id_B":"ioapti2","created_at_utc_A":1663115399,"created_at_utc_B":1663097455,"score_A":13,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Altogether, research does not support the manner in which deterrence theory is applied in countries - such as the US - which focus primarily on *severity* of punishment. Contrariwise, other factors should be given more attention, namely *certainty* and *celerity* of punishment - which are also part of the theory as originally advocated by its intellectual fathers, Cesare Beccaria and Jeremy Bentham. To quote Michael Tonry (2018):  >I make no claim of offering a comprehensive account of research on deterrence, but draw on efforts by others to do that in Nagin, Cullen, and Jonson\u2019s *Deterrence, Choice, and Crime* and elsewhere. **The five key lessons are these:**   >* **Harsher punishments deter violent, property, and drug crimes no more effectively than lesser ones.**  >* Sentences to imprisonment, all else about particular offenders being equal, do not reduce the likelihood of reoffending but instead appear to increase it.  >* **The death penalty is not a more effective deterrent to homicide than other available punishments.**  >* In economists\u2019 theories, increases in the certainty or severity of punishment should increase deterrent effects, but **mandatory minimum sentences, lengthy prison terms, and laws increasing sentence severity have in practice failed to do so.**  >* Police efforts to increase the likelihood of identification and apprehension of offenders appear to decrease the incidence of crime.  With respect to capital punishment in particular, there is *no credible evidence* for *any* effect on violent crime. Although research on the death penalty mainly concerns its putative effects on homicide^(1), there is little reason to believe that it is somehow effective at deterring other violent and nonviolent crimes. With respect to the use of capital punishment for drug-related offences in particular, Girelli \\(2019\\) provides the following observation in a report published by Harm Reduction International:  >**After decades of policies that rely on harsh punishment, and the threat and spectacle of executions, there is no evidence that the death penalty has any unique deterrent effect on either the supply or the use of controlled substances.** In fact, the opposite appears to be true: the 2018 World Drug Report, published by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), admits that in spite of punitive approaches to drug control, the drug market is booming, and a \u201cpotential supply-driven expansion of drug markets, with production of opium and manufacture of cocaine at the highest levels ever recorded\u201d is expected. The UNODC Regional Office for Southeast Asia \u2013 where most retentionist countries for drug offences are located \u2013 recently acknowledged that the production and trafficking of methamphetamine in the region has been increasing steadily, and is now reaching \u201calarming levels\u201d.  And elsewhere in the same report:  >More generally, punitive drug policies around the world fail to produce positive results because they ignore mounting evidence about defining aspects of drug use and drug markets. **In the same way, the death penalty simply cannot work as a tool of drug control and supply reduction, because in making it the cornerstone of their drug policies, governments choose to ignore the reasons that determine many to engage in the drug market** (such as coercion, ignorance of the consequences or lack of economic opportunities) **and the power dynamics shaping it.** Finally, **any measure that aims to work as a deterrent must be predictable and certain. Domestic narcotics laws, however, are extremely diverse and varied** (as the table at page 28 shows), **each punishing different crimes, types and quantities of drugs, insomuch that they are simply unfit to successfully deter any behaviour; even less those which are by nature transnational, such as many drug offences.**  ---  Overall, based on what is currently known about crime, criminality, prevention, etc., and on currently available evidence, the idea that pursuing harsher punishment is an effective criminal policy - regardless of which crime is targeted - is unsupported.  For further elaboration, here is a list of threads in this subreddit on the topic (from newest to oldest):  * what are the main theories on what leads to deterrence ?  * How valid is this study purporting a deterrent effect for the death penalty?  * Does fear of severe punishment decrease the crime rate?  * Is there a consensus on how long prison sentences should be ?  * Does harsh punishments reduce crime  * Why isn't the risk of imprisonment enough to deter most violent crime worldwide?  ---  ^(1) ^(This is not true for research on deterrence more broadly.)  ---  Tonry, M. (2018). An honest politician\u2019s guide to deterrence: Certainty, severity, celerity, and parsimony. In Deterrence, choice, and crime (pp. 365-391). Routledge.  Girelli, G. (2019). The death penalty for drug offences: Global Overview 2018. Harm Reduction International.","human_ref_B":"At least based on US measures of the implementation of more severe punishment (AKA deterrence theory), the answers vary significantly based on the type of crime and type of punishment. After the implementation of 3 strikes laws, California experienced a 17-20% decrease amongst felons with 2 strikes (Helland and Tabarrok 2006). While this does show a decrease, this still means that many, many peoples' lives were thrown away after their third felony. Is it really worth a 20% decrease in crime to put people in prison for the rest of their lives? I don't have the answer to that.  &#x200B;  The problem with the death penalty is that there is no counterfactual (Manski and Pepper 2013). Additionally, the death penalty is not equitably distributed amongst those convicted of murder. A large part of deterrence theory is related to the certainty of punishment.  &#x200B;  For further reading on this subject, check out Google Scholar and search the deterrence theory of criminology. I hope this helps.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17944.0,"score_ratio":1.4444444444}
{"post_id":"1pukrr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Which economists\/organizations are focusing on development of poor regions in highly developed countries? I've taken quite a few economic development classes and, understandably, they all tend to focus on the issues and policy options for the development of the Global South.  I would like to read about the issues and options for poor regions in highly developed countries. Policy options for LDCs often do not translate well to regions within developed countries. From what I gather, most research in this area focuses on urban areas. I am more interested in rural areas, specifically Southern Appalachia. However, I would still love to read any research or case studies on urban areas that might apply to these regions.  Thanks in advance.","c_root_id_A":"cd6bjqe","c_root_id_B":"cd6dnfg","created_at_utc_A":1383544017,"created_at_utc_B":1383554166,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"While I don't have much to offer specifically, I'd also be highly interested in the answer. Many macroeconomists work on inequality, but at a highly general level.  Urban econ guys might be a good place for urban issues, of course.  Ag econ might be one place to look for rural issues? Maybe? I'm reaching here...","human_ref_B":"Good question. From a AgEcon perspective, I'd say it's generally a gap in research. This is the case for a number of reasons, not least of all being the relative concern research bodies and their funders have for extreme cases of poverty in the developing world as opposed to those pockets of poverty within the developed one.  I am struggling to find someone specifically working on the topic, though I would imagine there exists work being done somewhere looking at these areas. A cursory search on Google Scholar for rural development in Appalachia, however, turns up little past 2000.  One region that does get more research on it is rural development within EU member states, as the '2nd Pillar' of the EU Common Agricultural Policy focuses on rural development and sustainable countryside livelihoods. Grethe's 'Agricultural policy: What roles for the EU and the member states?' is a good look at this area.  Two other papers to look at would be Binswanger & Rosenzweig's 'Behavioural and Material Determinants of Production Relations in Agriculture' and Chang's 'Rethinking public policy in agriculture - Lessons from history, distant and recent'.  The former (Binswanger) is a classic work looking at the conditions for (lack of) development in rural societies. It's useful in putting together some ideas for what topics might be of importance or worth stressing in all rural areas lacking development, so it would be of interest to developing research in under-developed regions no matter where they are. The second is a very good look at the history of both developed and developing countries' agricultural policies. It also does't deal directly with this question, but would be of interest for someone trying to piece together exactly what the conditions of rural development are in currently-developed regions.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10149.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1pukrr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Which economists\/organizations are focusing on development of poor regions in highly developed countries? I've taken quite a few economic development classes and, understandably, they all tend to focus on the issues and policy options for the development of the Global South.  I would like to read about the issues and options for poor regions in highly developed countries. Policy options for LDCs often do not translate well to regions within developed countries. From what I gather, most research in this area focuses on urban areas. I am more interested in rural areas, specifically Southern Appalachia. However, I would still love to read any research or case studies on urban areas that might apply to these regions.  Thanks in advance.","c_root_id_A":"cd6gqz3","c_root_id_B":"cd6bjqe","created_at_utc_A":1383574061,"created_at_utc_B":1383544017,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Roland Fryer does a lot of research on inner city education and its' challanges in the United States. He's a great researcher, so that's for the urban part.  This paper was presented last year in a conference I went to, it's about the decline of manufacturing in the \"Rust Belt\" and how it relates to labor unions: http:\/\/economics.sas.upenn.edu\/system\/files\/event_papers\/RB.pdf","human_ref_B":"While I don't have much to offer specifically, I'd also be highly interested in the answer. Many macroeconomists work on inequality, but at a highly general level.  Urban econ guys might be a good place for urban issues, of course.  Ag econ might be one place to look for rural issues? Maybe? I'm reaching here...","labels":1,"seconds_difference":30044.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"r940z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"I hear quite often from my fellow students that \"we should produce all our food locally\". This notion doesn't fit well with me but I have difficulty thinking about the multiple angles. Do you guys have any thoughts? I struggle with thinking about this issue in a concise manner, I'm curious what your thoughts are on the notion that we should produce all or most of our food locally. For context, I live in the Maritimes of Canada.   Some of the more common arguments that I hear my fellow students spout are:  (1) Locally grown food cuts down on emissions via reduced transportation. Reduced emissions being a positive thing.  (2) More control over our food supply being a goal worthy of pursuit.   (3) More abstract arguments like society being more \"connected\" with where its food comes from.  Above all else, the big problem I see with the idea is whether it's even plausible. If we were to eat only what we ate in Canada, we would cut out a lot of things from our diet. Not to mention I imagine that it's quite simply impossible for Canada to produce all it's own food, given the reduction of our national farming industry over the past half-century.   It's an issue I intend to learn more about, however I'd be curious to hear your perspectives.","c_root_id_A":"c43xbpq","c_root_id_B":"c43yqk5","created_at_utc_A":1332461808,"created_at_utc_B":1332469399,"score_A":7,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Along the transportation\/fuel argument, there is likely a lot more fuel used in the production of the food than the transportation of it. Factory farms can leverage economies of scale to use less resources per unit of food, from fertilizer and water to the fuel used to power tractors (hey, circling back!). Why do people think factory farmed food is cheaper than local food? Their input costs are cheaper. Some of that may be in socially appropriate ways like wages for the pickers, but I'm willing to bet a decent portion is in higher input costs like I listed earlier  You also rightly mention seasonality\/locality issues. You wont be drinking orange juice in Minnesota anymore, and you'll probably be canning your fruits and veges during the winter in everywhere but California\/Florida.    Control over food supply is certainly a good thing. Local produce tends to be higher quality, use less pesticides, and supports the local economy. It has its places, and it also shouldn't be taken to the extreme.","human_ref_B":"Hoo boy.  (1) is true, but it is a drop in the bucket compared to WHAT you eat. A paper not too long ago concluded that eating wholly local food produces less emissions benefit than cutting meat out of your diet for just one meal a week, because transportation is such a small portion of the emissions budget--far more emissions go into production, due to economies of scale as others have mentioned. [Here is one paper on the subject] (http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0306919208000997); there are better ones, but I can only find this one at the moment, unfortunately.   (2) What does \"control\" mean? This is a meaningless claim. The notion that you have more control over how the food an individual eats is produced because it is closer to you is very difficult to prove or support. Short of visiting each individual farm, how are you going to know how your food is produced? Does the average person have the resources or time to do that? You still have to take your producer's word for how it is produced in most cases. \"Local\" is not analogous to \"trustworthy\". Similarly, if you mean \"as a nation\", in most developed countries, control over the food supply is about as tight as it will ever get due to the complicated system of subsidies, price floors and ceilings, and so forth.   (3) is so abstract as to be almost meaningless. If you want \"connection\" to your food, grow it yourself. The abstract benefits \"connectedness\" can hardly be argued in any practical context.  Others have mentioned, appropriately, that it's not plausible. It's *possible*, but not plausible. To truly follow localism to its true logical extreme, you would have to cut out all foods that are produced at some arbitrary distance (usually 100 miles to localists). This means, in the winter, subsisting entirely on preserved foods, and eliminating any food that can't be produced in the local environment. Are your classmates willing to give up olive oil? Citrus fruits, grapes, peaches, and bananas? Rice? Shrimp? None of these things can be produced in the Maritimes in its natural environment, and producing them in an \"unnatural\" way (through greenhouse technology) would result in crazy increases in emissions and prices. It seems like your classmates don't understand that producing \"all or most things locally\" means exceedingly deep and pervasive changes not just in what is produced, but what they can eat, when, and how much it will cost. That doesn't even take into account the nutritional shortfalls of such a diet, or the catastrophes that can result from droughts or extreme weather. Think about the areas of Africa or Asia that have little access to the global food system. When disaster strikes, they don't buy food from other areas--they starve. You could argue that \"a developed country could buy food in such a situation\", but keep in mind that, if everything was local, they COULDN'T, because the global food system would have collapsed. Localism taken to its logical extreme causes this.   For a shorter answer, you can just tell them that localism has a lot of cachet, but most scientists scoff at it because its purported benefits have no basis in scientific analysis.   *Edit: I accidentally a word.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7591.0,"score_ratio":2.2857142857}
{"post_id":"r940z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"I hear quite often from my fellow students that \"we should produce all our food locally\". This notion doesn't fit well with me but I have difficulty thinking about the multiple angles. Do you guys have any thoughts? I struggle with thinking about this issue in a concise manner, I'm curious what your thoughts are on the notion that we should produce all or most of our food locally. For context, I live in the Maritimes of Canada.   Some of the more common arguments that I hear my fellow students spout are:  (1) Locally grown food cuts down on emissions via reduced transportation. Reduced emissions being a positive thing.  (2) More control over our food supply being a goal worthy of pursuit.   (3) More abstract arguments like society being more \"connected\" with where its food comes from.  Above all else, the big problem I see with the idea is whether it's even plausible. If we were to eat only what we ate in Canada, we would cut out a lot of things from our diet. Not to mention I imagine that it's quite simply impossible for Canada to produce all it's own food, given the reduction of our national farming industry over the past half-century.   It's an issue I intend to learn more about, however I'd be curious to hear your perspectives.","c_root_id_A":"c43yqk5","c_root_id_B":"c43y7mi","created_at_utc_A":1332469399,"created_at_utc_B":1332466579,"score_A":16,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Hoo boy.  (1) is true, but it is a drop in the bucket compared to WHAT you eat. A paper not too long ago concluded that eating wholly local food produces less emissions benefit than cutting meat out of your diet for just one meal a week, because transportation is such a small portion of the emissions budget--far more emissions go into production, due to economies of scale as others have mentioned. [Here is one paper on the subject] (http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0306919208000997); there are better ones, but I can only find this one at the moment, unfortunately.   (2) What does \"control\" mean? This is a meaningless claim. The notion that you have more control over how the food an individual eats is produced because it is closer to you is very difficult to prove or support. Short of visiting each individual farm, how are you going to know how your food is produced? Does the average person have the resources or time to do that? You still have to take your producer's word for how it is produced in most cases. \"Local\" is not analogous to \"trustworthy\". Similarly, if you mean \"as a nation\", in most developed countries, control over the food supply is about as tight as it will ever get due to the complicated system of subsidies, price floors and ceilings, and so forth.   (3) is so abstract as to be almost meaningless. If you want \"connection\" to your food, grow it yourself. The abstract benefits \"connectedness\" can hardly be argued in any practical context.  Others have mentioned, appropriately, that it's not plausible. It's *possible*, but not plausible. To truly follow localism to its true logical extreme, you would have to cut out all foods that are produced at some arbitrary distance (usually 100 miles to localists). This means, in the winter, subsisting entirely on preserved foods, and eliminating any food that can't be produced in the local environment. Are your classmates willing to give up olive oil? Citrus fruits, grapes, peaches, and bananas? Rice? Shrimp? None of these things can be produced in the Maritimes in its natural environment, and producing them in an \"unnatural\" way (through greenhouse technology) would result in crazy increases in emissions and prices. It seems like your classmates don't understand that producing \"all or most things locally\" means exceedingly deep and pervasive changes not just in what is produced, but what they can eat, when, and how much it will cost. That doesn't even take into account the nutritional shortfalls of such a diet, or the catastrophes that can result from droughts or extreme weather. Think about the areas of Africa or Asia that have little access to the global food system. When disaster strikes, they don't buy food from other areas--they starve. You could argue that \"a developed country could buy food in such a situation\", but keep in mind that, if everything was local, they COULDN'T, because the global food system would have collapsed. Localism taken to its logical extreme causes this.   For a shorter answer, you can just tell them that localism has a lot of cachet, but most scientists scoff at it because its purported benefits have no basis in scientific analysis.   *Edit: I accidentally a word.","human_ref_B":"It's not a terrible idea.    I think you're asking us to find ways to disagree with these points, but I could expand why they have merit greater weight than you seem to give them, and what information you need to have in order to break the assumption at their core if you really want to try and debate the notion.  I \"do\" debate, so looking at this as though it were a case run against me in a round...  I think it's a pretty tight case for \"for\" and you've taken on a bit of a losing proposition seeking to try and break it.  > (1) Locally grown food cuts down on emissions via reduced transportation. Reduced emissions being a positive thing.   I find it hard to believe you think greater emissions would instead be a good thing.  I feel this, assuming the a-to-b connection is made, is a solid point, tied to a recognizable first principle - that of reducing pollution.    The \"intuitive\" point made here is that trucking things a great distance creates more pollution than trucking things shorter distances.  I, personally, buy this logic.    As for reducing emissions, this topic aint my bag, so I'm not going to look up emissions of transport trucking produce for you.  However: if you want to kill this point, you need to demonstrate that the intuitive \"trucking shit places makes emissions\" is invalid because \"not trucking shit places creates *more* emissions.\"  Otherwise, emissions\/pollution have recognizable harms that I don't think you, I, or anyone who is not a climate-change denialist could reasonably desire to attempt to deconstruct.    > (2) More control over our food supply being a goal worthy of pursuit.   Why not?  In a debate, I would far rather take \"THW control its own food supply\" over \"THW allow another State full control over its food supply.\"  I, again, have trouble understanding why you might push back against this.    The premise of course being that if we're producing it, we can't get cut off if [America] decides they aren't feeling like selling us [onions?] this week.  Of course, this seems like a silly premise - but what if there's crop failure or shortages?  At that point, the producing nation typically comes first, and customer nations get the leftovers - at greatly inflated prices, because of scarcity.    If we control our own means of production, not only are we self-sufficient if American crops fail, but we can (probably) buy from the America if our crops fail.  If both crops fail, well, we're fucked.  But no more or less fucked than before we started growing our own.    If you want to break this, you need to show that there is a specific reason why we should *not* be agriculturally independant.  ...In a formal debate, I'd concede that point.  I can't even think of how to break this without going into the absurd.    > (3) More abstract arguments like society being more \"connected\" with where its food comes from.  No clue.  But, you don't seem to get it either so at least we're even.  In a round, this would either be a dropped point - where a team just doesn't get or engage with something the other team said, or a bogus one - where the argument doesn't make sense.    Try and determine what first principle they're rooting \"connection to food\" in and trace the steps between \"what is good?\" and \"why that means this point should stand\".    I probably would pick something like a produce quality argument based in lower commute times, so more root-ripened fresh produce, rather than truck-ripened industrial produce, which IIRC is nutritionally sub-par because root-ripening allows the food to \"finish,\" and \"ripeness\" is a cue for when food is at its peak to be *picked*, not just eaten.  But that's just me.    \"Emotional connection\" points, if that's what they're up to, don't survive \"uh, factual claim, cite please\" or the like.  Just don't let it stand un-challenged, and the point is yours.    __________  With the last paragraph, you make a lot of assumptions, many of which I suspect are rooted in some faulty understanding of the topic.    >If we were to eat only what we ate in Canada, we would cut out a lot of things from our diet.  First off, semantics: if we were to eat what we eat, nothing changes.    Assuming you meant \"eat what is native to Canada,\" admittedly that is a very different diet.  But that is also what is known as a \"straw man\" - you've misrepresented their actual argument, and then refuted the misrepresentation.    Strict \"grown locally\" doesn't assume natural growing conditions, merely local.  Natural greenhouses, for instance, render tomatoes \"in season\" four months of the year in rainy Vancouver.  Naturally grown tomatoes, by contrast, get 1 - 2 months, depending on that particular year's weather.  Heated, and even more, heated & lit greenhouses can get you a 12-month growing season, as with BC Hothouse peppers and Tomatoes.    More conventional \"grown locally\" movements ask for growing the majority of food locally, while importing some luxury items that would otherwise be unavailable, such as your tropical fruit.    >Not to mention I imagine that it's quite simply impossible for Canada to produce all it's own food,   ...Are you stupid?  Sorry, but seriously?  We have the second-largest landmass in the world.  If grown local is \"inside Canada,\" we're in the gravy, easy.  A lot of it is not prime growing land, but it's not like we don't have space to put up a few hydroponic greenhouses.  Fuck, do it somewhere zany like the Canadian Shield, where there's loads of space no one wants.  Insulate, electric lights, and it's relatively easily done.  With modern industrial farming techniques, space, water, and power are conceivably the only meaningful needs.    >given the reduction of our national farming industry over the past half-century.  This is what's known as an \"implementation challenge\" - the weak little brother of logical refutation: technical barriers aren't a huge point in a debate unless they are core to the model, as they are in the case of making time demands, for instance.  If they want Canada to be agriculturally independent in ten years, they can go fuck themselves.  If they want Canada to work towards a goal of eventually being agriculturally independent, then \"it would take work and money\" is kind of a moot point.  It is anything *but* \"impossible\" were the nation to make it a priority.    Grown local is rarely so generous as \"within the same nation\" - if that's the case you're opposing, you're pretty much hosed.  Local production typically sets a distance limit, which makes implementation of many small industrial farms a much larger challenge, and one that would need to be assessed in a financial viability or cost\/benefit analysis at which point the case becomes \"free burden\" - you are both attempting to convincingly espouse an ideology, rather than disputing contrasting supporting evidence or logical pitfalls.    In short, the main challenge to \"grown locally\" is the one you don't seem to have brought up, which is the key question of \"how?\" - from a purely academic stance, \"grown locally\" is incredibly strong logically, it's only in practical application that it becomes challenging.  If your answer to \"if time and money were of no object, would X be good or bad in its effects\" is \"well, I guess good,\" your only challenge to it is implementation.  Which as I mentioned, is kinda the weak little brother of logical refutation in a debate.  You can say \"it won't work\" as much as you want, and they'll keep going \"worthy goal\" and you'll just talk past each other until you get bored and part company.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2820.0,"score_ratio":5.3333333333}
{"post_id":"r940z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"I hear quite often from my fellow students that \"we should produce all our food locally\". This notion doesn't fit well with me but I have difficulty thinking about the multiple angles. Do you guys have any thoughts? I struggle with thinking about this issue in a concise manner, I'm curious what your thoughts are on the notion that we should produce all or most of our food locally. For context, I live in the Maritimes of Canada.   Some of the more common arguments that I hear my fellow students spout are:  (1) Locally grown food cuts down on emissions via reduced transportation. Reduced emissions being a positive thing.  (2) More control over our food supply being a goal worthy of pursuit.   (3) More abstract arguments like society being more \"connected\" with where its food comes from.  Above all else, the big problem I see with the idea is whether it's even plausible. If we were to eat only what we ate in Canada, we would cut out a lot of things from our diet. Not to mention I imagine that it's quite simply impossible for Canada to produce all it's own food, given the reduction of our national farming industry over the past half-century.   It's an issue I intend to learn more about, however I'd be curious to hear your perspectives.","c_root_id_A":"c43y7mi","c_root_id_B":"c4444ow","created_at_utc_A":1332466579,"created_at_utc_B":1332513592,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"It's not a terrible idea.    I think you're asking us to find ways to disagree with these points, but I could expand why they have merit greater weight than you seem to give them, and what information you need to have in order to break the assumption at their core if you really want to try and debate the notion.  I \"do\" debate, so looking at this as though it were a case run against me in a round...  I think it's a pretty tight case for \"for\" and you've taken on a bit of a losing proposition seeking to try and break it.  > (1) Locally grown food cuts down on emissions via reduced transportation. Reduced emissions being a positive thing.   I find it hard to believe you think greater emissions would instead be a good thing.  I feel this, assuming the a-to-b connection is made, is a solid point, tied to a recognizable first principle - that of reducing pollution.    The \"intuitive\" point made here is that trucking things a great distance creates more pollution than trucking things shorter distances.  I, personally, buy this logic.    As for reducing emissions, this topic aint my bag, so I'm not going to look up emissions of transport trucking produce for you.  However: if you want to kill this point, you need to demonstrate that the intuitive \"trucking shit places makes emissions\" is invalid because \"not trucking shit places creates *more* emissions.\"  Otherwise, emissions\/pollution have recognizable harms that I don't think you, I, or anyone who is not a climate-change denialist could reasonably desire to attempt to deconstruct.    > (2) More control over our food supply being a goal worthy of pursuit.   Why not?  In a debate, I would far rather take \"THW control its own food supply\" over \"THW allow another State full control over its food supply.\"  I, again, have trouble understanding why you might push back against this.    The premise of course being that if we're producing it, we can't get cut off if [America] decides they aren't feeling like selling us [onions?] this week.  Of course, this seems like a silly premise - but what if there's crop failure or shortages?  At that point, the producing nation typically comes first, and customer nations get the leftovers - at greatly inflated prices, because of scarcity.    If we control our own means of production, not only are we self-sufficient if American crops fail, but we can (probably) buy from the America if our crops fail.  If both crops fail, well, we're fucked.  But no more or less fucked than before we started growing our own.    If you want to break this, you need to show that there is a specific reason why we should *not* be agriculturally independant.  ...In a formal debate, I'd concede that point.  I can't even think of how to break this without going into the absurd.    > (3) More abstract arguments like society being more \"connected\" with where its food comes from.  No clue.  But, you don't seem to get it either so at least we're even.  In a round, this would either be a dropped point - where a team just doesn't get or engage with something the other team said, or a bogus one - where the argument doesn't make sense.    Try and determine what first principle they're rooting \"connection to food\" in and trace the steps between \"what is good?\" and \"why that means this point should stand\".    I probably would pick something like a produce quality argument based in lower commute times, so more root-ripened fresh produce, rather than truck-ripened industrial produce, which IIRC is nutritionally sub-par because root-ripening allows the food to \"finish,\" and \"ripeness\" is a cue for when food is at its peak to be *picked*, not just eaten.  But that's just me.    \"Emotional connection\" points, if that's what they're up to, don't survive \"uh, factual claim, cite please\" or the like.  Just don't let it stand un-challenged, and the point is yours.    __________  With the last paragraph, you make a lot of assumptions, many of which I suspect are rooted in some faulty understanding of the topic.    >If we were to eat only what we ate in Canada, we would cut out a lot of things from our diet.  First off, semantics: if we were to eat what we eat, nothing changes.    Assuming you meant \"eat what is native to Canada,\" admittedly that is a very different diet.  But that is also what is known as a \"straw man\" - you've misrepresented their actual argument, and then refuted the misrepresentation.    Strict \"grown locally\" doesn't assume natural growing conditions, merely local.  Natural greenhouses, for instance, render tomatoes \"in season\" four months of the year in rainy Vancouver.  Naturally grown tomatoes, by contrast, get 1 - 2 months, depending on that particular year's weather.  Heated, and even more, heated & lit greenhouses can get you a 12-month growing season, as with BC Hothouse peppers and Tomatoes.    More conventional \"grown locally\" movements ask for growing the majority of food locally, while importing some luxury items that would otherwise be unavailable, such as your tropical fruit.    >Not to mention I imagine that it's quite simply impossible for Canada to produce all it's own food,   ...Are you stupid?  Sorry, but seriously?  We have the second-largest landmass in the world.  If grown local is \"inside Canada,\" we're in the gravy, easy.  A lot of it is not prime growing land, but it's not like we don't have space to put up a few hydroponic greenhouses.  Fuck, do it somewhere zany like the Canadian Shield, where there's loads of space no one wants.  Insulate, electric lights, and it's relatively easily done.  With modern industrial farming techniques, space, water, and power are conceivably the only meaningful needs.    >given the reduction of our national farming industry over the past half-century.  This is what's known as an \"implementation challenge\" - the weak little brother of logical refutation: technical barriers aren't a huge point in a debate unless they are core to the model, as they are in the case of making time demands, for instance.  If they want Canada to be agriculturally independent in ten years, they can go fuck themselves.  If they want Canada to work towards a goal of eventually being agriculturally independent, then \"it would take work and money\" is kind of a moot point.  It is anything *but* \"impossible\" were the nation to make it a priority.    Grown local is rarely so generous as \"within the same nation\" - if that's the case you're opposing, you're pretty much hosed.  Local production typically sets a distance limit, which makes implementation of many small industrial farms a much larger challenge, and one that would need to be assessed in a financial viability or cost\/benefit analysis at which point the case becomes \"free burden\" - you are both attempting to convincingly espouse an ideology, rather than disputing contrasting supporting evidence or logical pitfalls.    In short, the main challenge to \"grown locally\" is the one you don't seem to have brought up, which is the key question of \"how?\" - from a purely academic stance, \"grown locally\" is incredibly strong logically, it's only in practical application that it becomes challenging.  If your answer to \"if time and money were of no object, would X be good or bad in its effects\" is \"well, I guess good,\" your only challenge to it is implementation.  Which as I mentioned, is kinda the weak little brother of logical refutation in a debate.  You can say \"it won't work\" as much as you want, and they'll keep going \"worthy goal\" and you'll just talk past each other until you get bored and part company.","human_ref_B":"Steven Landsburg had an interesting column on it a while back, critiquing a critic of the Locovore movement (Budiansky).  Well worth reading, but here are the important bits:   > Locovores] prefer that which is local to that which comes from afar . . . because of the energy spent to truck it across the country\u201d.  > [T]he alternative to that California tomato might be one grown in a lavishly heated greenhouse in the Hudson Valley, and at a higher energy cost. [So Budiansky adds] up the energy costs of growing and transporting food in different locations. The implicit recommendation seems to be that when you\u2019re choosing a tomato, you should care about all the energy costs.  > Well, yes. You should. You should care about all those costs. And here are some other things you should care about: How many grapes were sacrificed by growing that California tomato in a place where there might have been a vineyard? How many morning commutes are increased, and by how much, because that New York greenhouse displaces a conveniently located housing development? What useful tasks could those California workers perform if they weren\u2019t busy growing tomatoes? What about the New York workers? What alternative uses were there for the fertilizers and the farming equipment \u2014 or better yet, the resources that went into producing those fertilizers and farming equipment \u2014 in each location?  > How, then, could one ever hope to do the right computation? How can we possibly gather enough information to compare the opportunity costs of land, fertlizers, equipment, workers, transportation and energy costs (among many others) and reach a conclusion about which tomato imposes the fewest costs on our neighbors?  > Well, it turns out there\u2019s actually a way to do that. You do it by looking at a single number that does an excellent job of reflecting all those costs. That number is known as the price of the tomato... Markets are not perfect, so the price of a tomato does not, with 100% accuracy, reflect the social cost of acquiring that tomato. But in most circumstances it comes damn close, and in virtually all circumstances it comes a lot closer than Budiansky\u2019s sort of crabbed accounting.  [Source.  Landsburg is pretty ideological, and often I think he ignores the weightier human issues for a clean mechanistic evaluation, but he's not consistently ideological one way or another, and he's always thought provoking, so take it for what its worth.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":47013.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"r940z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"I hear quite often from my fellow students that \"we should produce all our food locally\". This notion doesn't fit well with me but I have difficulty thinking about the multiple angles. Do you guys have any thoughts? I struggle with thinking about this issue in a concise manner, I'm curious what your thoughts are on the notion that we should produce all or most of our food locally. For context, I live in the Maritimes of Canada.   Some of the more common arguments that I hear my fellow students spout are:  (1) Locally grown food cuts down on emissions via reduced transportation. Reduced emissions being a positive thing.  (2) More control over our food supply being a goal worthy of pursuit.   (3) More abstract arguments like society being more \"connected\" with where its food comes from.  Above all else, the big problem I see with the idea is whether it's even plausible. If we were to eat only what we ate in Canada, we would cut out a lot of things from our diet. Not to mention I imagine that it's quite simply impossible for Canada to produce all it's own food, given the reduction of our national farming industry over the past half-century.   It's an issue I intend to learn more about, however I'd be curious to hear your perspectives.","c_root_id_A":"c4444ow","c_root_id_B":"c43ys0m","created_at_utc_A":1332513592,"created_at_utc_B":1332469609,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Steven Landsburg had an interesting column on it a while back, critiquing a critic of the Locovore movement (Budiansky).  Well worth reading, but here are the important bits:   > Locovores] prefer that which is local to that which comes from afar . . . because of the energy spent to truck it across the country\u201d.  > [T]he alternative to that California tomato might be one grown in a lavishly heated greenhouse in the Hudson Valley, and at a higher energy cost. [So Budiansky adds] up the energy costs of growing and transporting food in different locations. The implicit recommendation seems to be that when you\u2019re choosing a tomato, you should care about all the energy costs.  > Well, yes. You should. You should care about all those costs. And here are some other things you should care about: How many grapes were sacrificed by growing that California tomato in a place where there might have been a vineyard? How many morning commutes are increased, and by how much, because that New York greenhouse displaces a conveniently located housing development? What useful tasks could those California workers perform if they weren\u2019t busy growing tomatoes? What about the New York workers? What alternative uses were there for the fertilizers and the farming equipment \u2014 or better yet, the resources that went into producing those fertilizers and farming equipment \u2014 in each location?  > How, then, could one ever hope to do the right computation? How can we possibly gather enough information to compare the opportunity costs of land, fertlizers, equipment, workers, transportation and energy costs (among many others) and reach a conclusion about which tomato imposes the fewest costs on our neighbors?  > Well, it turns out there\u2019s actually a way to do that. You do it by looking at a single number that does an excellent job of reflecting all those costs. That number is known as the price of the tomato... Markets are not perfect, so the price of a tomato does not, with 100% accuracy, reflect the social cost of acquiring that tomato. But in most circumstances it comes damn close, and in virtually all circumstances it comes a lot closer than Budiansky\u2019s sort of crabbed accounting.  [Source.  Landsburg is pretty ideological, and often I think he ignores the weightier human issues for a clean mechanistic evaluation, but he's not consistently ideological one way or another, and he's always thought provoking, so take it for what its worth.","human_ref_B":"Just going to mention an important issue that hasn't been brought up yet, and that's the notion of sustainability and security of the level of food production.  One of the big \"problems\" with the current food supply is that it's largely based on \"monoculture,\" rather than \"polyculture.\"  Part of this issue is that you could have 10,000 acres of corn, and every single one of those corn plants is an exact genetic clone of a plant created in a lab 10 years ago. This type of monoculture may be fine for a single 10,000 acre patch, but what if this exact type of plant provides 10% of the food supply? Sure it's been designed to produce a high yield, but as with all things, it can be dangerous to put too many of your eggs in one basket.  If a blight were to come through that affects corn, ideally you want as much genetic variation as possible, and with monoculture you don't have that. You may even get a blight that effects only a certain variety of corn, and if that variety happens to be the monoculture, the effects will be swift and devastating. When food is grown locally, this type of monoculture is dificult to sustain because of the variety of growing conditions.  In other words, Acme corn grows great in Iowa, but the growing season is too short in Canada for Acme corn, forcing Canadian growers to use Widget corn, introducing genetic variety to the total corn population. Then, what if there are floods in Iowa?  Well, at least there's corn in Canada. The cold logic of capitalism, however, suggests that we simply grow the crops where it is most productive or most profitable to do so, so if it's cheaper to buy Iowa corn at the Canadian market than it is to buy Canadian corn at the same market, then only the farmers in Iowa will make money growing corn.  If I haven't been clear about the point that I'm trying to make, here it is: growing and buying food locally is more expensive, but it allows for a more robust food production system.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":43983.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"r940z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"I hear quite often from my fellow students that \"we should produce all our food locally\". This notion doesn't fit well with me but I have difficulty thinking about the multiple angles. Do you guys have any thoughts? I struggle with thinking about this issue in a concise manner, I'm curious what your thoughts are on the notion that we should produce all or most of our food locally. For context, I live in the Maritimes of Canada.   Some of the more common arguments that I hear my fellow students spout are:  (1) Locally grown food cuts down on emissions via reduced transportation. Reduced emissions being a positive thing.  (2) More control over our food supply being a goal worthy of pursuit.   (3) More abstract arguments like society being more \"connected\" with where its food comes from.  Above all else, the big problem I see with the idea is whether it's even plausible. If we were to eat only what we ate in Canada, we would cut out a lot of things from our diet. Not to mention I imagine that it's quite simply impossible for Canada to produce all it's own food, given the reduction of our national farming industry over the past half-century.   It's an issue I intend to learn more about, however I'd be curious to hear your perspectives.","c_root_id_A":"c442eex","c_root_id_B":"c4444ow","created_at_utc_A":1332497183,"created_at_utc_B":1332513592,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Price in a competitive market accurately reflects the resources necessary to produce a good. Buy the cheapest produce (that tastes good) you can find. Not only will you do your pocketbook a favor, you'll be doing the planet a favor too.","human_ref_B":"Steven Landsburg had an interesting column on it a while back, critiquing a critic of the Locovore movement (Budiansky).  Well worth reading, but here are the important bits:   > Locovores] prefer that which is local to that which comes from afar . . . because of the energy spent to truck it across the country\u201d.  > [T]he alternative to that California tomato might be one grown in a lavishly heated greenhouse in the Hudson Valley, and at a higher energy cost. [So Budiansky adds] up the energy costs of growing and transporting food in different locations. The implicit recommendation seems to be that when you\u2019re choosing a tomato, you should care about all the energy costs.  > Well, yes. You should. You should care about all those costs. And here are some other things you should care about: How many grapes were sacrificed by growing that California tomato in a place where there might have been a vineyard? How many morning commutes are increased, and by how much, because that New York greenhouse displaces a conveniently located housing development? What useful tasks could those California workers perform if they weren\u2019t busy growing tomatoes? What about the New York workers? What alternative uses were there for the fertilizers and the farming equipment \u2014 or better yet, the resources that went into producing those fertilizers and farming equipment \u2014 in each location?  > How, then, could one ever hope to do the right computation? How can we possibly gather enough information to compare the opportunity costs of land, fertlizers, equipment, workers, transportation and energy costs (among many others) and reach a conclusion about which tomato imposes the fewest costs on our neighbors?  > Well, it turns out there\u2019s actually a way to do that. You do it by looking at a single number that does an excellent job of reflecting all those costs. That number is known as the price of the tomato... Markets are not perfect, so the price of a tomato does not, with 100% accuracy, reflect the social cost of acquiring that tomato. But in most circumstances it comes damn close, and in virtually all circumstances it comes a lot closer than Budiansky\u2019s sort of crabbed accounting.  [Source.  Landsburg is pretty ideological, and often I think he ignores the weightier human issues for a clean mechanistic evaluation, but he's not consistently ideological one way or another, and he's always thought provoking, so take it for what its worth.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16409.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"30c9lk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What are some good sources on the sociology of the rise of the Christian right and its influence on politics?","c_root_id_A":"cpr41hk","c_root_id_B":"cprdsxv","created_at_utc_A":1427348054,"created_at_utc_B":1427380330,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"*With God on Our Side: The Rise of the Religious Right* by William Martin","human_ref_B":"The Book of Falwell: Fundamentalist Language and Politics","labels":0,"seconds_difference":32276.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"30c9lk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What are some good sources on the sociology of the rise of the Christian right and its influence on politics?","c_root_id_A":"cpr7ey1","c_root_id_B":"cprdsxv","created_at_utc_A":1427361351,"created_at_utc_B":1427380330,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Faith and Election: The Christian Right in Congressional Campaigns 1978- 1988  Uneasy Alliance: Conservative Catholics and the Christian Right  Changing Fortunes: An Analysis of Christian Right Ascendance within American Political Discourse  Political Action Committees of the New Christian Right: A Longitudinal Analysis  Have a look at those and see if there's anything useful. If you don't have JSTOR access you may be able to find them elsewhere, or find papers by the authors of those papers elsewhere.  If you're still struggling, message me and I'll try and find something else for you.","human_ref_B":"The Book of Falwell: Fundamentalist Language and Politics","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18979.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"30c9lk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What are some good sources on the sociology of the rise of the Christian right and its influence on politics?","c_root_id_A":"cpr85ls","c_root_id_B":"cprdsxv","created_at_utc_A":1427364950,"created_at_utc_B":1427380330,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Plenty of suggestions already, but add this one to the pile. Lee Marsden's a senior lecturer at my university and writes on this all the time, including a relatively recent book. Here's an article he wrote for *E-IR* a little while ago, though much of it focuses primarily on foreign policy: http:\/\/www.e-ir.info\/2010\/04\/14\/the-christian-right-and-us-foreign-policy-today\/","human_ref_B":"The Book of Falwell: Fundamentalist Language and Politics","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15380.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1jj1r3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"It is said (especially on Reddit) that the financial sector snatches up a lot of bright scientific and mathematical minds, who instead of doing something \"useful for society\" end up making more money for the rich and powerful. How much truth is in this statement? For the record: No, I'm not one of *those* people. I'm playing Devil's Avocado here.","c_root_id_A":"cbf5a7w","c_root_id_B":"cbfbczc","created_at_utc_A":1375400050,"created_at_utc_B":1375418021,"score_A":15,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Not an answer, but just pointing out that the EconTalk podcast (which is generally on the right, opposing standard democratic economic initiatives) did an interview with a mathematician who went from doing high-end mathematics for Wall Street to working with Occupy Wall Street. It's a very interesting conversation:  http:\/\/www.econtalk.org\/archives\/2013\/02\/cathy_oneil_on.html  (And when I say that EconTalk is on the right, they do so in a (very) academic way. Don't imagine Sean Hannity type hysterics, its not that kind of thing)","human_ref_B":"There was a very interesting article about this in the Yale Daily News two years ago about this.  The article does state that:  >If this year is anything like the last 10, around 25 percent of employed Yale graduates will enter the consulting or finance industry.^1  and goes on to detail what many of these kids would rather do with their lives (from musical theater to opening a restaurant).  It's a well written, thoughtful article.  I recommend it if you're interested in the question.  It's one of the better reflections I've read about it, in part because it goes into some of the alternatives.  For example, one professor in the article wishes that people didn't go into banking and consulting, instead:  >Professor Hill wishes more Yalies would go into the productive economy, i.e. work for the corporations themselves.  >\u201cStudents have these ideologies dropped down on them from the \u201960s and \u201970s about corporations being evil,\u201d he said. \u201cFor some reason people will work for consultants and banks but not for PepsiCo or General Motors.\u201d As for the non-profit world, Hill sees it as a waste of our talents. \u201cIt\u2019s a question of grand strategy,\u201d he said, insisting that our energy is better spent elsewhere.  The article doesn't come to any clear answers because are there any clear answers?  Are Dow, Coke, and Ford more \"useful for society\" than McKinsey, Goldman, and Deloitte?  It's hard to say.  For that matter, is starting a restaurant or acting in musical theater more useful for society than going to work for BCG?  Everything I've read, however, indicates that finance and specialized business services are employing more people from the top universities than they were 20-30 years ago (and there are many books that go into *why* this all is happening--Saskia Sassen's *the Global City* is the first that comes to mind for me) and so if that's the question, the answer is yes.  However, what would those same people being do if they weren't getting jobs in those places?  For those wondering, here's a recent breakdown of where Yalies from the class of 2010 ended up one year after graduation: 21% are enrolled in graduate\/professional study (a fifty year low, down from 64% in 1966), though an additional 49% \"expect to do some kind of graduate\/professional study in the next year or two\" (a fifty year high).  The 21% includes 4% of the total who are in med school and 4% who are in law school.  Most of those engaged in immediate graduate study will end up in one of the other categories, obviously.  About 18% work in education (near the 19% high set the last time the survey was done in 2008, up from 4% in 1970).  11% work in business or finance (high: 22% in 2000, low: 8% in 1975).  16% work in industry, a thirty-five year high (low: 5% in 2002; data only goes back to 1975).  7% are in government or public service, 4% in communications, 4% in health fields (not including medical school), 4% in law related jobs (not including law school), 4% in the fine arts or museums, and one or two percent in several other categories.  If you care, they have a break down of employment by employment area by undergraduate major division (languages & literatures, humanities, social sciences, natural sciences) and by major, as well as several other sets of descriptive statistics.    So yes, more Yale graduates are working in business and finance than 20 years ago (seen by many people as \"not useful\"), but many more also go directly into working in education than 20 years ago (seen by many people as \"useful\").  The question is hard and any simple \"yes\" or \"no\" answer is not going to give you a fair assessment of the issue because ultimately, it's a moral judgement, not an objective one.  *Note 1*: Looking at the data she cites (the second thing I link to), I'm not sure where she gets her 25% number.  I honestly think she may have completely misread the numbers.  Further, it is also not immediately clear to me what counts as \"business\" and what counts as \"industry\" (does someone working in Alcoa or Pfizer's strategy division count as \"business\" or \"industry\"?), and likely the Yalies who filled out the survey had similar uncertainty.  The point remains, however, a significant percentage Yale graduating seniors--and from what I can tell a similar proportion of graduates from peer institutions--end up working in consulting or finance, even if it's not as high as 25%.  edit: added and edited in the first twenty minutes.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17971.0,"score_ratio":1.2666666667}
{"post_id":"1jj1r3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"It is said (especially on Reddit) that the financial sector snatches up a lot of bright scientific and mathematical minds, who instead of doing something \"useful for society\" end up making more money for the rich and powerful. How much truth is in this statement? For the record: No, I'm not one of *those* people. I'm playing Devil's Avocado here.","c_root_id_A":"cbfbczc","c_root_id_B":"cbf6pag","created_at_utc_A":1375418021,"created_at_utc_B":1375404249,"score_A":19,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"There was a very interesting article about this in the Yale Daily News two years ago about this.  The article does state that:  >If this year is anything like the last 10, around 25 percent of employed Yale graduates will enter the consulting or finance industry.^1  and goes on to detail what many of these kids would rather do with their lives (from musical theater to opening a restaurant).  It's a well written, thoughtful article.  I recommend it if you're interested in the question.  It's one of the better reflections I've read about it, in part because it goes into some of the alternatives.  For example, one professor in the article wishes that people didn't go into banking and consulting, instead:  >Professor Hill wishes more Yalies would go into the productive economy, i.e. work for the corporations themselves.  >\u201cStudents have these ideologies dropped down on them from the \u201960s and \u201970s about corporations being evil,\u201d he said. \u201cFor some reason people will work for consultants and banks but not for PepsiCo or General Motors.\u201d As for the non-profit world, Hill sees it as a waste of our talents. \u201cIt\u2019s a question of grand strategy,\u201d he said, insisting that our energy is better spent elsewhere.  The article doesn't come to any clear answers because are there any clear answers?  Are Dow, Coke, and Ford more \"useful for society\" than McKinsey, Goldman, and Deloitte?  It's hard to say.  For that matter, is starting a restaurant or acting in musical theater more useful for society than going to work for BCG?  Everything I've read, however, indicates that finance and specialized business services are employing more people from the top universities than they were 20-30 years ago (and there are many books that go into *why* this all is happening--Saskia Sassen's *the Global City* is the first that comes to mind for me) and so if that's the question, the answer is yes.  However, what would those same people being do if they weren't getting jobs in those places?  For those wondering, here's a recent breakdown of where Yalies from the class of 2010 ended up one year after graduation: 21% are enrolled in graduate\/professional study (a fifty year low, down from 64% in 1966), though an additional 49% \"expect to do some kind of graduate\/professional study in the next year or two\" (a fifty year high).  The 21% includes 4% of the total who are in med school and 4% who are in law school.  Most of those engaged in immediate graduate study will end up in one of the other categories, obviously.  About 18% work in education (near the 19% high set the last time the survey was done in 2008, up from 4% in 1970).  11% work in business or finance (high: 22% in 2000, low: 8% in 1975).  16% work in industry, a thirty-five year high (low: 5% in 2002; data only goes back to 1975).  7% are in government or public service, 4% in communications, 4% in health fields (not including medical school), 4% in law related jobs (not including law school), 4% in the fine arts or museums, and one or two percent in several other categories.  If you care, they have a break down of employment by employment area by undergraduate major division (languages & literatures, humanities, social sciences, natural sciences) and by major, as well as several other sets of descriptive statistics.    So yes, more Yale graduates are working in business and finance than 20 years ago (seen by many people as \"not useful\"), but many more also go directly into working in education than 20 years ago (seen by many people as \"useful\").  The question is hard and any simple \"yes\" or \"no\" answer is not going to give you a fair assessment of the issue because ultimately, it's a moral judgement, not an objective one.  *Note 1*: Looking at the data she cites (the second thing I link to), I'm not sure where she gets her 25% number.  I honestly think she may have completely misread the numbers.  Further, it is also not immediately clear to me what counts as \"business\" and what counts as \"industry\" (does someone working in Alcoa or Pfizer's strategy division count as \"business\" or \"industry\"?), and likely the Yalies who filled out the survey had similar uncertainty.  The point remains, however, a significant percentage Yale graduating seniors--and from what I can tell a similar proportion of graduates from peer institutions--end up working in consulting or finance, even if it's not as high as 25%.  edit: added and edited in the first twenty minutes.","human_ref_B":"For the general comment on why people with graduate STEM degrees go into finance:  Degrees such as \"Masters of Financial Engineering\" typically require individuals to have a background in mathematics. As part of preparing for an economics graduate program I sat in on a mathematical finance course where deriving comparably outdated formulae such as the black-scholes model require an understanding of major concepts of real analysis, especially the integration part in order to understand the stochastic calculus, and partial differential equations.  As a result individuals with a strong understanding of differential equations, typically stressed in physics and engineering programs or particular tracks of mathematics result in those with the best ability to model and forecast financial markets are those with graduate degrees in mathematics, physics, and engineering.  As for the \"doing something useful for society.\"   That's a value judgment that is hard to quantify. It asserts an *a priori* claim about the value of financial markets to the overall well being of individuals to become self fulfilling individuals, typically in the form that root academics in those fields provide greater value to society. Not having a MsFE, or been involved in graduate engineering or physics, I think it'd be hard to quantify objectively.   However, by being somewhat involved in academia right now, I would say there is a lot of value in doing various forms of finance (a lot of people at my department do agricultural finance, which most claim has increased farmers' standard of living quite a bit) compared to publishing in journals only a handful of people might read. Last part is entirely 'in my own opinion,' mind you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13772.0,"score_ratio":2.1111111111}
{"post_id":"uo9f2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"A question for the economists: many people on Reddit seem to believe investing in the market, even long term, is a bad idea because they fear it might not rebound. Is that a real possibility? Is this period in our history fundamentally different than other ones in that sense?","c_root_id_A":"c4x3stt","c_root_id_B":"c4x64vv","created_at_utc_A":1339008157,"created_at_utc_B":1339017289,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"The market is relative, not absolute. So in that respect there is no ground truth where the market \"should\" be. There are arguments that the market is currently overvalued, if this is the case there is no compelling reason to believe it will continue to go up in the medium term.   The market hit its inflation adjusted peak in ~2000, it will take a very significant amount of growth to hit that peak again. It took almost 30 years (and one of the greatest bull markets in US history) for the market to recover from 1929.   See http:\/\/www.multpl.com\/s-p-500-price\/","human_ref_B":"\"Past Performance is Not Indicative of Future Results.\" No one knows what the future will bring, especially economists. If you are young you should invest in indexes that cover us equities, global equities, maybe corporate bonds and real estate. Read that book by David Swenson on investing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9132.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"66qf33","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Is there any evidence for a (positive or negative) connection between the rise of Mass Incarceration in the United States and the steady drop in crime also in the U.S. over the last quarter century? My understanding is that crime has been dropping all over the developed world; but that the rise of mass incarceration is a peculiarly American phenomenon.   However, one could make the na\u00efve assumption that increased incarceration in the U.S. might be a cause of the decrease of crime in the U.S. over the same period of about 25 years.  is there any merit to this na\u00efve assumption? what is the evidence concerning the relationship, if any, between mass incarceration and crime rates?","c_root_id_A":"dgknsdp","c_root_id_B":"dgkmfhf","created_at_utc_A":1492802503,"created_at_utc_B":1492800914,"score_A":18,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"This is a good place to get started. Offers a list of theories on the drop in crime rates with links to resources. I use it for my Intro to Sociology courses and it helps demonstrate how complex the issue is.","human_ref_B":"Have you read Freakonomics? In that book, they attribute the use and rise of abortion and birth control as the most likely factor in the decrease in crime. Very interesting read. If anything, mass incarceration seems to sow the seeds of more crime as it breaks apart families, causes youths to grow up without a father or authority figure, and turn petty criminals into hardened convicts, and the growth of power of gangs within the prison system.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1589.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"5x0hne","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are some of the theories as to why the crime rate drastically rose in the 1960s? If you look at this chart, you can see the crime rate clearly spiked during the sixties and continued for quite some time.  One of my professors claimed that this is because the baby boomers became teenagers around the mid sixties and with teenagers being the ones most likely to participate in crime, the rise in crime was natural.  I've also read that many blame the rise on crime on the Warren Court with Supreme Court cases like *Mapp v. Ohio* (1961), *Escobedo v. Illinois* (1964) and *Miranda v. Arizona* (1966) as they were seen as \"letting criminals run free.\"  Are there any thoughts on this, any data, or anything on this matter? I'm curious what other suggestions are out there.","c_root_id_A":"def1rx7","c_root_id_B":"deez9nm","created_at_utc_A":1488471831,"created_at_utc_B":1488468958,"score_A":11,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I wonder if much of that has to do with more accurate reporting and increased enforcement of violent crime. For example, a fair amount of behavior that we'd categorize as domestic violence today probably would not have been considered criminal in say, the 1940s.   Additionally, in 1960 you might still be having some sort of post-WWII residuals. The murder rate in America was much lower during the war than immediately before and after. Guessing that has something to do with sanctioned outlets for violence, plus so many men being abroad.   http:\/\/www.jrsa.org\/projects\/Historical.pdf","human_ref_B":"So this card stack is focused on why crime rates dropped but the theories still point to your question as they seek to understand crime more generally.   www.vox.com\/cards\/crime-rate-drop  I use this for my sociology courses to help point student toward the various available resources. It is a good place to start in understanding patterns of crime.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2873.0,"score_ratio":1.375}
{"post_id":"hvz318","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What's the difference between a Crusade and a Jihad, I know that a Crusade comes from Christianity and the Jihad is from the Islam but are there any differences or do they mean the same?","c_root_id_A":"fyy2zew","c_root_id_B":"fyxvvjg","created_at_utc_A":1595476053,"created_at_utc_B":1595471641,"score_A":19,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"The simplest answer is that the Crusade**s** were a series of military campaigns involving European Christian and Muslim countries which took place between 1095 (First Crusade) and 1291 (Fall of Acre and the end of the Crusader states). See History.com's page on the crusades for a brief overview of the numbered crusades.  That said, scholars have long debated the definition of \"crusade\" and \"crusading.\" In fact, there is currently an understanding that crusading continued until the 16th century (some even place the end of the crusades at 1798 with the Knights' Hospitaller's loss of Malta). As Phillips explains in an essay for History Today:  >Academic debate moved forwards significantly during the 1980s, as discussion concerning the definition of a crusade gathered real steam. **Understanding of the scope of the Crusades widened with a new recognition that crusading extended far beyond the original 11th-century expeditions to the Holy Land, both in terms of chronology and scope. That is, they took place long after the end of the Frankish hold on the East (1291) and continued down to the 16th century.** With regards to their target, **crusades were also called against the Muslims of the Iberian peninsula, the pagan peoples of the Baltic region, the Mongols, political opponents of the Papacy and heretics** (such as the Cathars or the Hussites). An acceptance of this framework, as well as the centrality of papal authorisation for such expeditions, is generally referred to as the 'pluralist' position.  For illustration, see the Encyclopaedia Britannica:  >Between 1095, when the First Crusade was launched, and 1291, when the Latin Christians were finally expelled from their kingdom in Syria, there were numerous expeditions to the Holy Land, to Spain, and even to the Baltic; **the Crusades continued for several centuries after 1291. Crusading declined rapidly during the 16th century** with the advent of the Protestant Reformation and the decline of papal authority.  And the Ancient History Encyclopedia:  >**The idea of crusading was stretched even further to provide a religious justification for the conquest of the New World in the 15th and 16th century CE.**   In principle, crusades were holy wars meant to reconquer the Holy Land, but the concept proved to be flexible, and to serve not only religious, but also secular (e.g. political) purposes. The Ancient History Encyclopedia has an entry on the panoply of motives which made crusading appealing to different actors.  ---  Jihad often gets conflated with Holy War and\/or confused as an Islamic version of crusade, but that is based on an incorrect understanding of the term, if not straight-up misrepresentation (including by extremists and terrorists themselves). The term itself can mean multiple things, depending on context. To quote the Encyclopaedia Britannica:  >Jihad, (Arabic: \u201cstruggle\u201d or \u201ceffort\u201d) also spelled jehad, in Islam, a meritorious struggle or effort. **The exact meaning of the term jih\u0101d depends on context; it has often been erroneously translated in the West as \u201choly war.\u201d** Jihad, particularly in the religious and ethical realm, primarily refers to the human struggle to promote what is right and to prevent what is wrong.  Also see this brief piece on *The Conversation* by professor of religious studies Mohammad Hassan Khalil:  >**The Arabic term jihad literally means a \u201cstruggle\u201d or \u201cstriving.\u201d This term appears in the Quran in different contexts and can include various forms of nonviolent struggles**: for instance, the struggle to become a better person. This falls under the category of \u201cjihad of the self,\u201d an important subject in Islamic devotional works.  >**In the specific context of Islamic law, however, jihad generally signifies an armed struggle against outsiders.**  >**Medieval scholars of Islamic law delineated two basic forms of armed jihad: defensive jihad**, an armed struggle against invaders; and **aggressive jihad**, a preemptive or offensive attack commissioned by a political authority.  That said, the above does not mean that there have not been wars which have been labelled jihads. Again, per the Encyclopaedia Britannica:  >**Throughout Islamic history, wars against non-Muslims, even when motivated by political and secular concerns, were termed jihads to grant them religious legitimacy.**  However, I would also emphasize the following:  >**In contrast to such extremists, a number of modern and contemporary Muslim thinkers insist on a holistic reading of the Qur\u02be\u0101n, assigning great importance to the Qur\u02be\u0101n\u2019s restriction of military activity to self-defense in response to external aggression.** This reading further leads them to discount many classical rulings on warfare by premodern Muslim jurists as historically contingent and inapplicable in the modern period.  Also check the Harvard Religious Literacy Project which provides several meanings attributed to the term, including for example:  >These are not the only possible meanings of jihad, or even the most popular meanings as understood by Muslims through time and space. **Muslims also speak of a jihad of the tongue and jihad of the pen as ways to express the teachings of Islam. Some Muslims have understood jihad in ethical terms, conceiving of it as a person\u2019s inner struggle against the impulses of the ego, such as greed, anger, and jealousy**\u2014what the Prophet Muhammad himself referred to as the \u201cgreater jihad.\u201d","human_ref_B":"In terms of what they mean, they are two very different things.  Crusades are the series of campaigns that refer specifically to the atttempts by Christian kingdoms from 1095 to 1303 to regain control of Jerusalem. The crusade also include any attempt by the crusaders to gain control of city or fortress that help them in their cause towards gaining control of Jerusalem. You can view the timeline of the Crusades here on Oxford Reference.  Any other war or military campaign by Christian military that has got nothing to do with taking over Jerusalem is not considered a crusade.  Jihad on the other hand, is something more generic. Muslims argue that Jihad has dual meaning. The first refer to the \"inner struggle\" of the individual who is always fighting against temptations etc. The second meaning is \"armed struggle\" of the Muslim community who are fighting against an armed enemy. Source: Question of Jihad.  So, in a nutshell, the crusade is the name of a campaign with a specific political\/military objective. Jihad on the other hand, is something generic.  (Edit: spelling and some phrasing)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4412.0,"score_ratio":1.1176470588}
{"post_id":"1agyu5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Does Urban Sociology lead to mental illnesses (i.e.. depression, schizophrenia)?  If so, how exactly? What makes the urban social structure so different?","c_root_id_A":"c8xdz8e","c_root_id_B":"c8xeiv5","created_at_utc_A":1363550170,"created_at_utc_B":1363551977,"score_A":2,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I suggest reading into the mice world study and see how similar it is to our current situation.","human_ref_B":"There's evidence that depression is, indeed, at least a partial result of our modern lifestyle.  Our ancestors ate more omega 3s, got plenty of sleep, and exercised more, among other things.  This is a pretty good example of what's up.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1807.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1agyu5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Does Urban Sociology lead to mental illnesses (i.e.. depression, schizophrenia)?  If so, how exactly? What makes the urban social structure so different?","c_root_id_A":"c8xfkt8","c_root_id_B":"c8xdz8e","created_at_utc_A":1363555462,"created_at_utc_B":1363550170,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This is a interesting question. I believe when other animal populations are confined to a smaller area hostility arises. [here would be a good start] (http:\/\/scholar.google.com\/scholar?hl=en&q=urban+density+wellbeing&btnG=&as_sdt=1%2C10&as_sdtp=)","human_ref_B":"I suggest reading into the mice world study and see how similar it is to our current situation.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5292.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"72pjbr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Are there any psychological features (like personality traits or illnesses) that can predict taste in music?","c_root_id_A":"dnkhocz","c_root_id_B":"dnkjk9v","created_at_utc_A":1506492498,"created_at_utc_B":1506497157,"score_A":12,"score_B":38,"human_ref_A":"Pierre Bourdieu's _Distinction_ ties taste (including in art and music) to social class. It's a super interesting read, even if you just skip to the charts.","human_ref_B":"Yes. Study 6 in Rentfrow and Gosling in 2003 had about 3000 first year psychology students in two cohorts at a university in Texas do a variety of questionnaires, including the Big Five personality test and tests of self-esteem and depression. Rentfrow & Gosling had also asked the same students to indicate their liking of various genres of music.   Broadly, Rentfrow & Gosling found that music tastes sorted themselves into four categories - 'reflective and complex' music (e.g., jazz, classical, blues), 'intense and rebellious' music (e.g., alternative, metal), 'upbeat and conventional' music (e.g., pop, musicals, country), and 'energetic and rhythmic' music (e.g., soul, hip-hop). That is, people who liked also were more likely to like musicals, and people who liked hip-hop were more likely to like soul. Etc.   They found lots of correlations, but the notable, probably more powerful ones include positive correlations between:  * liking 'upbeat and conventional' music and extraversion, agreeableness, and self-ratings of political conservativism and athleticism (and negative correlations between upbeat and conventional music tastes and both depression scores and self-ratings of political liberalism)  * liking 'energetic and rhythmic' music and extraversion, agreeableness, and self-ratings of political liberalism  * liking 'intense and rebellious' music and openness to experience, and self-ratings of intelligence  * liking 'reflective and complex' music had a  really high correlation (.44 or .41 in two separate cohorts - the rest of these correlations I'm discussing here are largely between .10 and .30) with openness to experience, and with self-ratings of political liberalism, and intellgence (and negative correlations with self ratings of athleticism).  So yes, at a broad level, people who liked conventional, upbeat pop music or hip-hop in 2003 were more likely to be agreeable and extroverted, while people who liked jazz or alternative rock or metal or classical were more likely to have the trait of openness to experience (which correlates with things like being intellectually curious, creative, and self-reflective).  However, one thing to point out here is that half of these genres didn't exist fifty years before this study was done, and the meaning of these genres and the people who are fans of these genres changes over time; the current crop of university students were toddlers when this study was carried out, and they will likely relate to different genres of music in entirely different ways than people did in 2003. And there's certainly subgenres of rock which might be a bit more upbeat and conventional (Nickelback, for better or worse, comes to mind), and subgenres of hip-hop which might be less energetic and rhythmic and more reflective and complex (Kendrick Lamar's *To Pimp A Butterfly* comes to mind as a prominent example).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4659.0,"score_ratio":3.1666666667}
{"post_id":"1lywhs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Did any significant differences in accent develop between East and West Berliners due to the city having been split up? More generally, is a few decades of separation enough to make something like that happen?","c_root_id_A":"cc475xz","c_root_id_B":"cc47lyw","created_at_utc_A":1378658763,"created_at_utc_B":1378660109,"score_A":12,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Good question! In a general way I'd be inclined to say no. However, there have been some changes in the East German dialects that did not happen in the West. Many of the words that the East Germans use are not used in the West. While West Germans would say \"T-Shirt\", an East German would have known \"Nikki\", and likewise with \"Supermarkt\"\/\"Kaufhalle\", \"Overheadprojektor\"\/\"Polylux\", etc. See Zonenkinder by Jana Hensel for more details on these terms (and other explanations of life in the GDR).  Although I have not spent enough time in Berlin to really know the differences (only a couple of weekend trips for me), I would be inclined to say that the differences would be subtle if present, and that the regional dialect of Berlin is more similar with itself than other regions. East Berliners would have been able to (illegally) listen to West German radio and TV, even though they had their own cultural heritage.  There were two Germanies for 40 years; they have been reunited for almost 24 years already. Many young people in Berlin never grew up with the Berlin Wall, and Berlin has become a multicultural, metropolitan city.  Source: Studied German at university  Edit: More sources","human_ref_B":"You should cross-post this on \/r\/linguistics. I'm sure someone there will have knowledge of the subject.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1346.0,"score_ratio":1.0833333333}
{"post_id":"nsvrl4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Why should \"White\" be capitalized - what does this have to do with racism? Someone in my lab was commenting on a manuscript we were critiquing how \"White\" wasn't being capitalized and how this was wrong, but I am not clear on the reason behind this.","c_root_id_A":"h0pfjae","c_root_id_B":"h0p75sa","created_at_utc_A":1622913846,"created_at_utc_B":1622909693,"score_A":30,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"Before addressing your query, a disclaimer: I am convinced that academically we should capitalize both \"Black\" and \"White\" when using these terms to refer to social categories (e.g. 'Black Americans' and 'White Americans'), and personally seek to be as consistent as possible regarding this, unless I believe there are reasons to do otherwise.  ---  Academically, there are multiple manuals which recommend capitalizing both. According to the American Psychological Association (APA style):  >**Racial and ethnic groups are designated by proper nouns and are capitalized. Therefore, use \u201cBlack\u201d and \u201cWhite\u201d instead of \u201cblack\u201d and \u201cwhite\u201d (do not use colors to refer to other human groups; doing so is considered pejorative).** Likewise, capitalize terms such as \u201cNative American,\u201d \u201cHispanic,\u201d and so on. Capitalize \u201cIndigenous\u201d and \u201cAboriginal\u201d whenever they are used. Capitalize \u201cIndigenous People\u201d or \u201cAboriginal People\u201d when referring to a specific group (e.g., the Indigenous Peoples of Canada), but use lowercase for \u201cpeople\u201d when describing persons who are Indigenous or Aboriginal (e.g., \u201cthe authors were all Indigenous people but belonged to different nations\u201d).  Similarly, the American Medical Association (AMA style):  >The committee has concluded that **we will now capitalize both Black and White, which aligns with the capitalization preference applied to other racial\/ethnic categories. We acknowledge that there may be instances in which a particular context may merit exception to this guidance**, for example, in cases for which capitalization could be perceived as inflammatory or otherwise inappropriate.  As for the Chicago Manual of Style:  >So we are taking this opportunity to clarify that, as of today\u2014partly in light of old arguments, partly in light of new, and very much in light of recent and ongoing events and the evidence of a real shift in usage across many sources\u2014**we have joined the ranks of those who \u201cprefer otherwise.\u201d**  >**Specifically, we now prefer to write Black with a capital B when it refers to racial and ethnic identity. At the same time, we acknowledge that, as a matter of editorial consistency, White and similar terms may also be capitalized when used in this sense. We continue to recognize that individual preferences will vary, and we acknowledge that usage may depend on context.** A correction has been made to CMOS Online and will also appear in subsequent printings of the seventeenth edition ...]  >Specifically, **it is no longer accurate to observe, as we did in 2017** when the seventeenth edition was published, **that** \u201c***black*** **and** ***white*** . . . **are usually lowercased.\u201d** Though usage is far from settled, **many writers, editors, and publishers now capitalize one or both terms.**  ---  Now, as hinted in the excerpts I shared, there are ongoing debates. I am not aware of a strong consensus which has been settled. For example, the Associated Press capitalizes \"Black\" but not \"white.\" [The AP argues:  >**After a review and period of consultation, we found, at this time, less support for capitalizing white. White people generally do not share the same history and culture, or the experience of being discriminated against because of skin color.** In addition, AP is a global news organization and there is considerable disagreement, ambiguity and confusion about whom the term includes in much of the world.  >We agree that white people\u2019s skin color plays into systemic inequalities and injustices, and we want our journalism to robustly explore those problems. **But capitalizing the term white, as is done by white supremacists, risks subtly conveying legitimacy to such beliefs.**  >**Some have expressed a view that if we do not capitalize white, we are being inconsistent and discriminating against white people, or, conversely, that we are implying that white is the default. We also took note of the argument that capitalizing the term could pull white people more fully into issues and discussions of race and equality.**   This is not a universal position even among American journalists. For example, the National Association of Black Journalists instead:  >We are updating the organization's style guidance to reflect this determination. **The organization believes it is important to capitalize \"Black\" when referring to (and out of respect for) the Black diaspora.**  >**NABJ also recommends that whenever a color is used to appropriately describe race then it should be capitalized, including White and Brown.**  Likewise, the Diversity Style Guide, too:  >**The Diversity Style Guide has long advocated for the capitalization of White as well as Black.**  ---  Therefore, your mileage may vary. For instance, the anthropological magazine SAPIENS has chosen to capitalize both terms:  >In the past, SAPIENS only capitalized Black upon an author\u2019s request. Now **we join with these other organizations and adopt this change to our magazine\u2019s standard style. (We also will capitalize White and other historical \u201crace\u201d-based terms that are still in use, in contradiction to AP\u2019s recent decision.)** ...]  In discussing why SAPIENS has chosen to do so, and elaborating on the pros- and cons, the author argues:  >On the other hand, **if capitalizing Black is a critical way to make visible the social realities of race and expose the colonial histories of racist thinking, then White people should not be excused from these legacies.** They are neither exempt from history nor unaffected by race and racism.  >**Some who have grown up as White think they don\u2019t have a \u201crace\u201d\u2014an understanding that is often taken-for-granted but is incorrect.** Ideas about \u201cWhiteness\u201d were constructed over time and systematized through legal, religious, sociopolitical (including pop culture), economic, and other means to support the exploitation, annihilation, and oppression of particular groups of \u201cnon-White\u201d people. **White people benefit from being born into the top of the pernicious and persistent racial hierarchy, the power of which has been kept invisible so the system could be perpetuated. This interweaving of privilege and power needs to be unpacked and interrogated.**  >**Historically, \u201cWhiteness\u201d has been viewed as the norm or the default by which other groups are measured against. Thinking of White solely as a physical descriptor erases the fact and impact of White supremacy and White supremacist systems**\u2014and how those have shaped our collective social world. It erases the force of a troubling historic global identity of \u201cWhiteness as domination.\u201d  Philosopher [Kwame Anthony Appaiah argues in an opinion piece  >**Black and white are both historically created racial identities\u2014and whatever rule applies to one should apply to the other.**  And:  >Arguments matter; but only the arguments that win the day will determine what usages become standard, and it\u2019s hard to say in advance which ones that will be. Informal deliberations among a larger community of users will produce a new consensus, and create new facts of language. Words are public property; so are capital letters. **As those deliberations continue, though, let\u2019s try to remember that black and white are both historically created racial identities\u2014and avoid conventions that encourage us to forget this.**  And sociologist poet Eve Ewing argues in a blog post:  >**I haven\u2019t always capitalized \u201cWhite\u201d in my own writing, but I do now.** Here\u2019s why.  >**Whiteness is not only an absence. It\u2019s not a hole in the map of America\u2019s racial landscape. Rather, it is a specific social category that confers identifiable and measurable social benefits.** [...]  >**The terms we use, and the ways we write them, are less about saying or doing the \u201ccorrect\u201d thing,** the thing that will prevent you from getting flamed on Twitter or earning an eye roll in a staff meeting. Rather, **it\u2019s about what we want words to do for us and the arguments we\u2019re trying to make about ourselves and the world through the words we choose.**  >**So, what am I trying to do when I capitalize White?** One of my favorite sci-fi tropes is the archetypal scene in which a character tests whether an invisible force field is present by throwing something at it and then standing back cautiously to observe the almost-imperceptible buzz at the moment of impact. **Where there appears to be nothing at all, there is, in fact, danger. That\u2019s what I hope to do, in a small way, when I capitalize White. I\u2019m throwing a stick at the force field around the McCloskeys. I\u2019m trying to say, in a small way, \u201cI think there\u2019s something there.\u201d**  (Do read the different documents I shared, as most includes elaboration on the common reasons for and against capitalizing \"White,\" of which I sought to provide an overview.)","human_ref_B":"There seems to be a lot of stylistic consistency when it comes to capitalizing Black as a racial or cultural identity, but it's mixed thoughts on whether or not white (or White) should similarly be capitalized.     The AP capitalizes Black but not white and explains it here, where they say that Black people have a similar sense of identity and community that white people don't have. Others have said, as explained in this Atlantic piece, that capitalizing Black but not white is a way of righting a past wrong where Black people were treated as inferior to white people; and capitalizing Black and not white is just payback, racially speaking.  Others opinion pieces at The Atlantic and Washington Post think that so long as we're capitalizing Black we should capitalize White, because there's as much White identity as Black identity and that neither is one big homogenous group. Or another argument is that you should capitalize them both for 'intellectual clarity.'  And it has to do with racism as it has to do with Black people and White people and it's easy just to boil that down to race matters and people disagreeing with another group as racism.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4153.0,"score_ratio":1.3043478261}
{"post_id":"281e8s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Do higher taxes on the wealthy really have an exodus effect and thus negatively affect the economy? I posted this on \/r\/TrueAskRedditand someone suggested that I post it here too.  I advocate strongly for higher taxes than what most countries currently have, especially on the upper class. Note: I'm not talking about close to 100% income tax. We all know that doesn't work.   Anyway, one argument that I often hear against having higher taxes is that it will cause companies and highly trained individuals to leave the country, having a negative effect on the economy. This argument makes a lot of sense to me, however, I would like to know how much truth there is to it.   I've also arguments that higher government spending fuels the economy more than tax cuts of the same amount. This report] (http:\/\/www.americanprogress.org\/issues\/labor\/report\/2011\/09\/08\/10304\/government-spending-versus-tax-cuts\/), for example. This [chart from the report shows the economic activity fuelled by government spending vs tax cuts. This would imply that higher taxes (and thus higher government spending) is better for the economy.  Seeing that these two arguments contradict each other, I would like to know which one has more truth to it. What do you guys think?","c_root_id_A":"ci6l2si","c_root_id_B":"ci6hvcv","created_at_utc_A":1402671446,"created_at_utc_B":1402662523,"score_A":30,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"> Anyway, one argument that I often hear against having higher taxes is that it will cause companies and highly trained individuals to leave the country, having a negative effect on the economy. This argument makes a lot of sense to me, however, I would like to know how much truth there is to it.  This is almost certainly true at some margin. Higher taxes increase the incentives to move elsewhere.  However, there's been a lot of empirical work that suggests that the *size* of the effect is, in fact, quite small.  Piketty Saez Stantcheva's paper on Optimal Taxation of Top Labor Incomes is perhaps the best know paper on this issue.   Abstract:  > This paper presents a model of optimal labor income taxation where top incomes respond to marginal tax rates through three channels: (1) standard labor supply, (2) tax avoidance, (3) compensation bargaining. We derive the optimal top tax rate formula as a function of the three corresponding behavioral elasticities. The first elasticity (labor supply) is the sole real factor limiting optimal top tax rates. The optimal tax system should be designed to minimize the second elasticity (avoidance) through tax enforcement and tax neutrality across income forms. The optimal top tax rate increases with the third elasticity (bargaining) as bargaining efforts are zero-sum in aggregate. We provide evidence using cross-country times series macro-evidence and CEO pay micro-evidence. The macro-evidence from 18 OECD countries shows that there is a strong negative correlation between top tax rates and top 1% income shares since 1960, implying that the overall elasticity is large. However, top income share increases have not translated into higher economic growth. US CEO pay evidence shows that pay for luck is quantitatively more important when top tax rates are low. International CEO pay evidence shows that CEO pay is strongly negatively correlated with top tax rates even controlling for  rm characteristics and performance, and this correlation is stronger in firms with poor governance. These results are consistent with bargaining effects playing a role in the link between top incomes and top tax rates. If bargaining effects in fact exist, optimal tax rates should be higher than commonly assumed.  They suggest that taxation rates of top incomes can go up to around 80% without having large negative effects on economic growth.  Here's a WaPo article about this work. Here is a discussion in r\/economics.  ***  I know I have an answer about tax vs. spending multipliers. I can't find it. Here's \/u\/Integralds, though, who is a better source on this in any case.  My post (which I can't find) argues that the tax\/spending dichotomy is sort of trivial. There are many dimensions over which a stimulus can vary, and that is only one one of them.  As a behavioral economist, I'll note that different framing techniques can change that marginal propensity to consume.   As an empirical economist, I'll note that different sectors show different multipliers.  **edit**: found it!","human_ref_B":"Actually it doesn't even cause high earners to move to the next state over:  >Recent research shows income tax increases cause little or no interstate migration. Perhaps the most carefully designed study to date on this issue concerned the potential migration impact of New Jersey\u2019s 2004 tax increase on filers with incomes exceeding $500,000. It found that while the net out-migration rate of this income group accelerated after the tax increase went into effect, so did the net out-migration rate of filers with incomes between $200,000 and $500,000, and by virtually the same amount. At most, the authors estimated, 70 tax filers earning more than $500,000 might have left New Jersey between 2004 and 2007 because of the tax increase, costing the state an estimated $16.4 million in tax revenue. The revenue gain from the tax increase over those years was an estimated $3.77 billion, meaning that out-migration \u2014 if there was any at all \u2014 reduced the estimated revenue gain from the tax increase by a mere 0.4 percent.  http:\/\/www.cbpp.org\/cms\/?fa=view&id=3556","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8923.0,"score_ratio":1.875}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5by1qh","c_root_id_B":"c5bxsr9","created_at_utc_A":1341924723,"created_at_utc_B":1341922875,"score_A":56,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"\"It only takes 20 years for a liberal to become a conservative without changing a single idea\" - Robert Anton Wilson    Times change, if people don't change with them then their beliefs will become more dated and therefore, often, conservative.  It's not an inevitability but it  is likely.","human_ref_B":"It very much depends on how you define the concepts of people and conservative. In order to find out, you'd have to have clear definitions of what you consider conservative, as well as clearly defined age cohorts. The first part is definitely the trickiest, as it isn't easy to decide what conservative exactly means. You can't define it as having views that oppose progressive views, as then you'd have to define those as well. So all in all, there's a lot more to this question than would appear at first.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1848.0,"score_ratio":3.1111111111}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bxyx0","c_root_id_B":"c5by1qh","created_at_utc_A":1341924182,"created_at_utc_B":1341924723,"score_A":6,"score_B":56,"human_ref_A":"I've certainly become more liberal with age.  I think this depends a lot on historical context and how much of your life you spend watching the other side screw up royally.  As it stands, IMO, I've seen many more problems created by conservativism than I have by liberalism.","human_ref_B":"\"It only takes 20 years for a liberal to become a conservative without changing a single idea\" - Robert Anton Wilson    Times change, if people don't change with them then their beliefs will become more dated and therefore, often, conservative.  It's not an inevitability but it  is likely.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":541.0,"score_ratio":9.3333333333}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5by1qh","c_root_id_B":"c5bxobo","created_at_utc_A":1341924723,"created_at_utc_B":1341921833,"score_A":56,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"\"It only takes 20 years for a liberal to become a conservative without changing a single idea\" - Robert Anton Wilson    Times change, if people don't change with them then their beliefs will become more dated and therefore, often, conservative.  It's not an inevitability but it  is likely.","human_ref_B":"I think it's about perception. As a person grows older the values inherit in a society change (they change all the time). To some you might hold on, some you might change and newer generations will think you are conservative, if you hold on to some or don't change to the \"new\" ones. [edit] but i think that may be just one of many factors","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2890.0,"score_ratio":18.6666666667}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bxsr9","c_root_id_B":"c5c024g","created_at_utc_A":1341922875,"created_at_utc_B":1341934860,"score_A":18,"score_B":50,"human_ref_A":"It very much depends on how you define the concepts of people and conservative. In order to find out, you'd have to have clear definitions of what you consider conservative, as well as clearly defined age cohorts. The first part is definitely the trickiest, as it isn't easy to decide what conservative exactly means. You can't define it as having views that oppose progressive views, as then you'd have to define those as well. So all in all, there's a lot more to this question than would appear at first.","human_ref_B":"Cohort analysis in the US has shown that there is a move towards liberalism as persons age past young adulthood and again as they move past middle age.  This is shown by Glenn here and supported by Dangelis, Hardy and Cutler here, 33 years later.  A decent breakdown of the hypotheses on attitude change is available by Sears here PDF].  Dangelis and Cutler argue [here that older generations are no more likely to adopt conservative \"law and order\" ideas than younger generations, and are just as influenced by overall shifts to conservatism.    Edit: clarification.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11985.0,"score_ratio":2.7777777778}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5byev4","c_root_id_B":"c5c024g","created_at_utc_A":1341927019,"created_at_utc_B":1341934860,"score_A":13,"score_B":50,"human_ref_A":"Data shows that age groups tend to hold distinctive political stances. For example, teenagers are most likely to be libertarians; college aged young people, liberals; career aged (30-60), conservatives; elderly folks, statists.   From a glance, it appears that people become less socially liberal as they age, and where they stand on fiscal issues is related to how economically vulnerable they are (teens, safely under parents' roofs; people in their 20s, out on their own for the first time; older people, solidly in the apex of their careers; the elderly, obviously vulnerable).   What is complicated is that correlation != causation. Like some commenters here mentioned, our political leanings could be byproducts of our society's values (relatively speaking) when we were young. It's not hard to imagine, for instance, that teenagers when they were polled were influenced by Ron Paul - and many of them are in college now, explaining his current popularity on campuses.   It's my semi-educated opinion is that age is both cause and effect. (Social scientists, please feel free to criticize my hypothesis here.) Studies appear to show social liberalism is strongly related to one's fluid intelligence, and people tend to start declining in this department while young (at ~30 years old IIRC). I'm not saying it's the only cause but that it could play a part.   Also, people tend to become more conscientious as they age (at least from 30 to 60). Conservative people tend to be more conscientious. Interestingly enough, one's IQ score is negatively correlated with their conscientiousness. There are possible explanations but that's another topic.   I'm on iPhone right now. Will gladly provide sources if requested (and others are welcome to help out because it could be a while before I get on a computer).","human_ref_B":"Cohort analysis in the US has shown that there is a move towards liberalism as persons age past young adulthood and again as they move past middle age.  This is shown by Glenn here and supported by Dangelis, Hardy and Cutler here, 33 years later.  A decent breakdown of the hypotheses on attitude change is available by Sears here PDF].  Dangelis and Cutler argue [here that older generations are no more likely to adopt conservative \"law and order\" ideas than younger generations, and are just as influenced by overall shifts to conservatism.    Edit: clarification.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7841.0,"score_ratio":3.8461538462}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bymfn","c_root_id_B":"c5c024g","created_at_utc_A":1341928208,"created_at_utc_B":1341934860,"score_A":9,"score_B":50,"human_ref_A":"This is a bit of a misnomer I think. How many generations of data do we really have to look at? How similar are this generations conservatives to last generations? There's a lot of inconsistency.","human_ref_B":"Cohort analysis in the US has shown that there is a move towards liberalism as persons age past young adulthood and again as they move past middle age.  This is shown by Glenn here and supported by Dangelis, Hardy and Cutler here, 33 years later.  A decent breakdown of the hypotheses on attitude change is available by Sears here PDF].  Dangelis and Cutler argue [here that older generations are no more likely to adopt conservative \"law and order\" ideas than younger generations, and are just as influenced by overall shifts to conservatism.    Edit: clarification.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6652.0,"score_ratio":5.5555555556}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bxyx0","c_root_id_B":"c5c024g","created_at_utc_A":1341924182,"created_at_utc_B":1341934860,"score_A":6,"score_B":50,"human_ref_A":"I've certainly become more liberal with age.  I think this depends a lot on historical context and how much of your life you spend watching the other side screw up royally.  As it stands, IMO, I've seen many more problems created by conservativism than I have by liberalism.","human_ref_B":"Cohort analysis in the US has shown that there is a move towards liberalism as persons age past young adulthood and again as they move past middle age.  This is shown by Glenn here and supported by Dangelis, Hardy and Cutler here, 33 years later.  A decent breakdown of the hypotheses on attitude change is available by Sears here PDF].  Dangelis and Cutler argue [here that older generations are no more likely to adopt conservative \"law and order\" ideas than younger generations, and are just as influenced by overall shifts to conservatism.    Edit: clarification.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10678.0,"score_ratio":8.3333333333}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bxobo","c_root_id_B":"c5c024g","created_at_utc_A":1341921833,"created_at_utc_B":1341934860,"score_A":3,"score_B":50,"human_ref_A":"I think it's about perception. As a person grows older the values inherit in a society change (they change all the time). To some you might hold on, some you might change and newer generations will think you are conservative, if you hold on to some or don't change to the \"new\" ones. [edit] but i think that may be just one of many factors","human_ref_B":"Cohort analysis in the US has shown that there is a move towards liberalism as persons age past young adulthood and again as they move past middle age.  This is shown by Glenn here and supported by Dangelis, Hardy and Cutler here, 33 years later.  A decent breakdown of the hypotheses on attitude change is available by Sears here PDF].  Dangelis and Cutler argue [here that older generations are no more likely to adopt conservative \"law and order\" ideas than younger generations, and are just as influenced by overall shifts to conservatism.    Edit: clarification.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13027.0,"score_ratio":16.6666666667}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bz07p","c_root_id_B":"c5c024g","created_at_utc_A":1341930228,"created_at_utc_B":1341934860,"score_A":3,"score_B":50,"human_ref_A":"It has to do with your investment in the system, and a broader perspective. Often young people will throw out sweeping statements of change they want.  \"Global Warming? Stop driving all cars\".  \"Pesticides used on crops? Go 100% organic.\"    In my first example, you would have a much different perspective if you owned two cars and have invested your future in a house in the suburbs.  As your house value would plummet, you wouldn't be able to get to work, and your kids' future prospects would plummet.    In my second eg. millions of people would starve.   So slowing change is considered \"conservative\" to those young people.","human_ref_B":"Cohort analysis in the US has shown that there is a move towards liberalism as persons age past young adulthood and again as they move past middle age.  This is shown by Glenn here and supported by Dangelis, Hardy and Cutler here, 33 years later.  A decent breakdown of the hypotheses on attitude change is available by Sears here PDF].  Dangelis and Cutler argue [here that older generations are no more likely to adopt conservative \"law and order\" ideas than younger generations, and are just as influenced by overall shifts to conservatism.    Edit: clarification.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4632.0,"score_ratio":16.6666666667}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5c024g","c_root_id_B":"c5bzots","created_at_utc_A":1341934860,"created_at_utc_B":1341933328,"score_A":50,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Cohort analysis in the US has shown that there is a move towards liberalism as persons age past young adulthood and again as they move past middle age.  This is shown by Glenn here and supported by Dangelis, Hardy and Cutler here, 33 years later.  A decent breakdown of the hypotheses on attitude change is available by Sears here PDF].  Dangelis and Cutler argue [here that older generations are no more likely to adopt conservative \"law and order\" ideas than younger generations, and are just as influenced by overall shifts to conservatism.    Edit: clarification.","human_ref_B":"Why people get more conservative as they age, you ask? It's all about the fears I think.  Kids can claim to be whoever they want, even anarchists.  When you're 40, got to pay a ton of credits, need to push your idiot son into college, give quite a damn about neighbor's opinion, care about health insurance etc. etc., you gradually become fearful. The more fearful you are, the more you dislike unexpected things that can ruin your imperfect, but at least predictable life full of duty and responsibility. The more you associate change and danger, the easier it is to manipulate you into paranoid rejection of progress. By the time you get old, you think it would be nice to burn books.  Also, paternalism.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1532.0,"score_ratio":16.6666666667}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bxsr9","c_root_id_B":"c5bxobo","created_at_utc_A":1341922875,"created_at_utc_B":1341921833,"score_A":18,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It very much depends on how you define the concepts of people and conservative. In order to find out, you'd have to have clear definitions of what you consider conservative, as well as clearly defined age cohorts. The first part is definitely the trickiest, as it isn't easy to decide what conservative exactly means. You can't define it as having views that oppose progressive views, as then you'd have to define those as well. So all in all, there's a lot more to this question than would appear at first.","human_ref_B":"I think it's about perception. As a person grows older the values inherit in a society change (they change all the time). To some you might hold on, some you might change and newer generations will think you are conservative, if you hold on to some or don't change to the \"new\" ones. [edit] but i think that may be just one of many factors","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1042.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bxyx0","c_root_id_B":"c5byev4","created_at_utc_A":1341924182,"created_at_utc_B":1341927019,"score_A":6,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"I've certainly become more liberal with age.  I think this depends a lot on historical context and how much of your life you spend watching the other side screw up royally.  As it stands, IMO, I've seen many more problems created by conservativism than I have by liberalism.","human_ref_B":"Data shows that age groups tend to hold distinctive political stances. For example, teenagers are most likely to be libertarians; college aged young people, liberals; career aged (30-60), conservatives; elderly folks, statists.   From a glance, it appears that people become less socially liberal as they age, and where they stand on fiscal issues is related to how economically vulnerable they are (teens, safely under parents' roofs; people in their 20s, out on their own for the first time; older people, solidly in the apex of their careers; the elderly, obviously vulnerable).   What is complicated is that correlation != causation. Like some commenters here mentioned, our political leanings could be byproducts of our society's values (relatively speaking) when we were young. It's not hard to imagine, for instance, that teenagers when they were polled were influenced by Ron Paul - and many of them are in college now, explaining his current popularity on campuses.   It's my semi-educated opinion is that age is both cause and effect. (Social scientists, please feel free to criticize my hypothesis here.) Studies appear to show social liberalism is strongly related to one's fluid intelligence, and people tend to start declining in this department while young (at ~30 years old IIRC). I'm not saying it's the only cause but that it could play a part.   Also, people tend to become more conscientious as they age (at least from 30 to 60). Conservative people tend to be more conscientious. Interestingly enough, one's IQ score is negatively correlated with their conscientiousness. There are possible explanations but that's another topic.   I'm on iPhone right now. Will gladly provide sources if requested (and others are welcome to help out because it could be a while before I get on a computer).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2837.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bxobo","c_root_id_B":"c5byev4","created_at_utc_A":1341921833,"created_at_utc_B":1341927019,"score_A":3,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"I think it's about perception. As a person grows older the values inherit in a society change (they change all the time). To some you might hold on, some you might change and newer generations will think you are conservative, if you hold on to some or don't change to the \"new\" ones. [edit] but i think that may be just one of many factors","human_ref_B":"Data shows that age groups tend to hold distinctive political stances. For example, teenagers are most likely to be libertarians; college aged young people, liberals; career aged (30-60), conservatives; elderly folks, statists.   From a glance, it appears that people become less socially liberal as they age, and where they stand on fiscal issues is related to how economically vulnerable they are (teens, safely under parents' roofs; people in their 20s, out on their own for the first time; older people, solidly in the apex of their careers; the elderly, obviously vulnerable).   What is complicated is that correlation != causation. Like some commenters here mentioned, our political leanings could be byproducts of our society's values (relatively speaking) when we were young. It's not hard to imagine, for instance, that teenagers when they were polled were influenced by Ron Paul - and many of them are in college now, explaining his current popularity on campuses.   It's my semi-educated opinion is that age is both cause and effect. (Social scientists, please feel free to criticize my hypothesis here.) Studies appear to show social liberalism is strongly related to one's fluid intelligence, and people tend to start declining in this department while young (at ~30 years old IIRC). I'm not saying it's the only cause but that it could play a part.   Also, people tend to become more conscientious as they age (at least from 30 to 60). Conservative people tend to be more conscientious. Interestingly enough, one's IQ score is negatively correlated with their conscientiousness. There are possible explanations but that's another topic.   I'm on iPhone right now. Will gladly provide sources if requested (and others are welcome to help out because it could be a while before I get on a computer).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5186.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bymfn","c_root_id_B":"c5bxyx0","created_at_utc_A":1341928208,"created_at_utc_B":1341924182,"score_A":9,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"This is a bit of a misnomer I think. How many generations of data do we really have to look at? How similar are this generations conservatives to last generations? There's a lot of inconsistency.","human_ref_B":"I've certainly become more liberal with age.  I think this depends a lot on historical context and how much of your life you spend watching the other side screw up royally.  As it stands, IMO, I've seen many more problems created by conservativism than I have by liberalism.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4026.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bxobo","c_root_id_B":"c5bymfn","created_at_utc_A":1341921833,"created_at_utc_B":1341928208,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I think it's about perception. As a person grows older the values inherit in a society change (they change all the time). To some you might hold on, some you might change and newer generations will think you are conservative, if you hold on to some or don't change to the \"new\" ones. [edit] but i think that may be just one of many factors","human_ref_B":"This is a bit of a misnomer I think. How many generations of data do we really have to look at? How similar are this generations conservatives to last generations? There's a lot of inconsistency.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6375.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bxobo","c_root_id_B":"c5bxyx0","created_at_utc_A":1341921833,"created_at_utc_B":1341924182,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I think it's about perception. As a person grows older the values inherit in a society change (they change all the time). To some you might hold on, some you might change and newer generations will think you are conservative, if you hold on to some or don't change to the \"new\" ones. [edit] but i think that may be just one of many factors","human_ref_B":"I've certainly become more liberal with age.  I think this depends a lot on historical context and how much of your life you spend watching the other side screw up royally.  As it stands, IMO, I've seen many more problems created by conservativism than I have by liberalism.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2349.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bxobo","c_root_id_B":"c5c1926","created_at_utc_A":1341921833,"created_at_utc_B":1341939553,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I think it's about perception. As a person grows older the values inherit in a society change (they change all the time). To some you might hold on, some you might change and newer generations will think you are conservative, if you hold on to some or don't change to the \"new\" ones. [edit] but i think that may be just one of many factors","human_ref_B":"No.  It's about voter participation.     People largely maintain their belief system that they created during what is referred to as the \"formative years\" of political ideological development (this stage largely being influenced by the exposure to post-secondary education **AND their parent's political ideololgy**).  This has the effect of increasing voter participation in those that do attend post-secondary education.   What does increase with age is voter participation.   Since those that attend post-secondary education are most likely liberal leaning and since that slice of the population is a minority their political influence continually wanes as they get older.  This is because non-post secondary educated individuals who hold more conservative viewpoints who didn't vote in their 20's - 30's start voting.  Since their voting block is much bigger than those that attend college, you start to see a \"right of center\" voting pattern in the US.  This is why youth movements are almost always liberal and conservative movements hold a near perfect 40+ voting age.   **TL;DR: There are way more undereducated conservatives but they don't start voting in \"Force\" till they turn 35-40 ish. This gives the allusion that people become conservative with age, but rather its already conservative people who never voted before start voting.**   This is the primary reason Democrats want to expand post-secondary education and Republicans generally oppose such expansion.     Kinda neat huh?    edit: added TL;DR  edit2: stuff about parents","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17720.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bz07p","c_root_id_B":"c5c1926","created_at_utc_A":1341930228,"created_at_utc_B":1341939553,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"It has to do with your investment in the system, and a broader perspective. Often young people will throw out sweeping statements of change they want.  \"Global Warming? Stop driving all cars\".  \"Pesticides used on crops? Go 100% organic.\"    In my first example, you would have a much different perspective if you owned two cars and have invested your future in a house in the suburbs.  As your house value would plummet, you wouldn't be able to get to work, and your kids' future prospects would plummet.    In my second eg. millions of people would starve.   So slowing change is considered \"conservative\" to those young people.","human_ref_B":"No.  It's about voter participation.     People largely maintain their belief system that they created during what is referred to as the \"formative years\" of political ideological development (this stage largely being influenced by the exposure to post-secondary education **AND their parent's political ideololgy**).  This has the effect of increasing voter participation in those that do attend post-secondary education.   What does increase with age is voter participation.   Since those that attend post-secondary education are most likely liberal leaning and since that slice of the population is a minority their political influence continually wanes as they get older.  This is because non-post secondary educated individuals who hold more conservative viewpoints who didn't vote in their 20's - 30's start voting.  Since their voting block is much bigger than those that attend college, you start to see a \"right of center\" voting pattern in the US.  This is why youth movements are almost always liberal and conservative movements hold a near perfect 40+ voting age.   **TL;DR: There are way more undereducated conservatives but they don't start voting in \"Force\" till they turn 35-40 ish. This gives the allusion that people become conservative with age, but rather its already conservative people who never voted before start voting.**   This is the primary reason Democrats want to expand post-secondary education and Republicans generally oppose such expansion.     Kinda neat huh?    edit: added TL;DR  edit2: stuff about parents","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9325.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5bzots","c_root_id_B":"c5c1926","created_at_utc_A":1341933328,"created_at_utc_B":1341939553,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Why people get more conservative as they age, you ask? It's all about the fears I think.  Kids can claim to be whoever they want, even anarchists.  When you're 40, got to pay a ton of credits, need to push your idiot son into college, give quite a damn about neighbor's opinion, care about health insurance etc. etc., you gradually become fearful. The more fearful you are, the more you dislike unexpected things that can ruin your imperfect, but at least predictable life full of duty and responsibility. The more you associate change and danger, the easier it is to manipulate you into paranoid rejection of progress. By the time you get old, you think it would be nice to burn books.  Also, paternalism.","human_ref_B":"No.  It's about voter participation.     People largely maintain their belief system that they created during what is referred to as the \"formative years\" of political ideological development (this stage largely being influenced by the exposure to post-secondary education **AND their parent's political ideololgy**).  This has the effect of increasing voter participation in those that do attend post-secondary education.   What does increase with age is voter participation.   Since those that attend post-secondary education are most likely liberal leaning and since that slice of the population is a minority their political influence continually wanes as they get older.  This is because non-post secondary educated individuals who hold more conservative viewpoints who didn't vote in their 20's - 30's start voting.  Since their voting block is much bigger than those that attend college, you start to see a \"right of center\" voting pattern in the US.  This is why youth movements are almost always liberal and conservative movements hold a near perfect 40+ voting age.   **TL;DR: There are way more undereducated conservatives but they don't start voting in \"Force\" till they turn 35-40 ish. This gives the allusion that people become conservative with age, but rather its already conservative people who never voted before start voting.**   This is the primary reason Democrats want to expand post-secondary education and Republicans generally oppose such expansion.     Kinda neat huh?    edit: added TL;DR  edit2: stuff about parents","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6225.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"wbkoh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people actually become more conservative as they get older and if so, why?","c_root_id_A":"c5c0mtu","c_root_id_B":"c5c1926","created_at_utc_A":1341937174,"created_at_utc_B":1341939553,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I don't think that is necessarily true. It's one of those truisms that is propagated without very much evidence. And, of course, the problem with truisms it that they're generally based only on self-evidence rather than empirical analysis and corroboration.  A few counter-examples spring to mind. One only has to think of someone like John Stuart Mill who became more radical as he got older or, equally, the massive number of older people in the UK who were raised as socialists and trade unionists and have maintained their beliefs whilst those younger than them have adopted less radical centre-left philosophies.","human_ref_B":"No.  It's about voter participation.     People largely maintain their belief system that they created during what is referred to as the \"formative years\" of political ideological development (this stage largely being influenced by the exposure to post-secondary education **AND their parent's political ideololgy**).  This has the effect of increasing voter participation in those that do attend post-secondary education.   What does increase with age is voter participation.   Since those that attend post-secondary education are most likely liberal leaning and since that slice of the population is a minority their political influence continually wanes as they get older.  This is because non-post secondary educated individuals who hold more conservative viewpoints who didn't vote in their 20's - 30's start voting.  Since their voting block is much bigger than those that attend college, you start to see a \"right of center\" voting pattern in the US.  This is why youth movements are almost always liberal and conservative movements hold a near perfect 40+ voting age.   **TL;DR: There are way more undereducated conservatives but they don't start voting in \"Force\" till they turn 35-40 ish. This gives the allusion that people become conservative with age, but rather its already conservative people who never voted before start voting.**   This is the primary reason Democrats want to expand post-secondary education and Republicans generally oppose such expansion.     Kinda neat huh?    edit: added TL;DR  edit2: stuff about parents","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2379.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"rx2kt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Why do jokes become less funny when they have to be explained?","c_root_id_A":"c49ddap","c_root_id_B":"c49eujr","created_at_utc_A":1333762279,"created_at_utc_B":1333771369,"score_A":9,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Comedy bring us together because a shared joke is a shared meaning. A meme, for example, is humorous because we all know the formula and in some way relate to its characters.  Someone \"not getting\" a joke, and thus needing it to be explained, breaks this shared meaning and cheapens the joke's social influence.","human_ref_B":"I may be a linguist, but it's very little I know about joke-telling, but what I do know is this.  Most non-humoristic conversation adheres to Grice's Maxims. Jokes often consist in flouting one or more of these maxims.  If you explain a joke, you most likely do your best to convey the actual information about the joke, hence honoring the maxims in the interest of conveying information in a manner that is almost sure to be understood correctly, which in turn means that in your explanation you won't be showing the disregard for the maxims required for the joke to be funny.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9090.0,"score_ratio":1.2222222222}
{"post_id":"2ijxv3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What do you think about the notion, that the current twenty-somethings are overwhelmed by too many possibilities regarding their career\/life-choices? Plus: Can someone refer me to a study addressing this topic?","c_root_id_A":"cl2uk6p","c_root_id_B":"cl2u9ia","created_at_utc_A":1412693854,"created_at_utc_B":1412693221,"score_A":21,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"The other answers rightfully refer to Sheena Iyengar's research. She has interesting TED talks (link 1, link 2) if you don't want to dig into her papers. Schwartz' research is also closely related, see the other answers.   What she found and what others have found is essentially that people make mistakes when you increase the number of options available in a given choice situation, and that people are better off when they have less options available. Keep in mind that it's a whole research question to know how to measure being better off: should it be self-reported? inferred from behaviour?   However, we don't really know those results are robusts. As a matter of fact, a fellow PhD student tried to replicate her result in a lab setting and the effects disappeared. The problem is also that it's very ideological. Standard economics say that you can only be weakly better off as the number of options increase, but it's not hard to imagine that at some point you might be completely submerged by the number of options available. On the other hand,  having no choice is not great -- just try to tell people who knew USSR that having just one option for everything is great.   I do think there's a a third way. I'm very much in favour of Thaler and Sunstein's libertarian paternalism. Increasing the number of options available *is* great because it increases the odds of finding something you like. However, after decades of research in decision theory, we also know that people are also prone to biases. I think that our goal should be to help people overcome their biases, for example by designing better choice architectures, but without forcing them into anything.","human_ref_B":"There is a book called \"The Paradox of Choice\" by Barry Scwartz. I really agree with what I found in his research.    Here is his Ted Talk http:\/\/www.ted.com\/talks\/barry_schwartz_on_the_paradox_of_choice?language=en","labels":1,"seconds_difference":633.0,"score_ratio":2.1}
{"post_id":"2ijxv3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What do you think about the notion, that the current twenty-somethings are overwhelmed by too many possibilities regarding their career\/life-choices? Plus: Can someone refer me to a study addressing this topic?","c_root_id_A":"cl2tnnh","c_root_id_B":"cl2uk6p","created_at_utc_A":1412691881,"created_at_utc_B":1412693854,"score_A":4,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"I would direct you to this book, *Happiness and Economics*.  Though I will say that a greater number of choices normally corellates with greater stress levels (I cannot find the research at the moment), so it's not a giant leap to think that if a specific generation were presented, across the board, with more and more varied opportunities than the predecessors then it would also be more stressed than the preceding generations.","human_ref_B":"The other answers rightfully refer to Sheena Iyengar's research. She has interesting TED talks (link 1, link 2) if you don't want to dig into her papers. Schwartz' research is also closely related, see the other answers.   What she found and what others have found is essentially that people make mistakes when you increase the number of options available in a given choice situation, and that people are better off when they have less options available. Keep in mind that it's a whole research question to know how to measure being better off: should it be self-reported? inferred from behaviour?   However, we don't really know those results are robusts. As a matter of fact, a fellow PhD student tried to replicate her result in a lab setting and the effects disappeared. The problem is also that it's very ideological. Standard economics say that you can only be weakly better off as the number of options increase, but it's not hard to imagine that at some point you might be completely submerged by the number of options available. On the other hand,  having no choice is not great -- just try to tell people who knew USSR that having just one option for everything is great.   I do think there's a a third way. I'm very much in favour of Thaler and Sunstein's libertarian paternalism. Increasing the number of options available *is* great because it increases the odds of finding something you like. However, after decades of research in decision theory, we also know that people are also prone to biases. I think that our goal should be to help people overcome their biases, for example by designing better choice architectures, but without forcing them into anything.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1973.0,"score_ratio":5.25}
{"post_id":"2ijxv3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What do you think about the notion, that the current twenty-somethings are overwhelmed by too many possibilities regarding their career\/life-choices? Plus: Can someone refer me to a study addressing this topic?","c_root_id_A":"cl2u9ia","c_root_id_B":"cl2tnnh","created_at_utc_A":1412693221,"created_at_utc_B":1412691881,"score_A":10,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"There is a book called \"The Paradox of Choice\" by Barry Scwartz. I really agree with what I found in his research.    Here is his Ted Talk http:\/\/www.ted.com\/talks\/barry_schwartz_on_the_paradox_of_choice?language=en","human_ref_B":"I would direct you to this book, *Happiness and Economics*.  Though I will say that a greater number of choices normally corellates with greater stress levels (I cannot find the research at the moment), so it's not a giant leap to think that if a specific generation were presented, across the board, with more and more varied opportunities than the predecessors then it would also be more stressed than the preceding generations.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1340.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"13xvst","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"I feel that bringing factory jobs back to the US is a step backwards in terms of economic progress.  Is there any truth to this?   Disclaimer: My economics level of knowledge: 2\/10   At one point the US was \"making stuff\" - the industrial revolution brought lots of factory work to the US economy.  We then began automating or outsourcing this as our workforce evolved to suit an information economy - designing, programming, managing, servicing - not so much physical labor or menial work.    I've heard Romney mention multiple times that he would be bringing manufacturing jobs back to the US.  Wouldn't this stifle the progress of both domestic and international economies?  If we have a generation of workers here that can no longer work because they've become specialized in factory work (which is on its way out), wouldn't investing in re-education or training be better than \"easing\" the pain of progress by wrestling antiquated jobs back into our developed economy?","c_root_id_A":"c78662d","c_root_id_B":"c787kub","created_at_utc_A":1354128578,"created_at_utc_B":1354132989,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"From my understanding Romney says that, because he'd rather have industry workers then unemployment. It's simple slogan and politics works this way.  Industry have been outsourced from U.S. because outsourcing was cheaper alternative, right? You'd need either to reduce costs (mainly wages) or raise costs of importing (in form of any trade barrier). One way of reducing costs is loosening immigration law; higher supply of workers will lower the costs. There was an article about that reently in \/r\/economics\/ afair.  Ok, but what about workers? Having mismatch between workers skills and demand from labour market is called structural unemployment and demands actions; either natural movement from employees, or stimulated a little by government. Anyway, the only constant is change, as someone wise once said. In economics destroying something to create something new is called \"creative destruction\", and it's term created by Schumpeter in ~1960's, if you'd like to read more.","human_ref_B":"You are absolutely right. Read up on \"comparative advantage\". Our economy produces some things more cheaply than others. We are no longer able to produce manufactured goods at the lowest opportunity cost, so those jobs moved to where the cost was lowest.   However, because of our high level of college graduates, intellectual property laws, concentration of capital and excellent infrastructure we have a comparative advantage in opportunity costs when producing services and intellectual property.  If we attempt to \"force\" work at a higher cost through government subsidies or legal restrictions, the costs will still be there, they will just be \"hidden\" and paid for through taxation or lost productivity (inefficiency) elsewhere. It's always better for the countries with a comparative advantage to maximize output for that product in which they have the lowest cost of production.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4411.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"13xvst","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"I feel that bringing factory jobs back to the US is a step backwards in terms of economic progress.  Is there any truth to this?   Disclaimer: My economics level of knowledge: 2\/10   At one point the US was \"making stuff\" - the industrial revolution brought lots of factory work to the US economy.  We then began automating or outsourcing this as our workforce evolved to suit an information economy - designing, programming, managing, servicing - not so much physical labor or menial work.    I've heard Romney mention multiple times that he would be bringing manufacturing jobs back to the US.  Wouldn't this stifle the progress of both domestic and international economies?  If we have a generation of workers here that can no longer work because they've become specialized in factory work (which is on its way out), wouldn't investing in re-education or training be better than \"easing\" the pain of progress by wrestling antiquated jobs back into our developed economy?","c_root_id_A":"c78662d","c_root_id_B":"c78f639","created_at_utc_A":1354128578,"created_at_utc_B":1354161659,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"From my understanding Romney says that, because he'd rather have industry workers then unemployment. It's simple slogan and politics works this way.  Industry have been outsourced from U.S. because outsourcing was cheaper alternative, right? You'd need either to reduce costs (mainly wages) or raise costs of importing (in form of any trade barrier). One way of reducing costs is loosening immigration law; higher supply of workers will lower the costs. There was an article about that reently in \/r\/economics\/ afair.  Ok, but what about workers? Having mismatch between workers skills and demand from labour market is called structural unemployment and demands actions; either natural movement from employees, or stimulated a little by government. Anyway, the only constant is change, as someone wise once said. In economics destroying something to create something new is called \"creative destruction\", and it's term created by Schumpeter in ~1960's, if you'd like to read more.","human_ref_B":"Manufacturing output is often conflated with manufacturing jobs.  Output has risen steadily in the US, and continues to trend upward.  At the same time, employment in that sector has trended downward.  Increases in worker productivity are certainly a common and strong indicator of economic progress.  Bringing jobs back, at this point, would mean a massive increase in US manufacturing output, as each manufacturing employee is ridiculously more productive than at the height of US manufacturing employment.  It is a very difficult question to answer satisfactorily what careers and jobs may emerge to employ the portion of labor that has historically been devoted to manufacturing.  It was just as difficult a question before the industrial revolution to predict which jobs would replace the 90%+ of the population that was then devoted to agriculture.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":33081.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"13xvst","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"I feel that bringing factory jobs back to the US is a step backwards in terms of economic progress.  Is there any truth to this?   Disclaimer: My economics level of knowledge: 2\/10   At one point the US was \"making stuff\" - the industrial revolution brought lots of factory work to the US economy.  We then began automating or outsourcing this as our workforce evolved to suit an information economy - designing, programming, managing, servicing - not so much physical labor or menial work.    I've heard Romney mention multiple times that he would be bringing manufacturing jobs back to the US.  Wouldn't this stifle the progress of both domestic and international economies?  If we have a generation of workers here that can no longer work because they've become specialized in factory work (which is on its way out), wouldn't investing in re-education or training be better than \"easing\" the pain of progress by wrestling antiquated jobs back into our developed economy?","c_root_id_A":"c78f639","c_root_id_B":"c78asmp","created_at_utc_A":1354161659,"created_at_utc_B":1354143052,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Manufacturing output is often conflated with manufacturing jobs.  Output has risen steadily in the US, and continues to trend upward.  At the same time, employment in that sector has trended downward.  Increases in worker productivity are certainly a common and strong indicator of economic progress.  Bringing jobs back, at this point, would mean a massive increase in US manufacturing output, as each manufacturing employee is ridiculously more productive than at the height of US manufacturing employment.  It is a very difficult question to answer satisfactorily what careers and jobs may emerge to employ the portion of labor that has historically been devoted to manufacturing.  It was just as difficult a question before the industrial revolution to predict which jobs would replace the 90%+ of the population that was then devoted to agriculture.","human_ref_B":"my thoughts on this are why make something here for $20 an hour when thailand can make it for $1 an hour. this is why we trade. it would be inefficient for us to have manufacturing jobs here.  edit: add on: if we produce here things get more expensive. because it's more costly to produce here than elsewhere so that cost will be reflected on the prices.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18607.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"rlynt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Hypothetical question, how would our country be affected if every citizen was suddenly given $1 million dollars? Ignoring the fact that that amount of money probably doesn't exist, would it cripple our country? The majority of the lower class and probably a decent chunk of the middle class would presumably stop working.  Any interesting speculations?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c46x02h","c_root_id_B":"c46wyt8","created_at_utc_A":1333174229,"created_at_utc_B":1333173907,"score_A":12,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The price level would probably adjust pretty fast to such a huge change.  Most debt would effectively be wiped clean, with beneficial consequences for the borrowers and negative consequences for the lenders.  If people really believed this would never happen again, the economy would carry on as normal at the higher price level.  If they believed this might happen again, that might show up in higher inflation and\/or more inflation-protected contracts.","human_ref_B":"At first the people who could spend it the fastest would benefit first, and then there'd be massive inflation.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":322.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"rlynt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Hypothetical question, how would our country be affected if every citizen was suddenly given $1 million dollars? Ignoring the fact that that amount of money probably doesn't exist, would it cripple our country? The majority of the lower class and probably a decent chunk of the middle class would presumably stop working.  Any interesting speculations?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c46x02h","c_root_id_B":"c46wzks","created_at_utc_A":1333174229,"created_at_utc_B":1333174104,"score_A":12,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The price level would probably adjust pretty fast to such a huge change.  Most debt would effectively be wiped clean, with beneficial consequences for the borrowers and negative consequences for the lenders.  If people really believed this would never happen again, the economy would carry on as normal at the higher price level.  If they believed this might happen again, that might show up in higher inflation and\/or more inflation-protected contracts.","human_ref_B":"One would assume that supply and demand would show that a universal increase in money (inflation is what this is?) would cause a universal increase in the cost of goods and services.  Granted, some people may be more savvy with their million dollars than some others.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":125.0,"score_ratio":2.4}
{"post_id":"rlynt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Hypothetical question, how would our country be affected if every citizen was suddenly given $1 million dollars? Ignoring the fact that that amount of money probably doesn't exist, would it cripple our country? The majority of the lower class and probably a decent chunk of the middle class would presumably stop working.  Any interesting speculations?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c46wyt8","c_root_id_B":"c46wzks","created_at_utc_A":1333173907,"created_at_utc_B":1333174104,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"At first the people who could spend it the fastest would benefit first, and then there'd be massive inflation.","human_ref_B":"One would assume that supply and demand would show that a universal increase in money (inflation is what this is?) would cause a universal increase in the cost of goods and services.  Granted, some people may be more savvy with their million dollars than some others.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":197.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"1qvzef","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"What would happen if every person in the Democratic Republic of the Congo was given $1000? DR Congo is the world poorest country, with a per capita GDP (PPP) of $368. If the world's wealthiest man, Carlos Slim, had his $73 billion fortune evenly divided among all 75.5 million Congolese ($966 each) at the same time, would the Congolese people be better off? Or would inflation rise fast enough to effectively neutralize the cash injection?   Ignore any logistical difficulties that would make the implementation of this difficult; I'm interested in the aftermath of such a scenario.","c_root_id_A":"cdh6r0d","c_root_id_B":"cdh3fhd","created_at_utc_A":1384790735,"created_at_utc_B":1384778478,"score_A":11,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"The disappointing answer is that we do not know. In general, if you give some $1000 more than they had yesterday, they are $1000 better off and, given their discrete set of preferences and constraints, will use that $1000 to increase utility (given the monotonicity of utility). *How* and *how much* better they will be cannot be said. Whether we would see a sudden wisp of utility, burned out quite quick, or an investment would depend very much on each individual's preferences and constraints. It could not easily be argued that they would be *worse off*, but to what extent and for what duration they are better off is hard to say.  Some empirical research exists on cash transfers, but as you would imagine the data is scarce and limited. Here are three papers dealing with the topic, but there are many differences between your example and theirs. Most empirical studies have to use what we have, which are small and targeted cash transfers. Bigger ones (for example, treating the EITC as a cash transfer proxy), don't have the data sets with the appropriate level of detail. So we work with what we have.  'Reassessing Conditional Cash Transfer Programs' (Das, Do, and \u00d6zler 2005) surveys results from a number of small-scale programs and considers two potential goals of such transfers: efficiency (overcoming an externality or market failure) and equity. As this is quite a broad survey, I will only note their conclusion is that such small-scale programs can achieve their targeted goals, although given certain characteristics (e.g. amount transferred, eligibility conditions) of the transfers and programs there can be tensions between the two goals. It's also worth noting most of these are highly targeted programs, meaning they seek to achieve a specific and well-documented shortcoming. These are less about poverty alleviation through general means (as your question) and more about addressing specific issues that contribute or exacerbate poverty.  'Cash or Condition? Evidence from a Cash Transfer Experiment' (Baird, McIntosh, and \u00d6zler 2011) compares unconditional (as per your suggestion) and conditional cash transfers targeting adolescent girls. (The condition was school enrollment). This is a big review of the experiment, and I only have a passing knowledge of it all so I can only give you the headline issues. The performance of conditional vs. unconditional varied depending on the issue being analyzed. Enrollment and dropout-rates were slightly better with conditional, but pregnancy rates better with unconditional (perhaps not surprisingly, the condition is observed). In general, both plans are hit or miss, but conditional ones don't observe any significant gains in efficiency.  'Are cash transfers made to women spent like other sources of income?' (Schady and Rosero 2008) analyzes the impact of cash transfers to women in Ecuador on household food share expenditures, often used as a measure of poverty (argument being that each dollar in additional income goes to food, until food needs are met, at which point food share decreases as additional income is spent on other purposes). They found that cash transfers resulted in higher proportions spent on food, which they took in theory to indicate that cash transfers are not necessarily spent like income. Why this is is not covered, but it could be argued that the uncertainty of regular transfers make it more likely to be used to cover immediate needs, such as food. (The authors suggest that maybe food share expenditure is not a good measure for poverty). The important conclusion for your purposes is their argument that cash transfers cannot be analyzed using welfare analysis as if they were basic income (although, how that could change given regularity of payment, etc., is open to debate).  So, to return to the disappointing answer: we can't say. It's likely that for a subset of that population, we would see real returns on the transfer. For others, little to no change. In general, we could say it is like additional income and the welfare effects are as such (additional income lessening the constraint on demand --> shift in demand curve right, increase consumption, etc.). As Schady and Rosero note, however, that may not apply. Intermittent or uncertain transfers may not be spent like income, and so there may be lopsided or uncertain flows given the qualitative and quantitative characteristics of the transfer.  Edit: Typos\/clarity","human_ref_B":"Not really the answer you're looking for, but check out this podcast from Planet Money about a charity called GiveDirectly that does just what you're saying - give poor rural folk in certain African countries $1000 - no strings attached. Pretty interesting what happens.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12257.0,"score_ratio":1.5714285714}
{"post_id":"3hwaku","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What are great works in the study of corporate cultures? Is there a Rise and Fall of Rome equivalent?","c_root_id_A":"cubn4dn","c_root_id_B":"cubikyh","created_at_utc_A":1440233314,"created_at_utc_B":1440218446,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Try *The Smartest Guys in the Room* by McLean and Elkind. It discusses the Enron scandal thoroughly, including the corporate culture that led to such shenanigans.  You should also try PBS's Frontline, the episode \"A Dangerous Business\" (http:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wgbh\/pages\/frontline\/shows\/workplace\/)","human_ref_B":"Perhaps The Unconscious Civilization (1995)  by John Ralston Saul?  http:\/\/www.johnralstonsaul.com\/non-fiction-books\/the-unconscious-civilization\/","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14868.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3hwaku","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What are great works in the study of corporate cultures? Is there a Rise and Fall of Rome equivalent?","c_root_id_A":"cubj04d","c_root_id_B":"cubn4dn","created_at_utc_A":1440219474,"created_at_utc_B":1440233314,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I don't know if it qualifies as a \"great work\" but On a Clear Day You Can See General Motors is a pretty interesting look at GM in the late 1970s.","human_ref_B":"Try *The Smartest Guys in the Room* by McLean and Elkind. It discusses the Enron scandal thoroughly, including the corporate culture that led to such shenanigans.  You should also try PBS's Frontline, the episode \"A Dangerous Business\" (http:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wgbh\/pages\/frontline\/shows\/workplace\/)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13840.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"a9m1jr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Is there a rise in crime as the weather gets hotter?","c_root_id_A":"ecksdcu","c_root_id_B":"eckq1ti","created_at_utc_A":1545816357,"created_at_utc_B":1545812545,"score_A":28,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Yeah, as others have noted - sure. For example, Cohn studied the relationship between higher temperatures and both aggression and property crimes. It is best explained by a situational approach such as routine activities theory. For example, there are more opportunities for violent crime to occur during Summer because people are outside more often and thus interact more. Likewise, houses are emptier during Summer for the same reason, which creates more opportunities for burglaries.  To quote the second article for a brief rundown on the logic of Routine Activities applied to this topic:  >RA theory provides a more parsimonious explanation for seasonal differences than do psychological theories, which have led researchers to treat heat and cold as equivalent because both are aversive (Berkowitz, 1993). RA theory suggests that, in addition to examining how warm temperatures facilitate social interaction, we should also consider the possibility that cold reduces crime by inhibiting action, including interaction with other people (Cohen et al., 1980, p. 110). As a consequence, perpetrators are less likely to burglarize homes or commit robberies during cold than warm periods in fall and winter.  To be complete, there are studies about the psychological impact of hotter weather and whether it increases negative arousal. Anderson has published several papers exploring how higher temperatures can cause negative affect which may at least partially explain higher risk of aggression. There are laboratory findings to support the idea that there is a direct psychological effect to certain temperatures beyond the indirect effect of increased socialization and criminal opportunities, although it is harder to disentangle.","human_ref_B":"There's a New York Times article about it here.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3812.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"a9m1jr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Is there a rise in crime as the weather gets hotter?","c_root_id_A":"eckrv35","c_root_id_B":"ecksdcu","created_at_utc_A":1545815531,"created_at_utc_B":1545816357,"score_A":3,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"This is from a study showing the link between climate change and violence. And it's from The Robert Strauss Center for International Security and Law - https:\/\/www.strausscenter.org\/","human_ref_B":"Yeah, as others have noted - sure. For example, Cohn studied the relationship between higher temperatures and both aggression and property crimes. It is best explained by a situational approach such as routine activities theory. For example, there are more opportunities for violent crime to occur during Summer because people are outside more often and thus interact more. Likewise, houses are emptier during Summer for the same reason, which creates more opportunities for burglaries.  To quote the second article for a brief rundown on the logic of Routine Activities applied to this topic:  >RA theory provides a more parsimonious explanation for seasonal differences than do psychological theories, which have led researchers to treat heat and cold as equivalent because both are aversive (Berkowitz, 1993). RA theory suggests that, in addition to examining how warm temperatures facilitate social interaction, we should also consider the possibility that cold reduces crime by inhibiting action, including interaction with other people (Cohen et al., 1980, p. 110). As a consequence, perpetrators are less likely to burglarize homes or commit robberies during cold than warm periods in fall and winter.  To be complete, there are studies about the psychological impact of hotter weather and whether it increases negative arousal. Anderson has published several papers exploring how higher temperatures can cause negative affect which may at least partially explain higher risk of aggression. There are laboratory findings to support the idea that there is a direct psychological effect to certain temperatures beyond the indirect effect of increased socialization and criminal opportunities, although it is harder to disentangle.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":826.0,"score_ratio":9.3333333333}
{"post_id":"a9m1jr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Is there a rise in crime as the weather gets hotter?","c_root_id_A":"eclcjuv","c_root_id_B":"eckq1ti","created_at_utc_A":1545841014,"created_at_utc_B":1545812545,"score_A":9,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Yes, look at monthly crime data of Chicago or Minneapolis for a couple years.  Here's MPLS from 2006-2009. Notice the huge dips in crime around January each year. *Eddie Murphy Meme: \"Can't get into trouble if it's too cold to go outside.\"*  http:\/\/editions.lib.umn.edu\/smartpolitics\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2009\/04\/Figure1.jpg","human_ref_B":"There's a New York Times article about it here.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":28469.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"a9m1jr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Is there a rise in crime as the weather gets hotter?","c_root_id_A":"eckrv35","c_root_id_B":"eclcjuv","created_at_utc_A":1545815531,"created_at_utc_B":1545841014,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"This is from a study showing the link between climate change and violence. And it's from The Robert Strauss Center for International Security and Law - https:\/\/www.strausscenter.org\/","human_ref_B":"Yes, look at monthly crime data of Chicago or Minneapolis for a couple years.  Here's MPLS from 2006-2009. Notice the huge dips in crime around January each year. *Eddie Murphy Meme: \"Can't get into trouble if it's too cold to go outside.\"*  http:\/\/editions.lib.umn.edu\/smartpolitics\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2009\/04\/Figure1.jpg","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25483.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1x3g5e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Are there certain facial expressions that only certain cultures make (or certain cultures do not make)? Why?","c_root_id_A":"cf80vh1","c_root_id_B":"cf82owv","created_at_utc_A":1391639950,"created_at_utc_B":1391643829,"score_A":9,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I'm not going to go into great detail trying to respond to this, but I think an important elaboration to this question is if different cultures interpret similar facial expressions differently. Facial expressions and are interpretations of them are socially constructed interpretations of the cues given by another person and I'd be curious if\/how they vary.","human_ref_B":"Maybe how Russians perceive smiling differently than many other cultures  . http:\/\/www.russianlife.com\/blog\/why-dont-russians-smile\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3879.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1x3g5e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Are there certain facial expressions that only certain cultures make (or certain cultures do not make)? Why?","c_root_id_A":"cf89zqo","c_root_id_B":"cf8buwd","created_at_utc_A":1391660283,"created_at_utc_B":1391665024,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Not quite on point with your question, but I learned that anger, fear, and happiness and their accompanying facial expressions are recognized around the world. I just find it interesting","human_ref_B":"Some facial expressions are considered to be universal. Paul Ekman did a lot of work on expressions and microexpressions. Ekman said that there are seven basic universal emotions: Happiness, Sadness, Anger, Disgust, Surprise, Fear, and Contempt. His work is what I am most familiar with relating to facial expressions. Other researchers have stated otherwise, such as excluding contempt and including other emotions.   The only facial expressions that only some cultures make that I can think of are emblems, which are completely cultural. However, emblems can also be gestures. An example of an emblem that is pretty common in western cultures is putting the ends of your lips downward as you shrug your shoulders. Many people do this, or variations of it, but it isn't a natural response and won't be seen everywhere.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4741.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"oiefiz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What is the state of the current literature on early childhood gender dypshoria? Journalist Jesse Signal recently posted this article about a Science Based Medicine article by Steven Novella and David Groski  that he believes misrepresents the current debate around childhood gender dysphoria. Allegedly he's also planning to comment on others, but this is all he has so far.  In the article he makes seven claims about their paper.  1. That Novella and Gorski repeat a myth about how gender dysphoria and gender identity disorder were defined in the DSM. Namely, that the latter is mistakenly characterized as pathologizing dysphoric people. In his words, if someone didn't display any criteria aside from identifying differently from their AGAB, then they wouldn't be considered dysphoric. 2. Novella and Gorski ignore that even those supportive of puberty blocking treatment in transgender organizations think that a lot of people don't practice best standards, and they misrepresent WPATH's standards of care as having more rigor in regards to hormone treatment versus puberty blockers. 3. Novella and Gorski misrepresent the desistance debate, as common accusations that the studies with high desistance rates confused gender non-conforming youth with gender dysphoric youth are unfounded. They used specific and rigorous questions to determine dysphoria. And even if they are low, experts believe that recent examples of transgender youth are  part of a \"new developmental pathway,\" of post-pubertal transitioners. 4. Meta analyses cited by Novella and Gorski and studies on regret such as this recent one do not apply to \"the present American context,\" of gender dysphoric youth, and are instead focused on adults. 5. Novella and Gorski's criticism of Lisa Littman's controversial study fails to account for her defense of it, where she points out that her methodology and sampling are consistent with others in the field. In regards to the point that she drew respondents from trans-hostile websites, the writer points out that no one has been admonished from drawing from trans-positive websites, and thus the discussion is being unequally slanted. 6. Novella and Gorski overplay a study with modest results, and overplay a study from Jack Turban wherein many respondents were excluded due to not knowing about the use of puberty blockers, but it was not considered that the remaining respondents might also be confused on the matter. 7. Contrary to Novella and Gorski's claims, organizations like NICE and the NHS have found that evidence for early treatment of gender dysphoria is, quote, \"very low,\" and that what evidence exists is not conclusive whatsoever.  Now, I was a bit confused by this because I was under the impression that the literature was definitively supportive of early treatment. Signal himself comes across as trying to be an impartial ally, but what I've seen of the rest of his work makes me concerned that he's far less impartial than he claims. All in all, what is the truth of his points?","c_root_id_A":"h4x2jmh","c_root_id_B":"h4whtn3","created_at_utc_A":1626096756,"created_at_utc_B":1626081661,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"In addition to \/u\/Hypatia2001's excellent summary, I would also encourage you to read the other posts on Science Based Medicine relating to this topic:  https:\/\/sciencebasedmedicine.org\/abigail-shriers-irreversible-damage-a-wealth-of-irreversible-misinformation\/ (for a broad overview of the book that sparked this latest conversation)  https:\/\/sciencebasedmedicine.org\/irreversible-damage-to-the-trans-community-a-critical-review-of-abigail-shriers-book-irreversible-damage-part-one\/ (for more detailed analysis)  I have also heard that Cass Eris, a cognitive psychologist, has done a good job evaluating the book in question, though I haven't personally investigated it: https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=2OLNEiECN24&list=PLIK-x5uT6oS-jLoc8axeD\\_zZ\\_TDK0OTeb  I also point to The Advocate's evaluation of some of the social factors behind Jesse Singal having any voice at all on trans issues: https:\/\/www.advocate.com\/commentary\/2021\/3\/24\/cis-men-jesse-singal-dan-savage-dont-decide-whats-transphobic  Also, specifically with #4, the paper was published in March 2021, with ages of participants as young as in their 20's. It's relevant, considering Shrier's book itself largely uses citations from 2014-2017 and therefore the children she involves are close to being adults or are adults by the time of publication in 2020. Shockingly, children do become adults.","human_ref_B":"Separately, the NICE review and its problems have already been discussed here on this sub.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15095.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"wphn5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Serious question: Why does the US support Israel? Whenever I wonder about political stuff, I try to apply Occam's razor, and think about the simplest reasoning behind everything. It seems obvious that the US would want a strong ally in the Middle East post-WWII, to establish influence against the Warsaw Pact, but that was a long time ago, and even with that kind of reasoning, how does Israel receive *so* much aid?  What confuses me even more is that the US seems to struggle with Israeli policy, even though it has massive leverage over the country. Israeli militants do things like invade Lebanon or push Palestinians off their land and the US doesn't do much about it (I'm assuming here that if the US really wanted to do something about it, it would have). Wouldn't it make more sense to try gaining the trust of Muslim countries, since the US is doing so much in the Middle East right now?   Some people say that the Jewish lobby in the US is really strong. From what I understand though, it's more of a Jewish lobby and less of an Israeli one, isn't it? I feel like American Jews are distinct from Israeli ones. I could be gravely mistaken, obviously.","c_root_id_A":"c5fc0z9","c_root_id_B":"c5fbz4e","created_at_utc_A":1342547228,"created_at_utc_B":1342547050,"score_A":52,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":">From what I understand though, it's more of a Jewish lobby and less of an Israeli one, isn't it?  The biggest group of Israel supporters in the US are not religious Jews, but conservative Christians who support Israel unconditionally as the nation of God's chosen people. Many of them believe that Jesus will come back after the Jews rebuild Solomon's Temple, which will be on the site of the Dome of the Rock. This requires, among other things, for Israel to exist.   Christian Zionism is not in the news, because it isn't controversial. Among Christian Conservatives, there simply isn't any debate about whether Israel is in the right. Personally I think that doctrine is anti-Christian and would disgust Jesus, who preached absolute pacificism. However, American Christianity includes many who preach that God loves wealth, hates love, and demands Theocracy.  Check out this quote (from here):  >Genesis 12 says, \u201cI will bless those who bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee,\u201d Hagee preaches that **\u201cas people, churches, and nations deal with the State of Israel, so God will deal with them.\u201d** He tells the crowd, with equal parts grin and gruff, \u201cGet ready! Good things are getting ready to happen to you.\u201d  >\u201cThere are voices in the U.S. State Department calling for the city of Jerusalem to be divided,\u201d Hagee says. The crowd shouts a drawn out \u201cNo!\u201d unprompted. \u201cLet\u2019s make this clear!\u201d Hagee continues. \u201cThere shall be one Jerusalem. Never divided. For any reason. Not now and not ever!\u201d  How extreme are Christian Zionists? My dad is one, and he thinks the US must and should be *destroyed utterly* in the defense of Israel. Why? Because the US isn't mentioned in the prophecies of the end of the world, but as a Christian nation he thinks it must have some part in the prologue of the events.","human_ref_B":"For more on the Israel Lobby I strongly recommend you read this essay (short version of the book) by John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt (two HUGE names in foreign policy academia).  http:\/\/mearsheimer.uchicago.edu\/pdfs\/A0040.pdf  The essays answers the questions of what was the original purpose of the Israeli alliance, how the Lobby influences current US policy, and why the US does not have that much influence over Israel.  Caveat: the essay\/book has been widely criticized and I do not necessarily agree with it, however it directly addresses OPs questions and is the work of two extremely influential scholars","labels":1,"seconds_difference":178.0,"score_ratio":3.4666666667}
{"post_id":"wphn5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Serious question: Why does the US support Israel? Whenever I wonder about political stuff, I try to apply Occam's razor, and think about the simplest reasoning behind everything. It seems obvious that the US would want a strong ally in the Middle East post-WWII, to establish influence against the Warsaw Pact, but that was a long time ago, and even with that kind of reasoning, how does Israel receive *so* much aid?  What confuses me even more is that the US seems to struggle with Israeli policy, even though it has massive leverage over the country. Israeli militants do things like invade Lebanon or push Palestinians off their land and the US doesn't do much about it (I'm assuming here that if the US really wanted to do something about it, it would have). Wouldn't it make more sense to try gaining the trust of Muslim countries, since the US is doing so much in the Middle East right now?   Some people say that the Jewish lobby in the US is really strong. From what I understand though, it's more of a Jewish lobby and less of an Israeli one, isn't it? I feel like American Jews are distinct from Israeli ones. I could be gravely mistaken, obviously.","c_root_id_A":"c5fezpf","c_root_id_B":"c5fkx2t","created_at_utc_A":1342557230,"created_at_utc_B":1342580409,"score_A":6,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"To add to yep45's post about the history of US relations that you responded to, many Middle Eastern countries achieved independence after the Second World War with somewhat bad relations with the colonial powers, since they were promised independence during the First World War and instead became \"mandates\" (protectorates) of either France or the UK. This combined with a successful Israeli independence (which Truman eventually came to support) and American fear of growing Soviet and anti-American influence (non-aligned countries like Nasser's Egypt were often considered to be influenced by the Soviets) led to Israel becoming one of a few close American allies in the Middle East. From there support became entrenched and certain domestic groups kept it entrenched even as the original reasons became moot.  For current US policy, the two primary reasons as others pointed out are the Israeli lobby and Evangelical Christians. The former is more important because, as the Mearsheimer\/Walt article iamqba linked to, the frame the debate, act as experts, and lobby government to unequivically support Israel, an issue with little importance to the general public. For instance, Israel may officially support a two-state solution and the media and public generally take that as true, but Israeli action and the comments of prominent politicians have consistently been against a strong or viable independent Palestinian state. Usually this is framed in the US as Palestinians being unwilling to make concessions or no guarantee for the national security of Israel (I am not saying this is true or false).  Jews are a constituency of the Democratic electorate (plus relatively large in the largest swing state--Florida), but the Evangelical Christians a Republican one. Also, domestic political rhetoric factors into this as well. A change in policy toward Israel could be used by either party to discredit the one in power by being soft on security or terrorism.  The level and the reasoning for US support to Israel may be baseless, but there are many reasons for why the support still exists. As many academics and journalists have been pointing out in the last year or so, this may change as US policy becomes more irrational. American Jews might be less supportive of Israel's policies toward the Occupied Territories (Beinart's book says they are, but a recent study show there is increased attachment to Israel but not to that respective policy), Israel is become more isolated in the region as Turkey distances itself and many Arab governments become democratic, and Israeli occupation is Palestinian territories is becoming more permanent.","human_ref_B":">Serious question: Why does the US support Israel?  **AMERICAN LOBBIES**  - Jewish-Israel lobby.  The majority of American Jews may be secular, but they are still deeply affected by the current of 19th- early 20th century *racial anti-semitism* that culminated in the genocide of the Nazis.  While *Zionism* was an understandable response to such a reality, it is now an anachronism - and worse yet, a source for a whole new brand of anti-semitism (this time in the Muslim world, painted along religious rather than racial lines.)  - More decisively, the *Christian-Zionist* lobby in the USA.  While there certainly are religious Jewish supporters for Israel (some being quite fanatical, and difficult to distinguish from the most triumphalistic Islamists), they are numerically quite few.  The real religious support for Israel comes from those Protestants (mainly in the USA) who hold to eschatological views that center around the \"land of Israel\".  Given their express political orientation, they really do bear a similarity to other wiley theocrats.  Because of  their social conservatism, they are part of the Republican base (unlike secular American Jewry, who generally vote Democrat.)  **COLD WAR**  - Israel was one part of an uneasy family of M.Eastern states that the USA made to secure resources (basically, petroleum) and territory from the influence of the USSR\/Warsaw-Pact.  To do this a whole gaggle of disparate (and often mutually acrimonious) characters were assembled - theocrats, dictatorships...and Israel.  Much of the momentum of this period survives to the present day (even lacking an \"evil empire\" to justify the expense.)  **PRESENT**  - As the relationships between America and its \"other M.Eastern partners\" have fallen apart (most spectacularly in Iraq), Israel presented itself as America's most secure foothold in the region.  While the arguments in favor of that opinion are poor, it held a lot of political currency when wedded to the above mentioned factors (and the \"political momentum\" thereof.)  - Taking Christian-Zionists for a ride, **neo-conservatives** both in and out of government regard Israel as sufficiently similar (culturally and economically) to merit a special alliance, as a means of continuing American influence in the M.East.  How much this is based truly in the economic positions of the neo-cons (and not simple cultural chauvinism) is debatable.  **Note:** Like many of America's questionable alliances (if ethics or consistency can be said to have really mattered in such things), on a practical level these \"friendships\" have been fueled by *foreign aid* (the bulk of which being not-so-subtle subsidies for America's arms industry - the kind of **welfare spending**  harsh reactionaries never seem to have an issue with.)  **TL;DR** Lots of reasons, none of them particularly in the interests of the average (non-psychotic) American.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23179.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"wphn5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Serious question: Why does the US support Israel? Whenever I wonder about political stuff, I try to apply Occam's razor, and think about the simplest reasoning behind everything. It seems obvious that the US would want a strong ally in the Middle East post-WWII, to establish influence against the Warsaw Pact, but that was a long time ago, and even with that kind of reasoning, how does Israel receive *so* much aid?  What confuses me even more is that the US seems to struggle with Israeli policy, even though it has massive leverage over the country. Israeli militants do things like invade Lebanon or push Palestinians off their land and the US doesn't do much about it (I'm assuming here that if the US really wanted to do something about it, it would have). Wouldn't it make more sense to try gaining the trust of Muslim countries, since the US is doing so much in the Middle East right now?   Some people say that the Jewish lobby in the US is really strong. From what I understand though, it's more of a Jewish lobby and less of an Israeli one, isn't it? I feel like American Jews are distinct from Israeli ones. I could be gravely mistaken, obviously.","c_root_id_A":"c5fi858","c_root_id_B":"c5fkx2t","created_at_utc_A":1342569421,"created_at_utc_B":1342580409,"score_A":2,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Hey guys, way to handle this topic like adults. You get some serious conspiracy nuts out on this topic about Jews control the world, etc.  Did anyone mention the power of Jewish voters? Many older Jewish people live in the swing state of Florida. Pro-Israli gesturing by candidates does  often happen on a Florida tour.","human_ref_B":">Serious question: Why does the US support Israel?  **AMERICAN LOBBIES**  - Jewish-Israel lobby.  The majority of American Jews may be secular, but they are still deeply affected by the current of 19th- early 20th century *racial anti-semitism* that culminated in the genocide of the Nazis.  While *Zionism* was an understandable response to such a reality, it is now an anachronism - and worse yet, a source for a whole new brand of anti-semitism (this time in the Muslim world, painted along religious rather than racial lines.)  - More decisively, the *Christian-Zionist* lobby in the USA.  While there certainly are religious Jewish supporters for Israel (some being quite fanatical, and difficult to distinguish from the most triumphalistic Islamists), they are numerically quite few.  The real religious support for Israel comes from those Protestants (mainly in the USA) who hold to eschatological views that center around the \"land of Israel\".  Given their express political orientation, they really do bear a similarity to other wiley theocrats.  Because of  their social conservatism, they are part of the Republican base (unlike secular American Jewry, who generally vote Democrat.)  **COLD WAR**  - Israel was one part of an uneasy family of M.Eastern states that the USA made to secure resources (basically, petroleum) and territory from the influence of the USSR\/Warsaw-Pact.  To do this a whole gaggle of disparate (and often mutually acrimonious) characters were assembled - theocrats, dictatorships...and Israel.  Much of the momentum of this period survives to the present day (even lacking an \"evil empire\" to justify the expense.)  **PRESENT**  - As the relationships between America and its \"other M.Eastern partners\" have fallen apart (most spectacularly in Iraq), Israel presented itself as America's most secure foothold in the region.  While the arguments in favor of that opinion are poor, it held a lot of political currency when wedded to the above mentioned factors (and the \"political momentum\" thereof.)  - Taking Christian-Zionists for a ride, **neo-conservatives** both in and out of government regard Israel as sufficiently similar (culturally and economically) to merit a special alliance, as a means of continuing American influence in the M.East.  How much this is based truly in the economic positions of the neo-cons (and not simple cultural chauvinism) is debatable.  **Note:** Like many of America's questionable alliances (if ethics or consistency can be said to have really mattered in such things), on a practical level these \"friendships\" have been fueled by *foreign aid* (the bulk of which being not-so-subtle subsidies for America's arms industry - the kind of **welfare spending**  harsh reactionaries never seem to have an issue with.)  **TL;DR** Lots of reasons, none of them particularly in the interests of the average (non-psychotic) American.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10988.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"wphn5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Serious question: Why does the US support Israel? Whenever I wonder about political stuff, I try to apply Occam's razor, and think about the simplest reasoning behind everything. It seems obvious that the US would want a strong ally in the Middle East post-WWII, to establish influence against the Warsaw Pact, but that was a long time ago, and even with that kind of reasoning, how does Israel receive *so* much aid?  What confuses me even more is that the US seems to struggle with Israeli policy, even though it has massive leverage over the country. Israeli militants do things like invade Lebanon or push Palestinians off their land and the US doesn't do much about it (I'm assuming here that if the US really wanted to do something about it, it would have). Wouldn't it make more sense to try gaining the trust of Muslim countries, since the US is doing so much in the Middle East right now?   Some people say that the Jewish lobby in the US is really strong. From what I understand though, it's more of a Jewish lobby and less of an Israeli one, isn't it? I feel like American Jews are distinct from Israeli ones. I could be gravely mistaken, obviously.","c_root_id_A":"c5ffa6h","c_root_id_B":"c5fkx2t","created_at_utc_A":1342558216,"created_at_utc_B":1342580409,"score_A":2,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Money.","human_ref_B":">Serious question: Why does the US support Israel?  **AMERICAN LOBBIES**  - Jewish-Israel lobby.  The majority of American Jews may be secular, but they are still deeply affected by the current of 19th- early 20th century *racial anti-semitism* that culminated in the genocide of the Nazis.  While *Zionism* was an understandable response to such a reality, it is now an anachronism - and worse yet, a source for a whole new brand of anti-semitism (this time in the Muslim world, painted along religious rather than racial lines.)  - More decisively, the *Christian-Zionist* lobby in the USA.  While there certainly are religious Jewish supporters for Israel (some being quite fanatical, and difficult to distinguish from the most triumphalistic Islamists), they are numerically quite few.  The real religious support for Israel comes from those Protestants (mainly in the USA) who hold to eschatological views that center around the \"land of Israel\".  Given their express political orientation, they really do bear a similarity to other wiley theocrats.  Because of  their social conservatism, they are part of the Republican base (unlike secular American Jewry, who generally vote Democrat.)  **COLD WAR**  - Israel was one part of an uneasy family of M.Eastern states that the USA made to secure resources (basically, petroleum) and territory from the influence of the USSR\/Warsaw-Pact.  To do this a whole gaggle of disparate (and often mutually acrimonious) characters were assembled - theocrats, dictatorships...and Israel.  Much of the momentum of this period survives to the present day (even lacking an \"evil empire\" to justify the expense.)  **PRESENT**  - As the relationships between America and its \"other M.Eastern partners\" have fallen apart (most spectacularly in Iraq), Israel presented itself as America's most secure foothold in the region.  While the arguments in favor of that opinion are poor, it held a lot of political currency when wedded to the above mentioned factors (and the \"political momentum\" thereof.)  - Taking Christian-Zionists for a ride, **neo-conservatives** both in and out of government regard Israel as sufficiently similar (culturally and economically) to merit a special alliance, as a means of continuing American influence in the M.East.  How much this is based truly in the economic positions of the neo-cons (and not simple cultural chauvinism) is debatable.  **Note:** Like many of America's questionable alliances (if ethics or consistency can be said to have really mattered in such things), on a practical level these \"friendships\" have been fueled by *foreign aid* (the bulk of which being not-so-subtle subsidies for America's arms industry - the kind of **welfare spending**  harsh reactionaries never seem to have an issue with.)  **TL;DR** Lots of reasons, none of them particularly in the interests of the average (non-psychotic) American.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22193.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"wphn5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Serious question: Why does the US support Israel? Whenever I wonder about political stuff, I try to apply Occam's razor, and think about the simplest reasoning behind everything. It seems obvious that the US would want a strong ally in the Middle East post-WWII, to establish influence against the Warsaw Pact, but that was a long time ago, and even with that kind of reasoning, how does Israel receive *so* much aid?  What confuses me even more is that the US seems to struggle with Israeli policy, even though it has massive leverage over the country. Israeli militants do things like invade Lebanon or push Palestinians off their land and the US doesn't do much about it (I'm assuming here that if the US really wanted to do something about it, it would have). Wouldn't it make more sense to try gaining the trust of Muslim countries, since the US is doing so much in the Middle East right now?   Some people say that the Jewish lobby in the US is really strong. From what I understand though, it's more of a Jewish lobby and less of an Israeli one, isn't it? I feel like American Jews are distinct from Israeli ones. I could be gravely mistaken, obviously.","c_root_id_A":"c5fi858","c_root_id_B":"c5fmkog","created_at_utc_A":1342569421,"created_at_utc_B":1342587103,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Hey guys, way to handle this topic like adults. You get some serious conspiracy nuts out on this topic about Jews control the world, etc.  Did anyone mention the power of Jewish voters? Many older Jewish people live in the swing state of Florida. Pro-Israli gesturing by candidates does  often happen on a Florida tour.","human_ref_B":"I know this isn't your question - but I\"ll answer anyway.  (I grew up as an American in Lebanon).  There will be no peace in the territories known as Israel and Palestine (and for Lebanon and Syria) until:  1) there is a single unified state encompassing both (Israel and Palestine) - the areas designated for the Palestinians do not have the natural resources to be self-sufficient - so a two-state system is DOA. 2) this single unified state is democratic and constitutionally secular 3) everyone in it (Arab, Semitic Jew, African Jew, European Jew) are equal in status (many are unaware how poorly the European Jews treat the Semitic or African Jews) 4) there is a right of return for the Arabs (and their descendants) that were the victims of ethnic cleansing and land grabs (call them refugees, if you will) 5) The \"holy\" part of Jerusalem is made a UN territory dominated by none with access to all.  .....and this will not happen in my lifetime....and probably not in yours.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17682.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"wphn5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Serious question: Why does the US support Israel? Whenever I wonder about political stuff, I try to apply Occam's razor, and think about the simplest reasoning behind everything. It seems obvious that the US would want a strong ally in the Middle East post-WWII, to establish influence against the Warsaw Pact, but that was a long time ago, and even with that kind of reasoning, how does Israel receive *so* much aid?  What confuses me even more is that the US seems to struggle with Israeli policy, even though it has massive leverage over the country. Israeli militants do things like invade Lebanon or push Palestinians off their land and the US doesn't do much about it (I'm assuming here that if the US really wanted to do something about it, it would have). Wouldn't it make more sense to try gaining the trust of Muslim countries, since the US is doing so much in the Middle East right now?   Some people say that the Jewish lobby in the US is really strong. From what I understand though, it's more of a Jewish lobby and less of an Israeli one, isn't it? I feel like American Jews are distinct from Israeli ones. I could be gravely mistaken, obviously.","c_root_id_A":"c5ffa6h","c_root_id_B":"c5fmkog","created_at_utc_A":1342558216,"created_at_utc_B":1342587103,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Money.","human_ref_B":"I know this isn't your question - but I\"ll answer anyway.  (I grew up as an American in Lebanon).  There will be no peace in the territories known as Israel and Palestine (and for Lebanon and Syria) until:  1) there is a single unified state encompassing both (Israel and Palestine) - the areas designated for the Palestinians do not have the natural resources to be self-sufficient - so a two-state system is DOA. 2) this single unified state is democratic and constitutionally secular 3) everyone in it (Arab, Semitic Jew, African Jew, European Jew) are equal in status (many are unaware how poorly the European Jews treat the Semitic or African Jews) 4) there is a right of return for the Arabs (and their descendants) that were the victims of ethnic cleansing and land grabs (call them refugees, if you will) 5) The \"holy\" part of Jerusalem is made a UN territory dominated by none with access to all.  .....and this will not happen in my lifetime....and probably not in yours.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":28887.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3xj13k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"I am a High School student who just asked a Sociologist for a way to access their book for free... is there anything they can actually do for me? [X-post \/r\/AskAcademia] Anyone who is an academic or has any experience with similar situations- your input is welcome! This is the email that I sent them:  >I am a high school student attending [redacted] who is taking a fiction course. I have chosen to write a chapbook of flash fiction pieces set in various ports. When the chapbook is done I hope to have explored the social and economic changes that ports undergo. Hopefully this collect will be a meaningful reflection on labor, communal identity and globalization.  >To understand the topic properly I have been reading up on ports throughout history and the state of port cities today. I recently read some chapters from Port Cities as Areas of Transition: Ethnographic Perspectives. While the content was interesting, only three case studies suited my interests. Through a bit of digging I found your book and the contents really struck me as relevant to my project. Your focus on narratives of identity and and waterfront labor tie into the themes I am trying to tackle. The section on radicalism also would provide some great material to explore.  >My issue is that I have not been able to access this book... and I have put in great effort to do so already. I have asked friends who attend my local public university if they could check it out for me; but said university does not have the physical book. The inter-library loan that I have requested will take well over a month at minimum to arrive. By that time I am going to be revising my stories. I usually am pretty good at getting books for free online, however my usual sources did not have it either. I normally am fine with purchasing books; however I get the sense that the $100 price is intended for college libraries who want to buy it, not for students.  >So what I am asking is... do you know of any way for me to read this book? Would it be possible for you to send chapters as pdfs? Does your department have a copy that could be sent to the States? I totally understand if it is not possible from your position to give me access, but it really would mean a lot to me.  (tl;dr- this book covers the specific topics I am interested in, I am not going to get my hands on it in time. Is there a way for you to give me access to your research?)  I am now wondering... is there anything they can actually do for me? Will they be happy to help a High School student use their research? Will they be offended that I am asking to have it for free? Does this really just depend on the professor?","c_root_id_A":"cy53lqp","c_root_id_B":"cy572bc","created_at_utc_A":1450579083,"created_at_utc_B":1450585720,"score_A":5,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"You may be able to check out a digital copy of the book here: https:\/\/openlibrary.org  Open library is like a public library that lends ebooks for free to the world.","human_ref_B":"Gracious profs may send scans -- I've had some that did. Key word is \"gracious.\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6637.0,"score_ratio":3.2}
{"post_id":"3xj13k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"I am a High School student who just asked a Sociologist for a way to access their book for free... is there anything they can actually do for me? [X-post \/r\/AskAcademia] Anyone who is an academic or has any experience with similar situations- your input is welcome! This is the email that I sent them:  >I am a high school student attending [redacted] who is taking a fiction course. I have chosen to write a chapbook of flash fiction pieces set in various ports. When the chapbook is done I hope to have explored the social and economic changes that ports undergo. Hopefully this collect will be a meaningful reflection on labor, communal identity and globalization.  >To understand the topic properly I have been reading up on ports throughout history and the state of port cities today. I recently read some chapters from Port Cities as Areas of Transition: Ethnographic Perspectives. While the content was interesting, only three case studies suited my interests. Through a bit of digging I found your book and the contents really struck me as relevant to my project. Your focus on narratives of identity and and waterfront labor tie into the themes I am trying to tackle. The section on radicalism also would provide some great material to explore.  >My issue is that I have not been able to access this book... and I have put in great effort to do so already. I have asked friends who attend my local public university if they could check it out for me; but said university does not have the physical book. The inter-library loan that I have requested will take well over a month at minimum to arrive. By that time I am going to be revising my stories. I usually am pretty good at getting books for free online, however my usual sources did not have it either. I normally am fine with purchasing books; however I get the sense that the $100 price is intended for college libraries who want to buy it, not for students.  >So what I am asking is... do you know of any way for me to read this book? Would it be possible for you to send chapters as pdfs? Does your department have a copy that could be sent to the States? I totally understand if it is not possible from your position to give me access, but it really would mean a lot to me.  (tl;dr- this book covers the specific topics I am interested in, I am not going to get my hands on it in time. Is there a way for you to give me access to your research?)  I am now wondering... is there anything they can actually do for me? Will they be happy to help a High School student use their research? Will they be offended that I am asking to have it for free? Does this really just depend on the professor?","c_root_id_A":"cy591vt","c_root_id_B":"cy53lqp","created_at_utc_A":1450590345,"created_at_utc_B":1450579083,"score_A":13,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"99% of professors make cents on any academic textbook. They don't make any real amount of money. They do it more for the recognition. So they probably wouldn't be offended, probably just glad you're reading it.","human_ref_B":"You may be able to check out a digital copy of the book here: https:\/\/openlibrary.org  Open library is like a public library that lends ebooks for free to the world.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11262.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"3xj13k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"I am a High School student who just asked a Sociologist for a way to access their book for free... is there anything they can actually do for me? [X-post \/r\/AskAcademia] Anyone who is an academic or has any experience with similar situations- your input is welcome! This is the email that I sent them:  >I am a high school student attending [redacted] who is taking a fiction course. I have chosen to write a chapbook of flash fiction pieces set in various ports. When the chapbook is done I hope to have explored the social and economic changes that ports undergo. Hopefully this collect will be a meaningful reflection on labor, communal identity and globalization.  >To understand the topic properly I have been reading up on ports throughout history and the state of port cities today. I recently read some chapters from Port Cities as Areas of Transition: Ethnographic Perspectives. While the content was interesting, only three case studies suited my interests. Through a bit of digging I found your book and the contents really struck me as relevant to my project. Your focus on narratives of identity and and waterfront labor tie into the themes I am trying to tackle. The section on radicalism also would provide some great material to explore.  >My issue is that I have not been able to access this book... and I have put in great effort to do so already. I have asked friends who attend my local public university if they could check it out for me; but said university does not have the physical book. The inter-library loan that I have requested will take well over a month at minimum to arrive. By that time I am going to be revising my stories. I usually am pretty good at getting books for free online, however my usual sources did not have it either. I normally am fine with purchasing books; however I get the sense that the $100 price is intended for college libraries who want to buy it, not for students.  >So what I am asking is... do you know of any way for me to read this book? Would it be possible for you to send chapters as pdfs? Does your department have a copy that could be sent to the States? I totally understand if it is not possible from your position to give me access, but it really would mean a lot to me.  (tl;dr- this book covers the specific topics I am interested in, I am not going to get my hands on it in time. Is there a way for you to give me access to your research?)  I am now wondering... is there anything they can actually do for me? Will they be happy to help a High School student use their research? Will they be offended that I am asking to have it for free? Does this really just depend on the professor?","c_root_id_A":"cy591vt","c_root_id_B":"cy57rt7","created_at_utc_A":1450590345,"created_at_utc_B":1450587236,"score_A":13,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"99% of professors make cents on any academic textbook. They don't make any real amount of money. They do it more for the recognition. So they probably wouldn't be offended, probably just glad you're reading it.","human_ref_B":"What is the book title and author?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3109.0,"score_ratio":3.25}
{"post_id":"3xj13k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"I am a High School student who just asked a Sociologist for a way to access their book for free... is there anything they can actually do for me? [X-post \/r\/AskAcademia] Anyone who is an academic or has any experience with similar situations- your input is welcome! This is the email that I sent them:  >I am a high school student attending [redacted] who is taking a fiction course. I have chosen to write a chapbook of flash fiction pieces set in various ports. When the chapbook is done I hope to have explored the social and economic changes that ports undergo. Hopefully this collect will be a meaningful reflection on labor, communal identity and globalization.  >To understand the topic properly I have been reading up on ports throughout history and the state of port cities today. I recently read some chapters from Port Cities as Areas of Transition: Ethnographic Perspectives. While the content was interesting, only three case studies suited my interests. Through a bit of digging I found your book and the contents really struck me as relevant to my project. Your focus on narratives of identity and and waterfront labor tie into the themes I am trying to tackle. The section on radicalism also would provide some great material to explore.  >My issue is that I have not been able to access this book... and I have put in great effort to do so already. I have asked friends who attend my local public university if they could check it out for me; but said university does not have the physical book. The inter-library loan that I have requested will take well over a month at minimum to arrive. By that time I am going to be revising my stories. I usually am pretty good at getting books for free online, however my usual sources did not have it either. I normally am fine with purchasing books; however I get the sense that the $100 price is intended for college libraries who want to buy it, not for students.  >So what I am asking is... do you know of any way for me to read this book? Would it be possible for you to send chapters as pdfs? Does your department have a copy that could be sent to the States? I totally understand if it is not possible from your position to give me access, but it really would mean a lot to me.  (tl;dr- this book covers the specific topics I am interested in, I am not going to get my hands on it in time. Is there a way for you to give me access to your research?)  I am now wondering... is there anything they can actually do for me? Will they be happy to help a High School student use their research? Will they be offended that I am asking to have it for free? Does this really just depend on the professor?","c_root_id_A":"cy5asjj","c_root_id_B":"cy53lqp","created_at_utc_A":1450595345,"created_at_utc_B":1450579083,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"They will certainly not be offended, and might email you either the book or chapters if they feel they can copyright-wise. There are a few online repositories--Project Muse and ebrary--that may have the book. If you'd like to PM me the title I can try and find you a copy.","human_ref_B":"You may be able to check out a digital copy of the book here: https:\/\/openlibrary.org  Open library is like a public library that lends ebooks for free to the world.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16262.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"3xj13k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"I am a High School student who just asked a Sociologist for a way to access their book for free... is there anything they can actually do for me? [X-post \/r\/AskAcademia] Anyone who is an academic or has any experience with similar situations- your input is welcome! This is the email that I sent them:  >I am a high school student attending [redacted] who is taking a fiction course. I have chosen to write a chapbook of flash fiction pieces set in various ports. When the chapbook is done I hope to have explored the social and economic changes that ports undergo. Hopefully this collect will be a meaningful reflection on labor, communal identity and globalization.  >To understand the topic properly I have been reading up on ports throughout history and the state of port cities today. I recently read some chapters from Port Cities as Areas of Transition: Ethnographic Perspectives. While the content was interesting, only three case studies suited my interests. Through a bit of digging I found your book and the contents really struck me as relevant to my project. Your focus on narratives of identity and and waterfront labor tie into the themes I am trying to tackle. The section on radicalism also would provide some great material to explore.  >My issue is that I have not been able to access this book... and I have put in great effort to do so already. I have asked friends who attend my local public university if they could check it out for me; but said university does not have the physical book. The inter-library loan that I have requested will take well over a month at minimum to arrive. By that time I am going to be revising my stories. I usually am pretty good at getting books for free online, however my usual sources did not have it either. I normally am fine with purchasing books; however I get the sense that the $100 price is intended for college libraries who want to buy it, not for students.  >So what I am asking is... do you know of any way for me to read this book? Would it be possible for you to send chapters as pdfs? Does your department have a copy that could be sent to the States? I totally understand if it is not possible from your position to give me access, but it really would mean a lot to me.  (tl;dr- this book covers the specific topics I am interested in, I am not going to get my hands on it in time. Is there a way for you to give me access to your research?)  I am now wondering... is there anything they can actually do for me? Will they be happy to help a High School student use their research? Will they be offended that I am asking to have it for free? Does this really just depend on the professor?","c_root_id_A":"cy5asjj","c_root_id_B":"cy57rt7","created_at_utc_A":1450595345,"created_at_utc_B":1450587236,"score_A":8,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"They will certainly not be offended, and might email you either the book or chapters if they feel they can copyright-wise. There are a few online repositories--Project Muse and ebrary--that may have the book. If you'd like to PM me the title I can try and find you a copy.","human_ref_B":"What is the book title and author?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8109.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3xj13k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"I am a High School student who just asked a Sociologist for a way to access their book for free... is there anything they can actually do for me? [X-post \/r\/AskAcademia] Anyone who is an academic or has any experience with similar situations- your input is welcome! This is the email that I sent them:  >I am a high school student attending [redacted] who is taking a fiction course. I have chosen to write a chapbook of flash fiction pieces set in various ports. When the chapbook is done I hope to have explored the social and economic changes that ports undergo. Hopefully this collect will be a meaningful reflection on labor, communal identity and globalization.  >To understand the topic properly I have been reading up on ports throughout history and the state of port cities today. I recently read some chapters from Port Cities as Areas of Transition: Ethnographic Perspectives. While the content was interesting, only three case studies suited my interests. Through a bit of digging I found your book and the contents really struck me as relevant to my project. Your focus on narratives of identity and and waterfront labor tie into the themes I am trying to tackle. The section on radicalism also would provide some great material to explore.  >My issue is that I have not been able to access this book... and I have put in great effort to do so already. I have asked friends who attend my local public university if they could check it out for me; but said university does not have the physical book. The inter-library loan that I have requested will take well over a month at minimum to arrive. By that time I am going to be revising my stories. I usually am pretty good at getting books for free online, however my usual sources did not have it either. I normally am fine with purchasing books; however I get the sense that the $100 price is intended for college libraries who want to buy it, not for students.  >So what I am asking is... do you know of any way for me to read this book? Would it be possible for you to send chapters as pdfs? Does your department have a copy that could be sent to the States? I totally understand if it is not possible from your position to give me access, but it really would mean a lot to me.  (tl;dr- this book covers the specific topics I am interested in, I am not going to get my hands on it in time. Is there a way for you to give me access to your research?)  I am now wondering... is there anything they can actually do for me? Will they be happy to help a High School student use their research? Will they be offended that I am asking to have it for free? Does this really just depend on the professor?","c_root_id_A":"cy57rt7","c_root_id_B":"cy5cu1t","created_at_utc_A":1450587236,"created_at_utc_B":1450603053,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"What is the book title and author?","human_ref_B":"Possibly. They might send you the e-book or those chapters. The main stumbling block I see is just with the timing. It's the end of exam\/paper marking time and the beginning of Christmas holidays. You may not get a response before mid-January.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15817.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"95whbu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is it possible to assess third world countries by 'Middle Class' income? I currently live in a LEDC in Sub-Saharan Africa where it appears most expatriots feel like they earn less than their HEDC counterparts. This is due to a perceived higher cost of living in comparison to earnings.   I really want to quantify and use the information if its available as I have contract talks with my company (based in a more developed nation) coming up. The problem is, GDP, etc provides a nationwide average which doesnt have any relevance to a middle income person living in an extremely poor country.   How would one go about comparing cost of living in South Africa and United Kingdom with cost of living in Zambia for a middle class \/ middle income bracket only?","c_root_id_A":"e3vy1y4","c_root_id_B":"e3vy213","created_at_utc_A":1533823333,"created_at_utc_B":1533823335,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"This is a really complicated question because in low income countries the cost of locally-produced goods is low while the cost of imported goods is high. Purchasing power is the metric you need but defining the 'middle' relative to another country's 'middle' is hard.  I don't think basic statistics are going to help you much here. You need to find out what other comparable jobs are paying because that is what your employer will be thinking about. Browse the job market, find some examples which specify pay. If it's hard to find examples with a pay bracket specified, sign on with a recruitment agent and they'll tell you what they'd expect to get for you.","human_ref_B":"What is middle class, anyway? Is it a group of people who are between the working class and the \"elite\"? A majority of people between the extremes (e.g. between 20% poorest and 20% richest)? A specific percentile?  The Pew Research defines it as \"adults living in households with disposable incomes ranging from two-thirds to double the country\u2019s *own* median disposable household income (adjusted for household size). This definition allows middle-class incomes to vary across countries, because national incomes vary across countries.\"  So, is it possible to assess third world countries by 'Middle Class income'? Yes, as long as you have access to the numbers (e.g. statistics on income and its distribution), your problem is essentially to decide on a definition.  P.S. Taking into account D-Juice's input, my \"Yes\" does require a footnote - the definition (and the interpretation of data) also depends on the objectives. If middle class is based upon relative income, it does not necessarily say something meaningful about relative spending power.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"spq2w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Have people always be as depressed (and suicidal) as today? Is it getting worse - or better? Generally I believe that our times are very good in a lot of senses (peace, wealth, health etc.) but very often when I try to explain that we have made the world in this sense a better place, others will point out that many people today suffer from depression and suicide rates are high. Do you know if there is research that tried to compare this with earlier times?","c_root_id_A":"c4fzl5r","c_root_id_B":"c4fzyhu","created_at_utc_A":1335278542,"created_at_utc_B":1335280285,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"While the rates of violence and suicide have decreased year to year, could it be that another variable such as social repression or lack of upward mobility is the catalyst of the overall sense of depression?","human_ref_B":"French anthropologist and sociologist wrote about the problem of suicide in 1897).  He theorized that capitalism was the reason why \"advanced\" societies had such a higher suicide rate than other ones.  Satisfaction in life could not be gleaned from a mere doing of one's duties but had to be earned by a climbing of the socio-economic ladder.  Therefore,  irrespective of whether or not a society was actually a \"meritocracy\", the appearance of one is enough to drive people to suicide.  As well,  he includes some statistics in the book (if I remember correctly) from colonized countries.  Their suicide rates were extremely low despite the obvious damage they sustained from the colonizers.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1743.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"r5g4e7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Does democracy always exist with capitalism, or are the two mutually exclusive or highly correlated with one another? Does democracy always exist with capitalism, or are the two mutually exclusive or highly correlated with one another?   In the USA, we seem to conflate capitalism with \"freedom\" and \"democracy.\" Moreover, we also seem to conflate socialism with \"repressive\" and \"totalitarian.\"   * Is socialism more correlated with a repressive and totalitarian government?  * Is capitalism more correlated with a democratic republic government?","c_root_id_A":"hmnky47","c_root_id_B":"hmomxtm","created_at_utc_A":1638275032,"created_at_utc_B":1638292520,"score_A":9,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"This question highly depends on how you define the terms in it (especially \"socialism\" is one that is often used to mean different things, by different people). Furthermore, it is a bit speculative in nature, especially when considering that the Marxist definition of socialism (\"A socioeconomic system, where the bulk of the means of production is under social, democratic control.\"\\*) arguably does not apply to any state in history, especially not to those Marxist-Leninst ones, that call themselves socialist.  Let us define socialist states as those who define themselves as socialist, and capitalist states as all other. As I said, this definition is not necessarily correct - however, it is very common for people to use the one I provided. If you have a definition that you yourself would like to use instead, you can provide that in a reply.  In this case, we can look at 2020's democracy index\\*\\*, and evaluate the results. None of the full democracies in the list call themselves socialist, or have references to socialism in their constitution. If we look at those countries who call themselves socialist or have references to socialism in their constitution\\*\\*\\*, we find 5 flawed democracies, 6 hybrid regimes, and 7 authoritarian states. (The best ranking country with reference to socialism in their constitution being Portugal, with a score of 7.90 - for reference, the US is just ahead of them, with a score of 7.92). While there are only 56 authoritarian states (meaning 33% of all states recognized by this study), 7 of the socialist ones are authoritarian, meaning that 38% of all socialist states currently are authoritarian.  The data shows that today, a state that defines themselves as socialist, is more likely to be authoritarian, than one that does not. That is, if we use the definitions I provided. Furthermore, it is important to note that this data does not answer the - politically very relevant - questions of \"is it *necessary* that socialist states are more authoritarian?\", \"does capitalism cause democracy, or is this just a coincidence?\", etc. For these questions, political philosophers (maybe on r\/askphilosophy) would be more able to give answers.  &#x200B;  \\*definition by G.A.Cohen, Gilabert, Pablo and Martin O\u2019Neill, \"Socialism\", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2019 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.)  \\*\\*Economist Intelligence Unit World Democracy Index 2020  \\*\\*\\*https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/List\\_of\\_socialist\\_states#Current\\_socialist\\_states","human_ref_B":"This is such an important question with really complex (and uncertain) explanations. I will suggest a couple readings on the topic, but first suggest ways of refining the question.  >Does democracy always exist with capitalism, or are the two mutually exclusive or highly correlated with one another?  First off, you need to define \"democracy.\" Most political scientists will distinguish between \"formal democracy\" (basically, a political system in which government leaders are competitively elected and all citizens have an equal right to vote) and more \"substantive\" forms of democracy (where citizens' voice and preferences actually shape political decision-making, where political participation is high, etc.). Short of \"formal democracy\", we can also find myriad forms of \"limited democracy,\" where perhaps elections are not quite competitive, or where a part of the population is disenfranchised. For example, the United States would not be considered a \"formal democracy,\" by this definition, until at least 1964, with the passage of the Civil Rights Act (Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens 1992). Of course, *some* part of the population could vote, so we would consider the U.S. a limited democracy in its first 180 years (with the franchise gradually expanding to include a larger and larger share of the population).  Second, it would be good to know if you mean this historically (i.e. has democracy *always* existed with capitalism) or just in the present moment (i.e. does contemporary democracy always go with capitalism in the world today). Historically, there have been plenty of cases of capitalism *without* democracy (for example: fascism in Italy, Greece, Spain, Portugal, and Germany in the mid-20th century; neoliberal authoritarian governments across Latin America in the 1970s-1990s; illiberal, autocratic quasi-democracies in present-day Russia, Belarus, and Central Asian countries; or \"competitive authoritarian\" regimes all over the world). There are fewer examples of national-level democracy *without* capitalism, at least using the definition of formal democracy that most political scientists use. There are plenty of examples where anti-capitalist parties have been democratically elected to government, but these have either (a) had to compromise their most radical economic plans in order to govern (see Mudge 2018); (b) been removed by anti-democratic means, usually military invasions or coups d'\u00e9tat; or (c), least often, become authoritarian and not held competitive elections subsequent to taking government. I order these trajectories *roughly* in order of frequency. By far and away, most nominally socialist political organizations that have been in government for the last 100 years have governed over fundamentally capitalist or \"mixed\" economies.  Now, if you want to look at local and regional politics, you'll find more examples of democracy coexisting peacefully with non-capitalist forms of economic organization (for example, the state of Kerala in India comes to mind), but these are rare the country level.  As for readings:  One of the best book on the subject from a macro-historically point of view is Rueschemeyer, Stephens, and Stephens (1992) Capitalist Development and Democracy. It's an extremely well researched comparative historical analysis of a number of countries, both advanced capitalist democracies and late-developing countries. They build on and improve a political economy model closely associated with Barrington Moore's (1966) Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy. The main point of these books is that the presence and quality of democracy depends on *how* capitalism develops in a given society. There is a ton of heterogeneity in capitalist societies in the balance of class power, the role of the state in the economy, and the position of the country in the broader world system. So it's not simply whether or not capitalism exists in a society, but rather how the particular trajectory and structure of capitalism has shaped the distribution of power among different social groups and institutions.  In some cases, capitalism promoted democracy, and in other cases it undermined democracy.  For work looking more closely at how capitalism and democracy interrelate in the contemporary political process, I recommend Young, Banjeree, & Schwartz's (2018) \"Capital Strikes as a Corporate Political Strategy\" and Adam Pzerworski's new (2019) book Crises of Democracy.  (edited for spelling)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17488.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"ui0zhr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Has the black and white IQ gap closed over the last few decades, does it still exist? A friend of mine has unfortunately fallen down a rabbit hole of race realism and racialist IQ genetics (despite being half black himself) and we have constantly been debating this for the last week. I\u2019ll admit that this is quite out of my depth as I am in the STEM field not social sciences or psychology.  He\u2019s linked multiple papers about the supposed gap including Hernnstein and Murray\u2019s book the Bell Curve. He asserts it\u2019s genetic and that \u201cpoor Asians do better than the richest whites\u201d and other racist shit like that. As far as I know the best refutation I could find was Shaun\u2019s video essay on YouTube as well as other critiques published although admittedly I haven\u2019t watched the whole thing myself.  He asserts that even if their work does not hold to standard studies on IQ tests he linked still show an IQ gap of about 100 for whites and 85 for blacks. Problem is a lot of studies were done in the 70\u2019s and 80\u2019s. I can\u2019t find any recent literature on this issue, It\u2019s been about 50-60 years approximately 2 generations since desegregation and generally quality of life has risen. I would imagine the gap that he asserts is biological has closed a lot over the last decades due to social factors. Is there any relevant literature showing this?  Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"i79xecm","c_root_id_B":"i79zhgu","created_at_utc_A":1651660294,"created_at_utc_B":1651661852,"score_A":23,"score_B":138,"human_ref_A":"IQ tests were been debunked a long time ago.  IQ tests were developed specifically to be biased against non-white races.","human_ref_B":"Shaun's video is good, but not something I'd expect to change a racialist's mind unless they are already on the road to change their own mind. This document by Jinkinson Smith, written in 2018, provides a decent overview of the handful of available studies on the Black-White gap, and shows that the existing evidence points toward the gap narrowing over time. Out of 13 studies, Jinkinson identified three which found no closure whatsoever. Unsurprisingly, these three studies were authored by three notorious racialists or hereditarians: Murray, Gottfredson, and Rushton.  ---  Regardless, the issue at hand really is not whether or not a gap exists, but what are its causes. The arguments put forward by racialists, such as hereditarians, rely on strongly discredited premises and supported by junk science.  Most glaringly, the concept of biological race is thoroughly rejected by scientific experts (e.g., see the official positions of the American Society of Human Genetics30363-X) and its European counterpart, the American Association of Biological Anthropologists, the American Anthropological Association, also see the public facing work of geneticist Adam Rutherford). The overwhelming consensus is - to employ the language of philosopher of biology Massimo Pigliucci - antirealism about biological races, and realism about social races. Putting all of this aside (even though we have no legitimate reason to), rigorous genetic research fails to support the hereditarian hypothesis for the Black-White achievement gap.  Hereditarians are infamous for engaging in science denialism by appealing to false victim narratives (and leaning onto a long tradition of anti-intellectualism and science denialism) and by making claims that are, in the words of philosopher of biology Jonathan Kaplan,  >... **so out of touch with reality that they are either meant to deliberately mislead readers (lies), or that reveal a level of willful ignorance that is best explained by viewing the world through a lens deeply colored by racism.** (Their assertion that discrimination against blacks in the U.S. is not \u201cas pervasive\u201d as usually claimed also demands ignoring the vast body of published research, on discrimination in hiring, housing, policing, etc.)   Hereditarians consistently rely on the myth that the USA (and other countries in the world) are post-racial societies, and adopt \"colorblind\" lenses which blind them to the fact that progress either stalled or reversed in the decades following the Civil Rights era. For illustrative purposes, see:  * 50 years after the Kerner Commission: African Americans are better off in many ways but are still disadvantaged by racial inequality  * Black Americans mostly left behind by progress since Dr. King\u2019s death   * Why Did Racial Progress Stall in America?  * Affluent and Black, and Still Trapped by Segregation: Why well-off black families end up living in poorer areas than white families with similar or even lower incomes.  * Schools are still segregated, and black children are paying a price  * 65 years after Brown v. Board of Education, school segregation is getting worse: A new report finds that the historic school segregation ruling has been undermined in recent decades.   Also see the concept of redlining, sometimes called the Jim Crow of the North, which more recent research has shown is more pernicious than popularly acknowledged. Not only its effects persist today, but similar practices continued to exist. For illustration, see this *Washington Post* article describing discrimination in appraisals in the US, and the results of a *Newsday* investigation into unequal treatment by real estate agents in Long Island.  ---  Comparisons with Asian Americans are likewise based on a myth built upon ignorance about US history and superficial comparisons between two racialized minorities. As biological anthropologist Alan Goodman and evolutionary biologist Joseph Graves explain with respect to the myth that \"people of Asian descent achieve the highest levels of education in the U.S. because of higher IQs\":  >**Thus, we can understand racialized differences in educational attainment not by genetics, but rather by structured inequalities.** Asian Americans, taken as a racialized group, do tend to test higher on standardized tests and are more likely to complete high school and attend elite colleges in comparison to White students. However, **there is no scientific evidence to show this group is naturally more intelligent; rather, studies show these students\u2019 success may be due to a complex mix of factors, including attending better schools, U.S. immigration policies that favor highly educated immigrants, and students exerting more academic effort.**  >The only theories of cognitive performance differences that hold weight are those associated with early child development. **And poorer communities and many communities of color have been systematically denied access to quality education. When individuals and groups are deprived of appropriate nutrition, exposed to toxic materials, and\/or placed under psychosocial stress, they do not perform as well at cognitive tests as those who do not face those conditions.**  (Also see the case of Jewish people, another racialized group to which similar narratives are foisted upon.)  Lastly, many hereditarian arguments require dismissing the numerous substantive critiques about IQ testing and overinflating its value (see, e.g., here and here). Be aware that this observation is distinct from the claim that IQ testing is entirely meaningless or valueless. As far as I am concerned, the major takeaway for this discussion is that IQ tests do not assess some \"innate intelligence\" from which one can extrapolate that intergroup differences are likely due to \"innate\" differences (the \"default hypothesis\" is plain bullshit).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1558.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"jw8nxb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Statistically, what is the strongest predictor of Trump supporters? I have seen cases made for interaction of race and density, education and race, authoritarian personality traits, religion and race. Which variable or interaction of variables do studies show are the strongest predictors of Trump support?","c_root_id_A":"gcpbz2g","c_root_id_B":"gcp39pr","created_at_utc_A":1605690407,"created_at_utc_B":1605681954,"score_A":55,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"The Pew Research Survey called  \"An examination of the 2016 electorate, based on validated voters\" showed that White Evangelicals were the most likely to vote for Trump among all the factors they surveyed.     Also did you mean \"race and ethnicity\"? I am not sure what you mean by \"race and density\". Are you talking about population density like urban vs rural?","human_ref_B":"I found this linked study to be very interesting.  I have wondered this myself, but the way I frame it has changed from - Predictors of a Trump supporters, to what traits lead a person toward what he offers.   This study looked at people who are drawn to conspiracy theories, and then looks for traits like a need for uniqueness, if you read the study it even found some narcissism, and even discusses authoritarianism. It is very good read. Keep in mind its study.  \"I know things they don't know\"  Here is another link to the same study in case you cant access the first","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8453.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"jw8nxb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Statistically, what is the strongest predictor of Trump supporters? I have seen cases made for interaction of race and density, education and race, authoritarian personality traits, religion and race. Which variable or interaction of variables do studies show are the strongest predictors of Trump support?","c_root_id_A":"gcpc2bd","c_root_id_B":"gcp39pr","created_at_utc_A":1605690504,"created_at_utc_B":1605681954,"score_A":18,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Social Dominance Orientation and Right-Wing Authoritarianism dual process model (Duckitt & Sibley, 2001) : https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/10478400903028540   For Trump specifically (Azevedo, Jost,  & Rothmund, 2017): https:\/\/psycnet.apa.org\/record\/2017-41186-002  SDO wiki: https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Social_dominance_orientation  RWA wiki:https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Right-wing_authoritarianism  They are system justifying ideologies, which work in this framework, this lecture also specifically mentions trump and the study above: https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=g3_TB6NBViE&feature=youtu.be","human_ref_B":"I found this linked study to be very interesting.  I have wondered this myself, but the way I frame it has changed from - Predictors of a Trump supporters, to what traits lead a person toward what he offers.   This study looked at people who are drawn to conspiracy theories, and then looks for traits like a need for uniqueness, if you read the study it even found some narcissism, and even discusses authoritarianism. It is very good read. Keep in mind its study.  \"I know things they don't know\"  Here is another link to the same study in case you cant access the first","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8550.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"eu53d4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What is the most efficient way to promote economic equality?","c_root_id_A":"ffmzglk","c_root_id_B":"ffn4ana","created_at_utc_A":1580060459,"created_at_utc_B":1580061926,"score_A":3,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Did you mean effective?","human_ref_B":"The theory of optimal taxation is a large field in economics. Here's an overview.  Essentially, the theory is concerned with constructing the most efficient tax-and-transfer system in order to maximize a social welfare function. Different such functions are used, but most value increased equality to some extent.  The efficiency problem comes from the fact that individuals change their behavior when they are taxed - essentially, people work less when income is taxed, and this leads to a suboptimal allocation. One way around this is lump-sum taxation, where everyone pays the same amount. But this is very regressive, since the poor will pay a much larger share of their income than the rich.  Ideally, economists would like to tax earnings *ability* rather than actual earnings, since this would not distort behavior (you pay the same tax regardless how much you actually work, so there's no inventive to work less). Of course, this isn't possible in practice, but we can get closer by taxing things that are associated with earnings ability - this is called *tagging* (one of the more absurd suggestions is to tax height).   In practice, tagging is used by conditioning taxes and transfers on having children, and sometimes on age (lower taxes for older people).  It also follows that it's preferable to tax less mobile tax bases more. In particular, economists like property taxes because they're hard to avoid, and they're less distortionary than income taxes.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1467.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2mb10l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Often, people argue that an influx of immigrants to Sweden\/Britain\/the United States would destroy either the economy or the culture of the destination country. But has this ever happened? I'm defining immigrant as somebody who moves into an area with an established government in hopes of economic success. In this context, English settlers in New England are not immigrants, but Irish people who crossed the Atlantic in the 19th century are.","c_root_id_A":"cm3124r","c_root_id_B":"cm2l76p","created_at_utc_A":1416027991,"created_at_utc_B":1415993252,"score_A":35,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"In the 1820s, the Mexican government invited Americans to immigrate into what was then Northern Mexico.  Eventually they rescinded the invitation, but Americans continued to enter the area illegally.  Didn't work out so well for Mexico -- today, we call the region \"Texas.\"","human_ref_B":"Here's an Intelligence Squared Debate: Let Them Come: We Have Nothing to Fear From High Levels of Immigration","labels":1,"seconds_difference":34739.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"1blty0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"What causes some cultures to adopt western styles of dress and others to forgo it? And why do men tend to adopt it moreso than women? I was looking at this post over in \/r\/HistoryPorn and got to thinking - why is it that the Indian and Syrian women in those photos would likely be wearing a similar style of dress today (perhaps not so fancy for the Syrian woman), yet the Japanese lady would not?   My initial gut reaction would be 'wealth', but 1) Japan seems to have adopted Western fashion before it became wealthy and 2) Certain other wealthy countries, such as the countries on the Arabian Peninsula, have become wealthy without abandoning their traditional dress.  Colonialism seems to be out, as Japan only went through a short occupation period, whereas Syria was colonized for decades by the French and India for centuries by the British.   Religion would also be out, as plenty of followers of both Hinduism and Islam seem to do fine maintaining their modesty laws with Western-style clothing.  And as a corollary to this question, why is it that men seem to abandon traditional dress so much more often than women in a culture? Whereas I can think of multiple cultures in which traditional dress would be acceptable for a business meeting for women (West Africa, the Middle East, India, etc.) I can think of very few where traditional attire would be acceptable in such contexts for men (only the Arabian Peninsula and Burma come to mind).  So what is it that makes a culture more likely to adopt Western clothing? And why do men do so more than women?","c_root_id_A":"c982hyr","c_root_id_B":"c97u70u","created_at_utc_A":1365040010,"created_at_utc_B":1365017279,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"This going to be woefully short but you can break out the googe scholar for the rest. There's a good explanation from Institutional Theory. The business dress and the common western dress could be seen as the institutionalisation of a norm.   Basic idea is that societies and organisations are built on sets of norms - or ideas that are seen as intrinsically \"right\" and \"legitmate\"(Weber, 1978; Meyer, JW and Rowan, B 1977; Powell and DiMaggio, 1984). It can be anything, the language, the titles, the relationships, the dress, the food and the structure of the day.   So, once an idea is seen as giving you legitimacy with the framework of society or the organisation, that idea is then adopted and extensively enforced.   Another important idea from Bourdieu (1989, 2006) is the idea of social capital. He argues that capitalism not only create capital but the structure of it create norms and codes that are socially valuable and thus can be called social capital (Portes, A 1998, 2000; Adler, P.S and Kwon, S.W 2002. )  So put those together , take the norms that you need to accept to be considered legitimate and then consider the following of those norms a creation of social capital.   The dominant creation of norms has been the \"Western\" form of capitalism and that brings with it notions of social capital that are intrinsic. In both the case of colonialism , which was a direct intervention of Western norms into other societies, and international global capitalism the way you dress is an important norm and bring you social capital.   This is basically how it became \"normal\" to wear western cloths, especially a suit. Those who wore that attire had more legitimacy and social capital than those that did not. (Ladgegard, G 2006; Behtoui, A;  2006; Hartmann M, 2000)","human_ref_B":"I look forward to a properly cited response, but my suggestion would be business.  International business (still) involves mostly men, so they will be more likely to adopt foreign customs and conform to Western traditions.  Women are (generally) more involved with more traditional responsibilities or jobs.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22731.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1blty0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"What causes some cultures to adopt western styles of dress and others to forgo it? And why do men tend to adopt it moreso than women? I was looking at this post over in \/r\/HistoryPorn and got to thinking - why is it that the Indian and Syrian women in those photos would likely be wearing a similar style of dress today (perhaps not so fancy for the Syrian woman), yet the Japanese lady would not?   My initial gut reaction would be 'wealth', but 1) Japan seems to have adopted Western fashion before it became wealthy and 2) Certain other wealthy countries, such as the countries on the Arabian Peninsula, have become wealthy without abandoning their traditional dress.  Colonialism seems to be out, as Japan only went through a short occupation period, whereas Syria was colonized for decades by the French and India for centuries by the British.   Religion would also be out, as plenty of followers of both Hinduism and Islam seem to do fine maintaining their modesty laws with Western-style clothing.  And as a corollary to this question, why is it that men seem to abandon traditional dress so much more often than women in a culture? Whereas I can think of multiple cultures in which traditional dress would be acceptable for a business meeting for women (West Africa, the Middle East, India, etc.) I can think of very few where traditional attire would be acceptable in such contexts for men (only the Arabian Peninsula and Burma come to mind).  So what is it that makes a culture more likely to adopt Western clothing? And why do men do so more than women?","c_root_id_A":"c982fgg","c_root_id_B":"c982hyr","created_at_utc_A":1365039808,"created_at_utc_B":1365040010,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"One interesting case study of the \"westernization\" of dress is Turkey.  Under the Ottoman empire clothing for men and women stayed largely traditional, especially in the case of men wearing fez's and women wearing a veil.  After WWI, when Kamal Ataturk took power, part of his \"modernization\" was to ban the wearing of traditional clothing for anyone working a public sector job - Fez's and veils were out.  This gradually spread throughout the rest of the country, especially since he was a very popular leader - he singlehandedly made western clothes \"cool\" in Turkey over his period of rule.  The reason, if I call correctly was to both create a clean break in the identity of the country from being the Ottoman empire to being Turkey, and also to make the country more compatible with the West, which is where Ataturk saw the future (even through it was \"the West\" whom he had to fight to create Turkey in the first place).  Ataturk was an intriguing guy - he also banned the use of arabic script, instead having a roman script created for Turkish, and he personally went around and helped teach people how to read the new script.","human_ref_B":"This going to be woefully short but you can break out the googe scholar for the rest. There's a good explanation from Institutional Theory. The business dress and the common western dress could be seen as the institutionalisation of a norm.   Basic idea is that societies and organisations are built on sets of norms - or ideas that are seen as intrinsically \"right\" and \"legitmate\"(Weber, 1978; Meyer, JW and Rowan, B 1977; Powell and DiMaggio, 1984). It can be anything, the language, the titles, the relationships, the dress, the food and the structure of the day.   So, once an idea is seen as giving you legitimacy with the framework of society or the organisation, that idea is then adopted and extensively enforced.   Another important idea from Bourdieu (1989, 2006) is the idea of social capital. He argues that capitalism not only create capital but the structure of it create norms and codes that are socially valuable and thus can be called social capital (Portes, A 1998, 2000; Adler, P.S and Kwon, S.W 2002. )  So put those together , take the norms that you need to accept to be considered legitimate and then consider the following of those norms a creation of social capital.   The dominant creation of norms has been the \"Western\" form of capitalism and that brings with it notions of social capital that are intrinsic. In both the case of colonialism , which was a direct intervention of Western norms into other societies, and international global capitalism the way you dress is an important norm and bring you social capital.   This is basically how it became \"normal\" to wear western cloths, especially a suit. Those who wore that attire had more legitimacy and social capital than those that did not. (Ladgegard, G 2006; Behtoui, A;  2006; Hartmann M, 2000)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":202.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"m6hz9g","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"How do we figure out what media content is actually 'bad for children'? This question is inspired by the Grammy awards the other night. People were objecting to the sexual content of one of the music acts, and citing its possible influence on kids.  My memory from being a kid contains zero instances of being scarred or disturbed by sexual content. Either I didn't get it, or didn't see it as 'dirty'. It was something to giggle about with your friends.  What content DID disturb me, or have a bad influence? It was never what the adult brain might think.  I remember, for example, a comedy show where a girl was in a bath, and she pulled the plug on the bath, and started to go down the drain along with the water. That was a kids show, and it gave me nightmares.  Meanwhile, a 'not for kids' movie might go through my head perfectly fine.  I do feel like Loony Tunes was a bad influence. There's something aggressively sadistic about what happens to the 'bad guys' in those cartoons, that you wonder if it stems from the animators own issues, and I think it was very dark.  All in all, it seems to be that there's something about my childhood brain not understanding tone, and taking things more literally? I can't put my finger on it, so I wanted to ask here. What do we know about what media content is actually bad for children, and why?","c_root_id_A":"gr6d66p","c_root_id_B":"gr6o1om","created_at_utc_A":1615934989,"created_at_utc_B":1615940613,"score_A":4,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Good question.  I was curious myself.  The particular mechanism is hard to come by but, there is certainly a connection between sexual media and earlier and riskier sexual behavior. It seems children learn by watching and watching sexual content without any of associated risks portrayed makes children want to try it earlier than they would.   \"Exposure to sexually explicit media in early adolescence is related to risky sexual behavior in emerging adulthood\"  https:\/\/journals.plos.org\/plosone\/article?id=10.1371\/journal.pone.0230242  \"Media influences on children and adolescents: violence and sex.\"  https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC2594155\/  \"It Works Both Ways: The Relationship between Exposure to Sexual Content in the Media and Adolescent Sexual Behavior\"  https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/20376301\/  \"How Pornography Harms Children: The Advocate's Role\"  Not broadcast media, of course, but goes into the negative affects sexual content has on children.   https:\/\/www.americanbar.org\/groups\/public_interest\/child_law\/resources\/child_law_practiceonline\/child_law_practice\/vol-33\/may-2014\/how-pornography-harms-children--the-advocate-s-role\/","human_ref_B":"I would suggest that before asking \"how do we figure out what media content is actually 'bad for children'\" we should ask whether it makes sense to think in terms of categorically \"good\" and \"bad\" content and if this line of thought produces actionable intelligence.  Theoretically speaking, media content can be harmful in different manners depending on how harm is conceptualized. For example, media can be \"harmful\" in terms of (mis)information and (mis)education. Among many accomplishments, Fred Rogers \\(aka Mister Rogers\\) is known for his testimony before the U.S. Senate defending public television. To quote Strachan:  >Sitting in front of Sen. John O. Pastore, the chairman of the subcommittee, Rogers didn\u2019t get bogged down in budgetary minutia. Instead, **he talked about what he hoped to accomplish with his show. He used it, he said, to help children learn to deal with their problems in a healthy manner** \u2015 to instill a sense of confidence in the kids he worked with and who watched him. He used simple sentences and simple words to get his point across:  >>**This is what I give. I give an expression of care every day to each child, to help him realize that he is unique.** I end the program by saying, \u201cYou\u2019ve made this day a special day, by just your being you. There\u2019s no person in the whole world like you, and I like you, just the way you are.\u201d And **I feel that if we in public television can only make it clear that feelings are mentionable and manageable, we will have done a great service for mental health.** I think that it\u2019s much more dramatic that two men could be working out their feelings of anger \u2015 much more dramatic than showing something of gunfire.  Programs such as Sesame Street presuppose that media can be educational, and are beloved and praised for their pedagogical nature.  However, not all media serves the same purpose. There are many common beliefs and myths which have originated or have been promoted by television and films. For illustration, see:  * How Accurate are Crime Shows on TV? Debunking 7 Common Myths  * The 5 Biggest Tech Myths Perpetuated by TV Shows and Movies, According to Experts  Also see contemporary worries about \"fake news\" and disinformation.  Another manner in which media may be harmful is by producing undesirable behavior (multiple theories exist positing such a relationship). In the United States, there is much interest regarding whether violent media makes people violent. Relatedly, another popular topic is whether pornography contributes to sexual crimes. In recent years, there has also been much discussion about how media might increase suicide rates (e.g. see the controversy surrounding 13 Reasons Why) - I discuss that briefly in the comment attached to this one.   * See here for an overview about violent media.  * See here for an overview about pornography.  ---  There are no simple, straightforward, answers to these questions. We should not expect them, either. To quote Jewkes and Linnemann (2017):  >Scholars in the UK have strongly resisted attempts to assert a direct, causal link between media images and deviant behavior. The same cannot be said for those here in the United States, as researchers and various activist groups continue to search for links between things like video games or music and antisocial behaviors. Still, **for many, the idea of isolating television, film, or any other medium as a variable and ignoring all the other factors that might influence a person\u2019s behavior is considered too crude and reductive an idea to be of any epistemological value. Much effects research cannot adequately address the subtleties of media meanings, the polysemy of media texts** (that is, their being open to multiple interpretations), **the unique characteristics and identity of the audience member, or the social and cultural context within which the encounter between media text and audience member occurs. It mistakenly assumes that we all have the same ideas about what constitutes \u201caggression,\u201d \u201cviolence,\u201d and \u201cdeviance\u201d and that those who are susceptible to harmful portrayals can be affected by a \u201cone-off\u201d media incident, regardless of the wider context of a lifetime of meaning making.** Media effects research also tends to ignore the possibility that influence flows in both directions\u2014 which is to say that the characteristics, interests, and concerns of the audience may actually hold some sway over what the media produce.  This insight also applies to how media might or might not miseducate, misinform, etc. For example, take the (in)famous CSI Effect. As described in 2008 by Judge Donald Shelton, who together with two criminologists surveyed 1000 jurors:  >**Many attorneys, judges, and journalists have claimed that watching television programs like CSI has caused jurors to wrongfully acquit guilty defendants when no scientific evidence has been presented.** The mass media quickly picked up on these complaints. **This so-called effect was promptly dubbed the \"CSI effect,\" laying much of the blame on the popular television series and its progeny.**  He concludes with skepticism about whether the effect exists. If it exists, he concludes that it is negligible. A similar conclusion is reached years latter by Chin and Workewych \\(2016\\), who argue:  >**While researchers have not found a reliable effect of CSI viewership on conviction or acquittal, they have found evidence suggesting that the perceived realism of CSI and the expectations created by CSI may be impactful.** More specifically, those who ascribe a high degree of realism to CSI may be biased in favor of the prosecution when the prosecution leads forensic evidence (i.e., the defendant\u2019s effect). In addition, CSI viewership may increase expectations about evidence among some jurors, thus biasing them in favor of the defense.   Therefore, *if* there is an effect, it is not just about *content*: there are other factors to consider such as *framing*, and how people *perceive* the program.  ---  [Concludes next comment + ref. list]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5624.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"w4g5ci","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What is the science behind \"platforming\", debating controversial views, legitimization and \"the marketplace of ideas\"? A common sentiment I see online - one that appears fairly pervasive in the circles I frequent - is the idea that debating harmful or controversial ideas\/ideologies is counterproductive. It only serves to platform those with controversial ideas and legitimize their ideas, which helps their ideas spread.   (I typically see this in \"left-leaning\" circles and the ideas being platformed are typically considered \"right-leaning\" ideas. Since I am broadly left-leaning, if I use \"we\", I am likely referring to either society in general or some theoretical \"we as leftists\".)  I am not a strong believer in \"the marketplace of ideas\", debate for debate's sake, and so forth. At least, probably not to the extent that proponent's will typically use it. People don't reason into all of their positions, so I think it's a bit naive to believe only the best ideas will prosper. I only mention it because it feels like it might be a related buzzword.   ***(The following is just expressing my confusion in case it is helpful for directing studies, not inviting debate per se.)***  But I am not convinced by the logic espoused in my opening paragraph.   A legitimate party debating an idea makes it appear to be \"worth considering\", thus legitimizing it. Fine, that makes sense.  1. Who says *we're* legitimate in the first place? 2. Do we really have to worry about platforming when algorithms are going to feed content either way?  3. What is the distinction between platforming and introducing counter ideas vs letting those ideas be platformed and spread without any counters at all?  From my layperson view, it feels like: - We don't just legitimize an idea by debating it. The audience is legitimizing it themselves when they hear it, regardless of whether they learn about it from a legitimate source. That may help, but it doesn't feel like a primary mechanic of ideas spreading.  - These ideas are spreading anyway. The authors of these ideas work to spread them and legitimize them. (They have their own legitimacy, or gain it through differing qualities.) They seek out or create platforms. They are platformed, what is the marginal difference of platforming them further whilst introducing counter-ideas?   # Due Diligence I couldn't find anything in the sub that mentioned the following terms, but part of the problem is that I'm not sure what terms I should be searching to learn more!  - Legitimation  - Legitimization  - Marketplace of ideas  I also looked up some scholarly resources for this, but didn't find a lot.","c_root_id_A":"ih4zzif","c_root_id_B":"ih3i10y","created_at_utc_A":1658457397,"created_at_utc_B":1658434406,"score_A":13,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I am going to address your question with respect to misinformation and disinformation, which are major topics of recent research and are relevant to contemporary discussions on deplatforming, algorithms, etc. But first, with respect to question **1)**, I'd recommend asking on r\/askphilosophy instead as it's an epistemological question. Who or what ideas are or aren't \"legitimate\" is a matter of judgment. People and persons decide. For a formal answer, seek philosophers.  --- **Should we be worried about platforming?** ---  Research arguably suggests that there are multiple reasons to be concerned by how social media platforms are or aren't moderated. For instance, Vosoughi et al. (2018) corroborated the old adage that \"a lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes\" with respect to the spread of true and false news online. Furthermore:  >**Though one might expect network structure and individual characteristics of spreaders to favor and promote false news, the opposite is true. The greater likelihood of people to retweet falsity more than the truth is what drives the spread of false news, despite network and individual factors that favor the truth.** Furthermore, although recent testimony before congressional committees on misinformation in the United States has focused on the role of bots in spreading false news (36), **we conclude that human behavior contributes more to the differential spread of falsity and truth than automated robots do. This implies that misinformation-containment policies should also emphasize behavioral interventions, like labeling and incentives to dissuade the spread of misinformation, rather than focusing exclusively on curtailing bots.** Understanding how false news spreads is the first step toward containing it. We hope our work inspires more large-scale research into the causes and consequences of the spread of false news as well as its potential cures.  And to quote Wang et al. (2019):  >Social media platforms, although providing immense opportunities for people to engage with each other in ways that are beneficial, also allow misinformation to flourish. **Without filtering or fact-checking, these online platforms enable communities of denialists to thrive, for instance by feeding into each other's feelings of persecution by a corrupt elite** (McKee and Diethelm, 2010). **The accumulation of individual beliefs in these unfounded stories, conspiracy theories, and pseudoscience can give rise to social movements, such as the anti-vaccination movement, with profound consequences for public health.** This is further exacerbated by the fact that it is politically incorrect to question or criticize the belief of others, and the fight for truth is nevertheless against the flow of true believers armed with ignorance and misinformation (Kaufman et al., 2018).  Also, for illustration, repetition in the form of repeated exposure with misinformation can breed familiarity which in turn can increase the likelihood of believing the false information (the illusory truth effect). ~~Furthermore, I consider that Carthage must be destroyed.~~ According to Pennycook et al. (2018):  >Using actual fake news headlines presented as they were seen on Facebook, we show that even a single exposure increases subsequent perceptions of accuracy, both within the same session and after a week. Moreover, this \u201cillusory truth effect\u201d for fake news headlines occurs despite a low level of overall believability, and even when the stories are labeled as contested by fact checkers or are inconsistent with the reader\u2019s political ideology. **These results suggest that social media platforms help to incubate belief in blatantly false news stories, and that tagging such stories as disputed is not an effective solution to this problem.**  --- **Is deplatforming effective?** ---  There is evidence to suggest that deplatforming can be effective in reducing the reach and influence of those affected (Jhaver et al., 2021), at least in the short term - but it is no panacea, and we still have to deal with core user bases. As Honigberg explains:  >Despite positive short-term trends, it would be na\u00efve to think that the assortment of groups that took part in the January 6 insurrection are no longer a threat to U.S. national security. Rather, they are increasingly feeding off one another in the darkest corners of the Internet. **Deplatforming is akin to a medicinal therapeutic in America\u2019s long-term fight against its information disorder; the ailment may feel as though it has passed, but it continues to mutate and metastasize. A broader strategy is necessary in the long-term fight against disinformation and extremism.**   >**Shutting down accounts helps prevent average unsuspecting users from being exposed to dangerous content, but it doesn\u2019t necessarily stop those who already endorse that content.** When analyzing data from r\/The_Donald and r\/Incels, two forums that were removed from Reddit last year and later became their own standalone websites, researchers found a significant drop in posting activity and newcomers. Still, for those that continued to post on these relocated forums, researchers also noted an increase in signals associated with toxicity and radicalization.  To learn more about the pros and cons of deplatforming according to those who have studied deplatforming, check this blog by Jhaver and this other blog by Blackburn and colleagues.  What else can be done? A popular approach is inoculation, such as through \"prebunking,\" i.e., pre-emptively debunking misinformation rather than just reactively debunking it. This requires identifying and monitoring likely sources of misinformation in order to prepare corrections before the misinformation gets traction or escalated. To quote Ecker et al. (2022):  >**Misinformation corrections might be especially important in social media contexts because they can reduce false beliefs not just in the target of the correction but among everyone that sees the correction** \u2014 a process termed observational correction. Best practices for corrections on social media echo many best practices offline, but also include linking to expert sources and correcting quickly and early. **There is emerging evidence that online corrections can work both pre-emptively and reactively, although this might depend on the type of correction.**  Of course, this means that there must be much effort by all involved and concerned to actively identify and counteract misinformation.  --- **What about debates?** ---  The idea that public debates allow to combat disinformation tends to rely on unrealistic, idealistic, conceptions of \"debate.\" Firstly, those who participate in disinformation and those who seek to stop\/limit the spread of misinformation are not on equal footing. After all, as Poole points out, the former are under no obligation to take the high road. All bullshitters and denialists need to do to achieve success is to sow doubt (e.g., see *Merchants of Doubt*), and they have a large array of rhetorical devices and techniques to exploit people's biases, heuristics, and lack of specialized knowledge (expertise) to reach this minimal goal. As Hoofnagle and Hoofnagle \\(2007\\), who coined the term \"denialism,\" explain:  >**Part of understanding denialism is knowing that it\u2019s futile to argue with them, and giving them yet another forum is unnecessary. They also have the advantage of just being able to make things up and it takes forever to knock down each argument as they\u2019re only limited by their imagination while we\u2019re limited by things like logic and data.** Recognizing denialism also means recognizing that you don\u2019t need to, and probably shouldn\u2019t argue with it. **Denialists are not honest brokers in the debate** (you\u2019ll hear me harp on this a lot). **They aren\u2019t interested in truth, data, or informative discussion, they\u2019re interested in their world view being the only one, and they\u2019ll say anything to try to bring this about.** We feel that once you\u2019ve shown that what they say is deceptive, or prima-facie absurd, you don\u2019t have to spend a graduate career dissecting it and taking it apart. It\u2019s more like a \u201crule-of-thumb\u201d approach to bad scientific argument. **That\u2019s not to say we won\u2019t discuss science or our posts with people who want to honestly be informed, we just don\u2019t want to argue with cranks. We have work to do.**  Furthermore, depending on the topic (e.g., moral and political), personal experiences can be more important than facts in producing a perception of truth (Kubin et al., 2021).  ---  **\\[Continues next comment\\]**","human_ref_B":"One author who addresses your point #1 is Andrew Jason Cohen.  Cohen is starting from a classical liberal perspective, based around the harm principle (cf. John Stuart Mill. He draws an analogy between the deplatforming of extreme or minority political viewpoints on contemporary university campuses and the historical silencing of religious minorities. He argues that both these restrictions on freedom of speech lead to what he terms 'harms of silence'. The classical liberal is morally obliged to try and avoid these harms.  Cohen defines 'silencing' as:  > an act by one or more individuals, by a corporate entity, or by norms, that cause one or more other individuals to refrain from engaging in discussion of some topic. It need not actually stop conversation as other topics may be discussed\u2014 perhaps more superficial topics\u2014when people refrain from discussing a topic of concern. Silencing can be intentional, but need not be. It can also be wrongful, but need not be.  For Cohen, harmful silencing may or may not be intentional but it must, by necessity, be *wrongful*. The harm principle states that restriction of liberty is morally permissible only in order to prevent harm. So Cohen explains:  > my overarching concern is with when a particular sort of religious activity, speech, or what have you, may be permissibly limited and when *attempts to limit those* may themselves be limited  Thus speech may be harmful, and the limiting of speech may be harmful, and there is a calculus of relative harm that must be performed to ascertain the morality of deplatforming.  > If we take the harm principle seriously any silencing that causes a harm is at least subject to further discussion. Absent overriding reason to allow such silencing, it should be prevented.  Cohen gives various recent and older examples of silencing of religious expression. The seventeenth century persecution of Protestant-to-Catholic-to-Protestant convert Pierre Bayle (and his family) by French authorities. A 2018 case of a man fined in Switzerland for greeting a friend publicly with a cordial \"Allahu akbar.\u201d In these cases, harms of silence have been caused because of restrictions on *public* religiosity:  > even if the punishment for failure to abide by the law is relatively minor\u2014say having to pay a fine rather than go to jail\u2014the effect is silencing. People are less free to discuss the merits of their religion as opposed to the merits of another religion\u2014especially that endorsed by the government.When this is the case, people are less likely to learn about competing religions, so less likely to decide to choose a different religion or even become familiar with the beliefs of others.  > [..]  > To encourage discussion with people who reject or depart widely from one\u2019s religious views requires being able to discuss it publicly\u2014to invite discussion with people previously unknown to oneself. Such discussion is of value and many (arguably all) of us have interests in its occurring\u2014both in speaking and in hearing about different religions.  Absent a good justification, these interests are wrongfully set back if government or others do not tolerate public discussion of religion.23 The failure to tolerate, in other words, results in harms of silence.  Cohen then makes the comparison with deplatforming of speakers on college campuses. He does *not* claim that all speakers should be free to speak. He insists on a criterion of basic academic competence and good faith as necessary for productive discussion to actually take place, citing Milo Yiannopoulos as an example of a speaker who could not be *productively* invited to speak on a campus, whilst still acknowledging that failing to do so might lead to other issues:  > a political commentator that worked at Breitbart News with no reputation as an academic, comes to mind. While inviting him to a campus is likely a mistake\u2014as it would provide little opportunity for serious learning\u2014uninviting or de-platforming him causes other problems. It can, for example, easily give conservative students the impression that their voice is not respected  The counter-example Cohen gives, of someone *with* academic merit who was deplatformed, causing a harm of silence, is Charles Murray:  > Murray is known as a politically conservative thinker. Some academics defend Murray\u2019s work and others think it indefensible, but no matter one\u2019s assessment of its merits, it is academic work\u2014published in academic outlets with peer review. A talk on campus by Murray would not be worthless. He was invited by a student group to speak at the campus. The group\u2014The American Enterprise Club\u2014presumably hoped that his presence would spur honest discussion. Instead, opposed students acted in ways that would embarrass faculty and administrators at any college. They were rude to the speakers before Murray and then, as Murray began speaking, stood, turned their backs to him, and spoke loudly in unison against him so that he could not be heard. He may have said things they would want to argue against. He may have said things they would agree with. They could not know.   Cohen also discusses speakers who are invited and then either have their invitation withdrawn, or fail to show up, as a result of protests at their being invited in the first place.  > Here, the point is only that there were some that had an interest\u2014in most of these cases, a clear and stated interest\u2014in engaging with the silenced speakers (who also have an interest in engaging with them). Absent a justification that overrides those interests and the other problems with silencing\u2014significant at a college\u2014these silencing activities are harms.  The calculus of harm *does* rule out those who hold positions that are both opposed by an overwhelming weight of academic evidence and harm-causing in themselves. Cohen includes Holocaust deniers and those attributing autism to vaccines in this category.  For him, it is the professoriate of a college that is best placed to make this decision, both because they have the expertise to evaluate the academic credentials of a prospective speaker, and also because their endorsement suggest to prospective audiences that the event is likely to be one where good faith debate is both expected and to be encouraged. Individual students on campus always, of course, retain their right not to *listen*.  > open inquiry is the lifeblood of colleges. Their raison d\u2019\u00eatre is to create knowledge and encourage its spread through reasoned dialogue. This entails that\u2014in direct contrast to the objection\u2014silencing is what would kill colleges. The objection is thus not merely misguided when applied to colleges, but gets things completely backward. Colleges die from silencing, not from speech. We should also note, of course, that there is little cause to believe individuals are harmed by the sorts of speech in question. People may well be offended if their religion is questioned, but being offended is not the same as being harmed. [..] And, again, on college campuses [..] students should expect to be questioned. Speech that contradicts their view is not merely not harmful, it is imperative.  See Cohen, A. (2020). HARMS OF SILENCE: FROM PIERRE BAYLE TO DE-PLATFORMING. Social Philosophy and Policy, 37(2), 114-131.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22991.0,"score_ratio":1.625}
{"post_id":"xc7u9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"[Psychology] Why do people like listening to the same songs over and over? I've noticed that we tend to gravitate to a handful of our \"favorite songs\" and listen to them repeatedly. Why is it that people like listening to these few songs over and over? At some point we can play the songs in our heads from memory!","c_root_id_A":"c5l5t2j","c_root_id_B":"c5l56qe","created_at_utc_A":1343581239,"created_at_utc_B":1343578193,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It's all about mental triggers. There are some great Psych articles that you can look up on Japanese Music Therapy rehabilitation for terminally ill patients.  They measured the Cortisol(literally stress chemical the body produces) levels in patients before music, and after music.  Our favorite song can trigger a series of chemical responses in the brain, call them memories, feelings, etc.   Then again I'm just a Psych Major.","human_ref_B":"I am not a credible psychologist, but here are my two cents. When a person listens to music that they enjoy, they get some positive stimulation and a person typically feels good. A person then replays it over and over to recreate the good feeling they got. This could also be an evolutionary trigger that makes us want to dominate things, and in by listening to it continually, we are dominating it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3046.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"25u25y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.63,"history":"Why are there so many Islamic terrorist organizations yet so few Christian, Jewish, Hindu e.t.c terrorist groups?","c_root_id_A":"chku9u9","c_root_id_B":"chkt9um","created_at_utc_A":1400393392,"created_at_utc_B":1400389562,"score_A":40,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I think this question deserves some historical context. For example, the I.R.A during the second half of the 20th century could easily be considered a Catholic terrorist organization. Perhaps the Ku Klux Klan could be considered a Protestant one as well. Prior to the establishment of Israel there were plenty of paramilitary Jewish terrorist organizations committing terrorist acts against Palestinians as well as the British in the territory of Palestine.","human_ref_B":"What support do you have to show that there are more Islamic terrorist organizations proportional to the population than Christian, Jewish, Hindu, etc?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3830.0,"score_ratio":4.4444444444}
{"post_id":"25u25y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.63,"history":"Why are there so many Islamic terrorist organizations yet so few Christian, Jewish, Hindu e.t.c terrorist groups?","c_root_id_A":"chkymhx","c_root_id_B":"chkwxfs","created_at_utc_A":1400418401,"created_at_utc_B":1400408097,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I'll just chime in briefly to add some relevant studies to this discussion.  Terrorist organizations exist where there are political grievances. In the early 20th century, the most common acts of terrorism, as far as I can tell, were communist and anarchist groups. In Canada, for example, Cuban and Sikh terrorism still outranks Islamic terrorism as the highest killers. (Don't have a source on that, so treat it as such). Your point that there are \"so few\" Christian, Jewish, and Hindu terrorist groups is completely false, however. Other commentors have noted some examples, but have a look at the Irgun and Haganah as examples of recent Jewish terrorist groups. Have a look here for some information on Buddhist terrorism.  As for Islamic terrorism, a study by the University of Chicago found that suicide attacks are primarily driven by foreign occupation. See here.  The author of the study states in an article on Foreign Policy:  >**More than 95 percent of all suicide attacks are in response to foreign occupation**, according to extensive research that we conducted at the University of Chicago's Project on Security and Terrorism, where we examined every one of the over 2,200 suicide attacks across the world from 1980 to the present day.   This research is supported by another study by  David Shanzer of Duke University, Charles Kurzman of North Carolina University and Ebrahim Moosa of Duke University, titled *Anti-Terror Lessons of Muslim-Americans*. They found that Muslims who engage in terrorism frequently know very little about Islam:  >..most of those who engage in religiously inspired terrorism have little formal training in Islam and, in fact, are poorly educated about Islam. Muslim-Americans with a strong, traditional religious training are far less likely to radicalize than those whose knowledge of Islam is incomplete.    Lastly, if you look at the statements of known terrorists such as Bin Laden and the London bombers - they explicitly give political reasons for their actions. Bin Laden repeatedly stated that he wanted American troops out of the Gulf Arabian peninsula, and that the Saudi royal family were un-Islamic. The London bombers cited British military campaigns in Muslim countries such as Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as continued support for Israel.","human_ref_B":"I do not think this question warrants answering before the actual statistics of religious terrorism have been established. Since OP did not provide any basis for this claim, could somebody who is more informed on this issue enlighten us?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10304.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"ken8gw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Is there a difference in social and economic prosperity between African Americans and African refugees (and their descendants)? I originally made this post in another sub, but I didn\u2019t get as much statistical data as I had hoped, and I wanted to get different takes on the topic. If you don\u2019t feel like reading the whole thing (hopefully you at least read the important  parts of it for the specific context of why I ask this question), skip to the last paragraph.  This post is a little bit all over the place, but let me give some background. My parents are Eritrean immigrants who came to the US in the mid to late eighties during Eritrea\u2019s war with Ethiopia, and I was born in the US. Their general belief is that the social and economic oppression of a large portion of the working\/lower class African American population in the US is the result of the characteristics of black \u201cculture\u201d (if there is  even such a thing as a unified African American culture) which promotes behaviors that allow them to be subjected to unfair treatment from other racial groups like white people. I don\u2019t really have much of a viewpoint on this because I don\u2019t believe I have the proper life experience to make that kind of judgement. Nevertheless, there is some dissonance in the subject that I would like to get some clarification on:  Many of our parents and family members in the Habesha community (Ethiopian\/Eritrean community) came to the US as refugees during the eighties and nineties (some even as early as the seventies). A large number of them are not particularly educated, with many of them having fled their country from villages\/rural areas. It is not uncommon for many of our parents to have never completed elementary school. Even from the small minority of those who were able to receive a university degree in their home country, their degrees are generally largely unusable in the US for employment purposes, and so their job prospects are similar to other refugees.  When they come here, they generally work minimum wage jobs, work under the table for cash, and live in low income housing. My understanding from what they tell us is that they work a lot and save up money (along with being on welfare of course) until they can move out of the low income housing, and then they find a wife\/husband and have children somewhere else. If they want keep taking advantage of the low cost living, they remain in low income housing, get married, and have kids, and once the kids are old enough that they can be \u201cinfluenced by the hood mentality\u201d (their words), the parents are somehow able to take their kids and leave the neighborhood.  Despite this, our parents still work low income jobs and receive welfare benefits, but their kids enjoy a typical, middle class life. I don\u2019t know the details of everyone\u2019s finances, so I am unaware of how exactly they manage, but in the grand scheme, our families generally don\u2019t face many unbearable financial hardships due to living in America. In addition, there is pressure for our parents to send money back to Africa for their parents\/siblings\/extended family and friends, which many (especially men) do quite often. But socioeconomically, they remain at the same status throughout their lives as refugees. In my neighborhood alone, there have always been around 5 to 10 taxi cabs sitting around, all owned and driven by Eritreans\/Ethiopians, and that typically ends up being their livelihood until they stop working. Some woman stay at home to raise their children, while others work menial jobs to support the household.  Any kind of generational wealth for us is obviously non existent, and so it is in our family\u2019s interest for us to \u201cbecome successful\u201d in our careers. Although our parents\u2019 socioeconomic status has not and probably will not change in the US, the American born youth of the community has become quite successful, with many US born children having already received their PhDs and earning high salaries.  To white people and other non-African minorities, we appear as black. We still receive plenty of microaggression on account of our race. My father has been pulled over by the police numerous times when driving alone for matching certain suspicious profiles. My mother and I have been followed around in stores countless times and have been watched carefully by several employees at the checkout line. Even when passing by someone\u2019s house at night in my neighborhood, there are some people who, instead of entering their house after exiting their car, stand by their front door and watch us until we pass by before opening their front door and entering their house. A lot of this behavior does come from other uneducated foreigners, but definitely not all of it. My mother has a English sounding last name, and so on paper, she is often mistaken for a white woman. When making doctors appointments, people\u2019s tones immediately change once they hear that she has an accent. She recently wanted to buy a used car from someone, and when the lady who was selling it spoke to her (she was white), she became very nervous and kept asking whether or not the woman who had initially messaged her was really her (this woman had been very enthusiastic about selling my mother the car before this). The woman then kept asking my mother about where exactly she lived, how many kids she had, where she worked, and a bunch of other irrelevant questions, and she kept slowly trying to back out of the transaction. My mother was fully aware of what was happening, and she assured her that she didn\u2019t have to sell if she didn\u2019t want to, told her to have a nice day, and decided not to talk with her any further. Growing up, I took violin lessons, and in the first couple of lessons, my mother would come with me. The (white) teacher flat out told me to tell my mother she expected a regular check payment every month and that she \u201cdoesn\u2019t like checks that bounce\u201d (her exact words).  These are just a few of many experiences involving race that I have had growing up, but because my parents always had such a seemingly nonchalant attitude about it, I never learned to be offended by any of it. In fact,  my mother and I found it pretty hilarious most of the time.  TL;DR: I know it is unfair to make sweeping comparisons, but I have always been genuinely confused as to how related the \u201cblack American\u201d experience is today for African Americans and for African refugees. Despite the humble beginnings of African refugees in America, it is my understanding that their first generation children in America end up rising above the status they grew up with. I don\u2019t know too much about the Somali community, but from those I have known, their experiences seem to be similar. I am certain that there are a lot of holes in my knowledge, and so that\u2019s why I wanted to ask reddit to clear up whatever ignorance and help me learn more. First of all, do children of African immigrants (specifically refugees) do better on average than African Americans economically, and if so, are there any concrete correlations that can be associated with this? Do they face similar systemic disadvantages? Is it easier for someone like me or my parents to not be offended by racist behavior\/attitudes towards us? Am I facing a lot of confirmation bias by growing up in the environment that I did? Is any comparison between the two groups valid at all? Does anyone have any better information on this?","c_root_id_A":"gg4mflz","c_root_id_B":"gg3xrad","created_at_utc_A":1608198850,"created_at_utc_B":1608178802,"score_A":10,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"As a premise, this answer will address the topic of African *immigrants*, not *refugees* - an important distinction to be made. However, the elements below may serve to think about the latter and not jusr the former (e.g. racism is not limited to Black *Americans* and the hows and why someone migrates have to be taken into account).  To address your main query, I would recommend beginning with looking into the concept of model minority, and more specifically the model minority myth concerning Asian Americans. Understanding the myth allows to understand the pitfalls of comparing two social groups with different starting points and histories which explain differences in outcomes. Check this comment for further elaboration.  It also serves as a parallel to discuss the fact that some commentators (academic and otherwise) have identified African immigrants and their children as an \"invisible model minority.\" To the best of my knowledge, there is limited research in regard to this particular topic (one problem concerns what data is available and disaggregating it, see for illustration Ukpokodu, 2018), and how much it applies beyond the first generation.  That said, according to a recent article by Howard and Borgella (published this year, 2020):  >**Although Black Africans and native-born Black Americans are perceived to be members of the same racial group and are at times stereotyped similarly, Black Africans in the United States are often positively subtyped** (i.e., viewed as members of a target group who disconfirm their group\u2019s stereotypes and are \u201crefenced\u201d in a separate subcategory apart from members who confirm the stereotype; Allport,1954;Richards & Hewstone, 2001). **Black Africans are often categorized as being culturally superior compared to native-born Black Americans resulting in dramatic differences in the ways in which both groups are perceived, particularly in the domains of labor and education** (Greer,2013). For example, native-born Black Americans are often stereotyped as having lower qualification and ability in academic and occupational contexts than White Americans (e.g., Allport,1954;Devine,1989; Richeson & Sommers,2016). Black Africans on the other hand, are viewed as more hard-working and less entitled than native-born Black Americans (Greer,2013) and have been referred to as a\u201chidden model minority\u201din reference to their unacknowledged academic achievement (Ukpokodu,2017)  >**Although the** ***acknowledgement*** **of Black Africans\u2019 success may be \u201cinvisible,\u201d the** ***awareness*** **of their success and the belief that they are cultural superior relative to Black Americans is not.**  ---  Before discussing their paper further, I would first refer to this 2012 report for the Migration Policy Institute]( https:\/\/www.migrationpolicy.org\/research\/CBI-african-migration-united-states). As the authors explain:  >**Black African immigrants are among the best-educated US immigrants.** African immigrants are disproportionately admitted through the diversity program \u2014 which requires immigrants to have at least a high school degree or two years of experience in an occupation that requires at least two years or more of training to perform. High travel costs could partially explain the relatively high share of skilled Africans among US immigrants. **Relatively few Africans come to the country as unauthorized migrants (see Figure 1), and the unauthorized tend to be less well educated.**  Therefore, insight gained from understanding the \"Asian American success\" can also be used to try and understand \"African immigrant success.\" At the same time, the experiences of African Americans with discrimination are not exclusive to African *Americans*. As the authors remark deeper into the report:  >**The relatively high educational attainment and English proficiency of Black African immigrants appears to translate into high labor force participation, though not necessarily high earnings.** [...]  >Part of the explanation for African immigrants\u2019 low earnings may be underemployment among those who are highly skilled. In 2009 over a third of recent immigrants (those with fewer than ten years of US residency) who had a college degree or higher earned abroad were working in unskilled jobs (see Figure 5). The employment of high-skilled African immigrants seems to improve alongside their years of residence in the United States: the share working in unskilled jobs drops to 22 percent after ten years in the United States, comparable to the level for Asian immigrants and substantially lower than those from Latin America. **However, immigrants from Asia and Latin America tend to have limited English proficiency, while those from Africa are disproportionately fluent in English \u2014 an attribute that should improve their opportunities for skilled employment. At the same time, though, difficulties with credentialing and racial discrimination in the US labor market are factors that potentially reduce Black Africans\u2019 opportunities for skilled employment.**  Returning to Howard and Borgella, they conducted an audit study to assess whether people react different to \u201cBlack American names\u201d and \u201cAfrican (Nigerian) names.\u201d They conclude that candidates with Black American names are less likely to be selected than candidates with Nigerian names, and that the former were (overall) also evaluated more negatively...  >**However, we caution those who may interpret our results as suggesting that Black Africans are buffered against any anti-Black bias in the labor domain relative to native-born Black Americans.** Instead, the present research demonstrates the ways in which within-race differences, in this case nationality or ethnicity, can lead to some Black individuals either experiencing more or less racial bias in certain contexts. **Whereas Black Africans may have not faced anti-Black bias in terms of interview prospects and perceptions of hireability, they still may face bias similar to native-born Black Americans in other ways.** For example, **we found participants in our sample were less likely to see themselves working under** ***both*** **native-born Black American and Black African applicants in the future, relative to White American applicants.** In other words, our participants could not see themselves being supervised by a Black individual regardless if they were Black American or Black African. In addition, **we also found that individuals offered both Black American and Black African applicants significantly lower starting salaries** (i.e., roughly $2,000 less) **than White American applicants.**  By way of conclusion, I would remind that there are many different ways in which racism can manifest itself, and that it is also not the only kind of discrimination or prejudice which exists. Also see [colorism, xenophobia, ethnocentrism, ...  P.S. Regarding refugees, as you seek data in their regards, Migration Policy Institute has a 2015 report regarding \"successes and challenges\" of integration.  ---  Howard, S., & Borgella, A. M. (2020). Are Adewale and Ngochi more employable than Jamal and Lakeisha? The influence of nationality and ethnicity cues on employment-related evaluations of Blacks in the United States. The Journal of social psychology, 160(4), 509-519.  Ukpokodu, O. N. (2018). African immigrants, the \u201cNew Model Minority\u201d: Examining the reality in US K-12 schools. The Urban Review, 50(1), 69-96.","human_ref_B":"This is the essence behind the ADOS movement. If you want to read some books with a lot of data analysis I\u2019d suggest   * Immigration and the remaking of Black America  * The Color of Law  There are also studies showing that the affects of Jim Crowe discrimination have effects for generations.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20048.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"5vlgz0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Is there any evidence that a person's level of attractiveness affects how they're treated by other people? I'm having an argument with my friend. My side is that how attractive a person is can have an effect on how they're treated by other people, and my friend's position is that that is not so. Is there any evidence that points to either of us being right?","c_root_id_A":"de3n6qv","c_root_id_B":"de3mb2m","created_at_utc_A":1487829372,"created_at_utc_B":1487827833,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The term \"beauty bias\" is used a lot in sociology.  As you'd expect, things are generally better for prettier people: more likely to get jobs, as per \/u\/escapeexplore's comment they often make more money, etc.  However, it can also have the opposite effect. Women viewed as more attractive can sometimes actually be less likely to be hired for jobs where physical appearance is explicitly seen as less important, esp. if they're traditionally masculine jobs (i.e., a security guard).  i.e.: http:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/00224540903365414  But yeah, it's honestly kind of crazy how significant\/various the effects of attractiveness are (and how race\/gender etc. can interact with that).","human_ref_B":"This CBSNews article just came out today: [\"Very Unattractive\" Workers Can Out Earn Pretty People Economic Study Finds] (http:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/very-unattractive-workers-can-out-earn-pretty-people-economic-study-finds\/)  Basically it says:   * It's widely documented that income varies in part by level of attractiveness.   * A recent study claims that while attractive people make more than unattractive people, \"very unattractive\" people oddly make more than unattractive people, and sometimes even more than attractive people.   * The study also claims that earnings gaps are less pronounced when also accounting for other differences like health, intelligence, and personality.   * Some critics think the sample size of \"very unattractive\" people was too small and skewed the results of the study.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1539.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2ckk0w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is there any evidence that social media use is creating a \"generation of narcissists\"? \"Gen Y is so narcissistic\" is a common theme in thinkpieces and New York Times op-eds. It's often ascribed to all the time young people spend curating their social media profiles. \"Selfies\" are often pointed to as a sign of how narcissistic this generation is.  Is there any evidence that it's true? How would you even operationize this?  Question inspired by Senecatwo's post earlier today.","c_root_id_A":"cjgik1b","c_root_id_B":"cjgix76","created_at_utc_A":1407159465,"created_at_utc_B":1407160411,"score_A":2,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"Yes, there is at the least a growing body of correlational research establishing this connection.   Operationalizing subclinical narcissism is not an issue. The Narcissistic Personality Inventory (Raskin & Terry, 1988) is a very well-validated and widely used scale. It consists of 40 items where the participant is asked to choose one of two statements that describes them, with each pair consisting of one narcissistic (coded as 1) and one non-narcissistic (coded as 0) answer. NPI score is determined by simply summing the responses to all questions. The population average for this (at least in the U.S.) is right around 18.  As for research that uses this scale to make the connection with social media, here are some examples:  Buffardi, L. E., & Campbell, W. K. (2008). Narcissism and social networking websites. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 34, 1303-1324.  Carpenter, C. J. (2012). Narcissism on Facebook: Self-promotional and anti-social behavior. Personality and Individual Differences, 52, 482\u2013486.  Greenwood, D., Long, C., & Dal Cin, S. (2013). Fame and the social self: The need to belong, narcissism, and relatedness predict fame appeal. Personality and Individual Differences, 55, 490\u2013495.  Raskin, R., & Terry, H. (1988). A principal-components analysis of the Narcissistic Personality Inventory and further evidence of its construct validity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54(5), 890-902.","human_ref_B":"Here is a psych central article that seems to say that yes their is a higher amount of narcissism here is the article on psych central or at least narcassits post more frequently:  *\u201cAmong young adult college students, we found that those who scored higher in certain types of narcissism posted more often on Twitter,\u201d said Panek, who recently received his doctorate in communication studies from U-M.*  *\u201cBut among middle-aged adults from the general population, narcissists posted more frequent status updates on Facebook.\u201d*  Here is another paper from 2010, available here that shows narcissism with Facebook usage.  Although they mention a caveat:  *\"The simultaneous rise of narcissism and SNS usage in the Millennial generation raises the question: is there a relationship between the two? While we are not proposing that everyone who uses SNSs is a narcissist, the medium appears to provide the narcissistic individual an ideal opportunity to display vanity, self-promote, manipulate his\/her public-image, and gain approval and attention.*  *Surprisingly, we found that narcissism was not a strong predictor of the reported amount of time spent on SNSs or frequency of status updates. This suggests that Millennials\u2019 SNS usage is not solely about attention-seeking or maintaining self-esteem (a common stereotype for \u2018\u2018Generation Me;\u2019\u2019 e.g., Kelley, 2009), but is also a means of staying connected and communication\"*   Here is a 2009 Paper that shows a higher correlation between Facebook group usage and civic involvement  If we look at the studies then the answer to your question is, not necessarily.  Narcissists certainly utilize the medium but it isn't as clear cut as the media suggests (no surprise).    edit: grammar.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":946.0,"score_ratio":13.0}
{"post_id":"2ckk0w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is there any evidence that social media use is creating a \"generation of narcissists\"? \"Gen Y is so narcissistic\" is a common theme in thinkpieces and New York Times op-eds. It's often ascribed to all the time young people spend curating their social media profiles. \"Selfies\" are often pointed to as a sign of how narcissistic this generation is.  Is there any evidence that it's true? How would you even operationize this?  Question inspired by Senecatwo's post earlier today.","c_root_id_A":"cjgosan","c_root_id_B":"cjgik1b","created_at_utc_A":1407172472,"created_at_utc_B":1407159465,"score_A":14,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'm a bit late to the party and about to present something contrary to popular belief, so I won't be surprised if many people disagree with me (and my sources). However, among other things I research pathological personality traits including narcissism.  To begin with, much of this generation me research has been fueled by the findings of Twenge and colleagues. The methods that are used tend to be cross sectional. That is, polling college students and middle aged or elderly individuals at the same time. This is misrepresentative of actual trends in narcissism because we don't know how these people acted when they were young. Instead, we are left to believe they changed over time or that they've always been different.   Roberts et al 2010 suggests that we actually grow less narcissistic as we age. This is shown through both meta analyses and longitudinal work, so I put more weight in that than in cross sectional reports. The important take away is that being self-centered and entitled may serve a purpose in our formative years and that we develop out of this by experiencing life.   Source: http:\/\/pps.sagepub.com\/content\/5\/1\/97.short  I'd be happy to provide more, but I think this one speaks for itself and I'd just be giving the same citations in this paper.  Secondly, people in this thread are discussing how valid the narcissistic personality inventory is and this is down right wrong. The measure has horrific internal consistency among its factors. There's construct contamination with leadership, something that has nothing to do with narcissism. There are construct deficits as it does not assess any form of vulnerability that is also associated with narcissism.   More importantly via the Wikipedia page:  >>Thus, it may currently be concluded that the factor structure of the NPI is unknown.  http:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Narcissistic_Personality_Inventory  Numerous authors have addressed the need for other measures as the NPI is not entirely representative of narcissism itself. For instance, the pathological narcissism inventory assesses both grandiose and vulnerable feelings that manifest in narcissistic behaviors.   Sources: http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/m\/pubmed\/20001728\/  http:\/\/www.sakkyndig.com\/psykologi\/artvit\/pincus2009.pdf  Tldr: the NPI is not the best tool to detect narcissism as a whole and most research uses it cross sectionally. Combined, this makes most research very misleading when discussing how narcissistic each generation is. Developmental stages are likely more important than generations.","human_ref_B":"Yes, there is at the least a growing body of correlational research establishing this connection.   Operationalizing subclinical narcissism is not an issue. The Narcissistic Personality Inventory (Raskin & Terry, 1988) is a very well-validated and widely used scale. It consists of 40 items where the participant is asked to choose one of two statements that describes them, with each pair consisting of one narcissistic (coded as 1) and one non-narcissistic (coded as 0) answer. NPI score is determined by simply summing the responses to all questions. The population average for this (at least in the U.S.) is right around 18.  As for research that uses this scale to make the connection with social media, here are some examples:  Buffardi, L. E., & Campbell, W. K. (2008). Narcissism and social networking websites. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 34, 1303-1324.  Carpenter, C. J. (2012). Narcissism on Facebook: Self-promotional and anti-social behavior. Personality and Individual Differences, 52, 482\u2013486.  Greenwood, D., Long, C., & Dal Cin, S. (2013). Fame and the social self: The need to belong, narcissism, and relatedness predict fame appeal. Personality and Individual Differences, 55, 490\u2013495.  Raskin, R., & Terry, H. (1988). A principal-components analysis of the Narcissistic Personality Inventory and further evidence of its construct validity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54(5), 890-902.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13007.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"5xpylu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why did so few speak out against the Nazi atrocities? I'm interested in if there were any studies done in the aftermath of Nazi Germany as to why, with only limited exceptions, the populace did very little to speak out against the hatred, the violence, and ultimate genocide against many segments of society the Nazis deemed \"untermenschen?\"  I'm not looking to place blame, and I don't want this question to be misconstrued, but were there legitimate fears by the Germans to speak out?  What was the psychology, and the collective failure, of a nation to act?  Thanks for any insight.","c_root_id_A":"dekj0bd","c_root_id_B":"deksq3k","created_at_utc_A":1488796842,"created_at_utc_B":1488815604,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"A relevant author for this question would be Ian Kershaw He has written a lot on the very subject and has also been centrally interested in the same question. I have only read \"The Nazi Dictatorship\" the evidence seems to suggest a lot more chaotic and confusing situation on the ground than is often presented.","human_ref_B":"the Frankfurt School members\/associates come to mind as they attempted to grapple with this question in the pre- and post- Nazi era from many perspectives. The late Zygmunt Bauman's *Modernity and the Holocaust* is indebted to their analysis.   An aphorism from Adorno's Minima Moralia:  >*Pseudomenos* \u2013 The magnetic power which ideologies exert over human beings, while they have become entirely threadbare, is to be explained beyond psychology, in the objectively determined decay of logical evidence as such. It has come to the point that lies sound like truth, and truth like lies. Every statement, every news report, every thought is preformed by the centers of the culture-industry. What does not bear the trusted mark of such preformation lacks credibility in advance, all the more so that the institutions of public opinion garnish what they send out with a thousand factual proofs and all the power of conviction which the total apparatus can bring to bear. The truth which would like to do something against this, bears not merely the character of something improbable, but is moreover too poor to break through in direct competition with the highly concentrated apparatus of dissemination. The German extreme sheds light on the entire mechanism. When the Nazis began to torture, they did not merely terrorize people both inside and outside the country, but were at the same time the more secure against exposure, the more savage the atrocities became. Its sheer unbelievability made it easy to disbelieve what, for the sake of peace, no-one wanted to believe, while simultaneously capitulating before it. Those who trembled in fear told themselves that things were much exaggerated: well into the war, the details of the concentration camps were unwelcome in the English press. Every horror in the enlightened world turns necessarily into a horror story [Greuelm\u00e4rchen]. For the untruth of the truth has a kernel, to which the unconscious eagerly [begierig anspricht] turns. It does not only wish for horror. Rather Fascism is in fact less \u201cideological,\u201d to the extent it immediately proclaimed the principle of domination, which was elsewhere hidden. Whatever humane principles the democracies marshaled to oppose it, were effortlessly rebutted by pointing out that these do not concern all of humanity, but merely its false image, which Fascism is man enough to divest itself of. So desperate however have human beings become in their culture, that they are ready to cast off the frail signs of a better state of affairs, if only the world does their worse side the favor of confessing how evil it is. The political forces of opposition however are compelled to make use of the lie, if they do not wish to be completely extinguished as completely destructive. The deeper their difference from the existent, which nevertheless grants them shelter from a still worse future, the easier it is for the Fascists to nail them down as untruths. Only the absolute lie still has the freedom to say anything of the truth. The confusion of truth with lies, which makes it nearly impossible to maintain the difference between the two, and which makes holding on to the simplest cognition a labor of Sisyphus, announces the victory of the principle in logical organization, even though its military basis has been crushed. Lies have long legs: they are ahead of their time. The reconfiguration of all questions of truth into those of power, which truth itself cannot evade, if it does not wish to be annihilated by power, does not merely suppress the truth, as in earlier despotisms, but has reached into the innermost core of the disjunction of true and false, whose abolition the hired mercenaries of logic are anyway feverishly working towards. Thus Hitler, who no-one can say if he died or escaped, lives on.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18762.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"8dior2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What was it that made the indoctrination of Nazi propaganda so effective in Nazi Germany? What really makes me curious is how was the indocrination and the influence of the Nazi propoganda that Germans faced during the 30s and 40s which led to the Second World War.  I am really curious on how they were able to internalise these ideologies despite the amoral and egocentric ideologies such as racial superiority, racial genocide and even war when other countries such as the Allies and even the descendants and historians of WW2 all agree that these acts were clearly amoral and cruel and ruthless.  I am very inquisitive on how the Germans actually indulged and accepted these ideologies and actually did what they did under Hitler's rule without remorse (of course not all Germans were Nazis)","c_root_id_A":"dxnvi31","c_root_id_B":"dxnwuyr","created_at_utc_A":1524194196,"created_at_utc_B":1524195846,"score_A":6,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"You might want to try \/r\/AskHistorians for this one.","human_ref_B":"I'm writing a paper on this right now.  There are several good sources that you may be able to find, but one of the most popularly cited ones that I've found at my library was Hitler Youth, by Michael H. Kater.  He basically describes it as a relatively slow movement by the Nazi party to take advantage of a working class that was fed up with the injustices that were placed upon them after WW1.  By leveraging the sense of that injustice, the failures of the Weimar Republic (the government after WW1), and by capitalizing on the new forms of propaganda (films especially, check out The Eternal Jew or Hitler Youth Quex), the NSDAP effectively used the Jews (and others) as a scapegoat, a panacea for Germany's problems.  Kill them, and everything else will be fine.  There's some other stuff in there too, but I really need to get this paper written instead of writing it on Reddit.   Oh, and Ordinary Men by Christopher R. Browning is a bit of an easier read, but will give you much of the same information and will probably be easier to find.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1650.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"35inmf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Atrocities of the Axis Powers This question might overlap a bit with history but has anyone tried to explain why the Axis Powers, before and during the second world war, achieved such a high level of brutality, dehumanization, unethical, and certainly immoral treatment of subjugated people?  Examples include the holocaust, the treatment of Russian POWs versus English and American, the Rape of Nanking, the actions of Unit 731, Nazi human experimentation, Bataan death march, amongst various other crimes.   I guess my question is how did those powers reach such a wide scale and unprecedented level of evil? It seemed that the when allies were governed by at least *some* ethical and moral principles.   Did any of the perpetrators experience psychological problems afterwords? Feelings of remorse or shame?","c_root_id_A":"cr4w09b","c_root_id_B":"cr4ua16","created_at_utc_A":1431296063,"created_at_utc_B":1431292895,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Note that the Allies did plenty of bad stuff too - war isn't so great. In any case, one of the classic books on this topic is *Eichmann in Jerusalem*, although it's far from a systemic answer to the question. I suspect there is no one simple answer to this question. When lots of things are involved and we're talking about lots of events, figuring out what the causes are is an incredibly complex job, and this is assuming the causes themselves are simple enough to be in principle enumerated.","human_ref_B":"If you are really interested in the answer to this question and want something more thorough than what can be included in a few paragraphs of reddit comments (and let's face it, this answer cannot be adequately answered in such a space), I would recommend you read \"Ordinary Men\", a meticulously researched account of the 101st Police Battalion and the atrocities they took part in during WWII. The book presents a useful microcosm of the wider atrocities you're asking about, and discusses the origins of the battalion members, how and why they did what they did, how they reacted to it, and consequences they experienced after the war. The book also concludes with an interesting discussion of the various psychological and sociological theories relevant to explaining their actions, so the work as a whole should provide a fairly solid answer to your question.   It's a fairly well-known book, so should be easily accessible at your local bookstore or library.  Edit: Wording","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3168.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"jlg6a9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"Is there evidence that the option to abort a pregnancy makes men less likely to support women they get pregnant? The \"If she wants it, that's on her.\" attitude?  Besides the evidence of the rise in single parent households.","c_root_id_A":"gaqj1ms","c_root_id_B":"gaq53qq","created_at_utc_A":1604181222,"created_at_utc_B":1604172916,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Economists George Akerlof, Janet Yellen, and Michael Katz took a stab at using game theory to explain this back in 1996. Their idea was that the 'technology change' of more widespread abortion access \/ contraception use gave women who chose to keep the pregnancy less bargaining power when it came to securing a marriage with the father during an out-of-wedlock pregnancy, hence a rise in out-of-wedlock births.  Akerlof, George A., Janet L. Yellen, and Michael L. Katz. \"An Analysis of Out-of-Wedlock Childbearing in the United States.\" *The Quarterly Journal of Economics* 111, no. 2 (1996): 277-317. Accessed October 31, 2020. http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/2946680.  Jstor link:  https:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/2946680  Link to a policy brief on Brookings about the paper if you don't want to deal with economics modelling: https:\/\/www.brookings.edu\/research\/an-analysis-of-out-of-wedlock-births-in-the-united-states\/","human_ref_B":"About the best I can find is from the Turnaway Study, which found that:  >*Over time, the household composition difference between the Turnaway-Birth and Near Limit group narrowed, although at the end of the 5-year period the Turnaway-Birth group was more likely to be raising a child alone without a male partner or family.*  That doesn't really speak to whether the male partner (in the Near Limit group) that women may have been raising a child with was the same one who impregnated her, though.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8306.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"rhv1ef","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why is the US more religious than Europe? Why is the US more religious than Europe?  https:\/\/www.pewforum.org\/2018\/06\/13\/how-religious-commitment-varies-by-country-among-people-of-all-ages\/pf-06-13-18\\_religiouscommitment-03-05\/  53% of US say religion is very important to them. Meanwhile, just 22% of Spain, 11% of France, and 10% of UK.   Wasn't separation of church and state a more recent phenomenon in Europe? US has always had separation of church and state but, US is more religious than Europe now.","c_root_id_A":"houksus","c_root_id_B":"howbyr8","created_at_utc_A":1639699091,"created_at_utc_B":1639732965,"score_A":14,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":">>Religious belief and practice remain vibrant in the United States despite\u2014***or more likely, because of***\u2014 the separation of church and state. This paper provides an account of the history and current controversies over religious disestablishment. It explains how the constitutional structure of the American government affects religious freedom; and in surveying some of the most important Supreme Court cases dealing with religion, it provides an overview of the status of religious freedom in the United States.  https:\/\/www.bc.edu\/content\/dam\/files\/centers\/boisi\/pdf\/bc_papers\/BCP-ChurchState.pdf  Basically, the collusion of church and state, while it seems to mandate religious observance, in practice discredits it. People come to see the religion as more bogus. You can force people to go through the motions. You can't force them to have the faith. And forcing them to go through the motions has, for many people at the least, the effect of making them cynical and rejecting the faith behind the facade.","human_ref_B":"You may be interested in my very old answer in AskHistorians:   * Why did Europe become less religious over time and the US didn't?   I give ample citations in that longer response, but in short evidence suggests their are multiple reasons:   1) Self-identity rather than actual actions can be misleading: if you look at what people actually do rather than what they say, they're less different than the look,   2) Supply-side: competition between American religious organizations (rather than the monopoly of European state churches) improved their services,   3) Demand-side: Religion is in part driven by demand, and tends to be most popular among the financially and socially insecure, and the European welfare states reduced that demand,   4) Political identity: in Europe religion was at times close to unpopular regimes which made them unpopular, but also in places in Europe where religion is still popular religion was either opposed to previous unpopular regimes (anti-Communism in Poland and Slovakia). In America, historically religion wasn't tied to politics until the rise of the Religious Right in the 1980's and since then we've religion being slightly more important to those politically right and rapidly (in only 30 years) much less important to those politically left. An effect of \"If that's what religion is, count me out.\" A similar process played in socialist politics in Europe over 100 years ago but is relatively new in the American context.  5) National identity: in some places, to be X means to be Y. Historically, to be a Turk meant to be Muslim (it's how populations of the Ottoman Empire were split in the 1910-1923 period), to be Quebecois meant be Catholic (as opposed to the Protestant-majority Anglos). In Quebec, this was disrupted by the Quiet Revolution of the 1960's and in Turkey, arguably, it's happening since 2002 and the dominance of a mild strain of political Islam. That is, when religion becomes a partisan political identity it can break up religion as a unifying national identity. Arguably, American had being religious (any religion, Protestant, Catholic, or Jew) as a national identity starting in the 1940's and 1950's which increased religiosity and then this has only started to decline again since it began to become a more partisan political identity in the 1970s.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":33874.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"rhv1ef","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why is the US more religious than Europe? Why is the US more religious than Europe?  https:\/\/www.pewforum.org\/2018\/06\/13\/how-religious-commitment-varies-by-country-among-people-of-all-ages\/pf-06-13-18\\_religiouscommitment-03-05\/  53% of US say religion is very important to them. Meanwhile, just 22% of Spain, 11% of France, and 10% of UK.   Wasn't separation of church and state a more recent phenomenon in Europe? US has always had separation of church and state but, US is more religious than Europe now.","c_root_id_A":"houf3ru","c_root_id_B":"howbyr8","created_at_utc_A":1639696564,"created_at_utc_B":1639732965,"score_A":5,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Your premise is wrong. The U.S. did not always have separation of church and state. Massachusetts didn't disestablish their congregational church until 1833. https:\/\/www.shmoop.com\/church-and-state\/timeline.html#:\\~:text=Massachusetts%20disestablishes%20its%20Congregational%20churches%2C%20which%20have%20been,disestablish%20its%20official%2C%20tax-supported%20church.%20May%205%2C%201879   England still has the established Church of England. https:\/\/lawandreligionuk.com\/2012\/12\/14\/church-and-state-an-idiots-guide\/  So separation of church and state is not complete in Europe.","human_ref_B":"You may be interested in my very old answer in AskHistorians:   * Why did Europe become less religious over time and the US didn't?   I give ample citations in that longer response, but in short evidence suggests their are multiple reasons:   1) Self-identity rather than actual actions can be misleading: if you look at what people actually do rather than what they say, they're less different than the look,   2) Supply-side: competition between American religious organizations (rather than the monopoly of European state churches) improved their services,   3) Demand-side: Religion is in part driven by demand, and tends to be most popular among the financially and socially insecure, and the European welfare states reduced that demand,   4) Political identity: in Europe religion was at times close to unpopular regimes which made them unpopular, but also in places in Europe where religion is still popular religion was either opposed to previous unpopular regimes (anti-Communism in Poland and Slovakia). In America, historically religion wasn't tied to politics until the rise of the Religious Right in the 1980's and since then we've religion being slightly more important to those politically right and rapidly (in only 30 years) much less important to those politically left. An effect of \"If that's what religion is, count me out.\" A similar process played in socialist politics in Europe over 100 years ago but is relatively new in the American context.  5) National identity: in some places, to be X means to be Y. Historically, to be a Turk meant to be Muslim (it's how populations of the Ottoman Empire were split in the 1910-1923 period), to be Quebecois meant be Catholic (as opposed to the Protestant-majority Anglos). In Quebec, this was disrupted by the Quiet Revolution of the 1960's and in Turkey, arguably, it's happening since 2002 and the dominance of a mild strain of political Islam. That is, when religion becomes a partisan political identity it can break up religion as a unifying national identity. Arguably, American had being religious (any religion, Protestant, Catholic, or Jew) as a national identity starting in the 1940's and 1950's which increased religiosity and then this has only started to decline again since it began to become a more partisan political identity in the 1970s.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":36401.0,"score_ratio":3.2}
{"post_id":"rhv1ef","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why is the US more religious than Europe? Why is the US more religious than Europe?  https:\/\/www.pewforum.org\/2018\/06\/13\/how-religious-commitment-varies-by-country-among-people-of-all-ages\/pf-06-13-18\\_religiouscommitment-03-05\/  53% of US say religion is very important to them. Meanwhile, just 22% of Spain, 11% of France, and 10% of UK.   Wasn't separation of church and state a more recent phenomenon in Europe? US has always had separation of church and state but, US is more religious than Europe now.","c_root_id_A":"houf3ru","c_root_id_B":"houksus","created_at_utc_A":1639696564,"created_at_utc_B":1639699091,"score_A":5,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Your premise is wrong. The U.S. did not always have separation of church and state. Massachusetts didn't disestablish their congregational church until 1833. https:\/\/www.shmoop.com\/church-and-state\/timeline.html#:\\~:text=Massachusetts%20disestablishes%20its%20Congregational%20churches%2C%20which%20have%20been,disestablish%20its%20official%2C%20tax-supported%20church.%20May%205%2C%201879   England still has the established Church of England. https:\/\/lawandreligionuk.com\/2012\/12\/14\/church-and-state-an-idiots-guide\/  So separation of church and state is not complete in Europe.","human_ref_B":">>Religious belief and practice remain vibrant in the United States despite\u2014***or more likely, because of***\u2014 the separation of church and state. This paper provides an account of the history and current controversies over religious disestablishment. It explains how the constitutional structure of the American government affects religious freedom; and in surveying some of the most important Supreme Court cases dealing with religion, it provides an overview of the status of religious freedom in the United States.  https:\/\/www.bc.edu\/content\/dam\/files\/centers\/boisi\/pdf\/bc_papers\/BCP-ChurchState.pdf  Basically, the collusion of church and state, while it seems to mandate religious observance, in practice discredits it. People come to see the religion as more bogus. You can force people to go through the motions. You can't force them to have the faith. And forcing them to go through the motions has, for many people at the least, the effect of making them cynical and rejecting the faith behind the facade.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2527.0,"score_ratio":2.8}
{"post_id":"etjaed","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why does the USA's poverty rate seem to reliably stay between 10 to 15%? I was just looking at the overall poverty trend and noticed that though there are booms and busts, since 1970 they usually bounce between a low  of about 10% and a maximum of 15%. For a graph illustrating this, see here:  I know that poverty trends are more volatile within specific groups, and some rates like the single mother and child poverty rate are far above the 15% line. I'm just thinking of the overall trend.","c_root_id_A":"ffh0u4p","c_root_id_B":"ffgweb4","created_at_utc_A":1579920087,"created_at_utc_B":1579916765,"score_A":26,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"As noted by a report written by Chaudry et al. for the ASPE, the fluctuations seem to reflect economic cycles,  >* In 1964, 19.0 percent of the population lived in official poverty. **The rate fell to 11.1 percent by 1973 following the economic expansions in the 1960s and early 1970s**.  >* **Following the recessions in 1980, 1981,and 1990, the official poverty rate increased to just above 15 percent. The rate fell substantially with the growing economy of the 1990s**, once again approaching 11 percent by 2000.    >* **Beginning with the brief recession in 2001, the official poverty rate began to rise nearly continuously during the first decade of the new century, growing more quickly with the onset of the Great Recession in 2007 before beginning to decline again during economic recovery.**  That said, progress on reducing poverty seems to have stalled after the 1960s, although, to quote Gorman, there have been several factors which \"should have put substantial downward pressure on poverty rates in the United States\". This quote comes from a digest she wrote for a paper by Hoynes, Page and Stevens, who asked themselves your same question, and concluded that \"**the lack of improvement in the poverty rate reflects a weakened relationship between poverty and the macro-economy**\". According to them:  >In sum, **poverty rate dynamics reflect a complicated set of interactions between demographic trends and labor market conditions**\u2014a set of interactions that we do not yet fully understand. Unlike the conventional wisdom, we find that macroeconomic variables correlate well with changes in poverty since the 1980\u2019s. **During the last twenty five years, however, there has been tremendous growth in female labor supply, coupled with increases in female headship, and these two changes have pulled the poverty rate in opposite directions.** Our findings suggest that **a better understanding of how the trends in women\u2019s labor force participation and family structure are linked would provide valuable insight into the question of why the poverty rate has not fallen more.**  The following is also important:  >Using the weaker relationship between poverty and our labor market indicators after 1980, the predicted poverty rates are very close to the actual rates.  The question remains why this relationship changed after 1980, but **it is clear that median wage growth, rising inequality and the evolution of unemployment explain poverty rates well over the past 25 years.**  In other words, to quote Gorman, **\"t]he lack of progress despite rising living conditions is attributable to the stagnant growth in median wages and to increasing inequality\", but holding all else equal, part of the stability may be due to developments regarding women, labor and families which have produced contrasting outcomes**.  ---  To expand on the issue of wages, see for example what [Shierholz wrote in an article for the Economic Policy Institute about minimum wages:  >The figure shows the real (i.e., inflation-adjusted) value of the minimum wage, plus what the minimum wage would be if it had kept pace with productivity growth since 1968, as it did for the two decades prior. **If the minimum wage had kept up with productivity growth over this period, it would now be $18.67 per hour. That sounds shockingly high\u2014it is two-and-a-half times as high as the current minimum wage and is actually higher than the median wage**, which is $16.30 per hour. But **it\u2019s important to keep in mind that the primary reason a minimum wage of $18.67 sounds so high today is because the wages of most workers are so low. Most workers have not reaped the benefits of productivity growth for the last four decades.** If the median wage had kept pace with productivity growth over the last 40 years, it would now be $28.42 instead of $16.30. **In other words, an $18.67 minimum wage sounds shockingly high because the already affluent have captured most of the economic growth in the last 40 years, not because the economy hasn\u2019t seen the kind of productivity growth consistent with that kind of minimum wage growth.**  Although Hoyne et al. conclude that \"...] changes in welfare spending do little to explain the trends over time in the poverty rate\" ^(1), others conclude that so-called anti-poverty programs have been important to keep poverty  at bay, i.e. \"**[w]ithout government safety-net programs, millions more would be in poverty**\". To quote [Cooper, also writing for the EPI:  >**In 2014, 48.4 million people (or 15.3 percent of the US population) were in poverty, as measured by the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM)**\u2014a more sophisticated approach for measuring economic well-being than the official federal poverty line. However, **that number would have been significantly higher were it not for programs like the ones listed above.  In the absence of stronger wage growth for low and middle-income workers, these safety-net programs play an increasingly important role in helping struggling families afford their basic needs.**  There is also a lot which can be said about inequality in the USA, which according to Gould (again, EPI), is a main cause of persistent poverty:  >The figure below plots the impact of these economic and demographic factors on the official poverty rate from 1979 to 2007. **The impact of income inequality and income growth were quantitatively large, but in the opposite directions. Had income growth been equally distributed**, which in this analysis means that all families\u2019 incomes would have grown at the pace of the average, **the poverty rate would have been 5.5 points lower, essentially, 44 percent lower than what it was.**   Considering how several of these different factors which affect poverty pull in different directions, it is not surprising for relative stability to be the outcome.   ---  As a last fleeting note, to expand on what you have already acknowledged, these official rates hide uneven realities and developments which put together may also contribute to apparent overall stability. For example, see the visualization provided by this economic snapshot by the EPI concerning the difference between 1968 and 2016 poverty rates for different groups, and see this Pew Charitable Trusts article on \"Uneven Gains for States After 50 Years of the War on Poverty\".  ---  ^(1) ^(From the same paragraph: \"This does not imply that such programs fail to improve the well-being of the poor, however.\")","human_ref_B":"If you look at this article by Barbara Harriss-White you will see that capitalism itself creates poverty.  Note that the argument is not that capitalism is the only cause of poverty, or capitalism is the only economic system that causes poverty.  But as the author notes, if we are going to live in a world dominated by capitalism we have to understand how it creates both wealth and poverty.  So the US poverty rate is relatively stable because that is of rate of poverty created by our economy.  There are a few things that contribute to this, but its partly about the need for unemployment and cheap labor.   In order to keep downward pressure on wages we need to have a reserve pool of labor -- if everyone has a lot of money and can buy whatever they want, then we have inflation.  If that happens the government will raise interest rates to reduce investment to pressure companies to hire fewer people.  We need at least 3% unemployment to have a functioning economy","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3322.0,"score_ratio":1.7333333333}
{"post_id":"84qs57","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"If seasonal depression exists, does that mean there are more cases of depression in colder climates than in warmer ones in the US? I may be asking for a bad correlation here with confounding variables but there should be a significant difference between climates, yea?","c_root_id_A":"dvro0hk","c_root_id_B":"dvrzn1r","created_at_utc_A":1521157169,"created_at_utc_B":1521169138,"score_A":7,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/10363665","human_ref_B":"Well...  *For every 5 degree increase in latitude -- about 345 miles -- the suicide rate jumped 18 percent, according to the model.*  https:\/\/www.adn.com\/alaska-news\/article\/study-suggests-connection-between-alaska-suicide-rates-higher-latitudes\/2013\/11\/23\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11969.0,"score_ratio":2.2857142857}
{"post_id":"6ees0w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Has there been any research or good reading on the internet culture? Especially regarding internet famous people.  looking for any good reading or research.   Thanks in advance!!","c_root_id_A":"dia1c4w","c_root_id_B":"dia12gk","created_at_utc_A":1496250195,"created_at_utc_B":1496249903,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"A bit off from your specific request, but I had an old faculty member who dug into big internet questions like social use of technology, privacy, tech inequality, and things like that.  Here's some of her research:  https:\/\/scholar.google.com\/citations?user=XUODawIAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao  This article on \"microcelebrity\" might be most useful: https:\/\/scholar.google.com\/citations?view_op=view_citation&hl=en&user=XUODawIAAAAJ&citation_for_view=XUODawIAAAAJ:LkGwnXOMwfcC","human_ref_B":"It borders more on popular science rather than bona-fide social science, but Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirkey is pretty good. There's a few talks online about it you can check out too.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":292.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"6ees0w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Has there been any research or good reading on the internet culture? Especially regarding internet famous people.  looking for any good reading or research.   Thanks in advance!!","c_root_id_A":"dia12gk","c_root_id_B":"dia98s0","created_at_utc_A":1496249903,"created_at_utc_B":1496258552,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It borders more on popular science rather than bona-fide social science, but Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirkey is pretty good. There's a few talks online about it you can check out too.","human_ref_B":"Tonnes, the majority of it is in academic journals, but two defacto starting points are:   Sherry Turkle (read chronologically in order of publication to appreciate her work most). And Andrew Keen's cult of the amateur.   I am not a fan of the latter, it is popular opinion rather than actual science, but he makes some points that need to be made, particularly in relation to phenomena like fake news etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8649.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"6ees0w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Has there been any research or good reading on the internet culture? Especially regarding internet famous people.  looking for any good reading or research.   Thanks in advance!!","c_root_id_A":"diaku2c","c_root_id_B":"dia12gk","created_at_utc_A":1496271821,"created_at_utc_B":1496249903,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This is an interesting question. Does anyone know of any sources that look at the sub-culture of 4chan?","human_ref_B":"It borders more on popular science rather than bona-fide social science, but Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirkey is pretty good. There's a few talks online about it you can check out too.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21918.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"pjvefm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What can be said to someone to prove that institutional racism exists? My friend and I have gotten into it a few times. He doesn't believe institutional racism exists, only that racism exists within the populace at large. His belief is how our various laws and industry regulations are written apply fairly to all, the true problem is that the people within these system act on their own racist beliefs when acting within the system, therefore institutional racism does not truly exist. One example he uses is with hiring practices. It is explicitly illegal to discriminate based on skin colour during the hiring process, so when a White person is hired over an African American person based on the colour of their skin it isn't because of institutional racism, its because the person in charge of hiring was acting out on their own racism. He applies this logic to the criminal justice system too: that our laws do not discriminate against African Americans explicitly, and that the cause of higher rates of incarceration amongst them isn't because the system is broken, but because the people who run the system are.  I've tried using the argument \"the institution doesn't exist without the people who run it\" but that doesn't do it for him. He's open to learning, I'm just not very good at articulating my thoughts on the spot and don't have many good sources on hand, so I was hoping someone here could help me out with this. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hbzmgcm","c_root_id_B":"hbzfiri","created_at_utc_A":1631054506,"created_at_utc_B":1631051332,"score_A":80,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"I would probably point out a more modern, easy problem to hash out: The drug wars as they pertain to crack cocaine versus pure cocaine.  So the laws around the war on drugs were created with a bit of an odd imbalance, which can very much be used to enact racist outcomes via the power of government institutions. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act in 1986 created minimum federal guidelines for cocaine-related drug crimes. However, they did so in such a way that directly enabled unequal sentencing, by creating a harsher penalty for crack cocaine (which is just a derivative of cocaine cut with a filler agent. ) versus pure powder form of cocaine. 5 grams of crack cocaine would get someone the same sentence as someone with 500 grams of pure cocaine.  In other words, you could buy the 500 grams of pure cocaine and turn it into 1000 grams of crack cocaine. If the person got caught with just the 500 grams, it carried a 5 year minimum Federal sentence. The 1000 grams of crack? 200 years minimum. With no parole. Life in prison was on the table, over a simple formulaic change.  Because crack cocaine was more in use, and more widely distributed by poorer individuals (compared to the pure cocaine powder), this meant there was a larger penalty for people who bought or sold crack cocaine, versus the raw material that the crack cocaine was made with. So while there's no racial component to the law itself, the law creates a situation where poorer individuals can receive a harsher punishment than richer individuals. Due to the nature of poverty in the US, this means that black and Hispanic neighborhoods are more likely to have crack cocaine versus pure cocaine. As some of the numbers above show, black individuals made up some 80% of the people charged under the law, even when two-thirds of the known users were white or Hispanic. Many of these harsher punishments for crack cocaine came from myths and falsehoods about the drug itself being blamed for an uptick in violent crime and being more addictive, though these were proven false after the fact.  Beyond that, because drugs had wildly different markets and popularities amongst different groups or classes of people, any disparity in sentencing between any different drug meant there could be implicit racial biases in sentencing. When contrasted against things like methamphetamines, or even the differences in being accused of selling\/distributing a drug versus simple possession, it ensured that there was a bias along racial lines, even if the laws themselves never implied any sort of race or class status to those being charged. Black individuals had far worse outcomes under these new drug laws.  While your friend might still want to argue that it is individuals using laws to create the 'racist' outcomes, I'd point out that the differences in categories in the law is what enables those racist outcomes, regardless of the intent of the wording of those laws. It's similar to the argument against Voter ID laws.  Have a bit of a thought experiment. Say, music's banned and illegal. If all music use is punished equally, then it would be less institutional weight over the individual authority of a judge or police officer, to create the imbalanced racial outcomes in punishing vile music-playing citizens. Now if someone decides that Rap, or R&B, or Jazz music should be punished harsher, and Country music, or Classical, or Easy Listening Rock was punished less harshly... Well, while there's no implicit race mentioned in the laws that enact these unequal punishments, we would understand the social implication of which groups would more likely be harmed most\/least by enacting these sort of punitive requirements.","human_ref_B":"I've had the most success communicating this topic in the past by talking about the k-12 educational system.     Primary source: https:\/\/www.edworkingpapers.com\/sites\/default\/files\/ai21-363.pdf  Dylan Lukes and Christopher Cleveland. Working Paper. \u201cThe Lingering Legacy of Redlining on School Funding, Diversity, and Performance.\u201d EdWorkingPapers, 21-363, Pp. 1-85. Publisher's Version   Premises:   1. the historical practice of redlining has affected homeownership -specifically racial demographics in a given neighborhood- in America even after it was ended through generational inheritance of property     2. the neighborhoods minority groups were forced into were comprised of lower value properties     3. 36% of k-12 funding in the U.S. comes from local property taxes (which will only be recieved by their local schools)   source: https:\/\/edpolicyinca.org\/publications\/californias-education-funding-crisis-explained-12-charts     4. increased k-12 educational funding correlates to improved student outcomes   source: Baker, B. D. (2017). How money matters for schools. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.     Conclusion: Minority students -in general- today tend to receive less funding in their k-12 education as a direct result of both historical policy (red lining) and current policy (using property taxes as one of the primary methods of funding k-12 education) resulting in lowered student outcomes for minority students relative to white students. Not as a result of any individual actively working to strip them of their right to a fair education but because of the legacy of racism in the system and current institutional mechanisms, constituting institutional racism.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3174.0,"score_ratio":7.2727272727}
{"post_id":"pjvefm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What can be said to someone to prove that institutional racism exists? My friend and I have gotten into it a few times. He doesn't believe institutional racism exists, only that racism exists within the populace at large. His belief is how our various laws and industry regulations are written apply fairly to all, the true problem is that the people within these system act on their own racist beliefs when acting within the system, therefore institutional racism does not truly exist. One example he uses is with hiring practices. It is explicitly illegal to discriminate based on skin colour during the hiring process, so when a White person is hired over an African American person based on the colour of their skin it isn't because of institutional racism, its because the person in charge of hiring was acting out on their own racism. He applies this logic to the criminal justice system too: that our laws do not discriminate against African Americans explicitly, and that the cause of higher rates of incarceration amongst them isn't because the system is broken, but because the people who run the system are.  I've tried using the argument \"the institution doesn't exist without the people who run it\" but that doesn't do it for him. He's open to learning, I'm just not very good at articulating my thoughts on the spot and don't have many good sources on hand, so I was hoping someone here could help me out with this. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hbzhglf","c_root_id_B":"hbzmgcm","created_at_utc_A":1631052275,"created_at_utc_B":1631054506,"score_A":6,"score_B":80,"human_ref_A":"\"Racial disparities in traffic stops are large, ubiquitous across the nation, and troubling.\"  That's a quote from Racial Disparities in Traffic Stop Outcomes, by Baumgartner et al.  https:\/\/scholarship.law.duke.edu\/cgi\/viewcontent.cgi?article=1065&context=dflsc  \"Driving While Black\" or \"Driving While Brown\" are very real phenomena supported by demographic data collected from numerous states -- not just in the South.   Then there's the 2006 FBI report entitled \"White Supremacist Infiltration of Law Enforcement,\" which was only released without redaction in 2020. https:\/\/oversight.house.gov\/sites\/democrats.oversight.house.gov\/files\/White_Supremacist_Infiltration_of_Law_Enforcement.pdf  The systemic part of this comes from the fact that a redacted version wasn't published until 2017, and the redactions seem to conceal the worst of it -- with the result that our law enforcement agencies have failed to address this infiltration in the 15 years since the FBI reported it.  The Innocence Project reported in 2010:  \"The total number of wrongful convictions overturned through DNA testing underline the racial disparities in our system; 254 people have been exonerated through DNA tests, and 172 of them have been black or Latino.\"  https:\/\/innocenceproject.org\/race-and-wrongful-convictions\/  That grossly exceeds the Black and Latino makeup of our population.  Nixon policy advisor John Erlichman reportedly admitted in a 1994 interview that the War on Drugs was created as part of an effort to disrupt Black and leftist anti-war communities.  The admission was not published until after his death, and its veracity has been challenged, but there is no question that drug laws have had a disproportionate impact on racial minorities.  See, e.g.  >We used data from a national survey to examine arrest rate disparities between African American and White adolescents (aged 12\u201317 years; n = 6725) in relation to drug-related and other illegal behaviors. African American adolescents were less likely than Whites to have engaged in drug use or drug selling, but were more likely to have been arrested. Racial disparities in adolescent arrest appear to result from differential treatment of minority youths and to have long-term negative effects on the lives of affected African American youths.  https:\/\/ajph.aphapublications.org\/doi\/abs\/10.2105\/AJPH.2012.300699","human_ref_B":"I would probably point out a more modern, easy problem to hash out: The drug wars as they pertain to crack cocaine versus pure cocaine.  So the laws around the war on drugs were created with a bit of an odd imbalance, which can very much be used to enact racist outcomes via the power of government institutions. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act in 1986 created minimum federal guidelines for cocaine-related drug crimes. However, they did so in such a way that directly enabled unequal sentencing, by creating a harsher penalty for crack cocaine (which is just a derivative of cocaine cut with a filler agent. ) versus pure powder form of cocaine. 5 grams of crack cocaine would get someone the same sentence as someone with 500 grams of pure cocaine.  In other words, you could buy the 500 grams of pure cocaine and turn it into 1000 grams of crack cocaine. If the person got caught with just the 500 grams, it carried a 5 year minimum Federal sentence. The 1000 grams of crack? 200 years minimum. With no parole. Life in prison was on the table, over a simple formulaic change.  Because crack cocaine was more in use, and more widely distributed by poorer individuals (compared to the pure cocaine powder), this meant there was a larger penalty for people who bought or sold crack cocaine, versus the raw material that the crack cocaine was made with. So while there's no racial component to the law itself, the law creates a situation where poorer individuals can receive a harsher punishment than richer individuals. Due to the nature of poverty in the US, this means that black and Hispanic neighborhoods are more likely to have crack cocaine versus pure cocaine. As some of the numbers above show, black individuals made up some 80% of the people charged under the law, even when two-thirds of the known users were white or Hispanic. Many of these harsher punishments for crack cocaine came from myths and falsehoods about the drug itself being blamed for an uptick in violent crime and being more addictive, though these were proven false after the fact.  Beyond that, because drugs had wildly different markets and popularities amongst different groups or classes of people, any disparity in sentencing between any different drug meant there could be implicit racial biases in sentencing. When contrasted against things like methamphetamines, or even the differences in being accused of selling\/distributing a drug versus simple possession, it ensured that there was a bias along racial lines, even if the laws themselves never implied any sort of race or class status to those being charged. Black individuals had far worse outcomes under these new drug laws.  While your friend might still want to argue that it is individuals using laws to create the 'racist' outcomes, I'd point out that the differences in categories in the law is what enables those racist outcomes, regardless of the intent of the wording of those laws. It's similar to the argument against Voter ID laws.  Have a bit of a thought experiment. Say, music's banned and illegal. If all music use is punished equally, then it would be less institutional weight over the individual authority of a judge or police officer, to create the imbalanced racial outcomes in punishing vile music-playing citizens. Now if someone decides that Rap, or R&B, or Jazz music should be punished harsher, and Country music, or Classical, or Easy Listening Rock was punished less harshly... Well, while there's no implicit race mentioned in the laws that enact these unequal punishments, we would understand the social implication of which groups would more likely be harmed most\/least by enacting these sort of punitive requirements.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2231.0,"score_ratio":13.3333333333}
{"post_id":"pjvefm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What can be said to someone to prove that institutional racism exists? My friend and I have gotten into it a few times. He doesn't believe institutional racism exists, only that racism exists within the populace at large. His belief is how our various laws and industry regulations are written apply fairly to all, the true problem is that the people within these system act on their own racist beliefs when acting within the system, therefore institutional racism does not truly exist. One example he uses is with hiring practices. It is explicitly illegal to discriminate based on skin colour during the hiring process, so when a White person is hired over an African American person based on the colour of their skin it isn't because of institutional racism, its because the person in charge of hiring was acting out on their own racism. He applies this logic to the criminal justice system too: that our laws do not discriminate against African Americans explicitly, and that the cause of higher rates of incarceration amongst them isn't because the system is broken, but because the people who run the system are.  I've tried using the argument \"the institution doesn't exist without the people who run it\" but that doesn't do it for him. He's open to learning, I'm just not very good at articulating my thoughts on the spot and don't have many good sources on hand, so I was hoping someone here could help me out with this. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hbzko4i","c_root_id_B":"hbzmgcm","created_at_utc_A":1631053726,"created_at_utc_B":1631054506,"score_A":3,"score_B":80,"human_ref_A":"The plural of anecdote is not data. Similarly, data that show an institutional bias are not a few anecdotal bad apples, it's showing institutional racism.  Consider this study where the institution known as \"private industry\" systemically fails to respond to black job applicants. Sure you could argue that no law was broken and that was just a bunch of hiring managers filtering black resumes, but that both excuses and downplays the problem.   Look at it from the perspective of the applicant. A white candidate **on average** has a **150% better chance** of hearing back after applying for a job, or, in other words black candidate has a **60% worse** chance of hearing back. So clearly the institution is stacked against black job seekers.  I'm more concerned about the motives for this argument. It sounds like you agree that black people have a harder time getting a job, and are jailed at higher rates because of racist police. Let's say for a second that it isn't \"institutional\", it's just due racism at the margin and a lot of racists in the police force and other positions of power. Is he okay with that?  More sources:  * Housing  * Police  * Maternal mortality","human_ref_B":"I would probably point out a more modern, easy problem to hash out: The drug wars as they pertain to crack cocaine versus pure cocaine.  So the laws around the war on drugs were created with a bit of an odd imbalance, which can very much be used to enact racist outcomes via the power of government institutions. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act in 1986 created minimum federal guidelines for cocaine-related drug crimes. However, they did so in such a way that directly enabled unequal sentencing, by creating a harsher penalty for crack cocaine (which is just a derivative of cocaine cut with a filler agent. ) versus pure powder form of cocaine. 5 grams of crack cocaine would get someone the same sentence as someone with 500 grams of pure cocaine.  In other words, you could buy the 500 grams of pure cocaine and turn it into 1000 grams of crack cocaine. If the person got caught with just the 500 grams, it carried a 5 year minimum Federal sentence. The 1000 grams of crack? 200 years minimum. With no parole. Life in prison was on the table, over a simple formulaic change.  Because crack cocaine was more in use, and more widely distributed by poorer individuals (compared to the pure cocaine powder), this meant there was a larger penalty for people who bought or sold crack cocaine, versus the raw material that the crack cocaine was made with. So while there's no racial component to the law itself, the law creates a situation where poorer individuals can receive a harsher punishment than richer individuals. Due to the nature of poverty in the US, this means that black and Hispanic neighborhoods are more likely to have crack cocaine versus pure cocaine. As some of the numbers above show, black individuals made up some 80% of the people charged under the law, even when two-thirds of the known users were white or Hispanic. Many of these harsher punishments for crack cocaine came from myths and falsehoods about the drug itself being blamed for an uptick in violent crime and being more addictive, though these were proven false after the fact.  Beyond that, because drugs had wildly different markets and popularities amongst different groups or classes of people, any disparity in sentencing between any different drug meant there could be implicit racial biases in sentencing. When contrasted against things like methamphetamines, or even the differences in being accused of selling\/distributing a drug versus simple possession, it ensured that there was a bias along racial lines, even if the laws themselves never implied any sort of race or class status to those being charged. Black individuals had far worse outcomes under these new drug laws.  While your friend might still want to argue that it is individuals using laws to create the 'racist' outcomes, I'd point out that the differences in categories in the law is what enables those racist outcomes, regardless of the intent of the wording of those laws. It's similar to the argument against Voter ID laws.  Have a bit of a thought experiment. Say, music's banned and illegal. If all music use is punished equally, then it would be less institutional weight over the individual authority of a judge or police officer, to create the imbalanced racial outcomes in punishing vile music-playing citizens. Now if someone decides that Rap, or R&B, or Jazz music should be punished harsher, and Country music, or Classical, or Easy Listening Rock was punished less harshly... Well, while there's no implicit race mentioned in the laws that enact these unequal punishments, we would understand the social implication of which groups would more likely be harmed most\/least by enacting these sort of punitive requirements.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":780.0,"score_ratio":26.6666666667}
{"post_id":"pjvefm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What can be said to someone to prove that institutional racism exists? My friend and I have gotten into it a few times. He doesn't believe institutional racism exists, only that racism exists within the populace at large. His belief is how our various laws and industry regulations are written apply fairly to all, the true problem is that the people within these system act on their own racist beliefs when acting within the system, therefore institutional racism does not truly exist. One example he uses is with hiring practices. It is explicitly illegal to discriminate based on skin colour during the hiring process, so when a White person is hired over an African American person based on the colour of their skin it isn't because of institutional racism, its because the person in charge of hiring was acting out on their own racism. He applies this logic to the criminal justice system too: that our laws do not discriminate against African Americans explicitly, and that the cause of higher rates of incarceration amongst them isn't because the system is broken, but because the people who run the system are.  I've tried using the argument \"the institution doesn't exist without the people who run it\" but that doesn't do it for him. He's open to learning, I'm just not very good at articulating my thoughts on the spot and don't have many good sources on hand, so I was hoping someone here could help me out with this. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hbzfiri","c_root_id_B":"hbzpqg5","created_at_utc_A":1631051332,"created_at_utc_B":1631056009,"score_A":11,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"I've had the most success communicating this topic in the past by talking about the k-12 educational system.     Primary source: https:\/\/www.edworkingpapers.com\/sites\/default\/files\/ai21-363.pdf  Dylan Lukes and Christopher Cleveland. Working Paper. \u201cThe Lingering Legacy of Redlining on School Funding, Diversity, and Performance.\u201d EdWorkingPapers, 21-363, Pp. 1-85. Publisher's Version   Premises:   1. the historical practice of redlining has affected homeownership -specifically racial demographics in a given neighborhood- in America even after it was ended through generational inheritance of property     2. the neighborhoods minority groups were forced into were comprised of lower value properties     3. 36% of k-12 funding in the U.S. comes from local property taxes (which will only be recieved by their local schools)   source: https:\/\/edpolicyinca.org\/publications\/californias-education-funding-crisis-explained-12-charts     4. increased k-12 educational funding correlates to improved student outcomes   source: Baker, B. D. (2017). How money matters for schools. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.     Conclusion: Minority students -in general- today tend to receive less funding in their k-12 education as a direct result of both historical policy (red lining) and current policy (using property taxes as one of the primary methods of funding k-12 education) resulting in lowered student outcomes for minority students relative to white students. Not as a result of any individual actively working to strip them of their right to a fair education but because of the legacy of racism in the system and current institutional mechanisms, constituting institutional racism.","human_ref_B":"I would encourage distinguishing the different kinds of racism which exist (e.g. see here and here), and then making sure to apply the correct level of analysis. For instance, individual employers who discriminate against Black people are racists at the individual level. However, the concept of institutional racism requires adopting a wider lens. To quote Steve Garner (2009):  >**There are two distinct dimensions of racism \u2013 the individual and the collective. One makes no sense without the other. People must use the cultural stuff available to them**, and that includes the ideas on \u2018race\u2019 that we recognise as dividing groups of people into categories based on appearance and\/or culture. **One of the most difficult things that undergraduate students and lay people experience in trying to come to terms with this topic is the idea that there is a level at which racism** (like all other forms of discrimination) **operates** ***counter*** **to individuals\u2019 intentions and regardless of their personal convictions.** In the argument against institutional racism, there are individual actors who do bad things and those who do not. The objection is that within an organisation, the two are grouped together. Yet this type of response really misses the point of what the concept of institutional racism can do for us. **\u2018Institutional racism\u2019 underscores the idea that the individual and collective dimensions of social action co-exist, yet are distinct at the theoretical level.** It can therefore be said to be a real sociological concept that illuminates otherwise more muddied waters.  ---  For example, institutional racism arises when policies and practices are kept in place and carried out and which result in inequitable outcomes involving different racialized groups (i.e. groups falsely thought of as biological races and reified as such). Institutional racism does *not* require explicit laws which are overtly and\/or blatantly racist. As Bailey et al. (2017) explain:  >**Some of these institutional policies and practices explicitly name race** (eg, de jure Jim Crow laws, which required schools and medical facilities to be racially segregated, and restricted certain neighbourhoods to be white-only), **but many do not (eg, employer practices of screening applications on seemingly neutral codes, such as telephone area codes or ZIP codes, because of presumptions about which racial groups live where).**  *De jure* discrimination is often thought of as something of the past, most often because of the Civil Rights Act. This perspective fails to appreciate not only that history has inertia, but also that racism can be both subtle and covert, and that laws can be discriminatory while being ostensibly neutral. See Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah for a classic example. Also see episodes 501 and 502 of the podcast Opening Arguments (which deals with law-related topics) in which the hosts discuss Critical Race Theory (a legal approach) and why it exists.   Furthermore, institutional racism can be the outcome of persisting lack of awareness or unwillingness to recognize and address policies and practices which contribute to and\/or perpetuate marginalization and discrimination. In the words of Kwame Ture \\(Stokely Carmichael\\), who originally coined the term \"institutional racism\" (1966):  >Let me give an example of the difference between individual racism and institutionalized racism, and the society's response to both. **When unidentified white terrorists bomb a Negro Church and kill five children, that is an act of individual racism, widely deplored by most segments of the society. But when in that same city, Birmingham, Alabama, not five but 500 Negro babies die each year because of a lack of proper food, shelter and medical facilities, and thousands more are destroyed and maimed physically, emotionally and intellectually because of conditions of poverty and deprivation in the ghetto, that is a function of institutionalized racism. But the society either pretends it doesn\u2019t know of this situation, or is incapable of doing anything meaningful about it.** And this resistance to doing anything meaningful about conditions in that ghetto comes from the fact that the ghetto is itself a product of a product of a combination of forces and special interests in the white community, and the groups that have access to the resources and power to change that situation benefit, politically and economically, from the existence of that ghetto.  ---  The bottom-line is that focusing solely on individual racism is insufficient to explain and understand why disparate outcomes among racialized groups exist and continue to exist in the US (and other places). People carry out policies and practices, however their existence and persistence is due to a set of attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors which are institutionalized and embedded into societal structures (what research establishes is the existence of institutional, structural, *systemic* racism). This is well-established among experts in public health, and has been strongly highlighted by the ongoing pandemic. See for illustration this interview with epidemiologist Camara Phyllis Jones.  Also see the following thread for an illustration of the overwhelming amount of studies by anthropologists, historians, psychologists, sociologists, etc. which together demonstrate that structural, institutional, systemic racism is a reality in the US and elsewhere: Are there any good articles on systematic racism\/sexism?   ---  Bailey, Z. D., Krieger, N., Ag\u00e9nor, M., Graves, J., Linos, N., & Bassett, M. T. (2017). Structural racism and health inequities in the USA: evidence and interventions. The Lancet, 389(10077), 1453-1463.  Carmichael, S. (1966). Toward black liberation. The Massachusetts Review, 7(4), 639-651.  Garner, S. (2009). Racisms: an introduction. Sage.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4677.0,"score_ratio":1.7272727273}
{"post_id":"pjvefm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What can be said to someone to prove that institutional racism exists? My friend and I have gotten into it a few times. He doesn't believe institutional racism exists, only that racism exists within the populace at large. His belief is how our various laws and industry regulations are written apply fairly to all, the true problem is that the people within these system act on their own racist beliefs when acting within the system, therefore institutional racism does not truly exist. One example he uses is with hiring practices. It is explicitly illegal to discriminate based on skin colour during the hiring process, so when a White person is hired over an African American person based on the colour of their skin it isn't because of institutional racism, its because the person in charge of hiring was acting out on their own racism. He applies this logic to the criminal justice system too: that our laws do not discriminate against African Americans explicitly, and that the cause of higher rates of incarceration amongst them isn't because the system is broken, but because the people who run the system are.  I've tried using the argument \"the institution doesn't exist without the people who run it\" but that doesn't do it for him. He's open to learning, I'm just not very good at articulating my thoughts on the spot and don't have many good sources on hand, so I was hoping someone here could help me out with this. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hbzpqg5","c_root_id_B":"hbzhglf","created_at_utc_A":1631056009,"created_at_utc_B":1631052275,"score_A":19,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would encourage distinguishing the different kinds of racism which exist (e.g. see here and here), and then making sure to apply the correct level of analysis. For instance, individual employers who discriminate against Black people are racists at the individual level. However, the concept of institutional racism requires adopting a wider lens. To quote Steve Garner (2009):  >**There are two distinct dimensions of racism \u2013 the individual and the collective. One makes no sense without the other. People must use the cultural stuff available to them**, and that includes the ideas on \u2018race\u2019 that we recognise as dividing groups of people into categories based on appearance and\/or culture. **One of the most difficult things that undergraduate students and lay people experience in trying to come to terms with this topic is the idea that there is a level at which racism** (like all other forms of discrimination) **operates** ***counter*** **to individuals\u2019 intentions and regardless of their personal convictions.** In the argument against institutional racism, there are individual actors who do bad things and those who do not. The objection is that within an organisation, the two are grouped together. Yet this type of response really misses the point of what the concept of institutional racism can do for us. **\u2018Institutional racism\u2019 underscores the idea that the individual and collective dimensions of social action co-exist, yet are distinct at the theoretical level.** It can therefore be said to be a real sociological concept that illuminates otherwise more muddied waters.  ---  For example, institutional racism arises when policies and practices are kept in place and carried out and which result in inequitable outcomes involving different racialized groups (i.e. groups falsely thought of as biological races and reified as such). Institutional racism does *not* require explicit laws which are overtly and\/or blatantly racist. As Bailey et al. (2017) explain:  >**Some of these institutional policies and practices explicitly name race** (eg, de jure Jim Crow laws, which required schools and medical facilities to be racially segregated, and restricted certain neighbourhoods to be white-only), **but many do not (eg, employer practices of screening applications on seemingly neutral codes, such as telephone area codes or ZIP codes, because of presumptions about which racial groups live where).**  *De jure* discrimination is often thought of as something of the past, most often because of the Civil Rights Act. This perspective fails to appreciate not only that history has inertia, but also that racism can be both subtle and covert, and that laws can be discriminatory while being ostensibly neutral. See Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah for a classic example. Also see episodes 501 and 502 of the podcast Opening Arguments (which deals with law-related topics) in which the hosts discuss Critical Race Theory (a legal approach) and why it exists.   Furthermore, institutional racism can be the outcome of persisting lack of awareness or unwillingness to recognize and address policies and practices which contribute to and\/or perpetuate marginalization and discrimination. In the words of Kwame Ture \\(Stokely Carmichael\\), who originally coined the term \"institutional racism\" (1966):  >Let me give an example of the difference between individual racism and institutionalized racism, and the society's response to both. **When unidentified white terrorists bomb a Negro Church and kill five children, that is an act of individual racism, widely deplored by most segments of the society. But when in that same city, Birmingham, Alabama, not five but 500 Negro babies die each year because of a lack of proper food, shelter and medical facilities, and thousands more are destroyed and maimed physically, emotionally and intellectually because of conditions of poverty and deprivation in the ghetto, that is a function of institutionalized racism. But the society either pretends it doesn\u2019t know of this situation, or is incapable of doing anything meaningful about it.** And this resistance to doing anything meaningful about conditions in that ghetto comes from the fact that the ghetto is itself a product of a product of a combination of forces and special interests in the white community, and the groups that have access to the resources and power to change that situation benefit, politically and economically, from the existence of that ghetto.  ---  The bottom-line is that focusing solely on individual racism is insufficient to explain and understand why disparate outcomes among racialized groups exist and continue to exist in the US (and other places). People carry out policies and practices, however their existence and persistence is due to a set of attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors which are institutionalized and embedded into societal structures (what research establishes is the existence of institutional, structural, *systemic* racism). This is well-established among experts in public health, and has been strongly highlighted by the ongoing pandemic. See for illustration this interview with epidemiologist Camara Phyllis Jones.  Also see the following thread for an illustration of the overwhelming amount of studies by anthropologists, historians, psychologists, sociologists, etc. which together demonstrate that structural, institutional, systemic racism is a reality in the US and elsewhere: Are there any good articles on systematic racism\/sexism?   ---  Bailey, Z. D., Krieger, N., Ag\u00e9nor, M., Graves, J., Linos, N., & Bassett, M. T. (2017). Structural racism and health inequities in the USA: evidence and interventions. The Lancet, 389(10077), 1453-1463.  Carmichael, S. (1966). Toward black liberation. The Massachusetts Review, 7(4), 639-651.  Garner, S. (2009). Racisms: an introduction. Sage.","human_ref_B":"\"Racial disparities in traffic stops are large, ubiquitous across the nation, and troubling.\"  That's a quote from Racial Disparities in Traffic Stop Outcomes, by Baumgartner et al.  https:\/\/scholarship.law.duke.edu\/cgi\/viewcontent.cgi?article=1065&context=dflsc  \"Driving While Black\" or \"Driving While Brown\" are very real phenomena supported by demographic data collected from numerous states -- not just in the South.   Then there's the 2006 FBI report entitled \"White Supremacist Infiltration of Law Enforcement,\" which was only released without redaction in 2020. https:\/\/oversight.house.gov\/sites\/democrats.oversight.house.gov\/files\/White_Supremacist_Infiltration_of_Law_Enforcement.pdf  The systemic part of this comes from the fact that a redacted version wasn't published until 2017, and the redactions seem to conceal the worst of it -- with the result that our law enforcement agencies have failed to address this infiltration in the 15 years since the FBI reported it.  The Innocence Project reported in 2010:  \"The total number of wrongful convictions overturned through DNA testing underline the racial disparities in our system; 254 people have been exonerated through DNA tests, and 172 of them have been black or Latino.\"  https:\/\/innocenceproject.org\/race-and-wrongful-convictions\/  That grossly exceeds the Black and Latino makeup of our population.  Nixon policy advisor John Erlichman reportedly admitted in a 1994 interview that the War on Drugs was created as part of an effort to disrupt Black and leftist anti-war communities.  The admission was not published until after his death, and its veracity has been challenged, but there is no question that drug laws have had a disproportionate impact on racial minorities.  See, e.g.  >We used data from a national survey to examine arrest rate disparities between African American and White adolescents (aged 12\u201317 years; n = 6725) in relation to drug-related and other illegal behaviors. African American adolescents were less likely than Whites to have engaged in drug use or drug selling, but were more likely to have been arrested. Racial disparities in adolescent arrest appear to result from differential treatment of minority youths and to have long-term negative effects on the lives of affected African American youths.  https:\/\/ajph.aphapublications.org\/doi\/abs\/10.2105\/AJPH.2012.300699","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3734.0,"score_ratio":3.1666666667}
{"post_id":"pjvefm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What can be said to someone to prove that institutional racism exists? My friend and I have gotten into it a few times. He doesn't believe institutional racism exists, only that racism exists within the populace at large. His belief is how our various laws and industry regulations are written apply fairly to all, the true problem is that the people within these system act on their own racist beliefs when acting within the system, therefore institutional racism does not truly exist. One example he uses is with hiring practices. It is explicitly illegal to discriminate based on skin colour during the hiring process, so when a White person is hired over an African American person based on the colour of their skin it isn't because of institutional racism, its because the person in charge of hiring was acting out on their own racism. He applies this logic to the criminal justice system too: that our laws do not discriminate against African Americans explicitly, and that the cause of higher rates of incarceration amongst them isn't because the system is broken, but because the people who run the system are.  I've tried using the argument \"the institution doesn't exist without the people who run it\" but that doesn't do it for him. He's open to learning, I'm just not very good at articulating my thoughts on the spot and don't have many good sources on hand, so I was hoping someone here could help me out with this. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hbzpqg5","c_root_id_B":"hbzko4i","created_at_utc_A":1631056009,"created_at_utc_B":1631053726,"score_A":19,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I would encourage distinguishing the different kinds of racism which exist (e.g. see here and here), and then making sure to apply the correct level of analysis. For instance, individual employers who discriminate against Black people are racists at the individual level. However, the concept of institutional racism requires adopting a wider lens. To quote Steve Garner (2009):  >**There are two distinct dimensions of racism \u2013 the individual and the collective. One makes no sense without the other. People must use the cultural stuff available to them**, and that includes the ideas on \u2018race\u2019 that we recognise as dividing groups of people into categories based on appearance and\/or culture. **One of the most difficult things that undergraduate students and lay people experience in trying to come to terms with this topic is the idea that there is a level at which racism** (like all other forms of discrimination) **operates** ***counter*** **to individuals\u2019 intentions and regardless of their personal convictions.** In the argument against institutional racism, there are individual actors who do bad things and those who do not. The objection is that within an organisation, the two are grouped together. Yet this type of response really misses the point of what the concept of institutional racism can do for us. **\u2018Institutional racism\u2019 underscores the idea that the individual and collective dimensions of social action co-exist, yet are distinct at the theoretical level.** It can therefore be said to be a real sociological concept that illuminates otherwise more muddied waters.  ---  For example, institutional racism arises when policies and practices are kept in place and carried out and which result in inequitable outcomes involving different racialized groups (i.e. groups falsely thought of as biological races and reified as such). Institutional racism does *not* require explicit laws which are overtly and\/or blatantly racist. As Bailey et al. (2017) explain:  >**Some of these institutional policies and practices explicitly name race** (eg, de jure Jim Crow laws, which required schools and medical facilities to be racially segregated, and restricted certain neighbourhoods to be white-only), **but many do not (eg, employer practices of screening applications on seemingly neutral codes, such as telephone area codes or ZIP codes, because of presumptions about which racial groups live where).**  *De jure* discrimination is often thought of as something of the past, most often because of the Civil Rights Act. This perspective fails to appreciate not only that history has inertia, but also that racism can be both subtle and covert, and that laws can be discriminatory while being ostensibly neutral. See Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah for a classic example. Also see episodes 501 and 502 of the podcast Opening Arguments (which deals with law-related topics) in which the hosts discuss Critical Race Theory (a legal approach) and why it exists.   Furthermore, institutional racism can be the outcome of persisting lack of awareness or unwillingness to recognize and address policies and practices which contribute to and\/or perpetuate marginalization and discrimination. In the words of Kwame Ture \\(Stokely Carmichael\\), who originally coined the term \"institutional racism\" (1966):  >Let me give an example of the difference between individual racism and institutionalized racism, and the society's response to both. **When unidentified white terrorists bomb a Negro Church and kill five children, that is an act of individual racism, widely deplored by most segments of the society. But when in that same city, Birmingham, Alabama, not five but 500 Negro babies die each year because of a lack of proper food, shelter and medical facilities, and thousands more are destroyed and maimed physically, emotionally and intellectually because of conditions of poverty and deprivation in the ghetto, that is a function of institutionalized racism. But the society either pretends it doesn\u2019t know of this situation, or is incapable of doing anything meaningful about it.** And this resistance to doing anything meaningful about conditions in that ghetto comes from the fact that the ghetto is itself a product of a product of a combination of forces and special interests in the white community, and the groups that have access to the resources and power to change that situation benefit, politically and economically, from the existence of that ghetto.  ---  The bottom-line is that focusing solely on individual racism is insufficient to explain and understand why disparate outcomes among racialized groups exist and continue to exist in the US (and other places). People carry out policies and practices, however their existence and persistence is due to a set of attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors which are institutionalized and embedded into societal structures (what research establishes is the existence of institutional, structural, *systemic* racism). This is well-established among experts in public health, and has been strongly highlighted by the ongoing pandemic. See for illustration this interview with epidemiologist Camara Phyllis Jones.  Also see the following thread for an illustration of the overwhelming amount of studies by anthropologists, historians, psychologists, sociologists, etc. which together demonstrate that structural, institutional, systemic racism is a reality in the US and elsewhere: Are there any good articles on systematic racism\/sexism?   ---  Bailey, Z. D., Krieger, N., Ag\u00e9nor, M., Graves, J., Linos, N., & Bassett, M. T. (2017). Structural racism and health inequities in the USA: evidence and interventions. The Lancet, 389(10077), 1453-1463.  Carmichael, S. (1966). Toward black liberation. The Massachusetts Review, 7(4), 639-651.  Garner, S. (2009). Racisms: an introduction. Sage.","human_ref_B":"The plural of anecdote is not data. Similarly, data that show an institutional bias are not a few anecdotal bad apples, it's showing institutional racism.  Consider this study where the institution known as \"private industry\" systemically fails to respond to black job applicants. Sure you could argue that no law was broken and that was just a bunch of hiring managers filtering black resumes, but that both excuses and downplays the problem.   Look at it from the perspective of the applicant. A white candidate **on average** has a **150% better chance** of hearing back after applying for a job, or, in other words black candidate has a **60% worse** chance of hearing back. So clearly the institution is stacked against black job seekers.  I'm more concerned about the motives for this argument. It sounds like you agree that black people have a harder time getting a job, and are jailed at higher rates because of racist police. Let's say for a second that it isn't \"institutional\", it's just due racism at the margin and a lot of racists in the police force and other positions of power. Is he okay with that?  More sources:  * Housing  * Police  * Maternal mortality","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2283.0,"score_ratio":6.3333333333}
{"post_id":"pjvefm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What can be said to someone to prove that institutional racism exists? My friend and I have gotten into it a few times. He doesn't believe institutional racism exists, only that racism exists within the populace at large. His belief is how our various laws and industry regulations are written apply fairly to all, the true problem is that the people within these system act on their own racist beliefs when acting within the system, therefore institutional racism does not truly exist. One example he uses is with hiring practices. It is explicitly illegal to discriminate based on skin colour during the hiring process, so when a White person is hired over an African American person based on the colour of their skin it isn't because of institutional racism, its because the person in charge of hiring was acting out on their own racism. He applies this logic to the criminal justice system too: that our laws do not discriminate against African Americans explicitly, and that the cause of higher rates of incarceration amongst them isn't because the system is broken, but because the people who run the system are.  I've tried using the argument \"the institution doesn't exist without the people who run it\" but that doesn't do it for him. He's open to learning, I'm just not very good at articulating my thoughts on the spot and don't have many good sources on hand, so I was hoping someone here could help me out with this. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hc03kxa","c_root_id_B":"hbzhglf","created_at_utc_A":1631062456,"created_at_utc_B":1631052275,"score_A":10,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"There are already some really good responses and examples here. The justice system, housing, and education are all important examples of institutional racism in the United States.  I think it might be helpful to step back a bit to think about the concept of \"institutional racism,\" since I suspect that you (OP) and your friend might be working with different definitions and mental maps. First off, I get the sense that your friend is thinking of \"racism\" as synonymous with racial discrimination or racial prejudice. If this is the case, then it's easy to see how an institution (say, a law or policy or organization) that is not *explicitly* discriminatory would be understood as not racist. If you broaden the definition of racism to include behaviors, beliefs, and policies that systematically reproduce\\* racial inequality, then you begin to see how institutions can be racist without anybody in them acting discriminatory or prejudicial. So that's one thing: racism is a multi-dimensional phenomenon, and inter-personal prejudices or discrimination are just the tip of the iceberg.  The other, even trickier concept is *institutional*. That is a very ambiguous concept in social science. In the most general sense, institutions are \"stable patterns of behavior that define \\i.e. give meaning to\\], govern \\[i.e. apply rules or norms to\\], and constrain \\[i.e. decide what is and isn't legitimate\\] action\" ([Rojas 2013). This is why we call marriage an institution (for example): marriage is a pattern of behaviors defined by commonly-understood expectations, historically-shaped norms about what constitutes appropriate behavior, and shared meanings and rituals. Some institutions become very formalized, with codified rules and roles that are \"bigger\" than any individual: examples include schools, universities, parliaments, prisons, and courts. The key thing to understand is that institutions can take on a life of their own; norms or rules or ideas that were attached to an institution at its inception tend to stick around, even become invisible or taken for granted by the individuals operating within an institution. This phenomenon is sometimes called institutional \"path dependency\": once some feature or trajectory gets built into an institution, it is usually difficult to change.  So if you smoosh these two concepts together in *institutional racism*, you get a stable pattern of behaviors (often but not always solidified as formal rules and organizations) that reproduces racial inequality. The examples that others have mentioned all fit this definition pretty well. In each case, racial inequity is an outcome of actions that are defined, governed, and shaped by inherited rules, norms, and beliefs about what constitutes appropriate or legitimate behavior in a given institutional setting.  \\*\"reproduce\" is kind of jargony, but here it basically means to reinforce a particular status quo. For an analogy, the reproduction of gender roles might include something like giving baby dolls to little girls and giving army men to little boys. The reproduction of racial stereotypes might be only casting black men to play criminals on TV. Etc.","human_ref_B":"\"Racial disparities in traffic stops are large, ubiquitous across the nation, and troubling.\"  That's a quote from Racial Disparities in Traffic Stop Outcomes, by Baumgartner et al.  https:\/\/scholarship.law.duke.edu\/cgi\/viewcontent.cgi?article=1065&context=dflsc  \"Driving While Black\" or \"Driving While Brown\" are very real phenomena supported by demographic data collected from numerous states -- not just in the South.   Then there's the 2006 FBI report entitled \"White Supremacist Infiltration of Law Enforcement,\" which was only released without redaction in 2020. https:\/\/oversight.house.gov\/sites\/democrats.oversight.house.gov\/files\/White_Supremacist_Infiltration_of_Law_Enforcement.pdf  The systemic part of this comes from the fact that a redacted version wasn't published until 2017, and the redactions seem to conceal the worst of it -- with the result that our law enforcement agencies have failed to address this infiltration in the 15 years since the FBI reported it.  The Innocence Project reported in 2010:  \"The total number of wrongful convictions overturned through DNA testing underline the racial disparities in our system; 254 people have been exonerated through DNA tests, and 172 of them have been black or Latino.\"  https:\/\/innocenceproject.org\/race-and-wrongful-convictions\/  That grossly exceeds the Black and Latino makeup of our population.  Nixon policy advisor John Erlichman reportedly admitted in a 1994 interview that the War on Drugs was created as part of an effort to disrupt Black and leftist anti-war communities.  The admission was not published until after his death, and its veracity has been challenged, but there is no question that drug laws have had a disproportionate impact on racial minorities.  See, e.g.  >We used data from a national survey to examine arrest rate disparities between African American and White adolescents (aged 12\u201317 years; n = 6725) in relation to drug-related and other illegal behaviors. African American adolescents were less likely than Whites to have engaged in drug use or drug selling, but were more likely to have been arrested. Racial disparities in adolescent arrest appear to result from differential treatment of minority youths and to have long-term negative effects on the lives of affected African American youths.  https:\/\/ajph.aphapublications.org\/doi\/abs\/10.2105\/AJPH.2012.300699","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10181.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"pjvefm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What can be said to someone to prove that institutional racism exists? My friend and I have gotten into it a few times. He doesn't believe institutional racism exists, only that racism exists within the populace at large. His belief is how our various laws and industry regulations are written apply fairly to all, the true problem is that the people within these system act on their own racist beliefs when acting within the system, therefore institutional racism does not truly exist. One example he uses is with hiring practices. It is explicitly illegal to discriminate based on skin colour during the hiring process, so when a White person is hired over an African American person based on the colour of their skin it isn't because of institutional racism, its because the person in charge of hiring was acting out on their own racism. He applies this logic to the criminal justice system too: that our laws do not discriminate against African Americans explicitly, and that the cause of higher rates of incarceration amongst them isn't because the system is broken, but because the people who run the system are.  I've tried using the argument \"the institution doesn't exist without the people who run it\" but that doesn't do it for him. He's open to learning, I'm just not very good at articulating my thoughts on the spot and don't have many good sources on hand, so I was hoping someone here could help me out with this. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"hbzko4i","c_root_id_B":"hc03kxa","created_at_utc_A":1631053726,"created_at_utc_B":1631062456,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"The plural of anecdote is not data. Similarly, data that show an institutional bias are not a few anecdotal bad apples, it's showing institutional racism.  Consider this study where the institution known as \"private industry\" systemically fails to respond to black job applicants. Sure you could argue that no law was broken and that was just a bunch of hiring managers filtering black resumes, but that both excuses and downplays the problem.   Look at it from the perspective of the applicant. A white candidate **on average** has a **150% better chance** of hearing back after applying for a job, or, in other words black candidate has a **60% worse** chance of hearing back. So clearly the institution is stacked against black job seekers.  I'm more concerned about the motives for this argument. It sounds like you agree that black people have a harder time getting a job, and are jailed at higher rates because of racist police. Let's say for a second that it isn't \"institutional\", it's just due racism at the margin and a lot of racists in the police force and other positions of power. Is he okay with that?  More sources:  * Housing  * Police  * Maternal mortality","human_ref_B":"There are already some really good responses and examples here. The justice system, housing, and education are all important examples of institutional racism in the United States.  I think it might be helpful to step back a bit to think about the concept of \"institutional racism,\" since I suspect that you (OP) and your friend might be working with different definitions and mental maps. First off, I get the sense that your friend is thinking of \"racism\" as synonymous with racial discrimination or racial prejudice. If this is the case, then it's easy to see how an institution (say, a law or policy or organization) that is not *explicitly* discriminatory would be understood as not racist. If you broaden the definition of racism to include behaviors, beliefs, and policies that systematically reproduce\\* racial inequality, then you begin to see how institutions can be racist without anybody in them acting discriminatory or prejudicial. So that's one thing: racism is a multi-dimensional phenomenon, and inter-personal prejudices or discrimination are just the tip of the iceberg.  The other, even trickier concept is *institutional*. That is a very ambiguous concept in social science. In the most general sense, institutions are \"stable patterns of behavior that define \\i.e. give meaning to\\], govern \\[i.e. apply rules or norms to\\], and constrain \\[i.e. decide what is and isn't legitimate\\] action\" ([Rojas 2013). This is why we call marriage an institution (for example): marriage is a pattern of behaviors defined by commonly-understood expectations, historically-shaped norms about what constitutes appropriate behavior, and shared meanings and rituals. Some institutions become very formalized, with codified rules and roles that are \"bigger\" than any individual: examples include schools, universities, parliaments, prisons, and courts. The key thing to understand is that institutions can take on a life of their own; norms or rules or ideas that were attached to an institution at its inception tend to stick around, even become invisible or taken for granted by the individuals operating within an institution. This phenomenon is sometimes called institutional \"path dependency\": once some feature or trajectory gets built into an institution, it is usually difficult to change.  So if you smoosh these two concepts together in *institutional racism*, you get a stable pattern of behaviors (often but not always solidified as formal rules and organizations) that reproduces racial inequality. The examples that others have mentioned all fit this definition pretty well. In each case, racial inequity is an outcome of actions that are defined, governed, and shaped by inherited rules, norms, and beliefs about what constitutes appropriate or legitimate behavior in a given institutional setting.  \\*\"reproduce\" is kind of jargony, but here it basically means to reinforce a particular status quo. For an analogy, the reproduction of gender roles might include something like giving baby dolls to little girls and giving army men to little boys. The reproduction of racial stereotypes might be only casting black men to play criminals on TV. Etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8730.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"8d50nk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"I'm wary of the 'identity' concept and feel like I'm missing something. Any ideas of where I should look next? I'm not even sure how to put my finger on the issue that I am having, but I am left pretty unimpressed by most studies that focus on practically boiler-plate \"the construction of X ethnic identity in such and such a venue.\"  I'm not sure what I'm reacting against, if I even know what the hell I mean, or whether I just happened to read a few crap articles and books (distinct possibility!).   Maybe a slightly more specificity would clarify: I'm not sure what we actually learn about anything (beyond anecdotally) from studies of 'how identity is constructed.' I'm much more interested in where (I think) the rubber meets the road. E.g. How do lowcaste Nepalis find apartments in Kathmandu where they may face discrimination? is much more interesting (and WAY MORE intelligible) to me than \"how do low caste nepalis construct their identity when they relocate to Kathmandu for work?\"  Is this making sense?   So does anyone have any sources for me to read that will either A) sell me on the concept of identity and it's importance for understanding people and the world, or B) offer strong critiques of the employment of this concept and argue how we are better off without it?   (I'm mostly in sociology and anthropolgy using ethnographic methods)","c_root_id_A":"dxkg74c","c_root_id_B":"dxkg142","created_at_utc_A":1524060090,"created_at_utc_B":1524059925,"score_A":30,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I'm sorry, but I don't actually know what you mean? \"How do lower caste Nepalis find apartments in Kathmandu\" is not applicable to situations where \"how do lower caste Nepalis construct their identities\" is relevant? The first is a question about how Nepalis navigate a different setting. The second is a question that has broader uses.   For instance, if working class white people in the United States adhere to the identity of \"whiteness\" over \"working class,\" they will direct hostility and blame at minority ethnic groups instead of elites. The construction of whiteness as an identity in the United States can be traced to the ways in which it has expanded over the years: for instance, the Irish and Italians gradually became encoded as \"white\" instead of \"ethnic\" after black people started moving to the North after the abolition of slavery. The question of why \"whiteness\" is a more meaningful identity than \"class\" is central to understanding voting patterns, interethnic relations, and class relations within the United States.   (For the construction of whiteness btw, see The Condemnation of Blackness by Khalil Gibran Muhammad)","human_ref_B":"Social psych researcher here: identity construction can prove really useful. There\u2019s a lot of pride and self esteem we draw from our inherent groups (Born into- like, what it means to be a man) and acquired groups (career, political bent, etc.).     I would dive into work by Kate McLean at Western Washington. She does some excellent stuff on identity development. Same with Moin Syed at UMN Twin Cities. Also see Social Identity and Social Categorization theories (Tajfel & Turner; Turner).   From what I can tell, you may be less interested in how those identities are created and strengthened, but nor interested in the effect of those identities in social situations. The only thing I\u2019d advise is that a good way to understand why these identities have certain disparities(e.g., housing discrimination), you can look at the historical perspective of those identities, how they were formed, and how those disparities rose.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":165.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1920u8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is Iran seemingly the only place in Middle East without any Al-Qaeda cells or affiliates? When looking at a map of the Middle East, you can practically draw a U shape from Hezbollah in Lebanon, down to Al-Qaeda cells in Saudi Arabia and Yemen--though generally skipping the rich Arabian\/Persian Gulf states--then skip over to Afghanistan and Pakistan, where insurgent activity is practically headquartered. However, Iran is pretty much never mentioned in the context of 'terrorism' as we know commonly know it, only nuclear weapon production. I know Iranian literally means Aryan, and thus they are ethnically different from Arabs, but then again, aren't the people in Afghanistan and Pakistan non-Arab as well--in fact I believe they are considered Aryan since Aryans having centuries passed swooped down the Khyber Pass from modern day Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan into the northern India\/Pakistan area, along with some people from modern day Iran (the Persians) (if I remember my history correctly). So why is there such a connection between the Arab countries and Afghanistan and Pakistan, completely skipping Iran?","c_root_id_A":"c8k4km1","c_root_id_B":"c8k4h14","created_at_utc_A":1361591320,"created_at_utc_B":1361590905,"score_A":52,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Al-Qaeda is primarily a Sunni Muslim organization. Iran is mostly Shia Muslim. Generally the two sides hate each other almost as much as they do outside religions. Iran generally allies with Hezbollah, a primarily Shia group in Lebanon. Nearly all the other states in the Arab world are Sunni Muslim (Bahrain and Iraq being the exceptions).","human_ref_B":"It's a Shi'a country, Al-Qaeda is a Sunni backed group.  A lot of the violence in Iraq can be attributed to Sunni versus Shi'ia.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Shi%27a%E2%80%93Sunni_relations They have their own terror groups to back, Hezbollah http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Hezbollah.  The two branches of Islam hate each other as much Protestants and Catholics  have throughout history.  EDit: Jundallah is actually trying to overthrow the Iranian government.  Sorry.  Iran backs Hezbollah.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":415.0,"score_ratio":8.6666666667}
{"post_id":"pdhb1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why are so many Americans in prison? Today I was reading a popular-scientific magazine in the train on the way back from a business-meeting. There was an article about the history of prison uniforms. In the article, it was mentioned that over 1% of the American labor force is currently in prison. In my own country, the Netherlands, less then 0,01% of the Dutch Labor force is currently in prison.   The magazine has a reputation for good fact-checking, but still, is this statement thrue? And if so, what causes this? Are Americans more likely to commit crimes? Is the American police-system more effective in catching more criminals? Is the punishment for crimes more severe (and if so, 100 times more severe?)  I can think of and googled a few reasons, among witch are the Dutch soft drugs policy (owning, selling and using small (specified) amounts of certain drugs is not legal but also not punishable) and shorter prison scentences in the Netherlands. I don't believe those reasons explain the huge difference, unless ofcourse 99% of the Americans in prison are there for the use of small amounts of softdrugs. Also American prisons are privatizes, but I don't see the direct connection.  I'd like to state the obvious, I'm not really interested in the political reasons behind this or what's right or wrong in relation to this subjects, just the social-scientific explanation behind it.","c_root_id_A":"c3okdys","c_root_id_B":"c3oijo4","created_at_utc_A":1328571832,"created_at_utc_B":1328560847,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Sorry that I don't have a lot of time to answer. Rather than try to address specific charges, you can take a step back to see the wider picture. The simple answer is it's a mix between penal populism and the era of new punitiveness (read more here).  Cavadino and Dignan (2007, The Penal System: An Introduction) argue that the three main types of economies determine the level of punitiveness.   1.\tNeo-Liberal, e.g. US and UK.  2.\tConservative Corporatist, e.g. Germany and France.   3.\tSocial Democratic, e.g. Scandinavia. The latter has recently seen a more punitive approach on drugs related offenders. This is because the visible presence of drug addicts became a symbol of misplaced welfarism.  This may explain the differences between your country and the USA.   Manifestations of new punitiveness include   1.\t\u2018three strikes and you\u2019re out\u2019,   2.\t\u2018zero tolerance\u2019 and   3.\tthe repetition of the statement \u2018prison works\u2019 (Cavadino and Dignan, 2007; Garland, 2001).   Cavadino and Dignan (2007) argue that one measure of the severity of new punitiveness is the imprisonment rate, characterised by the number of prisoners a country contains per 100,000 of its general population.  A study in the USA during the 1990s found that as new punitiveness became a more prominent penal policy which caused imprisonment to increase, crime rates decreased (Levitt, 2004, Understanding Why Crime Fell in the 1990s: Four Factors that Explain the Decline and Six That Do Not, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 18 (1), pp.163-190). However, Levitt\u2019s research does not constitute empirical evidence as it ignores many of the causes of crime which occur simultaneously with any increase or decrease in crime, as well as increased or decreased reliance on prisons.  The level of recidivism is a good indicator of whether or not new punitiveness is an effective policy with regard to social control. The recidivism rates within the USA and UK are quite high which suggests that sentencing practices determined by new punitiveness are not effective.","human_ref_B":"I'd say that the drug policy is definitely a huge factor. Another thing I would consider is that many of those people honestly should not be incarcerated, and honestly need mental health care more than they need imprisonment. Check out this link for more information.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10985.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"pdhb1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why are so many Americans in prison? Today I was reading a popular-scientific magazine in the train on the way back from a business-meeting. There was an article about the history of prison uniforms. In the article, it was mentioned that over 1% of the American labor force is currently in prison. In my own country, the Netherlands, less then 0,01% of the Dutch Labor force is currently in prison.   The magazine has a reputation for good fact-checking, but still, is this statement thrue? And if so, what causes this? Are Americans more likely to commit crimes? Is the American police-system more effective in catching more criminals? Is the punishment for crimes more severe (and if so, 100 times more severe?)  I can think of and googled a few reasons, among witch are the Dutch soft drugs policy (owning, selling and using small (specified) amounts of certain drugs is not legal but also not punishable) and shorter prison scentences in the Netherlands. I don't believe those reasons explain the huge difference, unless ofcourse 99% of the Americans in prison are there for the use of small amounts of softdrugs. Also American prisons are privatizes, but I don't see the direct connection.  I'd like to state the obvious, I'm not really interested in the political reasons behind this or what's right or wrong in relation to this subjects, just the social-scientific explanation behind it.","c_root_id_A":"c3oj5la","c_root_id_B":"c3okdys","created_at_utc_A":1328563832,"created_at_utc_B":1328571832,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Just as an aside, there is a higher proportion of Black America in prison right now than there was at the height of Apartheid in S Africa.","human_ref_B":"Sorry that I don't have a lot of time to answer. Rather than try to address specific charges, you can take a step back to see the wider picture. The simple answer is it's a mix between penal populism and the era of new punitiveness (read more here).  Cavadino and Dignan (2007, The Penal System: An Introduction) argue that the three main types of economies determine the level of punitiveness.   1.\tNeo-Liberal, e.g. US and UK.  2.\tConservative Corporatist, e.g. Germany and France.   3.\tSocial Democratic, e.g. Scandinavia. The latter has recently seen a more punitive approach on drugs related offenders. This is because the visible presence of drug addicts became a symbol of misplaced welfarism.  This may explain the differences between your country and the USA.   Manifestations of new punitiveness include   1.\t\u2018three strikes and you\u2019re out\u2019,   2.\t\u2018zero tolerance\u2019 and   3.\tthe repetition of the statement \u2018prison works\u2019 (Cavadino and Dignan, 2007; Garland, 2001).   Cavadino and Dignan (2007) argue that one measure of the severity of new punitiveness is the imprisonment rate, characterised by the number of prisoners a country contains per 100,000 of its general population.  A study in the USA during the 1990s found that as new punitiveness became a more prominent penal policy which caused imprisonment to increase, crime rates decreased (Levitt, 2004, Understanding Why Crime Fell in the 1990s: Four Factors that Explain the Decline and Six That Do Not, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 18 (1), pp.163-190). However, Levitt\u2019s research does not constitute empirical evidence as it ignores many of the causes of crime which occur simultaneously with any increase or decrease in crime, as well as increased or decreased reliance on prisons.  The level of recidivism is a good indicator of whether or not new punitiveness is an effective policy with regard to social control. The recidivism rates within the USA and UK are quite high which suggests that sentencing practices determined by new punitiveness are not effective.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8000.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1r5khn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What would happen to the economy if we got rid of pennies and everything was sold in 5 or 10 cent values?","c_root_id_A":"cdjw91o","c_root_id_B":"cdk3wjj","created_at_utc_A":1385065581,"created_at_utc_B":1385082943,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Would it be harder in the US where sales tax is added to the price of the product as opposed to other countries where is added in with the price?","human_ref_B":"The question isn't *if* but *when*.  Many countries have stopped using their smallest denomination as inflation eventually makes it less practical:  * US half cent \u2014 discontinued in 1857) * British farthing \u2014 worth 1\/4 of a penny \u2014 discontinued in 1960) * old Israeli shekel \u2014 worth 1\/500th of a 1\/2 new shekel \u2014 discontinued in 1986  I tried to find a graph that compares the value of the smallest denomination across many countries, to see if there's any kind of consensus about when a particular denomination should be retired.  Unfortunately I haven't found one so far.  The data shouldn't be too difficult to compile.  I did find this graph, but it only compares the smallest *note*, unfortunately it doesn't take into consideration smaller coins.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17362.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"xrwok","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What would happen if we paid off our debt? What would happen to the United States economy if a large percentage of individual Americans made an asserted effort pay off their debts (Homes, Credit Cards, Student Loans, Cars, ect) in the next 5 years? How would it effect our economy in a whole over short period of time (5-10 years) and how would it effect over a long period of time (20-50 years) Would it be wise for a politician to ask his\/her constituents to pay their debt to help the economy?","c_root_id_A":"c5p1y54","c_root_id_B":"c5p1zql","created_at_utc_A":1344276856,"created_at_utc_B":1344277018,"score_A":4,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Assuming that new loans also drop so as to reduce total individual debt:  First, I would think that short term demand (for consumer products, households, etc) would drop, as more debt repayments represent a reduction in consumption.  This in turn, could lead to the long term growth path of the economy shifting downwards.  However, it would also include a long term reduction in interest payments, and other debt related revenues which financial institutions make. This could make the economy shift its weight away from the financial sector and towards other, (possibly more, possibly less) productive sectors.  Two further points are worth noting 1. As with all things economic, the key to sustainable and high growth is balance.  2. US households have spent the last 4 years deleveraging. Quote from the Economist 1\/1\/12 \"America's ratio of household debt to income is down by 15 percentage points from its peak in 2008, after rising by over 30 percentage points in the eight preceding years. McKinsey reckons America's households are between a third and halfway through their debt-reduction process. They think the household-debt hangover could end by mid-2013.\"","human_ref_B":"Money spent paying down debt is money not spent on consumption. If everybody redirected their income from consumption to debt repayment, it would probably spark another recession in the short run. In the long run, total interest payments would be lower due to the reduced debt burden and so the money that would have been spent on that could be redirected to consumption and in the long run there could be a boost but the positive impact of this would depend on the severity of previous recession (i.e. if it caused a very horrible recession, it's unlikely that the positives would outweigh the negatives).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":162.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"153ddt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What happens when a government goes bankrupt? In the talks about the bailouts for Greece the goal seems to be to prevent the Greek Government from going bankrupt. But what happens if they would? I posted some numbered questions to better display my confusion.  1: Do the countries assets get seized by the creditors?  2: Does the country descent to anargy?  3: Do they get kicked out of the EU?  4: What would the implications be for the stability of the Euro?   Thanks in advance folks!","c_root_id_A":"c7ixgir","c_root_id_B":"c7iypu5","created_at_utc_A":1355896358,"created_at_utc_B":1355902809,"score_A":4,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"Not really an answer but it might help: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Argentine_debt_restructuring","human_ref_B":"1. Government debt isn't backed by any asset, it's not like a mortgage backed with a house. Even if it were you'd need an army (most likely) to go get it.  For the rest of the questions countries can't go into bankruptcy like an individual, Governments default on their loans, not declare bankruptcy. What the bailouts are trying to do is to prevent a Greek default, by giving the Greeks enough money to run a government and make payments on their government debt.  If the Government fails to payout on a loan this devalues all the greek loans and any new issue of debt will have to offer a high interest rate.  This high interest rate is problematic because then the government budget is consumed by something that doesn't benefit the economy and then this would lower GDP.  Because they are part of the Eurozone they can't just print more money and risk hyperinflation.  2: Note the Greece has already had a technical default on one of their loans and they haven't had complete anarchy.  3: The president of the Euro central bank stated that he will do everything to keep  Greece in the euro zone.  4: If there were larger scale defaults by Greece, the Euro plunges and is more unstable. If Greece is removed from the euro zone the euro rises.  Hope that helps.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6451.0,"score_ratio":5.25}
{"post_id":"153ddt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What happens when a government goes bankrupt? In the talks about the bailouts for Greece the goal seems to be to prevent the Greek Government from going bankrupt. But what happens if they would? I posted some numbered questions to better display my confusion.  1: Do the countries assets get seized by the creditors?  2: Does the country descent to anargy?  3: Do they get kicked out of the EU?  4: What would the implications be for the stability of the Euro?   Thanks in advance folks!","c_root_id_A":"c7izu37","c_root_id_B":"c7ixgir","created_at_utc_A":1355911611,"created_at_utc_B":1355896358,"score_A":8,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Governments that borrow in their own currency never need to go bankrupt, as they can print the money with which to pay back their debts.  This leads to high inflation and depreciation of their currency, but it's fundamentally different from insolvency.  A government that borrows in currency that it does not print (e.g. Argentina in US dollars, Greece in Euros), *can* become insolvent (unable to pay it's debts). When that happens, the it typically repudiates part of, or all of it's loans, while seeking help from the IMF or World bank.","human_ref_B":"Not really an answer but it might help: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Argentine_debt_restructuring","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15253.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"ad58x6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Is species a social construction in the same way race and gender can be described as such? In that they are an interaction between perceived differences and similarities between individuals and the way that we categorise them socially; hope that makes sense.","c_root_id_A":"edebfg4","c_root_id_B":"eddufy6","created_at_utc_A":1546795717,"created_at_utc_B":1546784460,"score_A":25,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"We classify species in order to categorize the world of biology and evolution to make sense of it. However, there is no such thing as a \"natural taxonomic unit.\" Classifications are not natural but rather constructed by humans. It is a way for us to organize the way we think about evolution and speciation, and sometimes this can get blurry.  Nature is not divided neatly into the distinct categories we have created. For instance, plenty of species don\u00b4t have sex, and therefore we can\u00b4t classify them according to interbreeding. Here, things such as anatomy, behavior, genetics, or evolutionary history can be used instead. Another example is how there are hybrids of species. Hooded crows and carrion crows look different, and largely mate within their own groups \u2014 but in some areas, they hybridize. Should they be considered the same species or separate species?  It is a natural fact that there are organisms which share the vast majority of the same features, and which we give the name \"species.\" But, the concept of species itself is, in part, socially constructed.","human_ref_B":"This turns out to be a complicated question with people who come down on various sides of the issue, so don't trust anyone who gives you an unequivocal answer. See here for extensive discussion.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11257.0,"score_ratio":1.9230769231}
{"post_id":"3otjav","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"A social scientist at my university once said that the presence of seedy businesses such as strip clubs do not increase crime in the area. Is this true? It seems counter-intuitive, but he sounded very sure about it.","c_root_id_A":"cw0uvtd","c_root_id_B":"cw1mdn4","created_at_utc_A":1444930635,"created_at_utc_B":1444979455,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Maybe you can explain why it sounds counter-intuitive?","human_ref_B":"This paper finds at least no statistically significant effects on crime in the immediate vicinity. They also cite Linz, Land, Williams, Paul, and Ezell (2004) who I guess found also no effects. To be honest though, I only scanned these pretty quickly and I have no idea about the quality of this journal, since it's not really my field.   This type of problem would require pretty good data if you want to set up a proper model that identifies the club's effects on the crime rate in the area. If you had coverage of locations where these clubs had been opened and also a relatively good control group for these locations (wrt demographics etc.) at first glance it would seem to me you'd be able to estimate the effect. Perhaps this is a topic for some up-and-coming cute-o-nomics paper in the vein of Levitt, who knows...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":48820.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"8jwtth","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Why do people say the gender pay gap is a myth? I hear a lot about either the gender pay gap being a real issue or it is a total myth. So whats the issue with the gender pay gap?  My understanding is that it's not that women make less than men but they usually will enter into lower paying fields or work fewer hours. So is a way to resolve this issue to encourage more women to enter male-dominated fields? And if the reason women are working fewer hours is because they are also working as a housewife, should they be compensated for the work that is being done at home? After all, women are usually expected to do all the cooking, cleaning, taking care of the children (work that is equally as important), so shouldn't this work also be taken into consideration?","c_root_id_A":"dz398y6","c_root_id_B":"dz38tux","created_at_utc_A":1526498545,"created_at_utc_B":1526498174,"score_A":66,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"You are opening a Pandora's box.   I think, a lot of the debate outside the social sciences (i.e. on the mainstream media) comes from the fact that the matter is necessarly simplified, often too much. Are women on average paid less than men? Yes. But averages can be misleading. Does this average difference mean that women are always paid, with perfect parity of all possible concurrent conditions, less than men? No. But on average, they are.   Although in the social sciences there is a general agreement on the existence of a pay gap between men and women, the exact cause of it is far from being clear.   You address some of the main ones in your question, that is, women are (generally) segregated to occupations that pay (generally) less, like care-related professions, and (generally) work less and have more interruptions in their careers as men.   Now, there are lots of studies on the decomposition of the gender wage gap. There is consensus on the major causes (less working hours than men, depreciation of human capital, \"gender roles\" issues) but not on the amount with which each cause contributes to the overall effect.   There is also a problem of \"reverse causality\" when it comes to occupational segregation: it is not clear whether the fact that an occupation is female dominated causes lower wages or if vice versa, lower-wages occupation offer \"compensation\" for the monetary loss in form of more flexible schedules and part-time workdays and are therefore preferred by women to conciliate work and family.   So to answer to your question, it is not said that necessarly an increase of women in an occupation brings to them better wage conditions, it could also lead to an overall decrease of the wages for the whole occupation employees (devaluation of female dominated occupations). I am not going into the whole \"genderization\" of careers and housework, because i think it's a quite difficult subject, but there is some evidence that through generations things are slowly changing in a more egalitarian division of labor in and out the household.   So, if your question is, \"why there is still debate on this topic?\" i would say, the debate in the social sciences is not that heated as it is on the media. On the media there is mch more conflict on the subject first because there is a lot of oversimplification and confusion on both sides, second for the same reason because there is still debate on institutional racism. Inequalities that are deeply rooted in the society take long time to disappear, and from one side, people don't like to have - or to perceive - their privileges taken away. From the other side, people don't like being told they are on the wrong side of the debate\/history\/issue.  Edit: I apologize for the lack of sources in the original post.    I provide here just some of the works I am aware of on the subject, that could be useful for a quick overview, but keep in mind that there is a lot more. Also, this phenomenon is investigated both by economists and sociologists. I will provide mostly sociological sources since that's my field of study.    For an overview of gender roles, gendered division of labor and contemporary women's labor market participation: H.P. Blossfeld and S. Drobnic (edit.) \"careers of couples in contemporary society\", OUP 2001.    On Human capital depreciation and the role of interruptions of participation in the wage gap:   M. J. Budig, P. England, \u201cThe Wage Penalty for Motherhood\u201d, American Sociological Review (2001), 66(2): 204-225   M. Gangl, A. Ziefle, \u201cMotherhood, Labor Force Behavior, And Women\u2019s Careers: An Empirical Assessment of The Wage Penalty For Motherhood In Britain, Germany, And The United States\u201d, Demography, (2009) 46(2): 341\u2013369  On decomposition of the GWG: Blau and Kahn's \"The Gender Wage Gap: Extent, Trends, and Explanations\" available at http:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w21913 (but also any other work by the same authors)","human_ref_B":"This myth became so commonplace that the U.S government went and commissioned a major, comprehensive study on the topic to discern its validity: The CONSAD report.  In a nutshell, it basically explains only about ~6% of the wage gap (rather than the 24% most commonly cited) is likely due to the actual gender of the worker themselves.   The rest of the gap can be explained\/controlled for by other factors, such as self-selection bias in careers (women are more predisposed towards certain fields, like nursing, while men are to others, like engineering), or breaks in career (women must leave work when a child is born for obvious biological reasons, while men are not obligated), or other factors like experience, hours worked, etc. These are not strictly considered part of the unfair wage gap, since they are often volitional (women can choose to give birth or not, or can choose which field to study) rather than being uncontrollably forced upon them like which gender you happen to be born as.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":371.0,"score_ratio":2.275862069}
{"post_id":"16ncrx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"[Linguistics] Why is it English doesn't have gendered nouns and articles while many other languages in the area do?","c_root_id_A":"c7xuanw","c_root_id_B":"c7xnvc5","created_at_utc_A":1358330978,"created_at_utc_B":1358302620,"score_A":33,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"The whole story is long and a bit complicated, but here's a short version: English had a gender\/case system very much like the other Germanic languages, but a few shifts in pronunciation led to the endings loosing their use, so the system was dropped altogether (except in pronouns).   The most important shift was that various vowel endings which indicated case\/number in adjectives and nouns were obscured to a single sound, the \"indeterminate vowel\", which was often written as an \"e\". A number of endings like -a, -u, -e, -an, -um were all reduced to -e and whatever grammatical distinctions they carried before were lost. Around the same time -m endings were changed to -n endings and then eventually the -n was dropped altogether. This all started around the year 1000. So, putting these two things together a weak adjective which was *blinda* in the singular and *blindan* in the plural changed to *blinde* in both cases. Similar developments occurred with nouns and even verbs.  One result of the elimination of case\/gender is that English is much less flexible with word order than some of the other Germanic languages. Since there's no dative\/accusative\/nominative anymore, we need to structure our sentences in the standard SVO (subject, verb, object) model most of the time. We can get around this with some prepositions sometimes, but it can still sound awkward. For example, \"Bill threw Sara the ball,\" is ok as is, \"Bill threw the ball to Sara,\" but, \"To Sara Bill threw the ball,\" sounds strange.   If you want a nice and detailed book on all this, check out \"A History of the English Language\" by Albert Baugh and Thomas Cable.","human_ref_B":"English lost grammatical gender as the language became more syntactical. It did inflect for gender at one point (i.e., Old English).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":28358.0,"score_ratio":3.3}
{"post_id":"16ncrx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"[Linguistics] Why is it English doesn't have gendered nouns and articles while many other languages in the area do?","c_root_id_A":"c7xtsbu","c_root_id_B":"c7xuanw","created_at_utc_A":1358326568,"created_at_utc_B":1358330978,"score_A":10,"score_B":33,"human_ref_A":"A better question is why do other languages *have* gendered nouns\/articles? I speak some german\/french and find it horribly useless and annoying.","human_ref_B":"The whole story is long and a bit complicated, but here's a short version: English had a gender\/case system very much like the other Germanic languages, but a few shifts in pronunciation led to the endings loosing their use, so the system was dropped altogether (except in pronouns).   The most important shift was that various vowel endings which indicated case\/number in adjectives and nouns were obscured to a single sound, the \"indeterminate vowel\", which was often written as an \"e\". A number of endings like -a, -u, -e, -an, -um were all reduced to -e and whatever grammatical distinctions they carried before were lost. Around the same time -m endings were changed to -n endings and then eventually the -n was dropped altogether. This all started around the year 1000. So, putting these two things together a weak adjective which was *blinda* in the singular and *blindan* in the plural changed to *blinde* in both cases. Similar developments occurred with nouns and even verbs.  One result of the elimination of case\/gender is that English is much less flexible with word order than some of the other Germanic languages. Since there's no dative\/accusative\/nominative anymore, we need to structure our sentences in the standard SVO (subject, verb, object) model most of the time. We can get around this with some prepositions sometimes, but it can still sound awkward. For example, \"Bill threw Sara the ball,\" is ok as is, \"Bill threw the ball to Sara,\" but, \"To Sara Bill threw the ball,\" sounds strange.   If you want a nice and detailed book on all this, check out \"A History of the English Language\" by Albert Baugh and Thomas Cable.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4410.0,"score_ratio":3.3}
{"post_id":"16ncrx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"[Linguistics] Why is it English doesn't have gendered nouns and articles while many other languages in the area do?","c_root_id_A":"c7xocr5","c_root_id_B":"c7xuanw","created_at_utc_A":1358304158,"created_at_utc_B":1358330978,"score_A":4,"score_B":33,"human_ref_A":"Like Beake said, English used to have gender, but it gradually disappeared (for the most part - we still have him\/her, etc.).  The short answer, though, is that we're not sure why it disappeared. It may have had to do with contact with Old Norse, since the change started in the north of England while there was heavy contact between the languages.","human_ref_B":"The whole story is long and a bit complicated, but here's a short version: English had a gender\/case system very much like the other Germanic languages, but a few shifts in pronunciation led to the endings loosing their use, so the system was dropped altogether (except in pronouns).   The most important shift was that various vowel endings which indicated case\/number in adjectives and nouns were obscured to a single sound, the \"indeterminate vowel\", which was often written as an \"e\". A number of endings like -a, -u, -e, -an, -um were all reduced to -e and whatever grammatical distinctions they carried before were lost. Around the same time -m endings were changed to -n endings and then eventually the -n was dropped altogether. This all started around the year 1000. So, putting these two things together a weak adjective which was *blinda* in the singular and *blindan* in the plural changed to *blinde* in both cases. Similar developments occurred with nouns and even verbs.  One result of the elimination of case\/gender is that English is much less flexible with word order than some of the other Germanic languages. Since there's no dative\/accusative\/nominative anymore, we need to structure our sentences in the standard SVO (subject, verb, object) model most of the time. We can get around this with some prepositions sometimes, but it can still sound awkward. For example, \"Bill threw Sara the ball,\" is ok as is, \"Bill threw the ball to Sara,\" but, \"To Sara Bill threw the ball,\" sounds strange.   If you want a nice and detailed book on all this, check out \"A History of the English Language\" by Albert Baugh and Thomas Cable.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26820.0,"score_ratio":8.25}
{"post_id":"16ncrx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"[Linguistics] Why is it English doesn't have gendered nouns and articles while many other languages in the area do?","c_root_id_A":"c7xocr5","c_root_id_B":"c7xtsbu","created_at_utc_A":1358304158,"created_at_utc_B":1358326568,"score_A":4,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Like Beake said, English used to have gender, but it gradually disappeared (for the most part - we still have him\/her, etc.).  The short answer, though, is that we're not sure why it disappeared. It may have had to do with contact with Old Norse, since the change started in the north of England while there was heavy contact between the languages.","human_ref_B":"A better question is why do other languages *have* gendered nouns\/articles? I speak some german\/french and find it horribly useless and annoying.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22410.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1w148l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What are the most prominent economic trickle-down effects that will definitely stem from an increase in student loan defaults?","c_root_id_A":"cexridr","c_root_id_B":"cexw7ks","created_at_utc_A":1390578994,"created_at_utc_B":1390588476,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This is a good question I'm curious to hear the answer to also.  You might want to try http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/Askeconomics too.","human_ref_B":"Just to rephrase the question, you're asking what secondary effects result from higher student loan default rates?  Like who\/what gets hurt\/helped when student loans don't get paid back on time?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9482.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"jvr8x1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"What are the things that are considered as bad or immoral but they are actually good for the society. Like pornography, prostitution, polygamy, more\/less stereotypical gender role, less\/more gun control, less safety laws, being soft on crime, allowance of hard drugs, ...etc.","c_root_id_A":"gcmrt8n","c_root_id_B":"gclnr0e","created_at_utc_A":1605636071,"created_at_utc_B":1605613129,"score_A":23,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Mu.#%22Unasking%22_the_question) Science, and scientists (social or otherwise) do not themselves decide what is \"good\" or \"bad\" for society. They may make conclusions and recommendations based on what they assume to be desirable by their society or public, but it is ultimately people who decide what is good or bad.   In other words, your question is unanswerable without specification. For example, there is a scientific consensus that smoking is harmful to health in the sense that, from a strictly medical point of view, it contributes to maladies. That said, one cannot automatically skip from this conclusion to \"therefore smoking is bad for society.\" What if society is hedonistic, and therefore that what is good for society depends on whether it produces pleasure to individuals?   Let us take for granted (for discussion's sake) that smoking produces pleasure. If that is true, is it therefore actually good for society? Well, one could then argue that further down the road, smoking is likely to produce suffering, at least to some amount of people (e.g. not everyone develops cancer whether or not they are heavy smokers). But then, the question is, how do we weight these considerations? As in, the fact that the negative result is not 100% guaranteed, that it will come in the future, and the relative value of smoking pleasure and the suffering from illnesses caused by smoking. This is a philosophical discussion, not a scientific discussion.  ---  For a more concrete illustration, see this and this threads on prostitution in which I detail how among those who criticize the decriminalization and\/or legalization of sex work there are many who are having a different debate than most other researchers, such that they consider prostitution itself to be inherently harmful to women (and society). For illustration, in their dissent toward what I would consider the majority position on the effects of decriminalization, Coy et al. (2018) argue:  >**The approach that we share does not accept the inevitability of a sex trade and highlights prostitution as an abusive element of white supremacist capitalist patriarchy, rooted in racism and colonization** (Bhattacharya, 2016; Butler, 2015). From this vantage point, assuming that the demand for sexual access to women in the sex trade is socially constructed means it can be challenged and changed. As Miriam (2005, p. 2), drawing on Pateman, has noted: **\u201cthe root question of an abolitionist approach to prostitution is not whether or not women \u2018choose\u2019 prostitution, but why men have the right to demand that women\u2019s bodies are sold as commodities in the capitalist market.\u201d**  >...] **those who argue for the complete decriminalization of the sex trade as a form of a labor\u2014a model the sex industry businesses tend to prefer\u2014come from a particular ideological position as do those researchers, like us, who argue for the Equality\/Nordic Model based on the understanding that prostitution is both a cause and consequence of women\u2019s unequal social, economic, and political status in relation to men.**  \"Empirically\" one can argue that most researchers conclude that decriminalization produces desirable effects, but this conclusion depends on a certain idea of what is \"good\", the latter which is a philosophical matter (in the large sense, including ethics, political ideology, etc.).  By way of conclusion, I would keep in mind that even among consequentialists, there are different kinds and not everyone would agree that everything is permissible as long as it increases happiness. See [rule consequentialism.  ---  Coy, M., Smiley, C. & Tyler, M. Challenging the \u201cProstitution Problem\u201d: Dissenting Voices, Sex Buyers, and the Myth of Neutrality in Prostitution Research. Arch Sex Behav 48, 1931\u20131935 (2019).","human_ref_B":"Is this a question and do you have any evidence that supports your claims here?   https:\/\/www.asanet.org\/sites\/default\/files\/savvy\/introtosociology\/Documents\/Persell%20Methods%20Reading11.htm","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22942.0,"score_ratio":7.6666666667}
{"post_id":"jvr8x1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"What are the things that are considered as bad or immoral but they are actually good for the society. Like pornography, prostitution, polygamy, more\/less stereotypical gender role, less\/more gun control, less safety laws, being soft on crime, allowance of hard drugs, ...etc.","c_root_id_A":"gcmo5j6","c_root_id_B":"gcmrt8n","created_at_utc_A":1605634411,"created_at_utc_B":1605636071,"score_A":2,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"You've heard of the \"gay uncles\" hypothesis?  It aligns with kin selection.  So far only males have been studied, but the support seems strong. This information might be extrapolated to other \"non-reproductive\" people such as lesbians, those who choose not to have children, etc.  https:\/\/link.springer.com\/article\/10.1007\/s10508-011-9763-z  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Biology\\_and\\_sexual\\_orientation#Gay\\_uncle\\_hypothesis  https:\/\/www.advocate.com\/news\/daily-news\/2010\/02\/05\/study-supports-gay-super-uncles-theory","human_ref_B":"Mu.#%22Unasking%22_the_question) Science, and scientists (social or otherwise) do not themselves decide what is \"good\" or \"bad\" for society. They may make conclusions and recommendations based on what they assume to be desirable by their society or public, but it is ultimately people who decide what is good or bad.   In other words, your question is unanswerable without specification. For example, there is a scientific consensus that smoking is harmful to health in the sense that, from a strictly medical point of view, it contributes to maladies. That said, one cannot automatically skip from this conclusion to \"therefore smoking is bad for society.\" What if society is hedonistic, and therefore that what is good for society depends on whether it produces pleasure to individuals?   Let us take for granted (for discussion's sake) that smoking produces pleasure. If that is true, is it therefore actually good for society? Well, one could then argue that further down the road, smoking is likely to produce suffering, at least to some amount of people (e.g. not everyone develops cancer whether or not they are heavy smokers). But then, the question is, how do we weight these considerations? As in, the fact that the negative result is not 100% guaranteed, that it will come in the future, and the relative value of smoking pleasure and the suffering from illnesses caused by smoking. This is a philosophical discussion, not a scientific discussion.  ---  For a more concrete illustration, see this and this threads on prostitution in which I detail how among those who criticize the decriminalization and\/or legalization of sex work there are many who are having a different debate than most other researchers, such that they consider prostitution itself to be inherently harmful to women (and society). For illustration, in their dissent toward what I would consider the majority position on the effects of decriminalization, Coy et al. (2018) argue:  >**The approach that we share does not accept the inevitability of a sex trade and highlights prostitution as an abusive element of white supremacist capitalist patriarchy, rooted in racism and colonization** (Bhattacharya, 2016; Butler, 2015). From this vantage point, assuming that the demand for sexual access to women in the sex trade is socially constructed means it can be challenged and changed. As Miriam (2005, p. 2), drawing on Pateman, has noted: **\u201cthe root question of an abolitionist approach to prostitution is not whether or not women \u2018choose\u2019 prostitution, but why men have the right to demand that women\u2019s bodies are sold as commodities in the capitalist market.\u201d**  >...] **those who argue for the complete decriminalization of the sex trade as a form of a labor\u2014a model the sex industry businesses tend to prefer\u2014come from a particular ideological position as do those researchers, like us, who argue for the Equality\/Nordic Model based on the understanding that prostitution is both a cause and consequence of women\u2019s unequal social, economic, and political status in relation to men.**  \"Empirically\" one can argue that most researchers conclude that decriminalization produces desirable effects, but this conclusion depends on a certain idea of what is \"good\", the latter which is a philosophical matter (in the large sense, including ethics, political ideology, etc.).  By way of conclusion, I would keep in mind that even among consequentialists, there are different kinds and not everyone would agree that everything is permissible as long as it increases happiness. See [rule consequentialism.  ---  Coy, M., Smiley, C. & Tyler, M. Challenging the \u201cProstitution Problem\u201d: Dissenting Voices, Sex Buyers, and the Myth of Neutrality in Prostitution Research. Arch Sex Behav 48, 1931\u20131935 (2019).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1660.0,"score_ratio":11.5}
{"post_id":"tg8zr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"Why do people have such a hard time intellectualizing subtle impressions they have of people in everyday life? I mean subtle impressions from facial expression, tone of voice, gestures, etc. We feel like we understand something about somebody but we don't know how to say it or even verbalize it internally to our own self.  Is it because there is a split between the right and left hemisphere of the brain and those brain functions are difficult to communicate across the brain from the right side to the left side? Sorry for the simplistic assumption that subtle social impressions are a right brain activity.  Another related interesting thing is sometimes it seems like a person is responding to me on a non-verbal level in a way that implies understanding but when I talk to them it seems like they actually don't understand it at all. It is like they understand on one level- maybe one part of the brain but on another level- maybe another part of the brain they don't understand.","c_root_id_A":"c4mkulo","c_root_id_B":"c4mi3uy","created_at_utc_A":1336688625,"created_at_utc_B":1336676559,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"We don't have introspective access to the majority of our mental processes (Nisbett & Wilson, 1977)). Conscious working memory can only handle thinking about 7 (+\/- 2) things at one time (Miller, 1956).  As a result, much of the information that we process from our five senses are done automatically and non-consciously. As a result, many of our impressions come from influences outside of conscious awareness. These nonconscious impressions can influence our conscious beliefs, but we may not be aware that they do.  p.s. The processes I describe have nothing to do with right vs. left hemisphere localization. It's happening all over the brain.","human_ref_B":"I think the non-verbal understanding cues are possibly the person masking their inability to understand. It's polite to nod and allow a person to continue explaining, but once you finish what you're telling them they realized they have no clue what you meant, and it's their turn to talk without interrupting you.   I don't think it's a matter of hemisphere, as it's all connected. Perhaps you're correct that it's being processed on a less-than-conscious level. Considering we evolved from animals, body language definitely developed prior to spoken language, and so perhaps it's being processed in the more reptilian parts of our brains instead of in the conscious \"front\" of our brains, as we developed the capability to understand body language prior to the capability to understand or produce spoken language.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12066.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"11wd8n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"There are many countries with militaries comprised of both men and women, other than the U.S. Do they also suffer high rates of soldier-soldier rape?","c_root_id_A":"c6qhdsr","c_root_id_B":"c6qf5fr","created_at_utc_A":1350993216,"created_at_utc_B":1350972947,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"For those asking - this website suggests every 30 minutes a rape occurs in the US military. Another interesting article on the [topic] (http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/society\/2011\/dec\/09\/rape-us-military)","human_ref_B":"do you have any idea what the rate is in the US military?  I know i have read a lot about under-reporting and under-investigating of rapes in the US military.  is it possible that similar problems in foreign militaries would cause them to have artificially low rates of sexual assault?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20269.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"s8c7t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Why does the United States have such a weak welfare state compared to many European countries? The United States is one of the largest, richest, and most powerful countries in the world. It seems unusual to me that issues of poverty and social welfare are given so little attention\/funding. What are the reasons for this? Are they ideological (culture of \"rugged individualism\")? Socio-economic? Institutional? Or something else?","c_root_id_A":"c4bx0g2","c_root_id_B":"c4by5my","created_at_utc_A":1334345261,"created_at_utc_B":1334350344,"score_A":9,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"The USA isn't ethnically homogeneous like many European countries.","human_ref_B":"A mix of things.  The rugged western ideal which American expansion west created thought history.   The ideal of the American dream of a country built around the idea a hard working person can improve their quality of life  Teddy Roosevelt stripping the progressives out of the Republican party, eventually limiting progressive input to just the Democratic Party and dissolving the temporary union between progressive and business interests with Teddy.  Most importantly though, the rise of the Soviet Union neutered the left in America. The welfare state arose in Europe at the same time the USA was in the Cold War. USA political opinion shifted to oppose things which could be easily demonized as being communist like. The progressives left the Rep. party with Teddy, so with Democrats being associated with the left exclusively now because of the New Deal etc liberal ideals were doomed by circumstance. They were cornered in one party which could easily be demonized to be too similar to the Soviet Union. Whatever party and social structure which had existed which could be most associated with the S.U. would have been ruined.   Thus the arise of the US military\/corporate welfare system.   The USA has welfare programs, they are hidden. Military is one, anyone capable can join and get free health care, college etc.   Military Spending is another. Those engineers at Boeing get paid, so do the grocers, waitress, delivery boys etc that provide customer service to those Defense contractors. Many jobs are supported through military spending.   Corporate welfare exists; whether through rebuys when you fuck up like TARP, guaranteeing of markets through TSA screeners, Florida Drug testing, anything having to do with the Mickey Mouse Law, RIAA, entertainment industry, trying to ban vcr mp3 players. You get the point","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5083.0,"score_ratio":1.1111111111}
{"post_id":"1skk27","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Most countries have the name everyone calls them and an official name (Republic of X, Kingdom of Y, etc). Why is Canada's official name just Canada?","c_root_id_A":"cdypphk","c_root_id_B":"cdywlar","created_at_utc_A":1386722634,"created_at_utc_B":1386738020,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"If you're ever curious about \"Canada\" vs \"Dominion of Canada\", the Wikipedia discussion pages are actually pretty decent.   http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Talk:Canada\/Officialname1 http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Talk:Name_of_Canada","human_ref_B":"Fun fact: John A. McDonald and others (including the Governor General) around the time wanted to name the new country \"The Kingdom of Canada\" but officials in London vetoed this idea. One of the reasons they vetoed the idea is actually so the country would seem weaker and not a threat to the recently reunited United States.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15386.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"2r8e8b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Have other countries without free universities seen tuition inflation as the United States? For example, has Australia seen tuition inflation similar to US tuition inflation?","c_root_id_A":"cndl34o","c_root_id_B":"cndistw","created_at_utc_A":1420330885,"created_at_utc_B":1420326599,"score_A":18,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Note that tuition actually paid in the US has grown much more slowly than the published \"sticker price.\" http:\/\/nytimes.com\/2013\/10\/25\/education\/despite-rising-sticker-prices-actual-college-costs-stable-over-decade-study-says.html.","human_ref_B":"Define tuition inflation.   Edit: If you are interested in how much fees paid by students to universities in Australia, you may find the graph half way down this page useful (under Trends).  http:\/\/www.ncoa.gov.au\/report\/appendix-vol-1\/9-13-higher-education.html. Fees are increasing, but this doesn't take account of cost of living increases of inflation.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4286.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"117z8k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"U.S. Media has been largely criticized as inadequate, sensationalist, and celebrity focused. What kind of policy change can be made to change this and what evidence exists in support of this claim? Is there any way to theoretically change the standard in U.S. Media?  A large problem is that celebrity news and sensationalist headlines often get the viewers and make the money. Journalism as it is is struggling as the Internet grows -- not only because everyone gets their news for free now, but also because news organizations now recognize that the gossip and entertainment get the most clicks and therefore the most ad revenue. Journalism is also considered entertainment media so they don't even necessarily have to be accurate (according to *The Corporation*)  The Netherlands and Sweden have government subsidized news media which takes out the money incentive but puts a focus on quality. Could a similar policy or other policies work in the United States? Also, many of these things I've heard in class or online without any real statistics or tangible evidence. Does this evidence exist? These things interest me and are important to me but I'd hate to be talking out of my ass.","c_root_id_A":"c6k7ysd","c_root_id_B":"c6k8i76","created_at_utc_A":1349840746,"created_at_utc_B":1349843144,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Break up the media cartels.  Limit the amount of outlets one company can control.  Reform the FCC to pre 96 conditions.  Push for neutral news sites that have no influencial bias.  Make the distinction between actual news and editorial commentary more easily recognizeable.  Push for heavy fines for news outlets that knowingly pass fraudulent information.","human_ref_B":"Any policy change that reforms the press is a limitation on free speech.  Celebrity news is not journalism, it's entertainment.  Think of them as different species sharing the same ecosystem (print, film, web).  Entertainment is and should be allowed without suppression by public policy.  Entertainment is a business and should not be vilified for trying to make money any more than organic farming or fire suppression.  It is a mistake to put journalism in the same category as entertainment. Journalism is not considered entertainment media except erroneously. Once you separate them, you will see there are abundant good news outlets.  The answer for any individual is to choose to consume good media instead  of entertainment.    The U.S. has public and NGO media, also.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2398.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"117z8k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"U.S. Media has been largely criticized as inadequate, sensationalist, and celebrity focused. What kind of policy change can be made to change this and what evidence exists in support of this claim? Is there any way to theoretically change the standard in U.S. Media?  A large problem is that celebrity news and sensationalist headlines often get the viewers and make the money. Journalism as it is is struggling as the Internet grows -- not only because everyone gets their news for free now, but also because news organizations now recognize that the gossip and entertainment get the most clicks and therefore the most ad revenue. Journalism is also considered entertainment media so they don't even necessarily have to be accurate (according to *The Corporation*)  The Netherlands and Sweden have government subsidized news media which takes out the money incentive but puts a focus on quality. Could a similar policy or other policies work in the United States? Also, many of these things I've heard in class or online without any real statistics or tangible evidence. Does this evidence exist? These things interest me and are important to me but I'd hate to be talking out of my ass.","c_root_id_A":"c6kfqsj","c_root_id_B":"c6k7ysd","created_at_utc_A":1349887688,"created_at_utc_B":1349840746,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"\"journalism\" is just reportage, subject matter is secondary.  \"entertainment media\" is what it is. it's, first and foremost, filler on slow news days. and, really, most days are slow news days. i worked in a newsroom for ten years. believe me, the news **is** finite. secondly it's escapism for lots of people. it's usually unoffensive, sometimes a bit titillating, and is neutral enough for chat around the office water cooler. thirdly, there's little work involved in reporting on hollywood -- ready made press releases for much of it, and if robert downey jr. wanders into someone else's house in a late-night drug-induced fog, it's a story that's easily put together with lots of publicity photos of the celeb already at hand and news copy that's out on the AP.   but to think that -- whatever you want to call it: entertainment media, yellow journalism, sensationalism, fluff -- is a relatively recent thing is wrong.  the term \"yellow journalism\" was coined in the late 1800s and it was quite common. most big cities in this country had at least two big newspapers that competed for business. in denver, the rivalry between the denver post and the rocky mountain news was epic. the news ran their headlines in huge red type (in fact, tabloid format newspapers, like the rocky mountain news, developed reputations for being \"lower class\" papers).   \"newspaper wars\" were an actual thing. editors even dueled, believe it or not.  newspapers, radios, tvs, the internet...are all just delivery systems, and we don't really get our news for free. we pay money to either a cable or internet provider, or pay for a subscription to a newspaper. there's no news on the radio any more, except for public radio, and that's why it's constantly threatened. you have to go out of your way to get an antenna for your tv if you don't want cable, and then you get your news only a couple times of day, but no cnn or fox news. you can get your daily news fix via free wifi, but somebody, somewhere is paying for it.  and we already do subsidize the media in this country, just not as openly as in the countries you mention. [here's another interesting article on the subject] (http:\/\/stevebuttry.wordpress.com\/2010\/01\/08\/five-more-reasons-government-shouldnt-subsidize-journalism\/).  personally? i believe the internet is our saving grace, as long as we keep it free and open. there's no rule that says a journalist has to work for the new york times or the bbc, there never has been and there never will. the internet ensures that, more than any other delivery system. providing free internet access for all is what should be subsidized. the other delivery systems will have to adapt. some are already; some will fade into oblivion.  being a journalist, i've been very concerned about \"local tv news.\" i worked at newspapers in a number of communities in wyoming and colorado that weren't part of the focus of the tv news unless something out of the ordinary happened. if the local newspapers -- even if they're just weeklies in small, rural towns -- disappear, how will people stay informed, short of visiting the city government website, the police department's website, etc., etc.? i think websites like facebook are beginning to address that challenge. other websites will emerge, others will evolve.","human_ref_B":"Break up the media cartels.  Limit the amount of outlets one company can control.  Reform the FCC to pre 96 conditions.  Push for neutral news sites that have no influencial bias.  Make the distinction between actual news and editorial commentary more easily recognizeable.  Push for heavy fines for news outlets that knowingly pass fraudulent information.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":46942.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1d5ina","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is the Libor \"Scandal\" circulating on Reddit\/Rolling Stone being exaggerated? http:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/politics\/news\/everything-is-rigged-the-biggest-financial-scandal-yet-20130425  This has been submitted about twenty times across several subreddits, none of which seems to have the standard \"As an economist let me debunk this and do some Explain like I'm five years old why this is sensationalist\"  It just strikes me as a bit unbelievable. Could someone more educated in the market enlighten the situation?","c_root_id_A":"c9n5ve3","c_root_id_B":"c9n6vtc","created_at_utc_A":1366993663,"created_at_utc_B":1366996198,"score_A":26,"score_B":45,"human_ref_A":"We're talking about scales that are very, very small for people who aren't involved in daily financial markets.   We're talking 1-2 basis points, white noise, so that it doesn't affect Joe Consumer all that much, on average. If your interest rate comes in at 4.23% rather than 4.20%, it's not going to make a massive difference in your life.  It does affect people who need to move hundreds of billions of $ *today*, that is, people who are deep in the financial sector. There's nontrivial movements of wealth for those individuals - two basis points (0.02%) can mean a lot of money for those guys.  It still sucks, and it's worth investigating, and is still fraud, but in my estimation (I am willing to be proven wrong), it's not huge for the vast swath of individuals.  I'll also note that the Fed funds rate is more important than LIBOR for US-based interest-rate setting.","human_ref_B":"Hey everyone.  Please please please start using sources here.  So far I don't see a single sourced top level comment and sources are readily available - LIBOR & ICAP manipulation has been covered widely in financial press - economist, bloomberg, WSJ, the times, reuters, the ft, etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2535.0,"score_ratio":1.7307692308}
{"post_id":"ein9rw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What evidence is there that minimum wage increases cause (or don't cause) firms to reduce other non-wage benefits for low wage employees?","c_root_id_A":"fct88d1","c_root_id_B":"fcsd84j","created_at_utc_A":1577935476,"created_at_utc_B":1577914904,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Here is a study on the minimum wage increase in Seattle and its effects.   https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w25182","human_ref_B":"Econtalk podcast had an episode. It was based on Seattle and was done with the cooperation of the mayor.  https:\/\/www.econtalk.org\/jacob-vigdor-on-the-seattle-minimum-wage\/","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20572.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"tifd9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"There's Baby Boomers, Gen X, Gen Y. Were there any names for generations before? What are the future names?","c_root_id_A":"c4mvkd4","c_root_id_B":"c4mx56z","created_at_utc_A":1336757854,"created_at_utc_B":1336764886,"score_A":7,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Today's generation is referred to as the Millennial Generation. I don't know about the prior generations to Baby Boomers, though.","human_ref_B":"I think we need to rethink these names.   I suggest changing the Baby Boomers to the \"entitlement generation\".   $15T and counting. That is all.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7032.0,"score_ratio":1.8571428571}
{"post_id":"tifd9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"There's Baby Boomers, Gen X, Gen Y. Were there any names for generations before? What are the future names?","c_root_id_A":"c4mvsti","c_root_id_B":"c4mx56z","created_at_utc_A":1336758921,"created_at_utc_B":1336764886,"score_A":9,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"In the early 2000s, prior to 9\/11, there was bunches of discussion in popular media, including TIME, about the fact that the as-yet-unnamed generation after Generation Y didn't have any coalescing event to name them after.  The Columbine shooting was the biggest defining event of that generation thus far, and it didn't hold much weight compared to wars or social revolutions.  This was before 9\/11, the transformative implementation of web 2.0 technology, the multiple wars, the economic collapse... rapidly, there was a shift from too little to define the generation to too much.  I think the term Millenial is therefore an appropriate way to describe the generation.  This doesn't directly answer your question, but I think the conversation on what gives a generation its name and why is an interesting one, and I'd love to hear whatever people have to contribute to the subject.","human_ref_B":"I think we need to rethink these names.   I suggest changing the Baby Boomers to the \"entitlement generation\".   $15T and counting. That is all.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5965.0,"score_ratio":1.4444444444}
{"post_id":"tifd9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"There's Baby Boomers, Gen X, Gen Y. Were there any names for generations before? What are the future names?","c_root_id_A":"c4mvvs4","c_root_id_B":"c4mx56z","created_at_utc_A":1336759283,"created_at_utc_B":1336764886,"score_A":6,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"But these names are very recent inventions, whereas Gen Y has been in use since those kids were born.","human_ref_B":"I think we need to rethink these names.   I suggest changing the Baby Boomers to the \"entitlement generation\".   $15T and counting. That is all.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5603.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"tifd9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"There's Baby Boomers, Gen X, Gen Y. Were there any names for generations before? What are the future names?","c_root_id_A":"c4mvkd4","c_root_id_B":"c4mvsti","created_at_utc_A":1336757854,"created_at_utc_B":1336758921,"score_A":7,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Today's generation is referred to as the Millennial Generation. I don't know about the prior generations to Baby Boomers, though.","human_ref_B":"In the early 2000s, prior to 9\/11, there was bunches of discussion in popular media, including TIME, about the fact that the as-yet-unnamed generation after Generation Y didn't have any coalescing event to name them after.  The Columbine shooting was the biggest defining event of that generation thus far, and it didn't hold much weight compared to wars or social revolutions.  This was before 9\/11, the transformative implementation of web 2.0 technology, the multiple wars, the economic collapse... rapidly, there was a shift from too little to define the generation to too much.  I think the term Millenial is therefore an appropriate way to describe the generation.  This doesn't directly answer your question, but I think the conversation on what gives a generation its name and why is an interesting one, and I'd love to hear whatever people have to contribute to the subject.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1067.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"slq7d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Have there been similar cohorts to the baby boomer generation in history, and what were the economic implications of them? Basically I see both the United States and China facing a sort of crisis with their aging populations. I'm sure this has happened before, but were the nations able to overcome this issue? I'm hoping we can learn from history to solve this crisis that will have a considerable impact on our generation.","c_root_id_A":"c4f13ek","c_root_id_B":"c4f2heg","created_at_utc_A":1335047097,"created_at_utc_B":1335055949,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Longer lifespans and fewer children per household seem like they'd have an effect, too. Would like to see an answer to this.","human_ref_B":"Don't forget the inverse cases, Japan and Germany.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8852.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"3m868l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why does the Nordic countries have such a high standard of living? As measure by one of the Happiness indexs and other tests. I don't really know much about how the tests are done at all.  I've seen lots of contrasting info online. http:\/\/www.coyoteblog.com\/coyote_blog\/2005\/04\/the_scandinavia.html  http:\/\/www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org\/countries\/sweden\/  http:\/\/www.libsdebunked.com\/socialism\/scandinavian-socialism-argument\/  Can anyone help me out please?  Thanks","c_root_id_A":"cvcxutn","c_root_id_B":"cvczq9b","created_at_utc_A":1443124636,"created_at_utc_B":1443127400,"score_A":10,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Are you asking why they are successful at it, or why they strive to achieve it?","human_ref_B":"Maybe not on point re your question, but those sources you point out don't seem very objective, to put it mildly. On a page named libsdepunked.com you'd expect posts to have some political agenda that disagrees with the concept of a welfare state.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2764.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"3m868l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why does the Nordic countries have such a high standard of living? As measure by one of the Happiness indexs and other tests. I don't really know much about how the tests are done at all.  I've seen lots of contrasting info online. http:\/\/www.coyoteblog.com\/coyote_blog\/2005\/04\/the_scandinavia.html  http:\/\/www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org\/countries\/sweden\/  http:\/\/www.libsdebunked.com\/socialism\/scandinavian-socialism-argument\/  Can anyone help me out please?  Thanks","c_root_id_A":"cvcxutn","c_root_id_B":"cvczuzi","created_at_utc_A":1443124636,"created_at_utc_B":1443127594,"score_A":10,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Are you asking why they are successful at it, or why they strive to achieve it?","human_ref_B":"I'd suggest reading Acemoglu's \"Can't We All Be More Like Scandinavians? Asymmetric Growth and Institutions in an Interdependent World\"  http:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w18441  > Because of their more limited inequality and more comprehensive social welfare systems, many perceive average welfare to be higher in Scandinavian societies than in the United States. Why then does the United States not adopt Scandinavian-style institutions? More generally, in an interdependent world, would we expect all countries to adopt the same institutions? To provide theoretical answers to this question, we develop a simple model of economic growth in a world in which all countries benefit and potentially contribute to advances in the world technology frontier. A greater gap of incomes between successful and unsuccessful entrepreneurs (thus greater inequality) increases entrepreneurial effort and hence a country's contribution to the world technology frontier. We show that, under plausible assumptions, the world equilibrium is asymmetric: some countries will opt for a type of \"cutthroat capitalism\" that generates greater inequality and more innovation and will become the technology leaders, while others will free- ride on the cutthroat incentives of the leaders and choose a more \"cuddly\" form of capitalism. Paradoxically, those with cuddly reward structures, though poorer, may have higher welfare than cutthroat capitalists; but in the world equilibrium, it is not a best response for the cutthroat capitalists to switch to a more cuddly form of capitalism. We also show that domestic constraints from social democratic parties or unions may be beneficial for a country because they prevent cutthroat capitalism domestically, instead inducing other countries to play this role.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2958.0,"score_ratio":1.1}
{"post_id":"14uyav","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Are public shootings (school shootings, mall shootings, etc.) unique to the United States or do they occur globally? In light of the recent school shooting in Connecticut, I was curious if this is a US issue or if things like this occur globally? Do our gun control laws have an effect on the frequency of these kinds of events or would they happen regardless of the laws in place?","c_root_id_A":"c7gofv0","c_root_id_B":"c7goi6r","created_at_utc_A":1355519931,"created_at_utc_B":1355520137,"score_A":15,"score_B":87,"human_ref_A":"Globally.  Wikipedia]   [Timeline of School Shootings Internationally since 1996 [Infoplease]","human_ref_B":">Do our gun control laws have an effect on the frequency of these kinds of events or would they happen regardless of the laws in place?  This is the kind of question that's kind of... not exactly unrelated, but misleading to ask. In other countries, different weapons are used - for example, the China reference we just saw where knifing got so bad that parents had to patrol schools, and so on.  A better question to ask might be *why does it happen so much in America*, and we actually kind of know the answer to that. America's mass media is extremely fascinated with events like this, because the American people are extremely fascinated by people like this.  Their study entitled 'Media and Mass Homicides' published in the journal Archives of Suicide Research tracked seven mass homicide incidents occurring in Australia, New Zealand and the UK between 1987-1996. They found a complex web of multiple influences between the different incidents on the perpetrators, especially influenced by the colossal media coverage each tragedy received.  Americans as a society are obsessed with individuality and personal values - in some ways, lone gunmen represent the one of the end-points of the fantasy of individual power. When they are given a voice in death, it legitimizes the idea that one way to make a statement is to perform an action like this. Almost exclusively, we see people who have no voice and feel unheard or like they have \"a message to send\" using these tactics.  Looking at the tools used to achieve their objective is, in my personal opinion, a less useful question than asking why they had their objective in the first place. If I cut down your tree, you don't ask me \"why did you use an axe instead of a chainsaw\", you ask \"why the hell did you think it was okay to cut down my tree?!\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":206.0,"score_ratio":5.8}
{"post_id":"14uyav","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Are public shootings (school shootings, mall shootings, etc.) unique to the United States or do they occur globally? In light of the recent school shooting in Connecticut, I was curious if this is a US issue or if things like this occur globally? Do our gun control laws have an effect on the frequency of these kinds of events or would they happen regardless of the laws in place?","c_root_id_A":"c7go2wy","c_root_id_B":"c7goi6r","created_at_utc_A":1355518778,"created_at_utc_B":1355520137,"score_A":6,"score_B":87,"human_ref_A":"It happens in other places too.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Anders_Behring_Breivik#2011_attacks","human_ref_B":">Do our gun control laws have an effect on the frequency of these kinds of events or would they happen regardless of the laws in place?  This is the kind of question that's kind of... not exactly unrelated, but misleading to ask. In other countries, different weapons are used - for example, the China reference we just saw where knifing got so bad that parents had to patrol schools, and so on.  A better question to ask might be *why does it happen so much in America*, and we actually kind of know the answer to that. America's mass media is extremely fascinated with events like this, because the American people are extremely fascinated by people like this.  Their study entitled 'Media and Mass Homicides' published in the journal Archives of Suicide Research tracked seven mass homicide incidents occurring in Australia, New Zealand and the UK between 1987-1996. They found a complex web of multiple influences between the different incidents on the perpetrators, especially influenced by the colossal media coverage each tragedy received.  Americans as a society are obsessed with individuality and personal values - in some ways, lone gunmen represent the one of the end-points of the fantasy of individual power. When they are given a voice in death, it legitimizes the idea that one way to make a statement is to perform an action like this. Almost exclusively, we see people who have no voice and feel unheard or like they have \"a message to send\" using these tactics.  Looking at the tools used to achieve their objective is, in my personal opinion, a less useful question than asking why they had their objective in the first place. If I cut down your tree, you don't ask me \"why did you use an axe instead of a chainsaw\", you ask \"why the hell did you think it was okay to cut down my tree?!\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1359.0,"score_ratio":14.5}
{"post_id":"14uyav","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Are public shootings (school shootings, mall shootings, etc.) unique to the United States or do they occur globally? In light of the recent school shooting in Connecticut, I was curious if this is a US issue or if things like this occur globally? Do our gun control laws have an effect on the frequency of these kinds of events or would they happen regardless of the laws in place?","c_root_id_A":"c7gofv0","c_root_id_B":"c7gqao9","created_at_utc_A":1355519931,"created_at_utc_B":1355526280,"score_A":15,"score_B":49,"human_ref_A":"Globally.  Wikipedia]   [Timeline of School Shootings Internationally since 1996 [Infoplease]","human_ref_B":">Kieran Healy, a sociologist at Duke University, made this graph of \u201cdeaths due to assault\u201d in the United States and other developed countries. We are a clear outlier.  Furthermore, the article points out, \"Eleven of the 20 worst mass shootings in the last 50 years took place in the United States.\" (Does not include today's incident)  It also makes the point that \"More guns tend to mean more homicide.\" And the US has the highest gun ownership rate per capita by far.  We are also a country with a massive military industrial complex, which only further contributes to the weapons issue.  The WA Post article also notes, \"States with stricter gun control laws have fewer deaths from gun-related violence.  Last year, economist Richard Florida dove deep into the correlations between gun deaths and other kinds of social indicators. Some of what he found was, perhaps, unexpected: Higher populations, more stress, more immigrants, and more mental illness were not correlated with more deaths from gun violence. But one thing he found was, perhaps, perfectly predictable: States with tighter gun control laws appear to have fewer gun-related deaths. The disclaimer here is that correlation is not causation.\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6349.0,"score_ratio":3.2666666667}
{"post_id":"14uyav","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Are public shootings (school shootings, mall shootings, etc.) unique to the United States or do they occur globally? In light of the recent school shooting in Connecticut, I was curious if this is a US issue or if things like this occur globally? Do our gun control laws have an effect on the frequency of these kinds of events or would they happen regardless of the laws in place?","c_root_id_A":"c7go2wy","c_root_id_B":"c7gqao9","created_at_utc_A":1355518778,"created_at_utc_B":1355526280,"score_A":6,"score_B":49,"human_ref_A":"It happens in other places too.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Anders_Behring_Breivik#2011_attacks","human_ref_B":">Kieran Healy, a sociologist at Duke University, made this graph of \u201cdeaths due to assault\u201d in the United States and other developed countries. We are a clear outlier.  Furthermore, the article points out, \"Eleven of the 20 worst mass shootings in the last 50 years took place in the United States.\" (Does not include today's incident)  It also makes the point that \"More guns tend to mean more homicide.\" And the US has the highest gun ownership rate per capita by far.  We are also a country with a massive military industrial complex, which only further contributes to the weapons issue.  The WA Post article also notes, \"States with stricter gun control laws have fewer deaths from gun-related violence.  Last year, economist Richard Florida dove deep into the correlations between gun deaths and other kinds of social indicators. Some of what he found was, perhaps, unexpected: Higher populations, more stress, more immigrants, and more mental illness were not correlated with more deaths from gun violence. But one thing he found was, perhaps, perfectly predictable: States with tighter gun control laws appear to have fewer gun-related deaths. The disclaimer here is that correlation is not causation.\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7502.0,"score_ratio":8.1666666667}
{"post_id":"14uyav","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Are public shootings (school shootings, mall shootings, etc.) unique to the United States or do they occur globally? In light of the recent school shooting in Connecticut, I was curious if this is a US issue or if things like this occur globally? Do our gun control laws have an effect on the frequency of these kinds of events or would they happen regardless of the laws in place?","c_root_id_A":"c7gqao9","c_root_id_B":"c7gq26p","created_at_utc_A":1355526280,"created_at_utc_B":1355525423,"score_A":49,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":">Kieran Healy, a sociologist at Duke University, made this graph of \u201cdeaths due to assault\u201d in the United States and other developed countries. We are a clear outlier.  Furthermore, the article points out, \"Eleven of the 20 worst mass shootings in the last 50 years took place in the United States.\" (Does not include today's incident)  It also makes the point that \"More guns tend to mean more homicide.\" And the US has the highest gun ownership rate per capita by far.  We are also a country with a massive military industrial complex, which only further contributes to the weapons issue.  The WA Post article also notes, \"States with stricter gun control laws have fewer deaths from gun-related violence.  Last year, economist Richard Florida dove deep into the correlations between gun deaths and other kinds of social indicators. Some of what he found was, perhaps, unexpected: Higher populations, more stress, more immigrants, and more mental illness were not correlated with more deaths from gun violence. But one thing he found was, perhaps, perfectly predictable: States with tighter gun control laws appear to have fewer gun-related deaths. The disclaimer here is that correlation is not causation.\"","human_ref_B":"These have definitely occurred in other countries, but the reactions to them can be quite different. The Port Arthur shooting in Australia is one example, a case with 35 fatalities which triggered the adoption of severe gun-control legislation and a government 'gun buyback' scheme paid for by taxpayers.    http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Port_Arthur_massacre_%28Australia%29#Community_and_Government_Reaction","labels":1,"seconds_difference":857.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"14uyav","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Are public shootings (school shootings, mall shootings, etc.) unique to the United States or do they occur globally? In light of the recent school shooting in Connecticut, I was curious if this is a US issue or if things like this occur globally? Do our gun control laws have an effect on the frequency of these kinds of events or would they happen regardless of the laws in place?","c_root_id_A":"c7go2wy","c_root_id_B":"c7gofv0","created_at_utc_A":1355518778,"created_at_utc_B":1355519931,"score_A":6,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"It happens in other places too.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Anders_Behring_Breivik#2011_attacks","human_ref_B":"Globally.  Wikipedia]   [Timeline of School Shootings Internationally since 1996 [Infoplease]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1153.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"14uyav","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Are public shootings (school shootings, mall shootings, etc.) unique to the United States or do they occur globally? In light of the recent school shooting in Connecticut, I was curious if this is a US issue or if things like this occur globally? Do our gun control laws have an effect on the frequency of these kinds of events or would they happen regardless of the laws in place?","c_root_id_A":"c7go2wy","c_root_id_B":"c7gq26p","created_at_utc_A":1355518778,"created_at_utc_B":1355525423,"score_A":6,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"It happens in other places too.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Anders_Behring_Breivik#2011_attacks","human_ref_B":"These have definitely occurred in other countries, but the reactions to them can be quite different. The Port Arthur shooting in Australia is one example, a case with 35 fatalities which triggered the adoption of severe gun-control legislation and a government 'gun buyback' scheme paid for by taxpayers.    http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Port_Arthur_massacre_%28Australia%29#Community_and_Government_Reaction","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6645.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"75y2uf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"\"If we don't dig up the oil, other countries will\" I'm from a small oil-nation, and this is an argument that I frequently see to justify the expansion of our oil sector. Many also use the same argument to justify our country having fur farms: \"if we don't have fur farms, other countries will fill the lack in demand, and they will do it much more cruel than us.\"   I am sure people in countries all over the world argue similarly for industries that are morally dubious or harmful to common goods. How valid is this argument? Are there any concepts that describe this phenomenon, and which I can read more about?","c_root_id_A":"do9x2fg","c_root_id_B":"doa7ugw","created_at_utc_A":1507830784,"created_at_utc_B":1507842301,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"This phenomenon is often called the tragedy of the commons.","human_ref_B":"If the oil is in your sovereign territory, not at all. The issue at stake is the *price* of oil. Oil is a scarce commodity, but there is a great deal of oil in the world that is not \"worth it\" because the input calories required to get it out aren't worth the output. Lower supply increases the price and increases use of non-oil energy substitutes, but higher prices increase the input calories\/expense allowable for economic viability. The degree of effect is a more complex question. So, no, point blank not a valid argument. Coal on the other hand...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11517.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"75y2uf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"\"If we don't dig up the oil, other countries will\" I'm from a small oil-nation, and this is an argument that I frequently see to justify the expansion of our oil sector. Many also use the same argument to justify our country having fur farms: \"if we don't have fur farms, other countries will fill the lack in demand, and they will do it much more cruel than us.\"   I am sure people in countries all over the world argue similarly for industries that are morally dubious or harmful to common goods. How valid is this argument? Are there any concepts that describe this phenomenon, and which I can read more about?","c_root_id_A":"do9x2fg","c_root_id_B":"doa8b2u","created_at_utc_A":1507830784,"created_at_utc_B":1507842815,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This phenomenon is often called the tragedy of the commons.","human_ref_B":"> for industries that are morally dubious or harmful to common goods  If by common goods you're talking about firm externalities (like local or global pollution), there's a very established and expansive theoretical literature on designing regulatory policies in these settings in microeconomics.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12031.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1uug0u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Why does it seem like the Middle East is more prone to religious based rule than other regions of the world? From purely personal observation, it seems like the Middle East is more prone to religious based rule than any other region in the world. Why is this? For example, it seems that South East Asia (like the areas around Thailand), Latin America and Africa are less prone to religious rule. Why does it seem like the Middle East is heavily influenced by the Islam religion (or at least the guise of Islam), particularly its more conservative usages. I use the word \"seemingly\" because I may be wrong, and maybe it's not as influenced as it seems, or other areas are actually prone to religious rule as well (because I don't have a lot of international knowledge, just general ideas of what happens around the world). I know that some Middle Eastern countries were fairly liberal compared to now some decades ago, why has this changed?","c_root_id_A":"celrwpm","c_root_id_B":"celssdo","created_at_utc_A":1389318088,"created_at_utc_B":1389320172,"score_A":2,"score_B":36,"human_ref_A":"For the sake of this post, I'm only going to limit myself to Islam for your question.  Islam is relatively unique, especially in the region of the world we are talking about.  Most faiths, especially Christianity and Judaism, were formed as religions separate from the state, then later integrated to become religions of the states that adopted them.  Not so with Islam; from its beginnings it had certain political systems that were prescribed in its doctrine from the very beginning.  The Prophet Muhammad was as much a religious leader as he was a political one.  In order for the fledgling faith to survive its early years in the Arabian Peninsula, it needed a structure with firm leadership that could guide it to grow and expand while meeting the needs of the followers.  The first Islamic State was founded by the Prophet himself, set with its own constitution.  From there on, there was a series of caliphates extending all the way through the Ottoman Empire, so for the majority of the population in the Middle East religion was symbiotic to politics.","human_ref_B":"A hundred years ago, you could ask why Catholic countries had so many religious based parties compared to the rest of the world because of Christian Democratic parties, which are still active in many parts of the Europe and Latin America as important social and economic conservative party (*edit*: originally, I wrote \"dominant\", but Christian democratic parties are senior coalition or potential senior coalition partners in a few countries, most notably Germany, but Christian Democratic parties are in or would be in center-right coalitions in a wide stretch of European and Latin American parliamentary democracies.  Many parties associated with Christian Democracy, like Spain's People's Party, do not necessarily have \"Christian Democracy\" in their party name; the \"Centrist Democrat International\" was founded as the \"Christian Democrat World Union\", the slightly more conservative equivalent to the various Socialist Internationals, and the EU level party \"European People's Party\"). The standard book on the origins of this is *The Rise of Christian Democracy in Europe* by Kalyvas (1996), which is fascinating and gets into how these movement emerged even without the powers that be really wanting them to organize as such. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, see Christian democracy on Wikipedia.  One of the things to keep in mind is that involvement in a democratic system moderates parties (this know as moderation theory, but it's really related to the \"median voter theorem\", which argues that parties tend to move towards the median voter over time). The two main examples of this moderation are European Social Democrats and European Christian Democrats, both of whom started out fairly radical but are now often the mainstream Center-Left and Center-Right parties, respectively, in Europe. G\u00fcne\u015f Murat Tezc\u00fcr applies this theory to Muslim parties in Iran and Turkey in *Muslim Reformers in Iran and Turkey: The Paradox of Moderation* and find it works, but modifications are necessary because of the role \"guardians\" (the military in Turkey, the literal Guardian Council in Iran) in these imperfect democracies. I forget what modifications he exactly proposes, though, to be perfectly honest. Kurzman and Naqvi's \"Do Muslims Vote Islamic\" (Figure 2, pg. 58 and Figure 3, pg. 59) presents further evidence for the moderation of Islamist parties over time.  The thing is, historically in the Middle East, like many other places, beyond specific grievances, there are relatively few things to mobilize around: class, religion, ethnicity. In the Arab world, ethnicity is pretty homogeneous so beyond pan-Arabism (one of the dominant movements of the middle of the 20th century) you don't have much with ethnicity (in Turkey, you do with the Kurds, in North Africa, a little with the Berbers, here and there in Iran). Pan-Arabism was dominant among the ruling groups in the Arab republics (Iraq, Syria, Egypt) and important in some of the monarchies (the \"nationalism\" in Anderson's *Nationalist Voices in Jordan* is pan-Arab nationalism, not Jordanian nationalism). This, however, just straight up failed as the local elites would generally lose influence in that situation, so though the middle \"effendiya\" class voted and supported pan-Arabism where they could, the elites made sure it never came to fruition (Anderson has a particularly good section on how this happened in the 50's in Jordan, but see the failure of the United Arab Republic of Syria+Egypt and Ba'athist politics more generally for how it failed in the Republics). In the 1940's, two of the largest civil society groups were the Communist Party of Iraq and beyond and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and beyond. The Communist Party and labor unions more generally was eventually more or less beaten or co-opted into Arab socialism (most Arab dictatorships often used corporatist systems where there was essentially one national union controlled by national elites, see the UGTT in Tunisia as an example, though some countries allowed more independent labor unions), while the Muslim Brothers were alternately oppressed and tolerated (oppressed particularly when they condoned violence with people like Sayyid Qutb, tolerated particularly when they renounced it under I think Hudaybi or maybe Tilmisani). By the 90's, in many Arab states, the Muslim Brotherhood-like organizations were essentially the only tolerated, large, independent civil society group. They tended push the regimes, but in predictable, tolerable ways, unlike say strong labor unions (though Egypt had relatively strong labor unions) or the like. So therefore, in every transition or near transition to democracy, Muslim Brother-like groups dominated because they were often the only major organized opposition, the only group that could politicize *and* had people in every province, every major city, besides the regime (the Algerian regime rather famously found this out during their near transition to democracy in the early 90's, when they did half a round of voting and the Islamists absolutely killed it in every first past the post single member district; Hamas, the \"non-regime\" party in Palestine, is an off-shoot of the Muslim Brothers, etc. etc.). That's why it's no surprise the run-off for president in Egypt was a close race between a Mubarak crony [Shafik] and a (moderate) Muslim Brother [Morsi]--they were really the only two widely organized groups. Because of the organizational advantages, any system that uses local single member first past the post districts (think US house districts) will return a huge number of religious candidates. This is what happened in Egypt recently, and Algeria a two decades ago. If you make voting rules different, say a single nation-wide district with pure proportional representation (think voting for Israel's Knesset) you get a result like Tunisia where Muslim parties still have a strong showing, but the opposition is i) more represented, ii) less tied to the old non-democratic regime, iii) capable of getting more organized. (See Al Stepan's \"Tunisia and the Twin Tolerations\").  It's funny because this happens even in relatively mature democracies, like Turkey where, as Cihan Tugal's *Passive Revolution* and Jenny White's *Islamist Mobilization in Turkey* show, the non-religious parties really don't even try to organize at the grassroots level among the urban (and presumably rural) poor [far left parties used to be active in these neighborhoods, and interestingly, in Turkey, the Islamist parties when they first started organizing in these neighborhoods were pretty left economically, though today they are neither particularly statist nor redistributive].  So in young democracies and authoritarian states with strictly limited civil societies, you see the dominance of Muslim Brotherhood-type parties. In more mature democracies, like Turkey's, you see much more mature parties like the AKP, who it is hard to argue are more religious than the American Republican Party, for example.  They are socially conservative and Islamically inspired, for sure, but they aren't advocating mandatory headscarves, or complete alcohol bans, or abortion bans, or Shariah law in criminal cases, or really anything along those lines (though some have argued this is changing with, for example, the recent changes in rules about alcohol sales, these limits are still within the realm of \"normal\" for Western democracies).  In other Muslim countries that have bad more vibrant civil societies, like Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Indonesia, you rarely see religious parties get more than 10-20% of the vote (see Charles Kurzman and Ijlal Naqvi's article \"Do Muslims Vote Islamic\"). Indeed, Turkey's more explicitly religious parties, like Refah and Fazilet, contested elections they also tended to get similar results. Only when the moderate wing of those parties broke off to form the AKP did they become *the* social conservative party in Turkey. Mainly, in early elections, the AKP stood on anti-corruption, pro-economic growth, pro-EU, pro-good governance platforms, and general populism.  Ziya Onis makes the point that, in Turkey (and it's easy to generalize this point), Islamist parties are the only ones that can make cross-class coalitions, bringing in counter elite pious businessmen from the Central Anatolian periphery (money for election campaigns) with urban poor (votes).  So, to sum up, those \"fairly liberal\" groups you remember from 70s and 80s are still there (in Turkey, they're know as they Beyaz T\u00fcrkler), but political liberalization has allowed a new counter-elite to emerge.  The \"liberalism\" was often very state driven. Often the only thing the counter-elite had to mobilize around was religion. And, since secularism was associated with the state, it's natural to oppose it, see Ahmet Kuru's *Secularism and State Policies Toward Religion* which argues that in places where the *previous* regime was strongly tied with religion (like Turkey and France), there tends to be an assertive secularism, whereas in places where the previous regime was not strongly tied to the religious establishment (like in the US), you tend to have a more passive secularism.  We can probably flip this argument on its head and argue that states where the regime are assertively secular, we get more assertively religious opposition parties. While some groups may seem relatively radical now, in the long term, we can expect these groups to moderate (*if* democracy continues, that is--Turkey, for the time being, is when this happens. Algeria, with its long campaign of counter-regime Islamic terrorism, is perhaps a frightening example of what happens when democracy is taken away). This simplifies a few things, leaves out most of the economy and the effect economic liberalization (\"free markets\" or \"neoliberalism\", depending on your political preference) have had, but a first step in that direction may be Noah Feldman's fun article in the *New York Times Magazine* called \"Why Shariah?'. The summary of that article is that things like \"shariah\" mean \"cutting off hands\" in the West, but to many people in these countries it simply means \"justice\" (and if you'd lived under generations of dictators, justice might sound nice). It's no accident that so many of the Islamist parties have \"justice\" in their name (Turkey, Morocco, Egypt, definitely, I think Jordan and Pakistan and several others.).   While there are relatively few Buddhist countries where the major conservative party is implicitly or explicitly religiously oriented, this is common in parts of Europe (particularly explicit in the Catholic parts), the United States, parts of Latin America, and India (see the BJP or Hindutva).   *edited a little for clarity when off mobile*.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2084.0,"score_ratio":18.0}
{"post_id":"1forox","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What would the effect be of requiring American companies to maintain American standards in other countries? Right now, if a country owns a factory or a plant overseas, it can adhere only to that nations requirements for payment, pollution, building standard, ect ect.  What would be the effect though on the international community, American Companies, and the cost of goods, if those companies had to, meet American minimum standards, unless the country they were in had higher standards?","c_root_id_A":"cacfs5r","c_root_id_B":"cacgwct","created_at_utc_A":1370405363,"created_at_utc_B":1370409180,"score_A":3,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"For some clarification, would this also apply to companies that do business with other companies in other countries? For example, many clothing retailers don't own the factories making the clothes that they sell, so this question doesn't seem to cover something like that.","human_ref_B":"As I see it you are asking about the ethics of multinational corporations.  That is 'American' ethics applying to all plants even overseas.    This came up in my International Business class for my MBA recently as well.    Firstly I have to disagree with your first statement: >\"it can adhere only to that nations requirements for payment, pollution, building standard, ect ect.\"  A company can make its own standard regardless of local laws.  One of the case studies we read was of IKEA and their use of child labor in India to make their rugs (by a third party supplier) (case study here) after this IKEA set a code of conduct that had to be adhered to by the company and the contractors by a written agreement.  IKEA then found an external monitoring company to check up on those standards as well.    Patagonia is another example of a company that does monitoring at their factories.  They do this via a company called the Fair Labor Association who checks that the factories live up to the code of conduct set by Patagonia.   A lot of this deals with Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) the idea of CSR came about when the idea of what a company's responsibility was.  It used to be that the only responsibility to the community was seen as to simply make money.  Edward R Friedman proposed that the purpose of a corporation was to satisfy it's stakeholders.  Stakeholders are  customers, suppliers, shareholders, community, customers, etc. and the company should not satisfy one stakeholder above the others (profit over community) the stakeholder model is in fairly wide use.  (just Google $company_name csr for a specific example)  Now as companies become more and more global they spread their version of ethics as they go around the globe if they tie in a policy to their corporate culture.  However as mentioned there are times that may not be covered under this code of ethics.  In Saudi Arabia for example in order to get building permits or interface with the government a bribe is expected to 'move the process along'.   In China (at least in our case study) if an employee is caught stealing then they are put to death and the local custom is to turn them in or the manager is seen as weak.  This raises a difficult question for a company do you follow local laws or do what you would do back home?    Some people say \"when in Rome...\" and the counter argument is to not do anything that will show up in the headlines \"$foo_company turns over worker for execution in China Story at 11!\"  Surely a debate for business ethics.  There is a manual available from trade.gov Also there are specific country issues available like this link to Columbia from export.gov.    There is also a misunderstanding about wages across the world.  When a headlines flashes across the screen we typically see a very low wage being paid (in USD) to a worker in another country.  It is important to remember that the cost of living in not comparable across countries.  Here is an excerpt from a paper I wrote about Nike's use of child labor in the 90s.  \"The yearly minimum wage is $241 for an Indonesian and $8,056 for a worker in the US (Bartlett and Beamish, 692).  This number looks startling at first however the reader must recall that consumer prices are not consistent across the globe.  Going to 1997 dollars the exchange rate for $1 to 1 Rp is 10,014 (Bartlett and Beamish, 692).   That means that the equivalent salary in rupiah is 2,413.374.  The price of 1 serving of rice and tofu is 260 rupiah.  In other words the salary is enough for 11,173 servings of rice and tofu, or 30 servings a day; 91% of workers were able to support themselves and 82% of workers were able to save wages on their salaries.\" Quoted book here (sorry no online version)  So the media flashes numbers across the screen without it being really relevant because it sells stories.  But if companies were to 'enforce' a higher standard then costs would rise because the cost of labor would rise.  edit:changed my numbers from 91 to 97 in the Nike example.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3817.0,"score_ratio":8.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1forox","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What would the effect be of requiring American companies to maintain American standards in other countries? Right now, if a country owns a factory or a plant overseas, it can adhere only to that nations requirements for payment, pollution, building standard, ect ect.  What would be the effect though on the international community, American Companies, and the cost of goods, if those companies had to, meet American minimum standards, unless the country they were in had higher standards?","c_root_id_A":"cacfs5r","c_root_id_B":"cachtrc","created_at_utc_A":1370405363,"created_at_utc_B":1370413026,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"For some clarification, would this also apply to companies that do business with other companies in other countries? For example, many clothing retailers don't own the factories making the clothes that they sell, so this question doesn't seem to cover something like that.","human_ref_B":"Something to note: Passing a law in the US that affects American companies in other countries has been done with regard to bribery.   To attempt an answer: You're asking what would happen if all American companies had the additional restriction of meeting American minimums. The answer is simply that those which relied on producing products at points below those minimums would either adjust or go out of business.   Likely most American companies affected would go out of business because local alternatives in each country who aren't American, don't have the restriction, so they're at a competitive advantage.  **TL;DR** What would happen if you restricted *only* American companies in some way? You would hurt the American companies.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7663.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1ja9vt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What would be the positive and the negative economic effects of abolishing patents?","c_root_id_A":"cbcrj82","c_root_id_B":"cbcuxyh","created_at_utc_A":1375126373,"created_at_utc_B":1375134689,"score_A":10,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"I think you'd see an immediate end to all pharm research. The R&D costs of bringing a new product from first discovery to FDA approval is in the hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars and easily takes a decade. The only way to recoup these costs is the temporary legal monopoly on production that a patent provides.   This is true for really any R&D intensive product, from microchips to aerospace. These things, or the processes that make them, are often fairly easy to copy by an expert who can observe the process or the product. If you can't ensure legal ability to prevent people from using them or requiring that they pay you for the advancement, any type of costly, long-term research by private investors is off the table. For more on this, and other problems of commercializing advanced innovations, check out Scott Shane's book Academic Entrepreneurship","human_ref_B":"I had the privilege of seeing Alex Tabarrok, an economist from GMU, give a presentation on innovation.   He has made the argument that patent laws and innovation follow a similar relationship to tax rates and government revenue, as demonstrated by the Laffer Curve] (http:\/\/i.investopedia.com\/inv\/dictionary\/terms\/laffercurve.gif). That is, that patent laws (measured by patent strength) increase innovation up to a certain point of efficiency, and past that point of efficiency they decrease innovation.   Calling it the [Tabarrok Curve, he agrees that protection of intellectual property (patents) is useful in promoting innovation by guaranteeing that hard earned intellectual innovations will be protected by property rights. But he also argues that past a certain point innovators will start to use patents in a socially costly way. That is, they will use patents as a defensive measure.  For example, under the first-to-file law, a competitive firm has the ability to claim and purchase patent rights to a certain product that their competitor is developing and tuck it away. They have no intention on developing the product themselves, just keeping it away from their competitor.   Here is a fictitious example: Google can purchase the patent rights to a certain software development that Yahoo is working on. So long as Google claims the rights first, they legally own the software development. Google will then have the ability to prevent Yahoo from coming out with the development and keep a competitive advantage.   The result is bickering in lawsuits, wasting time, money, paper and intellectual pursuit.   The point is, that at a certain point, patent laws become too restrictive. Yes they are useful, but as most things in economics, there is a point of diminishing returns.   So to answer your question, economic activity would slow to a halt with no patent laws. BUT patent laws that are too numerous and complex (as many believe they are) do the same to economic activity, as explained by the Tabarrok Curve.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8316.0,"score_ratio":1.9}
{"post_id":"xqily","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"What would be the effects on western society of abolishing paid advertising? It seems that so many wealthy people owe their fortunes to the effects of paid advertising (everything relating to TV and the internet, for example, not to mention political campaigning in the US).  The purpose of advertising is, after all, to \"push\" information about something out to the general public.  If this mechanism were to be removed entirely, then the public would need to seek out this information for whatever they are interested in, or, perhaps there is some model for how this might work in a society where advertising is provided as a public service by the government.  Has anyone ever done a study or simulation or thought exercise about how the removal of paid advertising would effect society?  I started thinking about this the other day and it got so huge and far reaching I became unable to think about it clearly.","c_root_id_A":"c5osk4u","c_root_id_B":"c5oq555","created_at_utc_A":1344223906,"created_at_utc_B":1344213948,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"More product placement, indirect marketing etc","human_ref_B":"What you are thinking about is the diffusion of information. There is a lot of research on that. Also, you do not need the government, people share their experiences with products and services with others all the time. For instance, I have a Dell and I think they are amazing. Now you have my opinion on the matter, which I think is just a little bit more valuable then seeing an advertisement because I did not tell you that information so that I can collect a pay cheque.     Advertisement, regardless of what businessmen want you to think, is nothing more than trying to trick you into buying the company's product over another company's. The aim is to \"steal\" the competitor's profits and to push the focus from the quality of the product\/service to the quality of the marketing team. In its essence, advertisement does not provide any real value to society, on the contrary it would be socially beneficial if it were banned (but I am not advocating for it).      PS - there have been some nice studies on advertisement and the price of health insurance in the USA. You can search for it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9958.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"xqily","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"What would be the effects on western society of abolishing paid advertising? It seems that so many wealthy people owe their fortunes to the effects of paid advertising (everything relating to TV and the internet, for example, not to mention political campaigning in the US).  The purpose of advertising is, after all, to \"push\" information about something out to the general public.  If this mechanism were to be removed entirely, then the public would need to seek out this information for whatever they are interested in, or, perhaps there is some model for how this might work in a society where advertising is provided as a public service by the government.  Has anyone ever done a study or simulation or thought exercise about how the removal of paid advertising would effect society?  I started thinking about this the other day and it got so huge and far reaching I became unable to think about it clearly.","c_root_id_A":"c5oxdis","c_root_id_B":"c5oq555","created_at_utc_A":1344255729,"created_at_utc_B":1344213948,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"What about inside shops? Would you hide all products there and have everyone order things they had never seen before? What about information about prices? Packaging? Special offers?   What would happen would be marketing would move \"underground\", much the same as alcohol did under prohibition or bread prices under price-controls. Advertising is an inevital part of any free-market systems where several suppliers compete for buyers. In order to elliminate advertising completely you would have to end the free market.","human_ref_B":"What you are thinking about is the diffusion of information. There is a lot of research on that. Also, you do not need the government, people share their experiences with products and services with others all the time. For instance, I have a Dell and I think they are amazing. Now you have my opinion on the matter, which I think is just a little bit more valuable then seeing an advertisement because I did not tell you that information so that I can collect a pay cheque.     Advertisement, regardless of what businessmen want you to think, is nothing more than trying to trick you into buying the company's product over another company's. The aim is to \"steal\" the competitor's profits and to push the focus from the quality of the product\/service to the quality of the marketing team. In its essence, advertisement does not provide any real value to society, on the contrary it would be socially beneficial if it were banned (but I am not advocating for it).      PS - there have been some nice studies on advertisement and the price of health insurance in the USA. You can search for it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":41781.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"9t8b6u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Can you recommend a conservative\/non-marxist parallel of \"A Brief History of Neoliberalism\" by Harvey? That is, an analysis of the category or \"narrative\" of neoliberalism, not parallel categories.   BTW this is my first post on reddit, hurrah","c_root_id_A":"e8ubo01","c_root_id_B":"e8ubhul","created_at_utc_A":1541070494,"created_at_utc_B":1541070192,"score_A":18,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"One problem you might have here is that conservative theorists and historians, aside from a few outliers, tend to eschew the label neoliberalism owing to its pejorative connotations. This generally means there is an under-theorisation by conservatives of the category neoliberalism as an object of analysis worthy of study. Many conservative accounts instead prefer to argue that what we call neoliberalism doesn't exist or that it is an ideological category used to attack the current economic order.   I don't know if they go in as much depth as Harvey, but I would recommend the work of Thomas Friedman and Jonah Norberg as these are the only two \"outlier\" theorists I know of who actually call themselves neoliberals and defend it as such.   If you are looking for non-Marxist, but still leftist, accounts, Philip Mirowski's work on neoliberalism stands head and shoulders above nearly all others--and for me is on par with, if not better than, David Harvey's. He's a historian with neoliberalism as his main research area so he's been going on about it for some time, with most of his work being committed to rebuking the conservative narrative mentioned above that neoliberalism doesn't \"exist\"\/is not a worthy category of study. Check out his Neoliberal Thought Collective book and Never Let a Serious Crisis Go To Waste, both are excellent (although I've only flicked through the thought collective one).","human_ref_B":"Perhaps Thomas Friedman\u2019s \u201cThe World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century\u201d  He\u2019s a journalist, not an academic.  And I\u2019m not an academic but I read it in college.  And I\u2019m a leftist, politically, but open to reading other views.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":302.0,"score_ratio":1.6363636364}
{"post_id":"g64tqy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why does a temperate climate give a country an economic advantage as opposed to a tropical country?","c_root_id_A":"fo7kzps","c_root_id_B":"fo7h6u9","created_at_utc_A":1587580120,"created_at_utc_B":1587578269,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"It's an unanswered question - though there is enough evidence to suggest temperature as a factor in economic development. We know that controlling for other factors, tropical zones have lower productivity. There are several factors that makes agriculture more difficult in the tropics.   Factors such as soil quality, rain variablity,  and limited irrigation potential all effect tropical agriculture - and agriculture is how developed nations built healthy populations.   Then there is evidence that a lack of frost in tropic regions makes dealing with agricultural pests far more difficult. It also makes malaria worse. In temperate regions winter frost will kill off a lot of these pests. Humidity and temperature increases can turn zero cases of malaria into an epidemic.   There are biological reasons that plants don't do as well in high temperatures in the tropics.   &#x200B;  https:\/\/www.casade.org\/tropical-climate-and-economic-development-further-evidence\/ this study looks at a lot of the evidence on the matter. Obviously this is an important area of research due to climate change increasing temperature.","human_ref_B":"Development economist Jeffrey Sachs thinks it's linked to malaria.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1851.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"x65hq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"How does Mecca cope with the fact that there are now 1,250,000,000 Muslims in the world, all of whom want to visit? The Hajj, the pilgrimage Muslims make to Mecca, is one of the Five Pillars of Islam, something every Muslim should make in their life, health permitting.  I'm sure this worked out much better a few centuries ago, when most Muslims lived within a few hundred miles of Mecca.  In the modern world, the number of pilgrims converging on Mecca must be a huge logistical problem.  I'm curious about how the folks that run things there (visit to the Kaaba, hotel accommodations, etc.) deal with all the pilgrims.  Related question:  Is it common for pilgrims to make acquaintances with fellow pilgrims that might lead to later international business relationships (\"networking\")?  Related question:  What about the poor bastards that can't afford the trip?  Indonesia has 123,000,000 Muslims, ~10% of the world Muslim population.  Most of these folks will never be able to afford the trip.  What are they supposed to do?  Thank you for your help.","c_root_id_A":"c5jjgla","c_root_id_B":"c5jjhh6","created_at_utc_A":1343278071,"created_at_utc_B":1343278163,"score_A":3,"score_B":68,"human_ref_A":"I don't know about the logistics, but I do know that many pilgrims do not make it because of financial situations. It is a sad reality for them but one that is permissible in Islam. So while yes it's important, Allah will be forgiving if monetary or medical reasons prevented you from making the Hajj.","human_ref_B":"Thanks for the question. I'll try to answer some of the points you raise.  Although there are 1.2-1.5 Billion Muslims in the world, not all of them will make it and most will only go once in their life time. The numbers are increasing every year and it is a huge challenge logistically now that travel is easier as compared to before.  With regards how the local authorities deal with it,I have been told by family members that the local authorities although not perfect they are remarkably organized and they have the yearly experience. The Saudi gov. has made design changes to the holy sites so that more people can come and visit and in a safe manner. This includes more accommodation, better travel facilities and also better routes so the sacred practices can be made in a quick and safe manner.  The Saudi gov. has also given certain Hajj visa quotas to each country in the world, esp. the Muslim ones so that it is a fair balance and also a measure to prevent a huge influx of visitors in the season. This way the Saudi authorities will know roughly how many people will come and thus prepare accordingly.  With regards to the actual Hajj it self, although it is a pillar in Islam, if you can not afford it, or if you have debt or you are unwell, then you are definitely not obliged to go.   One interesting point you make about the millions of people that gather in one place is that one of the goals of Hajj is that people of all walks of life from different cultures and colours all meet and great each other. Many friendships have been created this way that lasted a life time. In fact religious tradition encourages that you greet your fellow person conducting Hajj and engage in friendly dialog, all this to promote a sense of unity and humanity.  It is also a time to reflect that no matter how rich or poor you are, we are all equal in the eyes of God. To symbolize this equality, everyone wears the same simple cloth, whether billionaire or a poor, black or white, all will wear the same. We will all die and in the hear-after we will come back to face our maker and the only thing that will have bearing is our conduct in our life time not how rich or important we were.  The process is a wonderfully spiritual affair, esp. if the Muslim in question prepares in advance and reads and asks on how to best conduct the Hajj. Many converts to Islam who went to Hajj not only loved it but found that it changed their lives for the better.  I am sure others will be able to answer more than this, also there are many videos online that explain the process itself and what it means for Muslims.   Edit: Spelling.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":92.0,"score_ratio":22.6666666667}
{"post_id":"x65hq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"How does Mecca cope with the fact that there are now 1,250,000,000 Muslims in the world, all of whom want to visit? The Hajj, the pilgrimage Muslims make to Mecca, is one of the Five Pillars of Islam, something every Muslim should make in their life, health permitting.  I'm sure this worked out much better a few centuries ago, when most Muslims lived within a few hundred miles of Mecca.  In the modern world, the number of pilgrims converging on Mecca must be a huge logistical problem.  I'm curious about how the folks that run things there (visit to the Kaaba, hotel accommodations, etc.) deal with all the pilgrims.  Related question:  Is it common for pilgrims to make acquaintances with fellow pilgrims that might lead to later international business relationships (\"networking\")?  Related question:  What about the poor bastards that can't afford the trip?  Indonesia has 123,000,000 Muslims, ~10% of the world Muslim population.  Most of these folks will never be able to afford the trip.  What are they supposed to do?  Thank you for your help.","c_root_id_A":"c5jkfhm","c_root_id_B":"c5jjgla","created_at_utc_A":1343282225,"created_at_utc_B":1343278071,"score_A":10,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It is a stretch to say all want to. There are lot of Muslims equivalent to Christmas and Easter Catholics.","human_ref_B":"I don't know about the logistics, but I do know that many pilgrims do not make it because of financial situations. It is a sad reality for them but one that is permissible in Islam. So while yes it's important, Allah will be forgiving if monetary or medical reasons prevented you from making the Hajj.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4154.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"x65hq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"How does Mecca cope with the fact that there are now 1,250,000,000 Muslims in the world, all of whom want to visit? The Hajj, the pilgrimage Muslims make to Mecca, is one of the Five Pillars of Islam, something every Muslim should make in their life, health permitting.  I'm sure this worked out much better a few centuries ago, when most Muslims lived within a few hundred miles of Mecca.  In the modern world, the number of pilgrims converging on Mecca must be a huge logistical problem.  I'm curious about how the folks that run things there (visit to the Kaaba, hotel accommodations, etc.) deal with all the pilgrims.  Related question:  Is it common for pilgrims to make acquaintances with fellow pilgrims that might lead to later international business relationships (\"networking\")?  Related question:  What about the poor bastards that can't afford the trip?  Indonesia has 123,000,000 Muslims, ~10% of the world Muslim population.  Most of these folks will never be able to afford the trip.  What are they supposed to do?  Thank you for your help.","c_root_id_A":"c5jnt0x","c_root_id_B":"c5jn90d","created_at_utc_A":1343307280,"created_at_utc_B":1343303624,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"FWIW, they have a $21 billion project to expand the mosque accomodate 2-2.5 million visitors at one time.","human_ref_B":"There is a documentary on this subject, but I can't seem to find it for you.  Maybe some IMDB ninja can help.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3656.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"x65hq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"How does Mecca cope with the fact that there are now 1,250,000,000 Muslims in the world, all of whom want to visit? The Hajj, the pilgrimage Muslims make to Mecca, is one of the Five Pillars of Islam, something every Muslim should make in their life, health permitting.  I'm sure this worked out much better a few centuries ago, when most Muslims lived within a few hundred miles of Mecca.  In the modern world, the number of pilgrims converging on Mecca must be a huge logistical problem.  I'm curious about how the folks that run things there (visit to the Kaaba, hotel accommodations, etc.) deal with all the pilgrims.  Related question:  Is it common for pilgrims to make acquaintances with fellow pilgrims that might lead to later international business relationships (\"networking\")?  Related question:  What about the poor bastards that can't afford the trip?  Indonesia has 123,000,000 Muslims, ~10% of the world Muslim population.  Most of these folks will never be able to afford the trip.  What are they supposed to do?  Thank you for your help.","c_root_id_A":"c5jn90d","c_root_id_B":"c5js4n4","created_at_utc_A":1343303624,"created_at_utc_B":1343324017,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"There is a documentary on this subject, but I can't seem to find it for you.  Maybe some IMDB ninja can help.","human_ref_B":"The Atlantic had a fantastic set of photos of the Hajj and Eid al-Adha from about a year that might be of interest to you.  There also seems to be some interesting literature about the effect of the Hajj on individuals; one article that comes to mind suggested that traveling to Mecca often makes people more open-minded and tolerant of other cultures. Let me know if you're interested and I can try to track it down for you.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20393.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1lidk7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Fractional Reserve Banking: How does it really really work? (without the cash example). Hello \/r\/AskSocialScience   It's been really difficult for me to find an answer to this question, as most articles I find, usually use the 10% cash only example. I have found and read an \"alternate\" version which seems more plausible for modern times, but I need an expert to prove its validity.  **Here is how I think FRB works:**  Example country: EUROZONE which has only got a 1% Reserve Requirement according to this Wikipedia article.   1. Bob goes to the Bank and deposits 100\u20ac. 2. The Bank now has Bob's 100\u20ac in its reserves and Bob has an account (bank liability \/ promise) worth 100\u20ac.   Next day.   3. Alice enters the bank and asks for a 9.900\u20ac loan. She doesn't want cash, she wants it in her bank account like most people do nowadays.  4. The bank opens Alice a bank account and gives her the loan. The bank gives her \"credit\" and types in the numbers in her bank account. 5. Since Alice now has an account, the Bank has a liability towards her of 9.900\u20ac, but also an asset worth 9.900\u20ac + interset which is Alice's debt.   Total deposits: 10.000\u20ac   Total reserve: 100\u20ac  Notice that the bank is still keeping 100\u20ac in its reserves, which accounts for 1% (reserve ratio) of its liabilities.   ERGO: The Bank doesn't need physical cash in its reserves to give out credit.  **And here comes the interesting part:**  The next day both Alice and Bob go to a restaurant and pay with their awesome debit cards.   Bob pays 100\u20ac for his meal, and Alice pays 9.900\u20ac for her meal. Now, what the debit card is actually doing is transfering the liabilities (promises) the bank had with Bob and Alice towards the restaurant owner's bank account.   Notice that we exchange 10.000\u20ac worth of real goods and services for money that did previously not exist and does only so in form of a Bank's promise (credit).   ------  Could an expert please point out the flaws and validity of this example?  Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cbzk625","c_root_id_B":"cbzn73f","created_at_utc_A":1378038488,"created_at_utc_B":1378051707,"score_A":11,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Quick note for those in the US, it is standard in many other countries to use a period where the US uses a comma in large numbers so in the question above when Alice borrows 9.900 this is like writing \"9,900\" in the US.  Vice versa, too, 9,9 is a decimal in this notation.","human_ref_B":"Your example is incorrect.  The bank can only loan out a 99% of the deposit Bob made into the bank.  So Alice can only be offered a 99\u20ac loan if the bank deposits worth 100\u20ac.  However, when Alice deposits her loan into another checking account, the bank that oversees that checking account can now loan out 98.01\u20ac, and the next bank can then loan out 99% of that, or 97.0299\u20ac.  If banks continue lending ad infinitum, the deposits will eventually increase by 10,00\u20ac (10.00\u20ac) including the initial 100\u20ac deposit.  If the bank could lend out 9,900\u20ac on the deposit of 100\u20ac, the bank in which Alice deposited the 9,900\u20ac could then make a loan for 980100\u20ac.  The next bank could then loan out 97,029,900\u20ac, and so on.  This obviously doesn't happen, but it seems to be a common misconception about fractional reserve banking.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13219.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1lidk7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Fractional Reserve Banking: How does it really really work? (without the cash example). Hello \/r\/AskSocialScience   It's been really difficult for me to find an answer to this question, as most articles I find, usually use the 10% cash only example. I have found and read an \"alternate\" version which seems more plausible for modern times, but I need an expert to prove its validity.  **Here is how I think FRB works:**  Example country: EUROZONE which has only got a 1% Reserve Requirement according to this Wikipedia article.   1. Bob goes to the Bank and deposits 100\u20ac. 2. The Bank now has Bob's 100\u20ac in its reserves and Bob has an account (bank liability \/ promise) worth 100\u20ac.   Next day.   3. Alice enters the bank and asks for a 9.900\u20ac loan. She doesn't want cash, she wants it in her bank account like most people do nowadays.  4. The bank opens Alice a bank account and gives her the loan. The bank gives her \"credit\" and types in the numbers in her bank account. 5. Since Alice now has an account, the Bank has a liability towards her of 9.900\u20ac, but also an asset worth 9.900\u20ac + interset which is Alice's debt.   Total deposits: 10.000\u20ac   Total reserve: 100\u20ac  Notice that the bank is still keeping 100\u20ac in its reserves, which accounts for 1% (reserve ratio) of its liabilities.   ERGO: The Bank doesn't need physical cash in its reserves to give out credit.  **And here comes the interesting part:**  The next day both Alice and Bob go to a restaurant and pay with their awesome debit cards.   Bob pays 100\u20ac for his meal, and Alice pays 9.900\u20ac for her meal. Now, what the debit card is actually doing is transfering the liabilities (promises) the bank had with Bob and Alice towards the restaurant owner's bank account.   Notice that we exchange 10.000\u20ac worth of real goods and services for money that did previously not exist and does only so in form of a Bank's promise (credit).   ------  Could an expert please point out the flaws and validity of this example?  Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cbzmsgk","c_root_id_B":"cbzn73f","created_at_utc_A":1378050331,"created_at_utc_B":1378051707,"score_A":9,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Are you saying that the bank takes 100\u20ac in deposits _in total_ and then loans out 9900\u20ac? Because if so, that is a common misconception and far from the truth. If the bank lends Alice more money than it has, then it will collapse as soon as she spends the loan. The bank can only lend money that it has, minus the reserve. In your example, having gotten 100\u20ac it would be able to loan 99\u20ac. A bank run occurs, not when people spend their loans (which usually happens quickly, eg for a mortgage), but when depositors come to collect the money which is still loaned out.","human_ref_B":"Your example is incorrect.  The bank can only loan out a 99% of the deposit Bob made into the bank.  So Alice can only be offered a 99\u20ac loan if the bank deposits worth 100\u20ac.  However, when Alice deposits her loan into another checking account, the bank that oversees that checking account can now loan out 98.01\u20ac, and the next bank can then loan out 99% of that, or 97.0299\u20ac.  If banks continue lending ad infinitum, the deposits will eventually increase by 10,00\u20ac (10.00\u20ac) including the initial 100\u20ac deposit.  If the bank could lend out 9,900\u20ac on the deposit of 100\u20ac, the bank in which Alice deposited the 9,900\u20ac could then make a loan for 980100\u20ac.  The next bank could then loan out 97,029,900\u20ac, and so on.  This obviously doesn't happen, but it seems to be a common misconception about fractional reserve banking.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1376.0,"score_ratio":2.4444444444}
{"post_id":"1lidk7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Fractional Reserve Banking: How does it really really work? (without the cash example). Hello \/r\/AskSocialScience   It's been really difficult for me to find an answer to this question, as most articles I find, usually use the 10% cash only example. I have found and read an \"alternate\" version which seems more plausible for modern times, but I need an expert to prove its validity.  **Here is how I think FRB works:**  Example country: EUROZONE which has only got a 1% Reserve Requirement according to this Wikipedia article.   1. Bob goes to the Bank and deposits 100\u20ac. 2. The Bank now has Bob's 100\u20ac in its reserves and Bob has an account (bank liability \/ promise) worth 100\u20ac.   Next day.   3. Alice enters the bank and asks for a 9.900\u20ac loan. She doesn't want cash, she wants it in her bank account like most people do nowadays.  4. The bank opens Alice a bank account and gives her the loan. The bank gives her \"credit\" and types in the numbers in her bank account. 5. Since Alice now has an account, the Bank has a liability towards her of 9.900\u20ac, but also an asset worth 9.900\u20ac + interset which is Alice's debt.   Total deposits: 10.000\u20ac   Total reserve: 100\u20ac  Notice that the bank is still keeping 100\u20ac in its reserves, which accounts for 1% (reserve ratio) of its liabilities.   ERGO: The Bank doesn't need physical cash in its reserves to give out credit.  **And here comes the interesting part:**  The next day both Alice and Bob go to a restaurant and pay with their awesome debit cards.   Bob pays 100\u20ac for his meal, and Alice pays 9.900\u20ac for her meal. Now, what the debit card is actually doing is transfering the liabilities (promises) the bank had with Bob and Alice towards the restaurant owner's bank account.   Notice that we exchange 10.000\u20ac worth of real goods and services for money that did previously not exist and does only so in form of a Bank's promise (credit).   ------  Could an expert please point out the flaws and validity of this example?  Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cbzr2wl","c_root_id_B":"cbzp4om","created_at_utc_A":1378063569,"created_at_utc_B":1378057696,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"You don't need debit cards. Fractional reserve banking works equally well in principle with whatever. We could be using gold coins.  The bank has a 10% reserve requirement. Bob goes to the bank and deposits 10 gold coins. Now Alice comes along and asks the bank to lend her 90 gold coins. The bank says, \"sorry, no can do\" because of the 10% reserve requirement\u2014*this is the part that you are getting incorrect*. The bank can't lend out 90 gold coins because it doesn't *have* 90 gold coins. It only has 10. The bank says, \"the best we can do is to lend out 9 gold coins, since we only have 10 and we have to keep 10% in reserves\". Alice takes her 9 gold coin loan, deposits them in her bank account, and then goes home.  Now if we add this all up, Bob has 10 gold coins in his account and Alice has 9 gold coins in her account and the bank has a total of 10 gold coins in reserves. Now Carol comes along asking for a loan. The bank says, \"we have 19 gold coins in deposits so we need to hold onto 1.9 gold coins in reserves, which means we can lend out up to 8.1 gold coins\". Carol takes it and puts it in her bank account.  When Danny comes along the next day, the bank has 27.1 gold coins in deposits which means they need to hold onto 2.71 gold coins and can lend out 7.29.  If you carry this process out to infinity, the result is that they are holding 10 in reserves and have 1000 in deposits. And that's *fine*\u2014that's exactly what having a 10% reserve requirement *means*. But at no point are they lending out money that they do not have in reserves.","human_ref_B":"No comment on the question, just some links from related questions.   * Help understanding \"money as debt\" video?  * How do loans and fractional reserve banking work?  * Books on central banking for the layperson?  * Is fractional reserve banking different from a ponzi scheme?    * How does money creation work in the banking system?   * Truth of Ron Paul's devaluation statements?  * Is fractional reserve banking inflationary?  * Can sovereign debt actually be repaid?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5873.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"2zrxrw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Does Capitalism \"End?\" Does inflation continue forever, do recessions just come and go, do deficits never get paid, or does it eventually, mathematically, just unravel at some point? If it doesn't, what resets it enough to not have loaves of bread costing 200 dollars?","c_root_id_A":"cply892","c_root_id_B":"cpm171h","created_at_utc_A":1426941397,"created_at_utc_B":1426950389,"score_A":10,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"About 100 years ago a loaf of bread cost about 1 penny in the UK - today it costs about a pound. That's a massive increase in the price, but because everything increases by a similar amount, including wages, it doesn't cause problems in the long run. There isn't any real difference between an economy where bread costs 1p and one where bread costs 100p if everything else is also as expensive - all it does is add two zeros onto the price of everything, and as another comment said governments often take zeros off the value of the currency. In the next 100 years bread could well cost $200, and there wouldn't be any problem with that, because everyone would be earning proportionately more as well.","human_ref_B":"Mathematically, there is something that prevents capitalism from working. It's called the rate of profit. And there is a tendency for it to fall over time (with countervailing tendencies). This is called the tendency for the rate of profit to fall which was described originally (incorrectly) by bourgeois economists (Smith and Ricardo) but then fixed by Karl Marx in Capital Volume 3.  The reason as to why this happens is kinda hard to wrap your head around, especially since I would have to basically describe Capital to you for everything to make sense. So I'll try to do a tl;dr version. Keep in mind that value cannot be made in exchange (Marx thoroughly disproves that in chapter 5 of volume 1) and therefore there must be a commodity that produces value (labor). Furthermore, keep in mind that the labor theory of value relies on the average labor time it takes to make a commodity (socially necessary labor time or SNLT). If it takes 5 hours to make a shoe and it takes me 10 hours, it does not make my shoe more valuable.  There are 3 variables I'm going to look at: c, v, and s. C is constant capital (raw materials and machines for example), v is variable capital (labor), and s is surplus value (unpaid labor). Over time, capitalists find new ways to increase productivity. A computer, giant drills, cars, whatever it may be. For the capitalist that uses it first, he can produce more items than everybody else (the labor time for his is less than the SNLT) and he starts to put everybody else out of business. His profits are super profits, and that's why he looks for these new inventions. When everybody else catches up, the SNLT goes down and therefore the value of each object goes down too.  Unfortunately for the capitalists, these machines (the c) are not free. The workers are still working as much as they ever are, but the costs have gone up. Therefore what we would call the organic composition of capital (OCC) (which is the ratio between c and v: c\/v) has increased. What does this mean? Well, now let's look at profits. Profits would be s\/(c+v). Over time OCC raises, so v becomes irrelevant. So then the equation would become s\/c. But wait a second, we know that s is unpaid labor. Unless workers work longer (or there are more of them) or are getting paid less, s isn't going to get bigger. So the more the OCC raises, the smaller profits are going to be. This is exactly what happens, and so something has to give when profits fall too low. This is a type of crisis (recession for example). The price of c in this profitability crisis falls, so then profits are at least partially restored. Then the crisis for a while is resolved.  Again more bad news for the capitalists. This countervailing tendency isn't enough (there are others but they are less powerful so I'm going to ignore them for this post) to really restore profit back to there highest point. Profitability is going down, and has been for a long time. Andrew Kliman in his book The Failure of Capitalist Production: Underlying Causes of the Great Recession talks about profitability with data included. Esteban Maito also came out with a paper recently where he shows the rate of profit since the 19th century.  I wrote this kinda quickly so I hope I didn't condense too much.  Resources:  Kliman, Andrew. The Failure of Capitalist Production: Underlying Causes of the Great Recession. N.p.: Pluto, 2011. Print.  Maito, Esteban Ezequiel. \"The historical transience of capital: the downward trend in the rate of profit since XIX century.\" (2014).  Marx, Karl. Capital (Volume 1: A Critique of Political Economy): A Critique of Political Economy. Digireads. com Publishing, 2004.  edit: \/u\/kc_socialist would probably enjoy this thread in general. I definitely have learned a lot from him.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8992.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"1h8kbk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What percentage of wealth in the United States (or elsewhere) is earned, rather than inherited? And what does it mean for capitalism? There are a lot of ways to look at this. Perhaps it would be nice to know what the percentages are for the top 1%, the top 10%, the middle class, etc. Either way, any info is appreciated.  What inspired this question (a rather colloquial story):  So a friend of a friend of a friend has a big ol' lakehouse down in florida, and he invited me to stay for a few days. Of course I was like hell yeah, and I went.  At first, it was nice. I was just living the rich life, ridiculously beautiful home, good booze, etc.  But, after the first day, it started to bother me.  This dude is from a rich ass family. Florida royalty. He is like 25 years old, plays video games all day, and is honestly stupid as a bag of fucking rocks. He went to a shitty little college, took like 8 years to finish, and you honestly can't even talk to the dude without being legitimately shocked at how stupid he is. He works a crappy job, and will tell you all day long about how brave and honorable he is, because he works a job despite coming from wealth. He isn't some spoiled brat either. He's an ignorant redneck with the right last name. And yet, here he is, living the high-life, no financial worries, in a MANSION that was just given to him. Meanwhile, a vast majority of Americans are struggling to get by.  And, fine. He's the spoiled trust fund kid. It happens. This isn't me jealously whining, I am trying to make a point. It isn't even about him.  The case is that his family made their wealth back in the 1800's. So, there are DOZENS of his family members around the area. They are all disgustingly-rich. And they have POWER. They are on hospital boards, they own most of the land in the area, they know people who work at Coca-Cola and dozens of other massive corporations, they've worked with presidents closely, they know foreign kings (no joke) and get so many favors its INSANE.  So, THIS is this a failure of capitalism? It seems like capitalism works, but only for a few generations.  Have we've reached a point in our economic, capitalistic development where achievement isn't even close to being the largest factor in regards to wealth? Is it all about last names, money hording, and luck?  If this uninspired millionaire I visited can be in the top 1% by being a lucky fool, and thousands of geniuses go poor... capitalism isn't functioning as intended in my opinion. The idea is that money would drive progress, ambition, and achievement. But, is it these days? Or, as money continues to funnel to the top and be horded by big families, does the effectiveness of capitalism begin to fall?","c_root_id_A":"carxjd8","c_root_id_B":"carxx7c","created_at_utc_A":1372423287,"created_at_utc_B":1372425087,"score_A":17,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"James Heckman's new book Giving Kids a Fair Chance might be a good read.  > In Giving Kids a Fair Chance, Nobel Prize-winning economist James Heckman argues that the accident of birth is the greatest source of inequality in America today. Children born into disadvantage are, by the time they start kindergarten, already at risk of dropping out of school, teen pregnancy, crime, and a lifetime of low-wage work. This is bad for all those born into disadvantage and bad for American society.  > Current social and education policies directed toward children focus on improving cognition, yet success in life requires more than smarts. Heckman calls for a refocus of social policy toward early childhood interventions designed to enhance both cognitive abilities and such non-cognitive skills as confidence and perseverance. This new focus on preschool intervention would emphasize improving the early environments of disadvantaged children and increasing the quality of parenting while respecting the primacy of the family and America's cultural diversity.  > Heckman shows that acting early has much greater positive economic and social impact than later interventions -- which range from reduced pupil-teacher ratios to adult literacy programs to expenditures on police -- that draw the most attention in the public policy debate. At a time when state and local budgets for early interventions are being cut, Heckman issues an urgent call for action and offers some practical steps for how to design and pay for new programs.  > The debate that follows delves deeply into some of the most fraught questions of our time: the sources of inequality, the role of schools in solving social problems, and how to invest public resources most effectively. Mike Rose, Geoffrey Canada, Charles Murray, Carol Dweck, Annette Lareau, and other prominent experts participate.  Sam Bowles has a review in Science. Bowles and Gintis's Inheritance of Inequality is also a good read. The basic take home is that there is a 41% correlation for intergenerational income. 20% is due to environmental effects, 9% due to genetic effects, and 12% due to wealth effects. That's probably a lower bound, though:  > This \u008e figure, while substantial, may be an underestimate, as it is based on data that, for the reasons mentioned above, do not capture a key transmission process, namely inheritance of wealth upon the death of one\u2019s parents. Moreover, the estimate should be adjusted upward to take account of the fact that those with greater wealth tend to have higher average returns to their wealth (Bardhan, Bowles and Gintis, 2000; Yitzhaki, 1987). Greater parental or own wealth may also raise the rate of return to schooling and other human investments, but we have no way of taking account of this empirically. For a sample of very rich parents, the contribution of wealth to the intergenerational correlation would be much higher, of course. For a sample of families with very limited wealth, the contribution would be nearly zero. The difference in the contribution of wealth effects across theincome distribution is a re\u008fflection of the heterogeneous nature of the transmission process mentioned earlier. Because of the very skewed distribution of wealth, the family with the mean level of wealth (to which our estimates apply) is considerably wealthier than the median family.","human_ref_B":"As far as providing a straightforward answer to your first question, I don't think anyone else here has done that, so please take a look at this report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics - PDF warning  Note that it is based on a series of survey data, and as such admits that it probably contains a downward bias in estimates of inherited wealth.   Jump straight to Table 1 for the numbers.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1800.0,"score_ratio":1.2352941176}
{"post_id":"5nxcwq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"How does Cultural Capital work in concrete terms?  From second-hand reading I have a good general idea of what cultural capital is, but I don't always get the its' \"explanative power\".   For example, when you search for literature about what could influence\/determine tolerance of non-conformity, cultural capital is more often than not noted as playing a significant role. I can see why one could expect that the years and the kind of schooling you may have had could influence your tolerance of homosexuality for instance. But it is often operationalized in terms of \"participation in cultural activities\" or something alike.  How does being someone that goes to the opera once in a while make you likely to also be someone that is tolerant of homosexuality? And that is, with those two not being mere byproducts of the same other indicators of social standing, but the former actively explaining part of the latter?","c_root_id_A":"dcf1bo3","c_root_id_B":"dcfh3s3","created_at_utc_A":1484405115,"created_at_utc_B":1484427869,"score_A":2,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"I mean, you've hit the nail on the head really. It's very very difficult to operationalise cultural capital. People try, I mean, look at the 'Great British Class Survey' (Savage et al, 2013), but it's still not... 100%?  I don't think cultural capital does do more than indicate social standing\/social class in an explanatory sense. Also trying to discuss social capital as a thing on it's own without discussing Bourdieu's work as a whole isn't super helpful because you're missing out on things like habitus and fields.","human_ref_B":"With Bourdieu, you really need his concept of \"habitus\" to see the connections. It's not that the going to museums causes you to be tolerant of homosexuality..... remember, Bourdieu's main statistical method is multiple correspondence analysis, it's how things cluster.   Embodying high cultural status (that's the core of habits--embodying things; Bourdieu never really defines it much better in any of his other works) means that you go to museums and are tolerant of homosexuality. Habitus is your tastes, it's your hobbies, it's what brand of beer your drink, it's whether you shake hands or give a high five, it's whether you spit in public, etc. These are *learned*, by imitation generally, and stratified by socio-economic class. But they're not learned at the museum or something like that. The museum is just a quantifiable measurement of your status (maybe not a good one even), it is not the cause of your status.   For more on Bourdieu see my old posts: Bourdieu and Dan Brown; Bourdieu and why beards and fixies won't be mullets and Camaros; Bourdieu and how \"being at ease\" and \"liking everything\" have become high status markers. Of those, the last one might be particularly useful. Check out the linked Shamus Khan chapter if you have a minute, it's like 12 or 16 simple, clear pages, and it gets into how the modern elite habitus is inculcated at an elite boarding school.   I think education or tastes are generally a better proxy than cultural event participation because the events they choose are often very dated and I think in some cases are rare events that people are more likely to answer based on many times they think they should have gone rather than actually went. I just saw an article about participation in Turkey and they were all about events that secular Turks would go to, but not about events that pious Turks would go to. So these measures can just be quite silly, but you shouldn't mistake these measures of cultural capital as causal. Think of them more as degrees on a thermometer than the weather system that causes a heat wave.   For completeness, Bourdieu most famously defined Habitus as:  >s]ystems of durable, transposable dispositions, structured structures predisposed to function as structuring structures, that is, as principles which generate and organize practices and representations that can be objectively adapted to their outcomes without presupposing a conscious aiming at ends or an express mastery of the operations necessary in order to attain them.  The first line of the [wiki page on Habitus doesn't do a bad job either:  >Habitus is a system of embodied dispositions, tendencies that organize the ways in which individuals perceive the social world around them and react to it.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22754.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"okvge5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Are there societal reasons why having children isn't part of the climate crisis conversation? When searching the net for 'things a person can do about climate change' there seems to be no\/very little mention about the downstream impacts of having children (which are significant.) My question comes to this community to see if this has been studied\/if it's considered tabooed to speak about among social scientists\/ or if it just doesn't generate clicks.","c_root_id_A":"h5am0lo","c_root_id_B":"h5aj6gr","created_at_utc_A":1626368103,"created_at_utc_B":1626366918,"score_A":68,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"There is an active debate about the role of population control in managing the environmental impact of human society. Advocates for population control (the neo-malthusian perspective) argue that, by basic arithmetic, reproducing increases the amount of resource consumption and pollution (especially in developed countries) which runs in the opposite direction of what is required for mitigating climate change and biodiversity loss.   There's two basic retorts to this perspective. The first, as detailed in this WIRE Climate Change paper on population and ethics, involves pushback from religious conservatives in many regions that oppose family planning, sexual health education, and contraceptive access that underpins a non-coercive strategy of population control. Similar pressures operate in the United States (this Vox article is a good issue summary by the way), for example, making population control a problematic agenda item among members of the mainstream environmental movement.   The second retort is that population control implies a kind of racist, post-colonial mentality that is really fear mongering about growing populations of non-white folks in other countries (or in our own). These people tend to argue that population decreases as countries get wealthier, so the real issue is global inequality for which high levels of population growth are a symptom. The environmental footprint is highest among low-population growth countries in the west, so focusing on population shifts the burden of responsibility from those who have emitted and polluted the most to the lower-resourced and high-population growth countries of the global south.","human_ref_B":"A study published in 2017 listed having one fewer child as one of the most impactful actions for reducing personal greenhouse gas emissions, togheter with living car-free, avoiding airplane travel and eating a plant-based diet.  This study was widely discussed in the media where I live, in Sweden, and from what I've understood it also gained some traction in the US for example. If you're interested you can find more information about the debate caused by the study in this article. So it might not be a taboo subject, but certainly controversial among some groups. It does however seem to generate clicks.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1185.0,"score_ratio":6.1818181818}
{"post_id":"okvge5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Are there societal reasons why having children isn't part of the climate crisis conversation? When searching the net for 'things a person can do about climate change' there seems to be no\/very little mention about the downstream impacts of having children (which are significant.) My question comes to this community to see if this has been studied\/if it's considered tabooed to speak about among social scientists\/ or if it just doesn't generate clicks.","c_root_id_A":"h5aj6gr","c_root_id_B":"h5art3m","created_at_utc_A":1626366918,"created_at_utc_B":1626370530,"score_A":11,"score_B":34,"human_ref_A":"A study published in 2017 listed having one fewer child as one of the most impactful actions for reducing personal greenhouse gas emissions, togheter with living car-free, avoiding airplane travel and eating a plant-based diet.  This study was widely discussed in the media where I live, in Sweden, and from what I've understood it also gained some traction in the US for example. If you're interested you can find more information about the debate caused by the study in this article. So it might not be a taboo subject, but certainly controversial among some groups. It does however seem to generate clicks.","human_ref_B":"Malthusianism raising one of its many heads again.  First of all, it is absolutely part of the debate. If you search \"carbon footprint children\" you should find both newspaper articles and papers. Eco-reproductive concerns in the age of climate change gives a pretty good summary of recent papers in its introduction, if you can get access.  One of the most discussed publication over recent years was an open letter from 2017 - The climate mitigation gap: education and government recommendations miss the most effective individual actions, the authors even did an AMA, and there were many, many newspaper articles repeating what they wrote. (I looked at the research they based their calculations on, and iirc Wynes and Nicholas took the cumulative life years of person + all offspring over a century following different fertility rates, multiplied them by current carbon emission rates, and then divided them by currently living people to say that if you had X children, their projected future carbon emissions was equivalent to multiplying carbon emissions this very year. I found the approach ... painful.)  A very recent paper is Population Ethics and the Prospects for Fertility Policy as Climate Mitigation Policy, which sums it up nicely:  >In particular, we ask whether fertility policy is likely to have a large effect on carbon emissions, and therefore on temperature change. Our answer is no. Prospects for a policy of fertility-reduction-as-climate-mitigation are limited by **population momentum**, a demographic factor that limits possible variation in the size of the population, even if fertility rates change very quickly. In particular, a hypothetical policy that instantaneously changed fertility and mortality rates to replacement levels would nevertheless result in a population of over 9 billion people in 2060. We use a leading climate-economy model to project the consequence of such a hypothetical policy for climate change. As a standalone mitigation policy, such a hypothetical change in the size of the future population \u2013 much too large to be implementable by any foreseeable government programme \u2013 would reduce peak temperature changely to 6.4\u00b0C, relative to 7.1\u00b0C under the most likely population path. Therefore, fertility reduction is unlikely to be an adequate core approach to climate mitigation.  What I personally would like to point out is that the global total fertility rate has been dropping for decades, nearing replacement level already; and in high income countries it's been at sub-replacement level for years to decades, to the extent that some European countries' population had been shrinking before taking in refugees starting in 2015. Countries like China and Singapore try to increase their birth rate for the same reason. Except for Sub-Saharan Africa, the main driver in population growth is rising life expectancy, not birth rates.  The second point to consider is that while demographic transition is a complex topic and not exactly the same everywhere, high birth rates are globally associated with low income contexts. That means that those whose change in fertility behaviour might have the biggest impact are also the ones whose carbon emission is currently among the lowest. \\[ETA: That means this whole discussion is mostly aimed at making wealthy people feel good about themselves for not having five children, without having to make real changes in their lives, and without us as societies having to change how our economies work - growth based and externalising cost wherever possible. People who consider climate change in their family planning usually make that decision based on the world their children would live in, not on the 1 in 7.9bio part of the overall environmental impact that child will have.)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3612.0,"score_ratio":3.0909090909}
{"post_id":"11hvey","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Psychology] How do people end up in abusive relationships? Threads like [this one are filled with stories of people who 'woke up' one day to the fact that their SO is a terrible person. What is the anatomy of an abusive relationship from a psychological perspective? How do they start? What's the best way to avoid them?","c_root_id_A":"c6mpwu4","c_root_id_B":"c6mnwmm","created_at_utc_A":1350307336,"created_at_utc_B":1350285078,"score_A":11,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Abuse is often insidious. An abuser may start out being perfectly pleasant and apparently (or actually) loving, but eventually, generally in small increments, they start abusing their spouses. Often they'll take very minor mistakes or annoyances and blow them out of proportion. Some of these people are very good at making you feel as though everything is your fault, because they rationalize away their own blame for their abusive behavior all the time. Anyone they mistreat or attack \"deserved\" it. You may hear stories of righteous retribution from them. However it happens, though, a little bit at a time their autonomy starts to over-ride your own. You may find yourself thinking that things would go a lot better if you weren't such a screw-up, and you begin to sympathize with them even as they're berating or assaulting you. Some will turn every conversation into an argument and accuse you of exactly that. It can be very hard to tell you're a victim when you're being told that everything is your fault, especially if it's by someone you love dearly. Even in abusive situations where the victim *is* cognizant of what's going on they may well decide \"it's not so bad\" because the love of that person is so important to them. It's sad to have to cut ties with someone that you've spent years building bonds with, even if they're often horrible to you. It's still a relationship, even if it's a dysfunctional one, and there are often good times that it can be very hard to give up. I went back to my abuser three times before I smartened up. All it takes is a couple years to forget the bad stuff and crave the good, sprinkle a little kindness and you're drawn right back in if you don't keep your wits about you. It's too easy to think they've changed, especially when they promise they'd never hurt you again. Hell, a few months ago I'd been back in contact with her (just as 'friends') and it really seemed like she'd changed. Then I opened my eyes for half a second and realized what I was doing was not only unhealthy but the beginning of the pattern that'd led me back to her every other time, so I took her off my facebook. This, of course, resulted in a slew of abusive messages, including one encouraging me to kill myself, so as much as you might think these people change, they really don't. Survivors of abuse need to know that so that they can maintain their autonomy and rebuild their lives.","human_ref_B":"I may not have the credentials for this, but since nobody has answered yet... It's pretty complicated and it can sneak up on you.  At first you may not think that the negative things happening to you are that bad.  You might think that they're one-off instances.  Or, you might be used to similar treatment from those you grew up around.  Even if you realise certain things are bad, you don't tell anyone because you feel like they'll blame you in some way.  Or you'll feel stupid for having stayed in the relationship and you feel like you can be stronger if you can fix it somehow.  Then one day you realise things are much worse than you've been making them out to be.  Or something even worse happened that definitely crossed one of your tolerance lines.  You start to reflect on the relationship as a whole, add up all the other, smaller things and it turns out they weren't so small after all.  If you want psychological back-ups for this, you can google things like emotional and physical abuse.  Many sites that are there to help people in the situation discuss the psychology behind it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22258.0,"score_ratio":1.2222222222}
{"post_id":"i75uaa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What books can I recommend to my stepsister in highschool? Hope this question is pertinent for this sub, if not please do what the rules dictate.    I'm visiting my dad's side of family and see the book \"Civilisation and its Discontents\" on my stepsister's table. I'm delighted to discover that she shares the same interest in social sciences as I do, but I don't think this book is a great introductory text to any field.      Aside from it being possibly a hard read, it's written from a period where methodologies were not as developed as today. Also we're from China. Schools don't teach critical thinking. A high schooler may very likely take what's in a book as \"the truth\". I also think the activity of reading books without knowing some context can do some harms. For example, if a highschooler in China encounters a misogynist point of view in a book written by an authoritive figure, they might take it at its face value. Whereas if they know the book was written in a period where misogyny was rampant, they could take some distance from the point of view.      Obviously I don't want to destroy her interest by commenting on her choice, so I'm hoping to recommend some books for her that are interesting, have less biases and more scientific rigour. It could be from any field, she doesn't know what to study in University so I'm hoping to help her discover some choices. It should be preferably not a theoretical text, but focus on one or more concrete questions, provides some context in the field and applies modern methodologies in its investigation. In this way she can be gently introduced the concepts and theories while they're being applied. Ideally the book should be somewhat popular so that there could be a translation. Thank you in advance for any recommendations and other advices.    Edit:formatting","c_root_id_A":"g112uto","c_root_id_B":"g11d4v3","created_at_utc_A":1597091034,"created_at_utc_B":1597095995,"score_A":4,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Well, what kinds of books did she like before? Did she like books with a bit of flare to the story? Maybe she likes more factual, dry reads?  I would say just let her read that book for a while. Let her tell you what she thinks of the book. I think that will help you recommend the next book for her.","human_ref_B":"I have no clue if this book has been translated in Chinese (?), but if that is the case, I would recommend Augustin Fuentes's Race, Monogamy, and Other Lies They Told You: Busting Myths about Human Nature.  ---  To explain my recommendation and why I believe it fulfills your wishes: The author is a physical anthropologist and a primatologist who makes use of his knowledge of both human and animal behavior to concretely tackle \"common knowledge\" about what is often assumed to be \"human nature.\" I recommend this book because it is well written and aimed at general audiences, while being well-sourced (academically so).   The book is rich in terms of incorporating several perspectives (biological, psychological, sociocultural, ...) to make his points. At the same time, he seeks to promote critical thinking, e.g. the book's first part seeks to help readers to construct a \"myth busting tool-kit.\" His book also puts away the old and weary debate of nature *versus* nurture and teaches about nature *and* nurture (i.e. that humans are naturenutural).   ---  In other words, the book's description:  >There are three major myths of human nature: humans are divided into biological races; humans are naturally aggressive; men and women are truly different in behavior, desires, and wiring. In an engaging and wide-ranging narrative Agust\u00edn Fuentes counters these pervasive and pernicious myths about human behavior. Tackling misconceptions about what race, aggression, and sex really mean for humans, Fuentes incorporates an accessible understanding of culture, genetics, and evolution requiring us to dispose of notions of \u201cnature or nurture.\u201d Presenting scientific evidence from diverse fields, including anthropology, biology, and psychology, Fuentes devises a myth-busting toolkit to dismantle persistent fallacies about the validity of biological races, the innateness of aggression and violence, and the nature of monogamy and differences between the sexes. A final chapter plus an appendix provide a set of take-home points on how readers can myth-bust on their own. Accessible, compelling, and original, this book is a rich and nuanced account of how nature, culture, experience, and choice interact to influence human behavior.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4961.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"i75uaa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What books can I recommend to my stepsister in highschool? Hope this question is pertinent for this sub, if not please do what the rules dictate.    I'm visiting my dad's side of family and see the book \"Civilisation and its Discontents\" on my stepsister's table. I'm delighted to discover that she shares the same interest in social sciences as I do, but I don't think this book is a great introductory text to any field.      Aside from it being possibly a hard read, it's written from a period where methodologies were not as developed as today. Also we're from China. Schools don't teach critical thinking. A high schooler may very likely take what's in a book as \"the truth\". I also think the activity of reading books without knowing some context can do some harms. For example, if a highschooler in China encounters a misogynist point of view in a book written by an authoritive figure, they might take it at its face value. Whereas if they know the book was written in a period where misogyny was rampant, they could take some distance from the point of view.      Obviously I don't want to destroy her interest by commenting on her choice, so I'm hoping to recommend some books for her that are interesting, have less biases and more scientific rigour. It could be from any field, she doesn't know what to study in University so I'm hoping to help her discover some choices. It should be preferably not a theoretical text, but focus on one or more concrete questions, provides some context in the field and applies modern methodologies in its investigation. In this way she can be gently introduced the concepts and theories while they're being applied. Ideally the book should be somewhat popular so that there could be a translation. Thank you in advance for any recommendations and other advices.    Edit:formatting","c_root_id_A":"g111lw0","c_root_id_B":"g11d4v3","created_at_utc_A":1597090437,"created_at_utc_B":1597095995,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Viktor E. Frankl ~ Man's search for meaning.  An amazing read and a good introduction to humankind's resilience in the face of incalculable odds. But maybe hard for her to understand or empathize due to its Western vision.  Frankl, V. E. (1985). Man's search for meaning. Simon and Schuster.  source to the peer reviews","human_ref_B":"I have no clue if this book has been translated in Chinese (?), but if that is the case, I would recommend Augustin Fuentes's Race, Monogamy, and Other Lies They Told You: Busting Myths about Human Nature.  ---  To explain my recommendation and why I believe it fulfills your wishes: The author is a physical anthropologist and a primatologist who makes use of his knowledge of both human and animal behavior to concretely tackle \"common knowledge\" about what is often assumed to be \"human nature.\" I recommend this book because it is well written and aimed at general audiences, while being well-sourced (academically so).   The book is rich in terms of incorporating several perspectives (biological, psychological, sociocultural, ...) to make his points. At the same time, he seeks to promote critical thinking, e.g. the book's first part seeks to help readers to construct a \"myth busting tool-kit.\" His book also puts away the old and weary debate of nature *versus* nurture and teaches about nature *and* nurture (i.e. that humans are naturenutural).   ---  In other words, the book's description:  >There are three major myths of human nature: humans are divided into biological races; humans are naturally aggressive; men and women are truly different in behavior, desires, and wiring. In an engaging and wide-ranging narrative Agust\u00edn Fuentes counters these pervasive and pernicious myths about human behavior. Tackling misconceptions about what race, aggression, and sex really mean for humans, Fuentes incorporates an accessible understanding of culture, genetics, and evolution requiring us to dispose of notions of \u201cnature or nurture.\u201d Presenting scientific evidence from diverse fields, including anthropology, biology, and psychology, Fuentes devises a myth-busting toolkit to dismantle persistent fallacies about the validity of biological races, the innateness of aggression and violence, and the nature of monogamy and differences between the sexes. A final chapter plus an appendix provide a set of take-home points on how readers can myth-bust on their own. Accessible, compelling, and original, this book is a rich and nuanced account of how nature, culture, experience, and choice interact to influence human behavior.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5558.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"i75uaa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What books can I recommend to my stepsister in highschool? Hope this question is pertinent for this sub, if not please do what the rules dictate.    I'm visiting my dad's side of family and see the book \"Civilisation and its Discontents\" on my stepsister's table. I'm delighted to discover that she shares the same interest in social sciences as I do, but I don't think this book is a great introductory text to any field.      Aside from it being possibly a hard read, it's written from a period where methodologies were not as developed as today. Also we're from China. Schools don't teach critical thinking. A high schooler may very likely take what's in a book as \"the truth\". I also think the activity of reading books without knowing some context can do some harms. For example, if a highschooler in China encounters a misogynist point of view in a book written by an authoritive figure, they might take it at its face value. Whereas if they know the book was written in a period where misogyny was rampant, they could take some distance from the point of view.      Obviously I don't want to destroy her interest by commenting on her choice, so I'm hoping to recommend some books for her that are interesting, have less biases and more scientific rigour. It could be from any field, she doesn't know what to study in University so I'm hoping to help her discover some choices. It should be preferably not a theoretical text, but focus on one or more concrete questions, provides some context in the field and applies modern methodologies in its investigation. In this way she can be gently introduced the concepts and theories while they're being applied. Ideally the book should be somewhat popular so that there could be a translation. Thank you in advance for any recommendations and other advices.    Edit:formatting","c_root_id_A":"g11d4v3","c_root_id_B":"g115vpk","created_at_utc_A":1597095995,"created_at_utc_B":1597092504,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I have no clue if this book has been translated in Chinese (?), but if that is the case, I would recommend Augustin Fuentes's Race, Monogamy, and Other Lies They Told You: Busting Myths about Human Nature.  ---  To explain my recommendation and why I believe it fulfills your wishes: The author is a physical anthropologist and a primatologist who makes use of his knowledge of both human and animal behavior to concretely tackle \"common knowledge\" about what is often assumed to be \"human nature.\" I recommend this book because it is well written and aimed at general audiences, while being well-sourced (academically so).   The book is rich in terms of incorporating several perspectives (biological, psychological, sociocultural, ...) to make his points. At the same time, he seeks to promote critical thinking, e.g. the book's first part seeks to help readers to construct a \"myth busting tool-kit.\" His book also puts away the old and weary debate of nature *versus* nurture and teaches about nature *and* nurture (i.e. that humans are naturenutural).   ---  In other words, the book's description:  >There are three major myths of human nature: humans are divided into biological races; humans are naturally aggressive; men and women are truly different in behavior, desires, and wiring. In an engaging and wide-ranging narrative Agust\u00edn Fuentes counters these pervasive and pernicious myths about human behavior. Tackling misconceptions about what race, aggression, and sex really mean for humans, Fuentes incorporates an accessible understanding of culture, genetics, and evolution requiring us to dispose of notions of \u201cnature or nurture.\u201d Presenting scientific evidence from diverse fields, including anthropology, biology, and psychology, Fuentes devises a myth-busting toolkit to dismantle persistent fallacies about the validity of biological races, the innateness of aggression and violence, and the nature of monogamy and differences between the sexes. A final chapter plus an appendix provide a set of take-home points on how readers can myth-bust on their own. Accessible, compelling, and original, this book is a rich and nuanced account of how nature, culture, experience, and choice interact to influence human behavior.","human_ref_B":"I'm focused on economics, and unfortunately for those in China my knowledge is more US-centric, but here's what I came up with--  **Economics:** *Peddling Prosperity* by Paul Krugman is a fun introduction to economic policy. (I swear it's more entertaining than it sounds!) *The Worldly Philosophers* by Robert Heilbroner is an old classic that students have been reading for decades.  **Sociology:** *Bowling Alone* by Robert Putnam is great.  **Psychology:** *The Blank Slate* by Steven Pinker is also great. *How We Know What Isn't So* by Thomas Gilovich is another good book that could be especially useful for promoting critical thinking.  **Political Science:** *Winning the War on War* by Joshua Goldstein is probably not as well known as the other books I recommend, but it's a super interesting read. I'm curious about how its claims hold up in light of recent events. I'd recommend *The Gamble* by John Sides and Lynn Vavreck, but it's focused like a laser on American politics.  Since this subreddit requires citations, here's economist Greg Mankiw's review of Peddling Prosperity in the Journal of Economic Literature.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3491.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"i75uaa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What books can I recommend to my stepsister in highschool? Hope this question is pertinent for this sub, if not please do what the rules dictate.    I'm visiting my dad's side of family and see the book \"Civilisation and its Discontents\" on my stepsister's table. I'm delighted to discover that she shares the same interest in social sciences as I do, but I don't think this book is a great introductory text to any field.      Aside from it being possibly a hard read, it's written from a period where methodologies were not as developed as today. Also we're from China. Schools don't teach critical thinking. A high schooler may very likely take what's in a book as \"the truth\". I also think the activity of reading books without knowing some context can do some harms. For example, if a highschooler in China encounters a misogynist point of view in a book written by an authoritive figure, they might take it at its face value. Whereas if they know the book was written in a period where misogyny was rampant, they could take some distance from the point of view.      Obviously I don't want to destroy her interest by commenting on her choice, so I'm hoping to recommend some books for her that are interesting, have less biases and more scientific rigour. It could be from any field, she doesn't know what to study in University so I'm hoping to help her discover some choices. It should be preferably not a theoretical text, but focus on one or more concrete questions, provides some context in the field and applies modern methodologies in its investigation. In this way she can be gently introduced the concepts and theories while they're being applied. Ideally the book should be somewhat popular so that there could be a translation. Thank you in advance for any recommendations and other advices.    Edit:formatting","c_root_id_A":"g111lw0","c_root_id_B":"g112uto","created_at_utc_A":1597090437,"created_at_utc_B":1597091034,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Viktor E. Frankl ~ Man's search for meaning.  An amazing read and a good introduction to humankind's resilience in the face of incalculable odds. But maybe hard for her to understand or empathize due to its Western vision.  Frankl, V. E. (1985). Man's search for meaning. Simon and Schuster.  source to the peer reviews","human_ref_B":"Well, what kinds of books did she like before? Did she like books with a bit of flare to the story? Maybe she likes more factual, dry reads?  I would say just let her read that book for a while. Let her tell you what she thinks of the book. I think that will help you recommend the next book for her.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":597.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"b43xm5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Why was violent crime so much lower in the 1950s than at any time since then? Violent crime rate from wikipedia: >1960 - 160.9  >1990 - 770.2  >2018 - 386.3  We can see it is falling since its peak. This isn't what I am interested in. I am interested in why it was so low before the 1960s, so much so that it was 2-3 times lower than it is today. If you think about all the influencing variables on crime it seems extraordinary  -people were poorer back then, which is a major causal factor in crime. Significantly the bottom 10-20% were much poorer than they are now  -improving policing methods and CCTV are likely to act as a deterrent on crime  -leisure activities are much more abundant now, the demographic most likely to commit crime (men age 18-30) spend their free time on the internet or watching TV instead of out on the streets   -I would argue as a result of this the relative cost of crime vs being a free man is higher now than it was back then  -abortion was illegal which has been demonstrated as a causal factor in crime rates  -levels of education across the board were lower  Can anyone explain it?","c_root_id_A":"ej41mrc","c_root_id_B":"ej44mot","created_at_utc_A":1553257701,"created_at_utc_B":1553260454,"score_A":11,"score_B":59,"human_ref_A":"These researchers make a strong case that higher levels of economic inequality likely leads to higher levels of violence (and a plethora of other social problems): https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Spirit_Level_(book))","human_ref_B":"OK, first of all - the Uniform Crime Reporting Statistics do show that the official rates of violent crime did increase by those numbers with a peak in the early 90s before falling since - this is what we call the crime drop and is still a current topic of research.  And these trends can also be observed in other Western countries, so it can be argued that it is not specific to American culture, society or politics, but rather something about the culture, history, society and politics of Western countries in general.  Firstly, it is important to comment on official crime data. Baumer and Lauritsen observed the following:  >Using data from 1973 to 2005, our findings show that significant increases have occurred in the likelihood of police notification for sexual assault crimes as well as for other forms of assault and that these increases were observed for violence against women and violence against men, stranger and non-stranger violence, as well as crimes experienced by members of different racial and ethnic groups. The reporting of property victimization (i.e., motor vehicle theft, burglary, and larceny) also increased across time.  In fact,  >**According  to  UCR  data**  on  nonlethal  serious  violence  (i.e.,  rape,robbery,  and  aggravated  assault), **the  number  of  violent  crimes  in  the United States decreased by about 27 percent from 1991 to 2005.** However, **the NCVS suggested a much larger decrease for these same crimes\u2014about 51  percent.**  Our  findings  reveal  that  changes  in  police  notification  of  violent  crimes  can  account  for  much  of  these  divergent  estimates.   It is also important to be aware that studies interested in much longer time-series have shown that violent crime has been declining for centuries, and that fluctuations in the shorter term are not by themselves surprising.  Let's now flip the question around: why did violent crime rates *increase* since the 1960s, reaching a peak in the 1990s, before resuming the long(er) term trend of decline?  Michael Tonry would argue that it is because of changing thresholds of violence. For several reasons, people over time become less and less tolerant of violent behavior and redefine behaviors too.  Redefinition and lower tolerance makes it so that people \"recognize\" more violence (think interpersonal violence towards domestic partners) and report them more often. Contemporaneously, this also means police are more likely to take reports seriously and to record them appropriately.  After all, think of the political and socio-cultural turmoils in those decades and how we have since then become more and more sensitive to issues such as domestic violence and rape. Before, police would not be too interested in dealing with your \"issues at home\", today there are greater incentives to intervene.  There are other explanations that are given, too (and these are not necessarily incompatible with each other).   Changes in lifestyle might also have contributed, such that:  >In that perspective, the 1960s were undoubtedly  a  turning  point  in  the  way  of  life  of  West  European  populations.  According  to  Wallerstein (1989), the year **1968 produced a revolution in the world system**. That year is engraved in the collective imagination by the **outbreak of protests, university occupations and general strikes in May 1968 in Paris, but many other revolts were taking place across Europe** (Klimke and Scharloth, 2008). Indeed, 1968 is often considered to be a turning point in history in several regions of the world, as it was the year of the **approval of the Civil Rights Act in the United States and of several rebellions in Latin America** (Aguirre  Rojas,  2006).  The  1960s  also  witnessed  a  **relaxation  of  the  norms  that  controlled relations between young people**, the generalization of rock and roll as the music identifying a whole new generation, and the **development of the first gangs**, such as the mods and rockers in England. Although the effect of such gangs on delinquency was greatly  overestimated  in  the  moral  panic  that  followed  their  expansion  (Cohen,  1972;  Goode and Ben-Yehuda, 2009), they **symbolize the change in lifestyles** that we want to illustrate.  We  have  already  mentioned  the  influence  of  the  **birth  control  pill**,  which  became available in the 1960s, on infanticide, but one must not underestimate the role of contraception in the full integration of women in the labour market.  Another explanation that is being explored, but that concerns the more recent trends in crime, is the advent of Internet which means that younger people (those most likely to commit crimes) are more often at home behind their computers, rather than on the streets, which might contribute to a reduction of violent crimes in exchange for an increase of crimes we are not recording appropriately. More people at home means simultaneously less victims and less offenders meeting each other in vulnerable spaces.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2753.0,"score_ratio":5.3636363636}
{"post_id":"407n89","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"I hear a lot about how crime is caused partly by systemic poverty. There was a lot of systemic poverty in the past, so in ancient times or the middle ages was there more crime?","c_root_id_A":"cys49y6","c_root_id_B":"cys9xu1","created_at_utc_A":1452372300,"created_at_utc_B":1452381654,"score_A":11,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"This question would be better suited to \/r\/AskHistorians, although I would suggest adding context (e.g., time period, type of crime) to your submission.","human_ref_B":"According to Steven Pinker (in Better Angels of Our Nature), violent crimes and  violence in general were higher in the past.  He mostly tracks wars and general levels of acceptable torture (crucifixion, blood sports), but primary sources (Domesday Book) show that murder rates were higher in the past.  I found this page that summarizes the data well for a number of countries:  http:\/\/ourworldindata.org\/data\/violence-rights\/homicides\/ (Only an interested layperson -- hope these citations are sufficient.)  The more problematic part of your question is the term \"systematic poverty\".  In the history of homo sapiens, I would speculate that more than 90% of the population has lived in subsistence poverty.  (No citation, actual number not important, just a talking point.)  When we talk about US poverty, we're talking about a different beast completely.  People in US poverty (by and large) do not starve to death or die of exposure.  In fact, their material conditions are probably better than some royalty in the past (food access, dental care access, lack of plague, infant\/child mortality, sanitation, plumbing) and certainly better than the bottom 90% through history.  So, if you are looking at their absolute condition, I don't think you can talk meaningfully about the current impoverished in the West.  They may be effectively disenfranchised but they are not poor in any historical sense of the word.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9354.0,"score_ratio":1.5454545455}
{"post_id":"1fervg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Why do the citizens of the UK still support\/accept the monarchy? The question actually goes for any of the remaining European monarchies (UK, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Netherlands, Spain etc.) As someone born in a very democratic country I have always been puzzled by those places still having a king or queen as head of state.","c_root_id_A":"ca9jmwy","c_root_id_B":"ca9kuy4","created_at_utc_A":1370017047,"created_at_utc_B":1370020501,"score_A":24,"score_B":31,"human_ref_A":"Over here in the UK, the monarchy have little to no power. At the same time, the Royal Family is a huge earner in terms of tourism,   That being said, not everybody accepts the Monarchy, there are some republicans around. However, during the recent Jubilee and the Royal Wedding, they were little seen, but there were some small groups protesting. These groups were most definitely in the minority though, by a long way. See here.","human_ref_B":"Painting very very broad strokes here but for a long time, British nationalism or rather what it mean to be British, could be distilled approximately into empire, navy, technical\/scientific innovation, and monarchy. These existed in parallel with the international prestige associated with such things.  Following the first world war, it was clear that the first three were in decline. The second world war effectively destroyed them, with the Suez crisis irrecoverably shattering any illusions of Great Power status.   Difficult economic and social times followed in the last 1960s and throughout 1970s with British identity in crisis and it was apparent that Britain was in decline. For this reason, it might be why the Falkland conflict was so popular as it echoed back to a time when Britain was great; the last throes of a dying empire.  I think that British identity and culture did recover and by the 1990's. Popular culture had reinvented itself with a new generation, casting off the baggage of the old and differentiating itself\/emerging from the many counter culture movements of the previous generation. This is encapsulated by the 'cool britannia' movement etc.  To get back on track, I think the appeal of monarchy for a lot of people is in its inherent symbolic value. It can provide a real and tangible link to Britain's perceived economic, scientific, and expansionist golden age. It informs a sense of legitimacy, nationalism, and pride, acting as a constant reminder of the illustrious past and of future possibilities. Not everyone buys into this of course.  An apt comparison might be the increasing debate on American decline, contrasted with the rising fortunes of China. Common discourse always seems to include an emphasis on 'returning to what made us great' and to the past glories of American science\/technology and innovation especially during the Cold War. For many British, this symbolic idea is the monarchy, but for the Americans, it might be contained within more intangible values formulated during the nation's founding or later.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3454.0,"score_ratio":1.2916666667}
{"post_id":"3o0rol","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"To PhD students in Psychology - How much peer reviewed research were you reading as an undergraduate? I am at the point in my undergraduate career where I am trying to narrow down my research interests to prepare for my senior thesis and the graduate school hunt. I was just wondering how much research I should be trying to read weekly to be on par with others who have gone to graduate school. Should I try and read one a day? One a week?  EDIT: Also, does anyone have tips on how I can organize what I have read to try and narrow down my interests? The graduate students in my labs have told me an excel document would probably be a good idea but I was wondering if anyone had any other tips and tricks for organizing, remembering, and utilizing the research that you read. Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cvt5b22","c_root_id_B":"cvt67bn","created_at_utc_A":1444350420,"created_at_utc_B":1444351935,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I read *a lot* of journal articles and books during undergrad.  As soon as you begin to understand your own field, you start to realize how little you actually know.  In general, there's so much across the discipline of psychology worth reading that you really can't start soon enough, IMO.   I study emotion, which intersects with so many subfields (cognitive, social, clinical, cultural, neuro), topics (language, perception, action, psychopathology, memory, psychophysiology, consciousness, etc.), and levels of analysis (imaging, single cell, lesion, behavioral, animal, etc.).   So it's vital that I read widely and deeply, and thus very helpful that I started early.  Indeed, the most prominent emotion researchers are highly familiar with almost all of these fields, topics, and methods.  You have to be if you want to do innovative work.    I don't think it's necessary to be as hardcore as I was, but it can only benefit you to start early.  Just read at a pace that you find comfortable, and you'll be good.","human_ref_B":"What I tell undergrads who work with me: first open up an intro to psych book and figure out what topics (broadly) do and\/or don't interest you. Next, open up a higher level text book in that (those) subjects and do the same thing with those chapters. Once you have the field and area more narrowed down, read a couple of recent articles (use PsycINFO to find some). Pay attention to methods to see if you want to do those types of things. Pay attention to who is cited. At this point, you should have favorites. At this point you can focus your peer-reviewed readings more to the area you find most interesting.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1515.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"3o0rol","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"To PhD students in Psychology - How much peer reviewed research were you reading as an undergraduate? I am at the point in my undergraduate career where I am trying to narrow down my research interests to prepare for my senior thesis and the graduate school hunt. I was just wondering how much research I should be trying to read weekly to be on par with others who have gone to graduate school. Should I try and read one a day? One a week?  EDIT: Also, does anyone have tips on how I can organize what I have read to try and narrow down my interests? The graduate students in my labs have told me an excel document would probably be a good idea but I was wondering if anyone had any other tips and tricks for organizing, remembering, and utilizing the research that you read. Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cvt67bn","c_root_id_B":"cvt5hzx","created_at_utc_A":1444351935,"created_at_utc_B":1444350757,"score_A":9,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"What I tell undergrads who work with me: first open up an intro to psych book and figure out what topics (broadly) do and\/or don't interest you. Next, open up a higher level text book in that (those) subjects and do the same thing with those chapters. Once you have the field and area more narrowed down, read a couple of recent articles (use PsycINFO to find some). Pay attention to methods to see if you want to do those types of things. Pay attention to who is cited. At this point, you should have favorites. At this point you can focus your peer-reviewed readings more to the area you find most interesting.","human_ref_B":"If you plan on going to graduate school, learn to use a reference manager. I have hundreds of articles I may need to access on short notice and I can find them with a click of a button. I have many different folders for different topics in my field and most have sub folders to narrow things even further.   Personally, I use zotero but some prefer mendeley.  As far as undergrad readings, I was doing about one or two articles a day between classes and research labs. Definitely more during my senior thesis though.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1178.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3o0rol","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"To PhD students in Psychology - How much peer reviewed research were you reading as an undergraduate? I am at the point in my undergraduate career where I am trying to narrow down my research interests to prepare for my senior thesis and the graduate school hunt. I was just wondering how much research I should be trying to read weekly to be on par with others who have gone to graduate school. Should I try and read one a day? One a week?  EDIT: Also, does anyone have tips on how I can organize what I have read to try and narrow down my interests? The graduate students in my labs have told me an excel document would probably be a good idea but I was wondering if anyone had any other tips and tricks for organizing, remembering, and utilizing the research that you read. Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cvt5b22","c_root_id_B":"cvt5hzx","created_at_utc_A":1444350420,"created_at_utc_B":1444350757,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I read *a lot* of journal articles and books during undergrad.  As soon as you begin to understand your own field, you start to realize how little you actually know.  In general, there's so much across the discipline of psychology worth reading that you really can't start soon enough, IMO.   I study emotion, which intersects with so many subfields (cognitive, social, clinical, cultural, neuro), topics (language, perception, action, psychopathology, memory, psychophysiology, consciousness, etc.), and levels of analysis (imaging, single cell, lesion, behavioral, animal, etc.).   So it's vital that I read widely and deeply, and thus very helpful that I started early.  Indeed, the most prominent emotion researchers are highly familiar with almost all of these fields, topics, and methods.  You have to be if you want to do innovative work.    I don't think it's necessary to be as hardcore as I was, but it can only benefit you to start early.  Just read at a pace that you find comfortable, and you'll be good.","human_ref_B":"If you plan on going to graduate school, learn to use a reference manager. I have hundreds of articles I may need to access on short notice and I can find them with a click of a button. I have many different folders for different topics in my field and most have sub folders to narrow things even further.   Personally, I use zotero but some prefer mendeley.  As far as undergrad readings, I was doing about one or two articles a day between classes and research labs. Definitely more during my senior thesis though.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":337.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3o0rol","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"To PhD students in Psychology - How much peer reviewed research were you reading as an undergraduate? I am at the point in my undergraduate career where I am trying to narrow down my research interests to prepare for my senior thesis and the graduate school hunt. I was just wondering how much research I should be trying to read weekly to be on par with others who have gone to graduate school. Should I try and read one a day? One a week?  EDIT: Also, does anyone have tips on how I can organize what I have read to try and narrow down my interests? The graduate students in my labs have told me an excel document would probably be a good idea but I was wondering if anyone had any other tips and tricks for organizing, remembering, and utilizing the research that you read. Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cvt5b22","c_root_id_B":"cvt6thf","created_at_utc_A":1444350420,"created_at_utc_B":1444352956,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I read *a lot* of journal articles and books during undergrad.  As soon as you begin to understand your own field, you start to realize how little you actually know.  In general, there's so much across the discipline of psychology worth reading that you really can't start soon enough, IMO.   I study emotion, which intersects with so many subfields (cognitive, social, clinical, cultural, neuro), topics (language, perception, action, psychopathology, memory, psychophysiology, consciousness, etc.), and levels of analysis (imaging, single cell, lesion, behavioral, animal, etc.).   So it's vital that I read widely and deeply, and thus very helpful that I started early.  Indeed, the most prominent emotion researchers are highly familiar with almost all of these fields, topics, and methods.  You have to be if you want to do innovative work.    I don't think it's necessary to be as hardcore as I was, but it can only benefit you to start early.  Just read at a pace that you find comfortable, and you'll be good.","human_ref_B":"I studied international affairs so this could be a completely different standard, but I had to read about 15 - 20 peer-reviewed journal articles per week for my course readings during upper-year undergrad, plus more for the purpose of writing papers, etc.  I don't mean to hijack your thread, but I'm a bit surprised that psych would have any fewer than that.  Is it because the field is so broad that there are still more textbooks at that time?  As for organizing info, a citation manager might be helpful.  I used EndNote but it cost money.  Zotero is a free one and I assume there are others.  A good citation manager is like an online library that lets you attached PDFs and has a place to take notes or attach notes in a searchable format.  Then it plugs into Microsoft Word so you can easily add in-text citations and\/or footnotes and it will do the style (e.g. APA, Chicago, etc) for you automatically.  When you're writing a paper and remember you learned something from some random article two months ago, you can just enter a few words about the concept into your citation manager's search box and it will find the relevant citation for you.  Then you click \"Insert Citation\", enter the relevant page number, and it will drop it into your paper with proper formatting and all.  It's really useful for writing large papers like a senior thesis.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2536.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"8pscah","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Adjacent country clearly differ in many ways. Why is it that Northern states of the US have well-being indicators more similar to Canada than to Southern states of the US? Presumably \"cold weather\" is not the reason.","c_root_id_A":"e0e002d","c_root_id_B":"e0eh1w3","created_at_utc_A":1528562343,"created_at_utc_B":1528580319,"score_A":11,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"This is a study that attempts to show the existence of an \"honour culture\" in the US South, i.e. heightened social and biological responsiveness to threats to one's reputation: https:\/\/mypages.valdosta.edu\/mwhatley\/7670\/activity\/honor.htm  It has citations in its intro for the multiple explanations for differences between Northern and Southern US culture.  Pinker in The Better Angels Of Our Nature attributes the difference to patterns of migration of the first American colonists. The northern states mostly had people setting up farms with strict boundaries, e.g. for crops and farm animals. The southern states had shared open expanses for sheep, goats and horses, with subsistence hunting, and this resulted in a culture of honour because the shared land opened opportunities for exploitation and theft, whereas northern boundaried land reduced this. I read the passage years ago so I recommend checking out his book if interested.  Historical farming differences have been proven to result in significant psychological differences between people in different areas in China: https:\/\/www.npr.org\/sections\/thesalt\/2014\/05\/08\/310477497\/rice-theory-why-eastern-cultures-are-more-cooperative","human_ref_B":"On its face, the one glaring thing that the Southern states of the US have in common with Latin America is that their economy and social development were historically dominated by chattel slavery. Any response you get to this question that does not center slavery and Jim Crow and their legacy is like a production of Hamlet without the Prince.  The South has suffered long term consequences from the social structures put in place by the slave economy. In particular, the slave system wrought a particular political class and dominant ideology that was resistant to public investment.  You might take issue with Nancy Maclean's book, *Democracy in Chains* for many reasons, but this passage makes the case very well, referencing Robin Einhorn's *American Taxation, American Slavery**:*  >\u201cIt may surprise today\u2019s readers to know that in those days, Calhoun and like\\-minded large slave owners found themselves to be very much alone in their questioning of the legitimacy of taxation to advance public purposes. Such concerns did not arise where slavery was absent, the historian Robin Einhorn has shown, in the first careful study to examine state and local tax practices in early America. Einhorn found that where they were free to do so, voters regularly called on their governments to perform services they valued and elected candidates who pledged to provide them. They believed, as Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. later put it, that taxes are \u201cthe price we pay for civilization.\u201d   >   >What early free\\-state American voters liked about tax policy in their self\\-governing republic was that they, the people, decided by majority rule what they wanted their elected officials to do and how to tax for it. For these citizens, liberty meant having a say in questions of governance, being able to enter the public debate about the best way forward. Tracing such debates from the Colonial Era to the Civil War, Einhorn concluded, \u201cAmerican governments were more democratic, stronger, and more \u201d\u201ccompetent\u201d where slavery was negligible or nonexistent. They were \u201cmore aristocratic, weaker, and less competent\u201d where slavery dominated, as well as more likely to be captured by the wealthy few, who turned them to their own ends. Voters in free states wanted active government: they taxed themselves for public schools, roads to travel from place to place, canals to move their goods, and more. In the southern states, the yeomen of the backcountry, where slaves were fewer, often tried to get their governments to take up their concerns but found that \u201cplanters saw threats to their \u2018property\u2019 in any political action they did not control, even if the yeomen actually were demanding roads, schools, and other mundane services.\u201d The irony of all this is vast, as Einhorn points out: \u201cThe anti\\-government rhetoric that continues to saturate our political life is rooted in \\support for\\] slavery rather than liberty.\u201d The paralyzing suspicion of government so much on display today, that is to say, came originally not from average people but from elite extremists such as Calhoun who saw federal power as a menace to their system of racial slavery.\u201d  In addition to the ideological resistance to public investment resulting from the slave society, industrialization came late to the south because, until slaves were emancipated, the dominant forces of the southern economy had little incentive to diversify beyond the [lucrative agricultural sector. After slaves were emancipated, the exploitative sharecropping system kept black Americans trapped in poverty and unable to build wealth, and meanwhile slavery and sharecropping depressed the wages of Southern whites who found themselves in the position of competing with free labor.  And on top of all this, a tremendous amount of the South's wealth and assets were destroyed during the Civil War, and after the Civil War, the Reconstruction was quickly jettisoned by hostile interests within a decade of the end of the war.  It is truly mindboggling that someone would attempt to answer this question in terms of \"honor culture\" completely divorced from historical context of American slavery. To do so would seem to require either a profound ignorance of American history or a troubling ideological motivation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17976.0,"score_ratio":1.3636363636}
{"post_id":"3kparn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Is it fair to say that the United States is a patriarchal society? I teach a Humanities course and introduced the concept of phallic symbolism as we were discussing symbolism in film. A 20 year old male student challenged me by stating that there is no longer a male centered power structure in the US, so my use of the phallic imagery was mistaken.  I provided what I felt like were multiple instances to show that power in the US has historically been retained by the male population, which flows through to the current day. His response basically boils down to the fact that the current generation does not view society in the same way that \"my\" generation does (I am 40 by the way).   His biggest complaint is that I overlook the rapid change that has happened in technology and innovation over the past 15 years, which equalizes society. He used the cell phone as his example. Our world is now more interconnected than ever. He also stated that more women graduate college than men.  I don't feel as though 15 years of cell phone technology making the world a smaller place and allowing instantaneous communication negates the fact that our history has been dominated by a masculine hegemony.   I am doing a lot of re-reading of academic articles and Googling current non-academic sources, but I wanted to get opinions from others (and any great sources that you may have).","c_root_id_A":"cv052fx","c_root_id_B":"cv0ge3b","created_at_utc_A":1442163047,"created_at_utc_B":1442179908,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Hi, it looks like \/u\/redditfalcons has already given you a detailed response, I'd just like to refer you to the essay \"Patriarchy, the System\" by Allen Johnson, as I feel it's very relevant.  Here's the link:  https:\/\/www.google.com\/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http:\/\/www.umass.edu\/wost\/syllabi\/spring06\/johnson.pdf&ved=0CBwQFjAAahUKEwjG-aS2u_THAhWGGJIKHbIlB7E&usg=AFQjCNEB9Mum-JDydUef2r_JbTeIHGx35w&sig2=5qP-ksGSV2PTIsYGMp1hZw","human_ref_B":"Historically and currently, being born male was a huge advantage in almost every QOL and health statistic that is available. The amount of literature documenting this is as vast is it thorough. Great examples have already been provided. However being a young guy in my mid twenties that was skeptical of feminist theory for an (embarrassingly) long time  I kind of want to go a different direction.  The power social structures exert in many cases is either hidden or embedded into our perceptual and conceptual framework. This gives the basic things like language, sexual orientation, or even color perception the illusion of being universal and constant throughout ot time. We now know this to be untrue, social structures, and perception are as dynamic and varied as the individuals who form them.   The patriarchy of today is drastically different than the misogyny of the past. Many things we would considered horrific abuse and vulgar today were not only perfectly, legal but also socially acceptable in the 1950's and 60's. The feminist movements eliminated much of the \"low hanging fruit\" so to speak, like spousal rape and basic employment rights.  With many of the more obvious and flagrant abuses criminalized and\/or socially stigmatized and the huge progress women have made in the past 50 years it's easy to (incorrectly) assume that other problems or extensions of previous problems no longer exist. I am not trying legitimize or sympathize with this point of view but merely trying to understand it.   From my own non-scientific anecdotal experience it wasn't until an extremely patient and caring professor related feminism to the current events of our mutual interests in film, sports and hip-hop.   Sauce    http:\/\/www.sagepub.com\/sites\/default\/files\/upm-binaries\/45975_Chapter_3.pdf","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16861.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1x3sfw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why are trade unions still so unpopular? Even with income inequality being a hot button issue in many parts of the world and with the huge losses of jobs since the crisis in 2008, why are trade unions not being sought out? In the past, economic downturns and widespread inequality have led to booms in trade union numbers (as well as more radical political responses like the rise of socialism) but not this time.  I have two possible theories:  1) The lack of leadership. Trade unions are badly run by individuals that people don't flock to. All political movements now rely on personality politics enormously so this has become a major stumbling block.  2) Globalisation has neutered national level trade unions.  These are just guesses. I'd be really interested to hear if there was any serious recent research on this topic.","c_root_id_A":"cf7ybfc","c_root_id_B":"cf7u774","created_at_utc_A":1391634849,"created_at_utc_B":1391626800,"score_A":37,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Unions are in decline everywhere in the world and have been for the last several decades.    So on that basis, I'd discount your first thesis.   >In the large OECD economies most exposed to globalisation\u2014America, Britain, Germany, France and Japan\u2014unions\u2019 share of the workforce has dropped steadily to roughly half its level in 1980 (see chart below).  >Unions face what is, in effect, a threat to their business model. One problem is costs. Organising workforces is labour-intensive. Dues have to be high to cover fixed costs (particularly when these are shared among a shrinking pool of members). If he earns $12 per hour, a member of America\u2019s largest private-sector union, the Teamsters, must pay $360 in annual fees, for example.  >Members expect value in return: better rights, wages and working conditions. But unions are finding it harder to provide these. Since 1995, for example, the wage premium for British union members has fallen from 26% to 18%. That is partly because employers can threaten to move jobs abroad. American data from the 1980s and 1990s, and more recent research in Germany, show a correlation between foreign direct investment, outsourcing and lower union-wage premiums.  >The shift from manufacturing to services is another blow: workers who have honed a specific welding technique have more bargaining power than generalist computer programmers or hotel cleaners. Service workers are easy to replace when short-term contracts and casual work are common. They are harder to enlist, too. When work and capital flow freely across borders, battles against outsourcing put different national movements at odds. South Korean unionists threatened to \u201cwage a war\u201d in January 2012 when General Motors touted a deal with a German union to move production to Europe.  If you read the article, you can see there is only one exception to this rule - Scandinavian unions.   However, what makes Scandinavian unions different from the rest of the world is that they have essentially completely abandoned the central tenet of 20th century unionist ideology - class conflict.    IMO, the biggest problem that unions have today is that they're based around the ideology that there's a capitalist class and a working class and what is good for one is automatically bad for the other and vice versa.  What globalization is doing in the minds of workers is making them realize that their interests aren't class based, they're company based, specifically the company \/ industry they work for.  Strikes that cripple a business or industry in one nation, in the medium term means the destruction of the industry in that country.   So what does a union look like without meaningful strikes?    It looks a lot more like a specialized sub-industry booster group, one that focuses on workers.   Thus, Scandinavian unions.   Consider that there are basically now two auto industries in the US - one that's based in Detroit and unionized, and another that's based in the South, (the 'foreign' car companies relocating to the US) and non-unionized.  The non-unionized workforce gets better pay and benefits than the unionized one does, when you look at it as a whole, and that doesn't escape the attention of workers.","human_ref_B":"In the US and England they're unpopular. Thatcher and Reagan worked hard to dismantle them and we're feeling the effects today.   Some other countries like Germany and France are still ~~heavily~~ more unionized. Which is funny, because some people point to France as an example of union inefficiency, while ignoring how beneficial unions are to the German worker and economy.   http:\/\/en.dgb.de\/the-dgb\/++co++5091e362-2eb9-11df-48be-00188b4dc422  According to this source, unions in Germany are heavily centralized. National leadership is very much in charge and directs the course of the unions' decisions. They work closely with the federal government as well, to seek solutions in a more diplomatic way than striking.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8049.0,"score_ratio":7.4}
{"post_id":"1x3sfw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why are trade unions still so unpopular? Even with income inequality being a hot button issue in many parts of the world and with the huge losses of jobs since the crisis in 2008, why are trade unions not being sought out? In the past, economic downturns and widespread inequality have led to booms in trade union numbers (as well as more radical political responses like the rise of socialism) but not this time.  I have two possible theories:  1) The lack of leadership. Trade unions are badly run by individuals that people don't flock to. All political movements now rely on personality politics enormously so this has become a major stumbling block.  2) Globalisation has neutered national level trade unions.  These are just guesses. I'd be really interested to hear if there was any serious recent research on this topic.","c_root_id_A":"cf7u774","c_root_id_B":"cf85cud","created_at_utc_A":1391626800,"created_at_utc_B":1391649745,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"In the US and England they're unpopular. Thatcher and Reagan worked hard to dismantle them and we're feeling the effects today.   Some other countries like Germany and France are still ~~heavily~~ more unionized. Which is funny, because some people point to France as an example of union inefficiency, while ignoring how beneficial unions are to the German worker and economy.   http:\/\/en.dgb.de\/the-dgb\/++co++5091e362-2eb9-11df-48be-00188b4dc422  According to this source, unions in Germany are heavily centralized. National leadership is very much in charge and directs the course of the unions' decisions. They work closely with the federal government as well, to seek solutions in a more diplomatic way than striking.","human_ref_B":"> The case of labor is crucial, because it is the base of organization of any popular opposition to the rule of capital, and so it has to be dismantled. There\u2019s a tax on labor all the time. During the 1920s, the labor movement was virtually smashed by Wilson\u2019s Red Scare and other things. In the 1930s, it reconstituted and was the driving force of the New Deal, with the CIO organizing and so on. By the late 1930s, the business classes were organizing to try to react to this. They began, but couldn\u2019t do much during the war, because things were on hold, but immediately after the war it picked up with the Taft-Hartley Act and huge propaganda campaigns, which had massive effect. Over the years, the effort to undermine the unions and labor generally succeeded. By now, private-sector unionization is very low, partly because, since Reagan, government has pretty much told employers, \u201cYou know you can violate the laws, and we\u2019re not going to do anything about it.\u201d Under Clinton, NAFTA offered a method for employers to illegally undermine labor organizing by threatening to move enterprises to Mexico. A number of illegal operations by employers shot up at that time. What\u2019s left are private-sector unions, and they\u2019re under bipartisan attack.  Noam Chomsky  Short-form thesis (TL\/DR):  Unions have undergone a prolonged propaganda attack over the last 50-60 years and it has worked.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22945.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2b30do","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why are the Nordic countries social democratic countries? Hi! I was suggested to post here by \/r\/AskHistorians  I was thinking about this today. Why did the Nordic countries turn out Social democratic countries and liberal?  Is there something particular in their history that would explain this?","c_root_id_A":"cj1nn3c","c_root_id_B":"cj1l78s","created_at_utc_A":1405756919,"created_at_utc_B":1405747852,"score_A":10,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Look into the relation between Social Capital and the level of social security \/ welfare of a country. It appears there is a large correlation.  For example, if we believe what Putnam wrote in \"Bowling Alone\" then the level of Social Capital in the US has been declining for some decades now. And so has the level of social security \/ welfare and worker income.  Social Capital in nordic countries, Germany, Austria, etc. is continuously high. And even the \"conservative\" parties in these countries are mostly \"socialist\" when it comes to social security \/ welfare.  The connection between Social Capital and welfare makes sense, because if you have a high level of general trust, you will be more likely to spend your money (your taxes) to make sure that everybody has a minimum level of wellbeing. Or be in favor of everybody having a good work income, trusting that people will not be freeriding the system.  The lower the Social Capital, the less generalized trust is there. You don't trust that most people honestly need the money they get from the government, or try hard enough in their low income jobs to \"deserve\" a certain payment.","human_ref_B":"Also ask on \/r\/SocialDemocracy","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9067.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2b30do","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why are the Nordic countries social democratic countries? Hi! I was suggested to post here by \/r\/AskHistorians  I was thinking about this today. Why did the Nordic countries turn out Social democratic countries and liberal?  Is there something particular in their history that would explain this?","c_root_id_A":"cj1pe4f","c_root_id_B":"cj1pppx","created_at_utc_A":1405766791,"created_at_utc_B":1405768733,"score_A":4,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"There is a bit of ambiguity in your question, as \"social democratic countries\" can refer to different, but related, aspects. E.g. the presence of social democratic parties, the scope of social democratic policies, the support in the population for social democratic policies.   As others have already pointed out, Nordic countries are not *that* exceptional w.r.t. the power of social democratic political parties. What is more diverging, when compared to Ango-Saxon or Continental countries, is the comprehensive character and scope of their welfare state policies. Both in popular expressions and in research, that aspect is labeled as \"social democratic\", e.g. the \"social democratic welfare regime\" (Esping-Anderson, 1990).  One of the most successful theories for explaining why some countries have more \"broad\" welfare states is the Power Resource Theory (PRT), which claims that these differences are largely a **function of working class political mobilization** (Korpi, 1983; Huber and Stephens, 2001).   This causal dynamic is integrated in subsequent theories on welfare state development, such as the work of Esping-Anderson, which mixes PRT with (neo-)institutionalism. In a nutshell: when you have institutions such as specific welfare state programmes, they have their own institutional inertia, sustaining norms and practices that keep those institutions going, even if the original impetus (class political mobilization) is not that directly apparent anymore.  ----  Above is the general idea\/theory. I can't illustrate it exhaustively for Scandinavia---I'm not an historian, and not well-versed in the specific history of Scandinavian countries (I do for the socio-political history of Belgium), so I'm just describing the general pattern (copy-pasted from my reply in a previous thread on this topic):  To put it crudely, in Scandinavia you had **a lot of independent farmers, who joined up with the labourers in demanding a more universalistic welfare state**, while in continental, and esp. Anglo-Saxon countries, the farmers joined up more with the middle and upper classes, weakening the push of the labour movement for universalistic welfare state policies (and the redistribution needed to finance them).  **Scandinavia** is pretty unique as a region that, more peripheral to the British and continental industrial revolution, knew a strong development of an class of independent farmers through an uniquely largely peaceful transition to modern agriculture (in other countries there was more conflict with the traditional landowners).   This relatively large group of independent farmers, plus the growing (in size and assertiveness) working class was powerful enough to engage in a relatively peaceful\/democratic process of reforms towards the welfare state, a few decades before e.g. countries such as Belgium, where demands of the working class were largely resisted until after WOII.  The contrast with **Belgium** is informative. Here the farmers (esp. in the Northern, Flemish part) \"joined up\" with the (Flemish) capitalist class.   Leading members of the Catholic Party and Flemish bankers (e.g. Joris Helleputte, Frans Schollaert, etc.) shared a concern for the development of financial institutions in their region, and the risk that the large farming population would \"turn socialist\" (as happened in the previous decades in the Southern, more industrialized part of Belgium).  So the same group of people founded both the \"*Boerenbond*\" (\"Peasants Union\") and the \"*Volksbank*\" (\"Peoples Bank\") around 1890. These organisations provided credit and organised the small farmers population, and in a sense merged the (financial) interests of the peasants and the capitalist class in Belgium (at least in the Northern region).  Note that this is still true today! Not only is the *Boerenbond* a partner in the negotiations on social issues, dividing the traditional employers-vs-empoyees dynamic. Out of collaboration between the *Boerenbond* and the *Volksbank* grew the  KBC, on of the major companies of Belgium and the second largest IIRC bank\/insurer of the country. The *Boerenbond* and the Flemish banker families still form a shareholder-block that keeps tight control of of the holding.  ----  * Huber, E. and J.D. Stephens (2001), Development and Crisis of the Welfare State, Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press. * Esping-Anderson, G. (1990), Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism. Princeton University Press, New Jersey. * Korpi, W. (1983), The Democratic Class Struggle, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.","human_ref_B":"There's a working paper I just found called \"The Nordic Model: Conditions, Origins, Outcomes, Lessons\" (2009): http:\/\/www.hertie-school.org\/fileadmin\/images\/Downloads\/working_papers\/41.pdf.  Excerpt:  > Three factors are of major importance in characterizing the Scandinavian route of a peaceful process of general change from semi-feudal agrarian societies to affluent welfare state societies.  ... (1) The increasingly strong position of the peasantry during the preindustrial period which was connected with (2) The weakening position of the landlords and the power-holding aristocracy as a result of domestic crises and international conflicts thorough which Scandinavia (3) became a peripheral area in economic and political terms (Alestalo 1986, 11-12; Alestalo and Kuhnle 1987).  > The historical inheritance of the Nordic countries is that of fairly small class, income, and gender differences. The Scandinavian route towards the modern class structure was paved with the strong position of the peasantry, the weakening position of the landlords, and with the peaceful and rather easy access of the working class to the parliamentary system and to labour market negotiations. This inheritance is seen in small income differences and in the nonexistence of poverty (Ringen and Uusitalo 1992: 69-91; Fritzell & Lundberg 2005: 164-185). Moreover, Scandinavia is famous for her small gender differences...  > The beginnings of the modern Nordic welfare states can most meaningfully be traced to the last decades of the 19th century. As elsewhere in Europe, this development was at a general level associated with growing industrialization and urbanization, but also with the political innovation of large-scale social insurance schemes introduced in the German Reich during the 1880s (i.e. nation-building and state-formation)....  > Quite remarkably, the first major social insurance laws in the Nordic countries were passed at about the same time, in the course of five years, 1890-1895, in Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland, and Denmark as the only Nordic country introduced more than one law, altogether three, during the 1890s. Iceland introduced an old age pension (means-tested benefits) law, which was a moderation of the poor law, in 1890 (Olafsson 2005); Denmark a law offering benefits to \u2018respectable\u2019 old people in 1891, and a law on subsidies to voluntary sickness funds in 1892, and an employers\u2019 liability act for cases of industrial accidents in 1898; Sweden introduced subsidies to voluntary sickness funds in 1892; Norway passed an industrial accidents insurance law in 1894, where employers were obliged to finance insurance for their workers; and Finland introduced its first law on semi-compulsory industrial accident insurance in 1895. The striking simultaneousness in terms of timing cannot be depicted as a historical coincidence, and can only to some extent be explained by indicators of socio-economic development and political democratization. ...  Much more at the link. The basic idea is that social democracy thrives in Scandinavia partly because of political culture (emphasis on consensual governance, social cohesion) and partly due to the way history unfolded. There is also an element of \"path dependence\": Scandinavia started with social insurance programs pretty early, and that set the course for what came later.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1942.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"2b30do","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why are the Nordic countries social democratic countries? Hi! I was suggested to post here by \/r\/AskHistorians  I was thinking about this today. Why did the Nordic countries turn out Social democratic countries and liberal?  Is there something particular in their history that would explain this?","c_root_id_A":"cj1l78s","c_root_id_B":"cj1pppx","created_at_utc_A":1405747852,"created_at_utc_B":1405768733,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Also ask on \/r\/SocialDemocracy","human_ref_B":"There's a working paper I just found called \"The Nordic Model: Conditions, Origins, Outcomes, Lessons\" (2009): http:\/\/www.hertie-school.org\/fileadmin\/images\/Downloads\/working_papers\/41.pdf.  Excerpt:  > Three factors are of major importance in characterizing the Scandinavian route of a peaceful process of general change from semi-feudal agrarian societies to affluent welfare state societies.  ... (1) The increasingly strong position of the peasantry during the preindustrial period which was connected with (2) The weakening position of the landlords and the power-holding aristocracy as a result of domestic crises and international conflicts thorough which Scandinavia (3) became a peripheral area in economic and political terms (Alestalo 1986, 11-12; Alestalo and Kuhnle 1987).  > The historical inheritance of the Nordic countries is that of fairly small class, income, and gender differences. The Scandinavian route towards the modern class structure was paved with the strong position of the peasantry, the weakening position of the landlords, and with the peaceful and rather easy access of the working class to the parliamentary system and to labour market negotiations. This inheritance is seen in small income differences and in the nonexistence of poverty (Ringen and Uusitalo 1992: 69-91; Fritzell & Lundberg 2005: 164-185). Moreover, Scandinavia is famous for her small gender differences...  > The beginnings of the modern Nordic welfare states can most meaningfully be traced to the last decades of the 19th century. As elsewhere in Europe, this development was at a general level associated with growing industrialization and urbanization, but also with the political innovation of large-scale social insurance schemes introduced in the German Reich during the 1880s (i.e. nation-building and state-formation)....  > Quite remarkably, the first major social insurance laws in the Nordic countries were passed at about the same time, in the course of five years, 1890-1895, in Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland, and Denmark as the only Nordic country introduced more than one law, altogether three, during the 1890s. Iceland introduced an old age pension (means-tested benefits) law, which was a moderation of the poor law, in 1890 (Olafsson 2005); Denmark a law offering benefits to \u2018respectable\u2019 old people in 1891, and a law on subsidies to voluntary sickness funds in 1892, and an employers\u2019 liability act for cases of industrial accidents in 1898; Sweden introduced subsidies to voluntary sickness funds in 1892; Norway passed an industrial accidents insurance law in 1894, where employers were obliged to finance insurance for their workers; and Finland introduced its first law on semi-compulsory industrial accident insurance in 1895. The striking simultaneousness in terms of timing cannot be depicted as a historical coincidence, and can only to some extent be explained by indicators of socio-economic development and political democratization. ...  Much more at the link. The basic idea is that social democracy thrives in Scandinavia partly because of political culture (emphasis on consensual governance, social cohesion) and partly due to the way history unfolded. There is also an element of \"path dependence\": Scandinavia started with social insurance programs pretty early, and that set the course for what came later.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20881.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"2b30do","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why are the Nordic countries social democratic countries? Hi! I was suggested to post here by \/r\/AskHistorians  I was thinking about this today. Why did the Nordic countries turn out Social democratic countries and liberal?  Is there something particular in their history that would explain this?","c_root_id_A":"cj1pe4f","c_root_id_B":"cj1l78s","created_at_utc_A":1405766791,"created_at_utc_B":1405747852,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"There is a bit of ambiguity in your question, as \"social democratic countries\" can refer to different, but related, aspects. E.g. the presence of social democratic parties, the scope of social democratic policies, the support in the population for social democratic policies.   As others have already pointed out, Nordic countries are not *that* exceptional w.r.t. the power of social democratic political parties. What is more diverging, when compared to Ango-Saxon or Continental countries, is the comprehensive character and scope of their welfare state policies. Both in popular expressions and in research, that aspect is labeled as \"social democratic\", e.g. the \"social democratic welfare regime\" (Esping-Anderson, 1990).  One of the most successful theories for explaining why some countries have more \"broad\" welfare states is the Power Resource Theory (PRT), which claims that these differences are largely a **function of working class political mobilization** (Korpi, 1983; Huber and Stephens, 2001).   This causal dynamic is integrated in subsequent theories on welfare state development, such as the work of Esping-Anderson, which mixes PRT with (neo-)institutionalism. In a nutshell: when you have institutions such as specific welfare state programmes, they have their own institutional inertia, sustaining norms and practices that keep those institutions going, even if the original impetus (class political mobilization) is not that directly apparent anymore.  ----  Above is the general idea\/theory. I can't illustrate it exhaustively for Scandinavia---I'm not an historian, and not well-versed in the specific history of Scandinavian countries (I do for the socio-political history of Belgium), so I'm just describing the general pattern (copy-pasted from my reply in a previous thread on this topic):  To put it crudely, in Scandinavia you had **a lot of independent farmers, who joined up with the labourers in demanding a more universalistic welfare state**, while in continental, and esp. Anglo-Saxon countries, the farmers joined up more with the middle and upper classes, weakening the push of the labour movement for universalistic welfare state policies (and the redistribution needed to finance them).  **Scandinavia** is pretty unique as a region that, more peripheral to the British and continental industrial revolution, knew a strong development of an class of independent farmers through an uniquely largely peaceful transition to modern agriculture (in other countries there was more conflict with the traditional landowners).   This relatively large group of independent farmers, plus the growing (in size and assertiveness) working class was powerful enough to engage in a relatively peaceful\/democratic process of reforms towards the welfare state, a few decades before e.g. countries such as Belgium, where demands of the working class were largely resisted until after WOII.  The contrast with **Belgium** is informative. Here the farmers (esp. in the Northern, Flemish part) \"joined up\" with the (Flemish) capitalist class.   Leading members of the Catholic Party and Flemish bankers (e.g. Joris Helleputte, Frans Schollaert, etc.) shared a concern for the development of financial institutions in their region, and the risk that the large farming population would \"turn socialist\" (as happened in the previous decades in the Southern, more industrialized part of Belgium).  So the same group of people founded both the \"*Boerenbond*\" (\"Peasants Union\") and the \"*Volksbank*\" (\"Peoples Bank\") around 1890. These organisations provided credit and organised the small farmers population, and in a sense merged the (financial) interests of the peasants and the capitalist class in Belgium (at least in the Northern region).  Note that this is still true today! Not only is the *Boerenbond* a partner in the negotiations on social issues, dividing the traditional employers-vs-empoyees dynamic. Out of collaboration between the *Boerenbond* and the *Volksbank* grew the  KBC, on of the major companies of Belgium and the second largest IIRC bank\/insurer of the country. The *Boerenbond* and the Flemish banker families still form a shareholder-block that keeps tight control of of the holding.  ----  * Huber, E. and J.D. Stephens (2001), Development and Crisis of the Welfare State, Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press. * Esping-Anderson, G. (1990), Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism. Princeton University Press, New Jersey. * Korpi, W. (1983), The Democratic Class Struggle, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.","human_ref_B":"Also ask on \/r\/SocialDemocracy","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18939.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"yv2x4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What about Muhommad, Bhudda or Moses? Thanks to DepthHub I read the beautiful writeup on the debate about Jesus' existence. Very interesting.  But what about the leaders of the world's other largest religions? Do we have historical proof that they existed or not?   No, I'm agnostic so I'm not pulling for one particular outcome or the other, just curious.","c_root_id_A":"c5z2u0y","c_root_id_B":"c5z4btu","created_at_utc_A":1346008869,"created_at_utc_B":1346015088,"score_A":8,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Mohammed definitely existed. Early Muslims documented things a lot better\/more extensively which I like to think is due to the fact that they established the caliphate and government while early Christians only had bits and pieces of scripture, as well as letters which were standardized later on. Although it's anything but objective, the Hadith contains a wealth of information about Muhammad from his disdain of bad breath to the way he laughed.   Buddha on the other hand isn't really a person. Siddhartha Gautama Buddha is probably who you're referring to, and there's not much solid evidence to go on (the exact date and place of his birth and death is debated) but people seem to agree that he existed.","human_ref_B":"Hey! I posted that to DepthHub and it now comprises about 1\/3 of my total link karma! (not that karma matters to anyone...) :)  You may be interested in another post of mine about the historical Buhddah it links to this paper which has a lot of answers. I posted that because of this post I read concerning that same topic. which prompted me to look it up.   Utilizing Google Scholar, I found this paper on the historical Muhammad, it's pretty dry, but the best I can do.   Learnings Ahoy!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6219.0,"score_ratio":1.375}
{"post_id":"zedua","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Based on the history of nation-states, which nation-state of present do you think is closest to non-existence and which furthest? I was wondering this today when I was walking to work. I know every opinion will be 100% speculation, but hopefully based on strong evidence. Would a country like Japan likely endure geopolitical changes because of isolation and strong nationalism and remain a nation-state for many, many years? Would Spain be one of the closest to non-existence based on its many internal separatist political movements?  Thanks for your input!","c_root_id_A":"c63xiui","c_root_id_B":"c63wa6d","created_at_utc_A":1346875351,"created_at_utc_B":1346870814,"score_A":10,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"If we are talking about changing from it's current state, I would say;  Closest Syria. Furthest Norway.  Syria being in complete turmoil at the moment. When it falls, which kinda feels inevitable, it has many different religious and ethnic groups that will struggle for power. Doesn't seem too far fetched that the country would fall apart.  Norway is one of the richest countries in the world per capita, very high standard of living, always high on different surveys of most content, least corruption and so on. Also it's not an EU member state, so it wouldn't be part if the EU transformed into something resembling the United states.","human_ref_B":"am...... Belgium?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4537.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"zedua","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Based on the history of nation-states, which nation-state of present do you think is closest to non-existence and which furthest? I was wondering this today when I was walking to work. I know every opinion will be 100% speculation, but hopefully based on strong evidence. Would a country like Japan likely endure geopolitical changes because of isolation and strong nationalism and remain a nation-state for many, many years? Would Spain be one of the closest to non-existence based on its many internal separatist political movements?  Thanks for your input!","c_root_id_A":"c6400tv","c_root_id_B":"c63wa6d","created_at_utc_A":1346884607,"created_at_utc_B":1346870814,"score_A":10,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The Maldives have a pretty good chance of becoming non-existent - not because of any internal strife, but because they will be submerged by rising sea levels.","human_ref_B":"am...... Belgium?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13793.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1051o1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"If America put a halt on all exports from China and was forced to make its own goods what would happen to both economies? What would happen on a geopolitical scale? Someone brought up the idea in philosophy that we should not import goods from any country that does not have similar labor laws to the U.S. My first reaction was, \"China is going to have a shit\". What would really happen if there  was some sort of movement that banned all imports from countries that in fact did not have labor laws similar to the U.S and we did end up banning all imports from China, India, etc. Also, what would happen geopolitical?","c_root_id_A":"c6aj1og","c_root_id_B":"c6ahodt","created_at_utc_A":1348079976,"created_at_utc_B":1348074800,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Doing that would destroy the prosperity of millions, maybe tens of millions, chinese factory workers, tossing them back onto their farms.  It would be one of the largest humanitarian disasters in history.","human_ref_B":"It's worth checking out the Rand Corporation's paper on Conflict With China: Prospects, Consequences and Strategies for Deterrence, published in 2011.  From the abstract:  *This paper presents some scenarios that, if they were to come to pass, could result in military conflict with China over the next thirty years. ... The far-reaching specter of economic mayhem that would be a consequence of any Sino-American conflict, in effect a form of mutual assured economic destruction, also acts as a powerful mutual deterrent.*","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5176.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"zgjoz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Has there ever been any research into the ability to feel 'true love', and its prevalence, in the general population? I was reading the comment section in this article where a young woman had this to say:  >Gentlemen, I am a woman in my late 20s and I truly feel that there is a lot of romance in this article. I also believe that \"love\" is a very complex emotion. I love my family and many of my friends, however I have trouble believing in \"true love,\" that thing that fairy tales are made of. I know that some day I will get married, and I know that it will be a careful, pragmatic decision based of the acceptability of my partner as a parent, however, I also know that I will take into consideration how we get along. I may not end up feeling that \"spark\" of \"true love,\" but loving them as a friend is a must. I would rather have Will than Ross any day of the week!  Love is obviously a complex emotion, but from personal experience I would argue that true, romantic love (beyond the initial infatuation) is like orgasm: when you've felt it, you *know* you've felt it.   However, I've also encountered many accounts from people (including significantly older people) who seem to be convinced that 'true love' exists in the same realm as Sasquatch and Santa Claus. While I'm aware that sociopaths lack the ability to feel emotionally attached to others, this seems to be much more prevalent among normal, caring individuals then I would at first suspect.  So what do the social sciences have to say about this difficult-to-answer question? Are some people naturally, or due to upbringing, incapable of feeling romantic love? Or have they just not met Mr.\/Ms. Right yet?","c_root_id_A":"c64j5sy","c_root_id_B":"c64pln9","created_at_utc_A":1346974544,"created_at_utc_B":1347002941,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I think in order to conduct any kind of study like this, one would really need to define love. Quantify it. Which in my opinion would be pretty much impossible.       You could look at the idea of love across different cultures. See what kinds of affection people give to one another- between friends, between family, and between sexual partners. Look at what words people use- I believe some cultures don't have a word for 'love' as the Western world knows it. Stuff like that. Maybe you could get a better idea if the concept of love is a human universal or not.","human_ref_B":"Try reading works by Helen Fisher. She's trained as an anthropologist in evolution of emotions and gender differences, but has done a significant amount of work on the topic of romantic love and approaches the issue from a lot of disciplines, such as evolutionary anthro, sociology, and neuroscience.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":28397.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"zgjoz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Has there ever been any research into the ability to feel 'true love', and its prevalence, in the general population? I was reading the comment section in this article where a young woman had this to say:  >Gentlemen, I am a woman in my late 20s and I truly feel that there is a lot of romance in this article. I also believe that \"love\" is a very complex emotion. I love my family and many of my friends, however I have trouble believing in \"true love,\" that thing that fairy tales are made of. I know that some day I will get married, and I know that it will be a careful, pragmatic decision based of the acceptability of my partner as a parent, however, I also know that I will take into consideration how we get along. I may not end up feeling that \"spark\" of \"true love,\" but loving them as a friend is a must. I would rather have Will than Ross any day of the week!  Love is obviously a complex emotion, but from personal experience I would argue that true, romantic love (beyond the initial infatuation) is like orgasm: when you've felt it, you *know* you've felt it.   However, I've also encountered many accounts from people (including significantly older people) who seem to be convinced that 'true love' exists in the same realm as Sasquatch and Santa Claus. While I'm aware that sociopaths lack the ability to feel emotionally attached to others, this seems to be much more prevalent among normal, caring individuals then I would at first suspect.  So what do the social sciences have to say about this difficult-to-answer question? Are some people naturally, or due to upbringing, incapable of feeling romantic love? Or have they just not met Mr.\/Ms. Right yet?","c_root_id_A":"c64pln9","c_root_id_B":"c64pg2o","created_at_utc_A":1347002941,"created_at_utc_B":1347001891,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Try reading works by Helen Fisher. She's trained as an anthropologist in evolution of emotions and gender differences, but has done a significant amount of work on the topic of romantic love and approaches the issue from a lot of disciplines, such as evolutionary anthro, sociology, and neuroscience.","human_ref_B":">Love is obviously a complex emotion, but from personal experience I would argue that true, romantic love (beyond the initial infatuation) is like orgasm: when you've felt it, you *know* you've felt it.  This is what I heard about orgasms, too. As a result, it was *years* before I realized that what I was having was orgasms. I was convinced that because I didn't *know* that they were orgasms, they must not be. It wasn't until I read a description of the physiological effects of orgasm (heightened arousal, involuntary contractions, then rapid cessation of arousal) that I actually understood what the word meant.   In my experience, love is like orgasm. They're both genuinely enjoyable things to undergo, and we're driven to great lengths to seek them out. But they're not the euphoric, otherworldly, life-changing experience they're often described as; they're just very pleasant. You still have a whole life outside these experiences.  It's also worth noting that love (in my experience) is also like orgasm in that it can often feel quite different between experiences. One orgasm does not feel exactly the same as another. Likewise, being in love with one person does not feel the same as being in love with another. And, indeed, being in love with the *same* person can feel very different from day to day. There are days you feel utterly obsessed, days you feel content and perfect, days you wonder about other experiences you're missing, days that everything they do feels novel and like you're discovering them all over again, days that feel like you've always known each other and like you're finishing each other's sentences, and a dozen other emotions besides.  Basically, love is not a singular emotion. It is a very general term for a *lot* of different emotions we feel toward our romantic partners. I honestly don't even know what \"true love\" is supposed to mean; as far as I can tell, it's simply romantic attachment for a person (and all the varied emotions that entails) that is particularly stable and long-lasting. I'm not sure if all people are capable of this, though certainly a lot of people appear to be.   But if we define \"true love\" as a never-ending twitterpated euphoria\u2014then no, I don't think true love is possible for mentally healthy human beings. Such a thing would have been severely damaging to our ancestors, I suspect; they couldn't spend *all* their time gazing dreamily into each other's eyes when they had food to eat, children to raise, and predators to avoid.  I think this would be a very hard thing to study without a solid working definition.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1050.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"334ulb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why is the rate of obesity higher among the poor? Wouldn't you expect the opposite? (I'm talking about in the West, obviously)  And what explains the differing rates of obesity among various races?  Also, the rate of obesity tends to be about the same for men and women, and this holds true when looking at individual races.   One strange thing, however, is that among African-americans, the rate of obesity is significantly higher among women. Why would this be?","c_root_id_A":"cqhl2kl","c_root_id_B":"cqhl68z","created_at_utc_A":1429462886,"created_at_utc_B":1429463076,"score_A":2,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"This study just confirms the notion, that higher income means lower poverty Gains in income during early childhood are associated with decreases in BMI z scores among children in the United States. http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/25877494","human_ref_B":"This study supports one of the main ideas about obesity, that a lot of it is because of poor environment. That is \" Among the built environment variables, a poorer street connectivity and a more prominent presence of fast-food restaurants are associated with a higher obesity risk\" Built environment and obesity by urbanicity in the U.S. http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/25864019","labels":0,"seconds_difference":190.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"334ulb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why is the rate of obesity higher among the poor? Wouldn't you expect the opposite? (I'm talking about in the West, obviously)  And what explains the differing rates of obesity among various races?  Also, the rate of obesity tends to be about the same for men and women, and this holds true when looking at individual races.   One strange thing, however, is that among African-americans, the rate of obesity is significantly higher among women. Why would this be?","c_root_id_A":"cqhl2kl","c_root_id_B":"cqhwa6v","created_at_utc_A":1429462886,"created_at_utc_B":1429483682,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This study just confirms the notion, that higher income means lower poverty Gains in income during early childhood are associated with decreases in BMI z scores among children in the United States. http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/25877494","human_ref_B":"I would recommend reading Weighing In by Julie Guthman. Here is a short and useful review. Contrary to the popular consensus, calorie consumption and exercise have no ability to explain the historical and demographic uptick in obesity after the 1980s. One likely explanation is that obesity is a hormone disease caused by endocrine disruptors, toxic chemicals which are used in virtually every industrial process. Demographic obesity trends likely reflect something about exposure to these chemicals.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20796.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"wn48o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"[Economics] How true are these statements about the US economy and the Federal Reserve? I have recently come across these statements made by an avid Ron Paul supporter on the subject of economics, an area in which I have little experience. I was wondering if anyone could tell me how true these statements are.   >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite. America, after the first central bank was abolished, managed without one until Woodrow Wilson was manipulated into signing the Federal Reserve act by global bankers in 1913, at a time when only 3 congressmen were available to vote.The constitution forbids a central bank. Get rid of it  >Since 1913 the Fed has devalued the dollar by 98%. Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth created by the Federal Reserve to allow fractional reserve lending. Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.","c_root_id_A":"c5exed8","c_root_id_B":"c5esfjx","created_at_utc_A":1342473224,"created_at_utc_B":1342454481,"score_A":18,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"As a libertarian, let me try to qualify some of these statements, at risk of adding some sort of balance to this discussion.  >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite.  To understand why central banking and fractional reserve lending are bad requires a good understanding of Austrian Business Cycle Theory.  In a nutshell, artificial credit causes entrepreneurs to over-invest in capital goods because interest rates do not reflect the actual preference of consumers to save for the future.  These malinvestments are revealed in the bust phase of the boom-bust cycle.  A central bank doesn't \"smooth out\" business cycles, it exacerbates and enlarges them by providing even more fuel for the bubble phase.  There's a lot of resources out there about this, I'm sure they do a better job than I can.  >America, after the first central bank was abolished, ...  It is true Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson were staunch opponents against central banking.  They had seen the levels of debt the Bank of England had run up, and were committed to not inflicting the same thing to America.  Regarding the actual history of events surrounding the Federal Reserve Act, it was shady passage indeed.  A good book about the Federal Reserve's creation is The Creature From Jekyl Island.  >Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth  These are pretty vague terms.  It's better to say that gold is a better store of value than fiat paper, but it is not a better medium of exchange.    >Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  I haven't seen a \"mathematical\" proof to this one.  What is \"mathematically true\" is that our debt-based fiat system *requires* an exponentially increasing money supply.  That might be as benign as 2% nominal inflation, or as bad as hyperinflation.  It's up to the central bank's management of the money supply.  However, the system is not stable under 0% inflation or any amount of deflation.  If you also consider Cantillon effects of inflation, that is its tendency to distort the economy toward the sources of the new money (i.e. politically connected and financial sector), then wealth will concentrate in the those sectors and starve the real economy of resources.  If the central bank follows this with even more credit creation, as it is doing now with ZIRP and QE, we might conclude that the system is indeed headed for inevitable collapse.  Not surprisingly, ZIRP and QE have so far failed to restore unemployment to pre-2008 levels.  But in any case, this is not a mathematical \"proof\" of collapse, it's just an argument that central bank policy doesn't work.  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.  This is a bunch of nonsense.  What *is* true that he hints at is that hyperinflation cannot happen *without* a central bank.  So gold, if nothing else, is at least a protection against hyperinflation.","human_ref_B":"Economies have had boom and bust cycles way before the creation of any central bank. The FED's job (among other things) is to make sure that those bust cycles aren't as bad as they could potentially be. Had the fed not acted as it did in 2008, we would have faced soup kitchen lines longer than the ones during the Great Depression. Having an independent, stable central bank is a social good.   The world runs on fractional reserve banking and that's a good thing! It stimulates the economy and increases growth and wealth. Now, you may argue that it creates money out of nowhere, but what it actually brings about is deflation. This means that your money now has more buying power than it did before. A little inflation is good because it encourages spending instead of sitting on your pile of money, it also makes sure that there isn't too much deflation; too much of either one is a bad thing.  As for the gold standard: gold is, in itself, a commodity. That means it's worth as much as laws of supply and demand say it's worth. It's subject to bubbles driven by what people are willing to pay for it. But it's a bad currency because, simply, it's completely detached from output. Here's a simple model for understanding why. Imagine a closed economy with 100 people and a fixed supply of gold. Say output over 25 years doubles (a perfectly reasonable assumption if that economy grows 3% annually), but the supply of gold stays fixed. Now you've got twice as much output chasing the same amount of gold, so prices deflate (by half). Wages do the same thing. Now imagine for a second that you took out a loan in year 1 for 5 pounds of gold. Now, in year 25, the nominal value of your principal is the same, but the real value of the loan is double, plus interest. Given that kind of deflation, no one's going to be too willing to borrow in gold. Instead, they'll spend as little of their gold as possible and sit on it, waiting for it to appreciate. But if everyone's doing that, then where does the demand for goods and services come from? The simple answer is: from nowhere. Instead the gold standard discourages credit, depresses demand, and makes the money supply contingent on something as random and unpredictable as the amount of gold that is mined in a given year.  Central banks like the Fed do away with that problem by tethering the supply of credit to the output of the economy. If output goes up 3%, the money supply should roughly keep up. If extra credit is needed to stave off a panic, the Fed can provide liquidity (like it did in 1987 and 2008). If there's too much credit swirling around and too much money chasing too few goods and services, the Fed can cut the supply of credit by raising interest rates (like Paul Volcker did in the early 80's). Can the Fed screw up? Of course. It's run by people, but compared with the vagaries of the gold standard, it's an infinitely better approach.  Edit: Spelling.  Edit2: Could the libertarian downvote brigade explain why I'm being downvoted?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18743.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"wn48o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"[Economics] How true are these statements about the US economy and the Federal Reserve? I have recently come across these statements made by an avid Ron Paul supporter on the subject of economics, an area in which I have little experience. I was wondering if anyone could tell me how true these statements are.   >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite. America, after the first central bank was abolished, managed without one until Woodrow Wilson was manipulated into signing the Federal Reserve act by global bankers in 1913, at a time when only 3 congressmen were available to vote.The constitution forbids a central bank. Get rid of it  >Since 1913 the Fed has devalued the dollar by 98%. Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth created by the Federal Reserve to allow fractional reserve lending. Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.","c_root_id_A":"c5exed8","c_root_id_B":"c5erm7c","created_at_utc_A":1342473224,"created_at_utc_B":1342450917,"score_A":18,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"As a libertarian, let me try to qualify some of these statements, at risk of adding some sort of balance to this discussion.  >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite.  To understand why central banking and fractional reserve lending are bad requires a good understanding of Austrian Business Cycle Theory.  In a nutshell, artificial credit causes entrepreneurs to over-invest in capital goods because interest rates do not reflect the actual preference of consumers to save for the future.  These malinvestments are revealed in the bust phase of the boom-bust cycle.  A central bank doesn't \"smooth out\" business cycles, it exacerbates and enlarges them by providing even more fuel for the bubble phase.  There's a lot of resources out there about this, I'm sure they do a better job than I can.  >America, after the first central bank was abolished, ...  It is true Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson were staunch opponents against central banking.  They had seen the levels of debt the Bank of England had run up, and were committed to not inflicting the same thing to America.  Regarding the actual history of events surrounding the Federal Reserve Act, it was shady passage indeed.  A good book about the Federal Reserve's creation is The Creature From Jekyl Island.  >Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth  These are pretty vague terms.  It's better to say that gold is a better store of value than fiat paper, but it is not a better medium of exchange.    >Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  I haven't seen a \"mathematical\" proof to this one.  What is \"mathematically true\" is that our debt-based fiat system *requires* an exponentially increasing money supply.  That might be as benign as 2% nominal inflation, or as bad as hyperinflation.  It's up to the central bank's management of the money supply.  However, the system is not stable under 0% inflation or any amount of deflation.  If you also consider Cantillon effects of inflation, that is its tendency to distort the economy toward the sources of the new money (i.e. politically connected and financial sector), then wealth will concentrate in the those sectors and starve the real economy of resources.  If the central bank follows this with even more credit creation, as it is doing now with ZIRP and QE, we might conclude that the system is indeed headed for inevitable collapse.  Not surprisingly, ZIRP and QE have so far failed to restore unemployment to pre-2008 levels.  But in any case, this is not a mathematical \"proof\" of collapse, it's just an argument that central bank policy doesn't work.  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.  This is a bunch of nonsense.  What *is* true that he hints at is that hyperinflation cannot happen *without* a central bank.  So gold, if nothing else, is at least a protection against hyperinflation.","human_ref_B":"Do they provide sources for any of these claims?  Bonus points for sources that *aren't* the Von Mises Institute.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22307.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"wn48o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"[Economics] How true are these statements about the US economy and the Federal Reserve? I have recently come across these statements made by an avid Ron Paul supporter on the subject of economics, an area in which I have little experience. I was wondering if anyone could tell me how true these statements are.   >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite. America, after the first central bank was abolished, managed without one until Woodrow Wilson was manipulated into signing the Federal Reserve act by global bankers in 1913, at a time when only 3 congressmen were available to vote.The constitution forbids a central bank. Get rid of it  >Since 1913 the Fed has devalued the dollar by 98%. Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth created by the Federal Reserve to allow fractional reserve lending. Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.","c_root_id_A":"c5equlw","c_root_id_B":"c5exed8","created_at_utc_A":1342447123,"created_at_utc_B":1342473224,"score_A":3,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I unfortunately am not informed enough about the general ideas around what you are asking to answer your question, but as an additional question: Why is gold considered to be a more solid form of wealth than paper or electronic currency? [Gold] seems to me to be more stable in the long run (over decades or centuries)[than paper\/electronic currency] but [gold] still just as arbitrary a definition of worth as other forms of currency. In both cases by accepting the currency you are essentially saying \"I have faith that people will continue to value this in the future.\"  edit for clarification","human_ref_B":"As a libertarian, let me try to qualify some of these statements, at risk of adding some sort of balance to this discussion.  >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite.  To understand why central banking and fractional reserve lending are bad requires a good understanding of Austrian Business Cycle Theory.  In a nutshell, artificial credit causes entrepreneurs to over-invest in capital goods because interest rates do not reflect the actual preference of consumers to save for the future.  These malinvestments are revealed in the bust phase of the boom-bust cycle.  A central bank doesn't \"smooth out\" business cycles, it exacerbates and enlarges them by providing even more fuel for the bubble phase.  There's a lot of resources out there about this, I'm sure they do a better job than I can.  >America, after the first central bank was abolished, ...  It is true Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson were staunch opponents against central banking.  They had seen the levels of debt the Bank of England had run up, and were committed to not inflicting the same thing to America.  Regarding the actual history of events surrounding the Federal Reserve Act, it was shady passage indeed.  A good book about the Federal Reserve's creation is The Creature From Jekyl Island.  >Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth  These are pretty vague terms.  It's better to say that gold is a better store of value than fiat paper, but it is not a better medium of exchange.    >Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  I haven't seen a \"mathematical\" proof to this one.  What is \"mathematically true\" is that our debt-based fiat system *requires* an exponentially increasing money supply.  That might be as benign as 2% nominal inflation, or as bad as hyperinflation.  It's up to the central bank's management of the money supply.  However, the system is not stable under 0% inflation or any amount of deflation.  If you also consider Cantillon effects of inflation, that is its tendency to distort the economy toward the sources of the new money (i.e. politically connected and financial sector), then wealth will concentrate in the those sectors and starve the real economy of resources.  If the central bank follows this with even more credit creation, as it is doing now with ZIRP and QE, we might conclude that the system is indeed headed for inevitable collapse.  Not surprisingly, ZIRP and QE have so far failed to restore unemployment to pre-2008 levels.  But in any case, this is not a mathematical \"proof\" of collapse, it's just an argument that central bank policy doesn't work.  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.  This is a bunch of nonsense.  What *is* true that he hints at is that hyperinflation cannot happen *without* a central bank.  So gold, if nothing else, is at least a protection against hyperinflation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26101.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"wn48o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"[Economics] How true are these statements about the US economy and the Federal Reserve? I have recently come across these statements made by an avid Ron Paul supporter on the subject of economics, an area in which I have little experience. I was wondering if anyone could tell me how true these statements are.   >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite. America, after the first central bank was abolished, managed without one until Woodrow Wilson was manipulated into signing the Federal Reserve act by global bankers in 1913, at a time when only 3 congressmen were available to vote.The constitution forbids a central bank. Get rid of it  >Since 1913 the Fed has devalued the dollar by 98%. Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth created by the Federal Reserve to allow fractional reserve lending. Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.","c_root_id_A":"c5excol","c_root_id_B":"c5exed8","created_at_utc_A":1342473032,"created_at_utc_B":1342473224,"score_A":2,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"What sort of sources were you after, sources from the FED? from the government? from the government paid for academic institutions?   You could read The Creature from Jekyll Island by Edward Griffin. He as nothing to do with the mises institute and I don't even think he is a market anarchist.   http:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/The-Creature-Jekyll-Island-Federal\/dp\/0912986212\/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1342472886&sr=8-1  You could also watch the documentary series Money Masters or Money as Debt, both available on Youtube, they have nothing to do with the mises institute.   There are many books on the fed and the great depression and central banking that would agree with the points that you have requested sources for.   If you compare a dollar today relative to gold and other commodities you will see that the dollar has lost value by 98% since 1913. Central banks actually aim for inflation, they want to devalue\/debase the currency, you will find that in their mission statement on their website. It is no mystery. You even have arrogant so called economists commenting in this thread how great inflation is and how much we need central banking. haha.","human_ref_B":"As a libertarian, let me try to qualify some of these statements, at risk of adding some sort of balance to this discussion.  >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite.  To understand why central banking and fractional reserve lending are bad requires a good understanding of Austrian Business Cycle Theory.  In a nutshell, artificial credit causes entrepreneurs to over-invest in capital goods because interest rates do not reflect the actual preference of consumers to save for the future.  These malinvestments are revealed in the bust phase of the boom-bust cycle.  A central bank doesn't \"smooth out\" business cycles, it exacerbates and enlarges them by providing even more fuel for the bubble phase.  There's a lot of resources out there about this, I'm sure they do a better job than I can.  >America, after the first central bank was abolished, ...  It is true Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson were staunch opponents against central banking.  They had seen the levels of debt the Bank of England had run up, and were committed to not inflicting the same thing to America.  Regarding the actual history of events surrounding the Federal Reserve Act, it was shady passage indeed.  A good book about the Federal Reserve's creation is The Creature From Jekyl Island.  >Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth  These are pretty vague terms.  It's better to say that gold is a better store of value than fiat paper, but it is not a better medium of exchange.    >Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  I haven't seen a \"mathematical\" proof to this one.  What is \"mathematically true\" is that our debt-based fiat system *requires* an exponentially increasing money supply.  That might be as benign as 2% nominal inflation, or as bad as hyperinflation.  It's up to the central bank's management of the money supply.  However, the system is not stable under 0% inflation or any amount of deflation.  If you also consider Cantillon effects of inflation, that is its tendency to distort the economy toward the sources of the new money (i.e. politically connected and financial sector), then wealth will concentrate in the those sectors and starve the real economy of resources.  If the central bank follows this with even more credit creation, as it is doing now with ZIRP and QE, we might conclude that the system is indeed headed for inevitable collapse.  Not surprisingly, ZIRP and QE have so far failed to restore unemployment to pre-2008 levels.  But in any case, this is not a mathematical \"proof\" of collapse, it's just an argument that central bank policy doesn't work.  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.  This is a bunch of nonsense.  What *is* true that he hints at is that hyperinflation cannot happen *without* a central bank.  So gold, if nothing else, is at least a protection against hyperinflation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":192.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"wn48o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"[Economics] How true are these statements about the US economy and the Federal Reserve? I have recently come across these statements made by an avid Ron Paul supporter on the subject of economics, an area in which I have little experience. I was wondering if anyone could tell me how true these statements are.   >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite. America, after the first central bank was abolished, managed without one until Woodrow Wilson was manipulated into signing the Federal Reserve act by global bankers in 1913, at a time when only 3 congressmen were available to vote.The constitution forbids a central bank. Get rid of it  >Since 1913 the Fed has devalued the dollar by 98%. Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth created by the Federal Reserve to allow fractional reserve lending. Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.","c_root_id_A":"c5erm7c","c_root_id_B":"c5esfjx","created_at_utc_A":1342450917,"created_at_utc_B":1342454481,"score_A":10,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Do they provide sources for any of these claims?  Bonus points for sources that *aren't* the Von Mises Institute.","human_ref_B":"Economies have had boom and bust cycles way before the creation of any central bank. The FED's job (among other things) is to make sure that those bust cycles aren't as bad as they could potentially be. Had the fed not acted as it did in 2008, we would have faced soup kitchen lines longer than the ones during the Great Depression. Having an independent, stable central bank is a social good.   The world runs on fractional reserve banking and that's a good thing! It stimulates the economy and increases growth and wealth. Now, you may argue that it creates money out of nowhere, but what it actually brings about is deflation. This means that your money now has more buying power than it did before. A little inflation is good because it encourages spending instead of sitting on your pile of money, it also makes sure that there isn't too much deflation; too much of either one is a bad thing.  As for the gold standard: gold is, in itself, a commodity. That means it's worth as much as laws of supply and demand say it's worth. It's subject to bubbles driven by what people are willing to pay for it. But it's a bad currency because, simply, it's completely detached from output. Here's a simple model for understanding why. Imagine a closed economy with 100 people and a fixed supply of gold. Say output over 25 years doubles (a perfectly reasonable assumption if that economy grows 3% annually), but the supply of gold stays fixed. Now you've got twice as much output chasing the same amount of gold, so prices deflate (by half). Wages do the same thing. Now imagine for a second that you took out a loan in year 1 for 5 pounds of gold. Now, in year 25, the nominal value of your principal is the same, but the real value of the loan is double, plus interest. Given that kind of deflation, no one's going to be too willing to borrow in gold. Instead, they'll spend as little of their gold as possible and sit on it, waiting for it to appreciate. But if everyone's doing that, then where does the demand for goods and services come from? The simple answer is: from nowhere. Instead the gold standard discourages credit, depresses demand, and makes the money supply contingent on something as random and unpredictable as the amount of gold that is mined in a given year.  Central banks like the Fed do away with that problem by tethering the supply of credit to the output of the economy. If output goes up 3%, the money supply should roughly keep up. If extra credit is needed to stave off a panic, the Fed can provide liquidity (like it did in 1987 and 2008). If there's too much credit swirling around and too much money chasing too few goods and services, the Fed can cut the supply of credit by raising interest rates (like Paul Volcker did in the early 80's). Can the Fed screw up? Of course. It's run by people, but compared with the vagaries of the gold standard, it's an infinitely better approach.  Edit: Spelling.  Edit2: Could the libertarian downvote brigade explain why I'm being downvoted?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3564.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"wn48o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"[Economics] How true are these statements about the US economy and the Federal Reserve? I have recently come across these statements made by an avid Ron Paul supporter on the subject of economics, an area in which I have little experience. I was wondering if anyone could tell me how true these statements are.   >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite. America, after the first central bank was abolished, managed without one until Woodrow Wilson was manipulated into signing the Federal Reserve act by global bankers in 1913, at a time when only 3 congressmen were available to vote.The constitution forbids a central bank. Get rid of it  >Since 1913 the Fed has devalued the dollar by 98%. Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth created by the Federal Reserve to allow fractional reserve lending. Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.","c_root_id_A":"c5esfjx","c_root_id_B":"c5equlw","created_at_utc_A":1342454481,"created_at_utc_B":1342447123,"score_A":15,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Economies have had boom and bust cycles way before the creation of any central bank. The FED's job (among other things) is to make sure that those bust cycles aren't as bad as they could potentially be. Had the fed not acted as it did in 2008, we would have faced soup kitchen lines longer than the ones during the Great Depression. Having an independent, stable central bank is a social good.   The world runs on fractional reserve banking and that's a good thing! It stimulates the economy and increases growth and wealth. Now, you may argue that it creates money out of nowhere, but what it actually brings about is deflation. This means that your money now has more buying power than it did before. A little inflation is good because it encourages spending instead of sitting on your pile of money, it also makes sure that there isn't too much deflation; too much of either one is a bad thing.  As for the gold standard: gold is, in itself, a commodity. That means it's worth as much as laws of supply and demand say it's worth. It's subject to bubbles driven by what people are willing to pay for it. But it's a bad currency because, simply, it's completely detached from output. Here's a simple model for understanding why. Imagine a closed economy with 100 people and a fixed supply of gold. Say output over 25 years doubles (a perfectly reasonable assumption if that economy grows 3% annually), but the supply of gold stays fixed. Now you've got twice as much output chasing the same amount of gold, so prices deflate (by half). Wages do the same thing. Now imagine for a second that you took out a loan in year 1 for 5 pounds of gold. Now, in year 25, the nominal value of your principal is the same, but the real value of the loan is double, plus interest. Given that kind of deflation, no one's going to be too willing to borrow in gold. Instead, they'll spend as little of their gold as possible and sit on it, waiting for it to appreciate. But if everyone's doing that, then where does the demand for goods and services come from? The simple answer is: from nowhere. Instead the gold standard discourages credit, depresses demand, and makes the money supply contingent on something as random and unpredictable as the amount of gold that is mined in a given year.  Central banks like the Fed do away with that problem by tethering the supply of credit to the output of the economy. If output goes up 3%, the money supply should roughly keep up. If extra credit is needed to stave off a panic, the Fed can provide liquidity (like it did in 1987 and 2008). If there's too much credit swirling around and too much money chasing too few goods and services, the Fed can cut the supply of credit by raising interest rates (like Paul Volcker did in the early 80's). Can the Fed screw up? Of course. It's run by people, but compared with the vagaries of the gold standard, it's an infinitely better approach.  Edit: Spelling.  Edit2: Could the libertarian downvote brigade explain why I'm being downvoted?","human_ref_B":"I unfortunately am not informed enough about the general ideas around what you are asking to answer your question, but as an additional question: Why is gold considered to be a more solid form of wealth than paper or electronic currency? [Gold] seems to me to be more stable in the long run (over decades or centuries)[than paper\/electronic currency] but [gold] still just as arbitrary a definition of worth as other forms of currency. In both cases by accepting the currency you are essentially saying \"I have faith that people will continue to value this in the future.\"  edit for clarification","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7358.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"wn48o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"[Economics] How true are these statements about the US economy and the Federal Reserve? I have recently come across these statements made by an avid Ron Paul supporter on the subject of economics, an area in which I have little experience. I was wondering if anyone could tell me how true these statements are.   >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite. America, after the first central bank was abolished, managed without one until Woodrow Wilson was manipulated into signing the Federal Reserve act by global bankers in 1913, at a time when only 3 congressmen were available to vote.The constitution forbids a central bank. Get rid of it  >Since 1913 the Fed has devalued the dollar by 98%. Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth created by the Federal Reserve to allow fractional reserve lending. Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.","c_root_id_A":"c5equlw","c_root_id_B":"c5erm7c","created_at_utc_A":1342447123,"created_at_utc_B":1342450917,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I unfortunately am not informed enough about the general ideas around what you are asking to answer your question, but as an additional question: Why is gold considered to be a more solid form of wealth than paper or electronic currency? [Gold] seems to me to be more stable in the long run (over decades or centuries)[than paper\/electronic currency] but [gold] still just as arbitrary a definition of worth as other forms of currency. In both cases by accepting the currency you are essentially saying \"I have faith that people will continue to value this in the future.\"  edit for clarification","human_ref_B":"Do they provide sources for any of these claims?  Bonus points for sources that *aren't* the Von Mises Institute.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3794.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"wn48o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"[Economics] How true are these statements about the US economy and the Federal Reserve? I have recently come across these statements made by an avid Ron Paul supporter on the subject of economics, an area in which I have little experience. I was wondering if anyone could tell me how true these statements are.   >It does not take a genius to\ufeff figure out the the Fed is bad, and benefits only the elite. America, after the first central bank was abolished, managed without one until Woodrow Wilson was manipulated into signing the Federal Reserve act by global bankers in 1913, at a time when only 3 congressmen were available to vote.The constitution forbids a central bank. Get rid of it  >Since 1913 the Fed has devalued the dollar by 98%. Gold is real wealth, not theoretical wealth created by the Federal Reserve to allow fractional reserve lending. Any Fiat currency is mathematically bound to\ufeff collapse  >A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth, not by the regulations of a central bank. Only god can make something out of nothing. Fiat currencies a prone to inflation and hyper inflation. Money needs\ufeff to be an I owe you for gold, not gold itself.","c_root_id_A":"c5excol","c_root_id_B":"c5eyqsk","created_at_utc_A":1342473032,"created_at_utc_B":1342478622,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"What sort of sources were you after, sources from the FED? from the government? from the government paid for academic institutions?   You could read The Creature from Jekyll Island by Edward Griffin. He as nothing to do with the mises institute and I don't even think he is a market anarchist.   http:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/The-Creature-Jekyll-Island-Federal\/dp\/0912986212\/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1342472886&sr=8-1  You could also watch the documentary series Money Masters or Money as Debt, both available on Youtube, they have nothing to do with the mises institute.   There are many books on the fed and the great depression and central banking that would agree with the points that you have requested sources for.   If you compare a dollar today relative to gold and other commodities you will see that the dollar has lost value by 98% since 1913. Central banks actually aim for inflation, they want to devalue\/debase the currency, you will find that in their mission statement on their website. It is no mystery. You even have arrogant so called economists commenting in this thread how great inflation is and how much we need central banking. haha.","human_ref_B":">A nations wealth should be determined by it's value in resources, trade and business worth  These are important concepts. It is also important to recognize the distinction between stocks of value and flows from ongoing production. You can own land where you can grow food, or even a silo full of grain. However, the majority of what we consume on a daily basis was recently produced by someone else in trade for something recently produced by us in one form or another. If you live off of stock dividends, then that business is producing something useful. If you own a large farm, the food it produces from the sun and the labor you employ is an ongoing affair.  This should be a way to get at \"you can't eat gold\" without it only seeming like a cute statement. Gold itself is not \"real wealth\" it is a proxy. (It does have real industrial uses now, but that actually serves to make it less suitable as a proxy for value) By convention gold has often been used as a convenient medium of exchange and store of wealth. However, as a store of wealth, it only loosely represents value. You can have 10% of all the gold, and it represents less if there is less total value in the world economy. Furthermore, if you owned 100% of all gold, you wouldn't necessarily be rich, because everyone else would choose to use different forms of money to conduct their business. It only gains value as long as the convention persists.  There are reasons to advocate on behalf of precious metal as a foundation for monetary systems. For example, they may constrain some forms of economic mismanagement. Arguments that it is more \"real\" than other legal tender, do not have merit.  The person making the argument, talked about notions of real value, right after he called gold real wealth, so he sounds a little confused. Just as printing more money does not make citizens any wealthier, a gold discovery does not make them wealthier. In fact it is a waste for large numbers of healthy otherwise productive people to waste their time digging around in streams, just as it is a waste to use heavy printing presses and paper.  A careful central bank will attempt to predictably increase the monetary base at some rate commensurate with the growth of the economy. Trying too much monetary policy magic is just as dangerous as a large monetary imbalance between countries of similar wealth and production rates having wildly disparate quantities of gold reserves.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5590.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"vw9su2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Questions about Gender Genuine question(s). I\u2019m coming from a place of trying to understand and considering the accepted consensus that gender is a social construct I have no better place to ask than a community dedicated to social science.  Gender is a social construct, and one\u2019s gender identity is not the exact same as gender roles, gender expressions\/mannerisms, etc. For example, one can be a cis-female but adopt roles and mannerisms typically associated with manhood and masculinity. Their gender identity is congruent with their sex but still recognize and accept the \u2018incongruent\u2019 behaviors and roles. If it\u2019s easier, think of the cis-female tomboy.  Now, correct me if I\u2019m wrong here, but I also understand that in order to be trans one must experience gender incongruence which characterizes someone as transgender but differentiates someone from cisgender. (If GI is not needed, then is hostility towards individuals labels as trans trenders justified?)  Now this is where I get confused and seek the aid references of this community for guidance.   If an individual who has GI aims to transition into the opposite gender via surgery, wouldn\u2019t this strongly imply that there is a sort of understanding to be had about what makes someone (x) gender beyond roles and expressions such as mannerisms? Does this reinforce the notion that in order to completely feel like the gender your affirm yourself to be that it comes from an idea that is separate and distinguished from the mannerism, expressions, and roles that are associated with it?   I guess what i\u2019m asking is\u2026 if gender (identity) is nothing more than a social construct then why is it that individual who aim to transition not feel as fully the gender they affirms themselves to be until they are fully realized not just in their physical appearance but in totality what they perceive to understand as man or woman?","c_root_id_A":"ifquf2q","c_root_id_B":"ifs643c","created_at_utc_A":1657559752,"created_at_utc_B":1657578496,"score_A":9,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"**Gender identity itself is a composite of multiple \"sub-identities\":**  * Intrinsic Gender Identity * Gender Role * Gender Expression  According to Serano, these 3 forms of gender identity exist independently of each other.  > Hypatia , Volume 24 , Issue 3: Special Issue: Transgender Studies and Feminism: Theory, Politics, and Gendered Realities , Summer 2009 , pp. 200 - 205 > DOI: https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1111\/j.1527-2001.2009.01052_1.x  Within our daily lives, we can witness this in form of women performing traditionally male labours, while still identifying as woman (Intrinsic Identity and Gender Role clashing). We can witness this in various subcultures (The concept of \"tomboys\" and \"butch lesbians\", a woman who dresses and behaves as a man traditionally should) (Identity and Expression clashing).   The idea of \"I'm a man, so I don't wear a skirt\" pertains not to gender identity, but gender expression. Potentially, to your gender role as a way to advertise what role in society you fulfil by dressing the part. However, being a man does not dictate you cannot wear a skirt.    **For Intrinsic gender identity itself, I'll depart from social science and onto neuropsychology.**    *Burke et al (2017)* found was found that after controlling for sexual\/romantic orientation, culture, etc... there exist a difference between transgender people (with physical dysphoria, before transitioning medically) and cisgender people when it comes to neural structures.  These differences manifest primarily in neuro-motor regions, regions corresponding for sensory processing. Basically, places where the brain communicates with the body.   The differences are that these regions appear \"underdeveloped\", as if not being exercised.  It's not \"male brain\" or \"female brain\", it's \"my brain doesn't get the responses from my body that it expects\" vs \"my body looks and behaves like my brain expects.\"  *Khorashad et al (2021)* later investigated these findings, finding that these neural differences disappear upon taking gender-confirming cross-sex hormonal therapy. Or at the very least, minimize.   Meaning, it appears that the weakened connections become exercised and reinforced.  This explains why trans people who have medically transitioned no longer exhibit these patterns, and also tracks with reports of gender dysphoria easing over time even though the person does not culturally\/socially pass.  **Two methods of action are proposed:**  a) body feels and behaves as the brain's \"internal blueprint\" expects it to: hormone levels are correct, the proper genes are expressed now, the right proteins and shape and function.  Just like doing exercises reinforces neural pathways, so does the body responding like the brain expects it to does the same.  b) Hormones directly bind with hormone receptors in the brain, encouraging the formation of new neural structures.  B would explain what some trans people call \"hormonal\/endocrine dysphoria.\" Or rather the euphoria from being on hormones even before physical changes set in.  The two mechanisms proposed are not exclusive, but yet to be determined.   > Burke, S.M., Manzouri, A.H. & Savic, I. Structural connections in the brain in relation to gender identity and sexual orientation. Sci Rep 7, 17954 (2017). https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1038\/s41598-017-17352-8 >  > Khorashad, B.S., Manzouri, A., Feusner, J.D. et al. Cross-sex hormone treatment and own-body perception: behavioral and brain connectivity profiles. Sci Rep 11, 2799 (2021). https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1038\/s41598-020-80687-2","human_ref_B":"**Gender** (the socio-anthropological concept) is a social construct, that does not however mean that an individual's gender **identity** (the psychological concept) is a social construct.   Cultural anthropologist Nanda (2014) provides a short definition of gender with reference to sex which should be sufficient for further discussion:  >Sex refers to the biologically differentiated status of male or female. It includes anatomic sex, particularly the genitals, and also secondary and invisible characteristics such as genes and hormones. **Gender refers to the social, cultural, and psychological constructions that are imposed on the biological differences of sex.**  **Gender** is a social construction insofar that gender categories and the meanings assigned to them (the content of gender, its representations, etc.) are both historically and culturally contingent as a result of interactive and communicative processes within a given social context (e.g., a society)^(1). Hence, not only there exist societies with gender systems which recognize more than two genders, but there is also heterogeneity among two gender systems (e.g., what it means to be a \"man\" or a \"woman\" is not strictly identical from culture to culture).  Depending on the theoretical and conceptual framework, **gender identity** is either a facet of individual identity or a category of social identity (of which we have multiple). Overall, it usually refers to a person's self-concept with reference to gender - how someone experiences and perceives themselves in terms of being a \"man,\" a \"woman,\" or other. (Other concepts such as gender *role* and *expression* are related, but separate.)  ---  Binary systems predominate in Euro-American societies, with people (usually) being assigned a gender at birth (boy\/girl) based upon their external sex structures^(2), namely their genitals: a baby with a penis and scrotal sac is male and therefore a boy (later a man), and a baby with a clitoris and vagina is female and therefore a girl (later a woman).  Most develop gender identities which are in accord with their assigned sex\/gender^(3). They are **cisgender**. In contrast, there are **transgender** people whose gender identities are incongruent with their assigned sex\/gender. There are also **gender diverse** people whose identities in some shape or form do not conform to the traditional binaries. Briefly, regarding cisgender \"tomboys\": in principle, these are girls whose gender identity is in accord with their assigned gender\/sex , but who reject the traditional norms concerning how girls should behave, preferring to behave as expected from boys: they are **gender nonconforming**.  Further research is needed on gender identity development, but it is currently understood that social, psychological, and biological processes are involved, which interact in complex manners, and that children have a sense of gender already at an early age (Martin & Ruble, 2004; Bussey, 2011; G\u00fclg\u00f6z et al., 2019). Concerning social processes, a common mistake is to confuse *socialization*, i.e., the process through which people are taught and internalize the norms and ideas of a given society, with *social construction*.  ---  Transgender people may experience significant distress due to the aforementioned incongruence and be diagnosed with gender dysphoria. To quote the official website of the American Psychiatric Association (APA):  >**Gender dysphoria:** A concept designated in the DSM-5 as clinically significant distress or impairment related to a strong desire to be of another gender, which may include desire to change primary and\/or secondary sex characteristics. Not all transgender or gender diverse people experience dysphoria.  I believe it is important to stress the following: **not all transgender people experience gender dysphoria.** Likewise, I believe I should also stress that what makes gender dysphoria a psychiatric condition is the *distress* associated with the incongruence one's gender identity and their assigned sex\/gender. Gender dysphoria can be a reason to pursue medical and surgical venues to achieve gender affirmation, but it is neither necessary nor sufficient.  Note that \"gender dysphoria\" is not classified in the latest edition of the World Health Organization (WHO)'s ICD-11, the other major internationally recognized diagnostic manual. Instead, the manual includes \"Gender Incongruence\" which instead of being classified among \"mental health disorders\" is currently found in a chapter dedicated to \"sexual health.\" This is part of wider trends toward de-pathologizing and de-stigmatizing transgender people (which has involved the APA, too). According to Reed et al. (2016):  >**In most countries, the provision of health services requires the diagnosis of a health condition that is specifically related to those services. If no diagnosis were available to identify transgender people who were seeking related health services, these services would likely become even less available than they are now. Thus, the Working Group on Sexual Disorders and Sexual Health has recommended retaining gender incongruence diagnoses in the ICD\u201011 to preserve access to health services**, but moving these categories out of the ICD\u201011 chapter on Mental and Behavioural Disorders (see Table 2). After consideration of a variety of placement options, these categories have been provisionally included in the proposed new ICD\u201011 chapter on Conditions Related to Sexual Health.  ---  Transgender people may seek to pursue multiple kinds of gender affirmation. Besides social affirmation and legal affirmation, they may also seek medical and surgical affirmation. The point of affirmation is to be recognized and acknowledged as the gender with which they identify. This desire can include the wish to possess a body which aligns with their gender identity. Fundamentally speaking, this is not different from the many ways in which each of us (regardless of gender identity) take care of our bodies and accessorize and modify our bodies^(4) to match the images we have of ourselves or wish for ourselves, and at the same time, to have others to recognize the same image.  Be aware that there have been multiple linguistic shifts surrounding these concepts which have accompanied greater understanding of these topics, and also reflect changes in how scholars and practitioners comprehend the relevant populations. For example, as documented by philosopher Shannon Dea (2016), the older term \"trans**sexual**\", which has strong ties to psychiatry but also carries sexual connotations, has - for multiple reasons - lost favor over the years. Currently, the mainstream term is \"trans**gender**.\" Similarly, terms such as \"male-to-female\" and \"female-to-male\" have lost favor, replaced by terms such as \"trans woman\" or \"transfeminine\" and \"trans man\" or \"transmasculine.\"  The current mainstream approach to providing support and care to transgender people is based upon the \"**gender** affirmative model.\" Transgender people not only may seek to receive \"**gender**-affirming hormones\" but also to pursue \"**gender** affirmation surgery\" or \"**gender** confirmation surgery.\" These two terms are gradually replacing what is widely known as \"**sex** reassignment surgery.\" In short, not only have there been shifts toward depathologizing the experiences of transgender people, but also to more precisely describe their experiences, who they are, and label the nature of their needs.  ---  ^(1) ^(For that matter, there are philosophers, e.g. Butler, and anthropologists, e.g. Nanda, who have challenged the classic tradition of distinguishing sex and gender by virtue of the latter being a social construct: sex as a concept is *also* a social construction. Sex is not a monolithic concept, but rather a variable concept with multiple definitions which are more or less relevant in different contexts. Likewise, the correspondence between sex and gender is more complex than implied by the classic distinction.)   ^(2) ^(One of many ways of conceptualizing sex. For illustration, according to Poston [2019], there are five biological definitions of sex: based on chromosomes, based on gonads, based on hormones, based on internal sex characteristics, and based on external sex characteristics. But there are other definitions which are also widely used. For evolutionary biologists, sex is based upon the production of gametes. Only some of these are either relevant or typically used in medical settings or in daily life.)  ^(3) ^(The difference is moot given that being categorized as male\/female comes with being categorized as boy\/girl or man\/woman, at least in Euro-American societies.)  ^(4) ^(In surgical and non-surgical ways. Haircuts, tanning, tattoos, colored eye contacts, fitness, plastic surgery, ...)  ---  Bussey, K. (2011). Gender identity development. In S. J. Schwartz, K. Luyckx, V. L. Vignoles (Eds.), Handbook of identity theory and research (pp. 603-628). Springer.  Dea, S. (2016). Beyond the binary: Thinking about sex and gender. Broadview Press.  G\u00fclg\u00f6z, S., Glazier, J. J., Enright, E. A., Alonso, D. J., Durwood, L. J., Fast, A. A., ... & Olson, K. R. (2019). Similarity in transgender and cisgender children\u2019s gender development. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116(49), 24480-24485.  Martin, C. L., & Ruble, D. (2004). Children's search for gender cues: Cognitive perspectives on gender development. Current directions in psychological science, 13(2), 67-70.  Nanda, S. (2014). Gender diversity: Crosscultural variations. Waveland Press.  Poston, D. L. (2019). Age and Sex. In D. L. Poston (Ed.), Handbook of population (pp. 19-49). Springer.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18744.0,"score_ratio":1.1111111111}
{"post_id":"vw9su2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Questions about Gender Genuine question(s). I\u2019m coming from a place of trying to understand and considering the accepted consensus that gender is a social construct I have no better place to ask than a community dedicated to social science.  Gender is a social construct, and one\u2019s gender identity is not the exact same as gender roles, gender expressions\/mannerisms, etc. For example, one can be a cis-female but adopt roles and mannerisms typically associated with manhood and masculinity. Their gender identity is congruent with their sex but still recognize and accept the \u2018incongruent\u2019 behaviors and roles. If it\u2019s easier, think of the cis-female tomboy.  Now, correct me if I\u2019m wrong here, but I also understand that in order to be trans one must experience gender incongruence which characterizes someone as transgender but differentiates someone from cisgender. (If GI is not needed, then is hostility towards individuals labels as trans trenders justified?)  Now this is where I get confused and seek the aid references of this community for guidance.   If an individual who has GI aims to transition into the opposite gender via surgery, wouldn\u2019t this strongly imply that there is a sort of understanding to be had about what makes someone (x) gender beyond roles and expressions such as mannerisms? Does this reinforce the notion that in order to completely feel like the gender your affirm yourself to be that it comes from an idea that is separate and distinguished from the mannerism, expressions, and roles that are associated with it?   I guess what i\u2019m asking is\u2026 if gender (identity) is nothing more than a social construct then why is it that individual who aim to transition not feel as fully the gender they affirms themselves to be until they are fully realized not just in their physical appearance but in totality what they perceive to understand as man or woman?","c_root_id_A":"ifqqdol","c_root_id_B":"ifquf2q","created_at_utc_A":1657558185,"created_at_utc_B":1657559752,"score_A":6,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"So, a good book to start with is Categories we Live By by \u00c0sta.  Her's is, I think, a quite persuasive view in social ontology (the field of philosophy concerned with things like gender).      In broad strokes, the consensus goes roughly as follows: gender categories are socially constructed, and you will be ascribed gender by members of your social group insofar as they see you as conforming to the broad idea of what that gender involves (so far, Butler).  This can admit of a lot of variation.  There are lots of ways to get recognised as a man, and if you're at the margins of what people recognise as 'man', people might be a little shitty to you.  Separately from this, lots of people seem to have a subjective experience of fittingness regarding gender categories.  Young boys who are mistaken for girls on the phone get annoyed, teenagers who later transition sometimes feel very disoriented during puberty, adults who transition later in life often report that there had been something wrong their whole life but they could never place it because it was everywhere.  The relationship between this subjective experience and the intersubjective social category is hotly debated, but some kind of reference relation at least has to hold.  This is pretty much where consensus runs out.        So, bodies.  Different people engaged in medically assisted transition for different reasons.  Some trans people report a feeling of ill-fit that includes their body, but some report it only to do with social roles.  People who transition medically do so for lots of reasons, including feelings of at-homeness in their body, a desire to cue others to assign them their target gender, and many others.  There isn't really an academic consensus that I'm aware of on this, and importantly, there doesn't seem to be consensus among trans people as to how to understand these experiences.  Probably lots of different and slightly contradictory things are happening with different people.","human_ref_B":"**Gender identity itself is a composite of multiple \"sub-identities\":**  * Intrinsic Gender Identity * Gender Role * Gender Expression  According to Serano, these 3 forms of gender identity exist independently of each other.  > Hypatia , Volume 24 , Issue 3: Special Issue: Transgender Studies and Feminism: Theory, Politics, and Gendered Realities , Summer 2009 , pp. 200 - 205 > DOI: https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1111\/j.1527-2001.2009.01052_1.x  Within our daily lives, we can witness this in form of women performing traditionally male labours, while still identifying as woman (Intrinsic Identity and Gender Role clashing). We can witness this in various subcultures (The concept of \"tomboys\" and \"butch lesbians\", a woman who dresses and behaves as a man traditionally should) (Identity and Expression clashing).   The idea of \"I'm a man, so I don't wear a skirt\" pertains not to gender identity, but gender expression. Potentially, to your gender role as a way to advertise what role in society you fulfil by dressing the part. However, being a man does not dictate you cannot wear a skirt.    **For Intrinsic gender identity itself, I'll depart from social science and onto neuropsychology.**    *Burke et al (2017)* found was found that after controlling for sexual\/romantic orientation, culture, etc... there exist a difference between transgender people (with physical dysphoria, before transitioning medically) and cisgender people when it comes to neural structures.  These differences manifest primarily in neuro-motor regions, regions corresponding for sensory processing. Basically, places where the brain communicates with the body.   The differences are that these regions appear \"underdeveloped\", as if not being exercised.  It's not \"male brain\" or \"female brain\", it's \"my brain doesn't get the responses from my body that it expects\" vs \"my body looks and behaves like my brain expects.\"  *Khorashad et al (2021)* later investigated these findings, finding that these neural differences disappear upon taking gender-confirming cross-sex hormonal therapy. Or at the very least, minimize.   Meaning, it appears that the weakened connections become exercised and reinforced.  This explains why trans people who have medically transitioned no longer exhibit these patterns, and also tracks with reports of gender dysphoria easing over time even though the person does not culturally\/socially pass.  **Two methods of action are proposed:**  a) body feels and behaves as the brain's \"internal blueprint\" expects it to: hormone levels are correct, the proper genes are expressed now, the right proteins and shape and function.  Just like doing exercises reinforces neural pathways, so does the body responding like the brain expects it to does the same.  b) Hormones directly bind with hormone receptors in the brain, encouraging the formation of new neural structures.  B would explain what some trans people call \"hormonal\/endocrine dysphoria.\" Or rather the euphoria from being on hormones even before physical changes set in.  The two mechanisms proposed are not exclusive, but yet to be determined.   > Burke, S.M., Manzouri, A.H. & Savic, I. Structural connections in the brain in relation to gender identity and sexual orientation. Sci Rep 7, 17954 (2017). https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1038\/s41598-017-17352-8 >  > Khorashad, B.S., Manzouri, A., Feusner, J.D. et al. Cross-sex hormone treatment and own-body perception: behavioral and brain connectivity profiles. Sci Rep 11, 2799 (2021). https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1038\/s41598-020-80687-2","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1567.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"vw9su2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Questions about Gender Genuine question(s). I\u2019m coming from a place of trying to understand and considering the accepted consensus that gender is a social construct I have no better place to ask than a community dedicated to social science.  Gender is a social construct, and one\u2019s gender identity is not the exact same as gender roles, gender expressions\/mannerisms, etc. For example, one can be a cis-female but adopt roles and mannerisms typically associated with manhood and masculinity. Their gender identity is congruent with their sex but still recognize and accept the \u2018incongruent\u2019 behaviors and roles. If it\u2019s easier, think of the cis-female tomboy.  Now, correct me if I\u2019m wrong here, but I also understand that in order to be trans one must experience gender incongruence which characterizes someone as transgender but differentiates someone from cisgender. (If GI is not needed, then is hostility towards individuals labels as trans trenders justified?)  Now this is where I get confused and seek the aid references of this community for guidance.   If an individual who has GI aims to transition into the opposite gender via surgery, wouldn\u2019t this strongly imply that there is a sort of understanding to be had about what makes someone (x) gender beyond roles and expressions such as mannerisms? Does this reinforce the notion that in order to completely feel like the gender your affirm yourself to be that it comes from an idea that is separate and distinguished from the mannerism, expressions, and roles that are associated with it?   I guess what i\u2019m asking is\u2026 if gender (identity) is nothing more than a social construct then why is it that individual who aim to transition not feel as fully the gender they affirms themselves to be until they are fully realized not just in their physical appearance but in totality what they perceive to understand as man or woman?","c_root_id_A":"ifquf2q","c_root_id_B":"ifqq7e0","created_at_utc_A":1657559752,"created_at_utc_B":1657558119,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"**Gender identity itself is a composite of multiple \"sub-identities\":**  * Intrinsic Gender Identity * Gender Role * Gender Expression  According to Serano, these 3 forms of gender identity exist independently of each other.  > Hypatia , Volume 24 , Issue 3: Special Issue: Transgender Studies and Feminism: Theory, Politics, and Gendered Realities , Summer 2009 , pp. 200 - 205 > DOI: https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1111\/j.1527-2001.2009.01052_1.x  Within our daily lives, we can witness this in form of women performing traditionally male labours, while still identifying as woman (Intrinsic Identity and Gender Role clashing). We can witness this in various subcultures (The concept of \"tomboys\" and \"butch lesbians\", a woman who dresses and behaves as a man traditionally should) (Identity and Expression clashing).   The idea of \"I'm a man, so I don't wear a skirt\" pertains not to gender identity, but gender expression. Potentially, to your gender role as a way to advertise what role in society you fulfil by dressing the part. However, being a man does not dictate you cannot wear a skirt.    **For Intrinsic gender identity itself, I'll depart from social science and onto neuropsychology.**    *Burke et al (2017)* found was found that after controlling for sexual\/romantic orientation, culture, etc... there exist a difference between transgender people (with physical dysphoria, before transitioning medically) and cisgender people when it comes to neural structures.  These differences manifest primarily in neuro-motor regions, regions corresponding for sensory processing. Basically, places where the brain communicates with the body.   The differences are that these regions appear \"underdeveloped\", as if not being exercised.  It's not \"male brain\" or \"female brain\", it's \"my brain doesn't get the responses from my body that it expects\" vs \"my body looks and behaves like my brain expects.\"  *Khorashad et al (2021)* later investigated these findings, finding that these neural differences disappear upon taking gender-confirming cross-sex hormonal therapy. Or at the very least, minimize.   Meaning, it appears that the weakened connections become exercised and reinforced.  This explains why trans people who have medically transitioned no longer exhibit these patterns, and also tracks with reports of gender dysphoria easing over time even though the person does not culturally\/socially pass.  **Two methods of action are proposed:**  a) body feels and behaves as the brain's \"internal blueprint\" expects it to: hormone levels are correct, the proper genes are expressed now, the right proteins and shape and function.  Just like doing exercises reinforces neural pathways, so does the body responding like the brain expects it to does the same.  b) Hormones directly bind with hormone receptors in the brain, encouraging the formation of new neural structures.  B would explain what some trans people call \"hormonal\/endocrine dysphoria.\" Or rather the euphoria from being on hormones even before physical changes set in.  The two mechanisms proposed are not exclusive, but yet to be determined.   > Burke, S.M., Manzouri, A.H. & Savic, I. Structural connections in the brain in relation to gender identity and sexual orientation. Sci Rep 7, 17954 (2017). https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1038\/s41598-017-17352-8 >  > Khorashad, B.S., Manzouri, A., Feusner, J.D. et al. Cross-sex hormone treatment and own-body perception: behavioral and brain connectivity profiles. Sci Rep 11, 2799 (2021). https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1038\/s41598-020-80687-2","human_ref_B":"Part of how gender is socially constructed is that there are gendered norms about how someone with a particular gender identity\u2019s body should be. Cisnormativity normalizes a two-gender system with cisgender bodies. Transnormativity in addition normalizes medicalized standards around the body for trans individuals. Often identities will not be legally recognized without conformity to medical transition standards, for example. Adjacently these kinds of normative ideas also have been interrelated with non-medically-necessarily surgical interventions on intersex infants - sometimes even without parental consent\/knowledge.  Many trans people do not pursue surgical transition and some also do not pursue hormonal transition, but among those who do (or wish to even if they don\u2019t) one factor is that undergoing these treatments results in their gender identity being more validated socially and legally.  Most gender-affirming surgery is actually done on cisgender people, eg: breast enhancements for cis women, pectoral implants for cis men, etc. It\u2019s notable that these surgeries (as well as many hormone therapies) are generally available to cisgender people without the same kinds of psychological and more general healthcare gatekeeping as for trans folk.  See, eg https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0277953621008091?via%3Dihub which talks about many of these issues.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1633.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"vw9su2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Questions about Gender Genuine question(s). I\u2019m coming from a place of trying to understand and considering the accepted consensus that gender is a social construct I have no better place to ask than a community dedicated to social science.  Gender is a social construct, and one\u2019s gender identity is not the exact same as gender roles, gender expressions\/mannerisms, etc. For example, one can be a cis-female but adopt roles and mannerisms typically associated with manhood and masculinity. Their gender identity is congruent with their sex but still recognize and accept the \u2018incongruent\u2019 behaviors and roles. If it\u2019s easier, think of the cis-female tomboy.  Now, correct me if I\u2019m wrong here, but I also understand that in order to be trans one must experience gender incongruence which characterizes someone as transgender but differentiates someone from cisgender. (If GI is not needed, then is hostility towards individuals labels as trans trenders justified?)  Now this is where I get confused and seek the aid references of this community for guidance.   If an individual who has GI aims to transition into the opposite gender via surgery, wouldn\u2019t this strongly imply that there is a sort of understanding to be had about what makes someone (x) gender beyond roles and expressions such as mannerisms? Does this reinforce the notion that in order to completely feel like the gender your affirm yourself to be that it comes from an idea that is separate and distinguished from the mannerism, expressions, and roles that are associated with it?   I guess what i\u2019m asking is\u2026 if gender (identity) is nothing more than a social construct then why is it that individual who aim to transition not feel as fully the gender they affirms themselves to be until they are fully realized not just in their physical appearance but in totality what they perceive to understand as man or woman?","c_root_id_A":"ifs643c","c_root_id_B":"ifqqdol","created_at_utc_A":1657578496,"created_at_utc_B":1657558185,"score_A":10,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"**Gender** (the socio-anthropological concept) is a social construct, that does not however mean that an individual's gender **identity** (the psychological concept) is a social construct.   Cultural anthropologist Nanda (2014) provides a short definition of gender with reference to sex which should be sufficient for further discussion:  >Sex refers to the biologically differentiated status of male or female. It includes anatomic sex, particularly the genitals, and also secondary and invisible characteristics such as genes and hormones. **Gender refers to the social, cultural, and psychological constructions that are imposed on the biological differences of sex.**  **Gender** is a social construction insofar that gender categories and the meanings assigned to them (the content of gender, its representations, etc.) are both historically and culturally contingent as a result of interactive and communicative processes within a given social context (e.g., a society)^(1). Hence, not only there exist societies with gender systems which recognize more than two genders, but there is also heterogeneity among two gender systems (e.g., what it means to be a \"man\" or a \"woman\" is not strictly identical from culture to culture).  Depending on the theoretical and conceptual framework, **gender identity** is either a facet of individual identity or a category of social identity (of which we have multiple). Overall, it usually refers to a person's self-concept with reference to gender - how someone experiences and perceives themselves in terms of being a \"man,\" a \"woman,\" or other. (Other concepts such as gender *role* and *expression* are related, but separate.)  ---  Binary systems predominate in Euro-American societies, with people (usually) being assigned a gender at birth (boy\/girl) based upon their external sex structures^(2), namely their genitals: a baby with a penis and scrotal sac is male and therefore a boy (later a man), and a baby with a clitoris and vagina is female and therefore a girl (later a woman).  Most develop gender identities which are in accord with their assigned sex\/gender^(3). They are **cisgender**. In contrast, there are **transgender** people whose gender identities are incongruent with their assigned sex\/gender. There are also **gender diverse** people whose identities in some shape or form do not conform to the traditional binaries. Briefly, regarding cisgender \"tomboys\": in principle, these are girls whose gender identity is in accord with their assigned gender\/sex , but who reject the traditional norms concerning how girls should behave, preferring to behave as expected from boys: they are **gender nonconforming**.  Further research is needed on gender identity development, but it is currently understood that social, psychological, and biological processes are involved, which interact in complex manners, and that children have a sense of gender already at an early age (Martin & Ruble, 2004; Bussey, 2011; G\u00fclg\u00f6z et al., 2019). Concerning social processes, a common mistake is to confuse *socialization*, i.e., the process through which people are taught and internalize the norms and ideas of a given society, with *social construction*.  ---  Transgender people may experience significant distress due to the aforementioned incongruence and be diagnosed with gender dysphoria. To quote the official website of the American Psychiatric Association (APA):  >**Gender dysphoria:** A concept designated in the DSM-5 as clinically significant distress or impairment related to a strong desire to be of another gender, which may include desire to change primary and\/or secondary sex characteristics. Not all transgender or gender diverse people experience dysphoria.  I believe it is important to stress the following: **not all transgender people experience gender dysphoria.** Likewise, I believe I should also stress that what makes gender dysphoria a psychiatric condition is the *distress* associated with the incongruence one's gender identity and their assigned sex\/gender. Gender dysphoria can be a reason to pursue medical and surgical venues to achieve gender affirmation, but it is neither necessary nor sufficient.  Note that \"gender dysphoria\" is not classified in the latest edition of the World Health Organization (WHO)'s ICD-11, the other major internationally recognized diagnostic manual. Instead, the manual includes \"Gender Incongruence\" which instead of being classified among \"mental health disorders\" is currently found in a chapter dedicated to \"sexual health.\" This is part of wider trends toward de-pathologizing and de-stigmatizing transgender people (which has involved the APA, too). According to Reed et al. (2016):  >**In most countries, the provision of health services requires the diagnosis of a health condition that is specifically related to those services. If no diagnosis were available to identify transgender people who were seeking related health services, these services would likely become even less available than they are now. Thus, the Working Group on Sexual Disorders and Sexual Health has recommended retaining gender incongruence diagnoses in the ICD\u201011 to preserve access to health services**, but moving these categories out of the ICD\u201011 chapter on Mental and Behavioural Disorders (see Table 2). After consideration of a variety of placement options, these categories have been provisionally included in the proposed new ICD\u201011 chapter on Conditions Related to Sexual Health.  ---  Transgender people may seek to pursue multiple kinds of gender affirmation. Besides social affirmation and legal affirmation, they may also seek medical and surgical affirmation. The point of affirmation is to be recognized and acknowledged as the gender with which they identify. This desire can include the wish to possess a body which aligns with their gender identity. Fundamentally speaking, this is not different from the many ways in which each of us (regardless of gender identity) take care of our bodies and accessorize and modify our bodies^(4) to match the images we have of ourselves or wish for ourselves, and at the same time, to have others to recognize the same image.  Be aware that there have been multiple linguistic shifts surrounding these concepts which have accompanied greater understanding of these topics, and also reflect changes in how scholars and practitioners comprehend the relevant populations. For example, as documented by philosopher Shannon Dea (2016), the older term \"trans**sexual**\", which has strong ties to psychiatry but also carries sexual connotations, has - for multiple reasons - lost favor over the years. Currently, the mainstream term is \"trans**gender**.\" Similarly, terms such as \"male-to-female\" and \"female-to-male\" have lost favor, replaced by terms such as \"trans woman\" or \"transfeminine\" and \"trans man\" or \"transmasculine.\"  The current mainstream approach to providing support and care to transgender people is based upon the \"**gender** affirmative model.\" Transgender people not only may seek to receive \"**gender**-affirming hormones\" but also to pursue \"**gender** affirmation surgery\" or \"**gender** confirmation surgery.\" These two terms are gradually replacing what is widely known as \"**sex** reassignment surgery.\" In short, not only have there been shifts toward depathologizing the experiences of transgender people, but also to more precisely describe their experiences, who they are, and label the nature of their needs.  ---  ^(1) ^(For that matter, there are philosophers, e.g. Butler, and anthropologists, e.g. Nanda, who have challenged the classic tradition of distinguishing sex and gender by virtue of the latter being a social construct: sex as a concept is *also* a social construction. Sex is not a monolithic concept, but rather a variable concept with multiple definitions which are more or less relevant in different contexts. Likewise, the correspondence between sex and gender is more complex than implied by the classic distinction.)   ^(2) ^(One of many ways of conceptualizing sex. For illustration, according to Poston [2019], there are five biological definitions of sex: based on chromosomes, based on gonads, based on hormones, based on internal sex characteristics, and based on external sex characteristics. But there are other definitions which are also widely used. For evolutionary biologists, sex is based upon the production of gametes. Only some of these are either relevant or typically used in medical settings or in daily life.)  ^(3) ^(The difference is moot given that being categorized as male\/female comes with being categorized as boy\/girl or man\/woman, at least in Euro-American societies.)  ^(4) ^(In surgical and non-surgical ways. Haircuts, tanning, tattoos, colored eye contacts, fitness, plastic surgery, ...)  ---  Bussey, K. (2011). Gender identity development. In S. J. Schwartz, K. Luyckx, V. L. Vignoles (Eds.), Handbook of identity theory and research (pp. 603-628). Springer.  Dea, S. (2016). Beyond the binary: Thinking about sex and gender. Broadview Press.  G\u00fclg\u00f6z, S., Glazier, J. J., Enright, E. A., Alonso, D. J., Durwood, L. J., Fast, A. A., ... & Olson, K. R. (2019). Similarity in transgender and cisgender children\u2019s gender development. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116(49), 24480-24485.  Martin, C. L., & Ruble, D. (2004). Children's search for gender cues: Cognitive perspectives on gender development. Current directions in psychological science, 13(2), 67-70.  Nanda, S. (2014). Gender diversity: Crosscultural variations. Waveland Press.  Poston, D. L. (2019). Age and Sex. In D. L. Poston (Ed.), Handbook of population (pp. 19-49). Springer.","human_ref_B":"So, a good book to start with is Categories we Live By by \u00c0sta.  Her's is, I think, a quite persuasive view in social ontology (the field of philosophy concerned with things like gender).      In broad strokes, the consensus goes roughly as follows: gender categories are socially constructed, and you will be ascribed gender by members of your social group insofar as they see you as conforming to the broad idea of what that gender involves (so far, Butler).  This can admit of a lot of variation.  There are lots of ways to get recognised as a man, and if you're at the margins of what people recognise as 'man', people might be a little shitty to you.  Separately from this, lots of people seem to have a subjective experience of fittingness regarding gender categories.  Young boys who are mistaken for girls on the phone get annoyed, teenagers who later transition sometimes feel very disoriented during puberty, adults who transition later in life often report that there had been something wrong their whole life but they could never place it because it was everywhere.  The relationship between this subjective experience and the intersubjective social category is hotly debated, but some kind of reference relation at least has to hold.  This is pretty much where consensus runs out.        So, bodies.  Different people engaged in medically assisted transition for different reasons.  Some trans people report a feeling of ill-fit that includes their body, but some report it only to do with social roles.  People who transition medically do so for lots of reasons, including feelings of at-homeness in their body, a desire to cue others to assign them their target gender, and many others.  There isn't really an academic consensus that I'm aware of on this, and importantly, there doesn't seem to be consensus among trans people as to how to understand these experiences.  Probably lots of different and slightly contradictory things are happening with different people.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20311.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"vw9su2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Questions about Gender Genuine question(s). I\u2019m coming from a place of trying to understand and considering the accepted consensus that gender is a social construct I have no better place to ask than a community dedicated to social science.  Gender is a social construct, and one\u2019s gender identity is not the exact same as gender roles, gender expressions\/mannerisms, etc. For example, one can be a cis-female but adopt roles and mannerisms typically associated with manhood and masculinity. Their gender identity is congruent with their sex but still recognize and accept the \u2018incongruent\u2019 behaviors and roles. If it\u2019s easier, think of the cis-female tomboy.  Now, correct me if I\u2019m wrong here, but I also understand that in order to be trans one must experience gender incongruence which characterizes someone as transgender but differentiates someone from cisgender. (If GI is not needed, then is hostility towards individuals labels as trans trenders justified?)  Now this is where I get confused and seek the aid references of this community for guidance.   If an individual who has GI aims to transition into the opposite gender via surgery, wouldn\u2019t this strongly imply that there is a sort of understanding to be had about what makes someone (x) gender beyond roles and expressions such as mannerisms? Does this reinforce the notion that in order to completely feel like the gender your affirm yourself to be that it comes from an idea that is separate and distinguished from the mannerism, expressions, and roles that are associated with it?   I guess what i\u2019m asking is\u2026 if gender (identity) is nothing more than a social construct then why is it that individual who aim to transition not feel as fully the gender they affirms themselves to be until they are fully realized not just in their physical appearance but in totality what they perceive to understand as man or woman?","c_root_id_A":"ifqq7e0","c_root_id_B":"ifs643c","created_at_utc_A":1657558119,"created_at_utc_B":1657578496,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Part of how gender is socially constructed is that there are gendered norms about how someone with a particular gender identity\u2019s body should be. Cisnormativity normalizes a two-gender system with cisgender bodies. Transnormativity in addition normalizes medicalized standards around the body for trans individuals. Often identities will not be legally recognized without conformity to medical transition standards, for example. Adjacently these kinds of normative ideas also have been interrelated with non-medically-necessarily surgical interventions on intersex infants - sometimes even without parental consent\/knowledge.  Many trans people do not pursue surgical transition and some also do not pursue hormonal transition, but among those who do (or wish to even if they don\u2019t) one factor is that undergoing these treatments results in their gender identity being more validated socially and legally.  Most gender-affirming surgery is actually done on cisgender people, eg: breast enhancements for cis women, pectoral implants for cis men, etc. It\u2019s notable that these surgeries (as well as many hormone therapies) are generally available to cisgender people without the same kinds of psychological and more general healthcare gatekeeping as for trans folk.  See, eg https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0277953621008091?via%3Dihub which talks about many of these issues.","human_ref_B":"**Gender** (the socio-anthropological concept) is a social construct, that does not however mean that an individual's gender **identity** (the psychological concept) is a social construct.   Cultural anthropologist Nanda (2014) provides a short definition of gender with reference to sex which should be sufficient for further discussion:  >Sex refers to the biologically differentiated status of male or female. It includes anatomic sex, particularly the genitals, and also secondary and invisible characteristics such as genes and hormones. **Gender refers to the social, cultural, and psychological constructions that are imposed on the biological differences of sex.**  **Gender** is a social construction insofar that gender categories and the meanings assigned to them (the content of gender, its representations, etc.) are both historically and culturally contingent as a result of interactive and communicative processes within a given social context (e.g., a society)^(1). Hence, not only there exist societies with gender systems which recognize more than two genders, but there is also heterogeneity among two gender systems (e.g., what it means to be a \"man\" or a \"woman\" is not strictly identical from culture to culture).  Depending on the theoretical and conceptual framework, **gender identity** is either a facet of individual identity or a category of social identity (of which we have multiple). Overall, it usually refers to a person's self-concept with reference to gender - how someone experiences and perceives themselves in terms of being a \"man,\" a \"woman,\" or other. (Other concepts such as gender *role* and *expression* are related, but separate.)  ---  Binary systems predominate in Euro-American societies, with people (usually) being assigned a gender at birth (boy\/girl) based upon their external sex structures^(2), namely their genitals: a baby with a penis and scrotal sac is male and therefore a boy (later a man), and a baby with a clitoris and vagina is female and therefore a girl (later a woman).  Most develop gender identities which are in accord with their assigned sex\/gender^(3). They are **cisgender**. In contrast, there are **transgender** people whose gender identities are incongruent with their assigned sex\/gender. There are also **gender diverse** people whose identities in some shape or form do not conform to the traditional binaries. Briefly, regarding cisgender \"tomboys\": in principle, these are girls whose gender identity is in accord with their assigned gender\/sex , but who reject the traditional norms concerning how girls should behave, preferring to behave as expected from boys: they are **gender nonconforming**.  Further research is needed on gender identity development, but it is currently understood that social, psychological, and biological processes are involved, which interact in complex manners, and that children have a sense of gender already at an early age (Martin & Ruble, 2004; Bussey, 2011; G\u00fclg\u00f6z et al., 2019). Concerning social processes, a common mistake is to confuse *socialization*, i.e., the process through which people are taught and internalize the norms and ideas of a given society, with *social construction*.  ---  Transgender people may experience significant distress due to the aforementioned incongruence and be diagnosed with gender dysphoria. To quote the official website of the American Psychiatric Association (APA):  >**Gender dysphoria:** A concept designated in the DSM-5 as clinically significant distress or impairment related to a strong desire to be of another gender, which may include desire to change primary and\/or secondary sex characteristics. Not all transgender or gender diverse people experience dysphoria.  I believe it is important to stress the following: **not all transgender people experience gender dysphoria.** Likewise, I believe I should also stress that what makes gender dysphoria a psychiatric condition is the *distress* associated with the incongruence one's gender identity and their assigned sex\/gender. Gender dysphoria can be a reason to pursue medical and surgical venues to achieve gender affirmation, but it is neither necessary nor sufficient.  Note that \"gender dysphoria\" is not classified in the latest edition of the World Health Organization (WHO)'s ICD-11, the other major internationally recognized diagnostic manual. Instead, the manual includes \"Gender Incongruence\" which instead of being classified among \"mental health disorders\" is currently found in a chapter dedicated to \"sexual health.\" This is part of wider trends toward de-pathologizing and de-stigmatizing transgender people (which has involved the APA, too). According to Reed et al. (2016):  >**In most countries, the provision of health services requires the diagnosis of a health condition that is specifically related to those services. If no diagnosis were available to identify transgender people who were seeking related health services, these services would likely become even less available than they are now. Thus, the Working Group on Sexual Disorders and Sexual Health has recommended retaining gender incongruence diagnoses in the ICD\u201011 to preserve access to health services**, but moving these categories out of the ICD\u201011 chapter on Mental and Behavioural Disorders (see Table 2). After consideration of a variety of placement options, these categories have been provisionally included in the proposed new ICD\u201011 chapter on Conditions Related to Sexual Health.  ---  Transgender people may seek to pursue multiple kinds of gender affirmation. Besides social affirmation and legal affirmation, they may also seek medical and surgical affirmation. The point of affirmation is to be recognized and acknowledged as the gender with which they identify. This desire can include the wish to possess a body which aligns with their gender identity. Fundamentally speaking, this is not different from the many ways in which each of us (regardless of gender identity) take care of our bodies and accessorize and modify our bodies^(4) to match the images we have of ourselves or wish for ourselves, and at the same time, to have others to recognize the same image.  Be aware that there have been multiple linguistic shifts surrounding these concepts which have accompanied greater understanding of these topics, and also reflect changes in how scholars and practitioners comprehend the relevant populations. For example, as documented by philosopher Shannon Dea (2016), the older term \"trans**sexual**\", which has strong ties to psychiatry but also carries sexual connotations, has - for multiple reasons - lost favor over the years. Currently, the mainstream term is \"trans**gender**.\" Similarly, terms such as \"male-to-female\" and \"female-to-male\" have lost favor, replaced by terms such as \"trans woman\" or \"transfeminine\" and \"trans man\" or \"transmasculine.\"  The current mainstream approach to providing support and care to transgender people is based upon the \"**gender** affirmative model.\" Transgender people not only may seek to receive \"**gender**-affirming hormones\" but also to pursue \"**gender** affirmation surgery\" or \"**gender** confirmation surgery.\" These two terms are gradually replacing what is widely known as \"**sex** reassignment surgery.\" In short, not only have there been shifts toward depathologizing the experiences of transgender people, but also to more precisely describe their experiences, who they are, and label the nature of their needs.  ---  ^(1) ^(For that matter, there are philosophers, e.g. Butler, and anthropologists, e.g. Nanda, who have challenged the classic tradition of distinguishing sex and gender by virtue of the latter being a social construct: sex as a concept is *also* a social construction. Sex is not a monolithic concept, but rather a variable concept with multiple definitions which are more or less relevant in different contexts. Likewise, the correspondence between sex and gender is more complex than implied by the classic distinction.)   ^(2) ^(One of many ways of conceptualizing sex. For illustration, according to Poston [2019], there are five biological definitions of sex: based on chromosomes, based on gonads, based on hormones, based on internal sex characteristics, and based on external sex characteristics. But there are other definitions which are also widely used. For evolutionary biologists, sex is based upon the production of gametes. Only some of these are either relevant or typically used in medical settings or in daily life.)  ^(3) ^(The difference is moot given that being categorized as male\/female comes with being categorized as boy\/girl or man\/woman, at least in Euro-American societies.)  ^(4) ^(In surgical and non-surgical ways. Haircuts, tanning, tattoos, colored eye contacts, fitness, plastic surgery, ...)  ---  Bussey, K. (2011). Gender identity development. In S. J. Schwartz, K. Luyckx, V. L. Vignoles (Eds.), Handbook of identity theory and research (pp. 603-628). Springer.  Dea, S. (2016). Beyond the binary: Thinking about sex and gender. Broadview Press.  G\u00fclg\u00f6z, S., Glazier, J. J., Enright, E. A., Alonso, D. J., Durwood, L. J., Fast, A. A., ... & Olson, K. R. (2019). Similarity in transgender and cisgender children\u2019s gender development. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116(49), 24480-24485.  Martin, C. L., & Ruble, D. (2004). Children's search for gender cues: Cognitive perspectives on gender development. Current directions in psychological science, 13(2), 67-70.  Nanda, S. (2014). Gender diversity: Crosscultural variations. Waveland Press.  Poston, D. L. (2019). Age and Sex. In D. L. Poston (Ed.), Handbook of population (pp. 19-49). Springer.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20377.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"vw9su2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Questions about Gender Genuine question(s). I\u2019m coming from a place of trying to understand and considering the accepted consensus that gender is a social construct I have no better place to ask than a community dedicated to social science.  Gender is a social construct, and one\u2019s gender identity is not the exact same as gender roles, gender expressions\/mannerisms, etc. For example, one can be a cis-female but adopt roles and mannerisms typically associated with manhood and masculinity. Their gender identity is congruent with their sex but still recognize and accept the \u2018incongruent\u2019 behaviors and roles. If it\u2019s easier, think of the cis-female tomboy.  Now, correct me if I\u2019m wrong here, but I also understand that in order to be trans one must experience gender incongruence which characterizes someone as transgender but differentiates someone from cisgender. (If GI is not needed, then is hostility towards individuals labels as trans trenders justified?)  Now this is where I get confused and seek the aid references of this community for guidance.   If an individual who has GI aims to transition into the opposite gender via surgery, wouldn\u2019t this strongly imply that there is a sort of understanding to be had about what makes someone (x) gender beyond roles and expressions such as mannerisms? Does this reinforce the notion that in order to completely feel like the gender your affirm yourself to be that it comes from an idea that is separate and distinguished from the mannerism, expressions, and roles that are associated with it?   I guess what i\u2019m asking is\u2026 if gender (identity) is nothing more than a social construct then why is it that individual who aim to transition not feel as fully the gender they affirms themselves to be until they are fully realized not just in their physical appearance but in totality what they perceive to understand as man or woman?","c_root_id_A":"ifs643c","c_root_id_B":"ifrjs4x","created_at_utc_A":1657578496,"created_at_utc_B":1657569708,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"**Gender** (the socio-anthropological concept) is a social construct, that does not however mean that an individual's gender **identity** (the psychological concept) is a social construct.   Cultural anthropologist Nanda (2014) provides a short definition of gender with reference to sex which should be sufficient for further discussion:  >Sex refers to the biologically differentiated status of male or female. It includes anatomic sex, particularly the genitals, and also secondary and invisible characteristics such as genes and hormones. **Gender refers to the social, cultural, and psychological constructions that are imposed on the biological differences of sex.**  **Gender** is a social construction insofar that gender categories and the meanings assigned to them (the content of gender, its representations, etc.) are both historically and culturally contingent as a result of interactive and communicative processes within a given social context (e.g., a society)^(1). Hence, not only there exist societies with gender systems which recognize more than two genders, but there is also heterogeneity among two gender systems (e.g., what it means to be a \"man\" or a \"woman\" is not strictly identical from culture to culture).  Depending on the theoretical and conceptual framework, **gender identity** is either a facet of individual identity or a category of social identity (of which we have multiple). Overall, it usually refers to a person's self-concept with reference to gender - how someone experiences and perceives themselves in terms of being a \"man,\" a \"woman,\" or other. (Other concepts such as gender *role* and *expression* are related, but separate.)  ---  Binary systems predominate in Euro-American societies, with people (usually) being assigned a gender at birth (boy\/girl) based upon their external sex structures^(2), namely their genitals: a baby with a penis and scrotal sac is male and therefore a boy (later a man), and a baby with a clitoris and vagina is female and therefore a girl (later a woman).  Most develop gender identities which are in accord with their assigned sex\/gender^(3). They are **cisgender**. In contrast, there are **transgender** people whose gender identities are incongruent with their assigned sex\/gender. There are also **gender diverse** people whose identities in some shape or form do not conform to the traditional binaries. Briefly, regarding cisgender \"tomboys\": in principle, these are girls whose gender identity is in accord with their assigned gender\/sex , but who reject the traditional norms concerning how girls should behave, preferring to behave as expected from boys: they are **gender nonconforming**.  Further research is needed on gender identity development, but it is currently understood that social, psychological, and biological processes are involved, which interact in complex manners, and that children have a sense of gender already at an early age (Martin & Ruble, 2004; Bussey, 2011; G\u00fclg\u00f6z et al., 2019). Concerning social processes, a common mistake is to confuse *socialization*, i.e., the process through which people are taught and internalize the norms and ideas of a given society, with *social construction*.  ---  Transgender people may experience significant distress due to the aforementioned incongruence and be diagnosed with gender dysphoria. To quote the official website of the American Psychiatric Association (APA):  >**Gender dysphoria:** A concept designated in the DSM-5 as clinically significant distress or impairment related to a strong desire to be of another gender, which may include desire to change primary and\/or secondary sex characteristics. Not all transgender or gender diverse people experience dysphoria.  I believe it is important to stress the following: **not all transgender people experience gender dysphoria.** Likewise, I believe I should also stress that what makes gender dysphoria a psychiatric condition is the *distress* associated with the incongruence one's gender identity and their assigned sex\/gender. Gender dysphoria can be a reason to pursue medical and surgical venues to achieve gender affirmation, but it is neither necessary nor sufficient.  Note that \"gender dysphoria\" is not classified in the latest edition of the World Health Organization (WHO)'s ICD-11, the other major internationally recognized diagnostic manual. Instead, the manual includes \"Gender Incongruence\" which instead of being classified among \"mental health disorders\" is currently found in a chapter dedicated to \"sexual health.\" This is part of wider trends toward de-pathologizing and de-stigmatizing transgender people (which has involved the APA, too). According to Reed et al. (2016):  >**In most countries, the provision of health services requires the diagnosis of a health condition that is specifically related to those services. If no diagnosis were available to identify transgender people who were seeking related health services, these services would likely become even less available than they are now. Thus, the Working Group on Sexual Disorders and Sexual Health has recommended retaining gender incongruence diagnoses in the ICD\u201011 to preserve access to health services**, but moving these categories out of the ICD\u201011 chapter on Mental and Behavioural Disorders (see Table 2). After consideration of a variety of placement options, these categories have been provisionally included in the proposed new ICD\u201011 chapter on Conditions Related to Sexual Health.  ---  Transgender people may seek to pursue multiple kinds of gender affirmation. Besides social affirmation and legal affirmation, they may also seek medical and surgical affirmation. The point of affirmation is to be recognized and acknowledged as the gender with which they identify. This desire can include the wish to possess a body which aligns with their gender identity. Fundamentally speaking, this is not different from the many ways in which each of us (regardless of gender identity) take care of our bodies and accessorize and modify our bodies^(4) to match the images we have of ourselves or wish for ourselves, and at the same time, to have others to recognize the same image.  Be aware that there have been multiple linguistic shifts surrounding these concepts which have accompanied greater understanding of these topics, and also reflect changes in how scholars and practitioners comprehend the relevant populations. For example, as documented by philosopher Shannon Dea (2016), the older term \"trans**sexual**\", which has strong ties to psychiatry but also carries sexual connotations, has - for multiple reasons - lost favor over the years. Currently, the mainstream term is \"trans**gender**.\" Similarly, terms such as \"male-to-female\" and \"female-to-male\" have lost favor, replaced by terms such as \"trans woman\" or \"transfeminine\" and \"trans man\" or \"transmasculine.\"  The current mainstream approach to providing support and care to transgender people is based upon the \"**gender** affirmative model.\" Transgender people not only may seek to receive \"**gender**-affirming hormones\" but also to pursue \"**gender** affirmation surgery\" or \"**gender** confirmation surgery.\" These two terms are gradually replacing what is widely known as \"**sex** reassignment surgery.\" In short, not only have there been shifts toward depathologizing the experiences of transgender people, but also to more precisely describe their experiences, who they are, and label the nature of their needs.  ---  ^(1) ^(For that matter, there are philosophers, e.g. Butler, and anthropologists, e.g. Nanda, who have challenged the classic tradition of distinguishing sex and gender by virtue of the latter being a social construct: sex as a concept is *also* a social construction. Sex is not a monolithic concept, but rather a variable concept with multiple definitions which are more or less relevant in different contexts. Likewise, the correspondence between sex and gender is more complex than implied by the classic distinction.)   ^(2) ^(One of many ways of conceptualizing sex. For illustration, according to Poston [2019], there are five biological definitions of sex: based on chromosomes, based on gonads, based on hormones, based on internal sex characteristics, and based on external sex characteristics. But there are other definitions which are also widely used. For evolutionary biologists, sex is based upon the production of gametes. Only some of these are either relevant or typically used in medical settings or in daily life.)  ^(3) ^(The difference is moot given that being categorized as male\/female comes with being categorized as boy\/girl or man\/woman, at least in Euro-American societies.)  ^(4) ^(In surgical and non-surgical ways. Haircuts, tanning, tattoos, colored eye contacts, fitness, plastic surgery, ...)  ---  Bussey, K. (2011). Gender identity development. In S. J. Schwartz, K. Luyckx, V. L. Vignoles (Eds.), Handbook of identity theory and research (pp. 603-628). Springer.  Dea, S. (2016). Beyond the binary: Thinking about sex and gender. Broadview Press.  G\u00fclg\u00f6z, S., Glazier, J. J., Enright, E. A., Alonso, D. J., Durwood, L. J., Fast, A. A., ... & Olson, K. R. (2019). Similarity in transgender and cisgender children\u2019s gender development. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116(49), 24480-24485.  Martin, C. L., & Ruble, D. (2004). Children's search for gender cues: Cognitive perspectives on gender development. Current directions in psychological science, 13(2), 67-70.  Nanda, S. (2014). Gender diversity: Crosscultural variations. Waveland Press.  Poston, D. L. (2019). Age and Sex. In D. L. Poston (Ed.), Handbook of population (pp. 19-49). Springer.","human_ref_B":"I think it\u2019s important to look at the evolution of this discussion over time. This is a continuously evolving area of research. It\u2019s still being refined.   The recent popularized interpretations are mostly formed by philosophers. Judith Butler expressed the view that social constructionism could be applied to gender. She also used an altered definition of gender in her works. This is different from previous mostly empirical methods with its own strengths and weaknesses.  > This \"boundary work\" creates and sustains the differential susceptibility of phenomena to ontological uncertainty  Ethnocentrism and power dynamics in society and academia have influenced this approach. The WEIRD phenomenon definitely applies. However with continuous discussion more clarity can be achieved.   > The fact that constructionist research has been U.S.-centric poses an important problem\u2013ethnocentrism. Most ethnocentrism is not intentional, so much as a reflection of limited experience. But it is especially easy for Americans to be ethnocentric: most of us are monolingual, and we often have very limited experience with other cultures, which makes it easy to assume that the social arrangements we are familiar with are widespread, if not universal.   https:\/\/core.ac.uk\/download\/pdf\/228548228.pdf  Note*: Cultures have for millennia had people changing gender role.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8788.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"vw9su2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Questions about Gender Genuine question(s). I\u2019m coming from a place of trying to understand and considering the accepted consensus that gender is a social construct I have no better place to ask than a community dedicated to social science.  Gender is a social construct, and one\u2019s gender identity is not the exact same as gender roles, gender expressions\/mannerisms, etc. For example, one can be a cis-female but adopt roles and mannerisms typically associated with manhood and masculinity. Their gender identity is congruent with their sex but still recognize and accept the \u2018incongruent\u2019 behaviors and roles. If it\u2019s easier, think of the cis-female tomboy.  Now, correct me if I\u2019m wrong here, but I also understand that in order to be trans one must experience gender incongruence which characterizes someone as transgender but differentiates someone from cisgender. (If GI is not needed, then is hostility towards individuals labels as trans trenders justified?)  Now this is where I get confused and seek the aid references of this community for guidance.   If an individual who has GI aims to transition into the opposite gender via surgery, wouldn\u2019t this strongly imply that there is a sort of understanding to be had about what makes someone (x) gender beyond roles and expressions such as mannerisms? Does this reinforce the notion that in order to completely feel like the gender your affirm yourself to be that it comes from an idea that is separate and distinguished from the mannerism, expressions, and roles that are associated with it?   I guess what i\u2019m asking is\u2026 if gender (identity) is nothing more than a social construct then why is it that individual who aim to transition not feel as fully the gender they affirms themselves to be until they are fully realized not just in their physical appearance but in totality what they perceive to understand as man or woman?","c_root_id_A":"ifqqdol","c_root_id_B":"ifqq7e0","created_at_utc_A":1657558185,"created_at_utc_B":1657558119,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"So, a good book to start with is Categories we Live By by \u00c0sta.  Her's is, I think, a quite persuasive view in social ontology (the field of philosophy concerned with things like gender).      In broad strokes, the consensus goes roughly as follows: gender categories are socially constructed, and you will be ascribed gender by members of your social group insofar as they see you as conforming to the broad idea of what that gender involves (so far, Butler).  This can admit of a lot of variation.  There are lots of ways to get recognised as a man, and if you're at the margins of what people recognise as 'man', people might be a little shitty to you.  Separately from this, lots of people seem to have a subjective experience of fittingness regarding gender categories.  Young boys who are mistaken for girls on the phone get annoyed, teenagers who later transition sometimes feel very disoriented during puberty, adults who transition later in life often report that there had been something wrong their whole life but they could never place it because it was everywhere.  The relationship between this subjective experience and the intersubjective social category is hotly debated, but some kind of reference relation at least has to hold.  This is pretty much where consensus runs out.        So, bodies.  Different people engaged in medically assisted transition for different reasons.  Some trans people report a feeling of ill-fit that includes their body, but some report it only to do with social roles.  People who transition medically do so for lots of reasons, including feelings of at-homeness in their body, a desire to cue others to assign them their target gender, and many others.  There isn't really an academic consensus that I'm aware of on this, and importantly, there doesn't seem to be consensus among trans people as to how to understand these experiences.  Probably lots of different and slightly contradictory things are happening with different people.","human_ref_B":"Part of how gender is socially constructed is that there are gendered norms about how someone with a particular gender identity\u2019s body should be. Cisnormativity normalizes a two-gender system with cisgender bodies. Transnormativity in addition normalizes medicalized standards around the body for trans individuals. Often identities will not be legally recognized without conformity to medical transition standards, for example. Adjacently these kinds of normative ideas also have been interrelated with non-medically-necessarily surgical interventions on intersex infants - sometimes even without parental consent\/knowledge.  Many trans people do not pursue surgical transition and some also do not pursue hormonal transition, but among those who do (or wish to even if they don\u2019t) one factor is that undergoing these treatments results in their gender identity being more validated socially and legally.  Most gender-affirming surgery is actually done on cisgender people, eg: breast enhancements for cis women, pectoral implants for cis men, etc. It\u2019s notable that these surgeries (as well as many hormone therapies) are generally available to cisgender people without the same kinds of psychological and more general healthcare gatekeeping as for trans folk.  See, eg https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0277953621008091?via%3Dihub which talks about many of these issues.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":66.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"6twn9c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is there any actual identifiable social policy that increases rates of birth among wealthy populations? Noah Smith had a recent tweet pointing out that the reactionary\/traditionalist claim that low births among developed countries comes down to culture doesn't account for Saudi Arabia or the Islamic Republic of Iran.  Both appear to be below replacement level while having very empowered and traditional patriarchies.  The deciding factor *appears* to be wealth, no matter the spiritedness of social efforts to keep women as housewives.    Is this born out of the data?  What does family demography have to say?","c_root_id_A":"dlopx52","c_root_id_B":"dlo4xn6","created_at_utc_A":1502853282,"created_at_utc_B":1502828799,"score_A":11,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Female literacy is oftentimes a better indicator of fertility rates than wealth.  For example, this study of India.  Wealth is correlated with female literacy, so it's often a good proxy for literacy, but correlation -- as we all know -- does not prove causation.  But if it did, we would \"know\" that female literacy causes low birth rates \"instead\" of wealth.  We can imagine multiple mechanisms why female literacy would correlate with low birth rate, and even causality that would run in both directions (i.e. that low pregnancy would increase female literacy).  But the bottom line is when you see a population of rich girls having lots of babies, chances are they are poorly educated rich girls, and when you see a population of poor girls not having babies, you will likely see that they are better educated poor girls.","human_ref_B":"Aside from the pretty arbitrary classification of Saudi Arabia and Iran together (based on what? The status of women in thse countries are VERY different: Iranian women not only drive but serve as Vice Presidents, elected to Parliament, work outside the home as doctors, lawyers, CEOs etc.) lets not forget that **Iran is a \"Highly Developed\" nation according to the UN.** Iranians massively improved their living standards after the 1979 Islamic Revolution according to the UN's Human Development Index  Iran's Human Development Index shows that prior to the revolution, Iranians were living short, miserable lives with literacy rates less than 50% and the trend was totally flat.   http:\/\/www.photius.com\/rankings\/human_developement_index_1975-2005.html   After the revoluition Iran's HDI improved 67%:  > Between  1980 and  2012,  Iran  (Islamic  Republic  of) \u2019s HDI value  increased from  0.443 to  0.742 ,  an  increase of  67 percent or  average  annual  increase of about  1.6 pe rcent .  http:\/\/hdr.undp.org\/sites\/default\/files\/Country-Profiles\/IRN.pdf  Compare that to China' 72%  http:\/\/hdr.undp.org\/sites\/default\/files\/Country-Profiles\/CHN.pdf  Brazil: 40% http:\/\/hdr.undp.org\/sites\/default\/files\/Country-Profiles\/BRA.pdf  Turkey: 52% http:\/\/hdr.undp.org\/sites\/default\/files\/Country-Profiles\/TUR.pdf  S Korea: 42% http:\/\/hdr.undp.org\/sites\/default\/files\/Country-Profiles\/KOR.pdf   After the revolution Iran's Human Development Index massively improved, at twice the rate of the rest of the world, making Iran into a \"Highly Developed\" nation, where people gained 22 years of additional lifespan and Iranians (particularly women) are among the best educated people in the world.   http:\/\/iranprimer.usip.org\/blog\/2013\/apr\/01\/un-stats-life-longer-and-healthier-iran  According to the UN:  >What do these numbers mean for the average citizen?  >The first component of the HDI is \u201ca long and healthy life\u201d.  UNDP measures this in terms of life expectancy at birth.  During the period from 1980, Iran increased this measure from 54.1 years to 75.4 years. >The second component is \u201caccess to knowledge\u201d.  The yardstick is expected years of schooling starting in 1990.  Iran recorded an increase from 9.2 to 15.1 years \u2013 an impressive achievement. >The third component is \u201ca decent standard of living\u201d.  Here again the increase has been considerable.  Having attained the status of a upper-middle-income country. http:\/\/www.ir.undp.org\/content\/iran\/en\/home\/countryinfo.html    **The change is particularly significant for women in Iran, who once had lower than 40% literacy rates but are now pushing careers instead of being \"housewives\":**  https:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/amyguttman\/2015\/12\/09\/set-to-take-over-tech-70-of-irans-science-and-engineering-students-are-women   http:\/\/www.latimes.com\/world\/la-fg-iran-unmarried-snap-story.html   This UN chart shows Iran's progress compared to other nations (Iran is the green line):  http:\/\/www.ir.undp.org\/content\/dam\/iran\/img\/News\/March%202013\/14%20March%202013-%20Global%20launch%20of%20the%202013%20Human%20Development%20Report%202013\/iran-trend%20hdr2013.jpg\/_jcr_content\/renditions\/cq5dam.web.540.390.jpeg  Futhermore grouping Iran and Saudi Arabia together based on...? what? ... is meaning less.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24483.0,"score_ratio":1.5714285714}
{"post_id":"1iikgz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What would happen if, in a moment, the US national debt were completely paid down? This guy received a fallacious statement from paypal stating his account had been credited $92 quadrillion doallars. When asked what he would do with that money, he said \"Probably pay down the national debt.\" Although this seems like a very kind and generous gesture, I have a feeling that injection of that volume of cash into the economy and completely wiping all debts would actually probably do more harm than good.   Would do you all suspect the consequences of something like this happening would be?","c_root_id_A":"cb4yzkn","c_root_id_B":"cb4tv91","created_at_utc_A":1374116661,"created_at_utc_B":1374101852,"score_A":26,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"The global financial sector would need to be reorganized. US treasuries are the default risk free investment in the world. If those were to disappear because the US debt was paid off, some alternative would need to be found.   See here: http:\/\/www.npr.org\/blogs\/money\/2011\/10\/21\/141510617\/what-if-we-paid-off-the-debt-the-secret-government-report","human_ref_B":"I don't think it would do as much as you think.  Considering that we owe ourselves most of that debt.  Here is a good video that might help.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14809.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1uyxdx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What were women's rights like in the Soviet Union?","c_root_id_A":"cenbau0","c_root_id_B":"cenb1mn","created_at_utc_A":1389488659,"created_at_utc_B":1389488038,"score_A":29,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The Soviet Union dramatically increased the participation of women in the labor force. This was accelerated by the dearth of male workers following WWII and women took on many jobs typically dominated by men such as welding and construction. Women made little progress in the domestic sphere, being responsible for housework and childcare on top of her professional occupation. \"Soviet Russia became the first country to legalize abortion freely; with the period between 1920 and 1936 being one in which women in the Soviet Union could freely obtain an abortion free of charge and at her own request... After the Revolution in 1917, divorce proceedings were simplified, with parties being able to get a relatively simple divorce through registering their request through the court. Alternatively, if both parties agreed to the divorce, the request was registered with the Registry Office and again divorce was granted. The procedure was made even simpler in 1926, when what was known was \u2018postcard divorces\u2019 were apparent. Either party would simply announce their desire for a divorce, either orally or by written notification. If the request was sent to the Registry Office, then the other party would be notified of the divorce by written notice three days later.\" The divorce and abortion laws were later reversed under Stalin. Most of Stalin's unpopular actions were revoked after his death but I don't know the status of those laws in the post-Stalin Soviet Union.  Source:http:\/\/wuhstry.wordpress.com\/2012\/01\/14\/soviet-social-and-economic-policy-concerning-women-1917-60\/","human_ref_B":"I saw your similar thread over in \/r\/AskHistorians. I've given you a link over to an older answer there, but I'd also ask here: what specifically interests you? It's kind of hard to sum up eighty years of gender relations for a reddit post with any accuracy.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":621.0,"score_ratio":7.25}
{"post_id":"48gict","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are some of the most enlightening papers you've read about SS ? Or put another way, papers which challenged \/ changed the way you view the world ?  I'm totally new to this domain, and after reading a few meta-studies, i became totally addicted to SS papers, and particularly psychology meta-studies, often summing up decades of research in a neatly organized way.","c_root_id_A":"d0jibw2","c_root_id_B":"d0jjzo1","created_at_utc_A":1456851210,"created_at_utc_B":1456853421,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Marvin Harris- Cultural Materialism changed the way I view the research process, and as an undergrad in somewhat of a rocky program, helped me understand the importance of paradigm.","human_ref_B":"> papers which challenged \/ changed the way you view the world ?  Not technically a \"Social Science Paper,\" but Althusser's Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses was like the perfect \"click\" for me. It's an attempt to unpack and update the sloppy idea of \"ideology\" which Marx left behind for us.   One of the most influential papers on how I think \/ view the world.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2211.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"48gict","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are some of the most enlightening papers you've read about SS ? Or put another way, papers which challenged \/ changed the way you view the world ?  I'm totally new to this domain, and after reading a few meta-studies, i became totally addicted to SS papers, and particularly psychology meta-studies, often summing up decades of research in a neatly organized way.","c_root_id_A":"d0jzp77","c_root_id_B":"d0jibw2","created_at_utc_A":1456874347,"created_at_utc_B":1456851210,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Hayek's \"The Use of Knowledge in Society\" and Arrow's Impossibility Theorem","human_ref_B":"Marvin Harris- Cultural Materialism changed the way I view the research process, and as an undergrad in somewhat of a rocky program, helped me understand the importance of paradigm.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":23137.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"9ek0gn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"What's the latest most interesting academic theory, article, or person you've read about? Just looking for some interesting new social science articles that you guys thought were interesting. Thanks in advance!","c_root_id_A":"e5px54w","c_root_id_B":"e5q492s","created_at_utc_A":1536583204,"created_at_utc_B":1536590657,"score_A":14,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Martha Nussbaum","human_ref_B":"Urry - What is the Future? (2016)  Posthumously published work about automation, technology, future, societal design, transparency, and participation. Awesome read.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7453.0,"score_ratio":1.0714285714}
{"post_id":"ng3944","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Why do gender roles exist and how did they come about? What causes them? Why are they found in seemingly every culture? Why are some roles, such as warrior\/soldier, universally inclined towards men?","c_root_id_A":"gyptj1s","c_root_id_B":"gyopdlz","created_at_utc_A":1621443299,"created_at_utc_B":1621425755,"score_A":17,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"One such hypothesis that has empirical evidence supporting it revolves around historical agricultural economic practices: On the Origin of Gender Roles  Descendants of societies that practiced plough agriculture, which requires physical strength- a comparative advantage of men- have stricter gender norms even today than others, including looking at attitudes of children of immigrants in the United States. The basic idea is that these societies primarily had men working in the field with the plough, and women then worked in the home. Societies with agricultural endowments (eg soil suitability for certain crops) whereby planting and harvesting crops did not require heavy physical manual labor had higher female labor force participation in the field, and subsequently the formation of less strict gender norms.  This is obviously not the whole story, but one that receives much more attention in the economics literature. I believe the hypothesis may have formed outside of economics originally, however it is popularized in the field by the work of economist Ester Boserup who pioneered much of economics research focusing on women's economic empower and roles throughout the development process    abstract attached here:  >\tThe study examines the historical origins of existing cross-cultural differences in beliefs and values regarding the appropriate role of women in society. We test the hypothesis that traditional agricultural practices influenced the historical gender division of labor and the evolution of gender norms. We find that, consistent with existing hypotheses, the descendants of societies that traditionally practiced plough agriculture today have less equal gender norms, measured using reported gender-role attitudes and female participation in the workplace, politics, and entrepreneurial activities. Our results hold looking across countries, across districts within countries, and across ethnicities within districts. To test for the importance of cultural persistence, we examine the children of immigrants living in Europe and the United States. We find that even among these individuals, all born and raised in the same country, those with a heritage of traditional plough use exhibit less equal beliefs about gender roles today.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC6664064\/#:~:text=Gender%20Roles%20Are%20Evolved%20and,roles%20as%20homemakers%20and%20caregivers.  There still needs to be more research to clearly define boundaries and contributing factors. It seems they form according to strengths, weaknesses and what attributes that society holds as prestigious.   In a resource scarce society, the ability to gather will be attractive and rewarded with attention and mates. Usually, female to male attention because of the instinctual attractiveness of being provided necessities during pregnancy or dangers from without.   In other societies it might be tested in strength, athletics and male:male competition. Again, rewarded with prestige that then signals a worthy partner.   With what we know so far, it depends on what does that society value, what is their necessity and what extraneous barriers are there to overcome.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17544.0,"score_ratio":2.125}
{"post_id":"13rhlr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"[Economics] I read an article in NYT on how manufacturing firms are having trouble recruiting workers due to low wages, why hasn't supply and demand caused wages to move upwards? (Link to article as text) http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2012\/11\/25\/magazine\/skills-dont-pay-the-bills.html?pagewanted=all","c_root_id_A":"c76ipot","c_root_id_B":"c76i3yk","created_at_utc_A":1353864429,"created_at_utc_B":1353861737,"score_A":29,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"The idea is that there isn't a gap. We are at equilibrium right now. If it was  profitable for the manufacturers to pay more (and poach these scarce employees from competitors), they would. That would kick off the supply\/demand adjustments you are talking about.  Welcome to the global era of free trade. What do US consumers get out of this? Cheap electronics, and other goods. Considering that US consumers these days have much more in terms of goods (smart phones, laptops, tablets, cheaper clothing, cheaper everything really...), I think it is a fair trade off.  Instead they are belly-aching that the supply of labor is not high enough to provide the manufacturing output they desire. One way of doing this is to get money via the government (google rent-seeking behavior), in order to create programs to supply more labor. That is not sustainable (in my opinion).","human_ref_B":"One potential response (Sociologist here, not economist) is that in response to a slowdown in the economy (and by extension in demand) there's less incentive to hire. Instead, keep production low, and complain about it to 1) get a better bargaining position with unions (see Hostess' \"bankruptcy\" claim) 2) ensure government official feel pressured to help secure the industry sector.  In this case, you'll get enough workers just by relying on those who HAVE to work to pay bills, and the lack of filled positions just helps you. In this theoretical world, the hiring and pay would both increase with a rise in exports, which we have yet to see after this recession.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2692.0,"score_ratio":3.2222222222}
{"post_id":"13rhlr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"[Economics] I read an article in NYT on how manufacturing firms are having trouble recruiting workers due to low wages, why hasn't supply and demand caused wages to move upwards? (Link to article as text) http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2012\/11\/25\/magazine\/skills-dont-pay-the-bills.html?pagewanted=all","c_root_id_A":"c76in1p","c_root_id_B":"c76ipot","created_at_utc_A":1353864131,"created_at_utc_B":1353864429,"score_A":6,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"Economist here. US CPI(consumer price index) is part of an international supply and demand formula. Therefore production cost (often being competitive element) is a big factor. Bloated executive salaries contribute to the profit margin being smaller. However they usually compensate their worth in expending sales volume. The reason industrial manufacturing has small wages is rooted in global trade competition. US developed into a service based economy long time ago and therefore industrial sector has a hard time competing with cheaper imported goods unless the goods are unique and patented.","human_ref_B":"The idea is that there isn't a gap. We are at equilibrium right now. If it was  profitable for the manufacturers to pay more (and poach these scarce employees from competitors), they would. That would kick off the supply\/demand adjustments you are talking about.  Welcome to the global era of free trade. What do US consumers get out of this? Cheap electronics, and other goods. Considering that US consumers these days have much more in terms of goods (smart phones, laptops, tablets, cheaper clothing, cheaper everything really...), I think it is a fair trade off.  Instead they are belly-aching that the supply of labor is not high enough to provide the manufacturing output they desire. One way of doing this is to get money via the government (google rent-seeking behavior), in order to create programs to supply more labor. That is not sustainable (in my opinion).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":298.0,"score_ratio":4.8333333333}
{"post_id":"13rhlr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"[Economics] I read an article in NYT on how manufacturing firms are having trouble recruiting workers due to low wages, why hasn't supply and demand caused wages to move upwards? (Link to article as text) http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2012\/11\/25\/magazine\/skills-dont-pay-the-bills.html?pagewanted=all","c_root_id_A":"c76in1p","c_root_id_B":"c76jcm3","created_at_utc_A":1353864131,"created_at_utc_B":1353866986,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Economist here. US CPI(consumer price index) is part of an international supply and demand formula. Therefore production cost (often being competitive element) is a big factor. Bloated executive salaries contribute to the profit margin being smaller. However they usually compensate their worth in expending sales volume. The reason industrial manufacturing has small wages is rooted in global trade competition. US developed into a service based economy long time ago and therefore industrial sector has a hard time competing with cheaper imported goods unless the goods are unique and patented.","human_ref_B":"If I may follow up, most of the answers here have avoided or missed the point of the NYT article, which is that the high-skill, high-tech manufacturing jobs that the US should still be able to compete in are not paying very well at all, and that's despite the fact that many workers are spending money to get educated to qualify for them.  Is the premise flawed? Ie, that even in that sector the US can't compete?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2855.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"13rhlr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"[Economics] I read an article in NYT on how manufacturing firms are having trouble recruiting workers due to low wages, why hasn't supply and demand caused wages to move upwards? (Link to article as text) http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2012\/11\/25\/magazine\/skills-dont-pay-the-bills.html?pagewanted=all","c_root_id_A":"c76kcp2","c_root_id_B":"c76l0m4","created_at_utc_A":1353870724,"created_at_utc_B":1353873149,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"When there's a labor shortage, companies have the option of closing down. When there's a labor excess, laborers theoretically could shut themselves down, but I suppose you can see why they won't. As a result, an excess of jobs will quickly vanish, while an excess of people won't.","human_ref_B":"I am a mechanical engineer that has worked for a mid sized manufacturing company in the midwest. Manufacturing is **highly competitive**. This limits profit and by extension the wages the companies are able to pay.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2425.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"330n9i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"How burdensome is student loan debt? I'm not from the U.S., but I always see some talk about student loans on this sub, and plenty of people talking about how awful it is on the Internet.  Yet, I know that those with college degrees on average earn more than those without (at least where I'm from). And I assume people wouldn't choose to go to college and take on such debt if they didn't think it worth it (perhaps not even financially but in some other way).  How long does it take to pay of student loans?","c_root_id_A":"cqgg8l8","c_root_id_B":"cqgg3fb","created_at_utc_A":1429361904,"created_at_utc_B":1429361403,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Follow up question: Wouldn't it be cheaper for a US student to go abroad (Canada, Europe etc) to get a college degree?","human_ref_B":"A traditional loan is 10 years, and some people do other plans like Income Based Repayment that takes 10-15% of your discretionary income. If the loan isn't paid off within 25 years it's discharged completely and you don't have to pay it.   There's another type of plan that's pretty common that I don't see on that site, it's a stepped plan that has you pay less at first and then more every few years. So monthly payments would be $300, then $500, then $800 or whatever. The idea is that you will earn more in 5 years so repayment will be easier, though you would ultimately be paying more.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":501.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"3q6i6u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Economics] How strong or weak is the evidence for the notion that higher minimum wage rates price low-skilled workers out of the labor market? Thomas Sowell [concludes one of his columns with this idea, basically saying there is a correlation between higher minimum wage rates and higher unemployment rates for lower-skilled workers, particularly minorities. However, a meta-study published by Schmitt found that of all of the studies since 2000, \"the weight of that evidence points to little or no employment response to modest increases in the minimum wage.\"","c_root_id_A":"cwcs4rg","c_root_id_B":"cwck8w5","created_at_utc_A":1445817460,"created_at_utc_B":1445804910,"score_A":10,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Here's a link to a very similar question asked a year ago which - no offense to anyone in this thread - provides much better answers than you'll currently find here:  https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/1sbr6e\/historically_does_raising_minimum_wage_result_in\/  tl;dr - it's complicated and pretty much everyone disagrees.","human_ref_B":"From your second link:  >Employers may adjust to a higher minimum wage by \"upgrading\" the skill level of their workforce, rather  than  cutting  the  level  of  their  staffing. This process  could  conceivably  work  against the employment prospects of less educated and less experienced workers, especially, the argument goes, black and Latino teens.    >As Walter E. Williams argues:  \"...when  faced  with  legislated  wages  that  exceed  the  productivity  of  some  workers, firms will make adjustments in their use of labor. One adjustment is not only to hire fewer  youths  but  also  to  seek  among  them the  more  highly  qualified  candidates.  It turns out for a number of socioeconomic reasons that white youths, more often than their  black  counterparts,  have  higher  levels  of  educational  attainment  and  training. Therefore,  a  law  that  discriminates  against  low skilled  workers  can  be  expected  to  place a heavier burden on black youths than on white ones.\"   >Donald  Deere,  Kevin  Murphy,  and  Finis  Welch  (1995)  and  Sabia,  Burkhauser,  and  Hansen  (2012) make arguments along these lines in their studies of workers with less than a high school degree.   It then goes on and says that Reich and others looked at the recent studies and couldn't find any evidence supporting this claim. What I find interesting about this is that we in fact have cases from the past where a minimum wage was implemented to price low-skilled workers out of the labor market, usually racially motivated.   http:\/\/dailycaller.com\/2014\/01\/16\/the-racist-history-of-the-minimum-wage\/  >In 1925 there were 55.20 per cent of white employees and 44.80 per cent of Orientals\u2026. In October, 1927 there were 68.86 per cent of white employees and 31.14 per cent of Orientals.   Here is an article from Walter E. Williams where he mentions the racist south African labor unions who defended a high minimum wage during apartheid to protect the white worker:  http:\/\/townhall.com\/columnists\/walterewilliams\/2014\/01\/08\/politics-and-minimum-wage-n1772533\/page\/full   I don't think that when we increase the minimum wage by a *modest* amount, anyone proposing a higher minimum wage will be satisfied. I fear that the conclusion that a *modest* increase has no negative effect will be used as it is already to further the narrative that *any* increase in the minimum wage has no negative consequences.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12550.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"3q6i6u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Economics] How strong or weak is the evidence for the notion that higher minimum wage rates price low-skilled workers out of the labor market? Thomas Sowell [concludes one of his columns with this idea, basically saying there is a correlation between higher minimum wage rates and higher unemployment rates for lower-skilled workers, particularly minorities. However, a meta-study published by Schmitt found that of all of the studies since 2000, \"the weight of that evidence points to little or no employment response to modest increases in the minimum wage.\"","c_root_id_A":"cwcs4rg","c_root_id_B":"cwcqhaz","created_at_utc_A":1445817460,"created_at_utc_B":1445814728,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Here's a link to a very similar question asked a year ago which - no offense to anyone in this thread - provides much better answers than you'll currently find here:  https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/1sbr6e\/historically_does_raising_minimum_wage_result_in\/  tl;dr - it's complicated and pretty much everyone disagrees.","human_ref_B":"Here is a good summary of views related to your second link. Seems like University of Chicago Booth School favors this view 4 to 1.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2732.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"ei2vg3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Is the decrease in maternal mortality a major contributor to the decrease in violence? My thinking goes like this: Childbirth has historically presented a danger to women, to the point that it would lead to an imbalance in mortality rates between the sexes. A world with more men than women would be a much more violent world. So it seems to me that the sharp decrease in childbirth-related deaths would be a direct cause of a decrease in violence.  I read Steven Pinker's The Better Angels of Our Nature a while ago, but I don't remember this being listed as a cause for the increased peace the world has seen.","c_root_id_A":"fcn0alv","c_root_id_B":"fcn69rq","created_at_utc_A":1577799474,"created_at_utc_B":1577804381,"score_A":6,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"What exactly do you mean by violence? Do you mean war or gender based violence or something else?","human_ref_B":"A major contributor, and in the manner you suggest? Unlikely. For an overview, see Schacht et al. who asked \"Too many men: the violence problem?\" Following their review of the literature and analysis of \"the patterning of violence across human societies in relation to the sex ratio\", they concluded that:  >In short, **the belief that violence and crime are exacerbated in human populations by the excess of males is overly simplistic.** We show in Table 1 that **the patterning of violent crime shows no simple association with sex ratio** ...]  To provide a little more detail, they enumerate several rasons \"[w]hy violent crime and sex ratio show such messy patterning\":  >* Mate competition is not necessarily violent [...]  >* Male violence is not necessarily mate competition [...]  >* Behavioral polymorphisms in male mating strategies abound in many species, including humans [...]  >* Female choice affects the relation between [adult sex ratio] and male violence [...]  >* Much of the logic above assumes a tradeoff between parenting effort and mating effort, which is not always the case [...]  >* Clearly, expecting a positive association between sex ratio and violence entails multiple assumptions that might not necessarily hold across different human populations.  ---  As you cite Pinker's book, I would also point out one of his starting points: work done by researchers such as [Eisner, Gurr and others indicate that violence in the Western world has been declining for centuries. That would be well before recent improvements in medicine.   Also in general terms, it is important to keep in mind which time frames we are considering when discussing \"increases\" and \"declines\". For example, see what happened in the Western world between the 1960s and the 1980s and between the 1990s and 2000s forward: there was a remarkable increase of crime (including violent crime) followed by a \"great decline\" known as the *crime drop*. Many focus on the drop, but it is also important to probe the preceding increase when considering the whole picture.  Just to provide some more information, there are *several* hypotheses for these trends in the Western world. For illustration, the Brennan Center for Justice identified and reviewed 13 different hypotheses from an American perspective and Farrell et al. identified and reviewed 17 hypotheses from a cross-national perspective. These are not exhaustive. Generally speaking, demographic changes do not appear to provide appropriate explanations for what has happened from a holistic point of view (and to reiterate, if we were to take several steps back, the trend of violent crime has overall been - with ups and downs - decreasing and it is important to consider relative increases and decreases when assessing a smaller interval).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4907.0,"score_ratio":2.8333333333}
{"post_id":"ei2vg3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Is the decrease in maternal mortality a major contributor to the decrease in violence? My thinking goes like this: Childbirth has historically presented a danger to women, to the point that it would lead to an imbalance in mortality rates between the sexes. A world with more men than women would be a much more violent world. So it seems to me that the sharp decrease in childbirth-related deaths would be a direct cause of a decrease in violence.  I read Steven Pinker's The Better Angels of Our Nature a while ago, but I don't remember this being listed as a cause for the increased peace the world has seen.","c_root_id_A":"fcndsdo","c_root_id_B":"fcn0alv","created_at_utc_A":1577809591,"created_at_utc_B":1577799474,"score_A":8,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"The maternal mortality rate is actually on the rise in the United States.   https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/national\/health-science\/a-shocking-number-of-us-women-still-die-from-childbirth-california-is-doing-something-about-that\/2018\/11\/02\/11042036-d7af-11e8-a10f-b51546b10756\\_story.html","human_ref_B":"What exactly do you mean by violence? Do you mean war or gender based violence or something else?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10117.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"16dkgk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.66,"history":"If statistics for gun violence in the USA exclude African American perpetrators what do the numbers become? I ask this because I heard a gentleman I work with stated, \"that unless you are black, poor or an urban dweller that your risk of being a gun violence victim is close to nil\". If this is true it raised several questions in my mind about how we approach gun control in the USA.","c_root_id_A":"c7v18a9","c_root_id_B":"c7v2hyo","created_at_utc_A":1357911350,"created_at_utc_B":1357917299,"score_A":23,"score_B":31,"human_ref_A":"There was a post about this last month. Not here but in \/r\/depthhub  http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/tb\/14w4eb  Hope this helps!","human_ref_B":"His argument is even more valid if you replace the 'or' with an 'and'.  The victims and perpetrators of gun violence are, overwhelmingly, young black males ages 18-35.   Source: MA in criminology, 2\/3 PhD in criminology.   Articles if anyone reads this and wants them.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5949.0,"score_ratio":1.347826087}
{"post_id":"51cbyv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why is the black & white wealth gap so large in the US? http:\/\/www.slate.com\/content\/dam\/slate\/blogs\/moneybox\/2014\/12\/15\/the_black_white_wealth_gap_it_s_bigger_than_you_even_think\/pew_graphs.png.CROP.promovar-mediumlarge.png  Black Median Net Worth $11,000 White Median Net Worth $141,900","c_root_id_A":"d7ay4gu","c_root_id_B":"d7ax9zi","created_at_utc_A":1473124732,"created_at_utc_B":1473123356,"score_A":52,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"My favorite book on the subject is *The Hidden Cost of Being African American* by Thomas Shapiro. A big part of the story is housing wealth, which is largely inherited from past generations where overtly racist real estate practices were more common. The book also highlights the importance of start up assets, which white folks have more access to. For example, if your parents help you pay a down payment for a house, you can start accumulating home equity through mortgage payments. In contrast, paying rent does nothing to increase your wealth.","human_ref_B":"There are lots of overlapping explanations. One is the effects of housing segregation - on this see *Closed Doors, Opportunities Lost: The Continuing Costs of Housing \tDiscrimination* by Yinger.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1376.0,"score_ratio":8.6666666667}
{"post_id":"51cbyv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why is the black & white wealth gap so large in the US? http:\/\/www.slate.com\/content\/dam\/slate\/blogs\/moneybox\/2014\/12\/15\/the_black_white_wealth_gap_it_s_bigger_than_you_even_think\/pew_graphs.png.CROP.promovar-mediumlarge.png  Black Median Net Worth $11,000 White Median Net Worth $141,900","c_root_id_A":"d7ax484","c_root_id_B":"d7ay4gu","created_at_utc_A":1473123117,"created_at_utc_B":1473124732,"score_A":2,"score_B":52,"human_ref_A":"And Is that wealth gap lower in other countries?","human_ref_B":"My favorite book on the subject is *The Hidden Cost of Being African American* by Thomas Shapiro. A big part of the story is housing wealth, which is largely inherited from past generations where overtly racist real estate practices were more common. The book also highlights the importance of start up assets, which white folks have more access to. For example, if your parents help you pay a down payment for a house, you can start accumulating home equity through mortgage payments. In contrast, paying rent does nothing to increase your wealth.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1615.0,"score_ratio":26.0}
{"post_id":"51cbyv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why is the black & white wealth gap so large in the US? http:\/\/www.slate.com\/content\/dam\/slate\/blogs\/moneybox\/2014\/12\/15\/the_black_white_wealth_gap_it_s_bigger_than_you_even_think\/pew_graphs.png.CROP.promovar-mediumlarge.png  Black Median Net Worth $11,000 White Median Net Worth $141,900","c_root_id_A":"d7ax9zi","c_root_id_B":"d7b164d","created_at_utc_A":1473123356,"created_at_utc_B":1473129558,"score_A":6,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"There are lots of overlapping explanations. One is the effects of housing segregation - on this see *Closed Doors, Opportunities Lost: The Continuing Costs of Housing \tDiscrimination* by Yinger.","human_ref_B":"Aside from housing discrimination, there's a few more factors affecting wealth (this list is definitely not exhaustive):  - The average black child has less education funding than the average white child - The average black person (especially male) is much more likely to be in jail at some point in their life, especially for drug crimes.  This severely impacts career and future employment prospects. They're also more likely to be treated worse than whites for the same crimes.  - A black person is more likely to be passed up for a job opportunity in favor of a white person, even if the black person has superior qualifications. Thus, black unemployment is higher  - Black people are a bit less healthy than white people for various reasons. Health disruptions affect ability to gain wealth. These reasons including cost of healthy food, quality of education and athletic opportunity, lack of healthful restaurants in black communities, less access to healthcare, worse treatment when they get healthcare. Related: http:\/\/www.newsweek.com\/2016\/09\/02\/how-poverty-affects-brains-493239.html  - Cycle of poverty. People stay poor because they're poor. The majority of people stay within their economic class","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6202.0,"score_ratio":4.8333333333}
{"post_id":"51cbyv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why is the black & white wealth gap so large in the US? http:\/\/www.slate.com\/content\/dam\/slate\/blogs\/moneybox\/2014\/12\/15\/the_black_white_wealth_gap_it_s_bigger_than_you_even_think\/pew_graphs.png.CROP.promovar-mediumlarge.png  Black Median Net Worth $11,000 White Median Net Worth $141,900","c_root_id_A":"d7b164d","c_root_id_B":"d7ax484","created_at_utc_A":1473129558,"created_at_utc_B":1473123117,"score_A":29,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Aside from housing discrimination, there's a few more factors affecting wealth (this list is definitely not exhaustive):  - The average black child has less education funding than the average white child - The average black person (especially male) is much more likely to be in jail at some point in their life, especially for drug crimes.  This severely impacts career and future employment prospects. They're also more likely to be treated worse than whites for the same crimes.  - A black person is more likely to be passed up for a job opportunity in favor of a white person, even if the black person has superior qualifications. Thus, black unemployment is higher  - Black people are a bit less healthy than white people for various reasons. Health disruptions affect ability to gain wealth. These reasons including cost of healthy food, quality of education and athletic opportunity, lack of healthful restaurants in black communities, less access to healthcare, worse treatment when they get healthcare. Related: http:\/\/www.newsweek.com\/2016\/09\/02\/how-poverty-affects-brains-493239.html  - Cycle of poverty. People stay poor because they're poor. The majority of people stay within their economic class","human_ref_B":"And Is that wealth gap lower in other countries?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6441.0,"score_ratio":14.5}
{"post_id":"51cbyv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why is the black & white wealth gap so large in the US? http:\/\/www.slate.com\/content\/dam\/slate\/blogs\/moneybox\/2014\/12\/15\/the_black_white_wealth_gap_it_s_bigger_than_you_even_think\/pew_graphs.png.CROP.promovar-mediumlarge.png  Black Median Net Worth $11,000 White Median Net Worth $141,900","c_root_id_A":"d7b1lzm","c_root_id_B":"d7ax9zi","created_at_utc_A":1473130228,"created_at_utc_B":1473123356,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"CFED attributes it primarily because our Federal wealth building policies have primarily been focused on the rich and middle class which are predominately comprised of White families (to the tune of $8 trillion in the last twenty years and budget increases nearly tripling since 1994).  These policies incentivize and assist in going to college, buying a house, and saving for retirement etc. Unfortunately these goals are largely unreachable and unused by POC and the impoverished in general.  http:\/\/cfed.org\/knowledge_center\/resource_directory\/search\/the_ever_growing_gap  If you want actual policy measures that aim at eliminating poverty, i highly suggest looking at CFED's annual scorecard. It has info on tons of policies which make it harder for the impoverished to build wealth. Things like asset limits on SNAP and other government programs, IDA programs, EITC, etc.  http:\/\/assetsandopportunity.org\/scorecard\/","human_ref_B":"There are lots of overlapping explanations. One is the effects of housing segregation - on this see *Closed Doors, Opportunities Lost: The Continuing Costs of Housing \tDiscrimination* by Yinger.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6872.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"51cbyv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why is the black & white wealth gap so large in the US? http:\/\/www.slate.com\/content\/dam\/slate\/blogs\/moneybox\/2014\/12\/15\/the_black_white_wealth_gap_it_s_bigger_than_you_even_think\/pew_graphs.png.CROP.promovar-mediumlarge.png  Black Median Net Worth $11,000 White Median Net Worth $141,900","c_root_id_A":"d7ax484","c_root_id_B":"d7b1lzm","created_at_utc_A":1473123117,"created_at_utc_B":1473130228,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"And Is that wealth gap lower in other countries?","human_ref_B":"CFED attributes it primarily because our Federal wealth building policies have primarily been focused on the rich and middle class which are predominately comprised of White families (to the tune of $8 trillion in the last twenty years and budget increases nearly tripling since 1994).  These policies incentivize and assist in going to college, buying a house, and saving for retirement etc. Unfortunately these goals are largely unreachable and unused by POC and the impoverished in general.  http:\/\/cfed.org\/knowledge_center\/resource_directory\/search\/the_ever_growing_gap  If you want actual policy measures that aim at eliminating poverty, i highly suggest looking at CFED's annual scorecard. It has info on tons of policies which make it harder for the impoverished to build wealth. Things like asset limits on SNAP and other government programs, IDA programs, EITC, etc.  http:\/\/assetsandopportunity.org\/scorecard\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7111.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"51cbyv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why is the black & white wealth gap so large in the US? http:\/\/www.slate.com\/content\/dam\/slate\/blogs\/moneybox\/2014\/12\/15\/the_black_white_wealth_gap_it_s_bigger_than_you_even_think\/pew_graphs.png.CROP.promovar-mediumlarge.png  Black Median Net Worth $11,000 White Median Net Worth $141,900","c_root_id_A":"d7ax9zi","c_root_id_B":"d7ax484","created_at_utc_A":1473123356,"created_at_utc_B":1473123117,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There are lots of overlapping explanations. One is the effects of housing segregation - on this see *Closed Doors, Opportunities Lost: The Continuing Costs of Housing \tDiscrimination* by Yinger.","human_ref_B":"And Is that wealth gap lower in other countries?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":239.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"5f5tfs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why is lobbying so prevalent in the US compared to Western Europe? Undoubtedly, lobbying is evident in all Western European countries, but it seems to be much more prevalent in the US.","c_root_id_A":"dahw5pb","c_root_id_B":"daidtlp","created_at_utc_A":1480274289,"created_at_utc_B":1480297362,"score_A":15,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"edit: part deleted for quality]  [The style is different, but lobbying in the EU exists just like in Washington.  Lobbying happens on an extremely wide scale in European countries and definitely in the EU institutions. There are 30.000 lobbyists in Brussels, that's about the same number as there are politicians and staff in the EU institutions. Corporate Europe Observatory is a good watchdog organisation that write about how lobbying in Europe works.","human_ref_B":"Much of Europe does not have an equivalent of the First Amendment, which provides for the right to \"petition the Government for a redress of grievances.\" This is commonly interpreted to mean lobbying the government.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23073.0,"score_ratio":1.0666666667}
{"post_id":"tayk6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Aside from Gold and Higher Education, are there any other \"bubbles\" projected for the next decade? I had wanted to come here and ask a question about how a vaccum gets created in an economic space, but it is late and I've forgotten the specific question.","c_root_id_A":"c4l5lje","c_root_id_B":"c4l5i11","created_at_utc_A":1336410323,"created_at_utc_B":1336409876,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"From what I understand, the higher education situation doesn't constitute a bubble.   These bubbles require assets that people invest in and expect a return on later in life, and higher education is still, even with todays prices, expected to have a return.","human_ref_B":"Do energy resources count if there are real strides in creating, constructing, and distributing alternative energy models and platforms throughout the world? How fast does something have to lose value for it to be a bubble?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":447.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"tayk6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Aside from Gold and Higher Education, are there any other \"bubbles\" projected for the next decade? I had wanted to come here and ask a question about how a vaccum gets created in an economic space, but it is late and I've forgotten the specific question.","c_root_id_A":"c4l6yh7","c_root_id_B":"c4l5t40","created_at_utc_A":1336416473,"created_at_utc_B":1336411304,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Social Networking investment - i.e. how will Linkedin, Yelp, and Facebook stock sustain the value shareholders have placed in them.  Media - will Hollywood, the big music companies, and print media be able to sustain sales enough to maintain shareholder value?   Housing Bubble 2.0 - if you don't think its a least a potential possibility, in some markets, I've got a bridge(view) in Brooklyn to sell you. On Kent Ave.","human_ref_B":"I don't really know the merits of this, but a lot of people seem to think Municipal Debt is a bubble.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5169.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"gv8gug","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Why are people racist? Why does racism exist? How does this play out on a evolutionary standpoint? And does racism stem from social and cultural beliefs?","c_root_id_A":"fsnckaj","c_root_id_B":"fsn7ymu","created_at_utc_A":1591114617,"created_at_utc_B":1591112387,"score_A":101,"score_B":51,"human_ref_A":"Before I answer, you need to understand my background. I am a research psychologist and I study the impact that stereotypes have on our judgments of others. I believe that racism often comes not from making incorrect judgments of others, but form attaching a negative evaluation to those judgments. Let me explain  Humans are naturally inclined towards categorization. This is something that seems to be fairly innate, or at least learned early on in life, because young children (Waxman & Gelman, 2009) and infants as young as three to four months old (Quinn et al., 2002) show evidence of it. From this young age individuals begin to form associations that help them to identify and categorize different aspects of the world around them (Packer & Cole, 2015). Through this process, we soon learn to regard objects that look, feel, or act similarly as being in a similar category. Most of the time, we are probably right. This process is evolutionarily advantageous because it makes it so that we do not have to use a lot of mental resources any time we encounter something new. We can rapidly make a guess about an object based on our past experience and we are usually correct.  These processes also work for social categorization. We have differing ideas about what various groups are like. I will call this idea stereotypes. If we define stereotypes as people\u2019s beliefs about groups and their individual members (Ashmore & Del Boca, 1981), research has found that inaccurate stereotypes are the exception and that most stereotypes have moderate to high levels of accuracy (Campbell, 1967; Jussim et al., 2016, 2018, 2019; Mackie, 1973; Ryan, 2003). This means that (like with any other form of category) if stereotypes are accurate, they should represent a generalized belief that is accurate for most members of a group most of the time.  So let\u2019s define racism as prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against a person or people on the basis of their membership in a particular racial or ethnic group. With this definition, the problem is never noticing that there are differences between groups. Different groups are different, and it is ok to notice that. The problem comes when we attach positive or negative evaluations to these differences. It is ok to notice that black individuals commit most of the violent crime in America (Latzer, 2018), the problem comes when I assume that this is caused by underlying violent tendencies among all blacks, or when I systematically devalue all blacks because of the possibility they might be violent (most research attributes this to poverty, culture, and institutional racism). This problem is further compounded when I share my negative evaluation of blacks with others and convince them to see things in a similar way.  Under this idea, racism comes from attaching negative evaluations to the differences between groups. Racism also comes from unfairly or systematically treating one group as less than another group. It also comes from parents, institutions, and cultures that have perpetuated negative evaluations.  \\*Please note that this is only one explanation for racism (and one that I wrote very quickly before a meeting I had to get to). This is a complicated issue that has a number of interacting forces many of which I can not get into here. I look forward to seeing what other explanations others share.  \\------------------------------------------------------------  Ashmore, R. D., & Del Boca, F. K. (1981). Conceptual approaches to stereotypes and stereotyping. *Cognitive Processes in Stereotyping and Intergroup Behavior*, *1*, 35.  Campbell, D. T. (1967). Stereotypes and the perception of group differences. *American Psychologist*, *22*(10), 817\u2013829. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1037\/h0025079  Jussim, L., Crawford, J. T., Anglin, S. M., Chambers, J. R., Stevens, S. T., Cohen, F., & Nelson, T. D. (2016). Stereotype accuracy: One of the largest and most replicable effects in all of social psychology. In *Handbook of prejudice, stereotyping, and discrimination* (2nd ed., Vol. 2, pp. 31\u201363).  Jussim, L., Stevens, S. T., & Honeycutt, N. (2018). Unasked questions about stereotype accuracy. *Archives of Scientific Psychology*, *6*(1), 214\u2013229. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1037\/arc0000055  Jussim, L., Stevens, S. T., & Honeycutt, N. (2019). The Accuracy of Stereotypes About Personality. In T. D. Letzring & J. S. Spain (Eds.), *The Oxford Handbook of Accurate Personality Judgment*. Oxford University Press.  Mackie, M. (1973). Arriving at \u201ctruth\u201d by definition: The case of stereotype inaccuracy. *Social Problems*, *20*(4), 431\u2013447.  Packer, M., & Cole, M. (2015). Culture in Development. In M. Bronstein & M. E. Lamb (Eds.), *Developmental science: An advanced textbook* (7th ed., pp. 43\u2013111). Psychology Press.  Quinn, P. C., Yahr, J., Kuhn, A., Slater, A. M., & Pascalis, O. (2002). Representation of the Gender of Human Faces by Infants: A Preference for Female. *Perception*, *31*(9), 1109\u20131121. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1068\/p3331  Ryan, C. (2003). Stereotype accuracy. *European Review of Social Psychology*, *13*(1), 75\u2013109. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1080\/10463280240000037  Waxman, S. R., & Gelman, S. A. (2009). Early word-learning entails reference, not merely associations. *Trends in Cognitive Sciences*, *13*(6), 258\u2013263. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1016\/j.tics.2009.03.006  &#x200B;  Edit: clarification","human_ref_B":"Ah, this question merits a highly extended answer, which I hope someone else will provide. However, I will try to point you in the right direction. Sociologists have probably spent the most time thinking about this question. In the field, the consensus seems to be that racism is rooted in the dominant group\u2019s desire to protect their group position. This idea has been attributed Herbert Blumer and his 1958 article \u201cRace Prejudice as a Sense of Group Position .\u201d  In addition, the view in the sociology of racism in over the past two decades has been that we largely live in an era of colorblind racism. You can read about this in Eduardo Bonilla-Silva\u2019s book \u201cRacism Without Racists.\u201d He explains how racism is able to persist in the face of so many people denying racist attitudes, having non-racist attitudes, and appearing to live non-racist lives (ex: having black friends, having a black bf\/gf, supporting \u201crace-neutral policies\u201d, etc.). His writing style can be a bit polemical but much empirical work after his book\u2019s publication has supported his claims. You can also check out the work of Lawrence Bobo.  Edit: added another example in the parentheses","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2230.0,"score_ratio":1.9803921569}
{"post_id":"8gbf74","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"What are some good books or articles on the social effects of technology? I recently started a subreddit on computer ethics, which deals with moral issues arising out of computer technology. Most people don't think of computers as giving rise to many ethical questions, but there are actually *hundreds*, many involving privacy.  Social science has a lot to offer computer ethics, because it can identify the effects that computers and technological developments have on society (e.g., does such and such a sentencing algorithm discriminate against minorites?). I'd appreciate it if the experts here could recommend interesting books or articles that I could read and\/or post on the subreddit.","c_root_id_A":"dyadmk4","c_root_id_B":"dyag75n","created_at_utc_A":1525207619,"created_at_utc_B":1525209995,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Not an expert, but I think you may be interested in some of the debates in regards to technology defining the social (technological determinism), social constructivism and media materiality. Also Hutchby's article on affordances. Maybe some software studies? I'm just excited I got something to say on a subreddit. New here and anonymity gives me courage. Oh, a book I remember now is 'Gramophone, film, typewriter' by Friedrich Kittler. Can you also provide a link to your other discussion?","human_ref_B":"This is close to my discipline.   Looking at the \"social impact of technology\" is so massive a field with so many millions of publications across the social sciences that it would be useful if you were a bit more specific in what you mean by \"computers\" and \"social effect\" and \"ethics\" and \"social science.\"  Algorithmic decision-making, cybersecurity, privacy, surveillance, digital advertising, the control of data, digital labor, the quantified self movement, the uber-ization of labor arrangements, automation, and artificial intelligence are just a few topics. Law, education, journalism, childcare, healthcare, urban planning, architecture, the democratic process, are just some of the institutions being changed by computation. Economics, sociology, anthropology, and communications have all produced reams of thought on the sociotechnical context of technology.   There are even specialized sub-fields expressly at this intersection. Science, Technology, and Society (STS), the History of Science, and the History of Technology are just a few.   there are endless ways to step into the discussion! great call on asking for resources.   Some links to dig into how the social sciences grapple with this question (primarily via STS):  http:\/\/sts.hks.harvard.edu\/about\/whatissts.html  http:\/\/4sonline.org\/  http:\/\/sts-program.mit.edu\/  Some links to non-profits and university research groups that may help:   https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2018\/02\/12\/business\/computer-science-ethics-courses.html  https:\/\/cyberlaw.stanford.edu\/  https:\/\/law.yale.edu\/isp  https:\/\/datasociety.net\/  https:\/\/cyber.harvard.edu\/  https:\/\/www.oii.ox.ac.uk\/   https:\/\/ainowinstitute.org\/  https:\/\/cihr.eu\/tag\/ethics-of-algorithms\/  edit: added more links","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2376.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"8gbf74","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"What are some good books or articles on the social effects of technology? I recently started a subreddit on computer ethics, which deals with moral issues arising out of computer technology. Most people don't think of computers as giving rise to many ethical questions, but there are actually *hundreds*, many involving privacy.  Social science has a lot to offer computer ethics, because it can identify the effects that computers and technological developments have on society (e.g., does such and such a sentencing algorithm discriminate against minorites?). I'd appreciate it if the experts here could recommend interesting books or articles that I could read and\/or post on the subreddit.","c_root_id_A":"dyakz63","c_root_id_B":"dyadmk4","created_at_utc_A":1525214856,"created_at_utc_B":1525207619,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Here are some classics for you:  *The Technological Society* by Jacques Ellul  *Simians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature* by Donna Haraway  *How We Became Posthuman: Virtual Bodies in Cybernetics, Literatures, and Informatics* by Katherine Hayles  *Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man* by Marshall McLuhan  *Technics and Civilization* by Lewis Mumford  *Human-Machine Reconfigurations: Plan and Situated Actions* by Lucy Suchman  *Cybernetics: or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine* by Norbert Wiener  \"Do Artifacts Have Politics?\" by Langdon Winner  *The Golem at Large: What You Should Know About Technology* by Harry Collins and Trevor Pinch  *What Computers Can't Do* by Herbert Dreyfus  *The Closed World: Computers and the Politics of Discourse in Cold War America* by Paul Edwards  \"Technology and the Illusion of the Escape from Politics\" by Yaron Ezrahi  \"The Ontology of the Enemy: Norbert Weiner and the Cybernetic Vision\" by Peter Galison  *Mechanization Takes Command: A Contribution to Anonymous History* by Sigfried Giedion  *The Cybernetics Group* by Steve Haims  *Artificial Intelligence: The Very Idea* by John Haugeland  *Between Human and Machine: Feedback, Control, and Computer Before Cybernetics* by David Mindell  \"Social Choice in Machine Design: The Case of Automatically Controlled Machine Tools\" by David Noble  *Normal Accidents: Living with High-Risk Technologies* by Charles Perrow  *The Media Equation: How People Treat Computers, Television and New Media Like Real People and Places* by B. Reeves and C. Nass  *Life on the Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet* by Sherry Turkle  *Ethical Know-How: Action, Wisdom and Cognition* by Francisco Varela  *The Computer and the Brain* by John von Neumann  *Cognition in the Wild* by Edwin Hutchins  *In the Age of the Smart Machine: The Future of Work and Power* by Shoshana Zuboff  \"When Computers Were Women\" by Jennifer Light","human_ref_B":"Not an expert, but I think you may be interested in some of the debates in regards to technology defining the social (technological determinism), social constructivism and media materiality. Also Hutchby's article on affordances. Maybe some software studies? I'm just excited I got something to say on a subreddit. New here and anonymity gives me courage. Oh, a book I remember now is 'Gramophone, film, typewriter' by Friedrich Kittler. Can you also provide a link to your other discussion?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7237.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"8gbf74","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"What are some good books or articles on the social effects of technology? I recently started a subreddit on computer ethics, which deals with moral issues arising out of computer technology. Most people don't think of computers as giving rise to many ethical questions, but there are actually *hundreds*, many involving privacy.  Social science has a lot to offer computer ethics, because it can identify the effects that computers and technological developments have on society (e.g., does such and such a sentencing algorithm discriminate against minorites?). I'd appreciate it if the experts here could recommend interesting books or articles that I could read and\/or post on the subreddit.","c_root_id_A":"dyakcl3","c_root_id_B":"dyakz63","created_at_utc_A":1525214191,"created_at_utc_B":1525214856,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Casey Fiesler & Blake Hallinan just published a relevant interesting paper at CHI 2018, titled \u201cWe Are the Product\u201d: Public Reactions to Online Data Sharing and Privacy Controversies in the Media.  Lots of good citations for this topic in their references as well.  Edit: This is from the field of human-computer interaction (HCI) which is very concerned about this topic, as is probably not surprising given the name of the field.","human_ref_B":"Here are some classics for you:  *The Technological Society* by Jacques Ellul  *Simians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature* by Donna Haraway  *How We Became Posthuman: Virtual Bodies in Cybernetics, Literatures, and Informatics* by Katherine Hayles  *Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man* by Marshall McLuhan  *Technics and Civilization* by Lewis Mumford  *Human-Machine Reconfigurations: Plan and Situated Actions* by Lucy Suchman  *Cybernetics: or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine* by Norbert Wiener  \"Do Artifacts Have Politics?\" by Langdon Winner  *The Golem at Large: What You Should Know About Technology* by Harry Collins and Trevor Pinch  *What Computers Can't Do* by Herbert Dreyfus  *The Closed World: Computers and the Politics of Discourse in Cold War America* by Paul Edwards  \"Technology and the Illusion of the Escape from Politics\" by Yaron Ezrahi  \"The Ontology of the Enemy: Norbert Weiner and the Cybernetic Vision\" by Peter Galison  *Mechanization Takes Command: A Contribution to Anonymous History* by Sigfried Giedion  *The Cybernetics Group* by Steve Haims  *Artificial Intelligence: The Very Idea* by John Haugeland  *Between Human and Machine: Feedback, Control, and Computer Before Cybernetics* by David Mindell  \"Social Choice in Machine Design: The Case of Automatically Controlled Machine Tools\" by David Noble  *Normal Accidents: Living with High-Risk Technologies* by Charles Perrow  *The Media Equation: How People Treat Computers, Television and New Media Like Real People and Places* by B. Reeves and C. Nass  *Life on the Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet* by Sherry Turkle  *Ethical Know-How: Action, Wisdom and Cognition* by Francisco Varela  *The Computer and the Brain* by John von Neumann  *Cognition in the Wild* by Edwin Hutchins  *In the Age of the Smart Machine: The Future of Work and Power* by Shoshana Zuboff  \"When Computers Were Women\" by Jennifer Light","labels":0,"seconds_difference":665.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"t10qqo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Looking for good texts on the concept of *reciprocity* in social, cultural, or even commercial contexts. I have a few already, but I wanted to mine the great wisdom of \/r\/asksocialscience for more. Thanks.  I owe you one.","c_root_id_A":"hyf09wf","c_root_id_B":"hyehrev","created_at_utc_A":1645815984,"created_at_utc_B":1645809015,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"There are some really interesting Indigenous perspectives emerging around reciprocity and I'm seeing a lot written on this in the field of education and curriculum studies. A good place to start would be William Pinar's summary on this here where he refers to the works of Rauna Kuokkanen. You can read Kuokkanen work directly here if you find the concepts raised by Pinar interesting.   In doing a search on Indigenous epistemologies around reciprocity, this article was of interest to me. I would highly encourage you to consider incorporating these Indigenous perspectives when thinking about reciprocity.   Kuokkanen, Rauna. 2007. Reshaping the University: Responsibility, Indigenous Epistemes, and   the Logic of the Gift. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.  Dostilio, Lina D., et al. \"Reciprocity: saying what we mean and meaning what we say.\" Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, vol. 19, no. 1, fall 2012, pp. 17+","human_ref_B":"Trust and Reciprocity by Elinor Ostrom","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6969.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"10uu0y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"[Economics] Explain to me why wealth is not a zero-sum game.  Assume that the system includes all resources accessible at that time. I've read some articles going both ways on this issue, but conceptually, this makes sense to me and so I want to hear why it's not true.  A more detailed version of my question: USA and first-world countries' relative wealth could not exist without relative poverty in much of the rest of the world.  Is this true?  In essence, we are borrowing value from those countries in order to build up our own standard of living.  The idea that we can meaningfully and sustainably increase the standard of living in 3rd world countries without detriment to our own is a delusion.","c_root_id_A":"c6guxiy","c_root_id_B":"c6gumg8","created_at_utc_A":1349238489,"created_at_utc_B":1349237305,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I don't think it really makes sense to say that \"wealth\" is or isn't a zero-sum game. Wealth is just a stock variable (as opposed to a flow variable; see http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Stock_and_flow ).  Generally people talk about zero-sum games in the context of free exchange. If an exchange is truly free (i.e. no coercion or manipulation or information asymmetries), then it is unambiguously NOT zero-sum. Why? Well, if both parties involved aren't better off with the trade than without it, then they would have no reason to trade.  Obviously, the assumption of truly free trades isn't one that always holds up to a lot of scrutiny, but I don't think it's unreasonable to assume (at least at a first glance at this very big question) that we're living in a world with competition and free exchange and all that.  The problem is not, I think, one of zero-sum vs. not zero-sum. The problem is one of distribution. That is to say, I don't think the problem is that standards of living across the world are becoming worse directly as a result of market transactions (well... MAJOR caveat here is externalities like pollution, but I don't think that's what you're getting at with this question.)  I think the issue you're interested in is that markets are only capable of giving us a Pareto efficient outcome. That is (somewhat loosely), no one can be made better off without someone being made worse off. The world that you describe -- one in which we can not meaningfully and sustainablly increase the standard living in 3rd world countries without detriment to our own -- is a Pareto-efficient outcome.  The problem here is that Pareto-efficiency is blind to distribution. Assuming that there aren't any goods or labor that I want to buy off of anyone, if I have a million dollars and nobody else has any money, that is Pareto efficient. Even if everyone is starving on the street, it is Pareto efficient.  It doesn't necessarily follow from that, however, that 1st-world living standards require a poor 3rd-world (it's probably worth mentioning here that \"1st-world\" and \"3rd-world\" are outdated terms; in this context, it makes more sense to refer to \"developed\" and \"developing,\" or \"core\" and \"periphery.\") It is likely true that there will always be wide gaps in wealth between the richest people and the poorest (for economic and non-economic reasons.) However, I don't think there's any reason to believe that such wide gaps will always exist in between countries.  Geez. This is a gigantic question. I hope I've at least scratched the surface of what you were looking for. Please feel free to ask follow-up questions. The answer I've given here is not even close to complete, and I've glossed over a LOT.","human_ref_B":">USA and first-world countries' relative wealth could not exist without relative poverty in much of the rest of the world. Is this true? ...that we can meaningfully and sustainably increase the standard of living in 3rd world countries without detriment to our own is a delusion.   First: What is wealth? You've just kind of thrown that out there without really defining it, not only that you've qualified it with \"relative.\"   I am a male of average height. Relative to my mother, I am tall.   My other issue with this question is an assumption you appear to be making: That there exists some finite lump of wealth or quality of life that must be split among nations.   Consider this thought experiment: Two workers, Bob and Alice build cars in their garage. Originally, they each devoted themselves to building their own car, producing 1 car, per person, per week. After hearing about this new-fangled Teamwork thing, Bob and Alice decided to try working together on one car at a time. The teamwork increased efficiency -- most of the car building process can be done in parallel, and it's easier to get things like doors and windshields in the right spot with 2 people. Bob and Alice are now able to produce 1.5 cars, per person, per week.   Using no additional resources, Bob and Alice have become more productive, and by producing more stuff have in a sense improved their standard of living. What if they discovered a new way to make car doors that used 1\/3 less aluminum and steel? Suddenly Bob and Alice have increased their output AND decreased their costs.  My point is: Productivity and efficiency gains are the closest thing to a free lunch you will ever get.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1184.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"10uu0y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"[Economics] Explain to me why wealth is not a zero-sum game.  Assume that the system includes all resources accessible at that time. I've read some articles going both ways on this issue, but conceptually, this makes sense to me and so I want to hear why it's not true.  A more detailed version of my question: USA and first-world countries' relative wealth could not exist without relative poverty in much of the rest of the world.  Is this true?  In essence, we are borrowing value from those countries in order to build up our own standard of living.  The idea that we can meaningfully and sustainably increase the standard of living in 3rd world countries without detriment to our own is a delusion.","c_root_id_A":"c6gumg8","c_root_id_B":"c6gw1lf","created_at_utc_A":1349237305,"created_at_utc_B":1349243534,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":">USA and first-world countries' relative wealth could not exist without relative poverty in much of the rest of the world. Is this true? ...that we can meaningfully and sustainably increase the standard of living in 3rd world countries without detriment to our own is a delusion.   First: What is wealth? You've just kind of thrown that out there without really defining it, not only that you've qualified it with \"relative.\"   I am a male of average height. Relative to my mother, I am tall.   My other issue with this question is an assumption you appear to be making: That there exists some finite lump of wealth or quality of life that must be split among nations.   Consider this thought experiment: Two workers, Bob and Alice build cars in their garage. Originally, they each devoted themselves to building their own car, producing 1 car, per person, per week. After hearing about this new-fangled Teamwork thing, Bob and Alice decided to try working together on one car at a time. The teamwork increased efficiency -- most of the car building process can be done in parallel, and it's easier to get things like doors and windshields in the right spot with 2 people. Bob and Alice are now able to produce 1.5 cars, per person, per week.   Using no additional resources, Bob and Alice have become more productive, and by producing more stuff have in a sense improved their standard of living. What if they discovered a new way to make car doors that used 1\/3 less aluminum and steel? Suddenly Bob and Alice have increased their output AND decreased their costs.  My point is: Productivity and efficiency gains are the closest thing to a free lunch you will ever get.","human_ref_B":">In essence, we are borrowing value from those countries in order to build up our own standard of living.  Your use of the term \"standard of living\" leads me to believe that you are using wealth as a proxy for quality of life, or some similar measure of \"how good one has it\".  Economically, this would be more accurately represented by the abstract concept of utility.  Utility is not a zero-sum game because utility is at least partially independent of market value. Let us say I invent a gloriously efficient method of producing dongles. Once utilized, this will increase the supply of dongles, thus reducing the price - so, in net worth terms, I suppose, wealth might be expected to stay the same.  But if I *really fucking love dongles*, I don't give a fuck that my 6 dongles are now worth $6 instead of $12. I have SIX DONGLES. Fuck.  That said, utility is *sort of* zero-sum - but not about the zero point, if that makes sense. In the above example, I cause an increase in productivity - every dongle-maker, because of my glorious invention, now poops out twice as many dongles per hour as he did before. That is the source of my utility increase. If you wanted to make me even happier, and give me something unheard of, like 9 dongles (MY LIFE IS COMPLETE), yes, you'd have to take 3 dongles from some other dude and deprive him of his dongle-related utility.  So, if you wanted to rapidly increase the quality of life in 3rd world countries, yes, there'd be costs to our own lives. But there is no reason that it cannot increase more slowly without cost to us - at least not the kind of reason you're looking for (there may be issues to do with a country simply not having the resources, for instace).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6229.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"10uu0y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"[Economics] Explain to me why wealth is not a zero-sum game.  Assume that the system includes all resources accessible at that time. I've read some articles going both ways on this issue, but conceptually, this makes sense to me and so I want to hear why it's not true.  A more detailed version of my question: USA and first-world countries' relative wealth could not exist without relative poverty in much of the rest of the world.  Is this true?  In essence, we are borrowing value from those countries in order to build up our own standard of living.  The idea that we can meaningfully and sustainably increase the standard of living in 3rd world countries without detriment to our own is a delusion.","c_root_id_A":"c6gv6zf","c_root_id_B":"c6gw1lf","created_at_utc_A":1349239556,"created_at_utc_B":1349243534,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Wealth is subjective. Did people think oil was valuable til people learned how to refine it to use as fuel? No.","human_ref_B":">In essence, we are borrowing value from those countries in order to build up our own standard of living.  Your use of the term \"standard of living\" leads me to believe that you are using wealth as a proxy for quality of life, or some similar measure of \"how good one has it\".  Economically, this would be more accurately represented by the abstract concept of utility.  Utility is not a zero-sum game because utility is at least partially independent of market value. Let us say I invent a gloriously efficient method of producing dongles. Once utilized, this will increase the supply of dongles, thus reducing the price - so, in net worth terms, I suppose, wealth might be expected to stay the same.  But if I *really fucking love dongles*, I don't give a fuck that my 6 dongles are now worth $6 instead of $12. I have SIX DONGLES. Fuck.  That said, utility is *sort of* zero-sum - but not about the zero point, if that makes sense. In the above example, I cause an increase in productivity - every dongle-maker, because of my glorious invention, now poops out twice as many dongles per hour as he did before. That is the source of my utility increase. If you wanted to make me even happier, and give me something unheard of, like 9 dongles (MY LIFE IS COMPLETE), yes, you'd have to take 3 dongles from some other dude and deprive him of his dongle-related utility.  So, if you wanted to rapidly increase the quality of life in 3rd world countries, yes, there'd be costs to our own lives. But there is no reason that it cannot increase more slowly without cost to us - at least not the kind of reason you're looking for (there may be issues to do with a country simply not having the resources, for instace).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3978.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1npt21","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.61,"history":"Why do women tend to complain more about the media's \"ideal body\" than men? You see muscular guys all the time, but there is rarely any backlash to it, is there any reasons why?","c_root_id_A":"cckwpnb","c_root_id_B":"cckwip7","created_at_utc_A":1380895484,"created_at_utc_B":1380894842,"score_A":92,"score_B":35,"human_ref_A":"My comment is going to refer to men and women with the presumption that most people are heterosexual, because research on attractiveness mostly presupposes this and uses heterosexuals as their sample.  While muscular men are rated as more sexy by women, they are also considered to be less committed and more volatile. As a result, the \"sexier\" men weren't more attractive as long-term partners (though they were for one-night stands).   In another study researchers found \"no correlation between a man's masculinity rating and how sexy women found him\". However, men with low body fat rated more attractive in general (summary and paywalled real source. These studies indicate that the stereotypical ideal body image of men is less important for their romantic success.  This study and plenty of others like it confirm the following: Men are more sexually stimulated by visual stimuli.  >Men place more emphasis than women on physical attractiveness in choosing partners for sex or marriage, whereas women emphasize their partners\u201d socioeconomic status (Berscheid & Walster, 1974; Buss & Barnes, 1986; Dion, 1981).  OKCupid's famous blog did some analysis of male and female attractiveness that I think is pretty interesting, specifically \"80% of guys were rated by women] as worse-looking than medium.\"  So women care less about how men look, but they also have unrealistic ideas about what the average man looks like.   Other studies have examined the effect of attractiveness on employment. [This study indicated that:  >A five point difference on a scale of 1 to 11] in attractiveness has the same impact as being female or having [an undergraduate] college degree.  and  >More attractive people are on average more likely to be employed and earn on average higher wages. The estimated effects of interviewer ratings [of attractiveness] are in general larger for men than for women, whereas self-ratings have larger effects among women. Attractiveness rated by other people, in our case the interviewer, has a larger impact than self-rated attractiveness. The wage effects of attractiveness are non-linear for men, which implies that wage punishment for unattractiveness is larger than wage premium for attractiveness, and linear for women. The wage effects of attractiveness are positive across the entire wage distribution.  One tidbit I'd like to note from this is that a woman's self-evaluation of her attractiveness tracks much more closely to other people's perception of her than a man's does. There are plenty of [indications that \"men tend to overrate significantly their own physical attractiveness compared to self-ratings by women.\" This book also suggests that the Pygmalion Effect  and its dark side the Golem Effect have a great deal to do with the effects of physical attractiveness. To summarize, higher expectations are placed on the attractive, and lower expectations on the unattractive, and they then tend to perform according to those expectations.   If you put these two ideas together, mens\u2019 tendency to consider themselves more attractive could lead to higher self-expectations, which they are given an extra boost to live up to while womens\u2019 lower self-evaluations reduce their own expectations for success and thus their performance.  **TL;DR** There isn't a monolithic ideal of what an attractive man is, and men all think they're hot anyway.","human_ref_B":"First, \"women\" don't tend to complain more frequently than men; feminists (people of all genders) tend to promote different body politics (what you perceive to be \"complain about the media's 'ideal body'\" is actually a little more nuanced than that). Within the broad feminist community there tend to be more people within that community who principally focus their efforts on \"women's issues\" rather than \"men's issues\" for political reasons. Within the academic community the rhetoric around masculinity is changing (i.e. it's becoming a more popular topic to write about), but historically mass media productions have maintained a diversity of men's bodies in a variety of different roles. From rockin' bods to big doofs, intellectual to slap-stick-stupid, dudes of all kinds have found representation on television and in film. Quantitatively, women have not experienced the same kind of treatment; don't get me started on bodies that don't conform to the dude\/chick binary.  In terms of citations, it's difficult for me to recommend one or two articles that would summarize all of the great work by black and white feminists, and critical cultural academics. I guess you could start with  [Kilbourne's \"The More You Subtract, The More You Add\"] (http:\/\/www.aef.com\/industry\/news\/data\/hot_issues\/1361) Maybe look at [Sut Jhally's \"Image\u00adBased Culture: Advertising and Popular Culture\"] (http:\/\/www.units.miamioh.edu\/technologyandhumanities\/sutjhally.pdf) If you want to extend this question to race, look at [Stuart Hall's \u201cThe Whites of Their Eyes\u201d] (http:\/\/www1.idc.ac.il\/libscan\/a2002\/84648.pdf) PM if you're interested in chatting about this further.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":642.0,"score_ratio":2.6285714286}
{"post_id":"o1fxv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What effect, if any, does raising the minimum wage have on inflation?  Hi, a friend and I were having a discussion about the minimum wage because in Ohio it rose from $7.40 to $7.70 on Jan. 1st, due to a Constitutional Amendment that passes in 2006 (Source). My friend claimed that raising the minimum wage would increase inflation, but I wasn't sure. Also, if I may ask, what are the positive and negative effects of raising the minimum wage?","c_root_id_A":"c3dn9cj","c_root_id_B":"c3duimw","created_at_utc_A":1325627641,"created_at_utc_B":1325692740,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Warning: I'm just an econ hobbyist, not an expert. However, since there are no other responses here, I'll take a crack at it.  Kind of. The basic thought behind \"raising minimum wage increases inflation\" is that it would result in cost-push inflation. Basically, the minimum wage makes all goods and services cost more, which means that businesses charge more, which means that the same dollar buys less, which is inflation. The counter-argument is that inflation can't really happen without the money supply increasing, which requires the intervention of a central bank. As it seems in most realms of economic thought, there are a number of arguments about what the actual result of policies would be. Will the increased cost of labor be absorbed by the company, or will it be passed on to consumers?  The effects of increasing minimum wage are:  1. Some businesses will lay off employees to cut costs. 2. Some businesses will put off hiring employees or give smaller raises to existing employees. 3. Some businesses will try to increase the cost of their product if the market can bear it, but an increase in price has an adverse effect on demand. 4. Some businesses will put off expansions or lower reinvestment to pay for the increased wages. 5. Some businesses will no longer be viable and will close. 6. Presumably there will be a higher standard of living for those people who retain their jobs at an increased wage. 7. Some businesses will move to a place where the minimum wage is lower.  As I see it, increasing minimum wage is bad *economic* policy, but maybe good *social* policy (to a point) because it can act as a tax on businesses which would otherwise rely on extremely low wages. The real problem comes with the ability of companies to move to a place with a lower minimum wage, which can cause serious repercussions for the country instituting the minimum wage law.","human_ref_B":"The minimum wage affects so few sectors of the economy that I would not expect it to have any effect on inflation. If you want to think about it, consider the following: because a higher minimum minimum wage can lead to higher output prices, it should cause inflation. Because a higher minimum wage *might* cause unemployment, and unemployment decreases individuals' disposable income, this could cause disinflation; but because it also increases the disposable income of individuals who remain employed (and the effect on unemployment might be very small), it should cause inflation (these are general equilibrium effect for anyone who's confused). So I'm really not sure what the net effect would be, but I do know that it's going to be very small as long as the minimum wage is not increased by an exorbitant amount.  The main thing people worry about with the minimum wage is unemployment, but *the impact of the minimum wage on unemployment is a topic of great debate*, and is not clearly understood at this point, at least in my opinion. Neoclassical theory predicts that an increase in the minimum wage should cause significant decreases in employment in affected sectors, because it causes the firms to substitute capital for workers (there's a simple supply and demand argument). There are other theories, though, like the search\/monopsony model that suggest that increasing the minimum wage will increase employment if the wages are low enough and the hiring firms' market power sufficiently high. Still other models of different frictions predict more unemployment, but say that the impact should be very small, or much smaller in the short run than the long run.  Empirically, the famous paper is Card and Krueger (1994, AER) which found very little impact of the minimum wage on employment in a quasi-experimental setting (actually the effect was slightly positive), and basically undid the consensus that existed prior to it that raising the minimum wage pretty much always caused unemployment. There are some concerns with the methodology of this paper, and subsequent research has found much larger impacts of the minimum wage, especially in the long run (see for example Baker Benjamin and Stanger, 1999, JOLE). Still more research on the cutting edge suggests that there are good reasons why these estimated elasticities are biased toward zero (so the impact on employment of a change in the minimum wage is underestimated), since firms operate dynamically and the minimum wage is set nominally, so the true effect on unemployment might still be quite large but unobserved (because inflation causes the real minimum wage to diminish immediately after being set). I think this last one is the explanation I buy, and that the impact on unemployment is something to be worried about, but this last sentence is definitely just my opinion. Nevertheless, I think sometimes the minimum wage can act as a check on firms' market power and can produce welfare gains, and so it's not always a bad idea to raise it, especially when the economy is growing.  Edit: in the interest of being thorough, I think it's important to note that firm profits will take a hit, since increasing their input costs can only make them worse off. In an economy where firms are barely making it, this could be very harmful, while when firms have \"profits to spare,\" the effect could be pretty small. This is an effect that's obvious but not often discussed in evaluating minimum wage policy.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":65099.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"o1fxv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What effect, if any, does raising the minimum wage have on inflation?  Hi, a friend and I were having a discussion about the minimum wage because in Ohio it rose from $7.40 to $7.70 on Jan. 1st, due to a Constitutional Amendment that passes in 2006 (Source). My friend claimed that raising the minimum wage would increase inflation, but I wasn't sure. Also, if I may ask, what are the positive and negative effects of raising the minimum wage?","c_root_id_A":"c3dosqo","c_root_id_B":"c3duimw","created_at_utc_A":1325639349,"created_at_utc_B":1325692740,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"In general Minimum wage has no direct effect on inflation. the cost effect is rather marginal because of international trade.  It does has a negative effect on employment as some workers will be too expensive thus fired and or replaced by capital goods like machinery that became profitable because of higher labour costs .  However there can be a effect in closed economies either through the cost effect but especially if a government ('s central bank) subsidizes the raise directly by printing some money and distributing it.  In economies where mosts of the people live close to that minimum wage their income will increase, the will try to buy morre but by doing that prices of goods will increase. The real effect of such a subsidy will be zero (since there weren't productivity gains) and inflation will settle in the economy.  This happens in Iran. :)","human_ref_B":"The minimum wage affects so few sectors of the economy that I would not expect it to have any effect on inflation. If you want to think about it, consider the following: because a higher minimum minimum wage can lead to higher output prices, it should cause inflation. Because a higher minimum wage *might* cause unemployment, and unemployment decreases individuals' disposable income, this could cause disinflation; but because it also increases the disposable income of individuals who remain employed (and the effect on unemployment might be very small), it should cause inflation (these are general equilibrium effect for anyone who's confused). So I'm really not sure what the net effect would be, but I do know that it's going to be very small as long as the minimum wage is not increased by an exorbitant amount.  The main thing people worry about with the minimum wage is unemployment, but *the impact of the minimum wage on unemployment is a topic of great debate*, and is not clearly understood at this point, at least in my opinion. Neoclassical theory predicts that an increase in the minimum wage should cause significant decreases in employment in affected sectors, because it causes the firms to substitute capital for workers (there's a simple supply and demand argument). There are other theories, though, like the search\/monopsony model that suggest that increasing the minimum wage will increase employment if the wages are low enough and the hiring firms' market power sufficiently high. Still other models of different frictions predict more unemployment, but say that the impact should be very small, or much smaller in the short run than the long run.  Empirically, the famous paper is Card and Krueger (1994, AER) which found very little impact of the minimum wage on employment in a quasi-experimental setting (actually the effect was slightly positive), and basically undid the consensus that existed prior to it that raising the minimum wage pretty much always caused unemployment. There are some concerns with the methodology of this paper, and subsequent research has found much larger impacts of the minimum wage, especially in the long run (see for example Baker Benjamin and Stanger, 1999, JOLE). Still more research on the cutting edge suggests that there are good reasons why these estimated elasticities are biased toward zero (so the impact on employment of a change in the minimum wage is underestimated), since firms operate dynamically and the minimum wage is set nominally, so the true effect on unemployment might still be quite large but unobserved (because inflation causes the real minimum wage to diminish immediately after being set). I think this last one is the explanation I buy, and that the impact on unemployment is something to be worried about, but this last sentence is definitely just my opinion. Nevertheless, I think sometimes the minimum wage can act as a check on firms' market power and can produce welfare gains, and so it's not always a bad idea to raise it, especially when the economy is growing.  Edit: in the interest of being thorough, I think it's important to note that firm profits will take a hit, since increasing their input costs can only make them worse off. In an economy where firms are barely making it, this could be very harmful, while when firms have \"profits to spare,\" the effect could be pretty small. This is an effect that's obvious but not often discussed in evaluating minimum wage policy.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":53391.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"ba7j62","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is there academic disagreement in social science? How is it resolved, especially in a qualitative context? In hard (natural?) science there seems to be disagreement, but those disagreements seem to often get resolved due to increased information, that validates one or more positions, and\/or invalidates the rest.     Ive heard that social science has disagreements as well, how are they resolved?","c_root_id_A":"ek9q6wp","c_root_id_B":"ek9pyoz","created_at_utc_A":1554582558,"created_at_utc_B":1554582359,"score_A":28,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Not all topics have consensus and even if there is consensus there remains those who disagree. The practical reply is that in any discipline there can be competing theories, interpretations and explanations besides disagreements on methodology, analyses, etc. These are 'resolved' with further research, attempts at replication, attempts at tackling the same subject with other methods or taking into account variables one believes another researcher did not account for and see if the results change.  For an example, see this thread on the effects of video games in which I give examples of how even in the same organization (i.e. the APA) there can be disagreements and on which grounds.  It is not fundamentally different for qualitative research. And generally speaking, both quantitative and qualitative research can help each other to solve disagreements, test interpretations and figure out new explanations. Qualitative research is not meant to be generalizable, but quantitative research can be built upon it. And if there are questions about how to explain something quantitative research has found, qualitative research could provide clues. And mixed-methods exist, of course.  Science is, as a whole, something that is built and developed through time. For example, Kuhn famously argued that the sciences are sooner or latter confronted with revolutions which bring a paradigm shift.","human_ref_B":"There's pretty much a spectrum here. Even when we can do pretty good experiments (randomised controlled trials), it's much, much harder experimenting on human beings. We have to be ethical and stuff. Clinical research (drugs, medical devices, other interventions) can often be done to a very high standard but are done in the context of learning curves, placebo effects where perfect blinding isn't possible, and the ethical imperative to ensure that people aren't (predictably) harmed.  Not all questions in medicine can be tested in a randomised controlled trial. We can't randomise ten year olds to become lifetime smokers or not. We can't randomise whether someone is born male or female, rich or poor, black or white. The chains of cause and effect are often complex and hard to unravel, and a very large number of causal\/explanatory models can be proposed and are often hard to test.  Where we can't experiment we need to build up a coherent picture by asking questions, or sub-questions, in a range of different ways to piece together what theories are consistent with reality. Money and Power often care about the results, so there is often a lot of chaff amongst the wheat (funding source is a powerful predictor of outcome in clinical trials).  At the qualitative end, this is often done to underpin quantitative research. If I want to study depression I need tools to measure depression and I need qualitative research to develop those tools. If I want to understand why low income is associated with so many poor outcomes I need qualitative research to identify the various channels by which disadvantage operates.  You often see (bad) studies on the latter question conclude something like (paraphrased) *\"lower socioeconomic status is associated with decreased life expectancy and this is due to lifestyle factors. This is obviously because poor people are too stupid to know what's good for them\"*. This causal explanation might be appealing to a certain type of prejudice but it ignores the stressors of poverty, physical as well as financial access to good food, air and environmental quality in poor neighbourhoods, the role of junk food as an affordable treat and sometimes the only feasible option for people working long hours, antisocial hours, multiple jobs, with slow and exhausting transport options.   Qualitative research in the social sciences is no different from theoretical research in the hard sciences. Empirical investigations are, or should be, grounded in theory. Without it they are an unanchored, uninterpretatable mess. The difference with social sciences is that human beings are really bloody difficult to experiment on or even observe accurately, and the things that relate to underlying causal mechanisms are often difficult to identify or quantify. And the politics of a spacecraft falling out of the sky or electronics not working when you press the on-switch are generally a lot simpler. The process is not that different, but the experimental subjects and the social context are.  This is quite long, a review of two books and a third section with the author's own thoughts, but it illustrates these arguments quite well: New Atheism, Worse Than You Think.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":199.0,"score_ratio":3.1111111111}
{"post_id":"1rh0fd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Are there any studies on how the socioeconomic backgrounds of professional NFL players have changed over time? It seems like these days lots of players got extra coaching when they were young, which costs money, compared to the narrative you hear about poor, hungry, athletically talented kids rising to fame with hard work. Any studies out there that look at this phenomenon over time?","c_root_id_A":"cdnfn65","c_root_id_B":"cdnedk5","created_at_utc_A":1385481186,"created_at_utc_B":1385477611,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"ITT: The book Outliers is the only source.","human_ref_B":"As others have mentioned, SES is usually linked to sports through the ability to afford equipment, facilities, etc.  Here's a short post from the Society Pages on how basketball used to be dominated by Jews: http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/2013\/11\/25\/when-jews-dominated-professional-basketball\/  It has more to do with race and stereotypes, but touches on your question as who we associate with certain sports changes over time, and how those associations may be shaped by overall social and economic opportunities.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3575.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"3ighz9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why is the concept of 'discourse' so popular in the social sciences? Habermas, Ricoeur and Foucault all use the term, and its utilised by practitioners of history, sociology etc influenced by them.  Side question: how do their interpretations of the concept differ?  Side-Side question: who's notion is the best? ;)","c_root_id_A":"cug6htf","c_root_id_B":"cugdmqd","created_at_utc_A":1440592878,"created_at_utc_B":1440605155,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Isn't discourse central to all science. Discoveries aren't relevant if they can't be conveyed to others in a formal and refutable way.","human_ref_B":"In Habermas' case, discourse is \"popular,\" because communication leads to consensus (Theorie des kommunikativen Handeln, 1981) in a society, provided the environment for this process is in place. I suggest you look up deliberative democracy as well, these topics are very exciting and tie in quite nicely with social constructivism. We talk\/deliberate to convey our respective realities and find solutions to the problems we face, not subjectively, as Weber had claimed, but mutually.  Can't speak to the other two.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12277.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"49vg8x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why are economists seen as apart from other social sciences? I asked a question in the \/r\/badeconomics discussion thread about this article.  http:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/business\/archive\/2015\/04\/economists-still-think-economics-is-the-best\/390063\/  and received responses like   >Charitable explanation: The other social sciences are far less useful then economics.  and   >Economics is pretty isolated from the other social sciences. Can't blame the researchers. Most economists are anal about causality; endogeneity is always a huge concern in econ but other social scientists don't seem to care enough about. And I would say the financial crisis is a very good reason not to pay attention to other fields. There's a huge gulf in how economic researchers interested in the financial crisis understand it (money market run) compared to well, the understanding of almost everyone else (bad bets on subprime mortgages).  and   >It's not an unheard of criticism. Even Piketty calls out mainstream econ's apparent distaste for inputs that come from sociology, anthropology and behavioral studies, and considers it detrimental to econ as a whole.  and  >It is BS. Economics is the strongest of the social sciences (especially now). Just because people didn't listen to economists and had a financial crisis doesn't mean the field should change in any way.  Why are economists less likely to draw from other social sciences?  Why is economics so seemingly insular?","c_root_id_A":"d0vb6cd","c_root_id_B":"d0vhcgk","created_at_utc_A":1457649809,"created_at_utc_B":1457660085,"score_A":4,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"There is a language and paradigm gap. Economics requires a fair amount of mathematics, and those sufficiently trained in math have made the jump (Kahneman). Additionally, mainstream economics has rejected much of Marx's work and diverged from the rest of the social sciences where parts of his work are foundational texts. Lastly, the other social sciences are several decades behind on empirical work. They do simple linear regressions and ignore questions of causality and endogeneity, which hasn't been acceptable in economics for the longest time.  Source: I study economic theory and political economy. Here is an example paper to illustrate the math requirements:  http:\/\/economics.mit.edu\/files\/10405","human_ref_B":"I won't address the substance of what people said on other subreddits.  Economics is really the most like physics, in that it comes up with neat equations that are useable for predictions.  There's actually a great sociology article that lays out a lot of the differences called \"'Dirty Hands' versus 'Clean Models': Is Sociology in Danger of Being Seduced by Economics?\"  This chart sort of summarizes its arguments of the differences.  But the long and the short of it is that, for most people who use rational choice theory, rational choice theory can be used to sufficiently explain many human phenomena.  Originally, rational choice theory was confined to mainly the allocation of scarce resources (the traditional domain of economics) but increasingly it's being used to explain much more.  Gary Becker really started that revolution in mainstream economics, looking at so much more than market behavior and consumption patterns.   The above article was written at a time when it looked like rational choice was going to take over sociology, when James Coleman was bringing rat choice models into sociology, when he was regularly collaborating with Becker himself, and they were found new journals, like Social Science Research.  It didn't catch on in sociology, but what sociologists wouldn't for the most part do (in part because our training in rational choice is *horrible*--other than people who went to UChicago in the 1980's and 1990's, it seems like most sociologists only treat rational choice as a laughable boogey man), economists did themselves in what's called \"Economic Imperialism\".  That's not an insult, that's the name of an economics article praising this development.  Here's the abstract, which I think gives a sense of why many economists think so highly of themselves and so poorly of other social scientists.  I mean, just peep the first line:  >Economics is not only a social science, it is a genuine science. Like the physical sciences, economics uses a methodology that produces refutable implications and tests these implications using solid statistical techniques. In particular, economics stresses three factors that distinguish it from other social sciences. Economists use the construct of rational individuals who engage in maximizing behavior. Economic models adhere strictly to the importance of equilibrium as part of any theory. Finally, a focus on efficiency leads economists to ask questions that other social sciences ignore. These ingredients have allowed economics to invade intellectual territory that was previously deemed to be outside the discipline's realm.  I'd say that's a different way of saying the \"clean models\" thing.  Economists are well aware of this drift into areas once covered by other fields. The well-known microeconomist Bryan Caplan has a very insightful blog post called \"In a Perfect World, I'd Call Myself a Sociologist\".  There's an old joke that goes something like, \"The difference between economists and everyone else is that economist assume people are fundamental the same.\"  This lets them try to answer a lot of questions that other social sciences feel like they can't.  And it also means that they often don't need to read other fields' \"theories\" because in rational choice they already have a convincing theory, to say nothing about methods.  While economists might accept some lab experiments from psychology, they tend to prefer causal methods and discount even quantitive methods from other social sciences that aren't experimental or quasi-experimental (IVs, regression discontinuity, etc), for applied micro, at least.  While some have argued that economic theory is actually largely qualitative and only hidden under a thin veneer of equations--this is the argument of economics' most famous Cassandra, Deirdre McCloskey, in her excellent *Secret Sins of Economists* (full PDF here)--there of course hasn't been any openly qualitative economics in generations, which means that many discount economics work out of hand (McCloskey's pamphlet of a book is a great read; for critics of economics, it lays out some clear virtues, and for proponents of economics, it makes some strong arguments for certain vices).  While there has been challenges from within economics to several parts of rational choice theory's core assumptions--that all people all the same and culture has some clear importance in behavior has recently been challenged (probably most famously in the really dope article \"In Search of Homoeconomicus\"), as has the whole idea that people are rational utility maximizers (basically by the whole field of behavioral economics)--this of course hasn't caused an abandonment or even retreat from economics's core ideas or the increased adoption of theory from other social sciences (except some social psychology).  But while others will point to methods (which are undeniably more statistically sophisticated) or training (which is undeniably more rigorous for the modal student), I really think it's economics' clear, universalist theory that really sets it apart.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10276.0,"score_ratio":7.25}
{"post_id":"49vg8x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why are economists seen as apart from other social sciences? I asked a question in the \/r\/badeconomics discussion thread about this article.  http:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/business\/archive\/2015\/04\/economists-still-think-economics-is-the-best\/390063\/  and received responses like   >Charitable explanation: The other social sciences are far less useful then economics.  and   >Economics is pretty isolated from the other social sciences. Can't blame the researchers. Most economists are anal about causality; endogeneity is always a huge concern in econ but other social scientists don't seem to care enough about. And I would say the financial crisis is a very good reason not to pay attention to other fields. There's a huge gulf in how economic researchers interested in the financial crisis understand it (money market run) compared to well, the understanding of almost everyone else (bad bets on subprime mortgages).  and   >It's not an unheard of criticism. Even Piketty calls out mainstream econ's apparent distaste for inputs that come from sociology, anthropology and behavioral studies, and considers it detrimental to econ as a whole.  and  >It is BS. Economics is the strongest of the social sciences (especially now). Just because people didn't listen to economists and had a financial crisis doesn't mean the field should change in any way.  Why are economists less likely to draw from other social sciences?  Why is economics so seemingly insular?","c_root_id_A":"d0vhcgk","c_root_id_B":"d0vdt4j","created_at_utc_A":1457660085,"created_at_utc_B":1457654100,"score_A":29,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I won't address the substance of what people said on other subreddits.  Economics is really the most like physics, in that it comes up with neat equations that are useable for predictions.  There's actually a great sociology article that lays out a lot of the differences called \"'Dirty Hands' versus 'Clean Models': Is Sociology in Danger of Being Seduced by Economics?\"  This chart sort of summarizes its arguments of the differences.  But the long and the short of it is that, for most people who use rational choice theory, rational choice theory can be used to sufficiently explain many human phenomena.  Originally, rational choice theory was confined to mainly the allocation of scarce resources (the traditional domain of economics) but increasingly it's being used to explain much more.  Gary Becker really started that revolution in mainstream economics, looking at so much more than market behavior and consumption patterns.   The above article was written at a time when it looked like rational choice was going to take over sociology, when James Coleman was bringing rat choice models into sociology, when he was regularly collaborating with Becker himself, and they were found new journals, like Social Science Research.  It didn't catch on in sociology, but what sociologists wouldn't for the most part do (in part because our training in rational choice is *horrible*--other than people who went to UChicago in the 1980's and 1990's, it seems like most sociologists only treat rational choice as a laughable boogey man), economists did themselves in what's called \"Economic Imperialism\".  That's not an insult, that's the name of an economics article praising this development.  Here's the abstract, which I think gives a sense of why many economists think so highly of themselves and so poorly of other social scientists.  I mean, just peep the first line:  >Economics is not only a social science, it is a genuine science. Like the physical sciences, economics uses a methodology that produces refutable implications and tests these implications using solid statistical techniques. In particular, economics stresses three factors that distinguish it from other social sciences. Economists use the construct of rational individuals who engage in maximizing behavior. Economic models adhere strictly to the importance of equilibrium as part of any theory. Finally, a focus on efficiency leads economists to ask questions that other social sciences ignore. These ingredients have allowed economics to invade intellectual territory that was previously deemed to be outside the discipline's realm.  I'd say that's a different way of saying the \"clean models\" thing.  Economists are well aware of this drift into areas once covered by other fields. The well-known microeconomist Bryan Caplan has a very insightful blog post called \"In a Perfect World, I'd Call Myself a Sociologist\".  There's an old joke that goes something like, \"The difference between economists and everyone else is that economist assume people are fundamental the same.\"  This lets them try to answer a lot of questions that other social sciences feel like they can't.  And it also means that they often don't need to read other fields' \"theories\" because in rational choice they already have a convincing theory, to say nothing about methods.  While economists might accept some lab experiments from psychology, they tend to prefer causal methods and discount even quantitive methods from other social sciences that aren't experimental or quasi-experimental (IVs, regression discontinuity, etc), for applied micro, at least.  While some have argued that economic theory is actually largely qualitative and only hidden under a thin veneer of equations--this is the argument of economics' most famous Cassandra, Deirdre McCloskey, in her excellent *Secret Sins of Economists* (full PDF here)--there of course hasn't been any openly qualitative economics in generations, which means that many discount economics work out of hand (McCloskey's pamphlet of a book is a great read; for critics of economics, it lays out some clear virtues, and for proponents of economics, it makes some strong arguments for certain vices).  While there has been challenges from within economics to several parts of rational choice theory's core assumptions--that all people all the same and culture has some clear importance in behavior has recently been challenged (probably most famously in the really dope article \"In Search of Homoeconomicus\"), as has the whole idea that people are rational utility maximizers (basically by the whole field of behavioral economics)--this of course hasn't caused an abandonment or even retreat from economics's core ideas or the increased adoption of theory from other social sciences (except some social psychology).  But while others will point to methods (which are undeniably more statistically sophisticated) or training (which is undeniably more rigorous for the modal student), I really think it's economics' clear, universalist theory that really sets it apart.","human_ref_B":"I think this bit from Mankiw is relevant to your question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5985.0,"score_ratio":14.5}
{"post_id":"49vg8x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why are economists seen as apart from other social sciences? I asked a question in the \/r\/badeconomics discussion thread about this article.  http:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/business\/archive\/2015\/04\/economists-still-think-economics-is-the-best\/390063\/  and received responses like   >Charitable explanation: The other social sciences are far less useful then economics.  and   >Economics is pretty isolated from the other social sciences. Can't blame the researchers. Most economists are anal about causality; endogeneity is always a huge concern in econ but other social scientists don't seem to care enough about. And I would say the financial crisis is a very good reason not to pay attention to other fields. There's a huge gulf in how economic researchers interested in the financial crisis understand it (money market run) compared to well, the understanding of almost everyone else (bad bets on subprime mortgages).  and   >It's not an unheard of criticism. Even Piketty calls out mainstream econ's apparent distaste for inputs that come from sociology, anthropology and behavioral studies, and considers it detrimental to econ as a whole.  and  >It is BS. Economics is the strongest of the social sciences (especially now). Just because people didn't listen to economists and had a financial crisis doesn't mean the field should change in any way.  Why are economists less likely to draw from other social sciences?  Why is economics so seemingly insular?","c_root_id_A":"d0vjht2","c_root_id_B":"d0vb6cd","created_at_utc_A":1457665331,"created_at_utc_B":1457649809,"score_A":14,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"(Update: in response \/u\/mjucft 's blistering criticisms, I went ahead and found a few peer-reviewed sources for parts of this post, in case anyone is interested.  Here's the best I've found so far. )  (~~I'm not sure that OP's question is really compatible with obeying both Rules #2 and #1 for this subreddit.  That is, I'm not sure OP's question is a sociology question, in the sense of it being something sociologists would be able to answer, citing peer-reviewed study. But OP's question is likely to be interesting to readers of this subreddit, and probably deserves mercy.  Likewise, I ask the moderators to show mercy to me and allow me to use multiple non-study citations from scientific sources.~~)  The link provided by \/u\/Scrennscrandley is a good one and my response here is meant as a supplement to it, not an alternative to it.    I write to offer two additional related elements:  * Often, the more math involved, the more respected a \u201cscience\u201d is.  (Especially if the discipline is light on other criteria]( http:\/\/undsci.berkeley.edu\/article\/mathematics) of being a \u201cscience\u201d)  * Economists put extra effort into math to distinguish their work from (originally) descriptive sociology and (more recently) philosophy.  For the most part, I see this as just a flavor of a similar phenomenon that occurs throughout all the sciences, where the more \"math-y\" the science, the more they look down on the others.  You can see this with theoretical physicists vs. experimental physicists; genetics vs. zoology, etc.  I speculate that economists may accentuate this hierarchy more than other scientists because they often lack recourse to another validator of science: empirical repeatability.   Another way of putting this is: Einstein got away with a Nobel Prize for a theory that took over 100 years to fully empirically test.  He got away with this because what he did was mostly math.  For most of the history of economics, it has been infeasible or unethical to test economic theories, particularly macroeconomic theories.  (For example, setting income tax rates in 98 identical countries from 1% to 99% and seeing which ones do or do not achieve economic growth.)  This means that the scientific \"ego\" of Economists is relatively more dependent on its \"mathiness\" than many other sciences.  One scholar has called this [\u201cphysics envy\u201d]( http:\/\/blogs.scientificamerican.com\/the-curious-wavefunction\/do-you-need-to-know-math-for-doing-great-science\/).   For most of the last century, economics was really just a branch of sociology (that is, economic behavior is a just a form of human group behavior, and sociology is the a study of human group behavior).  Economics began to distinguish itself by being more easily quantifiable, at first simply because measuring things with money is easier than measuring many of other things sociologists tend to measure.   So a sociologist might be respectable by publishing a paper that does little more than build a definitionally-rigorous vocabulary about a previously understudied social phenomenon (e.g. describing and naming the social hierarchies of criminal street gangs), an economist would be more likely to get published for mathematically rigorous work almost devoid of empirical testability (e.g. the rate at which economy of scale produces natural monopolies, as a function of transaction cost lowering due to vertical integration).   This tendency in economics possibly this also led to a [streetlight effect]( https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Streetlight_effect) where economists who wanted to get ahead avoided topics that didn\u2019t lend themselves to math. As time went on, economists sought to be even more \u201cmathy\u201d and rigorous by increased use of statistics.     In the last decade or two, this trend in economics suffered a substantial shock, with the advancement of the field of [behavioral economics]( https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Behavioral_economics), in which psychology science methods were used to test [economic game theory]( https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Game_theory#Economics_and_business).   It turns out that [these experiments undermined one of the principal axioms]( https:\/\/www.psychologytoday.com\/blog\/there-are-free-lunches\/201410\/why-is-behavioral-economics-so-revolutionary) of a great deal of economic theory, [rational choice theory.    Another major axiom of many economic models is that \u201cutility\u201d (an economist\u2019s word for happiness\u201d) is inherently impossible to measure directly, so many economists work around this empirical roadblock by assuming, for purposes of their work, that money=utility.     But if people don\u2019t actually behave rationally, and aren\u2019t really made happy largely in accordance with their money, then economics loses its empiricism and as a discipline risks being seen as a philosophy rather than a science.   My sense is that economists react to this by drawing an ever-tighter circle around their internal rigor.   There is, actually a fascinating parallel to this in theoretical physics.  It turns out that [there is a significant debate about whether String Theory, which has been a huge focus of theoretical physics for a few decades, was actually a \u201cscientific\u201d theory at all]( http:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/article\/is-string-theory-science\/).  Namely, String Theory was not producing testable hypotheses.   However, String Theory had two other things going for it: 1) it was an attempt to describe the natural world, and 2) it had a lot of math.  Economics will never have 1), so really, really, really showing they have #2 is critical to their self-perception as a science.","human_ref_B":"There is a language and paradigm gap. Economics requires a fair amount of mathematics, and those sufficiently trained in math have made the jump (Kahneman). Additionally, mainstream economics has rejected much of Marx's work and diverged from the rest of the social sciences where parts of his work are foundational texts. Lastly, the other social sciences are several decades behind on empirical work. They do simple linear regressions and ignore questions of causality and endogeneity, which hasn't been acceptable in economics for the longest time.  Source: I study economic theory and political economy. Here is an example paper to illustrate the math requirements:  http:\/\/economics.mit.edu\/files\/10405","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15522.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"49vg8x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why are economists seen as apart from other social sciences? I asked a question in the \/r\/badeconomics discussion thread about this article.  http:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/business\/archive\/2015\/04\/economists-still-think-economics-is-the-best\/390063\/  and received responses like   >Charitable explanation: The other social sciences are far less useful then economics.  and   >Economics is pretty isolated from the other social sciences. Can't blame the researchers. Most economists are anal about causality; endogeneity is always a huge concern in econ but other social scientists don't seem to care enough about. And I would say the financial crisis is a very good reason not to pay attention to other fields. There's a huge gulf in how economic researchers interested in the financial crisis understand it (money market run) compared to well, the understanding of almost everyone else (bad bets on subprime mortgages).  and   >It's not an unheard of criticism. Even Piketty calls out mainstream econ's apparent distaste for inputs that come from sociology, anthropology and behavioral studies, and considers it detrimental to econ as a whole.  and  >It is BS. Economics is the strongest of the social sciences (especially now). Just because people didn't listen to economists and had a financial crisis doesn't mean the field should change in any way.  Why are economists less likely to draw from other social sciences?  Why is economics so seemingly insular?","c_root_id_A":"d0vdt4j","c_root_id_B":"d0vjht2","created_at_utc_A":1457654100,"created_at_utc_B":1457665331,"score_A":2,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"I think this bit from Mankiw is relevant to your question.","human_ref_B":"(Update: in response \/u\/mjucft 's blistering criticisms, I went ahead and found a few peer-reviewed sources for parts of this post, in case anyone is interested.  Here's the best I've found so far. )  (~~I'm not sure that OP's question is really compatible with obeying both Rules #2 and #1 for this subreddit.  That is, I'm not sure OP's question is a sociology question, in the sense of it being something sociologists would be able to answer, citing peer-reviewed study. But OP's question is likely to be interesting to readers of this subreddit, and probably deserves mercy.  Likewise, I ask the moderators to show mercy to me and allow me to use multiple non-study citations from scientific sources.~~)  The link provided by \/u\/Scrennscrandley is a good one and my response here is meant as a supplement to it, not an alternative to it.    I write to offer two additional related elements:  * Often, the more math involved, the more respected a \u201cscience\u201d is.  (Especially if the discipline is light on other criteria]( http:\/\/undsci.berkeley.edu\/article\/mathematics) of being a \u201cscience\u201d)  * Economists put extra effort into math to distinguish their work from (originally) descriptive sociology and (more recently) philosophy.  For the most part, I see this as just a flavor of a similar phenomenon that occurs throughout all the sciences, where the more \"math-y\" the science, the more they look down on the others.  You can see this with theoretical physicists vs. experimental physicists; genetics vs. zoology, etc.  I speculate that economists may accentuate this hierarchy more than other scientists because they often lack recourse to another validator of science: empirical repeatability.   Another way of putting this is: Einstein got away with a Nobel Prize for a theory that took over 100 years to fully empirically test.  He got away with this because what he did was mostly math.  For most of the history of economics, it has been infeasible or unethical to test economic theories, particularly macroeconomic theories.  (For example, setting income tax rates in 98 identical countries from 1% to 99% and seeing which ones do or do not achieve economic growth.)  This means that the scientific \"ego\" of Economists is relatively more dependent on its \"mathiness\" than many other sciences.  One scholar has called this [\u201cphysics envy\u201d]( http:\/\/blogs.scientificamerican.com\/the-curious-wavefunction\/do-you-need-to-know-math-for-doing-great-science\/).   For most of the last century, economics was really just a branch of sociology (that is, economic behavior is a just a form of human group behavior, and sociology is the a study of human group behavior).  Economics began to distinguish itself by being more easily quantifiable, at first simply because measuring things with money is easier than measuring many of other things sociologists tend to measure.   So a sociologist might be respectable by publishing a paper that does little more than build a definitionally-rigorous vocabulary about a previously understudied social phenomenon (e.g. describing and naming the social hierarchies of criminal street gangs), an economist would be more likely to get published for mathematically rigorous work almost devoid of empirical testability (e.g. the rate at which economy of scale produces natural monopolies, as a function of transaction cost lowering due to vertical integration).   This tendency in economics possibly this also led to a [streetlight effect]( https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Streetlight_effect) where economists who wanted to get ahead avoided topics that didn\u2019t lend themselves to math. As time went on, economists sought to be even more \u201cmathy\u201d and rigorous by increased use of statistics.     In the last decade or two, this trend in economics suffered a substantial shock, with the advancement of the field of [behavioral economics]( https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Behavioral_economics), in which psychology science methods were used to test [economic game theory]( https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Game_theory#Economics_and_business).   It turns out that [these experiments undermined one of the principal axioms]( https:\/\/www.psychologytoday.com\/blog\/there-are-free-lunches\/201410\/why-is-behavioral-economics-so-revolutionary) of a great deal of economic theory, [rational choice theory.    Another major axiom of many economic models is that \u201cutility\u201d (an economist\u2019s word for happiness\u201d) is inherently impossible to measure directly, so many economists work around this empirical roadblock by assuming, for purposes of their work, that money=utility.     But if people don\u2019t actually behave rationally, and aren\u2019t really made happy largely in accordance with their money, then economics loses its empiricism and as a discipline risks being seen as a philosophy rather than a science.   My sense is that economists react to this by drawing an ever-tighter circle around their internal rigor.   There is, actually a fascinating parallel to this in theoretical physics.  It turns out that [there is a significant debate about whether String Theory, which has been a huge focus of theoretical physics for a few decades, was actually a \u201cscientific\u201d theory at all]( http:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/article\/is-string-theory-science\/).  Namely, String Theory was not producing testable hypotheses.   However, String Theory had two other things going for it: 1) it was an attempt to describe the natural world, and 2) it had a lot of math.  Economics will never have 1), so really, really, really showing they have #2 is critical to their self-perception as a science.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11231.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"49vg8x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why are economists seen as apart from other social sciences? I asked a question in the \/r\/badeconomics discussion thread about this article.  http:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/business\/archive\/2015\/04\/economists-still-think-economics-is-the-best\/390063\/  and received responses like   >Charitable explanation: The other social sciences are far less useful then economics.  and   >Economics is pretty isolated from the other social sciences. Can't blame the researchers. Most economists are anal about causality; endogeneity is always a huge concern in econ but other social scientists don't seem to care enough about. And I would say the financial crisis is a very good reason not to pay attention to other fields. There's a huge gulf in how economic researchers interested in the financial crisis understand it (money market run) compared to well, the understanding of almost everyone else (bad bets on subprime mortgages).  and   >It's not an unheard of criticism. Even Piketty calls out mainstream econ's apparent distaste for inputs that come from sociology, anthropology and behavioral studies, and considers it detrimental to econ as a whole.  and  >It is BS. Economics is the strongest of the social sciences (especially now). Just because people didn't listen to economists and had a financial crisis doesn't mean the field should change in any way.  Why are economists less likely to draw from other social sciences?  Why is economics so seemingly insular?","c_root_id_A":"d0vdt4j","c_root_id_B":"d0w698e","created_at_utc_A":1457654100,"created_at_utc_B":1457717476,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I think this bit from Mankiw is relevant to your question.","human_ref_B":"You may be interested in the formalist\/substantivist debate. This was not actually a debate between economists and anthropologists, but largely between economic anthropologists using different approaches. It comes from a distinction made by Karl Polanyi in the Great Transformation. The formalists argued that neo-classical economic models could be applied universally regardless of culture or time period while substantivists argued, a la Polanyi, that pre- and non-capitalist economies were embedded in social processes and these economic models did not apply. Here is a brief overview.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":63376.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"pw095r","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.63,"history":"why are asian American minorities treated more favorably than Hispanic and African American minorities? Is this just a perceived bias or is there actual research to back this up? Why is this? Blacks and Hispanics make up a much more populous demographic yet seem do the worst in all categories of quality of life.","c_root_id_A":"heeh8il","c_root_id_B":"hee9316","created_at_utc_A":1632694505,"created_at_utc_B":1632690898,"score_A":19,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Asian Americans are often considered as a sort of \"model minority,\" where they're seen as more educated and successful and act as a \"model\" for other minorities to follow. This perception has been seen to carry across racial groups according to this article. Asian American students are seen as more academically prepared and more likely to be successful in their careers, though this does not necessarily carry over to what is observed in real life. The authors conclude that  >In this study, we have focused on one stereotype and confirmed that Asian Americans were indeed regarded as academically superior by all racial groups including themselves, in spite of the evidence showing that there was no significant difference between the racial groups in this sample.  This whole \"model minority\" idea actually stems from the 60's when Asians being a \"model minority\" was a way for those in power to downplay and ignore the demands of the Civil Right's Movement.  Here's an excerpt from this article about the Model Minority thesis:  >Around this time articles began appearing in the popular press calling attention to the seemingly phenomenal success of Asian Americans. One of the first of these articles appeared in the New York Times under the heading, \u201cSuccess Story, Japanese-American Style.\u201d It was written by sociologist William Peterson, whose glowing account was epitomized in the following oft-quoted passage:   >   >\"By any criterion of good citizenship that we choose the Japanese-Americans are better than any other group in our society, including native born whites... Even in a country whose patron saint is the Horatio Alger hero, there is no parallel to this success story.\"   >   >This was followed shortly afterwards by an article in U.S. News & World Report entitled, Success Story of One Minority Group in the U.S. ,\u201d which offered these observations:   >   >\"At a time when it is being proposed that hundreds of billions be spent to uplift Negroes and other minorities, the nation\u2019s 300,000 Chinese Americans are moving ahead on their own-with no help from anyone else... In crime-ridden cities, Chinese districts turn up as islands of peace and stability...\"   >   >While paying homage to their past tribulations, both articles praised the two Asian American minorities for overcoming their adversities through the particular strengths of their cultural backgrounds, and strongly implied that Asian Americans had finally succeeded in becoming accepted into white, middle-class society through their hard work, uncomplaining perseverance and quiet accommodation.  In this article Suzuki also analyzes the potential reasoning behind the perceived success of Asian Americans, including the common values of Asian American families such as an emphasis placed on education as well as the failures of the \"model minority\" thesis to fully take into account the experiences of Asian Americans.  It's also worth noting that although many Asian Americans have higher than average median incomes and a higher incidence of college education, there is a wide gap depending their origin group.  Take a look at this Pew article (not going to include everything because of space):  >The share of Asian Americans ages 25 and older with at least a bachelor\u2019s degree varies greatly by origin group. Those of Indian (75%), Malaysian (65%), Mongolian (60%) or Sri Lankan (60%) origin are more likely than other Asian origin groups to have at least a bachelor\u2019s degree. By comparison, fewer than one-in-five Laotians (18%) and Bhutanese (15%) have at least a bachelor\u2019s degree. Roughly a third of all Americans ages 25 and older had a bachelor\u2019s degree or more education in 2019.   >   >The differences in educational attainment among national origin groups partly reflect the levels of education immigrants bring to the U.S. For example, three-quarters of Indian Americans had a bachelor\u2019s degree or more education in 2019. Many of them already had a bachelor\u2019s degree when they arrived in the U.S. with visas for high-skilled workers. Since 2001, half of H-1B visas \u2013 which require a bachelor\u2019s degree or equivalent \u2013 have gone to Indians.   >   >English proficiency varies considerably among Asian origin groups...   >   >There are wide disparities in income among Asian origin groups...   >   >As with education and income, poverty rates vary widely among Asians in the U.S....  **TL;DR: Asian Americans are perceived as more successful in society compared to other minorities, but the truth behind that perception is a lot more complicated.**","human_ref_B":"Do you have specific examples of \"treated more fairly\"?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3607.0,"score_ratio":9.5}
{"post_id":"pw095r","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.63,"history":"why are asian American minorities treated more favorably than Hispanic and African American minorities? Is this just a perceived bias or is there actual research to back this up? Why is this? Blacks and Hispanics make up a much more populous demographic yet seem do the worst in all categories of quality of life.","c_root_id_A":"hee9316","c_root_id_B":"hegfcx1","created_at_utc_A":1632690898,"created_at_utc_B":1632738718,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Do you have specific examples of \"treated more fairly\"?","human_ref_B":"This is a popular question. You may find the following threads useful:  * How does Critical Race Theory explain the success of Asians?  * 'Model' minorities vs. 'problem' minorities   * Why Black did not progress in US   * Has anyone written on explanations for the broad disparity of financial success and discrimination between different groups of East Asian immigrants to the US?  Here are some quick-and-dirty sources of information which summarize key points for general audiences:  * Asian Americans and the \u2018model minority\u2019 myth by historian Ellen Wu (author of *The Color of Success*)  * 'The Asian American Achievement Paradox' - Inside Higher Ed interview with sociologists Jennifer Lee) and Min Zhou (authors of the eponymous book)  * Asian-American success and the pitfalls of generalization - Brookings Institution report  * How America Created the \u201cModel Minority\u201d Myth - Adam Ruins Everything feat. historian Ellen Wu  * Asian Americans - Last Week Tonight with John Oliver  The two major issues with comparing \"Asian Americans\" with \"Black Americans\" and \"Hispanic and Latino Americans\" is that you are *not* comparing people with similar sociohistorical backgrounds and trajectories, and that the category of \"Asian American\" hides a lot of heterogeneity. Combined, these make for misleading comparisons and distorted pictures. Furthermore, the notion of \"Asian Americans\" as a \"Model minority\" masks (historical and contemporary) anti-Asian racism: the model minority myth comes along with the perpetual foreigner stereotype (see Accented Cinema's episode \"Shang-Chi and the Perpetual Foreigners\" for some insight on that).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":47820.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1g4sw0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"What is it about Communism that has made it almost intertwined throughout history with the formation of totalitarian governments? I'm just somewhat confused. It's almost as if somewhere in the Communist Manifesto it says that this ideology is only effective with authoritarian governments. Is there a part of the basic ideology of Communism that encourages dictatorial rule from leaders such as Mao, Stalin, the Kim family, etc?","c_root_id_A":"cagrvh8","c_root_id_B":"cagt52f","created_at_utc_A":1370976351,"created_at_utc_B":1370979439,"score_A":5,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":">\u201cTotalitarianism is not only hell, but all the dream of paradise-- the age-old dream of a world where everybody would live in harmony, united by a single common will and faith, without secrets from one another. Andre Breton, too, dreamed of this paradise when he talked about the glass house in which he longed to live. If totalitarianism did not exploit these archetypes, which are deep inside us all and rooted deep in all religions, it could never attract so many people, especially during the early phases of its existence. Once the dream of paradise starts to turn into reality, however, here and there people begin to crop up who stand in its way. and so the rulers of paradise must build a little gulag on the side of Eden. In the course of time this gulag grows ever bigger and more perfect, while the adjoining paradise gets even smaller and poorer.\u201d  \u2015 Milan Kundera, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting","human_ref_B":"The Communist ideology is based on much more than *The Communist Manifesto*. In fact, the *Manifesto* is actually a really poor source in defining the ideals of Communism and what it tries to accomplish. It was basically written as a propaganda piece to get the uneducated working class on board with the movement led by intellectual elites without having to give them a long education in politics, economics, history and the theories about these subjects that are central to Communism. For a more accurate view of Communism, Marx's *Das Kapital* and Engel's *The Condition of the Working Class in England* are the best for the ideology at its inception (Adam Smith's *The Wealth of Nations* should also be required reading because a lot of early Communist literature is a direct commentary on this work).  Where Totalitarianism comes from is actually quite simple. Several revolutions were attempted and failed and Marx took them to be experimental evidence that some of his ideas didn't work and that the theory needed some changing. The most important of these was the 1871 Paris Commune, where Socialists walled off Paris and proceeded to create a by-the-book Communist society. Within a few weeks, the French army decided they wanted their capital back and destroyed this society. In response, Marx wrote *The Civil War in France*, which was basically a commentary on what went wrong with this \"ideal\" society. Most of his recommendations involved the establishment of more authoritarian measures to secure the revolution against outside forces and more quickly bring down the structures of the previous regime. This was the precursor to Leninism, Stalinism, and Maoism, in which these ideas were put into action and actually maintained a stable power structure, unlike previous Communist revolts. To Communists at the time, stability was proof enough that this was the right road to achieve the utopian dream they sought.  It should be noted that in the 50s, many Communists in the West began to see how horrible life under Stalin had been and underwent a fundamentalist shift that emphasized the early, idealistic vision of Communism and treated the later writings that led to Totalitarian states like they never existed. They also started a euphemism campaign to relabel a lot of ideas to dissociate themselves from the Soviet Union. This is where the modern misconception of \"the USSR wasn't *really* Communist, they were *State Capitalist**\" comes from.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3088.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"1g4sw0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"What is it about Communism that has made it almost intertwined throughout history with the formation of totalitarian governments? I'm just somewhat confused. It's almost as if somewhere in the Communist Manifesto it says that this ideology is only effective with authoritarian governments. Is there a part of the basic ideology of Communism that encourages dictatorial rule from leaders such as Mao, Stalin, the Kim family, etc?","c_root_id_A":"cagt52f","c_root_id_B":"cagsdfz","created_at_utc_A":1370979439,"created_at_utc_B":1370977566,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The Communist ideology is based on much more than *The Communist Manifesto*. In fact, the *Manifesto* is actually a really poor source in defining the ideals of Communism and what it tries to accomplish. It was basically written as a propaganda piece to get the uneducated working class on board with the movement led by intellectual elites without having to give them a long education in politics, economics, history and the theories about these subjects that are central to Communism. For a more accurate view of Communism, Marx's *Das Kapital* and Engel's *The Condition of the Working Class in England* are the best for the ideology at its inception (Adam Smith's *The Wealth of Nations* should also be required reading because a lot of early Communist literature is a direct commentary on this work).  Where Totalitarianism comes from is actually quite simple. Several revolutions were attempted and failed and Marx took them to be experimental evidence that some of his ideas didn't work and that the theory needed some changing. The most important of these was the 1871 Paris Commune, where Socialists walled off Paris and proceeded to create a by-the-book Communist society. Within a few weeks, the French army decided they wanted their capital back and destroyed this society. In response, Marx wrote *The Civil War in France*, which was basically a commentary on what went wrong with this \"ideal\" society. Most of his recommendations involved the establishment of more authoritarian measures to secure the revolution against outside forces and more quickly bring down the structures of the previous regime. This was the precursor to Leninism, Stalinism, and Maoism, in which these ideas were put into action and actually maintained a stable power structure, unlike previous Communist revolts. To Communists at the time, stability was proof enough that this was the right road to achieve the utopian dream they sought.  It should be noted that in the 50s, many Communists in the West began to see how horrible life under Stalin had been and underwent a fundamentalist shift that emphasized the early, idealistic vision of Communism and treated the later writings that led to Totalitarian states like they never existed. They also started a euphemism campaign to relabel a lot of ideas to dissociate themselves from the Soviet Union. This is where the modern misconception of \"the USSR wasn't *really* Communist, they were *State Capitalist**\" comes from.","human_ref_B":"Speaking as an Economist, certainly a big part of the reason why we see so many dictatorships is explained in F.A Hayeks Road to Serfdom (https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Road_to_Serfdom)  In short Hayek argues here that centralisation paves the road for totalitarian systems - given the concentration of power it is very easy to establish a dictatorship.   As Communism relies necessarily on central planning you can easily see the connection.  However this is only part of the answer, and there is a multitude of other reasons - that I will leave for others to explain.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1873.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"1g4sw0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"What is it about Communism that has made it almost intertwined throughout history with the formation of totalitarian governments? I'm just somewhat confused. It's almost as if somewhere in the Communist Manifesto it says that this ideology is only effective with authoritarian governments. Is there a part of the basic ideology of Communism that encourages dictatorial rule from leaders such as Mao, Stalin, the Kim family, etc?","c_root_id_A":"cah0psk","c_root_id_B":"cagsdfz","created_at_utc_A":1370998998,"created_at_utc_B":1370977566,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There isn't a point of communism that says \"centralize and dominate\" of anything.  In fact the end point of utopian communism there is supposed to be no central authority as it is a utopia.  The issue is basically how it ends up coming about.  You don't get a peaceful communist revolution.  Even minor protests about changing how the wealth of the system is restricted gets met with a violent police response (eg trying to end Jim Crow, union strikes, ending the Bracero program, Occupy Wall Street, etc).  Any mass movement to fundamentally alter the generation and allotment of resources that has a good chance at working almost always ends in a civil war (eg the English Rebellion of 1215, the American Civil War, the Russian Civil War, the Spanish Civil War, etc).  And wars require centralized organization to win.  More than that they require centralized control of your entire supply chain, and obedience to the point where people will charge into a hail of gunfire for you.  So the war is over, and you won, and now you have this nice new system of obedience and control.  You don't need it anymore, so go ahead and utterly disband it, calmly step down from a position of power, transition to the set of ideals you fought the war for.  Said No One Ever.  Your movement has been hammered into a centralized obedience machine, it stays that way, even if it is totally contrary to your movements ideals.  Generally you come up with a new term that blends your military junta with what you were originally fighting for.  In the case of the communists Vietnam had \"doi moi\", China has a \"socialist market economy\", North Korea has \"economic juche\", the Soviet Union had \"soviet capitalism\", and the list goes on.  There is a lot of fine difference between those approaches that someone else can elaborate on, but in the big picture it's all the same crap - instead of the aristocrats running the show because they inherited conquered wealth, now you have a bunch of military leaders running the show because they conquered all the wealth.  These same leaders will pass this wealth on to their children.  This is called the Circle of ~~Screwing Over the Commoners~~ Life.  Usually if one of these new military governments doesn't fall apart to internal schisms, they lighten up after a few decades as new interests, movements, and time take their toll.  Here communism does have a bit of an inbuilt flaw - Engles looked at the response to the French Revolution and argued that in the event of an actual communist utopia being enacted, the other non communist nations would react by destroying that country to grab its now unclaimed wealth.  If you think he was wrong, I invite you to leave your wallet on the street and see if it is still there in a week's time.  Anyway, while he meant this as a call for solidarity across race and national lines (hence \"Workers of the World Unite!\") but it ended up getting used as an external enemy to justify keeping tight control instead of easing up over time.    So yeah, that's why things are generally terrible.  You have to hammer into a war machine to win, and once you've won it takes decades to loosen up, and the use of \"the barbarians are at the gate!\" has prevented that settling down.","human_ref_B":"Speaking as an Economist, certainly a big part of the reason why we see so many dictatorships is explained in F.A Hayeks Road to Serfdom (https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Road_to_Serfdom)  In short Hayek argues here that centralisation paves the road for totalitarian systems - given the concentration of power it is very easy to establish a dictatorship.   As Communism relies necessarily on central planning you can easily see the connection.  However this is only part of the answer, and there is a multitude of other reasons - that I will leave for others to explain.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21432.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1aa7oo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"Looking for sources on the \"four hour work day\" This is more political philosophy, but I thought I would try my hand.  I am looking for peer reviewed articles that look at the concept of the four hour work day. Andre Gorz has a tonne written about it, but I need to expand beyond his work.  Any suggestions are much appreciated. Thanks in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c8vjx2s","c_root_id_B":"c8vlwpe","created_at_utc_A":1363279699,"created_at_utc_B":1363285394,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Try citation mapping.  Look at his studies, and the citations.  Many online databases allow to do look both forward and backward.","human_ref_B":"Bertrand Russell had an essay about it, but I can not remember the name of it or which book it was in.  Perhaps skeptical essays.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5695.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"cc62cl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Is there any research available on men or women who seek a romantic\/sexual partner but are unable to find one? Are there any common characteristics about these people?","c_root_id_A":"etlg8kl","c_root_id_B":"etlhq5x","created_at_utc_A":1562935488,"created_at_utc_B":1562936747,"score_A":5,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"check out the work of John Gottman who did a bunch of work on interpersonal attraction out of the Love Lab at University of Washington.","human_ref_B":"There are some studies on involuntary singlehood, constrained singlehood and involuntary celibacy (who can however be partnered) but I am not aware of any study specifically on the demographics of voluntary and involuntary single and\/or celibate people.  Adamcyzk recruited 151 students and non-students in Poland to study their mental health, and in her sample there was not a significant difference between those who were voluntarily and involuntarily single (for at least 6 months) according to age, gender, place of residence, education level, duration of remaining single, or \"their use of psychological\/psychiatric help in the past\". But this is one example, in a study that was not meant to study these differences (or lack thereof), of a Polish sample.  ---  According to Pepping et al.:  >**Early sociological reviews argued that long-term singles are likely to be a heterogeneous group**; for some it may represent a personal choice to remain single, whereas for others it may reflect difficulty establishing or maintaining relationships (Keith, 1980; Stein, 1975, 1978). **Qualitative research supports this proposition**; some report that entering a romantic relationship was not an important goal and that they have chosen to remain single, whereas others attribute being single to having been hurt in previous relationships and to difficulties establishing relationships (Band-Winterstein & Manchik-Rimon, 2014; Forsyth & Johnson, 1995) [...]  >**We argue that long-term singles are a heterogeneous group, and the available evidence supports this proposition** (Forsyth & Johnson, 1995; BandWinterstein & Manchik-Rimon, 2014). Specifically, **there are likely to be multiple pathways to long-term singlehood**. For some, it may reflect anxiety about relationships (attachment anxiety) or discomfort with closeness (attachment avoidance). For others, singlehood may be a secure personal choice whereby attachment needs are met outside of romantic relationships. **This heterogeneity may help explain inconsistencies in the literature** if, for example, certain recruitment methods are biased toward tapping particular subgroups of singles [...]  >**What percentage of long-term singles are single by choice? The available evidence suggests that this group may be reasonably small**: Only **13.2%** (Lehmann et al., 2015) and **11%** (Forsyth & Johnson, 1995) **of singles report not wishing to be in a relationship or not wishing to marry, respectively**.  I do not have the impression there is much more to the literature that can directly answer your questions, as studies on the topic appear to have focused on pursuing other lines of research (such as prejudice towards being single, the psychology of being single and\/or the mental health outcomes of singlehood). Generally speaking, there are several different reasons why someone might remain single (short-term and long-term): personal choice, situation and opportunity, individual characteristics, etc. which do not make single people a homogenous group.  ---  ^(P.S. Beware not to confuse the involuntary celibacy studied in the papers I cited and the subculture associated, for example, with Reddit and recent events. In fact, the papers I link to were written in the early 2000s.)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1259.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"2bu5db","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"How religious is Australia compared to the rest of the Anglosphere? (America, Canada, UK)","c_root_id_A":"cj8zgyr","c_root_id_B":"cj8z9co","created_at_utc_A":1406444844,"created_at_utc_B":1406444012,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This would be a hard question to answer empirically.  The numbers are only going to tell part of the story since answers to these sorts of questions in surveys and even official government census data can be difficult to parse.  And this will only show you want people claim, not what they actually do.  That said, here are some numbers for percentage of adults who claim no religion in AU, UK, US, CA and NZ:  * AU: 22% [^\\[1\\]][1] * CA: 24% [^\\[2\\]][2] * NZ: 42% [^\\[3\\]][3] * UK (England and Wales, I'm too tired to grab NI and Scotland data right now): 25% [^\\[4\\]][4] * US: 15% [^\\[5\\]][5]  My apologies, but the StatsCan site wasn't working correctly when I attempted to grab the household survey data so I cribbed it from Wikipedia.  Make what you will of those stats, they don't tell you much about the degree of religiosity of the remaining population, but they are generally in-line with most of what I've read on religion in the English speaking world.  Reading through the commentaries by the various national statistics bureaus it seems consistent with everything I've seen on the topic.  In general all of these countries are trending away from religious self-identification.  The US is decidedly more religious than most other English speaking countries, NZ is generally socially much more liberal and progressive and Canada, the UK and Australia tend to be somewhat more similar in this regard.  All three nations are moving in a direction of rapidly becoming less religious but still have large pockets of extremely conservative religious groups and also have a significant religious immigrant population.  If you look at other data on social topics they generally align as well.  [1]: http:\/\/www.abs.gov.au\/ausstats\/abs@.nsf\/Lookup\/4102.0Main+Features30Nov+2013 \"Australian Bureau of Statistics: LOSING MY RELIGION?\" [2]: https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Demographics_of_Canada#Religion \"WP: Demographics of Canada: Religion\" [3]: http:\/\/www.stats.govt.nz\/Census\/2013-census\/profile-and-summary-reports\/quickstats-culture-identity\/religion.aspx \"Statistics New Zealand: 2013 Census QuickStats about culture and identity\" [4]: http:\/\/www.ons.gov.uk\/ons\/rel\/census\/2011-census\/key-statistics-for-local-authorities-in-england-and-wales\/rpt-religion.html \"Office for National Statistics: Religion in England and Wales 2011\" [5]: http:\/\/www.census.gov\/compendia\/statab\/2012\/tables\/12s0075.pdf \"US Census Bureau 2012 Statistical Abstract: Table 75. Self-Described Religious Identification of Adult Population: 1990, 2001, and 2008\"","human_ref_B":"According to the most recent census in 2011, 61% of Australians identify as Christian. That said, as already mentioned, many people will identify with a religion simply because they were raised in that religion, even if they don't actively practise it. It's also worth noting that the vast majority, if not all, private schools are religious in nature (mostly Catholic, I believe) and that some 34% of students in Australia attend a private school.   Also worth mentioning is that our last PM was openly atheistic and that the religious right seem to have far less pull in politics. That said, despite repeated calls over the years to stop the practice, the president of the senate currently recites a prayer before beginning proceedings each day.  Anecdotally, I have lived in both Canada and America and in my opinion, Australia is less religious than both, especially America. I can personally only think of 4 people I know who attend church weekly.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":832.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"bi0x44","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Do the more progressive\/blue areas in America have worse relations with their law enforcement vs more conservative\/red areas?","c_root_id_A":"elxuwrm","c_root_id_B":"elxhpnt","created_at_utc_A":1556402377,"created_at_utc_B":1556392449,"score_A":33,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I am not aware of studies looking at, say, citizen satisfaction with police by distinguishing more left or right-leaning US states.   There are some Pew Research Center surveys that show that self-reported Republicans tend to evaluate police more warmly than self-reported Democrats, and that the former tend to have more confidence in police than the latter. According to the same report, the latter are more likely to see police as enforcers rather than protectors. There does seem to be differences along party-lines, although these are not results from studies and therefore should be interpreted with due diligence.  Determining attitudes towards police is more complex than just measuring political attitudes. For example, according to Skogan:  >In brief, the **major determinants of citizen satisfaction with police encounters can be found in the things that police did at the scene**. These included **being polite, helpful, fair, attentive to what they had to say, and willing to explain what was going on**. On the surface, **social factors, such as race, age, and linguistic capabilities, seemed to be linked to views of the police**, a familiar story in American cities. However, **the link was there mostly because these personal factors were related to how the police treated those they stopped or served insome fashion**. Differences in treatment provided most of the link between those important social cleavages and views of the police.  You also have to take into account things such as procedural justice and how it affects police legitimacy. For example, Gau and colleagues argue that how police behaves can have an important impact:  >This study's implications for police policy center on the finding that **people's perceptions of procedural justice significantly impact their perceptions of legitimacy, even controlling for macro-level social and economic disadvantage.** This is an important finding from a policy standpoint because prior studies have found that severe area-level distress can hinder police agencies\u2019 ability to enlist citizens\u2019 help in crime-control efforts (Reisig & Parks, 2004) and can exacerbate the widespread, damaging impact of police misconduct (Kane, 2005). The present study suggests that **procedural justice can be as effective in maligned areas as in more advantaged ones.**  For example, Skogan's research on community policing (specifically the CAPS) shows how a policing model that brings police and community together can improve the former's image, although disparities can remain:  >**One goal of CAPS is to increase confidence in the fairness and effectiveness of the police**. Our surveys find that **opinions of the police improved steadily between 1993 and 1999, before leveling off at a new high in the 2000s**. At the same time, it is also apparent that the **gulf between the races in Chicago has not diminished at all**. Partly this is good news, for it signals that **improvement in the image of the police has been a general one, and not confined to one group**. On every measure, changes in opinion have been apparent among whites, African-Americans and Latinos alike, but the 15-20 percentage point gap between the views of whites and those of other racial groups scarcely closed over 11 years. **Chicagoans are happier about their police than they were a decade ago, but they are just as polarized in their views.**  In sum, I would expect for there to be statistical differences in attitudes towards police between different US states depending on their political configuration, but it is not a given that specific 'blue' states have worse or much worse attitudes. Well, at least in regards to their own local police, considering the Pew Research Center notes that:  >Overall, **U.S. adults give higher ratings to police in their community than they do to police nationwide**, and the **partisan gap in views of local police is narrower.**","human_ref_B":"What do you mean by worse relations?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9928.0,"score_ratio":4.125}
{"post_id":"9r6u2h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.61,"history":"What are we supposed to make of this provocative challenge to Grievance Studies (they include gender studies, queer studies, critical whiteness theory, fat studies, sociology) by these self described \"left wing academics?\" These critics use the term \"corruption.\"   https:\/\/areomagazine.com\/2018\/10\/02\/academic-grievance-studies-and-the-corruption-of-scholarship\/    Quote @ 5:4O:    >Grievance Studies does not continue the work of the civil rights movement.  It corrupts it.  It trades upon their good names to keep pushing a kind of snake oil upon the public...  *They appear to have put a lot of work into their challenge.  I am not in social science academia.*","c_root_id_A":"e8ewq2n","c_root_id_B":"e8f358m","created_at_utc_A":1540453020,"created_at_utc_B":1540465925,"score_A":11,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"As this is the third time in a few weeks that this topic has propped up in this subreddit, have the latest iteration (which wasn't removed), as I assume some users won't want to repeat themselves and repeat the same discussions.","human_ref_B":"I've been following Boghossian on twitter for a while now and I can assure you he's  pretty sleazy, and definitely has some political agenda. His ties with Richard Dawkins are pretty revealing: they both have a clear\/vocal anti-feminist stance, and Boghossian even used to brag about it on twitter. He is definitely not a left wing academic. This is so obviously a part of their plot. In fact, coming  up with a loaded term like 'grievance studies' is already a sign their goal isn't strictly academic. They just want to shut down academic debates employing non-academic means, and their goal is to create a moral panic around the social sciences. Don't get me wrong, these hoax attempts might be useful, and even entertaining. However, how we interpret their actual impact is what's being discussed here. The authors' interpretation is self-serving, their lame video is non-academic and highly demagogic. This hoax attempt tells us more about the broader culture wars, and how this kind of experiment can be weaponized, than about the legitimacy or validity of entire fields of knowledge. Again, the very fact they would come up with a loaded term like grievance studies, or even make their lame reaction video, clearly shows their ideological motivation. It's pure propaganda. Furthermore, Boghossian, like Jordan Peterson, also subscribes to the 'neo-marxist postmodernism' crap, iirc.  &#x200B;  More to the point, considering  the amount of gross blunders, explicit frauds and even hoaxes that we find year after year being published in the so-called 'harder' sciences, if Boghossian spent so much time and effort rallying against physics  (say, for having an atheist agenda) or biomed or computer sciences,  etc... as he does rallying against other fields like gender studies ...  then I'm pretty sure he would be able to publish a couple of fraudulent  papers here and there ... and then say \"take that physicists!\".  All sciences have issues with peer review.  For those keen on dismissing entire fields of knowledge over supposed hoaxes and their imagined implications, here's a list of episodes when the process of peer review in the 'harder' sciences failed... should we dismiss those fields in their entirety too?  * https:\/\/slate.com\/technology\/2006\/10\/sociologist-harry-collins-poses-as-a-physicist.html * https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Andrew\\_Wakefield#Fraud\\_and\\_conflict\\_of\\_interest\\_allegations; https:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/342\/bmj.c7452 * https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/science\/2016\/oct\/22\/nonsense-paper-written-by-ios-autocomplete-accepted-for-conference * https:\/\/www.nature.com\/news\/publishers-withdraw-more-than-120-gibberish-papers-1.14763; http:\/\/news.mit.edu\/2015\/how-three-mit-students-fooled-scientific-journals-0414 * https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/australia-news\/2014\/nov\/25\/journal-accepts-paper-requesting-removal-from-mailing-list * http:\/\/science.sciencemag.org\/content\/342\/6154\/60.full * https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0162013417300417 * https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bogdanov\\_affair * ...  edit: this article gives a somewhat balanced analysis: https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/outlook\/2018\/10\/04\/paper-that-would-never-have-gotten-past-peer-review-criticizes-academy-film\/?noredirect=on&utm\\_term=.948ad0d80fad","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12905.0,"score_ratio":1.9090909091}
{"post_id":"1kbjrd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Have there been any cases in which completely non-violent protest\/resistance single-handedly brought down a government? The usual argument against Gandhi's lionization is that the British were going to quit India anyway, and that they stayed in India longer with Gandhi opposing them than they would have in the face of a violent revolution. Regardless of what you think of Gandhi, are there any **other** cases in which a non-violent revolution brought down a government?  (Note that recent events in Egypt also do not count, as the protesters inspired a military coup rather than bringing down the gov't themselves.)","c_root_id_A":"cbnjkwz","c_root_id_B":"cbnjdps","created_at_utc_A":1376490247,"created_at_utc_B":1376489604,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As a mod both here and on askhistorians, I'd like to say this doesn't need to be an AskHistorians questions, though it certainly could be--the problem is many of the more interesting cases took place after AH's 1993 cut-off.  Tunisia's Arab Spring, the various Color revolutions, including Otpor!\/the Bulldozer Revolution in Serbia, and early 1989-1991 revolutions in the Warsaw Pact are all possible contenders.  However, as you hint with your Gandhi example, it's really hard to prove causation in complex societal processes.  The peaceful revolutions in Eastern Europe, for example, did they \"single handedly\" change the government?  I mean, groups like Solidarity in Poland certainly played the *decisive* role  in bringing down the government, but NATO pressure mattered too, of course, as well as crucially the Soviet Union's abandonment of the Brezhnev doctrine of, \"When forces that are hostile to socialism try to turn the development of some socialist country towards capitalism, it becomes not only a problem of the country concerned, but a common problem and concern of all socialist countries,\" which had ended Prague Spring 20 years earlier.","human_ref_B":"The only one that comes to mind is the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia in 1989.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":643.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1kbjrd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Have there been any cases in which completely non-violent protest\/resistance single-handedly brought down a government? The usual argument against Gandhi's lionization is that the British were going to quit India anyway, and that they stayed in India longer with Gandhi opposing them than they would have in the face of a violent revolution. Regardless of what you think of Gandhi, are there any **other** cases in which a non-violent revolution brought down a government?  (Note that recent events in Egypt also do not count, as the protesters inspired a military coup rather than bringing down the gov't themselves.)","c_root_id_A":"cbnk56n","c_root_id_B":"cbnjdps","created_at_utc_A":1376491937,"created_at_utc_B":1376489604,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Yes, there are to the best of my knowledge numerous cases where non-violent resistance \"brought down a government\". yodatsracist has mentioned\/linked to lists of all those that I'm familiar with.  On a related note, there are also numerous cases where non-violent resistance lead to demands being met (success) even if those demands go short of regime change. Erica Chenoweth found that:  > ...major nonviolent campaigns have achieved success 53 percent of the time, compared with 26 percent for violent resistance campaigns.There are two reasons for this success.   > First, a campaign\u2019s commitment to nonviolent methods enhances its domestic and international legitimacy and encourages more broad-based participation in the resistance, which translates into increased pressure being brought to bear on the target. Recognition of the challenge group\u2019s grievances can translate into greater internal and external support for that group and alienation of the target regime, undermining the regime\u2019s main sources of political, economic, and even military power.  >Second, whereas governments easily justify violent counterattacks against armed insurgents, regime violence against nonviolent movements is more likely to backfire against the regime. Potentially sympathetic publics perceive violent militants as having maximalist or extremist goals beyond accommodation, but they perceive nonviolent resistance groups as less extreme, thereby enhancing their appeal and facilitating the extraction of concessions through bargaining  Here's a good lecture by her on the subject.","human_ref_B":"The only one that comes to mind is the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia in 1989.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2333.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2sx9op","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Is there any scientific evidence to the idea that we can \"build up\" emotions that eventually need to be released or they become harmful? It doesn't sound very scientific to me, the idea of emotion as being a thing that can be stored and build up.","c_root_id_A":"cntrqvo","c_root_id_B":"cntry6x","created_at_utc_A":1421672577,"created_at_utc_B":1421673328,"score_A":10,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure if this is exactly what you're asking, but for example the notion that it's better to let anger out than \"hold it in\" is a pop psychology myth.  Related article in the website of the Association for Psychological Science.","human_ref_B":"The *catharsis hypothesis* is along the lines of your question: the idea that people build-up anger and have to \"blow-off\" steam every now and then by expressing it. *Hydraulic theory* proposes a similar idea: that unexpressed emotions build up pressure and must be expressed to relieve that pressure. The evidence for these hypotheses is mixed, at best.   Here's a chapter in the book *Human Aggression* that provides a summary of the research on catharsis. Here's a study that found venting anger actually increased feelings of anger: Does Venting Anger Feed or Extinguish the Flame? Here's a study that found expressing emotions immediately following a trauma predicted worse outcomes: Expressing thoughts and feelings following a collective trauma: Immediate responses to 9\/11 predict negative outcomes in a national sample.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":751.0,"score_ratio":2.9}
{"post_id":"gey7yt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What are some practical and effective ways to combat misinformation on social media? In the last couple weeks, I've noticed more and more posts in my social media feed promoting conspiracy theories about the pandemic and related issues. The latest one I've seen is about Dr. Judy Mikovits supposedly jailed for anti-vaccine research (not true in the slightest). I've read up on why people believe in conspiracy theories, but I haven't found much research on how to stop them from spreading on social media specifically. Education doesn't seem to be a factor, since the people posting these things are college-educated, sometimes with advanced degrees. And I'm not sure it's reasonable to expect social media platforms to filter out the junk.   So what are some practical and effective ways to fight this stuff?","c_root_id_A":"fpsts0e","c_root_id_B":"fpsxk6o","created_at_utc_A":1588879489,"created_at_utc_B":1588881312,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"You might find this short paper on *denialism* an interesting starting point. https:\/\/academic.oup.com\/eurpub\/article\/19\/1\/2\/463780    Denialism refers to the phenomenon where people reject the scientific consensus in favor of other, often unsubstantiated sources; the anti-vaccination movement is a form of denialism.   The authors conclude that \"it is necessary to shift the debate from the subject under consideration, instead exposing to public scrutiny the tactics they employ and identifying them publicly for what they are\", because denialists like anti-vaxers don't \"obey certain ground rules, such as a willingness to look at the evidence as a whole, to reject deliberate distortions and to accept principles of logic\".","human_ref_B":"John Cook of Skeptical Science does a lot of work on the topic. Although he is primarily concerned with climate change denial, his contributions and insights (and those of his colleagues!) are pertinent to all sorts of misinformation. See:  * Misinformation and Its Correction: Continued Influence and Successful Debiasing  * Busting myths: a practical guide to countering science denial  * Neutralizing misinformation through inoculation: Exposing misleading argumentation techniques reduces their influence  Regarding inoculation, check out this game meant to work as a \"fake news vaccine\", and its related article,  * Fake news game confers psychological resistance against online misinformation.  Of course, it is also important to prevent and manage the distribution of misinformation. As noted by Farrell et al., besides public inoculation, it is also necessary to work in the following areas to prevent large-scale proliferation: legal strategies, political mechanisms and financial transparency. Quoting:  >**Any coordinated response to this epistemic shift away from facts must both counter the content of misinformation as it is produced and disseminated, and (perhaps more importantly) must also confront the institutional and political architectures that make the spread of misinformation possible in the first place.** This therefore requires a dual process, and as a result, the strategies presented here do not exist in a vacuum from one another, but must be better coordinated if they are to be effective. For example, public inoculation and legal strategies depend on improved financial transparency, just as financial transparency can similarly be strengthened by legal strategies that are themselves dependent on continued research into the financial and ideological sources of misinformation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1823.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2hp9vn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Meta] Is there anything we can do about bad, general questions? I know this seems like a stretch or a bad topic, but please here me out.  I have been looking at ASS and there are some (probably 1 out of every 5) questions that are not so much \"Ask Social Science\" but \"Here's my opinion please substantiate it for me\").   [Why did the Anglo-Saxon culture take over the Earth?  * This question already has a very important assumption embedded in it (Anglo-Saxon culture is the dominant culture on Earth). The question doesn't provide any reasons on why they think so or where they might be coming from (Have they seen other parts of the world? What is Anglo-Saxon? How is Brazilian culture anything like Anglo-Saxon? Or Japanese? etc.)  Why do people from Non-Western cultures use extreme body language when grieving?  * This one was at least already pointed out. The question is culture-centric and has no basis to be asked, with no examples, and is phrased in a way where it's a US <> THEM (who are worse than I) way.  Why are soldiers right -wing?  *Again, a baseless claim that seeks justification.    It's frustrating to see. I'd like ASS to be just as strong as askscience but I don't enjoy seeing very culturally-centered questions  cluttering the front page when there are some actual interesting questions being asked.","c_root_id_A":"ckuvonz","c_root_id_B":"ckv3f77","created_at_utc_A":1411929918,"created_at_utc_B":1411945646,"score_A":4,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"It's a good question.  However, it's worth pointing out that, for example:  > Why did the Anglo-Saxon culture take over the Earth  Is one of the most-researched questions in economic history. Greg Clark's Farewell to Alms, for example, is largely devoted to answering that question.  (**edit**: I went and gave an answer here).  So it's a bit trickier to weed out the bad questions from the good questions than it might seem at first blush.  I have no idea if there is a literature on \"Why do people from Non-Western cultures use extreme body language when grieving?\" or \"Why are soldiers right -wing?\". Not my area. But I wouldn't be surprised if there is a substantial body of research asking these questions.","human_ref_B":"Isn't this a bad, general question?   How about, downvote and ignore? Do we really need a moderated rule to try and ban people asking things out of ignorance? Plenty of questions show up on here with incorrect presumptions.  Quality contributors generally correct them in addition to answering them as best the can.    Consider it a two part question and reframe it before answering if you think that helps. Correcting people's misconceptions should be part of a valuable answer.    It wouldn't be the worst thing to have better tagging system so we could more easily filter the answers, but I don't see how these are fundamentally invalid curiosities.  You could start a new subreddit dedicated to questions more in line with what you want.  It's not that easy to remove your own cultural subtext from questions.  Sometimes it's more blatant, but since it informs how we look at the world, it's probably unavoidable for the most part.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15728.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2hp9vn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Meta] Is there anything we can do about bad, general questions? I know this seems like a stretch or a bad topic, but please here me out.  I have been looking at ASS and there are some (probably 1 out of every 5) questions that are not so much \"Ask Social Science\" but \"Here's my opinion please substantiate it for me\").   [Why did the Anglo-Saxon culture take over the Earth?  * This question already has a very important assumption embedded in it (Anglo-Saxon culture is the dominant culture on Earth). The question doesn't provide any reasons on why they think so or where they might be coming from (Have they seen other parts of the world? What is Anglo-Saxon? How is Brazilian culture anything like Anglo-Saxon? Or Japanese? etc.)  Why do people from Non-Western cultures use extreme body language when grieving?  * This one was at least already pointed out. The question is culture-centric and has no basis to be asked, with no examples, and is phrased in a way where it's a US <> THEM (who are worse than I) way.  Why are soldiers right -wing?  *Again, a baseless claim that seeks justification.    It's frustrating to see. I'd like ASS to be just as strong as askscience but I don't enjoy seeing very culturally-centered questions  cluttering the front page when there are some actual interesting questions being asked.","c_root_id_A":"ckuvonz","c_root_id_B":"ckuqy8c","created_at_utc_A":1411929918,"created_at_utc_B":1411919898,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It's a good question.  However, it's worth pointing out that, for example:  > Why did the Anglo-Saxon culture take over the Earth  Is one of the most-researched questions in economic history. Greg Clark's Farewell to Alms, for example, is largely devoted to answering that question.  (**edit**: I went and gave an answer here).  So it's a bit trickier to weed out the bad questions from the good questions than it might seem at first blush.  I have no idea if there is a literature on \"Why do people from Non-Western cultures use extreme body language when grieving?\" or \"Why are soldiers right -wing?\". Not my area. But I wouldn't be surprised if there is a substantial body of research asking these questions.","human_ref_B":"We could include something in the sidebar about \"questioning the assumptions in your question\" or something like that. We could make a bot that could post the same thing when a new thread is made too.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10020.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2hp9vn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Meta] Is there anything we can do about bad, general questions? I know this seems like a stretch or a bad topic, but please here me out.  I have been looking at ASS and there are some (probably 1 out of every 5) questions that are not so much \"Ask Social Science\" but \"Here's my opinion please substantiate it for me\").   [Why did the Anglo-Saxon culture take over the Earth?  * This question already has a very important assumption embedded in it (Anglo-Saxon culture is the dominant culture on Earth). The question doesn't provide any reasons on why they think so or where they might be coming from (Have they seen other parts of the world? What is Anglo-Saxon? How is Brazilian culture anything like Anglo-Saxon? Or Japanese? etc.)  Why do people from Non-Western cultures use extreme body language when grieving?  * This one was at least already pointed out. The question is culture-centric and has no basis to be asked, with no examples, and is phrased in a way where it's a US <> THEM (who are worse than I) way.  Why are soldiers right -wing?  *Again, a baseless claim that seeks justification.    It's frustrating to see. I'd like ASS to be just as strong as askscience but I don't enjoy seeing very culturally-centered questions  cluttering the front page when there are some actual interesting questions being asked.","c_root_id_A":"ckuqy8c","c_root_id_B":"ckv3f77","created_at_utc_A":1411919898,"created_at_utc_B":1411945646,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"We could include something in the sidebar about \"questioning the assumptions in your question\" or something like that. We could make a bot that could post the same thing when a new thread is made too.","human_ref_B":"Isn't this a bad, general question?   How about, downvote and ignore? Do we really need a moderated rule to try and ban people asking things out of ignorance? Plenty of questions show up on here with incorrect presumptions.  Quality contributors generally correct them in addition to answering them as best the can.    Consider it a two part question and reframe it before answering if you think that helps. Correcting people's misconceptions should be part of a valuable answer.    It wouldn't be the worst thing to have better tagging system so we could more easily filter the answers, but I don't see how these are fundamentally invalid curiosities.  You could start a new subreddit dedicated to questions more in line with what you want.  It's not that easy to remove your own cultural subtext from questions.  Sometimes it's more blatant, but since it informs how we look at the world, it's probably unavoidable for the most part.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25748.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"2mnu2j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"How can we derive useful knowledge from Macroeconomics? We can't run controlled experiments, we have few natural experiments to work with, and  it's extremely difficult to distinguish between correlation and causation, so how can we derive knowledge with macroeconomics? how can we settle debates? how can we separete the wheat from the chaff?","c_root_id_A":"cm6qwug","c_root_id_B":"cm6ehdu","created_at_utc_A":1416375765,"created_at_utc_B":1416350062,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It is indeed very difficult to distinguish between correlation and causation in macro, and there are few natural experiments (and running natural experiments on national economies tends to be frowned upon.)  We build models. But you already know that. I want to review *why* we build models and what we build models *for.*  By \"model\" I mean a fully-articulated artificial economy, populated by agents with preferences, budget constraints, and technologies. We insert complications into these model economies that we think are relevant to some real-world phenomenon of interest. The model could be agent-based, representative-agent, or overlapping-generations, depending on the question of interest. The model could have monetary or financial or labor frictions, depending on the question of interest. Governments and monetary policymakers could be active or passive.   We calibrate or estimate the model, choosing parameter values so that the model delivers *reasonable* answers to questions that we already reasonably know the answer to. For example, we ask that the model economy deliver a volatility of investment that is three times that of output, and a volatility of nondurable consumption that is one-half that of output. We ask that hours worked be procyclical and that wages be, on net, roughly acyclical. And so on.   So we convince ourselves that the model is able to reasonably replicate certain features that we know about real economies.  Then we cross our fingers, hope the Lucas critique doesn't bite, and hope that the model economy can deliver novel insights about questions we don't know the answers to, questions that are too expensive or too unethical to run on real economies.   Then we argue endlessly about which model features are critical.  That's all theoretical macro.  Empirical macro tries to extend \"the set of things we reasonably know about real economies,\" the set of things our models ought to capture. Back in 1980 it was reasonable to expect our models to capture a mix of Kaldor's long-run facts and Prescott's short-run facts. Now we are more demanding and ask our models to replicate reality on more complicated dimensions; this is progress.  Applied macroeconomists use both time-series and micro-econometric techniques. Acemoglu, Johnson, and Robinson (2001 AER) used instrumental variables; Gali and Gertler (1999 JME) used time-series GMM; Nakamura and Steinsson's recent papers use factor analysis; modern estimation papers use  MLE or Bayesian methods.   We separate the wheat from the chaff through multiple empirical studies, encompassing multiple empirical strategies, taken over long time series in multiple countries or in multiple micro panels.   Lucas' 1995 Nobel speech is useful in thinking about these issues, as are Kydland and Prescott's 2004 Nobel speeches. Sims and Sargents' 2011 Nobel speeches are a good antidote to theory.  Phelps' 2006 Nobel speech is also informative.  One extremely concrete way to move the profession forward is to show that *your particular model* explains everything an older model did, and then some. That was what the New Keynesians did: they (succesfully, in my view) argued that their model could explain everything the RBC model could, and in addition could explain technology shocks better than the RBC model, and could explain monetary shocks better than a monetary RBC model. Developing and testing the NK model took a long time: about twenty-five years of accumulated theoretical and empirical work, but it was successful.","human_ref_B":"I think as computing power and econometrics become more advanced, clearing the \"wheat from the chaff\" will become easier and easier.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25703.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"oqzbz3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"To what extent does the work of John Money hold influence on the modern study of transgender individuals? I was speaking recently with a family member on the subject of transgender people, and they brought up the work of Dr. John Money in a decidedly negative fashion. They related the story of the Reimer siblings and how money coined the term \"gender identity.\" They seemed to be implying that this indicts the study of transgender people as a whole, especially since Money still has a fellowship named after him at the Kinsey institute, and was publishing research as late as the 2000's.  Right off the bat, this struck me as a bit odd, because how the Reimer case was described to me made it sound like it went against the now commonly-accepted idea that gender identity cannot be changed. I did a bit of digging and while modern research does suggest that biological and sociological factors play a role in trans identification, it still seems at odds with Money's conclusions. Furthermore, while Money is unanimously credited with the invention of the term \"gender role,\" the term \"gender identity,\" is also credited to Robert Stoller. I tried to find out who really originated it, but couldn't find anything concrete.  With all that in mind, what is the truth of the matter? Did Money coin gender identity? If so, how do modern conceptions of the term align or differ from his conception of it? How relevant are his beliefs on the matter to the modern study of transgender people?","c_root_id_A":"h6fp7rp","c_root_id_B":"h6f477e","created_at_utc_A":1627182491,"created_at_utc_B":1627170512,"score_A":20,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"John Money is arguably a notable person with respect to the history of psychology, however he is no longer an influential figure in the field with respect to contemporary psychological research on the topic of transgender people, and his work concerning David Reimer is viewed negatively. Also note my insistence on specifying his notability within psychology. In other fields (e.g. anthropology and sociology) it is not unlikely for him to not be cited, or at least to occupy an even smaller space.  There are multiple notable scholars who are recognized within the social sciences for contributing to the differentiation between sex and gender, their current conceptualization (which I have recently discussed here), and that of related concepts. It is also important to distinguish the history of these concepts, their labels, and their popularization.   ---  Anthropologist Margaret Mead is commonly recognized by anthropologists and sociologists for establishing the groundwork for what would become gender through her work on sex roles. See her famous book *Sex and Temperament in Three Primitive Societies*, first published in 1935. During the same time period (early 1900s), Magnus Hirschfeld opened what is considered the world's first trans clinic, and there were other scholars who sought to assess sex roles in a critical fashion, such as sociologist Viola Klein, known for her critique of Mead's subsequent work.   In 1945, psychologist Madison Bentley explicitly employs the term *gender* to refer to \"the socialized obverse of sex\":  >**In the grade-school years, too, gender (which is the socialized obverse of sex) is a fixed line of demarkation, the qualifying terms being 'feminine' and 'masculine.'** Many matters in grouping, playing, exercising, reciting, and the like, separate the boys from the girls. **That these are social matters of gender may be demonstrated by a reference across to the domestic animals, where there is sex but no gender,** sex which has its occasional demonstrations and signals but exerts little other influence upon the cattle, the horses, the cats and the chickens. **There can be no doubt that the gendering of the younger child sets a definite stamp upon it and distinctly contributes to its general socialization.** While bodily excitations and the whispered retailing of sexual matters among the older children leak through the converse of the small fry, the general question of sex within our context may be left to later epochs in the life course.  John Money, Joan Hampson, and John Hampson are commonly credited for coining the term *gender role* in 1955. According to Muehlenhard and Peterson (2011):  >They defined *gender role* as  >>**all those things that a person says or does to disclose himself or herself as having the status of boy or man,girl or woman, respectively.** It includes, but is not restricted to sexuality in the sense of eroticism. Gender role is appraised in relation to the following: general mannerisms, deportment and demeanor; play preferences and recreational interests; spontaneous topics of talk in unprompted conversation and casual comment; content of dreams, daydreams and fantasies; replies to oblique inquiries and projective tests; evidence of erotic practices and, finally, the person\u2019s own replies to direct inquiry. (p. 302)  Muehlenhard and Peterson also explain:  >Note that **Money and his colleagues used the word sex to refer to individuals\u2019 physical characteristics** (e.g., chromosomal sex, gonadal sex, hormonal sex) **and to refer to sex assignment and rearing. They used the word gender** (e.g., gender identity, gender role) **to refer to individuals\u2019 psychological characteristics and behavior.** They introduced the concept of gender as distinct from sex, but they used the term in phrases such as gender role and gender identity rather than alone.  According to Money (1973), he defined *gender identity* in 1967, within the glossary of a book published, as:  >The sameness, unity, and persistence of one\u2019s individuality as male or female (or ambivalent), in greater or lesser degree, especially as experienced in self-awareness and behavior. **Gender identity is the private experience of gender role, and gender role is the public expression of gender identity.**  In the same paper he acknowledges the following:  >**Robert Stoller**, the first psychoanalyst to recognize the theoretical importance of the new hermaphroditic data, **originated the term, core gender identity, and with it initiated a revision of classical psychoanalytic theory which is still actively in progress.**  Stoller is known for his 1968 book *Sex and Gender*, in which he provides the following definitions:  >***Gender*** **is a term that has psychological or cultural rather than biological connotations.** If the proper terms for sex are \"male\" and \"female,\" the corresponding terms for gender are \"masculine\" and \"feminine\"; these latter may be quite independent of (biological) sex. Gender is the amount of masculinity or femininity found in a person, and, obviously, while there are mixtures of both in many humans, the normal male has a preponderance of masculinity and the normal female a preponderance of femininity. ***Gender identity*** **starts with the knowledge and awareness, whether conscious or unconscious, that one belongs to one sex and not the other, though as one develops, gender identity becomes much more complicated,** so that, for example, one may sense himself as not only a male but a masculine man or an effeminate man or even a man who fantasies being a woman. ***Gender role*** **is the overt behavior one displays in society, the role which he plays**, especially with other people, **to establish his position with them insofar as his and their evaluation of his gender is concerned.**   That said, the term can be traced further back. According to Green (2010):  >**I do not know exactly when Stoller began using the term. I am confident that it was the name of the program when I arrived at UCLA to begin my psychiatry training in 1962. The term was formally introduced to the psychiatric\/psychoanalytic worlds in 1964** when he published \u2018\u2018A Contribution to the Study of Gender Identity\u2019\u2019(Stoller, 1964).   ---  This is not meant to be exhaustive. I also believe I should emphasize that since the sex\/gender distinction established itself in the late 1900s, there have been continued developments of the theoretical, conceptual, and empirical kinds. Citing John Money to discredit current research on transgender people is nonsense, especially considering that the tragic results of what was done to Reimer are consistent with the current understanding that gender identity is not something that can be imposed regardless of the fact that it is - as any other trait - the outcome of developmental processes which rely on the complex interplay between biological and environmental factors (the innate\/acquired distinction itself is bunk).  ---  Bentley, M. (1945). Sanity and hazard in childhood. The American Journal of Psychology, 58(2), 212-246.  Green, R. (2010). Robert Stoller\u2019s sex and gender: 40 years on. Archives of sexual behavior, 39(6), 1457-1465.  Money, J. (1973). Gender role, gender identity, core gender identity: Usage and definition of terms. Journal of the American Academy of Psychoanalysis, 1(4), 397-402.  Muehlenhard, C. L., & Peterson, Z. D. (2011). Distinguishing between sex and gender: History, current conceptualizations, and implications. Sex roles, 64(11), 791-803.","human_ref_B":"So much of what I know about John Money is either from the journalist authored \"as Nature Made Him\" by John Colapinto or from heresay from colleagues (a little more weight there given my background, I've at least spoken with people who knew him directly).  As a whole, yes, John Money is aptly credited for bringing a lot of ideas about the nurture side of gender into the light, and even coining some terms (who coined a term is basically always a point of debate in any science).  He just so happened to be harmfully wrong on several major points, and I think it's fair to say that one of those harms he should have taken more responsibility for is that the Reimer case ended in suicide.  The shitty thing was how pig headed he was about 'being right' to the point of ignoring his own data.  Your last question is really more an opinion thing than a fact one? but given how woefully wrong he was, I place him solidly in the historical names you should be familiar with, but whose conclusions aren't worth studying in detail.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11979.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2mccxh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Black Americans marry at lower rates than whites, and Black people are more likely to have children outside of marriage. When you control for income, is this still true?","c_root_id_A":"cm36cif","c_root_id_B":"cm3cmzi","created_at_utc_A":1416052121,"created_at_utc_B":1416073698,"score_A":9,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I don't know, but controlling for income won't answer the (probable) underlying questions. Since race is correlated with income, then when you statisticaly control for income, you're also controlling for race.  This is one of those areas where statistics doesn't have truly satisfying answers (though they can illuminate the question better), and research methods has a big bag of ethical concerns and lack of funding.  Edit: Some sources:  --------------------------------------------  The heart of the issue: \"In many cases there is no means of achieving the superficially appealing goal of 'correcting' or 'controlling for' real group differences in a potential covariate.\"  Some general pitfalls and limitations of statistical controls (especially if any causality is being inferred in observational data)  See here for a discussion of the generally unsatisfactory results of statistical controls in race studies in epidemiology.","human_ref_B":"Is original research permitted? I just looked at the second question: children out of wedlock. 2013 ACS 1-year estimates, women, age 15\u201350, gave birth in the last year, where unmarried = widowed|divorced|never married, income = household income. Some obs dropped because I used the demo version of Stat\/Transfer.  Na\u00efvely, the answer is that yes, African American women are far more likely to have children out of wedlock at every household income bracket, including above $200K.  Why should you trust my numbers? Because my summary statistics agree well enough with this report.      . svy: tab RAC1P unmarried, row     (running tabulate on estimation sample)      Number of strata   =         1                  Number of obs      =     31443     Number of PSUs     =     31443                  Population size    =   3470567                                                     Design df          =     31442      -------------------------------     Race1     |      unmarried          recode    |     0      1  Total     ----------+--------------------      White al | .7049  .2951      1      Black or | .3266  .6734      1      American |  .457   .543      1      Alaska N |  .472   .528      1      American | .3203  .6797      1      Asian al | .8802  .1198      1      Native H | .6581  .3419      1      Some Oth | .5436  .4564      1      Two or M | .5348  .4652      1               |          Total | .6426  .3574      1     -------------------------------      . svy: tab hincprange unmarried, row     (running tabulate on estimation sample)      Number of strata   =         1                  Number of obs      =     30947     Number of PSUs     =     30947                  Population size    =   3446572                                                     Design df          =     30946      --------------------------------                |      unmarried          hincprange |     0      1  Total     -----------+--------------------     -1.000e+09 | .3165  .6835      1          10000 |  .383   .617      1          15000 | .4671  .5329      1          25000 | .5234  .4766      1          35000 | .6135  .3865      1          50000 | .6836  .3164      1          75000 | .7748  .2252      1         100000 | .8095  .1905      1         150000 |  .843   .157      1         200000 | .8928  .1072      1                |           Total | .6453  .3547      1     --------------------------------   **Why should you *not* trust my numbers? Because, as bobbyfiend pointed out, they may not tell you what you really want to know.**  With those cautions, here are my calculations for the income groups: Less than $10,000; $10K\u2013$15K; $15K\u2013$25K; $25K\u2013$35K; $35K\u2013$50K; $50K\u2013$75K; $75K\u2013$100K; $100K\u2013$150K; $150K\u2013$200K; Above $200K.  *Edit: Comment length limit exceeded. Calculations are in my reply.*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21577.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"z65e0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why are capital gains taxed lower in the US than regular income What is the argument, what are the real reasons in your opinion, and should capital gains be taxed like regular income?","c_root_id_A":"c61uc53","c_root_id_B":"c61td08","created_at_utc_A":1346485557,"created_at_utc_B":1346475923,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Ultimately it is built on tax theory which says if you are going to tax, tax once. Taxing income and capital gains is taxing the same money multiple times, which is frowned upon for a variety of good theoretical and practical reasons. There is also the direct implication that counter incentivizing investment is the dumbest most wasteful, most damaging thing you can do.. There is that.","human_ref_B":"They aren't. Capital gains taxes are *in addition to* regular income taxes, not a *substitute for* regular income taxes. For math-related goodness, I give you Landsburg, Mankiw] (http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2012\/03\/04\/business\/capital-gains-vs-ordinary-income-economic-view.html), [Reinhardt, and Sumner.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9634.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5p9mf1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Have there been any resume studies comparing stereotypically black names with stereotypically lower-income or redneck white names? This came up in a discussion about resume studies I was having, and I just wanted to see if anybody could point me at any research that exists out there.","c_root_id_A":"dcpkb2e","c_root_id_B":"dcptj2r","created_at_utc_A":1484994040,"created_at_utc_B":1485015473,"score_A":8,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Here's one that focuses on resumes with black names: http:\/\/scholar.harvard.edu\/fryer\/publications\/causes-and-consequences-distinctively-black-names","human_ref_B":"Freakonomics mentioned it in their book  http:\/\/freakonomics.com\/podcast\/how-much-does-your-name-matter-a-new-freakonomics-radio-podcast\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21433.0,"score_ratio":1.375}
{"post_id":"41s9bw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Why does English have different symbols for upper case and lower case letters? as opposed to other languages who use the same symbol for both.  Whats the purpose for upper and lower case to begin with?","c_root_id_A":"cz4t0p9","c_root_id_B":"cz51g7r","created_at_utc_A":1453261284,"created_at_utc_B":1453282986,"score_A":13,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"What is the difference between this question and \"Why does English have upper and lower case letters\"?","human_ref_B":"The obvious answer is that English borrowed the glyphs from Latin, which has this distinction.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21702.0,"score_ratio":1.2307692308}
{"post_id":"41s9bw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Why does English have different symbols for upper case and lower case letters? as opposed to other languages who use the same symbol for both.  Whats the purpose for upper and lower case to begin with?","c_root_id_A":"cz51g7r","c_root_id_B":"cz4tjwm","created_at_utc_A":1453282986,"created_at_utc_B":1453262203,"score_A":16,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"The obvious answer is that English borrowed the glyphs from Latin, which has this distinction.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/NoStupidQuestions\/comments\/2d4xj3\/why_are_some_lower_case_letters_miniature\/?sort=confidence  I'm on mobile so I'm not sure if it will link, but this was a thread I remember reading a while back.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20783.0,"score_ratio":1.7777777778}
{"post_id":"41s9bw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Why does English have different symbols for upper case and lower case letters? as opposed to other languages who use the same symbol for both.  Whats the purpose for upper and lower case to begin with?","c_root_id_A":"cz51g7r","c_root_id_B":"cz4yi8x","created_at_utc_A":1453282986,"created_at_utc_B":1453272821,"score_A":16,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"The obvious answer is that English borrowed the glyphs from Latin, which has this distinction.","human_ref_B":"If you don't get a good answer here, try \/r\/linguistics.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10165.0,"score_ratio":1.7777777778}
{"post_id":"41s9bw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Why does English have different symbols for upper case and lower case letters? as opposed to other languages who use the same symbol for both.  Whats the purpose for upper and lower case to begin with?","c_root_id_A":"cz53m3k","c_root_id_B":"cz4t0p9","created_at_utc_A":1453291444,"created_at_utc_B":1453261284,"score_A":15,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Mostly it's an accident of history. The Roman capital letter script evolved over the centuries that followed the end of the empire, becoming more cursive, and easier to write for the scribes. By about 1200 years ago, the script looked more like our lower case than our upper case.  https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:KellsFol309r.jpg  After another couple of centuries, the script evolved to look very much like our lower case, but the scribes liked adding very large ornate letters at the start of paragraphs, and for those they often reverted to the original Roman appearance of the letters.  https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Minuscule_caroline.jpg  Capitalisation developed from that, especially when printing presses appeared, although with wildly inconsistent rules. For a while, it was common to capitalise all nouns, German-style, but this faded from English in the 18th century.","human_ref_B":"What is the difference between this question and \"Why does English have upper and lower case letters\"?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":30160.0,"score_ratio":1.1538461538}
{"post_id":"41s9bw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Why does English have different symbols for upper case and lower case letters? as opposed to other languages who use the same symbol for both.  Whats the purpose for upper and lower case to begin with?","c_root_id_A":"cz53m3k","c_root_id_B":"cz4tjwm","created_at_utc_A":1453291444,"created_at_utc_B":1453262203,"score_A":15,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Mostly it's an accident of history. The Roman capital letter script evolved over the centuries that followed the end of the empire, becoming more cursive, and easier to write for the scribes. By about 1200 years ago, the script looked more like our lower case than our upper case.  https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:KellsFol309r.jpg  After another couple of centuries, the script evolved to look very much like our lower case, but the scribes liked adding very large ornate letters at the start of paragraphs, and for those they often reverted to the original Roman appearance of the letters.  https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Minuscule_caroline.jpg  Capitalisation developed from that, especially when printing presses appeared, although with wildly inconsistent rules. For a while, it was common to capitalise all nouns, German-style, but this faded from English in the 18th century.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/NoStupidQuestions\/comments\/2d4xj3\/why_are_some_lower_case_letters_miniature\/?sort=confidence  I'm on mobile so I'm not sure if it will link, but this was a thread I remember reading a while back.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29241.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"41s9bw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Why does English have different symbols for upper case and lower case letters? as opposed to other languages who use the same symbol for both.  Whats the purpose for upper and lower case to begin with?","c_root_id_A":"cz53m3k","c_root_id_B":"cz4yi8x","created_at_utc_A":1453291444,"created_at_utc_B":1453272821,"score_A":15,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Mostly it's an accident of history. The Roman capital letter script evolved over the centuries that followed the end of the empire, becoming more cursive, and easier to write for the scribes. By about 1200 years ago, the script looked more like our lower case than our upper case.  https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:KellsFol309r.jpg  After another couple of centuries, the script evolved to look very much like our lower case, but the scribes liked adding very large ornate letters at the start of paragraphs, and for those they often reverted to the original Roman appearance of the letters.  https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Minuscule_caroline.jpg  Capitalisation developed from that, especially when printing presses appeared, although with wildly inconsistent rules. For a while, it was common to capitalise all nouns, German-style, but this faded from English in the 18th century.","human_ref_B":"If you don't get a good answer here, try \/r\/linguistics.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18623.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1mqure","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why hasnt the money stock dramatically decreased like it did during the Great Depression? According to monetarists the great depression was caused by a large contraction in the money supply (30% according to Friedman) because of banks calling in debts\/holding cash, etc. Allegedly the Fed should have just increased the money supply but instead did the opposite, etc. While the recent crisis is similar to the Great Depression (overleveraged banks that stop lending afterwards), looking at the money stock graph theres only a very small decrease around 2010 and overall seems to be increasing faster than in the pre-crisis years. Am I missing something or is it that the Fed's policies make up for the contraction?","c_root_id_A":"ccc0svc","c_root_id_B":"ccbyyrm","created_at_utc_A":1379682114,"created_at_utc_B":1379668521,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The Fed have massively increased the money base by using policies like QE. http:\/\/research.stlouisfed.org\/fred2\/graph\/?id=AMBSL,  Now in normal times that would lead to a large increase in the money supply. Looking at your graph we do not see this. The reason the large increase in the money base has not led to increases in the money supply to the extent you would expect is that banks are hoarding cash and not lending. This can be seen here http:\/\/research.stlouisfed.org\/fred2\/series\/EXCRESNS. Each bank is required to keep a certain level of reserves at the central bank. However since the recession banks have been holding in excess of what is required.","human_ref_B":"Look at the same graph with percent change from year ago setting:    http:\/\/research.stlouisfed.org\/fred2\/graph\/?chart_type=line&s[1][id]=MZMSL&s[1][transformation]=pch  Yes, MZM has increased, but not that dramatically when compared to oil crisis or the depression of 2000.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13593.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"48xjm3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Explanation for the tendency for male humans to try to prevent other males from having sex with female family members? For instance, in pop culture representation and in my own experience, boys and men will openly resent other men sexually pursuing their mother or sister (younger sisters in particular).  This is certainly a commonly accepted behaviour in C20th US \/ Hollywood culture but as far as I know it is universal.  Is there a biological or evolutionary (or more direct) explanation for this? Do other animals exhibit similar behaviour?  I couldn't find anything through Google search and I don't know where else to look as I'm not at all acquainted with the field. I appreciate anyone who can offer relevant research or point me in the right direction.","c_root_id_A":"d0o1ih5","c_root_id_B":"d0np7hx","created_at_utc_A":1457139283,"created_at_utc_B":1457120258,"score_A":17,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"This is not an answer, but a clue: There are several peer-reviewed studies (summarized and linked in this popular article) providing evidence that human women have evolved to avoid rape.  This seems logical: after all, women who are able to close their mates would have the best opportunities to maximize advantageous sexual selection.    One could imagine that the tendency for males sharing genes with a fertile female would want to assist her in maximizing her choice of sexual partners, and make it very difficult to mate with her unless she was very much cooperating.  This is not the same as (but would be complimentary to) a hypothesis that making it difficult to sexual access a female family member would help ensure that only the fittest males would succeed in breaking past the family barrier.   This reasoning would not support the notion of family member males making it *impossible* to impregnate a sister\/daughter, but it could support making it *difficult*.  tl\/dnr: If this phenomenon exists, it may be for the purpose of deterring male sexual aggression and maximizing female sexual choice (or the fitness of male sex partners), rather than literally for the purpose of limiting sexual reproduction impossible, outright.","human_ref_B":"Follow up question:-  Does anyone know why it tends to apply more to younger sisters rather than older ones?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":19025.0,"score_ratio":2.8333333333}
{"post_id":"qiaog3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What is the scientific consensus on video game addiction? Hi everyone! I want to know what does the current scientific community have to say about video game addiction, and how severe it is?","c_root_id_A":"hii51qn","c_root_id_B":"hii6kd7","created_at_utc_A":1635509975,"created_at_utc_B":1635510789,"score_A":3,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"As the field is way to new, there is no real consensus. As per definition (!), some characteristics are shared with other addictions. If you are interested in some insights, you might want to search for the term **internet gaming disorder or gamign disorder.**  https:\/\/www.who.int\/news\/item\/14-09-2018-inclusion-of-gaming-disorder-in-icd-11#:~:text=Gaming%20disorder%2C%20with%20its%20online%20and%20offline%20variants%2C,in%20personal%2C%20family%2C%20social%2C%20educational%20or%20occupational%20functioning.","human_ref_B":"As with videogame culture itself, the study of games is fraught with rifts and divisions. There are distinct positions across scholarship on games around addiction; some are characterised by null hypothesis work where nothing conclusive is found. Other scholarship is far more conclusively capable of detecting some sort of gaming addiction, usually via categories identified in the DSM-5. Child social work researchers have convincingly demonstrated that irrespective of a diagnosis of 'addiction' per se, young children that play videogames for long periods induce behavioural changes in themselves that are not dissimilar to the effects of being brought up in relative poverty or with nutrition deficits. This is usually in cases where there are already problems in place, but effectively these children are simulating mental traumas on themselves through their effects on their sleep patterns, socialisation contexts, and experience of non-digital worlds. Addiction is somewhat moot here, although this is probably similar to the issue of concern.  Psychological research into game addiction is to myself as a non-psychologist of poor quality. The games used for analysis are woefully out of touch or nonsensical for studies, often substituting a game in for the entirety of videogames. The conclusions are often proven using games chosen for high replayability, short timeouts on loss, and subscription based services that provoke engagement. For instance, is Silent Hill something we would consider capable of being an addictive game? Monopoly? The Stanley Parable? Desert Bus? I would say these are not appropriate games. What about WoW or LoL? Both have userbases that have played hundreds and hundreds of hours of these games in ways that probably are not particularly distinct from gambling addictions. The issue here to me is whether we can class gaming as a whole as being capable of addiction, or whether this is something to be evaluated on a case by cases basis in terms of interaction schema.  From this, the work of Natasha Dow Sch\u00fcll is particularly important because her work makes a connection on the basis of gambling that is repeated in videogames, and can be read in Addiction by Design.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":814.0,"score_ratio":7.6666666667}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6tyiwo","c_root_id_B":"c6u1uxc","created_at_utc_A":1351622587,"created_at_utc_B":1351634265,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"As far as I'm aware, in most cases a given economy has developed its institutions \"on the fly\" - for instance, the US banking system started off with a lot of local banks, and over a couple centuries (or perhaps less) turned into the unholy mess it is now, and so forth.  By contrast, economies in MMOs, like EVE, essentially come into being with the entire institutional structure already in place - the game is coded such that trades can be made securely, there is a currency in place from the very beginning, and so forth.  I have always wondered if this has a major impact on the way the economy evolves. MMOs tend (in my experience) to *rapidly* move towards highly unequal distributions of wealth, for one thing. Could you shed any light on this?","human_ref_B":"Just wanted to give you a shout out! I worked with an economic geographer for many years, and I am an urban\/regional  econometrician.  Here is a question.  Why do you think space is not considered in most standard economic models (aside from antitrust and well, urban, regional).  Isn't this silly?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11678.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6tzo2h","c_root_id_B":"c6u1uxc","created_at_utc_A":1351626641,"created_at_utc_B":1351634265,"score_A":4,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I studied economics in college (in a small way), and was always fascinated at the instances when real human behavior deviated notably from how it \"should\" be under classical economic models.  What are some counterintuitive or otherwise surprising findings you've come across in your research?","human_ref_B":"Just wanted to give you a shout out! I worked with an economic geographer for many years, and I am an urban\/regional  econometrician.  Here is a question.  Why do you think space is not considered in most standard economic models (aside from antitrust and well, urban, regional).  Isn't this silly?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7624.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6u1uxc","c_root_id_B":"c6u02rn","created_at_utc_A":1351634265,"created_at_utc_B":1351628065,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Just wanted to give you a shout out! I worked with an economic geographer for many years, and I am an urban\/regional  econometrician.  Here is a question.  Why do you think space is not considered in most standard economic models (aside from antitrust and well, urban, regional).  Isn't this silly?","human_ref_B":"What about the southeast part of the US especially the area called \"the bible belt\" causes the increase of poverty in that part of the United States?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6200.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6u15rl","c_root_id_B":"c6u1uxc","created_at_utc_A":1351631812,"created_at_utc_B":1351634265,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Have you taken\/taught any GIS courses?","human_ref_B":"Just wanted to give you a shout out! I worked with an economic geographer for many years, and I am an urban\/regional  econometrician.  Here is a question.  Why do you think space is not considered in most standard economic models (aside from antitrust and well, urban, regional).  Isn't this silly?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2453.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6tzo2h","c_root_id_B":"c6tyiwo","created_at_utc_A":1351626641,"created_at_utc_B":1351622587,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I studied economics in college (in a small way), and was always fascinated at the instances when real human behavior deviated notably from how it \"should\" be under classical economic models.  What are some counterintuitive or otherwise surprising findings you've come across in your research?","human_ref_B":"As far as I'm aware, in most cases a given economy has developed its institutions \"on the fly\" - for instance, the US banking system started off with a lot of local banks, and over a couple centuries (or perhaps less) turned into the unholy mess it is now, and so forth.  By contrast, economies in MMOs, like EVE, essentially come into being with the entire institutional structure already in place - the game is coded such that trades can be made securely, there is a currency in place from the very beginning, and so forth.  I have always wondered if this has a major impact on the way the economy evolves. MMOs tend (in my experience) to *rapidly* move towards highly unequal distributions of wealth, for one thing. Could you shed any light on this?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4054.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6u02rn","c_root_id_B":"c6tyiwo","created_at_utc_A":1351628065,"created_at_utc_B":1351622587,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"What about the southeast part of the US especially the area called \"the bible belt\" causes the increase of poverty in that part of the United States?","human_ref_B":"As far as I'm aware, in most cases a given economy has developed its institutions \"on the fly\" - for instance, the US banking system started off with a lot of local banks, and over a couple centuries (or perhaps less) turned into the unholy mess it is now, and so forth.  By contrast, economies in MMOs, like EVE, essentially come into being with the entire institutional structure already in place - the game is coded such that trades can be made securely, there is a currency in place from the very beginning, and so forth.  I have always wondered if this has a major impact on the way the economy evolves. MMOs tend (in my experience) to *rapidly* move towards highly unequal distributions of wealth, for one thing. Could you shed any light on this?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5478.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6tyiwo","c_root_id_B":"c6u2k8x","created_at_utc_A":1351622587,"created_at_utc_B":1351636802,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"As far as I'm aware, in most cases a given economy has developed its institutions \"on the fly\" - for instance, the US banking system started off with a lot of local banks, and over a couple centuries (or perhaps less) turned into the unholy mess it is now, and so forth.  By contrast, economies in MMOs, like EVE, essentially come into being with the entire institutional structure already in place - the game is coded such that trades can be made securely, there is a currency in place from the very beginning, and so forth.  I have always wondered if this has a major impact on the way the economy evolves. MMOs tend (in my experience) to *rapidly* move towards highly unequal distributions of wealth, for one thing. Could you shed any light on this?","human_ref_B":"What interests you the most or what did you find fascinating while you were studying in your areas of current expertise?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14215.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6tzo2h","c_root_id_B":"c6u02rn","created_at_utc_A":1351626641,"created_at_utc_B":1351628065,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I studied economics in college (in a small way), and was always fascinated at the instances when real human behavior deviated notably from how it \"should\" be under classical economic models.  What are some counterintuitive or otherwise surprising findings you've come across in your research?","human_ref_B":"What about the southeast part of the US especially the area called \"the bible belt\" causes the increase of poverty in that part of the United States?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1424.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6u21cj","c_root_id_B":"c6u2k8x","created_at_utc_A":1351634909,"created_at_utc_B":1351636802,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"were you at the West Lakes AAG last year at DePaul university? You sound like a guy I spoke with there, who I remember was an economic geographer and I seem to think did research on canadian cities. . Im a masters student (not at depaul) and I was up there giving a paper.","human_ref_B":"What interests you the most or what did you find fascinating while you were studying in your areas of current expertise?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1893.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6u21cj","c_root_id_B":"c6u15rl","created_at_utc_A":1351634909,"created_at_utc_B":1351631812,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"were you at the West Lakes AAG last year at DePaul university? You sound like a guy I spoke with there, who I remember was an economic geographer and I seem to think did research on canadian cities. . Im a masters student (not at depaul) and I was up there giving a paper.","human_ref_B":"Have you taken\/taught any GIS courses?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3097.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6u213x","c_root_id_B":"c6u21cj","created_at_utc_A":1351634885,"created_at_utc_B":1351634909,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"How close to an economics department are you? Is economic geography typically interacting with economics, or is it more distinct?  What can economic geography tell us about taxation that most economic studies on tax ignore? Does anyone do work related to behavioral economics or psychology in your field?  Thanks for doing this! I like this stuff but I know very little about it.","human_ref_B":"were you at the West Lakes AAG last year at DePaul university? You sound like a guy I spoke with there, who I remember was an economic geographer and I seem to think did research on canadian cities. . Im a masters student (not at depaul) and I was up there giving a paper.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6u15rl","c_root_id_B":"c6u2k8x","created_at_utc_A":1351631812,"created_at_utc_B":1351636802,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Have you taken\/taught any GIS courses?","human_ref_B":"What interests you the most or what did you find fascinating while you were studying in your areas of current expertise?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4990.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6u2k8x","c_root_id_B":"c6u213x","created_at_utc_A":1351636802,"created_at_utc_B":1351634885,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"What interests you the most or what did you find fascinating while you were studying in your areas of current expertise?","human_ref_B":"How close to an economics department are you? Is economic geography typically interacting with economics, or is it more distinct?  What can economic geography tell us about taxation that most economic studies on tax ignore? Does anyone do work related to behavioral economics or psychology in your field?  Thanks for doing this! I like this stuff but I know very little about it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1917.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"12cd6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"IAMA Economic Geographer. Ask me Anything! Hi everyone. I'm an Economic Geographer whose currently finishing his PhD. My dissertation research looks at how the interaction of local and global economic and social forces affects entrepreneurship in Canadian cities, but I've also done research on innovation, clusters, and the geography of the financial crisis.   I'm just sitting here, waiting out the hurricane and reading about the influence of the American oil industry on Calgary, so I'll try my best to answer all the questions I can!","c_root_id_A":"c6u2k8x","c_root_id_B":"c6u2jw5","created_at_utc_A":1351636802,"created_at_utc_B":1351636765,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"What interests you the most or what did you find fascinating while you were studying in your areas of current expertise?","human_ref_B":"I've loved what you have been able to share in this thread so far; thank you for sharing your time with us today.  On the idea of sharing (trading?) things like time, I was reading today about Japan's recent mandated ID laws for citizens, and it is becoming more and more apparent to me that information collected so thoroughly at the individual level will become more and more influential to global markets as data mining and personalized marketing begin to mature.    As an economic geographer, such personal data about online spending habits and even rudimentary data about public transit use could be an immensely powerful source for study, and i was wondering what you are most excited about in the production of such data sets. Could you say we \"spending\" our private information for services? Does your field see private information having the ability to mature as a unit of value in light of all this data \"mining\" and \"refining\"?  I can see local government taking. as a form of payment, data that: \"I am a student and i am using the bus at this time\". So, as the discount is fifty cents, i feel like it could, one day, be seen institutionally that such data is \"worth\" 50 cents to them.  I think i asked what i wanted to ask. (\"What is the future of geographic-based economics in a world of big data?\") Do you see Economic geography being the berthing spot for the next Keynes because of private data's recent influences?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":37.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"12c4ko","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why is modern society generally against suicide and death-by-choice? There was a suicide case in my wider social network, and it made me think about how we as society handle it.  In my western society there's still a lot based on historical norms originating from Christianity. I myself am an agnostic, so instead of just copying biblical norms I try to build my world view from a perspective of science, philosophy and a dash of social pragmatism.  So to make more sense of it I ask SocialScience: why is suicide (also related concepts like euthanasia and abortion) such a tricky issue? Why don't we have Futurama style suicide booths? Do the ancient philosophers had interesting idea's about it? What do enlightened minds think about it?  Disclaimer: I'm not depressed myself or wish anything bad upon anybody, and certainly don't advocate casually killing-off people or force policy.","c_root_id_A":"c6ttznj","c_root_id_B":"c6tv00l","created_at_utc_A":1351605043,"created_at_utc_B":1351609546,"score_A":6,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"From personal experience, what first comes to mind is that it's absolutely devastating to others who were a part of the deceased person's life","human_ref_B":"Since no one has mentioned an economic answer...   When you are a child society is basically investing in you.  You are given tons, and don't really give anything back.  Then when you are older, you are suppose to get a job, raise kids, ect.  You are then contributing to society.  If someone commits suicide when they are 16 or 25 or 30 or something, they have taken a bunch of societies resources, but not produced that much yet.  They end up being a net loss.     It would be like if you invested a bunch of money in a pension, and then when you were 64 the pension fund evaporated and you didn't get any money back.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4503.0,"score_ratio":2.8333333333}
{"post_id":"12c4ko","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why is modern society generally against suicide and death-by-choice? There was a suicide case in my wider social network, and it made me think about how we as society handle it.  In my western society there's still a lot based on historical norms originating from Christianity. I myself am an agnostic, so instead of just copying biblical norms I try to build my world view from a perspective of science, philosophy and a dash of social pragmatism.  So to make more sense of it I ask SocialScience: why is suicide (also related concepts like euthanasia and abortion) such a tricky issue? Why don't we have Futurama style suicide booths? Do the ancient philosophers had interesting idea's about it? What do enlightened minds think about it?  Disclaimer: I'm not depressed myself or wish anything bad upon anybody, and certainly don't advocate casually killing-off people or force policy.","c_root_id_A":"c6tx0ir","c_root_id_B":"c6ttznj","created_at_utc_A":1351617147,"created_at_utc_B":1351605043,"score_A":15,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"OK, while I'm definitely open to your point of view, I'm also going to present my scientifically-based argument against depression-induced suicide. No specific studies are coming to mind at the moment, but I remember reading somewhere that the problem with suicide, aside from the religious nonsense, is that it's a very permanent choice based on a frequently irrational and temporary state of mind created by depression. This point is arguable, but a depressed person is not really in the right state of mind to make a rational decision about whether or not to end his\/her life. As is the case with many who attempt suicide but fail, they want to commit suicide while they are in that depressed state but when they recover, they regret what they have done and want to live. Given this information, it seems like those around depressed\/suicidal people have a responsibility to protect them from themselves.","human_ref_B":"From personal experience, what first comes to mind is that it's absolutely devastating to others who were a part of the deceased person's life","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12104.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"12c4ko","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why is modern society generally against suicide and death-by-choice? There was a suicide case in my wider social network, and it made me think about how we as society handle it.  In my western society there's still a lot based on historical norms originating from Christianity. I myself am an agnostic, so instead of just copying biblical norms I try to build my world view from a perspective of science, philosophy and a dash of social pragmatism.  So to make more sense of it I ask SocialScience: why is suicide (also related concepts like euthanasia and abortion) such a tricky issue? Why don't we have Futurama style suicide booths? Do the ancient philosophers had interesting idea's about it? What do enlightened minds think about it?  Disclaimer: I'm not depressed myself or wish anything bad upon anybody, and certainly don't advocate casually killing-off people or force policy.","c_root_id_A":"c6tvoz3","c_root_id_B":"c6tx0ir","created_at_utc_A":1351612277,"created_at_utc_B":1351617147,"score_A":4,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"This entry from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy may be useful to you.","human_ref_B":"OK, while I'm definitely open to your point of view, I'm also going to present my scientifically-based argument against depression-induced suicide. No specific studies are coming to mind at the moment, but I remember reading somewhere that the problem with suicide, aside from the religious nonsense, is that it's a very permanent choice based on a frequently irrational and temporary state of mind created by depression. This point is arguable, but a depressed person is not really in the right state of mind to make a rational decision about whether or not to end his\/her life. As is the case with many who attempt suicide but fail, they want to commit suicide while they are in that depressed state but when they recover, they regret what they have done and want to live. Given this information, it seems like those around depressed\/suicidal people have a responsibility to protect them from themselves.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4870.0,"score_ratio":3.75}
{"post_id":"12c4ko","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why is modern society generally against suicide and death-by-choice? There was a suicide case in my wider social network, and it made me think about how we as society handle it.  In my western society there's still a lot based on historical norms originating from Christianity. I myself am an agnostic, so instead of just copying biblical norms I try to build my world view from a perspective of science, philosophy and a dash of social pragmatism.  So to make more sense of it I ask SocialScience: why is suicide (also related concepts like euthanasia and abortion) such a tricky issue? Why don't we have Futurama style suicide booths? Do the ancient philosophers had interesting idea's about it? What do enlightened minds think about it?  Disclaimer: I'm not depressed myself or wish anything bad upon anybody, and certainly don't advocate casually killing-off people or force policy.","c_root_id_A":"c6twdr9","c_root_id_B":"c6tx0ir","created_at_utc_A":1351614860,"created_at_utc_B":1351617147,"score_A":3,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Well it must be remembered that this stigma predominantly occurs in western society. In countries like Japan, Korea etc. traditionally suicide has been viewed as honorable. However, in our society, I would agree with the suggestion that religious attitudes play a great role. The Greeks and Romans practiced suicide without negative connotation. The social restructuring brought about by Christianity seems likely to mark that shift of attitude.","human_ref_B":"OK, while I'm definitely open to your point of view, I'm also going to present my scientifically-based argument against depression-induced suicide. No specific studies are coming to mind at the moment, but I remember reading somewhere that the problem with suicide, aside from the religious nonsense, is that it's a very permanent choice based on a frequently irrational and temporary state of mind created by depression. This point is arguable, but a depressed person is not really in the right state of mind to make a rational decision about whether or not to end his\/her life. As is the case with many who attempt suicide but fail, they want to commit suicide while they are in that depressed state but when they recover, they regret what they have done and want to live. Given this information, it seems like those around depressed\/suicidal people have a responsibility to protect them from themselves.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2287.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"12c4ko","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why is modern society generally against suicide and death-by-choice? There was a suicide case in my wider social network, and it made me think about how we as society handle it.  In my western society there's still a lot based on historical norms originating from Christianity. I myself am an agnostic, so instead of just copying biblical norms I try to build my world view from a perspective of science, philosophy and a dash of social pragmatism.  So to make more sense of it I ask SocialScience: why is suicide (also related concepts like euthanasia and abortion) such a tricky issue? Why don't we have Futurama style suicide booths? Do the ancient philosophers had interesting idea's about it? What do enlightened minds think about it?  Disclaimer: I'm not depressed myself or wish anything bad upon anybody, and certainly don't advocate casually killing-off people or force policy.","c_root_id_A":"c6txina","c_root_id_B":"c6txf1j","created_at_utc_A":1351618918,"created_at_utc_B":1351618566,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As Edgar_Allan_Joe said suicide isn't stigmatized in Japan as much as it is in the West.  There is the cultural history of Seppuku (ritual suicide to \"die honorably\") that is still present to some extent today.  Men in particular will sometimes commit suicide as a means of providing for their families through life insurance, which pays out in the event of a suicide.  In fact suicide is often because of job lose, which can be hard to recover from because of hiring practices in Japan, especially late in life.  More can be found here.  I'm no expert but it seems to me based on my limited understanding of Japanese culture that death is handled much differently there than it is in the West.  There also seems to be less focus on individual lives (very \"needs of the many\").  Suicide in Japan is traditionally not a purely selfish act and is sometimes seen as a way to protect one's family or community.   That being said suicide is a social problem and an individual's right to die is less significant than the impact those deaths have on society.  Euthanasia is another story all together and that issue definitely is certainly more complex.  If someone is simply depressed they can still contribute to society and their lose can be detrimental not only to those close to them but society as a whole.  Individual suicide doesn't impact society a great deal but the lose of large numbers of young or middle age people can be devastating to society.  As MuffinMopper stated suicide among young people represents a lose net lose economically, which certainly has sociological implications as well.","human_ref_B":"A good read by my man Emile.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":352.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"12c4ko","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why is modern society generally against suicide and death-by-choice? There was a suicide case in my wider social network, and it made me think about how we as society handle it.  In my western society there's still a lot based on historical norms originating from Christianity. I myself am an agnostic, so instead of just copying biblical norms I try to build my world view from a perspective of science, philosophy and a dash of social pragmatism.  So to make more sense of it I ask SocialScience: why is suicide (also related concepts like euthanasia and abortion) such a tricky issue? Why don't we have Futurama style suicide booths? Do the ancient philosophers had interesting idea's about it? What do enlightened minds think about it?  Disclaimer: I'm not depressed myself or wish anything bad upon anybody, and certainly don't advocate casually killing-off people or force policy.","c_root_id_A":"c6txmf3","c_root_id_B":"c6txf1j","created_at_utc_A":1351619302,"created_at_utc_B":1351618566,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"What if we phrased the question differently?  Is wanting to live the only natural state of being for a healthy, competent individual?  Is it possible that wanting to not live might be a natural state of being for some individuals?  I'd love to see how any of you who have commented would answer this question on a fundamental level, leaving religious, societal, familial, etc. factors out of the equation.","human_ref_B":"A good read by my man Emile.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":736.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5mgk12","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Why are Palestinians, Egyptians, Turkish, etc. considered people of color but Greeks, Sicilians, and southern French and Italians not?","c_root_id_A":"dc3rt4f","c_root_id_B":"dc3lgtt","created_at_utc_A":1483757925,"created_at_utc_B":1483748840,"score_A":28,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"According to the definition of the U.S. Census:  >White. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa. It includes people who indicate their race as \"White\" or report entries such as Irish, German, Italian, Lebanese, Near Easterner, Arab, or Polish.  So everybody in your question is White according to the U.S. Government.  https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20090831085310\/http:\/\/quickfacts.census.gov\/qfd\/meta\/long_68178.htm","human_ref_B":"Can you provide evidence of this claim? Most international polling puts arab under white as far as i'm aware.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9085.0,"score_ratio":3.1111111111}
{"post_id":"5mgk12","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Why are Palestinians, Egyptians, Turkish, etc. considered people of color but Greeks, Sicilians, and southern French and Italians not?","c_root_id_A":"dc3zri0","c_root_id_B":"dc44ogi","created_at_utc_A":1483771651,"created_at_utc_B":1483785727,"score_A":12,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"Who is considered a \"person of color\" varies from society to society (and also over time in any given society), so this question only makes sense in the context of a given society at a given point in time. The canonical text on races in America is *Racial Formation in the United States* by Omi and Winant.","human_ref_B":"There is a theory in Sociology that argues that whiteness is a construct, or at the very least it is hierarchical, with different nationalities fitting along the scale of what we \"accept\" as white.   https:\/\/www.cwu.edu\/diversity\/sites\/cts.cwu.edu.diversity\/files\/documents\/constructingwhiteness.pdf   This is just one of the many research papers that tries to grapple with the very question you're trying to solve.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14076.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"5mgk12","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Why are Palestinians, Egyptians, Turkish, etc. considered people of color but Greeks, Sicilians, and southern French and Italians not?","c_root_id_A":"dc44ogi","c_root_id_B":"dc3lgtt","created_at_utc_A":1483785727,"created_at_utc_B":1483748840,"score_A":20,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"There is a theory in Sociology that argues that whiteness is a construct, or at the very least it is hierarchical, with different nationalities fitting along the scale of what we \"accept\" as white.   https:\/\/www.cwu.edu\/diversity\/sites\/cts.cwu.edu.diversity\/files\/documents\/constructingwhiteness.pdf   This is just one of the many research papers that tries to grapple with the very question you're trying to solve.","human_ref_B":"Can you provide evidence of this claim? Most international polling puts arab under white as far as i'm aware.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":36887.0,"score_ratio":2.2222222222}
{"post_id":"5mgk12","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Why are Palestinians, Egyptians, Turkish, etc. considered people of color but Greeks, Sicilians, and southern French and Italians not?","c_root_id_A":"dc3zri0","c_root_id_B":"dc3lgtt","created_at_utc_A":1483771651,"created_at_utc_B":1483748840,"score_A":12,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Who is considered a \"person of color\" varies from society to society (and also over time in any given society), so this question only makes sense in the context of a given society at a given point in time. The canonical text on races in America is *Racial Formation in the United States* by Omi and Winant.","human_ref_B":"Can you provide evidence of this claim? Most international polling puts arab under white as far as i'm aware.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22811.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1mgghi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why is there such a modern western cultural obsession with zombies and other post-apocalyptic narratives? I've noticed this phenomenon particularly in the United States but it's also true for other western countries.","c_root_id_A":"cc91e5g","c_root_id_B":"cc91wfx","created_at_utc_A":1379286263,"created_at_utc_B":1379287761,"score_A":5,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"pretty same discussion, from a movie angle: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/TrueFilm\/comments\/1hheyz\/if_cinema_reflects_the_collective_dreams_or\/ there you find this talk: http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=iSwAbQD-gZU","human_ref_B":"I read an interesting article in Scientific American back when the December 21st end of world craze was abuzz:  here  here's a nutshell quote:  \u201cI talk to kids in my practice and they see it as a good thing. They say, \u2018life would be so simple\u2014I\u2019d shoot some zombies and wouldn\u2019t have to go to school,\u2019\u201d Schlozman says. In both literature and in speaking with patients, Schlozman has noticed that people frequently romanticize the end times. They imagine surviving, thriving and going back to nature.\"  Basically, in roobomatic terms, the idea of fighting off zombies and running off to use your survival wits in the wilderness of post-civilization, however flawed the logistics of this fantasy may be,  sounds preferable to the drudgery of showing up to work and paying off the mortgage and credit cards.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1498.0,"score_ratio":2.8}
{"post_id":"uvx00","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Are there any democracies in the world that explicitly disallow political parties? It seems to me that political parties do a lot more harm than good.   Primarily they create a monopoly on choice, preventing new ideas from rising to the top in much the same way as a monopoly in the free market does.  Do any countries regulate their democratic monopolies in the same way that some do their free market monopolies?","c_root_id_A":"c4z39c8","c_root_id_B":"c4z3swt","created_at_utc_A":1339425473,"created_at_utc_B":1339428044,"score_A":4,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"It depends how you define democracy. For example, the Soviet Union claimed it was a democracy, but only allowed one party to exist.   You may want to take a look at CB Macpherson's book, The Real World of Democracy, as it covers different conceptions of democracy.","human_ref_B":"If you want to implement a new idea, then you have to build a coalition of people willing to support that idea. That's the use of political parties.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2571.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"uvx00","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Are there any democracies in the world that explicitly disallow political parties? It seems to me that political parties do a lot more harm than good.   Primarily they create a monopoly on choice, preventing new ideas from rising to the top in much the same way as a monopoly in the free market does.  Do any countries regulate their democratic monopolies in the same way that some do their free market monopolies?","c_root_id_A":"c4z3swt","c_root_id_B":"c4z3iz6","created_at_utc_A":1339428044,"created_at_utc_B":1339426765,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"If you want to implement a new idea, then you have to build a coalition of people willing to support that idea. That's the use of political parties.","human_ref_B":"Political parties arise because negotiating with one party is easier than negotiating with dozens, hundreds or thousands of individuals.  Political parties don't necessarily limit choice and prevent new ideas. I presume you are referring to the situation in the USA, and in that case it's the \"winner-takes-it-all\" voting that boycotts influence of new parties in the political system. Instead, interest groups have to try and gain influence directly (lobbying) or by gaining influence in one of the two big parties, either in shady backroom deals or by hijacking that party's discourse (eg. Tea Party).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1279.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"uvx00","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Are there any democracies in the world that explicitly disallow political parties? It seems to me that political parties do a lot more harm than good.   Primarily they create a monopoly on choice, preventing new ideas from rising to the top in much the same way as a monopoly in the free market does.  Do any countries regulate their democratic monopolies in the same way that some do their free market monopolies?","c_root_id_A":"c4z3swt","c_root_id_B":"c4z1z1k","created_at_utc_A":1339428044,"created_at_utc_B":1339417110,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If you want to implement a new idea, then you have to build a coalition of people willing to support that idea. That's the use of political parties.","human_ref_B":"A government is an institution that provides services and security for the territory it governs. A democracy is a type of government (well, there are different types of democracy as well) which has its policies dictated by what is usually a multi-party system. Each party will have its own agenda - some parties only care about labor rights, some only care about civil liberties, and some only care about 'piracy'.  Regardless of what they campaign and lobby for, it is inevitably political. There will always be another party out there that disagrees partly or completely with any particular lobby. The breadth (think US parties) doesn't matter so much - even the Pirate Party (which has a much smaller scope) is political.  Why? Because there are laws that say X is wrong. Well, Pirate Party doesn't like that law, so they get together and run a campaign to get it changed - in this case, by running for a legislative position. In this way, they can help not only educate the populace, but also get their politician to vote for their political agenda.  In other words, the very act of participating in a government means that one is participating in politics.  That said, how can a democracy exist that bans its very foundations from participating?  Those sorts of 'democracies' do exist, but they aren't really democracies - think Hosni Mubarak or Bashar al-Assad.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10934.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"uvx00","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Are there any democracies in the world that explicitly disallow political parties? It seems to me that political parties do a lot more harm than good.   Primarily they create a monopoly on choice, preventing new ideas from rising to the top in much the same way as a monopoly in the free market does.  Do any countries regulate their democratic monopolies in the same way that some do their free market monopolies?","c_root_id_A":"c4z39c8","c_root_id_B":"c4z3iz6","created_at_utc_A":1339425473,"created_at_utc_B":1339426765,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"It depends how you define democracy. For example, the Soviet Union claimed it was a democracy, but only allowed one party to exist.   You may want to take a look at CB Macpherson's book, The Real World of Democracy, as it covers different conceptions of democracy.","human_ref_B":"Political parties arise because negotiating with one party is easier than negotiating with dozens, hundreds or thousands of individuals.  Political parties don't necessarily limit choice and prevent new ideas. I presume you are referring to the situation in the USA, and in that case it's the \"winner-takes-it-all\" voting that boycotts influence of new parties in the political system. Instead, interest groups have to try and gain influence directly (lobbying) or by gaining influence in one of the two big parties, either in shady backroom deals or by hijacking that party's discourse (eg. Tea Party).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1292.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"uvx00","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Are there any democracies in the world that explicitly disallow political parties? It seems to me that political parties do a lot more harm than good.   Primarily they create a monopoly on choice, preventing new ideas from rising to the top in much the same way as a monopoly in the free market does.  Do any countries regulate their democratic monopolies in the same way that some do their free market monopolies?","c_root_id_A":"c4z39c8","c_root_id_B":"c4z1z1k","created_at_utc_A":1339425473,"created_at_utc_B":1339417110,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It depends how you define democracy. For example, the Soviet Union claimed it was a democracy, but only allowed one party to exist.   You may want to take a look at CB Macpherson's book, The Real World of Democracy, as it covers different conceptions of democracy.","human_ref_B":"A government is an institution that provides services and security for the territory it governs. A democracy is a type of government (well, there are different types of democracy as well) which has its policies dictated by what is usually a multi-party system. Each party will have its own agenda - some parties only care about labor rights, some only care about civil liberties, and some only care about 'piracy'.  Regardless of what they campaign and lobby for, it is inevitably political. There will always be another party out there that disagrees partly or completely with any particular lobby. The breadth (think US parties) doesn't matter so much - even the Pirate Party (which has a much smaller scope) is political.  Why? Because there are laws that say X is wrong. Well, Pirate Party doesn't like that law, so they get together and run a campaign to get it changed - in this case, by running for a legislative position. In this way, they can help not only educate the populace, but also get their politician to vote for their political agenda.  In other words, the very act of participating in a government means that one is participating in politics.  That said, how can a democracy exist that bans its very foundations from participating?  Those sorts of 'democracies' do exist, but they aren't really democracies - think Hosni Mubarak or Bashar al-Assad.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8363.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"uvx00","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Are there any democracies in the world that explicitly disallow political parties? It seems to me that political parties do a lot more harm than good.   Primarily they create a monopoly on choice, preventing new ideas from rising to the top in much the same way as a monopoly in the free market does.  Do any countries regulate their democratic monopolies in the same way that some do their free market monopolies?","c_root_id_A":"c4z3iz6","c_root_id_B":"c4z1z1k","created_at_utc_A":1339426765,"created_at_utc_B":1339417110,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Political parties arise because negotiating with one party is easier than negotiating with dozens, hundreds or thousands of individuals.  Political parties don't necessarily limit choice and prevent new ideas. I presume you are referring to the situation in the USA, and in that case it's the \"winner-takes-it-all\" voting that boycotts influence of new parties in the political system. Instead, interest groups have to try and gain influence directly (lobbying) or by gaining influence in one of the two big parties, either in shady backroom deals or by hijacking that party's discourse (eg. Tea Party).","human_ref_B":"A government is an institution that provides services and security for the territory it governs. A democracy is a type of government (well, there are different types of democracy as well) which has its policies dictated by what is usually a multi-party system. Each party will have its own agenda - some parties only care about labor rights, some only care about civil liberties, and some only care about 'piracy'.  Regardless of what they campaign and lobby for, it is inevitably political. There will always be another party out there that disagrees partly or completely with any particular lobby. The breadth (think US parties) doesn't matter so much - even the Pirate Party (which has a much smaller scope) is political.  Why? Because there are laws that say X is wrong. Well, Pirate Party doesn't like that law, so they get together and run a campaign to get it changed - in this case, by running for a legislative position. In this way, they can help not only educate the populace, but also get their politician to vote for their political agenda.  In other words, the very act of participating in a government means that one is participating in politics.  That said, how can a democracy exist that bans its very foundations from participating?  Those sorts of 'democracies' do exist, but they aren't really democracies - think Hosni Mubarak or Bashar al-Assad.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9655.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"uvx00","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Are there any democracies in the world that explicitly disallow political parties? It seems to me that political parties do a lot more harm than good.   Primarily they create a monopoly on choice, preventing new ideas from rising to the top in much the same way as a monopoly in the free market does.  Do any countries regulate their democratic monopolies in the same way that some do their free market monopolies?","c_root_id_A":"c4z62ab","c_root_id_B":"c4z1z1k","created_at_utc_A":1339437716,"created_at_utc_B":1339417110,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"What? No. There's a lot of confusion in your post OP (monopolies don't stifle innovation for instance), but I think it stems from:  >It seems to me that political parties do a lot more harm than good.   This isn't true, and political parties play a key (and inevitable) role in allowing representative democracy to work in industrial societies.   * Political parties aid policy making, by creating effective and coherent political blocs. Can you imagine how hard it would be to form a majority in the House of Commons without any parties?  * Political parties provide signals to the voter, so that he or she knows what they're getting if they vote for Candidate Bloggs.  * They provide the organisational skills and manpower required to fight in the political sphere on the behalf of those they stand for.  etc.   Parties get a bad rap, but they're not all bad, honest - which is a good thing as the advantages they give are overwhelming when it comes to political competition. The United States was founded with a distinct fear of \"party and faction, and within a couple of years of the Constitution being ratified, quasi-parties had already established themselves.","human_ref_B":"A government is an institution that provides services and security for the territory it governs. A democracy is a type of government (well, there are different types of democracy as well) which has its policies dictated by what is usually a multi-party system. Each party will have its own agenda - some parties only care about labor rights, some only care about civil liberties, and some only care about 'piracy'.  Regardless of what they campaign and lobby for, it is inevitably political. There will always be another party out there that disagrees partly or completely with any particular lobby. The breadth (think US parties) doesn't matter so much - even the Pirate Party (which has a much smaller scope) is political.  Why? Because there are laws that say X is wrong. Well, Pirate Party doesn't like that law, so they get together and run a campaign to get it changed - in this case, by running for a legislative position. In this way, they can help not only educate the populace, but also get their politician to vote for their political agenda.  In other words, the very act of participating in a government means that one is participating in politics.  That said, how can a democracy exist that bans its very foundations from participating?  Those sorts of 'democracies' do exist, but they aren't really democracies - think Hosni Mubarak or Bashar al-Assad.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20606.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"uvx00","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Are there any democracies in the world that explicitly disallow political parties? It seems to me that political parties do a lot more harm than good.   Primarily they create a monopoly on choice, preventing new ideas from rising to the top in much the same way as a monopoly in the free market does.  Do any countries regulate their democratic monopolies in the same way that some do their free market monopolies?","c_root_id_A":"c4z62ab","c_root_id_B":"c4z4qyr","created_at_utc_A":1339437716,"created_at_utc_B":1339432236,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"What? No. There's a lot of confusion in your post OP (monopolies don't stifle innovation for instance), but I think it stems from:  >It seems to me that political parties do a lot more harm than good.   This isn't true, and political parties play a key (and inevitable) role in allowing representative democracy to work in industrial societies.   * Political parties aid policy making, by creating effective and coherent political blocs. Can you imagine how hard it would be to form a majority in the House of Commons without any parties?  * Political parties provide signals to the voter, so that he or she knows what they're getting if they vote for Candidate Bloggs.  * They provide the organisational skills and manpower required to fight in the political sphere on the behalf of those they stand for.  etc.   Parties get a bad rap, but they're not all bad, honest - which is a good thing as the advantages they give are overwhelming when it comes to political competition. The United States was founded with a distinct fear of \"party and faction, and within a couple of years of the Constitution being ratified, quasi-parties had already established themselves.","human_ref_B":"In canada cash contributions from corporations, unions and individuals are restricted. Additionally there are limits on local campaign spending. Some broadcasters are also required to run ads for every political party, albiet infrequently and the richer parties can buy more.   Canada has the fptp system, but still allowed the rise and fall of parties like the bloc, social credit and ccf. Although none of those parties ever came to power, the gained influence. The current rise of the NDP i think helps show that fptp canfacilitate change.  But that's not really getting at your idea, it's a more minor form of regulation than banning parties altogether. The gov't of nunavut works via consensus, as some other gov'ts might. Sorry for not offering proof, this phone is slow and cumbersome.   I was a member of both of canada's youth parliaments and I floated (okay, pushed) the idea of having no parties, and advocatingf for no parties at the federal and provincial level. It was a very complex, fluid, poorly written and convoluted idea that you may still find by googling my name -tye shutty- and looking through political forums. But essentially it would be the role of MPs to debate and marshal evidence, decisions being through forced consensus when one side was proved superior -like a court room but with more resources and time for big questions. With the final goal of each debate being the common good. But the idea stinks of modernism and ignorance towards the truly divergent interests (and ignorance of ignorance perhaps) in society.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5480.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"pyf5u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Can someone help me understand the nature of personal commitment.  Particularly, are there critical factors, or ideal conditions that compel a person to make a sincere commitment to a another person, a cause or their self improvement?    Also, what can strengthen a person's resolve to stick to their initial commitment and sustain it over time.","c_root_id_A":"c3tca5t","c_root_id_B":"c3tbujm","created_at_utc_A":1329804636,"created_at_utc_B":1329801903,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I can't speak for anyone else, but for myself it depends on a few things.  1. Dissatisfaction with current life is what started all the processes (search for new job, search for degree, self-improvement)  2. Loving what I do: Sometimes I absolutely hate school. To be honest I have absolutely no use for the way education is run in North America. While I despise the institution of school, I still am thoroughly enthralled with what I am learning there. This is the same for my job, while I may not enjoy all aspects of my job, I have an extreme fascination with the industry and I love learning about it. 3. Having good people to work with. There are definitely days when my classmates and coworkers drive me effing crazy, but for the most part I have a good crew of people to work with in both situations. That goes a long ways to making it bearable. 4. Work environment. This is one that you might not have much control over, but definitely having a supportive environment, where I actually feel comfortable and valuable helps a ton. I know that my contributions are appreciated. On a personal level this is a little harder, its takes more conscious effort to notice and appreciate how your efforts at self discovery are actually valuable to you.","human_ref_B":"Sorry I don't have sources for this off the top of my head. In terms of developing a strong commitment for a worker, I know that some sense of autonomy and variation is key to strengthening and sustaining internalized commitment.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2733.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"skanx5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What impacts long term emotional being more: a therapy or a change in social or environmental settings? That's an extremely broad question. However I'm trying to find out how change in social or environmental settings affects the emotional structure, and how does it affect it vs therapy.  For example: is moving to a different city, getting promotion at work, gaining new friends, and more - impacts emotional being more or less than a therapy?  I'm looking to understand positive impact, but negative impact would be great as well.  If you have any better way of wording this question - please suggest. Don't forget to add a link to a research or your comment will be automatically deleted.  Any paper would be appreciated!","c_root_id_A":"hvl4yxc","c_root_id_B":"hvkfqxb","created_at_utc_A":1643996053,"created_at_utc_B":1643986572,"score_A":16,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The thing is that they aren't independent effects.  Example.   Environment is toxic which is causing a person a lot of stress.  Such as a job.  Person goes to therapy.   Therapist can teach the person how to better manage the job setting such as learning how to communicate with Co workers and boss to reduce the stressful problems there.   Resulting in a reduction of stress from the environment.    Alternatively, therapy may help the patient realize that they need to leave their job and help motivate them to find a new workplace.    So therapy itself can impact the environment.    On the other hand. If the person decides to change work places on their own , they might be able to resolve the impacting factor of thar environment.  But if instead the issue involves problems with communication or other maladaptive behaviors on the part of the patient, then moving to a new environment won't help.    So there is no black and white answer to your question.   You can see how it would depend greatly on the specific environment and issues the individual has.    Link provided to keep bots from removing my comment  https:\/\/www.apa.org\/topics\/psychotherapy","human_ref_B":"Check this pie chart from Asay and Lambert (1999)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9481.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"1aglcc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"What are the differences between your field in Europe vs in the USA?  I suppose the approach to things like children education varies and it'll reflect in the Academic world as well.","c_root_id_A":"c8xe93i","c_root_id_B":"c8x9hu6","created_at_utc_A":1363551075,"created_at_utc_B":1363534593,"score_A":9,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Archaeology.  In Europe it's typically part of the History or Classics Department.  In the US it's part of the Anthropology Department.  This results in very different areas of focus and different approaches towards the subject in general.","human_ref_B":"economic geography is very marginalized in the US and very, very popular in Europe, especially in the UK and Northern Europe. It has a lot to do with the history of the discipline: geography isn't taught in US high schools any more, so there are fewer students, making the discipline much smaller. In addition to this, geography departments were closed down at a lot of the top US universities in the 1950s and 1960s, making it much smaller.   Geography is frequently taught in UK and European high schools, so there are more students who major in it at university. For economic geography more specifically, there are much closer links between econ geog and business schools and economics departments, increasing their profile and stature. Add to this the importance of regional comparisons (which is the bread and butter of economic geography) and a focus on innovation research in the EU has provided a whole lot more research grants for economic geographers in Europe.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16482.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"1aglcc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"What are the differences between your field in Europe vs in the USA?  I suppose the approach to things like children education varies and it'll reflect in the Academic world as well.","c_root_id_A":"c8x8maw","c_root_id_B":"c8xe93i","created_at_utc_A":1363530659,"created_at_utc_B":1363551075,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Actually my field is very similar across the US and Europe, mostly because everyone in those locations publishes in English, so we are using the same literature and resources.  However, there's very little overlap with Eastern countries. For example, every once in a while I will run across an interesting article title only to find that the article is written in Chinese. That means that their scientists and our scientists can't really work off of each others progress in the field..","human_ref_B":"Archaeology.  In Europe it's typically part of the History or Classics Department.  In the US it's part of the Anthropology Department.  This results in very different areas of focus and different approaches towards the subject in general.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20416.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"1aglcc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"What are the differences between your field in Europe vs in the USA?  I suppose the approach to things like children education varies and it'll reflect in the Academic world as well.","c_root_id_A":"c8x8maw","c_root_id_B":"c8x9hu6","created_at_utc_A":1363530659,"created_at_utc_B":1363534593,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Actually my field is very similar across the US and Europe, mostly because everyone in those locations publishes in English, so we are using the same literature and resources.  However, there's very little overlap with Eastern countries. For example, every once in a while I will run across an interesting article title only to find that the article is written in Chinese. That means that their scientists and our scientists can't really work off of each others progress in the field..","human_ref_B":"economic geography is very marginalized in the US and very, very popular in Europe, especially in the UK and Northern Europe. It has a lot to do with the history of the discipline: geography isn't taught in US high schools any more, so there are fewer students, making the discipline much smaller. In addition to this, geography departments were closed down at a lot of the top US universities in the 1950s and 1960s, making it much smaller.   Geography is frequently taught in UK and European high schools, so there are more students who major in it at university. For economic geography more specifically, there are much closer links between econ geog and business schools and economics departments, increasing their profile and stature. Add to this the importance of regional comparisons (which is the bread and butter of economic geography) and a focus on innovation research in the EU has provided a whole lot more research grants for economic geographers in Europe.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3934.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1djfem","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is it that, in English, there is not a transitive verb for 'have sex' except ones with vulgar connotations? This question came up among friends earlier- why is the non-crude vocabulary for sex limited to indirect euphemisms (made love, slept with, etc.) Is it a holdover from more prudish times? All of the options I can think of (he *fucked* her, *did*, *screwed*, *boned*, *nailed*, etc) seem to suggest that the direct-object participant is passive and being demeaned. Does any word for the act just naturally pick up this kind of meaning? Is it common in other languages? It seems plausible that a neutral word would be used derogatorily and come to pick up that kind of connotation.","c_root_id_A":"c9qvwgq","c_root_id_B":"c9qx33c","created_at_utc_A":1367481305,"created_at_utc_B":1367491216,"score_A":35,"score_B":236,"human_ref_A":"There's \"knew\" (in the \"biblical\" sense)  \"He knew her. She knew him. They knew one another.\"  I know it's a bit archaic, but it's all I got :P  As for why there are so few options for non-vulgar transitive sex-verbs... I'm really not qualified to guess.","human_ref_B":"Transitive? Because having sex is not something you make TO another person, but WITH another person. There's not subject and object, but two subjects.   The vulgar ones are transitive because they consider one of the persons to be an object, not a subject.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9911.0,"score_ratio":6.7428571429}
{"post_id":"1djfem","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is it that, in English, there is not a transitive verb for 'have sex' except ones with vulgar connotations? This question came up among friends earlier- why is the non-crude vocabulary for sex limited to indirect euphemisms (made love, slept with, etc.) Is it a holdover from more prudish times? All of the options I can think of (he *fucked* her, *did*, *screwed*, *boned*, *nailed*, etc) seem to suggest that the direct-object participant is passive and being demeaned. Does any word for the act just naturally pick up this kind of meaning? Is it common in other languages? It seems plausible that a neutral word would be used derogatorily and come to pick up that kind of connotation.","c_root_id_A":"c9qx33c","c_root_id_B":"c9qwin9","created_at_utc_A":1367491216,"created_at_utc_B":1367486177,"score_A":236,"score_B":31,"human_ref_A":"Transitive? Because having sex is not something you make TO another person, but WITH another person. There's not subject and object, but two subjects.   The vulgar ones are transitive because they consider one of the persons to be an object, not a subject.","human_ref_B":"\"Pleasured\" seems to be a non-crude example, and one that seems fairly sex-specific: otherwise, one would probably use \"pleased\".  I also wonder if the associations you describe are gendered. People will often say \"she fucked\/did\/screwed him\" as readily as the reverse, and I'm not sure it's always taken as the man being passive and demeaned. Rather, both uses put emphasis on the subjects agency\/decision to engage in the sex. Perhaps they are considered more crude because they are used to imply that there was inequality in the amount of agency involved in initiating the act (he pressured\/tricked\/convinced her into doing it, or she threw herself at him, etc...these are stereotypical gendered sexual narratives layered on top of the agency inequality), while \"made love\", \"slept with\", etc. imply an equality, or at least fail to suggest an inequality. This is the \"proper\" form of sex in our culture, one in which both parties understand the situation in the same way and have made the same decision.  \"Pleasured\" would be an exception, because it draws attention away from the morality of the act (which depends on the agency of those involved) and focuses on the sensation of the act; it re-frames sex as a sensation rather than an action, and it borrows the positive connotations of \"pleasure\" to counteract the negative social attitudes towards sex.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5039.0,"score_ratio":7.6129032258}
{"post_id":"1djfem","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is it that, in English, there is not a transitive verb for 'have sex' except ones with vulgar connotations? This question came up among friends earlier- why is the non-crude vocabulary for sex limited to indirect euphemisms (made love, slept with, etc.) Is it a holdover from more prudish times? All of the options I can think of (he *fucked* her, *did*, *screwed*, *boned*, *nailed*, etc) seem to suggest that the direct-object participant is passive and being demeaned. Does any word for the act just naturally pick up this kind of meaning? Is it common in other languages? It seems plausible that a neutral word would be used derogatorily and come to pick up that kind of connotation.","c_root_id_A":"c9qwjlz","c_root_id_B":"c9qx33c","created_at_utc_A":1367486419,"created_at_utc_B":1367491216,"score_A":13,"score_B":236,"human_ref_A":"\"To bed\"?  It's probably just a historical accident. Why isn't there an English transitive verb that means \"to cause to disappear\"? It would be really useful! Other languages have such a word.","human_ref_B":"Transitive? Because having sex is not something you make TO another person, but WITH another person. There's not subject and object, but two subjects.   The vulgar ones are transitive because they consider one of the persons to be an object, not a subject.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4797.0,"score_ratio":18.1538461538}
{"post_id":"1djfem","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is it that, in English, there is not a transitive verb for 'have sex' except ones with vulgar connotations? This question came up among friends earlier- why is the non-crude vocabulary for sex limited to indirect euphemisms (made love, slept with, etc.) Is it a holdover from more prudish times? All of the options I can think of (he *fucked* her, *did*, *screwed*, *boned*, *nailed*, etc) seem to suggest that the direct-object participant is passive and being demeaned. Does any word for the act just naturally pick up this kind of meaning? Is it common in other languages? It seems plausible that a neutral word would be used derogatorily and come to pick up that kind of connotation.","c_root_id_A":"c9qx33c","c_root_id_B":"c9qwqnn","created_at_utc_A":1367491216,"created_at_utc_B":1367488179,"score_A":236,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Transitive? Because having sex is not something you make TO another person, but WITH another person. There's not subject and object, but two subjects.   The vulgar ones are transitive because they consider one of the persons to be an object, not a subject.","human_ref_B":"There's always \"did,\" which is a bit abstract, but about as neutral as it gets and works regardless of the gender of the subject\/object.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3037.0,"score_ratio":29.5}
{"post_id":"1djfem","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is it that, in English, there is not a transitive verb for 'have sex' except ones with vulgar connotations? This question came up among friends earlier- why is the non-crude vocabulary for sex limited to indirect euphemisms (made love, slept with, etc.) Is it a holdover from more prudish times? All of the options I can think of (he *fucked* her, *did*, *screwed*, *boned*, *nailed*, etc) seem to suggest that the direct-object participant is passive and being demeaned. Does any word for the act just naturally pick up this kind of meaning? Is it common in other languages? It seems plausible that a neutral word would be used derogatorily and come to pick up that kind of connotation.","c_root_id_A":"c9qx33c","c_root_id_B":"c9qwo9m","created_at_utc_A":1367491216,"created_at_utc_B":1367487591,"score_A":236,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Transitive? Because having sex is not something you make TO another person, but WITH another person. There's not subject and object, but two subjects.   The vulgar ones are transitive because they consider one of the persons to be an object, not a subject.","human_ref_B":"My favorite transitive copulating-verb is to tup. As ever-so-charmingly used in an Urban Dictionary sentence, \"you've tupped every maiden in the village, what now?\"  It's derived from sheep-sex (and sounds a bit Shakespearean), an it's not exactly without a hint of vulgarity, but it's significantly more polite than the list OP came up with.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3625.0,"score_ratio":29.5}
{"post_id":"1djfem","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is it that, in English, there is not a transitive verb for 'have sex' except ones with vulgar connotations? This question came up among friends earlier- why is the non-crude vocabulary for sex limited to indirect euphemisms (made love, slept with, etc.) Is it a holdover from more prudish times? All of the options I can think of (he *fucked* her, *did*, *screwed*, *boned*, *nailed*, etc) seem to suggest that the direct-object participant is passive and being demeaned. Does any word for the act just naturally pick up this kind of meaning? Is it common in other languages? It seems plausible that a neutral word would be used derogatorily and come to pick up that kind of connotation.","c_root_id_A":"c9qwjlz","c_root_id_B":"c9qzhw5","created_at_utc_A":1367486419,"created_at_utc_B":1367503709,"score_A":13,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"\"To bed\"?  It's probably just a historical accident. Why isn't there an English transitive verb that means \"to cause to disappear\"? It would be really useful! Other languages have such a word.","human_ref_B":"All the \"school yard jokes\" have been removed. We don't need\/want over a dozen \"lol <insert sex joke here>\" comments.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17290.0,"score_ratio":1.9230769231}
{"post_id":"1djfem","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is it that, in English, there is not a transitive verb for 'have sex' except ones with vulgar connotations? This question came up among friends earlier- why is the non-crude vocabulary for sex limited to indirect euphemisms (made love, slept with, etc.) Is it a holdover from more prudish times? All of the options I can think of (he *fucked* her, *did*, *screwed*, *boned*, *nailed*, etc) seem to suggest that the direct-object participant is passive and being demeaned. Does any word for the act just naturally pick up this kind of meaning? Is it common in other languages? It seems plausible that a neutral word would be used derogatorily and come to pick up that kind of connotation.","c_root_id_A":"c9qwqnn","c_root_id_B":"c9qzhw5","created_at_utc_A":1367488179,"created_at_utc_B":1367503709,"score_A":8,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"There's always \"did,\" which is a bit abstract, but about as neutral as it gets and works regardless of the gender of the subject\/object.","human_ref_B":"All the \"school yard jokes\" have been removed. We don't need\/want over a dozen \"lol <insert sex joke here>\" comments.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15530.0,"score_ratio":3.125}
{"post_id":"1djfem","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is it that, in English, there is not a transitive verb for 'have sex' except ones with vulgar connotations? This question came up among friends earlier- why is the non-crude vocabulary for sex limited to indirect euphemisms (made love, slept with, etc.) Is it a holdover from more prudish times? All of the options I can think of (he *fucked* her, *did*, *screwed*, *boned*, *nailed*, etc) seem to suggest that the direct-object participant is passive and being demeaned. Does any word for the act just naturally pick up this kind of meaning? Is it common in other languages? It seems plausible that a neutral word would be used derogatorily and come to pick up that kind of connotation.","c_root_id_A":"c9qwo9m","c_root_id_B":"c9qzhw5","created_at_utc_A":1367487591,"created_at_utc_B":1367503709,"score_A":8,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"My favorite transitive copulating-verb is to tup. As ever-so-charmingly used in an Urban Dictionary sentence, \"you've tupped every maiden in the village, what now?\"  It's derived from sheep-sex (and sounds a bit Shakespearean), an it's not exactly without a hint of vulgarity, but it's significantly more polite than the list OP came up with.","human_ref_B":"All the \"school yard jokes\" have been removed. We don't need\/want over a dozen \"lol <insert sex joke here>\" comments.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16118.0,"score_ratio":3.125}
{"post_id":"9l79ab","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"What factors help lead people to commit murder? Afterwards, how do they come to terms with it or rationalize the act, or do they not do so? I would be greatly interested in reading recommendations of a sociological or psychological flavor on the topic.   As a note, I am not interested in serial killers, mass murders, etc. -- my interest in the topic is solely on the social context around, motivations of, and ex post reasoning of one off (and possibly sporadic) killers.   Thank you for any suggestions!","c_root_id_A":"e750eth","c_root_id_B":"e75cem2","created_at_utc_A":1538634803,"created_at_utc_B":1538656515,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I would recommend:  Murder as a Sociological Phenomenon  What Sociologists can tells us about serial killing  Suicide by mass murder: Masculinity, aggrieved entitlement, and  rampage school shootings  Confession to murder: Critical notes on the Sociology of Motivation  Murder by Structure: Dominance Relations and the Social Structure of Gang Homicide  Hope this helps!","human_ref_B":"Different kinds of homicide have different motivations and risk factors. Infanticide is not the same as femicide (the homicide of women, most often in the context of a relationship, which is one of the leading causes of female violent death).   But *generally* speaking, the most common risk factors are (a couple of sources \\[one\\] and \\[two\\]: gang activity, being involved in drug trafficking, substance use, gun accessibility, being unemployed, being male, being young, having antecedents of violent behavior (violence tends to be a precursor to homicide), having been diagnosed for a disruptive behavior disorder, having been held back in school, low SES. Weak self-control can also contribute to the risk of committing a murder.   However, these risk factors should not be interpreted as is - there are interactions, such as poorer people living in worse contexts and thus having more opportunities to interact with gangs or not achieving good education. You might have been confronted with the issue of the over-representation of Black offenders, however their 'race' interacts with several other factors such as them being more likely to be disadvantaged socially and economically, living in worse contexts, etc:  \"Race was not included as a risk factor because it is more likely an index of exposure to a high degree of risk factors for violence, rather than representing a meaningful explanatory factor (Farrington & Loeber, 2003)\".  Regarding context more largely (and this touches upon motivation), one of the reasons homicide rates might have fallen is progress in medicine and reduced lethality of assaults. After all, not all homicides are *intentional*. In the context of homicide committed by an intimate partner, it is often the result of abusive relationships. According to this study, controlling partners are particularly dangerous, and an important trigger is the female partner leaving for another person.  Concerning rationalization of the act, that is more the realm of qualitative studies. Sykes and Matza suggested that criminals do employ neutralizations techniques to justify their act to themselves and others (e.g. 'he deserved it', 'it wasn't my fault', 'he'll recover', etc.). Depending on the case, it is reasonable to expect murderers to employ similar techniques too, but I cannot provide you studies concerning non-serial murderers.  ^(Just a small ending note, I would avoid using the word \"help\" in this context, as we wouldn't want to) *^(help)* ^(people become murderers.)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21712.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"6xry3d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Labour used to be commonly viewed as rehabilitative. Is there any evidence for or against rehabilitation through labour? Basically what it says in the title. Is there any evidence that labour either improves or hinders rehabilitation outcomes, measured through criterion like recidivism and contrition?  If this isn't possible to answer because no one has made a justice system that focused on rehabilitation for us to look at, is there a next closest thing we could look at?","c_root_id_A":"dmiakvs","c_root_id_B":"dmi6coj","created_at_utc_A":1504448364,"created_at_utc_B":1504439982,"score_A":11,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The evidence from the Norwegian prison system is that in combination with humane treatment and therapies, it is helpful http:\/\/pulitzercenter.org\/projects\/europe-norway-prison-rehabilitation-bastoy-island https:\/\/phys.org\/news\/2016-08-norwegian-prisons-criminal.html  This is a very different environment from the sort of hard labour traditionally associated with prisons, and those in many other countries, however.","human_ref_B":"Ooh - great question! I don't have an answer from a prison perspective, but this question does remind me of 'blue zones' - ie. People with activity to do, social connection etc, are more likely to lead happier, longer lives. https:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/brettsteenbarger\/2015\/03\/22\/are-you-operating-in-your-blue-zone\/#71193d6d4895  Whether this could apply to a prision rehabilitation process, I'm not sure.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8382.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"1jwefw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is there any research that examines whether \"cute\" or \"innocent\" looking people are nicer and\/or less likely to commit crime than those who appear more intimidating?","c_root_id_A":"cbjagxx","c_root_id_B":"cbj6ke3","created_at_utc_A":1375935271,"created_at_utc_B":1375923943,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I think it's reasonable to suppose a link involving high testosterone, which has been shown to be correlated with both distinctively male features (i.e. \"intimidating,\" not \"cute\") as well as criminal behavior. To my knowledge, this hasn't been studied directly though...but my knowledge is pretty limited.","human_ref_B":"All though the social behaviour could change if people treat you as a ugly\/handsome person. I think you will become more synical and hateful if you become outcasted or just treated slightly different depending on your looks. Cause looks don't really mean anything to your mind.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11328.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"gnsbc2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is there any research that explains why societies respond differently to terrorism-related deaths than to, for example, COVID-19 deaths? I've seen *a lot* of armchair social scientists on Reddit try to explain this, but I'd be curious to see if there's been any actual research done on this.   Just to expand on what I mean by this - a lot of people throw around the comment \"we're having a 9\/11 every day and no one seems to care.\" Before that, it wasn't uncommon to see people say \"more people die of car accidents than terrorism\" or \"more people die of diabetes\" or etc, etc.....  So, to restate my question: are there any papers or social science concepts that help explain why societies react differently to different types of 'unnatural' deaths?","c_root_id_A":"frcbhit","c_root_id_B":"frc9hip","created_at_utc_A":1590068917,"created_at_utc_B":1590067729,"score_A":14,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"It is a matter of perceptions, and how our memories and risk assessment function (among other things). It is not just terrorism which produces \"more fear than it should\" in terms of objective criteria such as how many deaths it actually causes and the risk of being a victim. Thing is, humans do not see the world through unfiltered lenses, and in a purely objective and dispassionate manner.  For instance, many people tend to be more afraid of shark attacks, being murdered by a stranger, and airplane crashes, rather than home accidents, being murdered by an acquaintance ^(1), and car crashes. All of which are likelier to happen.  ---  What do these \"terrifying\" events have in common? Well, for instance, (paradoxically) their (relative) **rarity**. To quote Kahneman and Tversky,   >Because people are limited in their ability to comprehend and evaluate extreme probabilities, **highly unlikely events are either ignored or overweighted**, and the difference between high probability and certainty is either neglected or exaggerated.  (As an aside, I will note that there can be discrepancies between perceptions and choices, where evaluation of rare risks may be overestimated, but underweighted in decision-making).   Besides our problems with evaluating probabilities in general (see this brief opinion piece by Newell et al.), there are other qualities to consider, too, such as how \"**sensational(ized)**\" these events are, and their **consequences**.   ---  First, consider how events such as terrorism and airplane crashes (independently of cause) are **depicted and mediatized**. You are likelier to hear about an airplane crash than a car crash, and you are likelier to hear a lot about a large jetliner crashing in which several died, than a smaller plane in which only the pilot died, or nobody died at all.  Therefore, consider how the media (and people in general) selects and frames stories - not all of which are equally \"**newsworthy**\" (see Tiegreen and Newman and Vasterman et al.).  ---  Then, keep in mind that not all deaths are of the same *kind* even putting aside *cause* of death. See for instance what Gigerenzer called **dread risks**;  >**People tend to avoid situations in which many people may be killed atone point in time, as opposed to situations in which the same number may be killed, but the deaths are distributed over a longer period of time** (Slovic, 1987). **The former low-probability, high-consequence events are called dread risks**. The crash of four planes in the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001, exemplifies such a catastrophic event.  Or in other words,  >Why are we scared of what most likely will not kill us? Psychology provides us with an answer. It is called fear of dread risks. **This fear is elicited by a situation in which many people die within a short time.** Note that the fear is not about dying, but **about suddenly dying together with many others at one point of time. When as many\u2014or more\u2014people die distributed over the year,** whether from gun violence, motorcycle accidents, or in hospital beds, **it is hard to conjure up anxiety.**  This is not (meant to be) exhaustive. Another shared quality is the **perception of control)** (see Weinstein) and perceptions of vulnerability. For example, people tend to feel in control when driving a car, but not when being a passenger on an airplane. Terrorism is perceived as unpredictable and sudden, likewise a stranger choosing to murder us.   ---  Put all of the above together with the several heuristics and biases to which humans are prone, such as availability bias. Meyers summarized several of these elements on a column for the American Psychological Society. **Addendum]** Also see [zero-risk bias regarding decision-making relative to risks such as terrorism (e.g. Raue and Schneider)  ---  ^(1) ^(Also note that death by murder is also an uncommon event compared to all other causes of death, and crime in general.)","human_ref_B":"Brilliant question!  Social science in itself is broad and there are multiple perspectives and concepts that can be applied to explain the phenomenon you are talking about.  In addition to the ones already mentioned by other posts, one other concept is the social constructionist view.  Proponents of this view would argue that any problem which in this case, mass casualty, is only a 'problem' to the extent that the people in power deems it a problem. And often, peiple in power are people who have control over media. In the book, Terrorism: A Critical Introduction by Jackson et al, you'll see that it is actually beneficial for media to give as mych hype as possible to terrorism.  Following this argument, one can reason that prior to Covid-19, there is little benefit for any media outlet to give much attention to an impending virus outbreak - something which in fact, viroligists have been warning about. In fact, in the aftermath of SARS, nations around the world signed a treaty to improve infrasturctures and research work to prevent or at least to tackle a pandemic effectively. However,  10 years after the treaty, nothing much has been done. SARS: 10 Years later. But I digress.  So, in short, for as long the mainstream media sees it profitable for them to portray terrorism as public enemy #1, and for political leaders to be able to rally support behind a symbolic enemy, they will continue to do so and people will continue to believe so too hence the different reactions to casualties from Sept 11 VS casualties from other disasters.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1188.0,"score_ratio":2.8}
{"post_id":"1578oi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"[Linguistics] Why do English speakers tend to abbreviate names by adding an \"ee\" sound at the end? Why do English speakers tend to abbreviate names by adding an \"ee\" sound at the end rather than some other sound?  Example: Charles becomes Charlie, Gerald becomes Jerry, Edward becomes Eddie.   What sounds do other languages use instead?","c_root_id_A":"c7jwdti","c_root_id_B":"c7jw89c","created_at_utc_A":1356055473,"created_at_utc_B":1356054823,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"In Spanish, it's often (but not always) the diminutive suffix, \"-ito\" or \"-ita\".","human_ref_B":"French speaker here : we add nothing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":650.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1578oi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"[Linguistics] Why do English speakers tend to abbreviate names by adding an \"ee\" sound at the end? Why do English speakers tend to abbreviate names by adding an \"ee\" sound at the end rather than some other sound?  Example: Charles becomes Charlie, Gerald becomes Jerry, Edward becomes Eddie.   What sounds do other languages use instead?","c_root_id_A":"c7jw89c","c_root_id_B":"c7k0whh","created_at_utc_A":1356054823,"created_at_utc_B":1356075278,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"French speaker here : we add nothing.","human_ref_B":"This question is better suited for \/r\/linguistics.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20455.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"81wv0j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"If there was no legislation on minimum wage, would there be a minimum formed on the market beyond which wages could not or would not fall? If yes, what would it be with respect to average wage?","c_root_id_A":"dv6quow","c_root_id_B":"dv67dt8","created_at_utc_A":1520205856,"created_at_utc_B":1520183893,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The minimum wage is a classic example of a price floor.  In this case it is a floor for the hourly price of labor.    If there weren't a price floor, all else equal, market equilibrium would determine the average wage.  That being said, average wage isn't a very useful metric to think about the labor market, since the whole reason for a minimum wage is to try and keep low skilled workers from being exploited, not to affect the average wage.  It is much more beneficial to think about the wages for individual kinds of labor.  If there were no minimum wage, it's likely that low skilled labor prices would fall and labor force participation would rise.   So to answer your questions,  >If there was no legislation on minimum wage, would there be a minimum formed on the market beyond which wages could not or would not fall?\"    Yes, but determining where exactly that would be is a near impossible task, as there are too many uncontrolled variables. >If yes, what would it be with respect to average wage?  Using intuition about prices floors, we can say that the market equilibrium for some low skilled labor is below minimum wage, but how far below is unknown.  With respect to \"Average wage,\" that market determined minimum would pretty obviously be below the market average.    Minimum wage has many more effects on the whole labor market besides just determining the lowest wage someone can be paid, but that whole discussion is probably beyond the scope of the question.","human_ref_B":"Under perfect competition, wages are set at the productivity of the worker. If we correct for the monopsony power of the employer, it should be some amount less than that, depending on the difference in bargaining power. However, the worker may opt out of the workforce if all offers they receive are less than the opportunity cost of not working.  N.B.: Labor supply curves are backward-bending. This means that as wages increase past a certain point, workers will supply less as the opportunity cost of their time rises.  In a dynamic setting, this is complicated by search costs (which is a component of the aforementioned monopsony power). Workers may accept lower paying jobs because of the costly uncertainty of continuing to search.  Finally, for any given worker, they have various different levels of productivity depending on the job they accept. In a world without frictions, they would accept the highest paying and most productive job. However, with search costs and other frictions, they will satisfice.  Source: Standard search model of labor economics Read a labor econ book. This is a grad level option:  https:\/\/mitpress.mit.edu\/books\/labor-economics","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21963.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"8k2aft","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What causes people to have unconditional support or love for a public figure? Like Donald Trump for example? For example, a lot of Trump supporters tend to support Trump no matter what he does and they almost never criticize or condemn anything that he does. Even when he is in the wrong and even when he does something that they do not support. What causes this kind of extreme loyalty to a person that they don't even know in real life? It's not like they owe him anything, but I've always been very confused by the unwavering support he has amongst his supporters","c_root_id_A":"dz54wa3","c_root_id_B":"dz6anif","created_at_utc_A":1526579841,"created_at_utc_B":1526626993,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Hoffer's *The True Believer: Thoughts On The Nature Of Mass Movements* is a good book on the subject.","human_ref_B":"Max Weber wrote about this quite a bit, and called the phenomenon \u201ccharisma\u201d or \u201ccharismatic leadership.\u201d It\u2019s more complex than the term suggests. He argues that there is a social process by which leaders come into their power from a collective. The theory in many ways suggests it has little to do with the individual leader but instead what matters more is what they represent and the expected processes by which someone arrives at their leadership.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":47152.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"vie5s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"This may seem like an odd question, but why are we always so amazed by the accomplishments and achievements of early civilizations? They were still humans--they still had the same brains and drives and capacities that we do now, right? For example, it really shouldn't be *that* shocking that the Egyptians built the pyramids, should it? They're *goddamned impressive structures*, but so are the things we concoct in current times. The brains of ancient Egyptians (or members of any ancient civilization) were just as functional as ours, so why should their technological marvels *genuinely surprise* us so much? Is it just our arrogance that makes us react this way?","c_root_id_A":"c54td3p","c_root_id_B":"c54rhgh","created_at_utc_A":1340522084,"created_at_utc_B":1340510577,"score_A":58,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"You ever hear the quote \"If I have seen farther it is by standing on the shoulders of giants\" by Issac Newton? Meaning, of course, that his achievements in physics and mathematics were only possible by building off of previous physicians and mathematicians.   No individual human could invent all the technology we have now.  It's not a matter of an individual human brain at all. The only reason our technology is as advanced as it is is because we've had thousands of years to work on it. The Egyptians didn't have that time or that body of knowledge, so their building the Pyramids is much more impressive than if we built them now.  It's the difference between someone proving the Pythagorean theorem on their own and proving the Pythagorean theorem with access to a modern-day library.","human_ref_B":"Yes! This is something that has always vexed me as well. I think people assume that at any point during a generation, people are working off of the accumulated knowledge of previous generations; however, there is nothing to say that any person has experienced the successes of previous generations other than by looking at the relative educational structure. In the same light, there's nothing to say that a culture or civilization could have reached higher than other similar or even future cultures and this information or skillset was not passed directly to any set of contemporary culture. I always feel like people underestimate the power of population density, lack of available stimuli or jobs, and the will of an autocrat. I feel like these factors combine to provide a domain for anything that has happened. I think the power of our relative population densities has been divided by all the available activities that are available to the personal agent. Or, in other words, the more things that people are able to do, the less likely it is that the whole population will be energized to complete a great project in collaboration with eachother, because each unit is more or less likely to engage in an other activity apart from the project.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11507.0,"score_ratio":7.25}
{"post_id":"vie5s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"This may seem like an odd question, but why are we always so amazed by the accomplishments and achievements of early civilizations? They were still humans--they still had the same brains and drives and capacities that we do now, right? For example, it really shouldn't be *that* shocking that the Egyptians built the pyramids, should it? They're *goddamned impressive structures*, but so are the things we concoct in current times. The brains of ancient Egyptians (or members of any ancient civilization) were just as functional as ours, so why should their technological marvels *genuinely surprise* us so much? Is it just our arrogance that makes us react this way?","c_root_id_A":"c54td3p","c_root_id_B":"c54t4ko","created_at_utc_A":1340522084,"created_at_utc_B":1340520326,"score_A":58,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"You ever hear the quote \"If I have seen farther it is by standing on the shoulders of giants\" by Issac Newton? Meaning, of course, that his achievements in physics and mathematics were only possible by building off of previous physicians and mathematicians.   No individual human could invent all the technology we have now.  It's not a matter of an individual human brain at all. The only reason our technology is as advanced as it is is because we've had thousands of years to work on it. The Egyptians didn't have that time or that body of knowledge, so their building the Pyramids is much more impressive than if we built them now.  It's the difference between someone proving the Pythagorean theorem on their own and proving the Pythagorean theorem with access to a modern-day library.","human_ref_B":"We compare the level of accomplishment with what they possessed in their civilization at that time. This amazement can happen at any point in time. I don't think there is anything wrong with recognizing greatness, no matter what time in history it happened. And the greatness can encompass many things. Whether it's a technological breakthrough, a testimony to a civilization's power, or simply the genius of a single person.  I think the biggest point is the mystery. We know how we do things today. We know what can be accomplished with our advancements. Now we have to figure out how people did it without our technology and modern knowledge. The more mystery behind it, the more our astonishment rises, because it is so foreign to the us now. Foreign things surprise us. We can't help ourselves.   Really, humankind is bringing forth greatness and marvel all the time. It is just more fascinating when we don't completely understand the how and the why. The Great Pyramids are a wonderful example: here is a 20 year, monumental project taken upon a powerful, ancient civilization with no modern machinery\/technology that employed tens of thousands of people who were just fighting for basic survival in order to honor a single, soon to be dead person by stacking a bunch of rocks on top of each other with some nice mathematical precision. The whole concept is pretty foreign to us when compared to our modern times, and that's what makes it amazing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1758.0,"score_ratio":6.4444444444}
{"post_id":"vie5s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"This may seem like an odd question, but why are we always so amazed by the accomplishments and achievements of early civilizations? They were still humans--they still had the same brains and drives and capacities that we do now, right? For example, it really shouldn't be *that* shocking that the Egyptians built the pyramids, should it? They're *goddamned impressive structures*, but so are the things we concoct in current times. The brains of ancient Egyptians (or members of any ancient civilization) were just as functional as ours, so why should their technological marvels *genuinely surprise* us so much? Is it just our arrogance that makes us react this way?","c_root_id_A":"c54t4ko","c_root_id_B":"c54rhgh","created_at_utc_A":1340520326,"created_at_utc_B":1340510577,"score_A":9,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"We compare the level of accomplishment with what they possessed in their civilization at that time. This amazement can happen at any point in time. I don't think there is anything wrong with recognizing greatness, no matter what time in history it happened. And the greatness can encompass many things. Whether it's a technological breakthrough, a testimony to a civilization's power, or simply the genius of a single person.  I think the biggest point is the mystery. We know how we do things today. We know what can be accomplished with our advancements. Now we have to figure out how people did it without our technology and modern knowledge. The more mystery behind it, the more our astonishment rises, because it is so foreign to the us now. Foreign things surprise us. We can't help ourselves.   Really, humankind is bringing forth greatness and marvel all the time. It is just more fascinating when we don't completely understand the how and the why. The Great Pyramids are a wonderful example: here is a 20 year, monumental project taken upon a powerful, ancient civilization with no modern machinery\/technology that employed tens of thousands of people who were just fighting for basic survival in order to honor a single, soon to be dead person by stacking a bunch of rocks on top of each other with some nice mathematical precision. The whole concept is pretty foreign to us when compared to our modern times, and that's what makes it amazing.","human_ref_B":"Yes! This is something that has always vexed me as well. I think people assume that at any point during a generation, people are working off of the accumulated knowledge of previous generations; however, there is nothing to say that any person has experienced the successes of previous generations other than by looking at the relative educational structure. In the same light, there's nothing to say that a culture or civilization could have reached higher than other similar or even future cultures and this information or skillset was not passed directly to any set of contemporary culture. I always feel like people underestimate the power of population density, lack of available stimuli or jobs, and the will of an autocrat. I feel like these factors combine to provide a domain for anything that has happened. I think the power of our relative population densities has been divided by all the available activities that are available to the personal agent. Or, in other words, the more things that people are able to do, the less likely it is that the whole population will be energized to complete a great project in collaboration with eachother, because each unit is more or less likely to engage in an other activity apart from the project.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9749.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"5yyg9z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Are introverts really looked down upon? If so, is there evolutionary psychology behind to it? My question was inspired from a post in \/r\/Philippines where OP said he was being given a hard time for being an introvert. I did notice this as well that introverts seem to be looked upon. I am generally quiet myself and not introvert per se but I do talk and engage with others when I want to or needed be. Others that I know, however, who are more introverted get criticised for avoiding the group in general. I think those people I mentioned are naturally socially anxious but that's another story.  Is there a reason why introverts are looked down upon by a group? I am speculating that it might be evolutionary that humans think we should all stick together, being social and all, in order to survive and those who do not participate are seen as not contributing to the group in any way.","c_root_id_A":"deuuimf","c_root_id_B":"deuon5r","created_at_utc_A":1489375530,"created_at_utc_B":1489366861,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Your question implies (or assumes a particular answer to) an empirical question. I don't know how to prove the negative with a citation, so I'll just link here to a google scholar search with some likely terms: I'm very open to being wrong about this, but I don't know of literature actually studying the question of whether introverts are the systematic target of prejudice or discrimination or negative stereotyping.   That said, and knowing I might be wrong, there's certainly a lot of assuming that \"introverts\" are a marginalized class of individuals. The word is in quotes because introversion is a dimensional personality trait, not a set of categories. I don't know if there is epidemiology-type research showing some kind of clustering of correlates or outcomes or something that would strengthen the case for the existence of a discrete group of people identified as \"introverts\" (there might be), so I continue to think in dimensional terms: there are some people very high on the introversion personality trait. There are also people medium-high, less high, etc.  But lots of writers of scholarly and quasi-scholarly literature insist that introverts are marginalized, in some cases apparently suggesting that the marginalization processes are similar to those studied in sexism and racism research.  My problems with this are threefold:  **1.** I don't know of any research demonstrating an overall bias against \"introverts\" (I know the public might perceive a discrete group of people even though science doesn't seem to, so this is still a real possibility; I just don't know of the research).  **2.** The somewhat defensive defenses of \"introverts\" I have seen\/read\/survived at conferences have all made the apparently solid observations that North Americans\/Western Europeans have many socially positive prototypes, myths, figures of speech, etc. associated with the characteristics of extroversion, with implied denigration of those characteristic of introversion. These authors also point out (probably quite accurately) that there are many activities in our meta-society that are easier for extroverts than for introverts, such as those requiring public speaking, aggressive socializing, daily assertiveness, etc. While these points seem to make lots of sense, they ignore some things, like...  (a) ...the fact that our societies also have many positive things to say about introvert traits, with negative things to say about extroverts (\"Speak softly and carry a big stick,\" \"Still waters run deep,\" \"If you can't say anything nice...\" \"just flapping his gums,\" \"running her mouth,\" \"babbling brooks,\" \"Quiet people have the loudest minds,\" etc.) that imply the opposite of the persecuted-introvert hypothesis. Look at any list of \"quotes about introverts\" and see how many are critical of introvert-typical behavior. There are any number of literary or Hollywood heroes\/heroines who are introverts (Introversion fits well with the \"quiet\/demure\" part of traditional female gender roles, as well as with the \"strong, silent\" male gender role--go count the number of action heroes who appear to just love parties and chitchat) and these characters are often portrayed as patiently suffering the extrovert fools around them.   (b) ...logically, the existence of an easier pathway for success with some characteristics than others does not necessarily imply prejudice, much less active discrimination; physically stronger people pass firefighter exams more easily, but that doesn't mean the rest of us are a bunch of anti-weak-people bigots. People with high levels of psychopathy (and correspondingly low levels of empathy) have an easier time making loads of money as CEOs or corporate lawyers, but this doesn't mean everyone carries some anti-nice-person prejudice.  **3.** The \"takedowns\" of extroversion are all kind of holier-than-thou. Okay, maybe I'm the defensive one, now; I have never been described as an introvert, so that's a possibility. However, just read\/listen to\/watch a few of these, and I think you'll agree that the tone is often one of superiority; it's not just that introverts are a persecuted class of people who are just as good as anyone else; the injustice is so much worse because introverts are *better* than other people, and those other people don't recognize that fact! If the extroverts would just stop talking for a few minutes, or stay home and read a book or two, or leave the friggin' party early, maybe they could become smart, insightful, and truly independent, too! And finally recognize that the introverts in their lives have always been better at these things! Some of these pieces are much less like this than others, I realize; some are quite reasonable, and point out important ways in which we seem to have structured our world to prioritize certain interpersonal strategies over others, with bad consequences. It's telling that there is a micro-industry in celebrating introversion in the US right now. Actually, googling \"quotes about introverts\" and \"sayings about talking,\" etc. I'm becoming convinced that this isn't new; perhaps we've been bemoaning the unfair dominance of extrovert traits for centuries.  **4.** People have experiences. Those experiences are real. They cause suffering. They are compelling. We are behavioral scientists, and these facts do not mean that we instantly accept those people's accounts of the *causality* of those experiences. If the \"introverts\" of the world are convinced they are experiencing systematic oppression (trying to use a feminist definition of that term), this could be due to systematic bias and discriminatory behavior, or probably other things. For one thing, nearly *everyone* feels they are socially disconnected and disadvantaged; it's one of the most common human experiences to feel that you aren't really a full member of your community, that you aren't as respected or appreciated as you'd like, that your intimate relationships aren't as close or authentic as you wish they were, etc. Another possibility is that people with lots of introversion are more likely to have self-fulfilling prophecy effects, in which their discomfort in certain social situations leads to other people behaving in ways they perceive as threatening or marginalizing, and around and around. More possibilities will surely have been considered by smarter people than I. In any case, one common thread in the \"introverts unite\" treatises I've seen is a complete lack of any meaningful null hypothesis. Well, there are lots of them, and hey, science.  So before we start answering the question of where anti-introvert prejudice comes from, let's get some data: is it even a thing? Lots of armchair philosophers think it is, and lots of people who cherry-pick cultural tidbits seem to conclude that it is, but I suspect the reality is more mixed. American culture, at least (I'm American, and most of the pro-introvert content I've seen is also American), has always had a mix of celebrating and demonizing both extroversion-typical and introversion-typical behaviors (I didn't mention it above, but \"deranged loner\" is the media flip-side of \"strong, silent type\", so yeah, our world has some nasty things to say about introverts, too, sometimes). I suspect that any research out there (I'm assuming there is some... how could there not be?) finds something other than a simple anti-introvert prejudice construct if it asks reasonably balanced sets of questions. I don't think this will be structured much like racist, anti-gay, sexist, or even anti-political-leanings kinds of prejudice at all.  TL;DR: Hold your horses. Let's find out if anti-introvert discrimination is a thing before we start trying to explain it.  *Edit (24 hours later)*: IDK if I can trust reddit's vote count, but this one has zigzagged up and down between about 15 and 3. Heh. Only one actual comment, of course, but I assume some people are annoyed that I have questioned the Introvert Orthodoxy. So be it. If it can't stand scrutiny, then it's a a bad idea.","human_ref_B":"Follow on question. Would certain occupations\/lifestyles be given a \"pass\" despite being introverted, such as monks or nuns?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8669.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"7xyqwg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Legendary drug lord Pablo Escobar lost $2.1 billion in cash each year due to the rats eating it in storage or being damaged by water. Where did those $2.1 billion values go? Did the world become $2.1 billion poorer each year?","c_root_id_A":"dudaft8","c_root_id_B":"dud3buj","created_at_utc_A":1518828986,"created_at_utc_B":1518820569,"score_A":14,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"There was a bit more to the quote.   \"... the rats would eat it in storage or it would be damaged by water or lost\".  The 'my rat ate it' part seems like a pretty suspicious excuse if you ask me.  It wasn't exactly Honest Abe watching over this money.  I always wondered it 'the rats ate it' was an expression (or something lost in translation) meaning 'folks took their cut to watch it'.    Has there ever been a historically similar situation where rats literally ate a significant sum of cash?","human_ref_B":"I'm not sure what all the deleted comments said, but you might have more luck getting a good answer if you post this to \/r\/AskEconomics","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8417.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"mol7dm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Engineering is the use of scientific principles to design and build machines. What is the equivalent for this in social science? I'm a Sociology graduate, now studying master's degree in Anthropology too. This has bugged me for a few years and I still couldn't get a proper answer so I am trying Reddit. Let me give you an example.   We know how languages work and we can also get to know how to influence them in reality (making laws, creating language regulators, doing immersion programs, etc.). How do we call, then, the field of designing language revitalization (or language extinction) programs? That's not politics because politics are about the objectives (I want to promote this language because reasons) and not the how (then do it this way according to science).   This can also be applied to any social issue (education, gender roles, sexualities, national communities, social cohesion, etc.). I know about what in my country we call \"applied research\", but as far as I know those are mainly small projects which I don't find that interesting and don't make it to papers (for example, designing a plan to support pregnant women in a neighbourhood).   How can we frame the social equivalent of engineering or a somehow similar field of knowledge?","c_root_id_A":"gu5vby4","c_root_id_B":"gu5kelj","created_at_utc_A":1618160722,"created_at_utc_B":1618155485,"score_A":28,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"This is known as public policy in North America (perhaps elsewhere). Getting a degree in public policy as opposed to say, political science or sociology, means you are interested in the design, analysis and implementation of policy. Schools of public policy usually serve as a pipeline to institutions tasked with the design of policy, but are vocationally focused and therefore often much more expensive than academic programs.","human_ref_B":"This article might be of interest to you: Dilemmas in a General Theory of Planning. However, I personally do not know the answer to your question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5237.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c459uk6","c_root_id_B":"c459xr2","created_at_utc_A":1332806375,"created_at_utc_B":1332806849,"score_A":14,"score_B":49,"human_ref_A":"That immigrants send all their money back home. The cost of living in the US is going up (or am I wrong?) and wages have stagnated while producitivity of the worker has actually increased. I have met a few cases where they do send large amounts of money back home, but those are few and far between, many are struggling to get by with the high cost of living and have never mentioned sending money back home.  However, I will be conducting a survey with the NGO I'm working for later this summer through the university. I will get back to you when I have more data.","human_ref_B":"Linguist here.  People tend to think that we:   * know a ton of languages (we usually don't). Don't ask a linguist how many languages he\/she speaks. Seriously, don't!  * are prescriptivist with regards to languages --- i.e. grammar nazis. We're not --- we're more concerned with observing how language evolves than we are with trying to stop it from doing so. I don't know a single linguist who isn't fed up with being asked to resolve linguistic disputes.  * shouldn't make mistakes when using language, but we're only people. Incredibly handsome, rich and famous people --- literally swimming in money, drugs and women like the scientific rock stars we are --- but people none the less. ;)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":474.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c459tq1","c_root_id_B":"c459xr2","created_at_utc_A":1332806246,"created_at_utc_B":1332806849,"score_A":11,"score_B":49,"human_ref_A":"That George Bush wold have beaten Bill Clinton in 1992 without Ross Perot in the race.","human_ref_B":"Linguist here.  People tend to think that we:   * know a ton of languages (we usually don't). Don't ask a linguist how many languages he\/she speaks. Seriously, don't!  * are prescriptivist with regards to languages --- i.e. grammar nazis. We're not --- we're more concerned with observing how language evolves than we are with trying to stop it from doing so. I don't know a single linguist who isn't fed up with being asked to resolve linguistic disputes.  * shouldn't make mistakes when using language, but we're only people. Incredibly handsome, rich and famous people --- literally swimming in money, drugs and women like the scientific rock stars we are --- but people none the less. ;)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":603.0,"score_ratio":4.4545454545}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45afjn","c_root_id_B":"c45clgj","created_at_utc_A":1332809476,"created_at_utc_B":1332820513,"score_A":32,"score_B":36,"human_ref_A":"Economist don't know what stock is going to do well. They also don't have secret knowledge they could use to manipulate the system to become rich.","human_ref_B":"Psychologist here:  * That every fucking psychologist is some sort of therapist\/counselor. * That we get a chubby and jizz at the fact that we can analyze any person we encounter. * That psychology is shitty, \"easy\", or that certification in psychology comes from a cereal box. * and this one is fucking interesting, that psychology is just like astrology, based on shitty fortune telling.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11037.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c459uk6","c_root_id_B":"c45afjn","created_at_utc_A":1332806375,"created_at_utc_B":1332809476,"score_A":14,"score_B":32,"human_ref_A":"That immigrants send all their money back home. The cost of living in the US is going up (or am I wrong?) and wages have stagnated while producitivity of the worker has actually increased. I have met a few cases where they do send large amounts of money back home, but those are few and far between, many are struggling to get by with the high cost of living and have never mentioned sending money back home.  However, I will be conducting a survey with the NGO I'm working for later this summer through the university. I will get back to you when I have more data.","human_ref_B":"Economist don't know what stock is going to do well. They also don't have secret knowledge they could use to manipulate the system to become rich.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3101.0,"score_ratio":2.2857142857}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c459tq1","c_root_id_B":"c45afjn","created_at_utc_A":1332806246,"created_at_utc_B":1332809476,"score_A":11,"score_B":32,"human_ref_A":"That George Bush wold have beaten Bill Clinton in 1992 without Ross Perot in the race.","human_ref_B":"Economist don't know what stock is going to do well. They also don't have secret knowledge they could use to manipulate the system to become rich.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3230.0,"score_ratio":2.9090909091}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45clgj","c_root_id_B":"c45buqg","created_at_utc_A":1332820513,"created_at_utc_B":1332816654,"score_A":36,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"Psychologist here:  * That every fucking psychologist is some sort of therapist\/counselor. * That we get a chubby and jizz at the fact that we can analyze any person we encounter. * That psychology is shitty, \"easy\", or that certification in psychology comes from a cereal box. * and this one is fucking interesting, that psychology is just like astrology, based on shitty fortune telling.","human_ref_B":"That a thousand people is not a large enough sample size to measure opinion.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3859.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45c3nz","c_root_id_B":"c45clgj","created_at_utc_A":1332817905,"created_at_utc_B":1332820513,"score_A":20,"score_B":36,"human_ref_A":"I think the worst myth any layperson believes is that their *opinions* based on watching TV pundits is commensurate with the indepth technical knowledge we learn in the classroom, no matter what specific field.  Also, honest to god, a Randroid Libertarian was grilling me one day for 10 mins when I mentioned how none of my Econ professors lent any academic credence to Ron Paul (freshwater, saltwater, don't matter)","human_ref_B":"Psychologist here:  * That every fucking psychologist is some sort of therapist\/counselor. * That we get a chubby and jizz at the fact that we can analyze any person we encounter. * That psychology is shitty, \"easy\", or that certification in psychology comes from a cereal box. * and this one is fucking interesting, that psychology is just like astrology, based on shitty fortune telling.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2608.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45clgj","c_root_id_B":"c45augy","created_at_utc_A":1332820513,"created_at_utc_B":1332811604,"score_A":36,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Psychologist here:  * That every fucking psychologist is some sort of therapist\/counselor. * That we get a chubby and jizz at the fact that we can analyze any person we encounter. * That psychology is shitty, \"easy\", or that certification in psychology comes from a cereal box. * and this one is fucking interesting, that psychology is just like astrology, based on shitty fortune telling.","human_ref_B":"That as a geographer I must either:  * be attempting to discover new places despite them all being discovered. * have an encyclopedic knowledge of world locations--countries, capitals, mountain ranges, rivers, local popular drugs, etc. * draw maps for a living.  EDIT: Clarification on the map making. There are people who still do this called Cartographers, and lots of geographers still do study the science and art of visualizing spatial data. Let me tell you this is such a developed skill set on its own I'd bet only 30-40% of geographers make even their own simplest maps.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8909.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45clgj","c_root_id_B":"c45b9lu","created_at_utc_A":1332820513,"created_at_utc_B":1332813713,"score_A":36,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Psychologist here:  * That every fucking psychologist is some sort of therapist\/counselor. * That we get a chubby and jizz at the fact that we can analyze any person we encounter. * That psychology is shitty, \"easy\", or that certification in psychology comes from a cereal box. * and this one is fucking interesting, that psychology is just like astrology, based on shitty fortune telling.","human_ref_B":"That psychology isn't a science and doesn't use the scientific method.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6800.0,"score_ratio":2.5714285714}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45clgj","c_root_id_B":"c459uk6","created_at_utc_A":1332820513,"created_at_utc_B":1332806375,"score_A":36,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Psychologist here:  * That every fucking psychologist is some sort of therapist\/counselor. * That we get a chubby and jizz at the fact that we can analyze any person we encounter. * That psychology is shitty, \"easy\", or that certification in psychology comes from a cereal box. * and this one is fucking interesting, that psychology is just like astrology, based on shitty fortune telling.","human_ref_B":"That immigrants send all their money back home. The cost of living in the US is going up (or am I wrong?) and wages have stagnated while producitivity of the worker has actually increased. I have met a few cases where they do send large amounts of money back home, but those are few and far between, many are struggling to get by with the high cost of living and have never mentioned sending money back home.  However, I will be conducting a survey with the NGO I'm working for later this summer through the university. I will get back to you when I have more data.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14138.0,"score_ratio":2.5714285714}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c459tq1","c_root_id_B":"c45clgj","created_at_utc_A":1332806246,"created_at_utc_B":1332820513,"score_A":11,"score_B":36,"human_ref_A":"That George Bush wold have beaten Bill Clinton in 1992 without Ross Perot in the race.","human_ref_B":"Psychologist here:  * That every fucking psychologist is some sort of therapist\/counselor. * That we get a chubby and jizz at the fact that we can analyze any person we encounter. * That psychology is shitty, \"easy\", or that certification in psychology comes from a cereal box. * and this one is fucking interesting, that psychology is just like astrology, based on shitty fortune telling.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14267.0,"score_ratio":3.2727272727}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45augy","c_root_id_B":"c45buqg","created_at_utc_A":1332811604,"created_at_utc_B":1332816654,"score_A":16,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"That as a geographer I must either:  * be attempting to discover new places despite them all being discovered. * have an encyclopedic knowledge of world locations--countries, capitals, mountain ranges, rivers, local popular drugs, etc. * draw maps for a living.  EDIT: Clarification on the map making. There are people who still do this called Cartographers, and lots of geographers still do study the science and art of visualizing spatial data. Let me tell you this is such a developed skill set on its own I'd bet only 30-40% of geographers make even their own simplest maps.","human_ref_B":"That a thousand people is not a large enough sample size to measure opinion.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5050.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45buqg","c_root_id_B":"c45b9lu","created_at_utc_A":1332816654,"created_at_utc_B":1332813713,"score_A":20,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"That a thousand people is not a large enough sample size to measure opinion.","human_ref_B":"That psychology isn't a science and doesn't use the scientific method.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2941.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c459uk6","c_root_id_B":"c45buqg","created_at_utc_A":1332806375,"created_at_utc_B":1332816654,"score_A":14,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"That immigrants send all their money back home. The cost of living in the US is going up (or am I wrong?) and wages have stagnated while producitivity of the worker has actually increased. I have met a few cases where they do send large amounts of money back home, but those are few and far between, many are struggling to get by with the high cost of living and have never mentioned sending money back home.  However, I will be conducting a survey with the NGO I'm working for later this summer through the university. I will get back to you when I have more data.","human_ref_B":"That a thousand people is not a large enough sample size to measure opinion.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10279.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c459tq1","c_root_id_B":"c45buqg","created_at_utc_A":1332806246,"created_at_utc_B":1332816654,"score_A":11,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"That George Bush wold have beaten Bill Clinton in 1992 without Ross Perot in the race.","human_ref_B":"That a thousand people is not a large enough sample size to measure opinion.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10408.0,"score_ratio":1.8181818182}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45c3nz","c_root_id_B":"c45augy","created_at_utc_A":1332817905,"created_at_utc_B":1332811604,"score_A":20,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"I think the worst myth any layperson believes is that their *opinions* based on watching TV pundits is commensurate with the indepth technical knowledge we learn in the classroom, no matter what specific field.  Also, honest to god, a Randroid Libertarian was grilling me one day for 10 mins when I mentioned how none of my Econ professors lent any academic credence to Ron Paul (freshwater, saltwater, don't matter)","human_ref_B":"That as a geographer I must either:  * be attempting to discover new places despite them all being discovered. * have an encyclopedic knowledge of world locations--countries, capitals, mountain ranges, rivers, local popular drugs, etc. * draw maps for a living.  EDIT: Clarification on the map making. There are people who still do this called Cartographers, and lots of geographers still do study the science and art of visualizing spatial data. Let me tell you this is such a developed skill set on its own I'd bet only 30-40% of geographers make even their own simplest maps.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6301.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45c3nz","c_root_id_B":"c45b9lu","created_at_utc_A":1332817905,"created_at_utc_B":1332813713,"score_A":20,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"I think the worst myth any layperson believes is that their *opinions* based on watching TV pundits is commensurate with the indepth technical knowledge we learn in the classroom, no matter what specific field.  Also, honest to god, a Randroid Libertarian was grilling me one day for 10 mins when I mentioned how none of my Econ professors lent any academic credence to Ron Paul (freshwater, saltwater, don't matter)","human_ref_B":"That psychology isn't a science and doesn't use the scientific method.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4192.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45c3nz","c_root_id_B":"c459uk6","created_at_utc_A":1332817905,"created_at_utc_B":1332806375,"score_A":20,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"I think the worst myth any layperson believes is that their *opinions* based on watching TV pundits is commensurate with the indepth technical knowledge we learn in the classroom, no matter what specific field.  Also, honest to god, a Randroid Libertarian was grilling me one day for 10 mins when I mentioned how none of my Econ professors lent any academic credence to Ron Paul (freshwater, saltwater, don't matter)","human_ref_B":"That immigrants send all their money back home. The cost of living in the US is going up (or am I wrong?) and wages have stagnated while producitivity of the worker has actually increased. I have met a few cases where they do send large amounts of money back home, but those are few and far between, many are struggling to get by with the high cost of living and have never mentioned sending money back home.  However, I will be conducting a survey with the NGO I'm working for later this summer through the university. I will get back to you when I have more data.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11530.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45c3nz","c_root_id_B":"c459tq1","created_at_utc_A":1332817905,"created_at_utc_B":1332806246,"score_A":20,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"I think the worst myth any layperson believes is that their *opinions* based on watching TV pundits is commensurate with the indepth technical knowledge we learn in the classroom, no matter what specific field.  Also, honest to god, a Randroid Libertarian was grilling me one day for 10 mins when I mentioned how none of my Econ professors lent any academic credence to Ron Paul (freshwater, saltwater, don't matter)","human_ref_B":"That George Bush wold have beaten Bill Clinton in 1992 without Ross Perot in the race.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11659.0,"score_ratio":1.8181818182}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45augy","c_root_id_B":"c45drf5","created_at_utc_A":1332811604,"created_at_utc_B":1332827684,"score_A":16,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"That as a geographer I must either:  * be attempting to discover new places despite them all being discovered. * have an encyclopedic knowledge of world locations--countries, capitals, mountain ranges, rivers, local popular drugs, etc. * draw maps for a living.  EDIT: Clarification on the map making. There are people who still do this called Cartographers, and lots of geographers still do study the science and art of visualizing spatial data. Let me tell you this is such a developed skill set on its own I'd bet only 30-40% of geographers make even their own simplest maps.","human_ref_B":"History is a linear narrative easily broken up into discrete time periods characterized by easy-to-learn-and-memorize concepts","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16080.0,"score_ratio":1.0625}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45b9lu","c_root_id_B":"c45drf5","created_at_utc_A":1332813713,"created_at_utc_B":1332827684,"score_A":14,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"That psychology isn't a science and doesn't use the scientific method.","human_ref_B":"History is a linear narrative easily broken up into discrete time periods characterized by easy-to-learn-and-memorize concepts","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13971.0,"score_ratio":1.2142857143}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45drf5","c_root_id_B":"c45d6h4","created_at_utc_A":1332827684,"created_at_utc_B":1332823882,"score_A":17,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"History is a linear narrative easily broken up into discrete time periods characterized by easy-to-learn-and-memorize concepts","human_ref_B":"Psychology Major here.  I don't like the myth that the right brain is for spatial, non verbal abilities whilst the left brain is responsible for verbal abilities\/organization\/logic, etc.  Some parts of the brain do have sectional functions, but the human brain is so much more complex than that, and it isn't that simple. Some verbal and spatial abilities require both parts of the brain simultaneously, and some activities require the opposite of the myth's expectation.  EDIT: Just a quick source. http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/neurophilosophy\/2007\/10\/the_left_brain_right_brain_myt.php Many more articles after googling \"left brain, right brain myth\" will support this too :]","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3802.0,"score_ratio":1.3076923077}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45drf5","c_root_id_B":"c459uk6","created_at_utc_A":1332827684,"created_at_utc_B":1332806375,"score_A":17,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"History is a linear narrative easily broken up into discrete time periods characterized by easy-to-learn-and-memorize concepts","human_ref_B":"That immigrants send all their money back home. The cost of living in the US is going up (or am I wrong?) and wages have stagnated while producitivity of the worker has actually increased. I have met a few cases where they do send large amounts of money back home, but those are few and far between, many are struggling to get by with the high cost of living and have never mentioned sending money back home.  However, I will be conducting a survey with the NGO I'm working for later this summer through the university. I will get back to you when I have more data.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21309.0,"score_ratio":1.2142857143}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45drf5","c_root_id_B":"c459tq1","created_at_utc_A":1332827684,"created_at_utc_B":1332806246,"score_A":17,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"History is a linear narrative easily broken up into discrete time periods characterized by easy-to-learn-and-memorize concepts","human_ref_B":"That George Bush wold have beaten Bill Clinton in 1992 without Ross Perot in the race.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21438.0,"score_ratio":1.5454545455}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45d9bl","c_root_id_B":"c45drf5","created_at_utc_A":1332824375,"created_at_utc_B":1332827684,"score_A":7,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"All I care about is making people 'happy'....and I am somehow disconnected with reality.  I think they confuse positive psychology with taking ecstasy...","human_ref_B":"History is a linear narrative easily broken up into discrete time periods characterized by easy-to-learn-and-memorize concepts","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3309.0,"score_ratio":2.4285714286}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45csta","c_root_id_B":"c45drf5","created_at_utc_A":1332821652,"created_at_utc_B":1332827684,"score_A":4,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Anthropology\/Archaeology student here.  Common reactions to my major and future career choice are:  -Digging up dinosaurs -Working at the store Anthropologie -Treasure hunting -\"How can you be an archaeologist when all the ancient civilizations have been discovered?\"  - Assuming anthropology is purely studying \"tribal\" cultures","human_ref_B":"History is a linear narrative easily broken up into discrete time periods characterized by easy-to-learn-and-memorize concepts","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6032.0,"score_ratio":4.25}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45d5bo","c_root_id_B":"c45drf5","created_at_utc_A":1332823696,"created_at_utc_B":1332827684,"score_A":5,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"In all honesty I really don't talk to people about my work. But I'm intrigued -- could someone tell me what the masses think about IR experts?","human_ref_B":"History is a linear narrative easily broken up into discrete time periods characterized by easy-to-learn-and-memorize concepts","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3988.0,"score_ratio":3.4}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45augy","c_root_id_B":"c459uk6","created_at_utc_A":1332811604,"created_at_utc_B":1332806375,"score_A":16,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"That as a geographer I must either:  * be attempting to discover new places despite them all being discovered. * have an encyclopedic knowledge of world locations--countries, capitals, mountain ranges, rivers, local popular drugs, etc. * draw maps for a living.  EDIT: Clarification on the map making. There are people who still do this called Cartographers, and lots of geographers still do study the science and art of visualizing spatial data. Let me tell you this is such a developed skill set on its own I'd bet only 30-40% of geographers make even their own simplest maps.","human_ref_B":"That immigrants send all their money back home. The cost of living in the US is going up (or am I wrong?) and wages have stagnated while producitivity of the worker has actually increased. I have met a few cases where they do send large amounts of money back home, but those are few and far between, many are struggling to get by with the high cost of living and have never mentioned sending money back home.  However, I will be conducting a survey with the NGO I'm working for later this summer through the university. I will get back to you when I have more data.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5229.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45augy","c_root_id_B":"c459tq1","created_at_utc_A":1332811604,"created_at_utc_B":1332806246,"score_A":16,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"That as a geographer I must either:  * be attempting to discover new places despite them all being discovered. * have an encyclopedic knowledge of world locations--countries, capitals, mountain ranges, rivers, local popular drugs, etc. * draw maps for a living.  EDIT: Clarification on the map making. There are people who still do this called Cartographers, and lots of geographers still do study the science and art of visualizing spatial data. Let me tell you this is such a developed skill set on its own I'd bet only 30-40% of geographers make even their own simplest maps.","human_ref_B":"That George Bush wold have beaten Bill Clinton in 1992 without Ross Perot in the race.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5358.0,"score_ratio":1.4545454545}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45b9lu","c_root_id_B":"c459tq1","created_at_utc_A":1332813713,"created_at_utc_B":1332806246,"score_A":14,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"That psychology isn't a science and doesn't use the scientific method.","human_ref_B":"That George Bush wold have beaten Bill Clinton in 1992 without Ross Perot in the race.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7467.0,"score_ratio":1.2727272727}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c459tq1","c_root_id_B":"c45d6h4","created_at_utc_A":1332806246,"created_at_utc_B":1332823882,"score_A":11,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"That George Bush wold have beaten Bill Clinton in 1992 without Ross Perot in the race.","human_ref_B":"Psychology Major here.  I don't like the myth that the right brain is for spatial, non verbal abilities whilst the left brain is responsible for verbal abilities\/organization\/logic, etc.  Some parts of the brain do have sectional functions, but the human brain is so much more complex than that, and it isn't that simple. Some verbal and spatial abilities require both parts of the brain simultaneously, and some activities require the opposite of the myth's expectation.  EDIT: Just a quick source. http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/neurophilosophy\/2007\/10\/the_left_brain_right_brain_myt.php Many more articles after googling \"left brain, right brain myth\" will support this too :]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17636.0,"score_ratio":1.1818181818}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45d6h4","c_root_id_B":"c45csta","created_at_utc_A":1332823882,"created_at_utc_B":1332821652,"score_A":13,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Psychology Major here.  I don't like the myth that the right brain is for spatial, non verbal abilities whilst the left brain is responsible for verbal abilities\/organization\/logic, etc.  Some parts of the brain do have sectional functions, but the human brain is so much more complex than that, and it isn't that simple. Some verbal and spatial abilities require both parts of the brain simultaneously, and some activities require the opposite of the myth's expectation.  EDIT: Just a quick source. http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/neurophilosophy\/2007\/10\/the_left_brain_right_brain_myt.php Many more articles after googling \"left brain, right brain myth\" will support this too :]","human_ref_B":"Anthropology\/Archaeology student here.  Common reactions to my major and future career choice are:  -Digging up dinosaurs -Working at the store Anthropologie -Treasure hunting -\"How can you be an archaeologist when all the ancient civilizations have been discovered?\"  - Assuming anthropology is purely studying \"tribal\" cultures","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2230.0,"score_ratio":3.25}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45d6h4","c_root_id_B":"c45d5bo","created_at_utc_A":1332823882,"created_at_utc_B":1332823696,"score_A":13,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Psychology Major here.  I don't like the myth that the right brain is for spatial, non verbal abilities whilst the left brain is responsible for verbal abilities\/organization\/logic, etc.  Some parts of the brain do have sectional functions, but the human brain is so much more complex than that, and it isn't that simple. Some verbal and spatial abilities require both parts of the brain simultaneously, and some activities require the opposite of the myth's expectation.  EDIT: Just a quick source. http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/neurophilosophy\/2007\/10\/the_left_brain_right_brain_myt.php Many more articles after googling \"left brain, right brain myth\" will support this too :]","human_ref_B":"In all honesty I really don't talk to people about my work. But I'm intrigued -- could someone tell me what the masses think about IR experts?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":186.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c459uk6","c_root_id_B":"c459tq1","created_at_utc_A":1332806375,"created_at_utc_B":1332806246,"score_A":14,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"That immigrants send all their money back home. The cost of living in the US is going up (or am I wrong?) and wages have stagnated while producitivity of the worker has actually increased. I have met a few cases where they do send large amounts of money back home, but those are few and far between, many are struggling to get by with the high cost of living and have never mentioned sending money back home.  However, I will be conducting a survey with the NGO I'm working for later this summer through the university. I will get back to you when I have more data.","human_ref_B":"That George Bush wold have beaten Bill Clinton in 1992 without Ross Perot in the race.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":129.0,"score_ratio":1.2727272727}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45csta","c_root_id_B":"c45d9bl","created_at_utc_A":1332821652,"created_at_utc_B":1332824375,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Anthropology\/Archaeology student here.  Common reactions to my major and future career choice are:  -Digging up dinosaurs -Working at the store Anthropologie -Treasure hunting -\"How can you be an archaeologist when all the ancient civilizations have been discovered?\"  - Assuming anthropology is purely studying \"tribal\" cultures","human_ref_B":"All I care about is making people 'happy'....and I am somehow disconnected with reality.  I think they confuse positive psychology with taking ecstasy...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2723.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45d5bo","c_root_id_B":"c45d9bl","created_at_utc_A":1332823696,"created_at_utc_B":1332824375,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"In all honesty I really don't talk to people about my work. But I'm intrigued -- could someone tell me what the masses think about IR experts?","human_ref_B":"All I care about is making people 'happy'....and I am somehow disconnected with reality.  I think they confuse positive psychology with taking ecstasy...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":679.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"rez1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"What are common myths of your social science field that the layperson believes?","c_root_id_A":"c45csta","c_root_id_B":"c45d5bo","created_at_utc_A":1332821652,"created_at_utc_B":1332823696,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Anthropology\/Archaeology student here.  Common reactions to my major and future career choice are:  -Digging up dinosaurs -Working at the store Anthropologie -Treasure hunting -\"How can you be an archaeologist when all the ancient civilizations have been discovered?\"  - Assuming anthropology is purely studying \"tribal\" cultures","human_ref_B":"In all honesty I really don't talk to people about my work. But I'm intrigued -- could someone tell me what the masses think about IR experts?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2044.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"my9n5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What is the difference between Communism and Socialism, and why are they viewed as such terrible things? I know it's not really connected to Communism\/Socialism, but what exactly is Fascism?","c_root_id_A":"c34wefw","c_root_id_B":"c34vi4r","created_at_utc_A":1322919918,"created_at_utc_B":1322902157,"score_A":10,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Socialism is a silly title. Every government is socialized to some extent; you can't have a **society** without **socialism**. The US is happy to tax their citizens, and use those resources to pay for the army, roads, police, schools, etc. They just draw the line at things like healthcare, and (decent) welfare etc, which are pejoratively condemned as socialism for some reason.   The Scandinavian social democracies collect a lot more tax, and redistribute it for the good of their society - most people outside of the US **don't** view this as a terrible thing.","human_ref_B":"Capitalism is the dictatorship of the bourgeois  Communism is the dictatorship of the proletariat  Fascism is the dictatorship of the state  Socialism is the transition phaze from capitalism to communism  Why is it a transition phaze ? simply because it is much more efficient and eliminates a lot of waste. As concentration of capital in few hands always leads to crisis and the beneficiaries in the capitalist system keep reducing.  The role of the state is to suppress one class over another. In a capitalist state the workers are suppressed more and in a socialist state the private enterprise and private profits are suppressed.  Why are they viewed as terrible things ?   There is conflicting and irreconcilable conflicts of interests between them, hence you would hear a lot of criticism and active military intervention from both sides about the other.  Recommended Read: Communist Manifesto","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17761.0,"score_ratio":1.1111111111}
{"post_id":"my9n5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What is the difference between Communism and Socialism, and why are they viewed as such terrible things? I know it's not really connected to Communism\/Socialism, but what exactly is Fascism?","c_root_id_A":"c350yxi","c_root_id_B":"c34x4zz","created_at_utc_A":1322958469,"created_at_utc_B":1322928815,"score_A":9,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"As far as socialism\/communism is concerned, it really depends who you ask, both within and outside of Marxian theory. The first problem is that when Marx started writing, the word \"socialism\" was being used by people of a very different, utopian political ideology. The second problem is that he often stated that he was unlikely to recognize communism when it actually came about. So there's that. Since a lot of people have already put there two cents in, I'll just address the bit about fascism.  Traditionally, fascism was seen as a third path between liberalism (representative government and a free market economy) and communism. This point needs to be stressed because there are a lot of people on both sides of the discourse that want to equate fascism with either ideology purely to poison the well. I tend to think of fascism as something historical (Italy, Spain, Germany in the early 20th century), (a) mostly because what it denoted isn't really found anywhere. (This isn't to say that it *couldn't* arise again.) and (b) because it's a hopelessly meaningless phrase that's applied to anyone you disagree with that reminds you of Hitler. Tight concepts and definitional clarity is best.  1. Corporatism - Basically, fascism responds to class struggle by institutionalizing the bargaining process within the government through formal channels (so basically, labor, business, and other groups set economic policy together with the government instead of negotiating contracts and striking and all that). In this respect, fascism shares a feature with corporatism, which is basically a successor ideology (but not the same so don't buy the guilt by association trap). NB: corporatism is not the same as corporatocracy, the US is not corporatist. Also, fascism is not based on class struggle - it rejects the idea of class identity.  2. Racism - whether of the racial separatist or supremacist vein. Social Darwinism is also central - people at the bottom are there for a reason and social betterment is equivalent to biological evolution.  3. Tradition - fear\/suspicion\/dislike of change in general and modernism in particular. This includes the arts as a mirror of society rather than an idealized portrait and history that does not conform to ideology. The criticism that is often leveled (fairly) against Marxism is relevant here; all aspects of human life are caught up in ideology and all human experience is reduced to ~~class struggle~~   4. Glorification of the state - there's a great history of fascist architecture that really shows the connection between art and politics but I'm too lazy to write it all out. Suffice it to say that the individual is of little concern. The state is what matters. Moreover, the state is not merely the government, but something almost mystical. I've always thought there was a connection between Hegel and fascism in this respect. Along with the state comes an obsession with hierarchy.  5. War as a means to an end and a way of life unto itself. The latter cannot be overstated.  6. Nationalism - patriotism encouraged, dissidence not tolerated, homogeneity of national values and ideals.","human_ref_B":"Dan Carlin has a show out about why people fear communism and anarchism so much   Personally, I think many people fear communism and socialism because   A) They are systems that don't jive with American ideals of individual liberty and the like.   B) Because all the governments calling themselves communist, they turned out to be REALLY terrible. China, USSR, North Korea, Cuba to an extent... its not like they were great places that got unfairly maligned. Famines and repression and killing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29654.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"my9n5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What is the difference between Communism and Socialism, and why are they viewed as such terrible things? I know it's not really connected to Communism\/Socialism, but what exactly is Fascism?","c_root_id_A":"c350yxi","c_root_id_B":"c3509sg","created_at_utc_A":1322958469,"created_at_utc_B":1322953027,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As far as socialism\/communism is concerned, it really depends who you ask, both within and outside of Marxian theory. The first problem is that when Marx started writing, the word \"socialism\" was being used by people of a very different, utopian political ideology. The second problem is that he often stated that he was unlikely to recognize communism when it actually came about. So there's that. Since a lot of people have already put there two cents in, I'll just address the bit about fascism.  Traditionally, fascism was seen as a third path between liberalism (representative government and a free market economy) and communism. This point needs to be stressed because there are a lot of people on both sides of the discourse that want to equate fascism with either ideology purely to poison the well. I tend to think of fascism as something historical (Italy, Spain, Germany in the early 20th century), (a) mostly because what it denoted isn't really found anywhere. (This isn't to say that it *couldn't* arise again.) and (b) because it's a hopelessly meaningless phrase that's applied to anyone you disagree with that reminds you of Hitler. Tight concepts and definitional clarity is best.  1. Corporatism - Basically, fascism responds to class struggle by institutionalizing the bargaining process within the government through formal channels (so basically, labor, business, and other groups set economic policy together with the government instead of negotiating contracts and striking and all that). In this respect, fascism shares a feature with corporatism, which is basically a successor ideology (but not the same so don't buy the guilt by association trap). NB: corporatism is not the same as corporatocracy, the US is not corporatist. Also, fascism is not based on class struggle - it rejects the idea of class identity.  2. Racism - whether of the racial separatist or supremacist vein. Social Darwinism is also central - people at the bottom are there for a reason and social betterment is equivalent to biological evolution.  3. Tradition - fear\/suspicion\/dislike of change in general and modernism in particular. This includes the arts as a mirror of society rather than an idealized portrait and history that does not conform to ideology. The criticism that is often leveled (fairly) against Marxism is relevant here; all aspects of human life are caught up in ideology and all human experience is reduced to ~~class struggle~~   4. Glorification of the state - there's a great history of fascist architecture that really shows the connection between art and politics but I'm too lazy to write it all out. Suffice it to say that the individual is of little concern. The state is what matters. Moreover, the state is not merely the government, but something almost mystical. I've always thought there was a connection between Hegel and fascism in this respect. Along with the state comes an obsession with hierarchy.  5. War as a means to an end and a way of life unto itself. The latter cannot be overstated.  6. Nationalism - patriotism encouraged, dissidence not tolerated, homogeneity of national values and ideals.","human_ref_B":"Socialism vs capitalism vs fascism: communism is an economic system where all goods are owned at the community level, and everything is public property. A popular communist motto is \"is according to his ability, each according to his need\".  The idea is that you work hard to improve their community and as a result the community provides what you need.  Socialism originally came about as a transition period from capitalism to communism. The idea is that government would assume control of the means of production and eventually delegate  the responsibility of managing them to the community. In a sense, communism is an extreme states rights approach to socialism. In reality, all the communist states of the world have been socialist. The quite notoriously keep all the economic power at the state level.  Fascism is something completely different. Fascism is about creating a strong and powerful nation, and has a \"by any means necessary\" approach. How they manage their economy depends on the intellectual climate of the time. The rise of fascism in Europe came at a time when Socialism was riding high, so they took a socialist approach to the economy. In Chile or 18th century (?? not totally sure, I don't have my bookmarks. It may also be 9th century) Japan too a hard capitalist approach to their economies as capitalism was considered the best way to create a strong economy, which a strong state would be based off.  Why they are disliked: For they layman, it is probably due to a combination of propaganda and the fact that anti-communism\/socialism is a common talking point for right wing parties in many countries. The fact socialist countries have a bad habit of killing millions of their own citizens.  Academic arguments against communism tend to be varied. The killing millions of people is still a pretty big talking point.  Its impracticality is a frequent complaint. It relies on a level of altruism that just doesn't exist.   Communism is also on pretty shaky intellectual ground. It is quite heavily based on the labor theory of value, which is garbage.  I think socialism isn't quite as rejected academically, like communism is. A key difference is academics respect the fact that socialism tends to be a big umbrella term that covers many different things, whereas a layman may only associate socialism with Russia and South America.  Reddit isn't the most academic place on Earth, but socialism is quite popular here. This liking of it can even been seen outside of the main political subreddits. Don't get me wrong, there is a strong argument against socialism; it just isn't universally seen as garbage like communism.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5442.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"11qkh5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is there an established protocol for astronauts who develop depression in space? [x-post from r\/answers] Obviously a suicidal or severely depressed astronaut is a threat not only to himself but to his entire mission. I'd imagine NASA does their best to weed out those prone to depression beforehand, but what about once they're in space?","c_root_id_A":"c6oqjly","c_root_id_B":"c6os625","created_at_utc_A":1350635072,"created_at_utc_B":1350651043,"score_A":5,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Astronauts are rather thoroughly screed for every possible medical and mental issue prior to making a mission. It is an exceedingly competitive environment so I'm sure the chances of this situation arising are exceedingly small.  However, they probably do have established protocols for all sorts of incidents that might conceivably happen in space. Remember, the space station is a multinational project.","human_ref_B":"Human psychological reaction to long periods in space is one of the main research goals of the ISS and earlier Space Stations.   I don't know about the protocols but here's a nice quote:   Cosmonaut Valery Ryumin, twice Hero of the Soviet Union, wrote in his journal during a particularly difficult period on board the Salyut 6 space station:   > *\u201cAll the conditions necessary for murder are met if you shut two men in a cabin measuring 18 feet by 20 and leave them together for two months.\u201d*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15971.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"urbg3x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Are there any examples of true communist communities? I'm not really talking about countries, but more so other types of communities. For example, I've heard people say the fanfiction community on AO3 is a good example of communism (not sure how, but I'd love to know if you know why). Are there any others you can think of?","c_root_id_A":"i8wtdn1","c_root_id_B":"i8xfizy","created_at_utc_A":1652763123,"created_at_utc_B":1652781692,"score_A":22,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"I'd look up asephalous societies.  The book The Forest People recounts a good example among a Mbuti population in the them Belgian-Congo.  https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Forest_People  They have an egalitarian society of hunter gatherers.  https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/culturecustomsof00muke","human_ref_B":"The Paris Commune was arguably a communist community. Arguably the Ukrainian Free State or Makhnovshchina is another example that was explicitly stateless.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18569.0,"score_ratio":1.0454545455}
{"post_id":"1m63gs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Are there any examples of cultures which have recently been observed to go through the process of converting adjectives, profession descriptors or toponyms into surnames? The English-speaking world is full of surnames which are derived from professions (Barber, Taylor, Butler, Cook), adjectives (Black, White, Brown, Short) or toponyms (Scott, England, Ireland, French).  As I understand it, these names are supposed to have begun as a way of describing individual people (e.g. John, the barber) before becoming immutable patrilineal surnames over time.  Are there any cultures in which this process has been observed to happen over the past century or so? Have we been able to understand why it is that a descriptive word for an individual turns into a name applied to his family?  Also, I apologise if this isn't the right subreddit to post this in, but considering it straddles anthropology, history and even linguistics to some extent, I was not sure where else I could have posted it.","c_root_id_A":"cc6an1d","c_root_id_B":"cc64ssn","created_at_utc_A":1378921275,"created_at_utc_B":1378903552,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Muslim Turks had no formal surnames until 1934. See the Turkish Surname Law. Families chose all sorts of names, from names you'd expect (\u0130mamo\u011flu=son of the imam, \u00c7ift\u00e7i=farmer, G\u00fcl=rose, Tartar indicates the families were probably from Crimea or the Caucasus, Erdo\u011fan=manly born, Kartal=eagle) to totally badass names (Gerid\u00f6nmez=won't turn back and Korkmaz=is never frightened). Some families have even lost track of what their names were meant to mean, a few of whom have told me that family legend says the bureaucrat mistranscribed what they had chosen as their name.   In some places, last names are still uncommon (Indonesia and Afghanistan are two that come to mind), but I don't know how those who have last names in those countries got them.   However, you're assuming that \"last-naming\" is a primarily society driven process. The cases I know best tend to indicate its a much more state-driven process. Fixed last names make people (and land and wealth) much easier to track. The political scientist & anthropologist James C. Scott relates fixed last names to \"legibility\" and argues:   >Given the variability of vernacular naming practices, the early modern state found it difficult even to identify particular individuals within a community without local cooperation. A banal example from a mediocre film, Witness, will illustrate the problem. In this film Harrison Ford plays a detective trying to track down a young boy who, he believes, witnessed a murder in bus station. The boy, he learns, comes from an Amish family. He arrives in the area with only a name and turns to that classical instrument of modern police work, the telephone directory. What is a telephone directory, after all, but an alphabetical listing of names, addresses, along with the unique number assigned to them, which serves in turn as the means of contacting them. But the Amish do not use phones, and he is stymied. He knows the last name (patronym) of the boy, but, it turns out that, as a relatively closed community, many Amish share common last names (e.g. Hoover, Boop). Again he is at an impasse. The success of his investigation, and the love interest in the film, turns on his enlisting the cooperation of the boy\u2019s mother (played by Kelly McGillis). The point is that when confronted with an illegible, vernacular community such as the Amish, an outsider, and by extension the state, can only navigate with the help of a \u201clocal tracker\u201d willing to share his or her knowledge. Having no other independent, reliable compass, the outsider is liable to be manipulated by that local tracker.  >The permanent patronym, which most Westerners have come to take for granted, is in fact a comparatively new phenomenon. The invention of permanent inherited patronyms was, along with the standardization of weights and measures, uniform legal codes, and the cadastral land tenure survey, a vital technique in modern statecraft. It was, in nearly every case, a state project designed to allow officials to identify unambiguously the majority of its citizens. The armature of the modern state: tithe and tax rolls, property rolls, conscription lists, censuses, deeds, birth, marriage and death certificates recognized in law were inconceivable without some means of fixing an individual\u2019s identity and linking him or her to a kin group. The permanent patronym was, in effect, the now long superseded precursor to modern photo-ID cards, passports, fingerprints, personal identification numbers, fingerprints, iris scans, and, finally DNA typing.  >Until at least the fourteenth century, the great majority of Europeans did not have permanent patronyms. An individual\u2019s name was typically his given name, which normally would suffice for local, vernacular. If something else were required, a second local designation was added indicating (in the English case), say, occupation (smith, miller, baker), geographical location (edgewood, hill), the father\u2019s given name (in Jewish and Middle Eastern practice preceded by \u201cben\u201d \u201cibn\u201d \u201cbin\u201d or in the Celtic case preceded by \u201cO\u2019\u201d, \u201cMc\u201d, \u201cAp\u201d or, as in the French case, simply appended, as hypothetically with Victor (son of) Hugo) or a personal characteristic (strong, short, doolittle, fair, newcomb). These secondary designations, however, were not permanent surnames, they did not generally survive their bearers.  >The acquisition of last names is, in fact, an exceptionally sensitive measure of the growing reach of the state. The census or catasto] of the Florentine state in 1427 was an audacious (and failed) attempt to rationalize the administration of revenue and manpower resources by recording the names, wealth, residences, land-holdings, and ages of the city-state\u2019s inhabitants. At the time, virtually the only Tuscan family names were those of a handful of great families [e.g., Strozzi] whose kin, including affines, adopted the name as a way of claiming the backing of a powerful corporate group. The vast majority were identified reasonably unambiguously by the registrars, but not by personal patronyms. They might list their father and grandfather (e.g., Luigi, son of Paulo, son of Giovanni) or they might add a nickname, a profession, or a personal characteristic. It is reasonably clear that what we are witnessing, in the catasto exercise, are the first stages of an administrative crystallization of personal surnames. And the geography of this crystallization traced, almost perfectly, the administrative presence of the Florentine state. While one-third of the households in the city declared a second name, the proportion dropped to one-fifth in secondary towns, and then to a low of one-tenth in the countryside. The small, tightly knit vernacular world had no need for a \u201cproper name\u201d: such names were, for all practical purposes, official names confined to administrative life. Many of the inhabitants of the poorest and most remote areas of Tuscany \u2014 those with the least contact with officialdom \u2014 only acquired family names in the seventeenth century. Nor were fifteenth-century Tuscans in much doubt about the purpose of the exercise; its failure was largely due to their foot-dragging and resistance. As the case of Florence illustrates, the naming project, like the standardization of measurements and cadastral surveys, was very much a purposeful state mission.  >Western state-making in the seventeenth and eighteenth imposed permanent patronyms as a condition of citizenship. It became well nigh universal with the exception of Iceland which, for folkloric reasons in most cases, mandates the old Norse system (i.e. Magnus Eric*son*, Katrin J\u00f3ns*d\u00f3ttir*). The telephone directory there lists subscribers by given name and occupation. Nations such as Iran, Turkey, and Thailand that have imposed permanent patronym as a state project in the twentieth century have until comparatively recently organized the phonebook alphabetically by given name. The imposition of permanent, anglicized patronyms on indigenous peoples of North America coincided, in the United States, with the issuance of property deeds connected to efforts to seizing the bulk of tribal lands, and in Canada among the Inuit, with interventions by the welfare and health bureaucracies. Both episodes make for a reading that is filled with equal parts of hilarity and melancholy.[1] Burma, Indonesia, Malaysia and much of the Middle East have not adopted permanent patronyms but now have moved to more modern technologies of personal identification.  That's from an [essay for the Cato Institute's website, but there's also a discussion of it in one of his books, I think *Seeing Like A State*, and his article (with two co-authors) \u201cThe Production of Legal Identities Proper to States: The Case of the Permanent Family Surname.\u201d *Comparative Studies in Society and History* 44(1) January 2002, pp.4-44, goes into more detail. Anyway, the whole Cato essay--and indeed literally anything else he's written--comes highly recommended and I think will help clarify things.","human_ref_B":"Ashkenazi Jews in 19th century Europe. Most used a patronymic system until compelled by governments to take surnames.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17723.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"17l9jr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"[Economics] How does Germany's lack of a minimum wage work?","c_root_id_A":"c86jztz","c_root_id_B":"c86lpwy","created_at_utc_A":1359588629,"created_at_utc_B":1359593829,"score_A":6,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"The US, at least at the federal level, also basically lacks a minimum wage.  Fewer than 3% of workers make minimum wage or less, and more than half of those that do are teenagers.","human_ref_B":"The German state provides guaranteed welfare aid in form of direct financial support. This is a de facto minimum wage because it is thought that nobody would voluntarily work for less then he would get without doing anything. As a principle the state doesn't interfere in wage negotiations between companies and unions, a minimum wage would limit this independence.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5200.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"1i8z21","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"I have about $100,000 in student debt. For my own economic well-being, should I be in favor of policies that lead to inflation?","c_root_id_A":"cb2a2wq","c_root_id_B":"cb2b3kr","created_at_utc_A":1373782587,"created_at_utc_B":1373787370,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Yes, you would. Hyperinflation would devalue the dollar, making easier to earn dollars, while the value of your loan would decrease, thus making it easier to pay it down.","human_ref_B":"If the rate of inflation, as measured in your earning capacity and the general level of prices you pay, exceeds the rate of interest on your loan, then you do stand to benefit. But, the interest rate on your loan may be indexed in a way that could work to your detriment. It depends on the interest rate structure.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4783.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"239ukv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What should be included on a reading list for anyone considering majoring in economics?","c_root_id_A":"cguynxm","c_root_id_B":"cguxcl7","created_at_utc_A":1397753607,"created_at_utc_B":1397751021,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I strongly recommend:  * The Armchair Economist by Steven Landsburg * Hidden Order: The Economics of Everyday Life by David Friedman * An intro textbook (Krugman or Mankiw are my favorites)  Depending on the rigor of your econ program, you may also want to brush up on calc.","human_ref_B":"Boomerang by Michael Lewis","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2586.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"239ukv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What should be included on a reading list for anyone considering majoring in economics?","c_root_id_A":"cguxcl7","c_root_id_B":"cgv82v5","created_at_utc_A":1397751021,"created_at_utc_B":1397772059,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Boomerang by Michael Lewis","human_ref_B":"I like my reading list, for obvious reasons.  Start with *The Armchair Economist* and *The Worldly Philosophers,* then temper the first with *Thinking, Fast and Slow.* For long-run macro, my current favorite is Deaton's *The Great Escape,* and for short-run macro there really is no substitute for a textbook.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21038.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"239ukv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What should be included on a reading list for anyone considering majoring in economics?","c_root_id_A":"cguzkbr","c_root_id_B":"cgv82v5","created_at_utc_A":1397755343,"created_at_utc_B":1397772059,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The Undercover Economist is an excellent introductory book that goes over the economic perspective well.  Depending on what you would want to do with the major, reading Freakonomics may or may not be a disservice to you. It's heavily criticized and completely glosses over how all of the conclusions drawn are actually obtained (in fairness, it's a pop science book and not a collection of the research papers it's drawing on), but if the questions and state of mind in the book interest you then you'll find a home in the research-oriented part of the field.","human_ref_B":"I like my reading list, for obvious reasons.  Start with *The Armchair Economist* and *The Worldly Philosophers,* then temper the first with *Thinking, Fast and Slow.* For long-run macro, my current favorite is Deaton's *The Great Escape,* and for short-run macro there really is no substitute for a textbook.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16716.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"239ukv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What should be included on a reading list for anyone considering majoring in economics?","c_root_id_A":"cgv2897","c_root_id_B":"cgv82v5","created_at_utc_A":1397760461,"created_at_utc_B":1397772059,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"While you will want to avoid the sub the reading list from \/r\/economics is pretty strong.  Also how good is your math? Pre-studying college level statistics will give you a pretty strong advantage heading in to a degree.","human_ref_B":"I like my reading list, for obvious reasons.  Start with *The Armchair Economist* and *The Worldly Philosophers,* then temper the first with *Thinking, Fast and Slow.* For long-run macro, my current favorite is Deaton's *The Great Escape,* and for short-run macro there really is no substitute for a textbook.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11598.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"239ukv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What should be included on a reading list for anyone considering majoring in economics?","c_root_id_A":"cgv4s7t","c_root_id_B":"cgv82v5","created_at_utc_A":1397765392,"created_at_utc_B":1397772059,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"My school is admittedly heavier on the left wing side but I would HIGHLY recommend David McNally's Global Slump: The Economics and Politics of Crisis and Resistance. It does a really great job of presenting ideas from Marx's Capital very clearly by placing them in the context of neoliberalism and financialization. Probably the least dry writing I've experienced about international finance. Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine is also really fascinating, more of a journalistic work but very compelling and relevant to the current economic landscape.","human_ref_B":"I like my reading list, for obvious reasons.  Start with *The Armchair Economist* and *The Worldly Philosophers,* then temper the first with *Thinking, Fast and Slow.* For long-run macro, my current favorite is Deaton's *The Great Escape,* and for short-run macro there really is no substitute for a textbook.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6667.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1ic9ee","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What do the majority of economists do? The ones who are not on TV. As in, do they make forecasts? If they get it wrong, do they get fired? Is there a tracker on the accuracy of heads of committees predictions?","c_root_id_A":"cb3a3ox","c_root_id_B":"cb3ap8z","created_at_utc_A":1373921458,"created_at_utc_B":1373922998,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"My stepfather is an economist. He is an academic and teaches a class a semester, sometimes he doesn't have to teach. He is getting near retirement age, but plans on continuing to publish after his retirement. Not all economists make predictions, many work on theory like my stepfather. His undergrad was math \/ economics, his masters was math, his Ph.D. was in economics. Yes, he has all three.  He works on mortgage rates and how best to pay them, how they affect economies, and the finding the best rates \/ methods for both the bank and consumers. He works alongside another colleague. Their papers are pretty well respected and they present at many economic conferences a year.","human_ref_B":"> What do the majority of economists do?  I can speak most specifically about monetary\/macro-economists, because I have data on their employment.  The Federal Reserve employs about 500 research and staff economists; the top-50 PhD-granting universities in the United States employ about 400 monetary and macroeconomists. That's not every macro job out there, but certainly represents the \"best jobs\" for people in my subfield.   Fed economists do research, prepare staff reports, perform forecasting exercises, and aid in managing the banking system. Professors of economics teach, do research, give presentations, etc.   Most economists are not forecasters, even among macroeconomists; and most economists aren't even macroeconomists to begin with.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1540.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"ywwtf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What is the academic opinion of economists on auditing the federal reserve.  I can only seem to find sources that are extremely political in nature.","c_root_id_A":"c5zm7q8","c_root_id_B":"c5znef5","created_at_utc_A":1346101252,"created_at_utc_B":1346105811,"score_A":6,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Although I am not sure how \"academic\" this reddit poster is, he sure seems to be academic, and claims to be an \"actual_economist\".  Anyways a good explanation of why he doesn't support an audit of the fed. http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/politics\/comments\/x596b\/ron_pauls_audit_the_fed_bill_passes_the_house\/c5jcspn","human_ref_B":"Broadly, thery are against it. There was a petition for Federal Rerve Independence a while ago, signed by a good number of economists, including many prominent macroeconomists.   > Open Letter to Congress and the Executive Branch  > Amidst the debate over systemic regulation, the independence of U.S. monetary policy is at risk. We urge Congress and the Executive Branch to reaffirm their support for and defend the independence of the Federal Reserve System as a foundation of U.S. economic stability. There are three specific risks that must be contained.  > First, central bank independence has been shown to be essential for controlling inflation. Sooner or later, the Fed will have to scale back its current unprecedented monetary accommodation. When the Federal Reserve judges it time to begin tightening monetary conditions, it must be allowed to do so without interference. Second, lender of last resort decisions should not be politicized.  > Finally, calls to alter the structure or personnel selection of the Federal Reserve System easily could backfire by raising inflation expectations and borrowing costs and dimming prospects for recovery. The democratic legitimacy of the Federal Reserve System is well established by its legal mandate and by the existing appointments process. Frequent communication with the public and testimony before Congress ensure Fed accountability.  > If the Federal Reserve is given new responsibilities every effort must be made to avoid compromising its ability to manage monetary policy as it sees fit.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4559.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"ya50t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Why don't big corporations come out in favor of Single Payer Universal Healthcare? Providing health care benefits is a huge expense to most big companies that have a lot of employees.    It would seem that these big corporations would actually be in favor of a single payer universal health care system in order to shift that financial burden off of themselves. Thus dramatically cutting their own costs and then perhaps even being able to afford higher pay for their employees and\/or lower prices for their products.  Big corporations have a lot of money and a lot of lobbying power, so why don't we see it?  There must be a reason.","c_root_id_A":"c5u05rt","c_root_id_B":"c5ttyz3","created_at_utc_A":1345115152,"created_at_utc_B":1345081875,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"No citations. No citations anywhere.","human_ref_B":"Kinda Related I read something about the Dutch health care system and they had a single payer healthcare and then I guess they realized it wasn't really doing much. Something about the older population not paying in money or something, but I'll try to find where I read that. Anyways they abolished the single payer system if I am not mistaken. Now I have no idea what the effects of that were at least from a company stand point. I think for the Dutch government it solved some problems of money not getting payed and leaking out.    So  my question is, would companies support other forms of universal healthcare even if it wasn't a single payer system? I don't know if business would have the same incentives the OP pointed out since I'm not really a social scientist","labels":1,"seconds_difference":33277.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"ya50t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Why don't big corporations come out in favor of Single Payer Universal Healthcare? Providing health care benefits is a huge expense to most big companies that have a lot of employees.    It would seem that these big corporations would actually be in favor of a single payer universal health care system in order to shift that financial burden off of themselves. Thus dramatically cutting their own costs and then perhaps even being able to afford higher pay for their employees and\/or lower prices for their products.  Big corporations have a lot of money and a lot of lobbying power, so why don't we see it?  There must be a reason.","c_root_id_A":"c5tuur6","c_root_id_B":"c5u05rt","created_at_utc_A":1345085163,"created_at_utc_B":1345115152,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Mostly, it's just corporate collusion. All these companies get massive tax breaks and perks and they aren't about to break up their racket.  All those ads for pharmaceutical remedies get paid to other corporations who make a lot of money shilling for the pharma industry.  If people could get cheap generic drugs over the name brand pills, it would save billions of dollars in health care, but that never comes up in the mainstream media on both sides.  The insurance companies also advertise a lot. With single payer, they're out of the picture because they're essentially middlemen between the public and the hospital. They take a huge amount of money out of health care through administrative costs and just crazy billing practices.  They work with the hospitals themselves, which are basically privately run. Under a single payer system, the goals change from trying to turn a profit, to trying to fix as many people as possible, affordably, effectively, and equally, desppite if one person doesn't have the money to pay for it.  Red tape eats most of your money and people just jacking up prices. Pills that cost way too much and insurance companies don't care because they can just get their customers to pay more.  You take the profit factor out of health care and suddenly these guys can't afford their $40 million dollar homes.","human_ref_B":"No citations. No citations anywhere.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":29989.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"qzfsb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why aren't there more assassinations? It seems to me like assassinations would become a lot more common as the population, information, and transportation increase. Increased population means more mentally unstable people, increased information means it's easier to find a target, and increased transportation means that it's much faster to get wherever you need to go. In addition to that, our techniques for killing people have gotten better and better as the years have gone on, which means that a person should have an increased chance of success when they *do* attempt assassination.  But this theory doesn't really seem to be borne out by the data, sparse as it is. Is security around famous actors, musicians, and politicians just really great, or is there some counter-balancing factor that I'm missing?","c_root_id_A":"c41ogvf","c_root_id_B":"c41ov11","created_at_utc_A":1331912246,"created_at_utc_B":1331914368,"score_A":14,"score_B":34,"human_ref_A":">Is security around famous actors, musicians, and politicians just really great  I think this is it. Even snookie travels around with several body guards - people who are trained and spend most of their energy protecting her. More important people have much larger groups\/departments devoted to their safety. I remember reading 10-15 years ago that the US president's security costs 50 million a year; I would imagine that's a lot higher today. You could blow up a large bomb next to Obama's limo and he'd probably survive (read up on his security, it's fascinating. They leave blood in a fridge in his limo in case he needs an emergency transfusion).","human_ref_B":"It's precisely because of the compression of space and time and massive information\/intelligence that makes assassinations risky in this age. Forensics has advanced so much that concealing the actor behind the assassination is extremely difficult - for an international actor, this makes it extremely risky. It goes without saying that assassination is casus belli for war.   Anyway, there have been some contemporary examples of assassination, notably by Israel, which regularly assassinates leaders from militant palestinian organizations - and it is also suspected of being behind the assassinations of iranian nuclear scientists.   Finally, assassination was largely a tool of fear more than politics, which is why its namesake (the hashashin) made sure to make it a public spectacle in order to dissuade their targets and unnerve them. Basically, it's a low-level form of political terrorism. Not something which is very useful for international actors in our current global environment.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2122.0,"score_ratio":2.4285714286}
{"post_id":"qzfsb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why aren't there more assassinations? It seems to me like assassinations would become a lot more common as the population, information, and transportation increase. Increased population means more mentally unstable people, increased information means it's easier to find a target, and increased transportation means that it's much faster to get wherever you need to go. In addition to that, our techniques for killing people have gotten better and better as the years have gone on, which means that a person should have an increased chance of success when they *do* attempt assassination.  But this theory doesn't really seem to be borne out by the data, sparse as it is. Is security around famous actors, musicians, and politicians just really great, or is there some counter-balancing factor that I'm missing?","c_root_id_A":"c41ogmi","c_root_id_B":"c41ov11","created_at_utc_A":1331912208,"created_at_utc_B":1331914368,"score_A":3,"score_B":34,"human_ref_A":"Weird, I was just wondering that myself. I don't have any concrete answers, but maybe we can speculate\/discuss a bit...  As you mentioned, security is incredibly tight around major leaders. It's nearly impossible to get close to someone like the president of the US.   In addition, I would wager that the kind of person who carries out assassinations is probably mentally unstable in some way, which ironically prevents them from having the wherewithal to execute a potentially complex assassination plot.   I also have to wonder whether we would even know if an attempt were made\/came close... I imagine governments wouldn't be too eager to divulge this information.","human_ref_B":"It's precisely because of the compression of space and time and massive information\/intelligence that makes assassinations risky in this age. Forensics has advanced so much that concealing the actor behind the assassination is extremely difficult - for an international actor, this makes it extremely risky. It goes without saying that assassination is casus belli for war.   Anyway, there have been some contemporary examples of assassination, notably by Israel, which regularly assassinates leaders from militant palestinian organizations - and it is also suspected of being behind the assassinations of iranian nuclear scientists.   Finally, assassination was largely a tool of fear more than politics, which is why its namesake (the hashashin) made sure to make it a public spectacle in order to dissuade their targets and unnerve them. Basically, it's a low-level form of political terrorism. Not something which is very useful for international actors in our current global environment.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2160.0,"score_ratio":11.3333333333}
{"post_id":"qzfsb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why aren't there more assassinations? It seems to me like assassinations would become a lot more common as the population, information, and transportation increase. Increased population means more mentally unstable people, increased information means it's easier to find a target, and increased transportation means that it's much faster to get wherever you need to go. In addition to that, our techniques for killing people have gotten better and better as the years have gone on, which means that a person should have an increased chance of success when they *do* attempt assassination.  But this theory doesn't really seem to be borne out by the data, sparse as it is. Is security around famous actors, musicians, and politicians just really great, or is there some counter-balancing factor that I'm missing?","c_root_id_A":"c41ogvf","c_root_id_B":"c41owhp","created_at_utc_A":1331912246,"created_at_utc_B":1331914594,"score_A":14,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":">Is security around famous actors, musicians, and politicians just really great  I think this is it. Even snookie travels around with several body guards - people who are trained and spend most of their energy protecting her. More important people have much larger groups\/departments devoted to their safety. I remember reading 10-15 years ago that the US president's security costs 50 million a year; I would imagine that's a lot higher today. You could blow up a large bomb next to Obama's limo and he'd probably survive (read up on his security, it's fascinating. They leave blood in a fridge in his limo in case he needs an emergency transfusion).","human_ref_B":"Well, we call them \"legitimate targeted killings\" now, that's why.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2348.0,"score_ratio":1.9285714286}
{"post_id":"qzfsb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why aren't there more assassinations? It seems to me like assassinations would become a lot more common as the population, information, and transportation increase. Increased population means more mentally unstable people, increased information means it's easier to find a target, and increased transportation means that it's much faster to get wherever you need to go. In addition to that, our techniques for killing people have gotten better and better as the years have gone on, which means that a person should have an increased chance of success when they *do* attempt assassination.  But this theory doesn't really seem to be borne out by the data, sparse as it is. Is security around famous actors, musicians, and politicians just really great, or is there some counter-balancing factor that I'm missing?","c_root_id_A":"c41owhp","c_root_id_B":"c41ogmi","created_at_utc_A":1331914594,"created_at_utc_B":1331912208,"score_A":27,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Well, we call them \"legitimate targeted killings\" now, that's why.","human_ref_B":"Weird, I was just wondering that myself. I don't have any concrete answers, but maybe we can speculate\/discuss a bit...  As you mentioned, security is incredibly tight around major leaders. It's nearly impossible to get close to someone like the president of the US.   In addition, I would wager that the kind of person who carries out assassinations is probably mentally unstable in some way, which ironically prevents them from having the wherewithal to execute a potentially complex assassination plot.   I also have to wonder whether we would even know if an attempt were made\/came close... I imagine governments wouldn't be too eager to divulge this information.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2386.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"qzfsb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why aren't there more assassinations? It seems to me like assassinations would become a lot more common as the population, information, and transportation increase. Increased population means more mentally unstable people, increased information means it's easier to find a target, and increased transportation means that it's much faster to get wherever you need to go. In addition to that, our techniques for killing people have gotten better and better as the years have gone on, which means that a person should have an increased chance of success when they *do* attempt assassination.  But this theory doesn't really seem to be borne out by the data, sparse as it is. Is security around famous actors, musicians, and politicians just really great, or is there some counter-balancing factor that I'm missing?","c_root_id_A":"c41ogvf","c_root_id_B":"c41ogmi","created_at_utc_A":1331912246,"created_at_utc_B":1331912208,"score_A":14,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":">Is security around famous actors, musicians, and politicians just really great  I think this is it. Even snookie travels around with several body guards - people who are trained and spend most of their energy protecting her. More important people have much larger groups\/departments devoted to their safety. I remember reading 10-15 years ago that the US president's security costs 50 million a year; I would imagine that's a lot higher today. You could blow up a large bomb next to Obama's limo and he'd probably survive (read up on his security, it's fascinating. They leave blood in a fridge in his limo in case he needs an emergency transfusion).","human_ref_B":"Weird, I was just wondering that myself. I don't have any concrete answers, but maybe we can speculate\/discuss a bit...  As you mentioned, security is incredibly tight around major leaders. It's nearly impossible to get close to someone like the president of the US.   In addition, I would wager that the kind of person who carries out assassinations is probably mentally unstable in some way, which ironically prevents them from having the wherewithal to execute a potentially complex assassination plot.   I also have to wonder whether we would even know if an attempt were made\/came close... I imagine governments wouldn't be too eager to divulge this information.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":38.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"qzfsb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why aren't there more assassinations? It seems to me like assassinations would become a lot more common as the population, information, and transportation increase. Increased population means more mentally unstable people, increased information means it's easier to find a target, and increased transportation means that it's much faster to get wherever you need to go. In addition to that, our techniques for killing people have gotten better and better as the years have gone on, which means that a person should have an increased chance of success when they *do* attempt assassination.  But this theory doesn't really seem to be borne out by the data, sparse as it is. Is security around famous actors, musicians, and politicians just really great, or is there some counter-balancing factor that I'm missing?","c_root_id_A":"c41ogmi","c_root_id_B":"c41p79k","created_at_utc_A":1331912208,"created_at_utc_B":1331916153,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Weird, I was just wondering that myself. I don't have any concrete answers, but maybe we can speculate\/discuss a bit...  As you mentioned, security is incredibly tight around major leaders. It's nearly impossible to get close to someone like the president of the US.   In addition, I would wager that the kind of person who carries out assassinations is probably mentally unstable in some way, which ironically prevents them from having the wherewithal to execute a potentially complex assassination plot.   I also have to wonder whether we would even know if an attempt were made\/came close... I imagine governments wouldn't be too eager to divulge this information.","human_ref_B":"I've thought about this, and I think perhaps its because people realise that it doesn't really matter... Killing one person rarely makes a difference in itself...   While the deaths of JFK or even Lincoln certainly had ramifications, killing neither really put a stop to the policies both had in place... The obvious exceptions here are perhaps Jonas Savimbi, whose death virtually ended the Angolan civil war, and Franco, whereby killing his anointed successor, ETA really did seem to shorten the dictatorship...  So then why would you kill someone?   If you are a nutter, then you may make a mistake, they have good security, I think it would be perhaps relatively easy to be picked up if you are so crazy as to think that killing someone famous for whatever reason is a good idea... They may set off other alarms here and there...  If you are involved in a political movement, then you know that real change of empires and administrations probably cannot be changed by removing one person... So truly dedicated and tactical people are also not interested...  The last category is a combination of the previous two - terrorists - those who are fanatical enough to try political gain through such means... Now, assassinations are relatively common war torn countries... So perhaps once more in the West it is a combination of good security, a lack of nutters, and a realisation of the lack efficacy of assassination as tool that keeps them low...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3945.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"qzfsb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why aren't there more assassinations? It seems to me like assassinations would become a lot more common as the population, information, and transportation increase. Increased population means more mentally unstable people, increased information means it's easier to find a target, and increased transportation means that it's much faster to get wherever you need to go. In addition to that, our techniques for killing people have gotten better and better as the years have gone on, which means that a person should have an increased chance of success when they *do* attempt assassination.  But this theory doesn't really seem to be borne out by the data, sparse as it is. Is security around famous actors, musicians, and politicians just really great, or is there some counter-balancing factor that I'm missing?","c_root_id_A":"c41pm4t","c_root_id_B":"c41rxi9","created_at_utc_A":1331918293,"created_at_utc_B":1331929764,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Many people have more to lose - and for those who *do* have nothing to lose (or think they don't), it's typically more difficult to access all the techniques and supporting stuff you mention.  In addition, organisations do rely less and less on personal loyalty, so assassinating someone will just get him replaced and increase the security budget of that organisation.","human_ref_B":"Regarding assassinations of US politicians and leaders: the conservatives and intelligence community feel they have the upper hand, so they don't need to kill anybody.  US liberals don't use assassination.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11471.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"12wws6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Considering the results of the election, what could be expected if the Tea Party were to split off the Republican Party? I've read many times that people only voted Democrat due to the state of the Republican party. Is there a way to estimate the results of the presidential elections if the Tea Party and GOP decided to go in different directions?","c_root_id_A":"c6ysv34","c_root_id_B":"c6yszvl","created_at_utc_A":1352472784,"created_at_utc_B":1352473408,"score_A":5,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"**EDIT: BEFORE you downvote me, hear me out: I think the Tea Party has lost its steam at this point and could only serve to hurt Republicans chances in any election. I think the Tea Party and the Republican Party essentially stand for the same things, the Tea Party is just more extreme. This is in agreement with uncertainness's comment.**  I don't know how much of an effect the Tea Party had on this election at all, certainly not the impact they had 2 years ago. Honestly, the Tea Party isn't that much different from anyone in the Republican Party. What I'd really love is for the Libertarian Party to get voters disenfranchised by both parties.  At least Libertarian's are not hypocrites when it comes to a small government. Republicans don't want a small government, they just want to cut funding for Democratic programs. Other than that, they'll keep spending just as much as the Dems.","human_ref_B":"It would depend on the office and the demographics of the voters (aka we need more information), but Duverger's Law suggests that the TEA Party would likely draw votes away from Republican candidates, which could result in more Democrats being elected.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":624.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"11ksjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"So I've learned that first-past-the-post (FPTP) voting is deeply flawed. Is there consensus on what we should be switching to?","c_root_id_A":"c6nc6e4","c_root_id_B":"c6nccpg","created_at_utc_A":1350407484,"created_at_utc_B":1350408086,"score_A":13,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Instant Runoff Voting is popular for it's resistance to tactical voting.  Edit: It may not be much more resistant to tactical voting than FPTP, see discussions below about IRV and approval voting.","human_ref_B":"I wouldn't be so quick to say it is \"deeply flawed.\"  As long as people wish to have a representative form of government, any vote calculation method must distort as you are summarizing a surprisingly large amount of data into very few seats.    And in a normative vein, any system which reduces the ability of the people to vote strategically, is just no fun to study.  I want people thinking more about politics and voting, not less.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":602.0,"score_ratio":1.3076923077}
{"post_id":"11ksjd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"So I've learned that first-past-the-post (FPTP) voting is deeply flawed. Is there consensus on what we should be switching to?","c_root_id_A":"c6nd9fu","c_root_id_B":"c6nce62","created_at_utc_A":1350411133,"created_at_utc_B":1350408220,"score_A":12,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would argue that IRV is a decent alternative, but it's also important to note that mathematically any voting method is going to have flaws.","human_ref_B":"Alternative Vote","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2913.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"52wmm8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Is there statistical evidence that validates the claims of racism relevant to Black Lives Matter? Ive seen conflicting studies. Example: Some show blacks are more likely to be killed per police confrontation, some actually show whites are.","c_root_id_A":"d7nwybu","c_root_id_B":"d7nwoxt","created_at_utc_A":1473953909,"created_at_utc_B":1473953576,"score_A":157,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"I don't think BLM is saying that black people are more likely to be killed by police per confrontation, it's saying they're more likely to be killed by police unnecessarily because of their race. This could still mean *fewer* deaths per encounter if one or both of the following are true:  1. Black people have more encounters with police than white people (perhaps because police stop black people more often - and they do).   2. Black people are killed for their skin color more often than white people are, but white people still get killed more because they do enough other bad stuff to outweigh not being black. (White people certainly kill the most police, for instance.)  See here, for instance, which talks about how unarmed black people are 5 times as likely to get shot as unarmed white people. See also here and here and here which might be talking about the study you have in mind.  In general it's tough to on your own get \"statistic evidence that validates the claims of racism\" because racism is a claim about right and wrong, not about the prevalence or lack thereof of certain actions. So for instance if I had statistical evidence that Donald Trump wants to exclude all Muslims from the United States, that would only validate a claim of racism if I think excluding all Muslims from the United States is racist.  That one's a pretty easy one to decide on, but when it comes to police violence things get (slightly?) more complicated. At the very least, some people seem to deny that *any* level of police violence against black people would constitute racism because they are inclined to give the police a free pass (their job is hard, they face lots of pressure, you have to make snap decision, etc.) No amount of statistical evidence can decide that for you one way or the other: it's up to you to decide if you think that the degree to which police shoot (and often kill) black people is overboard.  One way to do that would be to see if they kill black people as often as white people per encounter, but as I noted above that won't always get you good results, and any other easy comparison is likely to fail for similar sorts of reasons.","human_ref_B":"I can point to (one two three) different places demonstrating a racial gap in judicial sentencing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":333.0,"score_ratio":6.0384615385}
{"post_id":"6yeklp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How did Hitler become Hitler? I know my question seems very broad or even obvious but what I am trying to figure out is how Hitler convinced a nation that genocide was for the greater good? I know their was fear mixed into it but was there a social stigma already in place that made it possible for Nazi's to follow suit so easily? How does a single man convince a nation that genocide is not a big deal? How did Hitler do it?","c_root_id_A":"dmmrzhv","c_root_id_B":"dmmvyi0","created_at_utc_A":1504692490,"created_at_utc_B":1504701160,"score_A":13,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure if I'm allowed to post this, as what I mention *is* the citation, but there's a documentary called Nazis - A Warning From History that I found when trying to answer this very question.  It covers Germany and the rise of the Nazi party, and is amazing. It answered a lot of questions for me, and has interviews with Nazis, collaborators, and victims (it's from 1997 so a lot of people were still alive).  While it's not a text based answer and is ripe for deletion, I beg the mods to leave it, it is an absolute must-see documentary series if you're interested in the rise of the Nazis.","human_ref_B":"Nazi education is often very lackluster because it focuses too much on Germany itself and too little on the actual mechanics behind Nazi ideology and fascism which can come about in pretty much any shape or form and in any country.  Probably the best description comes from the NSDAP member Carl Schmitt who describes how fascism works.  According to Schmitt, fascism works by creating order through an eternal enemy. So establishing a strong identity by fabricating an ever-present other. The fascist state must be in a constant state of war with the other. This war cannot ever be a metaphorical 'war of minds' or something but a very real, concrete war that speaks to the primitive fears of the people. Creating an atmosphere of constant fear for survival among the people is essential for the fascist state. This fear manifests in hate towards the other and cruelties being inflicted on the other which, in turn, provokes fears and violent reactions by the other which then provokes even more cruel reactions. Therefore a fascist state will always culminate in genocide and war and can never, ever be peaceful. Peace being the one constant normative goal of all political philosophy, fascism fails miserably in this most important aspect. And so it can never work. What the other was for the nazis you already guessed: The Jews. Today's nazis like to create more abstract ideas such as 'deep state' or other conspiracy theories but the mechanics work the same and we can see today that the fear is getting more and more real and guided towards actual people. But not only nazis can be fascist. Something that nobody really seems to understand is that ISIS and other islamic extremist groups are, for all intents and purposes, also fascist. Here the other are the kuffar. They capitalize on fear of the other by comitting atrocities which provokes violent reactions to justify more atrocities.  Additionally, the notion that Hitler was the only man responsible, putting everyone under some kind of diabolical spell is wrong. There were a lot of people who made Hitler what he was.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8670.0,"score_ratio":2.0769230769}
{"post_id":"6yeklp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How did Hitler become Hitler? I know my question seems very broad or even obvious but what I am trying to figure out is how Hitler convinced a nation that genocide was for the greater good? I know their was fear mixed into it but was there a social stigma already in place that made it possible for Nazi's to follow suit so easily? How does a single man convince a nation that genocide is not a big deal? How did Hitler do it?","c_root_id_A":"dmmvcl6","c_root_id_B":"dmmvyi0","created_at_utc_A":1504700097,"created_at_utc_B":1504701160,"score_A":9,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"I would recommend reading Anthony Gidden's account of the work of Weber, a German sociologist of around WW1. ~~(Sorry, I left the book at home, so I can't cite the title for you)~~  He describes the history of the time. When Germany was first unified, it was one of the last big european countries to formally become a country, and one of the latecommers to the industrialisation party.   Consequently there were two well-formed and distinct classes in German society. The landed elite, who occupied previously farming estates in the eastern edge ('Junkers'), and the working classes, who were adapting to conditions of industrialisation.  Weber (as interpretted by Giddens) remarks that neither class had the \"political maturity\" to run a country. Although the landed elite had some of the political clout, they didn't have the expertise or desire to deploy it. The working class had not yet developed the necesary cultural ideas to form a \"true\" democracy.  Giddens goes on to say that many parts of German society wanted for a \"Ceasar\" type character, to rule Germany as an empire, and sheild the elite gentry from having to get involved in politics.  According to this theory, when Hitler became political, the conditions were ripe for his ascendancy to power.   Some have gone on to speculate (e.g. Stephen Fry in his fiction book), that were it not for Hitler, some other tyrant would have ascended to the german throne.   Edit: Thanks mods for waiting for the citation. The source to which I refer is   Giddens, A (1995), *Politics, Sociology and Social Theory*, Cambridge, Polity","human_ref_B":"Nazi education is often very lackluster because it focuses too much on Germany itself and too little on the actual mechanics behind Nazi ideology and fascism which can come about in pretty much any shape or form and in any country.  Probably the best description comes from the NSDAP member Carl Schmitt who describes how fascism works.  According to Schmitt, fascism works by creating order through an eternal enemy. So establishing a strong identity by fabricating an ever-present other. The fascist state must be in a constant state of war with the other. This war cannot ever be a metaphorical 'war of minds' or something but a very real, concrete war that speaks to the primitive fears of the people. Creating an atmosphere of constant fear for survival among the people is essential for the fascist state. This fear manifests in hate towards the other and cruelties being inflicted on the other which, in turn, provokes fears and violent reactions by the other which then provokes even more cruel reactions. Therefore a fascist state will always culminate in genocide and war and can never, ever be peaceful. Peace being the one constant normative goal of all political philosophy, fascism fails miserably in this most important aspect. And so it can never work. What the other was for the nazis you already guessed: The Jews. Today's nazis like to create more abstract ideas such as 'deep state' or other conspiracy theories but the mechanics work the same and we can see today that the fear is getting more and more real and guided towards actual people. But not only nazis can be fascist. Something that nobody really seems to understand is that ISIS and other islamic extremist groups are, for all intents and purposes, also fascist. Here the other are the kuffar. They capitalize on fear of the other by comitting atrocities which provokes violent reactions to justify more atrocities.  Additionally, the notion that Hitler was the only man responsible, putting everyone under some kind of diabolical spell is wrong. There were a lot of people who made Hitler what he was.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1063.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"6yeklp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How did Hitler become Hitler? I know my question seems very broad or even obvious but what I am trying to figure out is how Hitler convinced a nation that genocide was for the greater good? I know their was fear mixed into it but was there a social stigma already in place that made it possible for Nazi's to follow suit so easily? How does a single man convince a nation that genocide is not a big deal? How did Hitler do it?","c_root_id_A":"dmmvcl6","c_root_id_B":"dmn3tc8","created_at_utc_A":1504700097,"created_at_utc_B":1504711481,"score_A":9,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I would recommend reading Anthony Gidden's account of the work of Weber, a German sociologist of around WW1. ~~(Sorry, I left the book at home, so I can't cite the title for you)~~  He describes the history of the time. When Germany was first unified, it was one of the last big european countries to formally become a country, and one of the latecommers to the industrialisation party.   Consequently there were two well-formed and distinct classes in German society. The landed elite, who occupied previously farming estates in the eastern edge ('Junkers'), and the working classes, who were adapting to conditions of industrialisation.  Weber (as interpretted by Giddens) remarks that neither class had the \"political maturity\" to run a country. Although the landed elite had some of the political clout, they didn't have the expertise or desire to deploy it. The working class had not yet developed the necesary cultural ideas to form a \"true\" democracy.  Giddens goes on to say that many parts of German society wanted for a \"Ceasar\" type character, to rule Germany as an empire, and sheild the elite gentry from having to get involved in politics.  According to this theory, when Hitler became political, the conditions were ripe for his ascendancy to power.   Some have gone on to speculate (e.g. Stephen Fry in his fiction book), that were it not for Hitler, some other tyrant would have ascended to the german throne.   Edit: Thanks mods for waiting for the citation. The source to which I refer is   Giddens, A (1995), *Politics, Sociology and Social Theory*, Cambridge, Polity","human_ref_B":"You're right that this is an incredibly broad question, but it's a good one. I've personally spent some years studying this topic, and regret that I don't have more time to devote to an answer at the moment... But there is a major factor in the establishment of the Nazi Reich that hasn't yet been mentioned in this thread: Germany had essentially no history of successful democratic government. And 'democratic' here doesn't mean socially or fiscally liberal like modern American Democrats - this is 'democratic' in the basic sense of elected leaders, civilian leadership over military, etc!  Germany had only been unified as a country in 1871 and remained a constitutional monarchy until the end of World War I, when the Kaiser (German emperor) abdicated his throne and fled the country. There was a period of tremendous confusion about who would govern and there were small attempted revolutions by members of the extreme left and extreme right. At this point, a few moderate politicians seized the opportunity to (without much consultation) declare Germany a democratic republic, and the decision stuck. This announcement was made in the town of Weimar, and so interwar Germany came to be known as the Weimar Republic.  This is extremely important, because human beings don't just disappear when history books stop discussing them. They have memories, and experiences, and beliefs. In 1919, Germany became a country in which leaders would be truly elected by popular vote *for the first time in its history.* Many were happy to see the change, but a huge number of Germans still wanted a return of the monarchy, or a similar form of conservative authoritarian government. This means that in 1932 (when the Nazis started to explode in polling), the country still only had 13 years experience of democratic rule in its entire history. And that decade had not been a very happy one...  History books usually say the Treaty of Versailles was responsible for destroying the German economy, because it forced Germany to repay huge amounts of money to the allied nations from World War 1. This isn't untrue, but after a few terrible years of hyperinflation (made worse by bad economic policy decisions) Germany was actually growing due to loans from American banks until the Great Depression in 1929. The American economy collapsed overnight, and all the credit that banks were loaning to German businesses disappeared. This meant the German economy was destroyed as well, and so was the slight bit of faith in the Weimar government that the German public had developed.  After they spent a few years desperate and starving, people start to (understandably) get upset. The Weimar government was unable to address the economic crisis or secure international help, so the extreme left (the KPD or Communist Party of Germany) and all the parties of the extreme right (of which the Nazis or NSDAP were one) began to grow and publicly confront each other. There was a lot of political violence: mass marches, street brawls, and attacks on public figures like politicians, judges, and newspaper journalists. In short, the country was threatening to dissolve. So with extremists on both ends of the spectrum emboldened, the centrists of Germany were looking for a way out - a way to stop this national disintegration and restore public order.  Getting short on time, but for the reasons referenced earlier (like the brief and tainted history of democracy in the country) the centrist German population leaned conservative and essentially chose to ally with the extreme right to shut out the extreme left. The economic ruin of the Great Depression created enough extremist sentiment in Germany that even moderates saw the Nazis as their best chance to stop a Communist revolution and return the country to stability.  Sorry that this turned into a huge wall of words, but the specific elements of German history are 100% essential to understanding why the Nazis were able to seize power. And this doesn't even touch on some other key pieces of (at the time) German culture, like Pan-Germanism or scientific racism or the \"stab-in-the-back myth\". Hope it helps though, and if you wanna ask anything I will try to answer when I have another break!  EDIT: In German and not *super* scholarly, but two of the sources that I found extremely insightful in my studies are:  *  *Geschichte des Nationalsozialismus (History of National Socialism)*, Michael Wildt, 2008 *  *Der Staat Hitlers (Hitler's State)*, Martin Broszat, 2007","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11384.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"6yeklp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How did Hitler become Hitler? I know my question seems very broad or even obvious but what I am trying to figure out is how Hitler convinced a nation that genocide was for the greater good? I know their was fear mixed into it but was there a social stigma already in place that made it possible for Nazi's to follow suit so easily? How does a single man convince a nation that genocide is not a big deal? How did Hitler do it?","c_root_id_A":"dmn3tc8","c_root_id_B":"dmmzzy8","created_at_utc_A":1504711481,"created_at_utc_B":1504706953,"score_A":12,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"You're right that this is an incredibly broad question, but it's a good one. I've personally spent some years studying this topic, and regret that I don't have more time to devote to an answer at the moment... But there is a major factor in the establishment of the Nazi Reich that hasn't yet been mentioned in this thread: Germany had essentially no history of successful democratic government. And 'democratic' here doesn't mean socially or fiscally liberal like modern American Democrats - this is 'democratic' in the basic sense of elected leaders, civilian leadership over military, etc!  Germany had only been unified as a country in 1871 and remained a constitutional monarchy until the end of World War I, when the Kaiser (German emperor) abdicated his throne and fled the country. There was a period of tremendous confusion about who would govern and there were small attempted revolutions by members of the extreme left and extreme right. At this point, a few moderate politicians seized the opportunity to (without much consultation) declare Germany a democratic republic, and the decision stuck. This announcement was made in the town of Weimar, and so interwar Germany came to be known as the Weimar Republic.  This is extremely important, because human beings don't just disappear when history books stop discussing them. They have memories, and experiences, and beliefs. In 1919, Germany became a country in which leaders would be truly elected by popular vote *for the first time in its history.* Many were happy to see the change, but a huge number of Germans still wanted a return of the monarchy, or a similar form of conservative authoritarian government. This means that in 1932 (when the Nazis started to explode in polling), the country still only had 13 years experience of democratic rule in its entire history. And that decade had not been a very happy one...  History books usually say the Treaty of Versailles was responsible for destroying the German economy, because it forced Germany to repay huge amounts of money to the allied nations from World War 1. This isn't untrue, but after a few terrible years of hyperinflation (made worse by bad economic policy decisions) Germany was actually growing due to loans from American banks until the Great Depression in 1929. The American economy collapsed overnight, and all the credit that banks were loaning to German businesses disappeared. This meant the German economy was destroyed as well, and so was the slight bit of faith in the Weimar government that the German public had developed.  After they spent a few years desperate and starving, people start to (understandably) get upset. The Weimar government was unable to address the economic crisis or secure international help, so the extreme left (the KPD or Communist Party of Germany) and all the parties of the extreme right (of which the Nazis or NSDAP were one) began to grow and publicly confront each other. There was a lot of political violence: mass marches, street brawls, and attacks on public figures like politicians, judges, and newspaper journalists. In short, the country was threatening to dissolve. So with extremists on both ends of the spectrum emboldened, the centrists of Germany were looking for a way out - a way to stop this national disintegration and restore public order.  Getting short on time, but for the reasons referenced earlier (like the brief and tainted history of democracy in the country) the centrist German population leaned conservative and essentially chose to ally with the extreme right to shut out the extreme left. The economic ruin of the Great Depression created enough extremist sentiment in Germany that even moderates saw the Nazis as their best chance to stop a Communist revolution and return the country to stability.  Sorry that this turned into a huge wall of words, but the specific elements of German history are 100% essential to understanding why the Nazis were able to seize power. And this doesn't even touch on some other key pieces of (at the time) German culture, like Pan-Germanism or scientific racism or the \"stab-in-the-back myth\". Hope it helps though, and if you wanna ask anything I will try to answer when I have another break!  EDIT: In German and not *super* scholarly, but two of the sources that I found extremely insightful in my studies are:  *  *Geschichte des Nationalsozialismus (History of National Socialism)*, Michael Wildt, 2008 *  *Der Staat Hitlers (Hitler's State)*, Martin Broszat, 2007","human_ref_B":"Giddens is great, also I'd recommend the work of Paxton, which can give you a more structural understanding of how nazism worked, where the party, the leader, the people, the public opinion, and the conservatives (who actually let them in power, Paxton also dwelves into all the myths surrounding nazism, Hitler's rise to power through violence and Hitler being the ultimate leader are two of many), so in a way the sistem works as a group in interrelated assets in tension, all needing each other and also pulling each other.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4528.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3m003j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is political power in the United States tilted towards urban or rural areas?","c_root_id_A":"cvaw7cv","c_root_id_B":"cvax469","created_at_utc_A":1442972192,"created_at_utc_B":1442973799,"score_A":4,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Not a science-based answer, but a good analysis here: http:\/\/www.governing.com\/topics\/politics\/gov-rural-areas-lose-people-not-power.html","human_ref_B":"Here is a empirical study of Japan and the United States in terms of Institutional Bias for rural areas in fiscal policy:http:\/\/general.utpb.edu\/FAC\/McMichael_T\/Teaching\/PTS\/Thies%201998%20LSQ.pdf","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1607.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"1he61q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"While discussing bad statistics in Triple P studies, people said that social science isn't real science. I'd like to hear your thoughts. Is that opinion wrong, partially wrong, or misguided? After this study was discussed in \/r\/science, several comments were made that social science isn't real science. I've heard such comments in person and online fairly often. I don't know your side of the story. Are some or all of the social sciences \"real science\"? Is that a misguided way of looking at social science? Please post your thoughts and arguments.","c_root_id_A":"cathu9g","c_root_id_B":"catilk5","created_at_utc_A":1372642164,"created_at_utc_B":1372644486,"score_A":3,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"What do these people mean when they say that \"Social science isn't real science?\" Can you link us to specific arguments that have been made about this?","human_ref_B":"It's very human to classify things, and to the extent that 'social science' is distinct from 'natural science' as a category, there's nothing wrong with that, really. Certainly, most areas of inquiry in social science lack the experimental rigor that characterizes most physics or chemistry. Even when we attempt experimental controls, it is very difficult to isolate every variable in such complex and interrelated phenomena.  Personally, I don't really see it as a hard line, so much as a spectrum. Physics is more methodologically rigorous than chemistry, which is more so than biology, which is more so than economics, et cetera.   Insofar as those of us in the social sciences are trying to evaluate claims and discover which of them are more likely to be true, we are in some way using the empirical methods of science. At the same time, we lack the ability to predict and model the behavior of people as closely as my housemate, a physicist, predicts and models solar flares. We probably always will, even as we get better at what we do, the physicists will continue to improve at what they do. Ultimately, we're all just trying to understand how things work, and the classification is somewhat secondary.  It's worth noting, I suppose, that it's almost never the 'actual' scientists I've met that are particularly quarrelsome about what is or is not science. Several of my close friends are physicists, and they are content in their position at the top of the 'science hierarchy.' When you hear this, it's generally an Economist complaining about the lack of mathematical methods in sociology, a Psychologist trying to claim to be more 'scientific' in defense against 'economic imperialism', or someone with a bachelor's degree in Engineering trying to sound impressive.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2322.0,"score_ratio":6.6666666667}
{"post_id":"wkuy4z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What type of research flaw is this? When you only investigate a variable or phenomena in the context of a particular type of outcome and then conclude that this phenomenon always results in this outcome.  &#x200B;  For example (just made this up)  When investigating why house prices on a particular street rise, you often find that the opening of a chinese takeaway on that street occured 6 months in advance.  You study how chinese takeaway opening on a street has led to house prices rising on those streets, ONLY in cases where house prices have risen.  Finishing your study, you conclude that opening a chinese takeaway ALWAYS leads to house prices rising.  &#x200B;  You have not analysed cases where house prices haven't risen, or have fallen. You have only studied cases with one outcome, house prices rising. But you have concluded that this outcome will always occur in the case of a chinese takeaway opening.  &#x200B;  &#x200B;  I hope this makes sense!  &#x200B;  Edit: This is not a question for homework. I'm writing my dissertation and have noticed this flaw in studies in a particular area of research, but cannot remember what it's called.","c_root_id_A":"ijq6idh","c_root_id_B":"ijqedt3","created_at_utc_A":1660143984,"created_at_utc_B":1660147000,"score_A":10,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"There's a number of things wrong with the kinds of studies you describe: they fail to consider the counterfactual (null hypothesis), they incorrectly attribute causation without accounting for nonspuriousness, mechanism, or context [1], and they are not experiments - there is no control group.      [1] https:\/\/us.sagepub.com\/sites\/default\/files\/upm-binaries\/14289_BachmanChapter5.pdf","human_ref_B":"This is called selecting on the dependent variable.  Edit: Looks like this sub requires peer-reviewed sources. See Barbara Geddes's article on this: https:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/23317768","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3016.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"18q0ep","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"How much influence does the EU really have over its member countries? Is the UK at any real advantage being a part of it? It seems like the UK is an oddball in the EU. Like other member states it doesn't have the Euro as its currency, but because it is an isolated place away from the mainland, it seems like it isn't really affected by what happens in the EU.  How much influence does EU policy have on the UK?  If the Euro were to go down the drain what effect would this have on the UK?  Can the UK do whatever it wants regarding its policy making or does it have to abide by what the EU tells it regarding certain types of policy?\\  Sorry if these questions are stupid, I'm in my first year studying a social policy degree and I'm trying to learn as much as I can about the entire field. I feel like my knowledge is really lacking so I'm trying to go to basics and learn form there.   Thanks in advance for any answers","c_root_id_A":"c8h4l7m","c_root_id_B":"c8h4mmo","created_at_utc_A":1361176740,"created_at_utc_B":1361177009,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Also, there is the question of whether being outside would meaningfully increase our freedom of action.  By way of comparison, Switzerland is not in the EU but has 10 treaties with it, and frames much of its law so as to be compatible with it, because it would be impractical to do things any other way.","human_ref_B":"The EU makes some regulations with applicability across the whole EU (important when there needs to be a very literal interpretation) but normally it publishes directives in areas of mutual interest, essentially defined as affecting cross border relations within the community and those with nations outside. Things that are obviously in scope include international trade and trading standards, cross border finance, cross border police cooperation and so on. The principle of subsidiarity means that UK only issues are a matter for the British government and not the EU. However there may be cross-overs as a good or service in the UK that may be available outside is subject to EU legislation. Note that countries outside the EU but working with the EU will find that they have to comply with EU directives, but they have no way to influence the drafting process.  In addition to regulations and directives, the EU may publish decisions which are normally from the European Court about the interpretation of regulations and directives. In addition, there are non-binding recommendations and advisements (known as Avis).  Generally the EU implements a \"level playing field\" so an enterprise providing goods or services can be based in any EU country and work throughout the community.   Directives must then be implemented by national legislation and\/or regulation. This is not a \"rubber stamping\" process but rather the implementation in national terms of the \"spirit\" of the directive together with any enforcement. As directives are jointly developed, there should not be any issues blocking implementation at national level. Sometimes a national government may negotiate to opt-out of part or all of a directive as happened with the UK with the Euro or Schengen.  | Type                | Addresses             | Effects                        | |:----------------|:-------------------|:-----------------------| | REGULATION | All Member States, natural and legal persons|Directly applicable and binding in their entirety| | DIRECTIVE | All or specific Member States | Binding with respect to the intended result. Directly applicable only under particular circumstances | | DECISION | Not specified. All or specific Member States; specific natural or legal persons | Directly applicable and binding in their entirety | | RECOMMENDATION | All or specific Member States, other EU bodies, individuals | Not binding | | AVIS | All or specific Member States, other EU bodies | Not binding |  The above table is lifted from an EU publication the ABC of European Law.  Incidentally, Human Rights come from the Council of Europe which is not an EU entity as opposed to  Workers' rights come generally from the EU.  The \"level playing field\" principle is vital for international banking. You only need to be regulated in one EU country to provide services throughout the EU. Financial institutions like to \"cluster\" because despite electronic trading, there is still a great need for physical meetings. The UK is well placed because of GMT, it is English speaking and if you have an office setup in the UK, you can work directly in any EU market without disadvantage. When the EU implements directives affecting the working of financial institutions, these are of major importance to the UK.  The UK has a love\/hate relationship with the Euro. For historical reasons, it has the world's largest foreign exchange (FX) market. When someone wanted to trade large quantities of French Francs for Deutchmarks they would do so via London. The disappearance of so many currencies meant a reduction of business in the city. At the same time, it has simplified cross-border trade, reducing risk and creating opportunities for other financial services.  If the Euro disappeared, it would complicate things. Personally, I travel a lot for pleasure in the EU. I usually end up with just Swiss Francs and Euros. If the Euro disappeared, my change collection would go back to pre-Euro levels and I would have French Francs, Guilders, Deutchmarks, Italian Lire and so on. Personally, not convenient. So what about companies, well they end up having bank accounts for each major currency that they work in. As the currencies are all free to shift in relative value, it makes pricing a nightmare. Essentially it makes import\/export more the province of larger companies who can manage the complexity and even they would see a considerable rise in costs.  EDIT: Fixed the bit about regulations coming from SPRM's comment and added some bits on European Law","labels":0,"seconds_difference":269.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"24xkeg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Does your dominant hand influence your decisions ie. do you have a selection bias to the right if you're right handed Working on a study and can't seem to find any references as to whether this would affect a persons decisions, my gut feeling is that it would but I need a reference to include it obviously. Much appreciation","c_root_id_A":"chbopjq","c_root_id_B":"chbp5jl","created_at_utc_A":1399450155,"created_at_utc_B":1399452885,"score_A":4,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"What sort of decisions do you mean?  As in \"Given the choice between two identical apples, a right-handed person will choose the apple on the right\" style scenario?","human_ref_B":"I am currently doing the second study on exactly this (among others).   We are investigating very low level decisions so I don't know whether this is what you were aiming for. People can freely decide whether to move their right-hand index finger or left-hand index finger (all are right-handed). These are obviously decisions where the participants don't care what the outcome is, so they are inherently different from most everyday decisions. While we were investigating something more complex, I also analyzed whether they had   - a preferred finger - were faster with their dominant hand - if transcranial magnetic stimulation affected the dominant hand more than the other  **I could not find any dominant hand advantages** in this paradigm. Also, the participants did not perceive their dominant hand to be preferred (as in more often or faster). This does not mean that there never is an advantage, but in this paradigm I wasn't able to find it.  EDIT: I would love to cite something but those studies are in the progress and not published yet. So take everything with a grain of salt.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2730.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"211v6i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is the addition of Crimea good economically for Russia? I just listened to a speaker talk about how Ukraine isn't a great country economically speaking and specifically Crimea was the least economically beneficial.  Any reality to this?","c_root_id_A":"cg8z7xm","c_root_id_B":"cg8weat","created_at_utc_A":1395485312,"created_at_utc_B":1395467714,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Basically, it has a lot to do with economic power in the area, power and gas distribution, and control of the South Stream.  Here you have some reading to begin with:  * Ukraine crisis is about Great Power oil, gas pipeline rivalry (The Guardian) * Pipeline chess across the Black Sea (Le Monde Diplomatique, English) * Map of Ukrainian Gas Pipelines * Expanded map of oil and gas pipelines in the region  I also recommend listening to these NPR's Planet Money podcasts:  * The Fight Over Ukraine's Gas Bill * A Planet Money War","human_ref_B":"Opposing viewpoints from *Foreign Affairs*:  * \u201cIs Losing Crimea a Loss? What Russia Can Expect in Ukraine's Rust Belt\u201d by Alexander J. Motyl * \u201cWill Conquest Pay? In Crimea, Russia Might Come Out Ahead\u201d by Peter Liberman and Julie A. George","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17598.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1atwt4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Something a little lighthearted: what are some of your favourite (or funniest) completely obsolete theories or quotes from thinkers and researchers you have come across? Sometimes, the papers I read for university have quotes from the olden days. They're always good for a chuckle!  Two related to women:  1 \"[Women], as the weaker, are driven by nature to have recourse not to force but to cunning: hence their instinctive treachery, and their irremediable tendency to lying.\"  which goes well with:  2 \"The impulse to lie is much stronger in women, because, unlike that of a man, her memory is not continuous, whilst her life is discrete, unconnected, dis-continuous, swayed by the sensations and perceptions of the moment instead of dominating them.\"  Also, I was reading a paper on resistance in young people and genuinely laughed out loud for the first time in a long time at an academic paper:  3 \"Teenagers who identify as goth disrupt or refuse Western discourses of adolescence as becoming or as centred around fun.\"  There's just something so nice about the simplicity and bluntness of the statement that made me stifle giggles in the library.  Sources:  1 Selected Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer, trans. ernest Belfort Bax, 341. Quoted in Sander L. Golman, Jewish Self-Hatred: Anti-Semitism and the Hidden Language of the Jews, 243.  Unfortunately I don't have any dates.  2 Sex and Character, 146, cited in Gilman, Jewish Self-Hatred, 245.  3 Raby, Rebecca (2005) What is Resistance? Journal of Youth Studies 8\/2; p. 151-171","c_root_id_A":"c914hhp","c_root_id_B":"c914o1p","created_at_utc_A":1364070595,"created_at_utc_B":1364071261,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"You might like this.","human_ref_B":"On [3], seriously, what is this I don't even.....I can't even *parse* this quote.  Is it saying that goth kids think *fun* is too establishment?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":666.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"acdlwl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Is there a proper study on how much race affects income when properly adjusted? When I look for these kind of stats all i get is \"x group makes more than y group\"     I want to know what happens when you account for education, social status, personality, life choices and location. Do the differences disappear or maximize or stay the same?","c_root_id_A":"ed7waz9","c_root_id_B":"ed7ztc7","created_at_utc_A":1546602537,"created_at_utc_B":1546607335,"score_A":5,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"This doesn\u2019t directly address the quantification of income effects, but I will mention that the most reliable and direct evidence we have of racial discrimination in the job market comes from resume experiments and in-person audits. This cuts right through the \u201ccorrelation is not causation problem\u201d that you rightly point out in your question.","human_ref_B":"What you're describing is the question of what race's \"main\" effect is after you control for many of its causal mechanisms. This will result in the conclusion that there is no race effect, eventually, because you've fully \"explained\" the association by accounting for the mediating factors through which it operates on income. This, however, would be inaccurate. Really the picture is (crudely) Race-->[XYZ hundred mediators]-->outcome.   Race itself isn't a terribly meaningful variable as far as biology goes- much of the variation it captures is actually a function of environment, status, personality, and so on.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4798.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"jn93lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Place\/capability of people with low IQ in society What do people with a low IQ (80 and less) do (career-wise)? Can an unintelligent person be a capable manager? Do they live mostly on social welfare?   Does being unintelligent relate to poverty, or does poverty lead to a person being less intelligent? Will an unintelligent person born in a \"normal family\" end up poor (unless taken care of by the family)?  My initial statement mentions the idea of someone having a low IQ. I understand that people with certain disabilities would score lower on an IQ test, while still being intelligent. I am not talking about the cases where an IQ test is unreliable.  I've heard that unintelligent are losing their place in society (lecture by J. Peterson). Unintelligent people have more trouble finding jobs (everyone faces difficulties while searching for a job), especially with less demand in physical labor as they are being replaced by machines. That leads to poverty. And poverty leads to more uneducation, drugs, pregnancies, criminal behaviour. Or is it being born in poverty that causes this cycle to begin with?  According to this website, ~10% of people have an IQ lower than 80 (with a 15 SD, so I assume the number is not completely reliable). That would mean 800 million people are... pretty unintelligent? Isn't that a problem we should be worried about? Even in a western country like Spain, that is 500 thousand people out of 50 million. (even more, since the average IQ is 98 as opposed to 100)  *My reason for asking these questions:* I am a student. My parents are also graduates. According to some sources, I can safely assume our IQ is above 105. With that in mind, I assume that my social circles (within uni) and the family friends I grew up with have been rather intelligent people. I didn't have friends in school, so I didn't get to know people in that setting. I have no idea how unintelligent the other side of the world is. Is an IQ of 80 really stupid? Are they pretty much normal people that I wouldn't be able to differentiate in a random setting?  If I've made any wrong assumptions in my post, I am open to being corrected on the assumption rather than the idea that evolved from it. I am open to reading studies done on this topic. I don't study psychology\/sociology, so I had trouble finding relevant articles on this topic.  **I am also aware that IQ tests are not reliable, so when I mention IQ I mean any type of *intelligence* over a number that can be studied for, gamed, or that is biased against different kind of intelligences (math vs patterns vs language vs any other).**","c_root_id_A":"gb19a3e","c_root_id_B":"gb1nl7o","created_at_utc_A":1604431253,"created_at_utc_B":1604437998,"score_A":8,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"### High IQs predict success across many outcomes  For example, IQ predicts academic achievement very well. Koenig et al. (2008) estimated that the correlation between IQ and SAT scores (r=0.82) is greater than the correlation between SAT Math and SAT verbal (r=0.74) and the correlation between ACT math and ACT verbal (r=0.67).  In a recent review of intelligence research by experts in the field, Nisbett et al. (2012) summarized the predictive power of IQ as follows (page 131):  > \u2026the measurement of intelligence \u2014 which has been done primarily by IQ tests \u2014 has utilitarian value because it is a reasonably good predictor of grades at school, performance at work, and many other aspects of success in life (Gottfredson, 2004; Herrnstein & Murray, 1994). For example, students who score high on tests such as the SAT and the ACT, which correlate highly with IQ measures (Detterman & Daniel, 1989), tend to perform better in school than those who score lower (Coyle & Pillow, 2008). Similarly, people in professional careers, such as attorneys, accountants, and physicians, tend to have high IQs. Even within very narrowly defined jobs and on very narrowly defined tasks, those with higher IQs outperform those with lower IQs on average, with the effects of IQ being largest for those occupations and tasks that are most demanding of cognitive skills (F. L. Schmidt & Hunter, 1998, 2004)  A meta-analysis by Strenze (2007) shows that intelligence (measured by IQ scores) is one of the best predictors of future socioeconomic success. The analysis concludes with the following (page 415):  > These results demonstrate that intelligence, when it is measured before most individuals have finished their schooling, is a powerful predictor of career success 12 or more years later when most individuals have already entered stable careers. Two of the correlations \u2013 with education and occupation \u2013 are of substantial magnitude according to the usual standards of social science.  Strenze (2015) cites several meta-analyses showing the correlation between intelligence and a variety of measures of success (Table 25.1). The results showed large correlations between intelligence and academic performance in primary education (_r_=0.58), educational attainment (_r_=0.56), job performance (0.38-0.53, depending on the sample), occupational attainment (_r_=0.43), skill acquisition in work training (_r_=0.38), and several other metrics of success.  ### Low IQs predict many social dysfunctions  For example, an article published in *Scientific American* report the following outcomes for non-Hispanic whites of various IQ scores:  -   Of those with IQs in the normal range (90-110), 6% live in poverty, 6% are High School dropouts, 8% of women are chronic welfare recipients, and 3% of men have been incarcerated. -   Of those with IQs between 75-90, 16% live in poverty, 35% are High School dropouts, 17% of women are chronic welfare recipients and 7% of men have been incarcerated. -   Of those with IQs below 75, 30% live in poverty, 55% are High School dropouts, 31% of women are chronic welfare recipients, and 7% of men have been incarcerated.  Again, these numbers are just for non-Hispanic whites to avoid issues with confounding the effects of race.  Low IQ scores predict a low likelihood of holding skilled and prestigious occupations. For example, Hauser (2002) found:  -   Half of all janitors have an IQ just above 90 (Figure 12), slightly more than 25% have IQs above 100, and very few (slightly more than 5%) have IQs above 110. -   The average electrical engineer has an IQ over 110, a small minority (<25%) have IQs below 100, and very few (<5%) have IQs below 90.  Generally speaking, the likelihood of a sub-90 person attaining an occupation that requiring complex cognitive processing (e.g. doctors, engineers, professors, analysts, etc.) is very low. They are more likely to be found in unskilled or low-skilled labor (e.g. janitors, manual labor, etc.). Gottfredson (1997) has also emphasized the scant occupational opportunities for low-IQ individuals (page 90):  > \u2026virtually all occupations accommodate individuals down to IQ 110, but virtually none routinely accommodates individuals below IQ 80 (WPT 10). Employment options drop dramatically with IQ-from virtually unlimited above IQ 120 to scant below IQ 80. Such options are virtually nonexistent today (except in sheltered settings) for individuals below IQ 70 to 75, the usual threshold for borderline mental retardation  Individuals with low IQs tend to be unable to complete all but the simplest of tasks. In fact,  10 U.S. Code \u00a7 520 outlaws low-IQ individuals from participating in the Armed Forces.  Gottfredson (1997) cites evidence that these requirements are not arbitrary; the requirements are necessary to prevent the recruits from being overpopulated with expensive and untrainable members (page 90):  > Lest IQ 80 seem an unreasonably high (i.e., exclusionary) threshold in hiring, it should be noted that the military is prohibited by law (except under a declaration of war) from enlisting recruits below that level (the 10th percentile). That law was enacted because of the extraordinarily high training costs and high rates of failure among such men during the mobilization of forces in World War II (Laurence & Ramsberger, 1991; Sticht et al., 1987; U.S. Department of the Army, 1965). Minimum enlistment standards since World War II have generally been higher than the 10th percentile, and closer to what they are today for the different services: the 16th AFQT percentile (Army, about IQ 85), 21st (Marine Corps and Air Force, IQ 88), and 27th (Navy, IQ 91). It should be noted that these are the enlistment standards for high school graduates. Non-graduates must score above the 27th to 65th percentiles on the AFQT, depending on the service in question (Laurence & Ramsberger, 1991, p. 11).  ### IQ predicts outcomes independently of parental SES  Some of the predictive power of IQ may be due to its correlation with parental SES. But much of its predictive power is independent of its association with parental SES.  Strenze (2007) showed that the predictive power of IQ is slightly stronger than that of parental SES (Table 1). Specifically, IQ measured before age 19 outdoes parental SES in predicting future educational attainment, occupational prestige, and income (see \u201cbest studies\u201d). In other words, if you want to predict an adolescent\u2019s success in adulthood along a given metric of success (e.g., whether income, educational attainment, or occupational prestige), it is more useful to know that individual\u2019s IQ than it is to know the success of their parents along that same metric. Strenze (page 416) argues that this would be unexpected if the predictive power of IQ could be attributed primarily to its association with parental SES:  > If the correlation between intelligence and success was a mere byproduct of the causal effect of parental SES or academic performance, then parental SES and academic performance should have outcompeted intelligence as predictors of success; but this was clearly not so. These results confirm that intelligence is an independent causal force among the determinants of success; in other words, the fact that intelligent people are successful is not completely explainable by the fact that intelligent people have wealthy parents and are doing better at school.  Another analysis comparing the effects of intelligence and socioeconomic background (SEB) on success was performed by Ganzach (2011). He investigated a sample of high school graduates from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY). Intelligence was measured using the Armed Forces Qualifying Test (AFQT) when the participants were in their youth. He found that \u201cSEB affected wages solely by its effect on entry pay whereas intelligence affected wages primarily by its effect on mobility. The effect of intelligence on entry pay seems to be weaker than the effect of SEB\u201d (page 127). In other words, both intelligence and SEB impacted entry pay, but only intelligence affected the pace of pay increases throughout one\u2019s career.","human_ref_B":"Broadly speaking, research on IQ scores tend to support the conclusion that it holds noteworthy predictive value (see for example Strenze's 2015 meta-analysis), although one can find prominent critics (see statistician Nassim Nicholas Taleb for perhaps one of the more recent and arguably radical perspectives on the matter).  That said, although the meme \"IQ tests measure the ability to complete IQ tests\" is generally considered cheeky, there are serious debates concerning what is intelligence, and what is IQ. To quote Strenze:  >As we think about intelligence and success, we must remember that the scientific question about the relationship between intelligence and success is closely connected to other scientific questions about intelligence and, most importantly, to the following question: **What is it that IQ tests really measure? This chapter was based on the implicit assumption that IQ tests are reasonably good measures of general cognitive ability, but not all social scientists would agree with that. To make sense of the correlations between intelligence and success, one must have a view on IQ testing and on the nature of intelligence,** in general, which is why I now direct the reader to other chapters of this book where these related topics are discussed.  Thus, for illustration, Earl Hunt writes in 2011:  >**Chapter 1 presented a view of intelligence as a concept, and as it is assessed by IQ and related tests. I argued, in agreement with several other authors** (especially Robert Sternberg, but with echoes of Raymond Cattell), **that intelligence should be thought of as the collection of cognitive skills and knowledge required to achieve success in one\u2019s society. Some of these skills are common to all human societies, and some of them have varying degrees of relevance depending on the society.** Our present cognitive tests evaluate some of the cognitive skills and knowledge needed in modern industrial and post-industrial societies. Without making any statement about the moral values involved, the practical fact is that these skills are important worldwide, for there are far more societies interested in becoming industrial or post-industrial cultures than there are developed societies that want to revert to farming and herding, let alone to being gleaners and hunter-gatherers.  ---  Succinctly, much debate concerns the concept of general intelligence, and the *g* factor. To quote Mackintosh (2011):  >Factor analysis alone will never dictate any particular psychological interpretation of the nature of human intelligence. For that, what is needed is psychological research and theory. **It is essential to keep clear the distinction between two quite separate questions. The first, empirical, question is whether the pattern of intercorrelations actually observed between different IQ tests does or does not imply that a single general factor,** ***g***, **accounts for a sizeable proportion of the variance in the matrix. The second question is quite different: it is how to interpret the factorial solution or solutions most plausibly suggested by any observed pattern of intercorrelations.**  >Some of the criticisms advanced against Spearman\u2019s position have confused these two questions. Many of those who argue that there is no such thing as general intelligence, or that intelligence is too multi-faceted and complex an idea to be captured by a single number, often do not make it clear, perhaps even to themselves, which question they are addressing. **Are they asserting that factor analysis of a battery of IQ tests will not, as a matter of fact, yield a significant general factor? If so, they are mistaken. Or are they insisting, as did Thomson (1916), for example, that the observation of such a general factor does not necessarily imply the existence of a single underlying process of general intelligence?**  Thus, for example, Stuart Ritchie argues in 2015:  >There is debate in psychology about whether Spearman or Thomson was correct about g; nobody has yet made the right discoveries to clinch the argument (Bartholomew et al., 2009). **But this rather arcane and nerdy disagreement needn\u2019t distract us from the consensus: whatever its cause, there is a general factor of intelligence; comprehensive IQ tests measure it and, as we\u2019ll see in the next chapter, it matters.**  Whereas Kovacs and and Conway argue in 2019:  >**For more than a century, the standard view in the field of human intelligence has been that there is a \u201cgeneral intelligence\u201d that permeates all human cognitive activity.** This general cognitive ability is supposed to explain the positive manifold, the finding that intelligence tests with different content all correlate. **Yet there is a lack of consensus regarding the psychological or neural basis of such an ability. A recent account, process-overlap theory, explains the positive manifold without proposing general intelligence.** As a consequence of the theory, **IQ is redefined as an emergent formative construct rather than a reflective latent trait. This implies that IQ should be interpreted as an index of specific cognitive abilities rather than the reflection of an underlying general cognitive ability.**  ---  Putting aside these debates, and to provide a brief targeted answer to your main query, I would stress that even if we accept the predictive validity of IQ scores, prediction should not be confused with prophecy in regard to individual destinies.  Likewise, it is important to distinguish the observation that, say, medical doctors tend to obtain *on average* higher IQ scores with whether *individual* medical doctors have higher IQ scores. In fact, substantial dispersion has been documented for several occupations. See Hauser (2002), whose report includes this figure (which I am borrowing from Taleb's blog post to make a different point) and note the wide ranges of IQ scores; there can be janitors on the higher end who have higher IQ scores than college professors on the lower end. Your average college professor may obtain relatively high IQ scores, but there is a remarkable amount of professors with lower IQ scores.  The following is anecdotal, but I believe serves to flesh out my point: renowned physicist Richard Feynman is known for having obtained an IQ score of 125, which is arguably much lower than what most people might have expected from him. Similarly, World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov scored 135]( https:\/\/blog.mindvalley.com\/garry-kasparov-iq\/). Again, many might expect a much higher IQ score given his accomplishments.  ---  Regarding the relationship between poverty, intelligence, behavior, I would suggest looking into the status of behavioral theories of poverty, which Brady (2019) defines in the following manner:  >Behavioral theories are represented in Figure 1a. **In these theories, behavior is the key mechanism directly causing poverty** (AEI-Brookings 2015, Sawhill 2003). **According to this explanation, the poor are poor because they engage in counterproductive, poverty-increasing behavior or risks like single motherhood or unemployment** (Bertrand et al. 2004, Durlauf 2011). **Poverty is high in a context because there is a high prevalence of those with demographic characteristics indicating such behaviors** (Cruz & Ahmed 2018, Kaida 2015, Ku et al. 2018, Milazzo & van de Walle2017).   These theories tend to fall flat in terms of adequately explaining poverty. For more elaboration, see my replies in the following thread: [How does Social Science view the \"Behavioral Poverty\" theory? You will also find information on how the condition of being poor can affect cognitive abilities\/functioning.  I would point you towards this thread which was recently posted Does poverty lead to violent crime, and does it explain the racial crime gap?, in which I explain how poverty does not contribute itself (i.e not directly) to criminality specifically.  Lastly, a general remark about intelligence in the broad sense, and material conditions in the broad sense: keep in mind that, to quote Zuk and Spencer (2020),  \"**no trait, whether behavioral or otherwise, is caused by either genes or the environment or even by an additive combination of the two; the interaction is the important feature.**\" Or in other words, **humans are**, to quote biological anthropologist Agust\u00edn Fuentes, \"**naturenurtural**\" or, as other anthropologists have put it, biocultural. Depending on where you are born, where you grow, and where you live, there will be differences concerning your cognitive abilities compared to those born, grown and living in other places. Concretely, contrary to popular belief\/fear, environmental factors (including education) contribute in shaping the heritability of IQ (e.g. see Tucker-Drob & Bates, 2016 and Ritchie & Tucker-Drob, 2018).  [Reference list next comment]","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6745.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"3wzbxh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Has there been any research done on successful autodidacts? Has there been any good research or work done on SUCCESSFUL autodidacts? I am interested not only in what kinds of qualities they may have, but what kinds of skills and aptitudes they possess. Also, good practices for anyone who would like to be an autodidact.","c_root_id_A":"cy0f0rv","c_root_id_B":"cy0oyox","created_at_utc_A":1450225346,"created_at_utc_B":1450241878,"score_A":6,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Saul Kripke is a noted autodidact in the field of philosophy and had a profound influence on the field. It seems like it's difficult to find extensive autobiographical details, but some might be mentioned in his publications:  http:\/\/kripkecenter.commons.gc.cuny.edu\/resources\/published-works\/","human_ref_B":"I know of one book that does a fantastic survey of autodidactism and provides several case studies, \"The Passion to Learn: An Inquiry Into Autodidactism\" by Joan Solomon. Unfortunately, it's also expensive as fuck.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16532.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"hfrg22","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Can you help me understand what this study is saying about male patterns of criminality in trans women? As a disclaimer I'd like to say that i know this study is commonly misrepresented by transphobes. and the the author herself has expressed frustration with this. I'm trans myself and I'd just like to be able to understand where the misrepresentation is wrong  So this study contains the following paragraph:  >Second, regarding any crime, male-to-females had a significantly increased risk for crime compared to female controls but not compared to males. This indicates that they retained a male pattern regarding criminality. The same was true regarding violent crime  People use this to say that trans women commit crimes in the same ways as men and thus shouldn't be allowed into womens bathrooms etc. Specifically in reference to one person who claimed the study showed that trans women rape at the same rates as cis men the lead author said:  >\"The individual in the image who is making claims about trans criminality, specifically rape likelihood, is misrepresenting the study findings\"  she goes on to explain that \"male pattern of criminality\" in this context refers to crime rate and not types of crimes committed.  Is this then saying that (because of the definition of male pattern of criminality given) trans women just happen to commit violent crime at the same rate as cis men but that this crime **isn't** as sexually motivated (as would suggest trans women ARE a rape risk) and instead caused by other factors? (relative poverty\/likelihood of being abused\/other negative social conditions linked to being trans etc.)  She also states that for the later group (the study aggregates two groups of people (from 1973 to 1988, and 1989 to 2003)) differences in mortality, suicide attempts, and crime disappear. But she makes the claim here that \"If one is only interested in transwomen data is only available for the whole period\" so how does the original statement of differences in crime disappearing in the later group hold up for trans women specifically?  I guess my main question is. if for the whole period trans women retained similar rates of crime to cis men and the study doesn't itself show that trans women are less likely to commit sexual assault. would it not be best to assume that trans women are a similar rape risk to cis women as cis men(especially implied since the wording of the study said \"retained\")? Or is it the case that the study just shows similar crime rates but to assume the types of crimes committed are similar would be irresponsible until its properly shown in its own study?","c_root_id_A":"fvzv8tl","c_root_id_B":"fw0ce1h","created_at_utc_A":1593119823,"created_at_utc_B":1593128843,"score_A":3,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"I would discourage using that study to make conclusions about criminality among transgender people. It uses convictions as its indicator for criminality. Criminologists do *not* consider convictions among the more valid indicators of criminality (its reliability is a different kettle of fish depending on which assumptions hold):  * Conviction is furthest from the actual criminal or delinquent behavior,  * Much fewer individuals reach convictions stage compared to those who commit a crime (see attrition), and those who do not reach the final stage are not necessarily innocent,  * There are several stages between behavior and conviction, during which biases can be introduced (e.g. decision to arrest, prosecute, convict, ...).  See for example this New York Times article on the crime funnel. Keeping the above in mind, take the following excerpt of their discussion:  >In this study, **male-to-female individuals had a higher risk for criminal convictions compared to female controls but not compared to male controls.** This suggests that the sex reassignment procedure neither increased nor decreased the risk for criminal offending in male-to-females. By contrast, **female-to-males were at a higher risk for criminal convictions compared to female controls and did not differ from male controls**, which suggests increased crime proneness in female-to-males after sex reassignment.  In fact, their findings can be interpreted in other ways besides how they ultimately interpreted it. To conclude anything about *crime proneness* is questionable, e.g. higher conviction rates is not simplistically equal to higher rates of criminal conduct. Now, I can predict many people would take these findings and think something along the lines of, \"but is this not consistent with testosterone making people more aggressive?\" This is however based on outdated notions about testosterone, which is not, in fact, an \"aggression hormone.\" It is more complex than that. For illustration, see:  * Eisenegger et al.'s \"Prejudice and truth about the effect of testosterone on human bargaining behaviour\"   * Dreher et al.'s \"Testosterone causes both prosocial and antisocial status-enhancing behaviors in human males\"  * Coccaro's \"Testosterone and Aggression: More Than Just Biology?\"  Furthermore, the authors *do* note in the paper what Dhejne told TransAdvocate (which they arguably should have insisted upon later on):  >Transsexual individuals were at increased risk of being convicted for any crime or violent crime after sex reassignment (Table 2); **this was, however, only significant in the group who underwent sex reassignment before 1989.**  In summary, their results regarding criminality should be taken with a good dose of salt.","human_ref_B":"Science can\u2019t decide what the best assumptions to make are beyond providing data that supports one assumption versus another. The point of discussions like this one https:\/\/www.transadvocate.com\/fact-check-study-shows-transition-makes-trans-people-suicidal_n_15483.htm (and the link you provided to the AMA post) is that this study data provides no evidence in support of any claims or assumptions regarding rape. So it would be irresponsible to argue this article provides evidence trans women rape at the same rates as men. Or, indeed, when you look at the details of the findings\/explanations provided, to argue that the study provides evidence recently transitioned women have similar rates of criminality as men at all: what the author is saying is the vast majority of the reported crimes are connected to people who transitioned before 1989, so any statements about statistical significance of patterns depend heavily on those cases.  What it does demonstrate is a clear downward trend in overall criminality in the most recent cohort studied vs the older cohort. (See Table 2 here: https:\/\/journals.plos.org\/plosone\/article\/figure?id=10.1371\/journal.pone.0016885.t002). The author notes in the AMA that the total number of violent incidents for both trans women and men in the recent cohort was *4*, which is why it is not included in the table analysis linked to above - there\u2019s not enough statistical power to meaningfully examine such a small number of incidents given the number of cases.  This is particularly remarkable given that it\u2019s likely trans women are disproportionately policed given likely disproportionate involvement in sex work and other black\/grey market activities as survival strategies (see, eg: https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1111\/1467-9566.12436)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9020.0,"score_ratio":7.6666666667}
{"post_id":"hfrg22","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Can you help me understand what this study is saying about male patterns of criminality in trans women? As a disclaimer I'd like to say that i know this study is commonly misrepresented by transphobes. and the the author herself has expressed frustration with this. I'm trans myself and I'd just like to be able to understand where the misrepresentation is wrong  So this study contains the following paragraph:  >Second, regarding any crime, male-to-females had a significantly increased risk for crime compared to female controls but not compared to males. This indicates that they retained a male pattern regarding criminality. The same was true regarding violent crime  People use this to say that trans women commit crimes in the same ways as men and thus shouldn't be allowed into womens bathrooms etc. Specifically in reference to one person who claimed the study showed that trans women rape at the same rates as cis men the lead author said:  >\"The individual in the image who is making claims about trans criminality, specifically rape likelihood, is misrepresenting the study findings\"  she goes on to explain that \"male pattern of criminality\" in this context refers to crime rate and not types of crimes committed.  Is this then saying that (because of the definition of male pattern of criminality given) trans women just happen to commit violent crime at the same rate as cis men but that this crime **isn't** as sexually motivated (as would suggest trans women ARE a rape risk) and instead caused by other factors? (relative poverty\/likelihood of being abused\/other negative social conditions linked to being trans etc.)  She also states that for the later group (the study aggregates two groups of people (from 1973 to 1988, and 1989 to 2003)) differences in mortality, suicide attempts, and crime disappear. But she makes the claim here that \"If one is only interested in transwomen data is only available for the whole period\" so how does the original statement of differences in crime disappearing in the later group hold up for trans women specifically?  I guess my main question is. if for the whole period trans women retained similar rates of crime to cis men and the study doesn't itself show that trans women are less likely to commit sexual assault. would it not be best to assume that trans women are a similar rape risk to cis women as cis men(especially implied since the wording of the study said \"retained\")? Or is it the case that the study just shows similar crime rates but to assume the types of crimes committed are similar would be irresponsible until its properly shown in its own study?","c_root_id_A":"fw0u2ac","c_root_id_B":"fvzv8tl","created_at_utc_A":1593139417,"created_at_utc_B":1593119823,"score_A":23,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This is not a direct response to your question, but a commentary on the \"Trans-Women in bathrooms\" argument.  It is the case that sexual assault is not something that generally happens by strangers in public spaces, regardless of identity. [Perpetrators are generally repeat offending older men that are known by the survivor.]  (https:\/\/www.rainn.org\/statistics\/perpetrators-sexual-violence)     Mixed gender spaces, including bathrooms, have not been established to be significantly more or less dangerous than segregated gender spaces. So any trans person argument along these lines is already moot, prior to any special considerations.","human_ref_B":"I would discourage using that study to make conclusions about criminality among transgender people. It uses convictions as its indicator for criminality. Criminologists do *not* consider convictions among the more valid indicators of criminality (its reliability is a different kettle of fish depending on which assumptions hold):  * Conviction is furthest from the actual criminal or delinquent behavior,  * Much fewer individuals reach convictions stage compared to those who commit a crime (see attrition), and those who do not reach the final stage are not necessarily innocent,  * There are several stages between behavior and conviction, during which biases can be introduced (e.g. decision to arrest, prosecute, convict, ...).  See for example this New York Times article on the crime funnel. Keeping the above in mind, take the following excerpt of their discussion:  >In this study, **male-to-female individuals had a higher risk for criminal convictions compared to female controls but not compared to male controls.** This suggests that the sex reassignment procedure neither increased nor decreased the risk for criminal offending in male-to-females. By contrast, **female-to-males were at a higher risk for criminal convictions compared to female controls and did not differ from male controls**, which suggests increased crime proneness in female-to-males after sex reassignment.  In fact, their findings can be interpreted in other ways besides how they ultimately interpreted it. To conclude anything about *crime proneness* is questionable, e.g. higher conviction rates is not simplistically equal to higher rates of criminal conduct. Now, I can predict many people would take these findings and think something along the lines of, \"but is this not consistent with testosterone making people more aggressive?\" This is however based on outdated notions about testosterone, which is not, in fact, an \"aggression hormone.\" It is more complex than that. For illustration, see:  * Eisenegger et al.'s \"Prejudice and truth about the effect of testosterone on human bargaining behaviour\"   * Dreher et al.'s \"Testosterone causes both prosocial and antisocial status-enhancing behaviors in human males\"  * Coccaro's \"Testosterone and Aggression: More Than Just Biology?\"  Furthermore, the authors *do* note in the paper what Dhejne told TransAdvocate (which they arguably should have insisted upon later on):  >Transsexual individuals were at increased risk of being convicted for any crime or violent crime after sex reassignment (Table 2); **this was, however, only significant in the group who underwent sex reassignment before 1989.**  In summary, their results regarding criminality should be taken with a good dose of salt.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":19594.0,"score_ratio":7.6666666667}
{"post_id":"3sw9cy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is there a term for the idea of being part of a culture, but being on the edge or fringe of it? Like a reluctance to identify openly with a group for fear of negative repercussions from the dominant culture. In my research I kept finding this to be the case with the population I'm working with, but I have no idea what the formal term for this is. For example, many of my participants said things like \"I'm one of them, but I'm not like the rest of them\". They were very intent on separating from the group they identify with because of their negative characteristics, but they identified with that group behind closed doors.  Any help is very much appreciated!","c_root_id_A":"cx10e4f","c_root_id_B":"cx10t7k","created_at_utc_A":1447605161,"created_at_utc_B":1447606006,"score_A":5,"score_B":33,"human_ref_A":"I think that if you look at any fringe group you will find a subsection that would identify this way. I think the number of whom would depend on the status of the larger fringe group in the dominant culture.   The homeless population would be a good example of this as it is one that doesn't really have a strong advocacy component within it. In this group I would expect to find more people who feel shame about their situation and would therefore try to disassociate from it.  I don't know if there is a specific term for it, but I do think it is a common experience.","human_ref_B":"Formally, \"liminal\" is a term from anthropology that seems to fit your description. You appear to be describing a \"liminal group\", people who are in-between two groups, not part anymore of their former group and also not yet fully part of their new group.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":845.0,"score_ratio":6.6}
{"post_id":"9tdhdh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"In general, is there a correlation between societies\/religions with strict, well-defined gender roles and languages that divide words into masculine\/feminine categories? Sorry if the question is ambiguous. I'm not in the social sciences at all, but I've been thinking a lot recently about how language influences thought (is there a name for this sub-discipline?). Is there a consensus in the field on any causative link between the two in the case of gender specifically?","c_root_id_A":"e8vpboe","c_root_id_B":"e8wb8ui","created_at_utc_A":1541114392,"created_at_utc_B":1541136056,"score_A":6,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Language influencing thought is called Linguistic Relativism Hypothesis, and it has many different variants and strengths, as well as a rich history. It is also widely regarded to be bunk, especially in Cognitive Science and Linguistics. If you want, I can search for the literature on it, but for now I will opt for a brief summary:   While the notion that language (and when we talk about language, we talk about its form e.g. the presence of cases, the variety of pronouns or gender divisions) influences thought is a popular one because it is easy to asume that language is the \"medium\" of thought, it has proven to be baseless as of yet. We are logocentric because it is quite easy to get to that position, but some inquiry reveals that thought is more complex. Language is a window to human thought, yes, but it is not the medium, as thought itself extends much beyond language. This is supported by studies in spatial cognition, emotional cognition, concept formation, and linguistics itself. You can think in many ways that are not language-based and you do it every day. The easiest argument for this is the following: structurally speaking, German and Spanish are much more complex than English. There are things that can be said in these languages that are very difficult to express in english due to the language's syntax. But this doesn't mean that an English speaker has less complex thoughts than a German speaker, or that certain ways of conceptualizing the world are limited to the more grammatically-restricted language. The mind keeps its capabilities. The only way that language influences thought is through its communicative function, which is always there regardless of form, and we communicate many things in many different ways all the time.","human_ref_B":"tl;dr Possibly, but surprisingly no one seems to have gone to the trouble of answering it definitively.  Languages without any gender tended to be less sexist than languages with grammatical gender. However, languages with natural gender (that is, it has gender morphology, but not inanimate objects) were less sexist.  https:\/\/link.springer.com\/article\/10.1007\/s11199-011-0083-5  To me, this indicates that the correlation is spurious. It's hard not to get a biased sample with this sort of thing because we're necessarily talking about the languages which have survived into the modern era. So European languages will be over-represented. I'm not really crazy about a convenience sample of the world's major languages and trying to tease out correlations from that sample, because there's obviously going to be a lot going underneath the surface to cause them to be major languages unrelated to the language's structure.  As an example, I remember reading once that cosmopolitan languages or languages under heavy influence of a foreign culture are more likely to develop towards a more analytic morphology. I don't know if this is true or not, but if it were that would imply that languages which are more international (i.e. economically developed and less isolated) would inflect and decline for fewer things in general, including gender.  There was another study which tried to answer the opposite question: does learning a gendered language make you more sexist. The answer seems to be yes, but the study looked iffy, too, and there's an issue with the fact that the person just spent a significant amount of time explicitly learning about sex and gender which would presumably not be an issue to a native speaker who already knows the language. So it answers a slightly different question.  I don't have access to my old college's academic database anymore, but looking through scholar.google.com there seems to be not a lot of study on the subject, which is surprising. Those that I could read or skim didn't seem amazingly definitive.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21664.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"bybavt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Is there any correlation between countries with legalized sex work and lower sex crime rates? For the countries that have legalized sex work industries or simply tolerate it, is there any correlated reduction in sex related crimes?  If so can we prove causation?","c_root_id_A":"eqg1o7o","c_root_id_B":"eqfvdwo","created_at_utc_A":1560030434,"created_at_utc_B":1560027348,"score_A":44,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Generally speaking, it is important to consider that different countries have different policies and implementations. For example, Sweden) makes it legal to *sell* sex, but not to *purchase* sex.   ---  Some researchers (including certain feminist scholars) cricitize both decriminalization and legalization for several reasons, including the notion that prostitution is by nature a form of sexual exploitation which harms women. For example, quoting Farley argues that \u201c**legal sex businesses provide locations where sexual harassment, sexual exploitation, and violence against women are perpetrated with impunity**\u201d and that \u201cs]tate-sponsored prostitution endangers all women and children in that **acts of sexual predation are normalized**\u2014acts ranging from the seemingly banal (breast massage) to the lethal (snuff prostitution that includes filming of actual murders of real women and children)\u201d.    Other criticisms concern the relationship between human trafficking and prostitution, the notion being that decriminalizing and\/or legalizing the latter contributes to the former (for example by creating breaches). See for example [Lee and Persson's analysis, and their argument that at least purchasers of sex should be criminalized to eradicate trafficking and promote gender equality, and that there exist scenarios where criminalizing sex workers is desirable.  ---  It should be noted that the relationship between human trafficking and decriminalization\/legalization of prostitution is contested, and problematic to establish. The former is a highly secretive criminal activity which is hard to measure accurately and reliably. Studies attempting to demonstrate that decriminalizing or legalizing the latter increasing the former have issues such as not taking into account that making sex work legal makes it more visible, and evolutions in attitudes (both among the general population and among the authorities) can increase official numbers even though things are going better. Quoting Weitzer:  >The empirical studies featured in this volume of The Annals demonstrate **the ways in which migration and trafficking are much more complex and variegated than the image popularized in the dominant discourse. This kind of research is quite challenging, which explains why there are so few high-quality studies to date. It is extremely difficult to gain access** to participants in illegal enterprises even after they have left the trade.  ---  That said, is there evidence of either decriminalizing or legalizing sex work affecting sexual offenses? Yes, there are some studies that have found positive outcomes. For example, Bishop et al. studied \"the largest 25 Dutch cities between 1994 and 2011\" and found that **opening a legal street prostitution zone decreases registered sexual abuse and rape by about 30% to 40% in the first two years**\u201d.   According to Cunningham and Shah's analysis of Rhodes Island,  \u201c**decriminalization caused both forcible rape offenses and gonorrhea incidence to decline for the overall population**. Our synthetic control model finds **824 fewer reported rape offenses (31 percent decrease)**\u201d.  ---  These different considerations can be synthesized together, by recognizing the issue of *how* sex work is decriminalized and\/or legalized. For example, prostitution laws in the UK have pushed sex workers off-street, which was the objective, *however* as Hubbard and Scoular observe:  >**Sex workers can still be financially exploited, injured or killed when working off-street** \u2013 particularly when premises are not surveyed or acknowledged by the authorities \\\u2026\\] **this apparently laissez-faire approach has delineated a private sphere of non-intervention, creating an unregulated market** in which private forms of commercial sex are, by omission, sanctioned \\[\u2026\\] **We hence conclude by arguing for policies that recognise that sex will always be bought and sold, and which do not seek to criminalise it or simply push it out of sight, but allow it to occur as safely, as orderly and as fairly as possible**\u201d.  Likewise, [Biberstein and Killias recognize that \u201c**\\a\\]busive situations can develop in all sectors of this market**\u201d while arguing that \u201c**the answer cannot be either or, but needs to consider contradictory aspects**\u201d. Following their Swiss study, they recommend that \u201c**regulations should be designed to increase sex workers\u2019 protection without infringing on transparency and predictability for both sex workers and managers**\u201d.  ---  In sum, there is evidence suggesting that decriminalization and\/or legalization, if properly implemented, can reduce sexual offenses (and there can also be [other positive outcomes beyond criminal\/victimological). There exist arguments against decriminalization and\/or legalization, which can be partially supported when considering poorly implemented policies or scenarios without proper follow-ups.","human_ref_B":"The best causal evidence I know of comes from when Rhode Island accidentally legalized (indoor) prostitution for a couple years. Reported rape fell by 30%. Technically this is at the state level while you asked about countries, but close enough imo.  Published version; Ungated version","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3086.0,"score_ratio":2.3157894737}
{"post_id":"bybavt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Is there any correlation between countries with legalized sex work and lower sex crime rates? For the countries that have legalized sex work industries or simply tolerate it, is there any correlated reduction in sex related crimes?  If so can we prove causation?","c_root_id_A":"eqg0001","c_root_id_B":"eqg1o7o","created_at_utc_A":1560029743,"created_at_utc_B":1560030434,"score_A":7,"score_B":44,"human_ref_A":"At least one study found an increase in trafficking:  > This paper investigates the impact of legalized prostitution on human trafficking inflows. According to economic theory, there are two opposing effects of unknown magnitude. The scale effect of legalized prostitution leads to an expansion of the prostitution market, increasing human trafficking, while the substitution effect reduces demand for trafficked women as legal prostitutes are favored over trafficked ones. Our empirical analysis for a cross-section of up to 150 countries shows that the scale effect dominates the substitution effect. On average, countries where prostitution is legal experience larger reported human trafficking inflows.  https:\/\/papers.ssrn.com\/sol3\/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1986065","human_ref_B":"Generally speaking, it is important to consider that different countries have different policies and implementations. For example, Sweden) makes it legal to *sell* sex, but not to *purchase* sex.   ---  Some researchers (including certain feminist scholars) cricitize both decriminalization and legalization for several reasons, including the notion that prostitution is by nature a form of sexual exploitation which harms women. For example, quoting Farley argues that \u201c**legal sex businesses provide locations where sexual harassment, sexual exploitation, and violence against women are perpetrated with impunity**\u201d and that \u201cs]tate-sponsored prostitution endangers all women and children in that **acts of sexual predation are normalized**\u2014acts ranging from the seemingly banal (breast massage) to the lethal (snuff prostitution that includes filming of actual murders of real women and children)\u201d.    Other criticisms concern the relationship between human trafficking and prostitution, the notion being that decriminalizing and\/or legalizing the latter contributes to the former (for example by creating breaches). See for example [Lee and Persson's analysis, and their argument that at least purchasers of sex should be criminalized to eradicate trafficking and promote gender equality, and that there exist scenarios where criminalizing sex workers is desirable.  ---  It should be noted that the relationship between human trafficking and decriminalization\/legalization of prostitution is contested, and problematic to establish. The former is a highly secretive criminal activity which is hard to measure accurately and reliably. Studies attempting to demonstrate that decriminalizing or legalizing the latter increasing the former have issues such as not taking into account that making sex work legal makes it more visible, and evolutions in attitudes (both among the general population and among the authorities) can increase official numbers even though things are going better. Quoting Weitzer:  >The empirical studies featured in this volume of The Annals demonstrate **the ways in which migration and trafficking are much more complex and variegated than the image popularized in the dominant discourse. This kind of research is quite challenging, which explains why there are so few high-quality studies to date. It is extremely difficult to gain access** to participants in illegal enterprises even after they have left the trade.  ---  That said, is there evidence of either decriminalizing or legalizing sex work affecting sexual offenses? Yes, there are some studies that have found positive outcomes. For example, Bishop et al. studied \"the largest 25 Dutch cities between 1994 and 2011\" and found that **opening a legal street prostitution zone decreases registered sexual abuse and rape by about 30% to 40% in the first two years**\u201d.   According to Cunningham and Shah's analysis of Rhodes Island,  \u201c**decriminalization caused both forcible rape offenses and gonorrhea incidence to decline for the overall population**. Our synthetic control model finds **824 fewer reported rape offenses (31 percent decrease)**\u201d.  ---  These different considerations can be synthesized together, by recognizing the issue of *how* sex work is decriminalized and\/or legalized. For example, prostitution laws in the UK have pushed sex workers off-street, which was the objective, *however* as Hubbard and Scoular observe:  >**Sex workers can still be financially exploited, injured or killed when working off-street** \u2013 particularly when premises are not surveyed or acknowledged by the authorities \\\u2026\\] **this apparently laissez-faire approach has delineated a private sphere of non-intervention, creating an unregulated market** in which private forms of commercial sex are, by omission, sanctioned \\[\u2026\\] **We hence conclude by arguing for policies that recognise that sex will always be bought and sold, and which do not seek to criminalise it or simply push it out of sight, but allow it to occur as safely, as orderly and as fairly as possible**\u201d.  Likewise, [Biberstein and Killias recognize that \u201c**\\a\\]busive situations can develop in all sectors of this market**\u201d while arguing that \u201c**the answer cannot be either or, but needs to consider contradictory aspects**\u201d. Following their Swiss study, they recommend that \u201c**regulations should be designed to increase sex workers\u2019 protection without infringing on transparency and predictability for both sex workers and managers**\u201d.  ---  In sum, there is evidence suggesting that decriminalization and\/or legalization, if properly implemented, can reduce sexual offenses (and there can also be [other positive outcomes beyond criminal\/victimological). There exist arguments against decriminalization and\/or legalization, which can be partially supported when considering poorly implemented policies or scenarios without proper follow-ups.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":691.0,"score_ratio":6.2857142857}
{"post_id":"e79bh2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"How valid of a metric is the Human Development Index in determining a nation's developedness? I ask this because, not to be racist, but in the engineering world, I see so many intelligent Chinese people and Indian people, but India has an HDI of .6 and China .75. There are Sub-Saharan African countries with better HDIs than India, and black-carribean countries with higher HDIs than China.   I would like an evaluation before I change my view to \"Barbadians are more successful than the Chinese, and Botswanians are more successful than the Indians.\"  Have I been brainwashed by Western racist ideas, to question a metric such as HDI when black countries have higher HDIs than India and China and some Southeast Asian countries?   To be clear, I am African American, just a curious soul","c_root_id_A":"f9xc14i","c_root_id_B":"f9wwile","created_at_utc_A":1575708621,"created_at_utc_B":1575700183,"score_A":26,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"You seem to equate 'developedness'  with intelligence and\/or being successful. Neither are being measured by the human development index (HDI).  Before the HDI, development was usually measured as the GDP per capita (essentially the yearly wealth of a country divided by the number of inhabitants). Using that metric, the most 'successful' country is Luxembourg_per_capita). The problem with this measure is that it does not tell us anything about how that wealth is distributed, and it implies that money is the most important thing in the world.      Amartya Sen and Abhub al-Maq (an Indian and a Pakistani) developed the index and the idea behind it in the early nineties. Their idea was quite simple: development should not be about money, but about humans. It thus measures to what extent a country is able to provide human development for its inhabitants, based on three necessities:  1. A long and healthy life (measured as the life expectancy at birth) 2. Knowledge (measured as the combination of expected years of schooling and mean years of schooling. Essentially this is how long people have been in school) 3. A decent standard of living (measured as the GNI per capita)  'Knowledge'  is in there, but it does not measure intelligence per se, just the amount of years people have been in school (or are expected to be in school).   Be aware that the HDI is a rather crude measure. It gives only averages, and you can rightfully question to what extent the measurement captures the concepts. Life expectancy at birth does not really tell you if a long life is also a healthy life, for example. Going to school is not the same as acquiring knowledge, and the GNI per capita suffers from the same problem as GDP per capita as that it does not tell you how that money is distributed. There are also doubts about the calculations going into the index.  There are other measures out there that try to capture 'human development', but each has its own issues and goals (There are already 6 versions of the HDI itself). Before going there, it might be good to ask yourself what you mean exactly with 'development'? Is it that everybody is treated equally? That we are superrich? That no kids die of hunger? That we can live in freedom?      If you want to read more about that question, I can recommend Amartya Sen's 'Development as Freedom'","human_ref_B":"What do you mean by \"developedness?\"","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8438.0,"score_ratio":5.2}
{"post_id":"2sssn0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Who are more progressive on social issues: the top 10% or the bottom 10%? Are the wealthiest Americans (or Europeans) more aligned to the left on abortion, gay rights, and gun control than the most poor?","c_root_id_A":"cnslnfu","c_root_id_B":"cnskw7p","created_at_utc_A":1421560801,"created_at_utc_B":1421558741,"score_A":24,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"SOCIAL ISSUES AND SOCIOECONOMIC STATUS JEROME L. HIMMELSTEIN AND JAMES A. McRAE, JR; Oxford Journal 1988  \"They include abortion, ERA, nuclear power, environmental regulation, defense spending, and several issues concerning minority rights (government aid to minorities, busing, and speed of civil rights progress) in the NES and abortion, environmental regulation, minority rights, defense spending, pornography, and legalization of marijuana in the GSS. For comparison, we also analyze the classic economic issue of government domestic spending on both surveys\"  \"This paper examines the hypothesized inverse relationship between socioeconomic status and conservatism on a wide range of so-called social issues...Our results suggest that the hypothesized relationship is absent for most dimensions of socioeconomic status and most social issues. The most consistent exception to this is that liberalism on social issues tends to increase with education, but even here the relationship varies considerably from issue to issue. The lack of a consistent relationship reflects both the diversity of the social issues and the fuzziness of the social\/economic distinction...The other socioeconomic variables show very little of the predicted pattern. Income, in fact, has a more marked conservative influence on social issues (minorities, nuclear power, defense spending) than a liberal one (abortion)...In short, the social issues that we have examined do not consistently pit liberal upper strata against conservative lower strata\"  Granted this study is relatively old, it however demonstrates that Social Economic Status doesn't really dictate feeling about social issues.  A more up to date (2013) study covers this question (somewhat.) Political Parties and Representation of the Poor in the American States Elizabeth Rigby George Washington University ,Gerald C. Wright Indiana University  \"Materially, while there is overlap across the states in the preferences of income groups, it is also clear (see Figure 1 ) that the poor (and even the middle-income group) prefer more liberal economic policies than do those in the upper-income third. Therefore, we suspect that if the preferences of each income group were accorded equal weight, both parties' stances on economic issues would shift to the left. And accordingly, although to a smaller degree, Democratic parties' stances on social issues would shift rightward.\"  Also one can take a look at this graph from the same study http:\/\/postimg.org\/image\/71uu5uvbv\/  The only way to really get a definitive answer to your specific question would to do you own research project, although that would be incredibly difficult because you need to have valid random samples within the top 10% and bottom 10%.  Edit: While I'm sure many of the users of this sub are smarter than I, I probably shouldn't have assumed all readers could interpret the graph. It shows that people in the Low Income section tend to be more economically liberal and socially conservative, while those in the High Income section tend to be more economically conservative and socially liberal.","human_ref_B":"I would also wonder about the perceptions of the top and bottom.  Does the top perceive the bottom as more right or left on these issues, or vice versa?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2060.0,"score_ratio":4.8}
{"post_id":"11b6ig","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What do you think the top 5 (or 10) books every economist *must* read are?","c_root_id_A":"c6l16qv","c_root_id_B":"c6kyyay","created_at_utc_A":1349982709,"created_at_utc_B":1349975144,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"You mean people who *want to be* economists or people who already *are* economists?  Because I can rattle off a half-dozen popular books for aspiring undergraduate economists with ease, but it's nearly impossible to do the same for professional economists without delving into specialization.  Then there are OOFs - out-of-field books. I don't think every economist should read a book in psychology\/political science\/sociology, but doing so would be helpful for most economists by situating their research in the broader social science discussion.","human_ref_B":"I'd argue that there isn't even one single book that every economist \"must\" read.   * For textbooks, every major subject that I can think of is handled well enough by more than one book (and supplemented by lecture notes, anyway), so the choice of book isn't monumentally important. Even something like Mas-Colell, which I'd imagine nearly everyone has read at least parts of, isn't a must-read.  * For other books, there's just too much specialization to say that **every** economist **must** read so-and-so book.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7565.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"11b6ig","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What do you think the top 5 (or 10) books every economist *must* read are?","c_root_id_A":"c6l0jw0","c_root_id_B":"c6l16qv","created_at_utc_A":1349980568,"created_at_utc_B":1349982709,"score_A":5,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I think that if you are going to be an economist you need to have a basis of the classics.    Adam Smith - Wealth of Nations is an eye opening experience.  John Stuart Mill - Principals of Political Economy sets a great foundation, and you can see lots of parallels with the New Deal, and our current economic policies.   John Maynard Keynes - The End of Laissez-Faire is the beginning of current economics.  I love John Galbraith - The Great Crash 1929. You can see a lot of what caused the crash leading to the great depression.  Max Weber - The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism will give you an understanding that economy is not all math, but also has a social component that needs to be accounted for.  This gives you a good base, which is what I believe you are looking for.  If you want to understand the current economic period, then you are going to have to get an economics degree, and then find a genie in a lamp and wish for understanding.","human_ref_B":"You mean people who *want to be* economists or people who already *are* economists?  Because I can rattle off a half-dozen popular books for aspiring undergraduate economists with ease, but it's nearly impossible to do the same for professional economists without delving into specialization.  Then there are OOFs - out-of-field books. I don't think every economist should read a book in psychology\/political science\/sociology, but doing so would be helpful for most economists by situating their research in the broader social science discussion.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2141.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"11b6ig","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What do you think the top 5 (or 10) books every economist *must* read are?","c_root_id_A":"c6l7gl1","c_root_id_B":"c6l3ez9","created_at_utc_A":1350006158,"created_at_utc_B":1349990243,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Disclaimer: I'm an historian with a healthy dose of skepticism towards neoclassical economics, so take my suggestions with a grain of salt. Some economic(s) history:  Donald MacKenzie: \"An Engine, Not a Camera - How Financial Models Shape Markets\" (MIT Press 2008)  Philip Mirowski: \"Machine Dreams - Economics Becomes a Cyborg Science\" (Cambridge University Press 2000)  Kenneth Pomeranz: \"The Great Divergion - China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy\" (Princeton University Press 2000)  E.A. Wrigley: \"Energy and the English Industrial Revolution\" (Cambridge University Press 2010)  Timothy Mitchell: \"Carbon Democracy - Political Power in the Age of Oil\" (Verso 2011)  Giovanni Arrighi: \"The Long Twentieth Century - Money, Power and the Oriding of our Times\" (Verso 1994)  Joel Mokyr: \"The Enlightened Economy - Britain and the ndustrial Revolution 1700-1850\" (Penguin 2009)  and some complexity theory (e.g. Willi Semmler, Duncan Foley, Peter Flaschel, Carl Chiarella, etc.)","human_ref_B":"Verbeek put out a pretty good textbook on econometrics. SO did Greene. That is important to know, because most econometric textbooks suck.   I'd say its also really, really important to get a solid grasp of economic history. Sadly enough, universities focus on models instead of what has *actually happened* in the history of nations. For ex: I think its much handier to read about the dutch tulip bubble , than to try to find a model about bubbles. Especially since there are a lot of mainstream neo-classical types which claim that bubble's just don't occur (interesting theory). That said, for econ history, I'd recommend reading  Eric s Rienhart  Ha Joon Chang","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15915.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"11b6ig","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What do you think the top 5 (or 10) books every economist *must* read are?","c_root_id_A":"c6l21we","c_root_id_B":"c6l7gl1","created_at_utc_A":1349985590,"created_at_utc_B":1350006158,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I'm into behavioral economics. Humans are so much more than simply rational and self-interested, and any study of economics that isn't deeply involved in sociology and psychology is incomplete.  I recommend reading Predictably Irrational, or at least Freakanomics.","human_ref_B":"Disclaimer: I'm an historian with a healthy dose of skepticism towards neoclassical economics, so take my suggestions with a grain of salt. Some economic(s) history:  Donald MacKenzie: \"An Engine, Not a Camera - How Financial Models Shape Markets\" (MIT Press 2008)  Philip Mirowski: \"Machine Dreams - Economics Becomes a Cyborg Science\" (Cambridge University Press 2000)  Kenneth Pomeranz: \"The Great Divergion - China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy\" (Princeton University Press 2000)  E.A. Wrigley: \"Energy and the English Industrial Revolution\" (Cambridge University Press 2010)  Timothy Mitchell: \"Carbon Democracy - Political Power in the Age of Oil\" (Verso 2011)  Giovanni Arrighi: \"The Long Twentieth Century - Money, Power and the Oriding of our Times\" (Verso 1994)  Joel Mokyr: \"The Enlightened Economy - Britain and the ndustrial Revolution 1700-1850\" (Penguin 2009)  and some complexity theory (e.g. Willi Semmler, Duncan Foley, Peter Flaschel, Carl Chiarella, etc.)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20568.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"11b6ig","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What do you think the top 5 (or 10) books every economist *must* read are?","c_root_id_A":"c6l3ez9","c_root_id_B":"c6l21we","created_at_utc_A":1349990243,"created_at_utc_B":1349985590,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Verbeek put out a pretty good textbook on econometrics. SO did Greene. That is important to know, because most econometric textbooks suck.   I'd say its also really, really important to get a solid grasp of economic history. Sadly enough, universities focus on models instead of what has *actually happened* in the history of nations. For ex: I think its much handier to read about the dutch tulip bubble , than to try to find a model about bubbles. Especially since there are a lot of mainstream neo-classical types which claim that bubble's just don't occur (interesting theory). That said, for econ history, I'd recommend reading  Eric s Rienhart  Ha Joon Chang","human_ref_B":"I'm into behavioral economics. Humans are so much more than simply rational and self-interested, and any study of economics that isn't deeply involved in sociology and psychology is incomplete.  I recommend reading Predictably Irrational, or at least Freakanomics.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4653.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"11b6ig","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What do you think the top 5 (or 10) books every economist *must* read are?","c_root_id_A":"c6lo2j5","c_root_id_B":"c6l21we","created_at_utc_A":1350088894,"created_at_utc_B":1349985590,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The reason this thread isn't getting great responses other than the usual \"here are the classic books\" and \"here are some good pop econ books\" is that economics as a discipline really hasn't been book-based for quite a few decades, so this question doesn't get you a lot of answers that relate to modern economic work. A much more apt question would be what the top **articles** every economist should read are.  To answer that question, I'd point to the AER Top 20 that was compiled for the AER's 100th anniversary. I also think that Akerlof's market for lemons paper, Kahneman\/Tversky's original prospect theory paper, and McFadden's early discrete choice analysis are all good classics to know about.  Table 2 in this article looks like a good list, too, although I imagine that having 7 of the top 10 articles be econometrics isn't sexy to most people.","human_ref_B":"I'm into behavioral economics. Humans are so much more than simply rational and self-interested, and any study of economics that isn't deeply involved in sociology and psychology is incomplete.  I recommend reading Predictably Irrational, or at least Freakanomics.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":103304.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"11b6ig","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What do you think the top 5 (or 10) books every economist *must* read are?","c_root_id_A":"c6ld9q9","c_root_id_B":"c6l21we","created_at_utc_A":1350041415,"created_at_utc_B":1349985590,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"karl marx's \"capital vol. 1\" should be on any list.","human_ref_B":"I'm into behavioral economics. Humans are so much more than simply rational and self-interested, and any study of economics that isn't deeply involved in sociology and psychology is incomplete.  I recommend reading Predictably Irrational, or at least Freakanomics.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":55825.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"21dym3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Is there a name for this phenomenon I've noticed, where people can't accept two different things with the same name? (x-post r\/answers) I realize that title made little to no sense, so let me explain:  I seem to have noticed this new-fangled logical fallacy where people think that a cheaper, less-authentic version of something somehow ruins the more-legitimate version.  You see it a lot with pizza. Someone will say, \"ugh, dominos? Haven't you had *real* New York pizza\/Italian pizza\/Chicago pizza?\"  This argument is weird, and it incorrectly assumes 2 things:  1) That dominos is desperately trying to re-create authentic NY\/Italian\/Chicago pizza (and failing).  and  2) Because of this, dominos is now awful and can't be enjoyed.   Thing is, dominos isn't *trying* to be authentic. It's just trying to sell a different kind of food completely. But, because Italians Pizza and Dominos pizza are both called \"pizza,\" people flip out. If dominos were just called \"Tomato and Cheese bread,\" less people would probably experience this phenomenon.  And, it isn't just pizza.  You can love Dogfish Head IPA and still appreciate that budweiser maybe has it's place (as something completely different). You can be a film connoisseur and still appreciate that Michael Bay films are mindless summer blockbusters (and being a mindless summer blockbuster doesn't somehow offend other films).   And again, you can love amazing New York\/Chicago\/Italian pizza, and still know that dominos is something else completely, and still has it's own merits.  Me? I live in Taiwan and eat (IMHO) the best Chinese food in the world. When I go back to the states, I eat Panda Express. It's delicious. I don't sit around going, \"wow, I had sesame chicken in Hong Kong and... ugggghh this is *sooooooo* wrong.\" Panda Express isn't trying to be HK -- Panda Express is trying to sell delicious cheap food from a trough. I imagine if Panda Express just called itself \"Jimmy's Fried Chicken Bits w\/ Rice\" or something, people wouldn't whine about how \"inauthentic\" is it.  People automatically assume that inauthentic things are worse, when in reality, the shift was usually hugely intentional (and doesn't necessarily say anything about the quality of said product).  To me, this is a logical fallacy. Has it ever been labelled or named?","c_root_id_A":"cgcei50","c_root_id_B":"cgcbiqd","created_at_utc_A":1395846895,"created_at_utc_B":1395839202,"score_A":14,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I'd say you're interpreting your observations in a certain way. The observation (arguing over very different types of pizza) isn't necessarily about the rejection of two different things with one name.   I would interpret people saying \"Dominos is gross, real pizza is THIS!\" as an act of aesthetic taste. Bourideu writes about it in Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste (wiki: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Distinction:_A_Social_Critique_of_the_Judgment_of_Taste).  Basically he argues certain preferences of taste are also ways of establishing oneself as being from a certain social class and not from another. (i.e. Cultured peoples enjoy authentic Chinese food from here, not the working class, poor man's, Chinese food from there).  So in a way... maybe aesthetic taste is a term that can help describe what you're observing.   But to go back to your question - a term for resisting one name with two or more associated products, no idea sorry.","human_ref_B":"Semantic dispute or Semantic discord? The phrase \"*Ugh, now we're just arguing semantics!*\" comes to mind.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7693.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"21dym3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Is there a name for this phenomenon I've noticed, where people can't accept two different things with the same name? (x-post r\/answers) I realize that title made little to no sense, so let me explain:  I seem to have noticed this new-fangled logical fallacy where people think that a cheaper, less-authentic version of something somehow ruins the more-legitimate version.  You see it a lot with pizza. Someone will say, \"ugh, dominos? Haven't you had *real* New York pizza\/Italian pizza\/Chicago pizza?\"  This argument is weird, and it incorrectly assumes 2 things:  1) That dominos is desperately trying to re-create authentic NY\/Italian\/Chicago pizza (and failing).  and  2) Because of this, dominos is now awful and can't be enjoyed.   Thing is, dominos isn't *trying* to be authentic. It's just trying to sell a different kind of food completely. But, because Italians Pizza and Dominos pizza are both called \"pizza,\" people flip out. If dominos were just called \"Tomato and Cheese bread,\" less people would probably experience this phenomenon.  And, it isn't just pizza.  You can love Dogfish Head IPA and still appreciate that budweiser maybe has it's place (as something completely different). You can be a film connoisseur and still appreciate that Michael Bay films are mindless summer blockbusters (and being a mindless summer blockbuster doesn't somehow offend other films).   And again, you can love amazing New York\/Chicago\/Italian pizza, and still know that dominos is something else completely, and still has it's own merits.  Me? I live in Taiwan and eat (IMHO) the best Chinese food in the world. When I go back to the states, I eat Panda Express. It's delicious. I don't sit around going, \"wow, I had sesame chicken in Hong Kong and... ugggghh this is *sooooooo* wrong.\" Panda Express isn't trying to be HK -- Panda Express is trying to sell delicious cheap food from a trough. I imagine if Panda Express just called itself \"Jimmy's Fried Chicken Bits w\/ Rice\" or something, people wouldn't whine about how \"inauthentic\" is it.  People automatically assume that inauthentic things are worse, when in reality, the shift was usually hugely intentional (and doesn't necessarily say anything about the quality of said product).  To me, this is a logical fallacy. Has it ever been labelled or named?","c_root_id_A":"cgcei50","c_root_id_B":"cgcd5hr","created_at_utc_A":1395846895,"created_at_utc_B":1395843750,"score_A":14,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'd say you're interpreting your observations in a certain way. The observation (arguing over very different types of pizza) isn't necessarily about the rejection of two different things with one name.   I would interpret people saying \"Dominos is gross, real pizza is THIS!\" as an act of aesthetic taste. Bourideu writes about it in Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste (wiki: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Distinction:_A_Social_Critique_of_the_Judgment_of_Taste).  Basically he argues certain preferences of taste are also ways of establishing oneself as being from a certain social class and not from another. (i.e. Cultured peoples enjoy authentic Chinese food from here, not the working class, poor man's, Chinese food from there).  So in a way... maybe aesthetic taste is a term that can help describe what you're observing.   But to go back to your question - a term for resisting one name with two or more associated products, no idea sorry.","human_ref_B":"I don't know if you'll be able to get many answers that will meet the strict guidelines of this sub.  I suggest that phrased differently this would be an interesting conversation for \/r\/changemyview.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3145.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"hz7rtk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is there a word for the phenomenon where leaders want underlings to implement a program, but the underlings cannot tell the leaders that it's not working for fear of losing their jobs?","c_root_id_A":"fzi4qk0","c_root_id_B":"fzjb3ar","created_at_utc_A":1595936520,"created_at_utc_B":1595959654,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"An adopted Yes-Men culture perhaps?  https:\/\/dictionary.cambridge.org\/dictionary\/english\/yes-man","human_ref_B":"Yep, it's called a \"death march\" -- https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Death\\_march\\_(project\\_management))","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23134.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"m73204","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would you guys say the are the causes of poverty in the US?","c_root_id_A":"gr9o8vi","c_root_id_B":"gr9tztr","created_at_utc_A":1616007785,"created_at_utc_B":1616010360,"score_A":8,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"The U.S. is the richest country in the history of humankind (in aggregate), so if I had to pick one broad main reason for poverty in the U.S. it would be the the fact that wages have stagnated for decades as well as the lack of redistribution of wealth. This is one of many papers that addresses this issue.","human_ref_B":"In his 2019 review of theories of causes of poverty, David Brady distinguishes three kinds of theories: behavioral, structural and political. He proposes:  >First, **the distinction between structural and behavioral explanations hinges on the question: How much are behaviors beyond individual control and dictated by structure?** If individuals lack agency in the face of overwhelming structural changes such as economic development, structure is more important than behavior. If individuals exert great control on whether they are poor even in structurally disadvantaged contexts, behavioral explanations remain essential despite the relevance of structural factors.  >Second, **political theories can be distinguished from behavioral theories principally by asking: How much can governments moderate the behavior-poverty link?** If states can choose whether and how much a given individual characteristic, such as single motherhood, is associated with poverty, this supports political over behavioral explanations. If risks like unemployment trigger poverty regardless of the social policy and institutional context, this favors behavioral explanations over political explanations.  >Third, **political theories can be distinguished from structural theories by asking: How much can governments moderate the effects of demographic and labor market contexts?** If states cannot manage to reduce poverty in the face of deindustrialization or absent economic development, for example, structure matters more than politics. If states can accomplish low poverty regardless of economic development or demographic change, politics matter more than structure.   He leans toward favoring political theories (which makes sense considering his field of expertise). That said, as he remarks, \"sociologists often combine political and structural factors.\" I would argue that, broadly speaking, social scientists agree that the primary causes of poverty in the US (and elsewhere) are of the contextual kind (with lots of vicious cycles involved), structural and\/or political to use Brady's classification. Behavioral theories tend to be strongly discredited by research.  For an accessible primer on the role of circumstances and \"luck\" and their relationship with individual agency (e.g. \"hard work\" and \"willpower\"), see for instance the following videos:  * Poverty isn't a lack of character; it's a lack of cash (Ted Talk by Rutger Bregman)  * Is Success Luck or Hard Work? (Veritasium)  The above established, I suggest exploring the many threads in this subreddit about the topics of poverty, welfare, inequality, social and economic mobility, etc. Here is a selection of threads:  I would suggest checking older threads on the same topic of poverty, e.g.:  * what are the main Causes that keeps poor poverty impoverished places still poor?   * What does Social Science think of the concept of \"Behavioral Poverty?\"  * Could almost anyone get out of poverty if they really tried, assuming they didn't have crippling mental health or drug addiction issues?  * Is \"welfare makes people lazy\" true or false?  * I know most poor people in America are \"working poor\", but why do they remain poor?  * Is it true that half of all kids today will make less than their parents, as Andrew Yang claims?  * What are the negative effects of structural racism for working-class people who do not belong to racially discriminated groups?  ---  Brady, D. (2019). Theories of the Causes of Poverty. Annual Review of Sociology, 45, 155-175.\u200f","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2575.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"23efis","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"What are the causes of Japan's economic stagnation, and why has it lasted so long?","c_root_id_A":"cgwok7r","c_root_id_B":"cgwsj3c","created_at_utc_A":1397932164,"created_at_utc_B":1397941622,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"A quality analysis can be found here:  The Economics of Japan's Lost Decades","human_ref_B":"The real cause of Japan's stagnation isn't because of savings or a demand glut, as suggested by others in this thread. It's a ridiculous notion and simply not true.  Japan's impressive growth was caused by capital mobilization as well as growth in productivity. The thing is, there exists diminishing returns to capital at a macro level. Capital growth can only sustain economic growth for so long, until returns to capital diminish to the point where additional capital investment is not worth the interest rate. At this point, economies rely on productivity growth to sustain development. This is why economies like China have such \"impressive\" growth.   Economies can only rely on growth of input factors for so long. Japan reached a steady state in which they could no longer sustain growth with capital growth. Japan has continued productivity growth, but not enough to sustain their previous growth.  Krugman has a great article discussing this and the myth of the \"Asian miracle\" here: http:\/\/www.foreignaffairs.com\/articles\/50550\/paul-krugman\/the-myth-of-asias-miracle","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9458.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"13vuyv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"[Economics] What are the true costs of obesity to society? I hear conflicting information on this topic. I've heard arguments decrying the health burdens placed on society due to the expensive care that comes with treating heart disease (and other illnesses that have obesity as a strong risk factor). At the same time I hear that the shorter lifespans of these individuals leads to a smaller share of the >65 demographic thus saving money on medicare, social security, etc. So which is it? I suppose this question could refer to smoking as well.","c_root_id_A":"c77ngg2","c_root_id_B":"c77mpka","created_at_utc_A":1354044651,"created_at_utc_B":1354042134,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The biggest difference in public health terms is that smoking produces a very tangible negative externality (second hand smoke) that obesity does not.  Now, that aside, I think the most significant costs associated with obesity are not on the healthcare end.  I somewhat buy into the idea that something has to kill you, sooner or later.  The biggest cost to society comes from a decrease in productivity and shorter productive lifespan resulting from their poorer health.  The reaction to this is that firms are less likely to hire obese workers (whether this discrimination is conscious is debatable), but this further diminishes society's ability to tap the skills of obese individuals.  That, I believe, is the true cost.","human_ref_B":"It's hard to determine in regards to smoking.  I have seen some empirical studies showing smokers cost less to insurers, and the intuition is at least clear - they dies sooner before many of the expenses of age kick in.  But it's not entirely clear in the data.  There was a paper a few years ago addressing this... I can't remember the source at the moment.  I find it less likely to be the case for obesity.  Health costs are only part of the equation, as obesity also reduces worker productivity (sick days, e.g.). And a simple search will bring up many studies trying to estimate the cost of obesity.  I haven't found any arguing that there is a benefit in terms of lower health spending due to early death.    My guess is that lung cancer is quick and ugly, and therefore far cheaper on average than diabetes, which is long lasting and requires years of care to manage.  Perhaps if we find a way to treat lung cancer, this will change.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2517.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"13vuyv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"[Economics] What are the true costs of obesity to society? I hear conflicting information on this topic. I've heard arguments decrying the health burdens placed on society due to the expensive care that comes with treating heart disease (and other illnesses that have obesity as a strong risk factor). At the same time I hear that the shorter lifespans of these individuals leads to a smaller share of the >65 demographic thus saving money on medicare, social security, etc. So which is it? I suppose this question could refer to smoking as well.","c_root_id_A":"c77mpka","c_root_id_B":"c77qwqy","created_at_utc_A":1354042134,"created_at_utc_B":1354055825,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"It's hard to determine in regards to smoking.  I have seen some empirical studies showing smokers cost less to insurers, and the intuition is at least clear - they dies sooner before many of the expenses of age kick in.  But it's not entirely clear in the data.  There was a paper a few years ago addressing this... I can't remember the source at the moment.  I find it less likely to be the case for obesity.  Health costs are only part of the equation, as obesity also reduces worker productivity (sick days, e.g.). And a simple search will bring up many studies trying to estimate the cost of obesity.  I haven't found any arguing that there is a benefit in terms of lower health spending due to early death.    My guess is that lung cancer is quick and ugly, and therefore far cheaper on average than diabetes, which is long lasting and requires years of care to manage.  Perhaps if we find a way to treat lung cancer, this will change.","human_ref_B":"Smoking saves the US Medicare program a lot of money because people die early from lung cancer.  Hospice programs are cheaper than treatment and terminal lung cancer patients are funneled to them pretty effectively.  Obesity is a different matter.  There are a couple ways to think about it which depend on where you are sitting.  If you measure costs from the perspective of \"If all the obese people in society all of a sudden had healthy weights, how different would the economy look?\" then you have a straightforward question.  Not an easy one to answer, but a fairly simple one.  Health care costs, fuel requirements, less food needed, etc all get cheaper.  On the other hand, if you grant that people should be free to make their own decisions about how they eat and exercise, and that maybe there are unavoidably obese people as well, then you have a more difficult question.  If we let people behave as they want, then we are only worried about external costs (externalities) imposed on society by obese people.  Health care costs not paid by obese people, or higher insurance rates because obese people are pooled with non-obese people then are important.  It gets uglier and probably more subjective.    For example. type 2 diabetes is strongly associated with obesity.  But there are plenty of non-obese people with it.  A diabetic obese person could have diabetes even if they were thin.  Can you count the societal cost of their diabetes as part of obesity's impact on society?  It becomes subjective.  Bottom line, as with many things like this, people will give you the answer they like.  And they won't be wrong.  But the opposite answer could be equally correct.  It's a matter of details and definitions that never end up getting communicated.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13691.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clflwe3","c_root_id_B":"clfjwhs","created_at_utc_A":1413904799,"created_at_utc_B":1413900672,"score_A":10,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"* Growth theory: as far as I can tell, the famous Solow 1956 article doesn't have a reference section.  * Business Cycles: You have to go back substantially further. Hume's 1752 *Of Money* doesn't have an explicit reference section, though he and Cantillon more-or-less implicitly cite each other.  In economics (maybe in other fields?) there tend to be \"nodes\" or \"points of convergence\" in various subfields. Some seminal paper will be written that fans out into a literature, then a second seminal paper will be written that re-orients the literature and fans out in a new direction, etc.  Consumption theory, for example, has a \"node\" at Keynes' *General Theory*, which spawned a ton of work, then another \"node\" twenty years later with Friedman's *Theory of the Consumption Function*, then a third \"node\" twenty years after that with Hall's empirical papers.  For investment, you have *The General Theory,* then Tobin's papers in the 1960s, then Fazzari's papers in the 1980s.  For the Phillips Curve, you have Phillips' article in 1968, then Lucas' paper in 1972, then Gali's article in 1999 as your focal points.","human_ref_B":"What counts as a citation? The format for citing sources only became standardized relatively recently. Does a reference to other works in the body of the text count? If so, not even Plato is going to be your end point, as he references plenty of other authors. I have a feeling that attempting this experiment would quickly result in a feedback loop as well.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4127.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clfjwhs","c_root_id_B":"clg0ypu","created_at_utc_A":1413900672,"created_at_utc_B":1413932271,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"What counts as a citation? The format for citing sources only became standardized relatively recently. Does a reference to other works in the body of the text count? If so, not even Plato is going to be your end point, as he references plenty of other authors. I have a feeling that attempting this experiment would quickly result in a feedback loop as well.","human_ref_B":"International relations is traditionally attributed to Thucydides' account of the Peloponnesian War.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":31599.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clfpd0j","c_root_id_B":"clg0ypu","created_at_utc_A":1413911269,"created_at_utc_B":1413932271,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Vitruvius 10 books of architecture written around 15 BC.","human_ref_B":"International relations is traditionally attributed to Thucydides' account of the Peloponnesian War.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21002.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clg0ypu","c_root_id_B":"clfyudl","created_at_utc_A":1413932271,"created_at_utc_B":1413928062,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"International relations is traditionally attributed to Thucydides' account of the Peloponnesian War.","human_ref_B":"International relations: Probably *The Prince*?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4209.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clg0ypu","c_root_id_B":"clfp4pn","created_at_utc_A":1413932271,"created_at_utc_B":1413910847,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"International relations is traditionally attributed to Thucydides' account of the Peloponnesian War.","human_ref_B":"Actually for communication it's pretty clear. Before the (original) national association formed, communication was rolled into English and basically didn't exist as an independent discipline. If you're looking for the 'initial texts' of communication studies, then much of that is going to be Speech Communication Quarterly, Issue 1, Vol 1, 1915","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21424.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clfs8aw","c_root_id_B":"clfjwhs","created_at_utc_A":1413916402,"created_at_utc_B":1413900672,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Economic geography would likely go back to Marx and Smith. I guess if you follow the implicit citations \u2014\u00a0the actual influential ideas \u2014 everyone is basically going to end up at Plato though.","human_ref_B":"What counts as a citation? The format for citing sources only became standardized relatively recently. Does a reference to other works in the body of the text count? If so, not even Plato is going to be your end point, as he references plenty of other authors. I have a feeling that attempting this experiment would quickly result in a feedback loop as well.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15730.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clfpd0j","c_root_id_B":"clfs8aw","created_at_utc_A":1413911269,"created_at_utc_B":1413916402,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Vitruvius 10 books of architecture written around 15 BC.","human_ref_B":"Economic geography would likely go back to Marx and Smith. I guess if you follow the implicit citations \u2014\u00a0the actual influential ideas \u2014 everyone is basically going to end up at Plato though.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5133.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clfp4pn","c_root_id_B":"clfs8aw","created_at_utc_A":1413910847,"created_at_utc_B":1413916402,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Actually for communication it's pretty clear. Before the (original) national association formed, communication was rolled into English and basically didn't exist as an independent discipline. If you're looking for the 'initial texts' of communication studies, then much of that is going to be Speech Communication Quarterly, Issue 1, Vol 1, 1915","human_ref_B":"Economic geography would likely go back to Marx and Smith. I guess if you follow the implicit citations \u2014\u00a0the actual influential ideas \u2014 everyone is basically going to end up at Plato though.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5555.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clfp4pn","c_root_id_B":"clfpd0j","created_at_utc_A":1413910847,"created_at_utc_B":1413911269,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Actually for communication it's pretty clear. Before the (original) national association formed, communication was rolled into English and basically didn't exist as an independent discipline. If you're looking for the 'initial texts' of communication studies, then much of that is going to be Speech Communication Quarterly, Issue 1, Vol 1, 1915","human_ref_B":"Vitruvius 10 books of architecture written around 15 BC.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":422.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clfp4pn","c_root_id_B":"clfyudl","created_at_utc_A":1413910847,"created_at_utc_B":1413928062,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Actually for communication it's pretty clear. Before the (original) national association formed, communication was rolled into English and basically didn't exist as an independent discipline. If you're looking for the 'initial texts' of communication studies, then much of that is going to be Speech Communication Quarterly, Issue 1, Vol 1, 1915","human_ref_B":"International relations: Probably *The Prince*?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17215.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clgpot3","c_root_id_B":"clfp4pn","created_at_utc_A":1413998746,"created_at_utc_B":1413910847,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Hamurabi's Code.","human_ref_B":"Actually for communication it's pretty clear. Before the (original) national association formed, communication was rolled into English and basically didn't exist as an independent discipline. If you're looking for the 'initial texts' of communication studies, then much of that is going to be Speech Communication Quarterly, Issue 1, Vol 1, 1915","labels":1,"seconds_difference":87899.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2jvxmv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"If you followed the web of citations from articles in your field back as far as you could, what initial texts (which don't themselves cite anything) would you end up on?","c_root_id_A":"clgpot3","c_root_id_B":"clg2ywq","created_at_utc_A":1413998746,"created_at_utc_B":1413936353,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Hamurabi's Code.","human_ref_B":"In comparative politics, the John Stuart Mill's *System of Logic* from the 1840s is probably the foundational text. He outlines the \"method of difference\" among other things. He does cite a few people throughout the book, but the citations seem unrelated to his broader point (a lot of minutiae and thinkers who've largely been forgotten).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":62393.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"10dg30","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What evidence is there that capital gains is more important than ordinary income? One of the biggest reasons capital gains is taxed at 15% is that investments need to be incentivized. Is there good data that shows this? Is it truly better than ordinary income?","c_root_id_A":"c6cnyrw","c_root_id_B":"c6colap","created_at_utc_A":1348494073,"created_at_utc_B":1348497265,"score_A":6,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"In theory, the point of the different tax rate on capital gains is that it moves investments\/savings from debt to equity investments. It is a way to decrease leverage in the marketplace since it makes equity sources of capital relatively cheaper. This is thought to increase savings in the short-run and increase returns from investment in the long run.   As someone above mentioned, it is also a way to make the taxation fairer since you will be closer to taxing the real income instead of the nominal income from the investment, the only problem with that is that most economies went from taxing capital gains at 75% (meaning 1 dollar of capital gains income = 75 cents of labour income) down to 50%. So if this was the 1980s that would hold. But at the much lower level of taxation or said another way, with the much larger tax credit, the likely explanation is that it is to move money from bonds to stocks. Meaning that the investors have more of a say in the riskiness of the business.   In reality, it is likely that none of the above actually happens and it just represents a way for some people to earn more after tax income. Here is one paper suggesting that.  http:\/\/www.fas.org\/sgp\/crs\/misc\/R40411.pdf","human_ref_B":">Is there good data that shows this?  No there is not. Neoclassical theory predicts that taxing investment will have very strong, undesirable long-run effects on capital accumulation, because investments pay off many times over the years. So a small decrease in investment today can mean a large decrease in output down the road. But people are starting to think that that theory isn't really the way the world works. There's a good discussion of the capital gains tax in this paper by some very famous economists, in which they explain what's wrong with the theory that says taxing capital is a bad idea.  The more policy-relevant finding on the CG tax rate concerns income-shifting from earnings income to capital income, see e.g. this paper by Austan Goolsbee on stock options. If a lot of realized capital gains are earnings disguised as investment, then the relative taxation of capital gains vs. income shrinks the income tax base and broadens the CG tax base without affecting real investment much. Which is why many tax economists favor increasing the CG tax. My impression is that the macro people are worried about the effect this will have on investment because of what theory says, but until there is a single shred of evidence that the CG tax really affects investment I'm skeptical.  Edit: Also there's a very good explanation of the CG tax done by the tax policy center here  Second edit: Below I posted a couple papers that directly study the effect of CG taxation on investment and find small effects. They're the best papers on the topic I know of, and are also cited in the Tax Policy Center brief above.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3192.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"10dg30","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What evidence is there that capital gains is more important than ordinary income? One of the biggest reasons capital gains is taxed at 15% is that investments need to be incentivized. Is there good data that shows this? Is it truly better than ordinary income?","c_root_id_A":"c6colap","c_root_id_B":"c6cismd","created_at_utc_A":1348497265,"created_at_utc_B":1348455947,"score_A":11,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":">Is there good data that shows this?  No there is not. Neoclassical theory predicts that taxing investment will have very strong, undesirable long-run effects on capital accumulation, because investments pay off many times over the years. So a small decrease in investment today can mean a large decrease in output down the road. But people are starting to think that that theory isn't really the way the world works. There's a good discussion of the capital gains tax in this paper by some very famous economists, in which they explain what's wrong with the theory that says taxing capital is a bad idea.  The more policy-relevant finding on the CG tax rate concerns income-shifting from earnings income to capital income, see e.g. this paper by Austan Goolsbee on stock options. If a lot of realized capital gains are earnings disguised as investment, then the relative taxation of capital gains vs. income shrinks the income tax base and broadens the CG tax base without affecting real investment much. Which is why many tax economists favor increasing the CG tax. My impression is that the macro people are worried about the effect this will have on investment because of what theory says, but until there is a single shred of evidence that the CG tax really affects investment I'm skeptical.  Edit: Also there's a very good explanation of the CG tax done by the tax policy center here  Second edit: Below I posted a couple papers that directly study the effect of CG taxation on investment and find small effects. They're the best papers on the topic I know of, and are also cited in the Tax Policy Center brief above.","human_ref_B":"it is generally better for the economy if people invest their savings back into it rather then hiding cash in their mattress. You may have heard of the money multiplier effect, well it relies on both consumption and investment to create next level spending whereas savings does this to a much lesser degree*.  Also, the money used to purchase the investment was already taxed once as income so taxes on the cashing out of these investments amounts to a second tax on the original income. What you call new income is really a rate of return commiserate with the risk of the investment. From the perspective of the saver\/investor there is minimal difference between the low risk return in a savings account and the substantially higher risk and return accrued from equities.  *Fractional reserve banking allows savings in bank accounts to be loaned back into the economy as well.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":41318.0,"score_ratio":1.5714285714}
{"post_id":"wffc2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Does (mild) inflation really hurt lenders more than borrowers?  And what are the implications for average citizens? I've been told by a number of professors and economists that inflation hurts lenders more than borrowers?  Is this really the case, and if so, why?  Also, can mild inflation (between %10-15) actually be a positive force in anyway, what are some, not readily apparent,positive consequences of inflation?","c_root_id_A":"c5d1fn0","c_root_id_B":"c5cwib2","created_at_utc_A":1342113333,"created_at_utc_B":1342086850,"score_A":8,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Inflation only \"hurts\" one party in a borrower-lender relationship if it was unanticipated.  A simple example. Suppose we live in a magic world where there is never any inflation, positive or negative (negative inflation is often referred to as deflation). This means that the value of money in terms of goods is constant: at two distinct points in time, a fixed quantity of money can be used to buy the same number of goods or services. If we had positive inflation, this wouldn't be the case: the same quantity of money would buy fewer goods at the later time than at the earlier one.  Now, suppose you want to lend me $100 for one year, and we agree on an interest rate of 5%, so that one year from now, I will repay you $105.  Since the value of money in terms of goods is constant, 5% is the \"real interest rate\" here. That is, if the lending and repayment were both to occur using goods instead of money, I would have to repay you with 5% more goods than you originally lent to me. This is an important concept: as borrowers and lenders, we don't care directly about how many dollars are lent or repaid. We care only about what we can *buy* with those dollars. The real interest rate is then the interest rate measured in terms of what we really care about.  Okay, now consider the same loan--$100 at a 5% desired real interest rate--but in a world where we expect inflation over the next year to equal 2%.  If we keep the same loan terms as in the no-inflation world, I'm repaying you $105, but because of the 2% inflation, the expected value of that repayment in terms of actual goods is $103 (measured in today's dollars). In other words, the expected real interest rate would only be 3% instead of the 5% that we would like.  What to do about this? The answer is fairly obvious: charge 7% on the loan instead of 5%. In this case, the money value of the repayment a year from now will be $107, but because of inflation, it is expected to buy $105 worth of goods, so that the expected real interest rate is back to 5%. Yippee!  Okay, now suppose that, even though we expected inflation to be 2%, and thus set the nominal interest rate on the loan at 7%, our inflation forecast turned out to be wrong. In particular, suppose actual inflation turned out to be 3%. In this case, I pay you $107, but because of inflation, it's actually only worth $104 in real terms. In this case, the actual real interest rate turns out to be 4%.  This lower real interest rate is great for me as a borrower, but bad for you as the lender. This is what people are referring to when they say inflation hurts lenders.  Again, though, notice that only the *unanticipated* component of inflation (equal to 3% - 2% = 1%) hurt you, the lender. The anticipated component (2%) was built into the interest rate in the first place, so it doesn't affect either of us negatively.  Note also that if actual inflation came in instead at 1%, the unanticipated component of inflation would equal 1% - 2% = -1%. In this case, the actual real interest rate would end up being 6%, which hurts the *borrower* instead of the lender.  This principle is embodied in the famous expectations-augmented Fisher equation.","human_ref_B":"Here's a good post.  >  So inflation steals your money, right? Well, sure. BUT, wait a second. What if you have a mortgage? Suppose you already bought a house, but you haven't paid off your mortgage yet. You have debt! What happens to this debt when inflation happens? Does it go up? Nope! Just like your bank account, it stays the same:  > Your mortgage debt: $160k --> $160k  > Now remember, your salary went up when inflation happened. So now, it takes you much less work to pay off your mortgage:  > Your mortgage debt: 4 years of your salary --> 2 years of your salary","labels":1,"seconds_difference":26483.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"wffc2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Does (mild) inflation really hurt lenders more than borrowers?  And what are the implications for average citizens? I've been told by a number of professors and economists that inflation hurts lenders more than borrowers?  Is this really the case, and if so, why?  Also, can mild inflation (between %10-15) actually be a positive force in anyway, what are some, not readily apparent,positive consequences of inflation?","c_root_id_A":"c5cwpmi","c_root_id_B":"c5d1fn0","created_at_utc_A":1342089262,"created_at_utc_B":1342113333,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"One generally positive consequence of inflation is that it boosts the incentive for businesses or other holders of cash to invest rather than horde cash. In an economic such as the US is right now, where companies have plenty of liquidity but are unwilling to invest due to a lack of demand, higher inflation levels could lead them to increase investment.","human_ref_B":"Inflation only \"hurts\" one party in a borrower-lender relationship if it was unanticipated.  A simple example. Suppose we live in a magic world where there is never any inflation, positive or negative (negative inflation is often referred to as deflation). This means that the value of money in terms of goods is constant: at two distinct points in time, a fixed quantity of money can be used to buy the same number of goods or services. If we had positive inflation, this wouldn't be the case: the same quantity of money would buy fewer goods at the later time than at the earlier one.  Now, suppose you want to lend me $100 for one year, and we agree on an interest rate of 5%, so that one year from now, I will repay you $105.  Since the value of money in terms of goods is constant, 5% is the \"real interest rate\" here. That is, if the lending and repayment were both to occur using goods instead of money, I would have to repay you with 5% more goods than you originally lent to me. This is an important concept: as borrowers and lenders, we don't care directly about how many dollars are lent or repaid. We care only about what we can *buy* with those dollars. The real interest rate is then the interest rate measured in terms of what we really care about.  Okay, now consider the same loan--$100 at a 5% desired real interest rate--but in a world where we expect inflation over the next year to equal 2%.  If we keep the same loan terms as in the no-inflation world, I'm repaying you $105, but because of the 2% inflation, the expected value of that repayment in terms of actual goods is $103 (measured in today's dollars). In other words, the expected real interest rate would only be 3% instead of the 5% that we would like.  What to do about this? The answer is fairly obvious: charge 7% on the loan instead of 5%. In this case, the money value of the repayment a year from now will be $107, but because of inflation, it is expected to buy $105 worth of goods, so that the expected real interest rate is back to 5%. Yippee!  Okay, now suppose that, even though we expected inflation to be 2%, and thus set the nominal interest rate on the loan at 7%, our inflation forecast turned out to be wrong. In particular, suppose actual inflation turned out to be 3%. In this case, I pay you $107, but because of inflation, it's actually only worth $104 in real terms. In this case, the actual real interest rate turns out to be 4%.  This lower real interest rate is great for me as a borrower, but bad for you as the lender. This is what people are referring to when they say inflation hurts lenders.  Again, though, notice that only the *unanticipated* component of inflation (equal to 3% - 2% = 1%) hurt you, the lender. The anticipated component (2%) was built into the interest rate in the first place, so it doesn't affect either of us negatively.  Note also that if actual inflation came in instead at 1%, the unanticipated component of inflation would equal 1% - 2% = -1%. In this case, the actual real interest rate would end up being 6%, which hurts the *borrower* instead of the lender.  This principle is embodied in the famous expectations-augmented Fisher equation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24071.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"ao4yyo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is there any research on the benefits (to employer or employee) of offering paid internships as opposed to unpaid?","c_root_id_A":"efz01za","c_root_id_B":"efz8dce","created_at_utc_A":1549573693,"created_at_utc_B":1549579443,"score_A":6,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Are you asking out of curiosity, or are you asking for citations with a specific intent in mind (i.e., a certain paper). Because the question seems pretty broad in the way it can be examined:  - Macroeconomic papers concerning national benefits of  (multiplier effect) versus free labor - Microconomic papers concerning student debt and the effects unpaid work has on debt servicing - Psychological papers concerning the stress of being in a financially precarious position - Sociological papers concerning the depressive effects on wages (expectation to work unpaid as a norm), and the depressive effects on education (increasing the financial burdens of entering that career field, possibly pushing out poorer entrants) - Political papers concerning the inclination towards corrupt rent-seeking for un(der)paid employees","human_ref_B":"Short answer: For the interns, no question getting paid has better long term outcomes. Particularly because if a company actually values an interns labour, they will help that intern down the road. Free labour is generally thought of as 'cheap' and that the company is doing them a favour. Companies that use free labour devalue all the work in the company, and it correlates to other problems in the workplace.   Long answer: Check out this amazing book! http:\/\/www.rossperlin.com\/intern-nation","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5750.0,"score_ratio":3.1666666667}
{"post_id":"ao4yyo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is there any research on the benefits (to employer or employee) of offering paid internships as opposed to unpaid?","c_root_id_A":"efz39o0","c_root_id_B":"efz8dce","created_at_utc_A":1549575862,"created_at_utc_B":1549579443,"score_A":5,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Here is some outcomes research on internships (paid and unpaid) and factors associated with them. https:\/\/www.naceweb.org\/job-market\/internships\/nace-center-current-research\/","human_ref_B":"Short answer: For the interns, no question getting paid has better long term outcomes. Particularly because if a company actually values an interns labour, they will help that intern down the road. Free labour is generally thought of as 'cheap' and that the company is doing them a favour. Companies that use free labour devalue all the work in the company, and it correlates to other problems in the workplace.   Long answer: Check out this amazing book! http:\/\/www.rossperlin.com\/intern-nation","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3581.0,"score_ratio":3.8}
{"post_id":"8pmolt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"The book \"Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids\" claims that income depends strongly on your genes and only weakly on who raised you. Is there research that against this hypothesis? The book cited many adoptive studies. The writer made the argument that all of the studies that he found suggest that for an adopted child, there is essentially no impact on future earnings based on the school district, and future income is only weakly dependent on parental earnings.  Given the literature that says that income is highly hereditary, would the two sets of research essentially conclude that high income is essentially genetic?","c_root_id_A":"e0cwrtw","c_root_id_B":"e0cxc4z","created_at_utc_A":1528503888,"created_at_utc_B":1528504543,"score_A":7,"score_B":44,"human_ref_A":"There's a lot of opinions but very little data going against. The vast majority of large-scale research into environmental influences fails to control for heredity, e.g. studies showing parents who read to kids often produce better developed and successful children (was it genes for language skills and emotional intimacy, or the action itself?).  Parents can have negative influences on children through abuse and privation, the literature on that is uncontroversial, however there is also a clear genetic component affecting outcomes in those cases.  However, if you read Harris's 1995 paper that sparked the style of thinking that likely produced the book you mention, she notes that a huge amount of environmental influences are simply unaccounted for. Consider birth order effects within families. Who's to say that we should expect all first-borns to have a similar familial environment due to their position? What if the first-born in one family ends up playing a similar social role in the family dynamic to that of a third-party in another family, they would have environmental effects shaping their development (hypothetically), but no statistical pattern would arise from unpredictable patterns like these, if the social roles of siblings vary enough between families. All it requires is that most siblings don't share similar roles in the family dynamic.  Also consider the unreasonable effectiveness of family therapy for treating various mental health issues. Studies into family therapy show improvements in various domains of mental health, however every study of specific mechanisms for these effects has failed to establish any replicable factors which would provide evidence for a pathway for family therapy's positive impact. It works, by all appearances, but we have no statistical evidence explaining why that would be the case, only theoretical and anecdotal. Alan Carr has a few papers on this issue specifically, and a few books generally on family therapy.  It's possible that there are environmental factors that are so noisy and dynamic that a pattern in the data is impossible under current paradigms (once-off paper survey research is prominent). Big data and the advent of extensive personal data collection could change this (e.g. comparing Facebook usage statistics within and between families, for example). Or easier longtudinal research through extensive online surveying.","human_ref_B":"The book \u201cInequality by Design: Cracking the Bell Curve Myth\u201d (1996) by Claude Fischer et al presents a large body of research to refute this. It\u2019s a direct response to Charles Murray\u2019s book.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":655.0,"score_ratio":6.2857142857}
{"post_id":"dm5ris","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"If someone knows many LGBT people, are they more likely to have more favorable views toward nontraditional gender roles? If someone knows many LGBT people, are they more likely to have more favorable views toward nontraditional gender roles?   It seems intuitive, but I'm wondering if it has been studied specifically.   (Specifically the gender career implicit association test, not the Gender Role Beliefs Scale.)","c_root_id_A":"f4ypm5d","c_root_id_B":"f4yvo45","created_at_utc_A":1571882128,"created_at_utc_B":1571886473,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I think it may depend on what you mean by \"nontraditional gender roles\" (not to mention the can of worms inherent in defining \"gender\" itself). I'm not sure it tracks exactly that any given member of the lgbt+ community should obviously have nontraditional views on, e.g. which gender should do hard labour. It seems just as likely that attitudes would be shaped more strongly as a product of birth year or geographic location.  Certainly it is the case that more *people* are embodying nontraditional genders (one source of many), and by extension nontraditional gender roles, for themselves if not demonstrably\/statistically for others.","human_ref_B":"I saw this thread on \/r\/socialpsychology first, but here is my comment from there. :)  > Interesting question! I don't think there is any research that has used the gender-career IAT to look at attitudes towards the LGBT community and non-tradition gender roles in particular, but there are a couple things I have found that could point towards something in the absence of that! Mainly, I think Intergroup Contact Theory (Pettigrew, 1998) would be useful here as it explains how exposure to outgroups can affect attitudes. >  > Fingerhut (2011) studied the predictors for outgroup allies' (heterosexuals) behaviors towards supporting the LGBT community. They found that heterosexuals who are friends with out-group members who are women and who are more educated were more likely to take action on behalf of the LGBT community (i.e., attending a gay rights event, donating time to organizations promoting LGBT rights, donating money to these organizations, signing a petition to legalize same-sex marriage, participating in discussions promoting LGBT rights, and initiating discussions promoting LGBT rights.) >  > The part that is more relevant to your question is that participants who reported having LGBT friends were significantly more likely to engage in allied behavior than those who didn't report having LGBT friends. >  > Obviously, this gets more at explicit attitudes rather than the implicit as these are overt behaviors that presumably reflect the attitude. But, Dasgupta and Rivera (2008) looked at how the social context can influence implicit and explicit attitudes. Although they stated that \"previous research contact research has shown that conscious [explicit] attitudes change in response to having outgroup members as friends,\" they found in their study that brief media contact and prolonged interpersonal contact also reduced implicit bias against stigmatized outgroups (in this case, gays and lesbians.) >  > So from this brief search and using Intergroup Contact Theory, it seems there are some findings that would suggest that a heterosexual who supports LGBT rights, has LGBT friends, and has frequent contact with those friends (and \"media contact\") would tend to hold more favorable views towards non-traditional\/non-binary gender roles. >  > However, I was unable to find any research on LGBT attitudes towards other LGBT community members. I looked to see if even there were any studies on people who reported being gay or lesbians' attitudes towards other gays or lesbians, but didn't see anything either.  I enjoyed reading all the other posts in this thread here, I'm glad it's a bit more active!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4345.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"111kxz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"How much of our gender is socially\/culturally constructed opposed to biologically determined? I've been reading a lot about gender recently and one of the things that I've found hardest to establish is just how much of our personal genders are socially constructed or biologically determined as there seems to be a lot of contradicting points of view between the different scientific fields. With people in the social sciences, leaning more towards a predominantly sociological basis for gender and biologists leaning more towards the other direction. Part of this is the whole debate regarding gender essentialism, the belief that there are uniquely feminine and uniquely masculine essences which exist independently of cultural conditioning.  I guess this all boils down to the classic 'nature vs nurture' debate. Also just to be clear, I mean 'gender' opposed to 'sex'.","c_root_id_A":"c6ijq7y","c_root_id_B":"c6ii0hh","created_at_utc_A":1349547529,"created_at_utc_B":1349539189,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I highly recommend giving \"Myths Of Gender: Biological Theories About Women And Men\" by Anne Fausto-Sterling (Professor of Biology and Gender Studies at Brown University) a read!   She has a very interesting example of the interaction between behavior and biology (and it's been a while, so forgive me if I don't remember this correctly). Take our s-shaped spine, that has to be an evolutionary adaptation for walking upright? Tuns out, if a baby goat looses it's front legs it starts hopping around on it's back leg. And it gets an S-shaped spine.   Genes\/behavior\/environment\/culture bound inexorably together. Systems theory and all that jazz.   http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Myths-Of-Gender-Biological-Theories\/dp\/0465047920","human_ref_B":"Define \"gender\".","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8340.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"111kxz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"How much of our gender is socially\/culturally constructed opposed to biologically determined? I've been reading a lot about gender recently and one of the things that I've found hardest to establish is just how much of our personal genders are socially constructed or biologically determined as there seems to be a lot of contradicting points of view between the different scientific fields. With people in the social sciences, leaning more towards a predominantly sociological basis for gender and biologists leaning more towards the other direction. Part of this is the whole debate regarding gender essentialism, the belief that there are uniquely feminine and uniquely masculine essences which exist independently of cultural conditioning.  I guess this all boils down to the classic 'nature vs nurture' debate. Also just to be clear, I mean 'gender' opposed to 'sex'.","c_root_id_A":"c6iierl","c_root_id_B":"c6ijq7y","created_at_utc_A":1349541210,"created_at_utc_B":1349547529,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Sounds interesting, I think I understand you question but I'm not sure. So for clarification's sake, you are asking is how dependent gender is on sexual dimorphism?  Or hypothetically speaking, if humans were asexual (or maybe all simultaneous hermaphrodites) to what degree would genders still exist?","human_ref_B":"I highly recommend giving \"Myths Of Gender: Biological Theories About Women And Men\" by Anne Fausto-Sterling (Professor of Biology and Gender Studies at Brown University) a read!   She has a very interesting example of the interaction between behavior and biology (and it's been a while, so forgive me if I don't remember this correctly). Take our s-shaped spine, that has to be an evolutionary adaptation for walking upright? Tuns out, if a baby goat looses it's front legs it starts hopping around on it's back leg. And it gets an S-shaped spine.   Genes\/behavior\/environment\/culture bound inexorably together. Systems theory and all that jazz.   http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Myths-Of-Gender-Biological-Theories\/dp\/0465047920","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6319.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"12536q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"How much of bullying is natural vs. being socially constructed?  I posted my answer in this thread but I'd prefer to get some more expert opinions as I may be wrong. Basically I feel that although bullying may be influenced to a degree by biological\/environmental factors it is mostly a social construct, I don't have anything to back this up however.","c_root_id_A":"c6sdrpg","c_root_id_B":"c6sbm4k","created_at_utc_A":1351309089,"created_at_utc_B":1351297570,"score_A":11,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It's a natural behavior that social sophistication has complicated. In lesser mammals, social status can be easily determined by play fighting and aggressive displays. Violence and ostracism are rare in nature.  Ostracism is almost the norm in humans. This is because the social skills that determine status are difficult to learn, and people who don't know them are easily identified and ostracized, preventing them from learning. The people with social skills are vicariously embarrassed watching them be awkward, and want to prevent this feeling by either avoiding them or telling them how bad they look.  The reason why they choose to communicate this negatively is because if they offered to educate one of these lonely people in a friendly way, the lonely person would overreact, come on too strong, and cling to them. The victim is partially to blame because they have lost the trust of their peers not to react awkwardly to constructive criticism.  The reason why including these incompetent people as friends is unacceptable is that socially adept, intelligent people are most productive socializing with equals. Including everybody drags down society. That's why we have subreddits. Do you agree that cloistering ourselves away from counterproductive influences is a positive form of ostracism?","human_ref_B":"The problem with your question is that all human interaction is social construction.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11519.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"12536q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"How much of bullying is natural vs. being socially constructed?  I posted my answer in this thread but I'd prefer to get some more expert opinions as I may be wrong. Basically I feel that although bullying may be influenced to a degree by biological\/environmental factors it is mostly a social construct, I don't have anything to back this up however.","c_root_id_A":"c6sbm4k","c_root_id_B":"c6se1o9","created_at_utc_A":1351297570,"created_at_utc_B":1351310592,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"The problem with your question is that all human interaction is social construction.","human_ref_B":"I've taught and lived in several different countries, and although bullying always exists, in some cultures it is far more prevalent and accepted. Korea, with its focus on Confucian hierarchy, has bullying and hurting others as intrinsic cultural values that show dominance. A person in a position of authority (husband, parent, teacher, elder, and especially boss) is expected to demean those below them, shift blame to them, and maintain low-level harassment in order to maintain assertiveness, all the while being immune from criticism themselves- and many enjoy it. Most Korean people admit to hating this but accept it as part of their culture. Of course, Korea also has a towering suicide rate.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13022.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"12536q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"How much of bullying is natural vs. being socially constructed?  I posted my answer in this thread but I'd prefer to get some more expert opinions as I may be wrong. Basically I feel that although bullying may be influenced to a degree by biological\/environmental factors it is mostly a social construct, I don't have anything to back this up however.","c_root_id_A":"c6sbm4k","c_root_id_B":"c6sim5u","created_at_utc_A":1351297570,"created_at_utc_B":1351352091,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The problem with your question is that all human interaction is social construction.","human_ref_B":"humans beings are *naturally social*... so the nature vs. nurture debate is not truly an accurate one, for both concepts permeate each other: as long as we have humans bodies, the genetic predisposition - which, by the way, is a socially constructed concept, traceable through time and space - obviously exists, but it is not deterministic, being played out differently, according to social and cultural contexts.   in the specific case of bullying, these genetic factors like cognitive deficits, irritability or hyperactivity, seem to be *conditioned* by:   demographic and socioeconomic conditions   parental discipline styles and parental stress   family cultural backgroung   peer behavior at school   absenteeism   or even by the \"quality\" of the neighborhood.   try checking The Development of Aggressive Behavior in Children and Young People, or The Nature and Extent of Bullying in School, for some discussion on this.   moreover, bullying also varies from school to school within the same city: it would be rather a coincidence that all the genetic bullies would randomly end up in the same schools.    and the purely genetic argument wouldn't also be able to account for the fact that \u00abIt was found that undergraduate females experienced more emotional bullying  perpetrated by females (46.67%) and males experienced more physical bullying perpetrated by males (13.79%). These were both statistically significant\u00bb.   finally, reinforcing the social side of the debate even further, we can also see that bullying assumes different shapes and forms, existing for example outside academic contexts like business organizations.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":54521.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"27c2uo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How is Masculinity a social construct? Is it? Femininity is a very commonly discussed topic, but is there any consideration on how masculinity is also socially constructed? What are the beliefs? If masculinity is a construct,how are men indoctrinated and socialized? I'm just interested in a thorough answer on this topic, or some sources.","c_root_id_A":"chzmj2q","c_root_id_B":"chziz1z","created_at_utc_A":1401949122,"created_at_utc_B":1401938438,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Not to hijack, but what is the relationship of *sexual dimorphism* and *gender* if we are to consider the latter a \"social construct\"?","human_ref_B":"There are a few journals that cover this topic exclusively, the area of study is usually called masculinities or masculine studies. I had saved some fun papers on it but my computer is busted ATM so I can't cite them. Google scholar should be useful though.   I think one of the clearest examples on the constructivist nature of our conception of masculinity is the practice of bodybuilding. Men involved in those activities are not only building a sense of personal capital (physical strength), but they are creating a new identity for themselves more in line with their idealized self-concept of the ultimate man.   Here's a paper that says all that more articulately. http:\/\/www.csub.edu\/~cgavin\/GST153\/schexbldtheor.pdf","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10684.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"27c2uo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How is Masculinity a social construct? Is it? Femininity is a very commonly discussed topic, but is there any consideration on how masculinity is also socially constructed? What are the beliefs? If masculinity is a construct,how are men indoctrinated and socialized? I'm just interested in a thorough answer on this topic, or some sources.","c_root_id_A":"chzmpw4","c_root_id_B":"chziz1z","created_at_utc_A":1401949839,"created_at_utc_B":1401938438,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Many great answers here. I thought I'd add an interesting reference from economics, discussing a potential mechanism for how gender roles could have very indirect biological roots. Alesina and coauthors show that societies that practiced plough agriculture long ago tend to have less gender equality, in terms of labor market participation, political participation, entrepreneurial activity, and attitudes.   This is due to plough cultivation requiring a lot of upper body strength but fewer people working, in contrast to shifting cultivation, which is done with hand tools but requires more people. Since upper body strength is one of the few areas where there are significant biological differences (on average) between men and women, plough cultivation resulted in women participating less in farm work.   This idea is originally due to Ester Boserup (Woman\u2019s Role in Economic Development, 1970), but Alesina et al contribute by establishing this fact empirically, as well as establishing a causal relation by using the fact that plough cultivation is more suitable in certain geo-climatic condition than in others.   I think this study is fascinating because it tells us that large gender differences persist today due to historical differences which have long ceased to be relevant. This is certainly another piece of evidence showing that gender roles are, to a large extent, cultural.","human_ref_B":"There are a few journals that cover this topic exclusively, the area of study is usually called masculinities or masculine studies. I had saved some fun papers on it but my computer is busted ATM so I can't cite them. Google scholar should be useful though.   I think one of the clearest examples on the constructivist nature of our conception of masculinity is the practice of bodybuilding. Men involved in those activities are not only building a sense of personal capital (physical strength), but they are creating a new identity for themselves more in line with their idealized self-concept of the ultimate man.   Here's a paper that says all that more articulately. http:\/\/www.csub.edu\/~cgavin\/GST153\/schexbldtheor.pdf","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11401.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1402mx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"I keep hearing the US health care system is crazy, and this country's healthcare system makes no sense, and so on and so forth. So what are the countries that have good health care systems? The question pretty much says it all. I'm looking to hear of examples of countries whose healthcare system seems to be reasonably functional, not perfect, but functional and reasonably stable. If you could go ahead and explain how it works that would be very much appreciated as well.","c_root_id_A":"c78pavn","c_root_id_B":"c78s8a3","created_at_utc_A":1354215578,"created_at_utc_B":1354224844,"score_A":15,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"In the UK [NHS healthcare] if I was to have an accident, say I fracture my skull, I would be taken to hospital where I would be taken in and seen to (Scans, drugs, probably at least 3\/4 days stay in a dorm like room unless a single one is available which is normally just by chance if you get one).  This would all cost nothing, well like said in other answers, it is covered through taxes.  Where this sort of healthcare can be a problem is for long term problems, as the waiting lists can be very large and you may be waiting months for surgery\/see a specialist and so on.  However, there is private healthcare in which you pay additionally for where you can get seen to much quicker.  In regards to A&E problems it is possible to get reimbursed money per night that you stayed in an NHS hospital, depending on your private healthcare agreement.","human_ref_B":"The German health care system might not be the best in the world, but here's how it works: There is a public health insurance (where ~85% of the population are enrolled) and private health insurances (for rich people, self employees etc.). Every employee is REQUIRED to have health insurances and pays 15.5% of their salary towards health insurance. If you loose your job, you keep the health insurance. Also, children and spouses are insured with you. There's only about 0.1% of the population who don't have any health insurance.  If you go to the doctor in Germany, you have to pay 10 Euros per visit (this is to prevent people from overusing the system), and EVERYTHING ELSE IS PAID FOR. That means people get preventative care and treatments for minor issues without having to worry about paying anything more than the 10 Euros. If you have an accident or cancer or any other major health issue, it will be treated with anything that is necessary without you having to worry about the cost.  I moved to the United States and have what is here considered a very good insurance plan. Everytime I go to the doctor here for things like removing a mole, filling a dental cavity etc, I have to pay hundreds of dollars in co-pay. I read about people who get cancer or have an accident and they and their families are financially ruined for the rest of their lifes, even if they have insurance. It is infuriating.. what is the point of having insurance if it doesn't pay for your health costs? I don't know why people in the US are so opposed to a public, non-profit insurance system but it seems to be the best way to me.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9266.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"1402mx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"I keep hearing the US health care system is crazy, and this country's healthcare system makes no sense, and so on and so forth. So what are the countries that have good health care systems? The question pretty much says it all. I'm looking to hear of examples of countries whose healthcare system seems to be reasonably functional, not perfect, but functional and reasonably stable. If you could go ahead and explain how it works that would be very much appreciated as well.","c_root_id_A":"c78nk6y","c_root_id_B":"c78s8a3","created_at_utc_A":1354210075,"created_at_utc_B":1354224844,"score_A":5,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"Singapore is said to have one of the best systems in the world: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Healthcare_in_Singapore","human_ref_B":"The German health care system might not be the best in the world, but here's how it works: There is a public health insurance (where ~85% of the population are enrolled) and private health insurances (for rich people, self employees etc.). Every employee is REQUIRED to have health insurances and pays 15.5% of their salary towards health insurance. If you loose your job, you keep the health insurance. Also, children and spouses are insured with you. There's only about 0.1% of the population who don't have any health insurance.  If you go to the doctor in Germany, you have to pay 10 Euros per visit (this is to prevent people from overusing the system), and EVERYTHING ELSE IS PAID FOR. That means people get preventative care and treatments for minor issues without having to worry about paying anything more than the 10 Euros. If you have an accident or cancer or any other major health issue, it will be treated with anything that is necessary without you having to worry about the cost.  I moved to the United States and have what is here considered a very good insurance plan. Everytime I go to the doctor here for things like removing a mole, filling a dental cavity etc, I have to pay hundreds of dollars in co-pay. I read about people who get cancer or have an accident and they and their families are financially ruined for the rest of their lifes, even if they have insurance. It is infuriating.. what is the point of having insurance if it doesn't pay for your health costs? I don't know why people in the US are so opposed to a public, non-profit insurance system but it seems to be the best way to me.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14769.0,"score_ratio":4.2}
{"post_id":"1402mx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"I keep hearing the US health care system is crazy, and this country's healthcare system makes no sense, and so on and so forth. So what are the countries that have good health care systems? The question pretty much says it all. I'm looking to hear of examples of countries whose healthcare system seems to be reasonably functional, not perfect, but functional and reasonably stable. If you could go ahead and explain how it works that would be very much appreciated as well.","c_root_id_A":"c78pfa0","c_root_id_B":"c78s8a3","created_at_utc_A":1354215970,"created_at_utc_B":1354224844,"score_A":8,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"I've always heard France is always rated at or near the top.  France's healthcare system","human_ref_B":"The German health care system might not be the best in the world, but here's how it works: There is a public health insurance (where ~85% of the population are enrolled) and private health insurances (for rich people, self employees etc.). Every employee is REQUIRED to have health insurances and pays 15.5% of their salary towards health insurance. If you loose your job, you keep the health insurance. Also, children and spouses are insured with you. There's only about 0.1% of the population who don't have any health insurance.  If you go to the doctor in Germany, you have to pay 10 Euros per visit (this is to prevent people from overusing the system), and EVERYTHING ELSE IS PAID FOR. That means people get preventative care and treatments for minor issues without having to worry about paying anything more than the 10 Euros. If you have an accident or cancer or any other major health issue, it will be treated with anything that is necessary without you having to worry about the cost.  I moved to the United States and have what is here considered a very good insurance plan. Everytime I go to the doctor here for things like removing a mole, filling a dental cavity etc, I have to pay hundreds of dollars in co-pay. I read about people who get cancer or have an accident and they and their families are financially ruined for the rest of their lifes, even if they have insurance. It is infuriating.. what is the point of having insurance if it doesn't pay for your health costs? I don't know why people in the US are so opposed to a public, non-profit insurance system but it seems to be the best way to me.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8874.0,"score_ratio":2.625}
{"post_id":"1402mx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"I keep hearing the US health care system is crazy, and this country's healthcare system makes no sense, and so on and so forth. So what are the countries that have good health care systems? The question pretty much says it all. I'm looking to hear of examples of countries whose healthcare system seems to be reasonably functional, not perfect, but functional and reasonably stable. If you could go ahead and explain how it works that would be very much appreciated as well.","c_root_id_A":"c78s8a3","c_root_id_B":"c78q8gi","created_at_utc_A":1354224844,"created_at_utc_B":1354218527,"score_A":21,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"The German health care system might not be the best in the world, but here's how it works: There is a public health insurance (where ~85% of the population are enrolled) and private health insurances (for rich people, self employees etc.). Every employee is REQUIRED to have health insurances and pays 15.5% of their salary towards health insurance. If you loose your job, you keep the health insurance. Also, children and spouses are insured with you. There's only about 0.1% of the population who don't have any health insurance.  If you go to the doctor in Germany, you have to pay 10 Euros per visit (this is to prevent people from overusing the system), and EVERYTHING ELSE IS PAID FOR. That means people get preventative care and treatments for minor issues without having to worry about paying anything more than the 10 Euros. If you have an accident or cancer or any other major health issue, it will be treated with anything that is necessary without you having to worry about the cost.  I moved to the United States and have what is here considered a very good insurance plan. Everytime I go to the doctor here for things like removing a mole, filling a dental cavity etc, I have to pay hundreds of dollars in co-pay. I read about people who get cancer or have an accident and they and their families are financially ruined for the rest of their lifes, even if they have insurance. It is infuriating.. what is the point of having insurance if it doesn't pay for your health costs? I don't know why people in the US are so opposed to a public, non-profit insurance system but it seems to be the best way to me.","human_ref_B":"I think some statistics are in order. You cannot measure the effectiveness of a country's health care system without also knowing the expenditures of each country on the particular subject. This is a nice article that gives a good picture of it all. There is also an interactive map that can give you a pretty handy overview of it all. As a general rule, the countries using the most money on health care obviously has the better health care system than most other countries, but as seen with the United States, this is definitely not the case.   Health care spending worldwide  I give other people the task of rating each individual country's health care system, but I'll leave this article, which is also a nice starting spot in the search for the best health care system:  The 36 best health care systems in the world  Keep in mind though, that the numbers this article uses are from 2000 and HEAVILY disputed and criticized, which is why WHO hasn't done another of these studies. It's not entirely accurate, but gives a good idea of what the individual countries do.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6317.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1402mx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"I keep hearing the US health care system is crazy, and this country's healthcare system makes no sense, and so on and so forth. So what are the countries that have good health care systems? The question pretty much says it all. I'm looking to hear of examples of countries whose healthcare system seems to be reasonably functional, not perfect, but functional and reasonably stable. If you could go ahead and explain how it works that would be very much appreciated as well.","c_root_id_A":"c78pavn","c_root_id_B":"c78nk6y","created_at_utc_A":1354215578,"created_at_utc_B":1354210075,"score_A":15,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"In the UK [NHS healthcare] if I was to have an accident, say I fracture my skull, I would be taken to hospital where I would be taken in and seen to (Scans, drugs, probably at least 3\/4 days stay in a dorm like room unless a single one is available which is normally just by chance if you get one).  This would all cost nothing, well like said in other answers, it is covered through taxes.  Where this sort of healthcare can be a problem is for long term problems, as the waiting lists can be very large and you may be waiting months for surgery\/see a specialist and so on.  However, there is private healthcare in which you pay additionally for where you can get seen to much quicker.  In regards to A&E problems it is possible to get reimbursed money per night that you stayed in an NHS hospital, depending on your private healthcare agreement.","human_ref_B":"Singapore is said to have one of the best systems in the world: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Healthcare_in_Singapore","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5503.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1402mx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"I keep hearing the US health care system is crazy, and this country's healthcare system makes no sense, and so on and so forth. So what are the countries that have good health care systems? The question pretty much says it all. I'm looking to hear of examples of countries whose healthcare system seems to be reasonably functional, not perfect, but functional and reasonably stable. If you could go ahead and explain how it works that would be very much appreciated as well.","c_root_id_A":"c78pfa0","c_root_id_B":"c78nk6y","created_at_utc_A":1354215970,"created_at_utc_B":1354210075,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I've always heard France is always rated at or near the top.  France's healthcare system","human_ref_B":"Singapore is said to have one of the best systems in the world: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Healthcare_in_Singapore","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5895.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"1402mx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"I keep hearing the US health care system is crazy, and this country's healthcare system makes no sense, and so on and so forth. So what are the countries that have good health care systems? The question pretty much says it all. I'm looking to hear of examples of countries whose healthcare system seems to be reasonably functional, not perfect, but functional and reasonably stable. If you could go ahead and explain how it works that would be very much appreciated as well.","c_root_id_A":"c78q8gi","c_root_id_B":"c78nk6y","created_at_utc_A":1354218527,"created_at_utc_B":1354210075,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I think some statistics are in order. You cannot measure the effectiveness of a country's health care system without also knowing the expenditures of each country on the particular subject. This is a nice article that gives a good picture of it all. There is also an interactive map that can give you a pretty handy overview of it all. As a general rule, the countries using the most money on health care obviously has the better health care system than most other countries, but as seen with the United States, this is definitely not the case.   Health care spending worldwide  I give other people the task of rating each individual country's health care system, but I'll leave this article, which is also a nice starting spot in the search for the best health care system:  The 36 best health care systems in the world  Keep in mind though, that the numbers this article uses are from 2000 and HEAVILY disputed and criticized, which is why WHO hasn't done another of these studies. It's not entirely accurate, but gives a good idea of what the individual countries do.","human_ref_B":"Singapore is said to have one of the best systems in the world: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Healthcare_in_Singapore","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8452.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"mrox4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I keep hearing Americans pays twice as much for healthcare, but has a terrible healthcare system. How accurate is that? A friend of mine broke her arm in a particularly awful way and without insurance it would've cost her 30,000 dollars. That does seem like a ridiculous price to pay; the same as a college education.  If that is an accurate statement, why is it so expensive?","c_root_id_A":"c33bi9h","c_root_id_B":"c33cmmi","created_at_utc_A":1322461969,"created_at_utc_B":1322477047,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would check out this data published by the OECD here. It spans 50 years and gives a very nice picture of spending and outcomes in the 30 richest countries. As to why we spend so much more and get so little is a much more difficult question to answer, and I am not really qualified to do so. I know there are various issues regarding incentives in the health care system, but its late and I'm feeling lazy.","human_ref_B":"Twice as much is perhaps an exaggeration, but the US does spend more than any other country on health care (per capita):  http:\/\/www.nationmaster.com\/graph\/hea_exp_per_cap_cur_us-expenditure-per-capita-current-us  While the US is ranked 22 in life expectancy:   http:\/\/www.nationmaster.com\/graph\/hea_lif_exp_hea_yea-health-life-expectancy-healthy-years  The US also has the 34th (UN) or 46th (CIA) worst infant mortality rate (either number is pathetic): http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/List_of_countries_by_infant_mortality_rate","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15078.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"mrox4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"I keep hearing Americans pays twice as much for healthcare, but has a terrible healthcare system. How accurate is that? A friend of mine broke her arm in a particularly awful way and without insurance it would've cost her 30,000 dollars. That does seem like a ridiculous price to pay; the same as a college education.  If that is an accurate statement, why is it so expensive?","c_root_id_A":"c33bi9h","c_root_id_B":"c33d6ik","created_at_utc_A":1322461969,"created_at_utc_B":1322487089,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I would check out this data published by the OECD here. It spans 50 years and gives a very nice picture of spending and outcomes in the 30 richest countries. As to why we spend so much more and get so little is a much more difficult question to answer, and I am not really qualified to do so. I know there are various issues regarding incentives in the health care system, but its late and I'm feeling lazy.","human_ref_B":"The USA has the finest health care money can buy.    If you can afford it, that is. An example: as far as anyone knows, Magic Johnson has had HIV for 20 years without it developing into full-blown AIDS. I somehow doubt the same would be true of a middle-class US American diagnosed at the same time.  Or, for that matter, a Canadian, Brit, etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25120.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"22y3x7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is suicide resulting from existential crises an actual, observed phenomenon, or does it just occur in popular culture? Existential philosophers have often talked about existentialism as the alternative\/conclusion of those who go through the namesake crisis but do not to commit suicide.  Camus' Myth of Sisyphus is basically a book devoted entirely to this idea.    I was wondering if, among those that commit suicide, sudden realization of the ultimate pointlessness of life is an actual cause for killing one's self.    I'm fascinated by the psychology of suicide.","c_root_id_A":"cgrmv6r","c_root_id_B":"cgrmxp8","created_at_utc_A":1397431260,"created_at_utc_B":1397431433,"score_A":3,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"With sufficient conceptual elaboration, it seems difficult to differentiate the conclusions one can arrive at in cases of clinical depression from existential crisis. . .","human_ref_B":"I wish I could give more detailed studies, unfortunately I'm on my phone.  But according to the general statistics you can easily find on sites like the National Institute of Mental Health, and Suicide Prevention sites, it's generally agreed that about 90% of suicides are due to depression, mental disorder, or substance abuse.  Those who suffer from chronic pain or insomnia help fill out most of the remaining 10%.  Suicide is also considered \"contagious\", in that the more incidents of suicide there are at a given time, the more likely it is for someone contemplating suicide to follow through.  Personally, I've never considered philosophical positions to be instigators of anything, but rather symptoms of  beliefs\/mentalities\/ideologies that the person already had, either due to past experiences, trauma, or biological factors.  Same goes for the concept of an \"existential crisis\" - if such a thing really exists, it exists only as a rationalization by someone already suffering from either depression, substance abuse, or at best marginalization due to cultural factors.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":173.0,"score_ratio":7.6666666667}
{"post_id":"22y3x7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is suicide resulting from existential crises an actual, observed phenomenon, or does it just occur in popular culture? Existential philosophers have often talked about existentialism as the alternative\/conclusion of those who go through the namesake crisis but do not to commit suicide.  Camus' Myth of Sisyphus is basically a book devoted entirely to this idea.    I was wondering if, among those that commit suicide, sudden realization of the ultimate pointlessness of life is an actual cause for killing one's self.    I'm fascinated by the psychology of suicide.","c_root_id_A":"cgrmxp8","c_root_id_B":"cgrl0cq","created_at_utc_A":1397431433,"created_at_utc_B":1397426707,"score_A":23,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I wish I could give more detailed studies, unfortunately I'm on my phone.  But according to the general statistics you can easily find on sites like the National Institute of Mental Health, and Suicide Prevention sites, it's generally agreed that about 90% of suicides are due to depression, mental disorder, or substance abuse.  Those who suffer from chronic pain or insomnia help fill out most of the remaining 10%.  Suicide is also considered \"contagious\", in that the more incidents of suicide there are at a given time, the more likely it is for someone contemplating suicide to follow through.  Personally, I've never considered philosophical positions to be instigators of anything, but rather symptoms of  beliefs\/mentalities\/ideologies that the person already had, either due to past experiences, trauma, or biological factors.  Same goes for the concept of an \"existential crisis\" - if such a thing really exists, it exists only as a rationalization by someone already suffering from either depression, substance abuse, or at best marginalization due to cultural factors.","human_ref_B":"Sorry, I don't have the answer, but I do have a followup.  If it is an observed phenomenon, how prevalent is it compared to \"typical\" cases where the subject is depressed or stressed out?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4726.0,"score_ratio":11.5}
{"post_id":"22y3x7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is suicide resulting from existential crises an actual, observed phenomenon, or does it just occur in popular culture? Existential philosophers have often talked about existentialism as the alternative\/conclusion of those who go through the namesake crisis but do not to commit suicide.  Camus' Myth of Sisyphus is basically a book devoted entirely to this idea.    I was wondering if, among those that commit suicide, sudden realization of the ultimate pointlessness of life is an actual cause for killing one's self.    I'm fascinated by the psychology of suicide.","c_root_id_A":"cgrl0cq","c_root_id_B":"cgrmv6r","created_at_utc_A":1397426707,"created_at_utc_B":1397431260,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Sorry, I don't have the answer, but I do have a followup.  If it is an observed phenomenon, how prevalent is it compared to \"typical\" cases where the subject is depressed or stressed out?","human_ref_B":"With sufficient conceptual elaboration, it seems difficult to differentiate the conclusions one can arrive at in cases of clinical depression from existential crisis. . .","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4553.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"22y3x7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is suicide resulting from existential crises an actual, observed phenomenon, or does it just occur in popular culture? Existential philosophers have often talked about existentialism as the alternative\/conclusion of those who go through the namesake crisis but do not to commit suicide.  Camus' Myth of Sisyphus is basically a book devoted entirely to this idea.    I was wondering if, among those that commit suicide, sudden realization of the ultimate pointlessness of life is an actual cause for killing one's self.    I'm fascinated by the psychology of suicide.","c_root_id_A":"cgrl0cq","c_root_id_B":"cgrulwz","created_at_utc_A":1397426707,"created_at_utc_B":1397449582,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Sorry, I don't have the answer, but I do have a followup.  If it is an observed phenomenon, how prevalent is it compared to \"typical\" cases where the subject is depressed or stressed out?","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Anomie  This is what I immediately thought of.   \" The nineteenth century\u00a0French\u00a0pioneer\u00a0sociologist\u00c9mile Durkheim borrowed the word from French philosopher\u00a0Jean-Marie Guyau\u00a0and used it in his influential book\u00a0Suicide\u00a0(1897), outlining the\u00a0social(and not individual) causes of\u00a0suicide, characterized by a rapid change of the standards or values of societies (often erroneously referred to as normlessness),[7]\u00a0and an associated feeling ofalienation\u00a0and purposelessness. He believed thatanomie\u00a0is common when the surrounding society has undergone significant changes in its economic fortunes, whether for better or for worse and, more generally, when there is a significant discrepancy between the ideological theories and values commonly professed and what was actually achievable in everyday life. This was contrary to previous theories on suicide which generally maintained that suicide was precipitated by negative events in a person's life and their subsequent\u00a0depression.\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22875.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"22y3x7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is suicide resulting from existential crises an actual, observed phenomenon, or does it just occur in popular culture? Existential philosophers have often talked about existentialism as the alternative\/conclusion of those who go through the namesake crisis but do not to commit suicide.  Camus' Myth of Sisyphus is basically a book devoted entirely to this idea.    I was wondering if, among those that commit suicide, sudden realization of the ultimate pointlessness of life is an actual cause for killing one's self.    I'm fascinated by the psychology of suicide.","c_root_id_A":"cgrxbvd","c_root_id_B":"cgrl0cq","created_at_utc_A":1397458850,"created_at_utc_B":1397426707,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"A classical sociologist, \u00c9mile Durkheim, wrote a founding book on suicide. It's referred to often in undergraduate courses on how a 'sociologist' should view social problems. His writings on suicide have been long critiqued, and perhaps don't hold up as well as he would've liked, but it's decent food for thought.  Durkheim noticed a few things in researching suicides in the late 1800s:  * Protestants committed suicide way more than Catholics, Jews and Anglicans  * In countries with majority Catholics, there were substantially lower rate of suicides. Same applies to Anglicans and Jews  * In countries where the population is mixed with Protestants\/Catholics, the rates of suicides for both groups remain constant  * During economic downturns, suicide rates went up  * More interestingly, during economic upturns when people are doing well, suicide rates went up as well  It's difficult to ascertain whether he had the theory or the data first, but his eventual thesis went something like this:  > Protestants kill themselves more often because their mechanisms of social integration, the church, is weaker than other religions (you know, the \"spirit of free inquiry,\" Luther's reformation, fewer links to the past and clergy). Therefore, people committed what Durkheim called, '**egoistic suicide**': Too little integration with his fellow human being  Further,  > People kill themselves during times of economic booms and crises in almost equal measure. This is counter-intuitive, as one would think that having increased material wealth would be good for the psyche. However, Durkheim argues that due to people seeing their situation as having no future because life could give them everything, but they are left empty inside. To Durkheim, because there is no limit on life, there is no moral regulation. When you kill yourself because you're morally empty\/conflicted. This is called **anomic suicide**.  There are also opposites of too little integration or moral regulation. If you're severely integrated, and you commit suicide because that's best for your group - think kamikazee - and you can't think too much for yourself, that's called **altruistic suicide**. Meanwhile, if you have too much moral regulation and you can't fit into it, you may suffer **fatalistic suicide**  **So to your point about *ultimate pointlessness of life*, Durkheim would say that is a key condition of anomic suicide**  As a veteran with PTSD and brushing close to suicide myself, I'm not completely bought by the idea of Integration vs Morality. A lot of fellow sociologists disagree with me on this, but I am more convinced that while wide-swaths of social events like war may make people more prone to suicide\/PTSD, the real underlying cause is chemically-based. Chemically based on that one has experienced life that the brain is wired to act in a certain way.   Further, like recent research on shyness and introverted-ness where we're realizing that it has benefits to the group and to the individual, depression may serve a functional 'problem' for society. Depression and its cousin, skepticism and negativity, find ways to see how things may not work. Abraham Lincoln, who went into frequent crying spells because of depression, may have used that kind of contemplativeness to create the moral argument for the Civil War.   So yes, you're not the first to think of what you're thinking, but it's always an interesting thing to consider.","human_ref_B":"Sorry, I don't have the answer, but I do have a followup.  If it is an observed phenomenon, how prevalent is it compared to \"typical\" cases where the subject is depressed or stressed out?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":32143.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"15jlaz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"How would coordinated asteroid mining affect the world's economy? Let's say several eccentric capitalists, (maybe 100 years down the line), are talking with some astronomers one day over coffee. They say they've found a large asteroid filled with many times the amount of precious metals that have ever been mined on Earth. Hearing this, the capitalists decide to fund a private mission to capture it and bring it carefully down to Earth, where it can be mined and studied. Let's leave the practicality of such and event out of the discussion.  Assuming the economy hasn't changed too much from the current status quo, what would a sudden, massive influx of precious metals, in quantities dwarfing what we've obtained so far on Earth, do to the world economy? For your sake, assume whatever metal is prevalent to your answer is found in abundance in the operation.","c_root_id_A":"c7n3556","c_root_id_B":"c7n1nk2","created_at_utc_A":1356661329,"created_at_utc_B":1356655166,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"> Let's leave the practicality of such and event out of the discussion.  It's hard to do that, really.  Precious metals or no, for asteroid mining to be profitable would require either extraordinarily cheap space travel (cheap fusion power, antimatter propulsion, space elevators, something in that vein) or an incredible inflation in the price of metals on Earth, and either one of those changes would alter the world's economy to the point of unrecognizability even before talking about the asteroid.  That being said, assuming it *could* happen, the obvious result is that the price of said metals plummets rapidly.  For an example of that, see Spain after the conquest - they brought over so much gold from the New World that it caused rampant inflation and eventually ruined Spain's economy.[1]  Of course, *because* it's so obvious, our capitalists would probably sit on their mineral wealth and distribute it relatively slowly to keep the price up, causing as little change in the economy as possible - and for an example of *that*, you can look at the modern diamond cartels.  [1]  Gold in that period, though, was only used for trade and conspicuous consumption; in the modern era, precious metals are valuable for their industrial uses as well.  It's possible that a massive influx of unobtanium could have a ripple effect on technology - if element X is suddenly cheap enough to use in mass quantities, experimenting and making neat things out of it becomes cost-effective - but I don't know enough about technology and rare elements to discuss that.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Planetary_Resources","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6163.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2sdyl1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Where do students who have graduated in Political Science or International Relations get jobs?","c_root_id_A":"cnom217","c_root_id_B":"cnops2e","created_at_utc_A":1421239495,"created_at_utc_B":1421248998,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I have a friends that is doing his phd in international relations specifically focusing on North Korea. He's worked at UN before. I think most people with those degrees find something at UN, UNICEF, WHO, Global fund, and other big international organizations. I think you can also find government positions","human_ref_B":"Political science is a very broad field, you can take it in many directions.   Broadly:  Executive Branch (State, DOD, IC, Justice, etc)  Congress  State and local government  Peace Corps\/AmeriCorps\/TFA (not a career, but it's a job)  Consulting firms  Non-profits  Media  Think tanks  This assumes they find jobs related to their degree. I know many people who graduated with a PoliSci degree who are now selling insurance, working at a bank or whatever. A lot of people also went to law or grad school.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9503.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2sdyl1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Where do students who have graduated in Political Science or International Relations get jobs?","c_root_id_A":"cnow0ne","c_root_id_B":"cnom217","created_at_utc_A":1421259526,"created_at_utc_B":1421239495,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I fix computers for a living.  Tunaman  Georgia State University  Poli Sci, Class of '95","human_ref_B":"I have a friends that is doing his phd in international relations specifically focusing on North Korea. He's worked at UN before. I think most people with those degrees find something at UN, UNICEF, WHO, Global fund, and other big international organizations. I think you can also find government positions","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20031.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2sdyl1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Where do students who have graduated in Political Science or International Relations get jobs?","c_root_id_A":"cnosx7l","c_root_id_B":"cnow0ne","created_at_utc_A":1421254545,"created_at_utc_B":1421259526,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I got a job at City Hall","human_ref_B":"I fix computers for a living.  Tunaman  Georgia State University  Poli Sci, Class of '95","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4981.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"20cgrp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What's your favorite example of how simple economic models often fail to predict economic trends? What about particularly interesting examples of the reverse?","c_root_id_A":"cg1wa29","c_root_id_B":"cg216yv","created_at_utc_A":1394744490,"created_at_utc_B":1394755076,"score_A":9,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"Can you provide an example for context?  Higher prices sometimes increases the demand for a good if prices act as a signal of quality.","human_ref_B":"There's the case cited in Freakonomics, where a fine on arriving late to a daycare to pick up children resulted in an increase in the tardiness of parents. Gneezy and Rustichini 2000  Arguably, the model didn't fail, the application did. Essentially, by instituting the price for late pick up, they informed parents that it was a more common practice than they may have otherwise realized and reduced the feeling of social taboo associated with being late to pick up their child. This violated the \"other things being equal\" provision of the model's prediction.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10586.0,"score_ratio":3.1111111111}
{"post_id":"20cgrp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What's your favorite example of how simple economic models often fail to predict economic trends? What about particularly interesting examples of the reverse?","c_root_id_A":"cg25vup","c_root_id_B":"cg2annb","created_at_utc_A":1394766071,"created_at_utc_B":1394781310,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Many models will assume that changes in nominal wage or prices (eg. you get paid twice as much, but everything costs double) will have no effect on individuals' behaviours, when this is very wrong in reality.  The more recent classes in macroeconomics I have been taking do assume imperfect information (or irrational worker behaviour), though to explain these.","human_ref_B":"Simple and simplistic application of the Quantity Theory of Money would lead one to think that tripling the monetary base in 2008 would lead to hyperinflation.  Recognizing that *the SRAS isn't vertical* and distinguishing monetary impulses from monetary responses to other shocks, would lead one to the more mundane conclusion that no, we wouldn't experience hyperinflation.  Some otherwise respectable and eminent economists made the former mistake.  The reverse:  * Supply and demand really is a pretty good way at taking a first pass at analyzing most markets * AS-AD is not a bad basic model for understanding economic fluctuations * Solow's model really does capture a lot of what was going on in East Asia during the 80s and 90s. * The Mundell-Fleming model really is a good way to analyze international macro, and is possibly better than newfangled international DSGE models * What we teach our freshmen really isn't that bad of a base of knowledge. That's why we teach it to freshmen: it works 85% of the time. If you want to know about the other 15%, take more economics. If you want to argue endlessly about the 15%, get a PhD.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15239.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc653qf","c_root_id_B":"dc653qe","created_at_utc_A":1483909964,"created_at_utc_B":1483909964,"score_A":12,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA in psychology and anthropology (double major) MA in Social Psychology PhD in Social Psychology Certificate in quantitative research methods  MPH Post-Doc in cancer prevention and control  Tons of job searching in academia, nonprofits, industry and government over 2 years at the end of my PhD and in my last year of post-doc. About 100 applications total, 6 interviews, 3 offers.   Currently work in a government regulatory setting on social science issues related to tobacco","human_ref_B":"BA in psychology and anthropology (double major) MA in Social Psychology PhD in Social Psychology Certificate in quantitative research methods  MPH Post-Doc in cancer prevention and control  Tons of job searching in academia, nonprofits, industry and government over 2 years at the end of my PhD and in my last year of post-doc. About 100 applications total, 6 interviews, 3 offers.   Currently work in a government regulatory setting on social science issues related to tobacco","labels":1,"seconds_difference":0.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc653qe","c_root_id_B":"dc66anf","created_at_utc_A":1483909964,"created_at_utc_B":1483911466,"score_A":2,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"BA in psychology and anthropology (double major) MA in Social Psychology PhD in Social Psychology Certificate in quantitative research methods  MPH Post-Doc in cancer prevention and control  Tons of job searching in academia, nonprofits, industry and government over 2 years at the end of my PhD and in my last year of post-doc. About 100 applications total, 6 interviews, 3 offers.   Currently work in a government regulatory setting on social science issues related to tobacco","human_ref_B":"Though this question violates rules 1 and 2 (it's not really answerable with social science), we do periodically get these career questions and let them stay up. I'll let this one stay up because we haven't had one in a while. (Person who reported all these answers, we as mods really appreciate when subscribers report bad answers so thank you! It makes our job easier.)  I'll tell you that **we have a wiki that contains a lot of useful information**. Look especially at the Neal Caren link in the \"General\" section.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1502.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc6mbkq","c_root_id_B":"dc68e83","created_at_utc_A":1483931740,"created_at_utc_B":1483914045,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"B.S. in Sociology and M.A in Applied Sociology.  I do data analysis for a university and teach adjunct.  I started working in databases as a student worker when I was pursuing my undergrad.  Worked on grants after I graduated.  Did not enjoy the heavily secretarial work.  When I started my Masters I did data analysis and survey work for one of the departments on campus that worked with retention data.  Had a brief stint in community activism after I graduated and disliked it...it was exhausting.  So, back I went to what I did well:  data wrangling.","human_ref_B":"Mostly lurking so far but I have a MA in political science with a strong focus on quantitative analysis. I work as a consultant in private research company where I primarily do data science related things.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17695.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc68e83","c_root_id_B":"dc68cvq","created_at_utc_A":1483914045,"created_at_utc_B":1483913998,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Mostly lurking so far but I have a MA in political science with a strong focus on quantitative analysis. I work as a consultant in private research company where I primarily do data science related things.","human_ref_B":"Follow up question if anyone has any advice on what to do during ones gap year. I've got a B.S. in psych and am currently working as a data scientist. But it's honestly not a great fit. I use regression occasionally, but mostly it's just been descriptive statistics. I want a job where I can actually use my knowledge of psychology for something.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":47.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc68e83","c_root_id_B":"dc653qe","created_at_utc_A":1483914045,"created_at_utc_B":1483909964,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Mostly lurking so far but I have a MA in political science with a strong focus on quantitative analysis. I work as a consultant in private research company where I primarily do data science related things.","human_ref_B":"BA in psychology and anthropology (double major) MA in Social Psychology PhD in Social Psychology Certificate in quantitative research methods  MPH Post-Doc in cancer prevention and control  Tons of job searching in academia, nonprofits, industry and government over 2 years at the end of my PhD and in my last year of post-doc. About 100 applications total, 6 interviews, 3 offers.   Currently work in a government regulatory setting on social science issues related to tobacco","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4081.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc6mbkq","c_root_id_B":"dc68cvq","created_at_utc_A":1483931740,"created_at_utc_B":1483913998,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"B.S. in Sociology and M.A in Applied Sociology.  I do data analysis for a university and teach adjunct.  I started working in databases as a student worker when I was pursuing my undergrad.  Worked on grants after I graduated.  Did not enjoy the heavily secretarial work.  When I started my Masters I did data analysis and survey work for one of the departments on campus that worked with retention data.  Had a brief stint in community activism after I graduated and disliked it...it was exhausting.  So, back I went to what I did well:  data wrangling.","human_ref_B":"Follow up question if anyone has any advice on what to do during ones gap year. I've got a B.S. in psych and am currently working as a data scientist. But it's honestly not a great fit. I use regression occasionally, but mostly it's just been descriptive statistics. I want a job where I can actually use my knowledge of psychology for something.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17742.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc6crca","c_root_id_B":"dc6mbkq","created_at_utc_A":1483919204,"created_at_utc_B":1483931740,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure if it counts, but it does incorporate (relaxed) experimental research. I just got my BA in psych and a minor in Social Science and I'm currently doing User Experience research and design for a major technology company.","human_ref_B":"B.S. in Sociology and M.A in Applied Sociology.  I do data analysis for a university and teach adjunct.  I started working in databases as a student worker when I was pursuing my undergrad.  Worked on grants after I graduated.  Did not enjoy the heavily secretarial work.  When I started my Masters I did data analysis and survey work for one of the departments on campus that worked with retention data.  Had a brief stint in community activism after I graduated and disliked it...it was exhausting.  So, back I went to what I did well:  data wrangling.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12536.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc6mbkq","c_root_id_B":"dc6f5ly","created_at_utc_A":1483931740,"created_at_utc_B":1483922031,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"B.S. in Sociology and M.A in Applied Sociology.  I do data analysis for a university and teach adjunct.  I started working in databases as a student worker when I was pursuing my undergrad.  Worked on grants after I graduated.  Did not enjoy the heavily secretarial work.  When I started my Masters I did data analysis and survey work for one of the departments on campus that worked with retention data.  Had a brief stint in community activism after I graduated and disliked it...it was exhausting.  So, back I went to what I did well:  data wrangling.","human_ref_B":"I work in a natural gas pipeline project. We employ quite a few sociologists. They go ahead of construction to inform the towns whose farmland the pipeline will go through (we purchased the land, but around it are their crops). They then liase between the locals and the project management about whatever issues they might have with construction. I'm sure they do more, but this is what i know.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9709.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc6mbkq","c_root_id_B":"dc6jkzu","created_at_utc_A":1483931740,"created_at_utc_B":1483927819,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"B.S. in Sociology and M.A in Applied Sociology.  I do data analysis for a university and teach adjunct.  I started working in databases as a student worker when I was pursuing my undergrad.  Worked on grants after I graduated.  Did not enjoy the heavily secretarial work.  When I started my Masters I did data analysis and survey work for one of the departments on campus that worked with retention data.  Had a brief stint in community activism after I graduated and disliked it...it was exhausting.  So, back I went to what I did well:  data wrangling.","human_ref_B":"BSc in Psychology, currently in Mexico working as a field research assistant studying Howler Monkeys. It took a year of applications to finally get accepted onto a project (and a year of working in retail to pay towards it) plus it is unpaid, but it will be essential to eventually be accepted onto a PhD course in Comparative Psychology.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3921.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc6mbkq","c_root_id_B":"dc653qe","created_at_utc_A":1483931740,"created_at_utc_B":1483909964,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"B.S. in Sociology and M.A in Applied Sociology.  I do data analysis for a university and teach adjunct.  I started working in databases as a student worker when I was pursuing my undergrad.  Worked on grants after I graduated.  Did not enjoy the heavily secretarial work.  When I started my Masters I did data analysis and survey work for one of the departments on campus that worked with retention data.  Had a brief stint in community activism after I graduated and disliked it...it was exhausting.  So, back I went to what I did well:  data wrangling.","human_ref_B":"BA in psychology and anthropology (double major) MA in Social Psychology PhD in Social Psychology Certificate in quantitative research methods  MPH Post-Doc in cancer prevention and control  Tons of job searching in academia, nonprofits, industry and government over 2 years at the end of my PhD and in my last year of post-doc. About 100 applications total, 6 interviews, 3 offers.   Currently work in a government regulatory setting on social science issues related to tobacco","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21776.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc68cvq","c_root_id_B":"dc653qe","created_at_utc_A":1483913998,"created_at_utc_B":1483909964,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Follow up question if anyone has any advice on what to do during ones gap year. I've got a B.S. in psych and am currently working as a data scientist. But it's honestly not a great fit. I use regression occasionally, but mostly it's just been descriptive statistics. I want a job where I can actually use my knowledge of psychology for something.","human_ref_B":"BA in psychology and anthropology (double major) MA in Social Psychology PhD in Social Psychology Certificate in quantitative research methods  MPH Post-Doc in cancer prevention and control  Tons of job searching in academia, nonprofits, industry and government over 2 years at the end of my PhD and in my last year of post-doc. About 100 applications total, 6 interviews, 3 offers.   Currently work in a government regulatory setting on social science issues related to tobacco","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4034.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc653qe","c_root_id_B":"dc6crca","created_at_utc_A":1483909964,"created_at_utc_B":1483919204,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"BA in psychology and anthropology (double major) MA in Social Psychology PhD in Social Psychology Certificate in quantitative research methods  MPH Post-Doc in cancer prevention and control  Tons of job searching in academia, nonprofits, industry and government over 2 years at the end of my PhD and in my last year of post-doc. About 100 applications total, 6 interviews, 3 offers.   Currently work in a government regulatory setting on social science issues related to tobacco","human_ref_B":"I'm not sure if it counts, but it does incorporate (relaxed) experimental research. I just got my BA in psych and a minor in Social Science and I'm currently doing User Experience research and design for a major technology company.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9240.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc653qe","c_root_id_B":"dc6f5ly","created_at_utc_A":1483909964,"created_at_utc_B":1483922031,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"BA in psychology and anthropology (double major) MA in Social Psychology PhD in Social Psychology Certificate in quantitative research methods  MPH Post-Doc in cancer prevention and control  Tons of job searching in academia, nonprofits, industry and government over 2 years at the end of my PhD and in my last year of post-doc. About 100 applications total, 6 interviews, 3 offers.   Currently work in a government regulatory setting on social science issues related to tobacco","human_ref_B":"I work in a natural gas pipeline project. We employ quite a few sociologists. They go ahead of construction to inform the towns whose farmland the pipeline will go through (we purchased the land, but around it are their crops). They then liase between the locals and the project management about whatever issues they might have with construction. I'm sure they do more, but this is what i know.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12067.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc653qe","c_root_id_B":"dc6jkzu","created_at_utc_A":1483909964,"created_at_utc_B":1483927819,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"BA in psychology and anthropology (double major) MA in Social Psychology PhD in Social Psychology Certificate in quantitative research methods  MPH Post-Doc in cancer prevention and control  Tons of job searching in academia, nonprofits, industry and government over 2 years at the end of my PhD and in my last year of post-doc. About 100 applications total, 6 interviews, 3 offers.   Currently work in a government regulatory setting on social science issues related to tobacco","human_ref_B":"BSc in Psychology, currently in Mexico working as a field research assistant studying Howler Monkeys. It took a year of applications to finally get accepted onto a project (and a year of working in retail to pay towards it) plus it is unpaid, but it will be essential to eventually be accepted onto a PhD course in Comparative Psychology.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17855.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5msuvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What area of social science do you work in? How did you get to that job\/position? Hello - read the sidebar and I hope this is OK to post! It didn't seem to fit well in r\/sociology.  I am wondering if you work in the social sciences, how did you get into your position? What schooling did you go through, what kind of job searching?  I have a BS in Sociology and currently work in Human Resources. While I enjoy what I do, I am curious about what else is available to me. My college professors all said there are so many things you can do with a sociology degree, but I'm having a hard time connecting the dots between my education and real life work!","c_root_id_A":"dc70n6d","c_root_id_B":"dc653qe","created_at_utc_A":1483964071,"created_at_utc_B":1483909964,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I have an anthropology BS and Advertising MA with potential plans to go on to PhD. I work in commercial semiotics at a \"innovation consultancy\" that is based in Finland, giving them a US context to their deliverables - they also have an NYC office.  If you are interested in marketing, consulting, or systems thinking, get in touch - there is a ton of resources out there for high paying, private sector work - EPICpeople.org is a good place to start.  I've also just been appointed a new blog - from National Practice of Anthropology where I'll be talking about social sciences in industry and will mix it with my personal outlet, www.anthro.design  Also - mariontanis.com\/s\/WorkPlaces.pdf is a list of firms I've compiled over the past year who use qualitative researchers - some use quant too so you may have an edge as a sociologist.  Feel free to get in touch, it's an exciting time for social scientists in industry, and lots of money to be made!","human_ref_B":"BA in psychology and anthropology (double major) MA in Social Psychology PhD in Social Psychology Certificate in quantitative research methods  MPH Post-Doc in cancer prevention and control  Tons of job searching in academia, nonprofits, industry and government over 2 years at the end of my PhD and in my last year of post-doc. About 100 applications total, 6 interviews, 3 offers.   Currently work in a government regulatory setting on social science issues related to tobacco","labels":1,"seconds_difference":54107.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5utgth","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Has any research been done on the efficacy of sexual consent classes? I'm wondering if we have any information on the outcomes of classes like these. All I can find on Google are anecdotes and opinion pieces","c_root_id_A":"ddx758d","c_root_id_B":"ddx1e1m","created_at_utc_A":1487465417,"created_at_utc_B":1487456633,"score_A":16,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"The answer is rather mixed, some things work, some things don't and some might even have harmful effects.  The Center for Disease Control evaluated current strategies that aimed to either reduce the number of sexual offenders or reduce the number of victims.  These programs commonly had three different strategies. Some where risk reduction strategies that focused on empowering the victim to identify and avoid sexual assault, some were focused on changing the behaviour and attitudes of perpetrators whilst others attempted to persuade bystanders to intervene in a pro social way when they encountered a sexual assault.  The CDC found that only three of the programs analysed were effective, Safe Dates, Shifting Boundaries and Real Consent. They also identifies 5 studies that were ineffective and 10 that needed more research. In addition to this there was also three that had harmful effect, this could be because of increased reporting or it could be because of adverse reactions from participants.  The main difference between successful programs and unsuccessful one seemed to be the length of the intervention, short programs generally failed where as long ones where more likely to have positive results.  Similarly the UK based Early Intervention Foundation has held an evidence seminar on preventing domestic violence and abuse. Included in the seminar was a presentation about school based programs to tackle sexual abuse. Of a total of 22 programs the only one they found to be effective was the Fourth R , this was based of 28 quantitative and 6 qualitative studies.  There is also the work of Project Mirabel which works with men that have a history of domestic violence, it uses group therapy to challenge attitudes as well as to provide men with tools to manage aggressive behaviour. It found a dramatic drop in violent and controlling behaviour as well as a complete eliminations of partners that \"Made you do something sexual that you did not want to do\", compared to 30 prior to the intervention.  &nbsp;  TL:DR Sometime they work, especially the longer, more intensive interventions but many of them are either poorly designed or lack enough good quality research to tell.  &nbsp;  Sources  A systematic review of primary prevention strategies for sexual violence perpetration.  Findings from Project Mirabal.  Edit: Found another meta analysis that confirmed what I've already written, 69 studies, 102 interventions. Longer programs were more effective. The content of the program, type of presenter, gender and type of audience was also important.","human_ref_B":"It's an interesting question. I don't know the literature but it's a very difficult thing to study. There are instruments used to identify \"undetected rapists\"; several studies have shown that a proportion of men (students and military recruits, average age mid-twenties-ish) admit to rape if it's not labelled as rape and their criminal histories appear to be more similar to those of incarcerated rapists than the general population. Repeat Rape and Multiple Offending Among Undetected Rapists. It might therefore be possible to to do a cluster randomised trial to assess effectiveness of intervention, and different sorts of intervention, although it might be hard to recruit universities to a \"no action\" control arm if they believe that what they're doing works.  You could do simpler observational studies based on what happens to rates of reporting but this is confounded by the fact that consent classes make people who experience coercion more likely to recognise it for what it is, more likely to understand the consequences of letting the behaviour go and more likely to feel confident that they will be taken seriously if they report it.  Wthout knowing the literature I'd guess that it is fairly unlikely that definitive studies have been done. I vaguely recall one that showed differences in attitudes persisting over time but people who have been taught the 'right' things to say are more likely to say them so it's not a very strong form of evidence. I'd be delighted to discover that sound research has been done but it seems fairly unlikely at this relatively early stage.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8784.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"85axsc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"I would like to know about the context of sexuality\/concept of sex in western liberal societies ? I know this is going to be a very long question , I would like the following themes addressed . To give a context of who I am , I am from a sexually conservative society. I am curious about sexuality in liberal societies.  * I would like arguments for or against sexually liberal society (non discouragement for pre-marital sex -teenage sex - swinger culture) vs moderately conservative society( discouragement of pre-marital sex , mated for life , strong belief in marriage institution) which would have best outcome for common good ?     * How does the mating competition favour both genders? does it tip the scale of balance towards one gender ? [A believe the balance has shifted toward females with rise medical advancement like contraceptive because earlier a women had to choose her mate carefully as unlike male once she is pregnant she could not reproduce for an year which means a female has to be choosy where as a male has to reproduce with as much female to increase the chances of passing on his linage , however with the contraceptives this disadvantage for women is removed. since a women's biological directives seek her to find best of the male who probably represent small percentage of male population , which means there would always be a pie of males who would never get laid as likely as females [alpha males having multiple female partners over the course of his lifetime] in  it encourage rise of alpha male societies , with a large bunch of beta-males most likely virgins ending up with non-virgin partners .The above stated ones are merely my own hypothesis I welcome people to dismantle or support it so I can recalibrate my opinions  ]    * Does the concept of serial monogamy exist ? ( constant divorces and remarriages)    * does broken marriages result in broken families with bad developmental outcomes for kids ? ( step-dad molesting , child poverty etc.) I had mentioned broken marriages because divorce seem to be more common in western societies. The society I am from believe in marriage for life at-least that's what the society encourages or coherces them to do .   * I have also read that a phenomenon called cuckold ( a father forced to raise his non-biological offspring without himself knowing about it ) seems to have higher occurrences in western liberal societies ? Does this phenomenon even exist ? if it exist doesn't it encourage alpha male behaviour ?    * What does the act of sex means for people of liberal societies ? is it simple like a kiss , handshake or something complex and emotionally connecting that has to be shown to only people whom they would believe to have relationship for life?    PS- I know the lot of above question seems like an accusation against sexually liberal societies , But that's not my intend I genuinely like to learn about the merits and demerits of the sexually liberal society . I been raised in a conservative family so I might have some misconception that may reflect in above question , if that's the case please correct me. I am strong believer in individual rights , but I also believe set of rules has to be set in place for society to function without chaos. However when I think about sexuality as both of these philosophy that I hold dear collides it creates a paradox that I cant make sense. So I believe by listening to your answers I can come to the right conclusion about sexually liberal societies myself.","c_root_id_A":"dvwbedm","c_root_id_B":"dvw4yez","created_at_utc_A":1521390941,"created_at_utc_B":1521382995,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"\u201cDoes the concept of serial monogamy exist?\u201d Umm, yeah. It\u2019s an established fact at this point\u2014Human Sexuality 101. It\u2019s argued that serial monogamy is more natural than monogamy, as it helped with child rearing and also mixed up the gene pool a bit; helping to develop traits that kept (and keep) us alive.   Also, when you discuss broken homes\u2014the term itself is biased negatively because you are using the term \u201cbroken.\u201d Furthermore, tying single-parent families to outcomes like molestation is very stigma-oriented.   I suggest you read some material about Human Sexuality and Gender Psychology\u2014maybe even Sexual Deviance. I think this would help you to understand. A couple enjoyable reads are: The Male Brain and also The Female Brain.  The History of Sexuality by Foucault is also an appropriate suggestion. Read some Kinsey for human sexuality and I would also suggest you look into attachment theory to address your \u201cbroken home\u201d question\u2014family systems theory in the context of addressing familial problems would give you a different perspective too.   There are so many legitimate resources on the internet\u2014take some time and learn it for yourself.","human_ref_B":"Regarding your point 5 - while the old term cuckold has taken on a new popularity I don't fully understand, most serious researchers wouldn't call it that because it is considered insulting. Of course the phenomenon of a man raising non-biological children without knowing exists in all societies. Infidelity is impossible to eliminate completely no matter how sexually conservative a society may be. That said, \"mistaken paternity\" or whatever you call it appears to be more common among young unmarried people having unprotected sex, especially of low socioeconomic class in high population densities. http:\/\/jech.bmj.com\/content\/59\/9\/749.long","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7946.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"2h7vz4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"How well-regarded is Naomi Klein's book and concept of the 'Shock Doctrine' within academia?","c_root_id_A":"ckqao03","c_root_id_B":"ckq8f4x","created_at_utc_A":1411483927,"created_at_utc_B":1411478545,"score_A":35,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Klein is not an academic, and so the work should be judged differently than how we judge a strictly academic treatment of this subject. Nonetheless there should be some similar criteria, e.g. are the facts correct? In this regard, Klein's work has held up fairly well to scrutiny. On the other hand, its treatment of the field of economics is rather heavy handed. What Klein's book does well is provide a meta-narrative for understanding a disparate set of phenomena, which she calls disaster capitalism. However there are better treatments of this subject from academics. But it is good supplemental reading, in a similar way that Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins also provides us with a readable narrative to understand something that is inherently way more complex than the way it's portrayed in the book. My two cents.  *Edit:  sorry did not include references....I will try to find some ASA reviews of the book  *Edit2:  here is Eric Klinenberg's interesting review of The Shock Doctrine in Bookforum. This pretty much sums up what I was trying to convey. > The Shock Doctrine is a massive, courageous undertaking, and Klein's impassioned critique of the violence that accompanies American economic imperialism is not merely necessary but urgent. At times, however, she overreaches, and her analysis falls short of her ambitions. The least developed idea is her boldest claim: that the practice of economic shock therapy not only partakes of the logic of physical torture but is also its moral equivalent. Klein persuasively shows that both Cameron and Friedman fantasized about their capacities to rebuild from clean slates and that neither adequately considered the human damage wrought by their shock therapies. But the two shock docs made scientific and political interventions that are strikingly dissimilar, and Klein's argument would have been more compelling had she established a deeper connection between them.  The critique is that Klein uses the metaphor of ECT or shock therapy to help the reader grasp her basic thesis. But it is not a perfect metaphor.","human_ref_B":"Here's a book review by Tyler Cowen, economist  >If nothing else, Ms. Klein's book provides an interesting litmus test as to who is willing to condemn its shoddy reasoning. In the New York Times, Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz defended the book: \"Klein is not an academic and cannot be judged as one.\" So nonacademics get a pass on sloppy thinking, false \"facts,\" and emotional appeals? In making economic claims, Ms. Klein demands to be judged by economists' standards \u2014 or at the very least, standards of simple truth or falsehood. Mr. Stiglitz continued: \"There are many places in her book where she oversimplifies. But Friedman and the other shock therapists were also guilty of oversimplification.\" Have we come to citing the failures of one point of view to excuse the mistakes of another?  I think that's fair. Most economists are going to think this book is crap, some will be more sympathetic to it because it attacks Friedman.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5382.0,"score_ratio":2.0588235294}
{"post_id":"11awxp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if the US federal system was disbanded and each of the states became a nation in it's own right?","c_root_id_A":"c6kw07l","c_root_id_B":"c6kziq1","created_at_utc_A":1349963744,"created_at_utc_B":1349977073,"score_A":12,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"The South, Texas, the lower Great Plains and Appalachia would band together and form an overtly Christian, patriotic militaristic state. You couldn't keep Kentucky and Mississippi apart if you tried. The man-love between Rand Paul and Haley Barbour is too strong.   The North East from DC to Maine and over through Chicago to Minneapolis would form an EU like confederation.   The West Coast would likewise form a single political unit.   The Mormons would hole up in the mountains and live off their food storage and wait for the Nephite Messiah to return and build Zion in Jackson County, Missouri.   The interesting question is what would happen with states that are deeply divided between the different regional loyalties. No. Virginia would go with the North-East while Lynchburg is clearing going with the South. The state would have to split or suffer a civil war. Likewise Ohio with Cincy joining the South and Cleveland staying with the North-East.  South Florida might become an independent nation as they don't fit in the South.   tl;dr: States would not remain independent if they became independent, but would group together culturally. States split between cultures (Ohio, Virginia) would either split or war would be fought.","human_ref_B":"Well for starters the bible belt would collapse into poverty. They're already the poorest part of the nation, and without the rest of us feeding them federal tax dollars they would struggle to feed and care for their citizens.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13329.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"11awxp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if the US federal system was disbanded and each of the states became a nation in it's own right?","c_root_id_A":"c6kuwge","c_root_id_B":"c6kziq1","created_at_utc_A":1349956569,"created_at_utc_B":1349977073,"score_A":11,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"You mean completely and totally independent nations, or are some \"EU-like\" features allowed? (for example: shared currency, no border controls between the states themselves)","human_ref_B":"Well for starters the bible belt would collapse into poverty. They're already the poorest part of the nation, and without the rest of us feeding them federal tax dollars they would struggle to feed and care for their citizens.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20504.0,"score_ratio":1.6363636364}
{"post_id":"11awxp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if the US federal system was disbanded and each of the states became a nation in it's own right?","c_root_id_A":"c6kv288","c_root_id_B":"c6kziq1","created_at_utc_A":1349957939,"created_at_utc_B":1349977073,"score_A":7,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Great question, but so many additional questions... How would the military be divided? What measures would be taken to prevent ambitious states from invading other states? Would the constitution be preserved and used for legislature by all states? What about public assistance programs? Somebody else already asked about currency and border control. Are the states capable of being self sufficient, at least from a tax-revenue perspective? What happens to large corporations?","human_ref_B":"Well for starters the bible belt would collapse into poverty. They're already the poorest part of the nation, and without the rest of us feeding them federal tax dollars they would struggle to feed and care for their citizens.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19134.0,"score_ratio":2.5714285714}
{"post_id":"11awxp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if the US federal system was disbanded and each of the states became a nation in it's own right?","c_root_id_A":"c6kziq1","c_root_id_B":"c6kvz7m","created_at_utc_A":1349977073,"created_at_utc_B":1349963600,"score_A":18,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Well for starters the bible belt would collapse into poverty. They're already the poorest part of the nation, and without the rest of us feeding them federal tax dollars they would struggle to feed and care for their citizens.","human_ref_B":"This happened from 1777 to 1789... it didn't work.  Articles of Confederation  Honestly, Alaska would be conquered by the Russians, California would descend into Civil War, and mor flyover and farming states would collaborate and become the United Prairie States and hold the East and West Coasts hostage with their food supplies.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13473.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"11awxp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if the US federal system was disbanded and each of the states became a nation in it's own right?","c_root_id_A":"c6kuwge","c_root_id_B":"c6kw07l","created_at_utc_A":1349956569,"created_at_utc_B":1349963744,"score_A":11,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"You mean completely and totally independent nations, or are some \"EU-like\" features allowed? (for example: shared currency, no border controls between the states themselves)","human_ref_B":"The South, Texas, the lower Great Plains and Appalachia would band together and form an overtly Christian, patriotic militaristic state. You couldn't keep Kentucky and Mississippi apart if you tried. The man-love between Rand Paul and Haley Barbour is too strong.   The North East from DC to Maine and over through Chicago to Minneapolis would form an EU like confederation.   The West Coast would likewise form a single political unit.   The Mormons would hole up in the mountains and live off their food storage and wait for the Nephite Messiah to return and build Zion in Jackson County, Missouri.   The interesting question is what would happen with states that are deeply divided between the different regional loyalties. No. Virginia would go with the North-East while Lynchburg is clearing going with the South. The state would have to split or suffer a civil war. Likewise Ohio with Cincy joining the South and Cleveland staying with the North-East.  South Florida might become an independent nation as they don't fit in the South.   tl;dr: States would not remain independent if they became independent, but would group together culturally. States split between cultures (Ohio, Virginia) would either split or war would be fought.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7175.0,"score_ratio":1.0909090909}
{"post_id":"11awxp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if the US federal system was disbanded and each of the states became a nation in it's own right?","c_root_id_A":"c6kw07l","c_root_id_B":"c6kv288","created_at_utc_A":1349963744,"created_at_utc_B":1349957939,"score_A":12,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"The South, Texas, the lower Great Plains and Appalachia would band together and form an overtly Christian, patriotic militaristic state. You couldn't keep Kentucky and Mississippi apart if you tried. The man-love between Rand Paul and Haley Barbour is too strong.   The North East from DC to Maine and over through Chicago to Minneapolis would form an EU like confederation.   The West Coast would likewise form a single political unit.   The Mormons would hole up in the mountains and live off their food storage and wait for the Nephite Messiah to return and build Zion in Jackson County, Missouri.   The interesting question is what would happen with states that are deeply divided between the different regional loyalties. No. Virginia would go with the North-East while Lynchburg is clearing going with the South. The state would have to split or suffer a civil war. Likewise Ohio with Cincy joining the South and Cleveland staying with the North-East.  South Florida might become an independent nation as they don't fit in the South.   tl;dr: States would not remain independent if they became independent, but would group together culturally. States split between cultures (Ohio, Virginia) would either split or war would be fought.","human_ref_B":"Great question, but so many additional questions... How would the military be divided? What measures would be taken to prevent ambitious states from invading other states? Would the constitution be preserved and used for legislature by all states? What about public assistance programs? Somebody else already asked about currency and border control. Are the states capable of being self sufficient, at least from a tax-revenue perspective? What happens to large corporations?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5805.0,"score_ratio":1.7142857143}
{"post_id":"11awxp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if the US federal system was disbanded and each of the states became a nation in it's own right?","c_root_id_A":"c6kvz7m","c_root_id_B":"c6kw07l","created_at_utc_A":1349963600,"created_at_utc_B":1349963744,"score_A":3,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"This happened from 1777 to 1789... it didn't work.  Articles of Confederation  Honestly, Alaska would be conquered by the Russians, California would descend into Civil War, and mor flyover and farming states would collaborate and become the United Prairie States and hold the East and West Coasts hostage with their food supplies.","human_ref_B":"The South, Texas, the lower Great Plains and Appalachia would band together and form an overtly Christian, patriotic militaristic state. You couldn't keep Kentucky and Mississippi apart if you tried. The man-love between Rand Paul and Haley Barbour is too strong.   The North East from DC to Maine and over through Chicago to Minneapolis would form an EU like confederation.   The West Coast would likewise form a single political unit.   The Mormons would hole up in the mountains and live off their food storage and wait for the Nephite Messiah to return and build Zion in Jackson County, Missouri.   The interesting question is what would happen with states that are deeply divided between the different regional loyalties. No. Virginia would go with the North-East while Lynchburg is clearing going with the South. The state would have to split or suffer a civil war. Likewise Ohio with Cincy joining the South and Cleveland staying with the North-East.  South Florida might become an independent nation as they don't fit in the South.   tl;dr: States would not remain independent if they became independent, but would group together culturally. States split between cultures (Ohio, Virginia) would either split or war would be fought.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":144.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"11awxp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if the US federal system was disbanded and each of the states became a nation in it's own right?","c_root_id_A":"c6l3ghj","c_root_id_B":"c6kvz7m","created_at_utc_A":1349990389,"created_at_utc_B":1349963600,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This is a really cool question to think about. I think as soon as the federal system was disbanded, states wouldn't even consider functioning alone (maybe a few exceptions like California, who could sustain themselves all around, however, a lot of other areas near them would depend on them). Certain geographical regions of the country would immediately negotiate and form large unions together. The Midwest (Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky, Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Michigan, a few others) and the South regions (Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, possibly the Carolinas) working together. It would be an easy transition I think; considering the current political\/economic ideologies.   Then you have the Northeast region, which is pretty much what we all refer to as \"New England\" today. States like Virginia, Pennsylvania, and possibly the Carolinas part of this region as well.  Then you have the Western region, and California dominating all activity in that region. Oregon and Washington being key players as well. Many states West of the Mississippi, but not near the coast (Wyoming, Montana, the Dakotas, New Mexico, Arizona) will heavily depend on food coming out of the fertile regions in California and some parts of Oregon. California has a lot of different kinds of foods coming out of there as opposed to producing large amounts of one thing.  The West, Northeast, and South regions would have a huge advantage considering they have access to the rest of the world via ocean. However, the Midwest really is a huge producer in crops and livestock. These industries are already completely established in the Midwest as well. So no money or time would be spent trying to get these industries going.   The West in the near future would have a lot of fresh water problems as well. I think that would be a huge concern for them.   Then you have Alaska. All up there by itself. 2\/3 the size of the continental US. Larger than any region by itself, and sitting on all that precious oil. It would probably be a mad dash to become allies with Alaska for that reason. Especially for the Midwest region. They are landlocked and depend heavily on oil for transporting goods, electricity, etc.   Fuck Hawaii. It's too far.   Honestly I can't even make an educated guess as to how the rest of the events would play out. I do believe however, that if the regions didn't work together (they all have something to offer each other), then an unavoidable civil war would occur. It would be pretty ugly.","human_ref_B":"This happened from 1777 to 1789... it didn't work.  Articles of Confederation  Honestly, Alaska would be conquered by the Russians, California would descend into Civil War, and mor flyover and farming states would collaborate and become the United Prairie States and hold the East and West Coasts hostage with their food supplies.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":26789.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1r64lu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"How did the Abrahamic religions become so powerful? Over 3,749,900,000 (53.57%) of people in the world are Christian\/Catholic\/some other sect, Muslim, or Jewish. How did this happen? Just curious.","c_root_id_A":"cdka29o","c_root_id_B":"cdk9bqh","created_at_utc_A":1385098303,"created_at_utc_B":1385096188,"score_A":8,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I can tell you about Christianity.   Colonialism helped a lot in spreading it.   http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Christianity_and_colonialism  There were a lot of forced conversions within the poor specially. I know families (In India) personally who were told that they would be given food if they converted. The same thing happened in Africa, South America, and other Asian countries when they were colonised.     Most of the colonisers went to the countries first only as missionaries, not as rulers. The idea was that they had to save the world from their barbaric religions\/beliefs.","human_ref_B":"Please remember to cite sources when you are making top-level comments.  Thanks!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2115.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1z4tn5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"How much of \"The Triple Package\" is conjecture bordering on racism vs. actual sociological study? There's a book that my wife's friends have read and have been discussing called \"The Triple Package\".  It talks about why certain groups (Chinese, Jewish, Indian, Iranian, Lebanese, Nigerians, Cuban exiles and Mormons) have succeeded whereas others have not succeeded as much.  The authors point to three traits that lead to success which these groups have in common:  1) A superiority complex  2) Insecurity  3) Impulse control  These seem to be very broad generalizations bordering on racism.  As I haven't read the book I can't comment on the research I'm just wondering if there is actual research that supports it or if it's just a crock of racist bs.","c_root_id_A":"cfqtwo5","c_root_id_B":"cfqpifk","created_at_utc_A":1393578449,"created_at_utc_B":1393561986,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"There's a book review in Slate by USC law professor Daria Roithmayr that does a great job of dismantling the claims in *The Triple Package*. I recommend the whole article, but the main premise is:   > The problem with the thesis [in *The Triple Package*] is that in setting out their claim, the authors ignore the more obvious explanation for differences in group success: history. To be specific, in their quest to make it all about culture, the authors either ignore or strongly discount the particular circumstances of a group\u2019s first arrival, and the advantages enjoyed by that first wave. It turns out that a group\u2019s immigration history explains differences in achievement much better than does the Triple Package theory.","human_ref_B":"They did an interview on NPR that explains their reasoning more in-depth.  Basically they said \"obviously these are generalizations (doesn't apply to everyone in the group, but the group as a whole), but its not racist if its true.\".","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16463.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"xe9q50","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"What scholarly research exists regarding the transracial identity? By transracial I mean people identify as a different race than the one associated with their biological ancestry. Has there been much actual scholarly research in this field?  I can only find one paper studying this identity through actual transracial participants, Transracial Identity and the Effect on the Life Circumstances: A Pilot Study in 14 Participants, as opposed to lots of articles which have no research working with transracial people.","c_root_id_A":"iogeeas","c_root_id_B":"iohf9bu","created_at_utc_A":1663193939,"created_at_utc_B":1663210894,"score_A":4,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Not what you're looking for, sorry, though I do want to plug this more theory-oriented paper which is the best I've found on the topic (though still ultimately unsatisfactory, in my opinion).","human_ref_B":"Oof, that's an awful paper. The abstract alone and the first few lines of the paper should be more than enough for anyone familiar with the concepts of ethnicity, nationality, and \"race\" to be compelled to throw it into the garbage bin. These are three different concepts which should not be conflated:   1. Ethnicity is not necessarily tied to particular countries or territories. People who share the same ethnic identity may be born in entirely different places, and people who were born in the same place may have different ethnic identities. Both cases are unremarkable.  1. People who identify with a different nationality than what is associated with the country in which they were born is commonplace. Furthermore, although \"nation\" and \"country\" are often used interchangeably, these are not actually the same. For example, not all nations have states of their own (see stateless nations).  Regarding \"race,\" it is a *social* category rooted in *false* beliefs about human biological variation and human evolution. In principle, the second half differentiates it from ethnicity and nationality. Although \"race\" is real in the social sense, the same is not true for its original biological sense. Your \"race\" is not, contrary to S\u00fclter and Kasten's claim, \"genetically determined\". Concerning ancestry specifically, although it is based on *assumptions* about ancestry (most notably in the US where it is common to conflate the two), it is actually not the same as ancestry - which, for the record, is a bit of a mess of a concept. For insight, see *What is ancestry?* by geneticists Iain Mathieson and Aylwyn Scally and *Genetic ancestry groups and genetic similarity* by population geneticist Graham Coop. For more on the topic, here are some recommended readings authored by population geneticists and biological anthropologists:  * A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived  * How to Argue With a Racist: History, Science, Race and Reality  * Race, Monogamy, and Other Lies They Told You  * Racism, Not Race: Answers to Frequently Asked Questions   ---  That all said, concerning your quest to find studies about people who identify as a \"different 'race',\" I am not aware of legit research which is framed with the vocabulary of \"transracialism.\"  It is not however too difficult to find research on self-identification with respect to racialization (which, unlike \"transracialism,\" is a well-established concept). For instance, the fact that \"racial\" identities can be malleable is well-documented and predates contemporary debates about \"transracialism\" (which are mostly really about transgender people). For illustration, there are multiple papers on the experiences of racialization of those who emigrate to the US and the different ways in which they self-identify. E.g., here is an excerpt from *Immigrant incorporation and racial identity: Racial self-identification among Dominican immigrants*, by Itzigsohn et al. (2005):  >**This research points to the complexity of the process of the formation of new identities by Dominican immigrants. Immigrants\u2019 racial identities are multiple and flexible. Dominicans give a large number and different responses to racial identification questions.** Yet, there are limits to the malleability of identities. The more the questions are asked in the terms of the American racial classification system, the more the racial identification choices are limited. **Encountering the American system of racial classification leads immigrants towards the need for racial self-definition within a limited number of socially recognized categories.** The modal category of racial self-identification is hispano\/a, a new American category of identity, although many respondents choose to continue using indio\/a, a Dominican based category of identification. In fact, both hispano\/a and indio\/a are categories of identity that denote racial mixture and are used to create distance from blackness. **Mass immigration seems to lead to the creation of categories of identity in between the two poles of black and white.**  And here is an excerpt of *Latino racial choices: the effects of skin colour and discrimination on Latinos\u2019 and Latinas\u2019 racial self-identifications* by Golazsh and Darity (2008):  >**The finding that subjective factors such as experiences of discrimination influence racial self-identification means that racial self-identification is indeed fluid, and can change over time.** Of course, these logistic regressions cannot determine causality, and it is conceivable that people who self-identify as black or Hispanic as opposed to white are also those persons who are more likely to experience discrimination. In any case, **the finding that skin colour affects racial self-identification means that parents\u2019 racial self-identification cannot always predict their children\u2019s racial self-identification, since our children\u2019s skin colour is not always a replica of our own.** Up until now, race in the United States has been discussed using primarily a rhetoric of descent, meaning that your racial identification is entirely dependent on that of your parents (Davis 2001). **However, the fact that these analyses demonstrate the subjective nature of racial self- identification indicates that racial self-identifications may be passed down to offspring less often than previously thought. These findings also lend support to Bonilla-Silva\u2019s (2004) argument that racial categorization in the US may be becoming more like those processes in Latin America, at least in terms of the possibility of choosing a racial status distinct from that of one\u2019s parents.** In any case, these analyses demonstrate that, while Latinos\/as can choose their racial identification, this choice is constrained by the colour of their skin and their experiences in the United States.  You can also find research on the relationship between personal identities and beliefs about \"genetic ancestry.\" For illustration, here is an excerpt from *DNA is not Destiny*, a book written by cultural psychologist Steven Heine:  >Consider the genotyping experience of Wayne Joseph, a principal of a large suburban high school in Southern California. **Joseph has been a pillar of the African American community there, and a staunch advocate for African American rights.** He once published an article in Newsweek arguing that Black History Month only served to marginalize the African American community. Like many African Americans, whose genealogical past is a mystery to them because of the slave trade, Joseph was curious about where his African ancestors came from. After watching an episode of 60 Minutes that discussed genetic ancestry testing, he decided to have his own DNA tested. He scraped his cheek with a swab and sent a sample of his cheek cells to DNA Print Genomics. **When his results were sent back to him, Joseph learned that he was 57 percent Indo-European, 39 percent Native American, 4 percent East Asian, and ZERO percent African. After a lifetime of being African American, Joseph learned that he was disqualified by his genes.**  >**Joseph experienced what sociologists call \u201cgenealogical disorientation\u201d and found his results completely discombobulating.** \u201cI kiddingly say, if I was 21 instead of 50, I\u2019d be in therapy . . . it does rock your whole world.\u201d After getting his results, he felt compelled to ask his mother, Betty, if he was adopted. \u201cHe is not adopted,\u201d she said. \u201cMother doesn\u2019t forget when she has a baby. And I had three babies. And he was one of them.\u201d **Of course, ancestry testing is not infallible, and Joseph\u2019s friends have urged him to get retested. But as he says, \u201cMy response to them is, \u2018OK, let\u2019s say I get retested, I come back 9 percent African, 10 percent African, so I\u2019m back in the club now?\u2019\u201d** Just as with Szegedi, Joseph\u2019s life narrative was entirely upended by some unexpected knowledge about his genes. You might think that your sense of identity should be based on your life history and set of experiences\u2014that is, it should arise from what you have done and the relationships you have. But **as these examples reveal, for many people, their \u201creal\u201d identity comes from the origin of their genetic essence.**  (For the record, these genealogical tests do not actually reveal your \"race.\" Putting aside that, the results of these commercial genetic ancestry tests should be taken with a healthy dose of skepticism and caution.)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16955.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1e1khk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Is there any evidence supporting the claim that it's more beneficial to educate girls in poor countries? There are a lot of charities that make the claim that educating girls in third world countries is more beneficial than educating boys, because girls share more knowledge with their mothers and when they're older, their children. A strong example of this comes from Plan Canada's \"Because I Am A Girl\" campaign:  > And yet, studies show that when you invest in girls, the whole world benefits. If a girl has enough to eat, a safe environment, and an education, she\u2019ll work to raise the standard of living for herself, her family and her community. And in time, she can even strengthen the economy of her entire country.  Is there any social or economic evidence suggesting that specifically focusing improved education on girls actually has this effect on communities and a countries economy? Are there similar studies reflecting a difference or similarity with the education of boys?","c_root_id_A":"c9w1bly","c_root_id_B":"c9vxfnl","created_at_utc_A":1368171532,"created_at_utc_B":1368155588,"score_A":21,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"An important long run benefit is that it reduces teenage pregnancy and increases the age of marriage for girls. As a consequence, it, i) Reduces population growth rates, which ii) Increases per capita GDP growth   Another long run benefit is that when mothers have more education, it: i) Reduces infant mortality, and ii) Increases the educational attainment of children. Strangely enough, father's education has a much smaller effect.  Edit: Add citations  * Early Marriage Among Women in Developing Countries * Who, What, Where, and When? Specifying the Impact of Educational Attainment and Labour Force Participation on Family Formation","human_ref_B":"This isn't an original source, but it cites studies and evidence that support the idea that when women and girls gain education (and economic & societal power), they benefit themselves, their families and their societies in a number of ways -- especially economically and health-wise. It's not just that girls and women share more knowledge with their families. Education allows them access to much greater economic opportunity. Being employed or starting a business allows women to control more of the household finances, which means they can put more money into education, housing, and food for their own children (whereas men may put more money into alcohol, candy, and prostitutes). Educated women also have fewer children, which means more resources can be put into each child.  http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2009\/08\/23\/magazine\/23Women-t.html?pagewanted=all","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15944.0,"score_ratio":1.2352941176}
{"post_id":"1e1khk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Is there any evidence supporting the claim that it's more beneficial to educate girls in poor countries? There are a lot of charities that make the claim that educating girls in third world countries is more beneficial than educating boys, because girls share more knowledge with their mothers and when they're older, their children. A strong example of this comes from Plan Canada's \"Because I Am A Girl\" campaign:  > And yet, studies show that when you invest in girls, the whole world benefits. If a girl has enough to eat, a safe environment, and an education, she\u2019ll work to raise the standard of living for herself, her family and her community. And in time, she can even strengthen the economy of her entire country.  Is there any social or economic evidence suggesting that specifically focusing improved education on girls actually has this effect on communities and a countries economy? Are there similar studies reflecting a difference or similarity with the education of boys?","c_root_id_A":"c9w1bly","c_root_id_B":"c9w0pfp","created_at_utc_A":1368171532,"created_at_utc_B":1368167816,"score_A":21,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"An important long run benefit is that it reduces teenage pregnancy and increases the age of marriage for girls. As a consequence, it, i) Reduces population growth rates, which ii) Increases per capita GDP growth   Another long run benefit is that when mothers have more education, it: i) Reduces infant mortality, and ii) Increases the educational attainment of children. Strangely enough, father's education has a much smaller effect.  Edit: Add citations  * Early Marriage Among Women in Developing Countries * Who, What, Where, and When? Specifying the Impact of Educational Attainment and Labour Force Participation on Family Formation","human_ref_B":"One factor that I've seen in a few countries--but am unable to support scientifically--is the impact of emigration, whether temporary or permanent. Often, it's young men that are the most willing to emigrate for socio-economic reasons. This causes an outlet (\"brain drain\") away from developing countries for the educated men. While educated women are less likely to leave for whatever reasons.  To provide some evidence, here are two national surveys conducted in Georgia and Armenia about interest in emigration. Both countries have high emigration, and in both, men are more interested in temporary emigration than women.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3716.0,"score_ratio":2.1}
{"post_id":"1e1khk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Is there any evidence supporting the claim that it's more beneficial to educate girls in poor countries? There are a lot of charities that make the claim that educating girls in third world countries is more beneficial than educating boys, because girls share more knowledge with their mothers and when they're older, their children. A strong example of this comes from Plan Canada's \"Because I Am A Girl\" campaign:  > And yet, studies show that when you invest in girls, the whole world benefits. If a girl has enough to eat, a safe environment, and an education, she\u2019ll work to raise the standard of living for herself, her family and her community. And in time, she can even strengthen the economy of her entire country.  Is there any social or economic evidence suggesting that specifically focusing improved education on girls actually has this effect on communities and a countries economy? Are there similar studies reflecting a difference or similarity with the education of boys?","c_root_id_A":"c9w0pfp","c_root_id_B":"c9w28fe","created_at_utc_A":1368167816,"created_at_utc_B":1368178859,"score_A":10,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"One factor that I've seen in a few countries--but am unable to support scientifically--is the impact of emigration, whether temporary or permanent. Often, it's young men that are the most willing to emigrate for socio-economic reasons. This causes an outlet (\"brain drain\") away from developing countries for the educated men. While educated women are less likely to leave for whatever reasons.  To provide some evidence, here are two national surveys conducted in Georgia and Armenia about interest in emigration. Both countries have high emigration, and in both, men are more interested in temporary emigration than women.","human_ref_B":"Esther Duflo wrote a really good paper in 2012 that surveys the evidence for the causal link (in both directions) between women's empowerment (generally, not only education) and economic development.   The short answer is that yes there are some studies that demonstrate that investing in girls specifically is effective... of course that doesn't mean that it's a universal rule, but it's been shown to be true in some contexts. Duflo's overall conclusion is that there is some evidence in both directions, the association isn't 100%: but fixing one side will not automatically fix the other.  Summarizing all of the examples would be a bit long, bu the full paper is available here  **Other sources** I can't be bothered to hunt for a free link to these, but if you want to read more, look for:  * Hanushek, Eric (2008), \u201cSchooling, Gender Equity, and Economic Outcomes\u201d  * Duncan, Thomas (1994), \u201cLike Father, Like Son, or, Like Mother, Like Daughter: Parental Education and Child Health\u201d * Schultz, Paul T. (2004), \u201cSchool Subsidies for the Poor: Evaluating the Mexican Progresa Poverty Program\u201d","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11043.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"15fvml","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is there anything good written on the subject of waste, from an economics or sociology perspective? Not waste like garbage, but like wasted time or resources. It seems to me this would be an important topic, but my exhaustive research (a two-minute Google search) failed to turn up much that looks useful.  Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"c7m4p8k","c_root_id_B":"c7m3mve","created_at_utc_A":1356487789,"created_at_utc_B":1356482604,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Economists tend to call waste \"inefficiency.\" There is a ton of writing on this topic. I can't really give recommendations without more specifics. Everyone writes about inefficiency.","human_ref_B":"You should investigate the sociology of work and in particular Braverman (1974)  and to contrast Taylor (1911) or Taylorism, I think you will find the  concepts you are interested in are linked more to work than any other topic, unless ofc you go with the green agenda.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5185.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"15fvml","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is there anything good written on the subject of waste, from an economics or sociology perspective? Not waste like garbage, but like wasted time or resources. It seems to me this would be an important topic, but my exhaustive research (a two-minute Google search) failed to turn up much that looks useful.  Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"c7m3l7q","c_root_id_B":"c7m4p8k","created_at_utc_A":1356482376,"created_at_utc_B":1356487789,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"There should be plenty on the subject. What you're giving us is extremely broad as well. Some alternative search terms perhaps? (this is certainly not exhaustive and very basic): deadweight loss, productivity, production functions, international trade, outsourcing, models for trade and so on.  I'd probably start with productivity.","human_ref_B":"Economists tend to call waste \"inefficiency.\" There is a ton of writing on this topic. I can't really give recommendations without more specifics. Everyone writes about inefficiency.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5413.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"15fvml","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is there anything good written on the subject of waste, from an economics or sociology perspective? Not waste like garbage, but like wasted time or resources. It seems to me this would be an important topic, but my exhaustive research (a two-minute Google search) failed to turn up much that looks useful.  Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"c7m3mve","c_root_id_B":"c7m3l7q","created_at_utc_A":1356482604,"created_at_utc_B":1356482376,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You should investigate the sociology of work and in particular Braverman (1974)  and to contrast Taylor (1911) or Taylorism, I think you will find the  concepts you are interested in are linked more to work than any other topic, unless ofc you go with the green agenda.","human_ref_B":"There should be plenty on the subject. What you're giving us is extremely broad as well. Some alternative search terms perhaps? (this is certainly not exhaustive and very basic): deadweight loss, productivity, production functions, international trade, outsourcing, models for trade and so on.  I'd probably start with productivity.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":228.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"cqbn7x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"When we talk about \"technology\", why do we talk about high techs like computers & gadgets, artificial intelligence, bioengineering. But not plumbing, scissors, baskets? Technology can be defined as \"the collection of techniques, skills, methods, and processes used in the production of goods or services or in the accomplishment of objectives.\"  We speak of hammers, saws, pickaxes only when we discuss them in the context of *primitive* or non-modern period. But when we speak of it in today's context, we don't consider them as technology. Why?","c_root_id_A":"eww3h86","c_root_id_B":"ewvdbil","created_at_utc_A":1565819627,"created_at_utc_B":1565803925,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Research in the history subfield on the history of technology (frequently focusing on the social construction of technology, or SCOT) often does study precisely those kinds of things. Wiebe Bijker's Of Bicycles, Bakelite, and Bulbs is a great example, as well as Ruth Schwartz Cowan's chapter on stoves in The Social Construction of Technological Systems (also edited by Bijker and others) comes to mind as well.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/eva.fcs.edu.uy\/pluginfile.php\/103404\/mod\\_resource\/content\/1\/Ingold-Eight-Themes-in-the-Anthropology-of-Technology-Author-s-Tim-Ingold.pdf","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15702.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"pw28l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"Why doesn't the United Nations use private soldiers (like Blackwater) to intervene in humanitarian crises? Wouldn't this be supported by the UNSC since civilian soldiers would not be involved?","c_root_id_A":"c3spy7l","c_root_id_B":"c3sqmlx","created_at_utc_A":1329633775,"created_at_utc_B":1329640730,"score_A":7,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Peacekeepers are an order of magnitude cheaper, coming mostly from Bangladesh and Uganda.","human_ref_B":"International treaties outlaw the use of mercenaries to wage war. Blackwater has very strict rules of engagement and they're primarily used as engineers and other support staff.  Source: Scott M. Sullivan, 2010, Assistant Professor of Law, LSU Law Center, J.D., University of Chicago, LL.M., European University Institute. Sullivan is a member of PRIV-WAR, an E.U.-commissioned research consortium assessing the impact of the increasing use of private military companies and security companies in armed conflict., Private Force\/ Public Goods (Connecticut Law Review),","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6955.0,"score_ratio":1.7142857143}
{"post_id":"7befi4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is there any evidence of income\/wealth differences being a) necessary or b) beneficial for society? Is there any actual evidence, theoretical or empirical, that shows that differences in wealth and\/or income are necessary for a society to function? What about evidence of their positive effects for society?  Spirit Level and a lot of other research tends to show that larger income and wealth inequalities tend to lead to negative societal outcomes such as obesity, teenage pregnancies, mental health problems, lower life expectancy and so forth, even for less patents and lower economic growth compared to more equal countries. Other research, such as Oxfam's reports, show that countries with more income inequality have more environmental problems as well.   So what's the evidence for the benefits of large inequalities? Is there any?","c_root_id_A":"dpi90q4","c_root_id_B":"dpi97ij","created_at_utc_A":1510109850,"created_at_utc_B":1510110057,"score_A":8,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"If you\u2019re talking up to date research there really aren\u2019t any strong arguments for inequality.   If you want a theoretical argument, Durkheim\u2019 s functionalist perspective would say that society pays higher valued careers more money because of the valuable things they provide to that society.  So doctors and lawyers provide a \u201cgood\u201d that our society places a high value on and they are compensated highly for it. If they were not, functionalism says that no one (or significantly less people) would want to be a doctor or a lawyer because their contribution to society would not be valued or rewarded as much.   So the inequality in this perspective basically creates a value for those careers and creates motivation for people to want to have those careers and want to provide those goods\/services to society","human_ref_B":"Most of what I've come across suggests income inequality is the effect of property inheritance. In really big picture terms you could argue that without a coevolution of private property you don't get a transition to agriculture. You also don't have the formation of states without agriculture. So if you buy into the understanding of history and you consider states and agriculture good things then maybe there's a benefit. It's not a direct benefit from inequality. Rather inequality is an emergent feature of the institutional norms and rules of these kinds of societies.   When we look at contemporary evidence generally speaking hunter gather societies and horticultural societies don't have large inequalities. What's interesting is looking at hunter gather societies that do have large inequalities, such as the St'at'imc or agricultural societies that don't have large inequalities such as the (post-great Law of Peace \/ pre Beaver Wars) Haudenosaunee (see Graeber's Debt for a possible explanation for this). What are the institutional differences? It's also interesting to reverse the question and consider in a state agriculture society what institutional forms would result in lower levels of inequality (hint: they have high levels of redistribution)? Samuel Bowles (cited above) makes the argument that internet culture and open source has many resemblances to hunter gather social organisation. I don't completely buy it but it's an interesting argument.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":207.0,"score_ratio":2.125}
{"post_id":"7befi4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is there any evidence of income\/wealth differences being a) necessary or b) beneficial for society? Is there any actual evidence, theoretical or empirical, that shows that differences in wealth and\/or income are necessary for a society to function? What about evidence of their positive effects for society?  Spirit Level and a lot of other research tends to show that larger income and wealth inequalities tend to lead to negative societal outcomes such as obesity, teenage pregnancies, mental health problems, lower life expectancy and so forth, even for less patents and lower economic growth compared to more equal countries. Other research, such as Oxfam's reports, show that countries with more income inequality have more environmental problems as well.   So what's the evidence for the benefits of large inequalities? Is there any?","c_root_id_A":"dphxhta","c_root_id_B":"dpi97ij","created_at_utc_A":1510096560,"created_at_utc_B":1510110057,"score_A":2,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Could you post your sources for equality leading to economic growth?  I know there have been a handful of papers that have found this, but there are quite a few more that have found inequality leading to investment which in turn leads to higher economic growth.  From a strictly correlation standpoint the most developed countries are often the most equal, however they often become equal after they have developed.  I would like to appropriately address your statements, but I need to see what you are working off of to do so.","human_ref_B":"Most of what I've come across suggests income inequality is the effect of property inheritance. In really big picture terms you could argue that without a coevolution of private property you don't get a transition to agriculture. You also don't have the formation of states without agriculture. So if you buy into the understanding of history and you consider states and agriculture good things then maybe there's a benefit. It's not a direct benefit from inequality. Rather inequality is an emergent feature of the institutional norms and rules of these kinds of societies.   When we look at contemporary evidence generally speaking hunter gather societies and horticultural societies don't have large inequalities. What's interesting is looking at hunter gather societies that do have large inequalities, such as the St'at'imc or agricultural societies that don't have large inequalities such as the (post-great Law of Peace \/ pre Beaver Wars) Haudenosaunee (see Graeber's Debt for a possible explanation for this). What are the institutional differences? It's also interesting to reverse the question and consider in a state agriculture society what institutional forms would result in lower levels of inequality (hint: they have high levels of redistribution)? Samuel Bowles (cited above) makes the argument that internet culture and open source has many resemblances to hunter gather social organisation. I don't completely buy it but it's an interesting argument.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13497.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"7befi4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is there any evidence of income\/wealth differences being a) necessary or b) beneficial for society? Is there any actual evidence, theoretical or empirical, that shows that differences in wealth and\/or income are necessary for a society to function? What about evidence of their positive effects for society?  Spirit Level and a lot of other research tends to show that larger income and wealth inequalities tend to lead to negative societal outcomes such as obesity, teenage pregnancies, mental health problems, lower life expectancy and so forth, even for less patents and lower economic growth compared to more equal countries. Other research, such as Oxfam's reports, show that countries with more income inequality have more environmental problems as well.   So what's the evidence for the benefits of large inequalities? Is there any?","c_root_id_A":"dphxhta","c_root_id_B":"dpi90q4","created_at_utc_A":1510096560,"created_at_utc_B":1510109850,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Could you post your sources for equality leading to economic growth?  I know there have been a handful of papers that have found this, but there are quite a few more that have found inequality leading to investment which in turn leads to higher economic growth.  From a strictly correlation standpoint the most developed countries are often the most equal, however they often become equal after they have developed.  I would like to appropriately address your statements, but I need to see what you are working off of to do so.","human_ref_B":"If you\u2019re talking up to date research there really aren\u2019t any strong arguments for inequality.   If you want a theoretical argument, Durkheim\u2019 s functionalist perspective would say that society pays higher valued careers more money because of the valuable things they provide to that society.  So doctors and lawyers provide a \u201cgood\u201d that our society places a high value on and they are compensated highly for it. If they were not, functionalism says that no one (or significantly less people) would want to be a doctor or a lawyer because their contribution to society would not be valued or rewarded as much.   So the inequality in this perspective basically creates a value for those careers and creates motivation for people to want to have those careers and want to provide those goods\/services to society","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13290.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"12p7x4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"[Economics] Why are there so many divisions in Macroeconomic thought?","c_root_id_A":"c6x22gj","c_root_id_B":"c6x1b3w","created_at_utc_A":1352171012,"created_at_utc_B":1352168387,"score_A":28,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"The degree to which there are schools of though in **academic macroeconomics** is vastly overstated. There were major, substantive, paradigm-destroying debates in macro during the 1960s (Keynesian\/Monetarist), 1970s (Keynesian\/New Classical) and 1980s (New Keynesian\/Real Business Cycle) but we've largely converged since the early 1990s. Almost all applied macroeconomic research is New Keynesian of some flavor, with heavy methodological influence from the New Classical and Real Business Cycle theories. Time will tell if the rise in agent-based computational macro will prove to be as paradigm-destroying as Lucas' program was forty years ago.  We have largely coalesced on a common language for modelling (DSGE), a common baseline language for causal inference (SVAR, though it's far from perfect), a common language for thinking about economic shocks (impulse, amplification, propagation), and a common language for thinking about the role of inefficiencies in the economy (wedges). By 2007, we had a few working medium-scale models that economists mostly agreed were ready for use in policy analysis (with some vocal exceptions).   We continue to disagree, sometimes heavily, on the empirical importance of the various wedges, frictions, and market imperfections in the economy. The financial crisis has weakened the c.2007 consensus somewhat - the much-vaunted policy models weren't able to analyze large financial panics.  There is serious lack of data in macro, and an equally serious lack of good identification techniques (what natural scientists would recognize as \"natural experiments\"), which makes inference difficult.   The proliferation of divisions of macro in the **public policy sphere** can be attributed to politics, lack of data, the public debate lagging the academic literature, etc.  The public lags the academic literature; that's fine. It means that in the public sphere the trifecta of Keynes, Hayek and Friedman continues to have sway on how people think about macroeconomic policy, even though all three of those thinkers had become irrelevant by 1972, their main insights absorbed into the body of academic work.    I have a pet theory that the \"divisions\" in macro, that we see in the popular media, are manifestations of the general need for a \"story\" or \"narrative,\" akin to political narratives, but it's just an hypothesis.","human_ref_B":"Because we don't have enough data to test our predictions. In science, when you have differing options for \"the way the world works,\" you can use tests in controlled experiments that allow you to distinguish between different ideas. In economics, you can't always do those experiments.  In micro, economists can sometimes get around it by doing lab experiments studying natural experiments, but these are far more rare in macro, because the outcomes in macro are massive quantities like employment and GDP. So the problem is even worse in macro.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2625.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"4akovl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do studies exist showing a clear response to if people living in the United States would rather work to live, or if they'd much rather live off welfare? I'm just curious if these studies exist, I've been searching for the but I can't seem to narrow my search terms down to anything that gives me results.","c_root_id_A":"d11eppx","c_root_id_B":"d11aprj","created_at_utc_A":1458091337,"created_at_utc_B":1458085996,"score_A":20,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"I found one study which found that in Europe, the more generous public welfare benefits were, the more likely citizens were to reply yes when asked \"I would enjoy having a paid job even if I did not need the money.\"","human_ref_B":"What you are looking for is called labour supply. It depends on how much the individual earns from having a job vs living only on transfers from the government.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5341.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"25aai1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"I'm reading Dominic Frisby's 'Life after the State'. What can I read as a counter argument to Libertarianism? In case you haven't heard of it, the blurb gives the gist:  > Have you ever had the nagging feeling that the problems the country faces are spiraling out of control, that the government has lost its way and that, despite its promises, nothing ever changes? Well, you're right. In every instance where government gets involved in people's lives with a desire to do good, it can always be relied on to make the situation much, much worse. Yet despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, we imagine that a world without the state would be a wild and terrifying place. With wit and devastating clarity of argument, Frisby shows in this book that human nature proves the opposite to be true. Welcome to Life After the State.  Ever a fan of balance, what does the other side have to say?","c_root_id_A":"chfeb29","c_root_id_B":"chfg9so","created_at_utc_A":1399840367,"created_at_utc_B":1399845250,"score_A":6,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"\/r\/askphilosophy panelist on political theory here. There are least a couple of political frameworks I can think of that would critique the right-libertarian position having in common the theme of capitalism being an issue.   The first would be the popular and contemporary liberal\/progressive one that states simply shrinking the state while leaving in place economic realities would lead to a plutocratic society. Corporations having the most power in society after the state would then become the new states acting in their own interests and against the well-being of the majority of society. Thus government regulations and taxes are necessary to control and reduce their power in society, and government can be a source of stability in capitalist societies. This is a very common position held by liberal economists. For example, Thomas Piketty's current massive bestseller *Capital in the Twenty-First Century* argues for significant progressive taxation to deal with growing inequality.   The second one is Marxist and is much more radical. It would generally agree with the right-libertarian that a stateless society is preferable, but it would also argue significant work would need to be done in economic society to make this possible. A state is necessary to protect the private property of capitalists, and the state would in fact be under the dominion of capitalism making statelessness impossible without changing property ownership in society to be more democratic and consequently non-exploitive unlike in our capitalist societies. There are quite a bit more layers involved in this including classlessness and moneylessness. *The Meaning of Marxism* by Paul D'Amato is a good introduction to this very influential ideology.","human_ref_B":"I think you're getting ahead of yourself. Before looking at *responses* to this argument, take a closer look at the argument itself.  > In every instance where government gets involved in people's lives with a desire to do good, it can always be relied on to make the situation much, much worse.  It's one thing to argue that not having government is, overall, a better state of affairs than having government. This statement, however, is phrased in such a way that it is clearly demonstrably false. He's literally claiming that government has *never succeeded at anything good.*   Blatant hyperbole like this is **not** acceptable in social science. It isn't really acceptable in *any* honest argument made in good faith.  I'm unfamiliar with the author's work, but this review suggests most of his arguments are fairly standard libertarian\/anarchist fare. So I'd recommend doing searches in this subreddit for each topic, *particularly* the federal reserve.  Be sure to Google his sources, and see if any patterns emerge (ie., they all seem to come from one ideological background). Check his facts.  His website lists no academic credentials. While non-scholar views shouldn't be dismissed outright, it's difficult to see how someone would be qualified to make a comprehensive argument against the state without experience in political science or economics. Frankly, I would hesitate to accept a claim as bold and unqualified as this one from *anyone,* no matter how well-qualified. Sometimes even credible people are full of shit.  The question of the role of the state is big - bigger than one book, or indeed one whole career. It's arguably the central question in all of political science and political economy. So it's important that any attempts to answer that question are held to a high standard. I'm deeply skeptical that this book addresses the question with sufficient rigor.  tl;dr: My cursory impression is that the book looks like trumped-up conjecture.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4883.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1wi4vl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"When Rand Paul says \"If we measure unemployment like we did in the 1970s...\" what exactly is he referring to? Is it simply an inclusion of partial or underemployment or is he changing parameters like age as well?","c_root_id_A":"cf2903w","c_root_id_B":"cf29f9l","created_at_utc_A":1391040515,"created_at_utc_B":1391041439,"score_A":9,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"I did some digging.  According to the BLS, the employment survey questionnaire undergone two major revisions since 1948:  1. A revision in 1962 2. A revision in 1994  From what I can gather, though, neither of those revisions changed the definition of **U3**, the headline unemployment rate, so there is no reason to think that the 1970s and 2010s data are not comparable.  These revisions modified how we count marginal attachment to the labor force (as far as I can tell).  I cannot find any evidence of a change in the U3 employment definition, so I cannot find any evidence of a change on the *questionnaire* side of things. But I could be missing something.  Of course the sampling weights change every ten years, but that's on the survey side of things.   If anyone has more specific information, most preferably scanned copies of the actual BLS questions, please let me know!","human_ref_B":"Prior to 1994, the official unemployment rate was measured by what is called U6 (various measures of unemployment range from U1 - U6,).   U6 is defined as: people without jobs who have actively looked for work in the past 4 weeks + \"discouraged workers\" +  \"marginally attached workers\" +  those who \"would like\" and are able to work, but have not looked for work recently.  In 1994 the Bureau of Labor Statistics changed the official measure of unemployment to U3 (people are without jobs and they have actively looked for work within the past four weeks) in line with the standards set by the International Labor Organization... basically bringing the US measure of unemployment in line with international definitions.  The BLS still measures and publishes U6 figures. I believe that the call from some GOP politicians to reintroduce U6 as the official measure is simply a political move as that number is always going to be higher than U3. In general, both measures move in the same way (U3 and U6 go up and down at more or less the same pace).  If you want to go deeper, this, this, and this all provide more info.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":924.0,"score_ratio":2.8888888889}
{"post_id":"99xy4o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Why have women apparently been less happier since the 1970s, despite progress made in securing women's rights and empowerment during that period? http:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w14969","c_root_id_A":"e4rbte3","c_root_id_B":"e4rldfc","created_at_utc_A":1535125787,"created_at_utc_B":1535133742,"score_A":22,"score_B":49,"human_ref_A":"This study only covers the US. There could be potential confounds, such as the weakening of workers rights.","human_ref_B":"There is some explanation for this in the paper itself. On page 2 it says: \"Arlie Hochschild's and Anne Machung's The Second Shift (1989) argued that women's movement into the paid labor force was not accompanied by a shift away from household production and they were thus now working a second shift.\" And: \"Women, they argued, have maintained the emotional responsibility for home and family: a point that is perhaps best examplified by the familiar refrains of a man \"helping\" around the house or being a good dad when \"babysitting\" the kids.\"  I haven't read the paper completely yet, I admit, but I suspect some other explanations might follow.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7955.0,"score_ratio":2.2272727273}
{"post_id":"5yq5g9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"What, if any, are some academically notable right-leaning sociologists? I've seen a few discussions here and of sociology's left-leaning nature, and while that's been dealt with as throughly as anyone could, my contrarianism leads me to ask are there are *any* notable right-wing sociologists? No reason, just curious. Best I could find as a layman was Nisbet.","c_root_id_A":"desg9cw","c_root_id_B":"des5tt0","created_at_utc_A":1489224392,"created_at_utc_B":1489201652,"score_A":21,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"It depends on the time you're discussing. Durkheim wasn't a rightist really, but he was a strong nationalist (Weber is not too different in this respect), and some of his students, like Ziya G\u00f6kalp in Turkey, were even more so.   I don't know if they were truly \"right wing\", but there were several who went against the dominant stream in sociology. Christian Smith just tried to write a book about this, *The Sacred Project of American Sociology*. It's got some empirical problems (but, not coincidentally, it comes out of a reading of Durkheim). See the review from the (left wing) demographer Philip Cohen: \"It's Modernity, Stupid\". The comment on it from Org Theory emphasizes the Durkheimian heritage. That second review ends with the paragraph:  >Smith is right that most readers will reject this book, and deservedly so. Its myriad flaws, disingenuousness, and fundamental incoherence certainly outweigh the kernel of worthwhile argument. But I do think that kernel exists, and I think sociology would be well served by continuing to consider the social origins of individuality and the collective consequences of morality, both positive and negative.  There are some recent examples of poor social science that have been called reaction right wing (Mark Regnerus, who is a good social scientist, but created the very poor and ideologically motivated \"New Family Structure Study\"; a similar guy who runs a center I think at UVA who provided some support for that study and whose name I'm blanking on). However, there were certainly earlier examples of work rejected as \"reactionary\" that later became known as good work. James Coleman's work on Catholic schools and on whites leaving cities because of busing seems to fit such.   From one obituary:  >Throughout his career, Coleman never shied away from controversy. He was also known for having the courage to change his stance on issues in light of new data. Subsequent to the completion of the Coleman Report, he analyzed data from cities that had created busing programs as a way of integrating black and white students into the same schools. In 1975, Coleman reported the conclusion that massive numbers of whites moved out of public schools in communities that had implemented busing programs. This conclusion led to one of the more controversial episodes in the recent history of American sociology.  >\"Some prominent members of the American Sociological Association moved to have Coleman expelled for daring to reach this conclusion,\" Becker said. \"It was not a fashionable or pleasant scientific finding. Fortunately for the integrity of the association, the move to expel him failed,\" Becker said.  >Coleman did not back away from his conclusions, despite pressure to do so, Becker said. Despite the controversy surrounding the report, Coleman was elected president of the ASA in 1991.  More on Coleman here, though I think it's hard to call him \"right wing\". But I think his legacy shows that sociology isn't in the same culture war place it once was: rejected in the 1970's, he was elected ASA president in the 1990's. I have met a few sociologists who privately held conservative positions (fewer Americans, but one of my closer friends is German and votes Angela Merkel\/CDP) and, in general, the right wing voting sociologists aren't particularly vocal about it and, so long as they produce good work that isn't blatantly ideologically motivated, I think they feel that like Coleman that can slip into sociology's mainstream.   I would speculate that conservativism might be more popular in sociology outside of America because American conservative assumptions (\"personal responsibility\") often go against the assumptions of sociology (that the things we're looking at are immanently social ). I imagine in systems where conservativism is focused more closely in something else (say, tradition or culture) there may be more famous right wing sociologists. For example, while his PhD is in political science, Charles Murray writes sociological books. Sociologists (and biologists and many others) strong condemned his chapter on race and intelligence in the *Bell Curve*, I wasn't alive when *Losing Ground* (about welfare) was published but it too was roundly commended I imagine. But his *Coming Apart*, which focused on things like tradition, at least got less condemnation and the sense I got were the arguments against it were on empirical rather than epistemological grounds (he's not a sociologist, here's a statistician and political scientist Andrew Gelman's take).","human_ref_B":"Most functionalists are right wing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22740.0,"score_ratio":1.2352941176}
{"post_id":"153slk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"\"Food deserts\" are often attributed with the spread of the obesity epidemic. But doesn't the invisible hand of capitalism dictate that if the demand existed, so would the supply? Isn't the problem not that access to healthy food is difficult but that the demand in many areas doesn't exist?","c_root_id_A":"c7j4n3h","c_root_id_B":"c7j0rq8","created_at_utc_A":1355938234,"created_at_utc_B":1355920621,"score_A":40,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Zoning laws are also an issue, especially in cities. I got my undergrad from GWU in DC, and I did my final thesis on zoning policy issues. Turns out in DC fast food places can be zoned in residential-commercial zones, while grocery stores can only be in commercial zones. That excludes the ability for a lot of grocery stores and other healthier food alternatives to even locate near where demand is. What is the result? A lot of people in DC, regardless of income, eat out *a lot* whether to local fast food places or sit down restaurants.  In juxtoposition, I'm now a graduate student out in Iowa, where zoning isn't quite as stringent, and the result is that most of the fast food places are along one of two roads, and due to what urban economics tells us, rather clustered at that. But, there are a plethora of various grocery stores spaced out around the town.  I'm by nature an \"institutionalist,\" in a variety of ways, and the formal legal structures we create that dictate how and where firms can locate definitely impacts access to healthy food, and local food culture.","human_ref_B":"Demand is a function of several factors, such as the price of the good in question, the price of other goods, income, tastes & preferences, expectations, consumption habits of other people, advertising & marketing, availability of the good in question (convenience), and so on. So demand is not just \"there,\" but is caused by a number of factors, some of which can be controlled by -- in the example -- producers of less healthy food.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17613.0,"score_ratio":2.8571428571}
{"post_id":"153slk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"\"Food deserts\" are often attributed with the spread of the obesity epidemic. But doesn't the invisible hand of capitalism dictate that if the demand existed, so would the supply? Isn't the problem not that access to healthy food is difficult but that the demand in many areas doesn't exist?","c_root_id_A":"c7j4bry","c_root_id_B":"c7j4n3h","created_at_utc_A":1355937143,"created_at_utc_B":1355938234,"score_A":12,"score_B":40,"human_ref_A":"When suppliers can manufacture demand, claims of an invisible hand pretty much fly out the window.","human_ref_B":"Zoning laws are also an issue, especially in cities. I got my undergrad from GWU in DC, and I did my final thesis on zoning policy issues. Turns out in DC fast food places can be zoned in residential-commercial zones, while grocery stores can only be in commercial zones. That excludes the ability for a lot of grocery stores and other healthier food alternatives to even locate near where demand is. What is the result? A lot of people in DC, regardless of income, eat out *a lot* whether to local fast food places or sit down restaurants.  In juxtoposition, I'm now a graduate student out in Iowa, where zoning isn't quite as stringent, and the result is that most of the fast food places are along one of two roads, and due to what urban economics tells us, rather clustered at that. But, there are a plethora of various grocery stores spaced out around the town.  I'm by nature an \"institutionalist,\" in a variety of ways, and the formal legal structures we create that dictate how and where firms can locate definitely impacts access to healthy food, and local food culture.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1091.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"153slk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"\"Food deserts\" are often attributed with the spread of the obesity epidemic. But doesn't the invisible hand of capitalism dictate that if the demand existed, so would the supply? Isn't the problem not that access to healthy food is difficult but that the demand in many areas doesn't exist?","c_root_id_A":"c7j36e2","c_root_id_B":"c7j4n3h","created_at_utc_A":1355933011,"created_at_utc_B":1355938234,"score_A":10,"score_B":40,"human_ref_A":"demand is, in part, a function of cost. and corn based foods are much cheaper.","human_ref_B":"Zoning laws are also an issue, especially in cities. I got my undergrad from GWU in DC, and I did my final thesis on zoning policy issues. Turns out in DC fast food places can be zoned in residential-commercial zones, while grocery stores can only be in commercial zones. That excludes the ability for a lot of grocery stores and other healthier food alternatives to even locate near where demand is. What is the result? A lot of people in DC, regardless of income, eat out *a lot* whether to local fast food places or sit down restaurants.  In juxtoposition, I'm now a graduate student out in Iowa, where zoning isn't quite as stringent, and the result is that most of the fast food places are along one of two roads, and due to what urban economics tells us, rather clustered at that. But, there are a plethora of various grocery stores spaced out around the town.  I'm by nature an \"institutionalist,\" in a variety of ways, and the formal legal structures we create that dictate how and where firms can locate definitely impacts access to healthy food, and local food culture.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5223.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"153slk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"\"Food deserts\" are often attributed with the spread of the obesity epidemic. But doesn't the invisible hand of capitalism dictate that if the demand existed, so would the supply? Isn't the problem not that access to healthy food is difficult but that the demand in many areas doesn't exist?","c_root_id_A":"c7j36e2","c_root_id_B":"c7j4bry","created_at_utc_A":1355933011,"created_at_utc_B":1355937143,"score_A":10,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"demand is, in part, a function of cost. and corn based foods are much cheaper.","human_ref_B":"When suppliers can manufacture demand, claims of an invisible hand pretty much fly out the window.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4132.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"153slk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"\"Food deserts\" are often attributed with the spread of the obesity epidemic. But doesn't the invisible hand of capitalism dictate that if the demand existed, so would the supply? Isn't the problem not that access to healthy food is difficult but that the demand in many areas doesn't exist?","c_root_id_A":"c7j36e2","c_root_id_B":"c7j60qm","created_at_utc_A":1355933011,"created_at_utc_B":1355942844,"score_A":10,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"demand is, in part, a function of cost. and corn based foods are much cheaper.","human_ref_B":"Public health person here. Of course, every market result is an economic result of some kind. You could argue that the current position of every macroscopic object on earth is a result of the law of gravity. That would be correct. But how much information do you get out of that?   You can just say, well, the kinds and prices of foods available in so-called \"food deserts\" are merely the result of what people there want and can afford. That would be true. But can you also say that those people \"want\" to be malnourished and obese? You need to consider the many ways in which the market has failed before you consider what you are observing to be the socially efficient result.  Information (knowledge of nutrition, how to cook with raw ingredients). Barriers to access (e.g., travel costs). Normative influences (what everyone else around you has been eating your whole life). Survival and poverty cultures (fatalism, short-term thinking, etc.).   The market is already distorted by agricultural subsidies. http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Agricultural_subsidy#United_States  It is not necessary to make a condescending argument that poor people are \"brainwashed\" or stupid to point out that one's immediate environment shapes normative standards. If everybody is buying and eating certain kinds of foods, and especially if stores are only selling certain kinds of foods, that becomes normal.   People are animals, not the preposterously rational and all-knowing calculating machines that economists pretend we are. If you give me a source of calories from sugar that is within my budget, I'm going to eat that food unless there are good reasons not to. I'm going to get those calories if I can. If humans naturally made only the most optimal food decisions, why is there obesity, type II diabetes, etc., in places where good food is cheaply available?  Here is a study of the subjective and objective reasons that people do not buy fresh fruit and vegetables in some places. Hendrickson, D. D., Smith, C. C., & Eikenberry, N. N. (2006). Fruit and vegetable access in four low-income food deserts communities in Minnesota. Agriculture And Human Values, 23(3), 371-383.   Bitler & Haider 2011 gives a good overview of the considerations for the economic study of food deserts.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9833.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"153slk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"\"Food deserts\" are often attributed with the spread of the obesity epidemic. But doesn't the invisible hand of capitalism dictate that if the demand existed, so would the supply? Isn't the problem not that access to healthy food is difficult but that the demand in many areas doesn't exist?","c_root_id_A":"c7j60qm","c_root_id_B":"c7j54x0","created_at_utc_A":1355942844,"created_at_utc_B":1355939896,"score_A":12,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Public health person here. Of course, every market result is an economic result of some kind. You could argue that the current position of every macroscopic object on earth is a result of the law of gravity. That would be correct. But how much information do you get out of that?   You can just say, well, the kinds and prices of foods available in so-called \"food deserts\" are merely the result of what people there want and can afford. That would be true. But can you also say that those people \"want\" to be malnourished and obese? You need to consider the many ways in which the market has failed before you consider what you are observing to be the socially efficient result.  Information (knowledge of nutrition, how to cook with raw ingredients). Barriers to access (e.g., travel costs). Normative influences (what everyone else around you has been eating your whole life). Survival and poverty cultures (fatalism, short-term thinking, etc.).   The market is already distorted by agricultural subsidies. http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Agricultural_subsidy#United_States  It is not necessary to make a condescending argument that poor people are \"brainwashed\" or stupid to point out that one's immediate environment shapes normative standards. If everybody is buying and eating certain kinds of foods, and especially if stores are only selling certain kinds of foods, that becomes normal.   People are animals, not the preposterously rational and all-knowing calculating machines that economists pretend we are. If you give me a source of calories from sugar that is within my budget, I'm going to eat that food unless there are good reasons not to. I'm going to get those calories if I can. If humans naturally made only the most optimal food decisions, why is there obesity, type II diabetes, etc., in places where good food is cheaply available?  Here is a study of the subjective and objective reasons that people do not buy fresh fruit and vegetables in some places. Hendrickson, D. D., Smith, C. C., & Eikenberry, N. N. (2006). Fruit and vegetable access in four low-income food deserts communities in Minnesota. Agriculture And Human Values, 23(3), 371-383.   Bitler & Haider 2011 gives a good overview of the considerations for the economic study of food deserts.","human_ref_B":"Part of it can be attributed to imperfect information. Firms don't do quality market research on poorer areas to assess demand, assuming there is none. But I can think of a couple examples where political pressure about the food desert issue has brought grocery stores to ghettos that are subsequently quite successful.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2948.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"153slk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"\"Food deserts\" are often attributed with the spread of the obesity epidemic. But doesn't the invisible hand of capitalism dictate that if the demand existed, so would the supply? Isn't the problem not that access to healthy food is difficult but that the demand in many areas doesn't exist?","c_root_id_A":"c7j7zg3","c_root_id_B":"c7j54x0","created_at_utc_A":1355949077,"created_at_utc_B":1355939896,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"One aspect of food deserts that has been missing from this discussion is the issue of transportation, both of food and people.  As a rule, the retail trend over the past few decades has been towards increasing centralization, in larger stores.  Local markets have given way to the supermarket, which in many places is now becoming a mega-mart with non-food items.  These stores require a serious cargo infrastructure, for both supply and transit.  That's much easier for large stores (that can have warehouse space) along easily-accessed arterial roads.  Already, that puts urban areas at a disadvantage -- it's simply more difficult to ship in the kind of product volume a large store would need.  Once the stores are located along arterial roads, access by customers requires something more than walking.  For suburban families with cars, that's not a major issue; even a twenty-minute car trip to a grocery store (although a pain) isn't an undue burden.  However, families without cars -- precisely those most likely to live in poorer areas -- are subject to the schedules of public transit.  The suitability of public transit for simple, regular errands like grocery trips is a matter of local policy.  Often, transit networks are focused on the far more voluminous issue of getting people to\/from work: moving people from the suburbs to the core in the morning and from the core to the suburbs in the evening.  That's not a great system for going to the grocery, and a twenty minute car trip could take an hour by bus.  To make matters worse, public transit also isn't suited for carrying personal cargo, especially at peak hours.  A family with a car can load up the trunk with a week's worth of groceries in a single go, but doing the same on a crowded bus is impractical at best. Not only are the trips more difficult, but the cargo restriction means that the non-auto family will have to take *more* trips to get the same amount of groceries.  These problems could be overcome with enough money, of course, but the market isn't failing here.   There just isn't the money for it, especially in the poorer areas affected by food deserts.  (TL;DR: The supply does exist, it's called \"get a car.\"  Solve that and you're set.)","human_ref_B":"Part of it can be attributed to imperfect information. Firms don't do quality market research on poorer areas to assess demand, assuming there is none. But I can think of a couple examples where political pressure about the food desert issue has brought grocery stores to ghettos that are subsequently quite successful.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9181.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1qrqa2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"The Stock Market is reaching all time record levels but unemployment remains relatively high. Why?","c_root_id_A":"cdfy8l9","c_root_id_B":"cdg5bcm","created_at_utc_A":1384642552,"created_at_utc_B":1384661978,"score_A":11,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Some argue that the loose monetary policy of the federal reserve contributes to inflated stock prices (without creating any direct benefit to unemployment). See this chart, this article and this quote:  >The theory behind why quantitative easing drives up stock prices is relatively straightforward. There are two main effects. First of all, quantitative easing involves buying long-term bonds, which in turn drives down the interest rates on these. The reason for this is that when there is a strong demand for bonds \u2013 which is exactly what quantitative easing artificially creates \u2013 bond issuers do not have to offer such high interest rates in order to attract investors. This in turn means that bonds are less attractive to non-governmental investors, and so they turn to stocks instead \u2013 driving up the price.  >The second reason is that quantitative easing makes more capital available to businesses at lower rates. This allows them to swap high-cost debt for low-cost debt and buy back stock \u2013 improving their earnings per share and driving up the value of the remaining stock. In principle, they can also use the money to grow their business organically and make acquisitions, again driving up the stock price because the fundamental value has increased.","human_ref_B":"Lots of speculation in here. Two main things that come to mind:  1.) The stock market \"record\" is in nominal, not real (ie inflation-adjusted) terms.   2.) The stock market indicates is based on forward looking expectations. People generally buy stocks with the expectations of earning money from future dividends.  So the stock market increasing indicates that people expect future times to be good, not that current times are. In other words, its a leading indicator, not a lagging indicator.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19426.0,"score_ratio":1.5454545455}
{"post_id":"keryj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Will abolishing minimum wage create jobs? Why or why not?  Also, aside from job creation (or not), what other effects would the abolition of minimum wage have?","c_root_id_A":"c2jotbg","c_root_id_B":"c2jpcdu","created_at_utc_A":1315959789,"created_at_utc_B":1315964082,"score_A":2,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"This is a good question. As a secondary question, what effect, if any, does minimum wage have on inflation?","human_ref_B":"There is no doubt that if the minimum wage were very high, that would reduce employment. However, at present levels in the US, there has been no evidence of any negative employment effects.  See this section of the Wikipedia article on minimum wage:  *\"little or no evidence of a negative association between minimum wages and employment\"*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4293.0,"score_ratio":7.5}
{"post_id":"keryj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Will abolishing minimum wage create jobs? Why or why not?  Also, aside from job creation (or not), what other effects would the abolition of minimum wage have?","c_root_id_A":"c2jpl31","c_root_id_B":"c2jotbg","created_at_utc_A":1315965931,"created_at_utc_B":1315959789,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Yes, at least in theory, because the minimum wage makes it illegal for workers for workers to work if their labor is worth less than whatever the binding price floor is.","human_ref_B":"This is a good question. As a secondary question, what effect, if any, does minimum wage have on inflation?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6142.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"keryj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Will abolishing minimum wage create jobs? Why or why not?  Also, aside from job creation (or not), what other effects would the abolition of minimum wage have?","c_root_id_A":"c2jotbg","c_root_id_B":"c2jqznd","created_at_utc_A":1315959789,"created_at_utc_B":1315977463,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This is a good question. As a secondary question, what effect, if any, does minimum wage have on inflation?","human_ref_B":"No losing minium wage would not be good for jobs, but have the opposite effect.  The wages people are making allow people to purchase goods, and gives a base to the economy.  People need to have the money to purchase goods in order to force companies to hire people to sell those goods, and in order to produce those goods.  By lowering min wage what you are doing is taking the people that most often spend their entire paycheck, rather than saving, and taking more money away that they would spend.  This means that less items are purchased, dropping the amount of money they put back into the economy.  When less items are sold, then less items are produced, and people in production lose their jobs.  When less is purchased, and less produced, the people that sell these items lose their jobs, and we have more people out of work.  Now that even more people are out of work we have less purchased, which means less sold and produced, causing a spiral downward.  The fact is that hiring is directly related to production.  This means that people are laid off, not because of the amount of money coming in, but the lessened production coming out.  A company that does not have enough people to operate because of funds is a poorly run company.  Every company that is properly managed should be able produce enough goods and services to hire the staff needed to produce those goods and services.  If not they need to look either at why their product is not selling, or where the inefficiencies are.  With these companies more staff is just over head, and killing the company faster.  With no min wage we will end up with the same issue we saw in England and America in the 1800's before unions, with sweatshops in every major city, crime running rampant, and we will see another workers revolution.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17674.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1e7c45","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"If North and South Korea were reunified today, what would it do to the population of North Korea? The closest similar situation I can think of is Germany's reunification, but it is a different case, given that Germany didn't fight a war against itself and that it was essentially a colony of the USSR. North Korea is an independent nation that carefully cultivates an insular ideology, and has - at least I get the impression - a population that is more loyal to that ideology than was the case in East Germany. However, even in Germany, you can still tell the difference economically between East and West, especially in Berlin. Still, Germany is doing well as a unified state. Would the same be the case in Korea or would the other factors I mentioned make a difference? Would North Koreans be able to handle a drastic ideological shift? What would happen?   If I'm in the wrong subreddit, my apologies in advance. This one seemed like a good place to get a good answer. :)","c_root_id_A":"c9xl4fp","c_root_id_B":"c9xln19","created_at_utc_A":1368406729,"created_at_utc_B":1368408342,"score_A":16,"score_B":36,"human_ref_A":"No one has mentioned it yet, so I will:  Massive unemployment. On both sides. In the North, you have the worlds largest standing army in one location. The major employeer is the military and the gov't in general, much of which is artificially propped up. In the south you would likely see a decrease in military size, possibly a doing away with the mandatory service period.","human_ref_B":"The difference between East and West Germany and North and South Korea though is that East Germany had a significantly smaller relative population than West Germany as compared to the Koreas, and that the economic disparity between the two countries is much, much smaller.  >**East Germany**: Population  in 1990: 16,111,000, GDP Per Capita in 1990: $9,679  >**West Germany**: Population in 1990: 62,168,000, GDP Per Capita in 1990: $15,300  >**North Korea**: Population in 2011: 24,554,000, GDP Per Capita in 2011: $1,800  >**South Korea**: Population in 2012: 50,004,000, GDP Per Capita in 2012: $32,272  East Germany had about a quarter the population that the West had, but was able to keep up with standards of living, mostly because the East German government was relatively better managed and more forward-thinking than that of North Korea. German reunification went smoothly because the people of East Germany did not live in decrepit conditions, and because there wasn't a whole lot of them compared to the West.  In contrast, North Korea's population is about half of that of South Korea, and their living conditions are much, much worse. The reunification of North and South Korea has the potential to be the greatest economic disaster to ever face the South, assuming that they would be held to pay for it. Such a thing, when not handled right, would also throw global markets into a stir, especially in Asia. Fortunately, North Koreans are for the most part employable, and aren't lacking in manufacturing and IT skills. The biggest problem would be faced by how the countries are reunited, and whether or not the collapse of the North Korean government came from a state of war or an internal collapse.  EDIT: Sources via Wikipedia, search the pages for each country if you feel you must.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1613.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"9rrg7e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What can explain the rise in popularity of Xanax in America's youth drug culture? Ten years ago rappers weren't rapping about Xanax, much less naming themselves after it (Lil Xan). When I went to rehab eight years ago nobody was there for Xanax. Prescription drug dealers had it, but people I knew weren't all that excited about it. I'm in rehab again and it seems like everyone under the age of twenty five used it. It's a favorite of the latest generation of rappers, and a lot of them have it in their systems when they overdose and die. It's not a new drug, and as far as I know it hasn't suddenly become more accessible (correct me if I'm wrong). Is there something about the specific profile of alprazolam, or benzodiazepines in general, that resonates with today's young drug users in a way that it didn't with the people I used with eight or ten years ago?","c_root_id_A":"e8jm8wr","c_root_id_B":"e8jgjxf","created_at_utc_A":1540644174,"created_at_utc_B":1540632448,"score_A":22,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"A few reasons.  Xanax and other benzos haven\u2019t received the public backlash or crackdown that opioids have. They remain relatively easy to get and are more associated with bored housewives than hardcore addicts.   Because they are so easy to get they are cheap. You can get a bar for like $5.   Mixing benzos with opioids and alcohol can heighten the effect of the opioid, making them a good option when you can\u2019t get enough of your drug of choice. Benzo-use is highest among users of other drugs, and 30% of opioid overdoses involve some kind of benzo. They are also popular for users of uppers like molly or blow to come down after a night of partying.  There have been concerns about the \u201cXanax epidemic\u201d since as early as 2000.  But it is not surprising that it continues to grow as a) our society becomes ever more anxiety producing, b) opioids become harder to get, and c) general addictive behavior and drug use remains relatively high among millennials.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/www.citylab.com\/life\/2018\/03\/the-unhappy-states-of-america\/555800\/  America is becoming a more and more unhappy place. Large sections of population are at a big risk of addiction due to poor mental health.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11726.0,"score_ratio":1.2222222222}
{"post_id":"5udfme","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is the outsourcing of STEM jobs in the US a sign of companies exploiting cheap foreign labor, or the US education system failing? After reading this article on the STEM \"crisis\" I'm becoming more and more convinced that in many fields (computer sciences & engineering) there isn't necessarily a shortage of potential STEM workers, but rather a shortage of *qualified* workers in the field, i.e. people with good education and experience in the field. I don't feel that highly educated, highly qualified STEM workers in the US have any issues competing with foreign workers, but those who fall short of expected qualifications might have issues.  I also can't understand why some rationalize outsourcing STEM jobs as exploitative. These jobs are usually the safest jobs in the market. Compared to the other choices in jobs some of these foreign workers have, STEM opportunities in the US are the best chance they have at improving their quality of life, even the ones who don't get H1-Bs and work in the overseas offices.   If you see the global job market as a supply and demand system, why would it make sense to restrict companies' ability to hire foreign workers? Doesn't the increase of outsourcing in the US simply signify that the education system is failing to produce enough quality workers to meet with employer demands?","c_root_id_A":"ddtygp0","c_root_id_B":"ddtz6zf","created_at_utc_A":1487273682,"created_at_utc_B":1487274487,"score_A":4,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"It doesn\u2019t add up >Meanwhile, The National Science Board\u2019s biennial book, Science and Engineering Indicators, consistently finds that the US produces several times the number of STEM graduates than can get jobs in their fields. Recent reports from the National Institutes of Health, the National Academies, and the American Chemical Society warn that overproduction of STEM PhDs is damaging America\u2019s ability to recruit native-born talent, and advise universities to limit the number of doctorates they produce, especially in the severely glutted life sciences. In June 2012, for instance, the American Chemical Society\u2019s annual survey found record unemployment among its members, with only 38 percent of new PhDs, 50 percent of new master\u2019s graduates, and 33 percent of new bachelor\u2019s graduates in fulltime jobs. Overall, STEM unemployment in the US is more than twice its pre-recession level, according to congressional testimony by Ron Hira, a science-labor-force expert at the Rochester Institute of Technology.  http:\/\/archives.cjr.org\/reports\/what_scientist_shortage.php  >But what \u201cwe all know,\u201d as Senator Cornyn put it, turns out not to be true\u2014and the perpetuation of this myth is discouraging Americans from pursuing scientific careers. Leading experts on the STEM workforce, including Richard Freeman of Harvard, Michael Teitelbaum of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Paula Stephan of Georgia State University, Hal Salzman of Rutgers, Lindsay Lowell of Georgetown, and Norman Matloff of the University of California-Davis, have said for years that the US produces ample numbers of excellent science students. In fact, according to the National Science Board\u2019s authoritative publication Science and Engineering Indicators 2008, the country turns out three times as many STEM degrees as the economy can absorb into jobs related to their majors.  What Scientist Shortage? >So what\u2019s going on? Simply put, a desire for cheap, skilled labor, within the business world and academia, has fueled assertions\u2014based on flimsy and distorted evidence\u2014that American students lack the interest and ability to pursue careers in science and engineering, and has spurred policies that have flooded the market with foreign STEM workers. This has created a grim reality for the scientific and technical labor force: glutted job markets; few career jobs; low pay, long hours, and dismal job prospects for postdoctoral researchers in university labs; near indentured servitude for holders of temporary work visas.   Your Question: >Doesn't the increase of outsourcing in the US simply signify that the education system is failing to produce enough quality workers to meet with employer demands?   No. It signifies that employers refuse to pay American worker's an honest wage.","human_ref_B":"As the article empirically notes; STEM is a large field and there's certain sectors that are saturated with skilled labor vs others that are not. This is why the tone and dialog set in the article are so relevant; due to heterogeneity there's no single strategy that can be applied to dealing with the issue. Previously(prior 2010) visa fraud and unethical practices weren't reported as widely as they have in the past 5 years, which definitely sets the stage for some reform.  I definitely believe that the hatred\/negative impression around STEM jobs is not completely irrational. Unfortunately, yes a lot of foreign companies (Indian, let's not generalize here) have indulged in less than ethical practices. The funny thing though is that there's excessive politicization of this issue, which leads to blame being laid on foreign workers rather than foreign companies. Here, lawmakers are missing their mark by penalizing workers instead of companies. To be fair its not easy to make the distinction; and some of the suggested reforms (Zoey Lofgren) could be potential solutions. But yes, STEM jobs by definition are not exploitative, off-shore firms definitely can be. Secondly, YES a lot of these firms are bringing in 'mediocre-skilled' labor at best which goes against the intention of STEM visas to bring in the best. So we definitely need to have some quality control; bemoaning the lack of skilled-labor whilst also giving employers the unchecked power to continue over-saturating the market is gross stupidity.  Its easier to blame broken foreign worker policies cause the alternative is scarier. In a rapidly growing digital world a lot of jobs are growing less relevant. On the supply side of the equation, non-programming jobs are getting irrelevant so much so that a tonne of Chemical, Biology, Social Science Phd's are contributing to the over-saturation of computer and data science jobs even when the role doesn't necessarily make utilization of their domain knowledge. There's always going to be a shortage of highly-skilled labor: that's the way the world works. Unfortunately with difficult problems passing the buck is all we do, but lets not blame education for inefficient human resource management when the blame lies with legislature.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":805.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1i3fce","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Why do women in Turkic and Slavic cultures often wear headscarves with coins hanging from them?","c_root_id_A":"cb0ob49","c_root_id_B":"cb0rif2","created_at_utc_A":1373573213,"created_at_utc_B":1373580957,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I'd add women from some places in India, Arabic countries and maybe Romania.","human_ref_B":"It's popular around dinaridi (hills in croatia and bosnia). Those coins are savings of certain family. More money, richer family.  Note these are small villages so theft was very hard to go unnoticed.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7744.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"cjk9i0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"If a job requires one to do something they think is unethical, will that person\u2019s ethics gradually change to remove the dissonance? Im wondering if there have been any studies around how otherwise \u201cgood\u201d people change their notions of right and wrong because their job or the social structure in that job demands it to fit in or even get the job done.","c_root_id_A":"evgsg00","c_root_id_B":"evf8stt","created_at_utc_A":1564515131,"created_at_utc_B":1564491237,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Cognitive dissonance is a popular catch-all psychological phenomenon which is often cited to explain seemingly hypocritical or otherwise inconsistent behavior such as the one you describe. Now, I do not intend to suggest that cognitive dissonance does *not* happen, or that it would *not* apply to such scenarios, but there is much more to attitudes and attitude change, and cognitive dissonance is oversimplified in common knowledge. I wish to use this opportunity to expand a bit further on what the theory entails.  ---  Firstly, it is not sufficient to have a discrepancy between behavior and attitudes to have cognitive dissonance. For example, to quote the author of the theory of cognitive dissonance, Festinger:  >One obvious determinant of the magnitude of dissonance lies in the characteristics of the elements between which the relation of dissonance holds. ***If two elements are dissonant with one another, the magnitude of the dissonance will be a function of the importance of the elements.*** The more these elements are important to, or valued by, the person, the greater will be the magnitude of a dissonant relation between them ...]  And also,  >***Let us consider now the total context of dissonances and consonances in relation to one particular element.*** *Assuming momentarily, for the sake of definition, that all the elements relevant to the one in question are equally important,* ***the total amount of dissonance between this element and the remainder of the person's cognition will depend on the proportion of relevant elements that are dissonant with the one in question.*** Thus, if the overwhelming majority of relevant elements are consonant with, say, a behavioral element, then the dissonance with this behavioral element is slight. If in relation to the number of elements consonant with the behavioral element the number of dissonant elements is large, the total dissonance will be of appreciable magnitude [...]  Therefore, it is necessary to consider the importance of the attitudes and behaviors in play, and to compare them to each other.   ---  Another thing to consider is whether or not the individual can avoid the dissonance by taking another path, such as by justifying their behavior. As [Aronson explains:  >However, **any threat provides cognitions that are consonant with not performing the activity; and the more severe the threat, the greater the consonance.** In short, **a severe threat provides ample justification for not performing the activity; a mild threat provides less justification**. leading the individual to add justifications of his own in the form of convincing himself that he does not like  to perform the activity.  For illustration, see the concept of techniques of neutralization. As Sykes and Matza explain:  >**The difficulties in viewing delinquent behavior as springing from a set of deviant values and norms-as arising, that is to say, from a situation in which the delinquent defines his delinquency as \"right\"-are both empirical and theoretical.**  Such that delinquents can have apparently incoherent attitudes and behaviors, such as committing theft, but admiring law-abiding people;  >**Techniques of neutralization may not be powerful enough to fully shield the individual from the force of his own internalized values and the reactions of conforming others**, for as we have pointed out, juvenile delinquents often appear to suffer from feelings of guilt and shame when called into account for their deviant behavior. And **some delinquents may be so isolated from the world of conformity that techniques of neutralization need not be called into play. Nonetheless, we would argue that techniques of neutralization are critical in lessening the effectiveness of social controls and that they lie behind a large share of delinquent behavior.**  Or see Shalvi et al.'s study on how people can do wrong and still feel moral:  >**Pre-violation justifications lessen the anticipated threat to the moral self** by redefining questionable behaviors as excusable. **Post-violation justifications alleviate the experienced threat to the moral self** through compensations that balance or lessen violations.   You can also read this paper on *ethical* dissonance and how people can \"deal\" with it. Other justifications can also include, for example, the perception of incentives (I am doing it for the reward). See for example Linder et al.:  >The 2 experiments together show that **a low incentive arouses dissonance, leading to attitude change, only when the person remains free to decide against compliance** after he has been fully informed about the incentive. **If the incentive is announced after the person is committed to compliance, a reinforcement effect obtains.**  Furthermore, it is important to consider the context, such that the workplace can also facilitate moral disengagement.  ---  Then there is also the matter of moral licensing, the phenomenon according to which a person that has done something good earlier feels like they \"gained credit\" which allows them to behave badly subsequently. Quoting Monin and Miller:  >**One  important  determinant  of  people's  willingness  to  express  politically  incorrect  attitudes  is  their  confidence that  they  are  unprejudiced.**  Although  confidence  of  this  type  may derive  from  a variety  of  sources,  **an  especially  important  source  is people's  past  behavior\u2014their  track  record**,  so to  speak.  The  more confident  people  are  that  their  past  behavior  reveals  a  lack  of prejudice,  the  less  they  will  worry  that  their  future  behavior  is, or can  be  construed  as, prejudiced  and  the  more  willing  they  will  be to  provide  politically  incorrect  responses.  Thus, **the  stronger  a person's  nonsexist  or  non racist  credentials,  the  less  worried  he  or she  will  be that  a given  action  would  constitute  (or  would be  seen as  constituting)  evidence   of  a  sexist   or  racist  disposition**  ---  There is much more that can be said, but I will only add the question of what about the person's self-concept? Quoting Aronson again:  >[...] **almost all of the experiments testing dissonance theory have made predictions based upon the tacit assumption that people have a high self-concept.** Why do people who buy new cars selectively expose themselves to advertisements about their own make of car (Ehrlich et  al.,  1957) and try to convince themselves that they made the right choice? Because **the knowledge that one has bought a junky car is dissonant with a high self-concept. But suppose a person had a low self-concept? Then the cognition that he bought a junky car would not be dissonant.** Indeed, if the theory holds, **such a person should engage in all kinds of \u201cbizarre\u201d behavior such as exposing himself to advertisements about other cars, hearing squeaks and rattles that are not even there, and saying, in effect, \u201cJust my luck, I bought a lemon-these things are always happening to me.\u201d**  ---  Therefore, yes. It is possible that a person required to do something unethical for their job might change attitude. They might either self-persuade themselves to resolve dissonance, or use their behavior to self-perceive their actual attitudes if we were to use an alternative explanation than dissonance. But it depends on several factors, and we should also question what got them to accept employment in the first place.  Cognitive dissonance *might* happen. Another person might justify their situation (I am under obligation!) or might neutralize their dissonance (I am following orders!). Perhaps it does not happen simply because they act otherwise ethically and believe they are \"allowed\" an exception, and\/or their identity as an ethical person is not that importance or salient, at least for whatever they are requested to do, and\/or they have a low self-concept (woe is me!).  Furthermore, cognitive dissonance can have several outcomes. The person might change cognition, but they might also change its importance, or its content, or add new cognitions to reinforce consonant elements and\/or reduce dissonant elements, if they do not just disengage and refuse to do the job instead.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=OsFEV35tWsg     That is a link to Philip Zimbardo's ted talk on the nature of evil. In it he talks about how good, moral people, could be drawn into doing undeniably evil acts almost accidentally. Its a fantastic talk, and I believe it focuses on abu-gharaib prison, where prisoners of war (90% of whom were innocent of their charges according to one guard!) from American war in Iraq were tortured in all sorts of inhumane ways. Another example, not all Germans were totally down with Hitler's final solution, not all guards of camps wanted to be there, and yet....","labels":1,"seconds_difference":23894.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1gka7k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"When did animal cruelty become a crime in the West? I've heard that bear baiting, dogfighting, and other animal bloodsports were much more common\/ accepted in the past. What changed in society and government to make them crimes?","c_root_id_A":"cal5ygx","c_root_id_B":"calaudx","created_at_utc_A":1371554528,"created_at_utc_B":1371573189,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"For the history of how and why tastes around animal cruelty changed through history in the west I highly suggest Steven Pinker's The Better Angels of Our Nature.","human_ref_B":"In the US, it first became against the law on April 19, 1866, in New York State, which passed an anti-cruelty law and gave the nine day old ASPCA the right to enforce it.  The law apparently included short terms of imprisonment as well as fines.    (http:\/\/www.aspca.org\/about-us\/history.aspx)  When laws against animal cruelty were first passed, there were no laws protecting the rights of children.  The welfare of children was considered the purview of the family and something the state had no business with.  (This might explain why there were no laws regarding cruelty to animals--animals were property, and had no more 'rights' in the state's eyes than your car.  You cannot be 'cruel' to your car.  But while I have read something on this it was at least a decade ago.)  In 1873, a Methodist missionary named Etta Wheeler became aware of a child named Mary Ellen who was being abused by her stepmother.  Wheeler couldn't find any legal protection for the child so she approached Henry Bergh, the founder of the ASPCA, and they sued under the animal protection legislation.  Bergh got custody of the 11 year old girl.  http:\/\/www.picturehistory.com\/product\/id\/20872  http:\/\/www.resourcesforattorneys.com\/childabuseandtheaspcaarticle.html  http:\/\/www.childrenservices.org\/directservices\/USAhistory.html  **TL;DR** Animal protection legislation in the US was the basis of child protective services.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18661.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"17kuqw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"When the US had slavery, were slaves considered to be \"labor\" or \"capital\" in economic terms? (why do I ask? Please answer the question as if I had not explained this, but I am wondering because I see a sort of parallel between slavery and computers, if computers are seen as \"capital\" only, despite continuous advances in areas like AI which potentially blur the distinction greatly. We either are over-estimating the importance of workers ability to make judgement calls on the job- even though many jobs try to minimize such ability-  or underestimating the value of machines ability to do so.)  This is an interesting essay about Moore's Law and its effect on the workplace. Worth reading.","c_root_id_A":"c86ga1u","c_root_id_B":"c86hjrd","created_at_utc_A":1359578494,"created_at_utc_B":1359581826,"score_A":14,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Classical economics treats labor and capital as parallel inputs, so I would say there is no meaningful distinction.","human_ref_B":"Oddly enough, I've done research on economics and slavery. So, I'm a little bit familiar on the literature.   Robert Fogel's Time on the Cross, AFAIK, although highly controversial, it is the most comprehensive look at slavery economics.  Anyway, I would say that in the context of slavery, slaves were definitely treated as capital. When slaves were sold, they were sold for the long-run output. Specific skill sets, like cook or carpenter, meant that a slave would be sold for substantially more. According to this paper, slaves were sold for the equivalent of $11,000 to $162,000 ($2009) each. At the time, this was several times the average income per person.   Basically, slaves were sold like you would sell a used tractor today. A slave in their prime, like a new tractor today, sold for the amount of services he\/she would provide in the long run.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3332.0,"score_ratio":1.5714285714}
{"post_id":"3bmxp0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"If two or more countries owe each other money, can they cancel out their mutual debts? Hi everyone,  My question about economics is inspired by this post: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/todayilearned\/comments\/3bjy51\/til_the_us_owes_less_to_other_countries_than_its\/ It seems that the governments of most nations owe a lot of money to the governments of other nations. If we lived in a simplified world with just two governments, then they could forgive each other's debts simply by canceling it out.  Similarly, with three governments A, B, and C where A owes B, B owes C and C owes A the same amount of money, the debts could be canceled out by three countries \"paying\" in cyclic order A -> B, B -> C, C -> A. However, since each country receives and pays the same amount, nobody has to pay anything.  In principle this could be applied to the world economy, only there are many more governments and the amounts are different. I think it would probably be an optimization problem in graph theory.  Does this kind of debt cancellation occur in real life, and if not, why not? Is it because each piece of the debt comes with a different interest rate?  Edit: My question also applies to heavily leveraged financial institutions.","c_root_id_A":"csnl4yr","c_root_id_B":"csnl8rn","created_at_utc_A":1435676950,"created_at_utc_B":1435677122,"score_A":6,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"with three governments A, B, and C   -   >\"For the purposes of this report, U.S. portfolio investment in foreign securities includes all foreign securities owned by U.S. residents \"  -  The problem here is that this report is not talking about the (only) debt held by the Federal Reserve and Government, but by U.S. residents (including U.S. corporations???). Also it is not talking (only) about ownership of foreign government debt. But instead, seems to be mostly talking about private American resident ownership of private Foreign debt.   -  http:\/\/www.treasury.gov\/ticdata\/Publish\/shc2013_report.pdf","human_ref_B":"Hypothetically yes but most countries would have no desire to do so, they hold debt of other sovereigns for good reason (EG playing a forex game, ensuring a flow of foreign currency etc).  They would not cancel the debt but rather hold it until maturity, when the coupon payment is made its made to itself and zeros. This is (indirectly) what occurs currently with the fed, they hold Treasuries and when these mature TD pay the fed the coupon value and the fed remit that back to TD (last year ~$100b). Between different governments the complication is calculating an exchange value, the value of government debt is modified by its risk so it wouldn't be straight coupon for coupon.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":172.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"9w12ga","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Is it true that romantic relationships last longer when two people don't know each other extremely well? In a report done by Backstrom and Kleinberg in 2014, they found that partners were more likely to stay together longer as a couple if they didn't know each other as well (although its not to say they didn't know each other at all). How true is this claim? If so, does anybody have possible reasons why this happens?","c_root_id_A":"e9hgrie","c_root_id_B":"e9hhqlz","created_at_utc_A":1541950254,"created_at_utc_B":1541950975,"score_A":4,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Where in the paper does it say that? Doesn\u2019t seem related in any way based on the abstract","human_ref_B":"I think one of the problems you'll find in researching this is that it's hard to objectively assess how well two people know each other. There are many ways to approach the question. Is it about basic trivia like where you're from, your favorite food, etc.? Is it about how that person reacts to things emotionally and\/or their overall character? Is it the ability to predict their reactions and behaviors to given situations? Any research that answers this question would have to pick a corner to stand in and assert it's the right one and I'm not sure how valid that would be.  Elements of each of these articles would suggest that knowing each other better results in a better long-term relationship:  https:\/\/www.psychologytoday.com\/us\/blog\/fulfillment-any-age\/201206\/the-12-ties-bind-long-term-relationships  https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/facts-about-marriage-2017-2#the-closer-a-couple-are-in-age-the-less-likely-they-are-to-get-divorced-5  In particular, marrying your best friend (who you presumably know very well) and spending a lot of time together and knowing where each other are at indicates greater knowledge of one another, but these aren't guarantees of knowledge of one another.  On an anecdotal level, I've been with my husband for 31 years and we know each other super well - no secrets, no surprises, and a lot of talk and communication all the time. I think transparency emotionally is key to deep and profound intimacy and that any notion of \"mystery\" in a relationship creates long-term insecurity, not intrigue. Also, curiosity and interest in each others lives (as reflected in some of the items in those articles) is linked to longer partnership satisfaction and that would also reflect knowing each other. YMMV.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":721.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"19r2iz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"In Asian countries, specifically India, where did the beauty ideal of fair skin become ingrained in the culture?","c_root_id_A":"c8qtyl1","c_root_id_B":"c8qqbg4","created_at_utc_A":1362589463,"created_at_utc_B":1362574637,"score_A":12,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Wow, I'm surprised no one has mentioned the Indo-Aryan migration hypothesis yet, as that's the presumed reason for the caste system in India and, as a result, why India favors the lighter skinned.  In not-so-brief: it's been apparent to scholars since the 16th century that many of the languages spoken in India are related to many of the languages spoken in Europe (including English). By the same token, they are related to many of the languages spoken in Iran and to small numbers of remnant languages spoken across the central asian steppe (see this language chart and this language map from the Wikipedia page on the topic). The original speculation as to why was necessarily silly to modern ears (they came up with a Biblical reason, relating both groups to the children of Noah's son Japeth, IIRC).  As we got better at this whole \"scholarly inquiry\" thing later on, archeologists noted continuum's of material culture spreading out east, west and south from someplace near the black sea. Later, genetic evidence piled on to again support the view that the groups coinciding with these archeological spectrums and the linguistic communities seemed to share common ancestry (see this map of Y-chromosome haplogroup R1a1a). This has lead to a theory called the Indo European hypothesis of which the Indo-Aryan migration is a subset.  Here I need to digress slightly to untangle something. Modern Linguists, studying todays languages, can *definitively* state that the Hindi languages, Iranian languages and European language-groups are all related to one another; Archeologists can *definitively* state that by looking at dig sites one can see certain trends in the evolution of material cultures (but these trends can be deeply ambiguous, depending on what is being looked at); and geneticists can *definitively* state there is some kind of historical relationship between people sharing similar chromosomal haplogroups. Trying to combine these things, however, is far, far less obvious than proponents of any of these hypotheses would like you to believe. So when discussing the problem of the Indo-Aryans and the Indo-Europeans more generally, it is important to note that linguists, archeologists and geneticists are discussing three totally different things, and later scholars are piecing these disparate threads together to attempt to tell a coherent story.  That said, let's look at the current most popular view: the Kurgan hypothesis). According to this hypothesis the ultimate culturo-linguistic (and to a lesser degree genetic) ancestor to the European, Iranian, Indian and Siberian indo-European language speakers was a group of people living on the Pontic-Caspian Steppe about 5-6,000 years ago.   First, linguistics: the Sanskrit word \"pitar\" is probably related to the Latin \"pater\" and English \"father.\" \"Mother\" is, similarly, \"mater\" in Latin and \"matar\" in Sanskrit. \"Nactam\" was the Sanskrit for \"night,\" as is \"noctis\" in Latin. It is dangerous to read too much in to words sounding the same, but this happens over and over and over again in Indo-European languages, and it happens in particular, regular ways (see this page on \"centum-satem isogloss\" for more). Using these kinds of comparisons down through history, Linguists have managed to isolate a feasible central radiating point from which the languages seem to have arisen, and they've put it someplace north of the Black sea (if you're wondering, the Baltic languages seem to be have been the most conservative, and to most closely resemble ancient proto-Indo-European... but this doesn't mean it's the point from which the language came, and it fact might mean quite the opposite). Using far more dubious methods, some Linguists have even derived an age for proto-Indo-European of 5-6,000 years.  Dubious methodology aside, there exists in Archeology a material culture which matches the needs of the I-E hypothesis both in time and space. This is the Yamna Culture of the Pontic-Caspian steppe. The most telling thing about their culture was a burial practice under mounds known as Kurgans, in pits, placed in a particular position. The Yamna culture provides an interesting fit not only because of its location in time and space but also because these people were very successful and managed to spread out from their homeland. To the west they became the potalvka culture and to the east, the thing you're interested in, they become the Catacomb culture.   So the reason for that entire long digression is to say this: there is a fairly traceable archeological line running east and southeast out of the steppe and into Iran, where they slowly move ever eastward until they hit the mountain ranges separating the Iranian Plateau from the Indian subcontinent. By this point that culture is quite distinct from both the original I-E culture and from it's contemporaries. We call them the Indo-Iranians (note the cognate \"iran\" and \"aryan\"). The same culture seems to have entered India from the northwest of that country, carrying with them a warlike bent, a successful material culture and a different genetic make-up than the pre-historic inhabitants (speakers of the Dravidian language family). There were many more Dravidians than Indo-Iranians and it took the intrusive culture awhile to establish itself, during which time it changed due to distance from the homeland and contact with new people, becoming known as the Indo-Aryans. In the end, the belief is, the Indo-Aryans conquered the indigenous inhabitants, but avoided mixing with them, at least initially. And here we come to the genetics part of the show, because the Indo-Aryans were probably fairly light-skinned. At least, the Kurgan builders were, and the people they had been mingling with in Iran were also fairly light skinned. The surviving Dravidian populations in India, however, are darker-skinned, and it seems somewhat likely that the Dravidians of north India would have been as well. So the new conquerers put restrictions on mingling based on skin color, and the beginnings of a color-based caste system were born. Incidentally we know something of these invaders because they became literate and gave us the Rigveda.  Over time, the populations did mingle, of course. And over time the proto-caste system became more elaborate. Eventually I asssume the original reasons for the system were completely forgotten, but the higher-caste's still retained more allele's the coded for light skin than did the lower caste, so the relationship of skin color to caste position persisted.  TL;DR: RACISM.","human_ref_B":"specifically with vietnam, we were originally chinese who migrated down and after a war with mainland china we split apart. but when we migrated down there were indigenous people there which we kind of just treated like crap, similar but not to the extent the whites did to the native americans. now they're mountain people. they had darker skin, we had lighter fair skin. we don't like their dark skin and backward ways and this could possibly be a reason for the fair skin beauty ingrain-ation. but it's a guess.  edit:   this shows that the current vietnamese population came form china: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Vietnamese_people  this talks about the mountain people being a minority group and are indigenous: http:\/\/www.vietvet.org\/mountain.htm","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14826.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"19r2iz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"In Asian countries, specifically India, where did the beauty ideal of fair skin become ingrained in the culture?","c_root_id_A":"c8qtg3j","c_root_id_B":"c8qtyl1","created_at_utc_A":1362587841,"created_at_utc_B":1362589463,"score_A":2,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"This is a ideal with a verrry long history  more  Basically fashion in most epochs goes out of it's way to illustrate that the woman is high-class enough that she doesn't have to work.  Not being in the sun and pale was fashionable when most women worked in the sun.  Later there was the development of dresses and clothing that was too impossibly impractical to work in, and so on.","human_ref_B":"Wow, I'm surprised no one has mentioned the Indo-Aryan migration hypothesis yet, as that's the presumed reason for the caste system in India and, as a result, why India favors the lighter skinned.  In not-so-brief: it's been apparent to scholars since the 16th century that many of the languages spoken in India are related to many of the languages spoken in Europe (including English). By the same token, they are related to many of the languages spoken in Iran and to small numbers of remnant languages spoken across the central asian steppe (see this language chart and this language map from the Wikipedia page on the topic). The original speculation as to why was necessarily silly to modern ears (they came up with a Biblical reason, relating both groups to the children of Noah's son Japeth, IIRC).  As we got better at this whole \"scholarly inquiry\" thing later on, archeologists noted continuum's of material culture spreading out east, west and south from someplace near the black sea. Later, genetic evidence piled on to again support the view that the groups coinciding with these archeological spectrums and the linguistic communities seemed to share common ancestry (see this map of Y-chromosome haplogroup R1a1a). This has lead to a theory called the Indo European hypothesis of which the Indo-Aryan migration is a subset.  Here I need to digress slightly to untangle something. Modern Linguists, studying todays languages, can *definitively* state that the Hindi languages, Iranian languages and European language-groups are all related to one another; Archeologists can *definitively* state that by looking at dig sites one can see certain trends in the evolution of material cultures (but these trends can be deeply ambiguous, depending on what is being looked at); and geneticists can *definitively* state there is some kind of historical relationship between people sharing similar chromosomal haplogroups. Trying to combine these things, however, is far, far less obvious than proponents of any of these hypotheses would like you to believe. So when discussing the problem of the Indo-Aryans and the Indo-Europeans more generally, it is important to note that linguists, archeologists and geneticists are discussing three totally different things, and later scholars are piecing these disparate threads together to attempt to tell a coherent story.  That said, let's look at the current most popular view: the Kurgan hypothesis). According to this hypothesis the ultimate culturo-linguistic (and to a lesser degree genetic) ancestor to the European, Iranian, Indian and Siberian indo-European language speakers was a group of people living on the Pontic-Caspian Steppe about 5-6,000 years ago.   First, linguistics: the Sanskrit word \"pitar\" is probably related to the Latin \"pater\" and English \"father.\" \"Mother\" is, similarly, \"mater\" in Latin and \"matar\" in Sanskrit. \"Nactam\" was the Sanskrit for \"night,\" as is \"noctis\" in Latin. It is dangerous to read too much in to words sounding the same, but this happens over and over and over again in Indo-European languages, and it happens in particular, regular ways (see this page on \"centum-satem isogloss\" for more). Using these kinds of comparisons down through history, Linguists have managed to isolate a feasible central radiating point from which the languages seem to have arisen, and they've put it someplace north of the Black sea (if you're wondering, the Baltic languages seem to be have been the most conservative, and to most closely resemble ancient proto-Indo-European... but this doesn't mean it's the point from which the language came, and it fact might mean quite the opposite). Using far more dubious methods, some Linguists have even derived an age for proto-Indo-European of 5-6,000 years.  Dubious methodology aside, there exists in Archeology a material culture which matches the needs of the I-E hypothesis both in time and space. This is the Yamna Culture of the Pontic-Caspian steppe. The most telling thing about their culture was a burial practice under mounds known as Kurgans, in pits, placed in a particular position. The Yamna culture provides an interesting fit not only because of its location in time and space but also because these people were very successful and managed to spread out from their homeland. To the west they became the potalvka culture and to the east, the thing you're interested in, they become the Catacomb culture.   So the reason for that entire long digression is to say this: there is a fairly traceable archeological line running east and southeast out of the steppe and into Iran, where they slowly move ever eastward until they hit the mountain ranges separating the Iranian Plateau from the Indian subcontinent. By this point that culture is quite distinct from both the original I-E culture and from it's contemporaries. We call them the Indo-Iranians (note the cognate \"iran\" and \"aryan\"). The same culture seems to have entered India from the northwest of that country, carrying with them a warlike bent, a successful material culture and a different genetic make-up than the pre-historic inhabitants (speakers of the Dravidian language family). There were many more Dravidians than Indo-Iranians and it took the intrusive culture awhile to establish itself, during which time it changed due to distance from the homeland and contact with new people, becoming known as the Indo-Aryans. In the end, the belief is, the Indo-Aryans conquered the indigenous inhabitants, but avoided mixing with them, at least initially. And here we come to the genetics part of the show, because the Indo-Aryans were probably fairly light-skinned. At least, the Kurgan builders were, and the people they had been mingling with in Iran were also fairly light skinned. The surviving Dravidian populations in India, however, are darker-skinned, and it seems somewhat likely that the Dravidians of north India would have been as well. So the new conquerers put restrictions on mingling based on skin color, and the beginnings of a color-based caste system were born. Incidentally we know something of these invaders because they became literate and gave us the Rigveda.  Over time, the populations did mingle, of course. And over time the proto-caste system became more elaborate. Eventually I asssume the original reasons for the system were completely forgotten, but the higher-caste's still retained more allele's the coded for light skin than did the lower caste, so the relationship of skin color to caste position persisted.  TL;DR: RACISM.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1622.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"wk5vz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What would happen if Greece leaves the Euro? How would this be arranged? In Europe you often hear people saying that Greece should leave the Euro an go back to their own\/old currency.  But how would this happen? And what are the consequences of this?  People in Greece currently have the Euro. Most of them have a job and earned some money. Their bank accounts are filled with Euros. If a state leaves the \u20ac currency, you can't just take that away from them, can you?  Say they go back to Drachma. Maybe 500 Drachmas = 1 Euro on the day of the change. People now have their old Euros and earn new Drachmas. All citizens have the same level of wealth as before.  As time changes the Drachma's value declines. 800 Drachmas = 1 Euro. And this could be expected. The citizens with more Euros now become relatively wealthier than before.","c_root_id_A":"c5e985m","c_root_id_B":"c5e5dxi","created_at_utc_A":1342340757,"created_at_utc_B":1342318071,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Greece would :  # Stop all means of withdrawing Euros in cash, i.e. place the army outside banks and close all ATMs.  # Introduce capital controls, this means controlling the flow of currency across it's borders to prevent people from electronically or physically moving their Euros out of Greece # Convert all the Euros in peoples bank accounts to drachmas at an arbitrary rate  As time goes by (a matter of seconds on the forex markets) the drachma will crash and greece will find itself in terrible a condition, unable to import almost anything.   This is roughly what my prof told me, I've done one full time term of economics at uni.","human_ref_B":"First, you are only technically correct that most greeks have a job. The unemployment rate over there is pretty high. Second, this type of transition occured in the opposite direction when any current euro using country switched their currency. My bet is that the euro in greece would slowly be phased out over time.   I think the bigger issue would be the view of the euro on an internatinal scale. 12 months ago, the euro was seen as a strong currency because of all of the economies supporting it. Now the eur\/dol is at a two year low. More importantly, if countries (or vendors) think that there is a possibility that a euro country will leave the euro and adopt a new, less valuable currency, this extra risk will reduce the value of the euro in any given country (probably less so for germany, but more for ireland, spain and greece). So, i dont think the greese leaving the euro is nearly as big of a deal for greece as it is a big deal for reducing confidence in all of the other euro countries.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22686.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"wk5vz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What would happen if Greece leaves the Euro? How would this be arranged? In Europe you often hear people saying that Greece should leave the Euro an go back to their own\/old currency.  But how would this happen? And what are the consequences of this?  People in Greece currently have the Euro. Most of them have a job and earned some money. Their bank accounts are filled with Euros. If a state leaves the \u20ac currency, you can't just take that away from them, can you?  Say they go back to Drachma. Maybe 500 Drachmas = 1 Euro on the day of the change. People now have their old Euros and earn new Drachmas. All citizens have the same level of wealth as before.  As time changes the Drachma's value declines. 800 Drachmas = 1 Euro. And this could be expected. The citizens with more Euros now become relatively wealthier than before.","c_root_id_A":"c5e985m","c_root_id_B":"c5e839l","created_at_utc_A":1342340757,"created_at_utc_B":1342332546,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Greece would :  # Stop all means of withdrawing Euros in cash, i.e. place the army outside banks and close all ATMs.  # Introduce capital controls, this means controlling the flow of currency across it's borders to prevent people from electronically or physically moving their Euros out of Greece # Convert all the Euros in peoples bank accounts to drachmas at an arbitrary rate  As time goes by (a matter of seconds on the forex markets) the drachma will crash and greece will find itself in terrible a condition, unable to import almost anything.   This is roughly what my prof told me, I've done one full time term of economics at uni.","human_ref_B":"All taxes\/wages would be payed in drachmas.  A bank holiday would be introduced, and all accounts changed to drachmas, in a completely arbitrary exchange rate to euro.  This would be straight up stealing, and thus many Greeks with knowledge of the situation have withdrawn their euros (if they believe that the euro crisis wont turn contagious) or opened Swiss frank accounts.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8211.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2doeg1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What exactly does a professional economist do? Hey, I'm an Economics undergrad who's passionate about the subject but who doesn't know exactly what I should do for a living when I graduate next year, and I'm wondering: how exactly does the work day of a professional Economist look like? I'm especially interested in the experiences of state and private sector economists as opposed to academic economists.","c_root_id_A":"cjrkh06","c_root_id_B":"cjrlhn2","created_at_utc_A":1408153613,"created_at_utc_B":1408156066,"score_A":7,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Are you asking about the career path of a Economist with a Phd, or someone with a BA\/BS in econ?","human_ref_B":"It might be best to ask this in \/r\/academiceconomics.  With that stated, I'm a current PhD student in economics. On any given day my day consists of studying for classes I'm taking, reading research I'm interested in to work with on my own, doing supplementary tasks in another professors work (programming, writing up parts of a paper, putting together lit reviews, etc), grading assignments for another profesosrs class (homework, tests, etc). I imagine if I stay within academia I'll move from more supplementary roles to primary roles including but not limited to, teaching, finding and writing grants, writing personal research for publication, advising undergraduates).  Previously I interned\/worked at two policy think tanks in DC after finishing my undergraduate degree. There my day to day tasks consisted of writing and publishing op-eds in newspapers around the country as part of outreach, helping with data collection and data cleaning (yay excel!), shorter policy pieces (\"we see from X that the trend is Y over this period, this is worrying\/good because Z\", compiling new data for the institute to publish for other researchers to use, etc), and then long term white papers, which was personal research that was not meant for a wide distribution.  I have a friend who did economic consulting after finishing their undergraduate degree. Most of their time was spent doing data cleaning over large data sets for the higher ups to utilize. SQL and SAS was what they spent most of their day using. Later the same friend picked up a paid internship at the BEA where they did more data cleaning stuff, but the staff also had side research projects that he helped with occasionally if I remember correctly (but haven't talked to him about his roles there as much and is thus more anecdotal).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2453.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"1pklbk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Can someone provide an example of an industry being deregulated where it benefits the consumer? Just looking for specific examples, preferably with short and long-term results and backed by hard data.","c_root_id_A":"cd3a1ag","c_root_id_B":"cd39nfh","created_at_utc_A":1383174309,"created_at_utc_B":1383173375,"score_A":41,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"I think consensus is clear that airline ( this isn't the best paper but it has all the good citations, same with this ) and telecom deregulation ( ditto ) are two good examples of beneficial deregulation, if by beneficial one means better prices and higher-quality products.  In general, deregulation entails lowering barriers to entry into an industry. Those barriers, such as licensing requirements, are often imposed at the behest of industry groups that represent incumbent firms, who use those barriers to prevent competition. You should be more interested in the theoretical motivation for deregulation, because we're never going to settle the debate about objectively consumer-positive deregulation. Both supply and demand are always chasing those tasty gains.","human_ref_B":"In Canada each province has its own laws around how liquor is sold. Liquor in Alberta is comparatively deregulated in comparison to Ontario. In Ontario, there are only three places to buy alcohol, the government stores, the beer store (private consortium) and the wine rack. This means that prices are fixed, the hours are limited and the geographic distance distance between liquor stores are often very wide.   In Alberta, there are only private liquor stores. Alcohol can be sold until 2am, compared to 9pm (11 for some places) in Ontario. There is also much greater selection in Alberta, and it is much easier for smaller producers to sell their product.   While I don't have hard data (its not my field) I know that there are good studies that suggest deregulation of alcohol benefits the consumer. I did a google scholar search, and found there are a number of studies on the topic: http:\/\/scholar.google.ca\/scholar?hl=en&q=alberta+liquor+dereulation&btnG=&as_sdt=1%2C5&as_sdtp=","labels":1,"seconds_difference":934.0,"score_ratio":2.1578947368}
{"post_id":"1pklbk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Can someone provide an example of an industry being deregulated where it benefits the consumer? Just looking for specific examples, preferably with short and long-term results and backed by hard data.","c_root_id_A":"cd39nfh","c_root_id_B":"cd3etgz","created_at_utc_A":1383173375,"created_at_utc_B":1383185568,"score_A":19,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"In Canada each province has its own laws around how liquor is sold. Liquor in Alberta is comparatively deregulated in comparison to Ontario. In Ontario, there are only three places to buy alcohol, the government stores, the beer store (private consortium) and the wine rack. This means that prices are fixed, the hours are limited and the geographic distance distance between liquor stores are often very wide.   In Alberta, there are only private liquor stores. Alcohol can be sold until 2am, compared to 9pm (11 for some places) in Ontario. There is also much greater selection in Alberta, and it is much easier for smaller producers to sell their product.   While I don't have hard data (its not my field) I know that there are good studies that suggest deregulation of alcohol benefits the consumer. I did a google scholar search, and found there are a number of studies on the topic: http:\/\/scholar.google.ca\/scholar?hl=en&q=alberta+liquor+dereulation&btnG=&as_sdt=1%2C5&as_sdtp=","human_ref_B":"The deregulation of railraods in the late 70s vastly lowered prices and increased productivity.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12193.0,"score_ratio":1.0526315789}
{"post_id":"1pklbk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Can someone provide an example of an industry being deregulated where it benefits the consumer? Just looking for specific examples, preferably with short and long-term results and backed by hard data.","c_root_id_A":"cd3etgz","c_root_id_B":"cd3eig6","created_at_utc_A":1383185568,"created_at_utc_B":1383184850,"score_A":20,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"The deregulation of railraods in the late 70s vastly lowered prices and increased productivity.","human_ref_B":"I don't have time to go into details but US railroad deregulation was a massive success, taking an industry that was hemorrhaging and resulting in substantially lower costs to both railroads and shippers and, as a result, substantial growth in traffic.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":718.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"3wj9rp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Is there an objective measure or indicator of when a country's form of government is stable? What I mean is that there is more or less chance for a military coup or insurgency. For example, even though the American military is very strong and there are millions of armed citizens who strongly dislike the president, there seems to be little chance of an overthrow.  Is there any way to express this other than \"\"its been x number of years since the last overthrow\"?","c_root_id_A":"cxwufus","c_root_id_B":"cxwvy8v","created_at_utc_A":1449958291,"created_at_utc_B":1449961064,"score_A":2,"score_B":35,"human_ref_A":"The Center for Systemic Peace has some data which might be of interest to you. In particular, I know that within sociology the Polity IV dataset is a respected source used in quantitatively-minded scholarship on international politics and regime change. For more info see: http:\/\/www.systemicpeace.org\/inscrdata.html.  Edit: I see that \/u\/mchambuzi already linked to the same site. I would definitely check that out!","human_ref_B":"Political institutions are probably one of the most discussed and debated topics across all sub-fields of political science. This is actually an interesting question, so please bare with me as I unpack it a little.  Regime stability is complicated mess, since involves not only the shape of the institutions themselves, but also individual behaviors. You can have \"the best\" institutional framework in the world, but if people don't think those institutions are legitimate or effective, you're unlikely to see long term stability. The reverse is can also be true, you can have a large portion of the population that might support a particular ideal (let's say democracy), but an institutional configuration that is inefficient or breeds corruption.  The most fundamental idea behind designing stable political institutions, is to get behavior (and demographic factors) to match up with an appropriate institutional design that will be stable under those pre-established conditions. This isn't always easy, because under certain circumstances institutional arrangements can be very stable (look at the republican presidential system in the United States) and under other circumstances the same institutional arrangement can be very unstable (look at republican presidential systems in Africa in the 1960s and 1970s). This is because Presidential systems, with their winner take all method of allocating executive power, function well when societies that have broad cross-cutting cleavages, but tend to fail in divided societies (Lipset and Rokkan 1967, Birnir 2007, Posner 2004, Spears 2002, etc).   Now, one more  step. We often see that institutions condition behavior, but we also often see that pre-established patterns of behavior lead to the development of particular types of institutions. For example, we know that certain  types of electoral systems can encourage vote pooling and lead to stability in divided societies (Horowitz 1991, Reilly 2002) and can also encourage more moderate politics (Horowitz 1990, 1993, Reilly 2002, 1997, etc). On the other hand, we also know that we are more likely to see certain types of institutional designs in divided societies (Cox 1997). This leads to a huge endogeneity problem.   So, now we reach the point where you're probably thinking:  * \"So...how do we know if it's institutions causing instability in society, or society that's causing instability in the institutional framework\"  * \"So...if they can influence each other at T*_n_* how do we know which caused which and what the hell is going on.\" * \"So...how do we even begin to sort that out and determine a objective measurement.\"  Congratulations, you're now a scholar of comparative institutions!  Researchers are actually still trying to figure out what institutions are stable under what conditions. Despite the fact that they haven't quite parsed out all the effects yet, that hasn't stopped a number of scholars and practitioners from producing measures of stability.  Here are few of the most common ones to get you started:  * **Polity.**  Developed and maintained by Marshall, Jaggers, and Gurr, polity is often the \"go-to\" in terms of institutional stability. Polity measures political institutions on a -10 to 10 scale (Consolidated Authoritarian to Consolidated Democracy) Typically when using Polity, scholars use one of three measures: Velocity of Change, Major Shifts, and Consolidation. Velocity of change is typically measured as the shift from in the polity index from the previous year or over the previous 5 years. Major shifts are usually measured as a shift of 6 or more points in polity score in  a specified period of time (a shift from a consolidated regime to a non-consolidated regime, or a shift from one type of regime to another). Consolidation more broadly is often defined as \"anocractic\" regimes falling between -6 and +6, and consolidated regimes falling above or below that range. * **Longevity.** There are a number of ways to measure regime longevity. Regimes are more likely to be stable if they've already been stable for a long time (Yes, that's path-dependence). Typically this is measured in terms of the natural log of the duration of the current institutional framework. The idea behind this is that in their formative years, governments are more likely to collapse, when an particular set of institutional framework is established it means more for stability in the time between 10 to 20 years than it does for a long running regime that ages from 110 years to 120 years. * **World Governance Indicators.** The World Bank maintains a set of governance indicators which it uses to predict regime stability. WGI differs from the previous two indicators in that it relies on the individuals perceptions of government rather than the institutional configuration itself. WGI measures perceptions about government accountability, stability, effectiveness, quality, rule of law, and corruption. * **Respect for the Rule of Law.** Regimes tend to be more stable when they value the \"rule of law\". That is, that case law and established legal precedent dictate outcomes rather than individual leaders.  This gets EVEN MORE complicated when measuring stability across regimes. Often times the things that make stable autocracies don't make for stable democracies. There have been some attempts to develop measures that are applicable to both types of regimes (polity is an example) another example is the measures of congruence between winning coalitions and the size of the selectorate that were developed by Bueno de Mesquita. Despite attempts at developing indicators that can measure stability across regimes, we often see measures that are specific to one type of government (particularly for democratic consolidation). What constitutes a consolidated democracy is an entire literature unto itself, but there are some measures that have been popular.  For example:  * **Number of Turnovers** You often see scholars discuss consolidation and stability in democratic regimes by the number of turnovers. Some scholars argue that democracies aren't stable until there has been at least two transitions between the opposition and the ruling party (Party 1 - Party 2 - Party 1). The idea  behind this type of measure of stability\/consolidation is that the major political forces have the opportunity to cheat on their contract and attempt to illicitly maintain power, but instead choose to allow institutional processes to take their course. This of course creates problems in practicality (for instance, it means that Mexico wasn't a stable democracy until recently). * **Popular Opinion** Linz and Stepan (1996) argue that democratic regimes aren't stable and consolidated until the public agrees that democracy is \"the only game in town\". This is a pretty stringent measure for stability, particularly in developing countries where we often see people who are willing to use extra-institutional means to allocate resources or gain power.  All of the measures I've discussed here have issues (some of them quite serious), and there are still major points of contention in the institutions literature.   Among them are:  * How useful is it to use past stability to measure the probability that regimes will continue to be stable? * How do we extrapolate measures of stability across regime types * What do we do with \"anocracies\". Historically, there has been a view (and there still is a view in the popular psyche) that governments are either democratic or autocratic, and that regimes in between are simply in transition. History has proven that this is not the case. We often see regimes that (perhaps are weak institutionally) but have endured for decades in-between democracy and autocracy. We now  have a number of \"semi-democracies\" and \"semi-autocracies\" (if this is something you're interested in, check out the literature on anocracies, regime transitions, neo-patrimonialism, feckless pluralism, etc) * How do we parse out what parts of instability are due to behavior and what parts of instability are due to institutional breakdown. * Is stability even something we should strive for? Sure, there's a tangible good in preventing complete institutional breakdown (for example civil war), but outside of that, how \"stable\" do we really want our governments to be? If regimes are completely resistant to political change because of their institutional configuration, does that lead to negative externalities for their people, economies, etc?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2773.0,"score_ratio":17.5}
{"post_id":"20b8my","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"Why is it that the imposition of an alcohol tax does defies the law of supply and demand by rarely reducing the consumption of alcohol? The economics subreddit sent me here sorry if I'm in the wrong place :)","c_root_id_A":"cg1mu6c","c_root_id_B":"cg1k0k9","created_at_utc_A":1394725203,"created_at_utc_B":1394717754,"score_A":16,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure how familiar you are with economics, but there is a concept called \"elasticity\" you seem to be disregarding.  Goods for which the demand curve is considered \"relatively inelastic\" have a very steep demand curve, i.e., changes in price do not greatly impact changes in quantity demanded.  The example you cite could be due to this concept.  If demand for alcohol is very inelastic (as is often the case is for low-price, addictive goods with few substitutes [weed is illegal in most places after all]), then taxes levied on alcohol will not severely impact the amount of alcohol consumed.  I would venture to guess that alcohol taxes \"do\" reduce the amount of alcohol consumed, but due to a high degree of inelasticity, it is not a very marked effect.","human_ref_B":"Why do you think it doesn't reduce consumption?  In Finland taxes have been lowered because people will buy their alcohol in Estonia otherwise. And it absolutely does increase demand. http:\/\/www.sciencedaily.com\/releases\/2011\/04\/110408101747.htm","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7449.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"14pwhq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Does a minimum wage going up actually result in higher prices?","c_root_id_A":"c7ffx5y","c_root_id_B":"c7fhepc","created_at_utc_A":1355331273,"created_at_utc_B":1355336344,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I don't have an answer for you, only more questions.  For example, it's probably pretty important how much the minimum wage is increasing - a thousand-dollar-per-hour increase will have a much different effect than a five-cent-per-hour increase.  Next, it's questionable if \"higher prices\" is really important. I'd suggest a better metric would be \"purchasing power of people with minimum wage incomes\", so if we increase minimum wage by 10% and prices increase by 5%, it's still *effectively* lower prices for the people that we're attempting to help.  Not that I know that would happen, but it's something that we'd have to take into account.","human_ref_B":"The theory states the following: If you increase minimum wage, those companies that pay employees minimum wage will incur higher costs, all else equal. Depending on circumstances, they will increase prices in proportion with the extra costs or lower their cost of production through lay-offs. Possibly both can occur, but not neither.  Empirically it is not clear what happens. There are papers contradicting each other all over the place as far as I know.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5071.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"jjop3r","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How effective are psychoanalytic therapies? Are they still relevant today? (Crossposting from \/r\/askpsychology )   Layman here.  A few days ago, I read this wonderful article by Oliver Burkeman that seems to suggest that psychoanalytic therapies are well-positioned to address issues such as the root causes of mental suffering in ways that CBT is not and I have a few questions:  1) I was under the (possibly incorrect) impression that much of Freud's theories are largely considered to be pseudoscience and therapies based on them do not qualify as 'evidence-based' treatments. To what extent is this true?  2) Is psychoanalysis better positioned to treat the 'root cause' of mental illness than CBT or am I misreading this? >CBT embodies a very specific view of painful emotions: that they\u2019re primarily something to be eliminated, or failing that, made tolerable. A condition such as depression, then, is a bit like a cancerous tumour: sure, it might be useful to figure out where it came from \u2013 but it\u2019s far more important to get rid of it. CBT doesn\u2019t exactly claim that happiness is easy, but it does imply that it\u2019s relatively simple: your distress is caused by your irrational beliefs, and it\u2019s within your power to seize hold of those beliefs and change them.  > Psychoanalysts contend that things are much more complicated. For one thing, psychological pain needs first not to be eliminated, but understood. From this perspective, depression is less like a tumour and more like a stabbing pain in your abdomen: it\u2019s telling you something, and you need to find out what. (No responsible GP would just pump you with painkillers and send you home.) And happiness \u2013 if such a thing is even achievable \u2013 is a much murkier matter. We don\u2019t really know our own minds, and we often have powerful motives for keeping things that way. We see life through the lens of our earliest relationships, though we usually don\u2019t realise it; we want contradictory things; and change is slow and hard. Our conscious minds are tiny iceberg-tips on the dark ocean of the unconscious \u2013 and you can\u2019t truly explore that ocean by means of CBT\u2019s simple, standardised, science-tested steps.  3) Is it accurate to say that CBT sees mental illnesses such as depression as symptoms of irrational thinking? > For traditional psychoanalysts \u2013 and those who practise newer \u201cpsychodynamic\u201d techniques, largely derived from traditional psychoanalysis \u2013 what happens in therapy is that seemingly irrational symptoms, such as the endless repetition of self-defeating patterns in love or work, are revealed to be at least somewhat rational. They\u2019re responses that made sense in the context of the patient\u2019s earliest experience. (If a parent abandoned you, years ago, it\u2019s not so strange to live in constant dread that your spouse might do so too \u2013 and thus to act in ways that screw up your marriage as a result.) CBT flips that on its head. Emotions that might appear rational \u2013 such as feeling depressed about what a catastrophe your life is \u2013 stand exposed as the result of irrational thinking. Sure, you lost your job; but it doesn\u2019t follow that everything will be awful forever.   4) Considering that this piece was written in 2016, has our understanding of psychoanalysis changed since then?","c_root_id_A":"gaeu1s4","c_root_id_B":"gaep0mv","created_at_utc_A":1603912683,"created_at_utc_B":1603910305,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I took a wonderful class in my master's program called \"Approaches to Psychotherapy,\" and I'd love to pass along some of the ideas and findings we discussed in that class. I do want to give a quick heads up: I am not a clinician, and critically examining Psychodynamic approaches to psychotherapy largely falls outside of my research program. My limited view stems largely from that class I took, I ultimately may be a little biased against Psychodynamic therapies, and I won't be able to answer all aspects of your question. Hopefully, however, I can help a little bit though!  There is quite a bit of contemporary evidence suggesting that psychodynamic approaches aid in lessening symptoms of a wide range of psychological disorders. \\Shedler (2009)\\]([https:\/\/www.briancollinson.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/06\/Shedler-Efficacy-of-Psychodynamic-Psychotherapy-T-LAP-10-9-20091.pdf) describes the characteristics of Psychodynamic approaches and argues that psychodynamic therapies are all too often depicted as an unchanged amalgamation of Freud's most outlandish theories, while the psychodynamic therapeutic approaches used today are updated, straightforward, and effective. He cites meta-analyses (studies that convert the findings of many independent studies into a single, common, comparable outcome measurement called an effect size) of randomized-controlled trials that find that psychoanalytic therapies have a large effect size (of over 0.8) for short-term improvements in client well-being, and an even larger effect size during a 9-month follow-up after treatment. The effectiveness of these psychodynamic therapies is comparable to other leading therapies like CBT. \\Leichsenring, Klein, and Salzer (2014)\\ provide an updated review of the literature and arrive at a similar conclusion: Psychodynamic therapies lead to improvements in client wellbeing who suffer from a wide range of disorders.  While it's clear that psychodynamic therapies make life better for the client, it is important to ask what drives the improvement. How does the -psychoanalytic approach differ from other therapies? How unique are psychodynamic therapies compared to others like CBT? According to Schedler (2009), previous literature has identified seven elements on which Psychodynamic approaches focus:  1. A focus on affect and expression of emotion. 2. An exploration of attempts to avoid distressing thoughts and feelings. 3. Identification of recurring themes and patterns. 4. An intense focus on past experiences. 5. A focus on interpersonal relationships. 6. A focus on the therapeutic relationship. 7. Exploration of wishes and fantasies.  While proponents of psychodynamic approaches argue that these seven features differ drastically from the features of other therapies, research has suggested that the common and shared elements of therapies contribute largely to clients' successes. Duncan (2002) outlines the Dodo Brid Hypothesis, which suggests that the simple act of receiving a therapeutic intervention, regardless of orientation, leads to the client improving, and Duncan points to a variety of meta-analyses that support this claim. Common factors shared by a large swath of therapies, like a focus on the client-therapist relationship, contribute largely to therapies success. According to Duncan, much of the variability in therapeutic success depends on client factors, not factors related to therapeutic orientation.  Furthermore, I think it's important to recognize that the majority of therapists apply elements of multiple therapeutic orientations into the clinical practice.  McClure et al. (2005) found that the over 60% of clinicians use an eclectic orientation or combine elements of multiple therapies. Many would argue that the mark of a good therapist is the therapists ability to recognize the needs of the client and to tailor treatment towards the client. When searching for a therapist, it's much more important to find a good fit between the client and therapist than it is to limiting you research to a specific therapeutic orientation.  I do want to quickly address your second and third questions: Ultimately, CBT employs a biopsychosocial model in understanding the development of psychopathology, and I think it's a gross over simplification to say that CBT views \"irrational thoughts\" as the origin of mental illness. Instead, CBT seeks to identify and challenge harmful core beliefs. Core beliefs manifest themselves in automatic thoughts, thoughts that pop up often without us realizing that they do. Mental illness, which stems from a person's experiences and genes, influences our core beliefs and color our automatic thoughts. For example, if someone holds the core belief that they are unlikable, when someone doesn't wave back when they try to say hello, someone with depression might automatically think, \"Ugh, they must hate me: they didn't even say hello back!\" However, someone who holds the core belief that other's like them, a person without depression might think, \"Oh funny, they didn't see me wave!\" CBT seeks to recognize that the same event can be interpreted very differently based on our cognitive lens. While psychodynamic approaches might spend a whole lot of time addressing where this belief came from and digging back into a client's past to understand its origin, CBT simply seeks to change that belief and the behaviors that manifest that belief with different learnable skills and techniques. Both can be effective, but many would argue that CBT's approach takes less time and is ultimately more practical. Aaron T. Beck, the creator of CBT, and his daughter Judith S. Beck have both published tons of work explaining the origins and practices of CBT.  I could go on a long rant about my issues and frustrations with psychodynamic approaches, but that feels outside of the scope of this question. Ultimately, findings suggest that psychodynamic approaches are effective and can help a client a whole bunch. However, therapy in general helps a ton, and much of that success may stem from common factors shared across therapeutic orientations. The success of a therapy often teeters on client-based factors, and different approaches may work differently for different folks. I hope that helps, and let me know if there's anything else I can answer!","human_ref_B":"1  It's largely untrue.   See Westen, D. (1998). The scientific legacy of Sigmund Freud: Toward a psychodynamically informed psychological science. Psychological Bulletin, 124(3), 333\u2013371. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1037\/0033-2909.124.3.333  2   Yes, psychoanalysis is better positioned to treat root causes. For some evidence of this, see Effectiveness of Long-term Psychodynamic Psychotherapy, by Leichsenring (2014).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2378.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"aqe6kq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"What is the equivalent concept of regulations on capitalism for socialism? I have seen comments in the past that what saved capitalism from its inherent evil (i.e. greed is good) is the government applying regulations upon it. An example would be enacting laws stopping monopolies and\/or cartels from happening, even if pure capitalism would see no wrong in the existence of one. If I'm wrong, please pardon my lack of knowledge.  My question now is, since we have all the good of capitalism with its evils snuffed out by having regulations, what is its equivalent concept for socialism to get all its good with its evils snuffed out? What are some examples of its implementation?  Just to be clear, my basic understanding of the two is capitalism is everyone works for their own upkeep, while socialism is everyone works for everyone's upkeep (barring mixed economies). The potential evil of capitalism is unchecked greed of a few that may lead to persisting inequities to the many, while the potential evil of socialism is rewarding unproductivity that can cripple the economy. The good for capitalism is what lead to technological revolutions and much more, while the good of socialism is ensuring everyone has at least their basic needs met (e.g. food, clothing, shelter, healthcare, education, etc.).  Since keeping the greed of people in check by regulations helped capitalism, would keeping the unproductivity of people in check (by either a rewarding\/punishing policy or something) be the answer to socialism's ills? Thank you for anyone who'll answer.","c_root_id_A":"egg3lun","c_root_id_B":"egfj6os","created_at_utc_A":1550135282,"created_at_utc_B":1550112473,"score_A":9,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"It's important to understand that capitalism is a form of \"free market\" that uses government institutions to bolster its productive ability. Compare this to the free markets of the Arabian world in the 16th and 17th century, which represented \"free markets\" with little to no government intervention. In the end, these Arab \"free markets\" could not compete with the \"free markets\" of the west, which had started to institute government created market constructs like joint stock companies and later on, limited liability companies. Essentially government created and backed constructs that allowed the market to act in more risky ways with less consequences for individuals.   I mention this because I think your initial assumption, that capitalism and governments are somehow opposite, is false. Making your question lack any meaning.  This is all covered in this review piece here.","human_ref_B":"Friendly reminder that all claims in top level comments **must be supported by citations** to relevant social science sources. No lay speculation.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22809.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"14sz1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why isn't public shaming used anymore and would it represent a viable alternative to incarceration for petty crimes?","c_root_id_A":"c7g9g96","c_root_id_B":"c7gg9kf","created_at_utc_A":1355449387,"created_at_utc_B":1355486625,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"It's extreme and not proportional to petty crimes, yet not enough for major crimes, and because it feeds a climate of revenge, and when teenage shop lifters start killing themselves, it could be difficult to sustain.","human_ref_B":"Shaming is a form of violence. It can be profoundly traumatizing. It plays on the idea that it is not violent, since it doesn't involve physical force or rupture. This is a bit of a lie, since it is enforced with physical force and compulsion. It plays into a \"see, I didn't do *that*\" mentality on the part of the spectators of the shamed, giving them a cheap and easy puff of energy for very little other than having avoided committing the crime in question. It can maim the shamed, since it makes use of publicity. It can tie in with general conditions of publicity that can be \"conveniently\" ignored: that some may not be psychologically constituted to be able to take such a publication, like, perhaps, the nurse who suicided in the recent Middleton scandal, or the gay musician who suicided upon learning his roommate videotaped and published (albeit in more limited form than the musician thought) his homosexual tryst. It feeds into a general retributive mentality, fostering the degraded form of compliance and socialization in the form \"do not do this or *this* will happen to you\", rather than an orientation to the original harm involved in a given crime.  Someone summed up Foucault's genealogy on this, from *Discipline and Punish*. From what I can tell, Foucault speaks out of both sides of his mouth and appears to have wanted people to get back to the more archaic forms of punishment. He seemed to have been rather critical of later developments in the form of rehabilitation and medicalization, while focusing on aspects of control without for all of that really taking a stand on the issue, in the name of a general philosophical \"objectivity\" that is highly questionable.  Shaming, as a form of violence, should be termed something like \"*sociolence*\" or perhaps \"*publicitence*\", if one likes using the \"varieties of violence\" nomenclature I use, appending \"-ence\" to a given thing to denote its violence version. However one terms it, the nature of publicitence or sociolence tends to elude understanding while at the same time fascinating; people who think that \"real truth\" really amounts to physical contact, bodies touching or moving bodies, ripping bodies, etc., may be very inclined to exploit the \"loophole\" in their understanding by which they may be inclined to view the violence of shaming as \"not really violent\", while enjoying the violence of the harm caused, the disconsternation of the shamed (if there is any)., etc., as a lurid treat.   In terms of retributive justice, it plays into a vast network of violences that go by unchecked precisely because their violence is not in the only \"legitimate\" form, that of physical rupture, torture, etc. Thus, for example, a public shaming could exact far more serious consequences, if held to a decent criterion of trauma based on *effects* (rather like the force-scale of tornados), rather than, again so conveniently, sticking to the \"oh, it's only really hurting if physical touch someone, hit them, beat or torture with an actual stick\", etc.   Foucault really deserves additional mention: his dominance on this issue is overwhelming when it comes to anyone wishing to think more extensively and with some acquaintance with a richer conceptual repertoire. This dominance has utterly seized the minds of virtually every single person thinking in terms of prisons, with a powerful approach, a kind of \"*non plus ultra*\" rhetoric, conceptual\/philosophical acumen and deep historical sweep that gives one to think that this is all there is to think on the matter. Like entering the prisons themselves in a long tour, one would never, on foot, get out of them if one wished to visit them all and report back. In a way it is the same with Foucault; although he may be summed up, one is never quite \"out\" of Foucault, it is virtually impossible to get anyone to think in any new ways. Yet for all its critical force, Foucauldian analysis has little to offer but this strange, and in my view a bit repugnant, pining for some return to the \"old ways\" before some falling from whatever it is Foucalt thought that prior status quo was after the socio-historo-cultural shift in *epistime*. Sorry to rant, but the dominance of Foucault can not be sufficiently brought into relief.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":37238.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"14sz1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why isn't public shaming used anymore and would it represent a viable alternative to incarceration for petty crimes?","c_root_id_A":"c7ga68m","c_root_id_B":"c7gg9kf","created_at_utc_A":1355452035,"created_at_utc_B":1355486625,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"It's still used. From time to time I'll read about a judge who decided to get creative and, for example, sentence a shoplifter to standing outside the shop they stole from with a sign saying what they'd done.","human_ref_B":"Shaming is a form of violence. It can be profoundly traumatizing. It plays on the idea that it is not violent, since it doesn't involve physical force or rupture. This is a bit of a lie, since it is enforced with physical force and compulsion. It plays into a \"see, I didn't do *that*\" mentality on the part of the spectators of the shamed, giving them a cheap and easy puff of energy for very little other than having avoided committing the crime in question. It can maim the shamed, since it makes use of publicity. It can tie in with general conditions of publicity that can be \"conveniently\" ignored: that some may not be psychologically constituted to be able to take such a publication, like, perhaps, the nurse who suicided in the recent Middleton scandal, or the gay musician who suicided upon learning his roommate videotaped and published (albeit in more limited form than the musician thought) his homosexual tryst. It feeds into a general retributive mentality, fostering the degraded form of compliance and socialization in the form \"do not do this or *this* will happen to you\", rather than an orientation to the original harm involved in a given crime.  Someone summed up Foucault's genealogy on this, from *Discipline and Punish*. From what I can tell, Foucault speaks out of both sides of his mouth and appears to have wanted people to get back to the more archaic forms of punishment. He seemed to have been rather critical of later developments in the form of rehabilitation and medicalization, while focusing on aspects of control without for all of that really taking a stand on the issue, in the name of a general philosophical \"objectivity\" that is highly questionable.  Shaming, as a form of violence, should be termed something like \"*sociolence*\" or perhaps \"*publicitence*\", if one likes using the \"varieties of violence\" nomenclature I use, appending \"-ence\" to a given thing to denote its violence version. However one terms it, the nature of publicitence or sociolence tends to elude understanding while at the same time fascinating; people who think that \"real truth\" really amounts to physical contact, bodies touching or moving bodies, ripping bodies, etc., may be very inclined to exploit the \"loophole\" in their understanding by which they may be inclined to view the violence of shaming as \"not really violent\", while enjoying the violence of the harm caused, the disconsternation of the shamed (if there is any)., etc., as a lurid treat.   In terms of retributive justice, it plays into a vast network of violences that go by unchecked precisely because their violence is not in the only \"legitimate\" form, that of physical rupture, torture, etc. Thus, for example, a public shaming could exact far more serious consequences, if held to a decent criterion of trauma based on *effects* (rather like the force-scale of tornados), rather than, again so conveniently, sticking to the \"oh, it's only really hurting if physical touch someone, hit them, beat or torture with an actual stick\", etc.   Foucault really deserves additional mention: his dominance on this issue is overwhelming when it comes to anyone wishing to think more extensively and with some acquaintance with a richer conceptual repertoire. This dominance has utterly seized the minds of virtually every single person thinking in terms of prisons, with a powerful approach, a kind of \"*non plus ultra*\" rhetoric, conceptual\/philosophical acumen and deep historical sweep that gives one to think that this is all there is to think on the matter. Like entering the prisons themselves in a long tour, one would never, on foot, get out of them if one wished to visit them all and report back. In a way it is the same with Foucault; although he may be summed up, one is never quite \"out\" of Foucault, it is virtually impossible to get anyone to think in any new ways. Yet for all its critical force, Foucauldian analysis has little to offer but this strange, and in my view a bit repugnant, pining for some return to the \"old ways\" before some falling from whatever it is Foucalt thought that prior status quo was after the socio-historo-cultural shift in *epistime*. Sorry to rant, but the dominance of Foucault can not be sufficiently brought into relief.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":34590.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"14sz1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why isn't public shaming used anymore and would it represent a viable alternative to incarceration for petty crimes?","c_root_id_A":"c7gba41","c_root_id_B":"c7gg9kf","created_at_utc_A":1355456010,"created_at_utc_B":1355486625,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"There are some judges that use alternative sentencing strategies that involve some form of public shaming.  For example, an individual might wear a sandwich board declaring that they stole an item, etc.  In this case, and to avoid 8th Amendement challenges, defendants are usually given a choice-  serve X amount of time in jail or wear the sandwich board on the street corner for a day.  Some progressive judges do use this, however it can be controversial.","human_ref_B":"Shaming is a form of violence. It can be profoundly traumatizing. It plays on the idea that it is not violent, since it doesn't involve physical force or rupture. This is a bit of a lie, since it is enforced with physical force and compulsion. It plays into a \"see, I didn't do *that*\" mentality on the part of the spectators of the shamed, giving them a cheap and easy puff of energy for very little other than having avoided committing the crime in question. It can maim the shamed, since it makes use of publicity. It can tie in with general conditions of publicity that can be \"conveniently\" ignored: that some may not be psychologically constituted to be able to take such a publication, like, perhaps, the nurse who suicided in the recent Middleton scandal, or the gay musician who suicided upon learning his roommate videotaped and published (albeit in more limited form than the musician thought) his homosexual tryst. It feeds into a general retributive mentality, fostering the degraded form of compliance and socialization in the form \"do not do this or *this* will happen to you\", rather than an orientation to the original harm involved in a given crime.  Someone summed up Foucault's genealogy on this, from *Discipline and Punish*. From what I can tell, Foucault speaks out of both sides of his mouth and appears to have wanted people to get back to the more archaic forms of punishment. He seemed to have been rather critical of later developments in the form of rehabilitation and medicalization, while focusing on aspects of control without for all of that really taking a stand on the issue, in the name of a general philosophical \"objectivity\" that is highly questionable.  Shaming, as a form of violence, should be termed something like \"*sociolence*\" or perhaps \"*publicitence*\", if one likes using the \"varieties of violence\" nomenclature I use, appending \"-ence\" to a given thing to denote its violence version. However one terms it, the nature of publicitence or sociolence tends to elude understanding while at the same time fascinating; people who think that \"real truth\" really amounts to physical contact, bodies touching or moving bodies, ripping bodies, etc., may be very inclined to exploit the \"loophole\" in their understanding by which they may be inclined to view the violence of shaming as \"not really violent\", while enjoying the violence of the harm caused, the disconsternation of the shamed (if there is any)., etc., as a lurid treat.   In terms of retributive justice, it plays into a vast network of violences that go by unchecked precisely because their violence is not in the only \"legitimate\" form, that of physical rupture, torture, etc. Thus, for example, a public shaming could exact far more serious consequences, if held to a decent criterion of trauma based on *effects* (rather like the force-scale of tornados), rather than, again so conveniently, sticking to the \"oh, it's only really hurting if physical touch someone, hit them, beat or torture with an actual stick\", etc.   Foucault really deserves additional mention: his dominance on this issue is overwhelming when it comes to anyone wishing to think more extensively and with some acquaintance with a richer conceptual repertoire. This dominance has utterly seized the minds of virtually every single person thinking in terms of prisons, with a powerful approach, a kind of \"*non plus ultra*\" rhetoric, conceptual\/philosophical acumen and deep historical sweep that gives one to think that this is all there is to think on the matter. Like entering the prisons themselves in a long tour, one would never, on foot, get out of them if one wished to visit them all and report back. In a way it is the same with Foucault; although he may be summed up, one is never quite \"out\" of Foucault, it is virtually impossible to get anyone to think in any new ways. Yet for all its critical force, Foucauldian analysis has little to offer but this strange, and in my view a bit repugnant, pining for some return to the \"old ways\" before some falling from whatever it is Foucalt thought that prior status quo was after the socio-historo-cultural shift in *epistime*. Sorry to rant, but the dominance of Foucault can not be sufficiently brought into relief.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":30615.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"14sz1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why isn't public shaming used anymore and would it represent a viable alternative to incarceration for petty crimes?","c_root_id_A":"c7gfht7","c_root_id_B":"c7gg9kf","created_at_utc_A":1355478636,"created_at_utc_B":1355486625,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I read recently of a woman who for driving on the sidewalk to avoid a school bus, received a novelty sentence by a judge, to wear a sign declaring herself an idiot for her act. I have memory of a few other similar punishments. It's not used often, but it is on occasion.","human_ref_B":"Shaming is a form of violence. It can be profoundly traumatizing. It plays on the idea that it is not violent, since it doesn't involve physical force or rupture. This is a bit of a lie, since it is enforced with physical force and compulsion. It plays into a \"see, I didn't do *that*\" mentality on the part of the spectators of the shamed, giving them a cheap and easy puff of energy for very little other than having avoided committing the crime in question. It can maim the shamed, since it makes use of publicity. It can tie in with general conditions of publicity that can be \"conveniently\" ignored: that some may not be psychologically constituted to be able to take such a publication, like, perhaps, the nurse who suicided in the recent Middleton scandal, or the gay musician who suicided upon learning his roommate videotaped and published (albeit in more limited form than the musician thought) his homosexual tryst. It feeds into a general retributive mentality, fostering the degraded form of compliance and socialization in the form \"do not do this or *this* will happen to you\", rather than an orientation to the original harm involved in a given crime.  Someone summed up Foucault's genealogy on this, from *Discipline and Punish*. From what I can tell, Foucault speaks out of both sides of his mouth and appears to have wanted people to get back to the more archaic forms of punishment. He seemed to have been rather critical of later developments in the form of rehabilitation and medicalization, while focusing on aspects of control without for all of that really taking a stand on the issue, in the name of a general philosophical \"objectivity\" that is highly questionable.  Shaming, as a form of violence, should be termed something like \"*sociolence*\" or perhaps \"*publicitence*\", if one likes using the \"varieties of violence\" nomenclature I use, appending \"-ence\" to a given thing to denote its violence version. However one terms it, the nature of publicitence or sociolence tends to elude understanding while at the same time fascinating; people who think that \"real truth\" really amounts to physical contact, bodies touching or moving bodies, ripping bodies, etc., may be very inclined to exploit the \"loophole\" in their understanding by which they may be inclined to view the violence of shaming as \"not really violent\", while enjoying the violence of the harm caused, the disconsternation of the shamed (if there is any)., etc., as a lurid treat.   In terms of retributive justice, it plays into a vast network of violences that go by unchecked precisely because their violence is not in the only \"legitimate\" form, that of physical rupture, torture, etc. Thus, for example, a public shaming could exact far more serious consequences, if held to a decent criterion of trauma based on *effects* (rather like the force-scale of tornados), rather than, again so conveniently, sticking to the \"oh, it's only really hurting if physical touch someone, hit them, beat or torture with an actual stick\", etc.   Foucault really deserves additional mention: his dominance on this issue is overwhelming when it comes to anyone wishing to think more extensively and with some acquaintance with a richer conceptual repertoire. This dominance has utterly seized the minds of virtually every single person thinking in terms of prisons, with a powerful approach, a kind of \"*non plus ultra*\" rhetoric, conceptual\/philosophical acumen and deep historical sweep that gives one to think that this is all there is to think on the matter. Like entering the prisons themselves in a long tour, one would never, on foot, get out of them if one wished to visit them all and report back. In a way it is the same with Foucault; although he may be summed up, one is never quite \"out\" of Foucault, it is virtually impossible to get anyone to think in any new ways. Yet for all its critical force, Foucauldian analysis has little to offer but this strange, and in my view a bit repugnant, pining for some return to the \"old ways\" before some falling from whatever it is Foucalt thought that prior status quo was after the socio-historo-cultural shift in *epistime*. Sorry to rant, but the dominance of Foucault can not be sufficiently brought into relief.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7989.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"14sz1l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why isn't public shaming used anymore and would it represent a viable alternative to incarceration for petty crimes?","c_root_id_A":"c7g9g96","c_root_id_B":"c7ga68m","created_at_utc_A":1355449387,"created_at_utc_B":1355452035,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It's extreme and not proportional to petty crimes, yet not enough for major crimes, and because it feeds a climate of revenge, and when teenage shop lifters start killing themselves, it could be difficult to sustain.","human_ref_B":"It's still used. From time to time I'll read about a judge who decided to get creative and, for example, sentence a shoplifter to standing outside the shop they stole from with a sign saying what they'd done.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2648.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"jdf1uo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How can we solve the problem of boys failing in school? It's true that boys are lagging behind academically, and some even say the gap has been widening gradually since as early as the 1970s.  \u2022Concerns that academic achievement is linked with femininity in young boys, and that's turning a lot of them away from school  \u2022Motivation to read for fun isn't as prevelent in school age boys as it is with girls:   \u2022Although some attribute this reversal of the gender gap in education to the fact that the education systems are becoming more welcoming to females since the \"old days\".","c_root_id_A":"g98cssn","c_root_id_B":"g98dqtc","created_at_utc_A":1603036793,"created_at_utc_B":1603037289,"score_A":20,"score_B":35,"human_ref_A":"More male teachers in elementary?  https:\/\/abcnews.go.com\/Health\/men-teach-elementary-school\/story?id=18784172  If seeing your demographic academically helps...  https:\/\/hub.jhu.edu\/2018\/11\/12\/black-students-black-teachers-college-gap\/","human_ref_B":"I'm not gonna do much in answering the actual question but I'll give you some of the research behind it that will help in answering.   Disclaimer: I'm not a researcher so I can't say if there's any consensus in the field or whether other factors exists the below sources do not address. I'll let the mods decide if this will qualify as an answer. I'll be happy to edit anything if it's not correct \/according to the sub rules.   This meta analysis suggests that while an education \/achievement gap exists, it's not a new one and that it has remained quite constant over a long period of time :  https:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/publication\/261953087_Gender_Differences_in_Scholastic_Achievement_A_Meta-Analysis  This article suggests that it's specific \"types\" of boys\/girls related to gender roles that underperform, rather than all boys\/girls:  https:\/\/link.springer.com\/article\/10.1007\/s10964-020-01293-z  Further both social class and race are larger factors in achievement and both impact boys more (especially class).   AFAIK there are no specific kinds of teaching that are better for boys comparing to girls, though some do improve the results of both.   https:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/publication\/264412254_Ethnicity_gender_social_class_and_achievement_gaps_at_age_16_Intersectionality_and_'Getting_it'_for_the_white_working_class  http:\/\/www.genderandeducation.com\/resources-2\/the-boys-underachievement-debate\/  I know there is more to this question but I can't find\/don't have time to find sources for it all.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":496.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"5iq1ox","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"[Serious] Why do cat lovers have a \"crazy\" stereotype yet dog lovers do not? There are crazy cat individuals yet no crazy dog individuals. A person living alone with 2 dogs has a totally different connotation than a person living alone with 2 cats. Why is that?","c_root_id_A":"dba3mq8","c_root_id_B":"dbab13g","created_at_utc_A":1481916161,"created_at_utc_B":1481925572,"score_A":18,"score_B":49,"human_ref_A":"Dogs are not vectors for the transmission of toxoplamosis. Cats are. I know that's not an academic source, but there's no shortage of literature on this.","human_ref_B":"I watched this documentary the other day (being a crazy cat lady myself) and I think it will help you answer your question : https:\/\/youtu.be\/eAR3erZ3DrA  Overall, it's just that cats have been seen, historically in Occident, as mysterious and contradictory creatures. They had been usually associate with witches and lonely people (women).  But watch the documentary if you have time - my english isn't good enough to explain everything :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9411.0,"score_ratio":2.7222222222}
{"post_id":"kd3uyc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.66,"history":"Is there a reason why the black community have been pioneers for many non race related movements? I asked this question here: https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/NoStupidQuestions\/comments\/kcz592\/why_is_the_black_community_pioneers_for_most_non\/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf  and a reply told me that this would be a good question to ask this sub but feel free to take it down if it goes against any rules! and pls don\u2019t yell at me \ud83d\ude33 thanks","c_root_id_A":"gfuq41q","c_root_id_B":"gfv1o05","created_at_utc_A":1607981133,"created_at_utc_B":1607986840,"score_A":19,"score_B":41,"human_ref_A":"Can you clarify or give some examples of what you're referring to?","human_ref_B":"The only example you gave was the gay rights movement, so I have to ask what is leading you to believe the black community has pioneered the gay rights movement? Historically and currently African Americans have had, and still have, the highest levels of homophobia when dividing by race:   \u201cThe proportion of African Americans who indicated that homosexuality was \u201calways wrong\u201d was 72.3% in 2008, largely unchanged since the 1970s\u201d  Citation: Persistence of racial differences in attitudes toward homosexuality in the United States Sara Nelson Glick, MPH and Matthew R. Golden, MD, MPH","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5707.0,"score_ratio":2.1578947368}
{"post_id":"1g6dt8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What are possible psychological or social consequences to Internet desensitization to what would have commonly seen as horrific or obscene images and videos decades ago?","c_root_id_A":"cahfs9w","c_root_id_B":"cah9t42","created_at_utc_A":1371055318,"created_at_utc_B":1371033444,"score_A":13,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"lets not all answer at once....  Possible social consequences could be arising as we speak, for all we know the mass shootings could be a consequence. I doubt they are, since violence has declined over the last 30 years. (in America anyway) But we do see a change in attitude towards controversial events, seeing as the videos and stories come out much sooner and to a much broader audience, the cases are publicized and people pay attention to what happens. Whether or not that awareness has any affect on the outcome of the situation, I don't know. But take the Arab Spring\/Uprising against totalitarian dictatorships. Much of the anger and contempt was propelled through the web. Many videos of police brutality and governmental control were spread around and the people reacted.   Excuse my rambling....I think the abundance of these videos has helped people realize how bad it gets in some places, and that we should try to help. Its like having a better version of the truth, without all the careful wording.","human_ref_B":"Who would downvote a question like this? Whats the point?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21874.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"143e9i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"In a phrase like \"Sino-Australian relations\", what is the name of the \"Sino\" form of China, what countries have such a name-thing, and what determines the order of countries in the phrase?","c_root_id_A":"c79k1mc","c_root_id_B":"c79kh3r","created_at_utc_A":1354360016,"created_at_utc_B":1354365217,"score_A":11,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Sorry for two things: One, I don't know if there is a rule that dictates which country comes first, but I would guess it doesn't really matter. And two, I don't know if the following link will work (I'm on my phone). But if not, just google \"Nationality prefixes.\"   http:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/Appendix:English_nationality_prefixes","human_ref_B":"\"Sina\" is Latin for china.  Source","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5201.0,"score_ratio":1.5454545455}
{"post_id":"hxpct4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Is toxic and fragile masculinity real and researched or is it just a made up term to describe how men can act?","c_root_id_A":"fzavv2z","c_root_id_B":"fz8yhkz","created_at_utc_A":1595772523,"created_at_utc_B":1595718635,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I can't speak to the academic foundation of toxic masculinity, but a good source exploring the fragility of masculinity, or precariousness of it, is this 2012 paper on 'Precarious Manhood Theory', which attempts to explain why some men expend so much energy establishing their masculinity, and so often overcompensate when they perceive they have been emasculated.","human_ref_B":"Conceived in accordance with Marx's superstructure as the main social psychological theory of culture:   https:\/\/cla.purdue.edu\/academic\/english\/theory\/marxism\/terms\/superstructure.html   Individuals compare themselves to others to determine where they stand in the social hierarchy as in this study:   https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/full\/10.1111\/bjso.12251   Social status among certain groups of men can include criteria such as: 1) Who has the prettiest girlfriend\/wife; 2) Who is the best fighter; and 3) Who is the richest? The answers determine respect along a continuum to its polar opposite contempt as explained in the study above. The previous sample criteria could lead many men to become violent, vain, narcissistic, misogynists in the pursuit of status as a kind of man.  The idea with toxic masculinity is that social status criteria like the examples given above exist and cause negative behaviors. There are no studies that I am aware of that provide empirical evidence of the existence if these kind of cultural status criteria. From personal experience I know they exist, but without good science we cannot know how prevalent they are.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":53888.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zktrk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Is it reasonable to believe that low skilled manufacturing jobs will not be coming back? I hear a lot of people demanding the president, be it Obama or Romney, create manufacturing jobs in the next 4 years. Are the days of huge factories with a large number of generally \"low skill routine\" jobs on an assembly line over? What does the future of the job market in OECD countries look like?","c_root_id_A":"c65gjhu","c_root_id_B":"c65j56g","created_at_utc_A":1347149712,"created_at_utc_B":1347161930,"score_A":9,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Well, its not *unreasonable*. Basically, the Fordist economy that existed before 1975 has largely been made-over by the Just-in-time manufacturing. The difference being that Fordist manufacturing was the assembly line style which required lots of labor. However, just-in-time manufacturing models generally require less labor, so if we do see a return of manufacturing jobs, they won't be on the grand scale of the Fordist era. Steel plants and car factories now require maybe 2500 workers instead of 15000 workers because of the advances in robotic manufacturing. So, its not necessarily reasonable to assume manufacturing will return at the scale it once was.   However, manufacturing is slowly returning from China as Chinese wages have increased, and if the rate at which manufacturing returns to the US increases dramatically, we could once again see a healthy manufacturing base in the US, simply because there will be more factories. If that trend continues or increases as China's economy improves, it surely is reasonable to say that there will be more manufacturing jobs in the US.","human_ref_B":"When I talk about Fordism and Post-Fordism in class, I use this article by Adam Davidson. It tells the story of 2 factory workers in a autoparts plant in South Carolina: an unskilled worker and a skilled worker. They work in the same factory, the unskilled worker just puts parts in a machine, lets the machine do its thing, does a quick QC check, and sends it on. Davidson talks to the manager of the plant who tells him that, in general, he'll automate a worker away if the cost of the upgrade is less than 3-5 times the annual salary of the worker. So, if this unskilled worker makes, say, 33,000 a year, if he can automate it for less than $125,000, he'll do it. Right now the robots to do her job cost more than that, so she still works. But robots cost less and less every year.   At the end of the day, technology means that fewer workers can be more productive. This means that even as onshoring brings manufacturing jobs back to the US, fewer people will be needed to manufacture those things. The people who do manufacturing work will be more highly skilled. They'll generally need a college education and specialized vocational training. While there will always be low-skilled work to be done in factories (especially in agricultural factories), the pay will have to be very low. Otherwise it would have already been automated.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12218.0,"score_ratio":1.4444444444}
{"post_id":"150xtc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"do these petition websites do ANYTHING? if so what? I feel like online petitions are bs. Do representatives actually look at these? http:\/\/signon.org\/sign\/gun-control-now-1.fb23?source=s.fb.ty&r_by=6583495  I'm referring to this kind of internetivism.","c_root_id_A":"c7iaeni","c_root_id_B":"c7id4vl","created_at_utc_A":1355797773,"created_at_utc_B":1355807501,"score_A":3,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"They give your email address (and other information) to political groups \/ members of congress for use later.","human_ref_B":"As an individual who interned in a DC Congressional office for a summer, I can tell you that very little gets done with these.  Thousands of these rude, condescending, and overly aggressive online petitions come in on a daily basis and the quantity is simply too much for an office that consists of 9 people, three of which are interns, to handle.    An intern will check the incoming emails, go through and delete all the ones without comments (this is done because computer programs are now capable of sending these to the office in bulk quantity, the ones with comments are how we know your're a human).  The ones with comments are compiled into a set and a form letter is sent out to each person who provides his address\/email.  The letters describe the Congressmember's position on the subject, upcoming votes on related legislation, and past legislation that he\/she voted for\/against. We will reply to form letters with form letters so don't bitch about it.  A lot of calls would come into the office complaining about form letters and we would go back into the records to find out that these people were emailing 30+ petitions a month.  Dont expect a personalized response that has real information if your're not going to write to your Congressman in a dignified manner.  **If you want to petition your Congressman\/woman take the time to write a handwritten and well thought out letter to him\/her.**  Dont ramble on for 10 pages about how your're \"being raped by the lack of a gold standard\" or any crazy shit like that (and dont use caps lock like the letter in your link does), but state your opinions in a clear, concise, and respectful fashion and you greatly increase the likelihood that someone, other than an intern, will read your letter.  I've seen letters go to staff on multiple occassions and even onto the Congressman. Dont waste your time and the time of unpaid interns with these petition websites.  30 personalized and well thought out letters regarding gun control is more indicative of public leanings than 300 boilerplate emails from moveon.org.  If more people are taking the time to write real letters instead of the 2 seconds it takes to sign one of those petitions, Congressional offices will take notice.     *edited for clarity and grammar","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9728.0,"score_ratio":6.3333333333}
{"post_id":"5kh9dl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Are there any sociological studies about the cultural structure of social media communities? Are there any sociological studies about the cultural structure of social media communities?  Dan Howell made a video about the Five Pillars of Tumblr, and it made me wonder if there's any validity to that idea.","c_root_id_A":"dbocsne","c_root_id_B":"dbo6j8a","created_at_utc_A":1482842307,"created_at_utc_B":1482822063,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Well, this is up my alley. Hi! I'm a digital anthropologist. There's a *lot* out there. Anthropology is the study of culture and ethnography is the name given to the texts we produce about the culture\/s we study. Digital anthropology looks at how this all works in digital (online) spaces.  If you're looking for a variety of sources, go to google scholar and use search terms like 'digital ethnography', 'digital anthropology', 'virtual anthropology' or 'virtual ethnography' plus the specific social media community you want to find out more about from an academic perspective.  There's already been some great suggestions (Boellstorf, boyd, etc) so I'd also suggest you look at the digital youth project by Heather Horst, Miller and Slater's work on Facebook, Crystal Abidin's work on Instagram and\/or 'Hanging Out, Messing Around, and Geeking Out' by Mizuko Ito et al. As for whether there's any validity to Dan Howell's 5 pillars of Tumblr? I mean, there's no scholarly work on it and it's not a term used in academia. In *that* sense it's not a valid theory. But, maybe it reflects a social phenomenon scholars haven't discussed in-depth yet. What do you think?","human_ref_B":"There are several traditional participant-observer ethnographies of the more immersive and interactive virtual spaces like World of Warcraft and Second Life, mostly by anthropologists (*Coming of Age in Second Life*, *Leet Noobs*, *My Life as Night Elf Priest*, and among actually many others, some book length some article length).   There have also been many, many studies of social media usage. My favorite is probably danah boyd. Her dissertation was about Facebook and MySpace and her newer *It's Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens* (booklength pdf here) takes a look at behavior on more networks. My favorite piece of hers is called \"White Flight in Networked Publics\", which is all about why people left \"chaotic\" MySpace for \"cleaner\" Facebook (at time when Facebook had limited membership), but is also about so much more. If you just look for danah boyd on Google Scholar, you'll see she's written academic papers about a large range of topics, many of which you can find PDFs of online.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20244.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"9evwoe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Had there been a study on \"humor\" in the field of anthropology or sociology? Any readings?   Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"e5seb4i","c_root_id_B":"e5s6lcf","created_at_utc_A":1536679327,"created_at_utc_B":1536672089,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Lot of work in conversation analysis (see Glenn and Holt, 2013 for example) and some on rhetorical psychology (Billig, 2005), which talks about wider social topics too.  Edit: that is, they highlight theoretical issued with \"humour\" and talk about laughter in particular.","human_ref_B":"Laughter Out of Place: Race, Class, Violence, and Sexuality in a Rio Shantytown by Donna Goldstein.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7238.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"s196ti","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is IQ really a good measure for intelligence? Does having a higher IQ grant a higher chance to be successful? I'm asking this since I see a lot of racist people online stating that certain demographics perform better at IQ tests than others, excusing discrimination, and I'm struggling to disprove them. I'm scared that racists are right.","c_root_id_A":"hs9yfhj","c_root_id_B":"hsanj7r","created_at_utc_A":1641943559,"created_at_utc_B":1641954305,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I can't answer \"is IQ a good measure of intelligence?\" since I don't know what the question is supposed to mean, and it's probably not even a scientific question. I can say however that \"intelligence\" within differential psychology is typically operationalized as the kinds of abilities measured by IQ tests. Also, scores on these tests predict plenty of common measures of success, including socioeconomic outcomes, academic performance, job performance, health, and anti-social behavior.   Regarding the relation between IQ and socioeconomic success, see a meta-analysis by Strenze (2007), a meta-analysis which shows that youth IQ scores are great predictors of educational level, occupational status, and income. For example, Table 1 reveals that, when IQ is measured before age 19 and socioeconomic outcomes after age 29, IQ correlates with income, occupational attainment, and educational attainment, to a higher degree than alternative predictors such as parental income, parental education, or parental SES index. The discussion notes the following:  > These results demonstrate that intelligence, when it is measured before most individuals have finished their schooling, is a powerful predictor of career success 12 or more years later when most individuals have already entered stable careers. Two of the correlations \u2013 with education and occupation \u2013 are of substantial magnitude according to the usual standards of social science (Cohen, 1988); the correlation with education even surpasses the well established correlation of .51 between intelligence and job performance (Schmidt & Hunter, 1998). The correlation with income is considerably lower, perhaps even disappointingly low, being about the average of the previous meta-analytic estimates (.15 by Bowles et al., 2001; and .27 by Ng et al., 2005). But it should be noted that other predictors, studied in this paper, are not doing any better in predicting income, which demonstrates that financial success is difficult to predict by any variable.   For a more concrete illustration of the relationship between IQ and socioeconomic outcomes, see Zagorsky (2007). He also used the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 to examine the association between youth IQ and income and net worth measured between the ages of 33 and 41 (page 491). He found correlations between IQ and income (r = 0.30) and between IQ and net worth (r = .16) (Table 2). These correlations may appear small but this is partially due to the fact that there is wide variation in net worth and income. For example, Table 2 shows the median income and net worth by IQ test score. For those with an average IQ of 100, their median incomes and net worth were $36,826 and $57,550 in 2004 dollars. For those with an 80 IQ, their income and net worth were $18,467 and $10,500. For those with a 120 IQ, their income and net worth were $48,681 and $127,500. Keep in mind these are in 2004 dollars.   Regarding academic performance, there are two primary metrics of performance we can use: standardized test scores and grades. The correlation between IQ scores and standardized test scores is so great that some researchers have declared that the SAT and ACT are measures of general intelligence. For example, see Koenig et al. (2008)  > The analyses presented above demonstrate a significant relationship between measures of cognitive ability and ACT scores. Based upon correlations with conventional intelligence tests and the first factor of the ASVAB, it appears that that ACT is a measure of general intelligence. Indeed, based on the correlations among the tests in Study 1, the ACT is indistinguishable from other tests that are identified as intelligence tests. In addition, the ACT shows a high correlation with the SAT, itself considered to be a measure of intelligence (Frey & Detterman, 2004). The jackknife analysis confirms the stability of these results.  For grades, the correlation with conventional intelligence tests is also great. See a meta-analysis by Roth et al. (2015):  > The results of our study clearly show that intelligence has substantial influence on school grades and thus can be regarded as one of the most (if not the most) influential variables in this context. Although intelligence turned out to be a significant predictor on all moderator levels, we were able to identify some scenarios in which even higher validities can be obtained. First of all, the population correlation was highest for tests relying on both verbal and nonverbal materials, indicating that a broad measure of intelligence or g respectively is the best predictor of school grades. Furthermore, the importance of intelligence increases throughout grade levels. This leads us to the conclusion that intelligence has special importance in educational contexts which deal with content that is more complex and thus can be mastered fully only with an appropriate cognitive ability level.  Deary et al. (2006) examined a 5-year prospective longitudinal survey of a representative sample of over 70,000 children in England to estimate estimate the relationship between intelligence and later academic achievement. Researchers measured the relationship between the general factor of intelligence (g) measured at age 11 and GSCE test points at age 16. The correlation between g measured at age 11 and GCSE test points at age 16 was r = .69. The largest correlation was found between g and mathematics (r = .77). Among students with a mean _g_ score, 58% achieved five or more GCSE scores at grades A* to C. Of those scoring 1 standard deviation higher on _g_, 91% achieved this criterion. Among those scoring 1 standard deviation lower on _g_, only 16% achieved this criterion (page 18).  Regarding job performance, see this brief review of meta-analyses by Strenze (2015). He cites many meta-analyses showing the correlation between intelligence and many measures of job performance, including supervisor ratings, work sample tests, promotions, skill acquisition in work training, etc. For example, he notes the following:  > Another important form of success is job performance, a measure of how well a worker performs his or her work tasks. That is obviously of great relevance to organizations, and much research has been devoted to finding good predictors of job performance. Positive correlations with supervisory ratings of job performance (0.53) and work sample tests (0.38) in Table 25.1 demonstrate that intelligent people are good workers, and IQ tests are, therefore, good personnel selection devices. Indeed, some researchers believe that IQ tests are the best personnel selection devices available (Schmidt and Hunter 1998). An interesting finding is that IQ tests are better predictors of performance among cognitively complex jobs, compared to less complex jobs (Ones et al. 2005). This means that IQ tests are very useful in selecting good engineers, architects, or dentists (cognitively complex jobs according to Roos and Treiman 1980 ); IQ tests are less useful for selecting good dishwashers, weavers, or garbage collectors, although, even among dishwashers, it is obvious that an intelligent worker is better than a less intelligent one.   Regarding anti-social behavior, see Ttofihi et al. (2016), a meta-analysis studying the relationship between intelligence and delinquency, violence, and crime. The authors investigated 15 longitudinal studies that estimated the impact of intelligence on the likelihood of offending among both high-risk and low-risk groups (\u201cHigh-risk\u201d groups includes individuals who were exposed to risk factors for offending such as e.g., poor child rearing, marital disturbance, imprisoned father, physical abuse, etc.). The authors found that, among the high-risk group, non-offenders were about 2.32 times as likely to have a high intelligence level as offenders (page 13). Some studies also investigated the effect of intelligence on offending among low-risk groups. For this group, non-offenders were only about 1.3 times as likely to have a high intelligence level, a non-significant result (page 12). The meta-analysis concludes that \u201cintelligence can function as a protective factor for offending\u201d. In other words, the impact of risk factors for offending is reduced among individuals of high intelligence; or, conversely, low intelligent individuals are particularly vulnerable to be negatively impacted by the risk factors for offending.  For a recent review of the association between cognitive ability and health outcomes, see Deary et al. (2021). They review data showing that intelligence is associated with lower risk of death (from diabetes, cancer, stroke, heart disease, etc.), lower rate of physical illnesses (hypertension, diabetes, etc.), lower rate of mental illnesses (depression, schizophrenia, dementia, etc.), and higher rate of healthy behaviors (not smoking, eating fruits\/vegetables, engaging in exercise, etc.).","human_ref_B":"I agree with much of the replies by \/u\/AltDogBarkBarkBark and \/u\/omaolligain, and \/u\/OriginalStomper is correct that there is much disagreement on what IQ scores actually represent. I will attempt to dig a little deeper into this latter iissue, and provide some insights into the relationship between IQ and intelligence.   **Is IQ really a good measure for intelligence?** ---  The value and validity of IQ tests as instruments to assess^(1) intelligence is a controversial topic for many researchers. For illustration, here is a remark by Strenze (2015) in his overview on the topic of intelligence and success:  >As we think about intelligence and success, we must remember that the scientific question about the relationship between intelligence and success is closely connected to other scientific questions about intelligence and, most importantly, to the following question: **What is it that IQ tests really measure? This chapter was based on the implicit assumption that IQ tests are reasonably good measures of general cognitive ability, but not all social scientists would agree with that.** To make sense of the correlations between intelligence and success, one must have a view on IQ testing and on the nature of intelligence, in general, which is why I now direct the reader to other chapters of this book where these related topics are discussed.  And here is what Nisbett and colleagues (2012) have to say in their review on the state of the art in the field of intelligence:  >**The measurement of intelligence is one of psychology\u2019s greatest achievements and one of its most controversial.** Critics complain that no single test can capture the complexity of human intelligence, all measurement is imperfect, no single measure is completely free from cultural bias, and there is the potential for misuse of scores on tests of intelligence. **There is some merit to all these criticisms. But we would counter that the measurement of intelligence\u2014which has been done primarily by IQ tests\u2014has utilitarian value because it is a reasonably good predictor of grades at school, performance at work, and many other aspects of success in life** (Gottfredson, 2004; Herrnstein & Murray, 1994).   ---  However, to fully appreciate the debate (and the critiques), it is important to be aware that there are different kinds of validity. What is arguably most contentious is the *construct* validity of IQ tests, which should not be confused with *predictive* validity on which many supporters of IQ tests insist upon (such as Nisbett et al. above). To understand the difference, I quote differential psychologist Ulrich Schimmack (2021):  >The problem of construct validation can be illustrated with the development of IQ scores. **IQ scores can have predictive validity (e.g., performance in graduate school) without making any claims about the construct that is being measured (IQ tests measure whatever they measure and what they measure predicts important outcomes).** However, IQ tests are often treated as measures of intelligence. **For IQ tests to be valid measures of intelligence, it is necessary to define the construct of intelligence and to demonstrate that observed IQ scores are related to unobserved variation in intelligence.** Thus, construct validation requires clear definitions of constructs that are independent of the measure that is being validated. **Without clear definition of constructs, the meaning of a measure reverts essentially to \u201cwhatever the measure is measuring,\u201d as in the old saying \u201cIntelligence is whatever IQ tests are measuring. This saying shows the problem of research with measures that have no clear construct and no construct validity.**   ---  Related to the thorny topic of conceptualizing intelligence, much of this debate involves also the matter of whether or not there is a \"general cognitive factor\" and what is or is not the famous *g* factor.) Again, there are two questions which are often confused but should be carefully distinguished, as explained by Mackintosh (2011):  >**Factor analysis alone will never dictate any particular psychological interpretation of the nature of human intelligence.** For that, what is needed is psychological research and theory. It is essential to keep clear the distinction between two quite separate questions. **The first, empirical, question is whether the pattern of intercorrelations actually observed between different IQ tests does or does not imply that a single general factor,** ***g***, **accounts for a sizeable proportion of the variance in the matrix. The second question is quite different: it is how to interpret the factorial solution or solutions most plausibly suggested by any observed pattern of intercorrelations.**  Or as cognitive psychologists Kovacs and Conway (2019) (who believe that there is value in IQ tests, but propose a different interpretation) explain:  >However, the term explained can be interpreted in both a statistical sense and a psychological sense. **Statistically,** ***g*** **indeed explains much of the positive manifold, which means that the correlations between tests** (or broad abilities) **can be accounted for with the tests\u2019 (or abilities\u2019) correlation with** ***g*** **as a latent variable. Yet a psychological explanation would mean pointing to actual processes and mechanisms represented by** ***g***. Without that, g remains a statistical construct: It summarizes the common variance among the tests or lower-order factors.  In short, to statistically observe this \"general factor\" does not necessarily mean that there is a \"single underlying process of general intelligence.\" We can acknowledge that the statistical construct exists, but how we interpret its existence is another kettle of fish. None of these issues will be resolved here on Reddit, and it is much to distill. But here is a selection of freely accessible articles or essays to get started:  * Measurement Matters: How do researchers \\(attempt to\\) measure intelligence? by cognitive psychologist Andrew Conway  * The Illusion of Culture-free Intelligence Testing by cultural psychologist Michael Cole)  * Here is why IQ is bullshit: A thread by computational cognitive scientist Steven Piantadosi (this is a relatively well-known thread, e.g., Conway praised it even though he does not agree 100%)  ---  ^(1) ^(I use the term \"assess\" rather than \"measure\" to make an effort to distinguish attempts at capturing latent constructs such as 'intelligence' from the exercise of observing physically measurable properties such as length, weight, or temperature.)  ---  Hauser, R. M. (2002). Meritocracy, cognitive ability, and the sources of occupational success. Madison, WI: Center for Demography and Ecology, University of Wisconsin.  Kovacs, K., & Conway, A. R. (2019). What is iq? life beyond \u201cgeneral intelligence\u201d. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 28(2), 189-194.  Mackintosh, N. (2011). IQ and human intelligence. Oxford University Press.  Schimmack, U. (2021). The validation crisis in psychology. Meta-Psychology, 5, 1-9.  Strenze, T. (2015). Intelligence and success. In Handbook of intelligence (pp. 405-413). Springer.  ---  I will address the second part of the question in a second comment.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10746.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"9696hz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Do immigrants have a net positive or net negative (long-term) effect on the economy of the host country? http:\/\/budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu\/issues\/2016\/1\/27\/the-effects-of-immigration-on-the-united-states-economy","c_root_id_A":"e3z1cg5","c_root_id_B":"e3yrfde","created_at_utc_A":1533934440,"created_at_utc_B":1533926251,"score_A":36,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Since you specifically ask about the \"effect on economy\", askeconomics has this FAQ.                 The FAQ links to this huge 500 page report from the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine from 14 economists, demographers and other academics reviewing several decades of data on immigration and its impact.               Some conclusions from the study:            - Recent immigrants experience weaker labor market success.       - this does not affect *on average* the economic prospects for the native, original population        - the fiscal impact of wellfare use by new immigrants is marginally higher than by the native population, but the size of the impact is very small to negligible, and most empirical research actually shows there is at least a small positive impact on a country's fiscal budget.       - Immigration barely affects the *average* employment levels of native-born workers. Some groups may have slight negative effects, but this strikingly enough mostly affects the prior group of immigrants, not the long-term natives.      - Immigration barely affects the *average* wages of native-born workers. Same nuance applies as the previous point.          tl;dr: Logically, all other factors equal, if a population of a country grows by 10%, the economy of that country will grow by 10%.           The obvious follow-up to that is: what if other factors aren't equal?             - Caricature best case scenario: If the 10% immigrants all have in-demand competences that are perfectly complementary (so: not substitutive or negative) to the country's economy, the economy will certainly grow by 10%, and probably more if the immigrants bring in competences that create *new* industries instead of just expanding your existing industries.       - Caricature worst case scenario: If all immigrants have zero competences (a very hypothetical situation\u2014most people can at least hold a shovel), they will not grow the economy, or can even be a drag on the economy if the value they add is smaller than the costs they entail.","human_ref_B":"What's your question?  I mean, there's a conclusion section right there at the end.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8189.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"2j9p27","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Hungary is one of the countries in the EU that does not use the Euro. What are the advantages of still using the forint? Personally, when I went there, the advantage to *me* was just that the a dollar gave you more forints that it would give you Euros.  I understand that using the Euro would encourage foreign investment. But what would be the disadvantages of using the Euro that are specific to Hungary.","c_root_id_A":"cl9r2ah","c_root_id_B":"cl9q313","created_at_utc_A":1413337726,"created_at_utc_B":1413335724,"score_A":11,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Simply put, having your own currency gives you the ability to exert much more precise control over nominal interest rates via monetary policy.  Part of the drawbacks of being part of a country in the EU that uses the euro is that your central bank is limited in its ability to manipulate the money supply, and by extension interest rates.  -Macroeconomics by Frederic Mishkin (Pearson, 2nd edition).","human_ref_B":"One advantage that is currently becoming more apparent is that it gives Hungary more independent control of its economy. If the economy of many Eurozone countries fail, for instance, it won't bring Hungary down, whereas it would have a negative impact on those countries using the Euro. This website explains it in non-economist terms.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2002.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"11854o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Would it be possible for Africa to create its own economy not dependent on international trade? If they were to band together and boycott international trade and rely on their own economies would it be possible for them to sustain a healthy economy.","c_root_id_A":"c6k83pr","c_root_id_B":"c6k96bp","created_at_utc_A":1349841333,"created_at_utc_B":1349846408,"score_A":10,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"I, personally, dislike most questions regarding international trade as they tend to be quite vague. When you say 'boycott international trade' in what areas are you refering to?  Africa could ban international trade in medical supplies. As most HIV drugs are patented in developed countries this would be a death sentence to millions.  Africa could ban international trade in industrial processes\/technology. Most ammonia, which is needed for fertilizer, is made using the Haber process, which was invented and patented in Germany. About a third of the population would die if Africa decided to stop using this process\/buying ammonia overseas because its not a native african invention.  Africa could ban international trade in the tourist industry. This would reduce consumer choice and therefore welfare, ie no one could go and visit the pyramids in egypt.  So, you should probably be much more specific when asking these sorts of questions.","human_ref_B":"Let me make certain assumptions about your questions, ok? and I upvoted you, so I hope you don't hate this subreddit.  In your mind, you were envisioning a nation like Gambia starting to produce things like T-shirts. (like you suggested, Gambia could start domestically and sell t-shirts locally and then spread internationally)  It would employ many people, which would give them money to buy things like food and medicine.  Why wouldn't a rational nation-state do that?   Of course African nations want to do that.  But in answer to your question, it is often times impossible.  (economics\/econ professor do a bad job of tying shit to the real world)  It is often not possible because *a healthy economy requires resources that Africa does not have, nor has the money to buy*  Let's continue to use the example of T-shirts.  First you need materials, like sheep for wool.  Sheep are not endemic (local) to Gambia.  Gambia needs to buy some sheep. but the gambian government doesn't have any money.  So right there you run into a problem.  To make shirts, you also need a factory.  Since the government can't spend the money to build a factory, where's the money going to come from? Well, investors! Gambian people don't have much money either.  (and if they did, the Gambian government would tax them so you can see how many African problems are cyclical) but let's assume there was one Gambian dude who had A LOT of money.  Great, he decides to build a factory.    But wait, who's gonna build it? Gambia doesn't have any equipment and tools (in economics terms: capital.)  And who's gonna work in the factory? There is nobody in Gambia who knows how to run a factory because the education system sucks (because the government has no money to spend on education). In economic terms, there is no labor.  Gambia has shitloads of land, but no labor and no capital.  BUT BUT, lets just pretend Gambia started to make t shirts.  No one would buy them, cause everyone in Gambia is poor. (that's not really subtle, more accurately: the market size of Gambians who have money to spend on t-shirts is too small to cover the cost of land, labor, and capital).  So no one would buy enough t-shirts, even if you made them.    You have to remember that a healthy economy revolves around the production of goods, of things that people can buy.  Insofar as Gambia can't produce nor buy anything, then it is impossible to create an isolationist economy.  Thus, the strategy so far has been to INCLUDE african nations within the global trade system.  The hope is that, for example, the USA gives Gambia investment funds and education to build factories, and that people around the world will buy t-shirts.  This is why inclusion within the world economy is actually (so the argument goes) crucial for the growth of African economies.  Imagine a ladder that you can climb once you get on it.  Many african economies are still on the ground, and they can't even get to the first rung.  The argument is that if we just get them started, the internal mechanics of capitalism will find a place for Africa and its people.  (that was the general argument of economist Jeffrey Sachs)  This was all incredibly ham-fisted and unsubtle so, if you want a real answer, then ask me more.  But i hope that answers your question.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5075.0,"score_ratio":2.4}
{"post_id":"11854o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Would it be possible for Africa to create its own economy not dependent on international trade? If they were to band together and boycott international trade and rely on their own economies would it be possible for them to sustain a healthy economy.","c_root_id_A":"c6k6of6","c_root_id_B":"c6k96bp","created_at_utc_A":1349835643,"created_at_utc_B":1349846408,"score_A":8,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"Autarky is nearly never the solution.","human_ref_B":"Let me make certain assumptions about your questions, ok? and I upvoted you, so I hope you don't hate this subreddit.  In your mind, you were envisioning a nation like Gambia starting to produce things like T-shirts. (like you suggested, Gambia could start domestically and sell t-shirts locally and then spread internationally)  It would employ many people, which would give them money to buy things like food and medicine.  Why wouldn't a rational nation-state do that?   Of course African nations want to do that.  But in answer to your question, it is often times impossible.  (economics\/econ professor do a bad job of tying shit to the real world)  It is often not possible because *a healthy economy requires resources that Africa does not have, nor has the money to buy*  Let's continue to use the example of T-shirts.  First you need materials, like sheep for wool.  Sheep are not endemic (local) to Gambia.  Gambia needs to buy some sheep. but the gambian government doesn't have any money.  So right there you run into a problem.  To make shirts, you also need a factory.  Since the government can't spend the money to build a factory, where's the money going to come from? Well, investors! Gambian people don't have much money either.  (and if they did, the Gambian government would tax them so you can see how many African problems are cyclical) but let's assume there was one Gambian dude who had A LOT of money.  Great, he decides to build a factory.    But wait, who's gonna build it? Gambia doesn't have any equipment and tools (in economics terms: capital.)  And who's gonna work in the factory? There is nobody in Gambia who knows how to run a factory because the education system sucks (because the government has no money to spend on education). In economic terms, there is no labor.  Gambia has shitloads of land, but no labor and no capital.  BUT BUT, lets just pretend Gambia started to make t shirts.  No one would buy them, cause everyone in Gambia is poor. (that's not really subtle, more accurately: the market size of Gambians who have money to spend on t-shirts is too small to cover the cost of land, labor, and capital).  So no one would buy enough t-shirts, even if you made them.    You have to remember that a healthy economy revolves around the production of goods, of things that people can buy.  Insofar as Gambia can't produce nor buy anything, then it is impossible to create an isolationist economy.  Thus, the strategy so far has been to INCLUDE african nations within the global trade system.  The hope is that, for example, the USA gives Gambia investment funds and education to build factories, and that people around the world will buy t-shirts.  This is why inclusion within the world economy is actually (so the argument goes) crucial for the growth of African economies.  Imagine a ladder that you can climb once you get on it.  Many african economies are still on the ground, and they can't even get to the first rung.  The argument is that if we just get them started, the internal mechanics of capitalism will find a place for Africa and its people.  (that was the general argument of economist Jeffrey Sachs)  This was all incredibly ham-fisted and unsubtle so, if you want a real answer, then ask me more.  But i hope that answers your question.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10765.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"11854o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Would it be possible for Africa to create its own economy not dependent on international trade? If they were to band together and boycott international trade and rely on their own economies would it be possible for them to sustain a healthy economy.","c_root_id_A":"c6k8qgj","c_root_id_B":"c6k96bp","created_at_utc_A":1349844223,"created_at_utc_B":1349846408,"score_A":4,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"They shouldn't need to. Africa has never been totally isolated from trade with Europe and Asia, sophisticated trade networks penetrated deep into the continent for hundreds (thousands?) of years. The last thing they should do is to adopt the view that they were better off when they were on their own, since that was never the case.","human_ref_B":"Let me make certain assumptions about your questions, ok? and I upvoted you, so I hope you don't hate this subreddit.  In your mind, you were envisioning a nation like Gambia starting to produce things like T-shirts. (like you suggested, Gambia could start domestically and sell t-shirts locally and then spread internationally)  It would employ many people, which would give them money to buy things like food and medicine.  Why wouldn't a rational nation-state do that?   Of course African nations want to do that.  But in answer to your question, it is often times impossible.  (economics\/econ professor do a bad job of tying shit to the real world)  It is often not possible because *a healthy economy requires resources that Africa does not have, nor has the money to buy*  Let's continue to use the example of T-shirts.  First you need materials, like sheep for wool.  Sheep are not endemic (local) to Gambia.  Gambia needs to buy some sheep. but the gambian government doesn't have any money.  So right there you run into a problem.  To make shirts, you also need a factory.  Since the government can't spend the money to build a factory, where's the money going to come from? Well, investors! Gambian people don't have much money either.  (and if they did, the Gambian government would tax them so you can see how many African problems are cyclical) but let's assume there was one Gambian dude who had A LOT of money.  Great, he decides to build a factory.    But wait, who's gonna build it? Gambia doesn't have any equipment and tools (in economics terms: capital.)  And who's gonna work in the factory? There is nobody in Gambia who knows how to run a factory because the education system sucks (because the government has no money to spend on education). In economic terms, there is no labor.  Gambia has shitloads of land, but no labor and no capital.  BUT BUT, lets just pretend Gambia started to make t shirts.  No one would buy them, cause everyone in Gambia is poor. (that's not really subtle, more accurately: the market size of Gambians who have money to spend on t-shirts is too small to cover the cost of land, labor, and capital).  So no one would buy enough t-shirts, even if you made them.    You have to remember that a healthy economy revolves around the production of goods, of things that people can buy.  Insofar as Gambia can't produce nor buy anything, then it is impossible to create an isolationist economy.  Thus, the strategy so far has been to INCLUDE african nations within the global trade system.  The hope is that, for example, the USA gives Gambia investment funds and education to build factories, and that people around the world will buy t-shirts.  This is why inclusion within the world economy is actually (so the argument goes) crucial for the growth of African economies.  Imagine a ladder that you can climb once you get on it.  Many african economies are still on the ground, and they can't even get to the first rung.  The argument is that if we just get them started, the internal mechanics of capitalism will find a place for Africa and its people.  (that was the general argument of economist Jeffrey Sachs)  This was all incredibly ham-fisted and unsubtle so, if you want a real answer, then ask me more.  But i hope that answers your question.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2185.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"11854o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Would it be possible for Africa to create its own economy not dependent on international trade? If they were to band together and boycott international trade and rely on their own economies would it be possible for them to sustain a healthy economy.","c_root_id_A":"c6k6of6","c_root_id_B":"c6k83pr","created_at_utc_A":1349835643,"created_at_utc_B":1349841333,"score_A":8,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Autarky is nearly never the solution.","human_ref_B":"I, personally, dislike most questions regarding international trade as they tend to be quite vague. When you say 'boycott international trade' in what areas are you refering to?  Africa could ban international trade in medical supplies. As most HIV drugs are patented in developed countries this would be a death sentence to millions.  Africa could ban international trade in industrial processes\/technology. Most ammonia, which is needed for fertilizer, is made using the Haber process, which was invented and patented in Germany. About a third of the population would die if Africa decided to stop using this process\/buying ammonia overseas because its not a native african invention.  Africa could ban international trade in the tourist industry. This would reduce consumer choice and therefore welfare, ie no one could go and visit the pyramids in egypt.  So, you should probably be much more specific when asking these sorts of questions.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5690.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"10ygs4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"If all American smokers decided on a single day to stop, what would the effect on the US economy be?","c_root_id_A":"c6hq2p6","c_root_id_B":"c6hqlrl","created_at_utc_A":1349387435,"created_at_utc_B":1349389485,"score_A":2,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Great question.","human_ref_B":"In the long term: positive, short term: negative  in the short term rgdp is lost by closing cigarette factories etc, in the long term human capital is greatly enhanced due to less medical bills, healthier population etc","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2050.0,"score_ratio":11.0}
{"post_id":"10ygs4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"If all American smokers decided on a single day to stop, what would the effect on the US economy be?","c_root_id_A":"c6hqo0c","c_root_id_B":"c6i1ao8","created_at_utc_A":1349389746,"created_at_utc_B":1349449116,"score_A":5,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Tax revenues on tobacco goes down. Later on as previous smokers age and don't die as young as they should have (shared) medical expenses go up.  Sorry I can't cite sources but I do have a graduate degree in business and economics.","human_ref_B":"This article quotes a Vanderbilt University, a University of Chicago, and even a Dutch study. Long story short, smokers are fiscally neutral for a country, because smokers die earlier but not too early (on average, they are on pension), causing many years of pension costs can be saved, while they did contribute to the system while working, and paid tobacco taxes while smoking. This neutralizes the higher medical costs associated with treatment of smoking-related diseases.          So from a public budget point of view, the effect would be neutral. Average life expectancy would go up, but that doesn't necessarily mean that you can't get chronically ill 10 years later from other sources (pollution, unhealthy diet, lack of exercise, what have you).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":59370.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"10ygs4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"If all American smokers decided on a single day to stop, what would the effect on the US economy be?","c_root_id_A":"c6hq2p6","c_root_id_B":"c6i1ao8","created_at_utc_A":1349387435,"created_at_utc_B":1349449116,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Great question.","human_ref_B":"This article quotes a Vanderbilt University, a University of Chicago, and even a Dutch study. Long story short, smokers are fiscally neutral for a country, because smokers die earlier but not too early (on average, they are on pension), causing many years of pension costs can be saved, while they did contribute to the system while working, and paid tobacco taxes while smoking. This neutralizes the higher medical costs associated with treatment of smoking-related diseases.          So from a public budget point of view, the effect would be neutral. Average life expectancy would go up, but that doesn't necessarily mean that you can't get chronically ill 10 years later from other sources (pollution, unhealthy diet, lack of exercise, what have you).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":61681.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"10ygs4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"If all American smokers decided on a single day to stop, what would the effect on the US economy be?","c_root_id_A":"c6hq2p6","c_root_id_B":"c6hqo0c","created_at_utc_A":1349387435,"created_at_utc_B":1349389746,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Great question.","human_ref_B":"Tax revenues on tobacco goes down. Later on as previous smokers age and don't die as young as they should have (shared) medical expenses go up.  Sorry I can't cite sources but I do have a graduate degree in business and economics.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2311.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"wq2ev","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why are tax rates not a continuous function of income? Also why aren't welfare programs a continuous function of income? I feel like this would remove the economic hurt that changing a tax bracket entails. Any particular reason why we have the current system instead of this?","c_root_id_A":"c5fgkzh","c_root_id_B":"c5fhw1r","created_at_utc_A":1342562933,"created_at_utc_B":1342568077,"score_A":2,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"It's easier to understand? A lot of voters only understand basic arithmetic.   Depends on what you'd replace it with. Can you give an example of a continuous function like you mention?  Also, I wonder what you mean by the \"hurt that changing a tax bracket entails.\"","human_ref_B":"Tax rates are indeed a continuous function of income, although they're not a *continuously differentiable* function of income, as the points between tax brackets are sudden discontinuities in the rate of change.  Remember, the tax brackets reflect *marginal rates*: according to this page on Forbes, in 2012 a single person paid 10% on the first $8700 of income, then 15% on income between $8700 and $35350, then 25% on income between $35350 and $85650, and so on. Getting into a new tax bracket will *never* by itself cause a person to earn less money then in a lower bracket. Every dollar earned below the top qualifying bracket is taxed at the same rate as before; every dollar above it, at the new marginal rate.  Here is a plot of total tax rate by income. (Unless I screwed up my script, in which case it's not), given a single taxpayer using rates from the Forbes article and neglecting standard deductions, credits, etc.  As for why--probably easier that way.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5144.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"wq2ev","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why are tax rates not a continuous function of income? Also why aren't welfare programs a continuous function of income? I feel like this would remove the economic hurt that changing a tax bracket entails. Any particular reason why we have the current system instead of this?","c_root_id_A":"c5fgkzh","c_root_id_B":"c5fmphu","created_at_utc_A":1342562933,"created_at_utc_B":1342587687,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It's easier to understand? A lot of voters only understand basic arithmetic.   Depends on what you'd replace it with. Can you give an example of a continuous function like you mention?  Also, I wonder what you mean by the \"hurt that changing a tax bracket entails.\"","human_ref_B":"There is no economic hurt in changing tax brackets.  The increase in taxes only applies to the income above the line that separates the brackets.  Let's say taxes are 20% on <$50,000\/yr, and 30% on everything over.  I earn $60,000.  I don't pay (0.3x60k), I pay (0.2x50k)+(0.3x10k).  You will never earn less by going up a tax bracket.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24754.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"fa0grw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"What effect has increasing rates of secularism had on American society? I recently got into a discussion about the influence of religion on US culture, and my debate partner gave me this source, claiming, among other things, that the banning of prayer from schools has resulted in the following negative effects on society. (https:\/\/www.sermoncentral.com\/sermons\/where-are-you-god-when-our-nation-seems-to-be-moving-away-from-you-glenn-newton-sermon-on-america-173627)  >A. Young People   >   >1. For 15 years before 1963 pregnancies in girls ages 15 through 19 years had been no more than   >   >\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 15 per thousand After 1963 pregnancies increased 187% in the next 15 years.   >   >2. For younger girls, ages 10 to 14 years, pregnancies since 1963 are up 553%.   >   >3. Before 1963 sexually transmitted diseases among students were 400 per 100,000. Since 1963,   >   >\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 they were up 226% in the next 12 years.   >   >B. The Family   >   >1. Before 1963 divorce rates had been declining for 15 years. After 1963 divorces increased   >   >\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 300% each year for the next 15 years.   >   >2. Since 1963 unmarried people living together is up 353%   >   >3. Since 1963 single parent families are up 140%.   >   >4. Since 1963 single parent families with children are up 160%.   >   >C. Education   >   >1. The educational standard of measure has been the SAT scores. SAT scores had been steady for   >   >\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 many years before 1963. From 1963 they rapidly declined for 18 consecutive years, even   >   >\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 though the same test has been used since 1941.   >   >2. Of the nation's top academic scholars, three times as many come from private religious   >   >\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 schools, which operate on one-third the funds as do the public schools.   >   >D. The Nation   >   >1. Since 1963 violent crime has increased 544%.   >   >3. Illegal drugs have become an enormous & uncontrollable problem.   >   >2. The nation has been deprived of an estimated 50 million citizens  Now, there are no citations for any of that, but I am aware that there was a crime wave starting in the early sixties, so I want to ask, what truth is there to this claim? Just how veracious are these statistics, and what is the truth behind their spike?","c_root_id_A":"fivr1mf","c_root_id_B":"fivdts1","created_at_utc_A":1582766133,"created_at_utc_B":1582758560,"score_A":41,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"So I am not going to go through this list your friend gave you and debunk every statistic, but I can tell you you most of this is totally made up.  For example, teen birth rates have been going down in the US since the 1950's.  I know its hard to believe because \"everyone knows\" teenagers are getting worse and worse every year.  But that's just not true and it never has been.  Here is US Government Website with some data on trends in teen pregnancy since the 1990's.  Here is another website with data from 1950-1990.  The 1950's were the high point of teenage pregnancy in the US.  That section on the SAT is also totally made up.  SAT scores have not been declining.  There was a slight dip in scores in the 60's and 70's, but that is no longer the case.  The test is constantly changed -- the idea that they have been using the same test since 1941 is absurd.  Not only does the test change every year, the overall structure of the test has changed drastically a few times, with whole sections added or taken away.  This document is clearly a piece of propaganda and not a serious set of statistics.","human_ref_B":"Statistics are but a part of the scientific endeavor. It is also necessary to interpret the data, and the main problem which tends to prop up with claims about moral and societal degeneration related to religion (or lack thereof) is an oversimplification of social reality. In fact, case in point.  ---  First of all, much more happened in the 1960s besides a decline in religiosity. To quote Bob Dylan, the times \\[were\\] a changin' or to quote Aebi and Linde,  >**The 1960s also witnessed a relaxation of the norms that controlled relations between young people, the generalization of rock and roll as the music identifying a whole new generation, and the development of the first gangs**, such as the mods and rockers in England. **Although the effect of such gangs on delinquency was greatly overestimated in the moral panic that followed their expansion** (Cohen, 1972; Goode and Ben-Yehuda, 2009), **they symbolize the change in lifestyles that we want to illustrate.**  Here is a non-exhaustive list:  * Second-wave feminism,   * The Civil Rights Act of 1960 and 1964  * The Sexual Revolution  * The Antiwar Movement  * The Protests of 1968  * Etc.  Also take into consideration the fact that, for example, religiosity appears to have continued declining since the 1960s while crime only rose between the 1960s and 1980s before resuming declining in the 1990s.   The idea that religion is somehow a guarantee for peace and necessary for non-violent behavior is a naive one. European history is bloodied by religious wars such as the Crusades and the European wars of religion.  More broadly in regard to anti-social and prosocial behaviors, I provided detailed replies to the following threads:  * Is there any evidence that a decrease in religiosity is correlated with societal problems?  * Does religion offer protection against sexual abuse, or does the culture force victims not to report it?  ---  Long story short, religious institutions may have had a role to play in the past in, for example, promoting self-control, but other institutions have since taken their place and they are not a requisite for prosocial behavior and a less violent society.   Broadly speaking, religiosity does not appear to protect against delinquent behavior except for victimless crimes (i.e. most societies regardless of religion have norms and values which are contrary to behaviors such as theft and murder). There are issues with studying religiosity (there are many aspects to it). For example, depending on how religion is lived, it can contribute to what we would today consider anti-social behavior (e.g. intimate partner violence).   Likewise, there are mixed results in regard to the relationship between religion and prejudice, or at least, how the former is lived. Point is, it is not a panacea and religiosity can have both positive *and* negative outcomes. Per Hood, Jr. et al:  >**The evidence indicates that religion is, in general, negatively associated with prejudice. However, those high in religiousness may hold negative attitudes toward proscribed behaviors, such as homosexuality.** Whether individuals separate the behavior from the person performing the behavior (the \u201csin\u2013sinner\u201d issue) has yet to be fully resolved, and this question will undoubtedly generate new research in the years to come. At present, **it seems that it is not religion per se that is linked to prejudice, but the ways in which one holds one\u2019s faith, the importance of one\u2019s religious group affiliation, and so on.**  Also see research on morality, such as, for example, Hofmann et al.'s experiments:  >**Comparing religious and nonreligious participants, there was no discernible difference in the frequency of positive moral experience** (both overall and by event). Thus, **we did not find evidence for religious people committing moral acts more frequently than non-religious people. Religious people reported fewer immoral experiences overall, but this difference was mostly attributable to religious people reporting having learned about immoral acts less often**\u2014a possible result of selective exposure\u2014**rather than having committed immoral deeds less often than non-religious people**.   And to quote Hood, Jr. et al. again:  >We have also found that the relationship of religiousness to helping behavior and prejudice is complex. Again, **there are indications that religious people** ***say*** **they are more helpful, but the findings do not bear this out for actual behavior in a nonreligious setting. within a religious context, the more faithful do indeed help more by giving money, time, and talent to religiously based causes. However, outside such a context, it becomes very difficult to distinguish helpers from non-helpers on the basis of their religion.**  The question is begged: is religion required for a person to be moral and\/or prosocial? (Also, is marriage inherently good and divorce inherently bad?). I conclude by quoting Skitka et al.'s paper titled \"Moral and religious convictions: Are they the same or different things?\"  >**People often assume that moral and religious convictions are functionally the same thing.** But are they? ...] **Meta-analytic tests of each of these hypotheses yielded weak support for the secularization hypothesis, no support for the equivalence or political asymmetry hypotheses, and the strongest support for the distinct constructs hypothesis.**  ---  If we are to discuss topics such as marriage and divorce, we should also consider both why an increase in divorce rates coincided with, for example, second-wave feminism (or conversely why divorce was less common in the past), and the fact that marriage and divorce are not the only two options in regard to partnership. What about [cohabitation? Also see:  * Number of U.S. adults cohabiting with a partner continues to rise, especially among those 50 and older  * More than half of Americans say marriage is important but not essential to leading a fulfilling life  ---  In regard to SAT scores and the notion of declining scores, if the argument is that private religious schools are better, there remains the question of why would they be better? Presumably it is not because of divine providence, otherwise it should not matter in which school goes a devout child, and if it is a matter of funds or quality of education, well, religion is not required. If it is a matter of discipline, see above. That said, this is assuming that it is even appropriate to make conclusions by taking aggregate SAT scores at face value. See for example Grissmer's contention:  >**Differences in SAT scores among schools, school districts, and states primarily reflect the different characteristics of the changing, self-selected population taking the test and very little about the quality of the schools attended.** The** changes in average scores over time also primarily reflect the ever changing characteristics of the self-selected pool of test takers**. Even worse, the national trends actually move in the opposite direction to school quality. **The better job the K-12 education system does in preparing more students to meet college standards, the lower will be the average SAT score** ...]  >**Any aggregation of SAT test scores above the level of the individual student**\u2014by high school, school district, state, or the nation\u2014**is simply uninterpretable as a measure of student achievement trends or as a measure of quality among schools, school districts, or states.**   Also see the following articles for parsimonious explanations for the \"decline\":  * [The real reason SAT scores are falling  * No, the sky is not falling: Interpreting the latest SAT scores  * Falling SAT Scores: Why are Students Testing Lower this Year?  This is not meant to be exhaustive, and rather to promote critical thinking and to highlight how more complex reality is.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7573.0,"score_ratio":2.5625}
{"post_id":"5t5dpy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Can capitalism work sustainably, or is the growth of capitalistic markets inherent to their health? By health\/sustainability I mean without wealth inequality pushing large swaths of the population into squalor, or consuming all of the earth's resources.  Is there a proven capitalistic model that would sustain inequality-controlled living conditions without population growth, while consuming only renewable (or otherwise practically unlimited) resources?","c_root_id_A":"ddkphc8","c_root_id_B":"ddkhnjh","created_at_utc_A":1486738534,"created_at_utc_B":1486721543,"score_A":20,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":">Is there a proven capitalistic model that would sustain inequality-controlled living conditions without population growth, while consuming only renewable (or otherwise practically unlimited) resources?  I think nearly everyone--supporters and detractors of capitalism--would agree that there is no *proven* model, but supporters of capitalism would probably object to the notion that any such model could be proven in advance rather than develop on its own.  *Capital in the Twenty-First Century* by Thomas Piketty argues that the tendency towards increases in inequality is an inherent law of capitalist modes of economy, but that (global) regulation can stem this tendency.  Marxists obviously reject the possibility of regulation having such ability and would likely argue any regulation would be captured by the logic of capitalist accumulation. Of course what the alternative would be is always an issue and debates within Marxism range from the abolishment of all hierarchal institutions (including the family) to a focus on renewing the commons and creating community-based economies. See everything ranging from *Commonwealth* to *Take Back the Economy* to *Rebel Cities* to *Magical Marxism*.   Piketty notably doesn't analyze issues of climate change, resource depletion, pollution, ect in real depth (he acknowledges them as really important issues, though). Piketty does implicitly seem to believe that perpetual growth is possible. Many Marxists are also guilty of not considering the limits the natural world might place on the economic and underestimate the potential for radical and dramatic changes in the Earth-system--*Molecular Red* by Ken Wark gives a good overview of this. Though some Marxists are trying to rectify this--see Jason Moore's *Capital in the Web of Life*.  Of course there are also the proponents of capitalism--or market economies, as many would likely say--who believe that capitalism is the best system to stay with to address inequality and environmental issues. The list here is long, but an interesting take on this could be found in the developers of the emerging 'Good Anthropocene' argument--which argues that rather being a negative, humans capacity to transform the planetary-system should be seen as the opportunity to change the Earth to meet our desires.   So, the short answer is: there is no proven model--capitalist or otherwise--but there is a lot of debate and theorization.","human_ref_B":"RemindMe! 2 days","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16991.0,"score_ratio":10.0}
{"post_id":"5t5dpy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Can capitalism work sustainably, or is the growth of capitalistic markets inherent to their health? By health\/sustainability I mean without wealth inequality pushing large swaths of the population into squalor, or consuming all of the earth's resources.  Is there a proven capitalistic model that would sustain inequality-controlled living conditions without population growth, while consuming only renewable (or otherwise practically unlimited) resources?","c_root_id_A":"ddkhnjh","c_root_id_B":"ddko6lr","created_at_utc_A":1486721543,"created_at_utc_B":1486736718,"score_A":2,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"RemindMe! 2 days","human_ref_B":"This is a speculative question with a poison-the-well approach that presupposes a specific set of answers, namely that *capitalism itself* is responsible for increased inequality and environmental degradation, when that isn't necessarily the case, or that these problems are both monocausal. For instance, why wouldn't bad institutions or poor governance be the main cause?   It also presupposes that the correct solution, or the ideal, would be \"inequality-controlled living conditions without population growth, while consuming only renewable (or otherwise practically unlimited) resources?\" That's a normative position pinned to a specific view of how the world *should* work, which is entirely speculative.  Not suitable for the subreddit in my opinion.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15175.0,"score_ratio":10.5}
{"post_id":"5t5dpy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Can capitalism work sustainably, or is the growth of capitalistic markets inherent to their health? By health\/sustainability I mean without wealth inequality pushing large swaths of the population into squalor, or consuming all of the earth's resources.  Is there a proven capitalistic model that would sustain inequality-controlled living conditions without population growth, while consuming only renewable (or otherwise practically unlimited) resources?","c_root_id_A":"ddkhnjh","c_root_id_B":"ddkzyqb","created_at_utc_A":1486721543,"created_at_utc_B":1486751039,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"RemindMe! 2 days","human_ref_B":"Somewhat self-indulgent and not everyone's pick - but Naomi Klein in \"This Changes Everything\" believes that capitalism's prolongation is based on its capacity to declare emergencies. Innovation is largely driven by necessity and 'artificial' emergencies such as war or depression motivates the system to perpetuate itself.   The United States, is propped by an almost constant state of war and a capacity to project hard power across the globe. It keeps people employed and is one of the last capacities of the state to involve itself in the system. We are about to have drone deliveries and unmanned vehicles based on technologies discovered through military research.   In a world of finite resources she proposes declaring an environmental emergency as a means of developing the required technologies and stimulating growth in sectors which will be green or renewable. Her ultimate goal is socialism which in a world of automation makes sense, but she recognises the market would play an initial role.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":29496.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5t5dpy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Can capitalism work sustainably, or is the growth of capitalistic markets inherent to their health? By health\/sustainability I mean without wealth inequality pushing large swaths of the population into squalor, or consuming all of the earth's resources.  Is there a proven capitalistic model that would sustain inequality-controlled living conditions without population growth, while consuming only renewable (or otherwise practically unlimited) resources?","c_root_id_A":"ddkvmm9","c_root_id_B":"ddkzyqb","created_at_utc_A":1486746028,"created_at_utc_B":1486751039,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This is unsurprisingly a big theme in the degrowth and ecological economics camps. For the most part capitalism is considered the basic framework of the world economy so it's left as an assumption.   Peter Victor has done a number of modelling exercises to see if given a reasonable set of assumptions you can do a managed degrowth of the Canadian economy to bring material and energy throughput down to a sustainable level without inequality blowing up.  The answer, somewhat surprisingly is that you can with a number of policy prescriptions that aren't that hard to support (shorter working weeks, strong anti-poverty measures, zero balance of trade, redirecting consumption from private goods to public goods, stabilizing population growth (which is mostly driven by immigration in canada), etc. Whether or not they could ever be politically feasible in Canada is bigger question but they are in the realm of possiblity (unlike say vapourware technology like Carbon Capture and Storage).  In Victor's modelling work just degrowing the economy with no eye on inequality is a disaster that makes austerity measures look good. Business as usual as well is comes to an extremely negative end as well. So in that sense you can look at Capitalism as it is currently practiced in most of the degrowth modelling as having extremely negative outcomes. There's pretty much universal agreement on that within Degrowth\/Eco-Econ. In fact it's largely the motivation for the existence of the sub-discipline.   If you are interested in this question degrowth literature does provide some of the best answers. The classic text is of course Limits to Growth, which has had a new relevance with Graham Turner's work looking at LtG's business as usual scenario runs against 30 years of emperical data (hint: it's bad). It's also useful to compare the projections of LtG's critics such as Nordhaus and Solow using Hotelling type models across the same period. Ugo Bardi has a nice book on some of the controversies between the conventional economics camps and LtG.","human_ref_B":"Somewhat self-indulgent and not everyone's pick - but Naomi Klein in \"This Changes Everything\" believes that capitalism's prolongation is based on its capacity to declare emergencies. Innovation is largely driven by necessity and 'artificial' emergencies such as war or depression motivates the system to perpetuate itself.   The United States, is propped by an almost constant state of war and a capacity to project hard power across the globe. It keeps people employed and is one of the last capacities of the state to involve itself in the system. We are about to have drone deliveries and unmanned vehicles based on technologies discovered through military research.   In a world of finite resources she proposes declaring an environmental emergency as a means of developing the required technologies and stimulating growth in sectors which will be green or renewable. Her ultimate goal is socialism which in a world of automation makes sense, but she recognises the market would play an initial role.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5011.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1gbsaj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Which books on economics should I read? So far I've taken micro and macro econ classes. What are some of the classic 'must read' economics books? I'm really open to any suggestions","c_root_id_A":"caizyz9","c_root_id_B":"caiq6pw","created_at_utc_A":1371239980,"created_at_utc_B":1371209216,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Let's begin with microeconomics.   1. The single best pop-microeconomics book is undoubtedly Landsburg's *The Armchair Economist.* I would suggest putting off reading any of the \"new pop econ\" (Freakonomics, Undercover Economist, whatever) until after reading *Armchair.* 2. A great second book in micro is Dixit's *Thinking Strategically.* It will teach you how to think like a game theorist without a lick of math. 3. A lovely book that bridges the gap between microeconomics and macroeconomics is Schelling's *Micromotives and Macrobehavior.*  He goes through all kinds of counterintuitive results that happen when you start moving away from individuals and start talking about aggregates. 4. *The Worldy Philosophers* is great on history of thought. So is *Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations*; the latter is particularly readable and a good writeup on the macro schools of thought and how they affected the economics profession through the 60s to 90s.  There are no good primers in macroeconomics. That said, you can read  1. Milton Friedman's *Capitalism and Freedom*  2. Milton Friedman's *Free to Choose* 3. Galbraith's *The New Industrial State*, and 4. Galbraith's *The Affluent Society.* 5. Perhaps something like Krugman's *Return to Depression Economics.* I'm waiting eagerly for someone to write a pop-macro book for this century that doesn't suck. (Recommendations welcome.)  A steady diet of economics dulls the palate. A great book that explores some of the sociological sides of the American economy over the past sixty years, while still being mostly right on the economics, is  1. Richard Florida, *The Rise of the Creative Class.*   Really, read Florida, he's lucid in most places and more right than he is wrong.  I don't recommend reading the long tomes we call \"classics\" - their value-added is low relative to modern treatments. Nevertheless, if you want to look smart at parties, you can (claim to have) read:  1. Smith, *Wealth of Nations* 2. Keynes, *General Theory* 3. Schumpeter, *Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy*","human_ref_B":"A good unbiased general review presented chronologically is New Ideas from Dead Economists.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":30764.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1gbsaj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Which books on economics should I read? So far I've taken micro and macro econ classes. What are some of the classic 'must read' economics books? I'm really open to any suggestions","c_root_id_A":"caisae3","c_root_id_B":"caizyz9","created_at_utc_A":1371219096,"created_at_utc_B":1371239980,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"If you are looking for perspectives on economic behavior and phenomena, consider the Handbook of Economic Sociology edition 2 (Smelser and Swedberg). I also like the selection of readings in the first edition (1994) which had a somewhat more anthropological vein.    http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Handbook-Economic-Sociology-Second-Edition\/dp\/0691121265 (Get it from the university library).","human_ref_B":"Let's begin with microeconomics.   1. The single best pop-microeconomics book is undoubtedly Landsburg's *The Armchair Economist.* I would suggest putting off reading any of the \"new pop econ\" (Freakonomics, Undercover Economist, whatever) until after reading *Armchair.* 2. A great second book in micro is Dixit's *Thinking Strategically.* It will teach you how to think like a game theorist without a lick of math. 3. A lovely book that bridges the gap between microeconomics and macroeconomics is Schelling's *Micromotives and Macrobehavior.*  He goes through all kinds of counterintuitive results that happen when you start moving away from individuals and start talking about aggregates. 4. *The Worldy Philosophers* is great on history of thought. So is *Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations*; the latter is particularly readable and a good writeup on the macro schools of thought and how they affected the economics profession through the 60s to 90s.  There are no good primers in macroeconomics. That said, you can read  1. Milton Friedman's *Capitalism and Freedom*  2. Milton Friedman's *Free to Choose* 3. Galbraith's *The New Industrial State*, and 4. Galbraith's *The Affluent Society.* 5. Perhaps something like Krugman's *Return to Depression Economics.* I'm waiting eagerly for someone to write a pop-macro book for this century that doesn't suck. (Recommendations welcome.)  A steady diet of economics dulls the palate. A great book that explores some of the sociological sides of the American economy over the past sixty years, while still being mostly right on the economics, is  1. Richard Florida, *The Rise of the Creative Class.*   Really, read Florida, he's lucid in most places and more right than he is wrong.  I don't recommend reading the long tomes we call \"classics\" - their value-added is low relative to modern treatments. Nevertheless, if you want to look smart at parties, you can (claim to have) read:  1. Smith, *Wealth of Nations* 2. Keynes, *General Theory* 3. Schumpeter, *Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20884.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1gbsaj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Which books on economics should I read? So far I've taken micro and macro econ classes. What are some of the classic 'must read' economics books? I'm really open to any suggestions","c_root_id_A":"caiw7z2","c_root_id_B":"caizyz9","created_at_utc_A":1371230156,"created_at_utc_B":1371239980,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Ben Bernanke's book on the great depression is a pretty interesting book.  The chapters feel a lot like journal articles i.e. modern economic practice.  But are rarely given to complex theorizing since the subject is historical, so you get a good idea of what happened in the great depression and to some extent how modern economics is conducted i.e. data driven with an air of science.  If you really want to get to the cutting edge and see actual published work, try Colin Camerer's book Behavioral Game Theory.  This is much more technical, but comes from an experimental point of view (which is very important in modern economics).  To see the early (and more mathematical) pre-cursor to Freakonomics's economics-can-be-used-to-explain-many-things attitude check out Gary Becker's The Economic Approach to Human Behavior.  This requires some calculus.  Another experimental classic is the Handbook of Experimental Economics.    A very accessible intro to game theory (and some interesting arguments about neo-classical economics) can be found in Herbert Gintis's Game Theory Evolving.  If you get really into it you can read the later chapters that deal with evolutionary game theory, but the first few chapters provide a great formal but accessible intro to game theory with many many problems to solve.","human_ref_B":"Let's begin with microeconomics.   1. The single best pop-microeconomics book is undoubtedly Landsburg's *The Armchair Economist.* I would suggest putting off reading any of the \"new pop econ\" (Freakonomics, Undercover Economist, whatever) until after reading *Armchair.* 2. A great second book in micro is Dixit's *Thinking Strategically.* It will teach you how to think like a game theorist without a lick of math. 3. A lovely book that bridges the gap between microeconomics and macroeconomics is Schelling's *Micromotives and Macrobehavior.*  He goes through all kinds of counterintuitive results that happen when you start moving away from individuals and start talking about aggregates. 4. *The Worldy Philosophers* is great on history of thought. So is *Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations*; the latter is particularly readable and a good writeup on the macro schools of thought and how they affected the economics profession through the 60s to 90s.  There are no good primers in macroeconomics. That said, you can read  1. Milton Friedman's *Capitalism and Freedom*  2. Milton Friedman's *Free to Choose* 3. Galbraith's *The New Industrial State*, and 4. Galbraith's *The Affluent Society.* 5. Perhaps something like Krugman's *Return to Depression Economics.* I'm waiting eagerly for someone to write a pop-macro book for this century that doesn't suck. (Recommendations welcome.)  A steady diet of economics dulls the palate. A great book that explores some of the sociological sides of the American economy over the past sixty years, while still being mostly right on the economics, is  1. Richard Florida, *The Rise of the Creative Class.*   Really, read Florida, he's lucid in most places and more right than he is wrong.  I don't recommend reading the long tomes we call \"classics\" - their value-added is low relative to modern treatments. Nevertheless, if you want to look smart at parties, you can (claim to have) read:  1. Smith, *Wealth of Nations* 2. Keynes, *General Theory* 3. Schumpeter, *Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9824.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1gbsaj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Which books on economics should I read? So far I've taken micro and macro econ classes. What are some of the classic 'must read' economics books? I'm really open to any suggestions","c_root_id_A":"caizyz9","c_root_id_B":"caiv4af","created_at_utc_A":1371239980,"created_at_utc_B":1371227294,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Let's begin with microeconomics.   1. The single best pop-microeconomics book is undoubtedly Landsburg's *The Armchair Economist.* I would suggest putting off reading any of the \"new pop econ\" (Freakonomics, Undercover Economist, whatever) until after reading *Armchair.* 2. A great second book in micro is Dixit's *Thinking Strategically.* It will teach you how to think like a game theorist without a lick of math. 3. A lovely book that bridges the gap between microeconomics and macroeconomics is Schelling's *Micromotives and Macrobehavior.*  He goes through all kinds of counterintuitive results that happen when you start moving away from individuals and start talking about aggregates. 4. *The Worldy Philosophers* is great on history of thought. So is *Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations*; the latter is particularly readable and a good writeup on the macro schools of thought and how they affected the economics profession through the 60s to 90s.  There are no good primers in macroeconomics. That said, you can read  1. Milton Friedman's *Capitalism and Freedom*  2. Milton Friedman's *Free to Choose* 3. Galbraith's *The New Industrial State*, and 4. Galbraith's *The Affluent Society.* 5. Perhaps something like Krugman's *Return to Depression Economics.* I'm waiting eagerly for someone to write a pop-macro book for this century that doesn't suck. (Recommendations welcome.)  A steady diet of economics dulls the palate. A great book that explores some of the sociological sides of the American economy over the past sixty years, while still being mostly right on the economics, is  1. Richard Florida, *The Rise of the Creative Class.*   Really, read Florida, he's lucid in most places and more right than he is wrong.  I don't recommend reading the long tomes we call \"classics\" - their value-added is low relative to modern treatments. Nevertheless, if you want to look smart at parties, you can (claim to have) read:  1. Smith, *Wealth of Nations* 2. Keynes, *General Theory* 3. Schumpeter, *Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy*","human_ref_B":"If you want to know a bit more about the (moral) philosophical side of economics, i would recommend: Economics of Good and Evil: the quest for economic meaning from Gilgamesh to Wall Street (Tom\u00e1\u0161 Sedl\u00e1\u010dek ). He states that economics didn't start with Adam Smith, but way earlier.. It's part a well written history of economics and part a plea for more ethical economics...  (to be honest: I also have a sociological background)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12686.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1gbsaj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Which books on economics should I read? So far I've taken micro and macro econ classes. What are some of the classic 'must read' economics books? I'm really open to any suggestions","c_root_id_A":"caiw7z2","c_root_id_B":"caiv4af","created_at_utc_A":1371230156,"created_at_utc_B":1371227294,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Ben Bernanke's book on the great depression is a pretty interesting book.  The chapters feel a lot like journal articles i.e. modern economic practice.  But are rarely given to complex theorizing since the subject is historical, so you get a good idea of what happened in the great depression and to some extent how modern economics is conducted i.e. data driven with an air of science.  If you really want to get to the cutting edge and see actual published work, try Colin Camerer's book Behavioral Game Theory.  This is much more technical, but comes from an experimental point of view (which is very important in modern economics).  To see the early (and more mathematical) pre-cursor to Freakonomics's economics-can-be-used-to-explain-many-things attitude check out Gary Becker's The Economic Approach to Human Behavior.  This requires some calculus.  Another experimental classic is the Handbook of Experimental Economics.    A very accessible intro to game theory (and some interesting arguments about neo-classical economics) can be found in Herbert Gintis's Game Theory Evolving.  If you get really into it you can read the later chapters that deal with evolutionary game theory, but the first few chapters provide a great formal but accessible intro to game theory with many many problems to solve.","human_ref_B":"If you want to know a bit more about the (moral) philosophical side of economics, i would recommend: Economics of Good and Evil: the quest for economic meaning from Gilgamesh to Wall Street (Tom\u00e1\u0161 Sedl\u00e1\u010dek ). He states that economics didn't start with Adam Smith, but way earlier.. It's part a well written history of economics and part a plea for more ethical economics...  (to be honest: I also have a sociological background)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2862.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"15t3ja","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why are governments obsessed with 'Growth'. Isn't economic and population growth unsustainable? I imagine until we start building cities on Mars, that as the population grows, people get more and more unhappy. Economic growth will increase as long as we have resources and technology reduces the consumption of those resources.","c_root_id_A":"c7pk6js","c_root_id_B":"c7prlor","created_at_utc_A":1357102123,"created_at_utc_B":1357145189,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I think Governments are typically more preoccupied with economic growth, as economic growth is an indicator of good governance and social progress as growth is caused by a large range of factors including technological innovation. Population growth results in a degree of economic growth but governments usually try to limit rampant growth(see China's one child policy or India's sterilization policy under Indhira Gandhi). In places with shrinking populations economic growth is structurally hampered by a market that is shrinking and a smaller labor force.","human_ref_B":"In abstract terms, economic growth is not unsustainable (population growth probably is)\u2014of course, this will depend on what we define as economic growth.   A more direct question would necessarily revolve around the nature of capitalism. Can the logic of capital accumulation provide the basis for a sustainable world? As we have seen throughout modern history, capital seeks out new markets, transforming previously unmarketable goods into commodities. This includes many things, from health services, to ideas, to water, to complex financial instruments. In other words, there is an expansion of 'places' (markets) in which commodities can be bought and sold, places where 'things' are transformed into commodities that can be privately and exclusively owned, either by individuals or fictitious individuals, such as the corporation. In this process, capital (as a set of social relations) seeks to 'privatize' or commoditize everything and anything so as to produce more capital. There are setbacks to be sure\u2014the welfare state is a good example\u2014based on political and economic conditions, the balance of class power, and other factors, but on the whole the trajectory is toward more and more capital accumulation, and thus, greater centralization of capital in what we now call transnational corporations.  Given the general nature of this logic, the trajectory is toward a fairly dystopian world where everything (and I mean everything) is bought and sold, subject to market forces. This is, of course, a hypothetical situation in which contingency plays no part\u2014and as we know, historical events are nothing if not incredibly contingent, and in some cases, contradictory to our understanding of development.   By itself, the nature and logic of capital accumulation seems unsustainable in the long run without destroying the planet and pushing the majority of the world's subordinate classes into further poverty, with less control of their political economic futures. Of course, that in itself is unsustainable, and thus, as we move from crisis to crisis we see different popular reactions and counter-movements (e.g., the Quebec student strike, Occupy, etc.). So while capital accumulation is likely unsustainable, I do not think it is impossible to have a world in which 'economic growth' is sustainable, but this would need to be an economic growth based not merely on profit for individuals\u2014fictitious or otherwise\u2014but rather, those who create social wealth in the first place.  That is my personal view on the matter, but in answer to your question of why governments are obsessed with 'growth' you could take a number of different approaches. Using a Foucauldian lens, you might ask where our fascination for 'growth' came from, examining texts and archives, etc., to determine the genealogy of the concept (more so, in the sense of what Foucault might call a particular governmentality of growth).  You could also take a Marxian-influenced perspective that examines the role of the state. The state (and government) cannot be viewed as independent actors. They are explicitly tied to the economic system, and, as such, are themselves a relation of production that makes possible the appearance of a separation between the political and economic system. Therefore, you might want to examine the particular 'economic'\u2014not to be taken as a separate entity\u2014conditions that has framed the nature of 'growth' in particular eras. Are they different? Why or why not? Is it merely a case of what I outline above, based on the nature of capital accumulation? Or, are there other factors that have influenced the nature of growth, its trajectory and development? What about political ideologies such as neoliberalism which takes a somewhat different approach to growth than the policies of the Keynesian Welfare State?  That's just a start, but hopefully it helps.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":43066.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"15t3ja","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why are governments obsessed with 'Growth'. Isn't economic and population growth unsustainable? I imagine until we start building cities on Mars, that as the population grows, people get more and more unhappy. Economic growth will increase as long as we have resources and technology reduces the consumption of those resources.","c_root_id_A":"c7psbmg","c_root_id_B":"c7pvfmr","created_at_utc_A":1357147861,"created_at_utc_B":1357158136,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"It's a peacock's tail. Even though the tail of a peacock is expensive to produce and is very disadvantageous when confronted with a predator, it's evolutionary advantageous for the peacock rooster because he gets more hens with a nicer tail. Why do the hens get away with selecting on superficialities? Because it signals good fitness if that rooster is competitive even with such a disadvantage, if he can afford the investment in the tail.  In recent human history the circumstances have been favoring economic growth. Therefore, any culture assuming that growth was possible, desirable and inevitable and risked a lot to grow has prospered, while steady state cultures have lost relative power, status and influence. This will remain true until the circumstances change and growth is no longer easy (for example dwindling resources, negative feedback like climate change, the increasing costs of administering greater entities might contribute to that).","human_ref_B":"The answer to your second question is 'yes'. The answer to your first question is more complex. If this is something you're interested in exploring, check out http:\/\/steadystate.org\/. Herman Daly is generally seen as the godfather of ecological economics, and it's worth exploring his stuff.  We're pretty much screwed unless we change a lot, quickly. And you're right that growth does not = happiness. GDP growth as an indicator of economic well-being is (slowly) being rejected by mainstream economists (see this report by Stiglitz, Sen and Fitoussi).  It's worth having a look at the Club of Rome Report as well.  We really don't need more growth. We need better\/more equitable distribution and some form of agreement on population control.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10275.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"15t3ja","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why are governments obsessed with 'Growth'. Isn't economic and population growth unsustainable? I imagine until we start building cities on Mars, that as the population grows, people get more and more unhappy. Economic growth will increase as long as we have resources and technology reduces the consumption of those resources.","c_root_id_A":"c7psbmg","c_root_id_B":"c7pk6js","created_at_utc_A":1357147861,"created_at_utc_B":1357102123,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It's a peacock's tail. Even though the tail of a peacock is expensive to produce and is very disadvantageous when confronted with a predator, it's evolutionary advantageous for the peacock rooster because he gets more hens with a nicer tail. Why do the hens get away with selecting on superficialities? Because it signals good fitness if that rooster is competitive even with such a disadvantage, if he can afford the investment in the tail.  In recent human history the circumstances have been favoring economic growth. Therefore, any culture assuming that growth was possible, desirable and inevitable and risked a lot to grow has prospered, while steady state cultures have lost relative power, status and influence. This will remain true until the circumstances change and growth is no longer easy (for example dwindling resources, negative feedback like climate change, the increasing costs of administering greater entities might contribute to that).","human_ref_B":"I think Governments are typically more preoccupied with economic growth, as economic growth is an indicator of good governance and social progress as growth is caused by a large range of factors including technological innovation. Population growth results in a degree of economic growth but governments usually try to limit rampant growth(see China's one child policy or India's sterilization policy under Indhira Gandhi). In places with shrinking populations economic growth is structurally hampered by a market that is shrinking and a smaller labor force.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":45738.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"15t3ja","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why are governments obsessed with 'Growth'. Isn't economic and population growth unsustainable? I imagine until we start building cities on Mars, that as the population grows, people get more and more unhappy. Economic growth will increase as long as we have resources and technology reduces the consumption of those resources.","c_root_id_A":"c7pk6js","c_root_id_B":"c7pvfmr","created_at_utc_A":1357102123,"created_at_utc_B":1357158136,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I think Governments are typically more preoccupied with economic growth, as economic growth is an indicator of good governance and social progress as growth is caused by a large range of factors including technological innovation. Population growth results in a degree of economic growth but governments usually try to limit rampant growth(see China's one child policy or India's sterilization policy under Indhira Gandhi). In places with shrinking populations economic growth is structurally hampered by a market that is shrinking and a smaller labor force.","human_ref_B":"The answer to your second question is 'yes'. The answer to your first question is more complex. If this is something you're interested in exploring, check out http:\/\/steadystate.org\/. Herman Daly is generally seen as the godfather of ecological economics, and it's worth exploring his stuff.  We're pretty much screwed unless we change a lot, quickly. And you're right that growth does not = happiness. GDP growth as an indicator of economic well-being is (slowly) being rejected by mainstream economists (see this report by Stiglitz, Sen and Fitoussi).  It's worth having a look at the Club of Rome Report as well.  We really don't need more growth. We need better\/more equitable distribution and some form of agreement on population control.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":56013.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"8hw5b0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is being poor associated with more violence used to solve problems? When you think of settling disputes on the street you think of violence.  Why does being poor breed violence?  What about financial security reduces the desire to use violence to solve problems?","c_root_id_A":"dyn9kxb","c_root_id_B":"dyn9te8","created_at_utc_A":1525793965,"created_at_utc_B":1525794175,"score_A":5,"score_B":38,"human_ref_A":"Do you have a source to confirm that poverty does, in fact, breed violence? Even if the two are correlated - which I would also like to see a proper source for - this could have more to do with legal recourses not being as available in poorer neighborhoods and nothing to do with desire. In other words it may have to do with the state of law being unevenly applied in richer vs poorer areas.","human_ref_B":"First of all, your premise is a bit reductive. I don't think most social scientists would accept the idea that \"financial security reduces the desire to use violence to solve problems\".  Still, I don't want to ignore the spirit of what you're asking because of the precise language you use in your question. Let's say you're asking \"why is poverty associated with crime\"? There's no easy or straightforward answer to this question. There a numerous criminological theories that try to address the causes of crime, and the role of class is implicit in most of them.  Here's a good review of the current sociological thinking on the subject.   Moving beyond scientific consensus, I've always found the perspective of Travis Hirschi's control theory to be really compelling, if you're looking for an individual level analysis. Basically he flips the question on it's head a bit. Instead of asking why are people deviant (which might include violence) he says, why is anyone adhering to norms? What compels us to follow rules? I.E. what stops us from being violent all the time? His answer is that social forces exert control on us, and the absence of these forces results in higher rates of deviant behavior. There are conditions related to poverty (family structure, joblessness, etc) that reduce the social forces compelling us to \"follow rules\".","labels":0,"seconds_difference":210.0,"score_ratio":7.6}
{"post_id":"o234b1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Are violent crime stats for African Americans misleading? According to FBI crime stats, black people account for less than 15% of the population but more than 50% of murder. This is a big arguing point for conservatives and at the moment I don't have a counterargument.   I know that these stats are submitted voluntarily by each individual police department, but that's not a counterargument.   Can anyone shed some light?","c_root_id_A":"h24b3ke","c_root_id_B":"h24rsnm","created_at_utc_A":1623954652,"created_at_utc_B":1623961712,"score_A":35,"score_B":47,"human_ref_A":"This might be useful...  Sampson, R. J., & Lauritsen, J. L. (1997). Racial and ethnic disparities in crime and criminal justice in the United States. Crime and justice, 21, 311-374.","human_ref_B":">According to FBI crime stats, black people account for less than 15% of the population but more than 50% of murder. This is a big arguing point  Citing statistics is not an argument in and of itself, it is just a statement. Commonly people do so *in order to* make some point, for instance that overrepresentation in crime statistics explains why Black Americans are disproportionately stopped and frisked (see here for issues with this argument) or why Black Americans are disproportionately shot and killed (see here for issues with this argument).  Is the criminal justice system colorblind? It is not. Does this have implications for official statistics? Yes. Do these sufficiently explain why Black Americans are overrepresented in violent crime? No. There are several other structural and institutional issues which together contribute to the problem. (See here for some insight.)  This is far from being an exhaustive list of common arguments and counterpoints.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7060.0,"score_ratio":1.3428571429}
{"post_id":"ufjpg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"How do countries outside of America view their own histories of slavery? It's surprising how widespread slavery was in the new world up until 1888 (if not beyond in some enclaves.)  I believe the last Portugese slave ship left Benin in ~1890. I guess I'm just wondering if countries involved in slavery (perhaps at any point, but particularly in the 17th-19th centuries) have taken different approaches towards making amends. Is there denial? Any attempts at repatriation? etc.?","c_root_id_A":"c4v1qfi","c_root_id_B":"c4v2dve","created_at_utc_A":1338576328,"created_at_utc_B":1338579061,"score_A":3,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"WP \"1981: Mauritania abolishes slavery\" (to make this worse slavery was abolished only for show - http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/worldnews\/comments\/r3dt4\/slaverys_last_stronghold_mauritania\/ )","human_ref_B":"Canada here, and speaking only of my own experiences in public school. I don't think we ever talked about black slavery here in history (referring to a elementary and secondary school level of teaching, not uni history classes) except to point out that slaves escaped here. As a kid, I got the impression that Canadians were not racist at all and happily welcomed black people and were glad to have saved the slaves. That's not true, but no one ever told me otherwise, and books and stories about the Underground Railroad tended to end with getting to Canada, so I just pictured it was all roses and interracial marriages after that.  We talk a little more about how incredibly awful we were to Asian immigrants\/workers (not just racism on its own but how we treated them when they worked building the railroad), but any kind of likeness to slaves or slave-like treatment never came up, even though they were underpaid, worked in dangerous and extreme conditions, huge taxes to make bringing their families over extremely expensive, and all sorts of nasty other stuff. It is told more in a \"it was awful to work in those times, especially if you were Chinese\" way, the same way we might say it was awful to be a child working in a factory during England's Industrial Revolution. There's a degree of removing ourselves from it, I think. I don't know much of anything we've done to make amends for that. Memorials, maybe.  Similarly, a lot of how horrible we were to native populations gets downplayed or even ignored. That said, that we are still making amends is relatively well known (and criticized\/applauded).  A lot depends on age, as well. You learn more of the nasty stuff as you get older. Children learn about North America being \"discovered\" as this empty new land. In high school, you become more aware that it was more accurately stolen from people who were already here and had their own customs, languages, and ways of life.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2733.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"ufjpg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"How do countries outside of America view their own histories of slavery? It's surprising how widespread slavery was in the new world up until 1888 (if not beyond in some enclaves.)  I believe the last Portugese slave ship left Benin in ~1890. I guess I'm just wondering if countries involved in slavery (perhaps at any point, but particularly in the 17th-19th centuries) have taken different approaches towards making amends. Is there denial? Any attempts at repatriation? etc.?","c_root_id_A":"c4v2j1h","c_root_id_B":"c4v1qfi","created_at_utc_A":1338579652,"created_at_utc_B":1338576328,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"In Denmark, I was taught that we were the first country to outlaw slave trade. I retrospect, and looking it up on wikipedia, it seems as if that story has a bit more to it than that. We did cover the Atlantic triangular slave trade and the colonies in the Danish West Indies as well. I guess the conclusion is that we participated but were not as bad as everyone else. Or so the story went.","human_ref_B":"WP \"1981: Mauritania abolishes slavery\" (to make this worse slavery was abolished only for show - http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/worldnews\/comments\/r3dt4\/slaverys_last_stronghold_mauritania\/ )","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3324.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"ufjpg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"How do countries outside of America view their own histories of slavery? It's surprising how widespread slavery was in the new world up until 1888 (if not beyond in some enclaves.)  I believe the last Portugese slave ship left Benin in ~1890. I guess I'm just wondering if countries involved in slavery (perhaps at any point, but particularly in the 17th-19th centuries) have taken different approaches towards making amends. Is there denial? Any attempts at repatriation? etc.?","c_root_id_A":"c4v5twv","c_root_id_B":"c4v7gun","created_at_utc_A":1338595334,"created_at_utc_B":1338604728,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"In Mexico slavery is not a big issue, because we abolished it in 1821, so it's been a while. Also it was more of a serfdom kind situation, not so much a ball and chains one. Also as it has been mentioned, the kind of slavery we had was only under Spain's rule.  And lastly, while most servants and semi slaves were indigenous, a few indigenous or indigenous looking mixed people had full rights.","human_ref_B":"Since you mentioned \"us\" in your post, here's a reply from a portuguese.  Altought we did a lot of slave sales, we were also one of the firsts (if I recall we were the firsts) to banish slavery. It's not really a topic of conversation arround here, and here's my theory on why: as you know, slaves came mainly from Africa. We kinda owned 5 countries there. In the 70's, there was a big war (that was one of the reasons why the dictatorship ended) between those countries and Portugal, that resulted in a great life loss for us. So some portuguese people think that that even the things. Also, nowadays we have an enormous amount of protocoles with these countries and we are basicly all friends.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9394.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"ufjpg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"How do countries outside of America view their own histories of slavery? It's surprising how widespread slavery was in the new world up until 1888 (if not beyond in some enclaves.)  I believe the last Portugese slave ship left Benin in ~1890. I guess I'm just wondering if countries involved in slavery (perhaps at any point, but particularly in the 17th-19th centuries) have taken different approaches towards making amends. Is there denial? Any attempts at repatriation? etc.?","c_root_id_A":"c4v5uyi","c_root_id_B":"c4v7gun","created_at_utc_A":1338595506,"created_at_utc_B":1338604728,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"In France, slavery was abolished twice. First in 1794, but it was reestablished by Napol\u00e9on under pressure from plantation owners in the colonies (mostly the caribbeans and La R\u00e9union, now overseas departments). It was then definitely abolished in 1848.  Slavery was therefore abolished relatively early in history (when compared to other countries), which allowed the issue to be swept under the rug. Besides, it was never a major part of the economic life of the country, only being massive in the colonies. Starting in the 90s, museums were created in the old slavers ports (Nantes, Bordeaux) and a day of remembrance was instituted.   It's really not so much of a controversial subject, nor has it ever been. While things have been changing recently, France has historically been a welcoming and open country, with comparatively few racial tensions.","human_ref_B":"Since you mentioned \"us\" in your post, here's a reply from a portuguese.  Altought we did a lot of slave sales, we were also one of the firsts (if I recall we were the firsts) to banish slavery. It's not really a topic of conversation arround here, and here's my theory on why: as you know, slaves came mainly from Africa. We kinda owned 5 countries there. In the 70's, there was a big war (that was one of the reasons why the dictatorship ended) between those countries and Portugal, that resulted in a great life loss for us. So some portuguese people think that that even the things. Also, nowadays we have an enormous amount of protocoles with these countries and we are basicly all friends.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9222.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1ujig9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Has there ever been a system where instead of voting for candidates for president, senator, governor, mayor, etc in elections, voters vote on candidates who run different departments (i.e. defense, health, education, budget, etc) It seems like it would be better than the current system in many ways.    Most people don't believe in every single thing that their preferred candidate for president believes in- this system would allow for voters to vote more specifically on issues. So now a socially liberal\/ economic conservative libertarian could vote for the budget director who lowers taxes, the drug czar who decriminalizes drugs, the health secretary who liberalizes abortion regulations, and the defense secretary in favor of drawing down the military. This would remove some of the artificial ties between issues (like in the U.S., pretty much all small government politicians are also anti-abortion) and allow the voters to have a government that more accurately reflects the range of views of the electorate.   In this plan, the positions the candidates run for would more or less correspond with the positions within the presidential cabinet. I'm interested to hear if you guys know if a similar plan has been tried before, and what would be the advantages\/ disadvantages.","c_root_id_A":"ceizjk2","c_root_id_B":"cej4nqr","created_at_utc_A":1389044044,"created_at_utc_B":1389055122,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Certainly a big disadvantage would be incoherence in policy and conflict among officials elected for different reasons. Obviously it matters what happened in the legislative election too, but in general an Education secretary elected to implement universal preschool isn't going to get much done in conflict with a Treasury secretary that wants to reduce taxes and vice-versa. Political parties could help stave this off by running a slate of candidates and encouraging voters to support them all, but to the extent this is successful you may as well have not changed the system.","human_ref_B":"What you propose does exist at the municipal level. It's called the Commission system. Voters elect each department head (police chief, treasurer, public works, etc), and the department heads ALSO act as councilmen, making up the city's legislature. It was moderately popular in the mid-20th Century, especially with mid-sized cities, which have a wide range of government services but limited resources. It's since been widely replaced by the council-manager system, where the council hires a nonpartisan professional city manager to supervise appointed department heads.  The perceived advantages were eliminating amateur political officials (part-time city councilmen and mayors) and reducing the distance between voters and the executives.  One disadvantage was that it sometimes resulted in fragmented policy (commissioners with different views using their executive powers to thwart each other). Another disadvantage was that elected commissioners weren't necessarily qualified or experienced in their department's field.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11078.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"g7784l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"How academically accepted are David Autor's findings regarding wage gaps and marriage? The paper in question is this one:  *Manufacturing Decline* and the *Falling Marriage Market Value* of *Young Men* by David Autor, David Dorn and Gordon Hanson.   https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w23173.pdf  I am particularly interested in the following claim it makes: gender-specific shocks to employment have an opposite effect on marriage rates.   >One unit shock to male-intensive employment reduces the fraction of young adult women ever married by 4.2points (t= 6.6, a 12 percent rise on a 1990 base of 34.8percent) and the fraction currently married by 3.6 points (t=\u22125.8). Adverse shocks to female-intensive employment have the opposite effects, and these effects are two-thirds as large as the impacts of shocks to male employment. (P. 13-14)  Simply put, Autor et al state that shocks to male employment cause a significant fall in marriage rates, while shocks to female employment cause it to go up. According to them, it is consistent with prior findings: namely, they claim that their findings confirm William Julius Wilson's hypothesis that falling economic prospects of men reduce women's gain from marriage, thus leading to falling marriage rates. In earlier interview (https:\/\/www.minneapolisfed.org\/article\/2016\/interview-with-david-autor), it is mentioned that \"It\u2019s not altogether shocking\u2014it\u2019s part of Gary Becker\u2019s classic model of marriage\".  In my experience, such views are... anything but uncontroversial. Is there an academic consensus on this matter? Thank you.","c_root_id_A":"fofxlk3","c_root_id_B":"fog0k1z","created_at_utc_A":1587744586,"created_at_utc_B":1587746043,"score_A":5,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w23173.pdf  The authors in this study didn't control for mate physical attractiveness & the ratio of males to females in general population\/demographics.  As a casual observation, right off the bat, those are pretty big confounding factors to leave unaccounted for.  With some of that in mind, here's \"Uncounted Costs Of World War II: The Effects Of Changing Sex Ratios On Marriage And Fertility\" By... E... Brainerd... lol, sorry -  \"The male employment rate is positively related to the sex ratio  as expected. **Theory also predicts that the female employment rate should be negatively related  to the sex ratio, but this relationship is not evident in the data.**\"  Granted, a society post WW is totally different from our current situation, for starters.  In closing, I suggest researching the wise words of Mac Fingall regarding mate choice - he hits upon that which many academics may neglect.","human_ref_B":"I do not believe I have seen this paper discussed outside of other economic papers concerning the topic of trade in America (e.g. trade-induced unemployment). In regard to mate selection and the characteristics of human relationships, I suggest looking into the literature about homogamy and heterogamy. See for example this thread: \"Is Hypergamy an actual thing in social science?\"  Broadly speaking, the consensus is that human relationships are characterized primarily by homogamy and homophily, i.e. similar kinds of people end up together, rather than different kinds of people. There exist instances in which, for example, women \"marry up\", but research indicates we should carefully distinguish different kinds of relationships (e.g. marriage and cohabitation) and the decision-making for different scenarios. In short, there are more factors to consider besides economic resources, and the dynamics may change over time.  ---  Regarding Autor et al.'s paper specifically, I would agree with Reeves and Halikias that even if their results hold, it is important to properly weigh the observed effects, and be careful with interpretation, i.e.:  >The research does indeed suggest that declining labor market success has made men in trade-affected areas less \u201cmarriageable.\u201d But the effects are relatively small. As the authors insist, \u201c**rising China trade is a contributor to, but** ***not*** **the primary driver of the broader demographic shifts on which we focus.\u201d** That is certainly true: **their conservative estimate is that the Chinese trade shock reduced marriage rates by roughly one percent, and increased out-of-wedlock childrearing by half a percent.** Against the overall trends, these are modest impacts ...]  >When it comes to marriage, it is clear that the impact of trade, as refracted through men\u2019s wage potential and therefore \u201cmarriageability,\u201d is pretty small beer. **The changes in family structure are the results of tectonic forces in culture, social norms, as well as the economy.** And as Isabel Sawhill and Joanna Venator have [pointed out, **the concept of \u201cmarriageability\u201d is in need of clearer definition, since it tends to rely on rather dated ideas of gender roles.**","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1457.0,"score_ratio":2.8}
{"post_id":"g7784l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"How academically accepted are David Autor's findings regarding wage gaps and marriage? The paper in question is this one:  *Manufacturing Decline* and the *Falling Marriage Market Value* of *Young Men* by David Autor, David Dorn and Gordon Hanson.   https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w23173.pdf  I am particularly interested in the following claim it makes: gender-specific shocks to employment have an opposite effect on marriage rates.   >One unit shock to male-intensive employment reduces the fraction of young adult women ever married by 4.2points (t= 6.6, a 12 percent rise on a 1990 base of 34.8percent) and the fraction currently married by 3.6 points (t=\u22125.8). Adverse shocks to female-intensive employment have the opposite effects, and these effects are two-thirds as large as the impacts of shocks to male employment. (P. 13-14)  Simply put, Autor et al state that shocks to male employment cause a significant fall in marriage rates, while shocks to female employment cause it to go up. According to them, it is consistent with prior findings: namely, they claim that their findings confirm William Julius Wilson's hypothesis that falling economic prospects of men reduce women's gain from marriage, thus leading to falling marriage rates. In earlier interview (https:\/\/www.minneapolisfed.org\/article\/2016\/interview-with-david-autor), it is mentioned that \"It\u2019s not altogether shocking\u2014it\u2019s part of Gary Becker\u2019s classic model of marriage\".  In my experience, such views are... anything but uncontroversial. Is there an academic consensus on this matter? Thank you.","c_root_id_A":"fofxlk3","c_root_id_B":"fogyiq5","created_at_utc_A":1587744586,"created_at_utc_B":1587758442,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w23173.pdf  The authors in this study didn't control for mate physical attractiveness & the ratio of males to females in general population\/demographics.  As a casual observation, right off the bat, those are pretty big confounding factors to leave unaccounted for.  With some of that in mind, here's \"Uncounted Costs Of World War II: The Effects Of Changing Sex Ratios On Marriage And Fertility\" By... E... Brainerd... lol, sorry -  \"The male employment rate is positively related to the sex ratio  as expected. **Theory also predicts that the female employment rate should be negatively related  to the sex ratio, but this relationship is not evident in the data.**\"  Granted, a society post WW is totally different from our current situation, for starters.  In closing, I suggest researching the wise words of Mac Fingall regarding mate choice - he hits upon that which many academics may neglect.","human_ref_B":"Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers are kind of the big names in economics on this. I'm actually kind of shocked that the paper you referenced didn't cite their work. But Econtalk has an interview with them. That's a good primer and Russ raises a lot of the objections to their work. There's also a good list of links and people's response to their research on the page. I'd start there:  https:\/\/www.econtalk.org\/stevenson-and-wolfers-on-happiness-growth-and-the-reinhart-rogoff-controversy\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13856.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"7oitw0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"How accepted in academia is Terence McKenna's hypothesis\/theory about psilocybin mushrooms as catalysts for the evolution of human consciousness? I read his book Food of the Gods and it's extremely enticing, more so because I discovered psychedelics (not a phase, mom!) and love them, and what they represent, ego death, etc...  But I've also read on the web how it's a fringe theory, about how some parts of the book are completely made up, etc... I'd like to set the record straight and see if the book is as good as it claims to be. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"dsa1dj8","c_root_id_B":"ds9v77o","created_at_utc_A":1515255401,"created_at_utc_B":1515245965,"score_A":41,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"*First off, note that I am speaking from a cognitive science perspective.*    I would argue that many academics are unfamiliar with his ideas, and those that are most likely think it's all hand-waiving. I say this for two reasons:   1) Evolutionary theories of behavior\/thought processes are impossible to either validate or falsify\u2014Mckenna's ideas only further complicate current theories, and   2) Consciousness is a somewhat taboo topic in academia.   Point (1) means that from a scientific point of view, his theories are meaningless\u2014they do not help us predict behavior, and what he is arguing for really just adds unnecessary complication to current theories. For example, some modern views on consciousness argue that it arises from complex interactions between the lower-level neural processes that are responsible for sensing the world and higher-level processes that integrate sensory information with other information. From an evolutionary perspective, researchers have taken this *information integration* perspective to suggest that consciousness is an emergent property of complex information processing systems. This is analogous to theories of attention which posit that attention is not a casual force that directs your focus, but instead attention is the *consequence* of some stimulus being salient. From this point of view, consciousness may just be the consequence of many independent sources of information being integrated into a single representation. Some researchers in artificial intelligence have taken this to mean that with the right algorithms\/computations, even machines could develop some form of consciousness so long as they have an artificial neural architecture that is complex enough.   As for point (2), it is hard to cite literature on the taboo nature of studying consciousness, but you can find some info on it in the above wikipedia links. Essentially, scientists have not agreed upon the best way to operationalize consciousness, meaning that it is almost impossible to measure in a comprehensive, satisfying way. Without good measurement, we cannot conduct good science.    Given the above points, McKenna's ideas don't really bring much to the table. He provides no mechanism for how psilocybin would bring about consciousness, and he doesn't even provide a concrete definition of what consciousness is that would allow for it to be measured. Without those things, it is hard to take his ideas seriously. His thinking is rooted in a lot of early psycho-analytic and analytical psychology (despite similar names, they are actually two different perspectives), both which have been denied by the scientific community for lack of predictive power, lack of explanation for causal mechanisms, and unnecessary complexity. McKenna's ideas do inspire curiosity about the topic of consciousness, but in the end I view him as more of an entertainer than anything else.","human_ref_B":"Maybe ask r\/askscience instead?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9436.0,"score_ratio":13.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1bkoqo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is it that gold is the only resources that people propose link currencies too? [Economics] Why is it that gold is the only resources that people propose link currencies too? What would be wrong with a wheat standard or an oil standard or kilowatt\/hours of electricity or hours of labour? What makes them different from gold?","c_root_id_A":"c97lu2d","c_root_id_B":"c97jjnn","created_at_utc_A":1364992413,"created_at_utc_B":1364974973,"score_A":32,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Planet Monday did a great podcast a few years back that looked into why so many different societies placed value in gold rather than other substances.. Essentially, gold is the only element that has all of several attributes that make it useful as a store of value. At a very basic level, it's :   * Not a gas. * Doesn't corrode or burst into flames * Doesn't kill you.  This actually eliminates most of the periodic table. It's also not that rare, but also somewhat rare. Iron wouldn't be a good store of value because it's too common. Other metals are so rare or hard to isolate that pre-scientficic societies could never isolate them. The only metals that fill these requirements are gold, silver and platinum, all of which are used as a store of value.","human_ref_B":"It isn't. Silver has also been a currency standard.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Silver_standard  Also, a proposed commodity standard","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17440.0,"score_ratio":1.4545454545}
{"post_id":"1bkoqo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is it that gold is the only resources that people propose link currencies too? [Economics] Why is it that gold is the only resources that people propose link currencies too? What would be wrong with a wheat standard or an oil standard or kilowatt\/hours of electricity or hours of labour? What makes them different from gold?","c_root_id_A":"c97lu2d","c_root_id_B":"c97kawn","created_at_utc_A":1364992413,"created_at_utc_B":1364980922,"score_A":32,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Planet Monday did a great podcast a few years back that looked into why so many different societies placed value in gold rather than other substances.. Essentially, gold is the only element that has all of several attributes that make it useful as a store of value. At a very basic level, it's :   * Not a gas. * Doesn't corrode or burst into flames * Doesn't kill you.  This actually eliminates most of the periodic table. It's also not that rare, but also somewhat rare. Iron wouldn't be a good store of value because it's too common. Other metals are so rare or hard to isolate that pre-scientficic societies could never isolate them. The only metals that fill these requirements are gold, silver and platinum, all of which are used as a store of value.","human_ref_B":"For each idea:  Wheat:  Japan once used rice as a basis for its currency, so what you are purposing have been done before. There isn't really too many things wrong with it. http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Japanese_currency  Oil is a bit too recent. That is, the oil age came about after the adoption of the gold standard. That said, there are no shortage of people that purpose that we link the dollar to oil. Here is one: http:\/\/www.angrybearblog.com\/2006\/09\/monetary-policy-abandoning-gold.html  Electricity is annoyingly hard to store, so using it have problems.  Labor have the problem that it is not funigble, e.g. one person' labor is different from another person' labor. That said, there are currencies linked around it. ithaca hour being the most famous example.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11491.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1bkoqo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is it that gold is the only resources that people propose link currencies too? [Economics] Why is it that gold is the only resources that people propose link currencies too? What would be wrong with a wheat standard or an oil standard or kilowatt\/hours of electricity or hours of labour? What makes them different from gold?","c_root_id_A":"c97lu2d","c_root_id_B":"c97lmz8","created_at_utc_A":1364992413,"created_at_utc_B":1364991375,"score_A":32,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Planet Monday did a great podcast a few years back that looked into why so many different societies placed value in gold rather than other substances.. Essentially, gold is the only element that has all of several attributes that make it useful as a store of value. At a very basic level, it's :   * Not a gas. * Doesn't corrode or burst into flames * Doesn't kill you.  This actually eliminates most of the periodic table. It's also not that rare, but also somewhat rare. Iron wouldn't be a good store of value because it's too common. Other metals are so rare or hard to isolate that pre-scientficic societies could never isolate them. The only metals that fill these requirements are gold, silver and platinum, all of which are used as a store of value.","human_ref_B":"As others have said, gold isn't the only resource that people link currencies with, but one of the reasons people have chosen gold is because it's relatively scarce and its \"value density\", that is, you can store lots of wealth in a few coins while you can't really do that with a ton of wheat or a barrel of oil.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1038.0,"score_ratio":6.4}
{"post_id":"1gglpl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why did China suddenly start developing a lot faster economically than India? I think I heard somewhere that it is because their leaders does what is best for the country as a whole and does not have to come to a consensus first like India's democracy. I would really appreciate your insights!","c_root_id_A":"cak7w9d","c_root_id_B":"cak1czm","created_at_utc_A":1371427426,"created_at_utc_B":1371404469,"score_A":16,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"A lot has to do with the timing of their shifts toward more free-market principles (in both cases, this has been managed very delicately by politicians, and with plenty of graft to grease the way).  I would suggest reading more about the so-called License Raj, the system of regulations and bureaucracy which stifled private enterprise for decades in independent India. It was tinkered with in the 1980s but really dismantled in what's often called a big bang in 1991 - under Narasimha Rao's (Congress) government, in which (current Prime Minister) Manmohan Singh served as finance minister. You can read a lot about this online - it involved a large set of macroeconomic reforms, but (I think equally importantly), it freed up many areas of the economy for private investment relatively free from government interference.  If you want a detailed account that takes into account historical context, you might try Sumit Majumdar's India's Late Late Industrialization - which also discusses the question of service-led vs. manufacturing-led growth, and is explicit in comparing India's development path to those of Japan, China and the tiger economies of Southeast Asia.  It seems like others here are mostly on the right line regarding China and the short-term advantages of autocracy for certain kinds of factor-led growth (see Alwyn Young on the tyranny of numbers, who documents that the majority of the growth we observed in the tiger economies is explained by the state-led accumulation and direction of factors, i.e. capital and labor, into export-led manufacturing industries).  I would just caution against buying in too much to the notion that democracy is bad for development as a consequence of this comparison; you'l see it often in lazy journalism, and you should recognize it as precisely the intellectual shortcut that it is.","human_ref_B":"Charts and graphs.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22957.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68u00x","c_root_id_B":"c68ssk4","created_at_utc_A":1347774233,"created_at_utc_B":1347768055,"score_A":22,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"sociology could perhaps inform economists relating to the workings of capitalism in general, and it's conception of \"free\"-market, specifically:     - the relations of political power influenced by\/influencing the economic sphere, and it's consequences towards effective and real citizenship;   - the role varied social inequalities play in a so-called meritocracy;   - the understanding of globalization as an arena where different global versions compete, rather than an inevitable process or state that has been achieved;   - the role of the State (as economic regulator) in different geographical areas of the world-system - central, semi-peripheral or peripheral - and it's consequences over time;   - the social conditioning of taste, and it's implications in the definition and reproduction of class;   - or the irrational aspects of individual decision in the supposed all-rational marketplace.","human_ref_B":"most economists have absolutely no understanding of politics whatsoever.  Not policy, mind you, but politics.  sometimes it seems they are almost willfully ignorant.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6178.0,"score_ratio":1.6923076923}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68qqmt","c_root_id_B":"c68u00x","created_at_utc_A":1347758332,"created_at_utc_B":1347774233,"score_A":7,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"My understanding is that Kahneman & Tversky's work on preference reversals, prospect theory, etc. has direct implications for economics, but has not been broadly adopted (actually, I heard one person suggest at a conference a few years ago that no serious theory in economics had even reasonably integrated the results).  So, maybe that one? It's also possible that I don't really know how well that stuff has been integrated or understood within econ.","human_ref_B":"sociology could perhaps inform economists relating to the workings of capitalism in general, and it's conception of \"free\"-market, specifically:     - the relations of political power influenced by\/influencing the economic sphere, and it's consequences towards effective and real citizenship;   - the role varied social inequalities play in a so-called meritocracy;   - the understanding of globalization as an arena where different global versions compete, rather than an inevitable process or state that has been achieved;   - the role of the State (as economic regulator) in different geographical areas of the world-system - central, semi-peripheral or peripheral - and it's consequences over time;   - the social conditioning of taste, and it's implications in the definition and reproduction of class;   - or the irrational aspects of individual decision in the supposed all-rational marketplace.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15901.0,"score_ratio":3.1428571429}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68qqmt","c_root_id_B":"c68ssk4","created_at_utc_A":1347758332,"created_at_utc_B":1347768055,"score_A":7,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"My understanding is that Kahneman & Tversky's work on preference reversals, prospect theory, etc. has direct implications for economics, but has not been broadly adopted (actually, I heard one person suggest at a conference a few years ago that no serious theory in economics had even reasonably integrated the results).  So, maybe that one? It's also possible that I don't really know how well that stuff has been integrated or understood within econ.","human_ref_B":"most economists have absolutely no understanding of politics whatsoever.  Not policy, mind you, but politics.  sometimes it seems they are almost willfully ignorant.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9723.0,"score_ratio":1.8571428571}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c690iwm","c_root_id_B":"c68xmnh","created_at_utc_A":1347819995,"created_at_utc_B":1347806672,"score_A":10,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Economists have more open minds than most of the discussion in this thread would indicate. We don't always assume people are rational, we don't think globalization is definitely a good thing, we're not dogmatically free market, we do study politics, we evaluate specific policies instead of talking in general, we use a lot of data, etc. I'm not going to pretend that we shouldn't learn from other disciplines, but insights or citations from sociology, psychology, and political science are fairly common in economics these days. A lot of times these things don't make it into undergrad textbooks, which is a shame since that's all the exposure many people get to econ.  I also think that it's generally a mistake to ask social scientists to criticize others' fields; I don't think I know enough about any other social science fields to criticize them confidently. I might know enough to ask some questions and have a discussion, but not enough to criticize. Maybe that's why few people posting here have validation. People don't spend their whole lives thinking about something without thinking a great deal about what's wrong with their theories. Oh well, carry on.","human_ref_B":"Economic\/cultural geographer here. The biggest thing I wished economists would learn is that local context matters. They try to deal with these issues through the study of institutions, but this is mainly to explain the residuals in their regressions. Studies from one city, region, or nation can rarely been universalized because of the unique social, cultural, political, and institutional factors at play. That is to say, studying the economics of Silicon Valley is of little use to other communities, because that region's development was so contingent on its unique history.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13323.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68qqmt","c_root_id_B":"c68xmnh","created_at_utc_A":1347758332,"created_at_utc_B":1347806672,"score_A":7,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"My understanding is that Kahneman & Tversky's work on preference reversals, prospect theory, etc. has direct implications for economics, but has not been broadly adopted (actually, I heard one person suggest at a conference a few years ago that no serious theory in economics had even reasonably integrated the results).  So, maybe that one? It's also possible that I don't really know how well that stuff has been integrated or understood within econ.","human_ref_B":"Economic\/cultural geographer here. The biggest thing I wished economists would learn is that local context matters. They try to deal with these issues through the study of institutions, but this is mainly to explain the residuals in their regressions. Studies from one city, region, or nation can rarely been universalized because of the unique social, cultural, political, and institutional factors at play. That is to say, studying the economics of Silicon Valley is of little use to other communities, because that region's development was so contingent on its unique history.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":48340.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68wdwo","c_root_id_B":"c68xmnh","created_at_utc_A":1347796449,"created_at_utc_B":1347806672,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"The results of research in cognitive psychology (especially in decision-making) have been filtering into economics for quite some time now - for instance the field of behavioural economics - and mutually improving each group's study of the decision-making behaviour of individual agents.  However (and I paint with broad strokes here), research into the heuristics people use to make decisions (see Gigerenzer), the extent to which emotions influence the decision-making process (see Damasio), and the fact that people can and do make decisions which they only rationalize after the fact (see choice blindness) has to the best of my knowledge yet to be incorporated into economic theory.  I also have limited knowledge of macroeconomics, but I don't believe that it actually takes note of psychological theory, new results in microeconomics, or if it even needs to when considering the behaviour of many agents in aggregate.","human_ref_B":"Economic\/cultural geographer here. The biggest thing I wished economists would learn is that local context matters. They try to deal with these issues through the study of institutions, but this is mainly to explain the residuals in their regressions. Studies from one city, region, or nation can rarely been universalized because of the unique social, cultural, political, and institutional factors at play. That is to say, studying the economics of Silicon Valley is of little use to other communities, because that region's development was so contingent on its unique history.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10223.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68w9a4","c_root_id_B":"c68xmnh","created_at_utc_A":1347794875,"created_at_utc_B":1347806672,"score_A":5,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Every social science, including economics, could benefit from some more knowledge about statistics and the trustworthiness of data and inferences. Economics not nearly as much as for instance sociology though.","human_ref_B":"Economic\/cultural geographer here. The biggest thing I wished economists would learn is that local context matters. They try to deal with these issues through the study of institutions, but this is mainly to explain the residuals in their regressions. Studies from one city, region, or nation can rarely been universalized because of the unique social, cultural, political, and institutional factors at play. That is to say, studying the economics of Silicon Valley is of little use to other communities, because that region's development was so contingent on its unique history.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11797.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c690iwm","c_root_id_B":"c68qqmt","created_at_utc_A":1347819995,"created_at_utc_B":1347758332,"score_A":10,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Economists have more open minds than most of the discussion in this thread would indicate. We don't always assume people are rational, we don't think globalization is definitely a good thing, we're not dogmatically free market, we do study politics, we evaluate specific policies instead of talking in general, we use a lot of data, etc. I'm not going to pretend that we shouldn't learn from other disciplines, but insights or citations from sociology, psychology, and political science are fairly common in economics these days. A lot of times these things don't make it into undergrad textbooks, which is a shame since that's all the exposure many people get to econ.  I also think that it's generally a mistake to ask social scientists to criticize others' fields; I don't think I know enough about any other social science fields to criticize them confidently. I might know enough to ask some questions and have a discussion, but not enough to criticize. Maybe that's why few people posting here have validation. People don't spend their whole lives thinking about something without thinking a great deal about what's wrong with their theories. Oh well, carry on.","human_ref_B":"My understanding is that Kahneman & Tversky's work on preference reversals, prospect theory, etc. has direct implications for economics, but has not been broadly adopted (actually, I heard one person suggest at a conference a few years ago that no serious theory in economics had even reasonably integrated the results).  So, maybe that one? It's also possible that I don't really know how well that stuff has been integrated or understood within econ.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":61663.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68wdwo","c_root_id_B":"c690iwm","created_at_utc_A":1347796449,"created_at_utc_B":1347819995,"score_A":6,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"The results of research in cognitive psychology (especially in decision-making) have been filtering into economics for quite some time now - for instance the field of behavioural economics - and mutually improving each group's study of the decision-making behaviour of individual agents.  However (and I paint with broad strokes here), research into the heuristics people use to make decisions (see Gigerenzer), the extent to which emotions influence the decision-making process (see Damasio), and the fact that people can and do make decisions which they only rationalize after the fact (see choice blindness) has to the best of my knowledge yet to be incorporated into economic theory.  I also have limited knowledge of macroeconomics, but I don't believe that it actually takes note of psychological theory, new results in microeconomics, or if it even needs to when considering the behaviour of many agents in aggregate.","human_ref_B":"Economists have more open minds than most of the discussion in this thread would indicate. We don't always assume people are rational, we don't think globalization is definitely a good thing, we're not dogmatically free market, we do study politics, we evaluate specific policies instead of talking in general, we use a lot of data, etc. I'm not going to pretend that we shouldn't learn from other disciplines, but insights or citations from sociology, psychology, and political science are fairly common in economics these days. A lot of times these things don't make it into undergrad textbooks, which is a shame since that's all the exposure many people get to econ.  I also think that it's generally a mistake to ask social scientists to criticize others' fields; I don't think I know enough about any other social science fields to criticize them confidently. I might know enough to ask some questions and have a discussion, but not enough to criticize. Maybe that's why few people posting here have validation. People don't spend their whole lives thinking about something without thinking a great deal about what's wrong with their theories. Oh well, carry on.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23546.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c690iwm","c_root_id_B":"c68zbyk","created_at_utc_A":1347819995,"created_at_utc_B":1347814956,"score_A":10,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Economists have more open minds than most of the discussion in this thread would indicate. We don't always assume people are rational, we don't think globalization is definitely a good thing, we're not dogmatically free market, we do study politics, we evaluate specific policies instead of talking in general, we use a lot of data, etc. I'm not going to pretend that we shouldn't learn from other disciplines, but insights or citations from sociology, psychology, and political science are fairly common in economics these days. A lot of times these things don't make it into undergrad textbooks, which is a shame since that's all the exposure many people get to econ.  I also think that it's generally a mistake to ask social scientists to criticize others' fields; I don't think I know enough about any other social science fields to criticize them confidently. I might know enough to ask some questions and have a discussion, but not enough to criticize. Maybe that's why few people posting here have validation. People don't spend their whole lives thinking about something without thinking a great deal about what's wrong with their theories. Oh well, carry on.","human_ref_B":"As a student of economics, I'd say that I'd like to see economists study the other disciplines as much as possible.  For example, in micro we recognize that, among other things, demand is a function of taste. Yet, from what I've seen, taste is treated as a black box in economics. I imagine that psychology and sociology would provide valued insights into how tastes, social norms, etc are formed.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5039.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68w9a4","c_root_id_B":"c690iwm","created_at_utc_A":1347794875,"created_at_utc_B":1347819995,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Every social science, including economics, could benefit from some more knowledge about statistics and the trustworthiness of data and inferences. Economics not nearly as much as for instance sociology though.","human_ref_B":"Economists have more open minds than most of the discussion in this thread would indicate. We don't always assume people are rational, we don't think globalization is definitely a good thing, we're not dogmatically free market, we do study politics, we evaluate specific policies instead of talking in general, we use a lot of data, etc. I'm not going to pretend that we shouldn't learn from other disciplines, but insights or citations from sociology, psychology, and political science are fairly common in economics these days. A lot of times these things don't make it into undergrad textbooks, which is a shame since that's all the exposure many people get to econ.  I also think that it's generally a mistake to ask social scientists to criticize others' fields; I don't think I know enough about any other social science fields to criticize them confidently. I might know enough to ask some questions and have a discussion, but not enough to criticize. Maybe that's why few people posting here have validation. People don't spend their whole lives thinking about something without thinking a great deal about what's wrong with their theories. Oh well, carry on.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25120.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68z6kt","c_root_id_B":"c690iwm","created_at_utc_A":1347814297,"created_at_utc_B":1347819995,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Economics seems to have little interest or methodology to evaluate the actual on-the-ground conditions and ground their policies in the lived experience of those to whom it applies.  Economics seems to exist largely in a vacuum, with few people actually grounding their work in an analysis of how it plays out in the \"real world\".  This is where a cultural anthropologist steps in.","human_ref_B":"Economists have more open minds than most of the discussion in this thread would indicate. We don't always assume people are rational, we don't think globalization is definitely a good thing, we're not dogmatically free market, we do study politics, we evaluate specific policies instead of talking in general, we use a lot of data, etc. I'm not going to pretend that we shouldn't learn from other disciplines, but insights or citations from sociology, psychology, and political science are fairly common in economics these days. A lot of times these things don't make it into undergrad textbooks, which is a shame since that's all the exposure many people get to econ.  I also think that it's generally a mistake to ask social scientists to criticize others' fields; I don't think I know enough about any other social science fields to criticize them confidently. I might know enough to ask some questions and have a discussion, but not enough to criticize. Maybe that's why few people posting here have validation. People don't spend their whole lives thinking about something without thinking a great deal about what's wrong with their theories. Oh well, carry on.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5698.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68wdwo","c_root_id_B":"c68w9a4","created_at_utc_A":1347796449,"created_at_utc_B":1347794875,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The results of research in cognitive psychology (especially in decision-making) have been filtering into economics for quite some time now - for instance the field of behavioural economics - and mutually improving each group's study of the decision-making behaviour of individual agents.  However (and I paint with broad strokes here), research into the heuristics people use to make decisions (see Gigerenzer), the extent to which emotions influence the decision-making process (see Damasio), and the fact that people can and do make decisions which they only rationalize after the fact (see choice blindness) has to the best of my knowledge yet to be incorporated into economic theory.  I also have limited knowledge of macroeconomics, but I don't believe that it actually takes note of psychological theory, new results in microeconomics, or if it even needs to when considering the behaviour of many agents in aggregate.","human_ref_B":"Every social science, including economics, could benefit from some more knowledge about statistics and the trustworthiness of data and inferences. Economics not nearly as much as for instance sociology though.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1574.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68w9a4","c_root_id_B":"c68zbyk","created_at_utc_A":1347794875,"created_at_utc_B":1347814956,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Every social science, including economics, could benefit from some more knowledge about statistics and the trustworthiness of data and inferences. Economics not nearly as much as for instance sociology though.","human_ref_B":"As a student of economics, I'd say that I'd like to see economists study the other disciplines as much as possible.  For example, in micro we recognize that, among other things, demand is a function of taste. Yet, from what I've seen, taste is treated as a black box in economics. I imagine that psychology and sociology would provide valued insights into how tastes, social norms, etc are formed.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20081.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"zy6qr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Non-economist social scientists - What part of your discipline is not understood well among economists? How might an economist benefit from further study in your discipline?","c_root_id_A":"c68zbyk","c_root_id_B":"c68z6kt","created_at_utc_A":1347814956,"created_at_utc_B":1347814297,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"As a student of economics, I'd say that I'd like to see economists study the other disciplines as much as possible.  For example, in micro we recognize that, among other things, demand is a function of taste. Yet, from what I've seen, taste is treated as a black box in economics. I imagine that psychology and sociology would provide valued insights into how tastes, social norms, etc are formed.","human_ref_B":"Economics seems to have little interest or methodology to evaluate the actual on-the-ground conditions and ground their policies in the lived experience of those to whom it applies.  Economics seems to exist largely in a vacuum, with few people actually grounding their work in an analysis of how it plays out in the \"real world\".  This is where a cultural anthropologist steps in.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":659.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"sfzrc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if a nation legalized the production of drugs, and started exporting them for profit?","c_root_id_A":"c4dq290","c_root_id_B":"c4dq8wr","created_at_utc_A":1334759674,"created_at_utc_B":1334760591,"score_A":16,"score_B":30,"human_ref_A":"How could they export them if none of the other nations permit them?","human_ref_B":"Vicente Fox tried to legalize drugs when he was President of Mexico. The United States threatened to take away financial aid and impose sanctions. Congress folded, and Mexico had to back off.  That was for legalizing it within their own country - not exporting drugs for profit. Any country that tries to legalize drugs will face sanctions, precisely because the United States is\/was worried about drugs being carried across the border. The Anti-Drug Abuse Acts of 1986 and 1988, amended by the International Narcotics Control Act of 1992, make access to the U.S. market and foreign aid handouts contingent on the participation of source nations in drug control programs.  America is basically the gorilla in the room that you would have to deal with if you wanted to legalize and start exporting. No country is going to sacrifice a large amount of their other exports in return for the not-too-profitable drug industry.  You'd also have to worry about who you were going to sell to. If drugs are legal where you are, they're still illegal everywhere else, and you'd have to find some sort of trading partner or risk every shipment from your country being searched and seized, cutting into the profits to be had. I think you'd probably want to get most of your money from tourism, but that's tough because countries with tourists to send your way would still act aggressively.  **TL;DR: Don't do it unless you're one of the big dogs.**","labels":0,"seconds_difference":917.0,"score_ratio":1.875}
{"post_id":"sfzrc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if a nation legalized the production of drugs, and started exporting them for profit?","c_root_id_A":"c4dyvol","c_root_id_B":"c4dvfrc","created_at_utc_A":1334799120,"created_at_utc_B":1334782564,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"North Korea sells and traffics drugs. High rate of Meth abuse in N.K.","human_ref_B":"Assuming that the nation was economically successful, the United States would trump up whatever allegations needed to go to war with and absolutely destroy that country.   Edit: If you want to downvote me at least have the courtesy to debate or provide an argument against what I've said.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16556.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"sfzrc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What would happen if a nation legalized the production of drugs, and started exporting them for profit?","c_root_id_A":"c4dyvol","c_root_id_B":"c4dw8xx","created_at_utc_A":1334799120,"created_at_utc_B":1334786468,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"North Korea sells and traffics drugs. High rate of Meth abuse in N.K.","human_ref_B":"If I am not mistaken, Russia has legalized the production of hemp for industrial use.  Hemp is actually used in quite a few products found in the US, but has to be imported. This is obviously different from \"drugs\", but not all that different.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12652.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1vtn82","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What has history proven to be the best way to stop the growing gap between the rich and the poor?","c_root_id_A":"cevysfe","c_root_id_B":"cevz7xe","created_at_utc_A":1390404187,"created_at_utc_B":1390405279,"score_A":9,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Class consciousness & the \"sociological imagination\" (education), democracy, informal & formal unions.   I'd cite The Protestant Work Ethic & Das Kapitol Vol. 1, also basic history, but apparently the foundations of modern economics\/middle class existence is too \"communist\" for a general audience.","human_ref_B":"On a world wide scale: Open borders. Think of how much more a Haitian in the US earns compared to his countrymen.   http:\/\/openborders.info\/double-world-gdp\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1092.0,"score_ratio":1.2222222222}
{"post_id":"z4kcw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"[PoliSci\/Sociology] Is there any data on average income, race, career\/job type, etc. for people of various political ideologies and parties? I'm talking about people within the United States, but if someone can offer a source that does a comparative analysis of different countries\/regions.","c_root_id_A":"c61frb7","c_root_id_B":"c61f493","created_at_utc_A":1346420579,"created_at_utc_B":1346417138,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"ANES or GSS, throw either in excel (or R) and play.","human_ref_B":"Not comprehensive, but very informative: *Red State, Blue State, Rich State, Poor State* by Andrew Gelman.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3441.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"10ihhw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics]You have $750billion that you can spend anywhere. You have full control of the monetary and fiscal policy. FIX THE ECONOMY GO! Basically you have a decent chunk of cash 750 billion$; and you have full control of government and the Fed. Fix the economy!","c_root_id_A":"c6dy56j","c_root_id_B":"c6du34n","created_at_utc_A":1348704293,"created_at_utc_B":1348689029,"score_A":11,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Super high speed rail connecting all major cities. I'm talking NYC to Chicago\/Atlanta\/Dallas overnight. DC-NYC in 30 minutes.   The build-out would create millions of jobs. The new connectivity would spur tourism up by over 100% domestically.","human_ref_B":">and you have full control of government and the Fed  1. Appoint Woodford, Svensson, and maybe Gali to the Fed. Keep Bernanke. Lose some of the members who aren't economists. 2. Scott Sumner would be giving weekly testimony in front of Congress  If I had ten divisions of those men, then our troubles here would be over very quickly.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15264.0,"score_ratio":2.2}
{"post_id":"10ihhw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics]You have $750billion that you can spend anywhere. You have full control of the monetary and fiscal policy. FIX THE ECONOMY GO! Basically you have a decent chunk of cash 750 billion$; and you have full control of government and the Fed. Fix the economy!","c_root_id_A":"c6dy56j","c_root_id_B":"c6dtl45","created_at_utc_A":1348704293,"created_at_utc_B":1348687291,"score_A":11,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Super high speed rail connecting all major cities. I'm talking NYC to Chicago\/Atlanta\/Dallas overnight. DC-NYC in 30 minutes.   The build-out would create millions of jobs. The new connectivity would spur tourism up by over 100% domestically.","human_ref_B":"I don't need the money.  I'd simply institute term limits for Congress and set up SEC-style regulation of public office-holders employment for the decade after they leave office.  Essentially I'd break the revolving-door between Congress and big business.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17002.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"10ihhw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics]You have $750billion that you can spend anywhere. You have full control of the monetary and fiscal policy. FIX THE ECONOMY GO! Basically you have a decent chunk of cash 750 billion$; and you have full control of government and the Fed. Fix the economy!","c_root_id_A":"c6e1w04","c_root_id_B":"c6du34n","created_at_utc_A":1348719998,"created_at_utc_B":1348689029,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"secede from the union; invest in gold","human_ref_B":">and you have full control of government and the Fed  1. Appoint Woodford, Svensson, and maybe Gali to the Fed. Keep Bernanke. Lose some of the members who aren't economists. 2. Scott Sumner would be giving weekly testimony in front of Congress  If I had ten divisions of those men, then our troubles here would be over very quickly.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":30969.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"10ihhw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics]You have $750billion that you can spend anywhere. You have full control of the monetary and fiscal policy. FIX THE ECONOMY GO! Basically you have a decent chunk of cash 750 billion$; and you have full control of government and the Fed. Fix the economy!","c_root_id_A":"c6e1w04","c_root_id_B":"c6e1054","created_at_utc_A":1348719998,"created_at_utc_B":1348716131,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"secede from the union; invest in gold","human_ref_B":"Radically expand the EITC. A guaranteed minimum income would save this shit.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3867.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"10ihhw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics]You have $750billion that you can spend anywhere. You have full control of the monetary and fiscal policy. FIX THE ECONOMY GO! Basically you have a decent chunk of cash 750 billion$; and you have full control of government and the Fed. Fix the economy!","c_root_id_A":"c6e1w04","c_root_id_B":"c6dtl45","created_at_utc_A":1348719998,"created_at_utc_B":1348687291,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"secede from the union; invest in gold","human_ref_B":"I don't need the money.  I'd simply institute term limits for Congress and set up SEC-style regulation of public office-holders employment for the decade after they leave office.  Essentially I'd break the revolving-door between Congress and big business.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":32707.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"10ihhw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics]You have $750billion that you can spend anywhere. You have full control of the monetary and fiscal policy. FIX THE ECONOMY GO! Basically you have a decent chunk of cash 750 billion$; and you have full control of government and the Fed. Fix the economy!","c_root_id_A":"c6dtl45","c_root_id_B":"c6du34n","created_at_utc_A":1348687291,"created_at_utc_B":1348689029,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I don't need the money.  I'd simply institute term limits for Congress and set up SEC-style regulation of public office-holders employment for the decade after they leave office.  Essentially I'd break the revolving-door between Congress and big business.","human_ref_B":">and you have full control of government and the Fed  1. Appoint Woodford, Svensson, and maybe Gali to the Fed. Keep Bernanke. Lose some of the members who aren't economists. 2. Scott Sumner would be giving weekly testimony in front of Congress  If I had ten divisions of those men, then our troubles here would be over very quickly.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1738.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"10ihhw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics]You have $750billion that you can spend anywhere. You have full control of the monetary and fiscal policy. FIX THE ECONOMY GO! Basically you have a decent chunk of cash 750 billion$; and you have full control of government and the Fed. Fix the economy!","c_root_id_A":"c6e1054","c_root_id_B":"c6dtl45","created_at_utc_A":1348716131,"created_at_utc_B":1348687291,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Radically expand the EITC. A guaranteed minimum income would save this shit.","human_ref_B":"I don't need the money.  I'd simply institute term limits for Congress and set up SEC-style regulation of public office-holders employment for the decade after they leave office.  Essentially I'd break the revolving-door between Congress and big business.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":28840.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2k8wb5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What effect does the severity of punishment have on the frequency of crime?","c_root_id_A":"cljd127","c_root_id_B":"cljcgfn","created_at_utc_A":1414246125,"created_at_utc_B":1414244104,"score_A":13,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The optimal deterrence theory stems largely from Becker's Crime and Punishment Paper.  The past 40+ years have been an attempt to test the hypothesis (criminals respond to probability of conviction\/arrest times and the level of punishment) of the rational criminal with mixed results depending on the type of crime.    The death penalty has been an especially controversial area. Starting with a paper by Erlich from the 70s results have been looked at in a number of different ways using state and county level data and changes in laws (such as the moratorium in the 70s). Here's  one http:\/\/www.cjlf.org\/deathpenalty\/DezRubShepDeterFinal.pdf  You may want to consider specific crimes, as premeditation intuitively would imply a more rational weighing of cost and benefits versus crimes of passion.  So white collar crimes tend to respond more (I don't know a source off top of my head).   Also, as another comment pointed out, behavioral law and economics scholars have shown (?) people respond more to the probability of being arrested and convicted than the size of penalty. I know a lot of this is discussed in Shavells book Economic Analysis of Law, as well as Posners Classic text of the same name.  cooter and Ullen have a chapter in their book as well on criminal deterrence.    Of course, the best place to start is Becker IMO for the economic model.  Everything else is just econometrics.  Steven Levitt also had a paper on prison conditions and their effect and I also remeber a paper on the location of women's prisons as being significant (threat of being moved far from family).","human_ref_B":"Look at tom Tyler's why people obey the law and the classic writings of Ceasar  beccarria and Jeremy Bentham. All theorize (and then Tyler tests) the connection between distributive outcomes and willingness to obey the law. What you're essentially looking at is deterrence theory.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2021.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"1ju4jh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Why latin american countries have a really high import taxes, while first world countries can get away with low tariffs?","c_root_id_A":"cbiguqg","c_root_id_B":"cbigmw1","created_at_utc_A":1375838803,"created_at_utc_B":1375838178,"score_A":11,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Actually, most first world countries keep high tariffs on a few products, to protect local companies.   That said, there are a few reasons for developing nations to maintain high tariffs in certain areas. First, many countries have fledgling companies or industries that they wish to give the chance to fully develop. Competing with larger foreign companies my mean these companies never get a chance to get off the ground. Even if the country in question would have a competitive advantage for a product, existing economies of scale can mean that local companies never really get the chance to compete.   There's also some trust issues. America and Europe have a long history of interfering with the sovereignty of other nations. Latin America in particular has experienced a lot of this from The United States. As such, they are extremely cautious (and sometimes hostile) in their dealings with the U.S.. Brazil and Uruguay in particular will often oppose any arrangement that The U.S. is in favor of at this point. They seek to protect themselves from U.S. influence by limiting trade with the U.S.  Also, there are a number of Latin American free trade agreements, mostly with other Latin American countries. (Mercosur, CSME, SICA) They are just reluctant to have local industries compete internationally for a variety of reasons.   Next, one of the biggest hurdles in negotiating trade and tariffs is which areas will be protected. South America has strong agricultural capability, but developing industries. They therefore wish to protect these industries while allowing more open trade of agricultural products. Meanwhile, developed nations wish to protect local agriculture while opening new markets for their industries to operate. This makes it incredibly difficult to reach an agreement. Actually, this particular conflict has locked up the WTO for a long time now.   I can answer any other questions on this, but I think this answer is probably long enough for now. As a note, The U.S. does still have high tariffs on a number of products (like automobiles).","human_ref_B":"The question makes it sound like it's reasonable policy for these Latin American countries. It's not.  If you have your own free-floating currency, imports are simply paid for by exports. By making imports more expensive you're favoring import-substitution companies at the expense of your export industry (well written here) whilst putting a large supply-side constraint on your economy by making all foreign produced goods\/services, often including energy, more expensive.  You'll note much the countries you're referring to have problems of growth, inflation, unemployment.. I don't believe you'll find any literature stating that import taxes are *helping* these issues, and I would argue it's likely quite the opposite. As for why first world nations have generally minimized mercantilist protectionist policies, well, start with the Wiki article on free trade. It has a segment there on disadvantages of tariffs which is relevant to Latin America - do note though that these countries as you say tend to have broad-based import taxes on *everything*, they're not trying to foster one specific industry but rather *all* import substitution industries. This just amplifies the costs.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":625.0,"score_ratio":1.375}
{"post_id":"1iobwo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Why do African Americans have a higher homicide and victimization rate? The Bureau of Justice Statistics reported a higher rate of homicides and victimization of African Americans. What is the cause of this?   I tried using google to find the answer but I found nothing conclusive.","c_root_id_A":"cb6j2fg","c_root_id_B":"cb6gl5n","created_at_utc_A":1374305626,"created_at_utc_B":1374295132,"score_A":9,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"It's a complex assortment of reasons. One major one is the war on drugs and the aftermath of the crack epidemic. Another is the extreme lack of employment opportunity for poorly educated young black males, combined with the fact that it's difficult for African Americans to get educated due to the lack of funding that inner city schools typically face. There's the distrust of police as a result of past and present racism. The list goes on.","human_ref_B":"That data is really important for people to understand! Many people, especially after watching news programs like Nancy Grace will assume that young white women are always being raped and murdered. The fact is that the most likely victim profile in America is a young black male. Thats practically the opposite of what most people would assume.   What made this situation is part of the complex history of race relations and class issues that exist in America. For the majority of American history black people were persecuted second class citizens. For close to two hundred years black people could not ride on the front of the bus; were not allowed in many public institutions; had to use different water fountains; etc. etc... Whole legal systems were setup to preserve white privilege and limit black rights. While the civil rights movement cleared up some of the structural issues, there are still numerous geographic and political policies that disadvantage black people in America. Look no further than the recent Zimmerman trial, where a black teen was murdered in cold blood, but because you are allowed to plead scared in Florida, Zimmerman got off...   That still doesn't answer your question though... I would point to the geographic and spatial distribution of resources by race. In America, the underfunded inner cities are predominately black, while the well funded suburbs are more often then not white. In many cities, police response times; ambulance ride times; and other emergency services are disproportionately biased towards the suburbs. Even more at the root, many local services are funded through property taxes. Schools for example derive a large amount of their budget from local property taxes. That means that rich communities will have better access to better schools, poor communities less so.   Why are black people the victims of crimes? I would say that they are the victims of more than just crimes... I could keep going, I spent my whole undergrad trying to understand issues of poverty, segregation, and uneven development. I still don't have a full understanding because this is one of the biggest, and most important topics in the social sciences. I really hope this thread takes off!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10494.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"4f67vr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"How did the Republican Party get the (white) working class, a traditionally left leaning demographic in other countries, on their side?","c_root_id_A":"d26eqmn","c_root_id_B":"d26if6u","created_at_utc_A":1460908772,"created_at_utc_B":1460914981,"score_A":3,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Top-level comments require social science sources. Thank you.","human_ref_B":"Political parties in the United States in the post-industrial nation were centered very much on class. The rich voted Republican and the working class voted Democrat. Then some rich adopted what Richard Inglehart calls a \"postmaterialist\" mindset. Wealthy Americans began taking up causes like environmentalism and civil rights. Now, the contention is that white working class voters wary of change and worry about losing their perceived social position voted against their economic interests in order to attempt to preserve this perceived identity. Richard Inglehart does a much better job explaining this here - https:\/\/www.foreignaffairs.com\/articles\/2015-12-14\/inequality-and-modernization (soft paywall - register for a free article\/month)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6209.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"4f67vr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"How did the Republican Party get the (white) working class, a traditionally left leaning demographic in other countries, on their side?","c_root_id_A":"d26jwda","c_root_id_B":"d26eqmn","created_at_utc_A":1460917402,"created_at_utc_B":1460908772,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The answer to your question depends in large part on what you consider \"working class.\" Even so, the claim that the white working class supports the GOP more than the Democratic Party now than in the past does not hold up well empirically. Most evidence suggests that there hasn't been a marked change in working class PID in the US (e.g. Bartels 2006).","human_ref_B":"Top-level comments require social science sources. Thank you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8630.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"bm8s1d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Are there markers for revolution? When do people stop respecting the wealthy? How close are we in US\/Europe? I was thinking today how income disparity is growing in the US, yet people still seem to idolize the wealthy (generally speaking).  Not everyone of course, but as a society, people still oggle over handbags and support Instagram influencers who get to travel the world because they're attractive. People still watch the Kardashians and consider people \"ballers\" if they drive lambos and spray champagne in the air.   Alongside this, the income disparity is growing, we have constant stories of corporate greed, and rich business people taking control of governments across the globe.  Is there a point at which the tables turn and society as a whole starts to dislike and punish this sort of behavior? Is there a point at which society has a whole stops being jealous of the wealthy, and instead starts to punish this sort of lifestyle? Is it already happening to some extent? Is it inevitable?  Thanks for any insight on this.","c_root_id_A":"emvgg82","c_root_id_B":"emvgeg0","created_at_utc_A":1557356148,"created_at_utc_B":1557356115,"score_A":42,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"It depends precisely what we mean by revolution, but in general, the classic pre-conditions for a Social Revolution (the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution, the Chinese Revolution, the fall of the Soviet Union) have thought to be a weak state undergoing a financial crisis so bad that It effectively cannot pay its officials and may well be suffering from military defeat as well. See Skocpol and others for this. The weakness of the state is generally the thing seen as crucial and since the current situation is just intractable working not even a little, people become much open to any other option. It\u2019s very often a sort of state collapse that opens the way up for the creation of a new, revolutionary order.   However, late work seems to indicate that the state doesn\u2019t *actually* have to be weak, people just have to think it\u2019s weak. See Skocpol and Keddie\u2019s articles about the Iranian Revolution, as well as Kurtzman\u2019s book. Work by Timur Kuran shows that revolutions are hard to predict because even the people who eventually protest don\u2019t know their \u201crevolutionary potential\u201d.   However, I think it\u2019s safe to say that the states in Europe and North America are not weak in the same way that states experience revolution tend to be. And, I think it\u2019s also important to note, here haven\u2019t been that mean revolutions are attempted revolutions in mature industrial democracies. Again, we can talk about definitions and edge cases, and there have been a handful of military coups, but it\u2019s hard to think of popular protests removing a democratically elected government and installing a revolutionary one in a consolidated liberal democracy. But the reasons for this are fairly obvious: if there is a constituency large enough for a revolution, they can hope to simple vote their side into power in the elections.   This does happen in immature democracies *especially* after contested elections where widespread fraud is suspected (see again the point about the perception of government strength) or some other similar catalyzing event (the assassination that inspired the Cedar Revolution), but in these case it\u2019s pretty clear that even a majority may not be able to simply vote themselves into power and other actions are needed.   But in short, it would seem that the industrialized West is not close to the conditions where we might conventionally expect the *possibility* of a revolution and we\u2019d have to broaden our definition of \u201crevolution\u201d considerably to include things done through normal legislative means (such as the New Deal in 1930s America). Inequality alone is generally not seen a precursor to revolution.   You may be interesting at sociologist Randall Collins\u2019s piece \u201cTipping Point Revolutions and State Breakdown Revolutions\u201d. It was written directly after the Arab Spring and shows how those revolutions ended up being less revolutionary than they seemed in most cases.   He identifies three things that tend to happen before the big social revolutions we tend to think of when we think revolution (rather than the more political revolutions like the Cedar Revolution or the Arab Spring revolutions):   1) crippling fiscal crisis in the state.    2) elite paralysis.   3) mass mobilization.   While there have been political revolutions which changed how politics have been conducted, there hasn\u2019t really been a social revolution since fall of the Soviet Union. There have been changes of power and democratization, but not anything massive like the kind that could over throw a mature industrial democracy.  There is no indication that there will be any sort of revolution or anything like that in the post-industrialized West, though dictatorships and weak and illiberal democracies may continue experience events like the Arab Spring and the Color Revolutions.","human_ref_B":"I think the second part of this reply I just gave to another user is also useful to understand the 'respecting the wealthy' part of the question, and to understand the social psychology related to things such as 'idolizing the wealthy', 'being envious of the elite' and accepting inequalities that affect you.  The three theories I present over there (Social dominance theory, and System justification theory and Social identity theory and related theories) provide frameworks to try and understand why disadvantaged groups, stigmatized groups and other minority groups (*nota bene*: the elite can be defined a majority group even without having a *numerical* majority, vice versa for minorities) accept a given status quo even if it is unfair and discriminatory against them. Conversely, without these conditions upholding the system, attempts to challenge it should follow (see for example feminism and the civil rights movement).  ---  **Social dominance theory** and **System justification theory** both take into consideration how people might *justify* or *legitimize* the system and its outcomes, even if unfavorable. For the American context, the 'American Dream' (e.g. believing that social and economic mobility is possible and that by working hard enough you can succeed), just world beliefs, etc. allow people to accept a given hierarchy and justify the system even if they are at the bottom of the barrel.   In regard to **Social identity theory** and related theories (e.g. Five-stage model of intergroup relations) take into consideration how people perceive the hierarchy and how their assessments affect their strategy to better their situation:   * How *stable* is it (is there only one possible hierarchy or social groups can change status?),   * How *legitimate* (the system is fair if legitimate and stable, discriminatory if illegitimate and unstable), and   * How *permeable* (can individuals change social group and thus status?).   For example, if the system is seen as legitimate but permeable, individuals will prefer to try and 'become individually rich' rather than attempt a group solution, such as campaigning and protesting ('change the system with other people').  ---  Have an illustration:  >The people Shalonda has known who have succeeded have done so through education, thus, **she implies that education can level the playing field and allow one to succeed financially**. Likewise, when asked how people get ahead in the U.S., Estefani, a 23-year-old first-generation Mexican immigrant, says:  >Estefani: Well, I think that is it, because almost everywhere, because it is the same here, many people, the first thing they say is study. **Study so that you will have a career and that way you have your career and you don\u2019t worry about anything, like that**.  >**Estafani\u2019s belief in the power of education for economic success trumps any assessment of structural barriers in the U.S. or elsewhere.** While education is an important contributing factor to economic mobility (Butler, Beach & Winfree, 2008), **citing it as the key to economic success fails to recognize the structural barriers to educational access and disparities in school quality that limit the benefits of education for all Americans, particularly those from disadvantaged neighborhoods** (Darling-Hammond, 2008).  ---  If one is convinced that the world is just, the hierarchy is unquestionable (i.e. rich people *are* meant to be on top of everyone else), that the system is legitimate (it is fair and its outcomes justifiable), and that lower-status individuals can and do move upwards (permeability), there are few(er) reasons to join in with other people to challenge or transform the system (by participating in social movements or, at the extreme, in social revolution) that, fair and legitimate as it is, might one day make you rich and high status.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":33.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"2u5b59","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"A lot of people claim that \"Awareness causes change.\" What are some examples of awareness of an issue going wrong? I had heard (but not researched) that women avoided Engineering because they had heard (\"been made aware\") that women get less money in Engineering, thereby completely sectioning themselves out of Engineering.  To what degree has this been researched, and to what degree has this happened in other active social theaters?","c_root_id_A":"co5jivs","c_root_id_B":"co5llu5","created_at_utc_A":1422603779,"created_at_utc_B":1422612893,"score_A":17,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"What I think you're trying to investigate is the connection between knowledge and behavior, which has a massive body of research on many, many different topics. Just type \"knowledge and behavior\" into Google Scholar in quotes and you'll instantly find examples that range from decisions regarding cancer to financial management to the treatment of wildlife.  Knowledge can very easily have unexpected outcomes since knowledge rarely means one thing to each person.  Going back to your question regarding \"awareness\" and focusing on public service announcements and knowledge-disseminating campaigns (some, of course, inevitably being more superficial and potentially open to interpretation or being unintentionally misleading than others), you might find this interesting: \"The knowledge-behavior gap in public information campaigns: a development communication view.\"  They cite one classic example: attempts to have farmers use fertilizer. It seems so simple: of course plants need food!  But the article draws out all the potential reasons why the gap between knowledge and behavior might exist, from the person on an individual level to their community to their culture to the greater systems and markets in which they interact.  Based on the article, it's easy to see just how a single piece of knowledge can be redirected so it never causes any kind of change \u2014 or becomes reinterpreted into an unexpected kind of behavior.    Finally, I'll leave you with one straightforward example, like you requested in your question: \"Unintended Effects of Health Communication Campaigns\". The authors come up with no less than *11* different ways for a health communication campaign to go wrong, with lots of examples.  I'll give you a few:   * Dissonance effects:  The message says one thing, but actually doing the behavior anywhere but in private causes problems.  Dissonance and frustration result.  Women raising infants \"felt guilty, deprived, and frustrated\"...\"in the face of health education messages promoting breast-feeding\" in the light of \"society's disapproval of breast-feeding public\".   * Boomerang effects: Appeals to fear result in the audience just avoiding thinking about any kind of risk associated with the behavior.  The article reports this in anti-alcohol, anti-smoking, and pro-condom campaigns that used fear to appeal to the public instead resulting in reports that they drank more, smoked more, and had unsafe sex more often.    There are even more examples in the article that I don't have time to list, but suffice to say this is a heavily studied topic, especially in the realm of public health, given the enormous potential public benefits and risks that can, have, and will continue to emerge in attempts to draw attention to important issues and change public behaviors.","human_ref_B":"Programs like DARE, which is meant to teach kids about how bad drugs are have been found to cause kids to take drugs sooner than they otherwise would (source). This is believed to be because they make kids think that their peers are doing drugs, so they try to do it too in order to fit in. Similarly, anti-smoking campaigns that have an authoritiarian message (e.g. \"just say no\") make kids more likely to smoke so they feel rebellious (source).   Some researchers believe that a better way to do public health campaigns is to emphasize that the majority of people do the right thing (e.g. 80% of X University students don't smoke), so they will follow along in order to fit in (source). However, it's debatable how effective this approach actually is (source).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9114.0,"score_ratio":1.2352941176}
{"post_id":"2u5b59","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"A lot of people claim that \"Awareness causes change.\" What are some examples of awareness of an issue going wrong? I had heard (but not researched) that women avoided Engineering because they had heard (\"been made aware\") that women get less money in Engineering, thereby completely sectioning themselves out of Engineering.  To what degree has this been researched, and to what degree has this happened in other active social theaters?","c_root_id_A":"co5etbf","c_root_id_B":"co5llu5","created_at_utc_A":1422591677,"created_at_utc_B":1422612893,"score_A":13,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"Are you talking about actual awareness of the facts, or elevated awareness in the media that might not be entirely accurate leading to misunderstanding and inappropriate action?  * Teaching children to be aware that other people touching their genitals is wrong is effective at reducing sexual abuse.  * Teaching children to be aware of \"stranger danger\" ignores the fact that most child abuse occurs with someone known to the victim.","human_ref_B":"Programs like DARE, which is meant to teach kids about how bad drugs are have been found to cause kids to take drugs sooner than they otherwise would (source). This is believed to be because they make kids think that their peers are doing drugs, so they try to do it too in order to fit in. Similarly, anti-smoking campaigns that have an authoritiarian message (e.g. \"just say no\") make kids more likely to smoke so they feel rebellious (source).   Some researchers believe that a better way to do public health campaigns is to emphasize that the majority of people do the right thing (e.g. 80% of X University students don't smoke), so they will follow along in order to fit in (source). However, it's debatable how effective this approach actually is (source).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21216.0,"score_ratio":1.6153846154}
{"post_id":"2u5b59","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"A lot of people claim that \"Awareness causes change.\" What are some examples of awareness of an issue going wrong? I had heard (but not researched) that women avoided Engineering because they had heard (\"been made aware\") that women get less money in Engineering, thereby completely sectioning themselves out of Engineering.  To what degree has this been researched, and to what degree has this happened in other active social theaters?","c_root_id_A":"co5llu5","c_root_id_B":"co5d81x","created_at_utc_A":1422612893,"created_at_utc_B":1422588551,"score_A":21,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Programs like DARE, which is meant to teach kids about how bad drugs are have been found to cause kids to take drugs sooner than they otherwise would (source). This is believed to be because they make kids think that their peers are doing drugs, so they try to do it too in order to fit in. Similarly, anti-smoking campaigns that have an authoritiarian message (e.g. \"just say no\") make kids more likely to smoke so they feel rebellious (source).   Some researchers believe that a better way to do public health campaigns is to emphasize that the majority of people do the right thing (e.g. 80% of X University students don't smoke), so they will follow along in order to fit in (source). However, it's debatable how effective this approach actually is (source).","human_ref_B":"As far as crime reduction goes California's three strikes law has doled out some harsh sentences but hasn't helped to reduce crime. It was enacted in large part because of a father who's daughter was murdered by a multiple offender. He spearheaded the initiative.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24342.0,"score_ratio":1.9090909091}
{"post_id":"2u5b59","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"A lot of people claim that \"Awareness causes change.\" What are some examples of awareness of an issue going wrong? I had heard (but not researched) that women avoided Engineering because they had heard (\"been made aware\") that women get less money in Engineering, thereby completely sectioning themselves out of Engineering.  To what degree has this been researched, and to what degree has this happened in other active social theaters?","c_root_id_A":"co5etbf","c_root_id_B":"co5jivs","created_at_utc_A":1422591677,"created_at_utc_B":1422603779,"score_A":13,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Are you talking about actual awareness of the facts, or elevated awareness in the media that might not be entirely accurate leading to misunderstanding and inappropriate action?  * Teaching children to be aware that other people touching their genitals is wrong is effective at reducing sexual abuse.  * Teaching children to be aware of \"stranger danger\" ignores the fact that most child abuse occurs with someone known to the victim.","human_ref_B":"What I think you're trying to investigate is the connection between knowledge and behavior, which has a massive body of research on many, many different topics. Just type \"knowledge and behavior\" into Google Scholar in quotes and you'll instantly find examples that range from decisions regarding cancer to financial management to the treatment of wildlife.  Knowledge can very easily have unexpected outcomes since knowledge rarely means one thing to each person.  Going back to your question regarding \"awareness\" and focusing on public service announcements and knowledge-disseminating campaigns (some, of course, inevitably being more superficial and potentially open to interpretation or being unintentionally misleading than others), you might find this interesting: \"The knowledge-behavior gap in public information campaigns: a development communication view.\"  They cite one classic example: attempts to have farmers use fertilizer. It seems so simple: of course plants need food!  But the article draws out all the potential reasons why the gap between knowledge and behavior might exist, from the person on an individual level to their community to their culture to the greater systems and markets in which they interact.  Based on the article, it's easy to see just how a single piece of knowledge can be redirected so it never causes any kind of change \u2014 or becomes reinterpreted into an unexpected kind of behavior.    Finally, I'll leave you with one straightforward example, like you requested in your question: \"Unintended Effects of Health Communication Campaigns\". The authors come up with no less than *11* different ways for a health communication campaign to go wrong, with lots of examples.  I'll give you a few:   * Dissonance effects:  The message says one thing, but actually doing the behavior anywhere but in private causes problems.  Dissonance and frustration result.  Women raising infants \"felt guilty, deprived, and frustrated\"...\"in the face of health education messages promoting breast-feeding\" in the light of \"society's disapproval of breast-feeding public\".   * Boomerang effects: Appeals to fear result in the audience just avoiding thinking about any kind of risk associated with the behavior.  The article reports this in anti-alcohol, anti-smoking, and pro-condom campaigns that used fear to appeal to the public instead resulting in reports that they drank more, smoked more, and had unsafe sex more often.    There are even more examples in the article that I don't have time to list, but suffice to say this is a heavily studied topic, especially in the realm of public health, given the enormous potential public benefits and risks that can, have, and will continue to emerge in attempts to draw attention to important issues and change public behaviors.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12102.0,"score_ratio":1.3076923077}
{"post_id":"2u5b59","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"A lot of people claim that \"Awareness causes change.\" What are some examples of awareness of an issue going wrong? I had heard (but not researched) that women avoided Engineering because they had heard (\"been made aware\") that women get less money in Engineering, thereby completely sectioning themselves out of Engineering.  To what degree has this been researched, and to what degree has this happened in other active social theaters?","c_root_id_A":"co5d81x","c_root_id_B":"co5jivs","created_at_utc_A":1422588551,"created_at_utc_B":1422603779,"score_A":11,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"As far as crime reduction goes California's three strikes law has doled out some harsh sentences but hasn't helped to reduce crime. It was enacted in large part because of a father who's daughter was murdered by a multiple offender. He spearheaded the initiative.","human_ref_B":"What I think you're trying to investigate is the connection between knowledge and behavior, which has a massive body of research on many, many different topics. Just type \"knowledge and behavior\" into Google Scholar in quotes and you'll instantly find examples that range from decisions regarding cancer to financial management to the treatment of wildlife.  Knowledge can very easily have unexpected outcomes since knowledge rarely means one thing to each person.  Going back to your question regarding \"awareness\" and focusing on public service announcements and knowledge-disseminating campaigns (some, of course, inevitably being more superficial and potentially open to interpretation or being unintentionally misleading than others), you might find this interesting: \"The knowledge-behavior gap in public information campaigns: a development communication view.\"  They cite one classic example: attempts to have farmers use fertilizer. It seems so simple: of course plants need food!  But the article draws out all the potential reasons why the gap between knowledge and behavior might exist, from the person on an individual level to their community to their culture to the greater systems and markets in which they interact.  Based on the article, it's easy to see just how a single piece of knowledge can be redirected so it never causes any kind of change \u2014 or becomes reinterpreted into an unexpected kind of behavior.    Finally, I'll leave you with one straightforward example, like you requested in your question: \"Unintended Effects of Health Communication Campaigns\". The authors come up with no less than *11* different ways for a health communication campaign to go wrong, with lots of examples.  I'll give you a few:   * Dissonance effects:  The message says one thing, but actually doing the behavior anywhere but in private causes problems.  Dissonance and frustration result.  Women raising infants \"felt guilty, deprived, and frustrated\"...\"in the face of health education messages promoting breast-feeding\" in the light of \"society's disapproval of breast-feeding public\".   * Boomerang effects: Appeals to fear result in the audience just avoiding thinking about any kind of risk associated with the behavior.  The article reports this in anti-alcohol, anti-smoking, and pro-condom campaigns that used fear to appeal to the public instead resulting in reports that they drank more, smoked more, and had unsafe sex more often.    There are even more examples in the article that I don't have time to list, but suffice to say this is a heavily studied topic, especially in the realm of public health, given the enormous potential public benefits and risks that can, have, and will continue to emerge in attempts to draw attention to important issues and change public behaviors.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15228.0,"score_ratio":1.5454545455}
{"post_id":"2u5b59","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"A lot of people claim that \"Awareness causes change.\" What are some examples of awareness of an issue going wrong? I had heard (but not researched) that women avoided Engineering because they had heard (\"been made aware\") that women get less money in Engineering, thereby completely sectioning themselves out of Engineering.  To what degree has this been researched, and to what degree has this happened in other active social theaters?","c_root_id_A":"co5d81x","c_root_id_B":"co5etbf","created_at_utc_A":1422588551,"created_at_utc_B":1422591677,"score_A":11,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"As far as crime reduction goes California's three strikes law has doled out some harsh sentences but hasn't helped to reduce crime. It was enacted in large part because of a father who's daughter was murdered by a multiple offender. He spearheaded the initiative.","human_ref_B":"Are you talking about actual awareness of the facts, or elevated awareness in the media that might not be entirely accurate leading to misunderstanding and inappropriate action?  * Teaching children to be aware that other people touching their genitals is wrong is effective at reducing sexual abuse.  * Teaching children to be aware of \"stranger danger\" ignores the fact that most child abuse occurs with someone known to the victim.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3126.0,"score_ratio":1.1818181818}
{"post_id":"b5ms7m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"How do Indigenous(north america\/australia) science scholars conduct studies\/investigations outside of Western scientific paradigms? Hello all,   I'm researching the legitimacy of Aboriginal sciences - environmental observations, storysharing, etc - and how post-colonialist Indigenous scholars are trying to use Indigenous knowledges for their academic research.   But a lot of the research I've addressed discusses how Western scientific paradigms are inherently imperialist towards Indigenous bodies of knowledges - using logic, rationale, and other standards of positivist thinking will contradict w\/ many Aboriginal beliefs.   So how do Aboriginal scholars conduct their work without using inherent paradigms which may discriminate against their cultural beliefs?  &#x200B;","c_root_id_A":"ejfjvfz","c_root_id_B":"ejf9as0","created_at_utc_A":1553621386,"created_at_utc_B":1553614552,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":">So how do Aboriginal scholars conduct their work without using inherent  paradigms which may discriminate against their cultural beliefs?  Usually we try to think in our native language.  The difference in vocabulary is subtle but massive.  Our values show through our language, many of your paradigms kind of don't translate and vice-versa.   For instance, words for \"treasure\" are the same or related to words for \"culture\" and \"family\".  Ya'all have \"potlucks\" where everyone brings a dish of food to share.  But our Potlach is less penurious.   We give till it hurts: we give our treasure to our treasure; we give culture to our family; we give culture to our treasure.  https:\/\/boomerandecho.com\/give-it-away-now-a-modern-potlatch\/  &#x200B;  >So how do Aboriginal scholars conduct their work without using inherent paradigms which may discriminate against their cultural beliefs?  Interesting.  You realize you're discriminating here, right?  Ya'all could learn valuable lessons from us, it's not just ya'all being  tolerant of our \"cultural beliefs\".  https:\/\/www.npr.org\/sections\/goatsandsoda\/2019\/03\/13\/685533353\/a-playful-way-to-teach-kids-to-control-their-anger  There may be things of value if you took the time to look.   &#x200B;","human_ref_B":"I don't feel qualified to answer this question to much depth but these sources may help.  You may find this article interesting.  https:\/\/www.apa.org\/monitor\/2017\/11\/decolonizing-psychology  It is not rooted in American or Australian psychology, but South African. It mentions some ways in which South African psychology is being \"decolonised\".  I also feel like this extract from Prilleltensky and Nelson's (2010) *Community Psychology: In Pursuit of Liberation and Well-being* may help:  >[On Colonization and Change in Australia] In this wider context of change, constructions of mental health informed by Indigenous people have begun to emerge. There has been a move away from the disease model towards a focus on wellness, holistic health and culturally informed and appropriate approaches (Hunter, 1997). An increasing number of Indigenous mental health professionals have begun to participate, reclaiming the authority to speak for, contextualize and determine Indigenous mental health. Training courses for Indigenous people and mental-health professionals assisted a shift in the conceptualization of mental health. Terms such as 'self-determination', 'quality of life', and 'well-being' entered the vocabulary of mental health professionals working in Indigenous settings (Hunter, 1997).  The chapter - Colonization and Racism - covers the topic to a fuller extent and details work in Australian and New Zealand indigenous populations.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6834.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"izmi5k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Politeness in Asian culture: why is it like that? Let's take Japanese as an example: their choices of words that pragmatically mean the same thing is contingent on social hierarchy \u2014 with different politeness levels to boot (*kudaketa*, *teinei*, and *keigo*). The words you vary greatly depending on whether you're talking to some on an equal social standing like a classmate, close friend, co-worker or someone on a higher status like parent or your manager. Honorifics too mean way more to them in everyday use than to English speakers, who can usually refer to their high school seniors with no need for honorifics without any fear of being called 'disrespectful'.   The same holds true for Indonesian culture as well; 1st grade high schoolers must refer to their upperclassmen as 'Kak \\[name\\]' lest they be branded as 'disrespectful'.  Similar to the Japanese, Bahasa Indonesia is also categorized in forms of 'formal' and 'informal' language.   I don't really see this linguistic distinction being that apparent in English speaking culture. While politeness to superiors is a universal thing in general, in English there doesn't seem to be a clear cut distinction between 'formal language' and 'informal language'. Politeness to superiors is not only held to a higher social importance but is also reflect in it's very language itself.  What are the reasons that make Asian culture more *politeness-centric* compared to English-speaking cultures?","c_root_id_A":"g6kbjtz","c_root_id_B":"g6klkz8","created_at_utc_A":1601061586,"created_at_utc_B":1601066959,"score_A":4,"score_B":71,"human_ref_A":"It's hard to make a *causal* argument about why a culture is the way it is. Like Saussure said of language, I think we can say culture is arbitrary.  One potential answer is embedded in your question, as you acknowledge. In fact, Takeo Doi wrote exhaustively about how the Japanese consciousness was so imbricated with its language. (Although worth noting is you say some Japanese words \"pragmatically\" mean the same thing, which is actually *quite the opposite...* the *pragmatics* of the words demonstrate how meaning is reliant on the context of the situation). Perhaps the language *compels* sensitivity to social hierarchy a la linguistic relativism. Or, equally as likely, a sensitivity to social hierarchy is *reflected* in that languaculture's speech.  Either way, it's really a chicken or the egg question, and one that I think is unanswerable in causal terms (that is, the *reasons* why Asian culture\\* is politeness-centric). Language influences culture, and culture influences language; they are resources for both.  \\*there is really no monolithic Asian culture  Disclaimer: I'm not a cultural anthropologist\/sociolinguist or any form thereof, but I am a social scientist who has some training in it.  &#x200B;  Agar, M. (1994). *Language shock: Understanding the culture of conversation*. New York, NY: William Morrow and Company.  Doi, T. (1973). The first idea of amae. In *The Anatomy of Dependence New York* (pp. 11\u201327). New York, NY: Kodansha International.  Whorf, B. (1956), Carroll, John B. (ed.), *Language, Thought, and Reality: Selected Writings of Benjamin Lee Whorf*, MIT Press.","human_ref_B":"This question is fundamentally mis-framed.  It's not a question of \"politeness\" but of recognizing social rank, and reinforcing social hierarchies inside highly stratified societies with an emphasis on public persona (face).   Japan had until only about a 150 years ago a formal social caste system, and very likely this a hold over from from said system. Where as in the US there is a myth of meritocracy and rugged individualism, erasing social status and strata.      In Japan the social myth is that these distinctions are important to the character of the person, in the US the social myth is that these distinctions don't exist.    https:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/publication\/316113423_The_Social_Life_of_the_Japanese_Language_Cultural_Discourses_and_Situated_Practice        https:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=tWWQR_FQmd8C&lpg=PR7&ots=9Z2lJYke6O&dq=japanese%20caste%20system&lr&pg=PR7#v=onepage&q=japanese%20caste%20system&f=false    https:\/\/www.cambridge.org\/core\/journals\/language-variation-and-change\/article\/intersection-of-sex-and-social-class-in-the-course-of-linguistic-change\/AAA8227B739187F5D2CBDA51EA212FD8     https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1002\/ejsp.127","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5373.0,"score_ratio":17.75}
{"post_id":"12lmqt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How would that world change if we discovered a way for humans to no longer need sleep?","c_root_id_A":"c6w50ww","c_root_id_B":"c6w507d","created_at_utc_A":1352013224,"created_at_utc_B":1352013070,"score_A":12,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Probably not for the better. We'd have many more hours available to us each day. In theory, it's possible that we could choose to keep working the same amount we do now and just enjoy more free time without sacrificing our material wealth. In practice, though, people would be pressured to work more and use those extra hours productively in order to maintain their same level of wealth relative to their neighbors.  I think people would grow increasingly depressed and mental illness would become even more widespread as people's lives seem to just become nothing more than meaningless work. Even if we overcome the body's need for sleep, the human psyche hasn't evolved around working for 18 hours a day, and the effects of having to work so much more would be pretty profound.","human_ref_B":"People consume  more shit since they're awake longer, we'd need more meals for the extra hours so there's that and we'd wear out things out faster. More shit consumed means more demand, more demand means more stock is needed, means more workers and\/or more total worked, hours will go up with 100% certainty, the minimum wage will probably increase a tiny bit to go along with the new 24hour wake.   tl;dr Shit consumption goes up -> more work -> not much else.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":154.0,"score_ratio":1.7142857143}
{"post_id":"1t64qx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Has there ever been a time where tax cuts have helped a struggling economy? **I apologize ahead of time for the wall of text that is this post.** Without getting into the politics of this question, I'd like some links and discussion on whether or not peer reviewed academia supports the notion that in times of economic instability tax breaks and tax cuts for citizens actually stimulates an economy. Republicans say tax cuts help and democrats say they don't.  I'm open to all sides of this issue but if you're going to affirm or deny the notion of tax cuts helping stimulate an economy please support your assertion with credible sources. Conjecture is what I' trying to avoid here.   With the second paragraph in mind I realize what I'm about to type flys in the face of what I've just written but just bear with me. A lot of the rhetoric you hear from mainstream republicans is that tax cuts help businesses and private citizens and increase the amount of money put back into the economy. This seems to only be true when the economy is strong and the middle class isn't worried about saving money. In hard economic times tax cuts seem to only increase the amount of money people have and in particular the trend I've noticed is that the middle class tends to put that extra money in savings or pay off existing debt - which does nothing for the economy. For what I can gather the only ones who \"stimulate\" the economy in economic hard times are the low income families who usually don't have a savings anyway so they go ahead and spend what extra money they get from tax cuts. Since the lower class doesn't comprise a major portion of the population, this extra flow of money into the economy shows little effect. **Someone please correct me if I'm wrong here (seriously)**  I think it's important to note that there haven't been any tax increases in quite some time, and the last tax cut we had were the Bush (two) tax cuts that came right after our invasion of Iraq. What seems crazy to me is that over the past eleven years and through two drastically different presidencies there has been large expenditures (Iraq\/Afghanistan wars, bank and auto industry bailout, and Obama's ~750 billion dollar stimulus package) with little to no internal revenue raising measures (taxes). Instead we've borrowed money at interest mainly from China and through the sale of US bonds.   So how do republicans support their assertion that tax cuts help a fledgling economy, and where do democrats draw their information from to refute this notion?  **Please,  please, please**, I'm looking for serious discussion here with little to no ad hominem attacks on anyone discussing this issue or the political parties involved. If you want to sling mud go over to r\/news or \/r political discussion.   Thanks ahead of time!","c_root_id_A":"ce4rbnm","c_root_id_B":"ce4t8cu","created_at_utc_A":1387384194,"created_at_utc_B":1387388435,"score_A":3,"score_B":39,"human_ref_A":"An issue relevant to answering this question is the fallacy of composition. It might be individually profitable for one country to lower its tax rate (e.g. to attract tax evaders to set up shop there) but if everyone does it, the benefit is lost.","human_ref_B":"The short answer: Yes.  The longer answer: Different taxes have different effects, and we have to be careful about what we think about how taxes help and hinder the economy through how they impact individual decisions.  First off, a lot of studies out there use a measure of aggregate tax rate that is defined by (total tax revenue of type x)\/(population). These type of studies CONSISTENTLY come up with not statistically significant results when it comes to estimating the impact of tax cuts. Gareth Myle's, \u201cEconomic Growth and the Role of Taxation \u2013 Aggregate Data\u201d link offers a good summary of things, but also points out that, \u201cmany regressions use instead a measure of the average rate of tax. This is despite the fact that economic theory predicts that the average rate is not the relevant variable for most decisions.\u201d  In comparison many papers that look at the effects of marginal tax rates on economic growth, total factor productivity, and even things like firm specific productivity, find a statistically significant correlated impact of taxes on growth. Even here we must use caveats. Things like personal income taxes have weird effects on labor, even looking at the relatively simple labor leisure model. Sales taxes are incredibly low to non-impactful, and property taxes often represent a willingness to pay. As a result, the two main taxes that impact *long run economic growth* are corporate taxes, and capital gains taxes, which are consistently shown by literature to have a statistically significant, and negative, effect on growth\/tfp\/etc.  A decent review of papers I compiled a while ago for a working paper I started doing econometric work for a few years ago is linked below is added at the end of the post. Some of these use the average tax rates I talk about, some use marginal tax rates, and a few review existing macro-growth literature in regards to tax policy.  Edit 1: Furthermore, many of these papers end up using log-linearized cobb-douglas functions inside of an ordinary least squares framework. I doubt these parameters truly are linear, but show around where a marginal cut in tax rates would affect most developed countries (a 10% tax cut would lead to around a .10% higher growth rate, being what I remember from papers like Young Lee's paper. Further, using Instrumental variable or two stage least squares might provide better estimates.  Alm, James. Rogers, Janet. \u201cDo State Fiscal Policies Affect State Economic Growth?\u201d Public Finance Review, Vol. 39 (2011)  Barro, Robert J. \u201cEconomic Growth in a Cross Section of Countries,\u201d The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 106, No. 2 (May, 1991) pp. 407-443.  Djankov, Simeon. Ganser, Tim. McLiesh, Caralee. Ramalho, Rita. Shleifer, Andrei. \u201cThe Effect of Corporate Taxes on Investment and Entrepreneurship.\u201d American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics Vol 2 (July 2010) pp 31-64  Felix, Alison. \u201cDo State Corporate Income Taxes Reduce Wages?\u201d Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City Economic Review 94 (2009) 5-30  Helms, L. Jay. \u201cThe Effect of State and Local Taxes on Economic Growth: A Time Series\u2014Cross Section Approach,\u201d The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 67, No. 4 (Nov., 1985) pp. 574-582  Johansson, Asa. Heady, Christopher. Arnold, Jens. Brys, Bert. Vartia, Laura. \u201cTaxation and Economic Growth.\u201d OECD Economics Department Working Papers No. 620.  Knight, Frank H. \u201cDiminishing Returns from Investment,\u201d Journal of Political Economy, vol. 52 (March 1944) pp. 26-47  Lee, Young. Gordon, Roger H. \u201cTax Structure and Economic Growth,\u201d Journal of Public Economics, Vol. 89 (2005) pp. 1027-1043  Mankiw, N. Gregory. Romer, David. Weil, David N. \u201cA Contribution to the Empirics of Economic Growth,\u201d The Quarterly Journal of Economics, May 1992.  Mofidi, Aleddin. Stone, Joe A. \u201cDo State and Local Taxes Affect Economic Growth?\u201d The \tReview of Economics and Statistics  Myles, Gareth D. \u201cEconomic Growth and the Role of Taxation \u2013 Aggregate Data.\u201d OECD \tEconomics Department Working Papers No. 714 (2009)  Romer, Paul M. \u201cGrowth Based on Increasing Returns due to Specializaton,\u201d American Economic Review, Vol. 77, No. 2 (May 1987) pp. 56-62  Schwellnus, Cyrille. Arnold, Jens. \u201cDo Corporate Taxes Produce Productivity and Investment at the Firm Level? Cross-Country Evidence from the Amadeus Dataset,\u201d OECD Economics Department Working Papers No. 641. OECD Publishing (2008)  Slemrod, Joel. Gale, William G. William Easterly. \u201cWhat Do Cross-Country Studies Teach about Government Involvement, Prosperity, and Economic Growth?\u201d Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Vol. 1995, No. 2 (1995) pp. 373-431  Solow, Robert M. \u201cA Contribution to the Theory of Economic Growth.\u201d The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 70, No. 1. (Feb., 1956) pp. 65-94  Wasylenko, Michael. McGuire, Therese. \u201cJobs and Taxes: The Effect of Business Climate on States\u2019 Employment Growth Rates.\u201d National Tax Journal, Vol. 38, No. 4 (December 1985), pp. 497-512.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4241.0,"score_ratio":13.0}
{"post_id":"1t64qx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Has there ever been a time where tax cuts have helped a struggling economy? **I apologize ahead of time for the wall of text that is this post.** Without getting into the politics of this question, I'd like some links and discussion on whether or not peer reviewed academia supports the notion that in times of economic instability tax breaks and tax cuts for citizens actually stimulates an economy. Republicans say tax cuts help and democrats say they don't.  I'm open to all sides of this issue but if you're going to affirm or deny the notion of tax cuts helping stimulate an economy please support your assertion with credible sources. Conjecture is what I' trying to avoid here.   With the second paragraph in mind I realize what I'm about to type flys in the face of what I've just written but just bear with me. A lot of the rhetoric you hear from mainstream republicans is that tax cuts help businesses and private citizens and increase the amount of money put back into the economy. This seems to only be true when the economy is strong and the middle class isn't worried about saving money. In hard economic times tax cuts seem to only increase the amount of money people have and in particular the trend I've noticed is that the middle class tends to put that extra money in savings or pay off existing debt - which does nothing for the economy. For what I can gather the only ones who \"stimulate\" the economy in economic hard times are the low income families who usually don't have a savings anyway so they go ahead and spend what extra money they get from tax cuts. Since the lower class doesn't comprise a major portion of the population, this extra flow of money into the economy shows little effect. **Someone please correct me if I'm wrong here (seriously)**  I think it's important to note that there haven't been any tax increases in quite some time, and the last tax cut we had were the Bush (two) tax cuts that came right after our invasion of Iraq. What seems crazy to me is that over the past eleven years and through two drastically different presidencies there has been large expenditures (Iraq\/Afghanistan wars, bank and auto industry bailout, and Obama's ~750 billion dollar stimulus package) with little to no internal revenue raising measures (taxes). Instead we've borrowed money at interest mainly from China and through the sale of US bonds.   So how do republicans support their assertion that tax cuts help a fledgling economy, and where do democrats draw their information from to refute this notion?  **Please,  please, please**, I'm looking for serious discussion here with little to no ad hominem attacks on anyone discussing this issue or the political parties involved. If you want to sling mud go over to r\/news or \/r political discussion.   Thanks ahead of time!","c_root_id_A":"ce4t8cu","c_root_id_B":"ce4sf9o","created_at_utc_A":1387388435,"created_at_utc_B":1387386657,"score_A":39,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The short answer: Yes.  The longer answer: Different taxes have different effects, and we have to be careful about what we think about how taxes help and hinder the economy through how they impact individual decisions.  First off, a lot of studies out there use a measure of aggregate tax rate that is defined by (total tax revenue of type x)\/(population). These type of studies CONSISTENTLY come up with not statistically significant results when it comes to estimating the impact of tax cuts. Gareth Myle's, \u201cEconomic Growth and the Role of Taxation \u2013 Aggregate Data\u201d link offers a good summary of things, but also points out that, \u201cmany regressions use instead a measure of the average rate of tax. This is despite the fact that economic theory predicts that the average rate is not the relevant variable for most decisions.\u201d  In comparison many papers that look at the effects of marginal tax rates on economic growth, total factor productivity, and even things like firm specific productivity, find a statistically significant correlated impact of taxes on growth. Even here we must use caveats. Things like personal income taxes have weird effects on labor, even looking at the relatively simple labor leisure model. Sales taxes are incredibly low to non-impactful, and property taxes often represent a willingness to pay. As a result, the two main taxes that impact *long run economic growth* are corporate taxes, and capital gains taxes, which are consistently shown by literature to have a statistically significant, and negative, effect on growth\/tfp\/etc.  A decent review of papers I compiled a while ago for a working paper I started doing econometric work for a few years ago is linked below is added at the end of the post. Some of these use the average tax rates I talk about, some use marginal tax rates, and a few review existing macro-growth literature in regards to tax policy.  Edit 1: Furthermore, many of these papers end up using log-linearized cobb-douglas functions inside of an ordinary least squares framework. I doubt these parameters truly are linear, but show around where a marginal cut in tax rates would affect most developed countries (a 10% tax cut would lead to around a .10% higher growth rate, being what I remember from papers like Young Lee's paper. Further, using Instrumental variable or two stage least squares might provide better estimates.  Alm, James. Rogers, Janet. \u201cDo State Fiscal Policies Affect State Economic Growth?\u201d Public Finance Review, Vol. 39 (2011)  Barro, Robert J. \u201cEconomic Growth in a Cross Section of Countries,\u201d The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 106, No. 2 (May, 1991) pp. 407-443.  Djankov, Simeon. Ganser, Tim. McLiesh, Caralee. Ramalho, Rita. Shleifer, Andrei. \u201cThe Effect of Corporate Taxes on Investment and Entrepreneurship.\u201d American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics Vol 2 (July 2010) pp 31-64  Felix, Alison. \u201cDo State Corporate Income Taxes Reduce Wages?\u201d Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City Economic Review 94 (2009) 5-30  Helms, L. Jay. \u201cThe Effect of State and Local Taxes on Economic Growth: A Time Series\u2014Cross Section Approach,\u201d The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 67, No. 4 (Nov., 1985) pp. 574-582  Johansson, Asa. Heady, Christopher. Arnold, Jens. Brys, Bert. Vartia, Laura. \u201cTaxation and Economic Growth.\u201d OECD Economics Department Working Papers No. 620.  Knight, Frank H. \u201cDiminishing Returns from Investment,\u201d Journal of Political Economy, vol. 52 (March 1944) pp. 26-47  Lee, Young. Gordon, Roger H. \u201cTax Structure and Economic Growth,\u201d Journal of Public Economics, Vol. 89 (2005) pp. 1027-1043  Mankiw, N. Gregory. Romer, David. Weil, David N. \u201cA Contribution to the Empirics of Economic Growth,\u201d The Quarterly Journal of Economics, May 1992.  Mofidi, Aleddin. Stone, Joe A. \u201cDo State and Local Taxes Affect Economic Growth?\u201d The \tReview of Economics and Statistics  Myles, Gareth D. \u201cEconomic Growth and the Role of Taxation \u2013 Aggregate Data.\u201d OECD \tEconomics Department Working Papers No. 714 (2009)  Romer, Paul M. \u201cGrowth Based on Increasing Returns due to Specializaton,\u201d American Economic Review, Vol. 77, No. 2 (May 1987) pp. 56-62  Schwellnus, Cyrille. Arnold, Jens. \u201cDo Corporate Taxes Produce Productivity and Investment at the Firm Level? Cross-Country Evidence from the Amadeus Dataset,\u201d OECD Economics Department Working Papers No. 641. OECD Publishing (2008)  Slemrod, Joel. Gale, William G. William Easterly. \u201cWhat Do Cross-Country Studies Teach about Government Involvement, Prosperity, and Economic Growth?\u201d Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Vol. 1995, No. 2 (1995) pp. 373-431  Solow, Robert M. \u201cA Contribution to the Theory of Economic Growth.\u201d The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 70, No. 1. (Feb., 1956) pp. 65-94  Wasylenko, Michael. McGuire, Therese. \u201cJobs and Taxes: The Effect of Business Climate on States\u2019 Employment Growth Rates.\u201d National Tax Journal, Vol. 38, No. 4 (December 1985), pp. 497-512.","human_ref_B":">extra money in savings or pay off existing debt - which does nothing for the economy  The fact that you think savings or deleveraging does nothing for the economy makes me question what they are teaching these days.    Anyway, here is a source that cites numerous studies pointing to negative effects of taxes:  http:\/\/taxfoundation.org\/article\/what-evidence-taxes-and-growth  I'm sure there could be found multiple empirical studies that point to the opposite, of course.  Such is the dance of a positivist epidemiological approach to economics.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1778.0,"score_ratio":19.5}
{"post_id":"t1uv4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Can someone kindly explain in layman's terms this \"downward nominal rigidity\" Professor Krugman keeps referencing lately? As well as it's implications in regards to price stability, unemployment, inflation and the fed.","c_root_id_A":"c4iuj7d","c_root_id_B":"c4itvzi","created_at_utc_A":1335900883,"created_at_utc_B":1335898185,"score_A":17,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Downward nominal rigidity is an empirical observation. From a microeconomic standpoint, wages should equal marginal product. Productivity shcks tend to be normally distributed, but wages have an interesting distrbution. People's wages very rarely fall. This stems from humans being loss averse and effort levels being non-contractible. Workers get pissed off if their wages are reduced! As such, when people marginal product falls, their wage usually stays constant. I'd suggest reading Bewley's Why Don't Wages Fall in a Recessiom and Kahneman, Knetsch and Thalers Fairness as a Restriction on Profit Seeking.  This ends up being important for the foundation of Keynesian economic thought, because it means labor markets don't adjust to nominal shocks in the short run. If that's the case, a small amount of positive inflation can 'grease the wheels' of the labor market. George Akerlof has several papers on this: see Rational Models of Irrational Behavior,  The Macroeconomics of Low Inflation, and Behavioral Macroeconomics and Macroeconomic Behavior.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/www.bankofengland.co.uk\/publications\/Documents\/workingpapers\/wp82.pdf  It seems a bit old but i dont think any major contributions have come out since 1998. Also it should be unbiased because it was before the recession (since which everybody has gone crazy about Keyenes). I think it is aimed at the public so it should be in \"layman's terms\"","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2698.0,"score_ratio":2.4285714286}
{"post_id":"sovvc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.98,"history":"What caused the increase in social liberalism in the 1960s?","c_root_id_A":"c4g58mu","c_root_id_B":"c4g4yq7","created_at_utc_A":1335302503,"created_at_utc_B":1335301361,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'd like to add that the GI Bill probably added to it.  A lot of vets that probably wouldn't go to college did and some of them tried to make sense of what they experienced.  Many authors, artists, musicians, etc went to college on the GI Bill: Kerouac, Bill Cosby, Harry Belafonte, Johnny Cash, Norman Mailer, James Wright, and most importantly of all... Rod Steiger (think about it, maaaan).","human_ref_B":"Baby boomers.  No--not because of their nature, but simply the fact that they were such a large generation.  They made up a significant amount of the population and were becoming independent adults in the 60s.  For American history, each generation tends to be more socially liberal than the previous.  We have this big generation that is more liberal than their parents, and they make their own music and culture and start to feel that they are distinct entity from their parents.  Baby boomers were the first generation really marketed towards.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1142.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2j4z37","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Is there a name for the concept of an idea (like a taboo) being perpetuated when no one believes in it, because everyone is afraid of being judged for it? I imagine this could be a continuum.  Let's say you have an idea or opinion or viewpoint V, in a population P of size p.  Some number of people b will believe in it, and punish those that declare that they don't in some way.  So, the p-b people that DON'T believe in it may, to avoid punishment, claim publically that they do believe V, so you have b+n(p-b) people professing their belief in V, where 0 <= n <= 1.  For non-zero values of n, some people will falsely support V.  But that number is then used by other non-believers to determine if they should support V, even if they don't believe it, along with possible punishments.  After a while, it is plausible to me that p might drop to 0, but if n also goes to 1, you have a belief that everyone defends but no one believes in.  So, what if any is the name of this phenomenon?  Is there any research that attempts to quantify it, hopefully more precisely than my attempt to explain my thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"cl8uenc","c_root_id_B":"cl8q5aa","created_at_utc_A":1413256185,"created_at_utc_B":1413247501,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm not aware of a name for it, but the phenomenon itself has certainly been noted.  Alexis de Tocqueville thought it a feature of democratic societies; in an aristocracy you change a few minds at the top and everyone changes with them, but in a democratic society, according to him:  >It sometimes happens that time, events, or the individual and solitary effort of intellects in the end shakes a belief little by little without anything appearing on the outside. They do not combat it openly. They do not unite to make war on it. Its sectarians quit it one by one without a sound; but each day some abandon it, until finally it is no longer shared except by the few.  >In this state it still reigns.  >As its enemies continue to be silent or to communicate their thoughts with each other only furtively, for a long time they themselves are unable to assure themselves that a great revolution has been accomplished, and in their doubt they remain motionless. They observe and stay silent. The majority no longer believes, but it still looks like it believes and this vain phantom of public opinion is enough to chill innovators and to keep them in silence and respect.   --Democracy in America, 1830.","human_ref_B":"This sounds to me like Timur Kuran's notion of \"preference falsification\" - depending on how interested you are, you could start with:  * the Wikipedia page on the topic here * his first major paper on the issue (1987) at Preference Falsification, Policy Continuity and Collective Conservatism * his book where he goes through many more applications of the topic: Private Truths, Public Lies (1995)  Closely related is the work of Tadelis\/Greif on crypto-morality.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8684.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"90zsvp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"What makes the concept of having a doppelg\u00e4nger scary? Does it threaten our identity? Our social status? Our meaning? It is related to the uncanny valley? Or does it simply play onto the fear of the unknown?","c_root_id_A":"e2v143k","c_root_id_B":"e2uhmwh","created_at_utc_A":1532309229,"created_at_utc_B":1532288884,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Clarification question : Why do you think it\u2019s scary \/ where is there any evidence this is a scary phenomenon?","human_ref_B":"Follow-up question, what makes us recognize a Doppelg\u00e4nger? Where is the line between a person looking relatively similar and constituting a Doppelg\u00e4nger?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20345.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1elhdh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why has the concept of personal\/familial honor remained so important in some cultures, while virtually disappearing in others? Up until even a hundred years or so ago, codes of honor were (it seems) prevalent in many cultures, if not most. Chivalry, the duel, \"I demand satisfaction!\", etc. But now it seems that the west, by and large, has lost that kind of attitude. However, we still hear about honor killings in the Middle East, the caste system in India, seppuku in Japan, etc.","c_root_id_A":"ca1h0yd","c_root_id_B":"ca1gvnk","created_at_utc_A":1368926179,"created_at_utc_B":1368925615,"score_A":14,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I acknowledge the rule that we should: >Keep discussion free of layman speculation.  **I would like to offer my layman's understanding of the answer to \/u\/TheEmperorsNewHose's question in the hopes of having a competent social scientist point out what is wrong with my answer and in doing so offer a more complete explanation to the question posed. I hope this is not against the rules.**   Your question is one that I have wondered about a lot myself. My own understanding is that my idea of individual and familial 'codes of honor' in the west and west comes about from the depiction of various honorable persons in a variety of places; books, movies, TV shows. In these depictions, the honorable persons are always in a seemingly lawless environment. So, the persons rely on themselves to produce a Just society. In these cases, I think codes of honor are like self accepted laws which affect nearly every facet of social interaction.   I think in the past, in the west and various places, many people relied on a mutual understanding of a sort of code of honor in much the same way we rely on laws or contracts today. In the absence of a stable and competent government places may still recognize a code of honor. In some cases, as with duels, it seems to me to be a way of settling disputes when in the absence of a mutually trusted court. It may be that in a feudal system one would have to justify one's actions not by their adherence with the law, but through their adherence with a code of honor. Now, I think that in developed and stable countries with a powerful and trusted justice system\/court system, there is no need to appeal to a code of honor in a great many matters. Of course, there are some aspects, like politeness, chivalry, and such, which carry over from codes of honor but are not written in law.      I think that in places like Japan, codes of honor are still very much remembered as a part of their cultural heritage and their lingering impact still affects many social interactions. I think that in the U.S.A., because of its extreme diversity, codes of honor are much less influential or useful and so they are not recognized or appreciated so much.   Also, I don't think many instances of suicide in Japan could really be considered Seppuku (Wikipedia says their have only been 6 in the last century). I also don't think that the caste system is a good example of honor code (unless I have a completely different understanding than you), because it's more of a social structure instead of something one uses to justifies actions. Honor killings in the middle east may be a good example but I don't know enough about them to say anything.   TL;DR: I think Codes of Honor developed in many diverse cultures as a way of producing justice in the absence of strong governments. I think that some places still either don't have strong governments, or still feel that early codes of honor are a part of their culture.   Also, I didn't address the different cultural understandings of how individual honor is connected to familial honor (if it is).","human_ref_B":"I see an issue with the how you posed this question. It puts non-Western countries in a **negative** light by highlighting **negative** cultural practices (*honor killings btw aren't as prevalent as the media would have you believe*) that aren't related to **positive** \"codes of honor.\" There definitely still practices in non-Western countries that have to do with honor; in the Middle East you give your guests the best you have, in India you always address your elders by title not by name, and in Japan you address people with respect in the form of slight bow or nod of your head. Overall, it's hinting at an attitude that assumes non-Western countries are somewhat backwards.   Now, to answer your question: I feel like countries that still have strong ties to their cultural roots keep up cultural practices of honor. On the other hands, countries where the population has largely diversified and and cultures have either become watered down or lost, \"codes of honor\" have faded as well. That's not to say that Western countries have their own versions of \"honor\" (i.e. simple things like not cutting people in line).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":564.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"10ar2i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"What would happen if countries stopped using the US Dollar for much of international trade, specifically crude oil? For example, if China and Russia went ahead with purchasing crude oil using their own currencies. There is rumour that this may soon occur, also between Mexico and China.   What would the implications of such a change be, specifically the effects on the stability of of the USD, the price of crude oil and what the US's likely response would be to this action?","c_root_id_A":"c6bucie","c_root_id_B":"c6c6nft","created_at_utc_A":1348327879,"created_at_utc_B":1348399069,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Some previous commentary:   http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/pogmu\/what_would_happen_if_the_world_abandons_the_us\/  http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/p0p0o\/why_are_people_worried_about_what_currency_oil_is\/","human_ref_B":"Your exchange rate would slide, as there's less use (and therefore demand) for the dollar. If it's merely that people no longer use it to buy oil, it probably wouldn't be a massive issue - just one less use for the dollar. Al beit a large use, but not the end of the world. You'll likely get to continue to run trade deficits as a lot of countries still like to build up reserves of USD just as a means of storing wealth - the trade deficits just won't be as large as they currently are.  Your export industry would increase in size, the amount you can import would decrease.  Although if countries decide they no longer want to store wealth in your dollar as a result of this decision it could be a lot more interesting. In theory, there's more than enough money overseas to crash your dollar. The government would have great difficulty preventing the hyperinflation that could easily present from this; it could easily ruin your economy. High taxes would be necessary to collect those trillions of dollars coming back to shore faster than they can cause harm in your economy, and you'd have a great deal of difficulty buying imports until the reserves have been all been returned to your shores and taxed away. Hopefully that happens before your stockpiles of oil runs out. If the above were to occur, it'd probably be easiest to reboot the currency. Launch a USD2, but only allow locals to convert their savings. Defaulting on every other country's savings like that would be.. interesting.. from a diplomatic point of view.  This wouldn't happen though, because it's not in anyone's interests. It's just an amusing hypothetical. Countries such as China have been meticulously saving in your currency for decades now, each year sending you more goods than you send in return, with them storing the change as a form of savings. People working in sweatshops just so that the government can save USD. If they crashed the dollar they'd have lost their entire savings - nothing in it for them (well, unless that was their goal).  What would happen instead is you'd just find your exports would grow. You'd run a trade surplus as countries gradually \"cash in\" on their savings in USD. Buying exports\/land\/businesses with it, but not so fast as to make your currency worthless. It's your money though, they have to play by your rules - the government can protect you a bit from foreign ownership of land\/business if it chooses, but this would drag out how long you need to run trade surpluses for.  tldr; your exchange rate would go down if crude was no longer sold by USD, but really hope that countries never decide to cash in on their trillions of US dollars of savings.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":71190.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"wrqty","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"[Economics] Exactly why are things \"Made in America\" so theoretically expensive now, and why aren't imported goods *much* cheaper? The accepted wisdom is that we must manufacture everything overseas because otherwise the products will be too expensive. However, this was really only the case for the past 20-30 years ago. Before then, a good proportion of products were made in the US and I have to assume they were priced to be within the reach of the normal consumer.  Did something change that suddenly made these products much more expensive to manufacture?  When the switch was made to imported goods, the labor cost should have dropped dramatically. Even taking inflation into account, the wages of a worker in the US is an order of magnitude greater than extremely low wages paid in a country like China. Are the products cheaper to make but merely inflated in price? Are market forces not sufficient to force downward pressure on prices?","c_root_id_A":"c5fwc8h","c_root_id_B":"c5fwfph","created_at_utc_A":1342638972,"created_at_utc_B":1342639283,"score_A":3,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"It's not that they are so expensive in America, it's that they are so much cheaper to produce elsewhere. People in poorer countries will settle for a much lesser wage than in the US. For example, a dollar in the US could buy a drink, but in China, it could but maybe 5 drinks (I don't know, just theoretical). If firms are able to produce for smaller cost, they are obviously going to choose to move to the lower cost producers.   You have to remember that before 30 years ago, China was going through extreme Communism and other countries didn't have much foreign direct investment to be able to mass produce goods like they can today.  Imported goods arent much cheaper because of tariffs set by the US government to try and prevent imported goods from flooding the market, and companies reacting to this by upping prices to protect their profit margins.","human_ref_B":"In some cases, the price did drop drastically. Electronics are made by tweens in Chinese factories, and they are ridiculously cheap. They are also (except Apple products) sold mostly as commodities. Nobody really gives a shit about the whether their DVD player is made by Magnavox or Panasonic.  EDIT: Forgot to add: I read somewhere that things in general are so cheap now that burglaries are down, because there's really nothing in our houses worth stealing. Stealing a $2000 TV that you could fence for $300 was worth it in 1965; today not so much. \/EDIT  In other cases, the story gets more complicated--many of the products we buy are so heavily branded that we're buying the brand *more than the product itself.*   Sneakers are an obvious example--when you buy Nikes, you're paying like $5 for the product and $95 for the swoosh. In fact, the sneakers are most likely *more expensive* than the DVD player.  (Remember back in the 1990s, when Michael Jordan was paid more to lend his image to Air Jordans than the entire Vietnamese workforce was paid to make them? That made perfect sense from Nike's point of view--Jordan added more value to the final price than the workforce did.)  > Are market forces not sufficient to force downward pressure on prices?  \"Market forces\" only apply to goods that are sold as commodities (like wheat and DVD players). As soon as you're selling, not plushies in general, but Mickey Mouse plushies specifically, the classical market--and for that matter most of current economic analysis--breaks down. A competitor might be able to sell Mickey Mouse plushies for a tenth of the price that Disney does, but if they do they go to jail.  EDIT: iamqba pointed out that there is a form of economic analysis for this situation--monopolistic competition. But I tend to think that our current thinking on monopolistic competition is inadequate. \/EDIT  So really, if Nike sneakers were made here (for, say, $20), they could totally be sold at the same price, but Nike would make less profit. It's cheaper to pay someone to say that the sneakers would be ruinously expensive if they were made here.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":311.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"18gey5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.67,"history":"Instead of a minimum wage increase, what about a wage ceiling directly tied to highest wage to average waged workers?  This might be a little outside of the box, and I haven't really thought this through completely. Perhaps you all would be able to flesh it out better than I could as well. What if instead of a minimum wage increase, the government made a law that private companies or at least publicly traded companies could not compensate their highest wage workers (CEO) at a ratio greater than 100 to 1 of their average wage worker. The current average is 380 to 1, according to AFL-CIO 2011 numberd. If you felt the need as a company to compensate your CEO at a higher level, you would have to raise the wages for your average worker. What would be the pitfalls of something like this? One argument would be that companies would not be able to attract the best talent if they were hogtied with a policy such as this. Any others? What would be the pitfalls of a policy such as this?","c_root_id_A":"c8emst5","c_root_id_B":"c8emvw8","created_at_utc_A":1360784724,"created_at_utc_B":1360784960,"score_A":9,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"This is just something I would like to insert into the discussion. Ben and Jerry's tried this method of capping the CEO pay (other way around I know) called the 7 to 1 plan or something (currently on my phone, can't check), and had real difficulty finding a CEO that was worth anything paying such a low salary. So there's that as a real life result.","human_ref_B":"This is an interesting question.  Technically, if you are talking about wage workers, you are talking about hourly employees, which most management is not. However, you could implement something pretty similar for total yearly earnings.  You would basically just have a 100% tax on all earnings above a certain level, or if you wanted to be generous, a 95% tax.  One pitfall of this policy is that it will affect companies very differently, depending on the type of labor they use.  Hospitals, which employ lot of doctors and nurses, might have a higher effective cap on CEO pay than, say, a clothing factory.    The real effect though, is that this policy will discourage high pay for some workers, without really incentivizing pay for lower-paid workers.  If you have a company with 10,000 employees, you have to pay $10,000 to increase average pay by $1. So, in essence, the marginal cost of raising your CEO pay by $1, assuming you are at the cap, is $10,001.  You are not going to use the same labor inputs, if you want to be able to attract the same quality of high-wage workers.  The way I see this working out, is that, in order to attract and retain high-quality engineers, doctors, actuaries, management, and programmers, companies are just going to contract out for low-wage work.  Companies that specialize in low-wage work might not be constrained by the 1-100 policy, and companies that specialize in high-wage work will be able to have a high average wage level and pay their highest paid workers a market-competitive rate. Contracted work wouldn't count towards your wage limit.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":236.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"71losb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Why aren't wages rising? Unemployment is very low, some economists I follow on Twitter even say we're near full employment. Yet wages are still very sticky, rising maybe a couple percent. Why isn't there more of a fight for workers?","c_root_id_A":"dnbyd52","c_root_id_B":"dnbx58s","created_at_utc_A":1506036274,"created_at_utc_B":1506034691,"score_A":15,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"There is a theory that technology is the cause.  A FAQ on Tech, Jobs, and Wages | Andrew McAfee (poor sound quality but it's a great summary)  A well respected MIT economist speaking at a conference on AI attended by elite industrialists, economists and AI experts.  https:\/\/futureoflife.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Andrew-McAfee.pdf  AI and the Economy | Erik Brynjolfsson  Under this theory new jobs are being created but middle class and middle paying jobs are being dismantled and inequality is increasing.  This is a general effect across the Western world where technology is more advanced and pervasive. Yet economic growth continues.  Middle skill jobs are down.  There was a decoupling of productivity to wages.  The Middle class is disappearing.  As Profits Climb Wages Plummet","human_ref_B":"You would have more luck getting a coherent empirical evidence backed answer by posting this to \/r\/askeconomics where the people who actually know this stuff reside","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1583.0,"score_ratio":1.0714285714}
{"post_id":"3g8l5t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Why do many children form such strong attachments to their stuffed animals? Don't know if this is the right sub for this but whatever.","c_root_id_A":"ctvy827","c_root_id_B":"ctvysax","created_at_utc_A":1439046892,"created_at_utc_B":1439048124,"score_A":7,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"These are called transitional objects, so if you read up on that you'll get some good info.","human_ref_B":"Look up transitional objects within Winnicott's theories on object relations.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1232.0,"score_ratio":2.2857142857}
{"post_id":"jay77","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"What causes fetishes to develop in a person? Do other animals have them?","c_root_id_A":"c2dclv7","c_root_id_B":"c2alt5u","created_at_utc_A":1313667621,"created_at_utc_B":1312659205,"score_A":26,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"This is anecdotal, not scientific:  I once met a gentleman who enjoyed being kicked in the scrotum, quite hard. This made him almost instantly ejaculate.   When I asked him why, he told me a story about his parents, who were very distant and remote... until he had a baseball-bat injury when he was about 5 which split his scrotum and required stitches.   He told me that his recovery from this injury was the only time he can remember being doted on and cared for by his parents, and theorized that he had associated scrotal pain with love and comfort for that reason.   Needless to say, I found this story fascinating, but not so fascinating that I wished to continue the relationship.","human_ref_B":"Fetishes are just an outcome of a particular thinking pattern developed through reinforcement.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1008416.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7i6jbm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Where did the concept of \"words as violence\" originate from? I can't seem to find where this idea originated. And besides it being a discoursive way of thinking - is there any hard science that justifies equating the spoken word with (physical) violence?","c_root_id_A":"dqwfg83","c_root_id_B":"dqx4ttf","created_at_utc_A":1512655644,"created_at_utc_B":1512681748,"score_A":5,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"i don't know where it originated from but i think the work of judith butler was very influential.  check out 'Excitable Speech. A Politics of the performance. 1997'","human_ref_B":"The notion that words--or more properly discourse--cause violence   gained steam with the post-structuralist philosophies of Foucault, Derrida, and so forth. Foucault, for instance, wanted to demonstrate the categories, classifications, and system of discipline (see both *The Order of Things* and *Discipline and Punish* in particular) had material effects on bodies. The point being that classifications and so forth aren't neutral systems but productive of the world we live in. When some bodies\/subjectivities fall outside of the dominant classifications, then they become classified as delinquent, insane, or otherwise undesirable and, thus, in need of correction or punishment.  Judith Butler did a great deal of work incorporating these insights into feminist theory. Her point is that hetero-normative and gender-normative systems of discourse and classification do violence to identities that fall outside of those frameworks by both authorizing attempts to 'normalize' and to punish those that refuse to change to the established norm as well as causing mental anguish to those that fall outside the norm.   So the prevalence of discourse that constantly position, for instance, queer identities as immoral, illogical, and\/or correctable does violence to the bodies of queer people because it both authorizes physical attacks on those people as well as causes mental pain and anguish.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26104.0,"score_ratio":3.6}
{"post_id":"7i6jbm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Where did the concept of \"words as violence\" originate from? I can't seem to find where this idea originated. And besides it being a discoursive way of thinking - is there any hard science that justifies equating the spoken word with (physical) violence?","c_root_id_A":"dqxdkjx","c_root_id_B":"dqxuhww","created_at_utc_A":1512691695,"created_at_utc_B":1512712052,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Before Butler's Excitable Speech, Robert Cover wrote \"Violence and the Word\" (1986) 95 Yale L.J. 1601. It examines the violence in legal interpretive acts. I don't know what type of 'hard science' would exmine this issue.","human_ref_B":"Check out Tirrell's *Genocidal Language Games* for a modern argument (from beyond feminist theory, not that there's anything wrong with that approach) that speech not only abets but licenses other kinds of violence.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20357.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"lb088","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why do communities in America adjacent to interstate  exits tend to be more economically poor? This may just be perspective bias, but it always seems that you come right into the ghetto at the worst but just generally seedy surroundings as you get off the interstate, and it gets better as you get farther away?  Just an observation, and I figured you guys could shed some light.","c_root_id_A":"c2r8pb8","c_root_id_B":"c2r9j9d","created_at_utc_A":1318534468,"created_at_utc_B":1318539532,"score_A":3,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"A spatial analysis of -- public transport and the propensity to be at those sites and the connection of that to low income -- would be interesting.","human_ref_B":"There are many many urban historians who have written on this. Highway exits have massively different impacts on property values depending on their particular location. Things prized in suburbs are anathema to property values in cities. In most large cities the location of highways near poor neighborhoods is because planners dumped interstates into areas with the least political clout or economic power--most commonly heavily minority areas. Putting an interstate here was the most \"economical\" from the State's perspective of land acquisition and dovetailed nicely with vogue of slum clearance. Once built highways tended to further reinforce the existing segregation and economic depression in those communities.  The end result is that today those communities are often even more devastated than they were prior to having their physical neighborhoods ripped apart so suburban commuters could get downtown faster in their cozy, private, cars.   If you want to read about the machinations of how this happened Caro's book on Robert Moses, The Power Broker, is a good place to start.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5064.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"jiyyy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What would happen if all countries in the world would freely grant citizenship to whoever asks for it? (and allow people to have as many other citizenships as they want)","c_root_id_A":"c2cjf09","c_root_id_B":"c2cjjug","created_at_utc_A":1313386290,"created_at_utc_B":1313387665,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Mass migration, for starters.","human_ref_B":"Citizenship defines the rights and responsibilities of a person in relation to a government. I think you would find that the concept of citizenship would cease to be relevant, replaced by a residency concept that serves basically the same purpose. Citizenship and ability to tax are often related. How do you envision taxation would work with this free-granting of citizenship? If you have to pay taxes to each government, I suspect most people would opt for single citizenship!  At first, I thought you were interested in removing barriers to immigration, which could be pretty interesting, particularly if citizenship remained tied to taxes. This could play out something like the school Voucher system, where \"good\" countries attract the most citizens and citizens would be free to choose the country with their preferred balance of services\/taxation.  It would be interesting to see how bringing competition with other states to provide the highest quality of living might make governments more responsive and proactive. On the other hand, it would doom the less attractive countries to bankruptcy and poorer people would be left behind. (something like the population shifts that occour immediately prior to communist revolutions).     Your followup text confused me. How would multiple citizenship work and why would that be desirable? Mostly I have seen multiple citizenships as a way to avoid compulsory military service (Russia) and to greatly complicate international travel if you use different passports on the way in\/out of a country.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1375.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"22akxh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"I have zero knowledge of economics. I want to at least have a basic understanding. Any book recommendations? I've studied mainly psychology in college, so you can be assured that I have a background in college level thinking. However I don't know jack about economics or its jargon. I've decided I want to have some understanding. Plus, I'm about 50 pages into David Graeber's \"Debt\" and although he's a great writer there's a lot I'm failing to grasp simply because I don't have the background.  Thank you very much. I appreciate it.","c_root_id_A":"cgkxwwt","c_root_id_B":"cgl29qn","created_at_utc_A":1396731383,"created_at_utc_B":1396742776,"score_A":7,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"The undercover economist is a great, laymens terms book to understand basic economics concepts.  I read it in first year uni and it helped me a lot   http:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/s\/ref=nb_sb_ss_fb_0_17?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=undercover%20economist&sprefix=undercover+econom%2Cmobile-apps%2C233&rh=i%3Astripbooks%2Ck%3Aundercover%20economist","human_ref_B":"Naked Economics and The worldly Philosopher. They are both used in introductory economics courses.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11393.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"22akxh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"I have zero knowledge of economics. I want to at least have a basic understanding. Any book recommendations? I've studied mainly psychology in college, so you can be assured that I have a background in college level thinking. However I don't know jack about economics or its jargon. I've decided I want to have some understanding. Plus, I'm about 50 pages into David Graeber's \"Debt\" and although he's a great writer there's a lot I'm failing to grasp simply because I don't have the background.  Thank you very much. I appreciate it.","c_root_id_A":"cglb3z9","c_root_id_B":"cglhc7b","created_at_utc_A":1396769878,"created_at_utc_B":1396799802,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Kahn academy has a section on economics.","human_ref_B":">Plus, I'm about 50 pages into David Graeber's \"Debt\" and although he's a great writer there's a lot I'm failing to grasp simply because I don't have the background.  This book provides a solid foundation and background for some of the ideas about money, debt and credit touched on in Graeber's book:  L. Randall Wray's Modern Money Theory: A Primer on Macroeconomics for Sovereign Monetary Systems","labels":0,"seconds_difference":29924.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1ugj0i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.67,"history":"How practical and useful is a Business Economics degree in the private sector? I had in mind Business Economics for my Masters degree. I really dislike theories and I am totally into practical stuff. I enjoyed BBA courses and was initially enrolled into Engineering.   Anyways, if I go on to do a masters in Business Economics:   * What type of career will I be able to pursue? What type of careers do Business Economist get into?  * I am more interested in a career in the private sector compared to the public sector. Would a BE degree help me get into the private sector?  * How *practical* and *useful* is a BE degree?  * Should I go for a Masters in Business Economics or for Applied Economics or what?","c_root_id_A":"cehus8s","c_root_id_B":"cei18w3","created_at_utc_A":1388932180,"created_at_utc_B":1388950928,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I am not familiar with a BE, can explain what the course load would be?  They certainly have to understand the theory behind why their applications are justified.  Theoretical modeling often provides a useful way to identify what empirical strategy needs to be undertaken.  Try the national association of business economists (NABE).  Their membership is exceptionally quant heavy ( ie, you will need to be very strong in math and stat)","human_ref_B":"I cannot answer your question, but I can give you a solution to it. The way I did when choosing education was sending emails to 5-10 different firms where I could think about working, and asked what education they were looking for in *that* position, or where I would fit if I had *that* education. I sent some emails to real estate offices, some to statistics bureaus and some to different banks. I went to the company's homepage, looked up the CEO and sent them an email. The respons was different, and some were better than others, therefore I suggest you to send two or three emails per sector.  Hope this helps! :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18748.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3a4qha","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Are there any cultures in which tattoos designate higher social status? I was watching a video on facebook of a Maori Haka, and wondered if the tattoos on their faces indicate some kind of social standing, or if it's just personalized. I'm not specifically interested in Maori tattoo culture, but I am wondering if there are cultures in which different tattoos mean different \"ranks\".  I remember hearing a story years ago from a friend about his friend's dad who fought as a Viet Cong (I'm aware the story is probably totally fictitious) and he had tattoos given to him in the jungle: two spirals, one on each shoulder, that somehow signified his rank above unmarked men.  Are there any cultural practices in which tattoos are given to people of a higher status, or possibly, different kinds of tattoos to designate multiple levels of social prestige? Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cs9nizt","c_root_id_B":"cs9j2mk","created_at_utc_A":1434556312,"created_at_utc_B":1434548571,"score_A":9,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Criminal gangs, especially urban street gangs in the US, as well as Russian\/Eastern European gangs use tattoos to denote various meanings or accomplishments.  For example, the cobweb tattoo can signify the length of a prison sentence, and the tear drop can signify that the person committed murder.  http:\/\/www.correctionsone.com\/corrections\/articles\/7527475-15-prison-tattoos-and-their-meanings\/","human_ref_B":"Lars Krutak's Tattoo Traditions of Native North America: Ancient and Contemporary Expressions of Identity discusses roles of tattoos in Native American cultures, from the nineteenth century Osage Honor Pack of War to colonial accounts. His website is quite extensive with other examples from around the world of tattoo meanings!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7741.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"3a4qha","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Are there any cultures in which tattoos designate higher social status? I was watching a video on facebook of a Maori Haka, and wondered if the tattoos on their faces indicate some kind of social standing, or if it's just personalized. I'm not specifically interested in Maori tattoo culture, but I am wondering if there are cultures in which different tattoos mean different \"ranks\".  I remember hearing a story years ago from a friend about his friend's dad who fought as a Viet Cong (I'm aware the story is probably totally fictitious) and he had tattoos given to him in the jungle: two spirals, one on each shoulder, that somehow signified his rank above unmarked men.  Are there any cultural practices in which tattoos are given to people of a higher status, or possibly, different kinds of tattoos to designate multiple levels of social prestige? Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cs9j2mk","c_root_id_B":"cs9wdo6","created_at_utc_A":1434548571,"created_at_utc_B":1434569959,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Lars Krutak's Tattoo Traditions of Native North America: Ancient and Contemporary Expressions of Identity discusses roles of tattoos in Native American cultures, from the nineteenth century Osage Honor Pack of War to colonial accounts. His website is quite extensive with other examples from around the world of tattoo meanings!","human_ref_B":"The Maori first nations of New Zealand.   From http:\/\/www.zealandtattoo.co.nz\/tattoo-styles\/maori-tattoos\/ :   \"Only people of rank or status were allowed to have, and could afford to have, tattoos. A person who did not have any high-ranking social status, such as a slave, could not have a face tattoo. Those who had the means to get a tattoo but did not were seen as people of lower social status.\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21388.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1y0h06","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"[Psychology] What research has been done on cell phone addiction?","c_root_id_A":"cfgbjuj","c_root_id_B":"cfgqovb","created_at_utc_A":1392510424,"created_at_utc_B":1392568258,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Do you mean mobile phones as in making calls and texting, or smart phones as in gaming, internet, &c?","human_ref_B":"Addiction, let's remember, is a term of art in psychology, with a clinical definition.  People might say they're \"addicted\" to chocolate cake, but not in clinical the sense that someone is addicted to nicotine or heroin.  There was a recent study that got a lot of attention in the news about so-called porn addiction which found no evidence for its existence.  To choose, three examples of the story:   * Don't Worry, You're Not Really Addicted to Porn (Because No One Is) (The Atlantic Wire)   * Porn, addictive? There\u2019s no proof (interview with the study's author on Salon)   * Study Casts Doubt on Porn Addiction, but Counselors Say It Exists (Newsweek)  What these studies suggest is that 1) most of the studies on \"porn addiction\" don't use data, 2) the studies that do exist don't interpret their data properly (the see an association between depression and pornography usage and assume that pornography leads to the depression) and 3) the studies that do exist use the wrong data (they use cross-sectional rather than longitudinal data; with longitudinal data--tracking the same people over time--the study argues that you see that depression causes the uptick in porn usage, rather than vice-verse).  Given all of that, I'd be rather skeptical about most research about \"cell phone addiction\".  While there are likely less powerful interest groups in this case (there are groups of counselors who really strongly believe that porn addiction is a thing), I'd want to know if there are any good studies that actually establish cell phone addiction is even a thing.  None of the other answers so far have convinced me of that.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":57834.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1drved","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What kind of research has been done on government corruption? I imagine it would be a difficult thing to study effectively but I'm curious what kind of research has been done on this and if perhaps researchers have any ideas on methods to fight corruption.","c_root_id_A":"c9tbuvj","c_root_id_B":"c9td1fb","created_at_utc_A":1367828939,"created_at_utc_B":1367839115,"score_A":4,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I found this paper from the IMF very helpful. Although it is mostly an overview about the topic, the bibliography is helpful.  There are a lot of remarks about the sources and types of corruption, showing e.g. how methods were developed to counter corruption (like bidding competitions).  Also, Tanzi talks about some strategies against corruption. He mentions examples (Singapore) and differentiates certain factors (e.g. raising public sector wages are not always a good way of decreasing corruption).","human_ref_B":"Corruption has been particularly popular within political science since a series of corruption scandals in Italy]( http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Tangentopoli) and [Japan during the 1990s stimulated academic interest in the topic, especially in relation to public choice theory.  Suffice to say, there has been a breadth of literature written about corruption in recent years.    Fighting corruption should be based on an understanding of what makes public officials corrupt in the first place.  Since there are multiple explanations, there are multiple recommendations on how to fight corruption.  If you came looking for an easy answer, there isn't one.  If you\u2019re looking for a more entry-level discussion, I would try Google.  I'll give a brief (thus not exhaustive) bibliography:    Gordon Tullock, \u2018The Welfare Costs of Tariffs, Monopolies and Theft\u2019, Western Economic Journal, 5 (1967), 224\u201332  Anne O. Krueger, \u2018The Political Economy of the Rent-seeking Society\u2019, American Economic Review, 64 (1974), 291\u2013303  Susan Rose-Ackerman, Corruption: A Study in Political Economy (New York: Academic Press, 1978).   Jagdish N. Bhagwati, \u2018Directly Unproductive, Profit-seeking (DUP) Activities\u2019, Journal of Political Economy, 90 (1982), 988\u20131002.  Robert Wade, \u2018The Market for Public Office: Why the Indian State is not Better at Development\u2019, World Development, 13 (1985), 467\u201397.  Chalmers Johnson, \u2018Tanaka Kakuei, Structural Corruption, and the Advent of Machine Politics in Japan\u2019, Journal of Japanese Studies, 12 (1986), 1\u201328.  Fred S. McChesney, \u2018Rent Extraction and Rent Creation in the Economic Theory of Regulation\u2019, Journal of Legal Studies, 16 (1987), 101\u201318.  Taro Yamama, \u2018The Recruit Scandal: Learning from the Causes of Corruption\u2019, Journal of Japanese Studies, 16 (1990), 90\u2013114.  Gerald W. Scully, \u2018Rent-seeking in US Government Budgets, 1900\u201388\u2019, Public Choice, 70 (1991), 99\u2013106.    Stephen Morris, Corruption and Politics in Contemporary Mexico (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1991).  Ronald J. Hrebenar, \u2018The Money Base of Japanese Politics\u2019, in Ronald J. Hrebenar, ed., The Japanese Party System (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1992).  Andrei Shleifer and Robert W. Vishny, \u2018Corruption\u2019, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 108 (1993), 599\u2013617.  Eric Rasmusen and J. Mark Ramseyer, \u2018Cheap Bribes and the Corruption Ban: A Coordination Game Among Rational Legislators\u2019, Public Choice, 78 (1994), 305\u201327.   Donald Wittman, The Myth of Democratic Failure: Why Political Institutions Are Efficient (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995).  Luigi Manzetti and Charles Blake, \u2018Market Reforms and Corruption in Latin America\u2019, Review of International Political Economy, 3 (1996), 671\u201382.  Daniel Kaufman, \u2018Corruption: The Facts\u2019, Foreign Policy, 107 (1997), 114\u201331.  Paul Heywood, \u2018Political Corruption: Problems and Perspectives\u2019, Political Studies, 45 (1997), 416\u201335.  Donatella della Porta and Alberto Vanucci, \u2018The \u201cPerverse Effects\u201d of Political Corruption\u2019, Political Studies, 45 (1997), 516\u201338.  Federico Varese, \u2018The Transition to the Market and Corruption in Post-socialist Russia\u2019, Political Studies, 45 (1997), 579\u201396.  Fred S. McChesney, Money for Nothing: Politicians, Rent Extraction, and Political Extortion (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1997).  Silvia Colazingari and Susan Rose-Ackerman, \u2018Corruption in a Paternalistic Democracy: Lessons from Italy for Latin America\u2019, Political Science Quarterly, 113 (1998), 447\u201370.  Rajeev K. Goel and Michael A. Nelson, \u2018Corruption and Government Size: A Disaggregated Analysis\u2019, Public Choice, 97 (1998), 107\u201320.  Kurt Weyland, \u2018The Politics of Corruption in Contemporary Latin America\u2019, Journal of Democracy, 9 (1998), 108\u201321.  Gabriella R. Montinola and Robert W. Jackman. Sources of Corruption: A Cross-Country Study. British Journal of Political Science, 32 (2002), 147\u2013170.  Daniel Treisman. What have we learned about the causes of corruption from ten years of cross-national empirical research? Annual Review of Political Science, Volume 10 (2007), 211-244.    If you are going to read just one, read the Treisman article.  I am less familiar with the newer stuff (mid-2000s onward).    Fixed a link.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10176.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"1drved","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What kind of research has been done on government corruption? I imagine it would be a difficult thing to study effectively but I'm curious what kind of research has been done on this and if perhaps researchers have any ideas on methods to fight corruption.","c_root_id_A":"c9td1fb","c_root_id_B":"c9tclbq","created_at_utc_A":1367839115,"created_at_utc_B":1367835425,"score_A":20,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Corruption has been particularly popular within political science since a series of corruption scandals in Italy]( http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Tangentopoli) and [Japan during the 1990s stimulated academic interest in the topic, especially in relation to public choice theory.  Suffice to say, there has been a breadth of literature written about corruption in recent years.    Fighting corruption should be based on an understanding of what makes public officials corrupt in the first place.  Since there are multiple explanations, there are multiple recommendations on how to fight corruption.  If you came looking for an easy answer, there isn't one.  If you\u2019re looking for a more entry-level discussion, I would try Google.  I'll give a brief (thus not exhaustive) bibliography:    Gordon Tullock, \u2018The Welfare Costs of Tariffs, Monopolies and Theft\u2019, Western Economic Journal, 5 (1967), 224\u201332  Anne O. Krueger, \u2018The Political Economy of the Rent-seeking Society\u2019, American Economic Review, 64 (1974), 291\u2013303  Susan Rose-Ackerman, Corruption: A Study in Political Economy (New York: Academic Press, 1978).   Jagdish N. Bhagwati, \u2018Directly Unproductive, Profit-seeking (DUP) Activities\u2019, Journal of Political Economy, 90 (1982), 988\u20131002.  Robert Wade, \u2018The Market for Public Office: Why the Indian State is not Better at Development\u2019, World Development, 13 (1985), 467\u201397.  Chalmers Johnson, \u2018Tanaka Kakuei, Structural Corruption, and the Advent of Machine Politics in Japan\u2019, Journal of Japanese Studies, 12 (1986), 1\u201328.  Fred S. McChesney, \u2018Rent Extraction and Rent Creation in the Economic Theory of Regulation\u2019, Journal of Legal Studies, 16 (1987), 101\u201318.  Taro Yamama, \u2018The Recruit Scandal: Learning from the Causes of Corruption\u2019, Journal of Japanese Studies, 16 (1990), 90\u2013114.  Gerald W. Scully, \u2018Rent-seeking in US Government Budgets, 1900\u201388\u2019, Public Choice, 70 (1991), 99\u2013106.    Stephen Morris, Corruption and Politics in Contemporary Mexico (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1991).  Ronald J. Hrebenar, \u2018The Money Base of Japanese Politics\u2019, in Ronald J. Hrebenar, ed., The Japanese Party System (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1992).  Andrei Shleifer and Robert W. Vishny, \u2018Corruption\u2019, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 108 (1993), 599\u2013617.  Eric Rasmusen and J. Mark Ramseyer, \u2018Cheap Bribes and the Corruption Ban: A Coordination Game Among Rational Legislators\u2019, Public Choice, 78 (1994), 305\u201327.   Donald Wittman, The Myth of Democratic Failure: Why Political Institutions Are Efficient (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995).  Luigi Manzetti and Charles Blake, \u2018Market Reforms and Corruption in Latin America\u2019, Review of International Political Economy, 3 (1996), 671\u201382.  Daniel Kaufman, \u2018Corruption: The Facts\u2019, Foreign Policy, 107 (1997), 114\u201331.  Paul Heywood, \u2018Political Corruption: Problems and Perspectives\u2019, Political Studies, 45 (1997), 416\u201335.  Donatella della Porta and Alberto Vanucci, \u2018The \u201cPerverse Effects\u201d of Political Corruption\u2019, Political Studies, 45 (1997), 516\u201338.  Federico Varese, \u2018The Transition to the Market and Corruption in Post-socialist Russia\u2019, Political Studies, 45 (1997), 579\u201396.  Fred S. McChesney, Money for Nothing: Politicians, Rent Extraction, and Political Extortion (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1997).  Silvia Colazingari and Susan Rose-Ackerman, \u2018Corruption in a Paternalistic Democracy: Lessons from Italy for Latin America\u2019, Political Science Quarterly, 113 (1998), 447\u201370.  Rajeev K. Goel and Michael A. Nelson, \u2018Corruption and Government Size: A Disaggregated Analysis\u2019, Public Choice, 97 (1998), 107\u201320.  Kurt Weyland, \u2018The Politics of Corruption in Contemporary Latin America\u2019, Journal of Democracy, 9 (1998), 108\u201321.  Gabriella R. Montinola and Robert W. Jackman. Sources of Corruption: A Cross-Country Study. British Journal of Political Science, 32 (2002), 147\u2013170.  Daniel Treisman. What have we learned about the causes of corruption from ten years of cross-national empirical research? Annual Review of Political Science, Volume 10 (2007), 211-244.    If you are going to read just one, read the Treisman article.  I am less familiar with the newer stuff (mid-2000s onward).    Fixed a link.","human_ref_B":"The first thing that came ot my mind is the 2001 AER paper by Ray Fisman on the case of Indonesia. Daron Acemoglu and some coauthors had done a similar study concerning the US, mentioned here, but I can't find the working paper online.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3690.0,"score_ratio":10.0}
{"post_id":"1drved","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What kind of research has been done on government corruption? I imagine it would be a difficult thing to study effectively but I'm curious what kind of research has been done on this and if perhaps researchers have any ideas on methods to fight corruption.","c_root_id_A":"c9tczyp","c_root_id_B":"c9td1fb","created_at_utc_A":1367838818,"created_at_utc_B":1367839115,"score_A":2,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"My University runs an undergrad course and a masters programme focused on the study of corruption. Unfortunately I don't take the course (not in my area of interest). However, the course tutor, Dan Hough, has recently published a book on corruption that is probably a really good starting point, considering I know he has researched the area extensively.  http:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Corruption-Anti-Corruption-Governance-Political\/dp\/1137268700  Like most academic texts its a tad expensive though, however you can read parts of it on the amazon 'look inside' thing.","human_ref_B":"Corruption has been particularly popular within political science since a series of corruption scandals in Italy]( http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Tangentopoli) and [Japan during the 1990s stimulated academic interest in the topic, especially in relation to public choice theory.  Suffice to say, there has been a breadth of literature written about corruption in recent years.    Fighting corruption should be based on an understanding of what makes public officials corrupt in the first place.  Since there are multiple explanations, there are multiple recommendations on how to fight corruption.  If you came looking for an easy answer, there isn't one.  If you\u2019re looking for a more entry-level discussion, I would try Google.  I'll give a brief (thus not exhaustive) bibliography:    Gordon Tullock, \u2018The Welfare Costs of Tariffs, Monopolies and Theft\u2019, Western Economic Journal, 5 (1967), 224\u201332  Anne O. Krueger, \u2018The Political Economy of the Rent-seeking Society\u2019, American Economic Review, 64 (1974), 291\u2013303  Susan Rose-Ackerman, Corruption: A Study in Political Economy (New York: Academic Press, 1978).   Jagdish N. Bhagwati, \u2018Directly Unproductive, Profit-seeking (DUP) Activities\u2019, Journal of Political Economy, 90 (1982), 988\u20131002.  Robert Wade, \u2018The Market for Public Office: Why the Indian State is not Better at Development\u2019, World Development, 13 (1985), 467\u201397.  Chalmers Johnson, \u2018Tanaka Kakuei, Structural Corruption, and the Advent of Machine Politics in Japan\u2019, Journal of Japanese Studies, 12 (1986), 1\u201328.  Fred S. McChesney, \u2018Rent Extraction and Rent Creation in the Economic Theory of Regulation\u2019, Journal of Legal Studies, 16 (1987), 101\u201318.  Taro Yamama, \u2018The Recruit Scandal: Learning from the Causes of Corruption\u2019, Journal of Japanese Studies, 16 (1990), 90\u2013114.  Gerald W. Scully, \u2018Rent-seeking in US Government Budgets, 1900\u201388\u2019, Public Choice, 70 (1991), 99\u2013106.    Stephen Morris, Corruption and Politics in Contemporary Mexico (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1991).  Ronald J. Hrebenar, \u2018The Money Base of Japanese Politics\u2019, in Ronald J. Hrebenar, ed., The Japanese Party System (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1992).  Andrei Shleifer and Robert W. Vishny, \u2018Corruption\u2019, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 108 (1993), 599\u2013617.  Eric Rasmusen and J. Mark Ramseyer, \u2018Cheap Bribes and the Corruption Ban: A Coordination Game Among Rational Legislators\u2019, Public Choice, 78 (1994), 305\u201327.   Donald Wittman, The Myth of Democratic Failure: Why Political Institutions Are Efficient (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995).  Luigi Manzetti and Charles Blake, \u2018Market Reforms and Corruption in Latin America\u2019, Review of International Political Economy, 3 (1996), 671\u201382.  Daniel Kaufman, \u2018Corruption: The Facts\u2019, Foreign Policy, 107 (1997), 114\u201331.  Paul Heywood, \u2018Political Corruption: Problems and Perspectives\u2019, Political Studies, 45 (1997), 416\u201335.  Donatella della Porta and Alberto Vanucci, \u2018The \u201cPerverse Effects\u201d of Political Corruption\u2019, Political Studies, 45 (1997), 516\u201338.  Federico Varese, \u2018The Transition to the Market and Corruption in Post-socialist Russia\u2019, Political Studies, 45 (1997), 579\u201396.  Fred S. McChesney, Money for Nothing: Politicians, Rent Extraction, and Political Extortion (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1997).  Silvia Colazingari and Susan Rose-Ackerman, \u2018Corruption in a Paternalistic Democracy: Lessons from Italy for Latin America\u2019, Political Science Quarterly, 113 (1998), 447\u201370.  Rajeev K. Goel and Michael A. Nelson, \u2018Corruption and Government Size: A Disaggregated Analysis\u2019, Public Choice, 97 (1998), 107\u201320.  Kurt Weyland, \u2018The Politics of Corruption in Contemporary Latin America\u2019, Journal of Democracy, 9 (1998), 108\u201321.  Gabriella R. Montinola and Robert W. Jackman. Sources of Corruption: A Cross-Country Study. British Journal of Political Science, 32 (2002), 147\u2013170.  Daniel Treisman. What have we learned about the causes of corruption from ten years of cross-national empirical research? Annual Review of Political Science, Volume 10 (2007), 211-244.    If you are going to read just one, read the Treisman article.  I am less familiar with the newer stuff (mid-2000s onward).    Fixed a link.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":297.0,"score_ratio":10.0}
{"post_id":"x3k4q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Who has more control of where gov't money is spent specifically, congress or the president?","c_root_id_A":"c5iviim","c_root_id_B":"c5ivot8","created_at_utc_A":1343172671,"created_at_utc_B":1343173360,"score_A":7,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"In theory, it would be Congress with the president just having the ability to veto budgets he or she doesn't agree with. However, I think, considering how much discretion the executive branch is given in implementing the laws and the fact that the president tends to be the first mover in terms of submitting a budget bill, that it's probably the president who gets more control in practice.","human_ref_B":"Hands down, Congress.  The President *cannot* write law, he can only veto laws passed by Congress, who can then override his veto with sufficient votes.  Despite the posturing, the President isn't all that *legally* powerful (barring the Commander-in-Chief part of it.)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":689.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"10m5y0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Why does a higher level of overall education in a society correspond with a lesser incidence of social problems?  It has been shown to generally correspond, but why?  Is it that educated people make better decisions about whatever social problem we happen to be talking about (safe sex, domestic abuse, etc.)? Do they make better decisions because they have better information on that subject **in particular**?  Or is that higher education levels makes those sorts of behaviors less attractive because of the opportunities available to them?  In other words, is it the specific education about the social problem or is it a side effect of higher levels of education?","c_root_id_A":"c6en8ki","c_root_id_B":"c6enr5u","created_at_utc_A":1348837512,"created_at_utc_B":1348840400,"score_A":7,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Both.  In addition to inheriting a higher probability of educational achievement, the well-educated inherit other social capital that reduces the probability of social problems.  Then education contributes to the behaviors that are more weakly correlated with social problems.","human_ref_B":"There is also a discipline that is learned through course work that teaches people to analyze situations before taking action. The further education takes someone, the more important proper analytical thinking becomes.  This does not mean that a person who is less educated is more prone to illegal or immoral action, or a person that is more educated is less prone to illegal or immoral action; rather a further educated person is more apt to think out the action, and the consequences of the action, before deciding to follow through with the action.  This does not seem to equate with crimes of passion.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2888.0,"score_ratio":1.8571428571}
{"post_id":"1v0h45","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"What are your thoughts on basic income? A couple of months ago Switzerland brought some new attention to the concept of basic income along with some of the standard criticisms usually based in arguments that seem more rooted in Ayn Rand fiction rather than actual economics or terms of social policy. I am considering producing a capstone for my masters program discussing basic income as a tax policy if I can't successfully FOIA enough information from a state agency to write my capstone on the incredibly exciting topic of tax policy.   One of the reasons why I am interested in the topic is because in the United States it seems to have support from both progressive camps and small government conservatives, libertarians, and some other groups represent a broad spectrum of political ideologies and create an opportunity to actually present a meaningful policy. It also can address some of the inefficiencies created by the current benefit systems, fix the problem of demand for state provided benefits always growing to meet the supply by supplying it to everyone, and the potential for addressing things in terms of social justice.   I would like to hear your thoughts on basic income as a policy, whether pro or con, and if you're willing to go into depth on the topic how you might implement it as a policy.","c_root_id_A":"cenrmk0","c_root_id_B":"cent514","created_at_utc_A":1389549333,"created_at_utc_B":1389552763,"score_A":6,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"Please note: First level comments requires sources and citations.   PLEASE abide by the subreddit rules!","human_ref_B":"If you want to just hear redditors' opinion, try \/r\/politicaldiscussion or \/r\/neutralpolitics or even \/r\/askreddit  This, however, is a forum where social science research plays a role in forming our opinions. So let's talk about how basic income is viewed in the literature.  1. Milton Friedman was a proponent of the *negative income tax,* which is a kind of basic income guarantee. He argued for it on the grounds that a simple NIT was more easily administered, more efficient, and more transparent than the hodgepodge of social welfare systems in place in the 1960s (and even today). In that vein, see here.  2. James Tobin argued for a NIT in his article, *Is a Negative Income Tax Practical?*, 1967 Yale Law Review, but I can't find an online version.  3. See also here for an opinionated but recent review.  4. Jonathan Hamilton has a Southern Economic Journal article discussing the links between the NIT and the Earned Income Tax Credit.  5. See also Alan Meltzer's article on the NIT in *Public Choice.*  These are all *negative income tax* proposals, which are similar to basic income guarantees and have received more attention in the literature.  Here are two more popular articles: pro and con.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3430.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1v0h45","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"What are your thoughts on basic income? A couple of months ago Switzerland brought some new attention to the concept of basic income along with some of the standard criticisms usually based in arguments that seem more rooted in Ayn Rand fiction rather than actual economics or terms of social policy. I am considering producing a capstone for my masters program discussing basic income as a tax policy if I can't successfully FOIA enough information from a state agency to write my capstone on the incredibly exciting topic of tax policy.   One of the reasons why I am interested in the topic is because in the United States it seems to have support from both progressive camps and small government conservatives, libertarians, and some other groups represent a broad spectrum of political ideologies and create an opportunity to actually present a meaningful policy. It also can address some of the inefficiencies created by the current benefit systems, fix the problem of demand for state provided benefits always growing to meet the supply by supplying it to everyone, and the potential for addressing things in terms of social justice.   I would like to hear your thoughts on basic income as a policy, whether pro or con, and if you're willing to go into depth on the topic how you might implement it as a policy.","c_root_id_A":"centwzl","c_root_id_B":"cenrmk0","created_at_utc_A":1389554490,"created_at_utc_B":1389549333,"score_A":11,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Just because OP says he wants opinions, doesn't mean you get a free pass on sources. If you make claims about the effects of the basic income, back them up! There's a mountain of research, and several recent case studies to draw from.  You are more than welcome to have an opinion, but your opinion should be informed by social science research.","human_ref_B":"Please note: First level comments requires sources and citations.   PLEASE abide by the subreddit rules!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5157.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"sqve9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What would the quality of life be like if wealth were more evenly distributed?  What would we have to give up? What aspects of society would be unsustainable? What would we gain? In the US? In the world?","c_root_id_A":"c4g8dcf","c_root_id_B":"c4g8dpu","created_at_utc_A":1335317062,"created_at_utc_B":1335317107,"score_A":20,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"This does not fully address your question, but Shige Oishi and colleagues \\(2011) have found that people in the United States are happier when there is less income inequality, and that this relationship is mediated by shifts in perceived unfairness and social trust.","human_ref_B":"Here is one controversial take that is certainly worth discussing. Research from epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett (vulgarized in their book *The Spirit Level*) suggests that in OECD countries, lower **income** inequality would be associated with:   * Better community life and social relations, as measured by the proportion of people who agree that \"most people can be trusted\"; * More gender-equal societies, as measured by an index of women's status (political participation, women's employment and earnings and women's social and economic autonomy); * A healthier population, as measured by the proportion of people suffering from mental illnesses, drug use, life expectancy rates, infant mortality, and the proportion of obese individuals; * Higher educational outcomes for children (average of math and literacy scores from the Programme for International Student Assessment, PISA); * Lower teen pregnancy rates; * Less crime: as measured by homicide rates, lower proportion of children experiencing conflict and incarceration rates; * More social mobility as measured by proportion of sons' income by father's income.  Wilkinson and Pickett's claims have certainly drawn their fair lot of criticism, especially based on their use of simple regression analysis.  I don't really want to delve too far into this debate as Wikipedia and various articles on-line do an excellent job at this.  I still wanted to bring it up though and recommend reading the book\/their peer-reviewed articles as their theoretical approach to explaining the causality behind their statistical findings - inequality's impact on individuals' stress levels, perception of solidarity, and feelings of status and self-worth that incorporate the biological, sociological and neurological, are fascinating.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":45.0,"score_ratio":1.45}
{"post_id":"sqve9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What would the quality of life be like if wealth were more evenly distributed?  What would we have to give up? What aspects of society would be unsustainable? What would we gain? In the US? In the world?","c_root_id_A":"c4g8dpu","c_root_id_B":"c4g846i","created_at_utc_A":1335317107,"created_at_utc_B":1335315874,"score_A":29,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Here is one controversial take that is certainly worth discussing. Research from epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett (vulgarized in their book *The Spirit Level*) suggests that in OECD countries, lower **income** inequality would be associated with:   * Better community life and social relations, as measured by the proportion of people who agree that \"most people can be trusted\"; * More gender-equal societies, as measured by an index of women's status (political participation, women's employment and earnings and women's social and economic autonomy); * A healthier population, as measured by the proportion of people suffering from mental illnesses, drug use, life expectancy rates, infant mortality, and the proportion of obese individuals; * Higher educational outcomes for children (average of math and literacy scores from the Programme for International Student Assessment, PISA); * Lower teen pregnancy rates; * Less crime: as measured by homicide rates, lower proportion of children experiencing conflict and incarceration rates; * More social mobility as measured by proportion of sons' income by father's income.  Wilkinson and Pickett's claims have certainly drawn their fair lot of criticism, especially based on their use of simple regression analysis.  I don't really want to delve too far into this debate as Wikipedia and various articles on-line do an excellent job at this.  I still wanted to bring it up though and recommend reading the book\/their peer-reviewed articles as their theoretical approach to explaining the causality behind their statistical findings - inequality's impact on individuals' stress levels, perception of solidarity, and feelings of status and self-worth that incorporate the biological, sociological and neurological, are fascinating.","human_ref_B":"More evenly distributed compared to the U.S. system? You could look at France as a modern example. The problem is that the more a government redistributes wealth, the less incentive there is for people to create value. How ready you are to push the boundaries of this tradeoff is the question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1233.0,"score_ratio":2.4166666667}
{"post_id":"sqve9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What would the quality of life be like if wealth were more evenly distributed?  What would we have to give up? What aspects of society would be unsustainable? What would we gain? In the US? In the world?","c_root_id_A":"c4g846i","c_root_id_B":"c4g8dcf","created_at_utc_A":1335315874,"created_at_utc_B":1335317062,"score_A":12,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"More evenly distributed compared to the U.S. system? You could look at France as a modern example. The problem is that the more a government redistributes wealth, the less incentive there is for people to create value. How ready you are to push the boundaries of this tradeoff is the question.","human_ref_B":"This does not fully address your question, but Shige Oishi and colleagues \\(2011) have found that people in the United States are happier when there is less income inequality, and that this relationship is mediated by shifts in perceived unfairness and social trust.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1188.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1f0i99","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What would the world be like if Neanderthals never went extinct? Would they be treated as slaves? Would people split up into supporting liberty of the Neanderthal or want to keep them in a zoo like other animals?  Would Neanderthals have their own schools, culture and way of life? Or would it mix over time and us Homo Sapiens would integrate into society with them?","c_root_id_A":"ca5lptv","c_root_id_B":"ca5nccg","created_at_utc_A":1369456981,"created_at_utc_B":1369464706,"score_A":5,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"That's sorta like the plot to Robert Sawyer's *Neanderthal Parallax* series of scifi books.  Not exactly high reading, but entertaining.  Basically they discover a parallel universe where Neanderthals make it to present day.  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Neanderthal_Parallax","human_ref_B":"The Neanderthals went extinct for a certain number of reasons, mostly related to what they are themselves (social structure or adaptability for e.g.). To play the what-if game implies that surviving Neanderthals would be different than the Neanderthals that roamed this earth and for that reason we can't apply our knowledge of Neanderthals in a socio-economic extrapolation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7725.0,"score_ratio":3.4}
{"post_id":"1f0i99","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What would the world be like if Neanderthals never went extinct? Would they be treated as slaves? Would people split up into supporting liberty of the Neanderthal or want to keep them in a zoo like other animals?  Would Neanderthals have their own schools, culture and way of life? Or would it mix over time and us Homo Sapiens would integrate into society with them?","c_root_id_A":"ca5lptv","c_root_id_B":"ca5nwk3","created_at_utc_A":1369456981,"created_at_utc_B":1369468149,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"That's sorta like the plot to Robert Sawyer's *Neanderthal Parallax* series of scifi books.  Not exactly high reading, but entertaining.  Basically they discover a parallel universe where Neanderthals make it to present day.  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Neanderthal_Parallax","human_ref_B":"Every population but sub-Saharan Africans have about 2% Neanderthal DNA.  http:\/\/news.discovery.com\/human\/evolution\/neanderthals-modern-human-121101.htm  http:\/\/www.time.com\/time\/health\/article\/0,8599,1987568,00.html  http:\/\/discovermagazine.com\/2013\/march\/14-interbreeding-neanderthals#.UaAjPtTWTT9","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11168.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"jvhm9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"I watched Waiting for Superman yesterday, and it made teachers unions in the US look like Satan for backing things like tenure. How much of this is true?","c_root_id_A":"c2fh767","c_root_id_B":"c2ffybb","created_at_utc_A":1314403565,"created_at_utc_B":1314393081,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If I may be so bold: fuck that shit.  Tenure is one of the only things protecting faculty from parents and students with an axe to grind, changes in administration, management (or state legislatures) that want to cut funding for programs, and so forth.  It's job security, and when you get the piss-poor pay we get, job security is one of the only things that makes it economically feasible as a career choice.  With my skill set, I could probably be making in the low six figures doing demography\/statistics in the private sector.  But I'm teaching.","human_ref_B":"It's very difficult to fire bad teachers, and good teachers (like the ones with Teach for America) have a very high turnover rate.  That's about the extent of my knowledge of that.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10484.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"r5cyb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What is the point of \"titillation?\" Of sexual fetishes? It doesn't seem very adaptive to be turned on my \"bad\" things (i.e., something being \"naughty\") and\/or weird fetishes (e.g., furries), yet fetishes seem to be rather common. Has anyone ever seen any good hypotheses about *why* people experience these sorts of things? Where it comes from or what purpose it serves.","c_root_id_A":"c431s1l","c_root_id_B":"c432hpc","created_at_utc_A":1332270121,"created_at_utc_B":1332273330,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I know little on this subject, but I have read about how a fetish for spanking commonly comes about from childhood spanking. The explanation for that was that the kids misbehave typically because they are neglected, yet require attention. This creates a mixture of the pleasure of attention with the pain of spanking and that sort of association leads to the fetish.","human_ref_B":"Interesting question. Might be a good one for r\/psychology as well. I would just add that there doesn't have to be a particular reason *why* people have certain traits. Evolution doesn't have any particular goal or direction, and as long as fetishes aren't harmful to reproduction they wouldn't be selected against.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3209.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"r5cyb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What is the point of \"titillation?\" Of sexual fetishes? It doesn't seem very adaptive to be turned on my \"bad\" things (i.e., something being \"naughty\") and\/or weird fetishes (e.g., furries), yet fetishes seem to be rather common. Has anyone ever seen any good hypotheses about *why* people experience these sorts of things? Where it comes from or what purpose it serves.","c_root_id_A":"c4348gl","c_root_id_B":"c434zy1","created_at_utc_A":1332281700,"created_at_utc_B":1332285681,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"You might be able to argue that a proclivity for sexual fetishism improves genetic diversity by providing mating opportunities outside of the typical social order.","human_ref_B":"I imagine fetishes are things you strongly associate with sex. This can be due to perhaps a brain mis-development, causing two areas to interact that otherwise\/predictably wouldn't. Or it could be a semi-learned experience. If I have a partner who gets off sexually to a fetish, I would start to use that fetish to my advantage in order to have sex myself. Through this, that fetish will become strongly associated with sex.  It is sort of a meme (the original meaning of the word), but with sexual ideas instead of general ideas. That partner could have developed that fetish from another partner, and so on and so forth, and the idea lives on. People may develop them from online videos as well. They are things that the brain deeply believes will allow them to have access to sex, at least in my interpretation of fetishes.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3981.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1xd3em","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.67,"history":"Is it still racist if I say the majority of a certain demographic has a specific trait?","c_root_id_A":"cfabcib","c_root_id_B":"cfaj5g8","created_at_utc_A":1391884384,"created_at_utc_B":1391904181,"score_A":20,"score_B":38,"human_ref_A":"Race is a social construct Read Here, and therefore cannot be a cause of anything. This does not mean it can't be correlated with things, such as crime (Cole, Smith, & DeJong, 2013). But this isn't the same as saying certain racial groups are more crime-prone. It just means certain racial groups are more likely to experience other social disadvantages (i.e. poverty), which can lead to crime.","human_ref_B":"Is it \"racist\" as in \"having or showing the belief that a particular race is superior to another.\" No, probably not. However:  1.) It may be seen as tactless in some circles, depending greatly on how you phrase it.  2.) Emphasizing certain statistics, even if they are true, can lead to profiling. Profiling can work as a feedback loop, and make the problem worse as more people put stock in it.  For example, the more people look at black people as more likely to be criminals, the more law-abiding black people get profiled as potentially dangerous, passed over for jobs, etc. This can lead to poverty, depression, resentment, etc., and can actually set in motion many of the factors that might encourage people to turn to crime. Then the trend becomes even *more* pronounced, the profiling gets worse, and down we go.  Similarly, if people think women aren't as good at math, logic, etc. they don't encourage them to excel at these things. They give them dollies instead of legos, etc. and then those girls don't grow up to be good at math and logic.  3.) Remember every time you are saying something, even if it's true, you are also implying something additional by saying it. Namely, that it matters, otherwise you presumably wouldn't have said it. So if you bring up the relationship between, say, race and education, you may be citing true statistics. The question is why are you bringing that up instead of the relationship between, say, poverty and education, or between location and education, etc. Clearly you think race is more relevant, or else why bring it up instead of one of these other statistics? It's not necessarily about what you're saying, it's about what you're implying by saying it.  Finally, I should mention that the way the word \"racist\" is used these days colloquially skews a bit from the dictionary definition. If you say something that smacks of ignorance or insensitivity toward the issues faced by less privileged racial groups, there's a fair chance it will get you called a racist. Even so, the person calling you that likely doesn't think you're a white supremacist or anything, they probably just think you're a jerk\/idiot.  edit: added links","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19797.0,"score_ratio":1.9}
{"post_id":"qk8zcl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why are the normal price mechanisms not working properly to fix supply shortages? Why are the normal price mechanisms not working properly to fix supply shortages?   Like, if you are ordering a product that needs to be shipped, shouldn't you theoretically be able to simply pay a higher and higher price, until more people are willing to work as truck drivers? (or whatever the bottleneck happens to be)   When people complain about the supply chain, are they actually implicitly saying that they're simply not willing to pay what it would actually cost to get stuff delivered on time, or is there some more fundamental breakdown of the normal mechanisms of supply and demand preventing equilibrium from even being reached at all?   I had this question after reading this post, specifically this:   >Normally one would settle this by changing prices, but for various reasons we won\u2019t get into price mechanisms aren\u2019t working properly to fix supply shortages.","c_root_id_A":"hiv1vim","c_root_id_B":"hivvx32","created_at_utc_A":1635754399,"created_at_utc_B":1635775838,"score_A":23,"score_B":36,"human_ref_A":"You want r\/askeconomics.","human_ref_B":"You're committing the Anthropomorphic Fallacy, markets don't exist, they don't fix anything. Markets are a story we tell ourselves to describe the way a very complex system (the sum of many humans buy and selling things) appear to act in the world.  One way to think of how global capitalism has organized it's infrastructure is that these massively complex global spanning organizations are \\*efficient\\*, i.e. they use the minimum amount of capital and labor to move goods around.  Another way to think about how global capitalism has organized it's infrastructure is that these massively complex global spanning organizations are \\*vulnerable\\*, and prone to cascade failure by centralizing resources and incentivizing the minimum amount of investment in spare capacity.  &#x200B;  https:\/\/link.springer.com\/article\/10.1007\/s11071-018-4135-z","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21439.0,"score_ratio":1.5652173913}
{"post_id":"1gbptv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Is there a direct correlation between the level of a state's urbanization with the level of its modernization? Like if you compare one state where 50% of the population lives in an urban area with a state where 30% of the population lives in an urban area, can you automatically assume the level of modernization is greater in the former than the latter?  What about historically vs. in current modern times?  I also say modernization because I'm not sure if industrialization is applicable now, given the heavy service sectors of many modern cities.","c_root_id_A":"caioepw","c_root_id_B":"caioaqc","created_at_utc_A":1371195885,"created_at_utc_B":1371195245,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Modernization is a terrible word for this, the term carries a lot of colonial baggage! But your question is still very good...   Urbanization is an indicator for a variety of social and economic phenomena. For example, the most urbanized countries in the world also happen to be the healthiest, wealthiest, and most educated. Take a look at this list, excluding city states, countries such as Denmark, Australia, France, Japan, etc. all appear in very high positions. Scroll to the bottom and you'll see many sub saharan African countries. While urbanization is not a perfect indicator, it can suggest aspects of a country's development (from a western capitalist perspective). So in that sense, yes a country that is more urbanized has a more developed economy, and will likely have better access to health, education, have less crime, more women's rights, lower infant mortality, and however many more stats you want...   You are right to say that urbanization no longer equates to industrialization. Instead, many cities are now called \"post-industrial\". The post industrial economy is based heavily on service and command functions. There are however numerous industrial urban regions in the world (coastal China...)  Historically, urbanization was used as an indicator for level economic specialization, agricultural efficiency, and levels of technological attainment. Rome was a city of a million before electricity!","human_ref_B":"Urbanization is easy to define, percentage of total population living in sectors defined as urban, but how are you defining modernization? Modernization isn't as clear cut.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":640.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"j1xsef","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What are the most important works in Migration Studies? Could someone name a couple of papers or books that are considered essential in the field of migration studies? I\u2019m doing a master\u2019s in social anthropology and would really like to get into the field. Thank you in advance:)","c_root_id_A":"g73b0ko","c_root_id_B":"g7253o9","created_at_utc_A":1601405260,"created_at_utc_B":1601387486,"score_A":9,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Finally something I am hopefully qualified for! I am doing my phd on refugee inclusion and taught some undergraduate courses on the topic of migration. One book I love is \u201cmigration\u201d by Samers and Collyer. They discuss so many so different approaches and theories and it\u2019s quite up to date. They guide you through the historical milestones but also discuss the status quo of social science on the respective topic (2016). From push & pull models  to Foucault and bordering, they cover a lot of ground and add a spatial perspective to the research field. So this might be a good starting point (though I\u2019m no anthropologist, but a socioeconomist myself).  Here\u2019s a review of it https:\/\/link.springer.com\/article\/10.1007\/s12134-011-0182-8","human_ref_B":"I'm not sure about the \"most\" important works on migration, but if you are interested U.S. immigration policy a couple of good books include:  Impossible Subjects, Mae Ngai https:\/\/press.princeton.edu\/books\/paperback\/9780691160825\/impossible-subjects  Deportation Nation, Daniel Kanstroom https:\/\/www.hup.harvard.edu\/catalog.php?isbn=9780674046221","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17774.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"j1xsef","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What are the most important works in Migration Studies? Could someone name a couple of papers or books that are considered essential in the field of migration studies? I\u2019m doing a master\u2019s in social anthropology and would really like to get into the field. Thank you in advance:)","c_root_id_A":"g73b0ko","c_root_id_B":"g739ij2","created_at_utc_A":1601405260,"created_at_utc_B":1601404526,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Finally something I am hopefully qualified for! I am doing my phd on refugee inclusion and taught some undergraduate courses on the topic of migration. One book I love is \u201cmigration\u201d by Samers and Collyer. They discuss so many so different approaches and theories and it\u2019s quite up to date. They guide you through the historical milestones but also discuss the status quo of social science on the respective topic (2016). From push & pull models  to Foucault and bordering, they cover a lot of ground and add a spatial perspective to the research field. So this might be a good starting point (though I\u2019m no anthropologist, but a socioeconomist myself).  Here\u2019s a review of it https:\/\/link.springer.com\/article\/10.1007\/s12134-011-0182-8","human_ref_B":"In sociology, Alejandro Portes' work, especially Immigrant America and the New Second Generation.  https:\/\/scholar.google.com\/citations?user=P7ocv9gAAAAJ&hl=en","labels":1,"seconds_difference":734.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"81ybwg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Evidence of Career Criminals? Most crimes (esp violent) are perpetrated by a small percentage of the population I am looking for published journal articles or well-regarded books which address the question: to what extent is violent crime perpetuated by a small and repeating group of offenders?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"dv6ns8l","c_root_id_B":"dv6ddv1","created_at_utc_A":1520202413,"created_at_utc_B":1520190659,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The Pareto principle is recurrently observed in criminological literature. The expectation (rule of thumb) is that a small fraction of offenders are responsible for a majority of offenses (and likewise most victimizations concern few recurrent victims).   Studies like Wolfgang and associate's Philadelphia cohort, Carrington et al.'s research in Canada and Farrington et al.'s Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development highlight these patterns of repeat offending (i.e. a small fraction of offenders are responsible for half or more of total offenses).  >A small proportion of the study males (7%) were defined as \u2018chronic offenders\u2019 because they accounted for about half of all officially recorded offences in this study. On average, their conviction careers lasted from age 14 to 35. (Farrington et al., 2006)  The rule of thumb  can be applied to violent crimes specifically, too.","human_ref_B":"I don't have the criminologist expertise to answer this question, but I study a similar phenomenon in politics: most casualties are caused by a few wars.  Try Google Scholar and the search terms \"power law\" or \"power laws\" AND crime or \"violent crime.\"  There do be some sources there which at least examine the question you asked.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11754.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"zz92b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"How does advertising fit into a a classical economics system? What Im looking for is how would a classical economy handle mass advertising? Would it be considered \"guiding\"  the invisible hand?","c_root_id_A":"c695uk5","c_root_id_B":"c692ays","created_at_utc_A":1347842186,"created_at_utc_B":1347827334,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The classic understanding in neoclassical economics is that, as others have said, advertising is simply about providing information. This 1961 paper by George Stigler has been influential here.   That's not overly convincing, though, since a lot of advertising doesn't look like it's primarily about providing information. One prominent repsonse from neoclassical economists has been to think of advertising in terms of signalling). For lots of products, consumers have poor information about quality. One way producers can convince consumers that their products are good is by advertising. When a firm advertises, it spends resources it can't get back in creating a brand which will stick in the mind of consumers. If they are going to produce bad products, this will become known and their advertising dollars won't be worth much to them. So, by advertising, a firm is credibly saying \"Hey, we're spending this money on advertsing so you'll remember us. We won't screw you over, because you'll remember that too. There are a few papers which take this approach, but here's an ungated one which explicitly contrasts its own rational choice approach to the cognitive psychology view.","human_ref_B":"I asked the same question here a while back, and the best reply I got was a citation-backed statement that advertising raises aggregate consumer demand but doesn't result in more informed consumers.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14852.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"ujin0s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Are test scores good predictors of success outside of school?","c_root_id_A":"i7jty5j","c_root_id_B":"i7l5z1o","created_at_utc_A":1651842847,"created_at_utc_B":1651863031,"score_A":9,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"What type of tests and what is your measure of success?","human_ref_B":"Do standardized test scores in high school predict college performance? Yes. How much? At least more than zero.    &#x200B;  Do standardized test scores predict job performance or income? Hard to say because SATs scores are highly correlated with your current family income (another source): families who make more money have children who can prep better and get higher scores. So while there is some data indicating that standardized test scores can predict income (like the Armed Forces test), there are certainly confounds.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20184.0,"score_ratio":2.4444444444}
{"post_id":"2gjxnx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"[Economics] What is the average percentage of every cash purchase that is received in change? I'm going to go ahead and warn you that this question might not be feasible to answer without a lot of data on cash transactions that just isn't available. But I'm hoping there might be a mathematical way of looking at it.  I am wondering about currency and how the denominations in which we deal might affect how we pay for things and receive change for cash purchases. For example, I buy a slice of pizza for $3.75 using a $5 bill and get $1.25 back, so the change I receive is 33% of the cost. Whereas I may buy $10.94 in groceries using a $20 bill, and my $9.06 change is about 82% of the price I paid. Alternatively I might buy $14.63 worth of groceries with $15, and my change is less than 1%.  My question is: If we had the data (we don't) and looked at all cash purchases, would we be able to discern a \"straightforward\" relationship between the denominations that our currency uses and the percentage of all purchases that is received in change?  Another way to think about this question is: When paying with cash (and therefore, unless using exact change, overpaying every time), what is the average percentage more than the item price that people pay? And the (IMO more interesting) followup: Does this percentage have a demonstrable relationship with cash denominations?  The \"so what\" of this question is that I imagine if we actually could answer this then we could design a hypothetical currency that minimizes change, which might have some ramifications for how much time cashiers spend making change etc. etc.... Plus I'm just curious.  Thanks for your help!","c_root_id_A":"ckjxliy","c_root_id_B":"ckjxw74","created_at_utc_A":1410882657,"created_at_utc_B":1410883212,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This is an interesting math problem, mostly because it is both simple to imagine its set-up but complex to calculate using pure data due to the sheer volume of non-standardized transactions.  What you're asking for, the average percentage of change in relation to actual cost of item, is a very straightforward average problem:  sum[(Cash paid - Amount due)\/(Amount due)]]\/Total Number of Transactions]  This would give you a simple average of all the percentages across all denominations used for all cash purchases. It would give you some idea of, on average, how much are people receiving in change, expressed in terms of the actual cost of the item they are paying for.  Then you'd like to disaggregate this, so that you calculated the average percentage of change with respect to total cost for each denomination, i.e. separate averages for each denomination. This would tell you, on average, what amount of change people are receiving for different denominations, expressed again in terms of percentage of cost of the item purchased.  If you had the data, a simple average formula on percentages would yield your results. Not really economics, simple accounting and mathematics. The main issue is data and ease of calculation. Although, if you had a sample, it would be relatively easy to do in Excel or any other spreadsheet app.  Another interesting question is whether you've set-up the correct metric for what you want. Is it the simplest and most intuitive way of looking at this issue? You want a relationship between the change handed out and the denominations used to determine whether our current currency denominations are 'inefficient.' In other words whether we should be loading our ATMs differently or developing currency in more price-related denominations.  Why divide by the cost of the item? What about dividing by the denomination of the currency? Which would most intuitively give us the result we want?   Take your two examples: $3.75 pizza with a $5 bill. $1.25 change is 33% of the cost and 25% of the denomination. If I buy something for $2.50 with a $5 bill, now it is 100% of the cost and 50% of the denomination. Finally, if I buy something for $1.25, my change will of course be 300% of the cost and 75% of the denomination. If I average the three, I get an average of 144% for cost and 50% for the denomination.  So which gives a better glimpse into the efficiency of a currency? As long as the metric is calculated consistently, and its set-up is explained clearly, the results will be comparable across denominations (i.e. if we looked at change for a $20 in costs of $5, $10 and $15, the results would be identical to the ones in the $5 example).  Dividing by the denominator gives a standard 0 to 1 metric, which can be useful depending on how you want to use the results. The cost metric, however, will expose with a bit more oomph when people are using large bills for small amounts. Using a $20 for a $1 snickers bar, and having percentages of either 1900% of cost or 95% of denomination. This result would only be achieved for a $5 bill if someone used it for something costing $0.25, which is a rare price.  But either metric also poses challenges to your results\u2014you want to know if there is a relationship between the percentage and the denomination, but if the spread between possible change and cost is higher for larger denominations, which it certainly is, the range of percentages will as well be higher. This means there will almost certainly be a relationship between the denomination and the percentage of change with respect to cost: If higher denominations are more likely to have higher differences in cost, they are more likely to have higher percentages included in the average.  This suggests there may be problems with [heteroscedasticity, meaning the variation of the dependent observations (change) is correlated with the variation of the independent observations (currency denominations). This doesn't necessarily mean you can make use of data on change to look at how currency denominations relate to change, but it does challenge your interpretation of the relationship between currency denominations and change.  So, to sum it up all this was to say you could definitely put together this metric, and probably use it to make some interesting statements about how currency is distributed. But it's worth thinking exactly how to set it up, what the communicates and how it will be used, and whether there are inherent statistical limitations to developing a metric with correlated variances. ------------- TL;DR I was really bored so just kept writing stuff about how to develop and interpret this metric, and its limitations","human_ref_B":"I'm sure you'll get some great comments, and this ventures into the mathematics realm, so if you don't get adequate responses here, perhaps there's a ask mathematics subreddit.  I can't really touch on your first few points, and main question... But I might be able to provide a bit of guidance on your last point.  >The \"so what\" of this question is that I imagine if we actually could answer this then we could design a hypothetical currency that minimizes change, which might have some ramifications for how much time cashiers spend making change etc. etc....  You will want to look up things such as \"Optimal Denomination of Currency\".  There are a handful of papers floating around about this. I vaguely remember considering it as a research topic until a professor nixed the idea.  Unfortunately, I no longer have JSTOR access, so can't help much with more papers\/details. :(","labels":0,"seconds_difference":555.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"46j4jj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Do any major religions besides Catholicism and Buddhism have a world-wide leader?","c_root_id_A":"d076cot","c_root_id_B":"d06h2co","created_at_utc_A":1455988376,"created_at_utc_B":1455924441,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Buddhism doesn't have a worldwide leader. (Traditionally, the Dalai Lama was the leader of the Tibetian government.)   That said, the Bahai faith is governed by their Universal House of Justice.","human_ref_B":"The Mormon church has a president.  https:\/\/www.lds.org\/church\/leader\/thomas-s-monson?lang=eng&role=01","labels":1,"seconds_difference":63935.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"19wxag","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"[Economics] What exactly is quantitative easing? (Yes, I've googled it, but I still having problems understanding)  How does buying government securities increase the money supply? What exactly are the feds trying to accomplish, and what are the risks?   Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8s16ar","c_root_id_B":"c8s1keu","created_at_utc_A":1362755899,"created_at_utc_B":1362757254,"score_A":9,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"I know you have already used Google, but check this inforgraphic out.","human_ref_B":"\"Normal\" monetary policy consists of the Fed printing money and buying short-term government debt.  Under \"quantitative easing\", the Fed prints money and buys assets other than short-term government debt. This includes long-term government debt, mortgage-backed debt, agency-backed debt, etc.  There is nothing particularly mysterious here.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1355.0,"score_ratio":2.1111111111}
{"post_id":"13lb10","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"I have a Masters of Applied Positive Psychology. I work as a consultant for Individuals, couples, and international NGO's. AMA Hey guys! As the title says AMA!","c_root_id_A":"c75024v","c_root_id_B":"c7508f8","created_at_utc_A":1353548608,"created_at_utc_B":1353549425,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"1. What's your standard day consist of? And no \"There is no standard day lolz\". Seriously. Humor us. 2. If someone was interested in applied positive psychology where should they start learning? 3. Why do you not work for any \"real\" businesses or corporations?","human_ref_B":"What advise do you have for people who think they are much more interesting than other people find them?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":817.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"13lb10","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"I have a Masters of Applied Positive Psychology. I work as a consultant for Individuals, couples, and international NGO's. AMA Hey guys! As the title says AMA!","c_root_id_A":"c750481","c_root_id_B":"c7508f8","created_at_utc_A":1353548878,"created_at_utc_B":1353549425,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Great - I have a question - Strength-Based work. I have done a fair bit of training in this (working for an NGO) and its often held up as the ideal working tool - do you feel it is effective? Is it worth the emphasis that is placed on it?","human_ref_B":"What advise do you have for people who think they are much more interesting than other people find them?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":547.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"13lb10","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"I have a Masters of Applied Positive Psychology. I work as a consultant for Individuals, couples, and international NGO's. AMA Hey guys! As the title says AMA!","c_root_id_A":"c752ob8","c_root_id_B":"c75024v","created_at_utc_A":1353560887,"created_at_utc_B":1353548608,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Heya. Neglect as a kid, nothing too bad- just a dad who was in the house but not really... There.. Has, I think, led me to an early adulthood in which I have difficulty in relationships- I'm needy and worry hardcore when I don't get attention from my SO which can drive them away. It's awful. I know that this is a shitty way to act but I can't seem to help it! Any practical advice to help me grow out of this?","human_ref_B":"1. What's your standard day consist of? And no \"There is no standard day lolz\". Seriously. Humor us. 2. If someone was interested in applied positive psychology where should they start learning? 3. Why do you not work for any \"real\" businesses or corporations?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12279.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"13lb10","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"I have a Masters of Applied Positive Psychology. I work as a consultant for Individuals, couples, and international NGO's. AMA Hey guys! As the title says AMA!","c_root_id_A":"c752ob8","c_root_id_B":"c750481","created_at_utc_A":1353560887,"created_at_utc_B":1353548878,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Heya. Neglect as a kid, nothing too bad- just a dad who was in the house but not really... There.. Has, I think, led me to an early adulthood in which I have difficulty in relationships- I'm needy and worry hardcore when I don't get attention from my SO which can drive them away. It's awful. I know that this is a shitty way to act but I can't seem to help it! Any practical advice to help me grow out of this?","human_ref_B":"Great - I have a question - Strength-Based work. I have done a fair bit of training in this (working for an NGO) and its often held up as the ideal working tool - do you feel it is effective? Is it worth the emphasis that is placed on it?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12009.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"13lb10","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"I have a Masters of Applied Positive Psychology. I work as a consultant for Individuals, couples, and international NGO's. AMA Hey guys! As the title says AMA!","c_root_id_A":"c752ob8","c_root_id_B":"c751d0d","created_at_utc_A":1353560887,"created_at_utc_B":1353554679,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Heya. Neglect as a kid, nothing too bad- just a dad who was in the house but not really... There.. Has, I think, led me to an early adulthood in which I have difficulty in relationships- I'm needy and worry hardcore when I don't get attention from my SO which can drive them away. It's awful. I know that this is a shitty way to act but I can't seem to help it! Any practical advice to help me grow out of this?","human_ref_B":"What's your experience working with youth?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6208.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"13lb10","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"I have a Masters of Applied Positive Psychology. I work as a consultant for Individuals, couples, and international NGO's. AMA Hey guys! As the title says AMA!","c_root_id_A":"c751wmu","c_root_id_B":"c752ob8","created_at_utc_A":1353557188,"created_at_utc_B":1353560887,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"What's the best way to imply that complaints and dissenting opinions are bad for an organization's morale?","human_ref_B":"Heya. Neglect as a kid, nothing too bad- just a dad who was in the house but not really... There.. Has, I think, led me to an early adulthood in which I have difficulty in relationships- I'm needy and worry hardcore when I don't get attention from my SO which can drive them away. It's awful. I know that this is a shitty way to act but I can't seem to help it! Any practical advice to help me grow out of this?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3699.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"13lb10","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"I have a Masters of Applied Positive Psychology. I work as a consultant for Individuals, couples, and international NGO's. AMA Hey guys! As the title says AMA!","c_root_id_A":"c752ob8","c_root_id_B":"c752c0l","created_at_utc_A":1353560887,"created_at_utc_B":1353559218,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Heya. Neglect as a kid, nothing too bad- just a dad who was in the house but not really... There.. Has, I think, led me to an early adulthood in which I have difficulty in relationships- I'm needy and worry hardcore when I don't get attention from my SO which can drive them away. It's awful. I know that this is a shitty way to act but I can't seem to help it! Any practical advice to help me grow out of this?","human_ref_B":"The only things I know positive psychology, applied or not-applied, is what I've read on wikipedia.  What misconceptions do I likely have about your field?  How are you different from a life coach?  What is one thing that everyone should learn about your field that would help themselves?  What resource(s)\/suggestions would you suggest\/have for a parent of a gifted child?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1669.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"3d3vwl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Are there any positive externalities commonly associated with the marginalization of minority groups for the majority? There are obviously beneficiaries of marginalization or it wouldn't happen, but I was trying to find some sources detailing the mechanisms associated with marginalization that perpetuate it. There must be some broad social benefits that are generally common to many societies across the world or the marginalization of minority groups wouldn't be so common, right? Or do specific cases of marginalization not relate to others outside of their own specific historical context?","c_root_id_A":"ct1y3y0","c_root_id_B":"ct25p4k","created_at_utc_A":1436810728,"created_at_utc_B":1436821853,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Benefits for whom -- the marginalized or the dominant social group that is doing the marginalization?","human_ref_B":"> There must be some broad social benefits that are generally common to many societies across the world or the marginalization of minority groups wouldn't be so common, right?  this assumes that this behavior is rational - i don't think you can conclude from \"a behavior is common\" to \"it is a good idea.\"  but if you're looking for mechanisms of marginalization and the psychology underlying it, you should look into social dominance theory  TL;DR -  * i gain self-esteem by identifying with some group * i thereby establish a cognitive bias to view my group in positive terms (and myself by association), and other groups in negative terms * i can better establish myself in the group, and better establish the status of the group as a whole, by derogating other groups * as this power accumulates, the derogation of out-groups ossifies into institutionalized discrimination, and ideologies\/myths which try to legitimize this inequality must be formed to protect the hierarchy * minority reference groups, having learned to become helpless in the face of institutionalized discrimination, conclude that their best path is to embrace the ideologies and structures of their collective oppression for personal gain","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11125.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"4qkfff","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why has the median middle class income been stagnant for over a decade? In the article at the bottom, by FiveThirtyEight, the author shows that middle class income has been stagnant for a long time. However, the article does not answer the question of why this is the case. Why is the middle class both shrinking and earning less? Bonus points if someone can tell me what we can do to fix it. Thanks.  http:\/\/fivethirtyeight.com\/features\/the-american-middle-class-hasnt-gotten-a-raise-in-15-years\/","c_root_id_A":"d4tphdb","c_root_id_B":"d4tt7ws","created_at_utc_A":1467272450,"created_at_utc_B":1467285031,"score_A":6,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"tl;dr rising inequality  This is a video by one of my sociology professors. I find it explains a lot of this exact topic in a sociological context. It made everything to clear to me.","human_ref_B":"Essentially a decoupling between wages and compensation in the US according to CEP.  > It is widely believed that in the US wage growth has fallen massively behind productivity growth. Recently, it has also been suggested that the UK is starting to follow the same path. Analysts point to the much faster growth of GDP per hour than median wages. We distinguish between \u201cnet decoupling\u201d \u2013 the difference in growth of GDP per hour deflated by the GDP deflator and average compensation deflated by the same index - and \u201cgross decoupling\u201d \u2013 the difference in growth of GDP per hour deflated by the GDP deflator and median wages deflated by a measure of consumer price inflation. We would expect that over the long-run real compensation growth deflated by the producer price (the labour costs that employers face) should track real labour productivity growth (value added per hour), so net decoupling should only occur if labour\u2019s share falls as a proportion of gross GDP, something that rarely happens over sustained periods. We show that over the past 40 years that there is almost no net decoupling in the UK, although there is evidence of substantial gross decoupling in the US and, to a lesser extent, in the UK. This difference between gross and net decoupling can be accounted for essentially three factors (i) compensation inequality (which means the average compensation is growing faster than the median compensation), (ii) the wedge between compensation (which includes employer-provided benefits like pensions and health insurance) and wages which do not and (iii) differences in the GDP deflator and the consumer price deflator (i.e. producer wages and consumption wages). These three factors explain basically ALL of the gross decoupling leaving only a small amount of \u201cnet decoupling\u201d. The first two factors are important in both countries, whereas the difference in price deflators is only important in the US.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12581.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"4qkfff","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why has the median middle class income been stagnant for over a decade? In the article at the bottom, by FiveThirtyEight, the author shows that middle class income has been stagnant for a long time. However, the article does not answer the question of why this is the case. Why is the middle class both shrinking and earning less? Bonus points if someone can tell me what we can do to fix it. Thanks.  http:\/\/fivethirtyeight.com\/features\/the-american-middle-class-hasnt-gotten-a-raise-in-15-years\/","c_root_id_A":"d4tphdb","c_root_id_B":"d4u06ii","created_at_utc_A":1467272450,"created_at_utc_B":1467297994,"score_A":6,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"tl;dr rising inequality  This is a video by one of my sociology professors. I find it explains a lot of this exact topic in a sociological context. It made everything to clear to me.","human_ref_B":"I didn't watch beyandemmett's video, but since its title has to do with globalizaiton that is an important point as to why productivity and wages have been decoupled.   A very structural answer comes from Thomas Piketty, who argues that inequality grows when r (rate of return on investment) > g (gdp growth), in the sense that if return on investment is higher than what is being created then it is redistribution to the investors (the wealthy). The periods of middle class growth were when r<g, because growth was so high. This was either spurts of unsustainable growth, reconstruction after war, and redistributive policies (the new deal in the US). The first two are not reliable in the long term.  The third is possible, but Piketty takes up the critique of globalization, similar to people like Peter Evans, that globalization limits the possibilities of the state. State are limited by international rules (WTO), Keynesian efficacy in a global market (which market demand-side support helps), and the power of international finance to punish states. I.e., fix r>g and investment flows out of your country.  This means that states need to discipline labor to keep their products competitive internationally (this definition neoliberalism can be found in hart-landsberg's \"Capitalist Globalization\").   How this state discipline comes about globally can be attributed to a change in the \"class compromise\", the new deal relationship that empowered labor (check out \"Crisis in Neoliberalism\" by Dumenil and Levy). The disempowerment of labor, with the help of globalization, allowed for an industry\/economy restructuring with the shareholder revolution, which moved away from \"stakeholder\" interest. This meant a global outlook, shorterm gains, and greater reliance on state value and the financial industry. This financialization is very important to a restructuring of corporations, labor-state relations, and class power, through free flows of capital globally (the disciplining of the state mentioned above), the move to flexible accumulation of globalized MNCs, and a greater tool of higher accumulation for large investors. For more on financialization I would look to the work of David Kotz first.  Finally, for a good intro to how\/why all this happened, take a look at David Harvey's \"A Brief History of Neoliberalism\". He takes a less structural approach, but shows how through ideology, education, and finance elites were able to make neoliberal ideology the standard for globalization, which in turn limits middle and working class power.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25544.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"11r3o8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"How does exposure of violent media such as films, television, books and video games affect us individually\/collectively? Violent games in particular have been a source of criticism for violence in the last decade. My question seeks to take more general approach reflecting all forms of violent media. Basically does watching\/playing violent media affect our individual and\/or collective psyches?   Desensitization is just one answer I can think off hand, I haven't got any studies to back that up.","c_root_id_A":"c6ozavb","c_root_id_B":"c6oyw84","created_at_utc_A":1350679583,"created_at_utc_B":1350678097,"score_A":15,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Funny you should ask! I just so happen to have a study on this with Mike Ward and Ben Engelstatter entitled \"Understanding the Effects of Violent Video Games on Violent Crime\".    http:\/\/papers.ssrn.com\/sol3\/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1804959  If nothing else, the literature review can guide you towards a literature. Briefly, to answer your question, there's a humongous literature examining the question about the causal effect of violence in media (watching television, watching movies, playing games) on aggression. It's called the \"general aggression model\" or GAM by psychologists today.  If you all did was the number of published studies that find a positive effect on aggression as a share of all published studies, you'd find that most studies that looked at this concluded that violent media caused aggression.  That said, I think there is an emerging second opinion among psychologists in this area that the earlier work was methodologically not strong enough for the APA (American Psych Association) to publicly support any kind of public statement about violent media and aggression. I presented my research on a violent media panel at a psych conference this summer and people were talking about it.  As I'm an economist, and not a psychologist, it kind of went in one ear and out the other, but others may know more about what I'm describing.  Our study tries to estimate the causal effect of violent video game *sales* using weekly video game sales from VGChartz matched with ESRB data (our measure of video games), then matched with weekly violent and non-violent crime data.  In addition to the looking at this using simple OLS analysis, we estimates an instrumental variables model which used as an instrument the critical score\/rating of the game aggregated over multiple reviewers (described in the paper).  We don't find really anything suggesting that the games are causing crime. In fact, if anything, we find negative effects. Crime appears to slightly dip during these really popular game releases within a few weeks.    Another good article by economists is by Dellavegna and Dahl in the Quarterly Journal of Economics. They look at movie violence and crime using a similar strategy to do it that we employed in ours. (You might say we are trying to borrow their strategy).  They found that when popular violent movies come out, crime falls during those evening hours when people are in the theater.  They think that people are switching out of alcohol-related activities, and that therefore the propensity to commit violence falls as a result.  But if you click through to our study, you'll find a decent lit review.  There's a TON of papers and books out there, though.  The contemporary person in video games is a psychologist named Anderson.  He has meta-analyses in article and book form that we cite that can put you down that road.","human_ref_B":"I am looking for the articles and I can't find them but I am sure I remember a metaevaluation of work in this area.  I think it came from the University of Washington.  I looked at studies in which children were exposed to violence on television and concluded that they act more violently after the exposure.  But these studies were criticized because they did not distinguish between pretending to be violent as a form of play, and actually acting violently.  The initial conclusion was that when you expose kids to violence on TV, they become more violent.  On further examination, it was shown that kids do not become more violent, they simply pretend to be violent.  The supposition was that there was a coding error because pretend violence was coded as actual violence.  As a result, another study was undertaken in which this distinction was made.  Again it shows that children who watch violent TV shows will mimic the violence, but not actually be more violent.  They display no real intent to hurt each other.  So, violent TV does not, contrary to popular belief, make kids more violent.  It has been said that if kids were influenced toward violence by exposure to violence in story form, what could be worse than the Bible, and biblical cartoons, songs, and so on.    I would presume that if you accept this conclusion with respect to TV, you would extend it to video games.    If anyone can find these widely cited studies, I hope you post them here.  I'd like to have copies.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1486.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"3knijl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Is there a replication crisis in the social sciences? Many Psychology Findings Not as Strong as Claimed, Study Says http:\/\/nyti.ms\/1JoE6N6  This disturbs me.  There are a lot of claims from social science that get enshrined in law and policy (priming) that may not be true.    People believe this stuff and what if the alleged effects are b.s.?  Has rhis influenced anyone's work?  What can one do about publication bias?","c_root_id_A":"cuzaqt4","c_root_id_B":"cuzdq9h","created_at_utc_A":1442088653,"created_at_utc_B":1442093937,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The way the replication project is being conducted is seriously flawed, so there is not really a way of knowing. The authors are basing replication off of matching a p-value, with a single study. The nature of p-values does not allow them to be a good criteria to judge whether a study was replicated or not, especially with only a single replication. Had the authors used meta-analytic techniques to combine the effect sizes of the initial study and their replication, they might have been able to say something to this effect. Personally, I would be more worried about the overuse of p values in science as a whole.","human_ref_B":"All sciences to a varying degree suffer from replication problems. Something that seems insignificant or circumstantial is omitted from the methods, the variables could be subject to a certain bias that was either unknown or unaware of etc. This isn't really new and has been more or less common knowledge. Psychologists are just the first to talk about it publically. Ideally a study or experiment could be tested and retested infinitely but resources are limited and funding is hard to come by.   That said there are some definite structural problems in journals, the academy and research in general. A strong universal bias towards positive results (whether through the granting of phds or the articles published in top journals), broadly disciplines and more specifically, schools of thought tend to be insular with little interdisciplinary dialogue and ethnic\/racial biases, to name of a few. Even if we can agree that their are problems, that doesn't necessarily mean we agree on how to solve them.     It becomes even more complicated when we consider that many of the problems are the result of unintended consequences to ideas or policies that seem intuitive or have lots of inertia. The vast majority of researchers are love their field and act in good faith. However,  stating social science is in anything close to resembling an  existential crises is a gross exaggeration (at least methodologically, public confidence or pr is a different story).The scientific method is not perfect but its the best we have come up with so far.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5284.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"3f184c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"How do social scientists deal with the fact that people are very untruthful in surveys? If someone called and asked right now, I would be Latino, make 300,000 a year, and be a fervent Donald Trump supporter. For paid surveys, I often lie about myself to qualify. I think this is pretty common,  in fact I don't know anyone who answers random phone surveys except to mess around. How can any survey be reported as having meaning?","c_root_id_A":"ctljw4x","c_root_id_B":"ctlk7it","created_at_utc_A":1438266825,"created_at_utc_B":1438267333,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I didn't know it was a fact \"people\" (how many is that anyway?) were untruthful in surveys, do you\/anyone have a source for that? Seems like it would vary a lot depending on what questions were asked...","human_ref_B":"Your question is not clear; do you think that some unspecified proportion of people answer very untruthfully, or do you think that a large proportion of people answer untruthfully to some unspecified degree?  As other commenters have said, it's not hard to detect people who make up outrageous lies. Especially if the survey has relatively more items, liars fast lose track of their made up answers and have difficulty answer questions consistently. You can use methods to detect multivariate outliers (extreme answers on multiple items) and the consistency of answers.   As you illustrate, it's fun to make up ridiculous combinations of responses, but people's first thought is not to make a up a moderate combinations of response merely to deceive the interviewer.   Surveys are a very important data source in social science. So, as you might imagine, determining the truthfulness of survey responses is an important activity of social science research. The accuracy of responses can sometimes be tested with multiple methodologies (e.g., administer a survey then a biological test).  There are different kinds of untruths: Lies told by the respondent to entertain himself or undermine the survey purpose and social desirability bias (both for given responses and nonresponse).   A method for reducing social desirability bias is randomized response (https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Randomized_response). I don't know how much this is actually used.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":508.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"s358x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is there any consensus on \"broken window\" policing? How effective is it? What are the pros\/cons? I find it intuitively appealing, but obviously there is lots of room to worry about civil rights abuses (chasing away homeless, etc).","c_root_id_A":"c4auk9p","c_root_id_B":"c4b13z6","created_at_utc_A":1334116562,"created_at_utc_B":1334164550,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Doesn't broken windows follow a reductionist kind of reasoning?  Ignoring important other factors such as economic\/demographic change?","human_ref_B":">Is there any consensus on \"broken window\" policing?  No. The theory is almost impossible to empirically test. There was a lot of discussion in this thread regarding the submitted link and the theory itself. The thread is a good read, you'll probably find out all you need to know there.  Regarding \"broken window policing\", there are two ways to look at that. The theory is quite simplistic, sounds *reasonable* and ligical at first. That is why a lot of police forces have bought into it which has resulted in zero-tolerance policing. This ties into 'right-realist' thinking with regard to understanding and managing crime and deviance in society. \u2018Incivility\u2019 is a term those on the right use to mean anti-social behaviour, such as assault and general hooliganism, and believe that if \u2018incivilities\u2019 are dealt with from the beginning crime will be reduced. A similar analogy was offered by Marcus Felson who compared crime and punishment to touching a hot stove. He explained that when you touch a hot stove you receive a \u201cquick, certain but minor\u201d pain which deters you from doing it again (Felson, 2002: 5). This is applied to crime management by right realists through zero tolerance policing. If minor offences are dealt with quickly and early, people will not commit crimes again which would reduce serious crimes in the long run. Of course, this about the individual and not the area, but I believe it is relevant to broken windows and zero tolerance. There isn't any empirical evidence which shows zero tolerance policing significantly reduces serious crime.  The other way to look at \"broken window policing\" is the more proactive approach (as opposed to the above reactive approach). At the minute, I am conducting research in this area. I am evaluating Secured By Design applied to social housing in Northern Ireland. Basically, SBD is all about preventing\/repairing broken windows, keeping neighbourhoods free from crime by designing them with security in mind. SBD encompasses a lot of principles such as defensible space, natural surveillance, 'sense of community' which criminologists & researchers (such as Jacobs, Newman, Jeffery, Clarke) have suggested prevent crime (a lot of which stemmed from the broken windows theory). Data analysis has not yet taken place for my research. Depending on where you live, this may have more to do with local councils than public police (where I live it's about 50\/50). Read the below material for a better understanding.  tl;dr no consensus, too hard to empirically test. also, depends on what you meant by 'broken windows policing'.  Clarke, R. V. (1983) \u2018Situational Crime Prevention: Its Theoretical Basis and Practical Scope\u2019, in M. Tonry and N. Morris (eds), Crime and Justice: An Annual Review of Research, 4 (1), pp.225-256. Chicago: Chicago University Press  Felson, M. (2002) Crime and Everyday Life (3rd ed.), Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications  Jacobs, J. (1961) The Death and Life of Great American Cities, New York: Vintage  Jeffery, C. R. (1971) Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design, Beverly Hills, CA: Sage  Newman, O. (1972) Defensible Space: Crime Prevention Through Urban Design, New York: MacMillan   Taylor, R. B. (2001) Breaking Away from Broken Windows: Baltimore Neighborhoods and the Nationwide Fight Against Crime, Grime, Fear, and Decline, Boulder, CO: Westview Press  Wilson, J. Q. and Kelling, G. L. (1982) \u2018Broken Windows: The Police and  Neighbourhood Safety\u2019, Atlantic Monthly, March, pp.29\u201338","labels":0,"seconds_difference":47988.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"s358x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is there any consensus on \"broken window\" policing? How effective is it? What are the pros\/cons? I find it intuitively appealing, but obviously there is lots of room to worry about civil rights abuses (chasing away homeless, etc).","c_root_id_A":"c4b13z6","c_root_id_B":"c4at5wt","created_at_utc_A":1334164550,"created_at_utc_B":1334110108,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":">Is there any consensus on \"broken window\" policing?  No. The theory is almost impossible to empirically test. There was a lot of discussion in this thread regarding the submitted link and the theory itself. The thread is a good read, you'll probably find out all you need to know there.  Regarding \"broken window policing\", there are two ways to look at that. The theory is quite simplistic, sounds *reasonable* and ligical at first. That is why a lot of police forces have bought into it which has resulted in zero-tolerance policing. This ties into 'right-realist' thinking with regard to understanding and managing crime and deviance in society. \u2018Incivility\u2019 is a term those on the right use to mean anti-social behaviour, such as assault and general hooliganism, and believe that if \u2018incivilities\u2019 are dealt with from the beginning crime will be reduced. A similar analogy was offered by Marcus Felson who compared crime and punishment to touching a hot stove. He explained that when you touch a hot stove you receive a \u201cquick, certain but minor\u201d pain which deters you from doing it again (Felson, 2002: 5). This is applied to crime management by right realists through zero tolerance policing. If minor offences are dealt with quickly and early, people will not commit crimes again which would reduce serious crimes in the long run. Of course, this about the individual and not the area, but I believe it is relevant to broken windows and zero tolerance. There isn't any empirical evidence which shows zero tolerance policing significantly reduces serious crime.  The other way to look at \"broken window policing\" is the more proactive approach (as opposed to the above reactive approach). At the minute, I am conducting research in this area. I am evaluating Secured By Design applied to social housing in Northern Ireland. Basically, SBD is all about preventing\/repairing broken windows, keeping neighbourhoods free from crime by designing them with security in mind. SBD encompasses a lot of principles such as defensible space, natural surveillance, 'sense of community' which criminologists & researchers (such as Jacobs, Newman, Jeffery, Clarke) have suggested prevent crime (a lot of which stemmed from the broken windows theory). Data analysis has not yet taken place for my research. Depending on where you live, this may have more to do with local councils than public police (where I live it's about 50\/50). Read the below material for a better understanding.  tl;dr no consensus, too hard to empirically test. also, depends on what you meant by 'broken windows policing'.  Clarke, R. V. (1983) \u2018Situational Crime Prevention: Its Theoretical Basis and Practical Scope\u2019, in M. Tonry and N. Morris (eds), Crime and Justice: An Annual Review of Research, 4 (1), pp.225-256. Chicago: Chicago University Press  Felson, M. (2002) Crime and Everyday Life (3rd ed.), Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications  Jacobs, J. (1961) The Death and Life of Great American Cities, New York: Vintage  Jeffery, C. R. (1971) Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design, Beverly Hills, CA: Sage  Newman, O. (1972) Defensible Space: Crime Prevention Through Urban Design, New York: MacMillan   Taylor, R. B. (2001) Breaking Away from Broken Windows: Baltimore Neighborhoods and the Nationwide Fight Against Crime, Grime, Fear, and Decline, Boulder, CO: Westview Press  Wilson, J. Q. and Kelling, G. L. (1982) \u2018Broken Windows: The Police and  Neighbourhood Safety\u2019, Atlantic Monthly, March, pp.29\u201338","human_ref_B":"Crazy timing. I looked at your question, didn't know the answer, and went to do something else listening to some podcasts. I happened to open a 60-second mind episode that was talking about this exact issue. Apparently new research suggests that there is a psychologically true component to the crack-down. The episode is called \"First Impressions Can Be Quite Accurate\" and they refer to a published article that you should be able to find easily.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":54442.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"s358x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is there any consensus on \"broken window\" policing? How effective is it? What are the pros\/cons? I find it intuitively appealing, but obviously there is lots of room to worry about civil rights abuses (chasing away homeless, etc).","c_root_id_A":"c4ayfez","c_root_id_B":"c4b13z6","created_at_utc_A":1334151265,"created_at_utc_B":1334164550,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'm no expert but I've read a lot about this over the last decade. Some research does show that it can help. However, police chiefs like to point to 1 or 2 things that *they* did to reduce crime since the mid-90s. The problem is the drop in crime has been nationwide. So NYC does  \"broken windows\" and uses CompStat and claim victory when crime falls. But what about all the other cities that did something else (or nothing new) and also saw a reduction in crime? IMHO, crime went down nationwide because of broad changes in the economy, drop in crack addicts, and social changes for urban poor. The police helped a bit on the margin.","human_ref_B":">Is there any consensus on \"broken window\" policing?  No. The theory is almost impossible to empirically test. There was a lot of discussion in this thread regarding the submitted link and the theory itself. The thread is a good read, you'll probably find out all you need to know there.  Regarding \"broken window policing\", there are two ways to look at that. The theory is quite simplistic, sounds *reasonable* and ligical at first. That is why a lot of police forces have bought into it which has resulted in zero-tolerance policing. This ties into 'right-realist' thinking with regard to understanding and managing crime and deviance in society. \u2018Incivility\u2019 is a term those on the right use to mean anti-social behaviour, such as assault and general hooliganism, and believe that if \u2018incivilities\u2019 are dealt with from the beginning crime will be reduced. A similar analogy was offered by Marcus Felson who compared crime and punishment to touching a hot stove. He explained that when you touch a hot stove you receive a \u201cquick, certain but minor\u201d pain which deters you from doing it again (Felson, 2002: 5). This is applied to crime management by right realists through zero tolerance policing. If minor offences are dealt with quickly and early, people will not commit crimes again which would reduce serious crimes in the long run. Of course, this about the individual and not the area, but I believe it is relevant to broken windows and zero tolerance. There isn't any empirical evidence which shows zero tolerance policing significantly reduces serious crime.  The other way to look at \"broken window policing\" is the more proactive approach (as opposed to the above reactive approach). At the minute, I am conducting research in this area. I am evaluating Secured By Design applied to social housing in Northern Ireland. Basically, SBD is all about preventing\/repairing broken windows, keeping neighbourhoods free from crime by designing them with security in mind. SBD encompasses a lot of principles such as defensible space, natural surveillance, 'sense of community' which criminologists & researchers (such as Jacobs, Newman, Jeffery, Clarke) have suggested prevent crime (a lot of which stemmed from the broken windows theory). Data analysis has not yet taken place for my research. Depending on where you live, this may have more to do with local councils than public police (where I live it's about 50\/50). Read the below material for a better understanding.  tl;dr no consensus, too hard to empirically test. also, depends on what you meant by 'broken windows policing'.  Clarke, R. V. (1983) \u2018Situational Crime Prevention: Its Theoretical Basis and Practical Scope\u2019, in M. Tonry and N. Morris (eds), Crime and Justice: An Annual Review of Research, 4 (1), pp.225-256. Chicago: Chicago University Press  Felson, M. (2002) Crime and Everyday Life (3rd ed.), Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications  Jacobs, J. (1961) The Death and Life of Great American Cities, New York: Vintage  Jeffery, C. R. (1971) Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design, Beverly Hills, CA: Sage  Newman, O. (1972) Defensible Space: Crime Prevention Through Urban Design, New York: MacMillan   Taylor, R. B. (2001) Breaking Away from Broken Windows: Baltimore Neighborhoods and the Nationwide Fight Against Crime, Grime, Fear, and Decline, Boulder, CO: Westview Press  Wilson, J. Q. and Kelling, G. L. (1982) \u2018Broken Windows: The Police and  Neighbourhood Safety\u2019, Atlantic Monthly, March, pp.29\u201338","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13285.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"s358x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is there any consensus on \"broken window\" policing? How effective is it? What are the pros\/cons? I find it intuitively appealing, but obviously there is lots of room to worry about civil rights abuses (chasing away homeless, etc).","c_root_id_A":"c4at5wt","c_root_id_B":"c4auk9p","created_at_utc_A":1334110108,"created_at_utc_B":1334116562,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Crazy timing. I looked at your question, didn't know the answer, and went to do something else listening to some podcasts. I happened to open a 60-second mind episode that was talking about this exact issue. Apparently new research suggests that there is a psychologically true component to the crack-down. The episode is called \"First Impressions Can Be Quite Accurate\" and they refer to a published article that you should be able to find easily.","human_ref_B":"Doesn't broken windows follow a reductionist kind of reasoning?  Ignoring important other factors such as economic\/demographic change?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6454.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1l2gwp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What are the sociological definition(s?) of racism? I hear it often said that the \"power+prejudice\" definition is used to the exclusion of all others in sociological research and academia, and that if you use any other definition you are most likely an uneducated plebe of some sort and probably also a member of the klan. I am aware that that definition has been used probably with some currency, but I'm doubtful that it has totally marginalized all other definitions.   Additionally, how would users of this definition deal with something like black americans discriminating against asian immigrants based on their race (hypothetical)? Would they just call it race-based prejudice but not racism?","c_root_id_A":"cbvaycg","c_root_id_B":"cbv7nht","created_at_utc_A":1377478066,"created_at_utc_B":1377467777,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This journal article by Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, provides a decent commentary over the definitions of racism and how it's been studied over the years.  I'll go ahead and highlight probably the more relevant points for you. His definition:   >I reserve the term racism (racial ideology) for the segment of the ideological structure of a social system that crystallizes racial notions and stereotypes. Racism provides the rationalizations for social, political, and economic interactions between the races . Depending on the particular character of a racialized social system and on the struggles of the subordinated races, racial ideology may be developed highly (as in apartheid), or loosely (as in slavery), and its content can be expressed in overt or covert terms.   > Although racism or racial ideology originates in race relations, it acquires relative autonomy in the social system and performs practical functions.)9 In Gilroy's words, racial ideology \"mediates the world of agents and the structures which are created by their social praxis.\" Racism crystallizes the changing \"dogma\" on which actors in the social system operate, and becomes \"common sense;\" it provides the rules for perceiving and dealing with the \"other\" in a racialized society. In the United States, for instance, because racial notions about what Blacks and Whites are or ought to be pervade their encounters, Whites still have difficulty in dealing with Black bankers, lawyers, professors, and doctors. Thus, although racist ideology is ultimately false, it fulfills a practical role in racialized societies  (I cut out internal citations, btw). So, this definition is largely structural, and that's pretty much how most social scientists study race in the modern era. He explains what he believes are the different aspects of this structure as well:  > First, racialized social systems are societies that allocate differential economic, political, social, and even psychological rewards to groups along racial lines; lines that are socially constructed. After a society becomes racialized, a set of social relations and practices based on racial distinctions develops at all societal levels. I designate the aggregate of those relations and practices as the racial structure of a society.   > Second, races historically are constituted according to the process of racialization; they become the effect of relations of opposition between racialized groups at all levels of a social formation.   > Third, on the basis of this structure, there develops a racial ideology (what analysts have coded as racism). This ideology is not simply a \"superstructural\" phenomenon (a mere reflection of the racialized system), but becomes the organizational map that guides actions of racial actors in society. It becomes as real as the racial relations it organizes.   > Fourth, most struggles in a racialized social system contain a racial component, but sometimes they acquire and\/or exhibit a distinct racial character. Racial contestation is the logical outcome of a society with a racial hierarchy. A social formation that includes some form of racialization will always exhibit some form of racial contestation.   > Finally, the process of racial contestation reveals the different objective interests of the races in a racialized system.   What this comes down to is that the simple psychological definition of racism is rather limiting and somewhat denies the historical and societal context of race. Race and perceptions of race - stereotypes, prejudices, or otherwise - are learned as well as reinforced by societal structures. This applies not just to whites, but to members of all race groups.  Omi and Winant's work on Racial Formations is probably also really helpful in understanding how race is understood academically.","human_ref_B":"I found an article on this exact problem recently. I'll link it below. Racism used to be strictly belief-based, but the new P+P=R definition has gained currency among many academics. It, however, is not the universally-accepted definition. The P+P=R definition has a few issues, including the idea of how much \"power\" is required.  http:\/\/www.andover.edu\/About\/Newsroom\/TheMagazine\/Documents\/8-PedOfRacismSWJournal.pdf","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10289.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"162uej","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Why is it that America has such a hard time raising taxes as opposed to Europe? Why is it that us Americans have such a hard time paying for the programs that we want? It's clear that America wants social insurance, we want a strong military, and we even want inequality when the political motivation is removed. Why can we not do it but Europe can?  My theories are  * Race based politics that the largely homogenous European countries didn't much face (why should I pay more taxes to help *those people*?)  * Plentiful natural resources have spoiled us with free lunches  * A deep-seated hostility toward the federal government since the 16^th century","c_root_id_A":"c7sdc1v","c_root_id_B":"c7sd1yy","created_at_utc_A":1357526997,"created_at_utc_B":1357526086,"score_A":8,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"A large part of the social, all-for-one, one-for-all mentality in Europe came from after WW2. Everyone suffered side by side, rich and poor. In a bunker you were all the same, and you could empathise with the people next to you. I think Americans have never really faced such hardship. The closest thing I guess would have been 9\/11, but that wouldn't have been the same - it was more fear, than actual devestation of your economy and infrastrcture, resulting in 'lets get together to hate these people we fear' rather than 'lets rebuild a better society where nobody will be this badly off again'.","human_ref_B":"For one thing, we eschew Federal-level sales taxes, which drive much of the difference in tax revenue between the US and EU.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":911.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"ebnonp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Does an inequality-adjusted measure of GDP exist?","c_root_id_A":"fb66fud","c_root_id_B":"fb65t38","created_at_utc_A":1576542549,"created_at_utc_B":1576542098,"score_A":10,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"the VMI?  https:\/\/ideas.repec.org\/p\/ipc\/pbrief\/7.html  https:\/\/www.eldis.org\/document\/A43359  > Does GDP per capita (or the average wealth per person in a country) reflect the amount of wealth that the vast majority of the individuals have? This briefing argues that this is not the case, as averages conceal the distribution of wealth in a society. It proposes an absolute measure of income and inequality, called the Vast Majority Income (VMI). The VMI reflects the total wealth held by the vast majority (the first 80 per cent) of the population \u2013 rather than all of the population (as GDP per capita reflects).","human_ref_B":"What do you mean by \"inequality-adjusted?\" Adjusted how?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":451.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"ebnonp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Does an inequality-adjusted measure of GDP exist?","c_root_id_A":"fb65t38","c_root_id_B":"fb68aep","created_at_utc_A":1576542098,"created_at_utc_B":1576543878,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"What do you mean by \"inequality-adjusted?\" Adjusted how?","human_ref_B":"I've seen Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI) cited on various blogs. It reduces GDP for negative environmental factors eg cost of pollution, loss of primary forest and soil quality, and social factors such as the cost of crime and commuting and increases the measure for positive factors missing from GDP such as housework, volunteer work, and higher education.   Also turns out that the world\u2019s Genuine Progress peaked in 1978 and has been falling since...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1780.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"gcs1pm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"Does research suggest people who gain power become corrupt or does it reaffirm our existing moral code?","c_root_id_A":"fpfgp4r","c_root_id_B":"fpe0g8w","created_at_utc_A":1588570717,"created_at_utc_B":1588537890,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Some relevant links to research that came to mind:   Social class, solipsism, and contextualism: How the rich are different from the poor.   Are the Rich More Selfish than the Poor, or Do They Just Have More Money? A Natural Field Experiment\\)  Interestingly, from the abstract:   >The growing concentration of resources among the rich has re-ignited a discussion about whether the rich are more selfish than others. While many recent studies show the rich behaving less pro-socially, endogeneity and selection problems prevent safe inferences about differences in social preferences. We present new evidence from a natural field experiment in which we \u201cmisdeliver\u201d envelopes to rich and poor households in a Dutch city, varying their contents to identify motives for returning them. Our raw data indicate the rich behave more pro-socially. Controlling for pressures associated with poverty and the marginal utility of money, however, we find no difference in social preferences. The primary distinction between rich and poor is simply that the rich have more money.   At least in the Netherlands there's not a whole lot of connection between rich and poor. Though, note, that's a European country, as opposed to the United States, where we see more individualistic and a \"greed is good\" sort of culture at the moment. Personally, I'd trust a European company more than a company from the United States when it comes to delivering quality and socially responsible goods.    _______________________________________________________________  Searched on google scholar \"rich wealthy money sympathy empathy compassion\".  Edit: As you can see I connected \"corruption\" with \"sympathy\" etc... as, in my opinion, that's a major factor, but may not be accurate and may differ from your ideas\/question.","human_ref_B":"This study that also used a game like Piff's Monopoly - albeit more dictator-like -  found that power corrupts, and that testosterone plays a role in this as well.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":32827.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"171x3o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why does the 22nd Amendment exist? I know the historic reasons, but what benefits to the country does limiting a President to two terms? I'm not from the USA so apologies if this is a question answered with common knowledge or is a bit stupid. But obviously we've just seen the inauguration on TV over here and there was talk about this being his last term, but no real explanation as to why this amendement was made.   To me it seems strange that even if there is the backing and confidence of the party and the people a President couldn't stay in power for more than eight years.  I would be grateful if someone could give a quick explanation to this!","c_root_id_A":"c81g2xw","c_root_id_B":"c81g0t2","created_at_utc_A":1358864910,"created_at_utc_B":1358864626,"score_A":58,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The \"two-term limit\" for US presidents was an infomal rule that goes as far back as George Washington. Until Theodore Rooselvelt (unsucccessfully) attempted a third term in the early twentieth century, everyone had respected and followed the rule, which was thought to be essential to the avoidance of the type of tyrrany inherent in monarchies and other non-democratic systems of governance. After Franklin D. Roosevelt successfully retained the position of US President for thirteen years, and in the aftermath of defeating a set of tyrannical dictatorships, it was deemed necessary to formaly codify the two-term limit rule. There are some historians who argue that the in-office illnesses suffered by both Franklin Roosevelt and earlier by Woodrow Wilson also played a significant role in the adoption of the 22nd Amendment, as there was significant concern that the President's power could be (and had been, in the case of Wilson) coopted by another person when the president became disabled. The 22nd Amendment would preclude the continued cooptation of presidential powers through the legal time limitations on that president's power. There are a number of other factors as well, but these are arguably the most important ones.","human_ref_B":"My understanding is it is mostly from a historical tradition dating back to the start of the nation. George Washington chose to only serve two terms and many of the early presidents followed in his footsteps by not seeking a third term. After Roosevelt won his 4th term (which he died before he could serve) congress decided to make the 2 term limit official as opposed to a voluntary convention.  Reading wikipedia it seems there are some people who believe it should be repealed with representative Jos\u00e9 Serrano proposing a bill every 2 years since 1997 to have it repealed. Personally I'd rather see it repealed so no one has a term limit, or amended so term limits apply to congressional candidates as well.  Wikipedia article","labels":1,"seconds_difference":284.0,"score_ratio":29.0}
{"post_id":"171x3o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why does the 22nd Amendment exist? I know the historic reasons, but what benefits to the country does limiting a President to two terms? I'm not from the USA so apologies if this is a question answered with common knowledge or is a bit stupid. But obviously we've just seen the inauguration on TV over here and there was talk about this being his last term, but no real explanation as to why this amendement was made.   To me it seems strange that even if there is the backing and confidence of the party and the people a President couldn't stay in power for more than eight years.  I would be grateful if someone could give a quick explanation to this!","c_root_id_A":"c81gx1o","c_root_id_B":"c81g0t2","created_at_utc_A":1358868342,"created_at_utc_B":1358864626,"score_A":37,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"When George Washington in particular looked back at history for models of what he wanted the new nation to look like, one of the principle models was ancient Rome and in particular the story of Cincinnatus, the dictator who took left his farm in time of crisis and returned to civilian life as soon as said crisis was over. This tale crossed the ocean and became the ideal of the \"citizen statesman\", the idea that public service was something to be entered into by good and honest citizens who would do their best for a few short years and then return to their daily life.  Now, of course even in the early days of America there were remarkably few politicians who actually lived the ideal of citizen statesman, George Washington being a key exception. However, you can see officeholders making all manner of gestures towards this ideal, such as the fact that for most of the 19th century it was considered hugely inappropriate for the candidate to actively campaign for office and that campaigning should be done only by supporters (and why even today most candidate committees are not \"Rick Perry for Governor\" but rather \"Texans for Rick Perry\" or \"Friends of Rick Perry\").  It was only during FDR's hugely expansive presidency which removed an unprecedented number of constraints on government activity and his four terms that congress felt what previously had been a lofty democratic ideal followed by all good men should be codified into law to prevent the sorts of abuses they perceived had occurred during the Roosevelt administration.  tl;dr- It is mostly historical reasons going back to the myths of Rome, then it was formally codified after FDR.","human_ref_B":"My understanding is it is mostly from a historical tradition dating back to the start of the nation. George Washington chose to only serve two terms and many of the early presidents followed in his footsteps by not seeking a third term. After Roosevelt won his 4th term (which he died before he could serve) congress decided to make the 2 term limit official as opposed to a voluntary convention.  Reading wikipedia it seems there are some people who believe it should be repealed with representative Jos\u00e9 Serrano proposing a bill every 2 years since 1997 to have it repealed. Personally I'd rather see it repealed so no one has a term limit, or amended so term limits apply to congressional candidates as well.  Wikipedia article","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3716.0,"score_ratio":18.5}
{"post_id":"254qa9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Has any country ever legalized insider trading? What were the effects? If not, what can we expect the effects to be? I've seen some radical libertarians propose that insider trading should be legal. Thus I wonder about the effects.","c_root_id_A":"chdzmj4","c_root_id_B":"chdxgof","created_at_utc_A":1399672412,"created_at_utc_B":1399667510,"score_A":23,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"No form of insider trading was illegal in the US until 1909, so we have plenty of experience. The stock market during this period was very easy to con, for example the Anaconda Copper scam, in which Rockefeller created, pumped up, and sold a $75 million company on the basis of a borrowed $39 million copper mine. Perhaps in principle saying \"let the buyer beware\" should lead to more accurate prices, but in practice unscrupulous sellers seem to be the main beneficiaries.","human_ref_B":"One of the Economics professor at my school has advocated for insider trading. I am not an expert on the issue so I do not want to butcher his words.  Here's the article:  http:\/\/online.wsj.com\/news\/articles\/SB10001424052748704224004574489324091790350?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052748704224004574489324091790350.html","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4902.0,"score_ratio":5.75}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65z61o","c_root_id_B":"c65wgxh","created_at_utc_A":1347248371,"created_at_utc_B":1347237186,"score_A":20,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"**Please please provide citations,** especially on topics where everyone has an opinion.    Also please don't downvote\/upvote based on whether you agree\/disagree, but on how good\/bad the answer is - sources\/authority, plausibility, critical thought.","human_ref_B":"The answer is actually surprising, at least imo. It's because people AREN'T stupid. People growing up in poor urban areas where the educational system hasn't worked for their parents and grandparents have no reason to value education. Education in America is set up in a way that schooling is only half the battle. The support you get at home can make a world of a difference.   Some people would like to say that racism is old news and doesn't affect us today. The truth is that even if racism magically disappeared (which it hasn't) with the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 these trends might even still exist today. As I said before you are looking at a group of people (African Americans) who have been failed pretty much every institution in this country ranging from the justice system to education, for a couple centuries. In situations like these people (regardless of racial\/ethnic background) adapt to what works.   Also notice I said African Americans instead of black people. You may be surprised to learn that some groups of black people, such as Nigerians, for example, are the most educated group of people in America. Not white\/black, but people, period. There are other groups such as Caribbean\/West Indian black people who don't have drop out rates like African Americans. I use this to further support my point. While all these people descend from West Africans, they all have different histories which affect their level of success today.  I know it was a long explanation but I tried to keep it general. If you have more specific questions ask away, I'd be happy to try and answer them.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11185.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65z07z","c_root_id_B":"c65z61o","created_at_utc_A":1347247696,"created_at_utc_B":1347248371,"score_A":11,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"One thing I didn't really see mentioned much here is the effect of the way we measure statistics.  Purely pulling numbers out of my ass, just to illustrate this example - let us say that the drop out rate for black children is 35% and the drop out rate for white children is 20%. You take these two statistics, and you say \"the drop out rate for black children is twice the drop out rate for white children, gasp!\"  However, this is actually painting an incorrect picture. The primary indicator for drop out rate is the *school* - that is, if you go to a school where the drop out rate is 35%, it doesn't matter if you're black or white very much at all. Likewise, if you're growing up in say, Plano Texas and attending Plano West (one of the best high schools in the nation), it doesn't really matter what race you are, you're much more likely to succeed than the average person.  The reality is that a black student attending Plano West isn't twice as likely as a white student to drop out. However, *any* student in an inner city school is much more likely to drop out, and since inner city schools are inordinately skewed toward certain minorities, we end up in a situation where minorities who have a large percentage of their population in sub-par school districts appear to, on average, be more likely to drop out.  It doesn't hurt that the \"black people drop out a lot\" narrative is a lot easier to stomach than the \"our schools suck so badly that working the streets and getting shot seem like a viable alternative to taking your SATs\".","human_ref_B":"**Please please provide citations,** especially on topics where everyone has an opinion.    Also please don't downvote\/upvote based on whether you agree\/disagree, but on how good\/bad the answer is - sources\/authority, plausibility, critical thought.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":675.0,"score_ratio":1.8181818182}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65wngq","c_root_id_B":"c65z61o","created_at_utc_A":1347237938,"created_at_utc_B":1347248371,"score_A":12,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"It's...a lot of factors. The short answer is, the socioeconomic status of blacks in America, combined with the re-segregation of the US school system and the use of exclusionary disciplinary practices that create a \"push out\" problem.  I don't have an advanced degree in the subject, so I apologize in advance for any vagueness of mistakes. I'll do the best to synthesize what I've learned so far.  First let's get into the details. To say that **all** blacks in America have a high drop-out rate is a serious oversimplification. Drop-out rates vary by income level; poor whites, blacks, Latinos, Asians, and any other subgroup you can find will all have high dropout rates that decease as income increases. Similarly, dropout rates vary by region type. Suburban schools tend to have low dropout rates, urban schools tend to have high dropout rates, and rural schools tend to be in the middle.  Remember that up until very recently in US history, schools systems were segregated, and not just in the south. Because most cities and states couldn't care less about the quality of education non-white students received, these schools were often very low-quality, especially in areas with the most virulent racism (again, not just in the south.)  So as you probably know, the civil rights movement happened, and was successful in ensuring legal rights for all students to gain aces to formerly all-white schools free from discrimination based on race, through such case as Brown v. Board of Education. But this was only true on paper, in reality it took decades to actually implement desegregation schools, mostly because the same Supreme Court that ruled segregated schools as unconstitutional gave up authority for integration to the same state governments that had created those segregated schools.   Whites did everything possible to prevent blacks from gaining equitable access to the school system. They used the \"massive resistance\" doctrine that was epitomized by Little Rock (\"Segregation now, segregation forever\"), and after Brown v. Board of Education, delay tactics (\"You can't just rush these things, people will get too upset, we need more time...\") and tokenism (\"Of course our school is integrated, we have a whole 10 black students out of 3,000!\"), as well as outright violence and intimidation. Source But when all of that failed after years or decades of legal pressure and activism, the response of whites was frequently to leave the cities for the suburbs, the phenomena known as White Flight. As whites abandoned the inner city, attention of media and policymakers left as well.  The result is the **re-segregation** of the US public school system, in which urban school schools, which are disproportionately composed of poor people of color receive far less funding and attention, in contrast to white suburban schools. Overview Remember that even with federal and state funding, local governments provide the backbone for schools. Since local governments receive their funding from property taxes, lots of poor people concentrated in a school district translates to a shortage of money where it is needed the most.  These inner-city schools have also seen a dramatic rise in **exclusionary disciplinary practices** such as detentions, suspensions, and expulsions. As crime and poverty increased in the inner city, conservatives often accounted it to a lack of morality by poor people of colon, and supported these practices to \"get tough\" on crime, juvenile delinquency, and school violence. Exclusionary disciplinary practices by definition take a student out of class, prevent them from learning, and frequently kick them out of school altogether. Numerous studies have documented that students of color are dramatically more likely to be punished in this way than white students, even for the same infraction. **Zero tolerance policies** are particularly unbalanced in this way. Source # Source #2    These combination of factors have created what many call a **school to prison pipeline**, which I highly encourage you to look up for further reading. Start here Thanks..and if someone more qualified than me could please let me know if I made any mistakes or oversights, that would appreciated.  *EDIT: A few minor formatting errors. **EDIT: Sources","human_ref_B":"**Please please provide citations,** especially on topics where everyone has an opinion.    Also please don't downvote\/upvote based on whether you agree\/disagree, but on how good\/bad the answer is - sources\/authority, plausibility, critical thought.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10433.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65z61o","c_root_id_B":"c65vofa","created_at_utc_A":1347248371,"created_at_utc_B":1347233923,"score_A":20,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"**Please please provide citations,** especially on topics where everyone has an opinion.    Also please don't downvote\/upvote based on whether you agree\/disagree, but on how good\/bad the answer is - sources\/authority, plausibility, critical thought.","human_ref_B":"The fourth season of The Wire focuses specifically on the inner-city school system and its shortcomings. Not very scientific, but worth a watch.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14448.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65wcx1","c_root_id_B":"c65z61o","created_at_utc_A":1347236744,"created_at_utc_B":1347248371,"score_A":3,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I'm a high school English teacher in an inner city school in CA. There are lots of reasons for this and we shouldn't generalize, of course, so these are some reasons I have observed first hand (in my very short career thus far)  - lack of resources-- better neighborhoods receive more money and have more fundraising resources and those communities are financially able to pass special taxes that go directly to their schools - schools that perform below standards actually get $ taken away from them... Not logical - inner city schools cannot attract great teachers due to low wages, poor conditions, no support, etc. - inner city schools also have inefficient hiring practices-- they wait until the last minute to hire people - teachers do not make education relevant in student's lives. I'm a big believer in good parenting which to me means \"don't slack in school son\/ daughter,\" but teachers need to make school relevant. Reading nothing but Shakespeare (I'm exaggerating) in English is not the way to do this. I'm a newish teacher and am trying to change this at my school-- I've hit several brick walls - and instant gratification attitude-- if you know you can make a lot of money drug dealing or other crimes, why would you waste your time in school\/ college when you can get the money and things you want quick and easy by breaking the law.  I consider myself a good teacher-- I actively pursued employment in an inner city school because I wanted to change the status quo. If only a little bit.  Edit: formatting","human_ref_B":"**Please please provide citations,** especially on topics where everyone has an opinion.    Also please don't downvote\/upvote based on whether you agree\/disagree, but on how good\/bad the answer is - sources\/authority, plausibility, critical thought.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11627.0,"score_ratio":6.6666666667}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65vsxa","c_root_id_B":"c65z61o","created_at_utc_A":1347234439,"created_at_utc_B":1347248371,"score_A":2,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"* bad schools * poor family structures (one parent families ect) * lack of resources to correct a problem.  For example, if a kid gets into drugs their family doesn't send them to a special high school in the woods.  Instead they drop out and start selling drugs. * in many cases their parents also dropped out, so it is a generational carry over effect. * like it or not, there are probably some physiological reasons as well.  All those stereotypes exist for a reason.","human_ref_B":"**Please please provide citations,** especially on topics where everyone has an opinion.    Also please don't downvote\/upvote based on whether you agree\/disagree, but on how good\/bad the answer is - sources\/authority, plausibility, critical thought.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13932.0,"score_ratio":10.0}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65z07z","c_root_id_B":"c65wgxh","created_at_utc_A":1347247696,"created_at_utc_B":1347237186,"score_A":11,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"One thing I didn't really see mentioned much here is the effect of the way we measure statistics.  Purely pulling numbers out of my ass, just to illustrate this example - let us say that the drop out rate for black children is 35% and the drop out rate for white children is 20%. You take these two statistics, and you say \"the drop out rate for black children is twice the drop out rate for white children, gasp!\"  However, this is actually painting an incorrect picture. The primary indicator for drop out rate is the *school* - that is, if you go to a school where the drop out rate is 35%, it doesn't matter if you're black or white very much at all. Likewise, if you're growing up in say, Plano Texas and attending Plano West (one of the best high schools in the nation), it doesn't really matter what race you are, you're much more likely to succeed than the average person.  The reality is that a black student attending Plano West isn't twice as likely as a white student to drop out. However, *any* student in an inner city school is much more likely to drop out, and since inner city schools are inordinately skewed toward certain minorities, we end up in a situation where minorities who have a large percentage of their population in sub-par school districts appear to, on average, be more likely to drop out.  It doesn't hurt that the \"black people drop out a lot\" narrative is a lot easier to stomach than the \"our schools suck so badly that working the streets and getting shot seem like a viable alternative to taking your SATs\".","human_ref_B":"The answer is actually surprising, at least imo. It's because people AREN'T stupid. People growing up in poor urban areas where the educational system hasn't worked for their parents and grandparents have no reason to value education. Education in America is set up in a way that schooling is only half the battle. The support you get at home can make a world of a difference.   Some people would like to say that racism is old news and doesn't affect us today. The truth is that even if racism magically disappeared (which it hasn't) with the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 these trends might even still exist today. As I said before you are looking at a group of people (African Americans) who have been failed pretty much every institution in this country ranging from the justice system to education, for a couple centuries. In situations like these people (regardless of racial\/ethnic background) adapt to what works.   Also notice I said African Americans instead of black people. You may be surprised to learn that some groups of black people, such as Nigerians, for example, are the most educated group of people in America. Not white\/black, but people, period. There are other groups such as Caribbean\/West Indian black people who don't have drop out rates like African Americans. I use this to further support my point. While all these people descend from West Africans, they all have different histories which affect their level of success today.  I know it was a long explanation but I tried to keep it general. If you have more specific questions ask away, I'd be happy to try and answer them.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10510.0,"score_ratio":1.1}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65wgxh","c_root_id_B":"c65wngq","created_at_utc_A":1347237186,"created_at_utc_B":1347237938,"score_A":10,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"The answer is actually surprising, at least imo. It's because people AREN'T stupid. People growing up in poor urban areas where the educational system hasn't worked for their parents and grandparents have no reason to value education. Education in America is set up in a way that schooling is only half the battle. The support you get at home can make a world of a difference.   Some people would like to say that racism is old news and doesn't affect us today. The truth is that even if racism magically disappeared (which it hasn't) with the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 these trends might even still exist today. As I said before you are looking at a group of people (African Americans) who have been failed pretty much every institution in this country ranging from the justice system to education, for a couple centuries. In situations like these people (regardless of racial\/ethnic background) adapt to what works.   Also notice I said African Americans instead of black people. You may be surprised to learn that some groups of black people, such as Nigerians, for example, are the most educated group of people in America. Not white\/black, but people, period. There are other groups such as Caribbean\/West Indian black people who don't have drop out rates like African Americans. I use this to further support my point. While all these people descend from West Africans, they all have different histories which affect their level of success today.  I know it was a long explanation but I tried to keep it general. If you have more specific questions ask away, I'd be happy to try and answer them.","human_ref_B":"It's...a lot of factors. The short answer is, the socioeconomic status of blacks in America, combined with the re-segregation of the US school system and the use of exclusionary disciplinary practices that create a \"push out\" problem.  I don't have an advanced degree in the subject, so I apologize in advance for any vagueness of mistakes. I'll do the best to synthesize what I've learned so far.  First let's get into the details. To say that **all** blacks in America have a high drop-out rate is a serious oversimplification. Drop-out rates vary by income level; poor whites, blacks, Latinos, Asians, and any other subgroup you can find will all have high dropout rates that decease as income increases. Similarly, dropout rates vary by region type. Suburban schools tend to have low dropout rates, urban schools tend to have high dropout rates, and rural schools tend to be in the middle.  Remember that up until very recently in US history, schools systems were segregated, and not just in the south. Because most cities and states couldn't care less about the quality of education non-white students received, these schools were often very low-quality, especially in areas with the most virulent racism (again, not just in the south.)  So as you probably know, the civil rights movement happened, and was successful in ensuring legal rights for all students to gain aces to formerly all-white schools free from discrimination based on race, through such case as Brown v. Board of Education. But this was only true on paper, in reality it took decades to actually implement desegregation schools, mostly because the same Supreme Court that ruled segregated schools as unconstitutional gave up authority for integration to the same state governments that had created those segregated schools.   Whites did everything possible to prevent blacks from gaining equitable access to the school system. They used the \"massive resistance\" doctrine that was epitomized by Little Rock (\"Segregation now, segregation forever\"), and after Brown v. Board of Education, delay tactics (\"You can't just rush these things, people will get too upset, we need more time...\") and tokenism (\"Of course our school is integrated, we have a whole 10 black students out of 3,000!\"), as well as outright violence and intimidation. Source But when all of that failed after years or decades of legal pressure and activism, the response of whites was frequently to leave the cities for the suburbs, the phenomena known as White Flight. As whites abandoned the inner city, attention of media and policymakers left as well.  The result is the **re-segregation** of the US public school system, in which urban school schools, which are disproportionately composed of poor people of color receive far less funding and attention, in contrast to white suburban schools. Overview Remember that even with federal and state funding, local governments provide the backbone for schools. Since local governments receive their funding from property taxes, lots of poor people concentrated in a school district translates to a shortage of money where it is needed the most.  These inner-city schools have also seen a dramatic rise in **exclusionary disciplinary practices** such as detentions, suspensions, and expulsions. As crime and poverty increased in the inner city, conservatives often accounted it to a lack of morality by poor people of colon, and supported these practices to \"get tough\" on crime, juvenile delinquency, and school violence. Exclusionary disciplinary practices by definition take a student out of class, prevent them from learning, and frequently kick them out of school altogether. Numerous studies have documented that students of color are dramatically more likely to be punished in this way than white students, even for the same infraction. **Zero tolerance policies** are particularly unbalanced in this way. Source # Source #2    These combination of factors have created what many call a **school to prison pipeline**, which I highly encourage you to look up for further reading. Start here Thanks..and if someone more qualified than me could please let me know if I made any mistakes or oversights, that would appreciated.  *EDIT: A few minor formatting errors. **EDIT: Sources","labels":0,"seconds_difference":752.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65wgxh","c_root_id_B":"c65vofa","created_at_utc_A":1347237186,"created_at_utc_B":1347233923,"score_A":10,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"The answer is actually surprising, at least imo. It's because people AREN'T stupid. People growing up in poor urban areas where the educational system hasn't worked for their parents and grandparents have no reason to value education. Education in America is set up in a way that schooling is only half the battle. The support you get at home can make a world of a difference.   Some people would like to say that racism is old news and doesn't affect us today. The truth is that even if racism magically disappeared (which it hasn't) with the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 these trends might even still exist today. As I said before you are looking at a group of people (African Americans) who have been failed pretty much every institution in this country ranging from the justice system to education, for a couple centuries. In situations like these people (regardless of racial\/ethnic background) adapt to what works.   Also notice I said African Americans instead of black people. You may be surprised to learn that some groups of black people, such as Nigerians, for example, are the most educated group of people in America. Not white\/black, but people, period. There are other groups such as Caribbean\/West Indian black people who don't have drop out rates like African Americans. I use this to further support my point. While all these people descend from West Africans, they all have different histories which affect their level of success today.  I know it was a long explanation but I tried to keep it general. If you have more specific questions ask away, I'd be happy to try and answer them.","human_ref_B":"The fourth season of The Wire focuses specifically on the inner-city school system and its shortcomings. Not very scientific, but worth a watch.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3263.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65wgxh","c_root_id_B":"c65wcx1","created_at_utc_A":1347237186,"created_at_utc_B":1347236744,"score_A":10,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The answer is actually surprising, at least imo. It's because people AREN'T stupid. People growing up in poor urban areas where the educational system hasn't worked for their parents and grandparents have no reason to value education. Education in America is set up in a way that schooling is only half the battle. The support you get at home can make a world of a difference.   Some people would like to say that racism is old news and doesn't affect us today. The truth is that even if racism magically disappeared (which it hasn't) with the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 these trends might even still exist today. As I said before you are looking at a group of people (African Americans) who have been failed pretty much every institution in this country ranging from the justice system to education, for a couple centuries. In situations like these people (regardless of racial\/ethnic background) adapt to what works.   Also notice I said African Americans instead of black people. You may be surprised to learn that some groups of black people, such as Nigerians, for example, are the most educated group of people in America. Not white\/black, but people, period. There are other groups such as Caribbean\/West Indian black people who don't have drop out rates like African Americans. I use this to further support my point. While all these people descend from West Africans, they all have different histories which affect their level of success today.  I know it was a long explanation but I tried to keep it general. If you have more specific questions ask away, I'd be happy to try and answer them.","human_ref_B":"I'm a high school English teacher in an inner city school in CA. There are lots of reasons for this and we shouldn't generalize, of course, so these are some reasons I have observed first hand (in my very short career thus far)  - lack of resources-- better neighborhoods receive more money and have more fundraising resources and those communities are financially able to pass special taxes that go directly to their schools - schools that perform below standards actually get $ taken away from them... Not logical - inner city schools cannot attract great teachers due to low wages, poor conditions, no support, etc. - inner city schools also have inefficient hiring practices-- they wait until the last minute to hire people - teachers do not make education relevant in student's lives. I'm a big believer in good parenting which to me means \"don't slack in school son\/ daughter,\" but teachers need to make school relevant. Reading nothing but Shakespeare (I'm exaggerating) in English is not the way to do this. I'm a newish teacher and am trying to change this at my school-- I've hit several brick walls - and instant gratification attitude-- if you know you can make a lot of money drug dealing or other crimes, why would you waste your time in school\/ college when you can get the money and things you want quick and easy by breaking the law.  I consider myself a good teacher-- I actively pursued employment in an inner city school because I wanted to change the status quo. If only a little bit.  Edit: formatting","labels":1,"seconds_difference":442.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65wgxh","c_root_id_B":"c65vsxa","created_at_utc_A":1347237186,"created_at_utc_B":1347234439,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The answer is actually surprising, at least imo. It's because people AREN'T stupid. People growing up in poor urban areas where the educational system hasn't worked for their parents and grandparents have no reason to value education. Education in America is set up in a way that schooling is only half the battle. The support you get at home can make a world of a difference.   Some people would like to say that racism is old news and doesn't affect us today. The truth is that even if racism magically disappeared (which it hasn't) with the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 these trends might even still exist today. As I said before you are looking at a group of people (African Americans) who have been failed pretty much every institution in this country ranging from the justice system to education, for a couple centuries. In situations like these people (regardless of racial\/ethnic background) adapt to what works.   Also notice I said African Americans instead of black people. You may be surprised to learn that some groups of black people, such as Nigerians, for example, are the most educated group of people in America. Not white\/black, but people, period. There are other groups such as Caribbean\/West Indian black people who don't have drop out rates like African Americans. I use this to further support my point. While all these people descend from West Africans, they all have different histories which affect their level of success today.  I know it was a long explanation but I tried to keep it general. If you have more specific questions ask away, I'd be happy to try and answer them.","human_ref_B":"* bad schools * poor family structures (one parent families ect) * lack of resources to correct a problem.  For example, if a kid gets into drugs their family doesn't send them to a special high school in the woods.  Instead they drop out and start selling drugs. * in many cases their parents also dropped out, so it is a generational carry over effect. * like it or not, there are probably some physiological reasons as well.  All those stereotypes exist for a reason.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2747.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65vofa","c_root_id_B":"c65z07z","created_at_utc_A":1347233923,"created_at_utc_B":1347247696,"score_A":6,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"The fourth season of The Wire focuses specifically on the inner-city school system and its shortcomings. Not very scientific, but worth a watch.","human_ref_B":"One thing I didn't really see mentioned much here is the effect of the way we measure statistics.  Purely pulling numbers out of my ass, just to illustrate this example - let us say that the drop out rate for black children is 35% and the drop out rate for white children is 20%. You take these two statistics, and you say \"the drop out rate for black children is twice the drop out rate for white children, gasp!\"  However, this is actually painting an incorrect picture. The primary indicator for drop out rate is the *school* - that is, if you go to a school where the drop out rate is 35%, it doesn't matter if you're black or white very much at all. Likewise, if you're growing up in say, Plano Texas and attending Plano West (one of the best high schools in the nation), it doesn't really matter what race you are, you're much more likely to succeed than the average person.  The reality is that a black student attending Plano West isn't twice as likely as a white student to drop out. However, *any* student in an inner city school is much more likely to drop out, and since inner city schools are inordinately skewed toward certain minorities, we end up in a situation where minorities who have a large percentage of their population in sub-par school districts appear to, on average, be more likely to drop out.  It doesn't hurt that the \"black people drop out a lot\" narrative is a lot easier to stomach than the \"our schools suck so badly that working the streets and getting shot seem like a viable alternative to taking your SATs\".","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13773.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65z07z","c_root_id_B":"c65wcx1","created_at_utc_A":1347247696,"created_at_utc_B":1347236744,"score_A":11,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"One thing I didn't really see mentioned much here is the effect of the way we measure statistics.  Purely pulling numbers out of my ass, just to illustrate this example - let us say that the drop out rate for black children is 35% and the drop out rate for white children is 20%. You take these two statistics, and you say \"the drop out rate for black children is twice the drop out rate for white children, gasp!\"  However, this is actually painting an incorrect picture. The primary indicator for drop out rate is the *school* - that is, if you go to a school where the drop out rate is 35%, it doesn't matter if you're black or white very much at all. Likewise, if you're growing up in say, Plano Texas and attending Plano West (one of the best high schools in the nation), it doesn't really matter what race you are, you're much more likely to succeed than the average person.  The reality is that a black student attending Plano West isn't twice as likely as a white student to drop out. However, *any* student in an inner city school is much more likely to drop out, and since inner city schools are inordinately skewed toward certain minorities, we end up in a situation where minorities who have a large percentage of their population in sub-par school districts appear to, on average, be more likely to drop out.  It doesn't hurt that the \"black people drop out a lot\" narrative is a lot easier to stomach than the \"our schools suck so badly that working the streets and getting shot seem like a viable alternative to taking your SATs\".","human_ref_B":"I'm a high school English teacher in an inner city school in CA. There are lots of reasons for this and we shouldn't generalize, of course, so these are some reasons I have observed first hand (in my very short career thus far)  - lack of resources-- better neighborhoods receive more money and have more fundraising resources and those communities are financially able to pass special taxes that go directly to their schools - schools that perform below standards actually get $ taken away from them... Not logical - inner city schools cannot attract great teachers due to low wages, poor conditions, no support, etc. - inner city schools also have inefficient hiring practices-- they wait until the last minute to hire people - teachers do not make education relevant in student's lives. I'm a big believer in good parenting which to me means \"don't slack in school son\/ daughter,\" but teachers need to make school relevant. Reading nothing but Shakespeare (I'm exaggerating) in English is not the way to do this. I'm a newish teacher and am trying to change this at my school-- I've hit several brick walls - and instant gratification attitude-- if you know you can make a lot of money drug dealing or other crimes, why would you waste your time in school\/ college when you can get the money and things you want quick and easy by breaking the law.  I consider myself a good teacher-- I actively pursued employment in an inner city school because I wanted to change the status quo. If only a little bit.  Edit: formatting","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10952.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65vsxa","c_root_id_B":"c65z07z","created_at_utc_A":1347234439,"created_at_utc_B":1347247696,"score_A":2,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"* bad schools * poor family structures (one parent families ect) * lack of resources to correct a problem.  For example, if a kid gets into drugs their family doesn't send them to a special high school in the woods.  Instead they drop out and start selling drugs. * in many cases their parents also dropped out, so it is a generational carry over effect. * like it or not, there are probably some physiological reasons as well.  All those stereotypes exist for a reason.","human_ref_B":"One thing I didn't really see mentioned much here is the effect of the way we measure statistics.  Purely pulling numbers out of my ass, just to illustrate this example - let us say that the drop out rate for black children is 35% and the drop out rate for white children is 20%. You take these two statistics, and you say \"the drop out rate for black children is twice the drop out rate for white children, gasp!\"  However, this is actually painting an incorrect picture. The primary indicator for drop out rate is the *school* - that is, if you go to a school where the drop out rate is 35%, it doesn't matter if you're black or white very much at all. Likewise, if you're growing up in say, Plano Texas and attending Plano West (one of the best high schools in the nation), it doesn't really matter what race you are, you're much more likely to succeed than the average person.  The reality is that a black student attending Plano West isn't twice as likely as a white student to drop out. However, *any* student in an inner city school is much more likely to drop out, and since inner city schools are inordinately skewed toward certain minorities, we end up in a situation where minorities who have a large percentage of their population in sub-par school districts appear to, on average, be more likely to drop out.  It doesn't hurt that the \"black people drop out a lot\" narrative is a lot easier to stomach than the \"our schools suck so badly that working the streets and getting shot seem like a viable alternative to taking your SATs\".","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13257.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65vofa","c_root_id_B":"c65wngq","created_at_utc_A":1347233923,"created_at_utc_B":1347237938,"score_A":6,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"The fourth season of The Wire focuses specifically on the inner-city school system and its shortcomings. Not very scientific, but worth a watch.","human_ref_B":"It's...a lot of factors. The short answer is, the socioeconomic status of blacks in America, combined with the re-segregation of the US school system and the use of exclusionary disciplinary practices that create a \"push out\" problem.  I don't have an advanced degree in the subject, so I apologize in advance for any vagueness of mistakes. I'll do the best to synthesize what I've learned so far.  First let's get into the details. To say that **all** blacks in America have a high drop-out rate is a serious oversimplification. Drop-out rates vary by income level; poor whites, blacks, Latinos, Asians, and any other subgroup you can find will all have high dropout rates that decease as income increases. Similarly, dropout rates vary by region type. Suburban schools tend to have low dropout rates, urban schools tend to have high dropout rates, and rural schools tend to be in the middle.  Remember that up until very recently in US history, schools systems were segregated, and not just in the south. Because most cities and states couldn't care less about the quality of education non-white students received, these schools were often very low-quality, especially in areas with the most virulent racism (again, not just in the south.)  So as you probably know, the civil rights movement happened, and was successful in ensuring legal rights for all students to gain aces to formerly all-white schools free from discrimination based on race, through such case as Brown v. Board of Education. But this was only true on paper, in reality it took decades to actually implement desegregation schools, mostly because the same Supreme Court that ruled segregated schools as unconstitutional gave up authority for integration to the same state governments that had created those segregated schools.   Whites did everything possible to prevent blacks from gaining equitable access to the school system. They used the \"massive resistance\" doctrine that was epitomized by Little Rock (\"Segregation now, segregation forever\"), and after Brown v. Board of Education, delay tactics (\"You can't just rush these things, people will get too upset, we need more time...\") and tokenism (\"Of course our school is integrated, we have a whole 10 black students out of 3,000!\"), as well as outright violence and intimidation. Source But when all of that failed after years or decades of legal pressure and activism, the response of whites was frequently to leave the cities for the suburbs, the phenomena known as White Flight. As whites abandoned the inner city, attention of media and policymakers left as well.  The result is the **re-segregation** of the US public school system, in which urban school schools, which are disproportionately composed of poor people of color receive far less funding and attention, in contrast to white suburban schools. Overview Remember that even with federal and state funding, local governments provide the backbone for schools. Since local governments receive their funding from property taxes, lots of poor people concentrated in a school district translates to a shortage of money where it is needed the most.  These inner-city schools have also seen a dramatic rise in **exclusionary disciplinary practices** such as detentions, suspensions, and expulsions. As crime and poverty increased in the inner city, conservatives often accounted it to a lack of morality by poor people of colon, and supported these practices to \"get tough\" on crime, juvenile delinquency, and school violence. Exclusionary disciplinary practices by definition take a student out of class, prevent them from learning, and frequently kick them out of school altogether. Numerous studies have documented that students of color are dramatically more likely to be punished in this way than white students, even for the same infraction. **Zero tolerance policies** are particularly unbalanced in this way. Source # Source #2    These combination of factors have created what many call a **school to prison pipeline**, which I highly encourage you to look up for further reading. Start here Thanks..and if someone more qualified than me could please let me know if I made any mistakes or oversights, that would appreciated.  *EDIT: A few minor formatting errors. **EDIT: Sources","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4015.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65wcx1","c_root_id_B":"c65wngq","created_at_utc_A":1347236744,"created_at_utc_B":1347237938,"score_A":3,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I'm a high school English teacher in an inner city school in CA. There are lots of reasons for this and we shouldn't generalize, of course, so these are some reasons I have observed first hand (in my very short career thus far)  - lack of resources-- better neighborhoods receive more money and have more fundraising resources and those communities are financially able to pass special taxes that go directly to their schools - schools that perform below standards actually get $ taken away from them... Not logical - inner city schools cannot attract great teachers due to low wages, poor conditions, no support, etc. - inner city schools also have inefficient hiring practices-- they wait until the last minute to hire people - teachers do not make education relevant in student's lives. I'm a big believer in good parenting which to me means \"don't slack in school son\/ daughter,\" but teachers need to make school relevant. Reading nothing but Shakespeare (I'm exaggerating) in English is not the way to do this. I'm a newish teacher and am trying to change this at my school-- I've hit several brick walls - and instant gratification attitude-- if you know you can make a lot of money drug dealing or other crimes, why would you waste your time in school\/ college when you can get the money and things you want quick and easy by breaking the law.  I consider myself a good teacher-- I actively pursued employment in an inner city school because I wanted to change the status quo. If only a little bit.  Edit: formatting","human_ref_B":"It's...a lot of factors. The short answer is, the socioeconomic status of blacks in America, combined with the re-segregation of the US school system and the use of exclusionary disciplinary practices that create a \"push out\" problem.  I don't have an advanced degree in the subject, so I apologize in advance for any vagueness of mistakes. I'll do the best to synthesize what I've learned so far.  First let's get into the details. To say that **all** blacks in America have a high drop-out rate is a serious oversimplification. Drop-out rates vary by income level; poor whites, blacks, Latinos, Asians, and any other subgroup you can find will all have high dropout rates that decease as income increases. Similarly, dropout rates vary by region type. Suburban schools tend to have low dropout rates, urban schools tend to have high dropout rates, and rural schools tend to be in the middle.  Remember that up until very recently in US history, schools systems were segregated, and not just in the south. Because most cities and states couldn't care less about the quality of education non-white students received, these schools were often very low-quality, especially in areas with the most virulent racism (again, not just in the south.)  So as you probably know, the civil rights movement happened, and was successful in ensuring legal rights for all students to gain aces to formerly all-white schools free from discrimination based on race, through such case as Brown v. Board of Education. But this was only true on paper, in reality it took decades to actually implement desegregation schools, mostly because the same Supreme Court that ruled segregated schools as unconstitutional gave up authority for integration to the same state governments that had created those segregated schools.   Whites did everything possible to prevent blacks from gaining equitable access to the school system. They used the \"massive resistance\" doctrine that was epitomized by Little Rock (\"Segregation now, segregation forever\"), and after Brown v. Board of Education, delay tactics (\"You can't just rush these things, people will get too upset, we need more time...\") and tokenism (\"Of course our school is integrated, we have a whole 10 black students out of 3,000!\"), as well as outright violence and intimidation. Source But when all of that failed after years or decades of legal pressure and activism, the response of whites was frequently to leave the cities for the suburbs, the phenomena known as White Flight. As whites abandoned the inner city, attention of media and policymakers left as well.  The result is the **re-segregation** of the US public school system, in which urban school schools, which are disproportionately composed of poor people of color receive far less funding and attention, in contrast to white suburban schools. Overview Remember that even with federal and state funding, local governments provide the backbone for schools. Since local governments receive their funding from property taxes, lots of poor people concentrated in a school district translates to a shortage of money where it is needed the most.  These inner-city schools have also seen a dramatic rise in **exclusionary disciplinary practices** such as detentions, suspensions, and expulsions. As crime and poverty increased in the inner city, conservatives often accounted it to a lack of morality by poor people of colon, and supported these practices to \"get tough\" on crime, juvenile delinquency, and school violence. Exclusionary disciplinary practices by definition take a student out of class, prevent them from learning, and frequently kick them out of school altogether. Numerous studies have documented that students of color are dramatically more likely to be punished in this way than white students, even for the same infraction. **Zero tolerance policies** are particularly unbalanced in this way. Source # Source #2    These combination of factors have created what many call a **school to prison pipeline**, which I highly encourage you to look up for further reading. Start here Thanks..and if someone more qualified than me could please let me know if I made any mistakes or oversights, that would appreciated.  *EDIT: A few minor formatting errors. **EDIT: Sources","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1194.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65vsxa","c_root_id_B":"c65wngq","created_at_utc_A":1347234439,"created_at_utc_B":1347237938,"score_A":2,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"* bad schools * poor family structures (one parent families ect) * lack of resources to correct a problem.  For example, if a kid gets into drugs their family doesn't send them to a special high school in the woods.  Instead they drop out and start selling drugs. * in many cases their parents also dropped out, so it is a generational carry over effect. * like it or not, there are probably some physiological reasons as well.  All those stereotypes exist for a reason.","human_ref_B":"It's...a lot of factors. The short answer is, the socioeconomic status of blacks in America, combined with the re-segregation of the US school system and the use of exclusionary disciplinary practices that create a \"push out\" problem.  I don't have an advanced degree in the subject, so I apologize in advance for any vagueness of mistakes. I'll do the best to synthesize what I've learned so far.  First let's get into the details. To say that **all** blacks in America have a high drop-out rate is a serious oversimplification. Drop-out rates vary by income level; poor whites, blacks, Latinos, Asians, and any other subgroup you can find will all have high dropout rates that decease as income increases. Similarly, dropout rates vary by region type. Suburban schools tend to have low dropout rates, urban schools tend to have high dropout rates, and rural schools tend to be in the middle.  Remember that up until very recently in US history, schools systems were segregated, and not just in the south. Because most cities and states couldn't care less about the quality of education non-white students received, these schools were often very low-quality, especially in areas with the most virulent racism (again, not just in the south.)  So as you probably know, the civil rights movement happened, and was successful in ensuring legal rights for all students to gain aces to formerly all-white schools free from discrimination based on race, through such case as Brown v. Board of Education. But this was only true on paper, in reality it took decades to actually implement desegregation schools, mostly because the same Supreme Court that ruled segregated schools as unconstitutional gave up authority for integration to the same state governments that had created those segregated schools.   Whites did everything possible to prevent blacks from gaining equitable access to the school system. They used the \"massive resistance\" doctrine that was epitomized by Little Rock (\"Segregation now, segregation forever\"), and after Brown v. Board of Education, delay tactics (\"You can't just rush these things, people will get too upset, we need more time...\") and tokenism (\"Of course our school is integrated, we have a whole 10 black students out of 3,000!\"), as well as outright violence and intimidation. Source But when all of that failed after years or decades of legal pressure and activism, the response of whites was frequently to leave the cities for the suburbs, the phenomena known as White Flight. As whites abandoned the inner city, attention of media and policymakers left as well.  The result is the **re-segregation** of the US public school system, in which urban school schools, which are disproportionately composed of poor people of color receive far less funding and attention, in contrast to white suburban schools. Overview Remember that even with federal and state funding, local governments provide the backbone for schools. Since local governments receive their funding from property taxes, lots of poor people concentrated in a school district translates to a shortage of money where it is needed the most.  These inner-city schools have also seen a dramatic rise in **exclusionary disciplinary practices** such as detentions, suspensions, and expulsions. As crime and poverty increased in the inner city, conservatives often accounted it to a lack of morality by poor people of colon, and supported these practices to \"get tough\" on crime, juvenile delinquency, and school violence. Exclusionary disciplinary practices by definition take a student out of class, prevent them from learning, and frequently kick them out of school altogether. Numerous studies have documented that students of color are dramatically more likely to be punished in this way than white students, even for the same infraction. **Zero tolerance policies** are particularly unbalanced in this way. Source # Source #2    These combination of factors have created what many call a **school to prison pipeline**, which I highly encourage you to look up for further reading. Start here Thanks..and if someone more qualified than me could please let me know if I made any mistakes or oversights, that would appreciated.  *EDIT: A few minor formatting errors. **EDIT: Sources","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3499.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c663re3","c_root_id_B":"c65vofa","created_at_utc_A":1347282706,"created_at_utc_B":1347233923,"score_A":9,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Cites you want?    There have been many studies done on the schools in Shaker Heights, Ohio, an affluent (generally middle class to very wealthy), racially integrated suburb of Cleveland.  Even in one of the best funded districts in the state, black students perform worse than white students.  http:\/\/muse.jhu.edu\/journals\/csd\/summary\/v044\/44.6jackson.html  *Black American Students in an Affluent Suburb presents an interesting departure from traditional studies of the Black and White achievement gap. A trio of elements made this study uniquely different. First, the school district is considered to be one of the best in the nation. Second, Shaker Heights is an upper middle-class suburb with a median family income of $66,000. Third, Shaker Heights is a highly educated community with an estimated 61% of the residents over 25 years old holding at least a bachelor's degree. The presence of these three elements, which are traditionally used to explain the achievement gap, adds a perplexing dynamic to the research contained in this book.*  *The gap in academic achievement between Black and White students in Shaker Heights led to the fundamental question that guided this research: Why do Black students, who seemingly have the appropriate conditions of life that should lead to academic success, still perform far below their White counterparts? Interestingly, the academic performance of Blacks in Shaker Heights was above the state and national average for Black students.*  A few more cites:  http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Black-American-Students-Affluent-Suburb\/dp\/080584516X (considered the most authoritative study)  http:\/\/wesscholar.wesleyan.edu\/cgi\/viewcontent.cgi?article=1565&context=etd_hon_theses (pdf) http:\/\/generaltoolbox.files.wordpress.com\/2011\/10\/the_canary_in_the_mine.pdf (pdf) http:\/\/annenberginstitute.org\/pdf\/cj_acheivement_gap.pdf(pdf)   For several years, I lived in South Euclid, a lower middle- to upper middle-class, stably racially integrated suburb not too far from Shaker Heights.  There was the same gap between black students and white students, with special programs at the high school targeted specifically towards black students to ensure they graduate.    http:\/\/www.clevescene.com\/cleveland\/class-action\/Content?oid=1502634  TL\/DR: the district didn't succumb to the soft bigotry of low expectations.  *Meanwhile, district officials, led by Superintendent Bill Zelei, refused to let daunting national trends discourage them. Half of black male students drop out anyway. Why bother trying? They didn't ship the new arrivals to special ed or let them coast in dumbed-down classes. They didn't pull money out of the high school and into majority-white elementary schools. They kept the honors courses, the Japanese language instruction, the art classes, and the drama club.*","human_ref_B":"The fourth season of The Wire focuses specifically on the inner-city school system and its shortcomings. Not very scientific, but worth a watch.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":48783.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c663re3","c_root_id_B":"c65wcx1","created_at_utc_A":1347282706,"created_at_utc_B":1347236744,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Cites you want?    There have been many studies done on the schools in Shaker Heights, Ohio, an affluent (generally middle class to very wealthy), racially integrated suburb of Cleveland.  Even in one of the best funded districts in the state, black students perform worse than white students.  http:\/\/muse.jhu.edu\/journals\/csd\/summary\/v044\/44.6jackson.html  *Black American Students in an Affluent Suburb presents an interesting departure from traditional studies of the Black and White achievement gap. A trio of elements made this study uniquely different. First, the school district is considered to be one of the best in the nation. Second, Shaker Heights is an upper middle-class suburb with a median family income of $66,000. Third, Shaker Heights is a highly educated community with an estimated 61% of the residents over 25 years old holding at least a bachelor's degree. The presence of these three elements, which are traditionally used to explain the achievement gap, adds a perplexing dynamic to the research contained in this book.*  *The gap in academic achievement between Black and White students in Shaker Heights led to the fundamental question that guided this research: Why do Black students, who seemingly have the appropriate conditions of life that should lead to academic success, still perform far below their White counterparts? Interestingly, the academic performance of Blacks in Shaker Heights was above the state and national average for Black students.*  A few more cites:  http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Black-American-Students-Affluent-Suburb\/dp\/080584516X (considered the most authoritative study)  http:\/\/wesscholar.wesleyan.edu\/cgi\/viewcontent.cgi?article=1565&context=etd_hon_theses (pdf) http:\/\/generaltoolbox.files.wordpress.com\/2011\/10\/the_canary_in_the_mine.pdf (pdf) http:\/\/annenberginstitute.org\/pdf\/cj_acheivement_gap.pdf(pdf)   For several years, I lived in South Euclid, a lower middle- to upper middle-class, stably racially integrated suburb not too far from Shaker Heights.  There was the same gap between black students and white students, with special programs at the high school targeted specifically towards black students to ensure they graduate.    http:\/\/www.clevescene.com\/cleveland\/class-action\/Content?oid=1502634  TL\/DR: the district didn't succumb to the soft bigotry of low expectations.  *Meanwhile, district officials, led by Superintendent Bill Zelei, refused to let daunting national trends discourage them. Half of black male students drop out anyway. Why bother trying? They didn't ship the new arrivals to special ed or let them coast in dumbed-down classes. They didn't pull money out of the high school and into majority-white elementary schools. They kept the honors courses, the Japanese language instruction, the art classes, and the drama club.*","human_ref_B":"I'm a high school English teacher in an inner city school in CA. There are lots of reasons for this and we shouldn't generalize, of course, so these are some reasons I have observed first hand (in my very short career thus far)  - lack of resources-- better neighborhoods receive more money and have more fundraising resources and those communities are financially able to pass special taxes that go directly to their schools - schools that perform below standards actually get $ taken away from them... Not logical - inner city schools cannot attract great teachers due to low wages, poor conditions, no support, etc. - inner city schools also have inefficient hiring practices-- they wait until the last minute to hire people - teachers do not make education relevant in student's lives. I'm a big believer in good parenting which to me means \"don't slack in school son\/ daughter,\" but teachers need to make school relevant. Reading nothing but Shakespeare (I'm exaggerating) in English is not the way to do this. I'm a newish teacher and am trying to change this at my school-- I've hit several brick walls - and instant gratification attitude-- if you know you can make a lot of money drug dealing or other crimes, why would you waste your time in school\/ college when you can get the money and things you want quick and easy by breaking the law.  I consider myself a good teacher-- I actively pursued employment in an inner city school because I wanted to change the status quo. If only a little bit.  Edit: formatting","labels":1,"seconds_difference":45962.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65vsxa","c_root_id_B":"c663re3","created_at_utc_A":1347234439,"created_at_utc_B":1347282706,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"* bad schools * poor family structures (one parent families ect) * lack of resources to correct a problem.  For example, if a kid gets into drugs their family doesn't send them to a special high school in the woods.  Instead they drop out and start selling drugs. * in many cases their parents also dropped out, so it is a generational carry over effect. * like it or not, there are probably some physiological reasons as well.  All those stereotypes exist for a reason.","human_ref_B":"Cites you want?    There have been many studies done on the schools in Shaker Heights, Ohio, an affluent (generally middle class to very wealthy), racially integrated suburb of Cleveland.  Even in one of the best funded districts in the state, black students perform worse than white students.  http:\/\/muse.jhu.edu\/journals\/csd\/summary\/v044\/44.6jackson.html  *Black American Students in an Affluent Suburb presents an interesting departure from traditional studies of the Black and White achievement gap. A trio of elements made this study uniquely different. First, the school district is considered to be one of the best in the nation. Second, Shaker Heights is an upper middle-class suburb with a median family income of $66,000. Third, Shaker Heights is a highly educated community with an estimated 61% of the residents over 25 years old holding at least a bachelor's degree. The presence of these three elements, which are traditionally used to explain the achievement gap, adds a perplexing dynamic to the research contained in this book.*  *The gap in academic achievement between Black and White students in Shaker Heights led to the fundamental question that guided this research: Why do Black students, who seemingly have the appropriate conditions of life that should lead to academic success, still perform far below their White counterparts? Interestingly, the academic performance of Blacks in Shaker Heights was above the state and national average for Black students.*  A few more cites:  http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Black-American-Students-Affluent-Suburb\/dp\/080584516X (considered the most authoritative study)  http:\/\/wesscholar.wesleyan.edu\/cgi\/viewcontent.cgi?article=1565&context=etd_hon_theses (pdf) http:\/\/generaltoolbox.files.wordpress.com\/2011\/10\/the_canary_in_the_mine.pdf (pdf) http:\/\/annenberginstitute.org\/pdf\/cj_acheivement_gap.pdf(pdf)   For several years, I lived in South Euclid, a lower middle- to upper middle-class, stably racially integrated suburb not too far from Shaker Heights.  There was the same gap between black students and white students, with special programs at the high school targeted specifically towards black students to ensure they graduate.    http:\/\/www.clevescene.com\/cleveland\/class-action\/Content?oid=1502634  TL\/DR: the district didn't succumb to the soft bigotry of low expectations.  *Meanwhile, district officials, led by Superintendent Bill Zelei, refused to let daunting national trends discourage them. Half of black male students drop out anyway. Why bother trying? They didn't ship the new arrivals to special ed or let them coast in dumbed-down classes. They didn't pull money out of the high school and into majority-white elementary schools. They kept the honors courses, the Japanese language instruction, the art classes, and the drama club.*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":48267.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"zmc14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why is the drop out rate for blacks in America so high? No racism please","c_root_id_A":"c65vsxa","c_root_id_B":"c65wcx1","created_at_utc_A":1347234439,"created_at_utc_B":1347236744,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"* bad schools * poor family structures (one parent families ect) * lack of resources to correct a problem.  For example, if a kid gets into drugs their family doesn't send them to a special high school in the woods.  Instead they drop out and start selling drugs. * in many cases their parents also dropped out, so it is a generational carry over effect. * like it or not, there are probably some physiological reasons as well.  All those stereotypes exist for a reason.","human_ref_B":"I'm a high school English teacher in an inner city school in CA. There are lots of reasons for this and we shouldn't generalize, of course, so these are some reasons I have observed first hand (in my very short career thus far)  - lack of resources-- better neighborhoods receive more money and have more fundraising resources and those communities are financially able to pass special taxes that go directly to their schools - schools that perform below standards actually get $ taken away from them... Not logical - inner city schools cannot attract great teachers due to low wages, poor conditions, no support, etc. - inner city schools also have inefficient hiring practices-- they wait until the last minute to hire people - teachers do not make education relevant in student's lives. I'm a big believer in good parenting which to me means \"don't slack in school son\/ daughter,\" but teachers need to make school relevant. Reading nothing but Shakespeare (I'm exaggerating) in English is not the way to do this. I'm a newish teacher and am trying to change this at my school-- I've hit several brick walls - and instant gratification attitude-- if you know you can make a lot of money drug dealing or other crimes, why would you waste your time in school\/ college when you can get the money and things you want quick and easy by breaking the law.  I consider myself a good teacher-- I actively pursued employment in an inner city school because I wanted to change the status quo. If only a little bit.  Edit: formatting","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2305.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"9eciii","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Books\/articles that discuss the (apparent) increasing polarization and decreasing civility in America I\u2019m old enough to remember the olden days (pre-internet) and my subjective recollection is that we, as a society, were a whole lot nicer to each other before the internet came around.  Or at least more civil.   I believe that part of this is due to the easy anonymity of the internet enabling people\u2019s less civil sides to emerge.     Looking for books and\/or articles that discuss this idea in more depth, even if they disagree with my supposition.  But something that focuses on the last 30-40 years and ideally includes the emergence of the internet as part of their exploration.    My only requirement is that the material is largely objective with no obvious biases\/axes to grind.   More Of a scientific study vs a political narrative.  And something easy\/enjoyable to read would be a bonus.    I checked the book list on the wiki, but didn\u2019t see anything.    Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"e5p6l4w","c_root_id_B":"e5o56i9","created_at_utc_A":1536543131,"created_at_utc_B":1536509982,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'd suggest the book by Lilliana Mason already recommended, and also two other books:  * *#Republic\u00a0: divided democracy in the age of social media* by Cass Sunstein * *Twitter and Tear Gas* by Zeynep Tufecki","human_ref_B":"Not exactly what you\u2019re looking for, but it still relevant to what you\u2019re interested in. https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Square-Tower-Networks-Freemasons-Facebook\/dp\/0735222916\/ref=nodl_","labels":1,"seconds_difference":33149.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"9eciii","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Books\/articles that discuss the (apparent) increasing polarization and decreasing civility in America I\u2019m old enough to remember the olden days (pre-internet) and my subjective recollection is that we, as a society, were a whole lot nicer to each other before the internet came around.  Or at least more civil.   I believe that part of this is due to the easy anonymity of the internet enabling people\u2019s less civil sides to emerge.     Looking for books and\/or articles that discuss this idea in more depth, even if they disagree with my supposition.  But something that focuses on the last 30-40 years and ideally includes the emergence of the internet as part of their exploration.    My only requirement is that the material is largely objective with no obvious biases\/axes to grind.   More Of a scientific study vs a political narrative.  And something easy\/enjoyable to read would be a bonus.    I checked the book list on the wiki, but didn\u2019t see anything.    Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"e5ob2ii","c_root_id_B":"e5p6l4w","created_at_utc_A":1536515331,"created_at_utc_B":1536543131,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/www.econtalk.org\/lilliana-mason-on-uncivil-agreement\/","human_ref_B":"I'd suggest the book by Lilliana Mason already recommended, and also two other books:  * *#Republic\u00a0: divided democracy in the age of social media* by Cass Sunstein * *Twitter and Tear Gas* by Zeynep Tufecki","labels":0,"seconds_difference":27800.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"jo19k2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Any article that suggests that Trumpism is a political by-product of the inequilty instilled by neoliberalism?","c_root_id_A":"gb6eapc","c_root_id_B":"gb85pig","created_at_utc_A":1604537068,"created_at_utc_B":1604583702,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It may very well be as Jack Snyder argued in his Foreign Affairs piece The Broken Bargain","human_ref_B":"I reckon it might be partially explainable with the System Justification Theory. System Justification is \u201cthe psychological process by which existing social arrangements are legitimized, even at the expense of personal and group interest\u201c (Jost & Banaji 1994:2) ^(1)  An later study implied that this process can have a palliative function^(2.)  And another one found some evidence that low-income respondents defend the system quite strongly, e.g. \"low-income respondents \\...\\] were more likely that economic inequality is legitimate and necessary\" (Jost et al. 2003:1)^(3) among other very interesting findings.  That's why I like to think people who are on the \"worse side of neoliberalism\" vote for a president representing and defending exactly that neoliberal system - to avoid cognitive dissonance.  &#x200B;  ^(1)Jost & Banaji (1994): [https:\/\/bpspsychub.onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1111\/j.2044-8309.1994.tb01008.x  ^(2)Jost & Hunyady (2003): https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/10463280240000046  ^(3) Jost, Pelham, Sheldon & Sullivan (2003): https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1002\/ejsp.127  (Edit: rephrasing)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":46634.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsgmbl","c_root_id_B":"cdsh7nt","created_at_utc_A":1386073683,"created_at_utc_B":1386076897,"score_A":5,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Political Science and Philosophy - I became a lawyer.","human_ref_B":"Undergrad in Security, terrorism and counterterrorism  MA in anti-money laundering and terrorism financing.  I am unemployed and cannot find a job.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3214.0,"score_ratio":2.4}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsfx94","c_root_id_B":"cdsh7nt","created_at_utc_A":1386069067,"created_at_utc_B":1386076897,"score_A":3,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I got a degree in philosophy. What I did with it was went to graduate school and found something I enjoy even more.  I'm a firm believer that your undergrad topic doesn't dictate the course of the rest of your life. It's reasonable to be looking at job prospects, but don't let yourself get overwhelmed with the fact that you don't have it all figured out. If you find something interesting, embrace it. You'll find branches off of what you may be doing now that you didn't previously realise were an option.","human_ref_B":"Undergrad in Security, terrorism and counterterrorism  MA in anti-money laundering and terrorism financing.  I am unemployed and cannot find a job.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7830.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsf568","c_root_id_B":"cdsh7nt","created_at_utc_A":1386063016,"created_at_utc_B":1386076897,"score_A":2,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I am not your target audience, but I think your degree would be extremely useful in the environmental sector. If you're interested, look up things about divestment and the carbon bubble. We totally need people like you to help communicate global issues.","human_ref_B":"Undergrad in Security, terrorism and counterterrorism  MA in anti-money laundering and terrorism financing.  I am unemployed and cannot find a job.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13881.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsh7nt","c_root_id_B":"cdsfmua","created_at_utc_A":1386076897,"created_at_utc_B":1386066897,"score_A":12,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Undergrad in Security, terrorism and counterterrorism  MA in anti-money laundering and terrorism financing.  I am unemployed and cannot find a job.","human_ref_B":"Applied Linguistics - became professor.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10000.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsgls7","c_root_id_B":"cdsh7nt","created_at_utc_A":1386073589,"created_at_utc_B":1386076897,"score_A":2,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"My undergrad degree is in anthropology and I am working in India as an intercultural trainer.","human_ref_B":"Undergrad in Security, terrorism and counterterrorism  MA in anti-money laundering and terrorism financing.  I am unemployed and cannot find a job.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3308.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsh7nt","c_root_id_B":"cdsgo7b","created_at_utc_A":1386076897,"created_at_utc_B":1386073994,"score_A":12,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Undergrad in Security, terrorism and counterterrorism  MA in anti-money laundering and terrorism financing.  I am unemployed and cannot find a job.","human_ref_B":"Psychology. Got my MSW. Worked as social worker. Stopped working as social worker (by choice). Currently work in high tech.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2903.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsh7nt","c_root_id_B":"cdsh063","created_at_utc_A":1386076897,"created_at_utc_B":1386075849,"score_A":12,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Undergrad in Security, terrorism and counterterrorism  MA in anti-money laundering and terrorism financing.  I am unemployed and cannot find a job.","human_ref_B":"My undergrad degree is in urban studies. I'm currently in grad school for the same field; however, I'm lukewarm about the academy. Before I went to grad school I worked at a high profile charitable foundation for several years on a public health initiative and gained lots of real world policy analysis skills. It was vaguely related to my field of interest, but most importantly it gave me a much more week rounded skill set, and that's been my approach to getting a PhD as well. Make yourself as versatile as possible. Take advantage of all the resources your degree offers. Take statistics classes, but also take classes that are qualitatively focused where you really learn to write (a seriously marketable skill these days... You won't see it expressly listed on a job requirements list but it absolutely shines through on application materials and gives you a huge advantage in my experience). What is infinitely more important than your degree is knowing how to THINK critically, which is the strongest advantage of getting a degree in the social sciences in my opinion. I guess what I'm really saying is that you don't have to figure out what you want to be \"when you grow up\" because there's a good chance it won't work out anyway. Your best bet is to be eclectic so that you're well suited for a variety of fields, even ones that you can't possibly imagine right now.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1048.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsh2kb","c_root_id_B":"cdsh7nt","created_at_utc_A":1386076199,"created_at_utc_B":1386076897,"score_A":2,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"BA - psych  Doing prereqs for a MS in Computer Science. Looking to do front end work.","human_ref_B":"Undergrad in Security, terrorism and counterterrorism  MA in anti-money laundering and terrorism financing.  I am unemployed and cannot find a job.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":698.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsirb0","c_root_id_B":"cdsgmbl","created_at_utc_A":1386082784,"created_at_utc_B":1386073683,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Just an FYI, we have a career section on the wiki.  The first link there is to this amazing chart showing where each major tends to end up, job-wise.    Economics majors tend to end up as accountants, financial managers, executives, management, and attorneys. Communication majors tend to end up as teachers, sales, office\/admin, arts\/design, and management.","human_ref_B":"Political Science and Philosophy - I became a lawyer.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9101.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsfx94","c_root_id_B":"cdsirb0","created_at_utc_A":1386069067,"created_at_utc_B":1386082784,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I got a degree in philosophy. What I did with it was went to graduate school and found something I enjoy even more.  I'm a firm believer that your undergrad topic doesn't dictate the course of the rest of your life. It's reasonable to be looking at job prospects, but don't let yourself get overwhelmed with the fact that you don't have it all figured out. If you find something interesting, embrace it. You'll find branches off of what you may be doing now that you didn't previously realise were an option.","human_ref_B":"Just an FYI, we have a career section on the wiki.  The first link there is to this amazing chart showing where each major tends to end up, job-wise.    Economics majors tend to end up as accountants, financial managers, executives, management, and attorneys. Communication majors tend to end up as teachers, sales, office\/admin, arts\/design, and management.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13717.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsirb0","c_root_id_B":"cdshsni","created_at_utc_A":1386082784,"created_at_utc_B":1386079438,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Just an FYI, we have a career section on the wiki.  The first link there is to this amazing chart showing where each major tends to end up, job-wise.    Economics majors tend to end up as accountants, financial managers, executives, management, and attorneys. Communication majors tend to end up as teachers, sales, office\/admin, arts\/design, and management.","human_ref_B":"Politics and social policy. Currently working as a Christmas temp in a shop. Chronically unemployed generally. When I explain to job centre staff that I have a degree they shrug and say \"who doesn't? Go work in telesales\"","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3346.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsirb0","c_root_id_B":"cdsf568","created_at_utc_A":1386082784,"created_at_utc_B":1386063016,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Just an FYI, we have a career section on the wiki.  The first link there is to this amazing chart showing where each major tends to end up, job-wise.    Economics majors tend to end up as accountants, financial managers, executives, management, and attorneys. Communication majors tend to end up as teachers, sales, office\/admin, arts\/design, and management.","human_ref_B":"I am not your target audience, but I think your degree would be extremely useful in the environmental sector. If you're interested, look up things about divestment and the carbon bubble. We totally need people like you to help communicate global issues.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":19768.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsirb0","c_root_id_B":"cdsfmua","created_at_utc_A":1386082784,"created_at_utc_B":1386066897,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Just an FYI, we have a career section on the wiki.  The first link there is to this amazing chart showing where each major tends to end up, job-wise.    Economics majors tend to end up as accountants, financial managers, executives, management, and attorneys. Communication majors tend to end up as teachers, sales, office\/admin, arts\/design, and management.","human_ref_B":"Applied Linguistics - became professor.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15887.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsgls7","c_root_id_B":"cdsirb0","created_at_utc_A":1386073589,"created_at_utc_B":1386082784,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"My undergrad degree is in anthropology and I am working in India as an intercultural trainer.","human_ref_B":"Just an FYI, we have a career section on the wiki.  The first link there is to this amazing chart showing where each major tends to end up, job-wise.    Economics majors tend to end up as accountants, financial managers, executives, management, and attorneys. Communication majors tend to end up as teachers, sales, office\/admin, arts\/design, and management.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9195.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsgo7b","c_root_id_B":"cdsirb0","created_at_utc_A":1386073994,"created_at_utc_B":1386082784,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Psychology. Got my MSW. Worked as social worker. Stopped working as social worker (by choice). Currently work in high tech.","human_ref_B":"Just an FYI, we have a career section on the wiki.  The first link there is to this amazing chart showing where each major tends to end up, job-wise.    Economics majors tend to end up as accountants, financial managers, executives, management, and attorneys. Communication majors tend to end up as teachers, sales, office\/admin, arts\/design, and management.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8790.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsh063","c_root_id_B":"cdsirb0","created_at_utc_A":1386075849,"created_at_utc_B":1386082784,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"My undergrad degree is in urban studies. I'm currently in grad school for the same field; however, I'm lukewarm about the academy. Before I went to grad school I worked at a high profile charitable foundation for several years on a public health initiative and gained lots of real world policy analysis skills. It was vaguely related to my field of interest, but most importantly it gave me a much more week rounded skill set, and that's been my approach to getting a PhD as well. Make yourself as versatile as possible. Take advantage of all the resources your degree offers. Take statistics classes, but also take classes that are qualitatively focused where you really learn to write (a seriously marketable skill these days... You won't see it expressly listed on a job requirements list but it absolutely shines through on application materials and gives you a huge advantage in my experience). What is infinitely more important than your degree is knowing how to THINK critically, which is the strongest advantage of getting a degree in the social sciences in my opinion. I guess what I'm really saying is that you don't have to figure out what you want to be \"when you grow up\" because there's a good chance it won't work out anyway. Your best bet is to be eclectic so that you're well suited for a variety of fields, even ones that you can't possibly imagine right now.","human_ref_B":"Just an FYI, we have a career section on the wiki.  The first link there is to this amazing chart showing where each major tends to end up, job-wise.    Economics majors tend to end up as accountants, financial managers, executives, management, and attorneys. Communication majors tend to end up as teachers, sales, office\/admin, arts\/design, and management.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6935.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsh2kb","c_root_id_B":"cdsirb0","created_at_utc_A":1386076199,"created_at_utc_B":1386082784,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"BA - psych  Doing prereqs for a MS in Computer Science. Looking to do front end work.","human_ref_B":"Just an FYI, we have a career section on the wiki.  The first link there is to this amazing chart showing where each major tends to end up, job-wise.    Economics majors tend to end up as accountants, financial managers, executives, management, and attorneys. Communication majors tend to end up as teachers, sales, office\/admin, arts\/design, and management.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6585.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsgmbl","c_root_id_B":"cdsfx94","created_at_utc_A":1386073683,"created_at_utc_B":1386069067,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Political Science and Philosophy - I became a lawyer.","human_ref_B":"I got a degree in philosophy. What I did with it was went to graduate school and found something I enjoy even more.  I'm a firm believer that your undergrad topic doesn't dictate the course of the rest of your life. It's reasonable to be looking at job prospects, but don't let yourself get overwhelmed with the fact that you don't have it all figured out. If you find something interesting, embrace it. You'll find branches off of what you may be doing now that you didn't previously realise were an option.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4616.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsf568","c_root_id_B":"cdsgmbl","created_at_utc_A":1386063016,"created_at_utc_B":1386073683,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I am not your target audience, but I think your degree would be extremely useful in the environmental sector. If you're interested, look up things about divestment and the carbon bubble. We totally need people like you to help communicate global issues.","human_ref_B":"Political Science and Philosophy - I became a lawyer.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10667.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsfmua","c_root_id_B":"cdsgmbl","created_at_utc_A":1386066897,"created_at_utc_B":1386073683,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Applied Linguistics - became professor.","human_ref_B":"Political Science and Philosophy - I became a lawyer.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6786.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsgls7","c_root_id_B":"cdsgmbl","created_at_utc_A":1386073589,"created_at_utc_B":1386073683,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"My undergrad degree is in anthropology and I am working in India as an intercultural trainer.","human_ref_B":"Political Science and Philosophy - I became a lawyer.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":94.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsfx94","c_root_id_B":"cdsf568","created_at_utc_A":1386069067,"created_at_utc_B":1386063016,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I got a degree in philosophy. What I did with it was went to graduate school and found something I enjoy even more.  I'm a firm believer that your undergrad topic doesn't dictate the course of the rest of your life. It's reasonable to be looking at job prospects, but don't let yourself get overwhelmed with the fact that you don't have it all figured out. If you find something interesting, embrace it. You'll find branches off of what you may be doing now that you didn't previously realise were an option.","human_ref_B":"I am not your target audience, but I think your degree would be extremely useful in the environmental sector. If you're interested, look up things about divestment and the carbon bubble. We totally need people like you to help communicate global issues.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6051.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsfmua","c_root_id_B":"cdsfx94","created_at_utc_A":1386066897,"created_at_utc_B":1386069067,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Applied Linguistics - became professor.","human_ref_B":"I got a degree in philosophy. What I did with it was went to graduate school and found something I enjoy even more.  I'm a firm believer that your undergrad topic doesn't dictate the course of the rest of your life. It's reasonable to be looking at job prospects, but don't let yourself get overwhelmed with the fact that you don't have it all figured out. If you find something interesting, embrace it. You'll find branches off of what you may be doing now that you didn't previously realise were an option.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2170.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsf568","c_root_id_B":"cdshsni","created_at_utc_A":1386063016,"created_at_utc_B":1386079438,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I am not your target audience, but I think your degree would be extremely useful in the environmental sector. If you're interested, look up things about divestment and the carbon bubble. We totally need people like you to help communicate global issues.","human_ref_B":"Politics and social policy. Currently working as a Christmas temp in a shop. Chronically unemployed generally. When I explain to job centre staff that I have a degree they shrug and say \"who doesn't? Go work in telesales\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16422.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsfmua","c_root_id_B":"cdshsni","created_at_utc_A":1386066897,"created_at_utc_B":1386079438,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Applied Linguistics - became professor.","human_ref_B":"Politics and social policy. Currently working as a Christmas temp in a shop. Chronically unemployed generally. When I explain to job centre staff that I have a degree they shrug and say \"who doesn't? Go work in telesales\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12541.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdshsni","c_root_id_B":"cdsgls7","created_at_utc_A":1386079438,"created_at_utc_B":1386073589,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Politics and social policy. Currently working as a Christmas temp in a shop. Chronically unemployed generally. When I explain to job centre staff that I have a degree they shrug and say \"who doesn't? Go work in telesales\"","human_ref_B":"My undergrad degree is in anthropology and I am working in India as an intercultural trainer.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5849.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdshsni","c_root_id_B":"cdsgo7b","created_at_utc_A":1386079438,"created_at_utc_B":1386073994,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Politics and social policy. Currently working as a Christmas temp in a shop. Chronically unemployed generally. When I explain to job centre staff that I have a degree they shrug and say \"who doesn't? Go work in telesales\"","human_ref_B":"Psychology. Got my MSW. Worked as social worker. Stopped working as social worker (by choice). Currently work in high tech.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5444.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdshsni","c_root_id_B":"cdsh063","created_at_utc_A":1386079438,"created_at_utc_B":1386075849,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Politics and social policy. Currently working as a Christmas temp in a shop. Chronically unemployed generally. When I explain to job centre staff that I have a degree they shrug and say \"who doesn't? Go work in telesales\"","human_ref_B":"My undergrad degree is in urban studies. I'm currently in grad school for the same field; however, I'm lukewarm about the academy. Before I went to grad school I worked at a high profile charitable foundation for several years on a public health initiative and gained lots of real world policy analysis skills. It was vaguely related to my field of interest, but most importantly it gave me a much more week rounded skill set, and that's been my approach to getting a PhD as well. Make yourself as versatile as possible. Take advantage of all the resources your degree offers. Take statistics classes, but also take classes that are qualitatively focused where you really learn to write (a seriously marketable skill these days... You won't see it expressly listed on a job requirements list but it absolutely shines through on application materials and gives you a huge advantage in my experience). What is infinitely more important than your degree is knowing how to THINK critically, which is the strongest advantage of getting a degree in the social sciences in my opinion. I guess what I'm really saying is that you don't have to figure out what you want to be \"when you grow up\" because there's a good chance it won't work out anyway. Your best bet is to be eclectic so that you're well suited for a variety of fields, even ones that you can't possibly imagine right now.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3589.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsh2kb","c_root_id_B":"cdshsni","created_at_utc_A":1386076199,"created_at_utc_B":1386079438,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"BA - psych  Doing prereqs for a MS in Computer Science. Looking to do front end work.","human_ref_B":"Politics and social policy. Currently working as a Christmas temp in a shop. Chronically unemployed generally. When I explain to job centre staff that I have a degree they shrug and say \"who doesn't? Go work in telesales\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3239.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsjj5w","c_root_id_B":"cdsf568","created_at_utc_A":1386085070,"created_at_utc_B":1386063016,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"My primary major was public policy, and after a year of fake jobs, I went into a master's degree in agricultural economics. I'm now, hopefully, just over a semester from graduation, and am applying to PhD's in the same field.","human_ref_B":"I am not your target audience, but I think your degree would be extremely useful in the environmental sector. If you're interested, look up things about divestment and the carbon bubble. We totally need people like you to help communicate global issues.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22054.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsjj5w","c_root_id_B":"cdsfmua","created_at_utc_A":1386085070,"created_at_utc_B":1386066897,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"My primary major was public policy, and after a year of fake jobs, I went into a master's degree in agricultural economics. I'm now, hopefully, just over a semester from graduation, and am applying to PhD's in the same field.","human_ref_B":"Applied Linguistics - became professor.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18173.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsjj5w","c_root_id_B":"cdsgls7","created_at_utc_A":1386085070,"created_at_utc_B":1386073589,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"My primary major was public policy, and after a year of fake jobs, I went into a master's degree in agricultural economics. I'm now, hopefully, just over a semester from graduation, and am applying to PhD's in the same field.","human_ref_B":"My undergrad degree is in anthropology and I am working in India as an intercultural trainer.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11481.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsjj5w","c_root_id_B":"cdsgo7b","created_at_utc_A":1386085070,"created_at_utc_B":1386073994,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"My primary major was public policy, and after a year of fake jobs, I went into a master's degree in agricultural economics. I'm now, hopefully, just over a semester from graduation, and am applying to PhD's in the same field.","human_ref_B":"Psychology. Got my MSW. Worked as social worker. Stopped working as social worker (by choice). Currently work in high tech.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11076.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsh063","c_root_id_B":"cdsjj5w","created_at_utc_A":1386075849,"created_at_utc_B":1386085070,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"My undergrad degree is in urban studies. I'm currently in grad school for the same field; however, I'm lukewarm about the academy. Before I went to grad school I worked at a high profile charitable foundation for several years on a public health initiative and gained lots of real world policy analysis skills. It was vaguely related to my field of interest, but most importantly it gave me a much more week rounded skill set, and that's been my approach to getting a PhD as well. Make yourself as versatile as possible. Take advantage of all the resources your degree offers. Take statistics classes, but also take classes that are qualitatively focused where you really learn to write (a seriously marketable skill these days... You won't see it expressly listed on a job requirements list but it absolutely shines through on application materials and gives you a huge advantage in my experience). What is infinitely more important than your degree is knowing how to THINK critically, which is the strongest advantage of getting a degree in the social sciences in my opinion. I guess what I'm really saying is that you don't have to figure out what you want to be \"when you grow up\" because there's a good chance it won't work out anyway. Your best bet is to be eclectic so that you're well suited for a variety of fields, even ones that you can't possibly imagine right now.","human_ref_B":"My primary major was public policy, and after a year of fake jobs, I went into a master's degree in agricultural economics. I'm now, hopefully, just over a semester from graduation, and am applying to PhD's in the same field.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9221.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsjj5w","c_root_id_B":"cdsh2kb","created_at_utc_A":1386085070,"created_at_utc_B":1386076199,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"My primary major was public policy, and after a year of fake jobs, I went into a master's degree in agricultural economics. I'm now, hopefully, just over a semester from graduation, and am applying to PhD's in the same field.","human_ref_B":"BA - psych  Doing prereqs for a MS in Computer Science. Looking to do front end work.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8871.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsf568","c_root_id_B":"cdsk8a0","created_at_utc_A":1386063016,"created_at_utc_B":1386086952,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I am not your target audience, but I think your degree would be extremely useful in the environmental sector. If you're interested, look up things about divestment and the carbon bubble. We totally need people like you to help communicate global issues.","human_ref_B":"Undergrad: Double Major in English and Philosophy.   Went to grad school for philosophy.  Now, I work as an English teacher and an academic editor (mostly for philosophers).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23936.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsk8a0","c_root_id_B":"cdsfmua","created_at_utc_A":1386086952,"created_at_utc_B":1386066897,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Undergrad: Double Major in English and Philosophy.   Went to grad school for philosophy.  Now, I work as an English teacher and an academic editor (mostly for philosophers).","human_ref_B":"Applied Linguistics - became professor.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20055.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsgls7","c_root_id_B":"cdsk8a0","created_at_utc_A":1386073589,"created_at_utc_B":1386086952,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"My undergrad degree is in anthropology and I am working in India as an intercultural trainer.","human_ref_B":"Undergrad: Double Major in English and Philosophy.   Went to grad school for philosophy.  Now, I work as an English teacher and an academic editor (mostly for philosophers).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13363.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsk8a0","c_root_id_B":"cdsgo7b","created_at_utc_A":1386086952,"created_at_utc_B":1386073994,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Undergrad: Double Major in English and Philosophy.   Went to grad school for philosophy.  Now, I work as an English teacher and an academic editor (mostly for philosophers).","human_ref_B":"Psychology. Got my MSW. Worked as social worker. Stopped working as social worker (by choice). Currently work in high tech.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12958.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsh063","c_root_id_B":"cdsk8a0","created_at_utc_A":1386075849,"created_at_utc_B":1386086952,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"My undergrad degree is in urban studies. I'm currently in grad school for the same field; however, I'm lukewarm about the academy. Before I went to grad school I worked at a high profile charitable foundation for several years on a public health initiative and gained lots of real world policy analysis skills. It was vaguely related to my field of interest, but most importantly it gave me a much more week rounded skill set, and that's been my approach to getting a PhD as well. Make yourself as versatile as possible. Take advantage of all the resources your degree offers. Take statistics classes, but also take classes that are qualitatively focused where you really learn to write (a seriously marketable skill these days... You won't see it expressly listed on a job requirements list but it absolutely shines through on application materials and gives you a huge advantage in my experience). What is infinitely more important than your degree is knowing how to THINK critically, which is the strongest advantage of getting a degree in the social sciences in my opinion. I guess what I'm really saying is that you don't have to figure out what you want to be \"when you grow up\" because there's a good chance it won't work out anyway. Your best bet is to be eclectic so that you're well suited for a variety of fields, even ones that you can't possibly imagine right now.","human_ref_B":"Undergrad: Double Major in English and Philosophy.   Went to grad school for philosophy.  Now, I work as an English teacher and an academic editor (mostly for philosophers).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11103.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsh2kb","c_root_id_B":"cdsk8a0","created_at_utc_A":1386076199,"created_at_utc_B":1386086952,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"BA - psych  Doing prereqs for a MS in Computer Science. Looking to do front end work.","human_ref_B":"Undergrad: Double Major in English and Philosophy.   Went to grad school for philosophy.  Now, I work as an English teacher and an academic editor (mostly for philosophers).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10753.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdskhqf","c_root_id_B":"cdsf568","created_at_utc_A":1386087608,"created_at_utc_B":1386063016,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA History - Product Designer \/ Analyst","human_ref_B":"I am not your target audience, but I think your degree would be extremely useful in the environmental sector. If you're interested, look up things about divestment and the carbon bubble. We totally need people like you to help communicate global issues.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24592.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdskhqf","c_root_id_B":"cdsfmua","created_at_utc_A":1386087608,"created_at_utc_B":1386066897,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA History - Product Designer \/ Analyst","human_ref_B":"Applied Linguistics - became professor.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20711.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdskhqf","c_root_id_B":"cdsgls7","created_at_utc_A":1386087608,"created_at_utc_B":1386073589,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA History - Product Designer \/ Analyst","human_ref_B":"My undergrad degree is in anthropology and I am working in India as an intercultural trainer.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14019.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdsgo7b","c_root_id_B":"cdskhqf","created_at_utc_A":1386073994,"created_at_utc_B":1386087608,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Psychology. Got my MSW. Worked as social worker. Stopped working as social worker (by choice). Currently work in high tech.","human_ref_B":"BA History - Product Designer \/ Analyst","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13614.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdskhqf","c_root_id_B":"cdsh063","created_at_utc_A":1386087608,"created_at_utc_B":1386075849,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA History - Product Designer \/ Analyst","human_ref_B":"My undergrad degree is in urban studies. I'm currently in grad school for the same field; however, I'm lukewarm about the academy. Before I went to grad school I worked at a high profile charitable foundation for several years on a public health initiative and gained lots of real world policy analysis skills. It was vaguely related to my field of interest, but most importantly it gave me a much more week rounded skill set, and that's been my approach to getting a PhD as well. Make yourself as versatile as possible. Take advantage of all the resources your degree offers. Take statistics classes, but also take classes that are qualitatively focused where you really learn to write (a seriously marketable skill these days... You won't see it expressly listed on a job requirements list but it absolutely shines through on application materials and gives you a huge advantage in my experience). What is infinitely more important than your degree is knowing how to THINK critically, which is the strongest advantage of getting a degree in the social sciences in my opinion. I guess what I'm really saying is that you don't have to figure out what you want to be \"when you grow up\" because there's a good chance it won't work out anyway. Your best bet is to be eclectic so that you're well suited for a variety of fields, even ones that you can't possibly imagine right now.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11759.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1rza9q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"What undergraduate degree in the social sciences did you graduate with and what did you do with it? I've been looking and looking, and I don't know where else this question would belong.  I'm studying economics and communication concurrently at Arizona State University and I'm in my second year... and I still don't know what I want to do when I graduate. I guess what I'm looking for is inspiration.  So, just like the title poses: what did you study in the social sciences and what did you do with the degree you got?","c_root_id_A":"cdskhqf","c_root_id_B":"cdsh2kb","created_at_utc_A":1386087608,"created_at_utc_B":1386076199,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA History - Product Designer \/ Analyst","human_ref_B":"BA - psych  Doing prereqs for a MS in Computer Science. Looking to do front end work.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11409.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"391wwe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is modern-day South Africa much different from Apartheid South Africa? Like maybe the Jim Crowe-esque laws are gone, but is there still a huge amount of racism going on in the societal atmosphere? I don't know much of the modern day South Africa, but I always seem to hear about overpopulated slums and shanty towns full of black people, showing that there hasn't been much social change.","c_root_id_A":"cs0jgff","c_root_id_B":"crzwiu6","created_at_utc_A":1433856508,"created_at_utc_B":1433800387,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I wrote a (history\/geography) essay on this topic a while back, specifically in reference to urban apartheid. I'll paraphrase some parts:  >In November 1993 the transitional executive committee (TEC) accepted an $850 million loan from the IMF, in secret. It required the agreement of big business, the NP government and the ANC to a secret protocol that restricted the ability to ease monetary policy, increase government expenditure, or change the tax structure, thereby tying the hands of any future government to the requirements of business, specifically monetarist (neoliberal) policy.^1 This agreement set the parameters of the role of the state, and the ANC who headed it. State policy was one of reduction and a generally 'hands-off' approach preferencing the growth of business and the assumed universal benefits it would bring. As such the prospects of urban change have to be seen in the context of state submission to (global) capital. In line with the IMF agreement public investment as a share of GDP has, in the post-apartheid era been the same or lower than the last decade of apartheid.^2 Of course the targets of state provision radically changed in the post-apartheid era to include blacks on equal terms. Yet the lack of a noticeable increase in state expenditure reflects either the unwillingness of the ANC to face the serious problems facing the conditions of blacks inherited from apartheid, or \u2013 more accurately \u2013 the transferral of responsibility to solve such problems to businesses, most noticeably through the privatisations initiated by the ANC....between 1995-2000 the average black African household income fell 19 percent, while white household income rose 15 percent, with unemployment doubling over the same period.^3  >The conflict between the desires of the ANC towards development to satisfy their supporters and make up for apartheid, and the global economy they wish to participate in and it's requirements...  >The contradictions of state policy merely reflects a more basic social antagonism of class that has become the overwhelming determinant of urban change, supplanting race.^4 This antagonism is reflected in the divisions between rich, generally white, suburbanites living in fortified zones with their concentrations of wealth and deep integration into global capitalist networks. The benefits of which it feels, and fears any holistic state intervention will disrupt. Opposed to a poorer, generally black, urban residents who's experience of global capital is fighting to retain access to basic utilities. Areas far from wealth and to which frustrated and limited state intervention can do little to change given the prevailing context. State policy as supposedly representing national interests expresses this antagonism in it's attempts to both serve the market and those who's suffering has been the sacrifice required by the market (in the forms of budget restraint, wage reductions, privatisations etc.). The reorganisation of the post-apartheid city on class, rather than racial lines, is reflected in a changing urban landscape. Beginning in the closing years of apartheid when many of it's racial controls became unworkable, rich \u2013 generally white \u2013 residents fled city-centres vulnerable to crime to more prosperous suburbs. With their own informal controls and fortified architecture, this groups seclusion from, and fear of, the poorer urban population reflects the social antagonism between the two played out upon city topology...  >The 'de jure' deracialisation of space has expanded opportunities whilst largely ignoring the actual possibility of their achievement. The high inequality of property, social services, employment and wealth prevents this 'de jure' deracialisation of space within the post-apartheid city being translated into \u201ca genuine desegregation of the urban landscape\u201d.^5 Hindson et al. has noted how in the closing years of apartheid the break with \u201cterritorial apartheid\u201d - especially the collapse of pass controls and the Group Areas Act \u2013 powerfully reinforced \u201cresidential apartheid and hence the racial geography of the city\u201d.^6 This implies the reproduction of the apartheid city wasn't transformed by the end of apartheids overtly coercive measures thus implying a deeper mechanism of social regulation possible transcending the particular apartheid cities characteristics. As such the post-apartheid city is both distinct and similar to it's predecessor; inequality has either stagnated or grown and is still strongly linked to race.^7 Yet the globalisation of the city within a framework of racial liberalistion has also transformed the drive of urban policy from one of racial, to directly economic imperatives. The post-apartheid city represents continuity in the seclusion of overwhelming rich white areas from poorer black ones. And change insofar as these groups positions within the cities has changed; no longer is their a clear distinction between a black urban periphery and a white urban centre characteristic of the apartheid city. Nor is race so firmly linked to class.  >the very shape of the city both in terms of physical characteristics and symbolic meaning are the outcome of peoples everyday practices in it. Inhabitants of the city do not stand as subjects impotently faced with an objective city already formed by institutional actors. The mass of subjects within the city are not 'victims' but interact, change and often challenge the received urban landscape, it's structures of power and patterns of reproduction. The permanency of grassroots community movements from apartheid perhaps signifies the continuity of symptoms such movements were formed to fight.  >All these community groups, 'defensive' or 'offensive' transform and challenge the city they 'receive' by challenging not only the submissive role required of their communities, but actively shaping the socio-cultural life of the city and their communities through the maintenance of it's semi-autonomous character ensuring their vibrant particularity. The reclaiming of land for public use by these groups is an attempt to make real the national discourse of a 'nation for everyone' all with a place to live within it. This vibrant network with it's links to other forms of community power, represents a fragmented but real 'on the ground' attempt to make the city truly post-apartheid, to challenge conditions of existence in the cities which for many have remained unchanged. Even if Freund's criticism perhaps remain overwhelmingly true, since the 2000's there's been a steady challenge, if not to the monopoly of the ANC over elected districts, but to the facade of ANC respectability inherited from it's historic role in the anti-apartheid struggle. Community activity, in it's myriad of forms, poses a direct challenge to the authority of government and businesses to control the city. If the continuing declining voter turnout represents a regression of public discourse in the face of perceived ANC impotence and corruption, then this community activity attempts to be it's positive corollary by not only voicing easily ignored concerns, but actively shaping the city in it's image.  >Though Murray is correct in noting \u201cmarket competition is the principal mechanism governing the regulation and organisation of urban space\u201d^8, this rule goes by no means unchallenged by the networks of community groups or the contradictory policies of state intervention. Today the post-apartheid city remains still defined in relation to it's oppressive forebear insofar as it's organisation is still ultimately serving the same interests for which the apartheid regime was originally constructed; capitalism. However this hegemony is challenged by a variety of sincere local officials and community activities who wish to translate the post-apartheid city from something which doesn't merely stand after apartheid, but opposed to it. Overall at present the differences are at once vast  - insofar as black life is no longer characterised by regular formal oppression from the state \u2013 and unobservable \u2013 insofar as the main demographics of black urban life remaining largely unchanged. The South African city today also exemplifies a topographical change in it's organisation of urban space and demographic distribution, which more broadly reflects an official policy tying cities directly into the requirements of international capital, which no longer mediated through racial distinctions and the success the ANC's BEE policy has produced a city defined by largely by class.  ^1 M. Legassick, 'South African political economy', *Centre for Civil Society Colloquium on the Economy, Society and Nature*, 2006, p.393  ^2 S. Gelb, \u201cOverview of the SA economy\u201d, in J. Daniel, R. Southall and J. Lutchman, *State of the Nation: South Africa 2004-5*, HSRC, p.385  ^3 P. Bond, 'From Racial to Class Apartheid: South Africa\u2019s Frustrating Decade of Freedom', *Monthly Review*, 2004, retrieved from here  ^4 P. Bond, *Cities of Gold, Townships of Coal: Essays on South Africa's New Urban Crisis*, Africa Research & Publication, 2000  ^5 M. Murray, *City of Extremes*, Duke University Press, 2011  ^6 D. Hindson, M. Byerley, M. Morris, 'From Violence to Reconstruction: the Making, Disintegration and Remaking of an Apartheid City', *Antipode*, 1994, pp.323-350, p.336  ^7 Legassick, op.cit.  ^8 Murray op.cit.,p.15","human_ref_B":"I won't answer as I'm not a social scientist, but I'd suggest asking this question in \/r\/southafrica. However, it's currently midnight here, so I'd wait at least 8 hours from the time of my comment before posting.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":56121.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"391wwe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is modern-day South Africa much different from Apartheid South Africa? Like maybe the Jim Crowe-esque laws are gone, but is there still a huge amount of racism going on in the societal atmosphere? I don't know much of the modern day South Africa, but I always seem to hear about overpopulated slums and shanty towns full of black people, showing that there hasn't been much social change.","c_root_id_A":"cs0jgff","c_root_id_B":"crzudqu","created_at_utc_A":1433856508,"created_at_utc_B":1433796815,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I wrote a (history\/geography) essay on this topic a while back, specifically in reference to urban apartheid. I'll paraphrase some parts:  >In November 1993 the transitional executive committee (TEC) accepted an $850 million loan from the IMF, in secret. It required the agreement of big business, the NP government and the ANC to a secret protocol that restricted the ability to ease monetary policy, increase government expenditure, or change the tax structure, thereby tying the hands of any future government to the requirements of business, specifically monetarist (neoliberal) policy.^1 This agreement set the parameters of the role of the state, and the ANC who headed it. State policy was one of reduction and a generally 'hands-off' approach preferencing the growth of business and the assumed universal benefits it would bring. As such the prospects of urban change have to be seen in the context of state submission to (global) capital. In line with the IMF agreement public investment as a share of GDP has, in the post-apartheid era been the same or lower than the last decade of apartheid.^2 Of course the targets of state provision radically changed in the post-apartheid era to include blacks on equal terms. Yet the lack of a noticeable increase in state expenditure reflects either the unwillingness of the ANC to face the serious problems facing the conditions of blacks inherited from apartheid, or \u2013 more accurately \u2013 the transferral of responsibility to solve such problems to businesses, most noticeably through the privatisations initiated by the ANC....between 1995-2000 the average black African household income fell 19 percent, while white household income rose 15 percent, with unemployment doubling over the same period.^3  >The conflict between the desires of the ANC towards development to satisfy their supporters and make up for apartheid, and the global economy they wish to participate in and it's requirements...  >The contradictions of state policy merely reflects a more basic social antagonism of class that has become the overwhelming determinant of urban change, supplanting race.^4 This antagonism is reflected in the divisions between rich, generally white, suburbanites living in fortified zones with their concentrations of wealth and deep integration into global capitalist networks. The benefits of which it feels, and fears any holistic state intervention will disrupt. Opposed to a poorer, generally black, urban residents who's experience of global capital is fighting to retain access to basic utilities. Areas far from wealth and to which frustrated and limited state intervention can do little to change given the prevailing context. State policy as supposedly representing national interests expresses this antagonism in it's attempts to both serve the market and those who's suffering has been the sacrifice required by the market (in the forms of budget restraint, wage reductions, privatisations etc.). The reorganisation of the post-apartheid city on class, rather than racial lines, is reflected in a changing urban landscape. Beginning in the closing years of apartheid when many of it's racial controls became unworkable, rich \u2013 generally white \u2013 residents fled city-centres vulnerable to crime to more prosperous suburbs. With their own informal controls and fortified architecture, this groups seclusion from, and fear of, the poorer urban population reflects the social antagonism between the two played out upon city topology...  >The 'de jure' deracialisation of space has expanded opportunities whilst largely ignoring the actual possibility of their achievement. The high inequality of property, social services, employment and wealth prevents this 'de jure' deracialisation of space within the post-apartheid city being translated into \u201ca genuine desegregation of the urban landscape\u201d.^5 Hindson et al. has noted how in the closing years of apartheid the break with \u201cterritorial apartheid\u201d - especially the collapse of pass controls and the Group Areas Act \u2013 powerfully reinforced \u201cresidential apartheid and hence the racial geography of the city\u201d.^6 This implies the reproduction of the apartheid city wasn't transformed by the end of apartheids overtly coercive measures thus implying a deeper mechanism of social regulation possible transcending the particular apartheid cities characteristics. As such the post-apartheid city is both distinct and similar to it's predecessor; inequality has either stagnated or grown and is still strongly linked to race.^7 Yet the globalisation of the city within a framework of racial liberalistion has also transformed the drive of urban policy from one of racial, to directly economic imperatives. The post-apartheid city represents continuity in the seclusion of overwhelming rich white areas from poorer black ones. And change insofar as these groups positions within the cities has changed; no longer is their a clear distinction between a black urban periphery and a white urban centre characteristic of the apartheid city. Nor is race so firmly linked to class.  >the very shape of the city both in terms of physical characteristics and symbolic meaning are the outcome of peoples everyday practices in it. Inhabitants of the city do not stand as subjects impotently faced with an objective city already formed by institutional actors. The mass of subjects within the city are not 'victims' but interact, change and often challenge the received urban landscape, it's structures of power and patterns of reproduction. The permanency of grassroots community movements from apartheid perhaps signifies the continuity of symptoms such movements were formed to fight.  >All these community groups, 'defensive' or 'offensive' transform and challenge the city they 'receive' by challenging not only the submissive role required of their communities, but actively shaping the socio-cultural life of the city and their communities through the maintenance of it's semi-autonomous character ensuring their vibrant particularity. The reclaiming of land for public use by these groups is an attempt to make real the national discourse of a 'nation for everyone' all with a place to live within it. This vibrant network with it's links to other forms of community power, represents a fragmented but real 'on the ground' attempt to make the city truly post-apartheid, to challenge conditions of existence in the cities which for many have remained unchanged. Even if Freund's criticism perhaps remain overwhelmingly true, since the 2000's there's been a steady challenge, if not to the monopoly of the ANC over elected districts, but to the facade of ANC respectability inherited from it's historic role in the anti-apartheid struggle. Community activity, in it's myriad of forms, poses a direct challenge to the authority of government and businesses to control the city. If the continuing declining voter turnout represents a regression of public discourse in the face of perceived ANC impotence and corruption, then this community activity attempts to be it's positive corollary by not only voicing easily ignored concerns, but actively shaping the city in it's image.  >Though Murray is correct in noting \u201cmarket competition is the principal mechanism governing the regulation and organisation of urban space\u201d^8, this rule goes by no means unchallenged by the networks of community groups or the contradictory policies of state intervention. Today the post-apartheid city remains still defined in relation to it's oppressive forebear insofar as it's organisation is still ultimately serving the same interests for which the apartheid regime was originally constructed; capitalism. However this hegemony is challenged by a variety of sincere local officials and community activities who wish to translate the post-apartheid city from something which doesn't merely stand after apartheid, but opposed to it. Overall at present the differences are at once vast  - insofar as black life is no longer characterised by regular formal oppression from the state \u2013 and unobservable \u2013 insofar as the main demographics of black urban life remaining largely unchanged. The South African city today also exemplifies a topographical change in it's organisation of urban space and demographic distribution, which more broadly reflects an official policy tying cities directly into the requirements of international capital, which no longer mediated through racial distinctions and the success the ANC's BEE policy has produced a city defined by largely by class.  ^1 M. Legassick, 'South African political economy', *Centre for Civil Society Colloquium on the Economy, Society and Nature*, 2006, p.393  ^2 S. Gelb, \u201cOverview of the SA economy\u201d, in J. Daniel, R. Southall and J. Lutchman, *State of the Nation: South Africa 2004-5*, HSRC, p.385  ^3 P. Bond, 'From Racial to Class Apartheid: South Africa\u2019s Frustrating Decade of Freedom', *Monthly Review*, 2004, retrieved from here  ^4 P. Bond, *Cities of Gold, Townships of Coal: Essays on South Africa's New Urban Crisis*, Africa Research & Publication, 2000  ^5 M. Murray, *City of Extremes*, Duke University Press, 2011  ^6 D. Hindson, M. Byerley, M. Morris, 'From Violence to Reconstruction: the Making, Disintegration and Remaking of an Apartheid City', *Antipode*, 1994, pp.323-350, p.336  ^7 Legassick, op.cit.  ^8 Murray op.cit.,p.15","human_ref_B":"If I could piggyback a question on this too - how much push from white South Africans at the time was there to end apartheid? Was there a far greater number of young whites wanting the change vs older whites?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":59693.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"8kqlrl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Is there evidence or are there studies showing that \"political correctness\" works? Sorry for the use of \"political correctness\" in the title. I realise it was invented as a pejorative and so I only use it for want of a better phrase.  My question more clumsily put is:  Is there evidence that the stigmatisation of certain words or ideas can lead to a more tolerant society? Or on the flip side is there evidence that the relaxing of social norms around what sort of speech is acceptable can lead to a less tolerant society?   Can you link me to any studies on this?  Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"dza6jhu","c_root_id_B":"dza9bz3","created_at_utc_A":1526824302,"created_at_utc_B":1526827882,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Research on *psychological reactance* suggests that political correctness might have paradoxical effects: the idea is that if someone perceives a threat or limitation to their freedom, they will react by changing their attitude in the opposite direction. This applies also to social norms pressuring individuals towards a certain behavior.  For example, Worchel and Arnold found that censoring a speech can increase the desire to hear the speech and not only, \"*that censorship by either a positively or negatively evaluated group leads to attitude change in the direction which was to have been advocated by the communication*\".   It is possible that imposing restriction on the \"freedom to be prejudiced\" might have the opposite effects via reactance: \"*Ironically, motivating people to reduce prejudice by emphasizing external control produced more explicit and implicit prejudice than did not intervening at all*\". Plant and Devine conclude that \"*p]romotion of autonomous prejudice regulation, then, is clearly more beneficial than social pressure for political correctness*\".  For practical purposes, this recent article suggests that [Donald Trump, an obvious example of violating \"politically correct norms\", benefited at least partially of these same norms via reactance.","human_ref_B":"Follow up question. To broaden this out, have there ever been studies on politeness in general (please, thank you, respecting other's boundaries) and its impact on interaction, on perceptions of the one using polite phrases and the one recieving.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3580.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"n3oyx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are there any religions that don't define themselves as the Chosen People\u2122? Do any religions say \"Those people over there are better than we are and closer to [deity], we should be more like them.\"","c_root_id_A":"c361q2x","c_root_id_B":"c360z8w","created_at_utc_A":1323260559,"created_at_utc_B":1323248037,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Taoist texts are full of the idea that ancient people were better, more authentic, closer to the Tao, etc. The attitude seems to be that most modern (relative to when the text was written) people suck and have lost track of the Tao.","human_ref_B":"Buddhism and Taoism maybe, but they're more of lifestyles.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12522.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"1lf0i4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What are the theories on the \"purpose\" of violence? Was just reading this book by Guy Halsall on violence in the early medieval west, and one of the theories he talked about was the use of violence between the medieval aristocracy as a means of communication, and one possible distinction was the separation between \"tactical\"\/realistic violence, that which is directed to achieve a specific end, vs \"strategic\"\/unrealistic violence which is the amorphous \"expression\" of the desire for particular ends, though not directed.  Which made me wonder, what other theories are out there as to the purpose of violence?    It also made me realise, there must be a great disconnect in academia between those with a \"social justice\" perspective on theories of violence, and anthropological\/historical perspectives on violence.  Was wondering if anyone could sum up the major theory lines for me?","c_root_id_A":"cbylvaw","c_root_id_B":"cbylmqc","created_at_utc_A":1377893770,"created_at_utc_B":1377893157,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Both Norbert Elias and Max Weber address theories of violence as a legitimizing force of authority both socially and historically, which would be in-line with your reading and are both excellent analyses of violence as a social structural tool.   By contrast there are the utilitarian views of violence in Anomie\/Strain, which u\/middledeck noted, and the work of Merton is great for this view, I really enjoy his stuff.    There are 2 others current violence examinations that should be mentioned.   First is the micro sociological view that Collins took in his book \"Violence, a micro-sociological theory,\" which takes a really interesting look at how personal violence must overcome other ingrained sociological cues we've learned in order to be successful. A very different view of violence and can really expand the understanding of it.   Finally, there is Adrian Raines' \"Anatomy of Violence\" where he examine violence from a biological perspective, examining what makes habitually violent people's brains different from others. A controversial subject, obviously, but a very interesting perspective.","human_ref_B":"Check out \"The Code of The Street\" on Google Scholar.   I've never heard of any theory as you describe \"the purpose of violence\", but there are plenty of theories about why violence occurs.   I'll try to sum them up later on (on mobile now), but most revolve around Anomie\/Strain theory, subculture of violence (see above), and a couple others.  I have an MA and 2\/3 of a PhD (about to advance to candidacy) in Criminology and Criminal Justice.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":613.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1lf0i4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What are the theories on the \"purpose\" of violence? Was just reading this book by Guy Halsall on violence in the early medieval west, and one of the theories he talked about was the use of violence between the medieval aristocracy as a means of communication, and one possible distinction was the separation between \"tactical\"\/realistic violence, that which is directed to achieve a specific end, vs \"strategic\"\/unrealistic violence which is the amorphous \"expression\" of the desire for particular ends, though not directed.  Which made me wonder, what other theories are out there as to the purpose of violence?    It also made me realise, there must be a great disconnect in academia between those with a \"social justice\" perspective on theories of violence, and anthropological\/historical perspectives on violence.  Was wondering if anyone could sum up the major theory lines for me?","c_root_id_A":"cbylmqc","c_root_id_B":"cbypwsk","created_at_utc_A":1377893157,"created_at_utc_B":1377905162,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Check out \"The Code of The Street\" on Google Scholar.   I've never heard of any theory as you describe \"the purpose of violence\", but there are plenty of theories about why violence occurs.   I'll try to sum them up later on (on mobile now), but most revolve around Anomie\/Strain theory, subculture of violence (see above), and a couple others.  I have an MA and 2\/3 of a PhD (about to advance to candidacy) in Criminology and Criminal Justice.","human_ref_B":"There's also Hannah Arendt's \"On Violence\" which talks about violence and power, and how they have an antithetical relationship;  Then there's the instrumentalist theories of violence, especially in ethnic conflict, that argue that elites construct security dilemmas in order to stay in power  But I think before anything, one of the most interesting questions is \"What is violence.\" It seems like everyone knows what it means but the more you deconstruct it, its definition becomes more and more vague. Most people think of violence as being a direct action, but violent actions can also be indirect and structural (Johan Galtung).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12005.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3jratr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Has anyone studied the phenomenon of goal measures becoming the goals themselves in society? E.g. Letter grades degrading educational goals I'm wondering what research has been done on the phenomenon where people create measure Y for goal X, and eventually over time people focus so heavily on achieving measure Y that they sometimes forget about the original goal X. And is there a name for this phenomenon?  For example, letter grades were created as a shorthand to measure academic performance. However, grades have been so integrated into our academic system and are given such weight at the various levels of schooling that often people do their work to achieve the grade, rather than for the sake of learning.  It seems to me that this kind of thing happens wherever humans and measures exist, and I'd be interested to know what kind of work has been done in this area, if anyone is familiar.","c_root_id_A":"curqesk","c_root_id_B":"cursw6e","created_at_utc_A":1441479145,"created_at_utc_B":1441483934,"score_A":8,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure if this is the framing you're looking for, but this is a common theme in sociological theories of 'rationalization,' a term which has a specific meaning. For example, for Max Weber in _The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism_ the accumulation of wealth was originally intended to allay anxiety about the ultimate fate of individuals in the afterlife under Calvinism (as an 'inward sign of outward grace') but became an end in itself as the original impetus for Calvinist piety passed away. For Weber such rationalization  is an essential feature of modern society and can be seen in a wide variety of contexts, such as bureaucracy and scientific inquiry.","human_ref_B":"Its all about motivation Ames.  When society offers these arbitrary measures, people will undoubtedly try to succeed with the bare minimum.  These types of people possess performance goals (where the goal is to impress others -- not to achieve).  People tend to develop performance goals when they view intelligence as static instead of malleable.  If people view intelligence as malleable, then they are more likely to adopt mastery goals instead (where the goal is to learn -- not to have good grades).  [See the study done by Stripek] (http:\/\/psycnet.apa.org\/journals\/edu\/88\/3\/397\/).  I wrote an article on this a couple years back.  It addresses a lot of research on the whole goal measure phenomenon in school.  I pasted it [here]  (http:\/\/choneycutt.hubpages.com\/hub\/Attention-on-AbilityHow-the-US-Education-System-Downplays-Effort?done) If it is too long, I encourage you to read the last paragraph because it summarizes the article.  All the references are at the bottom.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4789.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"3jratr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Has anyone studied the phenomenon of goal measures becoming the goals themselves in society? E.g. Letter grades degrading educational goals I'm wondering what research has been done on the phenomenon where people create measure Y for goal X, and eventually over time people focus so heavily on achieving measure Y that they sometimes forget about the original goal X. And is there a name for this phenomenon?  For example, letter grades were created as a shorthand to measure academic performance. However, grades have been so integrated into our academic system and are given such weight at the various levels of schooling that often people do their work to achieve the grade, rather than for the sake of learning.  It seems to me that this kind of thing happens wherever humans and measures exist, and I'd be interested to know what kind of work has been done in this area, if anyone is familiar.","c_root_id_A":"cursycp","c_root_id_B":"cus2iyj","created_at_utc_A":1441484049,"created_at_utc_B":1441503310,"score_A":7,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"You may find the notion of decoupling, as developed by John Meyer of Stanford (among others), interesting. He's examined this phenomenon in multiple contexts, including education.  If you have a general interest in education and the problems created by the conventional educational institutions in the United States, check out *Teaching as a Subversive Activity* by Neil Postman.","human_ref_B":"This comment has been overwritten by an open source script to protect this user&apos;s privacy.      If you would like to do the same, add the browser extension GreaseMonkey to Firefox and add this open source script.      Then simply click on your username on Reddit, go to the comments tab, and hit the new OVERWRITE button at the top.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19261.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"3jratr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Has anyone studied the phenomenon of goal measures becoming the goals themselves in society? E.g. Letter grades degrading educational goals I'm wondering what research has been done on the phenomenon where people create measure Y for goal X, and eventually over time people focus so heavily on achieving measure Y that they sometimes forget about the original goal X. And is there a name for this phenomenon?  For example, letter grades were created as a shorthand to measure academic performance. However, grades have been so integrated into our academic system and are given such weight at the various levels of schooling that often people do their work to achieve the grade, rather than for the sake of learning.  It seems to me that this kind of thing happens wherever humans and measures exist, and I'd be interested to know what kind of work has been done in this area, if anyone is familiar.","c_root_id_A":"cus2iyj","c_root_id_B":"curxxnv","created_at_utc_A":1441503310,"created_at_utc_B":1441493885,"score_A":8,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"This comment has been overwritten by an open source script to protect this user&apos;s privacy.      If you would like to do the same, add the browser extension GreaseMonkey to Firefox and add this open source script.      Then simply click on your username on Reddit, go to the comments tab, and hit the new OVERWRITE button at the top.","human_ref_B":"One obvious example is Marx, who wrote volumes on the distinction between what he called use-value and exchange-value.  You can't beat 'Capital vol. 1' if you want to get your head around it, but it's not an easy read. 'A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy' is a lot shorter, and covers a lot of the same concepts.  https:\/\/www.marxists.org\/archive\/marx\/works\/1859\/critique-pol-economy\/ch01.htm","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9425.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6z1r18","c_root_id_B":"e6z1sqc","created_at_utc_A":1538408954,"created_at_utc_B":1538408995,"score_A":9,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"Thinking Fast & Slow by Daniel Kahneman","human_ref_B":"conquest of bread is good","labels":0,"seconds_difference":41.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6z1leq","c_root_id_B":"e6z1sqc","created_at_utc_A":1538408820,"created_at_utc_B":1538408995,"score_A":4,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"Economix a fun read","human_ref_B":"conquest of bread is good","labels":0,"seconds_difference":175.0,"score_ratio":6.75}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6zdtao","c_root_id_B":"e6z1r18","created_at_utc_A":1538419093,"created_at_utc_B":1538408954,"score_A":15,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"*Nudge* by Thaler (Nobel Prize in Economics) & Sunstein   A book which is unquestionably about Economics and Public Policy  &#x200B;  I haven't read it yet but it's on my list:   Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics also by Thaler  &#x200B;  *Thinking Fast & Slow* by Kahneman (Nobel Prize in Economics)   Not strictly about economics but Kahneman essentially created the field of \"Behavioral Economics\" and the implications for his theories about decision making bias are extensive in Economics. In many ways Kahneman and Tverski's work is the foundation of Thaler's in *Nudge*.  &#x200B;  Also:   Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely   If you can't tell I like the Behavioral Econmics books...","human_ref_B":"Thinking Fast & Slow by Daniel Kahneman","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10139.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6zdtao","c_root_id_B":"e6z5ut3","created_at_utc_A":1538419093,"created_at_utc_B":1538412464,"score_A":15,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"*Nudge* by Thaler (Nobel Prize in Economics) & Sunstein   A book which is unquestionably about Economics and Public Policy  &#x200B;  I haven't read it yet but it's on my list:   Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics also by Thaler  &#x200B;  *Thinking Fast & Slow* by Kahneman (Nobel Prize in Economics)   Not strictly about economics but Kahneman essentially created the field of \"Behavioral Economics\" and the implications for his theories about decision making bias are extensive in Economics. In many ways Kahneman and Tverski's work is the foundation of Thaler's in *Nudge*.  &#x200B;  Also:   Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely   If you can't tell I like the Behavioral Econmics books...","human_ref_B":"Triumph of the City by Edward Glaeser.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6629.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6z1leq","c_root_id_B":"e6zdtao","created_at_utc_A":1538408820,"created_at_utc_B":1538419093,"score_A":4,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Economix a fun read","human_ref_B":"*Nudge* by Thaler (Nobel Prize in Economics) & Sunstein   A book which is unquestionably about Economics and Public Policy  &#x200B;  I haven't read it yet but it's on my list:   Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics also by Thaler  &#x200B;  *Thinking Fast & Slow* by Kahneman (Nobel Prize in Economics)   Not strictly about economics but Kahneman essentially created the field of \"Behavioral Economics\" and the implications for his theories about decision making bias are extensive in Economics. In many ways Kahneman and Tverski's work is the foundation of Thaler's in *Nudge*.  &#x200B;  Also:   Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely   If you can't tell I like the Behavioral Econmics books...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10273.0,"score_ratio":3.75}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6z27gd","c_root_id_B":"e6zdtao","created_at_utc_A":1538409346,"created_at_utc_B":1538419093,"score_A":2,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Nudge by Thaler","human_ref_B":"*Nudge* by Thaler (Nobel Prize in Economics) & Sunstein   A book which is unquestionably about Economics and Public Policy  &#x200B;  I haven't read it yet but it's on my list:   Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics also by Thaler  &#x200B;  *Thinking Fast & Slow* by Kahneman (Nobel Prize in Economics)   Not strictly about economics but Kahneman essentially created the field of \"Behavioral Economics\" and the implications for his theories about decision making bias are extensive in Economics. In many ways Kahneman and Tverski's work is the foundation of Thaler's in *Nudge*.  &#x200B;  Also:   Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely   If you can't tell I like the Behavioral Econmics books...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9747.0,"score_ratio":7.5}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6z8sm4","c_root_id_B":"e6zdtao","created_at_utc_A":1538414928,"created_at_utc_B":1538419093,"score_A":2,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Naked economics by charles wheelan","human_ref_B":"*Nudge* by Thaler (Nobel Prize in Economics) & Sunstein   A book which is unquestionably about Economics and Public Policy  &#x200B;  I haven't read it yet but it's on my list:   Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics also by Thaler  &#x200B;  *Thinking Fast & Slow* by Kahneman (Nobel Prize in Economics)   Not strictly about economics but Kahneman essentially created the field of \"Behavioral Economics\" and the implications for his theories about decision making bias are extensive in Economics. In many ways Kahneman and Tverski's work is the foundation of Thaler's in *Nudge*.  &#x200B;  Also:   Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely   If you can't tell I like the Behavioral Econmics books...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4165.0,"score_ratio":7.5}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6z1leq","c_root_id_B":"e6z1r18","created_at_utc_A":1538408820,"created_at_utc_B":1538408954,"score_A":4,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Economix a fun read","human_ref_B":"Thinking Fast & Slow by Daniel Kahneman","labels":0,"seconds_difference":134.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6z1leq","c_root_id_B":"e6z5ut3","created_at_utc_A":1538408820,"created_at_utc_B":1538412464,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Economix a fun read","human_ref_B":"Triumph of the City by Edward Glaeser.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3644.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6z27gd","c_root_id_B":"e6z5ut3","created_at_utc_A":1538409346,"created_at_utc_B":1538412464,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Nudge by Thaler","human_ref_B":"Triumph of the City by Edward Glaeser.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3118.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6zi3ey","c_root_id_B":"e6zmwo8","created_at_utc_A":1538422568,"created_at_utc_B":1538426419,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Factfullness by Hans Rosling Not strictly economics, but you should probably read it anyway.","human_ref_B":"Several good ones have been mentioned (Thinking: Fast and Slow, Debt: The First 5000 Years, Conquest of Bread), but I haven't seen *Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea* by Mark Blyth mentioned yet. Certainly an important (and good) read. Also recommend Yanis Varoufakis' *Talking to my Daughter About the Economy,* even if it is (necessarily) quite basic. Another good one is *The Growth Delusion* by David Pilling, though that is quite... narrowly focused.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3851.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6zmwo8","c_root_id_B":"e6z27gd","created_at_utc_A":1538426419,"created_at_utc_B":1538409346,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Several good ones have been mentioned (Thinking: Fast and Slow, Debt: The First 5000 Years, Conquest of Bread), but I haven't seen *Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea* by Mark Blyth mentioned yet. Certainly an important (and good) read. Also recommend Yanis Varoufakis' *Talking to my Daughter About the Economy,* even if it is (necessarily) quite basic. Another good one is *The Growth Delusion* by David Pilling, though that is quite... narrowly focused.","human_ref_B":"Nudge by Thaler","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17073.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"9kh84o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some of your favorite non-textbook, economics books? Besides Freakonomics, I've already read it.","c_root_id_A":"e6z8sm4","c_root_id_B":"e6zmwo8","created_at_utc_A":1538414928,"created_at_utc_B":1538426419,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Naked economics by charles wheelan","human_ref_B":"Several good ones have been mentioned (Thinking: Fast and Slow, Debt: The First 5000 Years, Conquest of Bread), but I haven't seen *Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea* by Mark Blyth mentioned yet. Certainly an important (and good) read. Also recommend Yanis Varoufakis' *Talking to my Daughter About the Economy,* even if it is (necessarily) quite basic. Another good one is *The Growth Delusion* by David Pilling, though that is quite... narrowly focused.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11491.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"6rruaz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What are some useful psychology books suitable for a layperson? I've already read a good smattering of these and enjoyed em. I'm thinking of stuff like Cialdini, positive psych, Duckworth's Grit, Thinking Fast and Slow, and stuff on cognitive biases in general. Any major topics\/classics I've missed?","c_root_id_A":"dl7ja44","c_root_id_B":"dl7s9o4","created_at_utc_A":1501955756,"created_at_utc_B":1501968070,"score_A":2,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"For reference, I've looked lately at moral psychology a lot - it's there a lot of cognitive stuff overlaps.  Meanings of life (Baum3eister)  second The Righteous Mind - even though it might have replication troubles  I haven't looked into it yet but Homicide is a good book about historical psychologies of murder","human_ref_B":"I don't think there are many popular books I'd recommend at this point in time - the field is so troubled by questions about the robustness of effects that once seemed certain, even experts don't really know what to trust. For example, I'd argue that Grit is utter nonsense - and there's plenty popular work on that - and even the rather great Thinking Fast and Slow has entire chapters (esp. on social priming) that should be removed from future editions. Positive psychology as a field heavily suffers from all of these issues, too.  Maybe instead have a read of The 7 Deadly Sins of Psychology, a \"A Manifesto for Reforming the Culture of Scientific Practice\". Meta, I know.  Edit: Or read something about those parts of psychology that do replicate. Stuart Ritchie's Intelligence: All That Matters, for example.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12314.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"6rruaz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What are some useful psychology books suitable for a layperson? I've already read a good smattering of these and enjoyed em. I'm thinking of stuff like Cialdini, positive psych, Duckworth's Grit, Thinking Fast and Slow, and stuff on cognitive biases in general. Any major topics\/classics I've missed?","c_root_id_A":"dl7hkkh","c_root_id_B":"dl7s9o4","created_at_utc_A":1501953524,"created_at_utc_B":1501968070,"score_A":2,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"The Social Animals - Brooks The Righteous Mind - Haight Anatomy of an Epidemic - Whitaker","human_ref_B":"I don't think there are many popular books I'd recommend at this point in time - the field is so troubled by questions about the robustness of effects that once seemed certain, even experts don't really know what to trust. For example, I'd argue that Grit is utter nonsense - and there's plenty popular work on that - and even the rather great Thinking Fast and Slow has entire chapters (esp. on social priming) that should be removed from future editions. Positive psychology as a field heavily suffers from all of these issues, too.  Maybe instead have a read of The 7 Deadly Sins of Psychology, a \"A Manifesto for Reforming the Culture of Scientific Practice\". Meta, I know.  Edit: Or read something about those parts of psychology that do replicate. Stuart Ritchie's Intelligence: All That Matters, for example.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14546.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"6rruaz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What are some useful psychology books suitable for a layperson? I've already read a good smattering of these and enjoyed em. I'm thinking of stuff like Cialdini, positive psych, Duckworth's Grit, Thinking Fast and Slow, and stuff on cognitive biases in general. Any major topics\/classics I've missed?","c_root_id_A":"dl7y9sh","c_root_id_B":"dl7ja44","created_at_utc_A":1501976761,"created_at_utc_B":1501955756,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I would recommend one of Keith Stanovich's books on rationality. The one that I really enjoyed was *The Robot's Rebellion: Finding Meaning in the Age of Darwin*. Mind you, as with most pop-psy books, you should read it with some healthy skepticism. Don't read it as if it speaks to a consensus within psychology.","human_ref_B":"For reference, I've looked lately at moral psychology a lot - it's there a lot of cognitive stuff overlaps.  Meanings of life (Baum3eister)  second The Righteous Mind - even though it might have replication troubles  I haven't looked into it yet but Homicide is a good book about historical psychologies of murder","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21005.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"6rruaz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What are some useful psychology books suitable for a layperson? I've already read a good smattering of these and enjoyed em. I'm thinking of stuff like Cialdini, positive psych, Duckworth's Grit, Thinking Fast and Slow, and stuff on cognitive biases in general. Any major topics\/classics I've missed?","c_root_id_A":"dl7y9sh","c_root_id_B":"dl7hkkh","created_at_utc_A":1501976761,"created_at_utc_B":1501953524,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I would recommend one of Keith Stanovich's books on rationality. The one that I really enjoyed was *The Robot's Rebellion: Finding Meaning in the Age of Darwin*. Mind you, as with most pop-psy books, you should read it with some healthy skepticism. Don't read it as if it speaks to a consensus within psychology.","human_ref_B":"The Social Animals - Brooks The Righteous Mind - Haight Anatomy of an Epidemic - Whitaker","labels":1,"seconds_difference":23237.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"bx3g0u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How is scientific rigor maintained in social science? when explaining a concept  to people do you only reference established, accepted \"proven works\"?  &#x200B;  A lot of people put out flat out wrong to pseudoscientific work on the topic of social science. How do i know which is correct?  basically i guess what i'm asking is, how do i not get misled by bad faith actors, liars,  pop sociologists?   &#x200B;  is there an encyclopedia for social science topics?  How do i get the \"real stuff\"?","c_root_id_A":"eq35sfl","c_root_id_B":"eq37266","created_at_utc_A":1559750021,"created_at_utc_B":1559750627,"score_A":8,"score_B":39,"human_ref_A":"> How to i get the \u201creal stuff\u201d?  Read social science articles from reputable journals (esp. those published by associations like ASA, APA, AAA, etc.), social science blogs (written by actual - not \u201cpop\u201d - social scientists), and news and magazine articles written by social scientists (e.g, NYT, Atlantic, etc. all publish articles by social scientists).","human_ref_B":">a lot of people put out flat out wrong, pseudoscientific work  What are your sources for this claim? I feel like you're just propagating the stereotype that social sciences aren't real sciences, aren't empiric, factual, or unbiased.   Even someone who is not an expert in the social sciences should be able to point out errors, inconsistencies or sloppy scholarship. That's what we have critical thinking for.  The above poster makes a very helpful post, but mostly mentions American associations: APA, ASA and so on. There is much scholarship from around the world that is worth reading :)  I don't share your black white dichotomy of 'good science vs bad science': Papers published in reputable journals aren't necessarily 'better', they just have a different, arguably more rigorous review process. But they may not be as welcome to show 'underdog' publications that go against the canonical narrative. Just my 2c.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":606.0,"score_ratio":4.875}
{"post_id":"bx3g0u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How is scientific rigor maintained in social science? when explaining a concept  to people do you only reference established, accepted \"proven works\"?  &#x200B;  A lot of people put out flat out wrong to pseudoscientific work on the topic of social science. How do i know which is correct?  basically i guess what i'm asking is, how do i not get misled by bad faith actors, liars,  pop sociologists?   &#x200B;  is there an encyclopedia for social science topics?  How do i get the \"real stuff\"?","c_root_id_A":"eq35sfl","c_root_id_B":"eq39ont","created_at_utc_A":1559750021,"created_at_utc_B":1559751950,"score_A":8,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"> How to i get the \u201creal stuff\u201d?  Read social science articles from reputable journals (esp. those published by associations like ASA, APA, AAA, etc.), social science blogs (written by actual - not \u201cpop\u201d - social scientists), and news and magazine articles written by social scientists (e.g, NYT, Atlantic, etc. all publish articles by social scientists).","human_ref_B":">  How do i get the \"real stuff\"?  You spend 5+ years in graduate school learning how to produce good research and producing it.  I think a major reason this question pops up so often re social sciences as opposed to natural sciences is that, when it comes to the natural sciences, people have some innate appreciation that, to understand them, they must go to school and study and gain domain knowledge. For some reason though, re social sciences, people are like, I see social interactions all the time - why can't I just sit in my pjs eating pizza and just *know things*? But like, dude, it's exactly the same. If you want to be able to identify incorrect research design, you have to like, study research design, read books about it, talk to people who do it, and do so thoroughly and consistently. You can't learn this shit from wikipedia. Sorry.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1929.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"1jwomc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Searched, but could not find, a discussion about the best blogs to read in your field of study or interest. Howabout one? Just got my RSS account up and running and I want to read some quality blogs. So far I have Stephen Walt and Chris Blattman.","c_root_id_A":"cbj4cy1","c_root_id_B":"cbj3b0f","created_at_utc_A":1375917455,"created_at_utc_B":1375914506,"score_A":34,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"**Sociology**:  *The \"Must Reads\"*:   * OrgTheory Mainly organizational theory, but covers a wide range of topics including social movements, networks, economic sociology, and social theory.  It's a blog that should appeal to a wide range of other disciplines.  Probably the most popular sociology blog with academics.    * Sociological Images is probably the most popular sociological blog with general audiences.  Focuses a lot on gender, race, and the media.  Warning: is the kind of blog that says \"trigger warning\" before discussing sensitive topics.     * Scatterplot A collection of young up-and-coming sociologists who will be the old guard in the future.  If the list below doesn't satisfy your cravings for sociological blogs, I'd encourage you to go through those three's blog rolls to see if there's more that interests you.  *Group Blogs* (in really no particular order):   * The Society Pages hosts Soc Images and several other blogs, including Citings and Sightings, covering social science in the news, which I just started following.     * Codes and Culture I don't read it, but I think it's a very methodological blog and is great for people who do data mining.   * Global sociology Like Soc Images, this aims to be \"public sociology\", focusing on small graphs and images.    * Everyday Sociology.   Light and accessible to the general public like Global Sociology and Soc Images, but (since it's being used to sell a text book) much less political.   * Legally Sociable \"Pleasant musings on sociology, law, cities and suburbs, housing, and miscellaneous errata.\"   * Racism Review  What it sounds like.     * Monclair Sociology The only department I know of that has put together a blog worth reading.     * Bad Hessian Brand, brand new blog about computational sociology.    * Black, White, and Gray A group of Christian sociologists of religion.   * Research on Religion Out of Baylor (which has one of the most notable crews of sociologists of religion).     * Mobilizing Ideas About social movements, out of Notre Dame.  *Related Fields*:   * The Immanent Frame A mufti-disciplinary blog about religion and secularism run by the Social Science Research Council.   * Savage Minds To my knowledge, the top anthropology blog.   * Crooked Timber A fascinating mix of philosophy and political science and more that is very widely read among social scientists of all stripes.   * The Monkey Cage Political science.  Again, very widely read (and widely associated with statistician Andrew Gelman, though many more people write for it).  And because you're already reading Walt and Blattman, I'd recommend Daniel Drezner's blog which, when I have time, is how I keep up on what's going in International Relations.  *Individual People*:   * Chris Uggen Well respected criminologist.   * Kieran Healy Networks and economic sociology.  One of the smartest sociologists out there.  Period.  Friends with all the Scatterplotters.   * Jen Lena She's a sociologist of culture who mainly uses quantitative and network methods.  Another one associated with the Scatterplotters.   * Randall Collins Works primarily on micro-sociology\/interaction these days.  I think he used to be a big deal.   * Statistical Modeling, Causal Inference, and Social Science.  Andrew Gelman (statistician and political scientist)'s personal blog.  A leader in the Bayesian revolution.   * Family Inequality Philipp N. Cohen's blog.  I don't check it that often, but I believe it covers a lot of broad sociological issues beyond merely family and inequality.     * Dan Hirschman An economic sociologist.  I don't always read it but it can deal with both sociological theory and quantitative methods.   * Claude Fischer Devastatingly smart quantitative sociologist, an \"old head\".  His academic work mainly covers (to my knowledge) inequality, race, and religion, but his blog covers an even wider set of topics.   * Iranian Redneck Darren Sherkat's blog.  He mainly studies religion from a quantitative perspective, but it often devolves into him screaming about \"whores\" and \"assholes\" and other people who don't properly approach quantitative sociology as a pure science.  Even when I don't agree with him, he's a fun read.  The opposite of Black, White, and Gray (he also hated 538 for a while).   * Religion and Other Curiosities.  Peter Berger's very, very in-depth blog, hosted by *the American Interest*.  Peter Berger, who wrote such classical texts as *The Social Construction of Reality* (1966) and *The Sacred Canopy* (1967), still has a sharp mind at age 84.   * Shamus Kahn, one of the scatterplotters, had a monthly column in *Time* magazine.  I don't know if that relationship is over, or has just been put on hold.    There are, of course, many more, but I tried to give a broad sampling of both quantitative and qualitative sociologists writing across a wide variety of subfields.    Edit: **if there's a sociology blog that you love and isn't on here, please tell me** so that I can consider it for inclusion when we make the \"AskSocialScience\" list of blog.","human_ref_B":"I did the same search a couple months ago. this guy's post got me started - he has a decently sized list of good Economic Development blogs.  My feedly account consists of:  Economist Full Print Edition  Economist blogs (list on the right, scroll a little)  ODI Opinion - lots of community development & environmental stuff  Economists Club - they also have a poli. sci. Blog  Oxfam Blogs, particularly From Poverty to Power, by Duncan Green  Mathbabe - not really Econ, sometimes development, mostly about data & models, but the posts are always interesting and she posts everyday.  Latin America's Moment - obviously, specifically about Latin American Econ. Dev., mixed with US - Latin American relations.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2949.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"1jwomc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Searched, but could not find, a discussion about the best blogs to read in your field of study or interest. Howabout one? Just got my RSS account up and running and I want to read some quality blogs. So far I have Stephen Walt and Chris Blattman.","c_root_id_A":"cbj4iui","c_root_id_B":"cbj4dc9","created_at_utc_A":1375917928,"created_at_utc_B":1375917488,"score_A":15,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"**Economics blogs**  (edit - added descriptions. Now you know my biases, and just because I say I don't like someone doesn't mean they aren't worth reading.)  Here's a wide sampling - I follow about 70 or 80% of these. I can't guarantee that every single one remains active, but a large chunk of them are.  **A. General Interest**  * Greg Mankiw's Blog. More links than content these days, but still worth keeping tabs on. * Cowen and Tabarrok's Marginal Revolution. They blog about everything, with some economics thrown in. * Paul Krugman's Conscience of a Liberal. The leading Democratic \/ liberal economics blogger.  * Jeff Frankel's Blog. Longish articles, posted infrequently. Focus on macro\/international issues.  * Mark Thoma's Economist's View. Worth it for his daily link list. Content is similar to Krugman. * Brad Delong's Grasping Reality. Content is similar to Krugman. Good knowledge of economic history of thought.  * The Becker-Posner Blog. Law and economics. * The NYT Economix. Various authors). * Steven Landsburg's The Big Questions. Sometimes pointed and abrasive. Wants to be the conservative anti-Krugman but doesn't quite make it.  **B. Purely Academic** (blogs that review recent research in economics)  * The Economic Logician. Reviews everything. Snarky, but in a good way. All hail EL! * A Fine Theorem. Written by a PhD student at Northwestern MEDS. Reviews mostly micro\/theory papers. * Christian Zimmermann's NEP-DGE blog. Weekly reviews of macro papers.  **C. Econometrics and Statistics**  * Andrew Gelman's Statistical Modelling * Chris Auld's Econometrics Blog * David Giles' Econometrics Blog * Error Statistics Philosophy * Normal Deviate * Diebold's No Hesitation (new!)  **D. Microeconomics and Applied Microeconomics**    * Jeff Ely's Cheap Talk. Sort of like Marginal Revolution, but with more economics. Fun game theory applications. * Acemoglu's Why Nations Fail blog. Development. * The Healthcare Economist. Health care. * Jason Collins' Evolving Economics. Evolutionary economics. Good food for thought. * Chris Blattman's International Development, Politics, Economics, and Policy. International development, politics, policy, etc. Just what it says in the title. * The World Bank's Development Impact. Development. Focus on reviewing recent research. * John Whitehead's Environmental Economics. The fun enviro econ blog. * Matthew Kahn's Environmental and Urban Economics. The somewhat more serious enviro econ blog.  **E. Macroeconomics**  * Scott Sumner's The Money Illusion. He is the modern pioneer of nominal income targeting. On the top of his game when talking about monetary economics. * Nick Rowe et al's Worthwhile Canadian Initiative. I learned about as much macro from Nick Rowe as from six years of formal economics training.  This blog is an excellent companion to the undergraduate economics student who is interested in macroeconomics. * Miles Kimball's Supply-Side Liberal. This has quickly become my favorite macroeconomics blog. He also writes on religion and society.  * Lars Christensen's The Market Monetarist. Think Scott Sumner with an international bent. Disclosure: I have written for Lars' blog. * Jim Hamilton's EconBrowser. Macroeconomics with some diversions into energy policy. Written by the top living time-series econometrician.  * Tim Duy's Fed Watch * Andy Harless' Employment, Interest, and Money * Simon Wren-Lewis' Mainly Macro. * Henrik Jensen's Academic Economics * Simon Johnson's The Baseline Scenario * Steve Williamson's New Monetarism. Right-wing, very much so. Doesn't like Krugman. Good posts on New Keynesian economics and is a window into the \"culture of macro\" more generally. * David Andolfatto's MacroMania. He can be more technical than some, but it's good to read him to get a perspective on model-informed policy advice. * John Cochrane's Grumpy Economist. Right-wing. Finance and macro. * John Taylor's Economics One. Right-wing. Written by the person who formulated the famous \"Taylor Rule.\" * Casey Mulligan's Supply and Demand. Right-wing. Had a good focus on the housing market during the Recession. * Noah Smith's Noahpinion. I'm not as impressed with Noah as some. Aspires to be a mini-Krugman. He's at the top of his game when talking about behavioral finance, and at the bottom of his game when taking potshots at graduate macro training.  * Atlanta Fed Macroblog * St. Louis Fed Economic Synopses  **F. Economics News**  * Central Bank News (surprisingly comprehensive) * Calculated Risk * The Sober Look * FT Alphaville (news and commentary)  **Enjoy** :)","human_ref_B":"Here are the feeds from my feedly account... not sure how to retain the links, or properly export, sorry...  - a sandwich, with words??? - Cognitive Policy Works - In Media Res - Just TV - media-studies \u00ab WordPress.com Tag Feed - MediaCitizen - National Association for Media Literacy Education - NO CAPTION NEEDED - Pressthink - Rhetorica - Social Media in Higher Education - Sociological Images - Spotlight on Digital Media and Learning - The Consumer Trap - BIOS [bioculture art lab] | BIOS [bioculture art lab] - BrosephStalin - Civic Media + Tactical Design in Contested Spaces - Clay Shirky - Confessions of an Aca\/Fan - Curating Media and Design - dkompare vs. mostly screens - Doing Media Studies - emergent by design - Evgeny Morozov's blog - Free Online Course Materials | Comparative Media Studies | MIT ... - gnovis - i eat media for breakfast - Institute of Network Cultures - Media Industries - MEDIA STUDIES - The Learning Network Blog - NYTimes.com - MIT Comparative Media Studies - Napsterization - NEPCA Journal - net critique by Geert Lovink - Sound of Ruins - Teaching Online Journalism - The Chicago School of Media Theory - Versobooks.com - We Study Media - You Suck at Transmedia","labels":1,"seconds_difference":440.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1jwomc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Searched, but could not find, a discussion about the best blogs to read in your field of study or interest. Howabout one? Just got my RSS account up and running and I want to read some quality blogs. So far I have Stephen Walt and Chris Blattman.","c_root_id_A":"cbj4iui","c_root_id_B":"cbj3b0f","created_at_utc_A":1375917928,"created_at_utc_B":1375914506,"score_A":15,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"**Economics blogs**  (edit - added descriptions. Now you know my biases, and just because I say I don't like someone doesn't mean they aren't worth reading.)  Here's a wide sampling - I follow about 70 or 80% of these. I can't guarantee that every single one remains active, but a large chunk of them are.  **A. General Interest**  * Greg Mankiw's Blog. More links than content these days, but still worth keeping tabs on. * Cowen and Tabarrok's Marginal Revolution. They blog about everything, with some economics thrown in. * Paul Krugman's Conscience of a Liberal. The leading Democratic \/ liberal economics blogger.  * Jeff Frankel's Blog. Longish articles, posted infrequently. Focus on macro\/international issues.  * Mark Thoma's Economist's View. Worth it for his daily link list. Content is similar to Krugman. * Brad Delong's Grasping Reality. Content is similar to Krugman. Good knowledge of economic history of thought.  * The Becker-Posner Blog. Law and economics. * The NYT Economix. Various authors). * Steven Landsburg's The Big Questions. Sometimes pointed and abrasive. Wants to be the conservative anti-Krugman but doesn't quite make it.  **B. Purely Academic** (blogs that review recent research in economics)  * The Economic Logician. Reviews everything. Snarky, but in a good way. All hail EL! * A Fine Theorem. Written by a PhD student at Northwestern MEDS. Reviews mostly micro\/theory papers. * Christian Zimmermann's NEP-DGE blog. Weekly reviews of macro papers.  **C. Econometrics and Statistics**  * Andrew Gelman's Statistical Modelling * Chris Auld's Econometrics Blog * David Giles' Econometrics Blog * Error Statistics Philosophy * Normal Deviate * Diebold's No Hesitation (new!)  **D. Microeconomics and Applied Microeconomics**    * Jeff Ely's Cheap Talk. Sort of like Marginal Revolution, but with more economics. Fun game theory applications. * Acemoglu's Why Nations Fail blog. Development. * The Healthcare Economist. Health care. * Jason Collins' Evolving Economics. Evolutionary economics. Good food for thought. * Chris Blattman's International Development, Politics, Economics, and Policy. International development, politics, policy, etc. Just what it says in the title. * The World Bank's Development Impact. Development. Focus on reviewing recent research. * John Whitehead's Environmental Economics. The fun enviro econ blog. * Matthew Kahn's Environmental and Urban Economics. The somewhat more serious enviro econ blog.  **E. Macroeconomics**  * Scott Sumner's The Money Illusion. He is the modern pioneer of nominal income targeting. On the top of his game when talking about monetary economics. * Nick Rowe et al's Worthwhile Canadian Initiative. I learned about as much macro from Nick Rowe as from six years of formal economics training.  This blog is an excellent companion to the undergraduate economics student who is interested in macroeconomics. * Miles Kimball's Supply-Side Liberal. This has quickly become my favorite macroeconomics blog. He also writes on religion and society.  * Lars Christensen's The Market Monetarist. Think Scott Sumner with an international bent. Disclosure: I have written for Lars' blog. * Jim Hamilton's EconBrowser. Macroeconomics with some diversions into energy policy. Written by the top living time-series econometrician.  * Tim Duy's Fed Watch * Andy Harless' Employment, Interest, and Money * Simon Wren-Lewis' Mainly Macro. * Henrik Jensen's Academic Economics * Simon Johnson's The Baseline Scenario * Steve Williamson's New Monetarism. Right-wing, very much so. Doesn't like Krugman. Good posts on New Keynesian economics and is a window into the \"culture of macro\" more generally. * David Andolfatto's MacroMania. He can be more technical than some, but it's good to read him to get a perspective on model-informed policy advice. * John Cochrane's Grumpy Economist. Right-wing. Finance and macro. * John Taylor's Economics One. Right-wing. Written by the person who formulated the famous \"Taylor Rule.\" * Casey Mulligan's Supply and Demand. Right-wing. Had a good focus on the housing market during the Recession. * Noah Smith's Noahpinion. I'm not as impressed with Noah as some. Aspires to be a mini-Krugman. He's at the top of his game when talking about behavioral finance, and at the bottom of his game when taking potshots at graduate macro training.  * Atlanta Fed Macroblog * St. Louis Fed Economic Synopses  **F. Economics News**  * Central Bank News (surprisingly comprehensive) * Calculated Risk * The Sober Look * FT Alphaville (news and commentary)  **Enjoy** :)","human_ref_B":"I did the same search a couple months ago. this guy's post got me started - he has a decently sized list of good Economic Development blogs.  My feedly account consists of:  Economist Full Print Edition  Economist blogs (list on the right, scroll a little)  ODI Opinion - lots of community development & environmental stuff  Economists Club - they also have a poli. sci. Blog  Oxfam Blogs, particularly From Poverty to Power, by Duncan Green  Mathbabe - not really Econ, sometimes development, mostly about data & models, but the posts are always interesting and she posts everyday.  Latin America's Moment - obviously, specifically about Latin American Econ. Dev., mixed with US - Latin American relations.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3422.0,"score_ratio":3.75}
{"post_id":"1jwomc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Searched, but could not find, a discussion about the best blogs to read in your field of study or interest. Howabout one? Just got my RSS account up and running and I want to read some quality blogs. So far I have Stephen Walt and Chris Blattman.","c_root_id_A":"cbj3b0f","c_root_id_B":"cbj4dc9","created_at_utc_A":1375914506,"created_at_utc_B":1375917488,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I did the same search a couple months ago. this guy's post got me started - he has a decently sized list of good Economic Development blogs.  My feedly account consists of:  Economist Full Print Edition  Economist blogs (list on the right, scroll a little)  ODI Opinion - lots of community development & environmental stuff  Economists Club - they also have a poli. sci. Blog  Oxfam Blogs, particularly From Poverty to Power, by Duncan Green  Mathbabe - not really Econ, sometimes development, mostly about data & models, but the posts are always interesting and she posts everyday.  Latin America's Moment - obviously, specifically about Latin American Econ. Dev., mixed with US - Latin American relations.","human_ref_B":"Here are the feeds from my feedly account... not sure how to retain the links, or properly export, sorry...  - a sandwich, with words??? - Cognitive Policy Works - In Media Res - Just TV - media-studies \u00ab WordPress.com Tag Feed - MediaCitizen - National Association for Media Literacy Education - NO CAPTION NEEDED - Pressthink - Rhetorica - Social Media in Higher Education - Sociological Images - Spotlight on Digital Media and Learning - The Consumer Trap - BIOS [bioculture art lab] | BIOS [bioculture art lab] - BrosephStalin - Civic Media + Tactical Design in Contested Spaces - Clay Shirky - Confessions of an Aca\/Fan - Curating Media and Design - dkompare vs. mostly screens - Doing Media Studies - emergent by design - Evgeny Morozov's blog - Free Online Course Materials | Comparative Media Studies | MIT ... - gnovis - i eat media for breakfast - Institute of Network Cultures - Media Industries - MEDIA STUDIES - The Learning Network Blog - NYTimes.com - MIT Comparative Media Studies - Napsterization - NEPCA Journal - net critique by Geert Lovink - Sound of Ruins - Teaching Online Journalism - The Chicago School of Media Theory - Versobooks.com - We Study Media - You Suck at Transmedia","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2982.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"1jwomc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Searched, but could not find, a discussion about the best blogs to read in your field of study or interest. Howabout one? Just got my RSS account up and running and I want to read some quality blogs. So far I have Stephen Walt and Chris Blattman.","c_root_id_A":"cbj9057","c_root_id_B":"cbje4gf","created_at_utc_A":1375930949,"created_at_utc_B":1375950957,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This thread is probably sidebar material.","human_ref_B":"IR studies:  * Duck of Minerva * Political Violence @ a Glance * Jay Ulfelder * Steve Saideman * Why Nations Fail * Foreign Policy blogs (Drezner, Bosco, Walt, Ricks in particular) * Ken Opalo  Political Science:  * Monkey Cage * Jonathan Bernstein","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20008.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"rmtvqc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"trying to find a (fairly) recent book: refuting tragedy of commons hey folks      I am pretty sure I remember a book coming out in the last five years which argues that tragedies of commons are not ubiquitous, drawing on studies in various indigenous and pre-colonial modes of ownership which reliably avoid them.      iirc it was written by a woman who worked in either economics or anthropology?  it made a splash when it came out so folk might remember.      does anyone know the book I mean?","c_root_id_A":"hpobm05","c_root_id_B":"hpobj1h","created_at_utc_A":1640262141,"created_at_utc_B":1640262085,"score_A":21,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"There is \"Governing the Commons\" from Elinor Ostrom. I think that fits your description, but it's from 1990?  >  Ostrom is probably best known for revisiting the so-called \u201ctragedy of the commons\" \u2013 a theory proposed by biologist Garrett Hardin in 1968. [19][23]  > \"In an article by the same name published in the journal Science, Hardin theorized that if each herdsman sharing a piece of common grazing land made the individually rational economic decision of increasing the number of cattle he keeps on the land, the collective effect would deplete or destroy the commons. In other words, multiple individuals\u2014acting independently and rationally consulting their own self-interest\u2014will ultimately deplete a shared limited resource, even when it is clear that it is not in anyone\u2019s long-term interest for this to happen. Ostrom believes that the \u201ctragedy\u201d in such situations isn\u2019t inevitable, as Hardin thought. Instead, if the herders decide to cooperate with one another, monitoring each other\u2019s use of the land and enforcing rules for managing it, they can avoid the tragedy.\"[19]  https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Elinor_Ostrom#Career","human_ref_B":"Elinor Ostrom published *Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action* in 1990. She received the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in 2009 which spurred interest in her work.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":56.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"29l0ww","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"This info-graphic has been circulating Facebook, and it seems pretty skewed. How accurate is it to say that the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments had 23%, 0%, and 0% Democrat support, respectively. Info-graphic in question.","c_root_id_A":"cilyhow","c_root_id_B":"cilyme7","created_at_utc_A":1404242289,"created_at_utc_B":1404242534,"score_A":30,"score_B":71,"human_ref_A":"The Republican and Democratic parties were very different when they were founded. They essentially flip flopped around the time of FDR. I'de suggest this \/r\/askhistorians wiki for more info. http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskHistorians\/wiki\/us_history#wiki_changing_role_of_republicans_and_democrats","human_ref_B":"Yes it is true but a lot of the reason is because of the makeup of the political parties at the time of each of those amendments.   The Republican Party at the time of Lincoln was the 'liberal' party and actually had to keep their most radical elements in check in order to secure the most support (Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin)  The Democrats at the time were a very southern party. This lead to a number of Southern Democrats to switch to Republican after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Republicans in turn implemented The Southern Strategy  There is another infographic out there that breaks down the voting on those same amendments North vs South. My google-fu is currently weak and the image evades me.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":245.0,"score_ratio":2.3666666667}
{"post_id":"29l0ww","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"This info-graphic has been circulating Facebook, and it seems pretty skewed. How accurate is it to say that the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments had 23%, 0%, and 0% Democrat support, respectively. Info-graphic in question.","c_root_id_A":"cily1gl","c_root_id_B":"cilyme7","created_at_utc_A":1404241419,"created_at_utc_B":1404242534,"score_A":10,"score_B":71,"human_ref_A":"Regarding the 15th Amendment, Wikipedia, citing Gillete (1965), says that no Democrats in the House voted in support of the bill.  It's unclear if any Democrats in the Senate voted for it, but it doesn't appear so.  Here is relevant Library of Congress page, but it's hard to find explicit voting records (sorry, don't have time to pore through the Congressional Globe).  Found Senate Vote 586 which shows no Democrats voting 'Aye.'  It's incorrect, I think, to say that there was 100% Republican support for 15.  The record shows 3 Republican Senators voting against, and 20 abstaining.  Again, Wikipedia cites Foner, 1988 as saying that some Northern Senators abstained to prevent the South from gaining too much political power.  Finally, Senator Charles Sumner abstained (according to Gillette via Wikipedia) because the Amendment did not forbid poll taxes and literary tests, so perhaps the abstentions cannot be viewed as lack of support for voting rights for blacks.  But of course, the Republican and Democratic parties of the 1860s and 1870s are quite a bit different than those of today.  (No source for this, but it seems rather obvious that political positions are going to shift dramatically over the course of 150 years.)  EDIT:  I think this is the House vote on the 15th Amendment, which shows 4 Republicans voting against.","human_ref_B":"Yes it is true but a lot of the reason is because of the makeup of the political parties at the time of each of those amendments.   The Republican Party at the time of Lincoln was the 'liberal' party and actually had to keep their most radical elements in check in order to secure the most support (Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin)  The Democrats at the time were a very southern party. This lead to a number of Southern Democrats to switch to Republican after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Republicans in turn implemented The Southern Strategy  There is another infographic out there that breaks down the voting on those same amendments North vs South. My google-fu is currently weak and the image evades me.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1115.0,"score_ratio":7.1}
{"post_id":"29l0ww","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"This info-graphic has been circulating Facebook, and it seems pretty skewed. How accurate is it to say that the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments had 23%, 0%, and 0% Democrat support, respectively. Info-graphic in question.","c_root_id_A":"cilyhow","c_root_id_B":"cily1gl","created_at_utc_A":1404242289,"created_at_utc_B":1404241419,"score_A":30,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"The Republican and Democratic parties were very different when they were founded. They essentially flip flopped around the time of FDR. I'de suggest this \/r\/askhistorians wiki for more info. http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskHistorians\/wiki\/us_history#wiki_changing_role_of_republicans_and_democrats","human_ref_B":"Regarding the 15th Amendment, Wikipedia, citing Gillete (1965), says that no Democrats in the House voted in support of the bill.  It's unclear if any Democrats in the Senate voted for it, but it doesn't appear so.  Here is relevant Library of Congress page, but it's hard to find explicit voting records (sorry, don't have time to pore through the Congressional Globe).  Found Senate Vote 586 which shows no Democrats voting 'Aye.'  It's incorrect, I think, to say that there was 100% Republican support for 15.  The record shows 3 Republican Senators voting against, and 20 abstaining.  Again, Wikipedia cites Foner, 1988 as saying that some Northern Senators abstained to prevent the South from gaining too much political power.  Finally, Senator Charles Sumner abstained (according to Gillette via Wikipedia) because the Amendment did not forbid poll taxes and literary tests, so perhaps the abstentions cannot be viewed as lack of support for voting rights for blacks.  But of course, the Republican and Democratic parties of the 1860s and 1870s are quite a bit different than those of today.  (No source for this, but it seems rather obvious that political positions are going to shift dramatically over the course of 150 years.)  EDIT:  I think this is the House vote on the 15th Amendment, which shows 4 Republicans voting against.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":870.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"6ihui8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Why do some people seem to never be able to be successful, and if they somehow became successful, they self-sabotage?","c_root_id_A":"dj6uflx","c_root_id_B":"dj6j88c","created_at_utc_A":1498025209,"created_at_utc_B":1498009063,"score_A":15,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Seconding r\/psychology. Also define \"successful\".","human_ref_B":"I would try posting this in r\/psychology.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16146.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"24vthl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"How does social science explain Japanophilia? I'm curious as to how people came to be so fascinated with Japan that entire subcultures form around the shared interest. Is that fascination limited to western civilization (I've certainly seen it in the US as well as in Germany; I suppose it extends to their cultural and geographic neighbors as well)?  Why Japan?","c_root_id_A":"chbfuy6","c_root_id_B":"chb702u","created_at_utc_A":1399424384,"created_at_utc_B":1399405671,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"In a word: Entertainment. Everybody, whether young or old, likes entertainment, and the US and Japan are probably the biggest producers of media entertainment in the entire world. Part of me feels like some of the Japan craze is piggybacking off the success of movies of other Asian countries that were big in the 70's and 80's, like Chinese Kung Fu and Hong Kong mafia movies, and the interest expanded to include Japan as well - the appeal of the foreign.  Specifically, most of the entertainment that gets exported from Japan caters to the younger generation (like anime, manga, video games, wacky variety shows, etc.), who will consume that kind of stuff at an unbelievable rate, which results in the mass media becoming pretty saturated with Japanese things - for example, Pokemon\/DBZ\/Sailor Moon first hit the 90's generation at a super impressionable age (as well as being some of the first animated cartoons a lot of kids saw that had a sequential, non-episodic plot), Nintendo was probably the first (or only?) major video game powerhouse pre-1990, and heck, even the Power Rangers show we grew up with was Japanese (Look it up yourself, if you don't believe me). Another major part is aesthetics - \"kawaii\"\/cuteness is a big part of Japanese culture and its marketing, and this is perfectly primed to appeal to girls and young people from around the world. This goes for the very sound of the language as well - to most (young) people, words like \"Minamoto no Yoshitsune,\" \"Samurai,\" and \"Tomodachi\" just sound *cooler* than \"George Patton,\" \"Knight,\" and \"Friend.\" Of course, this isn't universal but look at how dominant Japanese media is today -compare how many Anime Clubs there are in schools to Bollywood Clubs or Kung Fu Movie Clubs- over media from other Asian countries, or even any country in the world at all.  It's also a positive feedback loop - Japanese media will inspire more Japanese media. Each generation is going to compound with newer anime, bigger influences, and more hype than the last.","human_ref_B":"How exactly is this different from any other interest\/obsession?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18713.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"24vthl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"How does social science explain Japanophilia? I'm curious as to how people came to be so fascinated with Japan that entire subcultures form around the shared interest. Is that fascination limited to western civilization (I've certainly seen it in the US as well as in Germany; I suppose it extends to their cultural and geographic neighbors as well)?  Why Japan?","c_root_id_A":"chb702u","c_root_id_B":"chbhwnw","created_at_utc_A":1399405671,"created_at_utc_B":1399428799,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"How exactly is this different from any other interest\/obsession?","human_ref_B":"I have really wondered about this as opposed to Korea and\/or China. It's most notable in the amount of Japanese media you find in the US. Compare this to China, with a bigger population, or Korea with similar (if somewhat less) amounts of money. Why do I see dozens of Japanese movies, TV shows, and books? What social factors in the US or Japan led to this? Which economic factors?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23128.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"tq1cp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What caused the Republicans and Democrats to switch roles in the 1920s? Republicans had been the party of the progressives: Theodore Roosevelt, William H Taft, even Benjamin Harrison and William McKinley. It seemed like the Democrats were the more capitalist party, although Grover Cleveland is the only person I really know to compare them to. Then it seems like in the early 1900s, everyone was a progressive and the issue was foreign policy. Then as soon as Woodrow Wilson was president, the Republicans started supporting strict capitalism. The tradition continues today with Democrats running on Progressive issues and Republicans running on Capitalist issues.  What caused this role reversal to happen so surely and suddenly. I mean, with civil rights issues, it took over a century for the platforms to really reverse. What am I not getting here?","c_root_id_A":"c4oss71","c_root_id_B":"c4osjmh","created_at_utc_A":1337191859,"created_at_utc_B":1337190811,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I think you'll get a better answer if you try to explore the terms you are using first. When you contrast capitalism with progressivism it sounds a lot like you're claiming one party is what the people want, and the other is what the powerful want.  Take for example the corporate raiders who were maligned in the 1980s. They would be characterized as capitalist villains, but they played a necessary role in breaking up companies that were terribly managed by complacent, entitled boards of directors.  Similarly, at other points in history, sovereign rulers granted licenses that authorized single producers and protected them against disruptive innovations. Countries today have wildly differing requirements when it comes to business licensing, and it is difficult to decide where on the spectrum is business licensing protecting entrenched businesses and plutocrats, and when is it insuring that plutocrats have a more difficult time taking advantage of the downtrodden and their employees.  The same goes for intellectual property as for business licensing. A company with a large patent portfolio may be able to stifle competition. On other hand, imagine developing a new chip fabrication process. Even if you manage to raise $1B and implement it, incumbent companies like Intel could rapidly copy your idea and implement it cheaply enough that you would never make enough money to pay for the development costs or that investment.  Additionally, many progressive Africans specifically argue against the effectiveness of foreign aid policies that are overly paternalistic, and that end up encouraging patronage systems rather than growth and dynamic economies. In other words it isn't just about balancing egalitarian distribution of wealth with merit-based distribution, but who is the arbiter of merit if there is market liberalization is constrained, and even if there is complete parity of wealth, who is empowered with making decisions that affect policies and economic decisions.  Social policy has greatly improved with advances over the past half century in social sciences. We know more about which programs are most likely to lift people out of poverty for instance, and which albeit well-meaning policies are counter productive.  As a personal political assessment, I believe that the current distinction between the left and the right on social policy is that the right believes receiving aid is socially corrosive and undermines personal autonomy and ambition. The current (American) left on the other hand recognizes this possibility, but insists on examining programs on a case by case basis. As an example, take the federal assistance on school lunches. The left (and really a large part of the right, too) chooses that parents' poverty shouldn't affect their children's opportunity, and estimates that since childhood malnutrition impacts cognitive development, it is a factor in generational poverty.  Without a quantification to substantiate it, my impression is the American left used to believe that relative prosperity was pretty much an exogenous factor, and policy goals were largely about being nice to the people who are at the bottom. I think there is now a greater emphasis on the social science, and a focus on policies that are then judged on the basis of whether they decrease poverty, rather than whether they are palliative and decrease the suffering of poverty.  Compared to other countries, I believe that the American left is more pragmatic than idealistic. Furthermore, my opinion is that the American right has largely become ideological, and is still fighting a battle against well-meaning but counter productive policies that was won a long time ago. In fact I think the science is discovering new phenomena surrounding market failures and the nuances of emergence that the right is dismissing in favor of ideological embrace yesterday's policy mistakes.  It is simplistic to categorize parties as progressive or capitalist. There is spectrum on wealth concentration, which must be further refined to include a decision on how merit-based wealth disparities are determined. Furthermore there is a distinction between ideology and pragmatism, the arguments to be had about goals and desired outcomes, and the arguments to be had about the validity of the scientific conclusions about which policies produce which outcomes.","human_ref_B":"My understanding was that a big shift came about when Eisenhower ran for president. He was a moderate conservative and a military man. He is a big part of the reason that poorer, rural citizens especially with military ties switched to the Republican party. This is interesting as the social and moral standings of conservatism began to really split off and the economic side of conservatism began really favoring big business and fast change and growth to keep up the pace post WWII.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1048.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"209tgl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Many of my Economics professors do not believe in the concept of Ricardian Equivalence. Why is it still abided by when so many disagree with it? In general, Ricardian equivalence says that a tax decrease today will lead to a tax increase in the future. However, the argument is that if a government were to propose a tax increase, they would be voted out of office thus it would never happen.","c_root_id_A":"cg16ilm","c_root_id_B":"cg16fgn","created_at_utc_A":1394669620,"created_at_utc_B":1394669423,"score_A":29,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"What do you mean that it is abided by?  The idea of Ricardian Equivalence was more or less coined by Barro and it still is debated, but it is not something that is typically taken literally except for some extreme freshwater guys.  There was some heated debate a while back about this issue between economists like Cochrane and Delong.  Here is Noah Smith's post on the debate with some useful links  http:\/\/noahpinionblog.blogspot.com\/2011\/12\/great-ricardian-equivalence-throwdown.html  Edit: Barro later weighed in:  http:\/\/www.minneapolisfed.org\/publications_papers\/pub_display.cfm?id=3261&  >Barro: Let me say first that I think the Ricardian equivalence idea is basically right as a first-order proposition. However, people get confused as to exactly what it says. Before I say what that is, I should mention that, although the proposition is not mainstream in the sense of being fully accepted by most economists, the idea has had tremendous influence on the way economists think about this issue. Analysis often begins with Ricardian equivalence as a first-order proposition and then goes on to investigate why there are deviations from precise equivalence. Thus, like the Modigliani-Miller theorem on corporate finance, Ricardian equivalence has become a common starting point for the way people think about budget deficits. This situation is vastly different from what it was before the mid 1970s. To illustrate the potential pitfalls in what Ricardian equivalence says and does not say, one can consider the famous quote attributed to Vice President Cheney to the effect that President Reagan proved that budget deficits don't matter. The Cheney quote is often interpreted to mean that the level of government expenditure does not matter, and that surely is not what Ricardian equivalence says. The Ricardian proposition is about the consequences of paying for a given amount of public expenditure in different ways. Specifically, does it matter\u2014or does it matter a lot\u2014whether the government pays for its spending with current taxes or with current borrowing, which entails higher future taxes? So, a central part of the proposition is that the amount of public expenditure\u2014today and tomorrow\u2014is being held constant. It's never part of Ricardian equivalence that the level of government expenditure doesn't matter. As [University of Chicago economist] Milton Friedman put it, the costs or benefits of government outlays depend on the amount and nature of what the government spends\u2014there is no free lunch about paying for that spending. So whether you pay for it now or later is secondary. As a first-order proposition, it is right that it matters little whether you pay for government spending with taxes today or taxes tomorrow, which is basically what a fiscal deficit is. The difference between taxes today and taxes tomorrow is analogous to the difference between paying for spending with an income tax or a sales tax. The method of public finance is an important question, but it is less important than the question of how big the government is and what activities it should carry out. Taxing now versus taxing later is an issue about optimal taxation, that is, a public-finance topic. This view moves the analysis away from pure Ricardian equivalence to the optimal tax perspective, which brings in the principle of tax smoothing. The idea is that, unless something special is going on in different periods, optimal public finance dictates having tax rates, for example, on consumption or wage income, that are similar from one year to another. You do not want erratic movements in tax rates, because these patterns are highly distorting. From that standpoint, it is not desirable to have a very low tax rate today, financed by a fiscal deficit, followed by much higher tax rates in the future. This tax-smoothing result deviates from Ricardian equivalence, but in a  second-order way, in the same sense that the choice between an income tax and a sales tax is second order but nevertheless significant. Anyway, since we've talked so much about Ricardian equivalence, you might be interested in an anecdote. In 1973, I had worked out the basic invariance idea. If the government imposed some kind of intergenerational transfer\u2014through fiscal deficits or enlarged Social Security\u2014individuals who were connected through voluntary transfers to members of the next generation would neutralize the government's actions. All that was required was an interior solution for voluntary transfers from parents to children or in the reverse direction. Well, before I wrote anything, I sat down for a lunch with Fischer Black (famous, of course, for the Black-Scholes options-pricing formula). I took about 20 minutes to go through the whole analysis I had worked out. Fischer said nothing, but listened intently. When I finished, he uttered only one sentence: \"Sounds right to me.\"","human_ref_B":"Do you mean the original concept from the 1800s, or the concept reformulated (as far as I know) in the 1970s?  I think you need to clarify what you mean by, \"Why is it still abided by\", meaning:  Do you mean why is the phenomenon still observed (and if so, can you provide sources, because IIRC this is a hypothesis and not really anything you could prove in an easy manner)? Why is it still used as a justification for certain tax policy? Why is it still taught?  For posterity, wikipedia article.  My explanation as to why it isn't \"believed in\" is because government spending is big and nebulous, non-intuitive, changes every few years or less, and isn't directly easily observed by most people. How could you assume that people are realistically going to factor this in to their decision making? People generally don't factor inflation into their decision making, for instance.  There is definitely an argument to be made that FIRMS are forward looking like this, but consumers? Consumers (i.e., individuals) suffer from temporal discounting and, while I am sure firms may suffer from the same thing in a way, they're much more likely (do not have a source for this, mind you, just speculation but seems intuitive) to have strategic departments or individuals working for them setting strategic, long term goals which inform short term activity (in other words, the C-level executives, or a planning department, etc).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":197.0,"score_ratio":4.8333333333}
{"post_id":"209tgl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Many of my Economics professors do not believe in the concept of Ricardian Equivalence. Why is it still abided by when so many disagree with it? In general, Ricardian equivalence says that a tax decrease today will lead to a tax increase in the future. However, the argument is that if a government were to propose a tax increase, they would be voted out of office thus it would never happen.","c_root_id_A":"cg1aytb","c_root_id_B":"cg19eev","created_at_utc_A":1394679209,"created_at_utc_B":1394675792,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'll answer from an academic point of view.  Most models \"like\" Ricardian equivalence, in that R.E. simply falls naturally out of a wide class of standard macro models.  No, really, that's one reason: Ricardian equivalence is one of the \"key neutrality results\" that runs though a wide class of models. In that, it's like Modigliani-Miller or Wallace neutrality or monetary neutrality. It requires intentional modelling effort to \"break\" Ricardian equivalence. Many times, we don't particularly care about what a model has to say about the time-path of fiscal policy, so we include Ricardian equivalence (or don't take it out) to simplify our lives.  Many models will feature Ricardian equivalence even if the model's author doesn't think it's strictly true. Whether or not R.E. \"matters\" for your results is going to depend on what you're using that particular model to do.","human_ref_B":"What about a tax decrease and an equivalent spending cut? That doesn't lead unavoidably to a tax increase later, does it?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3417.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"13n3tl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.64,"history":"why does the taliban\/al quaeda carry out attacks in other muslim countries instead of focusing on israel? not trying to be a jerk or start a flame war or make obnoxious political statements. it just seems retarded to me that they attack targets that cause muslim casualties. but fanatics arent the brightest i guess","c_root_id_A":"c75f95t","c_root_id_B":"c75deu6","created_at_utc_A":1353637080,"created_at_utc_B":1353627592,"score_A":27,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Well the Taliban is localized to the Pakistan and Afghanistan area so I will focus on Al Qaeda.  Osama Bin Laden was struggling with the same issue you ask.    http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/05\/04\/osama-bin-laden-documents_n_1476878.html  The organization Al Qaeda is not as rigid and centralized like say the US military and contains many alliances and factions.  I think the best analogy is it's more of a franchise then a monolithic institution.  Besides attacking western targets Al Qaeda has been involved in a lot of insurgencies such as Iraq, Yemen, Afghanistan.  In insurgency your ultimate goal is to seize, nullify, or challenge political control of a region.  To do that sometimes the best way is to ruin the legitimacy of the government and exhaust the government.  It doesn't always use terrorism tactics but that is a tool for them.  From the State Department guide on COIN.  Here are some ways that involve terror to challenge the government and reasons for them.  >Provocation:  Insurgents often commit acts (such as atrocities) that are intended to prompt opponents to react irrationally, in ways that harm their interests. For example, government forces, frustrated by their inability to distinguish fighters from non-combatants, may be provoked into indiscriminate reprisals or harsh security measures that alienate parts of the population. Alternatively, one tribal, religious, ethnic or community group may be provoked into attacking another in order to create and exploit instability.    >Intimidation:  Insurgents intimidate individual members of the government (especially police and local government officials) to dissuade them from taking active measures against the insurgents. They will also publicly kill civilians who collaborate with government or coalition forces, thereby deterring others who might seek to work with the government.    >Protraction:  Insurgents seek to prolong the conflict in order to exhaust  opponents, erode their political will, and avoid losses. Typically insurgents react to government countermeasures by going quiet (reducing activity and hiding in inaccessible terrain or within sympathetic or intimidated population groups) when pressure becomes too severe. They then emerge later to fight on.   >Exhaustion:  Insurgents conduct activities such as ambushes, bombings,  attacks on government facilities, economic assets and transport infrastructure that are designed to compel security forces to undertake numerous onerous, high-cost defensive activities that expend scarce resources without significantly advancing the counterinsurgents\u2019 strategy  Now everybody can disagree what a legitimate government provides but most people believe it should at the very least provide a rule of law, basic public services and security.  Focusing on the later 2 an insurgent group may target sanitation services, electricity, or segments of the population. By using terror to remove these services it damages the legitimacy of the government.  They will also use terror to scare or suppress political parties.    Like the assassination of Benazir Bhutto  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Assassination_of_Benazir_Bhutto   State department guide http:\/\/www.state.gov\/documents\/organization\/119629.pdf  Here's the US Armies COIN manual, FM 3-24 manual it discusses terror in insurgencies in chapter 1 and is much more indepth.  http:\/\/www.fas.org\/irp\/doddir\/army\/fm3-24.pdf  Edit so in summary there are some reason why and Al-Qaeda is aware of negative aspects it can have on their goals but it doesn't have the command and control of say the US Army and Marines.","human_ref_B":"Speaking very generally, for the same reason Christians fought\/fight each other. There's different kinds of Islam in conflict with each other just as there was\/is conflict between Protestants and Catholics.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9488.0,"score_ratio":1.4210526316}
{"post_id":"13n3tl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.64,"history":"why does the taliban\/al quaeda carry out attacks in other muslim countries instead of focusing on israel? not trying to be a jerk or start a flame war or make obnoxious political statements. it just seems retarded to me that they attack targets that cause muslim casualties. but fanatics arent the brightest i guess","c_root_id_A":"c75dcxj","c_root_id_B":"c75f95t","created_at_utc_A":1353627318,"created_at_utc_B":1353637080,"score_A":5,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"it's easier.","human_ref_B":"Well the Taliban is localized to the Pakistan and Afghanistan area so I will focus on Al Qaeda.  Osama Bin Laden was struggling with the same issue you ask.    http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2012\/05\/04\/osama-bin-laden-documents_n_1476878.html  The organization Al Qaeda is not as rigid and centralized like say the US military and contains many alliances and factions.  I think the best analogy is it's more of a franchise then a monolithic institution.  Besides attacking western targets Al Qaeda has been involved in a lot of insurgencies such as Iraq, Yemen, Afghanistan.  In insurgency your ultimate goal is to seize, nullify, or challenge political control of a region.  To do that sometimes the best way is to ruin the legitimacy of the government and exhaust the government.  It doesn't always use terrorism tactics but that is a tool for them.  From the State Department guide on COIN.  Here are some ways that involve terror to challenge the government and reasons for them.  >Provocation:  Insurgents often commit acts (such as atrocities) that are intended to prompt opponents to react irrationally, in ways that harm their interests. For example, government forces, frustrated by their inability to distinguish fighters from non-combatants, may be provoked into indiscriminate reprisals or harsh security measures that alienate parts of the population. Alternatively, one tribal, religious, ethnic or community group may be provoked into attacking another in order to create and exploit instability.    >Intimidation:  Insurgents intimidate individual members of the government (especially police and local government officials) to dissuade them from taking active measures against the insurgents. They will also publicly kill civilians who collaborate with government or coalition forces, thereby deterring others who might seek to work with the government.    >Protraction:  Insurgents seek to prolong the conflict in order to exhaust  opponents, erode their political will, and avoid losses. Typically insurgents react to government countermeasures by going quiet (reducing activity and hiding in inaccessible terrain or within sympathetic or intimidated population groups) when pressure becomes too severe. They then emerge later to fight on.   >Exhaustion:  Insurgents conduct activities such as ambushes, bombings,  attacks on government facilities, economic assets and transport infrastructure that are designed to compel security forces to undertake numerous onerous, high-cost defensive activities that expend scarce resources without significantly advancing the counterinsurgents\u2019 strategy  Now everybody can disagree what a legitimate government provides but most people believe it should at the very least provide a rule of law, basic public services and security.  Focusing on the later 2 an insurgent group may target sanitation services, electricity, or segments of the population. By using terror to remove these services it damages the legitimacy of the government.  They will also use terror to scare or suppress political parties.    Like the assassination of Benazir Bhutto  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Assassination_of_Benazir_Bhutto   State department guide http:\/\/www.state.gov\/documents\/organization\/119629.pdf  Here's the US Armies COIN manual, FM 3-24 manual it discusses terror in insurgencies in chapter 1 and is much more indepth.  http:\/\/www.fas.org\/irp\/doddir\/army\/fm3-24.pdf  Edit so in summary there are some reason why and Al-Qaeda is aware of negative aspects it can have on their goals but it doesn't have the command and control of say the US Army and Marines.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9762.0,"score_ratio":5.4}
{"post_id":"13n3tl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.64,"history":"why does the taliban\/al quaeda carry out attacks in other muslim countries instead of focusing on israel? not trying to be a jerk or start a flame war or make obnoxious political statements. it just seems retarded to me that they attack targets that cause muslim casualties. but fanatics arent the brightest i guess","c_root_id_A":"c75deu6","c_root_id_B":"c75dcxj","created_at_utc_A":1353627592,"created_at_utc_B":1353627318,"score_A":19,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Speaking very generally, for the same reason Christians fought\/fight each other. There's different kinds of Islam in conflict with each other just as there was\/is conflict between Protestants and Catholics.","human_ref_B":"it's easier.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":274.0,"score_ratio":3.8}
{"post_id":"abx4v5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Can anyone recommend any good books and\/or articles on the history and impact of the drug trade, war on drugs, and the development of cartels? Any suggestions welcome, and I\u2019m sorry if this is a question that\u2019s been asked and answered before. I\u2019m looking for mostly layman-oriented material that\u2019s relatively easy to read and digest. Obviously sources that cover Latin America and its relationship to US demand would be interesting as that is where a lot of news coverage and popular culture tends to focus, but other parts of the world are interesting to me as well. In fact, if there is something that covers the global history of drug trade and drug policy, I\u2019m all for it. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"ed3vkn0","c_root_id_B":"ed45jae","created_at_utc_A":1546467156,"created_at_utc_B":1546474345,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Here are some books that cover a wide-range of information on the topic of drugs and criminology.  * In Policing the Globe, Peter Andreas and Ethan Nadelmann explain how and why prohibitions like the war on drugs practice increasingly extend across borders. They challenge the common belief that internationalization of crime control is too often described as simply a natural and predictable response to the growth of transnational crime in an age of globalization. Their answer describes the ambitious efforts by generations of western powers to export their own definitions of \"crime,\" not just for political and economic gain but also in an attempt to promote their own morals to other parts of the world. It's a great book.  * In Illegal Drugs, Drug Trafficking and Violence in Latin America Marcelo Bergman analyzes the political, economic and social effects of the war on drugs over the last twenty years, mostly from the context of Latin America but also the USA, Canada, Europe and the Far East. He also explores how drug-trafficking routes into Europe and the USA are developed, why the so-called drug cartels exist in the region, what level of profits illegal drugs generate, how such gains are distributed among producers, traffickers, and dealers, how much they make, why violence spread in certain places but not in others, and which alternative policies were taken to address the growing challenges posed by illegal drugs. Another great book.  * Finally, I recommend Drug Use and Abuse: A Comprehensive Introduction by Howard Abadinsky. Although it's a textbook, it's very broad and easy read. It can answer any question you have related to drugs, drug laws, drug addiction, types of drugs and their effects, the history of drug use and laws, the various psychological and sociological theories behind drug use, domestic and international drug control, drug trafficking and \"narcoterrorism\", and alternatives to the drug war, or anything else you think of. This would be a good place to look if you wanted to know something specific and could reference a certain chapter or author for more information. I use it for my class and my students say it's not too bad of a read either.","human_ref_B":"Chasing the Scream was a very insightful read on this topic, and included a good deal of the war on drug's race war element in America as well.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7189.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"abx4v5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Can anyone recommend any good books and\/or articles on the history and impact of the drug trade, war on drugs, and the development of cartels? Any suggestions welcome, and I\u2019m sorry if this is a question that\u2019s been asked and answered before. I\u2019m looking for mostly layman-oriented material that\u2019s relatively easy to read and digest. Obviously sources that cover Latin America and its relationship to US demand would be interesting as that is where a lot of news coverage and popular culture tends to focus, but other parts of the world are interesting to me as well. In fact, if there is something that covers the global history of drug trade and drug policy, I\u2019m all for it. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"ed45jae","c_root_id_B":"ed44s54","created_at_utc_A":1546474345,"created_at_utc_B":1546473739,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Chasing the Scream was a very insightful read on this topic, and included a good deal of the war on drug's race war element in America as well.","human_ref_B":"You may be interested in ZeroZeroZero by Roberto Saviano","labels":1,"seconds_difference":606.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"abx4v5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Can anyone recommend any good books and\/or articles on the history and impact of the drug trade, war on drugs, and the development of cartels? Any suggestions welcome, and I\u2019m sorry if this is a question that\u2019s been asked and answered before. I\u2019m looking for mostly layman-oriented material that\u2019s relatively easy to read and digest. Obviously sources that cover Latin America and its relationship to US demand would be interesting as that is where a lot of news coverage and popular culture tends to focus, but other parts of the world are interesting to me as well. In fact, if there is something that covers the global history of drug trade and drug policy, I\u2019m all for it. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"ed45jae","c_root_id_B":"ed3yr0o","created_at_utc_A":1546474345,"created_at_utc_B":1546469122,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Chasing the Scream was a very insightful read on this topic, and included a good deal of the war on drug's race war element in America as well.","human_ref_B":"I liked \u201cKilling Pablo\u201d and \u201cMethland.\u201d I don\u2019t know if those are what you\u2019re looking for","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5223.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"abx4v5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Can anyone recommend any good books and\/or articles on the history and impact of the drug trade, war on drugs, and the development of cartels? Any suggestions welcome, and I\u2019m sorry if this is a question that\u2019s been asked and answered before. I\u2019m looking for mostly layman-oriented material that\u2019s relatively easy to read and digest. Obviously sources that cover Latin America and its relationship to US demand would be interesting as that is where a lot of news coverage and popular culture tends to focus, but other parts of the world are interesting to me as well. In fact, if there is something that covers the global history of drug trade and drug policy, I\u2019m all for it. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"ed3yr0o","c_root_id_B":"ed4i1te","created_at_utc_A":1546469122,"created_at_utc_B":1546484668,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I liked \u201cKilling Pablo\u201d and \u201cMethland.\u201d I don\u2019t know if those are what you\u2019re looking for","human_ref_B":"*Drugs, Oil, and War: The United States in Afghanistan, Columbia, and Indochina* by Peter Dale Scott. I haven't read much on the drug trade and read this one long ago, being personally more interested in US foreign policy than the drug trade in general, but it was incredibly illuminating on how foreign policy and war effects and even supports the drug trade. It outlined the transition of opium production from the Golden Triangle in Southeast Asia into the Middle East and examined how our destabilization of the Middle East galvanized opium production there. There is so much more in there and I was very impressed after reading it. And especially in terms of your interest with the War on Drugs, this book goes to great lengths to highlight the hypocrisy of US domestic against foreign policy in terms of drug trafficking.  This book is a good survey of 20th drug trade, so it should definitely be of interest. The author has written other books on the topic, so check them out too.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15546.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"abx4v5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Can anyone recommend any good books and\/or articles on the history and impact of the drug trade, war on drugs, and the development of cartels? Any suggestions welcome, and I\u2019m sorry if this is a question that\u2019s been asked and answered before. I\u2019m looking for mostly layman-oriented material that\u2019s relatively easy to read and digest. Obviously sources that cover Latin America and its relationship to US demand would be interesting as that is where a lot of news coverage and popular culture tends to focus, but other parts of the world are interesting to me as well. In fact, if there is something that covers the global history of drug trade and drug policy, I\u2019m all for it. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"ed4af9h","c_root_id_B":"ed4i1te","created_at_utc_A":1546478323,"created_at_utc_B":1546484668,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"For the United States, a good book on the impact of the war on drugs is Alexander's *The New Jim Crow*.","human_ref_B":"*Drugs, Oil, and War: The United States in Afghanistan, Columbia, and Indochina* by Peter Dale Scott. I haven't read much on the drug trade and read this one long ago, being personally more interested in US foreign policy than the drug trade in general, but it was incredibly illuminating on how foreign policy and war effects and even supports the drug trade. It outlined the transition of opium production from the Golden Triangle in Southeast Asia into the Middle East and examined how our destabilization of the Middle East galvanized opium production there. There is so much more in there and I was very impressed after reading it. And especially in terms of your interest with the War on Drugs, this book goes to great lengths to highlight the hypocrisy of US domestic against foreign policy in terms of drug trafficking.  This book is a good survey of 20th drug trade, so it should definitely be of interest. The author has written other books on the topic, so check them out too.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6345.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"abx4v5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Can anyone recommend any good books and\/or articles on the history and impact of the drug trade, war on drugs, and the development of cartels? Any suggestions welcome, and I\u2019m sorry if this is a question that\u2019s been asked and answered before. I\u2019m looking for mostly layman-oriented material that\u2019s relatively easy to read and digest. Obviously sources that cover Latin America and its relationship to US demand would be interesting as that is where a lot of news coverage and popular culture tends to focus, but other parts of the world are interesting to me as well. In fact, if there is something that covers the global history of drug trade and drug policy, I\u2019m all for it. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"ed44s54","c_root_id_B":"ed3yr0o","created_at_utc_A":1546473739,"created_at_utc_B":1546469122,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You may be interested in ZeroZeroZero by Roberto Saviano","human_ref_B":"I liked \u201cKilling Pablo\u201d and \u201cMethland.\u201d I don\u2019t know if those are what you\u2019re looking for","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4617.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"abx4v5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Can anyone recommend any good books and\/or articles on the history and impact of the drug trade, war on drugs, and the development of cartels? Any suggestions welcome, and I\u2019m sorry if this is a question that\u2019s been asked and answered before. I\u2019m looking for mostly layman-oriented material that\u2019s relatively easy to read and digest. Obviously sources that cover Latin America and its relationship to US demand would be interesting as that is where a lot of news coverage and popular culture tends to focus, but other parts of the world are interesting to me as well. In fact, if there is something that covers the global history of drug trade and drug policy, I\u2019m all for it. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"ed4a43j","c_root_id_B":"ed3yr0o","created_at_utc_A":1546478065,"created_at_utc_B":1546469122,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Look for Books written by \u201cPeter Dale Scott\u201d like: Drugs, Oil, and War: The United States in Afghanistan, Colombia, and Indochina (War and Peace Library)","human_ref_B":"I liked \u201cKilling Pablo\u201d and \u201cMethland.\u201d I don\u2019t know if those are what you\u2019re looking for","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8943.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5dqxfh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is the Global Periphery (third world) going to remain \"undeveloped\" compared to the advanced technological societies because of constant technological innovation? \"Modernization\" seems like a very uneven process- throughout the 20th century development and modernization were the primary goals of many \"third world\" countries, where given the global situation was mostly far behind \"the West\" and Japan. But \"modernization\" seems like an endless process of innovation and conforming to some global standard. Are the poorer countries which have been poor throughout modern capitalism on the whole going to never catch up to advanced post-industrial largely Western societies, or are there specific examples which point towards a future where there won't be a Global North\/South?  Sorry for the long question.","c_root_id_A":"da6x5ut","c_root_id_B":"da79r9k","created_at_utc_A":1479562907,"created_at_utc_B":1479584239,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I won't pretend to know a solution, but there are certainly examples of third world countries breaking the reins of underdevelopment. Probably the most well known example of this would be the so-called Asian Tigers","human_ref_B":"Over a long enough timeframe, we can't possibly say.  So here's one thing, since Africa lack traditional infrastructure (railroads, etc) they have to get more out of what they have, which is why Africa is where most of the cutting-edge cell phone usage technology is being developed.. I ran a google search for \"cell phone technology in Africa\" and got a page of interesting, recent articles on the subject.  This doesn't mean the necessarily *will* catch up to, say, northern Europe at any point, but it's probably enough by itself to remove \"never going to\" from the list of reasonable conclusions at this point.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21332.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2rmgrq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"How Samuel Huntington is viewed among social scientists I remember reading parts of Clash of Civilizations in intro political science way back in my undergrad.  Considering recent events, it appears that Huntington was remarkably prescient. I may be misremembering the thrust of his argument, but is it still taken seriously by social scientists. It does seem like the world more and more resembles the world he predicted.","c_root_id_A":"cnhd5m6","c_root_id_B":"cnhdl5m","created_at_utc_A":1420648719,"created_at_utc_B":1420649438,"score_A":11,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"I don't really see the prescience.  A big thrust of his thesis was that hot conflicts will take place on the \"fault lines\" between civilizations.  Here are just a few of the conflicts over the last few years that don't line up with that idea (off the top of my head):  * Ukraine is Orthodox vs. Orthodox  * Syria (and Iraq) are Muslim vs. Muslim  * Central African Republic mostly christian vs. mostly christian  * Darfur Muslim vs. Muslim  * Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda etc. cult\/christian vs. errrbody  * Various hot conflicts in Dem. Rep. of Congo (about +5 million people dead since the mid 90s)  * Somalia (mostly muslim vs. muslim)  * Georgia vs. Russia (both orthodox)  * Yemen Muslim vs. Muslim vs. Muslim   There are easily a dozen more over the last 10-20 years that don't fit his definition.  Many of the civilizational conflicts we see today are actually holdovers from before his book (e.g., Israel\/Palestine, Kashmir, NW China), which seems to lessen the prescience of his book, they just haven't been resolved.   A few more points:  1) The \"glamour\" conflicts that get a lot of news coverage vs. those that don't get as much attention.  This can warp our perception of what is going on.  The civilizational narrative is easier to tell for parachute journalists.   2) You can always play games with how you define the variables (both in support and against the thesis).  Is the conflict in Mexico between the gov't and narcotrafficers included in Huffington's definition of clash\/conflict?   How do you define the actors?  Is the relatively cold conflict in Korea Sinic vs. Sinic (as Huffington labels them)? Is Ukraine Orthodox vs. Orthodox?  At what point is the US presence so big in those conflicts that it changes the equation? This is the problem with these huge grand theories, it is really hard to define all the moving parts in a way that is stable over time, geography, circumstance, etc.   3) For me, it seems one of the big common strands in conflicts today is between citizens and their own gov't (and outside forces supporting either those communities or the gov't).","human_ref_B":"His work on democratization (the stuff before *Clash*) is foundational.  He coined the concept of \"waves\" of democratization.  His last book, about Latin American migration to the U.S. we don't really talk about much.  I assume you're asking exclusively about *Clash of Civilizations*.  To summarize the argument in two sentence: he argues that in the Cold War, international relations were governed by a system of ideological alliances (Communist and Capitalist, or Free and Red, whatever you want to call it).  In the post Cold War, he predicted that we'd see between his 8 or so civilizations, especially between \"Islamic Civilization\" and others.  The civilizations are slightly different in the book and the article, but roughly, the West (W. Europe, U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand), Latin America, \"Orthodox\" (mostly FSU, including places without an Orthodox majority), Islamic, Confucian Civilizations (with subdivisions), and African.  Some places are isolated, like India, Ethiopia, and Haiti.  He's wrong.  Empirical studies have argued this repeatedly: Chiozzi, \"Is There a Clash of Civilizations? Evidence from Patterns of International Conflict Involvement, 1946-97\"; Henderson and Tucker, \"Clear and Present Strangers: The Clash of Civilizations and International Conflict\", and several others find that most interstate violence (even after the Cold War) is *within* civilizations, rather than between them.  I feel like people have stopped publishing studies on this because just none of them have found any good evidence for his argument.  Tucisiny's \"Civilizational Conflicts: More Frequent, Longer, and Bloodier?\" suggests these sorts of conflicts may be *worse* (for all time), but they are not necessarily more frequent in the post-Cold War era, which is what Huntington predicted.  I assume you think he's right because of the rise of a violent Islamism.  But  if we look at what's happening, it's really exactly not what Huntington predicted.  Huntington treated \"Islamic Civilizations\" as one.  What we see instead is a Sunni vs. Shi'a conflict, and we this in particular in places where the minority group was long in power, i.e. Iraq where the Sunni minority was long in power until the U.S. put in a semi-democratic Shi'a majority government and Syria, where the Alawite minority is still desperately holding on to power despite several majority by Sunni associated groups (the mostly secular Free Syrian Army, and two separate Islamist ones, ISIS and al-Nusra) as well as Kurdish groups.  Huntington wouldn't have predicted any of that stuff.    What explains this stuff better are not there macro-nationalist \"civilizations\", but nationalism (you're mainly interested, I assume, in int*ra*state conflict while Huntington was mainly thinking about int*er*state conflict).  Empirical work has found that, against conventional wisdom, heterogenous societies don't necessarily lead to more internal conflicts.  I think the first to make this argument was Fearon and Laitin's \"Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War\", but several other studies have similarly found no association between internal diversity and internal violent conflict.  Later studies refined this approach though: they found that while the existence of minorities didn't predict rebellion, the existence of ethinic who were systematically kept out of power did.  Fearon, Kimukikasara, and Laitin's \"Ethnic Minority Rule and Civil War Onset\" is one of these, but that is only about when minorities are in power.  I can't remember if this is the first of this literature, but Lederman and Wimmer's \"Why Do Ethnic Groups Rebel?: New Data and Analysis\" was the first to systematically argue that it's ethnic power relations, not the presence of diversity itself, that predicts conflict.  And again, they don't find that this increases in the post-Cold War era which was one of Huntington's main claims.  Add to this, we are seeing interesting alignments in international relations between ideological actors but it's not civilizations.  You see Sunni Arabs (often anchored and funded by Gulf money) and Shi'a Arab (often funded by non-Arab Iran), but this is classic regional hegemons counter-balancing each other (and again, not what Huntington predicted).  But Sunni\/Shi'a divisions don't perfectly predict IR in the region.  Sunni-majority Turkey has worked closely with Iran, as has Hamas (though they're no longer cooperating since Syria).  Fanatic violent Jihadist Salafi groups, like al Nusra, al Qaeda, and ISIS, tend to look unfavorably on other Sunni majority governments as \"hypocrites\" (which basically means \"fake Muslims\" in this context).  Ideology beyond sectarian ideology plays a big role as well--when Egypt was ruled briefly by the Muslim Brotherhood their regional foreign policy looked very different from today, post Sisi's coup (i.e. now Sunni states run by religious parties like Turkey and the Gulf States and Hamas-run Gaza are likely not to like Egypt, while the Sunni states without religious parties in charge like Jordan and the West Bank are more likely to like Egypt).  Again, this doesn't look civilizational as Huntington, Huntington predicted.  And outside the Middle East, I haven't seen anything that particularly civilizational (nor have I heard anyone argue for anything particularly civilizational) that couldn't be better explained with good old nationalism.  A good book explaining why we see more nationalism, and violence around nationalism, might be Jack Snyder's *From Voting to Violence*.  But look at like Ukraine--Huntington that's a conflict between two members of Huntington's \"Orthodox world\".  In Africa, much of the violence is between Islamists and local powers (Nigeria most famously), but a good proportion of the violence caused by Salafi Jihadists Islamists is in Muslim-majority countries (Mali, where Islamists briefly conquered Timbuktu, is probably the example that got the most press) and even in Nigeria, most of the violence is Muslim-on-Muslim violence.  Huntington's clash doesn't get us very there, either.  In the Asia\/Pacific region, most of the conflicts seem to be just around \"China is a growing power\" and \"North Korea is run by bellicose hermits\", or are very local conflicts (i.e. the long-standing tensions between Polynesian-descended Fijians and Indo-Fijians descended from South Asian laborers brought in the 19th and early 20th centuries) that you can understand better through nationalism than macro-nationalism. In South Asia, we see a variety of ethno-religiously shaded conflicts (India and Pakistan tensions over Kashmir, etc., but India maintains with Muslim majority Bangladesh; the Civil War in Sri Lanka between the Buddhist Sinhalese and the Hindu\/Muslim Tamils) but these all pre-date the Cold War.  So really no evidence of anything Huntingtonian outside of the Middle East, as least as far as I've seen or heard people talk about.  Nationalism is still pertinent (that is, an ideology that a specific group identity has the right to rule a specific region that they are historically tied to), but these \"nations\" only sometimes look like \"civilizations\".  And even when they do, as in the Sunni Arab vs. Shi'a Arab conflict, it's not what Huntington predicted, and as soon as you realize that the Kurds are in conflict with them both, you realize that group identity claims look more like  nationalism than what people would call a \"clash of civilizations\".  So, the tl;dr: is we have all read Huntington, we have all thought about him a bit because he's good to think with, but I don't know many social scientists who would think he's remarkably prescient (I'd be more likely to say, \"he's wrong in interesting ways\").","labels":0,"seconds_difference":719.0,"score_ratio":2.0909090909}
{"post_id":"9a08jo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"How do we know that not interacting with \"uncontacted people\" is the right decision? How do we as \"contacted peoples\" know that not interacting with them is what they want? Could we be inadvertently giving them the impression that they aren't welcome to speak to us?","c_root_id_A":"e4rythp","c_root_id_B":"e4s81pf","created_at_utc_A":1535145506,"created_at_utc_B":1535154740,"score_A":16,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"I think this question is better suited to philosophy as it's about ethics. Perhaps try x-posting to \/r\/askphilosophy","human_ref_B":"It's actually a pretty controversial topic already. It doesn't really seem like either choice is a good one.  Historically contact has had negative consequences for the isolated people (disease). Increasingly though not contacting them is also having negative consequences, because not contacting them doesn't exactly mean they're isolated from us or insulated from our activities. They're actually quite vulnerable.  I don't know if this is a good enough source for \/r\/asksocialscience, but I want to recommend this BBC article on the topic that's helped me form my opinion on this:  http:\/\/www.bbc.com\/future\/story\/20140804-sad-truth-of-uncontacted-tribes","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9234.0,"score_ratio":1.5625}
{"post_id":"9shn6b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Reccomendations for books on nationalism (with a particular focus on self-determination\/ independence movements?) I think my title says it all.  I'm interested in looking at nationalism but nationalism particularly in the context of sort of independence. Questions like the Palestine question or the Catlan question really interest me. Especially the fact there could be a balkanization of Europe.  Thoughts, comments, opinions?","c_root_id_A":"e8oxz4s","c_root_id_B":"e8pz5zx","created_at_utc_A":1540853864,"created_at_utc_B":1540902790,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"You could check out Just and Unjust Wars by Michael Walzer. Lots of talk about territorial integrity and self-determination in the book, and Walzer has further readings on civil wars and determination of minorities.  Additional readings by Kok-chor Tan at Princeton and Will Kymlika could also be helpful for you.","human_ref_B":"If you're into more academic (but still very readable) literature, these are three very fundamental books on nationalism. They represent the modernist\/constructivist school on nationalism, which posits that much of what we nowadays consider 'national identity' is not a natural product of history, biology and culture, but to a large extent either coincidental or socially and politically engineered. These theorists are highly respected and considered the main leaders of thought in the field.  **Ernest Gellner, _\"Nations and Nationalism\"_** (1983, but I think there are revised editions)  ^ Gellner is considered the main guy introducing the theory that 'nations' are not simply a natural phenomenon, but a product of modernization in the 19th century (at least in Europe). Before the 19th century, national identification did not exist in the same way as we know it today. It emerged as a result of industrialization and urbanisation, Romanticism and political opportunism. Very good theoretical framework and will make you think differently about the world once you read it.  **Benedict Anderson, _\"Imagined Communities\"_** (1983 - yup, it was a good year for nationalism studies)  ^ Anderson dives into a more conceptual discussion of what a nation is. Is it an extended family, is it a community of language or culture? He claims that it is a community that we believe to be a community, an 'imagined' one. It is a good companion to Gellner. Anderson focuses on the role of language and the emergence of print in creating communities of people that feel connected. This sometimes happened intentionally, and sometimes as a random historical development (if putting it a bit simplified).  **E.J. Hobsbawm, T. Ranger, _\"The Invention of Tradition\"_** (1983 - I'm not making this up)   ^ This one is less fundamental for nationalism studies but provides alot of useful examples of constructed and reproduced memory. It talks about how many traditions that we believe and assume to be ancient oftentimes orignate from much more recent times, and are developed with different, more instrumental purposes. A classic example is the Scottish tartan, which historically had a very different meaning than we (and even most Scots) think today.  **M. Billig, _\"Banal Nationalism\"_ (1995)**  ^ This is a response to the dominance of (above) 'elite-led constructivism' theories, and the idea that nationalism only takes place in moments of crisis and war. Billig proposed instead the view that 'nationalism' can manifest itself in very everyday means, through which normal people like you and me are constantly reminded which nation were are (not) part of. Very important development in the field!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":48926.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"9shn6b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Reccomendations for books on nationalism (with a particular focus on self-determination\/ independence movements?) I think my title says it all.  I'm interested in looking at nationalism but nationalism particularly in the context of sort of independence. Questions like the Palestine question or the Catlan question really interest me. Especially the fact there could be a balkanization of Europe.  Thoughts, comments, opinions?","c_root_id_A":"e8paz6u","c_root_id_B":"e8pz5zx","created_at_utc_A":1540865583,"created_at_utc_B":1540902790,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"It seems like you're looking more for histories and contemporary theory, but if you want the more classical-radical theory on it, required readings are Franz Fanon's *Black Skin, White Masks* and *Wretched of the Earth*. They focus more on colonial issues than the sort of how-do-we-divorce-as-nations, but Fanon was active in Algeria which is probably one of the closest to that sort of conflict among the decolonization conflicts.","human_ref_B":"If you're into more academic (but still very readable) literature, these are three very fundamental books on nationalism. They represent the modernist\/constructivist school on nationalism, which posits that much of what we nowadays consider 'national identity' is not a natural product of history, biology and culture, but to a large extent either coincidental or socially and politically engineered. These theorists are highly respected and considered the main leaders of thought in the field.  **Ernest Gellner, _\"Nations and Nationalism\"_** (1983, but I think there are revised editions)  ^ Gellner is considered the main guy introducing the theory that 'nations' are not simply a natural phenomenon, but a product of modernization in the 19th century (at least in Europe). Before the 19th century, national identification did not exist in the same way as we know it today. It emerged as a result of industrialization and urbanisation, Romanticism and political opportunism. Very good theoretical framework and will make you think differently about the world once you read it.  **Benedict Anderson, _\"Imagined Communities\"_** (1983 - yup, it was a good year for nationalism studies)  ^ Anderson dives into a more conceptual discussion of what a nation is. Is it an extended family, is it a community of language or culture? He claims that it is a community that we believe to be a community, an 'imagined' one. It is a good companion to Gellner. Anderson focuses on the role of language and the emergence of print in creating communities of people that feel connected. This sometimes happened intentionally, and sometimes as a random historical development (if putting it a bit simplified).  **E.J. Hobsbawm, T. Ranger, _\"The Invention of Tradition\"_** (1983 - I'm not making this up)   ^ This one is less fundamental for nationalism studies but provides alot of useful examples of constructed and reproduced memory. It talks about how many traditions that we believe and assume to be ancient oftentimes orignate from much more recent times, and are developed with different, more instrumental purposes. A classic example is the Scottish tartan, which historically had a very different meaning than we (and even most Scots) think today.  **M. Billig, _\"Banal Nationalism\"_ (1995)**  ^ This is a response to the dominance of (above) 'elite-led constructivism' theories, and the idea that nationalism only takes place in moments of crisis and war. Billig proposed instead the view that 'nationalism' can manifest itself in very everyday means, through which normal people like you and me are constantly reminded which nation were are (not) part of. Very important development in the field!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":37207.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"3p8jun","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is there any psychological reason we perceive the \"\/\" character as moving forward and \"\\\" as moving backward? Is this influenced by the direction we read in? I realized this morning that intuitively, \\ should be the forward slash character for people used to reading left-to-right, since right is generally perceived as forward and most things moving rightward in our day-to-day lives have a roughly \\ shaped front (think of cars, bird beaks, etc). Is there any language or culture where \/ is a backward slash and \\ is forwards? Is it dependent on the direction we read? If so, what about languages that read top to bottom?  I realize this is possibly more of a shower thought than something scientists are likely to have inquired into, but if there's one thing I've learned it's that my thoughts are never original, so surely *someone* has answered this before.","c_root_id_A":"cw480kb","c_root_id_B":"cw4golw","created_at_utc_A":1445193477,"created_at_utc_B":1445206377,"score_A":10,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"Hans Wallach did his doctoral thesis \"On the Visually Perceived Direction of Motion\" in 1935. It seems to me that the question of forward slash vs. back slash could be closely related to the Barberpole illusion. In my understanding, with the eye moving left-to-right in a horizontal space a forward slash would be perceived as moving forward, while a back slash would be perceived as moving backwards. It the slash was used in a script which was read right-to-left it would likely be perceived oppositely (inferring from Wallach's work, I have no examples of this), while if it were a vertically read text, as can be the case with Japanese for example, it would likely be perceived as moving up or down.  It could be that \/r\/linguistics could make a more direct contribution as to how marks similar to this are perceived in other writing systems, but as far as the psychological side of it goes this is the best explanation I could find for why they are named as they are.","human_ref_B":">Is there any psychological reason we perceive the \"\/\" character as moving forward and \"\\\" as moving backward?  It seems to me your question starts with a supposition, that while it may be, I'm not convinced is true; as I know many people who mix them up quite frequently.   Do you have any evidence that people perceive them that way, other than the fact they've been arbitrarily named by someone at some point?  Shouldn't the question really be, \"Do we have evidence that people perceive \/ and \\ as forward and back slash, based on cultural or some other definable reasons\"?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12900.0,"score_ratio":2.3}
{"post_id":"zlk1k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Moving westwards through the mediterranean, one encounters \"pide\" (Turkey), \"pita\" (Greece) and \"pizza\" (Italy). Is there a relation, and are there more like it?","c_root_id_A":"c65nlvi","c_root_id_B":"c65nbbz","created_at_utc_A":1347197418,"created_at_utc_B":1347194842,"score_A":12,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"you might try r\/etymology on this one","human_ref_B":"And to make things more confusing, there is the Indian \"paratha\" which is also considered a possible origin of the pizza.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2576.0,"score_ratio":1.7142857143}
{"post_id":"zlk1k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Moving westwards through the mediterranean, one encounters \"pide\" (Turkey), \"pita\" (Greece) and \"pizza\" (Italy). Is there a relation, and are there more like it?","c_root_id_A":"c65rys3","c_root_id_B":"c65r6o0","created_at_utc_A":1347218245,"created_at_utc_B":1347215049,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Pide is unlikely to be etymologically related except through borrowing, as Turkish is from a different language family entirely than Italian and Greek.","human_ref_B":"I found in Northeastern Italy, in the Friulan dialect, there's the word \"piadino\", which they use to refer to a kind of flatbread sandwich that very loosely resembles a grilled cheese made with a pita. It's the diminutive (I presume) of some unused word \"piado\".","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3196.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"zlk1k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Moving westwards through the mediterranean, one encounters \"pide\" (Turkey), \"pita\" (Greece) and \"pizza\" (Italy). Is there a relation, and are there more like it?","c_root_id_A":"c65rys3","c_root_id_B":"c65pkap","created_at_utc_A":1347218245,"created_at_utc_B":1347208257,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Pide is unlikely to be etymologically related except through borrowing, as Turkish is from a different language family entirely than Italian and Greek.","human_ref_B":"I've been listening to the History of English podcast and it's fascinating not only how the proto Indo-European language spanned so many languages, but how English received so many of its words with similar meaning from multiple sources.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9988.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"zlk1k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Moving westwards through the mediterranean, one encounters \"pide\" (Turkey), \"pita\" (Greece) and \"pizza\" (Italy). Is there a relation, and are there more like it?","c_root_id_A":"c65pkap","c_root_id_B":"c65qp10","created_at_utc_A":1347208257,"created_at_utc_B":1347213038,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I've been listening to the History of English podcast and it's fascinating not only how the proto Indo-European language spanned so many languages, but how English received so many of its words with similar meaning from multiple sources.","human_ref_B":"From the Online Etymology Dictionary:  Pizza >1935, from It. pizza, originally \"cake, tart, pie,\" of uncertain origin. Klein suggests a connection with M.Gk. pitta \"cake, pie,\" from Gk. pitta \"pitch.\"  Pita >\"thick, flat bread,\" 1951, from Modern Heb. pita or Modern Gk. petta \"bread,\" perhaps from Gk. peptos \"cooked,\" or somehow connected to pizza (q.v.).  No entry on Pide.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4781.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"zlk1k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Moving westwards through the mediterranean, one encounters \"pide\" (Turkey), \"pita\" (Greece) and \"pizza\" (Italy). Is there a relation, and are there more like it?","c_root_id_A":"c65r6o0","c_root_id_B":"c65pkap","created_at_utc_A":1347215049,"created_at_utc_B":1347208257,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I found in Northeastern Italy, in the Friulan dialect, there's the word \"piadino\", which they use to refer to a kind of flatbread sandwich that very loosely resembles a grilled cheese made with a pita. It's the diminutive (I presume) of some unused word \"piado\".","human_ref_B":"I've been listening to the History of English podcast and it's fascinating not only how the proto Indo-European language spanned so many languages, but how English received so many of its words with similar meaning from multiple sources.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6792.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"prdey","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"What are some reasons as to why an authoritarian government is better than a democracy. And are there any good books related to this subject?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c3rpngo","c_root_id_B":"c3rvnfv","created_at_utc_A":1329363687,"created_at_utc_B":1329413351,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"The Arrow Impossibility Theorem is a proof that:  >  when voters have three or more distinct alternatives (options), no voting system can convert the ranked preferences of individuals into a community-wide (complete and transitive) ranking while also meeting a specific set of criteria. These criteria are called unrestricted domain, **non-dictatorship**, Pareto efficiency, and independence of irrelevant alternatives.   You can meet the other three criteria if you relax the no-dictator restriction.","human_ref_B":"I recommend Gordon Tullock's *Autocracy.*  Essentially, the major problems of an autocracy are: you get a bad person in charge, and the decision maker is only one person who simply might not know the best course of action (or he selects advisers, but those advisers might not be the best quality, for the same reason, and the advisers don't have an incentive to provide the autocrat with bad news). Essentially, there's the incentive problem and the knowledge problem. In a democratic society there's a feedback mechanism that punishes politicians for failing these problems, but less so in an autocracy (revolution and coups are feedback mechanisms, but they're hardly optimal).   However, because it's such a crapshoot of the quality of the leader, there's the potential that someone gets in power who is of high quality and outperforms a democracy in a similar situation. Tullock argues that the hereditary monarchy mitigates the worst problems of autocracy (i.e., the worst getting on top) by making sure the person who has power gets it if they want it or not. If there is no choice in who gets power, there's also no incentive to invest in the pursuit of power, which frees up resources for other means. There's also fewer resources spent in debate - what the autocrat says, goes. The benefit of democracy is that it encourages debate, so there are fewer egregious errors.  So I would say, ultimately, that autocrats have a small probability of outperforming a similar democracy (or constitutional republic, etc), but a much larger probability of succumbing to either incentive or knowledge problems. If you're a risk-seeking gambler, you might bet on an autocracy, but the average performance for a democracy will (probably) be better and the potential downside much lower.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":49664.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"prdey","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"What are some reasons as to why an authoritarian government is better than a democracy. And are there any good books related to this subject?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c3rvnfv","c_root_id_B":"c3rn8aj","created_at_utc_A":1329413351,"created_at_utc_B":1329350417,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I recommend Gordon Tullock's *Autocracy.*  Essentially, the major problems of an autocracy are: you get a bad person in charge, and the decision maker is only one person who simply might not know the best course of action (or he selects advisers, but those advisers might not be the best quality, for the same reason, and the advisers don't have an incentive to provide the autocrat with bad news). Essentially, there's the incentive problem and the knowledge problem. In a democratic society there's a feedback mechanism that punishes politicians for failing these problems, but less so in an autocracy (revolution and coups are feedback mechanisms, but they're hardly optimal).   However, because it's such a crapshoot of the quality of the leader, there's the potential that someone gets in power who is of high quality and outperforms a democracy in a similar situation. Tullock argues that the hereditary monarchy mitigates the worst problems of autocracy (i.e., the worst getting on top) by making sure the person who has power gets it if they want it or not. If there is no choice in who gets power, there's also no incentive to invest in the pursuit of power, which frees up resources for other means. There's also fewer resources spent in debate - what the autocrat says, goes. The benefit of democracy is that it encourages debate, so there are fewer egregious errors.  So I would say, ultimately, that autocrats have a small probability of outperforming a similar democracy (or constitutional republic, etc), but a much larger probability of succumbing to either incentive or knowledge problems. If you're a risk-seeking gambler, you might bet on an autocracy, but the average performance for a democracy will (probably) be better and the potential downside much lower.","human_ref_B":"Do you mean *advantages* authoritarian regimes have over democratic ones, or an argument for the former being categorically superior to the latter?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":62934.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"prdey","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"What are some reasons as to why an authoritarian government is better than a democracy. And are there any good books related to this subject?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c3rvnfv","c_root_id_B":"c3rqj0d","created_at_utc_A":1329413351,"created_at_utc_B":1329368753,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I recommend Gordon Tullock's *Autocracy.*  Essentially, the major problems of an autocracy are: you get a bad person in charge, and the decision maker is only one person who simply might not know the best course of action (or he selects advisers, but those advisers might not be the best quality, for the same reason, and the advisers don't have an incentive to provide the autocrat with bad news). Essentially, there's the incentive problem and the knowledge problem. In a democratic society there's a feedback mechanism that punishes politicians for failing these problems, but less so in an autocracy (revolution and coups are feedback mechanisms, but they're hardly optimal).   However, because it's such a crapshoot of the quality of the leader, there's the potential that someone gets in power who is of high quality and outperforms a democracy in a similar situation. Tullock argues that the hereditary monarchy mitigates the worst problems of autocracy (i.e., the worst getting on top) by making sure the person who has power gets it if they want it or not. If there is no choice in who gets power, there's also no incentive to invest in the pursuit of power, which frees up resources for other means. There's also fewer resources spent in debate - what the autocrat says, goes. The benefit of democracy is that it encourages debate, so there are fewer egregious errors.  So I would say, ultimately, that autocrats have a small probability of outperforming a similar democracy (or constitutional republic, etc), but a much larger probability of succumbing to either incentive or knowledge problems. If you're a risk-seeking gambler, you might bet on an autocracy, but the average performance for a democracy will (probably) be better and the potential downside much lower.","human_ref_B":"Sorry, but nothing grinds my gears more than when people say \"democracy\" when they mean \"republic\". A democracy *is* a very authoritarian form of government (authoritarian generally being defined as a government system where obedience to the state takes precedence over individual freedom and rights). In a democracy, majority rule is an authoritarian force, as they have the power to impose whatever they want on the rest of the people. Oppression is still oppression, regardless of whether it comes from the 1% or the 51%.  As for your actual question, I believe you are asking whether an authoritarian government is better than a \"free\" government in any way. The only answer I can give is: better for whom? There are certainly no advantages for the people being forced to submit.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":44598.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"prdey","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"What are some reasons as to why an authoritarian government is better than a democracy. And are there any good books related to this subject?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c3rpngo","c_root_id_B":"c3rn8aj","created_at_utc_A":1329363687,"created_at_utc_B":1329350417,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The Arrow Impossibility Theorem is a proof that:  >  when voters have three or more distinct alternatives (options), no voting system can convert the ranked preferences of individuals into a community-wide (complete and transitive) ranking while also meeting a specific set of criteria. These criteria are called unrestricted domain, **non-dictatorship**, Pareto efficiency, and independence of irrelevant alternatives.   You can meet the other three criteria if you relax the no-dictator restriction.","human_ref_B":"Do you mean *advantages* authoritarian regimes have over democratic ones, or an argument for the former being categorically superior to the latter?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13270.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"bqgls7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Do loners, lone wolf types struggle worse in jobs with lots of mental stress like law enforcement, hospitals, etc? I have read that a lot of the ways police officers, doctors etc stay sane is because they have people to live for, to lean on during tough times. So what if some cop or doctor is some dude who lives in a one bedroom apartment, doesn't have any close friends or family, and outside of work most plays video games and doesn't socialize much. Will they have a harder time in those types of careers?","c_root_id_A":"eo63xz1","c_root_id_B":"eo5zz93","created_at_utc_A":1558310850,"created_at_utc_B":1558308120,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I would begin by giving a brief explanation of stress and how people can cope with stress. Quoting Biggs et al.,  >**Psychological stress is a complex phenomenon and numerous theoretical models have attempted to explain its etiology**. These theoretical explanations can be categorized according to their primary conceptualization of the stress experience: stress as an external stimulus; stress as a response; stress as an individual\/environmental interaction; and stress as an individual\/ environmental transaction (Brough, O\u2019Driscoll, Kalliath, Cooper, and Poelmans, 2009; Cox and Griffiths, 2010)  Generally speaking, it is understood that stress is not just the environment acting on the individual. An important part of stress and of coping with stress is psychological (cognitive). The manner a person perceives a situation and appraises it affects them, depending on other risk factors and protective factors:  >**Transactional explanations of stress emphasize the cognitive phenomenological processes that enable individuals to attribute meaning to their environment**, emphasizing the relational, dynamic nature of the transaction in which stress may arise (Lazarus, 1966; Lazarus and Folkman, 1984). Inherent within the transactional approach is the bidirectional nature of the transactions between an individual and their environment; therefore, **it is neither the individual nor the environment alone that produces stress but a complex transaction between the two** (Folkman, 1984; Lazarus and Folkman, 1984)  Therefore, taking into account several protective and risk factors and how demanding a job is, how stressful a person feels depends also on how they appraise a situation. **Appraisal** being \"**the cognitive process through which meaning is ascribed to events\/stimuli** (Boyd, Lewin, and Sager, 2009; Dewe and Cooper, 2007; Lazarus and Folkman, 1984; Oliver and Brough, 2002)\":  >According to Lazarus (1991), appraisals of individual\/environmental transactions integrate two sets of forces: (a) an individual\u2019s personal agenda, including their values, goals, and beliefs, and (b) environmental factors, such as demands and resources.  ---  Concerning the role of cognition with coping with stress, Richardson's meta-analysis found, for example, that **cognitive-behavioral interventions which \"promote the development of proactive as well as reactive responses to stress\" are effective** at managing stress:  >Examples are cognitive\u2013behavioral skills training, meditation, relaxation, deep breathing, exercise, journaling, time management, and goal setting.   Therefore, there are multiple ways to deal with stress. That said, a person can cope better if they have more resources. Resources include, indeed, social support. Quoting Westman and Chen:  >**The accumulation of resources is also likely to result in positive emotional states and attitudes. Social support is one such resource**; as it accumulates, **it can broaden an individual\u2019s resource pool and replace or reinforce other resources that are lacking** (Hobfoll, 1985). **Social support resources lead individuals to feel more confident about their ability to successfully accomplish their role-related goals and meet expectations in both the work and family domains** \\...\\]      >\\[House (1981)\\] further maintained that **social support may originate from various sources such as supervisors, coworkers, or family and friends**. Hobfoll (2001) identified several such social support resources in the work and family domains, such as \u201csupport from coworkers\u201d and \u201cunderstanding from my employer\/boss\u201d in the workplace, along with family-based resources such as \u201chelp with chores at home.\u201d    >In summary, **social support is an important resource that can reduce stress and strain and buffer the relationship between them when source congruence exists**. Furthermore, **social support in the work environment may affect the target individual as well as others**, through spillover from domain to domain and crossover between people.  Social support is not limited to family and friends, it can also include coworkers, supervisors, etc. A person who lives alone and does not have an extensive social network may have less resources, but they are not necessarily more stressed than another person depending on other protective\/risk factors and how they perceive things.  ---  This was a general overview, but I can conclude with a couple of papers on specifically police officers and how they cope with a particularly stressful job: investigating child pornography.  [Burns et al. \"interviewed 14 members of a Royal Canadian Mounted Police integrated \\Internet child exploitation\\] team\" and identified several strategies used to cope, including cognitive strategies such as mental preparation, dissociation and compartmentalization, focusing on evidence\/remaining analytical, etc.  They also found that these police officers considered it important to have good supervisors \"who understood the impact of ICE work\", \"receiving  appropriate  organizational  support  greatly added  to  their  sense  of  well-being\", and \"\\[s\\]everal   team   members   described   annual psychological  assessments  as  a  'safety  net.'\" Regarding social support:  >**Most  of  the  team  members  made  a point  of  accessing  additional  support  from  people outside  the  ICE  team.  Having  supportive  spouses,family members, or close friends provided opportunities to share feelings and experiences, and offered companionship to engage in outside activities** with, such  as  camping,  baseball,  or  driving.  Having  a sense  that  they  were  not  alone  in  the  world  was extremely important  [Powell et al. studied \"32 ICE investigators from all nine Australian jurisdictions\". Quoting their conclusions:  >Consistent with other ICE investigation research, **the participants in this study reported using a range of personal coping strategies**. These included informal debriefing, humor, focusing on the meaning and importance of ICE investigation, engaging in physical exercise, separating work from home, viewing ICE material analytically, controlling work flow, and mental distraction. Previous ICE investigator research suggests these should be effective coping strategies (Bokelberg, n.d.;Burns et al., 2008;Krause,2009;Perez et al., 2010;Wolak & Mitchell, 2009). **Central to the establishment of these reported strategies was the investigators\u2019 relationships with immediate colleagues.** It is well established within the general organizational research that emotional support from, and social bonding with, colleagues is an effective coping.  But there are some caveats that add some complexity to the topic:  >First, **participants felt that family members, who would other-wise be capable of providing emotional support, need to be protected from hearing about ICE material and the home needed to be (for the ICE investigator) a mental \u2018safe haven.\u2019** Not discussing work at home supposedly facilitated psychological detachment from work during off-work hours.  Finally, coming back to the importance of appraisal:  >Finally, **colleagues assist in the process of cognitive reappraisal**\u2014seeing the material as evidence\u2014a strategy that was also reported byBurns et al. (2008). A recent meta-analysis indicated that **perspective-changing reappraisals are a more effective means of emotional regulation than alternate strategies such as suppressing thoughts or emotions** (Webb, Miles, & Sheeran, 2012). **Reappraisal has also been negatively associated with anxiety and depression** (Aldao, Nolen-Koeksema, & Schwiezer, 2010).  ICE is arguably a 'extreme' example, but it shows how important appraisal is, the role of social support, and how several strategies can be employed (in different manners) to manage stress in these kinds of jobs.","human_ref_B":"r\/IOPsychology would probably be most likely to have a good answer for this question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2730.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7s4nfw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What are the main open problem in sociology? I quite don't get sociology and I'm trying to initiate myself. In order to understand it I would like to know what are the main unsolved problems in sociology. Not the goal of sociology nor its main concern but its main conjectures and unclear relationships that appear in this field.","c_root_id_A":"dt20rj8","c_root_id_B":"dt205xr","created_at_utc_A":1516619144,"created_at_utc_B":1516617591,"score_A":10,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"From my point of view, as a sociologist in training, all \"problems\" are open, there is no definitive understanding of society and how it works, and the last decades, as far as my understanding goes, were poor of new, great theories. And theories tend to explain well only part of the phenomenon you study, so for a lot of things is a matter of perspective and how to study stuff, since the same question can be addressed from different points of view. There are however more pressing problems, depending on the place you study, for example immigration and labor force participation and dynamics in Europe. But summing up, the main problem is how people behaves in society (whatever it is) and why do they act like that. Good luck finding an unique solution to that...","human_ref_B":"That\u2019s not how sociology or social sciences in general work.  It\u2019s not like math where there are problems to solve and semi-concrete answers.  It is an ever evolving field that changes as society changes.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1553.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"yw5zi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What are the strongest arguments against a flat tax? I was arguing with a good friend about whether America should switch to a flat tax. I am opposed to a flat tax because it would place more tax burden on the middle and lower classes.  My friend, however, laid out a pretty convincing argument based on fairness.  He argued that there is no reason why a wealthy person should pay a greater % of their income in taxes.  Are there other arguments against flat taxes out there?","c_root_id_A":"c5zdi2x","c_root_id_B":"c5zdn4v","created_at_utc_A":1346058021,"created_at_utc_B":1346059582,"score_A":8,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"To be fair we are all taxed the same. The first 1000 bucks I make gets taxed the same as Bill Gates first 1000 bucks.","human_ref_B":"Almost no matter how you structure a flat tax it is regressive, as you point out. That makes it \"unfair\" for the poor by forcing them to make greater sacrifices to pay tax that the wealthy.  There is no way to create a perfectly \"neutral\" tax system, mostly because people can't agree on how to judge the tax system. If everyone pays a flat 20% of their income, those making $200,000 have to sacrifice mush less than those making $20,000. But if the person making $200,000 pays a higher percentage, that is also \"unfair.\"  The basic reason why all industrial economies have a progressive rather than flat tax is practicality. A family of 4 making $20,000 are barely surviving, asking them for a 20% tax would make life much harder for them. It then becomes harder for that family to get out of poverty because they can barely cover food and rent. However a wealthy family of 4 making $200,000 will not be as greatly impacted. Their ability to pay food and rent is not at threat, even if the rent is not at a place as nice as they would like. They can afford more because they have more. Basics of life are a much smaller percentage of their income, so taxes are much less disruptive to them.   The US tax rate is 22% of GDP, the lowest in the first world by several percentage points. Even still, if all people had to pay 22% it would make life much harder for the poor, increase demand for government assistance programs, and extend the wealth disparity which suppresses demand (as there is less people with disposable income). Taxing the very poor then is bad for the economy and expands poverty by removing thousands of dollars that otherwise would have gone to basics. But the price of taxing the poor less is you have to tax the wealthy more to maintain that average. If you want families making $20,000 to pay few taxes, people making $200,000 will have to make up the difference.  Now that is for a flat income tax. It's basically an argument of practicality and poverty elimination which is admittedly not as principled an argument, but it is more well demonstrated rather than theoretical and has worked for over a century. However if (like many) he is talking about a flat *sales* tax, that is a different story.  A flat sales tax is even more regressive than a flat income tax. Going back to the two families at $20k and $200k, they both have four members and therefore only have four mouths to feed and bodies to cloth. Obviously the quality will be different, but there is a limit to how much is needed per person. The second family will spend more money than the first, and therefore pay more tax, but the money they spend on taxable items will be a smaller percentage of their income. This is not theory but imperical, those of great wealth, particularly those making a million or more, spend a much smaller portion of money in stores in the US. So the poor family that live paycheck to paychek will have almost all of their money go to taxes where as a wealthy family would have a much smaller percentage.  Additionally, at least in the US, a flat sales tax would a huge power grab by the federal government in what is normally considered a state matter. Sales tax has historically been set on a state by state basis, some state having no sales tax at all. States like having this power and so would fight hard to stop any federal unilateralism. And the party that usually sides with the states (Republicans) are also the party more likely to support a flat tax, so you will see an odd coalition of state's rights Republicans and most if not all Democrats opposing such a plan. It would politically be nearly impossible to implement in the US.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1561.0,"score_ratio":3.125}
{"post_id":"yw5zi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What are the strongest arguments against a flat tax? I was arguing with a good friend about whether America should switch to a flat tax. I am opposed to a flat tax because it would place more tax burden on the middle and lower classes.  My friend, however, laid out a pretty convincing argument based on fairness.  He argued that there is no reason why a wealthy person should pay a greater % of their income in taxes.  Are there other arguments against flat taxes out there?","c_root_id_A":"c5zdi2x","c_root_id_B":"c5zfwhw","created_at_utc_A":1346058021,"created_at_utc_B":1346077519,"score_A":8,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"To be fair we are all taxed the same. The first 1000 bucks I make gets taxed the same as Bill Gates first 1000 bucks.","human_ref_B":"A moral argument:  People shouldn't be unnecessarily burdened by taxes. That is, if you make 10,000 dollars a year and 15% goes to taxes, your life is adversely affected---you might have to chose between food and a place to live, for example. But, if you could kick in 1% while a person making over a million kicked in 30%, you both get to eat and have a place to sleep. Another way to think about it: a millionaire who losses 30% of his income to taxes isn't adversely affected---he still taking home more than he needs to have a good life. A flat tax is just unfair---the people at the lower ends get fucked while the people at the upper ends can amass more wealth that they don't need.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19498.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"2kor9s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Why does Paul appear to be a very common name for Catholics and not for Protestants? Maybe I don't have the right sample size but I have always noticed that Paul was a very common name for Catholics but I rarely met any people from a Protestant background with that name. The reason I became interested in this question is because I am taking a Religion class so I just read Romans and some other parts of Paul of Tarsus's writings and can see how his writings actually greatly appeal to Protestant theology. I am not trying to say that he belongs more to one or the other, but Paul had a huge impact on Luther, who commented on in his \"Preface on St. Paul to Romans\" that: >This letter is truly the most important piece in the New Testament. It is purest Gospel. It is well worth a Christian's while not only to memorize it word for word but also to occupy himself with it daily, as though it were the daily bread of the soul. It is impossible to read or to meditate on this letter too much or too well.  So now knowing the importance of St. Paul to Protestants, is there any reason why Catholics seem so much more likely to name their kids Paul?","c_root_id_A":"clngvzz","c_root_id_B":"clnbjpf","created_at_utc_A":1414611471,"created_at_utc_B":1414602125,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Perl & Wiggins (2004) do see a distinct pattern of Catholic preference for the name Paul or Pablo over Protestants, but it is framed within a larger category of New Testament name origins. Based on their study, Catholics chose New Testament names for their sons 34% of the time between the 1980s and 1994 compared with 21% for Protestants over the same period (Perl & Wiggins 2004: 218). There is a section that explicitly claims Paul is more prevalent amongst Catholics, but I don't fully understand the table so I cannot comment on it (Perl & Wiggins 2004: 219-220).  The long story short from the article is that they cannot find an explicitly theological reason for every name preference. What they do find is that nonbiblical saints and apocryphal characters are more common amongst Catholics, which they claim are \"all in the direction that one would expect given the groups\u2019 respective traditions\" p. 223. What this means is that since Catholics have saints and use apocryphal texts, known as deuterocanon, they have an invested theological reason for using those names in greater frequency than Protestants. This unfortunately doesn't cover Paul though, since he is in the 'New Testament' group of names. Perl & Wiggins do comment that the difference they observed \"exists for Catholicism only, as we are able to identify few individual names that are disproportionately common among Protestants\" p. 223.  **TL\/DR** Catholics do name their children Paul more frequently than Protestants and they do have theological naming traditions, but Paul isn't part of them. Paul may be used with a higher frequency because it is internally viewed by Catholics as a 'Catholic' name. Protestants seem to lack theologically based naming traditions, which would explain why Catholic usage of Paul is higher.  Source: Perl P. and J. Wiggins, \"Don\u2019t Call Me Ishmael: Religious Naming Among Protestants and Catholics in the United States\" *Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion* 43:2 (2004) 209\u2013228","human_ref_B":"Do you have any statistics or research to back up the premise of your question? It may just be your experience.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9346.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"20o98v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Could someone explain to me, in simple terms, the concept of rent-seeking? Today I set out to read Stiglitz's \"The Price of Inequality.\" I breezed through it, and it was quite an interesting read, but upon finishing it I realized I didn't fully grasp the concept of rent-seeking (or if I did that I may have interpreted it wrong). Could someone explain to me, simply, the concept of rent-seeking?","c_root_id_A":"cg59633","c_root_id_B":"cg5a5sn","created_at_utc_A":1395105913,"created_at_utc_B":1395108084,"score_A":9,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"Here are a couple definitions:   wikipedia   Library of Economics  Basically, rent seeking is the pursuit of economic advantage via political power.  For example, regulations which make it harder for new entrants to a market provide a rent to the existing firms in the form of market share.  Labor unions provide rents to their members in the form of higher wages by, in effect, shifting the supply curve for labor.","human_ref_B":"Rent seeking refers to the efforts made to capture or protect wealth ('rents') rather than their creation.  For example, a monopoly earns profits above the normal rate of return.  This creates incentives to become a monopolist rather than simply efforts to produce output. (Posner, 1970)  An example I like to use is suppose a group of people see a $100 bill on the ground.  All of those who see the money will quickly race to get that $100, which we would expect would be in proportion to the $100 prize.  This could be through fighting (might makes right) or racing to the prize to be first (as with Patents), or through lobbying authorities to grant them ownership (lobbying for exclusivity rights).  It is argued that the total effort could dissipate the entire value of that prize.  So if ten equally skilled people see the bill, and each has incentive to spend perhaps $10 of effort to capture the prize with 10% probability.  The winner gains in net $90, but accounting for expenditures by all competitors, the total wasted effort amounts to the full value of the prize. $100.  Of course, one of those 10 people may be stronger and faster than the rest.  So no one else bothers to compete for the $100 and that strong guy just walks up and takes the money uncontested.  But let's go back - why did that person become strong to begin with? Presumably they considered the costs and benefits of working out and getting strong.  But now being strong has an additional $100 in benefits - you get to win the contest.  So the incentives to workout and get strong are distorted and people spend excessive resources in that.  Similarly, suppose the local authority simply collects bribes to assign ownership to that $100.  Then the authority could get a bribe of up to $100.  A bribe isn't inefficient in that the bribe is simply a transfer, not a waste.  But now those who are in power get the extra benefit of that $100 bribe.  So now gaining that authority is worth $100 more and this creates additional distortionary incentives to win elections or gain power.  The idea of rent seeking was popularized by Tullock (though not coined by him) as applied to public choice (incentives in politics and government agency), but is now widely applied to the formation of monopolies, R and D races to patent, and other forms of all-pay auctions (first to the prize wins, but everyone pays).    Edit A mathematical model often employed is where probability of winning is proportional to the cost of effort. So say that person X spends $x and person Y spends $y, both trying to win the prize of A (for \"award\"). Then suppose the probability that X wins the prize is x\/(x+y). Then X will seek to maximize Ax\/(x+y)-x. And similarly for player Y they seek to maximize the symmetrical payoff in terms of y. The first order (necessary but not sufficient) condition for a maximization characterizes the optimum. We can show that for various cost functions, or probability functions, the total expenditure can even surpass the size of the prize. Or simplified, it's what we could call a Prisoners dilemma (with continuous strategies rather than discrete\/binary). (http:\/\/www.econ.ucla.edu\/people\/papers\/Hirshleifer\/Hirshleifer169.pdf)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2171.0,"score_ratio":2.7777777778}
{"post_id":"p344t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why are most of the AskSocialScience questions about economics? I've been goofing off here for a while, and I've noticed that a lot of the social science questions have to do with economics at different scales. Considering the breadth of the \"social sciences\" I would think there'd be a wider range of questions. Am I missing something?","c_root_id_A":"c3m3n88","c_root_id_B":"c3m41py","created_at_utc_A":1327941515,"created_at_utc_B":1327943754,"score_A":4,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I've always seen it as economics is something g that is very tangible to all of us, and of course plays a huge role in our lives. The economy is on the forefront of peoples minds, especially since  '08.  Another reason may be because other social sciences are somewhat abstract in the regards that it requires people to look at the world differently. For instances, how often do you think of how society influences your speech and how you perceive ideas such as 'respect'? But you hear about banks, monetary policy, and whatnot every single day.   Those are just the conclusions I've come up with.","human_ref_B":"The r\/economics subreddit gets a of of self post questions about economics, and we generally refer them to this board.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2239.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"p344t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why are most of the AskSocialScience questions about economics? I've been goofing off here for a while, and I've noticed that a lot of the social science questions have to do with economics at different scales. Considering the breadth of the \"social sciences\" I would think there'd be a wider range of questions. Am I missing something?","c_root_id_A":"c3m3n88","c_root_id_B":"c3m5run","created_at_utc_A":1327941515,"created_at_utc_B":1327952244,"score_A":4,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I've always seen it as economics is something g that is very tangible to all of us, and of course plays a huge role in our lives. The economy is on the forefront of peoples minds, especially since  '08.  Another reason may be because other social sciences are somewhat abstract in the regards that it requires people to look at the world differently. For instances, how often do you think of how society influences your speech and how you perceive ideas such as 'respect'? But you hear about banks, monetary policy, and whatnot every single day.   Those are just the conclusions I've come up with.","human_ref_B":"Is that a psychology question?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10729.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"p344t","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why are most of the AskSocialScience questions about economics? I've been goofing off here for a while, and I've noticed that a lot of the social science questions have to do with economics at different scales. Considering the breadth of the \"social sciences\" I would think there'd be a wider range of questions. Am I missing something?","c_root_id_A":"c3md68d","c_root_id_B":"c3m3n88","created_at_utc_A":1327990164,"created_at_utc_B":1327941515,"score_A":9,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Because if you ask about economics anywhere else, you're likely to get libertarians angrily demanding that you should already know the answer. You're more likely to get a good response here.","human_ref_B":"I've always seen it as economics is something g that is very tangible to all of us, and of course plays a huge role in our lives. The economy is on the forefront of peoples minds, especially since  '08.  Another reason may be because other social sciences are somewhat abstract in the regards that it requires people to look at the world differently. For instances, how often do you think of how society influences your speech and how you perceive ideas such as 'respect'? But you hear about banks, monetary policy, and whatnot every single day.   Those are just the conclusions I've come up with.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":48649.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"w3a9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are government run organizations inherently less efficient than private ones? Why? Just had a thought.  Most of the talk about privatization and increased contracting seems to assume that private organizations are more efficient. But is there really something inherently more efficient about a privately run company or is it just about management and incentives?  I understand the competition argument, but what about industries that encourage natural monopolies, such as utilities or infrastructure?","c_root_id_A":"c59x2w9","c_root_id_B":"c59za5d","created_at_utc_A":1341527891,"created_at_utc_B":1341538005,"score_A":13,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Private and public institutions have two very different goals. A public organization is meant to serve as many people as possible, sometimes at the cost of economic efficiency. A private institution is meant to make the highest profit, sometimes at the cost of service coverage.  So it depends, are you talking efficiency at covering people or efficiency at maximizing returns? Because either definition leads to a different answer.  A good example is the Post Office and UPS. UPS can pick and choose where they pick up packages, where they drop them off and how much to charge for that delivery. The post office must by law deliver to any address in the country for the same stamp as anywhere else. This means that there are some rural areas of the country where the post office runs at a loss, but those are areas UPS would ignore all together.  edit: I'd also like to add that any project or service that is difficult to monetize directly because its effects are distributed throughout the broader economy are often run terribly by private institutions. Large public works projects benefit everyone but few would be self-sustaining if they needed to find funding other than through taxes. It can happen (most of the freeways and newer bridges in New York were built privately) but it is both rare and can often be designed to maximize returns rather than maximize utility. In the New York example, Robert Moses owned the tri-borough bridge toll, so all his money came from car traffic. He therefore built all his project to maximize car usage (because that was most easy to monetize) at the expense of all other forms of transportation, not the best way to decide what to build.  As for utilities it's worth noting what the free market had done by the point of the 1930s. Big cities had multiple utility companies, multiple sets of phone and power lines littering the streets while rural America had yet to receive phone or electrical lines at all. Cities needed to harmonize utilities and rural areas needed utilities. So AT&T was given monopoly power on the condition that they provide service to everyone, not just the cities. Airlines were run with much the same regulatory model, force companies to run less profitable routs to increase coverage.   **TL;DR** Privatize and you trade profitability for smaller coverage, nationalize and you get broad coverage but less profit.","human_ref_B":"People don't seem to give a crap about science in AskSocialScience, but here you go anyway. This is one of the more-cited articles on this topic if you want to learn more.  Jensen, PH & Stonecash, RE. (2005). Incentives and the efficiency of public sector-outsourcing contracts. Journal of Economic Surveys 19 (5), 767-787.  Outsourcing the provision of traditionally publicly provided services has become commonplace in most industrialized nations. Despite its prevalence, there still is no consensus in the academic literature on the magnitude (and determinants) of expected cost savings to the government, nor the sources of those savings. This article considers the arguments for (and against) outsourcing and then examines the empirical evidence pertaining to whether any observed savings occur and whether they persist over time. In addition, we examine the existing evidence for the 'redistribution hypothesis' and the 'quality-shading hypothesis', which critics have used to argue that outsourcing lowers government expenditure by lowering wages and conditions and\/or lower quality services. Finally, we consider the impact of contract design on outsourcing outcomes. While the power of incentives is a strong theme in economics, recent work has suggested that high-powered incentives may be suboptimal for many public sector services, because they may crowd out intrinsic motivation, particularly in instances where agents are highly motivated. We discuss the implications of this insight for the efficiency of public sector outsourcing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10114.0,"score_ratio":1.3846153846}
{"post_id":"w3a9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are government run organizations inherently less efficient than private ones? Why? Just had a thought.  Most of the talk about privatization and increased contracting seems to assume that private organizations are more efficient. But is there really something inherently more efficient about a privately run company or is it just about management and incentives?  I understand the competition argument, but what about industries that encourage natural monopolies, such as utilities or infrastructure?","c_root_id_A":"c59wh00","c_root_id_B":"c59za5d","created_at_utc_A":1341525223,"created_at_utc_B":1341538005,"score_A":4,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"A lot of the time, nationalized firms were private firms who produced public goods or services. Many of these became loss making, but were still very necessary. Therefore, they become nationalised by the government. If you are producing below the average cost curve, you must be an inefficient company in terms of profit making (the firm is making a loss). The government on the other hand does not need to worry about making a profit as they are producing where the social benefit is maximised (or in theory they should be) rather than trying to achieve profit maximisation like the monopolised private industry.","human_ref_B":"People don't seem to give a crap about science in AskSocialScience, but here you go anyway. This is one of the more-cited articles on this topic if you want to learn more.  Jensen, PH & Stonecash, RE. (2005). Incentives and the efficiency of public sector-outsourcing contracts. Journal of Economic Surveys 19 (5), 767-787.  Outsourcing the provision of traditionally publicly provided services has become commonplace in most industrialized nations. Despite its prevalence, there still is no consensus in the academic literature on the magnitude (and determinants) of expected cost savings to the government, nor the sources of those savings. This article considers the arguments for (and against) outsourcing and then examines the empirical evidence pertaining to whether any observed savings occur and whether they persist over time. In addition, we examine the existing evidence for the 'redistribution hypothesis' and the 'quality-shading hypothesis', which critics have used to argue that outsourcing lowers government expenditure by lowering wages and conditions and\/or lower quality services. Finally, we consider the impact of contract design on outsourcing outcomes. While the power of incentives is a strong theme in economics, recent work has suggested that high-powered incentives may be suboptimal for many public sector services, because they may crowd out intrinsic motivation, particularly in instances where agents are highly motivated. We discuss the implications of this insight for the efficiency of public sector outsourcing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12782.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"w3a9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are government run organizations inherently less efficient than private ones? Why? Just had a thought.  Most of the talk about privatization and increased contracting seems to assume that private organizations are more efficient. But is there really something inherently more efficient about a privately run company or is it just about management and incentives?  I understand the competition argument, but what about industries that encourage natural monopolies, such as utilities or infrastructure?","c_root_id_A":"c59yq7p","c_root_id_B":"c59za5d","created_at_utc_A":1341535405,"created_at_utc_B":1341538005,"score_A":5,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I know that the hive will freak but a large part of it is Government Unions, they have all of the benefits of a union in the private sector but no profit requirement to force renegotiations.  Add to that, Government services are a monopoly so if a union decides to strike people have no where else to go for that service.    For example if the NY transit authority decided to strike, literally hundreds of thousands of people would have to find alternate transportation which would clog up the roads due to increased traffic etc...  With that kind of power the unions can fight any added efficiencies to the system because it can cost them jobs.  And they don't have to do it by striking they can just screw it up through sabotage (more like putting incorrect info into a data base, and less like damaging railroad tracks).  Last time I went to the DMV, I had to wait 2 hours and was given six different pieces of paper as a receipt.  In this day and age, I should be able to fill out all my forms online, which my municipality tried to do, but somehow they could never get it to work.    Believe me I'm not against unions in general, they need to exist otherwise people will get taken advantage of, but in a monopoly situation they hold too much power.","human_ref_B":"People don't seem to give a crap about science in AskSocialScience, but here you go anyway. This is one of the more-cited articles on this topic if you want to learn more.  Jensen, PH & Stonecash, RE. (2005). Incentives and the efficiency of public sector-outsourcing contracts. Journal of Economic Surveys 19 (5), 767-787.  Outsourcing the provision of traditionally publicly provided services has become commonplace in most industrialized nations. Despite its prevalence, there still is no consensus in the academic literature on the magnitude (and determinants) of expected cost savings to the government, nor the sources of those savings. This article considers the arguments for (and against) outsourcing and then examines the empirical evidence pertaining to whether any observed savings occur and whether they persist over time. In addition, we examine the existing evidence for the 'redistribution hypothesis' and the 'quality-shading hypothesis', which critics have used to argue that outsourcing lowers government expenditure by lowering wages and conditions and\/or lower quality services. Finally, we consider the impact of contract design on outsourcing outcomes. While the power of incentives is a strong theme in economics, recent work has suggested that high-powered incentives may be suboptimal for many public sector services, because they may crowd out intrinsic motivation, particularly in instances where agents are highly motivated. We discuss the implications of this insight for the efficiency of public sector outsourcing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2600.0,"score_ratio":3.6}
{"post_id":"w3a9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are government run organizations inherently less efficient than private ones? Why? Just had a thought.  Most of the talk about privatization and increased contracting seems to assume that private organizations are more efficient. But is there really something inherently more efficient about a privately run company or is it just about management and incentives?  I understand the competition argument, but what about industries that encourage natural monopolies, such as utilities or infrastructure?","c_root_id_A":"c59za5d","c_root_id_B":"c59wruo","created_at_utc_A":1341538005,"created_at_utc_B":1341526543,"score_A":18,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"People don't seem to give a crap about science in AskSocialScience, but here you go anyway. This is one of the more-cited articles on this topic if you want to learn more.  Jensen, PH & Stonecash, RE. (2005). Incentives and the efficiency of public sector-outsourcing contracts. Journal of Economic Surveys 19 (5), 767-787.  Outsourcing the provision of traditionally publicly provided services has become commonplace in most industrialized nations. Despite its prevalence, there still is no consensus in the academic literature on the magnitude (and determinants) of expected cost savings to the government, nor the sources of those savings. This article considers the arguments for (and against) outsourcing and then examines the empirical evidence pertaining to whether any observed savings occur and whether they persist over time. In addition, we examine the existing evidence for the 'redistribution hypothesis' and the 'quality-shading hypothesis', which critics have used to argue that outsourcing lowers government expenditure by lowering wages and conditions and\/or lower quality services. Finally, we consider the impact of contract design on outsourcing outcomes. While the power of incentives is a strong theme in economics, recent work has suggested that high-powered incentives may be suboptimal for many public sector services, because they may crowd out intrinsic motivation, particularly in instances where agents are highly motivated. We discuss the implications of this insight for the efficiency of public sector outsourcing.","human_ref_B":"Please note: massive oversimplication, I know, but as Terry Pratchett wrote, \"It's a useful lie.\"  It can be summed up as:  You want to make a profit? -----> business.  You want the thing to work, running on bare minimums? ----> government.  I don't know about monopolies down in the States, but in the area of Canada I live, we have a duopoly on TV: Bell and Rogers.  Bell controls the satellites and phone lines, and Rogers has cable. You can get Your TV through Bell, but I've never had it, and I don't know how.  Oh, my God. Caps, over billing, bloat ware (channels you don't want, but they send (and charge you for) anyway, it's awful.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11462.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"w3a9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are government run organizations inherently less efficient than private ones? Why? Just had a thought.  Most of the talk about privatization and increased contracting seems to assume that private organizations are more efficient. But is there really something inherently more efficient about a privately run company or is it just about management and incentives?  I understand the competition argument, but what about industries that encourage natural monopolies, such as utilities or infrastructure?","c_root_id_A":"c59x2w9","c_root_id_B":"c59wh00","created_at_utc_A":1341527891,"created_at_utc_B":1341525223,"score_A":13,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Private and public institutions have two very different goals. A public organization is meant to serve as many people as possible, sometimes at the cost of economic efficiency. A private institution is meant to make the highest profit, sometimes at the cost of service coverage.  So it depends, are you talking efficiency at covering people or efficiency at maximizing returns? Because either definition leads to a different answer.  A good example is the Post Office and UPS. UPS can pick and choose where they pick up packages, where they drop them off and how much to charge for that delivery. The post office must by law deliver to any address in the country for the same stamp as anywhere else. This means that there are some rural areas of the country where the post office runs at a loss, but those are areas UPS would ignore all together.  edit: I'd also like to add that any project or service that is difficult to monetize directly because its effects are distributed throughout the broader economy are often run terribly by private institutions. Large public works projects benefit everyone but few would be self-sustaining if they needed to find funding other than through taxes. It can happen (most of the freeways and newer bridges in New York were built privately) but it is both rare and can often be designed to maximize returns rather than maximize utility. In the New York example, Robert Moses owned the tri-borough bridge toll, so all his money came from car traffic. He therefore built all his project to maximize car usage (because that was most easy to monetize) at the expense of all other forms of transportation, not the best way to decide what to build.  As for utilities it's worth noting what the free market had done by the point of the 1930s. Big cities had multiple utility companies, multiple sets of phone and power lines littering the streets while rural America had yet to receive phone or electrical lines at all. Cities needed to harmonize utilities and rural areas needed utilities. So AT&T was given monopoly power on the condition that they provide service to everyone, not just the cities. Airlines were run with much the same regulatory model, force companies to run less profitable routs to increase coverage.   **TL;DR** Privatize and you trade profitability for smaller coverage, nationalize and you get broad coverage but less profit.","human_ref_B":"A lot of the time, nationalized firms were private firms who produced public goods or services. Many of these became loss making, but were still very necessary. Therefore, they become nationalised by the government. If you are producing below the average cost curve, you must be an inefficient company in terms of profit making (the firm is making a loss). The government on the other hand does not need to worry about making a profit as they are producing where the social benefit is maximised (or in theory they should be) rather than trying to achieve profit maximisation like the monopolised private industry.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2668.0,"score_ratio":3.25}
{"post_id":"w3a9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are government run organizations inherently less efficient than private ones? Why? Just had a thought.  Most of the talk about privatization and increased contracting seems to assume that private organizations are more efficient. But is there really something inherently more efficient about a privately run company or is it just about management and incentives?  I understand the competition argument, but what about industries that encourage natural monopolies, such as utilities or infrastructure?","c_root_id_A":"c59x2w9","c_root_id_B":"c59wruo","created_at_utc_A":1341527891,"created_at_utc_B":1341526543,"score_A":13,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Private and public institutions have two very different goals. A public organization is meant to serve as many people as possible, sometimes at the cost of economic efficiency. A private institution is meant to make the highest profit, sometimes at the cost of service coverage.  So it depends, are you talking efficiency at covering people or efficiency at maximizing returns? Because either definition leads to a different answer.  A good example is the Post Office and UPS. UPS can pick and choose where they pick up packages, where they drop them off and how much to charge for that delivery. The post office must by law deliver to any address in the country for the same stamp as anywhere else. This means that there are some rural areas of the country where the post office runs at a loss, but those are areas UPS would ignore all together.  edit: I'd also like to add that any project or service that is difficult to monetize directly because its effects are distributed throughout the broader economy are often run terribly by private institutions. Large public works projects benefit everyone but few would be self-sustaining if they needed to find funding other than through taxes. It can happen (most of the freeways and newer bridges in New York were built privately) but it is both rare and can often be designed to maximize returns rather than maximize utility. In the New York example, Robert Moses owned the tri-borough bridge toll, so all his money came from car traffic. He therefore built all his project to maximize car usage (because that was most easy to monetize) at the expense of all other forms of transportation, not the best way to decide what to build.  As for utilities it's worth noting what the free market had done by the point of the 1930s. Big cities had multiple utility companies, multiple sets of phone and power lines littering the streets while rural America had yet to receive phone or electrical lines at all. Cities needed to harmonize utilities and rural areas needed utilities. So AT&T was given monopoly power on the condition that they provide service to everyone, not just the cities. Airlines were run with much the same regulatory model, force companies to run less profitable routs to increase coverage.   **TL;DR** Privatize and you trade profitability for smaller coverage, nationalize and you get broad coverage but less profit.","human_ref_B":"Please note: massive oversimplication, I know, but as Terry Pratchett wrote, \"It's a useful lie.\"  It can be summed up as:  You want to make a profit? -----> business.  You want the thing to work, running on bare minimums? ----> government.  I don't know about monopolies down in the States, but in the area of Canada I live, we have a duopoly on TV: Bell and Rogers.  Bell controls the satellites and phone lines, and Rogers has cable. You can get Your TV through Bell, but I've never had it, and I don't know how.  Oh, my God. Caps, over billing, bloat ware (channels you don't want, but they send (and charge you for) anyway, it's awful.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1348.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"w3a9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are government run organizations inherently less efficient than private ones? Why? Just had a thought.  Most of the talk about privatization and increased contracting seems to assume that private organizations are more efficient. But is there really something inherently more efficient about a privately run company or is it just about management and incentives?  I understand the competition argument, but what about industries that encourage natural monopolies, such as utilities or infrastructure?","c_root_id_A":"c59wh00","c_root_id_B":"c59yq7p","created_at_utc_A":1341525223,"created_at_utc_B":1341535405,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"A lot of the time, nationalized firms were private firms who produced public goods or services. Many of these became loss making, but were still very necessary. Therefore, they become nationalised by the government. If you are producing below the average cost curve, you must be an inefficient company in terms of profit making (the firm is making a loss). The government on the other hand does not need to worry about making a profit as they are producing where the social benefit is maximised (or in theory they should be) rather than trying to achieve profit maximisation like the monopolised private industry.","human_ref_B":"I know that the hive will freak but a large part of it is Government Unions, they have all of the benefits of a union in the private sector but no profit requirement to force renegotiations.  Add to that, Government services are a monopoly so if a union decides to strike people have no where else to go for that service.    For example if the NY transit authority decided to strike, literally hundreds of thousands of people would have to find alternate transportation which would clog up the roads due to increased traffic etc...  With that kind of power the unions can fight any added efficiencies to the system because it can cost them jobs.  And they don't have to do it by striking they can just screw it up through sabotage (more like putting incorrect info into a data base, and less like damaging railroad tracks).  Last time I went to the DMV, I had to wait 2 hours and was given six different pieces of paper as a receipt.  In this day and age, I should be able to fill out all my forms online, which my municipality tried to do, but somehow they could never get it to work.    Believe me I'm not against unions in general, they need to exist otherwise people will get taken advantage of, but in a monopoly situation they hold too much power.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10182.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"w3a9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are government run organizations inherently less efficient than private ones? Why? Just had a thought.  Most of the talk about privatization and increased contracting seems to assume that private organizations are more efficient. But is there really something inherently more efficient about a privately run company or is it just about management and incentives?  I understand the competition argument, but what about industries that encourage natural monopolies, such as utilities or infrastructure?","c_root_id_A":"c59yq7p","c_root_id_B":"c59wruo","created_at_utc_A":1341535405,"created_at_utc_B":1341526543,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I know that the hive will freak but a large part of it is Government Unions, they have all of the benefits of a union in the private sector but no profit requirement to force renegotiations.  Add to that, Government services are a monopoly so if a union decides to strike people have no where else to go for that service.    For example if the NY transit authority decided to strike, literally hundreds of thousands of people would have to find alternate transportation which would clog up the roads due to increased traffic etc...  With that kind of power the unions can fight any added efficiencies to the system because it can cost them jobs.  And they don't have to do it by striking they can just screw it up through sabotage (more like putting incorrect info into a data base, and less like damaging railroad tracks).  Last time I went to the DMV, I had to wait 2 hours and was given six different pieces of paper as a receipt.  In this day and age, I should be able to fill out all my forms online, which my municipality tried to do, but somehow they could never get it to work.    Believe me I'm not against unions in general, they need to exist otherwise people will get taken advantage of, but in a monopoly situation they hold too much power.","human_ref_B":"Please note: massive oversimplication, I know, but as Terry Pratchett wrote, \"It's a useful lie.\"  It can be summed up as:  You want to make a profit? -----> business.  You want the thing to work, running on bare minimums? ----> government.  I don't know about monopolies down in the States, but in the area of Canada I live, we have a duopoly on TV: Bell and Rogers.  Bell controls the satellites and phone lines, and Rogers has cable. You can get Your TV through Bell, but I've never had it, and I don't know how.  Oh, my God. Caps, over billing, bloat ware (channels you don't want, but they send (and charge you for) anyway, it's awful.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8862.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"pl2wv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Good student, but lack of direction and purpose in studies\/research. How does on find their way in grad school? I finished my BA in Politics and Economics (International focus) over a year ago and have fortunately found Research Assistant positions and now a job now placed internationally doing relief\/dev't work. I've worked hard and have good grades and decent work and research experience for being out of university for just a year.   I have received a hefty research grant from the Canadian government and have applied to three good schools for an MA program. I feel confident in all three.  However, my dilemma: sometimes I feel like I'm faking it; I don't necessarily have a clear outcome of what I want from a MA program. I have a few research interests but not sure how defined they are and if I'll get bored of them in time. I'm struggling to find an area where I thrive, where I feel I can contribute. I often feel a need to be the BEST in my area, but feel it is out of reach.  Does anyone else feel similar to this? Have experienced this before starting the graduate degree?","c_root_id_A":"c3q8xal","c_root_id_B":"c3qa8a0","created_at_utc_A":1328997221,"created_at_utc_B":1329006352,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Are you me? I feel like I could have written this...  I am currently in my second year of my MA in Sociology and I spent my first year trying to articulate what exactly it was that I wanted to study. I had to really think about the reason I was going to grad school in the first place. I basically admitted to myself that it wasn't because I had a dying interest to study something specific but rather that I wanted to further my knowledge in the field in a more advanced way. Like you, I wanted to be the BEST in whatever area I chose to study, but was consistently frustrated because I could never think of something to pursue that hadn't been studied by a bajizillion people already. Once I let the mindset go, I switched to writing an MRP rather than a thesis and it was one of the better decisions I made. The lack of focus was making me procrastinate majorly, but now I am benefiting from the structure of the MRP stream.   As for the faking it - *everyone* feels that way. Trust me. It comes up a lot when talking to my fellow colleagues and professors. The more you talk about any issues that you experience in graduate school, the more you realize that many people are experiencing the exact same thing - but they attempt to hide it because they think they're the only ones!  What schools did you apply to?","human_ref_B":"Hello, I am on track to receive my Master's Degree in May in Sociology, and your words are very familiar to me. My fellow graduate students as well as our professors have had multiple discussions about what one of our professors referred to as \"imposter's syndrome\"--I looked and there is actually a wikipedia page for it: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Impostor_syndrome.  hollywoodending is completely right--most people feel that way, but because they are afraid they are the only ones, and (probably for some) because they don't want to appear amateurish or show weakness, they don't communicate it to each other. Since I have experienced a lot of pathos my first two years in graduate school, it has been one of my goals as the president of our graduate student association to promote a more communicative and supportive community for myself and my fellow graduate students. Because of the work load, the difficulty, and the feeling that everything is on the line (all the time) it can be very easy to feel alienated or isolated from other people. But I have found it beneficial to always remember that everyone is going through the same thing, whether they realize it or not.  I have found the cure to \"imposter's syndrome\" for me has been to prove to myself I am capable of excelling at graduate school by taking on several tasks and doing well at them (or sometimes just completing them). I have been a TA, RA, president of our association, and I am now conducting official internal review board sanctioned research for my master's thesis that I intend to publish, eventually. Out of all these experiences, nothing has made me feel legitimate quite like conducting my own research--for the first time I feel like a true sociologist! So, I hope that this feeling will not deter you from following this course, if it is what you desire. Graduate school can be so difficult, but you must remember that you are not alone! :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9131.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"1vyq8m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Why was Zimbardo able to conduct his famous \"prison\" experiment if it was Milgram's earlier obedience studies with electroshock that had led to the APA's adoption of ethical guidelines?","c_root_id_A":"cex9oxk","c_root_id_B":"cexbeot","created_at_utc_A":1390521380,"created_at_utc_B":1390525111,"score_A":7,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Zimbardo is very famous ***outside*** the academic community. Inside, he's a bit of a creeper. His 'famous' study was not published in a peer-reviewed journal so it holds almost no credibility aside from a cute story during the introduction of an academic paper. The only publication of the study was his book, the Lucipher effect. It can't really be cited as science and no argument would lean on it too heavily.   Remember that during the 70s, psychology was very much a wild west. It wasn't until 1996 that a new code of ethics was drafted to solidify the field's ethical considerations. New methods and techniques were being invented quite often and the APA wasn't very quick with keeping up with the times. Many people were pushing the limits of what we currently knew so it's tough to consider ethics for studies that were done prior to the standardization of ethical considerations of participants.","human_ref_B":"Milgram's studies had relatively little to do with the creation of Institutional Review Boards (the ethics boards that must oversee and approve all research with human subjects), which were launched in 1974, primarily in response to revelations of the Tuskegee Syphillis studies. Go wiki it..  Zimbardo ran his prison \"study\" in 1971.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3731.0,"score_ratio":1.8571428571}
{"post_id":"c3aydy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Qualitative researchers - do interviews need to be conducted in-person, or can rigorous data still be collected via email or Skype? I'm a primarily quantitative researcher currently working on the development of a particular workplace technology and its effect on employees. Recently, I decided to use my development budget to attend a qualitative research methods course, as I've always neglected to study this formally in the past. My PhD supervisor (also a quantitative researcher) took note of this and suggested I might like to undertake a qualitative research study, interviewing different workplace professionals on the perceived barriers to uptake of this technology.  I agree that this could be an interesting project, but my schedule is already pretty full with planned studies and I might struggle to find the time to interview 15-20 people in-person (each would probably involve me taking a full day out, as I'd need to travel to the site they work at). That made me wonder whether it is absolutely necessary for interview data to be captured in-person (or at least by phone), or whether forms of data such as email responses or instant-messaging interviews (e.g. by Skype) could still be considered rigorous enough? Is anyone aware of any qualitative studies in which data were collected using the latter methods?  I can think of a couple of limitations that these methods might bring (e.g. limited opportunity for emergent themes to naturally arise if responding to email messages, not as natural an environment for giving responses), but given that it might be the only way in which the study can realistically be conducted, I thought it was worth exploring.","c_root_id_A":"erpvreh","c_root_id_B":"erpw8hb","created_at_utc_A":1561129164,"created_at_utc_B":1561129485,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Here is a really accessible reading for exactly your question:  https:\/\/scholar.google.ca\/citations?user=vK9SCyYAAAAJ&hl=en#d=gs_md_cita-d&u=%2Fcitations%3Fview_op%3Dview_citation%26hl%3Den%26user%3DvK9SCyYAAAAJ%26citation_for_view%3DvK9SCyYAAAAJ%3A9yKSN-GCB0IC%26tzom%3D240","human_ref_B":"Taking a course in qualitative research methods right now. Based on your research question, the effect of a technology on employees, I'm afraid that with electronic communication *alone* you might run into some systemic bias. For instance, the people most comfortable doing a Skype interview are probably people that are generally comfortable with technology, which would have big implications for your research question.  I would never try and do interviews over email. It leaves so much to be desired as a data collection medium.  I think having a mixed-collection approach where you do both in-person and over Skype or phone would be a good way to maximize all your needs.  It's definitely been done over the phone with success:  https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC4722874\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":321.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"5kajf5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What book(s) would you recommend me to learn qualitative research methods? Hi social scientists,  Sociology student here. My university focuses heavily on quantitative research methods when it comes to research. However, I find qualitative research methods fairly interesting too.   Therefore, I am looking for a book on qualitative research methods, in particular focused on conducting interviews and observation studies. It is really important to me that the book contains a lot of examples\/samples. If possible, I want it to be focused on social sciences too (as opposed to, for example - interview questions for medical research).   Thanks in advance.","c_root_id_A":"dbn0ei5","c_root_id_B":"dbmtauc","created_at_utc_A":1482738522,"created_at_utc_B":1482723427,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Sorry to piggyback but as a fellow poor Sociology major I thought it would be allowed. My college focused on the qualitative methods approach. So any recommendations for a Quantitative approach?  (Still trying to figure out social stats)","human_ref_B":"Sarah Tracy's text unceremoniously titled \"Qualitative Research Methods\" is what we use in my courses. It's done a good job keeping me on track.   https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Qualitative-Research-Methods-Collecting-Communicating\/dp\/140519202X","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15095.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"melap","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"I'm curious to get perspectives from other disciplines on some of the Great Questions: Is there a Culture of Poverty in America? If so, what is it and what caused it? If the mods don't object I will post a few of these really big questions from time to time. I think it's valuable to see how people in other disciplines think about these questions.  I'm somewhat familiar with some of the views on this particular question, and at some point I will share what I know from economics and public policy classes\/research.  Since this is a little different from most questions on asksoc: if there's an objection to me doing this kind of thing, please let me know and I'll refrain in the future. I just think it will be interesting to talk about some of the questions that social scientists think are the great questions on r\/asksoc.","c_root_id_A":"c30b6vy","c_root_id_B":"c30c67z","created_at_utc_A":1321473779,"created_at_utc_B":1321479526,"score_A":7,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"From Econ\/Econ Sociology: (my own interpretation). There is no culture of poverty. Inner-city poverty is caused by two things: lack of social ties (to people with jobs) caused by changes in transportation costs and public policy that encouraged suburbanization. Successful people move out of the city, meaning there is less social and serindipitous interaction between people who are in the inner city, causing poverty to persist more than it otherwise would. (see WJ Wilson, who has done a lot of work on this)  Second, the war on drugs changes the relative value of skills in the drug market: from producers to those who can best subvert law enforcement. Because those in the inner city have low opportunity costs, the value of getting involved in the drug trade is high, which reinforces 'valuable' social ties leaving the inner city, and decreases investment in other types of social\/human capital.  That's my basic take; I'm sure there's a lot more. The culture of poverty  explanation for poverty is bunk; if there is a difference it's effect, not cause.  EDIT: I'm home now with a computer, so I wanted to expand on my answer.  First: what does it mean to have a culture of poverty? I can see two interpretations. The first would be some sort of contra-Max Weber in \"The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.\" Essentially, a specific segment of the population values things that are detrimental to long term economic well-being, like eschewing hard work, capital accumulation, innovation, etc for high-time preference and laziness. I don't think this interpretation can hold. The second interpretation would be some sort of \"destructive social capital\" factor. I recommend everyone read Alejandro Portes's Social Capital: It's Origins... where he outlines the benefits\/costs of close social ties.   Essentially, bad things are: Downward leveling norms, i.e., those who distinguish themselves from the group are punished; lack of outside opportunities, meaning that investing in group-specific skills can hurt you when interacting with outsiders (by having a distinctive dialect\/mannerisms); or excessive claims on successful group members (you get rich - suddenly everyone you know from K-12 is asking you for favors). Each of these sociological factors lower the benefits from breaking out of poverty, and thus encourage poverty. It's not that people's 'spirit' or 'culture' is any different, but people's values nevertheless keep them down. How empirically relevant are these? Specific communities may have these issues. For instance, a study that Portes references showed that Puerto Ricans in New York who tried to get white collar jobs by their community were often beat up, as they were seen as abandoning the community. I don't think this is usually a huge factor, though.  My contention is that several social\/political forces caused suburbanization, which limited access to \"bridging\" ties to people who could get those left in the inner city jobs. People with good contacts no longer hung around the city, where all the poor people were.","human_ref_B":"Would someone mind defining the term? What does \"culture of poverty\" refer to?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5747.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"melap","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"I'm curious to get perspectives from other disciplines on some of the Great Questions: Is there a Culture of Poverty in America? If so, what is it and what caused it? If the mods don't object I will post a few of these really big questions from time to time. I think it's valuable to see how people in other disciplines think about these questions.  I'm somewhat familiar with some of the views on this particular question, and at some point I will share what I know from economics and public policy classes\/research.  Since this is a little different from most questions on asksoc: if there's an objection to me doing this kind of thing, please let me know and I'll refrain in the future. I just think it will be interesting to talk about some of the questions that social scientists think are the great questions on r\/asksoc.","c_root_id_A":"c30bu3f","c_root_id_B":"c30c67z","created_at_utc_A":1321477543,"created_at_utc_B":1321479526,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I second you asking these big questions. I think they could create some great discussions! Let me look at some readings in human geography about this and I will try to get back to this.","human_ref_B":"Would someone mind defining the term? What does \"culture of poverty\" refer to?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1983.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1ucmoe","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"are there economies of scale in banking that justify the existence of \"too big to fail\" institutions?","c_root_id_A":"cegvcod","c_root_id_B":"cegzigw","created_at_utc_A":1388808689,"created_at_utc_B":1388820768,"score_A":3,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Here's a thing I found:  http:\/\/www.oecd.org\/regreform\/sectors\/46040053.pdf  Canada has a more concentrated banking system than the United States and a banking system with higher profits (I can't actually speak directly to size), but because of strict regulation it's not a huge problem. Because Canadian banks weren't exposed to the same risky loans, they didn't have a banking crisis.   Other countries, like France, had concentrated banking systems but weaker regulation. They were hit by a banking crisis.  I think you may be asking the wrong questions.","human_ref_B":"No.  >New empirical evidence regarding the performance of European banks is obtained by estimating an augmented Cobb-Douglas model, which allows us to disentangle the effects of input prices on average costs from other time-related effects such as technological progress. For our sample period this is important as average costs fell about 20% for the overall European banking industry just because the average interbank rate, which is used to construct the price of the input loanable funds, fell from 8.4% to 4.5%. > >To summarise our results, we find that the cost structure and performance of European banks over the period 1993-1997 can be characterised by the following key observations: > >**We do not find major economic gains from positive economies of scale for the overall European banking industry.** The picture becomes slightly different when looking only at the saving sector. Our results indicate that cost reductions of about 6% can be achieved for savings banks through larger (or, in some cases, smaller) scale. **However, increasing returns to scale do only exist for firms up to a size of EUR 600 million. The average cost curve is clearly U-shaped for saving institutions since the ten largest firms, i.e. with total assets exceeding EUR 50 billion, have significantly higher costs than savings banks in the optimal size class.**  http:\/\/www.eib.org\/attachments\/efs\/efr_1999_v01_en.pdf  Incidentally, it's probably germane to point out that executive and CEO pay is correlated with institution size.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12079.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1g5634","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"After adjustment for IQ and parental income, do college educated people still earn more than non-college educated people? We all know college educated people earn more than those who did not go to college. However, we never ask why this is.  Could it be because people with rich parents are more likely to go to college?  Could it be because people who finish college are likely to be more intelligent?  After adjusting for these factors, how much extra lifetime earnings do college educated people have?","c_root_id_A":"cahdmw7","c_root_id_B":"cagu2xc","created_at_utc_A":1371049622,"created_at_utc_B":1370981638,"score_A":9,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"u\/Integralds has summoned me, and I come!  There is quite a lot of work in this area. It's probably one of the best studied areas in labor economics. A lot of the econometric toolbox we use today were developed in trying to precisely measure the returns to education.  The preponderance of evidence indicates that education does have a positive *causal* effect on earnings. The best summary of the data is probably Card 1999. Using a variety of instruments an quasi-experiments shows that, after accounting for pre-existing variation, the causal effects of education are actually *higher* than the observational effects.  A few notes:  * None of the individual studies on their own are that convincing, IMO. There are fixed effects models, twin studies, and the paper \/u\/Pansrborne mentioned (using distance to college as an instrument). However, there story that all of the paint is a very consistent one. The strength of the literature overall is very strong. * The paper is from 1999. That doesn't make it irrelevant. There have been a few recent studies, but there isn't that much work being done on it nowadays. It's a more-or-less solved problem. If something happens that changes the relationship between education and earnings, a lucky graduate student will be able to make a big name for themself. Until then, no journals are really interested in publishing papers that confirm what we already know. * The paper doesn't allow us to distinguish between \"human capital\" and \"signaling\" models of education. Both are reasonable theories.","human_ref_B":"I hope one of the micro guys walks in here, because this is classic labor econ and I'm pretty sure there's an entire literature on the \"college wage premium regressions\" that I am blissfully unaware of.   However, I can offer two general comments.  1. Controlling for \"rich parents\" is very easy: if you're trying to figure out the effect of college on earnings, throw parental income onto the right-hand side. Nothing wrong with that. 2. Controlling for ability...ah, that's much trickier. See, like you say: college makes you smarter, but people who were already smart go to college. These are the \"productivity explanation\" of Katz\/Becker\/Mincer and \"signalling explanation\" of Spence, respectively. So if you try to throw some proxy for intelligence on the right-hand side of your regression, it's likely to be endogenous. You need an instrument to properly separate those two effects, which can be hard to come by.  Gods, they probably cover this somewhere in Mostly Harmless.  \/u\/urnbabyurn, \/u\/Jericho_Hill and \/u\/besttrousers probably know more than I do.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":67984.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"357m3s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Current economists or economics graduate students, what is your statistical software of choice: r, Stata, SAS, Matlab, something else? My summer project (and really for the whole next year) is to gain some proficiency in one of these programs to make myself more attractive for graduate school.  I'm immediately drawn to r because it is free and open source, but my school offers student licenses to Stata, SAS, and Matlab as part of a grant program for grad school prep, so my options are open at this point.  Any input you could offer would be great, but especially regarding learnability and frequency of use (i.e. do you use one more than the other?).","c_root_id_A":"cr1vrhc","c_root_id_B":"cr1tjbn","created_at_utc_A":1431035692,"created_at_utc_B":1431032234,"score_A":18,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I use Stata for statistical\/econometric work and Matlab for macro\/DSGE work.","human_ref_B":"i primarily use R and am branching out to python. advantages of R is that you are guaranteed to always have access to it no matter your institutional affiliation, but stata has a big business behind it, so it's relatively more user-friendly and there tend to be more quality-of-life improvements that are made. either one is fine. going from R to python has been really easy for me, i don't know if the transition from stata to python would be better or worse.  matlab is nice too, but most econometricians use stata or R, so you might not be able to look to your advisor\/peers for technical help like you would be able to if you were working in one of the more familiar environments. SAS is kinda weird, it's good for some very specific things but almost nobody uses it if they can avoid it. i haven't used it myself.  if you can get a free copy of stata, you might as well take it. you can spend a little time in both stata and R and see which one you like more. or you can skip both and go straight to python, which has plenty of data analysis libraries.   since comments require citations, here we go: here's documentation for the pandas toolkit for python. wes mckinney also has an o'reilly reference book for pandas that has been useful to me, so you can see if they have that in your library","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3458.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"357m3s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Current economists or economics graduate students, what is your statistical software of choice: r, Stata, SAS, Matlab, something else? My summer project (and really for the whole next year) is to gain some proficiency in one of these programs to make myself more attractive for graduate school.  I'm immediately drawn to r because it is free and open source, but my school offers student licenses to Stata, SAS, and Matlab as part of a grant program for grad school prep, so my options are open at this point.  Any input you could offer would be great, but especially regarding learnability and frequency of use (i.e. do you use one more than the other?).","c_root_id_A":"cr1timw","c_root_id_B":"cr1vrhc","created_at_utc_A":1431032204,"created_at_utc_B":1431035692,"score_A":9,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Having worked with GA's and Phd's from MIT, Harvard, etc... they use STATA because most of their data is small enough to compile locally. Corporate America uses SAS due to the sheer size of the data they crunch. They are slowly shifting to R.  I've not yet come across a Matlab user.","human_ref_B":"I use Stata for statistical\/econometric work and Matlab for macro\/DSGE work.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3488.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"357m3s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Current economists or economics graduate students, what is your statistical software of choice: r, Stata, SAS, Matlab, something else? My summer project (and really for the whole next year) is to gain some proficiency in one of these programs to make myself more attractive for graduate school.  I'm immediately drawn to r because it is free and open source, but my school offers student licenses to Stata, SAS, and Matlab as part of a grant program for grad school prep, so my options are open at this point.  Any input you could offer would be great, but especially regarding learnability and frequency of use (i.e. do you use one more than the other?).","c_root_id_A":"cr1tkno","c_root_id_B":"cr1vrhc","created_at_utc_A":1431032293,"created_at_utc_B":1431035692,"score_A":3,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I would recommend getting acquainted with all three (SAS\/Stata\/R) while you have the option. From a graduate school perspective, it will depend entirely on the department's preferences. However, you have the luxury of learning about all prior to being directed towards one. Many people use Stata or R in academia, and in the actual research working world SAS and R are more popular.","human_ref_B":"I use Stata for statistical\/econometric work and Matlab for macro\/DSGE work.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3399.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"357m3s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Current economists or economics graduate students, what is your statistical software of choice: r, Stata, SAS, Matlab, something else? My summer project (and really for the whole next year) is to gain some proficiency in one of these programs to make myself more attractive for graduate school.  I'm immediately drawn to r because it is free and open source, but my school offers student licenses to Stata, SAS, and Matlab as part of a grant program for grad school prep, so my options are open at this point.  Any input you could offer would be great, but especially regarding learnability and frequency of use (i.e. do you use one more than the other?).","c_root_id_A":"cr1timw","c_root_id_B":"cr1tjbn","created_at_utc_A":1431032204,"created_at_utc_B":1431032234,"score_A":9,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Having worked with GA's and Phd's from MIT, Harvard, etc... they use STATA because most of their data is small enough to compile locally. Corporate America uses SAS due to the sheer size of the data they crunch. They are slowly shifting to R.  I've not yet come across a Matlab user.","human_ref_B":"i primarily use R and am branching out to python. advantages of R is that you are guaranteed to always have access to it no matter your institutional affiliation, but stata has a big business behind it, so it's relatively more user-friendly and there tend to be more quality-of-life improvements that are made. either one is fine. going from R to python has been really easy for me, i don't know if the transition from stata to python would be better or worse.  matlab is nice too, but most econometricians use stata or R, so you might not be able to look to your advisor\/peers for technical help like you would be able to if you were working in one of the more familiar environments. SAS is kinda weird, it's good for some very specific things but almost nobody uses it if they can avoid it. i haven't used it myself.  if you can get a free copy of stata, you might as well take it. you can spend a little time in both stata and R and see which one you like more. or you can skip both and go straight to python, which has plenty of data analysis libraries.   since comments require citations, here we go: here's documentation for the pandas toolkit for python. wes mckinney also has an o'reilly reference book for pandas that has been useful to me, so you can see if they have that in your library","labels":0,"seconds_difference":30.0,"score_ratio":1.1111111111}
{"post_id":"357m3s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Current economists or economics graduate students, what is your statistical software of choice: r, Stata, SAS, Matlab, something else? My summer project (and really for the whole next year) is to gain some proficiency in one of these programs to make myself more attractive for graduate school.  I'm immediately drawn to r because it is free and open source, but my school offers student licenses to Stata, SAS, and Matlab as part of a grant program for grad school prep, so my options are open at this point.  Any input you could offer would be great, but especially regarding learnability and frequency of use (i.e. do you use one more than the other?).","c_root_id_A":"cr1tkno","c_root_id_B":"cr1x01p","created_at_utc_A":1431032293,"created_at_utc_B":1431037821,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I would recommend getting acquainted with all three (SAS\/Stata\/R) while you have the option. From a graduate school perspective, it will depend entirely on the department's preferences. However, you have the luxury of learning about all prior to being directed towards one. Many people use Stata or R in academia, and in the actual research working world SAS and R are more popular.","human_ref_B":"Matlab is not getting enough mentions. I thought I was being forward thinking by learning R, which I probably was in general since its open source and widely used, but the department I ended up in has many diehard Matlab people: quantitative macro and empirical IO.    Its not like the skills aren't somewhat transferable though.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5528.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"lf298","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"A question for those who have attained a Ph.D, was it worth it? Did you get what you wanted? This question was posted to AskAcademia by I_love_immuno. I am asking it here to get opinions from those who did not go into academia.   So, social scientists:  * Was it worth it?  * Do you feel that you have traded a normal life for a life chained down?  * Do you feel adequately compensated after all is said and done?  * Have you been able to afford to travel the world both monetarily and timewise?  * What did you do after your PhD?  I really appreciate your responses as I'm applying for a PhD very soon.  Thank you.","c_root_id_A":"c2scaie","c_root_id_B":"c2s7wat","created_at_utc_A":1318906356,"created_at_utc_B":1318876606,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I pretty much agree with what has been posted. It's extremely hard. If you do it because you want fame and glory, there are easier ways to attain it. If you do it because you love the subject, you want flexibility, etc, then go for it.   It's exhausting. If\/when you do it, don't fall for the grad school delusion. The grad school delusion goes somethings like this \"When I finish X, then I can Y\" where X is a paper, comps, class, finals, dissertation proposal etc. and Y is relaxing, self-care, spending time with friends\/family, etc.   It's a delusion. There will always be another \"X\", another test, another paper, another stressor. You need to take care of yourself and live your life DURING grad school. Your life is now stressful and demanding, it doesn't \"go away\" after whatever X you've achieved.","human_ref_B":"I'm midway now. Right now it looks like a huge waste of time. I'll let you know in 2 years.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29750.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"lf298","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"A question for those who have attained a Ph.D, was it worth it? Did you get what you wanted? This question was posted to AskAcademia by I_love_immuno. I am asking it here to get opinions from those who did not go into academia.   So, social scientists:  * Was it worth it?  * Do you feel that you have traded a normal life for a life chained down?  * Do you feel adequately compensated after all is said and done?  * Have you been able to afford to travel the world both monetarily and timewise?  * What did you do after your PhD?  I really appreciate your responses as I'm applying for a PhD very soon.  Thank you.","c_root_id_A":"c2sbfhy","c_root_id_B":"c2scaie","created_at_utc_A":1318900581,"created_at_utc_B":1318906356,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Almost...there...(so far so good).","human_ref_B":"I pretty much agree with what has been posted. It's extremely hard. If you do it because you want fame and glory, there are easier ways to attain it. If you do it because you love the subject, you want flexibility, etc, then go for it.   It's exhausting. If\/when you do it, don't fall for the grad school delusion. The grad school delusion goes somethings like this \"When I finish X, then I can Y\" where X is a paper, comps, class, finals, dissertation proposal etc. and Y is relaxing, self-care, spending time with friends\/family, etc.   It's a delusion. There will always be another \"X\", another test, another paper, another stressor. You need to take care of yourself and live your life DURING grad school. Your life is now stressful and demanding, it doesn't \"go away\" after whatever X you've achieved.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5775.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1mrume","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Why does Germany, being a major european and international economic player, only have one globally significant bank? Unlike most of its economically even smaller neighbors UK, France, Switzerland..","c_root_id_A":"ccc1nzg","c_root_id_B":"ccc2c4b","created_at_utc_A":1379685736,"created_at_utc_B":1379688015,"score_A":2,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"The easiest, most proximate answer is that years of mismanagement and corruption have left many of the banks unable to invest in projects that would make them a global player, and when they do, they (seemingly invariably) end up making bad investments. German banks required the largest bailouts of any European bank after the recent recession, and they were heavily involved in the subprime mortgage fiasco that brought done hundreds of American banks. A bigger picture, more systemic answer is that even absent the mismanagement the German banking system is organized differently from ours, with many\/most banks owned by local governments, and often used to serve the interests of those local governments. In general they don't operate in the cutthroat capitalistic way American banks do, instead acting as a semi-corrupt, or at least easily corrupted, arm of regional political concerns, and don't make any attempt to move into international finance.   Here's a good, and recent, article that goes into some detail on their current situation.","human_ref_B":"Bankers Trust, a major US investment had some issues with Derivatives after it sold some overly complex OTC products to people like Orange County and Proctor and Gamble. Essentially they had to settle and ended up needing a rich partner.  Deutsche were interested and as a rich retail bank with an underdeveloped investment banking division, this worked out well. Deutsche became dominant.   Behind them was Dresdner, also very well developed on the retail front and they joined with a UK investment bank,  Kleinwort Benson to form DKB. London was where the IB was happening but the show was sponsored with the money coming from the German retail investors.   There was also Commerzbank which had again a mostly retail operation in Germany but a thriving IB division in London (I forget who they took over). Commerzbank was being chased by DKB.   Finally there was HVB who were again mostly retail but were aggressively chasing IB business.   Along came Lehmann. The point is that many of the IB operations were run at arm's length so it was really a trigger for something that was probably going to happen anyway.   HVB had  big problems and it finally ended up being taken over by an Italian banking group, Unicredit. DKB had big problems but the Germans did not want to lose another major bank so they looked for a partner, Commerzbank to take over but the insurance business from both went to Allianz. Commerzbank was very active overseas but it had to consolidate it's operations. Deutsche had issues with a joint venture with Commerzbank for property investment called EuroHypo which had major problems with mortgage backed securities. Luckily for Deutsche, the venture was majority owned by Commerz so they took the hit politically but financially Deutsche had issues too. Commerz had government support to take over Dresdner but as a condition they had to keep as many German jobs as possible so they also were forced to curtail their overseas activities.   Underneath the big banks are the regional banks. In general they had a good retail base but were under pressure to increase their returns which is why banks like WestLB started playing in London, but without the boards really being aware of the risk that their investment banking activities worked under. Many of them had big issues.  At the same time the EU was applying pressure on the German government to remove the state guarantees for these banks. So the Landesbank were forced to curtail their activities.   Below that were the savings banks. These go down to the size of individual towns or cities. Effectively they their own corporate investment bank that was called DG at the time (it is now DV or something) . This had existed for a while and was not particularly exciting with their risk taking. They survived fairly well.   First tranche of sources (more will come):    *  Bankers Trust vs Orange County and Proctor & Gample   * Deutsche Bank's Aquisition of Bankers Trust   * Germany's Landebanken in Trouble   * Commerzbank's Aquisition of Dresdener   * German Banking Structures   Source: more to come later, but I have consulted to all of the majors at one time or another in London, Frankfurt and Munich.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2279.0,"score_ratio":10.0}
{"post_id":"1g6ywm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.61,"history":"Why is leanness in men (apparently) so attractive to women? Everything I understand about why women are attracted to men ignoring personality, etc., focuses on his ability to kill prey, defend their cave, etc.  Yet, when I talk about these things with my female friends, I think most of them would prefer a male physique low-moderate levels of muscle and very low fat to a much more capable physique with moderate-high muscle and moderate fat.  Why is this?","c_root_id_A":"cahe2ft","c_root_id_B":"cahegbp","created_at_utc_A":1371050815,"created_at_utc_B":1371051855,"score_A":9,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Culture, socialization, and psychology play a significant role in complicated preferences like sexual\/romantic attraction--it can't be reduced to evolutionary biology. The \"capability\" that's implied by more muscle and fat isn't relevant to most people's ability ability to survive\/thrive in a post-industrial society like North America or Western Europe, and any number of other influences may nudge a given woman's preferences towards leanness. E.g., images of celebrities or models, negative associations with higher muscle\/fat (think \"broey-ness\" or \"meathead\" stereotypes), associations of leanness with youth\/art\/intellect\/whatever, cultural privileging of muscular definition over other bodily characteristics (for an interesting discussion of this check out Shigehisa Kuriyama's *Expressiveness of the Body* on Ancient Greek and Chinese conceptions of anatomy and ideal bodies).  I'd say your best bet for figuring this out, though, would be to ask some thoughtful women who prefer lean men about why they do. Besides the friends you mention, you could also try r\/AskWomen.  Source: medical anthropology grad student","human_ref_B":"Why do most of Western men prefer slim women? Shouldn't they be more attracted to the ones with larger hips?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1040.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1g6ywm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.61,"history":"Why is leanness in men (apparently) so attractive to women? Everything I understand about why women are attracted to men ignoring personality, etc., focuses on his ability to kill prey, defend their cave, etc.  Yet, when I talk about these things with my female friends, I think most of them would prefer a male physique low-moderate levels of muscle and very low fat to a much more capable physique with moderate-high muscle and moderate fat.  Why is this?","c_root_id_A":"cahepdc","c_root_id_B":"cahe2ft","created_at_utc_A":1371052518,"created_at_utc_B":1371050815,"score_A":17,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"What makes you think being lean would put you at a disadvantage when hunting? Most hunting requires you to travel long distances, or even outrunning the prey on marathon like distances.","human_ref_B":"Culture, socialization, and psychology play a significant role in complicated preferences like sexual\/romantic attraction--it can't be reduced to evolutionary biology. The \"capability\" that's implied by more muscle and fat isn't relevant to most people's ability ability to survive\/thrive in a post-industrial society like North America or Western Europe, and any number of other influences may nudge a given woman's preferences towards leanness. E.g., images of celebrities or models, negative associations with higher muscle\/fat (think \"broey-ness\" or \"meathead\" stereotypes), associations of leanness with youth\/art\/intellect\/whatever, cultural privileging of muscular definition over other bodily characteristics (for an interesting discussion of this check out Shigehisa Kuriyama's *Expressiveness of the Body* on Ancient Greek and Chinese conceptions of anatomy and ideal bodies).  I'd say your best bet for figuring this out, though, would be to ask some thoughtful women who prefer lean men about why they do. Besides the friends you mention, you could also try r\/AskWomen.  Source: medical anthropology grad student","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1703.0,"score_ratio":1.8888888889}
{"post_id":"3092rp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is slavery now considered unacceptable? In *Debt: The First 5000 Years*, Graeber notes multiple times throughout the book that slavery was accepted for most of human history, and the most common way for someone to become a slave was capture in war.  Why is it that slavery is now seen as unacceptable?  (This might be better for AskHistorians, but I figured I would try here first)","c_root_id_A":"cpqhq3u","c_root_id_B":"cpqk62g","created_at_utc_A":1427308609,"created_at_utc_B":1427312292,"score_A":3,"score_B":37,"human_ref_A":"\"Seen as unacceptable\" should be defined. I will define it as, seen unacceptable by modern countries who have laws to prevent slavery.   Since each modern country might have it's own rationalization for ending slavery, as a student of American law I will go with what I know, US law.  In the US, the most notable and enforceable reason on how we have outlawed slavery is the 13th Amendment, which states:  >\"Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.\"  U.S. Constitution  However, you asked why. Why is a harder question, because it's so entangled with numerous social philosophies it would be hard to pin down. It could be something simple like economics, or something hard like morals.  I highly suggest looking at it from a different angle; HOW did people justify slavery? From there you can find counters to those arguments, particularly by a well respected scholar at the time of the 13th Amendment, Frederick Douglas.  Here is a great source on some of his arguments to counter how slavery was justified.","human_ref_B":"In *The Expanding Circle: Ethics, Evolution, and Moral Progress* by Peter Singer, the author argues that morality begins as a small circle to protect only one's kin but over the centuries continuously expands to include more and more members as our capacity to reason about morality develops. This would mean that over time we began to include the enslaved in our list of moral considerations and realize the wrongness of slavery.  From a dialectical Marxist point of view, I think the answer might differ a bit. Enough contradictions mount between the exploited class and the exploiting class to realize the unsustainability of the system when rebellions and revolutions occur. These were common throughout history, and a threshold seems to be reached where the subjugated class revolts and forcefully modifies society to make slavery impermissible. Arguably the most dramatic example is the Haitian Revolution which began as a slave revolt and ended by literally creating the modern day state of Haiti.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3683.0,"score_ratio":12.3333333333}
{"post_id":"aqwhbm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.64,"history":"Why are women generally more religious than men? This tends to be a common occurrence across all religions and cultures. Why is this the case?","c_root_id_A":"egjabhh","c_root_id_B":"egjheug","created_at_utc_A":1550245987,"created_at_utc_B":1550250912,"score_A":7,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"There are some answers for you here:   https:\/\/www.psychologytoday.com\/us\/blog\/the-secular-life\/201409\/why-are-women-more-religious-men  One of the points is one I've often considered and seems to rarely be mentioned when people talk about religion and that is inequality. The article mentions seeking \"comfort\" in religion, but that conjures up images of people talking to ministers or priests or reading their bible or praying, but I don't think it gets to the meat of why disadvantaged people in societies all over the world (and women are so) are religious.   I believe it's that they need to have a sense of justice and order in the world and when they feel they lack agency or opportunity, they look to a higher order\/power that they feel will mete out a fairer outcome in the end. Essentially, one may be poor, badly treated, and stuck in a lower status, but being \"good\" will mean that they will be rewarded by God in the end. When you are consistently getting the short end of the stick, this is a way of living with the suffering you experience. It's a form of self-soothing in the moment to know you'll be rewarded later, or that your suffering is seen and your sacrifices are appreciated by God.","human_ref_B":"As other users have questioned, it *is* important to first establish whether the premise is factual, especially for \"all religions and cultures\".   For America, for example, this Gallup poll suggests that women tend to be more religious than men, and there are other surveys and studies that found similar results. The appendix in this article provides statistical evidence for women tending to be more religious than men in several Western countries such as Australia, Canada, England and Wales, New Zealand, Scotland, the U.K, the U.S.A and Western Europe.  This sociologist of religion has argued that the pattern is \"universal\", such that for example:  > Many  years  ago,  after  examining  data  from  elaborate  sets  of  items  concerning  religious beliefs and actions, Charles Glock and I discovered that the best single measure of personal piety is simply to ask people how religious they are (Stark and Glock 1968). The English language version of the WVS item is:\u201cWhether you go to church or not, would you say you are a religious person.\u201dTable 1 compares men and women in 49 nations. In every instance, a higher percentage of women than men said they were a religious person. In all but Brazil the differences were highly statistically significant. These results were fully replicated when based on other measures of religiousness (and these were significant in Brazil as well).  He found similar results for Asian and other Eastern countries too:  > Thus,  of  36  gender  comparisons  in  non-Christian  nations,  women  are  significantly  more religious for 35. It would, of course, be wonderful to have data on much less developed nations and, indeed, on small, preliterate societies. However, given that data are available for most of the western hemisphere, all of Europe, and for the major nations of Asia, and that the gender effect holds in all of them, this suggests that what we are looking at something that at least borders upon the universal.  This article found a \"negative relationship between gender and belief in buddhas indicating] that females are more likely than males to express a belief in buddhas\" for Japan.   An argument *can* be made that is not based on anecdotes and stereotypes. Now, concerning the why, it is a big question and is probably a complex mix of [socialization effects, cultural influences (e.g. religiosity and traditional female lifestyles meld well together, religious places are a good place for socialization, etc.) and factors related to personality such as risk-taking behavior.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4925.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"aqwhbm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.64,"history":"Why are women generally more religious than men? This tends to be a common occurrence across all religions and cultures. Why is this the case?","c_root_id_A":"egjheug","c_root_id_B":"egj4f8x","created_at_utc_A":1550250912,"created_at_utc_B":1550241465,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As other users have questioned, it *is* important to first establish whether the premise is factual, especially for \"all religions and cultures\".   For America, for example, this Gallup poll suggests that women tend to be more religious than men, and there are other surveys and studies that found similar results. The appendix in this article provides statistical evidence for women tending to be more religious than men in several Western countries such as Australia, Canada, England and Wales, New Zealand, Scotland, the U.K, the U.S.A and Western Europe.  This sociologist of religion has argued that the pattern is \"universal\", such that for example:  > Many  years  ago,  after  examining  data  from  elaborate  sets  of  items  concerning  religious beliefs and actions, Charles Glock and I discovered that the best single measure of personal piety is simply to ask people how religious they are (Stark and Glock 1968). The English language version of the WVS item is:\u201cWhether you go to church or not, would you say you are a religious person.\u201dTable 1 compares men and women in 49 nations. In every instance, a higher percentage of women than men said they were a religious person. In all but Brazil the differences were highly statistically significant. These results were fully replicated when based on other measures of religiousness (and these were significant in Brazil as well).  He found similar results for Asian and other Eastern countries too:  > Thus,  of  36  gender  comparisons  in  non-Christian  nations,  women  are  significantly  more religious for 35. It would, of course, be wonderful to have data on much less developed nations and, indeed, on small, preliterate societies. However, given that data are available for most of the western hemisphere, all of Europe, and for the major nations of Asia, and that the gender effect holds in all of them, this suggests that what we are looking at something that at least borders upon the universal.  This article found a \"negative relationship between gender and belief in buddhas indicating] that females are more likely than males to express a belief in buddhas\" for Japan.   An argument *can* be made that is not based on anecdotes and stereotypes. Now, concerning the why, it is a big question and is probably a complex mix of [socialization effects, cultural influences (e.g. religiosity and traditional female lifestyles meld well together, religious places are a good place for socialization, etc.) and factors related to personality such as risk-taking behavior.","human_ref_B":"A somewhat different interpretation for working women\u2019s lower religious commitment emerges \r from recent studies in the U.S. by Indiana University-Bloomington sociologist Landon Schnabel. \r He suggests that women in the labor force, particularly those in high-paying, full-time jobs, are \r less religious because they receive less social validation and affirmation from religious \r congregations compared with women who follow more gender-typical roles and expectations.45\r Sociologist Linda Woodhead of Lancaster University theorizes that as Christian women in Europe \r and North America increasingly entered the labor force starting in the 1960s, they felt the need to \r create more independent, career-oriented identities separate from or alongside their identities as \r homemakers. But since most traditional forms of Christianity did not support working women\u2019s \r new identities, women\u2019s overall religiosity decreased. \u201cIn this complex project of completely \r refashioning identity, traditional forms of religion are more likely to prove a hindrance to women \r than a help,\u201d Woodhead writes  Source - Pew Research Center  Edit - http:\/\/www.pewforum.org\/2016\/03\/22\/theories-explaining-gender-differences-in-religion\/  PDF is at the end","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9447.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"aqwhbm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.64,"history":"Why are women generally more religious than men? This tends to be a common occurrence across all religions and cultures. Why is this the case?","c_root_id_A":"egjabhh","c_root_id_B":"egj4f8x","created_at_utc_A":1550245987,"created_at_utc_B":1550241465,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There are some answers for you here:   https:\/\/www.psychologytoday.com\/us\/blog\/the-secular-life\/201409\/why-are-women-more-religious-men  One of the points is one I've often considered and seems to rarely be mentioned when people talk about religion and that is inequality. The article mentions seeking \"comfort\" in religion, but that conjures up images of people talking to ministers or priests or reading their bible or praying, but I don't think it gets to the meat of why disadvantaged people in societies all over the world (and women are so) are religious.   I believe it's that they need to have a sense of justice and order in the world and when they feel they lack agency or opportunity, they look to a higher order\/power that they feel will mete out a fairer outcome in the end. Essentially, one may be poor, badly treated, and stuck in a lower status, but being \"good\" will mean that they will be rewarded by God in the end. When you are consistently getting the short end of the stick, this is a way of living with the suffering you experience. It's a form of self-soothing in the moment to know you'll be rewarded later, or that your suffering is seen and your sacrifices are appreciated by God.","human_ref_B":"A somewhat different interpretation for working women\u2019s lower religious commitment emerges \r from recent studies in the U.S. by Indiana University-Bloomington sociologist Landon Schnabel. \r He suggests that women in the labor force, particularly those in high-paying, full-time jobs, are \r less religious because they receive less social validation and affirmation from religious \r congregations compared with women who follow more gender-typical roles and expectations.45\r Sociologist Linda Woodhead of Lancaster University theorizes that as Christian women in Europe \r and North America increasingly entered the labor force starting in the 1960s, they felt the need to \r create more independent, career-oriented identities separate from or alongside their identities as \r homemakers. But since most traditional forms of Christianity did not support working women\u2019s \r new identities, women\u2019s overall religiosity decreased. \u201cIn this complex project of completely \r refashioning identity, traditional forms of religion are more likely to prove a hindrance to women \r than a help,\u201d Woodhead writes  Source - Pew Research Center  Edit - http:\/\/www.pewforum.org\/2016\/03\/22\/theories-explaining-gender-differences-in-religion\/  PDF is at the end","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4522.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"qxcgwg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"Do people believe that masculinity is superior to femininity? I read The Sage Encyclopedia of Psychology and Gender's entry on Patriarchy. If I understand it right, then Patriarchy is the belief that masculinity is superior to femininity. Has anyone actually done any surveys to see how many people believe that masculinity is superior to femininity? How does the prevalence of this belief vary among different demographic groups and across time and place? For the radical feminist conception of Patriarchy to work, is it even necessary for anyone to believe that masculinity is superior to femininity, just as an individual, or does it survive through our institutions even if no one believes it, explicitly or implicitly? If it requires someone to believe in it just as an individual, then who? How many people need to stop believing in patriarchy before it ceases to function as a system? If no one is required to believe in it for it to function, then what is required for it to function?","c_root_id_A":"hlaz6qw","c_root_id_B":"hl8q913","created_at_utc_A":1637355823,"created_at_utc_B":1637320661,"score_A":13,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Your premise is somewhat flawed in that defining patriarchy as belief in superiority of masculinity over femininity is an oversimplification. For example, while women who display masculinity, such as butch lesbians, may situationally enjoy some advantages, they may also be seen as threats and\/or face negative repercussions in a patriarchal framework. https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1080\/00918360802498625?casa_token=7Bpjw-he5J4AAAAA:vcS22SDDgJyD8X3jtZZEpKggP1QsyTTk0S8PoiAahCLdSVZ-ubWxs0Qd9Y5-0Bp39nsxVR8GqdK1  It\u2019s a bit more accurate to understand patriarchy as a social system that is predisposed towards men, especially men exhibiting hegemonic notions of masculinity, holding leadership positions or positions of power. Although this can certainly lead to (or originate from) notions of masculinity\u2019s superiority, some patriarchal systems avow a \u201ccomplementarian\u201d view of gender in which masculinity and femininity are said to excel in separate but equally valued spheres of life, which men and women are meant to exhibit respectively (and which, conveniently, places men as the preferred household and political leaders). https:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/pdf\/24542160.pdf?casa_token=-chRIEYRWkIAAAAA:1iC84DsfGQMtj7TSl71xUnNjgusLqRrbqTypggaGherx38zxb3vC-b_baCJNTRpKqmAGhU2iGHPbtQ3TM6yPDmVmmUUloarR1yTLQc0vdEBYraB5PQ","human_ref_B":"for this paper might help you get answers on you questions, Flood (2020, p. 5) conducted (1) a discourse analysis; (2) a survey with 1,600 respondents; (3) participant testing of statements.  The distribution over the statement *'Can traditional masculinity be seen as being problematic problematic'* was over the 1,600 respondents, distributed between opponents and propnents the following:   25.9% derrived to be opponents; 48.9% was identified to be ambivilent, and not holding any belife either or towards masuclinity. And 25.1% saw them selves as proponents of masculinity (2020, p. 5).  Women supported the statement disproportionally, while men tended to disproportionally not support the statement (Flood. 2020, p. 7).  \"So about one-third of women and one-sixth of men agree that traditional masculinity is problematic in important ways.\" (Flood. 2020, p. 8).  Its important to take into account that masculinity is not just attitudes and norms, but can equally cogient is parctices and behvaioural aspects of being a man, interpersonal relations as well as instituional (Flood. 2020, p. 3).  Some very short reflections as im working.  For my self, I think I've identified less of a need structure different 'dimensions\/aspects' like these in a consecutive orders of emergence and to see them as interacting. I dont find it obvious and neither intuitive to isolated a \"starting point.  I tend to think that it is a genuine mystery of \"how scaling happends over dimensions\" and how one aspect affects another aspect \u2013 as West (2017) reiterates, that disproportionate change can be followed by a small amount of change. Minor change can be followed by major change somewhere else in the system. Perhaps obvious, but this paradox is a hallmark in complex systesm perspective.  I think its quite accurate to say that \u2013 analogues to the way that a energy dissaptes from an engine after turned off. Society hold patterns of interactions which become instantiated in; institutions; behavior and; attituedes \u2013 which can be viewd of how intertia \"scale down.\" **But,** because its a large system of interrelationships, if you where to tone down \"traditional masculinity\" somewhere it would still persist somewhere else \u2013 which then acts as a counterweight and turning it back to the previous state.  **Why** this is so, is a lot above my competences. But i think it should (and perhaps only could) be answered through sociological terms. Im afraid i cant really offer any reflection that other than descriptives.  Flood, Michael. 2020. *Masculinities and health: Attitudes towards men and masculinities in Australia*. Victorian Health Promotion Foundation \\policy paper\\] ([embedded link)  West, Geoffrey B. (2017). *Scale: the universal laws of growth, innovation, sustainability, and the pace of life in organisms, cities, economies, and companies*. New York: Penguin Press.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":35162.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"11gjq0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Does government assistance (welfare) really provide more dependent society or is it just GOP party's scary tactic? Lately, lots of Republicans have self-entitlement and they don't realize how much the government helped them (financial aid, water, road, FDA, etc.) and they don't like to help the poor, because they fear that this might make people lazy.                Lots of Republicans \"friends\" argue that what Obama is doing right now is creating a government dependent society (which we are, I depend on government for water, highway, security, etc.). Also, they argue that there will be more people taking advantage of the system (i.e. they won't work hard, because they know the government will take care of them)         I wanted to refute them, but I didn't have any paper to disprove them otherwise.    Is there a study that relates government spending (excluding military and foreign aid) and number of people taking advantage of the system (if it's possible to find the number of people taking advantage of the system).          Alternatively, is there a paper that relates government spending on welfare and growth of private sector (that doesn't depend on government contract)?","c_root_id_A":"c6mac8d","c_root_id_B":"c6mactv","created_at_utc_A":1350226113,"created_at_utc_B":1350226219,"score_A":16,"score_B":33,"human_ref_A":"I don't feel like this is a very appropriate question, as it's currently phrased, and with the intent you currently appear to have.","human_ref_B":"You're asking for studies, but you need a rhetoric lesson. Knowledge does not come only from paper, and the type of paper you're suggesting would be hard to write for the reason you say  here: how do you quantify, much less measure, \"people taking advantage of the system\"?  And that is your tack to take. When your Republican friends are saying to you whatever the most recent GOP opinion machine talking points are, ask yourself how one might measure the things they're talking about. Hell, ask them too! You'll get evasions and huffy defensiveness because they haven't thought about it, and don't really know how to, but don't want to say so.   Work with them to *define their terms*, and then *define a way their claims can be tested*. They will either do this in good faith with you, and you can then 1) look up those studies which have actually been done and 2) point out that these talking points are very selective in whom they target, or they will huff and leave, in which case you've shut them up for awhile. When they come back the next day repeating the next thing Hannity and Limbaugh said, repeat the process: demand consistent use of terms and testing statements. Eventually they will either become libertarians or stop talking to you about their politics, either way you win.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":106.0,"score_ratio":2.0625}
{"post_id":"11gjq0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Does government assistance (welfare) really provide more dependent society or is it just GOP party's scary tactic? Lately, lots of Republicans have self-entitlement and they don't realize how much the government helped them (financial aid, water, road, FDA, etc.) and they don't like to help the poor, because they fear that this might make people lazy.                Lots of Republicans \"friends\" argue that what Obama is doing right now is creating a government dependent society (which we are, I depend on government for water, highway, security, etc.). Also, they argue that there will be more people taking advantage of the system (i.e. they won't work hard, because they know the government will take care of them)         I wanted to refute them, but I didn't have any paper to disprove them otherwise.    Is there a study that relates government spending (excluding military and foreign aid) and number of people taking advantage of the system (if it's possible to find the number of people taking advantage of the system).          Alternatively, is there a paper that relates government spending on welfare and growth of private sector (that doesn't depend on government contract)?","c_root_id_A":"c6mac8d","c_root_id_B":"c6makli","created_at_utc_A":1350226113,"created_at_utc_B":1350227492,"score_A":16,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"I don't feel like this is a very appropriate question, as it's currently phrased, and with the intent you currently appear to have.","human_ref_B":"> I wanted to refute them, but I didn't have any paper to disprove them otherwise.  That's not how it works. If you make a claim, the onus is on *you* to support it. Ask your friends to provide evidence and reasoning for their claims - if they can't or won't, that's an indicator of how seriously you should take their claims.  The question itself is deeply problematic. How is \"dependence\" or \"taking advantage of the system\" defined in observable and quantifiable terms? What has been observed to suggest either is increasing, and what reasoning establishes a plausible causal connection between that increase and an increase in welfare?  Also, when seeking evidence, \"a paper\" is insufficient. You can find \"a paper\" to support just about any view. To reasonably demonstrate anything, you would want as wide a variety of peer-reviewed literature as possible.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1379.0,"score_ratio":1.375}
{"post_id":"11gjq0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Does government assistance (welfare) really provide more dependent society or is it just GOP party's scary tactic? Lately, lots of Republicans have self-entitlement and they don't realize how much the government helped them (financial aid, water, road, FDA, etc.) and they don't like to help the poor, because they fear that this might make people lazy.                Lots of Republicans \"friends\" argue that what Obama is doing right now is creating a government dependent society (which we are, I depend on government for water, highway, security, etc.). Also, they argue that there will be more people taking advantage of the system (i.e. they won't work hard, because they know the government will take care of them)         I wanted to refute them, but I didn't have any paper to disprove them otherwise.    Is there a study that relates government spending (excluding military and foreign aid) and number of people taking advantage of the system (if it's possible to find the number of people taking advantage of the system).          Alternatively, is there a paper that relates government spending on welfare and growth of private sector (that doesn't depend on government contract)?","c_root_id_A":"c6maw92","c_root_id_B":"c6mcpis","created_at_utc_A":1350229203,"created_at_utc_B":1350237395,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I agree with other posters that your question isn't really phrased in a way that promotes discussion.  However, if you're sincere in wanting to know more about government assistant for the impoverished and the perceived dependency it creates I would recommend starting here and here.","human_ref_B":"There is some evidence there might be a poverty trap in the US.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8192.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"11gjq0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Does government assistance (welfare) really provide more dependent society or is it just GOP party's scary tactic? Lately, lots of Republicans have self-entitlement and they don't realize how much the government helped them (financial aid, water, road, FDA, etc.) and they don't like to help the poor, because they fear that this might make people lazy.                Lots of Republicans \"friends\" argue that what Obama is doing right now is creating a government dependent society (which we are, I depend on government for water, highway, security, etc.). Also, they argue that there will be more people taking advantage of the system (i.e. they won't work hard, because they know the government will take care of them)         I wanted to refute them, but I didn't have any paper to disprove them otherwise.    Is there a study that relates government spending (excluding military and foreign aid) and number of people taking advantage of the system (if it's possible to find the number of people taking advantage of the system).          Alternatively, is there a paper that relates government spending on welfare and growth of private sector (that doesn't depend on government contract)?","c_root_id_A":"c6mc4jm","c_root_id_B":"c6mcpis","created_at_utc_A":1350234886,"created_at_utc_B":1350237395,"score_A":4,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"You can see for yourself what happened once the war on poverty got started, the poverty rate stopped declining.  It didn't start declining again until welfare reform.","human_ref_B":"There is some evidence there might be a poverty trap in the US.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2509.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"11gjq0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Does government assistance (welfare) really provide more dependent society or is it just GOP party's scary tactic? Lately, lots of Republicans have self-entitlement and they don't realize how much the government helped them (financial aid, water, road, FDA, etc.) and they don't like to help the poor, because they fear that this might make people lazy.                Lots of Republicans \"friends\" argue that what Obama is doing right now is creating a government dependent society (which we are, I depend on government for water, highway, security, etc.). Also, they argue that there will be more people taking advantage of the system (i.e. they won't work hard, because they know the government will take care of them)         I wanted to refute them, but I didn't have any paper to disprove them otherwise.    Is there a study that relates government spending (excluding military and foreign aid) and number of people taking advantage of the system (if it's possible to find the number of people taking advantage of the system).          Alternatively, is there a paper that relates government spending on welfare and growth of private sector (that doesn't depend on government contract)?","c_root_id_A":"c6mii54","c_root_id_B":"c6mgmw0","created_at_utc_A":1350260689,"created_at_utc_B":1350253087,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"From a Canadian perspective, welfare can create a dependent society if there is no incentive for the person to better themselves.  If you give someone free money, they'll take it spend it, and then expect more. You don't want people on welfare because it's expensive and harmful to the person's sense of personal responsibility.  You want people to be self reliant so the better solution is to give money with stipulations that the person has to take training or look for a job.  We have programs set up here to either put people back to work, back in school, or to help become entrepraneurs.  Some people can't work. They're physically messed up so they can apply for support and get help without requiring a job.  Mostly, the purpose of welfare or social services is to provide support for people who lack a safety net. It's not something you want people staying on, but if they are in dire need, the programs are there.","human_ref_B":"jcpuf's comment is spot on. The one thing that I would add is that in the developing world, there is some evidence for government handouts, both from first world governments and resource-rich developing world governments, creating socially-detrimental dependency. Paul Collier's writing on the resource curse and Dambisa Moyo's Dead Aid discuss this evidence in some detail, without becoming too dense and quantitative.   Moyo thinks that this evidence should mean an end to bilateral aid, but other people in development think that fixing this problem, which in this context is fairly widely accepted as real, is a matter of policy reform, not of fullscale removal of aid programs. One can very easily take an analogous approach on American social spending, even if there were consensus on whether social spending produces dependency, and whether that dependency is even a bad thing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7602.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"11gjq0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Does government assistance (welfare) really provide more dependent society or is it just GOP party's scary tactic? Lately, lots of Republicans have self-entitlement and they don't realize how much the government helped them (financial aid, water, road, FDA, etc.) and they don't like to help the poor, because they fear that this might make people lazy.                Lots of Republicans \"friends\" argue that what Obama is doing right now is creating a government dependent society (which we are, I depend on government for water, highway, security, etc.). Also, they argue that there will be more people taking advantage of the system (i.e. they won't work hard, because they know the government will take care of them)         I wanted to refute them, but I didn't have any paper to disprove them otherwise.    Is there a study that relates government spending (excluding military and foreign aid) and number of people taking advantage of the system (if it's possible to find the number of people taking advantage of the system).          Alternatively, is there a paper that relates government spending on welfare and growth of private sector (that doesn't depend on government contract)?","c_root_id_A":"c6mii54","c_root_id_B":"c6mhr9f","created_at_utc_A":1350260689,"created_at_utc_B":1350257600,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"From a Canadian perspective, welfare can create a dependent society if there is no incentive for the person to better themselves.  If you give someone free money, they'll take it spend it, and then expect more. You don't want people on welfare because it's expensive and harmful to the person's sense of personal responsibility.  You want people to be self reliant so the better solution is to give money with stipulations that the person has to take training or look for a job.  We have programs set up here to either put people back to work, back in school, or to help become entrepraneurs.  Some people can't work. They're physically messed up so they can apply for support and get help without requiring a job.  Mostly, the purpose of welfare or social services is to provide support for people who lack a safety net. It's not something you want people staying on, but if they are in dire need, the programs are there.","human_ref_B":"Do you actually think that entitlements have no effect on people's behavior at all?   If I can get healthcare for the government, you don't think that makes me somewhat less likely to get a job that has medical benefits?  What if a person has the choice of a job with benefits 20 minutes from their house, or an identical job w\/o benefits next store?  You don't think government benefits will effect their decision?'   Honestly you are asking the wrong question here.  Obviously the government giving benefits of any kind makes people less likely to do that thing for themselves.  This is a cost of doing things for people, they don't do things for themselves.  Some might call this laziness.   The benefits of providing government benefits is that people people aren't starving or dying of minor medical problems.  Still though, to say that there is no cost of the government providing benefits is just plain wrong.  It makes people somewhat lazier, and could theoretically be less cost efficient.     It comes down to a cost benefit analysis.  You are making trade offs when the government does things for you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3089.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"135pu1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Are there any health care reforms that most economists generally agree upon?","c_root_id_A":"c7155m9","c_root_id_B":"c715951","created_at_utc_A":1352877975,"created_at_utc_B":1352878590,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"It is my understanding that most health economists agree that frontloading health spending* is more efficient than reactive health spending (providing free prenatal care is cheaper than \"free\" NICU care).    It depends on whether you would consider frontloading of health\/publichealth expenses a \"reform\" -- based on the way we currently view health in America (largely reactive, and usually addressed through biomedicine), I would say it's a huge \"reform.\"  It's not clear to me if your question also means a reform that is in some existing legislation, or just a possible reform.    Super non-controversial resource related to the importance of the \"first thousand days of life\" here -- the narrative is sculted toward poor countries, but everything said applies to the United States as well, particularly because some poor countries now match or even surpass us in various population indicators of health. A much more provocative (but much more informative) talk from a population health expert (and emergency dept physician) on the imporance of early life here.  **that is: public health spending, preventative health spending, social-determinants-of-health spending ... there are many ways to characterize it.  Whether you mean medicine or public health, I have never heard of anyone who studies this disagreeing that prevention is more cost effective than after-the-fact-cure.  I am talking about things like prenatal care, free primary care (managing diabetes is cheaper than ER visits and subsequent surgery for morbidity from diabetes, etc), maternity leave, etc.  It's not a coincidence that the healthiest countries in the world do this sort of thing, and that America largely doesn't (and we rank between #35 and #50 depending on how you want to measure \"health\").*","human_ref_B":"Most of my professors during my undergraduate years seemed to believe that healthcare is provided most efficiently when it is a national public good.  The end game for healthcare would be making it a public good without introducing bureaucratic inefficiencies and while maintaining enough intimacy with the end user that their needs are actually met.    This task seems impossible, but with time perhaps this is possible.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":615.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"135pu1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Are there any health care reforms that most economists generally agree upon?","c_root_id_A":"c718333","c_root_id_B":"c7155m9","created_at_utc_A":1352903085,"created_at_utc_B":1352877975,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"An awful lot of economists don't like occupational licensing.  Clearly some disagreement on the subject, but a plurality would loosen these restrictions.   There was this big idea in the 70s that we needed more doctors to foster competition to drive down prices.  Federal legislation went into play to expand access to medical school.  It worked in that we got more doctors.  It failed in that prices rose because, instead of competing on price, doctors specialized instead.   Sources: 1, 2.","human_ref_B":"It is my understanding that most health economists agree that frontloading health spending* is more efficient than reactive health spending (providing free prenatal care is cheaper than \"free\" NICU care).    It depends on whether you would consider frontloading of health\/publichealth expenses a \"reform\" -- based on the way we currently view health in America (largely reactive, and usually addressed through biomedicine), I would say it's a huge \"reform.\"  It's not clear to me if your question also means a reform that is in some existing legislation, or just a possible reform.    Super non-controversial resource related to the importance of the \"first thousand days of life\" here -- the narrative is sculted toward poor countries, but everything said applies to the United States as well, particularly because some poor countries now match or even surpass us in various population indicators of health. A much more provocative (but much more informative) talk from a population health expert (and emergency dept physician) on the imporance of early life here.  **that is: public health spending, preventative health spending, social-determinants-of-health spending ... there are many ways to characterize it.  Whether you mean medicine or public health, I have never heard of anyone who studies this disagreeing that prevention is more cost effective than after-the-fact-cure.  I am talking about things like prenatal care, free primary care (managing diabetes is cheaper than ER visits and subsequent surgery for morbidity from diabetes, etc), maternity leave, etc.  It's not a coincidence that the healthiest countries in the world do this sort of thing, and that America largely doesn't (and we rank between #35 and #50 depending on how you want to measure \"health\").*","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25110.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"aoj41a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Are the Chinese now Fascist? Looking at definitions of fascism, are China\u2019s actions closer to those definitions now?  https:\/\/ratical.org\/ratville\/CAH\/fasci14chars.html","c_root_id_A":"eg1k346","c_root_id_B":"eg186g5","created_at_utc_A":1549657848,"created_at_utc_B":1549649714,"score_A":56,"score_B":38,"human_ref_A":"I'd probably argue that they are closer to a totalitarian state that uses state capitalism to achieve some socialist\/collectivist goals, but leans more towards the one party dictatorship than the goals of the people, and are not particularly working towards Marxist ideals, as younger Marxist in the country point out.      While fascism is a form of totalitarianism, I would probably argue that China doesn't use military\/political violence to achieve national rejuvenation (though they certainly project military strength, but I'd argue, so does the US, Russia in similar fashion,) they tend to use economic forces. As far as I'm aware, they also don't propagandize fascism specifically, but Marxism (which the above article states, they've done to twist it to support their particular system of governance.)     This isn't to argue that they couldn't steer into fascism, as it wouldn't take a lot of push to start doing some of these ideas we typically see with fascism that aren't currently present in China, I would just argue that they're not currently there at the moment.","human_ref_B":"A few problems:  1) You're using an internet magazine as a definitive source. Or rather, a source several degrees removed (a piece of writing based on an article from another site, which itself is supposedly based on *another* article).  2) You're using internet magazine with a very overt *political ideological bias* to discuss a political topic  3) You do not have a clear question. \"Closer to those definitions now\" compared to when? And compared to whom? America fulfilled more of those criteria than the Soviet Union during the Cold War, does that make America fascist, or does it not count until at least X points are fulfilled on the 14-point list?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8134.0,"score_ratio":1.4736842105}
{"post_id":"aoj41a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Are the Chinese now Fascist? Looking at definitions of fascism, are China\u2019s actions closer to those definitions now?  https:\/\/ratical.org\/ratville\/CAH\/fasci14chars.html","c_root_id_A":"eg1k346","c_root_id_B":"eg1b2qo","created_at_utc_A":1549657848,"created_at_utc_B":1549651678,"score_A":56,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'd probably argue that they are closer to a totalitarian state that uses state capitalism to achieve some socialist\/collectivist goals, but leans more towards the one party dictatorship than the goals of the people, and are not particularly working towards Marxist ideals, as younger Marxist in the country point out.      While fascism is a form of totalitarianism, I would probably argue that China doesn't use military\/political violence to achieve national rejuvenation (though they certainly project military strength, but I'd argue, so does the US, Russia in similar fashion,) they tend to use economic forces. As far as I'm aware, they also don't propagandize fascism specifically, but Marxism (which the above article states, they've done to twist it to support their particular system of governance.)     This isn't to argue that they couldn't steer into fascism, as it wouldn't take a lot of push to start doing some of these ideas we typically see with fascism that aren't currently present in China, I would just argue that they're not currently there at the moment.","human_ref_B":"They are (and have been for a while) a small coalition government of which fascism is a type. So is a military dictatorship and the sort of quasi-monarchy that Russia is, etc.  &#x200B;  It's not really productive to call them fascist, they just belong to this class of government. So you can expect: human right abuses, persecution of minorities, cronyism, decay of infrastructure, etc; just like all small coalition government eventually spiral into.  &#x200B;  The interesting part is that they were a larger coalition government and trending toward a more centrist type of government before their latest Emperor took over (whatever his name is, Winnie the Pooh). But likely, until he dies, they will be a small coalition government, undoing the work that was started by Deng Xiaoping.  &#x200B;  Edit: typos","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6170.0,"score_ratio":11.2}
{"post_id":"6c7xwa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"How can I explain that fascism is a right wing ideology to some friends? They site dictionary definitions that say fascism means tight control over the economy and other seemingly left wing policy's. They argue that communist regimes are fascist because they call for a dictator and that since the Nazis implemented some left leaning economic policy's when they nationalized some industries. One of them also cited Augusto Pinochet, not sure for what exactly, but I believe he was an exception to a norm. They also demand sources and will try to discredit them as much as possible.  Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"dhsyjtp","c_root_id_B":"dhsprae","created_at_utc_A":1495272058,"created_at_utc_B":1495251377,"score_A":48,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"Left and right are not well defined.  They originally described revolutionaries and monarchists in 18th c. France.  The right-wing of that time certainly did not favor free market economics.  Political ideologies do not neatly fit on one axis.    Read Mussolini's Doctrine of Fascism.  He fundamentally rejects individualism, egalitarianism, democracy and pacifism and defines fascism in strongly spiritual, nationalist and imperial terms.    Also worth reading: Umberto Eco's Ur-Fascism, and George Mosse's The Crisis of German Ideology: Intellectual Origins of the Third Reich.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/www.interpretationjournal.com\/backissues\/Vol_26-3.pdf  Read the speech by Leo Strauss on German Nihilism. This is one of the best descriptions of fascism I've seen.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20681.0,"score_ratio":1.6551724138}
{"post_id":"1j88ws","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"We all know what \"Type A\" personalities are. What are Types B, C, D etc? Is this a widely accepted classification system or some pop fad Cosmo made famous 40 years ago that no one uses except to declare how \"Type A\" their successful workaholic buddy is?","c_root_id_A":"cbc979u","c_root_id_B":"cbc4ges","created_at_utc_A":1375057581,"created_at_utc_B":1375042386,"score_A":50,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Type-based theories of personality like this aren't really accepted anymore. The main reason is that type theories (such as MBTI) predict things like bimodal distributions that are not supported by the evidence. Rather, people differ on continuous dimensions (rather than as discrete types), and population distributions tend to resemble normal distributions. The standard accepted theory of personality today is the Big 5 (give or take one or two, depending on what people want to include and their theoretical perspective).  This wasn't just pop psychology, as serious psychologists used to subscribe to type-based theories of personality, these theories have just been discredited and replaced by trait-based theories. Wikipedia has a nice little discussion of this distinction. Other sources include work by McRae & Costa that unified the MBTI framework with the Big 5, basically Lewis Goldberg's entire catalog, and other current researchers that have addressed issues with personality such as Sam Gosling. Geoffrey Miller also has a nice intro to the topic at the beginning of his book Spent.  On the other hand, I work with applied personality research, and I have found it odd how compelling and intuitive non-psychologists find type-based theories. I have often wondered what it is about the way our minds think about people that makes us so susceptible to type-based thinking of personalities. I suspect this has something to do with natural intuitions that we all have about people being defined by the roles they play in a society or group, which do tend to be much more type-based (e.g., moms vs dads, bosses vs. subordinates, carpenters vs. lawyers, etc etc.). I think it is an interesting question what makes type-based theories of people so intuitively appealing, given that we are so good at reading people intuitively and these are not well supported by current evidence.","human_ref_B":"Wikipedia has an article on it with further reading in the reference section:  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Type_A_and_Type_B_personality_theory  reference worth looking into: Friedman, M. (1996). Type A Behavior: Its Diagnosis and Treatment. New York, Plenum Press (Kluwer Academic Press), pp. 31 ff.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15195.0,"score_ratio":4.1666666667}
{"post_id":"omxsb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why a rural communities more conservative\/right wing?  I just moved to a pretty small australian town for work and it puzzles me why peoples location correlates so well to their political views. Why is this?","c_root_id_A":"c3ilc1i","c_root_id_B":"c3iklw8","created_at_utc_A":1326996504,"created_at_utc_B":1326992422,"score_A":12,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Here are what I see as the major factors:   * There's a self-selection compounding effect; liberal people move to urban areas because urban areas are liberal, and conservative people move to rural areas because rural areas conservative. This isn't really an explanation though - I think it just helps to explain how it became more pronounced.  * People who live in urban areas will have a higher exposure to wealth inequality and divergent lifestyles. People who live in rural areas will be unlikely to see people who are much different than themselves. (I actually think this is the biggest reason, but have no proof to back it up.)  * An education gap exists between urban and rural schools. The education gap is somewhat related to political views; people with very little education and a very large amount of education tend to be liberal. (This is the best source I can find at the moment, but it links a page that has moved or been deleted.)  * Urban areas have more minorities, who tend to have liberal politics, aside from a few contentious issues like gay rights (which American blacks as a group famously oppose) and abortion. So the link between urban\/rural and liberal\/conservative might actual reflect the relationship between race and location.  Edit:   * Urban locations have a higher population density, which means that economies of scale cause them to get technology (and to a lesser extent, goods) first. Cell phone coverage started in urban areas and then moved to the rural areas. The same is true of pretty much any other communications technology I can think of; phone lines, internet connectivity, broadcast television, broadcast radio, cable television, etc. The link between technology and liberalism is a little more tenuous, especially because you run into the same cause\/effect problems. Does technology cause liberalism, or do liberals like technology? I would certainly expect technology to be both a cause and effect of progressivism though.","human_ref_B":"It may in part have to do with the fact that many big cities are coastal, and coastal cities have more immediate contact with people from all over the world. This kind of experience has a tendency to foster a more liberal community. It might also have to do with the prevalence of higher education in big cities as opposed to the country side. That might not be the full answer you're looking for, but I feel that there are several factors at work here and these might be a few of them.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4082.0,"score_ratio":2.4}
{"post_id":"jrn49","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Are college textbooks fairly priced? Will that change as technology changes how we access information? Inspired by the discussion for this post  Personally I hope that expensive textbooks and traditional textbook publishers all burn in a warehouse fire and that free, open access, online texts become more widely created and used, but what do people better versed in these matters think?","c_root_id_A":"c2elpwd","c_root_id_B":"c2eklaw","created_at_utc_A":1314117011,"created_at_utc_B":1314108351,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I think more and more people are beginning to realize the giant scam that is the college textbook market. Professors have known it for years, but because of pressure from publishers they need to use them. However, I've noticed more and more that they are using older additions or online copies. Personally, I'm not a fan of reading a textbook online, but I think if I were starting college over I would maybe have gotten an iPad or e-reader for this reason. I don't think though that digitization of textbooks will lead to any significant decrease in the price. There are too many people like me who want to physically hold a book. Open source texts are whole different issue. I might be okay with that if we could restrict contributions to actual experts. At the end of the day there are a lot of institutionalized issues with higher education in this country. Textbook prices are a significant one, but affordability in general is holding this country back.","human_ref_B":"I'm interested to see what the economists here have to say about the issue of technology. I think it's fair to say that the price is artificially inflated in a few ways.   Here in Kentucky we've passed at least one law making it harder for textbook publishers and colleges to switch to new editions that don't make substantial improvements over the old versions. So, requiring new editions for the sake of being able to up the price seems to be at least one way the price is manipulated.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8660.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"jrn49","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Are college textbooks fairly priced? Will that change as technology changes how we access information? Inspired by the discussion for this post  Personally I hope that expensive textbooks and traditional textbook publishers all burn in a warehouse fire and that free, open access, online texts become more widely created and used, but what do people better versed in these matters think?","c_root_id_A":"c2ekpjk","c_root_id_B":"c2elpwd","created_at_utc_A":1314109440,"created_at_utc_B":1314117011,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Some universities already utilize online material. I go to Northern Illinois University and many of my professors assigned readings from JSTOR and .pdf formatted articles. The usage of hard copies for assignments and readings depend on the discipline. For history majors, you spend more money on actual books written by historians, rather than buying typical textbooks. History majors also use online materials, as I stated before. Some subjects like science or math tend to use more hard materials. (If that is incorrect, please let me know). So I think we still have some ways to go before universities make online resources\/texts the standard. It also depends on the publishing company. Does anyone know if publishing companies make more money printing hard copies? That could be a possible reason why they are hesitant to participate in online publication.","human_ref_B":"I think more and more people are beginning to realize the giant scam that is the college textbook market. Professors have known it for years, but because of pressure from publishers they need to use them. However, I've noticed more and more that they are using older additions or online copies. Personally, I'm not a fan of reading a textbook online, but I think if I were starting college over I would maybe have gotten an iPad or e-reader for this reason. I don't think though that digitization of textbooks will lead to any significant decrease in the price. There are too many people like me who want to physically hold a book. Open source texts are whole different issue. I might be okay with that if we could restrict contributions to actual experts. At the end of the day there are a lot of institutionalized issues with higher education in this country. Textbook prices are a significant one, but affordability in general is holding this country back.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7571.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"jrn49","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Are college textbooks fairly priced? Will that change as technology changes how we access information? Inspired by the discussion for this post  Personally I hope that expensive textbooks and traditional textbook publishers all burn in a warehouse fire and that free, open access, online texts become more widely created and used, but what do people better versed in these matters think?","c_root_id_A":"c2eklaw","c_root_id_B":"c2eog5a","created_at_utc_A":1314108351,"created_at_utc_B":1314133954,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'm interested to see what the economists here have to say about the issue of technology. I think it's fair to say that the price is artificially inflated in a few ways.   Here in Kentucky we've passed at least one law making it harder for textbook publishers and colleges to switch to new editions that don't make substantial improvements over the old versions. So, requiring new editions for the sake of being able to up the price seems to be at least one way the price is manipulated.","human_ref_B":"Fairly priced? The market doesn't care about fair prices.  Nevertheless, there are definite distortions in the market for textbooks. For a given course there are only three or four up-to-date ones out there, and the instructor will choose just one for a particular course.  One might even argue there are natural barriers to entry for potential new textbook authors.   And demand for these textbooks is highly inelastic because students have no substitutes. Exclusion and inelastic demand give the publishing companies a good deal of market power, which would tend to lead to inefficient, inflated prices.  Why students do not engage more frequently in arbitrage (things like textbook exchange) is beyond me.  Legal online textbooks will do very little to decrease the price, I think, but piracy is another story. My feeling is that piracy has not reached the point where it has a serious impact on the market, but I suppose it's possible that in the future pirating could decrease the prices.  The risk is that it would go too far, and people would stop writing textbooks because there'd be no money in it for authors.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25603.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"jrn49","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Are college textbooks fairly priced? Will that change as technology changes how we access information? Inspired by the discussion for this post  Personally I hope that expensive textbooks and traditional textbook publishers all burn in a warehouse fire and that free, open access, online texts become more widely created and used, but what do people better versed in these matters think?","c_root_id_A":"c2eog5a","c_root_id_B":"c2ekpjk","created_at_utc_A":1314133954,"created_at_utc_B":1314109440,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Fairly priced? The market doesn't care about fair prices.  Nevertheless, there are definite distortions in the market for textbooks. For a given course there are only three or four up-to-date ones out there, and the instructor will choose just one for a particular course.  One might even argue there are natural barriers to entry for potential new textbook authors.   And demand for these textbooks is highly inelastic because students have no substitutes. Exclusion and inelastic demand give the publishing companies a good deal of market power, which would tend to lead to inefficient, inflated prices.  Why students do not engage more frequently in arbitrage (things like textbook exchange) is beyond me.  Legal online textbooks will do very little to decrease the price, I think, but piracy is another story. My feeling is that piracy has not reached the point where it has a serious impact on the market, but I suppose it's possible that in the future pirating could decrease the prices.  The risk is that it would go too far, and people would stop writing textbooks because there'd be no money in it for authors.","human_ref_B":"Some universities already utilize online material. I go to Northern Illinois University and many of my professors assigned readings from JSTOR and .pdf formatted articles. The usage of hard copies for assignments and readings depend on the discipline. For history majors, you spend more money on actual books written by historians, rather than buying typical textbooks. History majors also use online materials, as I stated before. Some subjects like science or math tend to use more hard materials. (If that is incorrect, please let me know). So I think we still have some ways to go before universities make online resources\/texts the standard. It also depends on the publishing company. Does anyone know if publishing companies make more money printing hard copies? That could be a possible reason why they are hesitant to participate in online publication.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24514.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"jrn49","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Are college textbooks fairly priced? Will that change as technology changes how we access information? Inspired by the discussion for this post  Personally I hope that expensive textbooks and traditional textbook publishers all burn in a warehouse fire and that free, open access, online texts become more widely created and used, but what do people better versed in these matters think?","c_root_id_A":"c2eog5a","c_root_id_B":"c2emjkp","created_at_utc_A":1314133954,"created_at_utc_B":1314122404,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Fairly priced? The market doesn't care about fair prices.  Nevertheless, there are definite distortions in the market for textbooks. For a given course there are only three or four up-to-date ones out there, and the instructor will choose just one for a particular course.  One might even argue there are natural barriers to entry for potential new textbook authors.   And demand for these textbooks is highly inelastic because students have no substitutes. Exclusion and inelastic demand give the publishing companies a good deal of market power, which would tend to lead to inefficient, inflated prices.  Why students do not engage more frequently in arbitrage (things like textbook exchange) is beyond me.  Legal online textbooks will do very little to decrease the price, I think, but piracy is another story. My feeling is that piracy has not reached the point where it has a serious impact on the market, but I suppose it's possible that in the future pirating could decrease the prices.  The risk is that it would go too far, and people would stop writing textbooks because there'd be no money in it for authors.","human_ref_B":"I individually try to buck the system in small ways - I specifically use an older edition of the textbook when possible, and request them from the bookstore.  My students pay anywhere from $.50 to $35 for their textbooks.  Any pertinent information that has changed (statistics, mostly), I give updated info in class.  Open-Source would be nice, but until there are a variety of open source options, it just isn't working for me.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11550.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"10ie5v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"The internet is clearly revolutionary. How can we use it to improve our democracies? I'm thinking an easy way to mesh with existing democratic structures: any political\/legislative issues could be voted on by constituents online. The online vote would then determine how the political representative of that constituency would vote.  I would be interested to hear other ideas\/thoughts\/comments!","c_root_id_A":"c6dtcb2","c_root_id_B":"c6drjg9","created_at_utc_A":1348686439,"created_at_utc_B":1348679785,"score_A":11,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":">The internet is clearly revolutionary.  Is it?  I tend to think about the internet as the natural continuation of the invention of the telegram. One could implement your suggestions using telephones, what makes doing it over the internet that different? Telecommunications is probably revolutionary...not sure about whether the internet is really just a step along that path or a distinct revolution of its own.  I'm not trying to criticize, this is something I've been thinking about ever since I had a conversation with an economist who's an expert on these things...he's old and thinks young people think the internet is a bigger deal than it is.","human_ref_B":"My only contribution is that any sort of electronic voting system for anything is not a wise idea.  I have this recurring nightmare where I vote on things, and my vote is never opened.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6654.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"10ie5v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"The internet is clearly revolutionary. How can we use it to improve our democracies? I'm thinking an easy way to mesh with existing democratic structures: any political\/legislative issues could be voted on by constituents online. The online vote would then determine how the political representative of that constituency would vote.  I would be interested to hear other ideas\/thoughts\/comments!","c_root_id_A":"c6ds7dq","c_root_id_B":"c6dtcb2","created_at_utc_A":1348682281,"created_at_utc_B":1348686439,"score_A":3,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"One way is to make all business with the government that can be done on-line done online.  If you apply for a building permit on-line, pay import duties on-line, apply for civil-service and military jobs on-line, bid for government contracts on-line, vote on-line, and innumerable other things, it drastically curtails the power that government officials have to exploit people or be corrupted.  Even if they were elected democratically, if officials can abuse their power to remain in office, then subsequent elections are not really democratic.  Opportunities for bribery or other forms of coercion are fewer, and officials have a record that can be reviewed by anyone.","human_ref_B":">The internet is clearly revolutionary.  Is it?  I tend to think about the internet as the natural continuation of the invention of the telegram. One could implement your suggestions using telephones, what makes doing it over the internet that different? Telecommunications is probably revolutionary...not sure about whether the internet is really just a step along that path or a distinct revolution of its own.  I'm not trying to criticize, this is something I've been thinking about ever since I had a conversation with an economist who's an expert on these things...he's old and thinks young people think the internet is a bigger deal than it is.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4158.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"10ie5v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"The internet is clearly revolutionary. How can we use it to improve our democracies? I'm thinking an easy way to mesh with existing democratic structures: any political\/legislative issues could be voted on by constituents online. The online vote would then determine how the political representative of that constituency would vote.  I would be interested to hear other ideas\/thoughts\/comments!","c_root_id_A":"c6drjg9","c_root_id_B":"c6duaf7","created_at_utc_A":1348679785,"created_at_utc_B":1348689727,"score_A":6,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"My only contribution is that any sort of electronic voting system for anything is not a wise idea.  I have this recurring nightmare where I vote on things, and my vote is never opened.","human_ref_B":"We could implement something as simple as allowing representatives to perform their job from their home district. There really is no reason to gather in D.C. anymore.   This way, their constituents have easier access to them and they may be more in-tune with the desires of the people that vote them in.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9942.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"10ie5v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"The internet is clearly revolutionary. How can we use it to improve our democracies? I'm thinking an easy way to mesh with existing democratic structures: any political\/legislative issues could be voted on by constituents online. The online vote would then determine how the political representative of that constituency would vote.  I would be interested to hear other ideas\/thoughts\/comments!","c_root_id_A":"c6ds7dq","c_root_id_B":"c6duaf7","created_at_utc_A":1348682281,"created_at_utc_B":1348689727,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"One way is to make all business with the government that can be done on-line done online.  If you apply for a building permit on-line, pay import duties on-line, apply for civil-service and military jobs on-line, bid for government contracts on-line, vote on-line, and innumerable other things, it drastically curtails the power that government officials have to exploit people or be corrupted.  Even if they were elected democratically, if officials can abuse their power to remain in office, then subsequent elections are not really democratic.  Opportunities for bribery or other forms of coercion are fewer, and officials have a record that can be reviewed by anyone.","human_ref_B":"We could implement something as simple as allowing representatives to perform their job from their home district. There really is no reason to gather in D.C. anymore.   This way, their constituents have easier access to them and they may be more in-tune with the desires of the people that vote them in.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7446.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"10ie5v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"The internet is clearly revolutionary. How can we use it to improve our democracies? I'm thinking an easy way to mesh with existing democratic structures: any political\/legislative issues could be voted on by constituents online. The online vote would then determine how the political representative of that constituency would vote.  I would be interested to hear other ideas\/thoughts\/comments!","c_root_id_A":"c6duaf7","c_root_id_B":"c6dtty0","created_at_utc_A":1348689727,"created_at_utc_B":1348688140,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"We could implement something as simple as allowing representatives to perform their job from their home district. There really is no reason to gather in D.C. anymore.   This way, their constituents have easier access to them and they may be more in-tune with the desires of the people that vote them in.","human_ref_B":"I don't know about online voting thingies, I'm skeptical of direct democracy as it gives too much power to the \"obvious\" choices one might make with little background on the topic and fifteen seconds of contemplation on a leading question.  But I definitely think the Internet meshes well with democracy as it stands. It magnifies civic engagement by helping those of us paying attention collaborate:  We can share the work of:   * investigating the people who would lead us in more depth than the soundbites presented by either side  * understanding the policies they propose and their implications for our society  * raising awareness of issues that we feel are neglected so that they have a better chance of becoming part of the discourse  * etcetera  The way the Internet population got together around SOPIPEDACTA is, I think, a harbinger of good things to come as the Internet population becomes simply the population. In turn, I hope, these demonstrations that an engaged citizenry can have influence will encourage more people to take part. That'd be a demoncracy-improving feedback loop for sure.  It would also be super cool if people collaborated via wiki or something to draft and refine legislation. Constitutional law hobbyists!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1587.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"tbpyg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"When did we start having\/using middle names and why? I can't imagine that we've *always* had middle names, so when did middle names start to gain popularity? And why? Is there a reason they are still used today?  Pretty straightforward, but if clarification is needed, please let me know. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c4l990g","c_root_id_B":"c4la2pg","created_at_utc_A":1336426219,"created_at_utc_B":1336429927,"score_A":11,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I'd like to know which cultures use middle names. I'm Korean and there is no middle name in Korea as well as in China and Japan. I was fascinated by middle names when I first came to the US as most people I met had middle names yet seldom used them.","human_ref_B":"The Romans used three names to indicated citizenship and family lineage.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3708.0,"score_ratio":1.0909090909}
{"post_id":"2xsaup","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Is it possible to have a church with no god? Saw this question in my study guide on the topic of religion. What I know from my very limited knowledge is that churches are a formal bureaucratic organization that have a hierarchy of religious officials and practice formal rituals of worship, but most churches tend to form around a central God that they worship.. right? Mormons, Christians, Catholics have different spiritual beings that they worship.   Does 'church' in the case mean something else?   Forgive me if I offend anyone's religious beliefs, still trying to get a footing in this topic..","c_root_id_A":"cp39t8k","c_root_id_B":"cp2x42l","created_at_utc_A":1425414172,"created_at_utc_B":1425393110,"score_A":12,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Unitarian Universalists are basically this.  You're welcome to believe in a God or Gods if you like, they don't mind of course, but it's not really important.  The worship, if you want to call it that, is instead built around a sort of shared humanity and community, with certain principles held in common esteem and shared experiences common to everyone's lives celebrated.  It's also kind of a refuge for a number of smaller communities that like the social aspect of a church but disagree with mainstream christianity for whatever reason.  LGBTQ folk, Wiccans, etc.","human_ref_B":"I should also note that the very \"church\" as an institute is endemic to christianity. So while most churches _in christianity_ form in the way you described, in other religions no such institute emerges at all. So it's no wonder that a church forms around a deity they worship \u2014 there's hardly any way to do otherwise in the christian tradition, and all \"Churches\" are essentially variations of one prototypical institute. Which prompts me to suggest that you're asking the wrong question: in a way, you're interested whether there could be further anomalous development in an already existing anomaly.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21062.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"b8lpjk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Does physical violence have a tendency to convince people to change their opinions? I read this post which is admittedly complete hearsay, but it makes a pretty simple claim: a nazi claimed that getting physically assaulted made him change his opinions. What I'm curious to find out is:  1. Is physically assaulting \/ battering someone an effective means of changing their opinions?  2. If such a link exists, under what conditions does it hold? Does it only work on diametrically opposed positions? The nazi in question appears to have been beaten up by some sort of antifa group, would nazis assaulting groups of antifa be about as successful at recruiting them? Would assault people protesting for something relatively tangential, e.g. building an overpass, be about as successful at recruiting nazis? I imagine there has to be some sort of relationship here as it seems unlikely I could wail on someone with a baseball bat while wearing paraphernalia that says \"Vote *NO* on proposition 14!\" to get them to vote with me.  3. I've heard elsewhere that condescension and aggression are actually less likely to convince those targeted to change their minds. If both statements are true, how can they be reconciled?  Obviously, this has some pretty scary implications if true, so I'm curious to know whether or not this is an isolated incident or if there is something more to this idea.","c_root_id_A":"ejz0coa","c_root_id_B":"ejz4kvg","created_at_utc_A":1554235385,"created_at_utc_B":1554238075,"score_A":6,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Erica Chenoweth's body of work suggests that on average and over time, physical violence as a strategy in resistance movements correlates negatively with the movement achieving its aims.  She points to greater participation of women, elderly, children and other groups less able to wield physical force effectively in successful nonviolent movements as something that differentiates those successful movements from violent ones, which she finds are less likely to be successful.  As movements grow, it becomes more likely that someone on the other side sees their grandma, or little sister, or someone else like that on the opposite side that they can't justify to themselves to hurt.  https:\/\/scholar.google.com\/citations?hl=en&user=76rUVKMAAAAJ  https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2019\/02\/why-nonviolent-resistance-beats-violent-force-in-effecting-social-political-change\/  That's a somewhat different scenario than the one you're describing of one person physically assaulting another, and whether to your point that assault *itself* is more likely to change a mind or not.  I have no clear answers to offer, but there are psychological perspectives that might make for interesting reading.  From an object relations perspective, some people are much more likely than others to see themselves as violent, as well as to attribute violent motivations to others - this is the type of person that I think of in your Nazi example.  Theorist-clinicians like Otto Kernberg point to early failures in attachment relationships as one source of that kind of mindset, which might take a corrective experience to remedy.  That corrective experience could look like being forced to understand that if you try to fight the world, the world fights back.  We could speculate that maybe sometimes a person getting beaten up for their beliefs experiences something like that, but I'm not aware of any research on where the threshold would be between that outcome, vs. the continuing cycle of violence giving an already violent person a continued excuse to see things the way they do and to respond to the world in the violent ways that they know how to respond.  International research on outcomes and recidivism from rehabilitative vs. punitive prisons might be one piece of evidence pointing towards violence being a relatively ineffective way to get other people to give up violent or otherwise morally repugnant beliefs.","human_ref_B":"For the study of social influence and attitude change, it is important to distinguish different kinds of influence and different outcomes of attempts at influence.  I am mainly referring to Moscovici's studies about the difference between majority and minority influence to inform my answer to your question, but not exclusively, as I am also basing myself on the vast literature about attitude and attitude change.  To begin with, there is a difference between obedience, conformity, conversion, etc.   For example, people can change behavior without changing attitude, for conformity's sake: this is called compliance. Thus majority influence has an effect on your **manifest behavior**: you conform to (comply with) the majority in order to avoid being labelled a deviant and suffering the consequences of stigma.  Minority influence however is more interesting for Moscovici, because it can create *cognitive conflict*. It makes you question your beliefs and attitudes, which can have **latent effects** rather than simply manifest.  Brute force and violence might change your manifest behavior, but that is ineffective persuasion\/social influence unless you only want **compliance and obedience**, rather than **conversion** (latent change without manifest change) or **actual influence** (both latent and manifest change).  If the protagonist of the anecdotal story *actually* changed attitude, *perhaps* their negative experiences led them to question their own beliefs and why they were a target of scorn and hate. Much of attitude change requires the person to persuade *themselves*. I would however take such a story with a pinch of salt.  **Violence** is a good way to get **conformity without either conversion nor actual influence**, but conformity is not long lived compared to actual influence. Think about the ineffectiveness of torture and the ineffectiveness of severe punishment.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2690.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1nk7if","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Which languages spoken today are still likely to be living languages 100+ years from now? I have often seen it said that \"of the 7000+ languages spoken today, most will not survive into the coming century\".  [This site] (http:\/\/www.unesco.org\/culture\/languages-atlas\/index.php) has some data on the languages that are considered endangered.   But my interest lies in the opposite direction -- I want to know what the languages with a realistic future are, not a dreary accounting of the doomed and dying.   I'm particularly interested in cases of languages like Tartar, Guarani, or even Afrikaans or Basque -- all languages that have several millions of native speakers currently, but which have limited geographic dispersal, and are not high-prestige languages, or have very limited levels of state support in the places where the current population of speakers resides.  I'd also like to ask you to be willing to forgive my somewhat brutally utilitarian view of language survival -- I am personally the descendent of immigrants from across Eurasia who made a deliberate effort NOT to pass on to their children or grandchildren the languages of their birth -- they felt that these languages were not useful in the context of their new lives in a new land, and felt they were doing their descendents a benefit by not burdening them with cumbersome cultural baggage.  In other words: it's easy to come up with a list of a few dozen languages like English, Mandarin, Spanish, Bengali, or even Korean -- languages with combined L1+L2 populations in the hundreds of millions, large diasporas, high levels of governments support, and substantial cultural prestige on several continents -- these are the languages that will almost doubtlessly still be spoken (at least in some form) widely several hundred years from now.  Similarly, it is easy to come up with a a list of several hundreds of lanaguges that are likely doomed -- fewer than a 10,000 speakers, most of whom are elderly or cultural and economically disadvantaged -- most of these languages, including a few of immense historical importance, like Manchu and Neo-Aramaic, are doomed to die over the next generation or so, despite the well-intentioned revival efforts of starry-eyed idealists.   But my real question is about the borderline cases -- languages that still have as many as a few million current speakers, but which are probably fucked in long run -- what are these languages, and why are their prospects so dire?   Or perhaps not as dire as they seem?","c_root_id_A":"ccjed90","c_root_id_B":"ccjfq28","created_at_utc_A":1380695237,"created_at_utc_B":1380704886,"score_A":12,"score_B":30,"human_ref_A":"I heard in a linguistics class that Dutch is actually arguably endangered in the long run, despite being a \"de facto national language\" with 23 million speakers (according to Ethnologue), because even in the Netherlands business and scholarship are increasingly conducted in English. http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/English_in_the_Netherlands","human_ref_B":"The pace of language death has perhaps been overstated. When Michael Krauss and others foregrounded language endangerment in linguistics, it was thought that a language would go extinct every two weeks. In compiling the ELCat and the Endangered Languages project, Lyle Campbell and others found that it was probably more like 1 language goes extinct every 3 months. That's still 4 a year, mind.  Predicting language death is very difficult. A simple measure of speaker numbers just won't do it for us. Fataluku, a language of East Timor, for instance, has around 30,000 speakers. But it isn't likely to go extinct any time soon, as parents are still teaching it to their children. Conversely, Okinawan, which has around 90,000 speakers, is likely to go extinct in the next 50 years unless significant measures are taken, as almost all of the speakers are above 40, and they are not passing it on to children.  People have tried to work on mathematical models of language shift (changing from one language to another), see Minett and Wang (2007), for instance, but these models don't make many predictions--and the authors admit they haven't really even tested them against empirical data. So it remains to be seen if we can start more accurately modelling language shift.  But we do have some criterion we can use to measure how likely a language is to die. Here I'm going to follow the criterion introduced in ELCat.  First, we'd want to look at intergenerational transmission. If a language is not being passed on to children, then there's really little hope of it surviving for longer than the last first language learners. Second, we'd want to look at the absolute number of speakers. As we saw above, though, we probably want to temper this a bit--very small communities can be stable, and large communities can be unstable. Third, we'd want to consider speaker number trends--that is, are the number of speakers changing or staying the same? How do they compare to the number of people in the community? Finally, we'd want to look at the domains of use of the language. If speakers know the language, but tend to use it only in really restricted domains, it could potentially be in trouble. We can see this even with \"big\" languages, like with children of immigrants who move to a monolingual country--often by the third generation, the immigrant language is completely gone, replaced by the language of the wider community.  But how realistic is language stabilization and revitalization? The prospects really do look grim in many cases. One of the primary issues is that, frankly, we don't know much about the vast majority of the world's languages. I would hesitate to say that more than about 300 languages are \"very well described\", and no more than 1,000 are even \"well described\". Creating a lasting record of a language which can be used for a variety of purposes (a language documentation) should probably be the primary, initial concern of linguists and community members (and you certainly don't need a linguist to do this!). You really can't do one important thing if you don't know about a language--assess how well the revitalization is going. In the end it really depends. It takes a lot of time and effort to revitalize a language, and where one project with a very small community might be quite successful, another with a larger community might not be so successful.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9649.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1nk7if","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Which languages spoken today are still likely to be living languages 100+ years from now? I have often seen it said that \"of the 7000+ languages spoken today, most will not survive into the coming century\".  [This site] (http:\/\/www.unesco.org\/culture\/languages-atlas\/index.php) has some data on the languages that are considered endangered.   But my interest lies in the opposite direction -- I want to know what the languages with a realistic future are, not a dreary accounting of the doomed and dying.   I'm particularly interested in cases of languages like Tartar, Guarani, or even Afrikaans or Basque -- all languages that have several millions of native speakers currently, but which have limited geographic dispersal, and are not high-prestige languages, or have very limited levels of state support in the places where the current population of speakers resides.  I'd also like to ask you to be willing to forgive my somewhat brutally utilitarian view of language survival -- I am personally the descendent of immigrants from across Eurasia who made a deliberate effort NOT to pass on to their children or grandchildren the languages of their birth -- they felt that these languages were not useful in the context of their new lives in a new land, and felt they were doing their descendents a benefit by not burdening them with cumbersome cultural baggage.  In other words: it's easy to come up with a list of a few dozen languages like English, Mandarin, Spanish, Bengali, or even Korean -- languages with combined L1+L2 populations in the hundreds of millions, large diasporas, high levels of governments support, and substantial cultural prestige on several continents -- these are the languages that will almost doubtlessly still be spoken (at least in some form) widely several hundred years from now.  Similarly, it is easy to come up with a a list of several hundreds of lanaguges that are likely doomed -- fewer than a 10,000 speakers, most of whom are elderly or cultural and economically disadvantaged -- most of these languages, including a few of immense historical importance, like Manchu and Neo-Aramaic, are doomed to die over the next generation or so, despite the well-intentioned revival efforts of starry-eyed idealists.   But my real question is about the borderline cases -- languages that still have as many as a few million current speakers, but which are probably fucked in long run -- what are these languages, and why are their prospects so dire?   Or perhaps not as dire as they seem?","c_root_id_A":"ccjfayv","c_root_id_B":"ccjfq28","created_at_utc_A":1380701311,"created_at_utc_B":1380704886,"score_A":2,"score_B":30,"human_ref_A":"Catalan.   Despite all difficulties, with the gaining support for independence and the effor for conservation of the catalan language, I cannot see it dying in such a short time, on the contrary, right now it's growing stronger.   Once the language of a large population of farmers, now it is the language of an industrialized nation that is, more than ever, aware of their identity and culture.  Also: Esperanto. It has survived two world wars, fascism in Europe and the cold war (during which it was considered a \"communist language\"). Now, it's slowly comming back thanks to the internet as people see how easy it is to learn and feel welcome in the Esperanto community which is especially ideal for travellers and language enthusiasts. My guess is that in 100 years it will have a broader support than it has now.","human_ref_B":"The pace of language death has perhaps been overstated. When Michael Krauss and others foregrounded language endangerment in linguistics, it was thought that a language would go extinct every two weeks. In compiling the ELCat and the Endangered Languages project, Lyle Campbell and others found that it was probably more like 1 language goes extinct every 3 months. That's still 4 a year, mind.  Predicting language death is very difficult. A simple measure of speaker numbers just won't do it for us. Fataluku, a language of East Timor, for instance, has around 30,000 speakers. But it isn't likely to go extinct any time soon, as parents are still teaching it to their children. Conversely, Okinawan, which has around 90,000 speakers, is likely to go extinct in the next 50 years unless significant measures are taken, as almost all of the speakers are above 40, and they are not passing it on to children.  People have tried to work on mathematical models of language shift (changing from one language to another), see Minett and Wang (2007), for instance, but these models don't make many predictions--and the authors admit they haven't really even tested them against empirical data. So it remains to be seen if we can start more accurately modelling language shift.  But we do have some criterion we can use to measure how likely a language is to die. Here I'm going to follow the criterion introduced in ELCat.  First, we'd want to look at intergenerational transmission. If a language is not being passed on to children, then there's really little hope of it surviving for longer than the last first language learners. Second, we'd want to look at the absolute number of speakers. As we saw above, though, we probably want to temper this a bit--very small communities can be stable, and large communities can be unstable. Third, we'd want to consider speaker number trends--that is, are the number of speakers changing or staying the same? How do they compare to the number of people in the community? Finally, we'd want to look at the domains of use of the language. If speakers know the language, but tend to use it only in really restricted domains, it could potentially be in trouble. We can see this even with \"big\" languages, like with children of immigrants who move to a monolingual country--often by the third generation, the immigrant language is completely gone, replaced by the language of the wider community.  But how realistic is language stabilization and revitalization? The prospects really do look grim in many cases. One of the primary issues is that, frankly, we don't know much about the vast majority of the world's languages. I would hesitate to say that more than about 300 languages are \"very well described\", and no more than 1,000 are even \"well described\". Creating a lasting record of a language which can be used for a variety of purposes (a language documentation) should probably be the primary, initial concern of linguists and community members (and you certainly don't need a linguist to do this!). You really can't do one important thing if you don't know about a language--assess how well the revitalization is going. In the end it really depends. It takes a lot of time and effort to revitalize a language, and where one project with a very small community might be quite successful, another with a larger community might not be so successful.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3575.0,"score_ratio":15.0}
{"post_id":"1eqhax","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"I have a vague memory of an article that said random unrelated DNA testing revealed that 1\/3 of the children were not from the father in Britain. Anyone know the source? I for the life of me can't find it on the internet, or don't know if I merely pieced it together from a mishmash of other information.  Also 1\/3 seems high, but I think that was the results they found out, and they supposedly quietly shelved the research afterwards or something.  Does anybody remember any article similar to this?","c_root_id_A":"ca2xgr9","c_root_id_B":"ca2xe5c","created_at_utc_A":1369127267,"created_at_utc_B":1369126650,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"This article, citing 2 academic studies,  states that 4% of fathers are unknowingly raising other men's children.","human_ref_B":"I typed the most fearmongering title I could think of into Google, which was:  \"Are you raising another man's child?\"  and Google spat out this article from Men's Health magazine in 2007.  Is this article related to what you're looking for?  Edit:  I have access to Ebsco through my school, and after reading that article, it most likely wasn't what you wanted, but I did find this one:  One in 25 'fathers' raises another man's child   I think this one is what you were looking for.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":617.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"1eqhax","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"I have a vague memory of an article that said random unrelated DNA testing revealed that 1\/3 of the children were not from the father in Britain. Anyone know the source? I for the life of me can't find it on the internet, or don't know if I merely pieced it together from a mishmash of other information.  Also 1\/3 seems high, but I think that was the results they found out, and they supposedly quietly shelved the research afterwards or something.  Does anybody remember any article similar to this?","c_root_id_A":"ca2xgr9","c_root_id_B":"ca2wl4g","created_at_utc_A":1369127267,"created_at_utc_B":1369120765,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This article, citing 2 academic studies,  states that 4% of fathers are unknowingly raising other men's children.","human_ref_B":"Dr Tatyana's Sex Advice to All Creation (quite academically sound despite the silly name) had a segment on a Y-chromosome study in one patrilineage that showed a much lower rate of adultery ~1%. Don't have it on my shelf right now to look up the reference now though...","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6502.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1eqhax","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"I have a vague memory of an article that said random unrelated DNA testing revealed that 1\/3 of the children were not from the father in Britain. Anyone know the source? I for the life of me can't find it on the internet, or don't know if I merely pieced it together from a mishmash of other information.  Also 1\/3 seems high, but I think that was the results they found out, and they supposedly quietly shelved the research afterwards or something.  Does anybody remember any article similar to this?","c_root_id_A":"ca2wl4g","c_root_id_B":"ca2xe5c","created_at_utc_A":1369120765,"created_at_utc_B":1369126650,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Dr Tatyana's Sex Advice to All Creation (quite academically sound despite the silly name) had a segment on a Y-chromosome study in one patrilineage that showed a much lower rate of adultery ~1%. Don't have it on my shelf right now to look up the reference now though...","human_ref_B":"I typed the most fearmongering title I could think of into Google, which was:  \"Are you raising another man's child?\"  and Google spat out this article from Men's Health magazine in 2007.  Is this article related to what you're looking for?  Edit:  I have access to Ebsco through my school, and after reading that article, it most likely wasn't what you wanted, but I did find this one:  One in 25 'fathers' raises another man's child   I think this one is what you were looking for.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5885.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"xiqvr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"We experienced another scare on the NYSE today from high-frequency trading. What are the benefits (other than profits for financial companies) of allowing high-frequency trading based on computer algorithms? I realize that this is more a finance question than anything else, and I'm not sure finance questions belong in this subreddit. But still, I'm curious if there's a good defense of this stuff out there that I don't know of because I'm ignorant of finance and journalists are only going to tell us the bad stuff about the financial sector. So why shouldn't we put a tiny, tiny tax on each transaction in the stock market (or each share that's bought and sold)? Or should we?","c_root_id_A":"c5mqon1","c_root_id_B":"c5mqp5n","created_at_utc_A":1343853494,"created_at_utc_B":1343853542,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Lower bid\/ask spreads for the rest of us.","human_ref_B":"Personally, I believe that finance (as a related field to economics) does belong in this subreddit, but to be fair, one of my degrees is in finance.  From the Wiki: >Members of the financial industry claim high-frequency trading substantially improves market liquidity,7] narrows Bid-offer spread, lowers volatility and makes trading and investing cheaper for other market participants.  That does a pretty good job of summarizing the supposed benefits of HFT.  If these effects hold true, then market participants will benefit, especially from the [higher liquidity.  In layman's terms, high frequency trading makes you more likely to be able to trade your stock at the price that you see floating across the stock ticker.  Unfortunately I need to return to work, but I will come back to add more or answer questions this evening.  edit:  It seems like we have a consensus, so I will leave it at that.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":48.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"uaimf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Exactly how profitable are health insurance companies in the U.S.? I've heard from some people that health insurance companies are these highly profitable big businesses while others have stated that these companies barely break even every quarter. I just want to know exactly how profitable health insurance companies are and where I could go to find more information.","c_root_id_A":"c4tq3kr","c_root_id_B":"c4tpekm","created_at_utc_A":1338314039,"created_at_utc_B":1338311015,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I could argue both sides. It's a fairly subjective call to say how profitable they *should* be.   On one hand, their profit margins are pretty thin if you compare them to many other industries, often sub-5%.   On the other hand insurance companies ensure fairly steady margins through actuary (as in, I don't think most of them are at risk of making a loss - they charge more than they will probably have to pay out). This mixed with their high volume and high revenues means the industry is steadily making billions in profits. Health insurance is a bit of a commodity where there is not much need for innovation, so I would argue health insurance companies are decently profitable.    Also, If you believe health insurance is a basic right that everyone should have, any profit may come off as \"stealing\" from the masses. I prefer to stay out of those kinds of political discussions though :)","human_ref_B":"Not exact by any means, but looking at Wikipedia it's roughly around 4.2% net-profit-margin. For comparison ExxonMobil, shows an 8.4% net-profit margin on over twice the revenue and Apple had 23.9% on 108B.  * Company | net-income \/ revenue = net-profit margin * UnitedHealth Group | 4.63B \/ 94.2B = 4.9% * WellPoint | 2.49B \/ 61.3B = 4.0% * Kaiser Permanente | 1.6B \/ 47.9B = 3.3% * Humana | 1.4B \/ 36.5 = 3.8%  **edit: **So fairly lean from a consumer standpoint.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3024.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"rhy5j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Are oil company tax cuts a \"gift\" to the oil execs, or could they actually lower gas prices? I was debating a friend on the potential benefits of reducing taxes on oil companies. My argument was crafted from a proposed hypothetical: * * * Let's say that not only did we reduce oil company taxes to 0%, we give each company $10 billion dollars per year to continue to do bring their gifts upon the world. Would that lower prices? It would reduce industry operating costs, which would make getting oil cheaper for American companies. They could then sell oil at a reduced price on the market, taking business away from the Saudi oil companies. I believe that such an activity would definitely have a downward effect on gas prices, if for no other reason that foreign companies would have to cut prices to compete.  I would argue that between one extreme of raising taxes to 90% and the other (giving them money after a 0% rate), one would encourage higher prices on the global market, and the other would encourage lower prices on the global market.   The differences in tax rates in reality would be much smaller and have a much less dramatic effect, but one could argue that moving along the price graph will still have at least a theoretical impact on global prices; perhaps (guessing) 6 significant digits out, but the impact would still exist. * * * I am by no means an oil industry expert or an economist, so I'd appreciate feedback as to where my logic, reasoning or understanding is flawed.","c_root_id_A":"c45zlma","c_root_id_B":"c45ze5n","created_at_utc_A":1332966908,"created_at_utc_B":1332965996,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The main flaw I see is that you're assuming that American oil companies set their own prices. While they have some small influence, nearly all the world's crude oil is controlled by a cartel, OPEC. You can pretty much narrow down the price of gas to OPEC and taxes, with some give and take for transportation, refining, and other expenses. American companies aren't really competing against foreign companies in the usual way.   The other is that you're assuming gasoline is an elastic good. I'm not sure how much econ you've studied, but elasticity refers to a product's responsiveness to price changes, specifically demand for that product  Gasoline is one of the most inelastic goods out there, for the simple reason that most people simply can't live without it. Not only that, but there are really no easy substitute products. Consumer demand only begins to drop off after ~$4.00\/gallon. OPEC knows this, and often raises prices just enough to rake in profits, only to lower them when consumers finally start to change their driving habits and\/or demand more alternative fuels.   So, from an oil company's perspective, why charge less? You might undercut your competitors a bit, but you could easily get away with charging more with no negative consequences. Oil company behavior for the past several years indicates that they would simply pocket any tax relief on the way to record profits. As a consumer, what recourse do you have? Stop driving?","human_ref_B":"A US$10 billion subsidy and a cutting taxes on crude oil would lower the cost of supplying crude oil (thus also the cost of gas), but gas and oil have relatively inelastic demand (i.e. changes in oil prices have a relatively low effect on quantity demanded) so lower production cost could cause companies to lower prices just a bit since it's unlikely that they would gain a lot more sales with the lower price. Makes more sense to keep what they have, sell it at a slightly lower price and enjoy the extra money they get from the subsidy and tax cut.  According to a 2011 IEA report, the US extracted around 9% of the worlds oil (couldn't find a number for gas production) so even if every drop of oil that was extracted by every country in the world was poured in to the market, the US could still only effect that 9% (I'm assuming you meant the US since you used the $-sign)  Keeping all other things equal, a subsidy and tax cut on oil production would lower the price of oil. How big of an effect that would actually have is subject to debate and influenced by many variables. My guess is that on a whole it would be a bad call and would probably be better to invest that money on renewable energy sources or fuel efficiency.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":912.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"29mkr6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Have there ever been actual studies done regarding anonymity and the internet? On the internet, people tend to see anonymous posting - even if they defend and promote anonymity - as an obstacle blocking civil discourse.  And this understanding is often treated as an unassailable truth about social interaction on the internet, wherein the \"Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory\" is taken as a given.  But is this all just conjecture based on an assumed common sense?  Or are there actual studies that demonstrate social breakdown when the participants are anonymous?","c_root_id_A":"cimmmqz","c_root_id_B":"cimfixv","created_at_utc_A":1404311871,"created_at_utc_B":1404282531,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"So the answer is that there have been a lot of studies regarding anonymity and its impacts on the social online. When you say, \"Or are there actual studies that demonstrate social breakdown when the participants are anonymous,\" I am going to assume you mean loss of given social norms generally present in face-to-face interaction, and premise my answer on that idea. Let me know if that doesn't quite get at what you mean. Some articles may be behind a paywall, sorry.  The Social Disinhibition Effect (SDE) as cited by \/u\/Bhima is very much so the opposite of the Social Inhibition Model(SIM), which essentially predicts that when around people we limit ourselves in various ways. We don\u2019t want to be judged by people in ways that reflect badly on us, and the wiki page on the topic has a lot of research which explores the idea lending a lot of support. The SDE has been challenged as being applied too broadly]( http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0747563211002317) as effects predicted in the SIM can still be found depending on exactly how anonymous a person truly is. For instance, thinking about the Internet \u2013 is there a difference in terms of how anonymous one here on Reddit is, versus a place like 4chan? To further this line of questioning, is there a difference in one\u2019s anonymity when you create an account to comment on a news story you will never use again, versus a more sustained screen name you will use\/have used for years?  While I myself have done some research on networks in anonymous settings, and have some fun data sets on topic, I want to bring in voices other than my own. Research on the impacts of anonymity go back to at least the [1990s and further, suggesting that in a structured environment anonymity can in fact bolster idea generation within a group (output is up, though quality does not necessarily increase). More current research has a ton more to say on the topic of anonymity effects. For instance some [recent work suggests]( http:\/\/download.springer.com\/static\/pdf\/909\/art%253A10.1007%252Fs10726-012-9318-2.pdf?auth66=1404482564_98e55a6b6aecee9bb3092155392fbbea&ext=.pdf) that the freeing effect found on idea generation noted in the 1990s certainly still exists \u2013 but arguments tend to break out more, and the actual arguments themselves influence fewer people if the person making them is unknown.  What all of the above leads me to say is that yes, the norms present in face-to-face communication do have a tendency to break down online, especially depending on \u201chow anonymous\u201d one perceives themselves to be. But important to take from this is that norms don\u2019t disappear entirely, and [developed group identities are common]( http:\/\/twentytwo.fibreculturejournal.org\/fcj-156-hacking-the-social-internet-memes-identity-antagonism-and-the-logic-of-lulz\/). In fact, the more anonymous a group is, the more likely new behavior [can or will emerge]( http:\/\/psp.sagepub.com\/content\/27\/10\/1243.full.pdf+html). Some environments with more pure-type anonymity such as 4chan encourage new ways for people to [generate identity for themselves]( http:\/\/www.asutriplehelix.org\/sites\/default\/files\/TTH%20Spring%202012%20Final%20Version%20Non%20Print%20Form.pdf#page=24) (look for page 24 if it doesn\u2019t open there for you automatically). What is so interesting is that once identity takes root, as discussed above, the SDE begins to disappear for the affected users and social inhibition begins to set in again. Perhaps with a new set of social norms, and with a lot of background noise from anonymous posters without any sense of persistent identity, but a break-down of the social in a true sense does not really occur.  **To summarize here, essentially we have the following:**  * Social inhibition seems to occur when we have identities to manage which can be judged by others.   * Anonymity exists on a continuum of sorts, with people associating with identities depending on how persistent those identities are, or how \u201cpure\u201d (my language) the anonymity is.  * Anonymity does in fact seem to impact discourse. More ideas and more arguments are common. Less importance, however, is given to individual posters.  * The more readily identities emerge, even in stronger anonymous networks (think [avatarring]( http:\/\/www.urbandictionary.com\/define.php?term=Avatarfag) or [tripcoding]( http:\/\/www.lurkmore.com\/wiki\/Tripcode) on 4chan), the less impact the Social Disinhibition Effect has. Important to note is that the actual norms which develop when the SDE begins to recede may not be reflective of original face-to-face communication, but norms do take root.  Hope that helps answer your question!","human_ref_B":"At the risk of being one of those comments that just quotes Wikipedia...  Yes there has been a study, it has a  a Wikipedia Page and the original paper is listed in the wiki sources and it's here: The Online Disinhibition Effect.  I pasted the abstract below.  Personally, I don't think this really reaches the level of \"unassailable truth\" that you mention... but at least it's more than the guys at Penny Arcade giving voice to something that many of us have thought.  Also, I have to admit to be disappointed paper's authors did not use the original title of theory for their paper.  ABSTRACT While online, some people self-disclose or act out more frequently or intensely than they would in person. This article explores six factors that interact with each other in creating this online disinhibition effect: dissociative anonymity, invisibility, asynchronicity, solipsistic introjection, dissociative imagination, and minimization of authority. Personality variables also will influence the extent of this disinhibition. Rather than thinking of disinhibition as the revealing of an underlying \"true self,\" we can conceptualize it as a shift to a constellation within self-structure, involving clusters of affect and cognition that differ from the in-person constellation.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29340.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1fky11","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"xpost from economics: is inflation caused solely by money issuance? If a government stopped printing money, what would happen to inflation? I frequent \/r\/bitcoin[1] which is a community usually full of anarchists, geeks and libertarians who believe most economic problems in the world are caused by central banking. A central theme is that inflation is caused merely by out of control printing of money, which makes sense but to me seems a rather simplistic idea, but I don't know much about economics to understand otherwise. What woud happen to a government if it simply stopped printing money? Would inflation decrease, stop or even become deflation? Can a country plagued by hyperinflation solve it's problem by simply stopping the presses (and of course finding money in other ways)? Were there any period or government that tried this? And if this is true, what caused inflation during the gold standard? Thanks and sorry if those basic questions belong somewhere else..","c_root_id_A":"cabfcpl","c_root_id_B":"cab9rdd","created_at_utc_A":1370287178,"created_at_utc_B":1370271733,"score_A":14,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"> A central theme is that inflation is caused merely by out of control printing of money, which makes sense but to me seems a rather simplistic idea, but I don't know much about economics to understand otherwise.  Over long time horizons (20 years and more), the rate of inflation in consumer prices is correlated 1-for-1 with the rate of growth in the stock of money. See chart 1. Similarly, over long time horizons, the rate of growth of the money stock is independent of output. (See chart 2, same paper.)  One of the longest-running and most enduring propositions of macroeconomics is that inflation is a monetary phenomenon over longish time horizons, say 20 years or more. This idea goes all the way back to Hume, in 1752.  Over shorter horizons, 1-5 years, the sources of inflation (rather, the sources of fluctuation in the inflation rate) are more tricky, and not tied 1-for-1 with fluctuations in the money growth rate. The short-run dynamics of inflation and money growth deserve their own post. Inflation is neither good nor bad; similarly deflation is neither good nor bad, over long time horizons - they simply don't matter. Over shorter time horizons, whether inflation is good or bad, or deflation is good or bad, depends on the mix of shocks that the economy is facing.    > What would happen to a government if it simply stopped printing money?  Would inflation decrease, stop or even become deflation?   In the short run, that is, over the course of 1-4 years, there would be a recession. Output and prices would both fall. Over longer time horizons, prices would continue to fall and output would rise, until output was back on its trend path and prices were permanently below their old trend. If the money stock were fixed entirely, no more printing of money, the price level would probably gradually drift downward due to population growth and technical progress.   > Can a country plagued by hyperinflation solve it's problem by simply stopping the presses (and of course finding money in other ways)? Were there any period or government that tried this?  Yes. See: Paul Volker in 1981 for the most dramatic example.  > And if this is true, what caused inflation during the gold standard?   Oh, this is easy. Under a gold standard, the price level is just the inverse of the price of gold. Thus, fluctuations in the supply and demand for gold drove fluctuations in consumer price inflation.  An increase in the supply of of gold, all else equal, drives down the relative price of gold, which leads to inflation in consumer prices.   An increase in the demand for gold, all else equal, drives up the relative price of gold and leads to deflation in consumer prices. Thus, in bad times (recession), a flight to quality (towards gold) could lead to deflation in consumer prices. Just an example.  The other two scenarios (decrease in supply, decrease in demand) are similar.  Underneath this entire post is nothing more than a simple AD-AS diagram with upward-sloping SRAS, vertical LRAS, and MV=PY for AD.","human_ref_B":"No, inflation (or deflation) are always present unless absolutely nothing is changing in the economy. MV=PY is the important identity which I'm sure you've seen on r\/bitcoin since it's full of followers of Austrian economics. If you hold M constant (i.e. have a fixed amount of money) then for example growth in real GDP (Y) would cause deflation (bad) unless it's offset by some rise in the velocity of money (V).  You'll also get inflation (or deflation) caused by fluctuations in individual markets when they form a big part of people's shopping baskets. That will never go away.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15445.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"18ilau","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"If the birthrates of the poor and the rich were reversed, how would this effect inequality and poverty? Would this have a significant effect on anything?  What about if the poor delayed their age at first child by 5 years?","c_root_id_A":"c8f6dzy","c_root_id_B":"c8f7tq3","created_at_utc_A":1360862899,"created_at_utc_B":1360867345,"score_A":3,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"There was a book written by Gregory Clarke, A Farewell to Alms, that showed how, over human history, the richest would have the most children because they could afford them and the child mortality rate was lower at higher standards of living.  He claims this has helped shape human genetics by naturally selecting for humans with a genetic disposition to doing what it takes to be wealthy.  Over time, this, with cultural changes, he claims, brought up societies full of people who were innovative and industrious.  But currently, the poor are reproducing more than the rich in developed countries. So the reverse could happen. Possibly.  Looking at your comments, it looks like you aren't just talking about within the context of a developed country. So do you mean worldwide? Maybe I can touch on some more detailed changes that might occur if you clarify that.","human_ref_B":"I think you might find Kathy Edin's book, Promises I Can Keep really interesting.  Here's a decent summary of her thesis  > In \"Promises I Can Keep: Why Poor Women Put Motherhood Before Marriage,\" Kathryn Edin and Maria Kefalas report the findings of their two-and-a-half year field study of 162 young, unmarried mothers living in Philadelphia's blighted urban neighborhoods. Although considerable research has been devoted to understanding the dramatic increase in non-marital child bearing among young women in low-income communities, Edin and Kefalas saw that the \"perspectives and life experiences\" of low-income single mothers were mostly absent from the body of scientific evidence. In the course of their interviews and interactions with the women in their study, Edin and Kefalas found that low-income teenagers do, in fact, \"knowingly\" become pregnant, and many consider early, out-of-wedlock child-bearing as not only a valid life option, but a mature and responsible choice.  > \"To most middle class observers, depending on their philosophical take on things, a poor woman with children but no husband, diploma or job is either a victim of her circumstances or undeniable proof that American society is coming apart at the seams,\" the authors write. \"But in the social world inhabited by poor women, a baby born into such conditions represents an opportunity to prove one's worth.\" While the poor women they studied perceive marriage as a \"luxury\" -- \"something they aspired to but feared they might never achieve\" -- having children is viewed as a necessity, \"an absolutely essential part of a young woman's life, the chief source of identity and meaning.\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4446.0,"score_ratio":7.3333333333}
{"post_id":"18ilau","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"If the birthrates of the poor and the rich were reversed, how would this effect inequality and poverty? Would this have a significant effect on anything?  What about if the poor delayed their age at first child by 5 years?","c_root_id_A":"c8f6dzy","c_root_id_B":"c8faqeq","created_at_utc_A":1360862899,"created_at_utc_B":1360876020,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"There was a book written by Gregory Clarke, A Farewell to Alms, that showed how, over human history, the richest would have the most children because they could afford them and the child mortality rate was lower at higher standards of living.  He claims this has helped shape human genetics by naturally selecting for humans with a genetic disposition to doing what it takes to be wealthy.  Over time, this, with cultural changes, he claims, brought up societies full of people who were innovative and industrious.  But currently, the poor are reproducing more than the rich in developed countries. So the reverse could happen. Possibly.  Looking at your comments, it looks like you aren't just talking about within the context of a developed country. So do you mean worldwide? Maybe I can touch on some more detailed changes that might occur if you clarify that.","human_ref_B":"Well child poverty rates should plummet: in the US, about half of all kids who are poor at birth stay poor for most of their childhood- this is compared to about 4% of kids who aren't born poor(p 6 figure 4). *Kids who are poor at birth account for 13% of all births, but 65% of all consistently poor children*.  (13% of kids are born in poverty vs 87% of kids are born outside of poverty; 49% of kids born into poverty remain persistently poor throughout childhood (persistent poverty meaning being poor for 9 or more years) compared to 4% of kids who weren't born poor), so the percentage of all persistently poor children who are born poor is equal to:  (.13 X .49)\/((.13 X .49)+(.87 X.04)) ~.65 or 65%.  So the poor having less children on its own should significantly reduce child poverty rates. And considering child poverty is a strong predictor of future poverty, it should also reduce adult poverty in the long run.  This all assumes that current trends in socioeconomic mobility don't change. This is probably a bad assumption because when the rich have lots of kids, those kids tend to experience downward social mobility (they can't all be Kings and Queens, so to speak).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13121.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1q2tu5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Does buying clothing made in sweatshops ultimately harm or benefit the workers? Let's say you want to buy a shirt that's manufactured in Indonesia, and you believe that Indonesian sweatshops abuse their workers. (Let's ignore that the impact that one individual has is trivial). Would it ultimately be better for the workers if you didn't buy the shirt--thus not supporting their abuse--or would that actually be worse for them, because they need the income\/employment?","c_root_id_A":"cd8qjt3","c_root_id_B":"cd8pz4y","created_at_utc_A":1383815668,"created_at_utc_B":1383811977,"score_A":25,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"There are varying degrees of child labor and coerced labor which are all lumped in to being 'sweatshops'. A child who is sold to another city or even country, abused, and kept working under gunpoint for practically no pay would be a form that does not benefit the worker for example. Most adults who make rational choices to work in factories are doing so out of their own best interest.   So the answer to your question, as expected, is it depends.   edit: page 70-76 of this outlines different working conditions. Additionally relevant sections of this book may compliment the Krugman article linked by \/u\/patented_digit .  This document I linked in a following comment establishes that some forms of labor present in sweatshops are not beneficial to development.","human_ref_B":"Too sleep-deprived at the moment to compose a coherent opinion, but I thought this video made some good points in \"defense\" of sweatshops.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3691.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"1q2tu5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Does buying clothing made in sweatshops ultimately harm or benefit the workers? Let's say you want to buy a shirt that's manufactured in Indonesia, and you believe that Indonesian sweatshops abuse their workers. (Let's ignore that the impact that one individual has is trivial). Would it ultimately be better for the workers if you didn't buy the shirt--thus not supporting their abuse--or would that actually be worse for them, because they need the income\/employment?","c_root_id_A":"cd8um03","c_root_id_B":"cd8pz4y","created_at_utc_A":1383837139,"created_at_utc_B":1383811977,"score_A":19,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"You might be interested to read Paul Krugman's 1997 article In Praise of Cheap Labor.","human_ref_B":"Too sleep-deprived at the moment to compose a coherent opinion, but I thought this video made some good points in \"defense\" of sweatshops.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25162.0,"score_ratio":3.8}
{"post_id":"1q2tu5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Does buying clothing made in sweatshops ultimately harm or benefit the workers? Let's say you want to buy a shirt that's manufactured in Indonesia, and you believe that Indonesian sweatshops abuse their workers. (Let's ignore that the impact that one individual has is trivial). Would it ultimately be better for the workers if you didn't buy the shirt--thus not supporting their abuse--or would that actually be worse for them, because they need the income\/employment?","c_root_id_A":"cd8um03","c_root_id_B":"cd8sagl","created_at_utc_A":1383837139,"created_at_utc_B":1383828384,"score_A":19,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You might be interested to read Paul Krugman's 1997 article In Praise of Cheap Labor.","human_ref_B":"Without sweatshops would Hong Kong or Singapore even exist today?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8755.0,"score_ratio":9.5}
{"post_id":"wbtzr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Is the labor theory of value totally discredited or not? After asking this same question recently on \/r\/debateacommunist, I was curious as to what \/r\/AskSocialScience thinks about the issue, especially whether the economists among us feel that their position has been fairly characterized. In that thread, various submitters claimed that economists often fail to understand what LTV is, and attack straw-man versions of it when they claim that it has been totally discredited. I'm curious to know what you think are the major advantages and disadvantages of LTV as compared to the subjective\/marginal theory of value? What are the weak and strong points of either theory?","c_root_id_A":"c5bzww7","c_root_id_B":"c5c33jt","created_at_utc_A":1341934272,"created_at_utc_B":1341946234,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Only have rudimentary background on this, apologies in advance.  My understading is that labor theory of value is essentially the gross profit by the employer- capital inputs - worker's wage. In that sense, we assume that the value of something = what the item was sold for minus what the worker *wasn't* paid.  Is it obsolete? As an economic tool of policy, I think it died with central planning as an economic model of productivity (with zero net profit as the goal, private producers cannot grow and incentives to improve labor are impossible). In terms of analysis\/paradigms, it's fairly easily applied to non-capital markets and income inequality.  Marginal theory of value is, for better or worse, the policy orthodoxy in a globalized capitalist economy and therefore the focal point of the majority of economic analysis. The evidence of exponential economic growth via financial and credit expansion are very difficult to explain via the LTV - given its relatively light labor intensity and diminishing value as both a factor of production and development of human capital through education and technology (so less labor produces more).  The great failing of the LTV, IMO, is that the decreasing labour\/capital ratio has made each item worth so much less in terms of labor input per unit of production and capital investment so much more. In turn, this would make the value of labor relatively worthless per unit of production compared to the time of *Das Kapital*'s publication. This obviously changed over time, as reflected by higher living standards fueled by higher wages as - with the onset of technology and education - labor is a smaller factor in profit creation yet wages have improved, which would imply under the LTV model that workers are relatively *overpaid* nowadays. I believe Marx states the LTV remains static and is measured by exploitation (net profit), which would IMO mean it is irrelevant in a modern economy. I do not know whether this has been revised by Neomarxists.","human_ref_B":"In my view, the \"labor theory of value\" is not really a theory at all, in the usual sense of being a causal explanation of some observation.  As a potential theory of causation, LTV fails the smell test. Increasing the labor applied to an object need not, all else equal, raise its price, a point which LTV advocates will generally admit. This immediately calls into question the causal relationship proposed.  Advocates of LTV, being quite aware of this fact, may respond as follows: the value ascribed to an object by LTV does not exactly determine its price, but rather acts as a sort of anchor, whereby prices vary around that anchor point. As evidence of this, they might point to a positive--though, at best, modest--correlation between the average quantity of labor used for production of a good and its price.  This is, however, not a particularly useful claim for evaluating alternative theories of price determination, in particular those founded on the idea of marginal subject value, since these theories would make the same prediction about equilibrium prices.  In the simplest such theory, price is determined at the intersection of supply and demand curves. If the quantity of labor required to produce a good goes up for some reason, this will tend to increase the firm's labor costs, resulting in a shift inward of the supply curve, raising the equilibrium price. TA-DA! More labor per object produced, higher price.  But I think there's a more fundamental problem with the \"anchor\" theory: it's either unfalsifiable or a meaningless tautology, depending on how you look at it. It's equivalent to saying, \"The price of an object is determined by the amount of labor used in its production, except for when the price is different from that quantity.\" Well, gee, thanks for that very illuminating bit of reasoning.  At the end of the day, I think LTV has currency with Marxists for philosophical reasons. First, it conveniently puts the \"worker\" at the center of the economic universe, something we see time and again in Marxist ideology.  Second, as a consequence, it allows one to say, \"The worker is contributing *x* to the value of this good, and so should receive a wage of *x*.\" To the extent that the worker receives less than *x*, we can say that the worker is being exploited. Again, we see this worker-centric view coming out.  Third, for those Marxists who advocate for a centrally-planned economy, it addresses one of the main practical challenges, namely, how should the price of a given object be set by the central planner? LTV gives a straightforward answer: just figure out how much labor goes into making that object, and boom, there's your price.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11962.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"mefh8n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.66,"history":"How exactly is systemic misogyny preventing women from starting companies like Apple, Tesla or Facebook?  One of the arguments for the existence of patriarchy is that most wealthy people are men, Im trying to understand how exactly does systemic misogyny prevent women from starting companies like apple, tesla or facebook and figured this might be the place to ask, so can someone explain? thanks","c_root_id_A":"gsi6agv","c_root_id_B":"gshg47v","created_at_utc_A":1616877287,"created_at_utc_B":1616867708,"score_A":74,"score_B":39,"human_ref_A":"Investors play a role:   Investors asked male entrepreneurs about the opportunities for their businesses, while female entrepreneurs were asked about the risks of failure. (Academy of Management Journal)  The same pitch presented by a man and a woman was rated more favorably when it was given by a man. (PNAS)  Despite identical personal qualifications and firm financials, female Founder\/CEOs were perceived as less capable than their male counterparts, and IPOs led by female Founder\/CEOs were considered less attractive investments. (Journal of Management)  Female-led ventures catering to male-dominated industries receive significantly less funding at significantly lower valuations than female-led ventures catering to female-dominated industries. In contrast, male-led ventures attain similar funding and valuation outcomes regardless of the gender dominance of the industries to which they cater. (Science)","human_ref_B":"Not a factor in *starting* businesses but does effect chances for success within them: The Glass Cliff effect: \"The glass cliff refers to women being more likely to rise to positions of organizational leadership in times of crisis than in times of success, and men being more likely to achieve those positions in prosperous times.\"   Bruckm\u00fcller, S., & Branscombe, N. R. (2010). The glass cliff: When and why women are selected as leaders in crisis contexts. British Journal of Social Psychology, 49(3), 433-451. DOI:  https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1348\/014466609X466594 Full Text : https:\/\/library.pcw.gov.ph\/sites\/default\/files\/glass%20cliff.pdf","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9579.0,"score_ratio":1.8974358974}
{"post_id":"2w8n64","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"If I want to do cross-cultural research, what should I pick as a secondary major or minor? I'm currently a psychology major and I really want to do cross-cultural social research. My program doesn't even offer a cross-cultural class so i was wondering what minor I could choose that would give me some sort of insight or knowledge to help me prepare for cross-cultural research. International Studies? Anthropology? European Studies?","c_root_id_A":"coooize","c_root_id_B":"coontwx","created_at_utc_A":1424218186,"created_at_utc_B":1424216921,"score_A":12,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would go with cultural anthropology, imo. A big part of doing said research will probably include field study, which is part of anth.","human_ref_B":"How about a language? Learning the language of the culture you want to cross study would be immensely useful.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1265.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"pi56a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"If cheap abundant energy technology were realized, could it have the negative consequence of acting as a permanent \"resource curse\" for undeveloped economies? Resource Curse","c_root_id_A":"c3pjjdh","c_root_id_B":"c3pl0po","created_at_utc_A":1328815279,"created_at_utc_B":1328822332,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"To qualify as cheap and abundant, are you assuming energy wouldn't need to come from natural resources found only in less developed countries?  If so, then the exploitation and resource export issues like corruption and international pressure would be abated.  On the other hand, we need a lot more than energy to accomplish\/create things.  Without energy as the bottleneck, demand for mineral resources might increase. Resource curses for this minerals may increase in potency as well.  tldr: Keeping powerful economic curses like this at bay requires going back to the basics: five tallow candles, a ring of colored sand, and a few acolytes chanting.","human_ref_B":"I'm going to give a slightly lengthier response than rogersm who is basically right, in my book.  It would dependent on the precise nature of your cheap abundant energy technology. I have presumed that you don't mean something like a new oil - something which comes predominantly from an \"undeveloped economy\" of sorts and is therefore exported and traded to other countries. If you do mean something like that, something that requires a material component that is similar to oil I would advise you look at oil rich countries and treat them as a model. In other words - quite probably yes.  If however, you mean something closer to solar (which for the purposes of this thought excercise we'll assume is a universal power source available to all) the answer is a resounding no. The problems of a Resource Curse boil down essentially to a sort of one track mindness taken on a grand scale.   If I was say, really good at beatboxing, and all my neighbours wanted me to beatbox the whole time then I'd probably let all my other skills lag. I would depend on them to bring round pizza and beer rather than cook, because they would do that to hear me beatbox. In the above scenario B everyone has a beatbox machine so I need to get myself sorted out and that means I can focus as much as I was ever going to on all the other life skills I may or might not need.  If we're in scenario B, to put it as simply as I can, there are no perverse economic insentives preventing me from maximising my utility as an individual, and to expand that back out to not be about beatboxing, beer and pizza, there is nothing to stop this undeveloped economy from doing whatever it was doing before. Except it now doesn't have to deal with a lack of energy resources.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7053.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2ahdm8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"How did saudi arabia and other Gulf States have saved themselves from terrorism when they are at the center of it ? It's clear that Saudi arabia supplies money, weapons and ideologies for terrorists and many terrorists like laden come from there, then how come it doesn't have terrorists attacks on itself ? How does it save itself from what it creates, Considering that all the countries around them are riddled with terrorism.","c_root_id_A":"civ726s","c_root_id_B":"civ6nio","created_at_utc_A":1405140736,"created_at_utc_B":1405139668,"score_A":23,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I lived in Qatar, so I can speak a little bit about it.  Qatar had a suicide bombing in 2005, so there is a terrorism threat even if attacks are not pervasive.  Qatar, along with Kuwait, is also considered a \"permissive terrorist financing environment,\" by the U.S. State Department. Funds from Qatar are believed to go to groups like I.S.I.S. and other groups in Syria, Iraq, and other countries.  However, internal opposition and terrorism is kept in check in large part because the majority of Qataris live exceptionally comfortable lives and are happy with the regime.   Qatar has the largest per capita GDP in the world thanks to one of the world's largest natural gas reserves. Its commercial laws direct most of that wealth towards Qatari nationals, who number only about 278,000 among a total population of about 2.1 million. The rest of the population consists of foreign nationals who make up most of the workforce. Indians and Nepalis make up the largest groups.  In the Arab Youth Survey, only one third of Qatari respondents ranked democracy as \"very important\" - the lowest proportion among 10 Arab countries surveyed. Eighty-eight per cent said the country was \"heading in the right direction.\"  The regime is vigilant about any opposition that might take root. Criticizing the government is a criminal act. A Qatari poet was imprisoned for life in December 2012 for insulting the emir.","human_ref_B":"List of militant incidents in Saudi Arabia","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1068.0,"score_ratio":2.3}
{"post_id":"2ahdm8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"How did saudi arabia and other Gulf States have saved themselves from terrorism when they are at the center of it ? It's clear that Saudi arabia supplies money, weapons and ideologies for terrorists and many terrorists like laden come from there, then how come it doesn't have terrorists attacks on itself ? How does it save itself from what it creates, Considering that all the countries around them are riddled with terrorism.","c_root_id_A":"civ6nio","c_root_id_B":"civb90c","created_at_utc_A":1405139668,"created_at_utc_B":1405156847,"score_A":10,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"List of militant incidents in Saudi Arabia","human_ref_B":"Saudi citizen here. Although not a specialist, I've followed this particular matter in the local and foreign press, and I've spoken to a few people in the government who were supposedly \"in the know\".  Saudi had sporadic problems with terrorism since the 90's which intensified for a few years after the second gulf war, with AQP (Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula) leading a rash of attacks mostly on western compounds and singular individuals.  The effect of the Iraq war on the Saudi populace's opinion cannot be overstated, it was of rage at what was seen as naked western aggression, this strengthened AQP and brought it local recruits and even a few individuals who acted independently. But they quickly over-reached, particularly in their attacks against compounds, where the overwhelming number of victims were Muslims and Arabs, and of course, the government made sure that this was the message that reached the public. This eventually helped put a major damper on the peoples support of AQP.  The government realized that it had a major problem on its hands, and they began a multi-pronged crack down on the group while also coming up with a rather brilliant plan to sap AQP of its recruits.   The person who lead Saudi's efforts was the head of Saudi's intelligence service, prince Mohammad bin Nayef, who began by rounding up known suspects and strengthening and restructuring the regular police force, both by increasing their numbers considerably and by allowing them to use more force. Prior to this, the police weren't allowed to even have bullets loaded in their guns, now they can shoot at the first sign of aggression. They were also reorganized, with a special anti-terrorism task force trained by the US and another more numerous street-level force that patrolled around high-value targets. This was the first prong.  The second prong was PR. The government went on a massive media campaign against terrorism, they blanketed the airwaves and print with articles from civil and religious leaders, all of whom were vociferous in their denouncement of terrorism. They didn't shy away from using shocking footage and pictures of the attacks either, images which repulsed most Saudi's and made them rethink their stance. They also removed troublesome imams, the radical ones who preached violence, from the mosques. In the meantime, the soldiers and policemen who were killed or injured on the job were lionized by the Royal family, with leading members of the family visiting them in hospitals, going to their funerals, and generously providing for their families. All this of course helped sway all but the most radical elements of saudi society towards the governments stance.  The final -and i think most important- prong was that the government began an amnesty program, where terrorists could surrender their arms and enter a rehabilitation program. This program has had a good record overall, with a low recidivism rate and a humanizing effect. By portraying the terrorists as \"prodigal sons\" and the government as a strong yet merciful paternal figure, the government appealed to arab society's tribal, paternalistic culture.  The combined effect of all the government's actions have been particularly successful, and although they are over the hump, so to speak, they're still vigilant against a resurgence, especially given the turmoil in the Levant and the ongoing Sunni-Shia hostilities.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17179.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"2ahdm8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"How did saudi arabia and other Gulf States have saved themselves from terrorism when they are at the center of it ? It's clear that Saudi arabia supplies money, weapons and ideologies for terrorists and many terrorists like laden come from there, then how come it doesn't have terrorists attacks on itself ? How does it save itself from what it creates, Considering that all the countries around them are riddled with terrorism.","c_root_id_A":"civ8v7e","c_root_id_B":"civb90c","created_at_utc_A":1405146235,"created_at_utc_B":1405156847,"score_A":3,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Well if you want to look at it from the angle of \"Saudi Arabia doesn't get proportionately attacked the same as their neighbors\" , then [Gary brecher's article]( http:\/\/pando.com\/2013\/12\/19\/the-war-nerd-saudis-syria-and-blowback\/) has some interesting commentary on Saudis exporting their jihad.","human_ref_B":"Saudi citizen here. Although not a specialist, I've followed this particular matter in the local and foreign press, and I've spoken to a few people in the government who were supposedly \"in the know\".  Saudi had sporadic problems with terrorism since the 90's which intensified for a few years after the second gulf war, with AQP (Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula) leading a rash of attacks mostly on western compounds and singular individuals.  The effect of the Iraq war on the Saudi populace's opinion cannot be overstated, it was of rage at what was seen as naked western aggression, this strengthened AQP and brought it local recruits and even a few individuals who acted independently. But they quickly over-reached, particularly in their attacks against compounds, where the overwhelming number of victims were Muslims and Arabs, and of course, the government made sure that this was the message that reached the public. This eventually helped put a major damper on the peoples support of AQP.  The government realized that it had a major problem on its hands, and they began a multi-pronged crack down on the group while also coming up with a rather brilliant plan to sap AQP of its recruits.   The person who lead Saudi's efforts was the head of Saudi's intelligence service, prince Mohammad bin Nayef, who began by rounding up known suspects and strengthening and restructuring the regular police force, both by increasing their numbers considerably and by allowing them to use more force. Prior to this, the police weren't allowed to even have bullets loaded in their guns, now they can shoot at the first sign of aggression. They were also reorganized, with a special anti-terrorism task force trained by the US and another more numerous street-level force that patrolled around high-value targets. This was the first prong.  The second prong was PR. The government went on a massive media campaign against terrorism, they blanketed the airwaves and print with articles from civil and religious leaders, all of whom were vociferous in their denouncement of terrorism. They didn't shy away from using shocking footage and pictures of the attacks either, images which repulsed most Saudi's and made them rethink their stance. They also removed troublesome imams, the radical ones who preached violence, from the mosques. In the meantime, the soldiers and policemen who were killed or injured on the job were lionized by the Royal family, with leading members of the family visiting them in hospitals, going to their funerals, and generously providing for their families. All this of course helped sway all but the most radical elements of saudi society towards the governments stance.  The final -and i think most important- prong was that the government began an amnesty program, where terrorists could surrender their arms and enter a rehabilitation program. This program has had a good record overall, with a low recidivism rate and a humanizing effect. By portraying the terrorists as \"prodigal sons\" and the government as a strong yet merciful paternal figure, the government appealed to arab society's tribal, paternalistic culture.  The combined effect of all the government's actions have been particularly successful, and although they are over the hump, so to speak, they're still vigilant against a resurgence, especially given the turmoil in the Levant and the ongoing Sunni-Shia hostilities.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10612.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"2ahdm8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"How did saudi arabia and other Gulf States have saved themselves from terrorism when they are at the center of it ? It's clear that Saudi arabia supplies money, weapons and ideologies for terrorists and many terrorists like laden come from there, then how come it doesn't have terrorists attacks on itself ? How does it save itself from what it creates, Considering that all the countries around them are riddled with terrorism.","c_root_id_A":"civb90c","c_root_id_B":"civ959b","created_at_utc_A":1405156847,"created_at_utc_B":1405147217,"score_A":18,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Saudi citizen here. Although not a specialist, I've followed this particular matter in the local and foreign press, and I've spoken to a few people in the government who were supposedly \"in the know\".  Saudi had sporadic problems with terrorism since the 90's which intensified for a few years after the second gulf war, with AQP (Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula) leading a rash of attacks mostly on western compounds and singular individuals.  The effect of the Iraq war on the Saudi populace's opinion cannot be overstated, it was of rage at what was seen as naked western aggression, this strengthened AQP and brought it local recruits and even a few individuals who acted independently. But they quickly over-reached, particularly in their attacks against compounds, where the overwhelming number of victims were Muslims and Arabs, and of course, the government made sure that this was the message that reached the public. This eventually helped put a major damper on the peoples support of AQP.  The government realized that it had a major problem on its hands, and they began a multi-pronged crack down on the group while also coming up with a rather brilliant plan to sap AQP of its recruits.   The person who lead Saudi's efforts was the head of Saudi's intelligence service, prince Mohammad bin Nayef, who began by rounding up known suspects and strengthening and restructuring the regular police force, both by increasing their numbers considerably and by allowing them to use more force. Prior to this, the police weren't allowed to even have bullets loaded in their guns, now they can shoot at the first sign of aggression. They were also reorganized, with a special anti-terrorism task force trained by the US and another more numerous street-level force that patrolled around high-value targets. This was the first prong.  The second prong was PR. The government went on a massive media campaign against terrorism, they blanketed the airwaves and print with articles from civil and religious leaders, all of whom were vociferous in their denouncement of terrorism. They didn't shy away from using shocking footage and pictures of the attacks either, images which repulsed most Saudi's and made them rethink their stance. They also removed troublesome imams, the radical ones who preached violence, from the mosques. In the meantime, the soldiers and policemen who were killed or injured on the job were lionized by the Royal family, with leading members of the family visiting them in hospitals, going to their funerals, and generously providing for their families. All this of course helped sway all but the most radical elements of saudi society towards the governments stance.  The final -and i think most important- prong was that the government began an amnesty program, where terrorists could surrender their arms and enter a rehabilitation program. This program has had a good record overall, with a low recidivism rate and a humanizing effect. By portraying the terrorists as \"prodigal sons\" and the government as a strong yet merciful paternal figure, the government appealed to arab society's tribal, paternalistic culture.  The combined effect of all the government's actions have been particularly successful, and although they are over the hump, so to speak, they're still vigilant against a resurgence, especially given the turmoil in the Levant and the ongoing Sunni-Shia hostilities.","human_ref_B":"Saudi Arabia has been struck by dozens of deadly terrorist or militant attacks over the past few decades.   Two types of groups have been responsible: Fundamentalist Sunni extremists, and minority Shi'ite groups.  Fundamentalist opposition has been strengthened by two forces: socio-economic conditions and the Saudi regime's perceived ties to the West, especially since the first Gulf War of the early 1990s.  Population growth, poor management, and a corrupt regime where much of the country's vast oil wealth flows to some 7,000 royal princes and their families has resulted in income inequality and high unemployment among large sectors of the Saudi population.  Increased internet connections and satellite TV from abroad has challenged the government's control over the media, igniting conservative outrage over increasing Western influence.  The government allied itself with Western powers during the first Gulf War, angering fundamentalist groups who believed infidels had no right to step foot on holy ground.   In short, a large number of unemployed, religiously aggrieved men have made Saudi Arabia a politically unstable country that has been home to dozens of deadly terrorist attacks.  Sources:  http:\/\/www.mafhoum.com\/press4\/124P51.pdf http:\/\/www.washingtoninstitute.org\/uploads\/Documents\/pubs\/PP_52_HOLIER_THAN_THOU.pdf http:\/\/www.foreignpolicy.com\/articles\/2011\/02\/28\/yes_it_could_happen_here","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9630.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"2o2a2e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is there any evidence of correlation between wealth and autism rates among the rich vs middle\/lower classes?","c_root_id_A":"cmj44l0","c_root_id_B":"cmj4dln","created_at_utc_A":1417547771,"created_at_utc_B":1417548198,"score_A":16,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"According to this study wealthier neighborhoods have higher autism rates. It is very important to point out, however, that autism is a diagnosis that is very much in the eye of the beholder. Wealthier parents may be more likely to seek a diagnosis if their child does not meet certain benchmarks or conform closely enough to behavioral norms, and having sought a diagnosis would be more likely to get one. Having a child that does not conform closely enough to parents idea of what their child should be like does not mean that there is necessarily something wrong with the child or that the child will not grow out of it. Sorry, I worked for a psychoanalyst in college and this was a soap box of his that I picked up.","human_ref_B":"Yes, possibly due to easier access to services for diagnosing:  http:\/\/www.plosone.org\/article\/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0011551  Results  Prevalence increased with increasing SES in a dose-response manner, with prevalence ratios relative to medium SES of 0.70 (95% confidence interval [CI] 0.64, 0.76) for low SES, and of 1.25 (95% CI 1.16, 1.35) for high SES, (P<0.001). Significant SES gradients were observed for children with and without a pre-existing ASD diagnosis, and in analyses stratified by gender, race\/ethnicity, and surveillance data source. The SES gradient was significantly stronger in children with a pre-existing diagnosis than in those meeting criteria for ASD but with no previous record of an ASD diagnosis (p<0.001), and was not present in children with co-occurring ASD and intellectual disability.  Conclusions  The stronger SES gradient in ASD prevalence in children with versus without a pre-existing ASD diagnosis points to potential ascertainment or diagnostic bias and to the possibility of SES disparity in access to services for children with autism. Further research is needed to confirm and understand the sources of this disparity so that policy implications can be drawn. Consideration should also be given to the possibility that there may be causal mechanisms or confounding factors associated with both high SES and vulnerability to ASD.  http:\/\/cfd153.cfdynamics.com\/images\/journals\/docs\/pdf\/asr\/Apr11ASRFeature.pdf  Scholars have also investigated parental social characteristics, such as socioeconomic status, education, and occupation for possible correlations with autism. This literature is largely inconclusive (Croen, Grether, and Selvin 2002; Larsson et al. 2005; Palmer et al. 2005). Early studies identified consistent associations between parental education or socioeconomic status and autism (Finegan and Quarrington 1979), while more current studies tend to find little to no association between parental education, income, or wealth and autism (Larsson et al. 2005). However, a recent study by Durkin and colleagues (2010) using area-based measures of socioeconomic status found that prevalence of autism increased with SES in a dose-response manner.  Resources may matter because obtaining an autism diagnosis can be extremely difficult. In obtaining a diagnosis and services for their children, parents often confront a dizzying institutional maze and spend considerable resources navigating through it. Some communities do not have qualified diagnosticians. Accordingly, community resources\u2014including screening resources, service availability, educational spending levels, the number of school-based health centers, and the number of pediatricians in a community\u2014have been tied to autism (Barbaresi et al. 2005; Mandell and Palmer 2005; Palmer et al. 2005). As with studies of potential environmental toxicity, the absence of a multilevel design makes it impossible to disentangle whether community resources have an independent effect or are acting as proxies for aggregated individual-level effects.  http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/21810908  RESULTS: 586 children with ASD were identified: autism prevalence was 10.2\/1000, higher in boys than girls (16 vs. 4\/1000); higher in white and Asian non-Hispanics than in black non-Hispanics and Hispanics (12.5, 14.0, 9.0, and 8.5\/1000, respectively); and higher (17.2\/1000 (95% CI 14.0-21.1)) in tracts with median income >US$90,000 than in tracts with median income \u2264US$30,000 (7.1 (95% CI 5.7-8.9)). Number of professional evaluations was higher, and age at diagnosis younger, in higher income tracts (p < .001), but both measures spanned a wide overlapping range in all SES levels. In multivariable models race\/ethnicity did not predict ASD, but the prevalence ratio was 2.2 (95% CI 1.5-3.1) when comparing highest with lowest income tracts.   CONCLUSIONS: In the US state of New Jersey, ASD prevalence is higher in wealthier census tracts, perhaps due to differential access to pediatric and developmental services.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":427.0,"score_ratio":1.1875}
{"post_id":"6zaljj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Are there any works utilizing ethnography that focus on a wealthy community?","c_root_id_A":"dmu19g6","c_root_id_B":"dmu06ij","created_at_utc_A":1505086068,"created_at_utc_B":1505084702,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"For a long time, ethnographies of wealthy communities were uncommon. Anthropologists tended to study people who were poor, or indigenous, or remote. More recently, anthropologists have turned their attention to studying more wealthy communities. One influential essay on this topic is called \"Up the Anthropologist--Perspectives Gained from Studying Up\" by Laura Nader (1972). (link here--PDF) One way to find ethnographies that \"study up\" would be to look at which scholars cite this paper.  One example of an ethnography that focuses on a wealthy community that immediately jumps to mind is *Liquidated: An Ethnography of Wall Street* by Karen Ho (2009). It looks at employees of big banks in New York City immediately before the financial crisis of 2008.  Another book that you might find helpful is called *Money, Manners, and Morals: The Culture of the French and the American Upper-Middle Class* by the sociologist Michele Lamont. It isn't really an ethnography (Lamont primarily used interviews rather than long-term participant observation), but you still might find it interesting.  There's also a whole literature on international development that looks not at the poor people who are being helped, but the relatively-wealthy people who are (trying) to do the helping--that is, looking at workers\/volunteers from wealthy countries who are trying to implement programs in the developing world.","human_ref_B":"Maybe you should narrow your question a bit?   Do you mean wealthy relative to their surroundings? The Greek City-States might fulfill that request, though their very high standards of living is arguably the result of their proportionately vast number of slaves. Or perhaps merchant republics like the Seren\u00ecsima Repulica Veneta, or its rival the Repubblica di Genova. Perhaps more contemporary, like the trading powerhouses of Hong Kong and Singapore?   Or perhaps by community you don't mean a nation or city-state, but merely a sub-section of society? In that case, well, almost every nation has its upper and lower classes, so you could pick almost literally anything. Or did you mean a more literal community, like the gated communities and HOA-ruled wealthy neighborhoods in contemporary America?  Sorry if that comes off as being pedantic, but the question simply seems too broad for anyone to answer without someone taking a blind guess at what you mean specifically.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1366.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1j6brt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Are there any commodities that have been successfully banned (without creating a black market)? I was listening to the Planet Money episode about rhino poaching, and they quoted someone who argued that as long as there were people willing to pay millions for rhino horns, prohibition would fail to work because someone would step up to meet the demand. Just like with alcohol prohibition fueling the mafia and with gangs cornering the drug market, the ban on selling rhino horns created a black market controlled by unsavory suppliers. He argued that governments should instead allow people to farm rhinos for their horns so that the demand could be met to put poachers out of business while preventing the rhino from going extinct.   Can anyone think of examples of commodities that were\/are in high demand but were successfully banned through state initiative? Or black markets that governments were able to effectively shut down?","c_root_id_A":"cbbpsfi","c_root_id_B":"cbbp6ns","created_at_utc_A":1374976314,"created_at_utc_B":1374974209,"score_A":13,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"CFCs, weapons of mass destruction (states can still acquire them, but citizens are effectively prevented from making them), pretty much anything that both require a lot of infrastructure to create and have worldwide cooperation of states to ban.","human_ref_B":"Britain banning slavery? Of course, slavery had and still has a black market, and had many unintended consequences, including killing Britain's new free labor sugar plantations in favor of others that still used slaves and encouraging countries to get serious about slave breeding. Overall I think the ban definitely made slavery less prevalent and actually improved the lives of those still in slavery, since it made more sense to invest in keeping them alive.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2105.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"1j6brt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Are there any commodities that have been successfully banned (without creating a black market)? I was listening to the Planet Money episode about rhino poaching, and they quoted someone who argued that as long as there were people willing to pay millions for rhino horns, prohibition would fail to work because someone would step up to meet the demand. Just like with alcohol prohibition fueling the mafia and with gangs cornering the drug market, the ban on selling rhino horns created a black market controlled by unsavory suppliers. He argued that governments should instead allow people to farm rhinos for their horns so that the demand could be met to put poachers out of business while preventing the rhino from going extinct.   Can anyone think of examples of commodities that were\/are in high demand but were successfully banned through state initiative? Or black markets that governments were able to effectively shut down?","c_root_id_A":"cbbphlc","c_root_id_B":"cbbpsfi","created_at_utc_A":1374975268,"created_at_utc_B":1374976314,"score_A":5,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"I believe they recently banned certain pesticides to protect bees.  Would this be considered a commodity to you?  There are also things like food additives that have been banned very successfully.  Both are highly valued, though not to the extent of things like alcohol and narcotics.  I think I might be stretching your definition beyond it's breaking point though.","human_ref_B":"CFCs, weapons of mass destruction (states can still acquire them, but citizens are effectively prevented from making them), pretty much anything that both require a lot of infrastructure to create and have worldwide cooperation of states to ban.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1046.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"2317se","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Have there been any recent scholarly publications (by ethicists, philosophers) that actually argue that religious belief\/practice itself is unethical? I ask merely out of curiosity -- funny enough, it was a totally unrelated book that made me wonder about this: David Benatar's Oxford monograph *Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming into Existence*, which argues (not very persuasively) that procreation is inherently immoral (and, as the title suggests, that existence itself is inherently \"harmful\").  So I'm definitely looking for journal articles or academic monographs on this...not Sam Harris or Christopher Hitchens type stuff.  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cgsgnc8","c_root_id_B":"cgss3w7","created_at_utc_A":1397512768,"created_at_utc_B":1397538153,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"You may want to head over and ask this in \/r\/askphilosophy.","human_ref_B":"Leiter's *Why Tolerate Religion*","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25385.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1h1mwd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Prison problems I've been wondering about. I'm hoping this is the right subreddit to ask this question. Whenever I've watched documentaries on prisons it looks like some of the biggest prison problems have to do (at least partially)with having such a large society of people confined together.   I'm not talking about overcrowding, but pure numbers. If we had prisons of let's say 10 people together who ONLY deal with each other, wouldn't that fix a lot of the gang, race and violence problems.  Obviously it would be very expensive to just have a prison of 5-10 inmates, but I'm thinking about blocking them off into sections and having them eat, exercise and ONLY meet each other so each section is not accessible to another section. There would have to be some changes but I believe it would be possible. The dynamic of 10 people is entirely different from a society of people. My thought is that the violence, gang issues and race problems would be less of a factor. Also, it would be much more difficult for any prisoner to control the prison population.  Have there been any studies on this? Any thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"caq0psj","c_root_id_B":"caq1enf","created_at_utc_A":1372185378,"created_at_utc_B":1372187114,"score_A":2,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"This sounds like a great idea, but my only question would be how would it work financially? This would undoubtedly require more staff in practice, but maybe if it lowered recidivism rates then it would be a net gain?","human_ref_B":"Well, the main problem with what you describe is that cutting prisons down to little cohorts of a dozen or so individuals is nothing at all like life outside the prison walls.  People aren't there just to be punished, but also to be rehabilitated.  Lately, there is a strong push towards a \"Parallel Universe\" policy for prisons (you can find more in the article described here https:\/\/www.ncjrs.gov\/App\/publications\/Abstract.aspx?id=188722). Basically, this theory holds that in order to best operate a prison system (and prepare the inmates for life after prison), the prison operator should strive to create an environment inside the prison that mirrors regular society as much as possible.  So prisoners have set schedules, they go to work or school in the prison like an individual would on the outside--basically, the idea is to treat the inmates like responsible adults to the extent possible.  I think you're also making a lot of assumptions in assuming that small prison cohorts would be better than a large general population.  There may not even be a possibility of cross group violence, but you would definitely have problems with small groups becoming polarized or being dominated by an especially powerful\/threatening person or small group.  Small groups of people do crazy shit when there is a crazy person to egg them on (see cults, etc.).  You would also either form extremely strong bonds between your little group (or extremely powerful rivalries).  I'm sure you can imagine why either possibility is not good when you are talking about criminals, many of whom will be given the opportunity to reoffend upon release.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1736.0,"score_ratio":13.0}
{"post_id":"v00kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Why does nearly everything feel overpriced? I know this is a complicated and subjective question, but I've noticed that it is very rare for me to exchange money for goods or services and feel like I got my full money's worth. In fact, any time you actually do get your money's worth on a purchase people proclaim what \"a great deal\" or \"a steal\" it is, because the converse is so much more common.  Example (in the US): I go to Five Guys and get a burger, fries and a drink. If you were to ask me what a good burger, fries and a drink should cost, I'd say about $8. However this would actually cost me closer to $11. If you go to McDonalds and get a shitty Big Mac, fries and a drink -- to me this inferior meal is worth about $5, but in actuality costs closer to $8.   It seems everything in the grocery store costs $1 to $4 more than it's worth, and the price\/value disparity seems to grow bigger with more expensive items. Do I just have a weird sense of value, or is there any statistical proof that an item is overpriced, and what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"c503ary","c_root_id_B":"c503aay","created_at_utc_A":1339607413,"created_at_utc_B":1339607367,"score_A":34,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Consider this: 'Stuff' is actually extremely cheap in our age. We live in an era where throwing out things and buying new is usually more economical than having people repair it. Labor is expensive.  Also you have to take inflation into account. 10 years ago those prices sound about right. Now, not so much. Your perception of value is probably stuck in the past.  Remember, things are only worth what people are willing to pay for them.","human_ref_B":"I am not going to get into the whole pricing question.....I only know about this from a marketing perspective, not an economic perspective.  However, while I understand why prices are set the way they are, I still have similar feelings to you and I think it's because we anchor our \"fair price\" on how much things cost when we first started paying attention to price.  For me, even though I know an entree at a standard chain restaurant is going to be 11 or 12 dollars, in my head, I imagine it should be closer to $7, the price I remember from my early teens.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":46.0,"score_ratio":4.8571428571}
{"post_id":"v00kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Why does nearly everything feel overpriced? I know this is a complicated and subjective question, but I've noticed that it is very rare for me to exchange money for goods or services and feel like I got my full money's worth. In fact, any time you actually do get your money's worth on a purchase people proclaim what \"a great deal\" or \"a steal\" it is, because the converse is so much more common.  Example (in the US): I go to Five Guys and get a burger, fries and a drink. If you were to ask me what a good burger, fries and a drink should cost, I'd say about $8. However this would actually cost me closer to $11. If you go to McDonalds and get a shitty Big Mac, fries and a drink -- to me this inferior meal is worth about $5, but in actuality costs closer to $8.   It seems everything in the grocery store costs $1 to $4 more than it's worth, and the price\/value disparity seems to grow bigger with more expensive items. Do I just have a weird sense of value, or is there any statistical proof that an item is overpriced, and what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"c503aay","c_root_id_B":"c503njp","created_at_utc_A":1339607367,"created_at_utc_B":1339608698,"score_A":7,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"I am not going to get into the whole pricing question.....I only know about this from a marketing perspective, not an economic perspective.  However, while I understand why prices are set the way they are, I still have similar feelings to you and I think it's because we anchor our \"fair price\" on how much things cost when we first started paying attention to price.  For me, even though I know an entree at a standard chain restaurant is going to be 11 or 12 dollars, in my head, I imagine it should be closer to $7, the price I remember from my early teens.","human_ref_B":"I agree with cyco's point that there is some room for \"bargaining\" between a buyer and a seller. Five Guys certainly isn't going to sell you food at cost; they wouldn't make any money. Thus they try to up the price as much as possible.  At the same time, you probably have some price above which you won't buy a burger from Five Guys. Below that price, you probably will. Five Guys knows this and has figured out that price, for the average person, from a lot of trial and error, and they price their burgers just below that.  Now comes a hard truth: you're pretty similar to everyone else, at least in terms of your taste for burgers. This implies that most people have that same \"reserve price\" in mind, too. Thus most people are paying almost as much as they're willing to for a burger when they go into Five Guys.  This is compounded by the fact that consumers have a *very* hard time collectively bargaining with a business to lower their price. If you don't like the price, you'll have a hard time convincing everybody to boycott until the price falls by $2, and Five Guys knows that.  tl;dr: aggregation and market power.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1331.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"v00kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Why does nearly everything feel overpriced? I know this is a complicated and subjective question, but I've noticed that it is very rare for me to exchange money for goods or services and feel like I got my full money's worth. In fact, any time you actually do get your money's worth on a purchase people proclaim what \"a great deal\" or \"a steal\" it is, because the converse is so much more common.  Example (in the US): I go to Five Guys and get a burger, fries and a drink. If you were to ask me what a good burger, fries and a drink should cost, I'd say about $8. However this would actually cost me closer to $11. If you go to McDonalds and get a shitty Big Mac, fries and a drink -- to me this inferior meal is worth about $5, but in actuality costs closer to $8.   It seems everything in the grocery store costs $1 to $4 more than it's worth, and the price\/value disparity seems to grow bigger with more expensive items. Do I just have a weird sense of value, or is there any statistical proof that an item is overpriced, and what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"c503njp","c_root_id_B":"c503eym","created_at_utc_A":1339608698,"created_at_utc_B":1339607841,"score_A":21,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I agree with cyco's point that there is some room for \"bargaining\" between a buyer and a seller. Five Guys certainly isn't going to sell you food at cost; they wouldn't make any money. Thus they try to up the price as much as possible.  At the same time, you probably have some price above which you won't buy a burger from Five Guys. Below that price, you probably will. Five Guys knows this and has figured out that price, for the average person, from a lot of trial and error, and they price their burgers just below that.  Now comes a hard truth: you're pretty similar to everyone else, at least in terms of your taste for burgers. This implies that most people have that same \"reserve price\" in mind, too. Thus most people are paying almost as much as they're willing to for a burger when they go into Five Guys.  This is compounded by the fact that consumers have a *very* hard time collectively bargaining with a business to lower their price. If you don't like the price, you'll have a hard time convincing everybody to boycott until the price falls by $2, and Five Guys knows that.  tl;dr: aggregation and market power.","human_ref_B":"Think of it this way: you have a maximum price that you're willing to pay for a burger. Five Guys has a minimum price at which they're willing to sell a burger. It's the job of Five Guys to get you to pay as much as possible without losing your business entirely.   So, when you get to Five Guys, your *preferred* price is around $8. However, considering the fact that you still buy the meal even when it costs ~$11, it follows that your maximum price is higher than $11. I would guess that part of the disappointment you feel is paying closer to your maximum.   As others have said, there's also the fact that the prices we grow up with influence what we think is \"fair.\"","labels":1,"seconds_difference":857.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"v00kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Why does nearly everything feel overpriced? I know this is a complicated and subjective question, but I've noticed that it is very rare for me to exchange money for goods or services and feel like I got my full money's worth. In fact, any time you actually do get your money's worth on a purchase people proclaim what \"a great deal\" or \"a steal\" it is, because the converse is so much more common.  Example (in the US): I go to Five Guys and get a burger, fries and a drink. If you were to ask me what a good burger, fries and a drink should cost, I'd say about $8. However this would actually cost me closer to $11. If you go to McDonalds and get a shitty Big Mac, fries and a drink -- to me this inferior meal is worth about $5, but in actuality costs closer to $8.   It seems everything in the grocery store costs $1 to $4 more than it's worth, and the price\/value disparity seems to grow bigger with more expensive items. Do I just have a weird sense of value, or is there any statistical proof that an item is overpriced, and what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"c503aay","c_root_id_B":"c506nau","created_at_utc_A":1339607367,"created_at_utc_B":1339619326,"score_A":7,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I am not going to get into the whole pricing question.....I only know about this from a marketing perspective, not an economic perspective.  However, while I understand why prices are set the way they are, I still have similar feelings to you and I think it's because we anchor our \"fair price\" on how much things cost when we first started paying attention to price.  For me, even though I know an entree at a standard chain restaurant is going to be 11 or 12 dollars, in my head, I imagine it should be closer to $7, the price I remember from my early teens.","human_ref_B":"There are a number of great points posted here but I would also like to highlight another common situation that affects both perceived and actual prices for individual consumers. Price discrimination is becoming both more common and more effective.  Simply put people with higher incomes pay more for things because they generally place a higher value on their time. Nearly every service or good that you are interested in can be purchased below retail price by watching for sales, couponing, or purchasing some other replacement good. When you do this you are effectively paying for part of the price of the item with your time rather than your income. Perhaps your perception of prices has changed with your income and you are no longer devoting as much time to reducing the cost of items, or as price discrimination has improved the retail value of items compared to your income has risen and you should reconsider how much time you are willing to spend to reduce the costs of the goods that you purchase.   Of course [incomes] (http:\/\/www.startribune.com\/nation\/158519085.html) have also fallen over the last several years so you really may be experiencing a very real loss of purchasing power.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11959.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"v00kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Why does nearly everything feel overpriced? I know this is a complicated and subjective question, but I've noticed that it is very rare for me to exchange money for goods or services and feel like I got my full money's worth. In fact, any time you actually do get your money's worth on a purchase people proclaim what \"a great deal\" or \"a steal\" it is, because the converse is so much more common.  Example (in the US): I go to Five Guys and get a burger, fries and a drink. If you were to ask me what a good burger, fries and a drink should cost, I'd say about $8. However this would actually cost me closer to $11. If you go to McDonalds and get a shitty Big Mac, fries and a drink -- to me this inferior meal is worth about $5, but in actuality costs closer to $8.   It seems everything in the grocery store costs $1 to $4 more than it's worth, and the price\/value disparity seems to grow bigger with more expensive items. Do I just have a weird sense of value, or is there any statistical proof that an item is overpriced, and what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"c506nau","c_root_id_B":"c503eym","created_at_utc_A":1339619326,"created_at_utc_B":1339607841,"score_A":9,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"There are a number of great points posted here but I would also like to highlight another common situation that affects both perceived and actual prices for individual consumers. Price discrimination is becoming both more common and more effective.  Simply put people with higher incomes pay more for things because they generally place a higher value on their time. Nearly every service or good that you are interested in can be purchased below retail price by watching for sales, couponing, or purchasing some other replacement good. When you do this you are effectively paying for part of the price of the item with your time rather than your income. Perhaps your perception of prices has changed with your income and you are no longer devoting as much time to reducing the cost of items, or as price discrimination has improved the retail value of items compared to your income has risen and you should reconsider how much time you are willing to spend to reduce the costs of the goods that you purchase.   Of course [incomes] (http:\/\/www.startribune.com\/nation\/158519085.html) have also fallen over the last several years so you really may be experiencing a very real loss of purchasing power.","human_ref_B":"Think of it this way: you have a maximum price that you're willing to pay for a burger. Five Guys has a minimum price at which they're willing to sell a burger. It's the job of Five Guys to get you to pay as much as possible without losing your business entirely.   So, when you get to Five Guys, your *preferred* price is around $8. However, considering the fact that you still buy the meal even when it costs ~$11, it follows that your maximum price is higher than $11. I would guess that part of the disappointment you feel is paying closer to your maximum.   As others have said, there's also the fact that the prices we grow up with influence what we think is \"fair.\"","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11485.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"v00kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Why does nearly everything feel overpriced? I know this is a complicated and subjective question, but I've noticed that it is very rare for me to exchange money for goods or services and feel like I got my full money's worth. In fact, any time you actually do get your money's worth on a purchase people proclaim what \"a great deal\" or \"a steal\" it is, because the converse is so much more common.  Example (in the US): I go to Five Guys and get a burger, fries and a drink. If you were to ask me what a good burger, fries and a drink should cost, I'd say about $8. However this would actually cost me closer to $11. If you go to McDonalds and get a shitty Big Mac, fries and a drink -- to me this inferior meal is worth about $5, but in actuality costs closer to $8.   It seems everything in the grocery store costs $1 to $4 more than it's worth, and the price\/value disparity seems to grow bigger with more expensive items. Do I just have a weird sense of value, or is there any statistical proof that an item is overpriced, and what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"c506nau","c_root_id_B":"c503zjy","created_at_utc_A":1339619326,"created_at_utc_B":1339609875,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There are a number of great points posted here but I would also like to highlight another common situation that affects both perceived and actual prices for individual consumers. Price discrimination is becoming both more common and more effective.  Simply put people with higher incomes pay more for things because they generally place a higher value on their time. Nearly every service or good that you are interested in can be purchased below retail price by watching for sales, couponing, or purchasing some other replacement good. When you do this you are effectively paying for part of the price of the item with your time rather than your income. Perhaps your perception of prices has changed with your income and you are no longer devoting as much time to reducing the cost of items, or as price discrimination has improved the retail value of items compared to your income has risen and you should reconsider how much time you are willing to spend to reduce the costs of the goods that you purchase.   Of course [incomes] (http:\/\/www.startribune.com\/nation\/158519085.html) have also fallen over the last several years so you really may be experiencing a very real loss of purchasing power.","human_ref_B":"May not be applicable to your example, but in other domains, the endowment effect probably explains some of this.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Endowment_effect","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9451.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"v00kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Why does nearly everything feel overpriced? I know this is a complicated and subjective question, but I've noticed that it is very rare for me to exchange money for goods or services and feel like I got my full money's worth. In fact, any time you actually do get your money's worth on a purchase people proclaim what \"a great deal\" or \"a steal\" it is, because the converse is so much more common.  Example (in the US): I go to Five Guys and get a burger, fries and a drink. If you were to ask me what a good burger, fries and a drink should cost, I'd say about $8. However this would actually cost me closer to $11. If you go to McDonalds and get a shitty Big Mac, fries and a drink -- to me this inferior meal is worth about $5, but in actuality costs closer to $8.   It seems everything in the grocery store costs $1 to $4 more than it's worth, and the price\/value disparity seems to grow bigger with more expensive items. Do I just have a weird sense of value, or is there any statistical proof that an item is overpriced, and what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"c506nau","c_root_id_B":"c505zyp","created_at_utc_A":1339619326,"created_at_utc_B":1339617071,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There are a number of great points posted here but I would also like to highlight another common situation that affects both perceived and actual prices for individual consumers. Price discrimination is becoming both more common and more effective.  Simply put people with higher incomes pay more for things because they generally place a higher value on their time. Nearly every service or good that you are interested in can be purchased below retail price by watching for sales, couponing, or purchasing some other replacement good. When you do this you are effectively paying for part of the price of the item with your time rather than your income. Perhaps your perception of prices has changed with your income and you are no longer devoting as much time to reducing the cost of items, or as price discrimination has improved the retail value of items compared to your income has risen and you should reconsider how much time you are willing to spend to reduce the costs of the goods that you purchase.   Of course [incomes] (http:\/\/www.startribune.com\/nation\/158519085.html) have also fallen over the last several years so you really may be experiencing a very real loss of purchasing power.","human_ref_B":"this phenomenon is known as anchoring, a cognitive bias we are all very susceptible to.  wherever your anchoring point is coming from seems to be particularly off--so is the fact that you are so sensitive to only a few dollars here and there (unless you live in extreme poverty).  the more one has to adjust from one's anchoring point, the better or worse the deal will seem.  it is possible and easy to readjust people's anchoring points, marketers do it all the time.  you could probably find a way to influence yourself consciously through some sort of cognitive behavioral therapy-like exercises.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2255.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"v00kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Why does nearly everything feel overpriced? I know this is a complicated and subjective question, but I've noticed that it is very rare for me to exchange money for goods or services and feel like I got my full money's worth. In fact, any time you actually do get your money's worth on a purchase people proclaim what \"a great deal\" or \"a steal\" it is, because the converse is so much more common.  Example (in the US): I go to Five Guys and get a burger, fries and a drink. If you were to ask me what a good burger, fries and a drink should cost, I'd say about $8. However this would actually cost me closer to $11. If you go to McDonalds and get a shitty Big Mac, fries and a drink -- to me this inferior meal is worth about $5, but in actuality costs closer to $8.   It seems everything in the grocery store costs $1 to $4 more than it's worth, and the price\/value disparity seems to grow bigger with more expensive items. Do I just have a weird sense of value, or is there any statistical proof that an item is overpriced, and what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"c509fx3","c_root_id_B":"c503zjy","created_at_utc_A":1339630189,"created_at_utc_B":1339609875,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Is a burger really only about $8 for you? Without Five Guys, you'd have to hunt an animal, kill it, clean it, grind it, and cook it. You think you can do that in 8 dollars' time?","human_ref_B":"May not be applicable to your example, but in other domains, the endowment effect probably explains some of this.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Endowment_effect","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20314.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"v00kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Why does nearly everything feel overpriced? I know this is a complicated and subjective question, but I've noticed that it is very rare for me to exchange money for goods or services and feel like I got my full money's worth. In fact, any time you actually do get your money's worth on a purchase people proclaim what \"a great deal\" or \"a steal\" it is, because the converse is so much more common.  Example (in the US): I go to Five Guys and get a burger, fries and a drink. If you were to ask me what a good burger, fries and a drink should cost, I'd say about $8. However this would actually cost me closer to $11. If you go to McDonalds and get a shitty Big Mac, fries and a drink -- to me this inferior meal is worth about $5, but in actuality costs closer to $8.   It seems everything in the grocery store costs $1 to $4 more than it's worth, and the price\/value disparity seems to grow bigger with more expensive items. Do I just have a weird sense of value, or is there any statistical proof that an item is overpriced, and what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"c505zyp","c_root_id_B":"c509fx3","created_at_utc_A":1339617071,"created_at_utc_B":1339630189,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"this phenomenon is known as anchoring, a cognitive bias we are all very susceptible to.  wherever your anchoring point is coming from seems to be particularly off--so is the fact that you are so sensitive to only a few dollars here and there (unless you live in extreme poverty).  the more one has to adjust from one's anchoring point, the better or worse the deal will seem.  it is possible and easy to readjust people's anchoring points, marketers do it all the time.  you could probably find a way to influence yourself consciously through some sort of cognitive behavioral therapy-like exercises.","human_ref_B":"Is a burger really only about $8 for you? Without Five Guys, you'd have to hunt an animal, kill it, clean it, grind it, and cook it. You think you can do that in 8 dollars' time?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13118.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"v00kn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Economics] Why does nearly everything feel overpriced? I know this is a complicated and subjective question, but I've noticed that it is very rare for me to exchange money for goods or services and feel like I got my full money's worth. In fact, any time you actually do get your money's worth on a purchase people proclaim what \"a great deal\" or \"a steal\" it is, because the converse is so much more common.  Example (in the US): I go to Five Guys and get a burger, fries and a drink. If you were to ask me what a good burger, fries and a drink should cost, I'd say about $8. However this would actually cost me closer to $11. If you go to McDonalds and get a shitty Big Mac, fries and a drink -- to me this inferior meal is worth about $5, but in actuality costs closer to $8.   It seems everything in the grocery store costs $1 to $4 more than it's worth, and the price\/value disparity seems to grow bigger with more expensive items. Do I just have a weird sense of value, or is there any statistical proof that an item is overpriced, and what causes it?","c_root_id_A":"c509fx3","c_root_id_B":"c506nbi","created_at_utc_A":1339630189,"created_at_utc_B":1339619329,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Is a burger really only about $8 for you? Without Five Guys, you'd have to hunt an animal, kill it, clean it, grind it, and cook it. You think you can do that in 8 dollars' time?","human_ref_B":"Maybe it's because the prices have actually gone up?  I certainly remember when a McDonald's meal was less than $5.  (Sure it was 20 years ago but that's when I last went to McDonald's on a regular basis.)    You're not only comparing Five Guys to McDonald's.  You're also comparing the prices to your entire history with these items.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10860.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"c9esde","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"where can i read about the history of classifying non-conformity as mental illness? like homosexuality, and being gender non-conforming","c_root_id_A":"esxd1g3","c_root_id_B":"esx5mv7","created_at_utc_A":1562328841,"created_at_utc_B":1562325729,"score_A":27,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"It is not uncommon for people to cite Foucault on the topic. However, it is debatable whether he can be considered a *historian*, rather than a philosopher who chose certain historical events and institutions to build a philosophical and critical narrative towards, for example, how psychiatrists and\/or psychologists build theories about people, and how society controls its members.  In fact, he is a contentious figure among historians and has been criticized for his choices in historical illustrations, and interpretations of facts and events, e.g.  >**Huppert** was driven to his \"thoughts on Foucault\" by the **dismayed realization that the historically illiterate were taking Foucault as a reliable guide to the European past**.  In fact, Foucault himself distanced himself from the label of historian:  >His attitude toward the discipline was one of wariness mixed with contempt. **\"I am not a professional historian; nobody is perfect,\" he once remarked**. In the Introduction to the second volume of his *Histoire de la sexualit\u00e9*, published just before his death, **he tells us that his works are studies of history but that he is not a historian**. In short he himself underlined his difference from disciplinary history, and rightly so, for he stands apart from the generally unquestioned conceptual and methodological assumptions that define its boundaries.  This is not to deny any value of his ideas, observations and criticisms, nor to ignore his contributions to the social sciences. But it is important to keep in mind that the history *Foucault* presents is not the same history *historians* present, as Foucault had other goals.  ---  In regard to recommending any text about the history of \"madness\" and how society reacted to what we might today consider mental disorders, I would suggest trying to ask \/r\/AskHistorians if their rules permit it.  Per your reference to how homosexuality, you could check Rachel Cooper's analysis of the DSM and what are its philosophical underpinnings (e.g. its epistemology of mental illness), which she situates historically, specifically in what context the American Psychiatric Association engaged with the issue of homosexuality, what led to its removal and how the definition of mental disorder was changed to avoid similar occurrencesm by adding the *harm criterion*. She also wrote a book about \"diagnosing the diagnostic manual\". But, these are not history papers either, although Cooper does describe the history of the DSM to explain the ideas behind it.","human_ref_B":"Foucault wrote 2 immense books about that, I just know the titles in French but that might help you to find them : Histoire de la sexualit\u00e9 and Histoire de la folie \u00e0 l'\u00e2ge classique.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3112.0,"score_ratio":6.75}
{"post_id":"2tu7sw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"If someone publicly announces \"Racism is awesome and murdering minorities is okay\" and the police put him on a list, is that a violation of free speech? I like free speech, but I'm a little fuzzy on what 'free speech' means exactly. Also, I'm frustrated with people who say things I don't like.","c_root_id_A":"co2dmje","c_root_id_B":"co2eeo0","created_at_utc_A":1422370171,"created_at_utc_B":1422371769,"score_A":9,"score_B":42,"human_ref_A":"Are you asking about the law, and if so, in which country?      Edit: just for a quick example, I'm from Canada, and here the main limit on free speech is when someone \"advocates or promotes genocide,\" (see the Criminal Code). Genocide here is defined as the destruction of an identifiable group, or the killing of members of that group. So \"racism is awesome\" would be protected speech, whereas \"murdering minorities is okay\" is much closer to crossing the line.    Or are you asking about the principle of free speech? If so, this is probably a question for \/r\/philosophy.","human_ref_B":"Assuming you're talking about \"free speech\" in the U.S., this comes about from the First Amendment to the Constitution.  > **Congress shall make no law** respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or **abridging the freedom of speech**, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.  Interpreted strictly, this means only that the federal government (and, as pointed out by \/u\/tiberius-claudius, state governments too) cannot make a law that punishes you for something you said.   This has no bearing on *noting* what someone says and taking a keener interest in their activities as a result. If people say something along the lines of your topic, for example, the police keeping an eye on this individual to ensure they do not take violent action against the targeted groups, or otherwise violate the law in such a way, is not impinging their ability to say whatever they wish without legal repercussion. No repercussion, other than being scrutinized more closely, has occurred.   It's important to note that this all deals with federal law and has nothing to do with corporate policy (i.e. firing someone for saying something) or being entitled to say whatever you want without consequence. If someone says something bone-headed like the above, their peers coming down hard on them is perfectly justified and cries of \"freedom of speech\" are entirely meaningless. Individuals may say whatever they want; they then get to accept the social and economic consequences that befall them as a result. They are only granted *legal* \"immunity\" by the First Amendment. And there are quite a few exceptions to that immunity, too.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1598.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"29n23r","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Was there significant crime increase during 9\/11? Seeing as how the police were preoccupied. Bonus question were there any other significant events that took place during that time that might have been overshadowed.","c_root_id_A":"cimw67w","c_root_id_B":"cimtwj8","created_at_utc_A":1404330604,"created_at_utc_B":1404326220,"score_A":8,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"NY has some data on overall crime by year. Major felony offenses in NY decreased pretty significantly in 2001, and continued to decrease all the way up until 2010. Non-major felonies also decreased in 2001. Misdemeanor offenses dropped. Violations went up.      The data only goes back to 2000, so it's hard to say that some of it wasn't already on the decline. This doesn't say that because of 9\/11 crime decreased, but it does show that, generally, people were arrested less in 2001.","human_ref_B":"For New York City, they're computerized collection of crime statistics (CompSTAT) goes back to 1995, but only the most recent week is kept on the nyc.gov website (http:\/\/www.nyc.gov\/html\/nypd\/downloads\/pdf\/crime_statistics\/cscity.pdf)  It appears that they were publishing this weekly info since at least March 2001 (see http:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20010306144520\/http:\/\/www.nyc.gov\/html\/nypd\/html\/pct\/cspdf.html) but the data's not actually there.  Anybody got ideas on digging these up?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4384.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"26fpb8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What do the social sciences have to say about the viability (or the lack thereof) of anarchy? I'd love to hear more about social science findings that shed light on whether anarchy is a stable way of organising societies (or not).  I think that political discussions are necessarily impoverished when the parties involved lack extensive knowledge of various fields, and this is why I am turning to all the learned scholars here. Thank you in advance for your insights!","c_root_id_A":"chqoxh8","c_root_id_B":"chqrpjd","created_at_utc_A":1401026764,"created_at_utc_B":1401035117,"score_A":5,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"This response may be more abstract than you were hoping for- but I believe it at least partially addresses your question. If we consider people actors making a number of decisions that have an assumption of rational choices, Anarchy does not bode well.  First the set up. The way I am approaching this question is game theoretic (think beautiful mind \/ john nash) - which inherently assumes that decisions made by disputants (people) in each interaction follow some preference. These preferences are at least somewhat opposed, some of the time, and disputants are rational.  Rational here means given the same information and scenario, they will make the same choice again. I'd recommend either of these two websites for an accessible introduction to game theory click or click and obviously the wiki click.  With that out of the way, we now define the boundaries of our interaction (or game). People will interact with each other in life an unknown number of times, and many of these interactions will be what we call 'zero sum games'. These zero sum games mean that the total amount of benefit from each interaction is limited. Think of it like resources. There are only so many jobs in your field, so much grain at a market, so many of x product at a given time that you are competing for.  In each of these interactions, a person can cooperate with others, or defect. Cooperation in a zero sum game distributes resources between parties, but everyone gets some. Defection, if successful, maximizes resources for the self, but if too many people defect the system doesn't work.  An easy example to think of this is driving your car. If everyone waits 3 seconds after a light turns green before they start driving through an intersection, they all are cooperating for safety. A defector would exploit this, and know he \/ she could run any red light by 3 seconds and incur very little chance of harm for doing so. However, as more and more people defect, the risk \/ danger of running red lights goes up.   So in this scenario, the resource is time saved. If everyone cooperates, they save the same amount of time - but defectors, when successful save more. However, if two or more people defect at the same instance, they both lose out as they have to spend a significant amount of time dealing with a car accident.  Now the kink in this setup is how many times you will interact with someone. If you know you will only interact with someone X times, it is in your best interest as a rational actor to defect, depending on the game payouts. This click is a great resource to see how different game theory games are played in real life scenarios. Here is a list of different games in a more abstract setting click  Societal rules and laws are by in large part, intended to make the cost of defection in interactions higher than the cost of cooperation. In other words, governments etc try to cook the books such that defection always has a higher cost, not just when too many defectors are in a system.  If we go back to our car example, people driving who run red lights run the risk of tickets, losing licenses, and getting the car towed in addition to the risk of an accident. These are additional societal constraints that exist because we as a group are trying to tip the scales towards cooperation.  Applying these concepts to other resources from driving and you would get resource hoarding, violence, and a number of other negative consequences that the removal of a societal structure would make into rational choices during interactions.   Hopefully this helped.","human_ref_B":"A few thoughts:  Robert Nozick is probably the most helpful. In anarchy state and utopia he argues for the minarchist state. According to Nozick a true anarchist state is impossible because people will band together for protection, leading others to sell protective services. Eventually one group will have exclusive rights to legitimate enforcement, causing that group to become the de facto government.   Nozick builds off of the literature on the state of nature.   You may want to look at political philosophy regarding the state of nature. Locke, Rousseau, and of course Hobbes all have different ideas about man in the state of nature, whether it is brutal nasty and short (Hobbes) or communal and moral (Rousseau).  Each explains why states began to form in their own way.  Finally, many IR scholars, like Kenneth Waltz, argue that the international world is in a perpetual state of anarchy (there is no international sovereign).  This is permanent because no state will relinquish sovereignty to another body. This is debated as states sign on to and enforce international laws and organizations.  Also Alexander Wendt argues that anarchy only exists between states because they choose to let anarchy exist and perpetuate anarchy as a norm (anarchy is what states make it).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8353.0,"score_ratio":2.2}
{"post_id":"1ph29c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What findings in social science have a clear application to aid the problems of developing countries, but aren't being utilized to their full potential? I asked a similar question to r\/askscience about technologies, but I am also interested what we have learned in the social sciences that could be used to benefit these \"3rd world\" countries","c_root_id_A":"cd2five","c_root_id_B":"cd2g32e","created_at_utc_A":1383083169,"created_at_utc_B":1383084490,"score_A":11,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Make a special emphasis on young girls of the third world and help facilitate their education and safety. According to studies, it has a very strong return on investment.   Link","human_ref_B":"I'll provide a radical perspective.  The most radical social scientists in 'development studies' question why these 'third world' countries are 'poor' and why they are 'developing' constantly.  A radical perspective views the global system as a whole - these countries are 'poor' or 'developing' exactly because we (the West) are rich. If you look into the history of globalisation you will see a concentration of resources towards the West; this begun through colonialisation and continues through the neo-liberalism of globalisation (global capitalism).   These countries are poor and developing because we are empoverishing them and ensuring they are constantly developing but never allowed to obtain true development (for example, assassinating elected leaders, or military intervention that stops natural processes of democratization).  So for radical social scientists the focus is not on developing countries and it certainly isn't on technologies that seem to offer the answer but never will. Instead the focus is on the exploiters and how our actions must be changed and how the 'third world' can be enabled\/allowed to find their own emanciaption.  see:  The Development Dictionary - Sachs  Post-Development  Neo-Colonialism  Dependency Theory  Edit: if you're going to downvote at least let me know what you're thinking :)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1321.0,"score_ratio":1.4545454545}
{"post_id":"1ph29c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What findings in social science have a clear application to aid the problems of developing countries, but aren't being utilized to their full potential? I asked a similar question to r\/askscience about technologies, but I am also interested what we have learned in the social sciences that could be used to benefit these \"3rd world\" countries","c_root_id_A":"cd2izvh","c_root_id_B":"cd2nwub","created_at_utc_A":1383091591,"created_at_utc_B":1383103570,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"This is an evidence based research database that has amazing potential for arguing for progressive human rights reform, but as far as I know, only people using it are the people working in the department that developed it  - University of Denver\/Korbel School of International Studies","human_ref_B":"This post is on the abstract side, so bear with me.   I think when everyone asks, \"why are poor countries poor?\" They are asking the wrong question. Poverty is the rule; wealth is the exception. The vast, vast majority of all people (99%) who have ever lived, lived at or near subsistence levels, and worked in agriculture. They lacked the even most basic of modern luxuries. Most of the people alive today (70-90%) live in these same or similar conditions. All of our evolutionary ancestors, from primates back to the primordial ooze, lived in what we would consider poverty. Poverty is the natural state of existence. It is *wealth* which is the exception and which needs an explanation.   I think this is and important distinction because there's a tendency for activists in the 1st world to look at poor countries and assume that they can simply impose a few characteristics to make them more like rich countries and the wealth will appear spontaneously, from some mechanical process. It's not that easy. Creating wealth is *hard*, as most people who have tried to get rich can probably attest. Trying to jump the gun, and push poor countries straight to first-world status, will almost certainly not work. You can accelerate and ease their development with improved\/cheaper technology, but in all probability just implementing some concrete institutions, while helpful, are not quite enough. The intangibles, such as the attitudes and habits of the people, are quite important.   If you want some hard data, I recommend Charles Murray's *Coming Apart*. It is entirely about Americans, but I think the implications about the intangibles I mentioned above are generally instructive.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11979.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1ph29c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What findings in social science have a clear application to aid the problems of developing countries, but aren't being utilized to their full potential? I asked a similar question to r\/askscience about technologies, but I am also interested what we have learned in the social sciences that could be used to benefit these \"3rd world\" countries","c_root_id_A":"cd2jj9z","c_root_id_B":"cd2nwub","created_at_utc_A":1383092897,"created_at_utc_B":1383103570,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Two interventions that have been proven (via RCT) to work are de-worming and provision of safe water dispensers. Evidence Action is working to provide these at scale.","human_ref_B":"This post is on the abstract side, so bear with me.   I think when everyone asks, \"why are poor countries poor?\" They are asking the wrong question. Poverty is the rule; wealth is the exception. The vast, vast majority of all people (99%) who have ever lived, lived at or near subsistence levels, and worked in agriculture. They lacked the even most basic of modern luxuries. Most of the people alive today (70-90%) live in these same or similar conditions. All of our evolutionary ancestors, from primates back to the primordial ooze, lived in what we would consider poverty. Poverty is the natural state of existence. It is *wealth* which is the exception and which needs an explanation.   I think this is and important distinction because there's a tendency for activists in the 1st world to look at poor countries and assume that they can simply impose a few characteristics to make them more like rich countries and the wealth will appear spontaneously, from some mechanical process. It's not that easy. Creating wealth is *hard*, as most people who have tried to get rich can probably attest. Trying to jump the gun, and push poor countries straight to first-world status, will almost certainly not work. You can accelerate and ease their development with improved\/cheaper technology, but in all probability just implementing some concrete institutions, while helpful, are not quite enough. The intangibles, such as the attitudes and habits of the people, are quite important.   If you want some hard data, I recommend Charles Murray's *Coming Apart*. It is entirely about Americans, but I think the implications about the intangibles I mentioned above are generally instructive.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10673.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"25mh0q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What are the effects on consumption due to increase in availabilty of alternative goods? I live in Norway, and as some of you may be aware of, we have pretty strict alcohol laws, with a pretty significant tax. We also have very strict import quotas, which are limited to 1L of spirit, 1,5L of wine and 2L of beer. These are interchangeable, so you could for example buy 3L of wine, instead of spirits and beer.  Recently, our goverment made it possible to also substitute tobacco with alcohol. So instead of the 200 cigarettes you are allowed to bring, you could bring an extra 2 liters of wine.  Would it be possible to convert this increase in supply, into an estimated decline in alcohol price, compared to the prices of taxed alcoholic beverages?  I kind of got lost in my own question, but this is the only way I could explain it.  I want to estimate the effects on total consumption of alcohol. I know that the price elasticity of wine and spirits is about -1,25 (between -1 and -1,5), and if I could somehow convert this increase in supply to an estimated decrease in price, I could use the price elasticity to estimate an increase in total consumption.","c_root_id_A":"chirrjy","c_root_id_B":"chir69v","created_at_utc_A":1400175099,"created_at_utc_B":1400173913,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You would also need a cross-price elasticity between alcohol and cigarettes.  They tend (from what I surmise) to be complementary, so the substitution effect would be small.","human_ref_B":"If the supply of alcohol increases, then *either* the price will fall *or* the demand will increase (or some balanced combination of the two). It sounds like you're expecting both?  Also, do you have any statistics for how much alcohol is imported by individuals vs sold domestically? As a North American I have trouble imagining it'll be enough to have an observable impact on the market.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1186.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"12d5t9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Which modern economies (countries) do you find most interesting\/fascinating\/positively shocking?","c_root_id_A":"c6u9jms","c_root_id_B":"c6ughtq","created_at_utc_A":1351667234,"created_at_utc_B":1351707802,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Probably Bhutan because of their Gross National Happiness Index. It just boggles my mind that they have incorporated psychological well-being into their measurement of progress. Seems so much more holistic than the rest of the world.","human_ref_B":"the sheer stubborn persistence of North Korea towards achieving their goal of being the worst place in the world.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":40568.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"kgyh9z","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What's the effect of corporate takeover defenses, such as poison pills? What's the effect of corporate takeover defenses, such as poison pills?   Do they maximize shareholder value, or do they exacerbate principal agent problems?","c_root_id_A":"ggio2e8","c_root_id_B":"ggkh75o","created_at_utc_A":1608498604,"created_at_utc_B":1608538023,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Could you clarify what you mean by \u201cpoison pills\u201d in the corporate takeover context? Do you have an example?","human_ref_B":"This question has been the subject of heated debate among economists since the hostile takeover of Revlon in the 80s, with arguments for both positions you mention.  A recent paper, Do Takeover Laws Matter? by Cain, McKeon, and Solomon (Journal of Financial Economics, 2017), looks at the impact of takeover laws on hostile takeovers.  They find that laws about poison pills specifically do not have much impact, but other laws do, and that legal regimes that make hostile takeovers easier increase firm value.  The paper has an extensive literature survey.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":39419.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"4dhust","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Who are some prominent social scientists who serve in the U.S. government? Are they usually in visible positions, or do they tend to stay in the back ground as advisers? I've researched this a little bit, but I would like to know your opinion!","c_root_id_A":"d1s5pay","c_root_id_B":"d1s0uxl","created_at_utc_A":1459953990,"created_at_utc_B":1459946066,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Almost certainly it's Janet Yellen.","human_ref_B":"Condoleezza Rice has a PhD in political science.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7924.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"4dhust","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Who are some prominent social scientists who serve in the U.S. government? Are they usually in visible positions, or do they tend to stay in the back ground as advisers? I've researched this a little bit, but I would like to know your opinion!","c_root_id_A":"d1s4c3i","c_root_id_B":"d1s5pay","created_at_utc_A":1459952053,"created_at_utc_B":1459953990,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Cass Sunstein worked in the government for a while.","human_ref_B":"Almost certainly it's Janet Yellen.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1937.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"4dhust","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Who are some prominent social scientists who serve in the U.S. government? Are they usually in visible positions, or do they tend to stay in the back ground as advisers? I've researched this a little bit, but I would like to know your opinion!","c_root_id_A":"d1t2287","c_root_id_B":"d1s0uxl","created_at_utc_A":1459997252,"created_at_utc_B":1459946066,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Michelle Obama was a sociology major as an undergraduate. So there's that.   The Census Bureau is made up almost entirely of social scientists.","human_ref_B":"Condoleezza Rice has a PhD in political science.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":51186.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"4dhust","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Who are some prominent social scientists who serve in the U.S. government? Are they usually in visible positions, or do they tend to stay in the back ground as advisers? I've researched this a little bit, but I would like to know your opinion!","c_root_id_A":"d1t2287","c_root_id_B":"d1s4c3i","created_at_utc_A":1459997252,"created_at_utc_B":1459952053,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Michelle Obama was a sociology major as an undergraduate. So there's that.   The Census Bureau is made up almost entirely of social scientists.","human_ref_B":"Cass Sunstein worked in the government for a while.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":45199.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"4nptuh","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"When and why do social scientists use log scales I noticed that in some instances (the popular science talks on why we might not be doomed by Hans Rosling, stick out for me) data like global income distribution is represented using a log scale.   Now I know that it makes sense to use log scale for doing stuff like plotting the progress of an exponential process.  But what are other reasons to use one, like in the casw as above?","c_root_id_A":"d45zeuz","c_root_id_B":"d45yl82","created_at_utc_A":1465740871,"created_at_utc_B":1465739093,"score_A":31,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Log scales are useful for describing phenomena where changes occur mainly multiplicatively instead of additively.  To construct a silly example, let's say we're playing a gambling game where everyone flips a coin and if they win, they gain $10, otherwise they lose $10. If you wanted to plot the final distribution of winnings, a linear scale is appropriate. If you played for 10 rounds, the largest possible value (if everyone starts at $0) is $100, so you can imagine a histogram with x-ticks for each $10.  If instead, the gambling game had you double your money if you won, and halve your money if you lost, then with 10 rounds if you start with $1 then the largest possible winnings is 2^10. If you wanted to depict the actual winnings value, again a linear scale is appropriate, but if you wanted to depict the number of win events minus the number of loss events, then a log scale is appropriate, with base 2. In a log scale, the largest x-tick would be 10, representing 10 wins and 0 losses.  Many real-world phenomena increase\/decrease multiplicatively rather than linearly (ie, many real-world phenomena are described well by exponential functions), and log scale plots are useful for depicting multiplicatively changing phenomena when you care more about the number of \"change events\" rather than the actual value. It turns out this is often the case, so log-plots are quite useful.","human_ref_B":"I'm a mathematician, not a social scientist, but in general one good reason to use a log scale is that it allows you to graph data of different orders of magnitude on the same axis.  For example, this graph shows world population growth on each continent starting from 1950, and without the logarithmic scale on the vertical axis it would be essentially impossible to show population growth for oceania, north america, and the entire world on the same graph.  Similarly, this graph of the phases of water uses a logarithmic scale for pressure on the vertical axis so that the diagram can usefully include pressures from  1 Pa to 1 TPa.  Without the logarithmic scale, the details of the picture below the 10 GPa line would occupy only the bottom 1% of the plot, which would make it impossible to see most of what's going on.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1778.0,"score_ratio":2.2142857143}
{"post_id":"xj1frt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Evolutionary psychology book recommendations? Hi! For a long time now I've been explaining some of my own and others' behaviour with evolutionary psychology. It often seems intuitive and is satisfying in the sense that you feel like you understand the underlying cause of some behaviour.   However, since I know that it's often just and illusion I'd be super interested to read something that would discuss the limitations and legitimate uses of evolutionary psychology. Preferably a somewhat easy read, without a ton of jargon and overdramatic sentences.  Thanks to all of you!","c_root_id_A":"ip7ma5m","c_root_id_B":"ip7fa3j","created_at_utc_A":1663690769,"created_at_utc_B":1663688109,"score_A":8,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy has an entry on Evolutionary Psychology. I would hesitate to call it an \"easy\" read, but I would say it's clearly and soberly written (i.e., \"without a ton of jargon and overdramatic sentences).  A book I'd recommend is Laland and Brown's *Sense and Nonsense: Evolutionary perspectives on human behaviour* which explores five approaches which attempt to study human behavior by applying evolutionary theory: human sociobiology, human behavioural ecology, evolutionary psychology, cultural evolution, and gene-culture coevolution. This book should fit your requirements, with the added value of introducing you to other perspectives besides Evolutionary Psychology. To quote the authors:  >Our intention is that this introductory book will be of use to undergraduate and postgraduate students (for example, in zoology, anthropology, and psychology) and to experts on one approach who would like to know more about the other perspectives, but also to lay persons interested in evolutionary explanations of human behaviour. We have tried to write the text so that anyone interested in this subject area will find the material easy to comprehend. Our intention is not to provide a textbook review of the whole subject area, but rather to give a taste of the various options. For readers who would like to know more about a particular perspective, further reading is provided at the end of the book.  For an openly critical book about Evolutionary Psychology, I'd point you toward Richardson's *Evolutionary Psychology as Maladapted Psychology*.  There are other authors and publications I could recommend, but I'll avoid dumping them all here. I'd say these three works are good entry points to the debates around EP and its status and place within the social and behavioral sciences.","human_ref_B":"These Stanford lectures are some of my favorite on evolutionary biology. Excellent professor imo. They touch on psychology quite a bit, the lectures are titled pretty well so if your not interested in the whole series it should be easy to pick the ones you are and check em out. https:\/\/youtube.com\/playlist?list=PLqeYp3nxIYpF7dW7qK8OvLsVomHrnYNjD","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2660.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"qn00lg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"What book\/author on \"digital ethnography\" methodologies would you recommend to an undergrad student? I'm planning on writing my undergrad theses on online communities and was wondering if you guys could give me some directions.","c_root_id_A":"hje2dgg","c_root_id_B":"hjd5cfd","created_at_utc_A":1636098959,"created_at_utc_B":1636077799,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Just to clarify something. Despite the name, digital ethnography involves using digital media in situ to conduct ethnographies, often of people using digital media. What you are describing is variously called 'online ethnography', 'embodied virtual ethnography', or 'netnography' and the study of online communities and their behaviours, including forum-squatting, spending time on reddit, and other similar practices. The distinction is of course blurry for obvious reasons, but I thought it would be worth bringing up in the event that you struggle to find sources when you search.  Some suggestions along these lines:  * Coleman, G 2010. \u2018Ethnographic Approaches to Digital Media\u2019, Annual Review of Anthropology, Vol. 39(1), pp 487-505. * Murthy, D 2008. \u2018Digital Ethnography: An Examination of the Use of New Technologies for Social Research\u2019 Sociology, Vol. 42(5), pp 837-855 * Postill, J and Pink S 2012. \u2018Social Media Ethnography: the digital researcher in a messy web, Media International Australia, Vol. 145, pp 123-134 * Teli, M, Pisanu F and Hakken D 2007. \u2018The Internet as a Library-of-People: For a Cyberethnography of Online Groups\u2019, Forum: Qualitative Social   Research, Vol. 8(3). Available from: http:\/\/www.qualitative-research.net\/index.php\/fqs\/article\/view\/283\/621\/","human_ref_B":"I can't speak well enough of \"Ethnography and Virtual Worlds\" by Boellstorff, Nardi, Pearce, and Taylor. These are some huge names in digital media research (as far as the social sciences like sociology and economy) so you double up in getting familiar with some of the main authors you will be citing as a upperclass undergraduate and as a graduate student.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21160.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"qn00lg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"What book\/author on \"digital ethnography\" methodologies would you recommend to an undergrad student? I'm planning on writing my undergrad theses on online communities and was wondering if you guys could give me some directions.","c_root_id_A":"hjd0ude","c_root_id_B":"hje2dgg","created_at_utc_A":1636075765,"created_at_utc_B":1636098959,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Kozinets","human_ref_B":"Just to clarify something. Despite the name, digital ethnography involves using digital media in situ to conduct ethnographies, often of people using digital media. What you are describing is variously called 'online ethnography', 'embodied virtual ethnography', or 'netnography' and the study of online communities and their behaviours, including forum-squatting, spending time on reddit, and other similar practices. The distinction is of course blurry for obvious reasons, but I thought it would be worth bringing up in the event that you struggle to find sources when you search.  Some suggestions along these lines:  * Coleman, G 2010. \u2018Ethnographic Approaches to Digital Media\u2019, Annual Review of Anthropology, Vol. 39(1), pp 487-505. * Murthy, D 2008. \u2018Digital Ethnography: An Examination of the Use of New Technologies for Social Research\u2019 Sociology, Vol. 42(5), pp 837-855 * Postill, J and Pink S 2012. \u2018Social Media Ethnography: the digital researcher in a messy web, Media International Australia, Vol. 145, pp 123-134 * Teli, M, Pisanu F and Hakken D 2007. \u2018The Internet as a Library-of-People: For a Cyberethnography of Online Groups\u2019, Forum: Qualitative Social   Research, Vol. 8(3). Available from: http:\/\/www.qualitative-research.net\/index.php\/fqs\/article\/view\/283\/621\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23194.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"qn00lg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"What book\/author on \"digital ethnography\" methodologies would you recommend to an undergrad student? I'm planning on writing my undergrad theses on online communities and was wondering if you guys could give me some directions.","c_root_id_A":"hjd0ude","c_root_id_B":"hjd5cfd","created_at_utc_A":1636075765,"created_at_utc_B":1636077799,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Kozinets","human_ref_B":"I can't speak well enough of \"Ethnography and Virtual Worlds\" by Boellstorff, Nardi, Pearce, and Taylor. These are some huge names in digital media research (as far as the social sciences like sociology and economy) so you double up in getting familiar with some of the main authors you will be citing as a upperclass undergraduate and as a graduate student.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2034.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9bpry3","c_root_id_B":"c9bpcnc","created_at_utc_A":1365530211,"created_at_utc_B":1365529078,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Nate Silver recently wrote a book, \"The Signal and the Noise\". Although I haven't read it yet, it's probably worth checking out.","human_ref_B":"Damned Lies and Statistics by Joel Best is entertaining and basic.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1133.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9bow3d","c_root_id_B":"c9bpry3","created_at_utc_A":1365527851,"created_at_utc_B":1365530211,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I recommend \"Proofiness\" by Charles Seife for some recreational reading on the subject. It's a pretty quick read.","human_ref_B":"Nate Silver recently wrote a book, \"The Signal and the Noise\". Although I haven't read it yet, it's probably worth checking out.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2360.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9bpcnc","c_root_id_B":"c9bow3d","created_at_utc_A":1365529078,"created_at_utc_B":1365527851,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Damned Lies and Statistics by Joel Best is entertaining and basic.","human_ref_B":"I recommend \"Proofiness\" by Charles Seife for some recreational reading on the subject. It's a pretty quick read.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1227.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9ca0po","c_root_id_B":"c9bow3d","created_at_utc_A":1365598994,"created_at_utc_B":1365527851,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Second Signal and the Noise. I'd also check out \"Mostly Harmless Econometrics\". The first section of each chapter is appropriate for a general audience, but it also does eventually math itself up.","human_ref_B":"I recommend \"Proofiness\" by Charles Seife for some recreational reading on the subject. It's a pretty quick read.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":71143.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9ca0po","c_root_id_B":"c9bpsv8","created_at_utc_A":1365598994,"created_at_utc_B":1365530278,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Second Signal and the Noise. I'd also check out \"Mostly Harmless Econometrics\". The first section of each chapter is appropriate for a general audience, but it also does eventually math itself up.","human_ref_B":"As a last resort, you could try looking at AP Statistics books if you really need to cram the information in. They cover the standard basics in a very organized manner.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":68716.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9ca0po","c_root_id_B":"c9bqkg2","created_at_utc_A":1365598994,"created_at_utc_B":1365532268,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Second Signal and the Noise. I'd also check out \"Mostly Harmless Econometrics\". The first section of each chapter is appropriate for a general audience, but it also does eventually math itself up.","human_ref_B":"The Lady Drinking Tea (historical)  Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics (classic)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":66726.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9ca0po","c_root_id_B":"c9br41e","created_at_utc_A":1365598994,"created_at_utc_B":1365533656,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Second Signal and the Noise. I'd also check out \"Mostly Harmless Econometrics\". The first section of each chapter is appropriate for a general audience, but it also does eventually math itself up.","human_ref_B":"Khan Academy","labels":1,"seconds_difference":65338.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9buqjk","c_root_id_B":"c9ca0po","created_at_utc_A":1365542561,"created_at_utc_B":1365598994,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Cartoon Guide to Statistics by Larry Gonick","human_ref_B":"Second Signal and the Noise. I'd also check out \"Mostly Harmless Econometrics\". The first section of each chapter is appropriate for a general audience, but it also does eventually math itself up.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":56433.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9ca0po","c_root_id_B":"c9bx6hx","created_at_utc_A":1365598994,"created_at_utc_B":1365548914,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Second Signal and the Noise. I'd also check out \"Mostly Harmless Econometrics\". The first section of each chapter is appropriate for a general audience, but it also does eventually math itself up.","human_ref_B":"Je\ufb00 Gill. Essential Mathematics for Political and Social Research. 2006, Cambridge University Press.  This will prep you pretty well.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":50080.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9bxbgb","c_root_id_B":"c9ca0po","created_at_utc_A":1365549281,"created_at_utc_B":1365598994,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"This was just reviewed in the economist:  http:\/\/www.economist.com\/news\/books-and-arts\/21573958-accessible-primer-number-crunching-joy-stats","human_ref_B":"Second Signal and the Noise. I'd also check out \"Mostly Harmless Econometrics\". The first section of each chapter is appropriate for a general audience, but it also does eventually math itself up.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":49713.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9ca0po","c_root_id_B":"c9by0fz","created_at_utc_A":1365598994,"created_at_utc_B":1365551135,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Second Signal and the Noise. I'd also check out \"Mostly Harmless Econometrics\". The first section of each chapter is appropriate for a general audience, but it also does eventually math itself up.","human_ref_B":"I'd strongly recommend *The Fundamentals of Political Science Research* by Kellstedt and Whitten (ISBN: 978-0521697880). It sounds perfect for what you are looking for. It is an actual introductory statistics textbook, but I found it to be very well-written and extremely readable. It has plenty on \"general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research\", but it also gets into some of the basic math stuff, so I think it might be a good start. It's also pretty cheap for a textbook.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":47859.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1bzs6w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendations for statistics books intended for a general audience? I'm going back to school for my Master's this fall, and I know Statistics will be one of the required classes. The course syllabus is not online yet, but my understanding is that it will include general statistics principles as well as how they relate specifically to political science and public policy research.  I'd like to prepare for this course as much as possible, especially considering I haven't taken a math class since AP Calculus!  I imagine some sort of Intro to Statistics text will be assigned, so I was hoping I could at least get a handle on the subject by reading a more layman-focused book.   Are there any pop-statisticians out there along the lines of, say, what Dan Ariely does for behavioral econ? (I happen to be reading *Predictably Irrational* at the moment.)  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c9ca0po","c_root_id_B":"c9bzv4q","created_at_utc_A":1365598994,"created_at_utc_B":1365556112,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Second Signal and the Noise. I'd also check out \"Mostly Harmless Econometrics\". The first section of each chapter is appropriate for a general audience, but it also does eventually math itself up.","human_ref_B":"We're using *Benefits of Social Statistics for a Diverse Society* by Leon-Gurerro & Frankfort-Nachmias from Sage Publications in my master's-level Stats class. It's a solid textbook that would be useful in understanding things.   Otherwise, as others have suggested, *The Signal and the Noise* by Nate Silver was really enjoyable to read. And *Damned Lies and Statistics* by Joel Best was also really useful.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":42882.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"belmw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Can anyone recommend a good and relatively objective book about central banks; the history, function, pros and cons, case studies, etc.? Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"el6xjho","c_root_id_B":"el817pu","created_at_utc_A":1555601170,"created_at_utc_B":1555626264,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Theory-Monetary-Institutions-Lawrence-White\/dp\/0631212140  https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Monetary-1867-1960-National-Economic-Publications\/dp\/0691003548\/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1I2H70WSYRZA8&keywords=a+monetary+history+of+the+united+states&qid=1555601092&s=books&sprefix=a+monetary%2Cstripbooks%2C140&sr=1-1  https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/History-Federal-Reserve-1913-1951-v\/dp\/0226520005\/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_3?keywords=a+history+of+the+federal+reserve+meltzer&qid=1555601148&s=books&sr=1-3-fkmrnull","human_ref_B":"The Ascent of Money does a good job of describing the history of banking, including central banks. Along the way you'll hear lots of pros and cons described in case studies.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25094.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"belmw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Can anyone recommend a good and relatively objective book about central banks; the history, function, pros and cons, case studies, etc.? Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"el817pu","c_root_id_B":"el7cuzu","created_at_utc_A":1555626264,"created_at_utc_B":1555610791,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The Ascent of Money does a good job of describing the history of banking, including central banks. Along the way you'll hear lots of pros and cons described in case studies.","human_ref_B":"\u201cThe End of Alchemy\u201d by Mervyn King is a good read about central banking and the future of the economy.   I highly recommend you check it out.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15473.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"belmw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Can anyone recommend a good and relatively objective book about central banks; the history, function, pros and cons, case studies, etc.? Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"el817pu","c_root_id_B":"el6rgqx","created_at_utc_A":1555626264,"created_at_utc_B":1555597135,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The Ascent of Money does a good job of describing the history of banking, including central banks. Along the way you'll hear lots of pros and cons described in case studies.","human_ref_B":"I like the book \"Other People's Money\". It's not directly related to the history, but does certainly tap into the other issues you mention.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29129.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"belmw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Can anyone recommend a good and relatively objective book about central banks; the history, function, pros and cons, case studies, etc.? Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"el7btai","c_root_id_B":"el817pu","created_at_utc_A":1555610159,"created_at_utc_B":1555626264,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Check out America's Bank by Lowenstein, for the American historical context.   It illustrates the kinds of problems people looked to the bank to solve and why the US version looks the way it does. Also, why it was so controversial and took so long to develop.","human_ref_B":"The Ascent of Money does a good job of describing the history of banking, including central banks. Along the way you'll hear lots of pros and cons described in case studies.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16105.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"belmw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Can anyone recommend a good and relatively objective book about central banks; the history, function, pros and cons, case studies, etc.? Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"el6rgqx","c_root_id_B":"el6xjho","created_at_utc_A":1555597135,"created_at_utc_B":1555601170,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I like the book \"Other People's Money\". It's not directly related to the history, but does certainly tap into the other issues you mention.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Theory-Monetary-Institutions-Lawrence-White\/dp\/0631212140  https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Monetary-1867-1960-National-Economic-Publications\/dp\/0691003548\/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1I2H70WSYRZA8&keywords=a+monetary+history+of+the+united+states&qid=1555601092&s=books&sprefix=a+monetary%2Cstripbooks%2C140&sr=1-1  https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/History-Federal-Reserve-1913-1951-v\/dp\/0226520005\/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_3?keywords=a+history+of+the+federal+reserve+meltzer&qid=1555601148&s=books&sr=1-3-fkmrnull","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4035.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"belmw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Can anyone recommend a good and relatively objective book about central banks; the history, function, pros and cons, case studies, etc.? Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"el7cuzu","c_root_id_B":"el6rgqx","created_at_utc_A":1555610791,"created_at_utc_B":1555597135,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"\u201cThe End of Alchemy\u201d by Mervyn King is a good read about central banking and the future of the economy.   I highly recommend you check it out.","human_ref_B":"I like the book \"Other People's Money\". It's not directly related to the history, but does certainly tap into the other issues you mention.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13656.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"belmw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Can anyone recommend a good and relatively objective book about central banks; the history, function, pros and cons, case studies, etc.? Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"el7cuzu","c_root_id_B":"el7btai","created_at_utc_A":1555610791,"created_at_utc_B":1555610159,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"\u201cThe End of Alchemy\u201d by Mervyn King is a good read about central banking and the future of the economy.   I highly recommend you check it out.","human_ref_B":"Check out America's Bank by Lowenstein, for the American historical context.   It illustrates the kinds of problems people looked to the bank to solve and why the US version looks the way it does. Also, why it was so controversial and took so long to develop.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":632.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1gpvou","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why is everything in Germany so cheap when its economy is so strong? This has always been a mystery to me. Even though Germany has one of the highest GDPs in the world, almost everything there (rents, food, drinks) is far, far cheaper than any of its neighbors in Europe. Why is this?","c_root_id_A":"cammt9d","c_root_id_B":"cammimf","created_at_utc_A":1371732273,"created_at_utc_B":1371730847,"score_A":26,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Food is cheap because the market is very competitive and no-frills discount stores are popular (Aldi!).  Rent ranges from affordable to very expensive depending on the location, but certainly not cheap by my standards. (Maybe you can come up with actual figures).   Also, the income spread is huge and increasing. Many household rely on the low-budget options to survive.","human_ref_B":"One of the reasons is an above the average competition.   F.e. supermarkets: Rewe, Lidl, Aldi, Netto, Edeka, Nahkauf, Real, Toom, Coop, Plus, Tegut,...","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1426.0,"score_ratio":13.0}
{"post_id":"9fxe1a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"In Africa, ethnic and national boundaries generally don't overlap. Millions of words have been written about ethnic divisions within African countries, but what kind of ethnic solidarity exists ACROSS African countries? Are Yoruba, Hausa, Somali, etc meaningful ethnic affinities in a trans-national context? To what extent does a Fula community in Nigeria identify with or even resemble another Fula community hundreds of miles away in Senegal? Does international ethnic solidarity, or the fear of this solidarity, play any significant role in national or international African politics?","c_root_id_A":"e602qcf","c_root_id_B":"e60gbpr","created_at_utc_A":1536978992,"created_at_utc_B":1537002102,"score_A":9,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"[deleted]","human_ref_B":"Good but very complex question. I don't have a comprehensive answer right now, but I'd say this paper on the impact of cross-border ethnic networks on trade is an interesting start:  http:\/\/scholar.googleusercontent.com\/scholar?q=cache:IgwbmsTYHdsJ:scholar.google.com\/&hl=en&as_sdt=0,5","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23110.0,"score_ratio":1.1111111111}
{"post_id":"69o38g","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Why do people hate Nickelback? I suspect there is some type of jockeying for position, am I correct? Has there been any examination of Nickelback and their place in cultural capital? edit: or anything of similar writing?","c_root_id_A":"dh88bdo","c_root_id_B":"dh8f1l7","created_at_utc_A":1494121691,"created_at_utc_B":1494132909,"score_A":30,"score_B":79,"human_ref_A":"You might start your search with Bryson's 1996 article cited below, part of which argues that even among people who are broadly accepting of a wide range of genres they still rate some music genres lower if its primary audience are made up of people with lower social standing (less education, non-white, lower income).  Now Bryson's paper focuses on very broad categories, is not very conclusive, and the specifics of the genres landscape have changed over 20 years, but you can argue that the extension would apply to Nickelback, who are derided in spaces where people are more likely to consider themselves musical omnivores and are more likely to be college educated or will likely be enrolled in college.  Nickelback's target audience (and this part would be mostly speculation) are likely people who are in blue-collar or lower-income environments, overlapping with the primary audience for the country-rock genre.  I did a cursory search for 'nickelback target audience' and came across this article and the way the author argues their dislike neatly aligns with the process of assigning value to \"authenticity.\"  Their statement: >What\u2019s peculiar about Nickelback is how they can be so popular but be so widely hated at the exact same time.  is one that's restated in a lot of the articles you may come across in how and why people hate Nickelback, but the observation is only especially peculiar if your tastes already don't overlap with the band's target audience.  Bryson, Bethany. (1996) \"Anything But Heavy Metal\": Symbolic Exclusion and Musical Dislikes","human_ref_B":"The most elucidating reason for the backlash against Nickelback I've found is Innuendo Studios' case study of internet celebrity, \"This is Phil Fish.\"  > Now, people don\u2019t hate Nickelback because they think the music is bad. People think loads of music is bad and don\u2019t give it any further thought. People hate Nickelback because the music is bad and popular. But it\u2019s more complicated that. It\u2019s because someone at a studio heard Nickelback and thought, \u201cI can sell that.\u201d It\u2019s because the music was so aggressively overplayed on the radio, and aggressively advertised, as if a PR department were trying to sculpt a mediocre band into a sensation, regardless of worthiness. It\u2019s because, despite all the hate, Nickelback\u2019s fame proved that this was actually working, that millions were buying into it. It\u2019s because Nickelback represented the apotheosis of an existing trend of shallow, whiny hard rock, which they made even more popular, and spawned legions of shallow, whiny imitators to continue the trend.  > It\u2019s because every step of this process seemed to have been taken solely for the benefit of the people getting rich off the record sales.  > \u201cI hate Nickelback,\u201d as a sentence, voices a complex opinion on cultural trends in popular music, and aligns the speaker with those who hate not just Nickelback, but all that Nickelback represents. They resent Nickelback the concept; Nickelback the actual band is of secondary importance. The band\u2019s crime, other than the writing of the actual songs, is their complicity in this system: they signed the record deal; they deemed themselves worthy and deserving of this studio-constructed fame; in a phrase, they bought into it. The ire felt for Nickelback the band is only somewhat harsher than the ire felt for the fans that buy the records: they are just the first and last links in a chain of politics \u2013 studio politics, radio politics, and record politics \u2013 that are seemingly ruining music. This entire chain comprises Nickelback the concept.  > And when people say, \u201cI hate Nickelback,\u201d this is the Nickelback they\u2019re referring to. And when someone tweets \u201cI hate Nickelback\u201d at Nickelback, they aren\u2019t really talking to the band \u2013 they\u2019re talking publicly to Culture about what Nickelback represents. The actual tweet to the actual band is just a shorthand.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11218.0,"score_ratio":2.6333333333}
{"post_id":"69o38g","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Why do people hate Nickelback? I suspect there is some type of jockeying for position, am I correct? Has there been any examination of Nickelback and their place in cultural capital? edit: or anything of similar writing?","c_root_id_A":"dh8f1l7","c_root_id_B":"dh82cew","created_at_utc_A":1494132909,"created_at_utc_B":1494112597,"score_A":79,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"The most elucidating reason for the backlash against Nickelback I've found is Innuendo Studios' case study of internet celebrity, \"This is Phil Fish.\"  > Now, people don\u2019t hate Nickelback because they think the music is bad. People think loads of music is bad and don\u2019t give it any further thought. People hate Nickelback because the music is bad and popular. But it\u2019s more complicated that. It\u2019s because someone at a studio heard Nickelback and thought, \u201cI can sell that.\u201d It\u2019s because the music was so aggressively overplayed on the radio, and aggressively advertised, as if a PR department were trying to sculpt a mediocre band into a sensation, regardless of worthiness. It\u2019s because, despite all the hate, Nickelback\u2019s fame proved that this was actually working, that millions were buying into it. It\u2019s because Nickelback represented the apotheosis of an existing trend of shallow, whiny hard rock, which they made even more popular, and spawned legions of shallow, whiny imitators to continue the trend.  > It\u2019s because every step of this process seemed to have been taken solely for the benefit of the people getting rich off the record sales.  > \u201cI hate Nickelback,\u201d as a sentence, voices a complex opinion on cultural trends in popular music, and aligns the speaker with those who hate not just Nickelback, but all that Nickelback represents. They resent Nickelback the concept; Nickelback the actual band is of secondary importance. The band\u2019s crime, other than the writing of the actual songs, is their complicity in this system: they signed the record deal; they deemed themselves worthy and deserving of this studio-constructed fame; in a phrase, they bought into it. The ire felt for Nickelback the band is only somewhat harsher than the ire felt for the fans that buy the records: they are just the first and last links in a chain of politics \u2013 studio politics, radio politics, and record politics \u2013 that are seemingly ruining music. This entire chain comprises Nickelback the concept.  > And when people say, \u201cI hate Nickelback,\u201d this is the Nickelback they\u2019re referring to. And when someone tweets \u201cI hate Nickelback\u201d at Nickelback, they aren\u2019t really talking to the band \u2013 they\u2019re talking publicly to Culture about what Nickelback represents. The actual tweet to the actual band is just a shorthand.","human_ref_B":"\"Nickelback is too much of everything to be enough of something,\" Anttonen wrote in her study. \"They follow genre expectations too well, which is seen as empty imitation, but also not well enough, which is read as commercial tactics and as a lack of a stable and sincere identity.\"  It's nothing to do with jockeying for position, Nickelback are just not very good and generic, extremely commerical. When you need a shorthand way to reference generic garbage, Nickelback is perfect. Everyone understands what it means.   http:\/\/www.ingentaconnect.com\/content\/intellect\/mms\/2016\/00000002\/00000001\/art00004","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20312.0,"score_ratio":2.724137931}
{"post_id":"69o38g","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Why do people hate Nickelback? I suspect there is some type of jockeying for position, am I correct? Has there been any examination of Nickelback and their place in cultural capital? edit: or anything of similar writing?","c_root_id_A":"dh88bdo","c_root_id_B":"dh82cew","created_at_utc_A":1494121691,"created_at_utc_B":1494112597,"score_A":30,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"You might start your search with Bryson's 1996 article cited below, part of which argues that even among people who are broadly accepting of a wide range of genres they still rate some music genres lower if its primary audience are made up of people with lower social standing (less education, non-white, lower income).  Now Bryson's paper focuses on very broad categories, is not very conclusive, and the specifics of the genres landscape have changed over 20 years, but you can argue that the extension would apply to Nickelback, who are derided in spaces where people are more likely to consider themselves musical omnivores and are more likely to be college educated or will likely be enrolled in college.  Nickelback's target audience (and this part would be mostly speculation) are likely people who are in blue-collar or lower-income environments, overlapping with the primary audience for the country-rock genre.  I did a cursory search for 'nickelback target audience' and came across this article and the way the author argues their dislike neatly aligns with the process of assigning value to \"authenticity.\"  Their statement: >What\u2019s peculiar about Nickelback is how they can be so popular but be so widely hated at the exact same time.  is one that's restated in a lot of the articles you may come across in how and why people hate Nickelback, but the observation is only especially peculiar if your tastes already don't overlap with the band's target audience.  Bryson, Bethany. (1996) \"Anything But Heavy Metal\": Symbolic Exclusion and Musical Dislikes","human_ref_B":"\"Nickelback is too much of everything to be enough of something,\" Anttonen wrote in her study. \"They follow genre expectations too well, which is seen as empty imitation, but also not well enough, which is read as commercial tactics and as a lack of a stable and sincere identity.\"  It's nothing to do with jockeying for position, Nickelback are just not very good and generic, extremely commerical. When you need a shorthand way to reference generic garbage, Nickelback is perfect. Everyone understands what it means.   http:\/\/www.ingentaconnect.com\/content\/intellect\/mms\/2016\/00000002\/00000001\/art00004","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9094.0,"score_ratio":1.0344827586}
{"post_id":"1q8wjo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"I want to go back to school for Economics but my undergrad is Creative Writing. Any advice? I'm willing to undertake whatever prerequisites might be required, but not exactly sure where to start. Help?","c_root_id_A":"cdagl1a","c_root_id_B":"cdagora","created_at_utc_A":1384021053,"created_at_utc_B":1384021365,"score_A":2,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Brush up on your calculus.","human_ref_B":"It is entirely possible.   0. Look at different Economics programs at different schools. Are you interested in monetary economics? Development economics? etc... Start figuring out where you'd like to apply to. 1. Each school will have a list of prerequisites for their program. Need to learn a lot of Math? Start with Khan Academy and then sign up later when you are more advanced to take a college calculus class (not all programs are math heavy, but if you aren't proficient in calculus and basic statistics you will be at a disadvantage - all schools have a math cram at the beginning of the program, but you will want that as a refresher and not as a few weeks of hell.) 2. Talk to the schools you are interested in applying to. You should follow the online presences of professors you are interested in. 3. Absolutely and unremittingly destroy the GRE.  Here's the example I am most familiar with: https:\/\/www.econ.berkeley.edu\/grad\/admissions\/preparation  for an alternative program at the same school http:\/\/areweb.berkeley.edu\/letter_chair.php","labels":0,"seconds_difference":312.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"1q8wjo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"I want to go back to school for Economics but my undergrad is Creative Writing. Any advice? I'm willing to undertake whatever prerequisites might be required, but not exactly sure where to start. Help?","c_root_id_A":"cdai8se","c_root_id_B":"cdagl1a","created_at_utc_A":1384025992,"created_at_utc_B":1384021053,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"What are your goals in this?  It's very very very difficult to get into a economics program without a math background. Khan Academy and Coursera probably won't cut it.  Here's a good guide to getting into a PHD program.  There's also a few jobs out there for people who1.) can write 2.) understand a little economics. The new Center for Equitable Growth is looking for a blogger. ideas42 is lookig for a Communications Associate. There are many similar jobs out there.","human_ref_B":"Brush up on your calculus.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4939.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1q8wjo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"I want to go back to school for Economics but my undergrad is Creative Writing. Any advice? I'm willing to undertake whatever prerequisites might be required, but not exactly sure where to start. Help?","c_root_id_A":"cdas5ay","c_root_id_B":"cdagl1a","created_at_utc_A":1384054331,"created_at_utc_B":1384021053,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Apply to a stand alone MA program after kicking ass on the gre.  These. Are less intensive and often you can wing the math, but you'll learn the basic skills to pivot as an economic analysts, and then you can decide if you want to go further.","human_ref_B":"Brush up on your calculus.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":33278.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1q8wjo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"I want to go back to school for Economics but my undergrad is Creative Writing. Any advice? I'm willing to undertake whatever prerequisites might be required, but not exactly sure where to start. Help?","c_root_id_A":"cdallen","c_root_id_B":"cdas5ay","created_at_utc_A":1384035733,"created_at_utc_B":1384054331,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"You could always apply to do another undergrad in economics. All you need then is a highschool transcript.","human_ref_B":"Apply to a stand alone MA program after kicking ass on the gre.  These. Are less intensive and often you can wing the math, but you'll learn the basic skills to pivot as an economic analysts, and then you can decide if you want to go further.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18598.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"11ub8w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"[simple english please] What would happen if every country converted to a single currency? However improbable this idea is it doesn't matter; I'm thinking purely hypothetically here. What I'm wondering is would certain countries with favourable exchange rates collapse? Would things actually be better? Would this help business?  edit; many apologies if this isn't the right subreddit for this type of question.","c_root_id_A":"c6ponpy","c_root_id_B":"c6poko9","created_at_utc_A":1350833949,"created_at_utc_B":1350833518,"score_A":26,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Countries can alter the amount and composition of their money in response to how the economy is doing. When an economy is growing slowly or not growing at all, a country can increase the amount of money in the economy, which can help the economy to grow faster. When the economy is growing too fast, it can reduce the amount of money in the economy and make the economy grow at a more sustainable rate.  The mechanism by which these changes operate can get pretty complicated. Basically, (and as far as I remember), there are two broad mechanisms. Firstly, when a country changes the amount of money in it's economy, it alters its exchange rate. So it can make it's goods cheaper to foreigners (so they more) or more expensive (so they buy less). Secondly, a change in the amount of money alters how much businesses pay in order to borrow money. The cheaper it is to borrow money, the more businesses borrow, and the more they invest, and the less they leave on deposit in a bank.  This is what is called monetary policy. It allows the many different economies of the world to managed. Some countries are growing, some are contracting, and some are moving along at a snail's pace. Monetary policy allows them a way to deal with this reality. If every country in the world had the same currency, they wouldn't be able to engage in this kind of management. Like you said, countries with favourable exchange rates would sell less things to other countries. Countries would no longer be able to have a monetary policy appropriate to their situation. Their economies could still adjust of course, but without monetary policy the adjustment tends to be a lot more difficult. For it to work, you'd basically need every country in the world to be as economically integrated in the world economy, as every state in america is integrated into the american economy, and all the political changes that that implies.  That's about as simple as I can make it. If you'd like to learn more about this topic, read about 'optimum currency area' theory.","human_ref_B":"We would give up our monetary sovereignty to whatever authority controlled the central bank, and as we are seeing in the euro crisis giving up monetary sovereignty in an economic shock is essentially akin to giving up fiscal, thus overall sovereignty.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":431.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"11ub8w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"[simple english please] What would happen if every country converted to a single currency? However improbable this idea is it doesn't matter; I'm thinking purely hypothetically here. What I'm wondering is would certain countries with favourable exchange rates collapse? Would things actually be better? Would this help business?  edit; many apologies if this isn't the right subreddit for this type of question.","c_root_id_A":"c6pt4f7","c_root_id_B":"c6ptifu","created_at_utc_A":1350852046,"created_at_utc_B":1350853565,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"One world currency has sort of been done before.  It stopped because of this: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Impossible_trinity  Basically, one world currency is essentially a fixed exchange rate, so if you have that, you have to choose either free capital movement, or independent monetary policy.   This was not particularly simple English. Sorry.","human_ref_B":"TL, DR version: Complete an utter disaster.  Monetary policy for one country is not optimal for (likely) any other country.  Source: I am a high level US gov't economist","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1519.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1wrjol","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"If a large developing country instituted a basic income, mandated its currency exchange rates and gave no regard to national debt what would happen? By developing country I mean nations like Nigeria, south Africa, Colombia, Venezuela.  Nation's that possess in their borders all the sectors\/resources of a successful economy.  By no regard to their national debt, I mean they have a fed but spend money without regard to how much they take in in taxes and use taxes and bond buying and selling primarily as a monetary policy tool.  Maybe they don't even keep track of the national debt.   What other mechanisms would this hypothetical nation need to put in place to prevent things like rampant inflation or any other ill effects.  What would happen in the short medium and long term?","c_root_id_A":"cf544zk","c_root_id_B":"cf54mow","created_at_utc_A":1391353274,"created_at_utc_B":1391355025,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"> By no regard to their national debt, I mean they have a fed but spend money without regard to how much they take in in taxes and use taxes and bond buying and selling primarily as a monetary policy tool. Maybe they don't even keep track of the national debt.  This essentially means they don't have a national debt because nobody would lend to a country that did something like this. Everything would have to be paid straight from the taxes received. Although that seems like a good thing, it would disincentivize the government from investing in things like infrastructure and the like. The reason is that the returns from those projects would accrue over time so they'd want the costs to also accrue over time.  They might still be able to do UBI and an exchange-rate peg but they'd need unthinkable levels of foreign currency reserves.","human_ref_B":"The tool to analyse you question is the impossible trinity, which say that from the following 3 options you can only chose 2:  1. Free movement of capital 2. Independent monetary policy 3. Fixed exchange rates.  Now, it all depends on how the government finances its debts. It can  borrow from abroad (external debt) or borrow from within the country (internal debt). To simplify the analysis we will look at two extreme cases, i.e. only external debt and only internal debt.  1st scenario (external debt): Now, with only external debt a developing country can only borrow in a foreign currency (usually the US-Dollar), so it needs inflow of capital to pay interest rates and repay the debt. Furthermore, developing countries can only borrow relatively short-term, e.g. 1 or 2 years instead 2 or 3 decades as most developed countries can do. If government debt is high, you need large inflows of foreign capital. Additionally, investors might increasingly start to question a governments ability to repay the debt and the capital inflows stop and the country is in crisis. This is a simplified explanation of what economists call a sudden stop).  2nd scenario (internal debt). If a country has only internal debt it doesn't need any  movements of capital to repay the debt. As long as the population of a country is willing to lend the government money, as with for example Japan, there are no problems with inflation as the central bank can focus on its monetary targets. However, if people start to distrust their own government and stop lending money the government also runs into problems. If the debt is held by a large fraction of the population an outright default while it is possible it is usually not chosen as it is a recipe for disaster. Governments usually resort to various forms of financial repression eventually will turn towards their central bank to buy government debts and then we have inflation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1751.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1wrjol","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"If a large developing country instituted a basic income, mandated its currency exchange rates and gave no regard to national debt what would happen? By developing country I mean nations like Nigeria, south Africa, Colombia, Venezuela.  Nation's that possess in their borders all the sectors\/resources of a successful economy.  By no regard to their national debt, I mean they have a fed but spend money without regard to how much they take in in taxes and use taxes and bond buying and selling primarily as a monetary policy tool.  Maybe they don't even keep track of the national debt.   What other mechanisms would this hypothetical nation need to put in place to prevent things like rampant inflation or any other ill effects.  What would happen in the short medium and long term?","c_root_id_A":"cf54mow","c_root_id_B":"cf518q0","created_at_utc_A":1391355025,"created_at_utc_B":1391335871,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The tool to analyse you question is the impossible trinity, which say that from the following 3 options you can only chose 2:  1. Free movement of capital 2. Independent monetary policy 3. Fixed exchange rates.  Now, it all depends on how the government finances its debts. It can  borrow from abroad (external debt) or borrow from within the country (internal debt). To simplify the analysis we will look at two extreme cases, i.e. only external debt and only internal debt.  1st scenario (external debt): Now, with only external debt a developing country can only borrow in a foreign currency (usually the US-Dollar), so it needs inflow of capital to pay interest rates and repay the debt. Furthermore, developing countries can only borrow relatively short-term, e.g. 1 or 2 years instead 2 or 3 decades as most developed countries can do. If government debt is high, you need large inflows of foreign capital. Additionally, investors might increasingly start to question a governments ability to repay the debt and the capital inflows stop and the country is in crisis. This is a simplified explanation of what economists call a sudden stop).  2nd scenario (internal debt). If a country has only internal debt it doesn't need any  movements of capital to repay the debt. As long as the population of a country is willing to lend the government money, as with for example Japan, there are no problems with inflation as the central bank can focus on its monetary targets. However, if people start to distrust their own government and stop lending money the government also runs into problems. If the debt is held by a large fraction of the population an outright default while it is possible it is usually not chosen as it is a recipe for disaster. Governments usually resort to various forms of financial repression eventually will turn towards their central bank to buy government debts and then we have inflation.","human_ref_B":"Well, look at Venezuela, that has huge profits from Crude, and they are still unable (but willing) to do this.   The result will be either defaulting on int. debts for all their foreign purchases (like Ecuador back in 2000, had to give up their national currency due to extreme inflation and being cut off from the int. (money) markets), or not purchasing ANYTHING on foreign markets anymore (such as Cuba, Argentina, Venezuela, who restrict currency exchange and foreign imports). As said above (below?), China has a very good program that allows them to be cheapest in the world (for a while) to build up an entire economy. But they will also face problems in the future, when they want to spend the money they have been making (which will change the currency exchange so much, all their products become really expensive to the rest of the world, which will destroy their entire economy).  So, there is always a choice between some of the following points:  Do you want affordable imports?  Do you want affordable exports?  Do you want to spend all money coming in from natural resources?  Do you want your people to be able to travel to (and spend money in) other countries?  Do you want people from other countries coming to your country (to spend money)?  Look at a country like Norway, they did not spend their income from natural resources, but 'saved' it. After a few more years, they will have enough saved so that nobody has to work ever again, the interest on their savings is enough to pay everybody a huge sum each month\/year without it affecting the main sum. I think this is the only way it can become true.   A different road is to be able to *make* all the money to spend on the basic income every month\/year, by taxation\/import levies. This could work if a country has unending natural resources or huge trade balances, and taxes the right amount of businesses\/people for a relatively high percentage. Big lobbies have prevented this in most if not all countries, since investors want a return on their investment.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":19154.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"58ufao","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Is there any precedent for the absolute denial of established facts by a presidential candidate and their supporters? The idea that Clinton started birtherism and Trump stopped it.  The idea that there are more illegal immigrants pouring over our borders than ever.  What brings groups of people around to accepting reality?","c_root_id_A":"d93ixdq","c_root_id_B":"d941p46","created_at_utc_A":1477174711,"created_at_utc_B":1477211706,"score_A":16,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"You're asking two seperte questions.   I guess the Know-Nothing Party was kinda similar in them clinging to conspiracy theories.  Now I'm not entirely sure *why* people do that. There's the economic argument that people since the great recession are under a lot of stress and kick downards, blaming the already disadvantaged. On the other hand there is the culture war argument, best summed up by Vox's White Riot. I honestly have no idea which one is closer to the truth, which one explains all this better","human_ref_B":"Funny you should ask, but yesterday I was reading James M. McPherson's *Battle Cry of Freedom*, a history of the American Civil War, and during the run-up to the election of 1860 there were hundreds of stories of slave rebellions, of escaped slaves molesting white women, of Northern strangers sowing discord and abolition in their wake, of secret plans by the \"Black Republican\" party to force all Americans to enter interracial marriages, etc, all of which were totally bogus.  McPherson observes:  >Stories of slave uprisings that followed the visits of mysterious Yankee strangers, of arsons and rapes and poisonings by slaves crowded the Southern press.  Somehow these horrors never seemed to happen in one's own neighbourhood.  Many, in fact, were reported in faraway Texas.  And curiously, only newspapers backing Breckenridge seemed to carry such stories.  Bell and Douglas newspapers even had the affrontery to accuse Breckenridge Democrats of getting up \"falsehoods and sensation tales\" to \"arouse the passions of the people and drive them into the Southern Disunion movement\".  >[...]  >In vain, then, did a Southern conservative point out that most of these atrocity stories \"turned out, on examination, to be totally false and *all of them* grossly exaggerated\".  One the eve of the election a Mississippian observed that \"the minds of the people are aroused to a pitch of excitement probably unparalleled in the history of the country\".  A writer in a Texas Methodist weekly was sure that \"the designs of the abolitionists are...poison [and] fire\" to \"deluge [the South] in blood and flame...and force their fair daughters into the embrace of buck Negros for wives\".  However irrational these fears, the response was real - vigilante lynch law that made the John Brown scare of the previous winter look like a Sunday School picnic.  \"It is better for us to hang ninety-nine innocent (suspicious) men than let one guilty one pass\", wrote a Texan, \"for the guilty one endangers the peace of society\".  - McPherson, James M. *Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era*, OUP 2003, pg 229.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":36995.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"12cx2a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"Has there been much research into whether religious people tend to commit fewer or more crimes than non-religious people? I ask because of the large amount of anecdotal evidence you see on Reddit and in the media of Christians and Muslims committing hate crimes and acts of terrorism. I would love to know whether, if you normalize for economic background and whatever other factors, religious people actually commit fewer or more crimes than non-religious people. I'm sure it's not an easy thing to study.","c_root_id_A":"c6u5uo5","c_root_id_B":"c6u24m4","created_at_utc_A":1351649362,"created_at_utc_B":1351635239,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"This isn't totally related but you might find it interesting. At least on the background.  It would be fair to say that all of political psychology developed in order to explain how the Germans could have elected Adolph Hitler. As such, there is a string of work on the link between authoritarianism and religion. As in, religious people tend to have more authoritarian personalities. So even though it didn't start out that way, researchers have found the same sort of authoritarian traits in strongly religious people.  That sort of work started out with the Fascist (F)-Scale). This way of thinking about authoritarianism has sort of fallen by the way side now. The predecessor to the F-Scale was Right Wing Authoritarianism \\(RWA\\) scale. The RWA scale was the first real rigorous psychological measure of what authoritarianism means. You can find examples of measurment surveys for both of these online.  Following those two scales the field seems to have split. You have some people who think that authoritarianism can be basically measured by examining the big five personality traits. So these people think that a combination of a low score on the openness to experience trait combined with a high score on the conscientiousness basically maps onto authoritarianism. For an example of how the big five is used in political psychology see Mondak \\(2010\\) and for an example of the personality approach to authoritarism, see Stenner \\(2005\\), though her argument is a bit more complicated.  The second 'split' which is still related to the personality trait approach is that people have this thing called social dominance orientation \\(SDO\\) which maps onto that person's preference for hierarchy. Those with high scores on that are more authoritarian.  Anyway, like I said. It isn't directly related, but I thought you'd appreciate the background.  Additionally, I think the General Social Survey has most if not all of the variables of interest to you so maybe check that out.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/friendlyatheist\/2012\/03\/29\/what-percentage-of-prisoners-are-atheists-pew-forum-offers-an-answer\/","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14123.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"1llhe0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Some questions about minimum wage. I've perused some of the older threads and I've learned that:   1. Raising minimum wage is a poor anti-poverty strategy, but strengthening EITC, TANF, and similar policies would help.   2. There is little or no negative effect of a raise in minimum wage on employment.   However, I didn't see much conversation about general impacts of a raised minimum wage on the economy. President Obama campaigned on raising it to $9.50 nationally, and Paul Krugman claims it would be better to raise it to $10 in present terms. Say the government decided to raise it to $10, what would be the general impacts on the economy?   Further, I read some comments by someone arguing that raising minimum wage is bad policy because... I don't know, it wasn't well written, but they were talking about those workers that start at minimum wage, receive raises, and are making $10 at the present, then new employees come in under the raised minimum wage and make the same wage. They said that is \"bad for the economy.\" Does this situation actually happen? If the minimum wage is raised, are there any corrections to this situation?   Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cc0lz9y","c_root_id_B":"cc0teut","created_at_utc_A":1378173832,"created_at_utc_B":1378209537,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"These three threads (1, 2, & 3) have an excellent discussion of minimum wage - likely what OP is referring to.  There are several other good threads on minimum wage, but I think these are among the best.  They support both of the two points listed above.","human_ref_B":"I'm surprised that no one has linked the IGM poll response.  Summaries:  What economists think about raising the minimum wage.  > It\u2019s no wonder there\u2019s so much expert uncertainty on this question, given the contentious and tangled literature on the subject. Twenty years ago, a landmark study by Alan Krueger (now chairman of President Obama\u2019s Council of Economic Advisers) and David Card used a natural experiment to study an increase in the minimum wage. It found that raising the wage did not reduce employment. (Casey Mulligan and Larry Katz have pointed me to lots of earlier studies that also used empirical data.) Other studies have had more mixed results, and some have shown negative, though generally small, employment effects.  > Ask economists about whether raising the minimum wage is worth the potential risks to low-skilled workers, though, and the responses tend to be much more favorable to a minimum-wage increase:  > Nearly half of the panelists agreed or strongly agreed that the benefits of raising the minimum wage and indexing it to inflation outweighed the costs. In the comments section, several of the economists mentioned that other policies, like the earned income tax credit, might be better suited to addressing the needs of low-income workers. Professor Romer had mentioned this in her column, as well.  Economists think the minimum wage is worth it  > The IGM Forum, which is run by the University of Chicago\u2019s Booth School of Business, polled top economists on the minimum wage. The first question they asked was whether raising the minimum wage could make it harder for some low-wage workers to find jobs. The responses were mixed, as the following chart shows.  > The second question was whether they thought increasing the minimum wage was worth it given the possible downsides. They do. economists minimum wage 2   > Full results, with further commentary from the polled economists, here.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":35705.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1llhe0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Some questions about minimum wage. I've perused some of the older threads and I've learned that:   1. Raising minimum wage is a poor anti-poverty strategy, but strengthening EITC, TANF, and similar policies would help.   2. There is little or no negative effect of a raise in minimum wage on employment.   However, I didn't see much conversation about general impacts of a raised minimum wage on the economy. President Obama campaigned on raising it to $9.50 nationally, and Paul Krugman claims it would be better to raise it to $10 in present terms. Say the government decided to raise it to $10, what would be the general impacts on the economy?   Further, I read some comments by someone arguing that raising minimum wage is bad policy because... I don't know, it wasn't well written, but they were talking about those workers that start at minimum wage, receive raises, and are making $10 at the present, then new employees come in under the raised minimum wage and make the same wage. They said that is \"bad for the economy.\" Does this situation actually happen? If the minimum wage is raised, are there any corrections to this situation?   Thank you!","c_root_id_A":"cc0s5hj","c_root_id_B":"cc0teut","created_at_utc_A":1378199771,"created_at_utc_B":1378209537,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I wrote my thesis on the employment effects of the US statewide minimum wage from 2001 to 2007, and I reached a conclusion markedly different than that of Neumark and Wascher, using BLS data.   * Overall, there is a slight, positive relationship between statewide minimum wages and employment, as a panel.  * 2\/3 of all US states in particular see a significant positive relationship between wages and employment, and this relationship is causal.   * 1\/4th of states show a negative relationship between wages and employment. These states are mostly agrarian states.   * a few states have no significant relationship between statewide minimum wages and employment  * price elasticity of labor demand is different for different sectors of the economy, broadly speaking. While the classical economic view of wages and employment being negatively related can be empirically upheld for the manufacturing sector, but the service sector has a positive relationship between minimum wages and employment, in line with Keynesian (GE) thinking.   * An increase in wages also leads to a shift from the manufacturing sector to the service sector, in terms of employment. The service sector accounts for around 70% of the US employment  * states which are at least 68% service sector dependent are likely to increases in employment in response to increases in statewide minimum wages.","human_ref_B":"I'm surprised that no one has linked the IGM poll response.  Summaries:  What economists think about raising the minimum wage.  > It\u2019s no wonder there\u2019s so much expert uncertainty on this question, given the contentious and tangled literature on the subject. Twenty years ago, a landmark study by Alan Krueger (now chairman of President Obama\u2019s Council of Economic Advisers) and David Card used a natural experiment to study an increase in the minimum wage. It found that raising the wage did not reduce employment. (Casey Mulligan and Larry Katz have pointed me to lots of earlier studies that also used empirical data.) Other studies have had more mixed results, and some have shown negative, though generally small, employment effects.  > Ask economists about whether raising the minimum wage is worth the potential risks to low-skilled workers, though, and the responses tend to be much more favorable to a minimum-wage increase:  > Nearly half of the panelists agreed or strongly agreed that the benefits of raising the minimum wage and indexing it to inflation outweighed the costs. In the comments section, several of the economists mentioned that other policies, like the earned income tax credit, might be better suited to addressing the needs of low-income workers. Professor Romer had mentioned this in her column, as well.  Economists think the minimum wage is worth it  > The IGM Forum, which is run by the University of Chicago\u2019s Booth School of Business, polled top economists on the minimum wage. The first question they asked was whether raising the minimum wage could make it harder for some low-wage workers to find jobs. The responses were mixed, as the following chart shows.  > The second question was whether they thought increasing the minimum wage was worth it given the possible downsides. They do. economists minimum wage 2   > Full results, with further commentary from the polled economists, here.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9766.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"825235","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Did Bourdieu's criticism of economics and his call to broaden it to an \"economic study of (all) practices\" get any traction in the actual field of economics?","c_root_id_A":"dv7lpxo","c_root_id_B":"dv7jfvv","created_at_utc_A":1520256639,"created_at_utc_B":1520252701,"score_A":16,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The first thing to note is that Bourdieu wasn't the first one to make this call. Karl Polanyi, a prominent economic historian, wrote all the way back in 1957 in his book on early economic development, *Trade and Market in the Early Empires* (emphasis added):  >The simple recognition from which all such attempts must start is the fact that in referring to human activities the term economic is a compound of two meanings that have independent roots. We will call them the substantive and the formal meaning.  >The substantive meaning of economic derives from man's dependence for his living upon nature and his fellows. It refers to the interchange with his natural and social environment, in so far as this results in supplying him with the means of material want satisfaction.  >The formal meaning of economic derives from the logical character of the means-ends relationship, as apparent in such words as \"economical\" or \"economizing.\" **It refers to a definite situation of choice, namely, that between the different uses of means induced by an insufficiency of those means. If we call the rules governing choice of means the logic of rational action, then we may denote this variant of logic, with an improvised term, as formal economics.**^1  >The two root meanings of \"economic,\" the substantive and the formal, have nothing in common. The latter derives from logic, the former from fact. The formal meaning implies a set of rules referring to choice between the alternative uses of insufficient means. The substantive meaning implies neither choice nor insufficiency of means; man's livelihood may or may not involve the necessity of choice and, if choice there be, it need not be induced by the limiting effect of a \"scarcity\" of the means; indeed, some of the most important physical and social conditions of livelihood such as the availability of air and water or a loving mother's devotion to her infant are not, as a rule, so limiting.\u00b7 The cogency that is in play in the one case and in the other differs as the power of syllogism differs from the force of gravitation. The laws of the one are those of the mind; the laws of the other are those of nature. The two meanings could not be further apart; semantically they lie in opposite directions of the compass.  >**It is our proposition that only the substantive meaning of \"economic\" is capable of yielding the concepts that are required by the social sciences for an investigation of all the \u00b7empirical economies of the past and present.**^2 The general frame of reference that we endeavor to construct requires, therefore, treatment of the subject matter in substantive terms. The immediate obstacle in our path lies, as indicated, in that concept of \"economic\" in which the two meanings, the substantive and the formal, are naively compounded. Such a merger of meanings is, of course, unexceptionable as long as we remain conscious of its restrictive effects. But the current concept of economic fuses the \"subsistence\" and the \"scarcity\" meanings of economic without a sufficient awareness of the dangers to clear thinking inherent in that merger.  Let's talk about the bolded parts, indicated by ^1 and ^2.  ^1 Here Polanyi essentially defines \"formal\" economics as the style of economics found in contemporary economic departments: \"optimization\" modelling founded on the axiom of scarcity.   ^2 Here Polanyi proposes that his \"substantive\" definition of economic study, roughly analogous to Bourdieu's \"study of all practices\", is the only (a) empirical and (b) productive way to study economics in human society, and that the \"formal\" methodology is both unnecessarily constraining and doesn't yield accurate results.   The problem, according to Polanyi, is that formal economics starts with a framework and tries to cram human behavior into it. I say \"framework\" and not \"theory\" because utility maximization is technically unfalsifiable, which, if we accept Popperian standards, makes it unscientific. You can technically construct a utility function that \"explains\" any set of behavior, and so the effectiveness of the framework is limited. Polanyi, and Bourdieu in line with him, were advocates for a more anthropological study of economics, that is to say, one founded first and foremost on real-world observation of real economic activity, broadly defined as any activity that satisfies human needs (a bit of an outdated functionalist definition, but let's run with it for the time being).  So what have been the results? Well, Polanyian \"substantivism\" is well-represented in other social sciences that purport to examine economic behavior, like sociology and anthropology (see more about the formalist-substantivist debate summarized here). However, it has made limited inroads into economics proper because the entire economics discipline is basically founded on the formal method. If substantive thought made any significant inroads into economics proper, it would basically mean tossing out all of the economic modelling that has defined economics for the last century, so I personally don't see it happening \"from the inside\" any time soon.","human_ref_B":"Probably Institutional Economics, for example Nitzan & Bichler","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3938.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"2dmi08","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Is the weather determining in the development of civilizations and peoples? I live part of the time in Africa. It doesn't feel right to me to hear some people say that one of the main causes of undervelopment is the weather (where suposedly, a cold climate helps you think more and be more proactive in comparison to very hot weather, and \"theories\" of that sort).","c_root_id_A":"cjr3j12","c_root_id_B":"cjr53tn","created_at_utc_A":1408119528,"created_at_utc_B":1408122452,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"There is a new working paper from researchers at Columbia and Harvard on this exact topic. Here is the abstract (bold mine): >Does temperature affect economic performance? Has temperature always affected social welfare through its impact on physical and cognitive function? While many studies have explored the indirect links between climate and welfare (e.g. agricultural yield, violent conflict, or sea-level rise), few address the possibility of direct impacts operating through human physiology. This paper presents a model of labor supply under thermal stress, building on a longstanding physiological literature linking thermal stress to health and task performance. A key prediction is that effective labor supply \u2013 defined as a composite of labor hours, task performance, and effort \u2013 is decreasing in temperature deviations from the biological optimum. We use country-level panel data on population-weighted average temperature and income (1950-2005), to illustrate the potential magnitude of the effect. Using a fixed effects estimation strategy, **we find that hotter-than-average years are associated with lower output per capita for already hot countries and higher output per capita for cold countries: approximately 3%-4% in both directions.** We then use household data on air conditioning and heating expenditures from the US to provide further evidence in support of a physiologically based causal mechanism. This more direct causal link between climate and social welfare has important implications for both the economics of climate change and comparative development.  Citation: Heal, G. and J. Park. 2014. \"Feeling the Heat: Temperature Physiology & the Wealth of Nations.\" Harvard Environmental Economics Program Discussion Paper 14-51. Available at: http:\/\/www.hks.harvard.edu\/m-rcbg\/heep\/papers\/DP51_heal-park.pdf","human_ref_B":"Okay so what you are speaking of sounds a lot like Environmental Determinism, or Geographical Determinism.   There is so much reading out there on the subject if you wish, since the theory was formed in the antiquity and was a popular part of geography in the late 19th\/early 20th century. Most of this theory has been largely dismissed as discriminatory and euro-centric, used to excuse\/explain away world poverty, imperialism, etc.    As others have mentioned, Jared Diamond has touched on this theory although a much more modern version\/he rejects the \"Geographic Determinism\" term and it's negative connotations.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2924.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2av6ze","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Could Somebody Kindly Explain How The 2008 Recession Began With Mortgage? In details like I'm a five year old.","c_root_id_A":"cizdypn","c_root_id_B":"cizllp1","created_at_utc_A":1405546490,"created_at_utc_B":1405563158,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Hi.  This is a wonderfully entertaining and informative explanation brought to you by the folks at This American Life.","human_ref_B":"Question; What role, if any, did the Affordable Housing Act 2002 play in the crisis?  \"One of the programs is designed to help deserving families with bad credit histories...\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16668.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"12ehsu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"[Economics] Why do gas prices drop, instead of rise, after a hurricane? I remember back when Hurricane Ike hit Houston the prices were ~$3.30. And while waiting in extremely long lines for gas after the hurricane had passed a few days later, I noticed the prices were ~$1.80.  Also, I heard about gas prices lowering after Sandy as well.  Wouldn't the cease of gas production in the Gulf of Mexico from Hurricane Ike or the cease of gas production from the Atlantic from Hurricane Sandy raise the prices, in their respective regions, because of a limit on local gas supplies?","c_root_id_A":"c6uqzz0","c_root_id_B":"c6ukr7o","created_at_utc_A":1351756534,"created_at_utc_B":1351723995,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You are correct in that a cease in gas production from Sandy would probably increase gas prices slightly. BUT...the the storm hit and energy consuming part of the united states, not an energy producing  area. For this reason, the drop in demand from the storm probably outweighs the drop in gas supply, causing a net reduction in prices at the pump. Actually two refineries were indeed damaged by Sandy, but again the reduction in supply from this is probably only a couple hundred thousand barrels a day, where as the millions of new yorkers and others who are staying off the road temporarily after the storm will cause a drop in demand of at least a million barrels a day.","human_ref_B":"Just a thought hasn't been mentioned yet: a lot of cars (and perhaps roads) get damaged during storms, so people are driving less in the aftermath.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":32539.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"12ehsu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"[Economics] Why do gas prices drop, instead of rise, after a hurricane? I remember back when Hurricane Ike hit Houston the prices were ~$3.30. And while waiting in extremely long lines for gas after the hurricane had passed a few days later, I noticed the prices were ~$1.80.  Also, I heard about gas prices lowering after Sandy as well.  Wouldn't the cease of gas production in the Gulf of Mexico from Hurricane Ike or the cease of gas production from the Atlantic from Hurricane Sandy raise the prices, in their respective regions, because of a limit on local gas supplies?","c_root_id_A":"c6uqzz0","c_root_id_B":"c6uho6u","created_at_utc_A":1351756534,"created_at_utc_B":1351712092,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You are correct in that a cease in gas production from Sandy would probably increase gas prices slightly. BUT...the the storm hit and energy consuming part of the united states, not an energy producing  area. For this reason, the drop in demand from the storm probably outweighs the drop in gas supply, causing a net reduction in prices at the pump. Actually two refineries were indeed damaged by Sandy, but again the reduction in supply from this is probably only a couple hundred thousand barrels a day, where as the millions of new yorkers and others who are staying off the road temporarily after the storm will cause a drop in demand of at least a million barrels a day.","human_ref_B":">raise the prices, in their respective regions, because of a limit on local gas supplies?  not necessarily, because:   the global gas market does not run solely on micro economical laws of supply and demand;     the bigger the markets, the more irrational and difficult they are to predict, not existing therefore any contemporary economic model capable of accurately predicting such markets;   feeding on risk, oil futures are being traded *globally* since 1983, being one main drive behind *local* prices.    try checking these: 1 2 3 4","labels":1,"seconds_difference":44442.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"28tpwn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Can someone explain the \"success\" gesture? Examples in post. How did it get so popular? Is it learned behavior? Is it in any way instinctual? Do any primates perform this gesture or something like it? Why\/how did it become so ubiquitous?  Some examples here:   http:\/\/imgur.com\/tQRH0kr  http:\/\/gifs.gifbin.com\/20048442yu.gif  http:\/\/nesncom.files.wordpress.com\/2013\/12\/wooddance.gif?w=550&h=309  http:\/\/imgur.com\/dUMSUBf  http:\/\/gifrific.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/Tiger-Woods-fistpump-slow-motion.gif  http:\/\/gifrific.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/Data-Star-Trek-Fist-Pump.gif  http:\/\/imgur.com\/Vli699e  http:\/\/imgur.com\/d5O41d4  http:\/\/imgur.com\/wh8HQPV","c_root_id_A":"ciejk2e","c_root_id_B":"cieitih","created_at_utc_A":1403492191,"created_at_utc_B":1403490346,"score_A":13,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/news.sfsu.edu\/victory-stance-may-be-universal-gesture-triumph-not-pride-study-suggests  >\"We found that displays of triumph include different behaviors to those of pride and occur more immediately after a victory or win,\" said David Matsumoto, professor of psychology at San Francisco State University. \"Triumph has its own signature expression that is immediate, automatic and universal across cultures.\"  It's possible the gesture OP is after may be universal as well, but I don't know of any studies about the specific one-armed inward pump.","human_ref_B":"I feel like this is something you may find more information on in \/r\/askhistorians. If nothing else, you may find evidence (old artwork or something) to help get some idea of when it started.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1845.0,"score_ratio":1.0833333333}
{"post_id":"v5o11","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What is the current state of your field? A while back, there was a post on what the agreements were in macroeconomics, and there were some good responses linking to areas of agreement in macro.  I'd like to see similar responses for the other social science fields.  * What are the areas of agreement in your field? * What methodology does your field accept? * What are some areas in need of further research in your field?","c_root_id_A":"c51lau2","c_root_id_B":"c51kyej","created_at_utc_A":1339898180,"created_at_utc_B":1339896181,"score_A":12,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I think my field can be separated into four different groups:  1. The EU will fail 2. The EU will not fail 3. The EU might fail 4. The EU might not fail  :)  I'll add though, that few people actually think it likely that the EU will completely unravel.","human_ref_B":"International studies. A bit broad and defined by a specific person's interests. I have an interest in public opinion but I tend to be a bit nihilistic about it. Plus there are very few good methodologies for public opinion in developing countries. I am also interested in development issues, but there seems to be quite a bit of disagreement in that area.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1999.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"v5o11","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What is the current state of your field? A while back, there was a post on what the agreements were in macroeconomics, and there were some good responses linking to areas of agreement in macro.  I'd like to see similar responses for the other social science fields.  * What are the areas of agreement in your field? * What methodology does your field accept? * What are some areas in need of further research in your field?","c_root_id_A":"c51kyej","c_root_id_B":"c51oruv","created_at_utc_A":1339896181,"created_at_utc_B":1339919238,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"International studies. A bit broad and defined by a specific person's interests. I have an interest in public opinion but I tend to be a bit nihilistic about it. Plus there are very few good methodologies for public opinion in developing countries. I am also interested in development issues, but there seems to be quite a bit of disagreement in that area.","human_ref_B":"In the field of judicial politics, there is a general agreement that  1. In Judicial Decision-Making ideology is the most important factor (The Attitudinal Model) 2. In collegial courts, strategic decision-making takes place, mitigated or encouraged by the institutional rules of the courts (ie. Rule of Four, Join-3, Opinion bargaining, etc.) 3.  Lawyers and law firms with more experience before the Supreme Court are more successful, ceteris paribus. 4. The Solicitor General's Office is the most successful \"law firm,\" largely because of the unique role they play.  Methodologically, we tend to be highly quantitative.  Ranging from OLS, to logistic regression, to Bayesian Ideal Point Estimation, to Non-parametric matching, the field (subfield) is heavily geared towards being quantoids.  There is small, dedicated group doing work ala American Political Development which trends toward qualitative work, but I would say most students being trained today get a heavy dosage of math\/stat (as an example, I am the only grad student in my department allowed to teach the undergrads\/1st year grad stats because I decided to earn an MA in stats along the way).  There is also a heavy bent now towards game theory, something I wish I knew more.  The one area I think needs the most research still is judicial impact.  We know a significant amount of how courts reach decisions, but little about the broad based effect they have in society.  I would also argue (since it is my area), that we know much about the federal system and federal justices, but quite little about State courts and their judges.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23057.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"v5o11","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What is the current state of your field? A while back, there was a post on what the agreements were in macroeconomics, and there were some good responses linking to areas of agreement in macro.  I'd like to see similar responses for the other social science fields.  * What are the areas of agreement in your field? * What methodology does your field accept? * What are some areas in need of further research in your field?","c_root_id_A":"c51lwq9","c_root_id_B":"c51oruv","created_at_utc_A":1339901557,"created_at_utc_B":1339919238,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Political Science\/International Relations? Last I checked, the U.S. government\/NSF was supposed to abandon any funding. Perhaps this is rumor or heresy, maybe I'm demented, but could anyone confirm this?","human_ref_B":"In the field of judicial politics, there is a general agreement that  1. In Judicial Decision-Making ideology is the most important factor (The Attitudinal Model) 2. In collegial courts, strategic decision-making takes place, mitigated or encouraged by the institutional rules of the courts (ie. Rule of Four, Join-3, Opinion bargaining, etc.) 3.  Lawyers and law firms with more experience before the Supreme Court are more successful, ceteris paribus. 4. The Solicitor General's Office is the most successful \"law firm,\" largely because of the unique role they play.  Methodologically, we tend to be highly quantitative.  Ranging from OLS, to logistic regression, to Bayesian Ideal Point Estimation, to Non-parametric matching, the field (subfield) is heavily geared towards being quantoids.  There is small, dedicated group doing work ala American Political Development which trends toward qualitative work, but I would say most students being trained today get a heavy dosage of math\/stat (as an example, I am the only grad student in my department allowed to teach the undergrads\/1st year grad stats because I decided to earn an MA in stats along the way).  There is also a heavy bent now towards game theory, something I wish I knew more.  The one area I think needs the most research still is judicial impact.  We know a significant amount of how courts reach decisions, but little about the broad based effect they have in society.  I would also argue (since it is my area), that we know much about the federal system and federal justices, but quite little about State courts and their judges.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17681.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"v5o11","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What is the current state of your field? A while back, there was a post on what the agreements were in macroeconomics, and there were some good responses linking to areas of agreement in macro.  I'd like to see similar responses for the other social science fields.  * What are the areas of agreement in your field? * What methodology does your field accept? * What are some areas in need of further research in your field?","c_root_id_A":"c51w3e0","c_root_id_B":"c51r57l","created_at_utc_A":1339971621,"created_at_utc_B":1339945744,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Public Policy wonk here. I cover a range of topics, but I'll give you a quick state of affairs:  * International Development: We're not sure if it works, but we're continuing to try to do it anyways * Cybersecurity Policy: We're not sure what it is, but we're continuing to try and do it anyways * Human Rights Policy: We're not sure they exist, but we're trying to make people believe they do * Civil Liberties and Tech Policy: We're not sure what the violation of your rights will be tomorrow, but we're trying to clean up yesterday's mess   In all seriousness, policy work is continually an exercise of balancing the \"right\" answer with the possible answer. I had the opportunity a while back to meet with one of Obama's top economic advisers and he described working at the White House as \"living in a world of second and third choices.\" That's democracy for you though - even in the few instances when we think we really have found an answer to a policy challenge, we're constantly confronted by the fact that its usually politically infeasible. It'd be depressing if it wasn't so fucking fascinating.","human_ref_B":"The field of economic geography has bifurcated since the 1990s. Right now there are two major ways of approaching the topic: critical political economy and innovation\/economic development. The former is most popular in North America and focuses on the origins of social and spatial injustice, international political economy and development, and activist-based interventions. The later looks at the causes of regional economic development and decline, with a specific focus on the role of innovation, creativity, and clusters in regional economic trajectories.   Both sides commonly use qualitative methods, but the political economy side is more likely to use participant-observation, activist research (e.g working with a community group). The economic development side does use qualitative methods like interviews, but will also depend on quantitative analysis of surveys or census data.   There isn't a whole lot of intermingling between the two groups. We generally publish in different journals and use completely different theoretical frameworks (Foucault vs evolutionary economic geography, for example). Innovation scholars like me are more interesting in debating\/fighting with economists more than talking with the people down the hall from us.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25877.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1ipmh4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is there such a thing as alternative or research prisons? I'm thinking something along the lines of a prison where they try out different correctional practices, maybe research what works for best for rehabilitation and reducing recitivism. And if not, is there research on what works, and is it being implemented anywhere?","c_root_id_A":"cb6tlbj","c_root_id_B":"cb6twsf","created_at_utc_A":1374355121,"created_at_utc_B":1374356243,"score_A":3,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Check out the American Correctional Association - they are the oldest and largest organization dedicated to best practices in the field.","human_ref_B":"This Norwegian prison implements some pretty radical penal practices. Might be of interest given your question: http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/society\/2013\/feb\/25\/norwegian-prison-inmates-treated-like-people","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1122.0,"score_ratio":6.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1ipmh4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is there such a thing as alternative or research prisons? I'm thinking something along the lines of a prison where they try out different correctional practices, maybe research what works for best for rehabilitation and reducing recitivism. And if not, is there research on what works, and is it being implemented anywhere?","c_root_id_A":"cb6upi9","c_root_id_B":"cb6ufq6","created_at_utc_A":1374359074,"created_at_utc_B":1374358117,"score_A":12,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"The research aspect would be tricky. Prisoners are considered a vulnerable population for research and extra safegaurds are needed for ethical approval of studies to make sure partipants are not coerced. So a prison designed to research new methods might have difficulty with getting approved by an IRB.","human_ref_B":"Interesting little docu about Greenland's \"Open Prisons\": http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=8EMRUUuz7CU  Outdated prison philosophies (especially for-profit prisons) are going to be a huge issue in the next few decades. Hopefully sooner rather than later.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":957.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1ipmh4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is there such a thing as alternative or research prisons? I'm thinking something along the lines of a prison where they try out different correctional practices, maybe research what works for best for rehabilitation and reducing recitivism. And if not, is there research on what works, and is it being implemented anywhere?","c_root_id_A":"cb6upi9","c_root_id_B":"cb6tlbj","created_at_utc_A":1374359074,"created_at_utc_B":1374355121,"score_A":12,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The research aspect would be tricky. Prisoners are considered a vulnerable population for research and extra safegaurds are needed for ethical approval of studies to make sure partipants are not coerced. So a prison designed to research new methods might have difficulty with getting approved by an IRB.","human_ref_B":"Check out the American Correctional Association - they are the oldest and largest organization dedicated to best practices in the field.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3953.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1ipmh4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is there such a thing as alternative or research prisons? I'm thinking something along the lines of a prison where they try out different correctional practices, maybe research what works for best for rehabilitation and reducing recitivism. And if not, is there research on what works, and is it being implemented anywhere?","c_root_id_A":"cb6tlbj","c_root_id_B":"cb6ufq6","created_at_utc_A":1374355121,"created_at_utc_B":1374358117,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Check out the American Correctional Association - they are the oldest and largest organization dedicated to best practices in the field.","human_ref_B":"Interesting little docu about Greenland's \"Open Prisons\": http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=8EMRUUuz7CU  Outdated prison philosophies (especially for-profit prisons) are going to be a huge issue in the next few decades. Hopefully sooner rather than later.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2996.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1r9toq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Dear Economists, this thought occurred to me the other day, and it scares the hell out of me. Please tell me why I'm wrong. Alright, so this thought occurred to me the other day.  Basically, ever since the financial crisis in 2008 and even before then central banks in most countries especially the US have been lending money at near 0% interest rates.  Now conventional economic wisdom tells us that extended periods of low interest rates increases the money supply and leads to inflation.  However, we have yet to see a significant increase in inflation as the result of this extended period of extremely low interest rates.  It occurs to me that this may be a result of the way we measure inflation.  Econ 101 says that inflation is measures by taking a basket of common consumer goods and determining how much it costs to buy those goods, the more money required to buy them, the greater the rate of inflation.  However, the money being lent at the fed window (at near 0% interest) is only lent to large institutional investors and the interest rates for the common consumer have not changed dramatically.    Suppose then, that you are a large institutional investor that has access to almost unlimited quantities of nearly free money.  Common sense says that you should borrow all of the money that you can and purchase any investment products that will likely return at a rate greater than 0.025% interest (or whatever the current fed rate is).  In fact all of the large institutional investors should be doing the same, potentially driving up the cost of almost all investment products as a result of the unnatural demand brought on by nearly free money.  Persons paying attention to the news of late will also note that at present the US stock market is in record high territory, despite the still relatively weak economic recovery in the US and Europe.  My theory is thus:  that the near 0% interest rate given by the fed to large institutional borrowers has created huge levels of inflation, however, the inflation is not able to be measured using traditional tools because the extra money has only been used to buy investment assets (stocks, bonds, derivatives, etc.), and that the price of those products, is, as a result currently inflated (perhaps hugely) by said excess monetary supply.  If this is true it would mean a few things, first that the fed borrowing window has created a two tiered monetary system, with one access to money for the ~0.5% (or less) who can borrow directly from the fed and another monetary system for the rest of us.  Second, and more importantly, that the stock and bond market may be in the midst of a bubble, brought on by easy access to nearly free money, and that this bubble may be largely hidden and potentially massive.  Following from that conclusion, should such a bubble exist it has the potential to massively impact the stock market (perhaps the kind of crash we have not seen since pre-1929), including large investors like pension and mutual funds.  So that\u2019s my theory, it would really reassure me if someone much more well versed in economics than I could tell me why I\u2019m wrong.  Please.","c_root_id_A":"cdlaq4o","c_root_id_B":"cdl68ld","created_at_utc_A":1385232387,"created_at_utc_B":1385217463,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I would respond by looking at inflation expectations (which you can get from subtracting TIPS rate of return from nominal Treasury rate of return); a loosening of monetary policy (i.e. presence of free money) would create a wider difference between Treasury and TIPS, even in the bubble scenario you describe, because assets linked to the nominal economy (stocks, nominal-rate bonds) would see huge gains relative to inflation-protected assets such as TIPS.  Based on the data (graph of 5 yr TIPS\/Treasury rates from FRED, same basic conclusion if you look at 1 yr, 5 yr, 10 yr, etc.) then you can see that the difference between Treasury and TIPS has pretty much been stable (very moderate increases, but not much) since 2010. So the inflation you're looking for isn't hiding in capital markets; it just isn't there.","human_ref_B":"Two answers: one theoretical, one empirical.  The theoretical answer: the Fed actually wants the banks to drive up asset prices.  That's exactly how monetary policy is supposed to work.  Higher bond prices -> lower borrowing rates, so companies can go out and increase investment by borrowing at lower rates.  Also, the banks aren't \"borrowing\" from the Fed's discount window (they only  do so if they have problems)  Empirical: you can easily see from the Fed's data that the banks aren't borrowing from it.  In fact one problem is that the banks are keeping the money in the Fed as excess reserves (although I think this part of the issue is overhyped).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14924.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"skse6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Someone in my economics class keeps arguing that Warren Buffet actually pays 49% in taxes. What about his argument is wrong? He claims that Buffet pays 19% in federal taxes, but 30% in capital taxes because he gets his money from Berkshire Hathaway stocks or something which pays a 30% capital tax, and therefor actually pays more taxes than his secretary. I'm positive he's wrong for multiple reasons, one of them being that Berkshire Hathaway doesn't really pay near 30% because of loopholes, but there isn't any way to prove this. Can anyone give a full explanation?","c_root_id_A":"c4ez3x6","c_root_id_B":"c4ey2rh","created_at_utc_A":1335035436,"created_at_utc_B":1335029334,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"His argument was wrong because he should have done that in an accounting course.","human_ref_B":"So their reasoning is 19% + 30% = 49%? Why would you listen to anything this person says?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6102.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"skse6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Someone in my economics class keeps arguing that Warren Buffet actually pays 49% in taxes. What about his argument is wrong? He claims that Buffet pays 19% in federal taxes, but 30% in capital taxes because he gets his money from Berkshire Hathaway stocks or something which pays a 30% capital tax, and therefor actually pays more taxes than his secretary. I'm positive he's wrong for multiple reasons, one of them being that Berkshire Hathaway doesn't really pay near 30% because of loopholes, but there isn't any way to prove this. Can anyone give a full explanation?","c_root_id_A":"c4ez3x6","c_root_id_B":"c4ey7go","created_at_utc_A":1335035436,"created_at_utc_B":1335030122,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"His argument was wrong because he should have done that in an accounting course.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2007\/07\/15\/business\/yourmoney\/15view.html?_r=1  This article from Greg Mankiw explains it nicely, IMO.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5314.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"cq2fyr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Does anyone have a citation for guns detering (or not detering) crime? Hi,  Do guns deter crime? I need a citation in either direction (scholarly publication; more recently published = better but I'll take anything).   Thanks for the help","c_root_id_A":"ewtvmky","c_root_id_B":"ewuiaed","created_at_utc_A":1565755095,"created_at_utc_B":1565782128,"score_A":4,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Here\u2019s   a link to a 1993 CDC study. It\u2019s about homicide, not crime in general.   Btw, here\u2019s a link to an opinion piece on the possible reasons   why it\u2019s difficult to find the research you are looking for (in the US).","human_ref_B":"A citation or even a handful of them would not provide you with a clear picture, especially if we focus on America, where it is both controversial and hard to study. Before anything, let's set the situation.   ---  What does the literature have to offer? Arguably for many, the contentious debate among researchers began with Lott's More Guns, Less Crimes. Another notorious paper is Kleck and Gertz's study on defensive gun use.   Lott's book prompted the National Research Council to review the evidence and produce a report in 2004 which is often used as a reference point. It concluded that no strong conclusions could be made, with a single dissent by James Q. Wilson on the effect of right-to-carry laws on homicide rates (dissent whch the rest of the committee considered to not hold scientific merit):  >While much has been learned, much remains to be done, and this report necessarily focuses on the important unknowns in this field of study. **The committee found that answers to some of the most pressing questions cannot be addressed with existing data and research methods, however well designed**.  >For example, **despite a large body of research, the committee found no credible evidence that the passage of right-to-carry laws decreases or increases violent crime, and there is almost no empirical evidence that the more than 80 prevention programs focused on gun-related violence have had any effect on children**\u2019s behavior, knowledge, attitudes, or beliefs about firearms. The committee found that **the data available on these questions are too weak to support unambiguous conclusions or strong policy statements.**  ---  Concerning Kleck and Gertz, they suggested that there were about 2.1 million DGUs each year in the US, but this number is widely considered an over-estimation which is not reconcilable with what is known about crime in the US.  Cook and Ludwig replicated their study for the National Institute of Justice and concluded, for several reasons:  >**The NSPOF based estimate of millions of DGUs each year greatly exaggerates the true number, as do other estimates based on similar surveys. Much debated is whether the widespread ownership of firearms deters crime or makes it more deadly\u2014or perhaps both\u2014but the DGU estimates are not informative in this regard**.  Likewise, more recently, the RAND Corporation reached the same conclusion:  >**Estimates for the prevalence of DGU span wide ranges and include high-end estimates\u2014for instance, 2.5 million DGUs per year\u2014that are not plausible given other information that is more trustworthy**, such as the total number of U.S. residents who are injured or killed by guns each year. **At the other extreme, the NCVS estimate of 116,000 DGU incidents per year almost certainly underestimates the true number.** There have been few substantive advances in measuring prevalence counts or rates since the NRC (2004) report.  ---  Aneja et al. revisited the NRC's report. While agreeing with their original conclusions, they also offer corrections and new models to evaluate the evidence, pointing towards significant effects of RTC laws on aggravated assault, and suggesting they may in fact meaningfully increase gun assaults.   A recent study by Donohue et al. using \"more complete state panel data (through 2014) and new statistical techniques to estimate the impact on violent crime when states adopt right-to-carry (RTC) concealed handgun laws\" concluded, \"using different statistical approaches\u2014panel data regression and synthetic control\u2014with varying strengths and shortcomings and with different model specifications all suggest that the net effect of state adoption of RTC laws is a substantial increase in violent crime\".  Following his review of the literature, Kleck concluded that it is weak research which supports the hypothesis that higher gun ownership causes higher crime rates, whereas strong research do not find support for the hypothesis. He argues that many studies do not use a valid measure of gun prevalence, do not control for important confounding variables and\/or cannot establish causality.  ---  Admittedly, a sizable number of Americans report owning a gun for self-defense, but as highlighted it is debatable how often guns are used for legitimate self-defense in the US. There *is* a problem with determining gun prevalence, as underlined by RAND Corporation:  >Stronger study designs may be available to more persuasively establish the causal effects of gun ownership or gun prevalence on violent crime; however, **many such study designs are currently hampered by poor information on the prevalence of gun ownership and the consequent reliance on proxy measures of availability and prevalence**. For this reason, **we recommend that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or another federal agency resume routine collection of voluntarily provided survey data on gun ownership and use.**  This is a difficult problem to overcome in the US, where there is, for example, strong opposition to national gun registries.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":27033.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"iv7hq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Can someone explain the Republican Party in a non-biased way? What do they stand for and why does everyone seem to think they are only trying to fuck up the economy even more?","c_root_id_A":"c2704em","c_root_id_B":"c2779um","created_at_utc_A":1311246436,"created_at_utc_B":1311311917,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Oh man, I didn't think this subreddit would get people. I kinda gave up on it. It was in the banned list for a bit.   I promise, I will work on getting it going when I get back from work.","human_ref_B":"Well, to my understanding, American \"conservatism\" started stirring back up after the huge government expansions of WWII and the New Deal. It only gained momentum during the prosperous but volatile 50s and 60s when it advocated local control of policy amidst a brewing civil rights movement and resonated with Americans looking to protect their own. In the twilight of the 70s, when corporatism began its gradual takeover of policy, the ends of big business fit best with Republican (conservative) principles as opposed to the left-liberals (even if they weren't statists). The culture of consumption which birthed Reagan essentially cemented the economic direction of the Republican party and set the agenda for the next three decades. A belief, whether sincere or sensationalist, in economically liberating Americans from the government (tax cuts, etc.) naturally follows. And here we are.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":65481.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"iv7hq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Can someone explain the Republican Party in a non-biased way? What do they stand for and why does everyone seem to think they are only trying to fuck up the economy even more?","c_root_id_A":"c2age3j","c_root_id_B":"c277d72","created_at_utc_A":1312588584,"created_at_utc_B":1311312916,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"One line soundbite: \"Do you think the government can spend your money better than you can?\"  edit: fix typo","human_ref_B":"Here is a little bit of my view on the question. I am fresh out of college so I am no academic, and a little drunk:  The Republican Party has (like the Democratic Party) gone through a pretty huge transformation since its creation. As it stands now, the Republican Party is seen by many people as standing up for the \"big guy\" as opposed to everyone else. I believe this is because the theoretical framework of the modern Republican Party is largely based on semi-libertarian individualism and the protection of business interests. They profess that protection of business and private enterprise is good for the economy. Hence, nearly every national Republican politician believes in low tax revenues, which they believe will allow people to produce and consume more, thus providing revenue to the federal government without raising taxes.   Their professed belief in minimal government intervention in many areas and their marriage of economic and social\/religious conservatives alienates many people, including many libertarians who are only concerned with free enterprise. Also, while they decry \"big government\" many neo-conservatives in the Republican Party support expensive military and defense funding, without war taxes. These combine to cause many people to view the average Republican voter as either a slick businessman or an ignorant, overly-religious redneck. This is off-putting to many people such as Democratic Party voters who tend to be more urban, include more minorities, and support public initiatives through high tax revenues for the wealthy.  All in all, it all has to do with differing philosophies and the division in the U.S. between rural\/urban, business\/labor, and conservative\/liberal (if you want to generalize people's political beliefs into such categories). Also, in my opinion, most politicians are corrupt in some way. Seeing as the Republican's political ideology believes that low taxes and low regulation will aid the economy and thus people's lives, and give tepid support to actual social initiatives, many people view them as callous.   *As to why people believe they are fucking up the economy: I suppose it mostly has to do with the fact that they like to cut tax revenues, which Democrats believe need to be high (on a graduated scale) so that social institutions and initiatives can be funded. Seeing as how the Republican Party was in control when the U.S. invaded Iraq and Afghanistan (which costs the government a butt load of money) and did not raise any kind of taxes to offset the costs incurred, many people are\/were pissed at them.  Edit: grammar stuff","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1275668.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"iv7hq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Can someone explain the Republican Party in a non-biased way? What do they stand for and why does everyone seem to think they are only trying to fuck up the economy even more?","c_root_id_A":"c2age3j","c_root_id_B":"c29svqs","created_at_utc_A":1312588584,"created_at_utc_B":1312365316,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"One line soundbite: \"Do you think the government can spend your money better than you can?\"  edit: fix typo","human_ref_B":"> What do they stand for and why does everyone seem to think they are only trying to fuck up the economy even more?  Other people are doing a good job in explaining their positions, but I must explain it to you, your perception that \"everyone\" seem to think that they are only trying to fuck up the economy is heavily biased because of left-liberal nature of Reddit.  Out there Democrats are equally hated(in fact hated even more by the common man because they are currently the party in power). I rarely find people on street telling me with same amount of anger as I find on reddit that they think Republicans are trying to kill the economy.  Most people gave Obama and Democrats fair chance in past 2-3 years(according to them). Average American is frustrated by the situation of the economy, the Democrat are offerring a solution, and Republicans other. On reddit it looks like only Democrats are offerring a solution and Republicans are merely trying to stop them, but this is not true.  For every American who fully supports Democrats plan I can find you an American who fully supports Republican plan and is completely against the former, and for every two of these Americans I can find you 10 Americans who just dislike both the sides equally and\/or have no opinion or are just confused.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":223268.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3nri3l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Are there any studies showing that people behave differently when they're being watched?","c_root_id_A":"cvqzewz","c_root_id_B":"cvr7in6","created_at_utc_A":1444194151,"created_at_utc_B":1444222833,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I think Erving Goffman has an excellent perspective on the differences in how we act based on who is watching us.  He relates social life to performing in a theatre! It's a great way to visualize the ideology of presenting different versions of yourself based on your audience (grandparents vs. peers).  I attached a link. I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for but I hope it helps.  http:\/\/sociology.about.com\/od\/Works\/a\/Presentation-Of-Self-Everyday-Life.htm  http:\/\/www.slideshare.net\/danielledirks\/dramaturgy-and-goffmanspresentationofself","human_ref_B":"Another aspect of this is whether they think they're being watched, even if they're not. Jeremy Bentham developed the idea of the panopticon but Foucault also discussed it. https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Panopticism","labels":0,"seconds_difference":28682.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"3nri3l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Are there any studies showing that people behave differently when they're being watched?","c_root_id_A":"cvr7in6","c_root_id_B":"cvr130b","created_at_utc_A":1444222833,"created_at_utc_B":1444199022,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Another aspect of this is whether they think they're being watched, even if they're not. Jeremy Bentham developed the idea of the panopticon but Foucault also discussed it. https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Panopticism","human_ref_B":"Lots of studies! In fact it can be called different things depending on what field you're in, because it's so prolific.   In my field (social psychology), it's called social facilitation. Specifically, subjects tend to perform better on simple or well-practiced tasks when in the real or perceived presence of others. In fact, Norman Triplett wrote about this effect in 1898, and many now consider that to be the first ever social psychology theory (he didn't call it by that term specifically - it was only coined by Floyd Allport in 1924).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":23811.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"3nri3l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Are there any studies showing that people behave differently when they're being watched?","c_root_id_A":"cvr7in6","c_root_id_B":"cvr3y61","created_at_utc_A":1444222833,"created_at_utc_B":1444210828,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Another aspect of this is whether they think they're being watched, even if they're not. Jeremy Bentham developed the idea of the panopticon but Foucault also discussed it. https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Panopticism","human_ref_B":"Milgrim and Stanford come to mind.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12005.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"avg7p5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Are the Unions actually to blame for the 1970s UK economic crisis (stagflation,winter of discontent, end of post-war consensus)? Had the Unions really caused the end of the post-war consensus by driving up wages too high? Or was there another way? Could Keynesianism have survived in some form? What is the truth of the matter?","c_root_id_A":"ehfx94c","c_root_id_B":"ehf16nv","created_at_utc_A":1551316690,"created_at_utc_B":1551294845,"score_A":27,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I recently read Greenspan and Woolbridge's *Capitalism in America*, and in it they discuss the 1970's inflationary spiral here in the United States. They seems to pin the blame on, in order of importance,     1. Oil supply shock, caused by the OPEC embargo 2. US financial system hitting the gold ceiling 3. inefficiently structured managerial systems and firms 4. extractive union negotiations  I can't give specifics on the UK, but in as much as the parallel crisis in the US gives insight into what's happening in the UK at the time, strong and extractive unions don't seem to be to blame.   For some cross-sectional evidence, look at West Germany in the 1970's (or Germany today) which had a higher rate of unionization (and has a higher percentage of it's workforce unionized today) than either the US or the UK. Along with Japan, West Germany was the major center of firms and conglomerates which were out-competing US firms internationally. It's not definitive proof, but this trivia seems to point the finger away from strong unions as the general cause of economic malaise. At best, perhaps strong unions can compound and exacerbate problems already current.   &#x200B;","human_ref_B":"I don't have an answer, but Thomas Piketty's Capital In The 21st Century covers a lot post-war economics. Maybe that would help. Its widely considered the most important economic book in quite some time and is all about studying the past century of economics (including UK) via the data we've incidentally started to collect via income tax.  Good luck finding a proper answer!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21845.0,"score_ratio":13.5}
{"post_id":"3afi33","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Does the Confederate flag of the South Carolina Capitol usually fly at half-mass for national tragedies? I don't care about the political implications of whether or not they should have the flag. I just want to know if they usually lower the flag for other national tragedies? Is this the first exception?","c_root_id_A":"csccmdo","c_root_id_B":"csccfgw","created_at_utc_A":1434752568,"created_at_utc_B":1434752206,"score_A":19,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure if this is really an AskSocialScience question, but here's what I know.  The answer appears to be no, or at least not since it was removed from the dome of the State Assembly.  The law was devised in such a way that it's nearly impossible to lower the flag and the flagpole itself isn't a normal flagpole that allows you to easily raise or lower a flag.  Here's a decent summary of the situation:  http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/morning-mix\/wp\/2015\/06\/19\/why-south-carolinas-confederate-flag-isnt-at-half-mast-after-church-shooting\/  > \u201cThis flag must be flown on a flagpole located at a point on the south side of the Confederate Soldier Monument, centered on the monument, ten feet from the base of the monument at a height of thirty feet,\u201d it read. \u201cThe flagpole on which the flag is flown and the area adjacent to the monument and flagpole must be illuminated at night and an appropriate decorative iron fence must be erected around the flagpole.\u201d  > Anyone who wanted to move the flag faced one of the greatest hurdles in democratic politics: \u201cThe provisions of this section may only be amended or repealed upon passage of an act which has received a two-thirds vote on the third reading of the bill in each branch of the General Assembly,\u201d the bill read.  > A further obstacle to critics of the Confederate flag: It\u2019s affixed to the pole, and can\u2019t come down unless someone gets up there and pulls it down \u2014 which would be illegal anyway.  > \u201cThe flag is part of a Confederate War Memorial, and is not on a pulley system, so it cannot be lowered, only removed,\u201d Raycom Media reporter Will Wilson tweeted.","human_ref_B":"There are specific laws governing the Confederate flag in South Carolina. The governor can't order it to be flown at half staff, unlike the state flag. This article describes the situation.  http:\/\/m.washingtonpost.com\/news\/morning-mix\/wp\/2015\/06\/19\/why-south-carolinas-confederate-flag-isnt-at-half-mast-after-church-shooting","labels":1,"seconds_difference":362.0,"score_ratio":1.9}
{"post_id":"3afi33","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Does the Confederate flag of the South Carolina Capitol usually fly at half-mass for national tragedies? I don't care about the political implications of whether or not they should have the flag. I just want to know if they usually lower the flag for other national tragedies? Is this the first exception?","c_root_id_A":"csccmdo","c_root_id_B":"csccfsg","created_at_utc_A":1434752568,"created_at_utc_B":1434752222,"score_A":19,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure if this is really an AskSocialScience question, but here's what I know.  The answer appears to be no, or at least not since it was removed from the dome of the State Assembly.  The law was devised in such a way that it's nearly impossible to lower the flag and the flagpole itself isn't a normal flagpole that allows you to easily raise or lower a flag.  Here's a decent summary of the situation:  http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/morning-mix\/wp\/2015\/06\/19\/why-south-carolinas-confederate-flag-isnt-at-half-mast-after-church-shooting\/  > \u201cThis flag must be flown on a flagpole located at a point on the south side of the Confederate Soldier Monument, centered on the monument, ten feet from the base of the monument at a height of thirty feet,\u201d it read. \u201cThe flagpole on which the flag is flown and the area adjacent to the monument and flagpole must be illuminated at night and an appropriate decorative iron fence must be erected around the flagpole.\u201d  > Anyone who wanted to move the flag faced one of the greatest hurdles in democratic politics: \u201cThe provisions of this section may only be amended or repealed upon passage of an act which has received a two-thirds vote on the third reading of the bill in each branch of the General Assembly,\u201d the bill read.  > A further obstacle to critics of the Confederate flag: It\u2019s affixed to the pole, and can\u2019t come down unless someone gets up there and pulls it down \u2014 which would be illegal anyway.  > \u201cThe flag is part of a Confederate War Memorial, and is not on a pulley system, so it cannot be lowered, only removed,\u201d Raycom Media reporter Will Wilson tweeted.","human_ref_B":"A further obstacle to critics of the Confederate flag: It\u2019s affixed to the pole, and can\u2019t come down unless someone gets up there and pulls it down \u2014 which would be illegal anyway.  \u201cThe flag is part of a Confederate War Memorial, and is not on a pulley system, so it cannot be lowered, only removed,\u201d Raycom Media reporter Will Wilson tweeted.  Source","labels":1,"seconds_difference":346.0,"score_ratio":3.8}
{"post_id":"4zji6f","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Do people who are educated and bear a healthy (not extreme) amount of scepticism experience schizophrenia differently? I was thinking about what it would be like if I had schizophrenia, and I find it hard to believe that I would ever think the FBI was after me. Would someone like me be just as susceptible to that fear, or would I pick something to which I can relate?  More generally, is there clinical research into the kinds of things schizophrenics become paranoid or have delusions of grandeur about, hopefully regressed against level of education?","c_root_id_A":"d6wrpnf","c_root_id_B":"d6wsyuw","created_at_utc_A":1472166415,"created_at_utc_B":1472168274,"score_A":25,"score_B":33,"human_ref_A":"I really like this TED talk because it describes the experience of schizophrenia from the perspective of a highly competent and educated professional.","human_ref_B":"There is some interesting research on how culture more broadly influences the schizophrenic experience. For instance, this work is pretty famous, and found that schizophrenic auditory hallucinations tend to be friendly and playful in interdependent cultures with little mental health stigma, whereas they are aggressive and mean in independent western societies where there is much more stigma and less social support.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1859.0,"score_ratio":1.32}
{"post_id":"28outy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Can someone explain antipositivism? I don't understand what the point of research is if there's no true reality. Or am I missing the point?","c_root_id_A":"cidfdxv","c_root_id_B":"cidb9ux","created_at_utc_A":1403373231,"created_at_utc_B":1403361995,"score_A":13,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Anti-positivism is not fully the same as saying there's no true reality.  Weber was an anti-positivist (perhaps the first one to be explicitly so, since positivism in the social sciences only dates explicitly to Comte).  Instead of positivist, he's \"interpretivist\" (Simmel was the same).  That's not the same as arguing there's no true reality.  Weber's greatest work, *the Protestant Ethic*, make a neat little causal argument.  Here's James Coleman's illustration of it from *Foundations of Social Theory* (Coleman is one of the most important sociologists of the second half of the 20th century, and certainly the most important rational choice sociologist).  Coleman is using Weber to illustrate his \"boat\", his model for connecting macro-level change with micro-level interaction (the deck of the boat is macro, the keel is micro).  Coleman's take on Weber is not so important, but the point is this is anti-positive research that explains something--it's not arguing against true reality or anything.    In this case, it's explaining how Protestantism lead to capitalism.  It's important to also note what it's *not* explaining.  It's not explaining a general relationship between religion and economic systems.  It's not explaining a relationship between two variables that can be recreated under other circumstances (for Weber, most major changes were \"overdetermined\").  It's not explaining a general principle or law.  It's explaining the (single) origin of capitalism, which lies (for him) in Calvinism.  Most history, for example, is anti-positivist (or, perhaps more accurately, non-positivist).  Most socio-cultural anthropology similarly so (Geertz, though less loved than he was two generations ago, is explicitly a Weberian).  Now, the post-modernists took this to some sort of strange Platonic extreme of social constructivism.  Most social scientists have not found this useful, though some in anthropology continue to do so.    Here's a discussion from the top sociology blog about whether or not to drop post-modernism from theory classes (most people agree \"drop\").  This is not, however, an argument about positivism vs. anti-positivism--Weber stays in.  \"Understanding\", or *Verstehen*, the original concept that the anti-positivists were actually *in favor of*, still has a place in every sociological theory class.  Economics, psychology, and physical anthropology tend to have little room for this sort of interpretivism (they tend to be interested in universal, positive laws of human behavior); sociology allows for anti-positivism, but in general, high status work tends to be more positivistic; socio-cultural anthropology and especially history tend to find positivism less useful because they are interested in very specific questions (how this people at this time did this thing).  If history, anthropology, and some parts of sociology are interested in a general phenomenon--say the penetration of capitalism throughout the world-system--they tend to be interested in the variation throughout the world, rather than parsimonious, variable based laws.  Now, it's possible to do historical comparative work and try to come up with universal laws--the first two generations of historical comparative sociology was like this.  Tilly, for instance, argued that states *universally* were created in large part through a process of wars creating debts which had to be repaid through taxation which required larger, more central governments to collect.  Likewise, Skocpol argued for a universal process of \"social revolutions\" (think French Revolution social revolution because society change; American Revolution only a political revolution because only the government changed) that starts with the financial breakdown of the state.  Sure, she points out differences in her careful study of Russia, Chinese, and French cases, but what she's interested in is what they all have in common.  Hopefully that helps clarify some!  Antipositivism is not necessarily that extreme post-modernism that you have in mind (in sociology, we've found post-modernism less useful, except for maybe Latour and Foucault in specific subfields--perhaps an anthropologist or a geographer could explain why post-modernism is useful for research in their field).","human_ref_B":"Not an explanation, just a quick anecdote:  Do you remember reddit's obsession with that safe which couldn't be opened? And everyone wanted to know what was in the safe, and speculated about what was inside, and projected their dreams and hopes and fears into it? And then OP delivered by finally opening the safe only to find that it was empty.  Positivism can tell us a lot about the material world, and how the safe was not actually empty but actually contained some nitrogen and oxygen gasses which interacted with the metal safe to oxidize the material and corrode, making the safe hard to open.  It can't tell us much about how people reacted to that stuation, what it meant to them, why they believed what they did about its contents, and ultimately the metaphor of an empty safe being not physically empty but devoid of human meaning and intention.  That's maybe a good start to answering your question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11236.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1e5y5j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Has there ever been a historical case of a ponzi scheme that has worked? In other words has there been an extremely rare exception to the typical cases where the schemer finds a way to lower the debt ceiling enough to either pay it off themselves or some other circumstance?   I was reading some of these stories (https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/List_of_Ponzi_schemes) and a lot of the perpetrators start with a legitimate financial background and for either greed or because their performance couldn't keep up with their intentions they fall into a pattern of paying off old investors with new money, but there has to be an instance where somebody broke the cycle before it got too bad isn't there?   Maybe not, just something that I was curious about.   Thanks all for insightful input.","c_root_id_A":"c9x3k8j","c_root_id_B":"c9x4b2m","created_at_utc_A":1368329744,"created_at_utc_B":1368332712,"score_A":3,"score_B":33,"human_ref_A":"Wouldn't we never know based on the nature of what you're asking?","human_ref_B":"Ponzi schemes always fail. You can't generate a return on an investment if you don't actually invest in anything, so the only way to pay the investors more than they put in is by expanding the flow of new investment. Which is inherently unsustainable, purely as a matter of mathematics. Once the money gets invested in something real, it's no longer a Ponzi scheme. There could be examples of pools of money that started out as a Ponzi scheme and ended up a legitimate investment enterprise...but it usually wouldn't happen because unrealistically high returns are what get Ponzi schemes started in the first place.  >but there has to be an instance where somebody broke the cycle before it got too bad isn't there?  If you break the cycle before some people lose a *lot* of money, you've just created a small Ponzi scheme instead of a large one. It doesn't make the Ponzi scheme a success.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2968.0,"score_ratio":11.0}
{"post_id":"1e5y5j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Has there ever been a historical case of a ponzi scheme that has worked? In other words has there been an extremely rare exception to the typical cases where the schemer finds a way to lower the debt ceiling enough to either pay it off themselves or some other circumstance?   I was reading some of these stories (https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/List_of_Ponzi_schemes) and a lot of the perpetrators start with a legitimate financial background and for either greed or because their performance couldn't keep up with their intentions they fall into a pattern of paying off old investors with new money, but there has to be an instance where somebody broke the cycle before it got too bad isn't there?   Maybe not, just something that I was curious about.   Thanks all for insightful input.","c_root_id_A":"c9x9q8y","c_root_id_B":"c9x6r3s","created_at_utc_A":1368368241,"created_at_utc_B":1368345013,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"How is this different from Social Security? As I understand it, SS depends on the new payers in the system to support existing retirees.","human_ref_B":"What you could do, of course, is what Madoff claimed to have been trying to do when he first started paying returns out of new investment funds: run a Ponzi scheme and try to convert it into a real investment house.   Of course, if you are having to pay old investors with new investors' money, it's a big hint that you are shit at investing, which suggests you may always be shit at investing. And of course Madoff's reputation was that he was a investment genius without equal, so he couldn't go back to ordinary profit levels.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":23228.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1e5y5j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Has there ever been a historical case of a ponzi scheme that has worked? In other words has there been an extremely rare exception to the typical cases where the schemer finds a way to lower the debt ceiling enough to either pay it off themselves or some other circumstance?   I was reading some of these stories (https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/List_of_Ponzi_schemes) and a lot of the perpetrators start with a legitimate financial background and for either greed or because their performance couldn't keep up with their intentions they fall into a pattern of paying off old investors with new money, but there has to be an instance where somebody broke the cycle before it got too bad isn't there?   Maybe not, just something that I was curious about.   Thanks all for insightful input.","c_root_id_A":"c9x9q8y","c_root_id_B":"c9x8p3g","created_at_utc_A":1368368241,"created_at_utc_B":1368362245,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"How is this different from Social Security? As I understand it, SS depends on the new payers in the system to support existing retirees.","human_ref_B":"All Ponzi schemes work - except for the last ones to subscribe.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5996.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1zfpby","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What is some background history and what are the precedents of the current situation in Ukraine? (x-post \/r\/AskHistorians cause I wasn't sure where to post this) How does it relate to the current situation?","c_root_id_A":"cftdbj6","c_root_id_B":"cftl8x2","created_at_utc_A":1393871042,"created_at_utc_B":1393887134,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Wikipedia is not bad on this; see e.g. here.  I had a short post here that you might find interesting. I'm scraping most of my knowledge on the timing from here. This article is a bit shallow but can be considered useful for orientation.","human_ref_B":"What we know as Ukraine has two main regions. If you excuse a lot of simplification, let's look at some maps.  The first, the Ukraine, has been a border region for many great empires (Poland-Lithuania, Austria, Ottomans,Russia). It's population is mainly slavic, descended from the Kievan Rus. Here is a map from 1751.   The second is the Crimea. It used to be populated by a group of Turkic muslims called the Crimean Tartars, who were vassals of the Ottomans. Map](http:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/4\/4d\/New_Russia_on_territory_of_Ukraine.png.   The Russian Empire had a long pre-occupation about being a naval power, and the Black Sea provided ports that wouldn't freeze. They also didn't like being raided by the Tartars (the Tartars had a massive slave trade in kidnapped slavs).  The Russians fought a long proxy war (and many direct wars) against the Ottomans to cement Black Sea power by having their fellow Orthodox slavs, the Ukrainian Cossacks, raid the Tartars and vice-versa. The Russians also gradually assimilated the Cossacks into their Empire during this period of expansion. After finally conquering the Crimea, they opened the area to Russian and Ukrainian settlement, and built naval facilities on the peninsula. The Crimean War was fought on the peninsula as it was the seat of Russian Black Sea power, and Britain \/ France \/ the Ottomans wanted to halt Russian expansion to the Balkans.   The modern borders are inherited from the [Ukrainian SSR, which eventually included both areas. Like other SSRs, it originally had some autonomy but became increasingly dominated by Moscow. It became more of a regional administrative unit, with areas added on over time. The Ukraine suffered the Holodomor famines and Chernobyl, and the aforementioned ethnic cleansing. Stalin ethnically cleansed the Tartars after many independence-minded Tartars sided with the Nazis, leaving a majority of recent settlers.  If you look at modern maps of voting block and Russian speakers, you can see how the Crimean Tartar lands, now heavily settled by Russians as well as Ukrainians, lean towards Russia, and the traditional Ukrainian lands lean European. You can also see why the Crimean peninsular is where things are really going down, seeing how recently it was part of Russia.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16092.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1zfpby","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What is some background history and what are the precedents of the current situation in Ukraine? (x-post \/r\/AskHistorians cause I wasn't sure where to post this) How does it relate to the current situation?","c_root_id_A":"cftktgk","c_root_id_B":"cftl8x2","created_at_utc_A":1393886237,"created_at_utc_B":1393887134,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"For context I recommend looking at the Russo-Georgian war.","human_ref_B":"What we know as Ukraine has two main regions. If you excuse a lot of simplification, let's look at some maps.  The first, the Ukraine, has been a border region for many great empires (Poland-Lithuania, Austria, Ottomans,Russia). It's population is mainly slavic, descended from the Kievan Rus. Here is a map from 1751.   The second is the Crimea. It used to be populated by a group of Turkic muslims called the Crimean Tartars, who were vassals of the Ottomans. Map](http:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/4\/4d\/New_Russia_on_territory_of_Ukraine.png.   The Russian Empire had a long pre-occupation about being a naval power, and the Black Sea provided ports that wouldn't freeze. They also didn't like being raided by the Tartars (the Tartars had a massive slave trade in kidnapped slavs).  The Russians fought a long proxy war (and many direct wars) against the Ottomans to cement Black Sea power by having their fellow Orthodox slavs, the Ukrainian Cossacks, raid the Tartars and vice-versa. The Russians also gradually assimilated the Cossacks into their Empire during this period of expansion. After finally conquering the Crimea, they opened the area to Russian and Ukrainian settlement, and built naval facilities on the peninsula. The Crimean War was fought on the peninsula as it was the seat of Russian Black Sea power, and Britain \/ France \/ the Ottomans wanted to halt Russian expansion to the Balkans.   The modern borders are inherited from the [Ukrainian SSR, which eventually included both areas. Like other SSRs, it originally had some autonomy but became increasingly dominated by Moscow. It became more of a regional administrative unit, with areas added on over time. The Ukraine suffered the Holodomor famines and Chernobyl, and the aforementioned ethnic cleansing. Stalin ethnically cleansed the Tartars after many independence-minded Tartars sided with the Nazis, leaving a majority of recent settlers.  If you look at modern maps of voting block and Russian speakers, you can see how the Crimean Tartar lands, now heavily settled by Russians as well as Ukrainians, lean towards Russia, and the traditional Ukrainian lands lean European. You can also see why the Crimean peninsular is where things are really going down, seeing how recently it was part of Russia.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":897.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"w5dq1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Was there ever a time that women who weren't virgins on their wedding day actually wore a non-white dress? Has this rule ever been enforced, voluntarily or not? .","c_root_id_A":"c5ahewv","c_root_id_B":"c5aglg3","created_at_utc_A":1341628862,"created_at_utc_B":1341625721,"score_A":32,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"For the record, I am an older woman who was brought up in a rural village in England.    Most young women marrying for the first time would wear white or ivory regardless of whether they were living with their partners beforehand or whatever.  No, actually, most women, even if marrying for the second or third time would do the same.  The only time I was ever aware of women intentionally not wearing white to get married, was when they were widows, and were wearing a coloured dress (generally blue) as a sign of respect for their marriage to their deceased husbands.","human_ref_B":"The white wedding dress is a fairly recent western tradition, made popular with the elite after Queen Victoria's wedding in 1840. The popularity increased, because a pure white wedding dress was seen as a sign of wealth (think of laundering costs.) White was also a popular color for girl's debutantes, so there was also the link to entering womanhood. And with anything, what was popular with the elite soon became popular with all the lower classes.  Etiquette books are what linked the white dress to modesty, really, and turned a simple fashion phase into a tradition. Veils, required for many churches, were seen as covering the face of the \"shy and blushing bride\" and by connection the white dress also became linked to modesty. However, it wasn't until WW2 that the white dress became really popular and the tradition of \"virgins\" wear white for their wedding day became a thing. You can thank a mixture of marketing and the rise of Christian ideals for that one.  It's not a rule to wear white on your wedding day to display your virginity; it's a tradition. And with all traditions, people take it with a grain of salt. Due to the connotations that an unmarried, sexually active woman faced, many women just go along with the tradition of white, whether it is true or not. Historically, a sexually pure woman is more respected in society, and both families benefit from such views. So, there really is no point of parading a woman out and saying, \"Hey guys! This woman is not a virgin! Now let's marry her off!\"   The fashion trend is changing. Off white, and beige dresses are slowly making their way to the market. Pops of colors are also becoming a bit more fashionable. With sexual purity not being as critical, women are more comfortable with breaking this tradition.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3141.0,"score_ratio":1.5238095238}
{"post_id":"w5dq1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Was there ever a time that women who weren't virgins on their wedding day actually wore a non-white dress? Has this rule ever been enforced, voluntarily or not? .","c_root_id_A":"c5ahewv","c_root_id_B":"c5af85h","created_at_utc_A":1341628862,"created_at_utc_B":1341619398,"score_A":32,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"For the record, I am an older woman who was brought up in a rural village in England.    Most young women marrying for the first time would wear white or ivory regardless of whether they were living with their partners beforehand or whatever.  No, actually, most women, even if marrying for the second or third time would do the same.  The only time I was ever aware of women intentionally not wearing white to get married, was when they were widows, and were wearing a coloured dress (generally blue) as a sign of respect for their marriage to their deceased husbands.","human_ref_B":"DISCLAIMER I am not a specialist of anything in social sciences or history   Your question would receive better answers in ~~r\/askscience~~ r\/askhistorians. Michel Pastoureau says that in the Middle Ages women would wear their brighter dress, often red, and that the white dress is an invention of the Victorian Era. I don't know about individual variations depending on if the woman is *really* a virgin or not. For better answers ask a historian.   EDIT : I meant to type r\/askhistorians. Obviously. I typed \"historians\" in the last sentence. I know askscience has nothing to do with this.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9464.0,"score_ratio":6.4}
{"post_id":"w5dq1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Was there ever a time that women who weren't virgins on their wedding day actually wore a non-white dress? Has this rule ever been enforced, voluntarily or not? .","c_root_id_A":"c5ahewv","c_root_id_B":"c5agl7e","created_at_utc_A":1341628862,"created_at_utc_B":1341625696,"score_A":32,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"For the record, I am an older woman who was brought up in a rural village in England.    Most young women marrying for the first time would wear white or ivory regardless of whether they were living with their partners beforehand or whatever.  No, actually, most women, even if marrying for the second or third time would do the same.  The only time I was ever aware of women intentionally not wearing white to get married, was when they were widows, and were wearing a coloured dress (generally blue) as a sign of respect for their marriage to their deceased husbands.","human_ref_B":"According to Wikipedia, white wedding dresses became popular after Queen Victoria's wedding in 1840. People later started assuming that white = virginity. From reading that article, it doesn't seem likely that white dresses have ever exclusively been worn by virgins, and there was a long time when even virgins wore colors other than white.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3166.0,"score_ratio":5.3333333333}
{"post_id":"w5dq1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Was there ever a time that women who weren't virgins on their wedding day actually wore a non-white dress? Has this rule ever been enforced, voluntarily or not? .","c_root_id_A":"c5aglg3","c_root_id_B":"c5af85h","created_at_utc_A":1341625721,"created_at_utc_B":1341619398,"score_A":21,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The white wedding dress is a fairly recent western tradition, made popular with the elite after Queen Victoria's wedding in 1840. The popularity increased, because a pure white wedding dress was seen as a sign of wealth (think of laundering costs.) White was also a popular color for girl's debutantes, so there was also the link to entering womanhood. And with anything, what was popular with the elite soon became popular with all the lower classes.  Etiquette books are what linked the white dress to modesty, really, and turned a simple fashion phase into a tradition. Veils, required for many churches, were seen as covering the face of the \"shy and blushing bride\" and by connection the white dress also became linked to modesty. However, it wasn't until WW2 that the white dress became really popular and the tradition of \"virgins\" wear white for their wedding day became a thing. You can thank a mixture of marketing and the rise of Christian ideals for that one.  It's not a rule to wear white on your wedding day to display your virginity; it's a tradition. And with all traditions, people take it with a grain of salt. Due to the connotations that an unmarried, sexually active woman faced, many women just go along with the tradition of white, whether it is true or not. Historically, a sexually pure woman is more respected in society, and both families benefit from such views. So, there really is no point of parading a woman out and saying, \"Hey guys! This woman is not a virgin! Now let's marry her off!\"   The fashion trend is changing. Off white, and beige dresses are slowly making their way to the market. Pops of colors are also becoming a bit more fashionable. With sexual purity not being as critical, women are more comfortable with breaking this tradition.","human_ref_B":"DISCLAIMER I am not a specialist of anything in social sciences or history   Your question would receive better answers in ~~r\/askscience~~ r\/askhistorians. Michel Pastoureau says that in the Middle Ages women would wear their brighter dress, often red, and that the white dress is an invention of the Victorian Era. I don't know about individual variations depending on if the woman is *really* a virgin or not. For better answers ask a historian.   EDIT : I meant to type r\/askhistorians. Obviously. I typed \"historians\" in the last sentence. I know askscience has nothing to do with this.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6323.0,"score_ratio":4.2}
{"post_id":"w5dq1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Was there ever a time that women who weren't virgins on their wedding day actually wore a non-white dress? Has this rule ever been enforced, voluntarily or not? .","c_root_id_A":"c5agl7e","c_root_id_B":"c5aglg3","created_at_utc_A":1341625696,"created_at_utc_B":1341625721,"score_A":6,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"According to Wikipedia, white wedding dresses became popular after Queen Victoria's wedding in 1840. People later started assuming that white = virginity. From reading that article, it doesn't seem likely that white dresses have ever exclusively been worn by virgins, and there was a long time when even virgins wore colors other than white.","human_ref_B":"The white wedding dress is a fairly recent western tradition, made popular with the elite after Queen Victoria's wedding in 1840. The popularity increased, because a pure white wedding dress was seen as a sign of wealth (think of laundering costs.) White was also a popular color for girl's debutantes, so there was also the link to entering womanhood. And with anything, what was popular with the elite soon became popular with all the lower classes.  Etiquette books are what linked the white dress to modesty, really, and turned a simple fashion phase into a tradition. Veils, required for many churches, were seen as covering the face of the \"shy and blushing bride\" and by connection the white dress also became linked to modesty. However, it wasn't until WW2 that the white dress became really popular and the tradition of \"virgins\" wear white for their wedding day became a thing. You can thank a mixture of marketing and the rise of Christian ideals for that one.  It's not a rule to wear white on your wedding day to display your virginity; it's a tradition. And with all traditions, people take it with a grain of salt. Due to the connotations that an unmarried, sexually active woman faced, many women just go along with the tradition of white, whether it is true or not. Historically, a sexually pure woman is more respected in society, and both families benefit from such views. So, there really is no point of parading a woman out and saying, \"Hey guys! This woman is not a virgin! Now let's marry her off!\"   The fashion trend is changing. Off white, and beige dresses are slowly making their way to the market. Pops of colors are also becoming a bit more fashionable. With sexual purity not being as critical, women are more comfortable with breaking this tradition.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"w5dq1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Was there ever a time that women who weren't virgins on their wedding day actually wore a non-white dress? Has this rule ever been enforced, voluntarily or not? .","c_root_id_A":"c5af85h","c_root_id_B":"c5agl7e","created_at_utc_A":1341619398,"created_at_utc_B":1341625696,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"DISCLAIMER I am not a specialist of anything in social sciences or history   Your question would receive better answers in ~~r\/askscience~~ r\/askhistorians. Michel Pastoureau says that in the Middle Ages women would wear their brighter dress, often red, and that the white dress is an invention of the Victorian Era. I don't know about individual variations depending on if the woman is *really* a virgin or not. For better answers ask a historian.   EDIT : I meant to type r\/askhistorians. Obviously. I typed \"historians\" in the last sentence. I know askscience has nothing to do with this.","human_ref_B":"According to Wikipedia, white wedding dresses became popular after Queen Victoria's wedding in 1840. People later started assuming that white = virginity. From reading that article, it doesn't seem likely that white dresses have ever exclusively been worn by virgins, and there was a long time when even virgins wore colors other than white.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6298.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"uoqxt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Was there ever a better time for black people than now in US history? I live in [segregated] chicago and it's hard to believe that this is the best time for black people in the US. Public housing is a mess, segregation is getting worse, and the low income areas are like visiting another country sometimes.","c_root_id_A":"c4x879l","c_root_id_B":"c4x9i8t","created_at_utc_A":1339026141,"created_at_utc_B":1339032343,"score_A":2,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"It's hard to imagine one. Perhaps the 1990s?","human_ref_B":"I think location makes a huge difference here, as well as education\/income status. For example, a black person living in Harlem during the 1920s during the Renaissance may have been better off than someone living in an inner-city project today. On the other hand, many avenues that people of all races take for granted today (e.g. universities, certain occupations, living wherever you want) would not have been available.   Also, the problems you mentioned affect poor people of all races moreso than black people specifically.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6202.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"uoqxt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Was there ever a better time for black people than now in US history? I live in [segregated] chicago and it's hard to believe that this is the best time for black people in the US. Public housing is a mess, segregation is getting worse, and the low income areas are like visiting another country sometimes.","c_root_id_A":"c4xcolc","c_root_id_B":"c4x879l","created_at_utc_A":1339048558,"created_at_utc_B":1339026141,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Search Overtown, Miami in the 1950s & early 60's. Thriving black community until the government plowed interstate 95 through it.","human_ref_B":"It's hard to imagine one. Perhaps the 1990s?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22417.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"uoqxt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Was there ever a better time for black people than now in US history? I live in [segregated] chicago and it's hard to believe that this is the best time for black people in the US. Public housing is a mess, segregation is getting worse, and the low income areas are like visiting another country sometimes.","c_root_id_A":"c4x879l","c_root_id_B":"c4xhreh","created_at_utc_A":1339026141,"created_at_utc_B":1339086641,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"It's hard to imagine one. Perhaps the 1990s?","human_ref_B":"As someone who has done some academic study of rice issues, I think the answer is--while it's complicated--no time has ever been better than now. I think the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder is probably in rougher shape now than it has been since civil rights (see: war on drugs and access to guns), but for people not overly involved with the war on drugs (not being shot at, going to jail, etc) it's easily the best time ever. Middle class Blacks are achieving at amazing levels and we are seeing the emergence of multiple generations of achievement among Black families.  So, mostly yes, partially no. I disagree about the Harlem renaissance and all that because, while it must've been very exciting, Blacks had no rights and were treated much more shabbily (particularly middle and upper class Blacks) than they ever would be now en masse.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":60500.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"22xeb8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How come people from places like NYC tend to have a culture of independence while suburban areas have a feel of tight social circles\/village-like mentality I have a hard time describing this so try to bare with me.    I notice people in NYC, a city where people can remain anonymous, have a lot more comfort of doing things alone such as; going to eat out alone, making friends alone, leading a sex life where they don't feel their social status will be jeopardize, etc.     I grew up in the suburbs and notice there are more tight knit social circles. People rely more on their friends to make decisions and social status is more important.    With comparing colleges I have a different feel with colleges from places like Boston and NYC than I do with colleges that are in the suburban parts of Connecticut. (like UCONN which is more rural which I feel makes the cliques tighter) Living in both NYC and CT and traveling around I can't really put my finger on the different mindset but I want to find out how it exist and be more aware of it.    I know this is a generalization but there is something in the culture of these areas that promote these values I can't describe it in words. I feel like there would be a book on this topic.","c_root_id_A":"cgrty0v","c_root_id_B":"cgrps2v","created_at_utc_A":1397447867,"created_at_utc_B":1397438279,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I reckon a good place to start would be by asking the question: is the phenomenon real?  I haven't been to NYC, but I have lived in a few cities. One of the first things people try to do is establish tight social circles which have a village-like mentality. At the same time, people in the suburbs often value their independence.  My anecdotal evidence is worth the same as yours. I wouldn't assume what I have seen has a great deal of truth to it.  I could also speculate as to why we have these observations, and the result may say more about ourselves than about the places we go. I grew up in a suburb famous for its village feel; I moved into urban areas to depart that feel. The last time I lived in a big city, I was raising a child; the experience was much more socially tight.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Gemeinschaft_and_Gesellschaft  I don't have a better article than wikipedia, but this sounds like the type of thing you're talking about, if anyone else wants to go in depth on what the concept is getting at this looks like it is what you wanted.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9588.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"22xeb8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How come people from places like NYC tend to have a culture of independence while suburban areas have a feel of tight social circles\/village-like mentality I have a hard time describing this so try to bare with me.    I notice people in NYC, a city where people can remain anonymous, have a lot more comfort of doing things alone such as; going to eat out alone, making friends alone, leading a sex life where they don't feel their social status will be jeopardize, etc.     I grew up in the suburbs and notice there are more tight knit social circles. People rely more on their friends to make decisions and social status is more important.    With comparing colleges I have a different feel with colleges from places like Boston and NYC than I do with colleges that are in the suburban parts of Connecticut. (like UCONN which is more rural which I feel makes the cliques tighter) Living in both NYC and CT and traveling around I can't really put my finger on the different mindset but I want to find out how it exist and be more aware of it.    I know this is a generalization but there is something in the culture of these areas that promote these values I can't describe it in words. I feel like there would be a book on this topic.","c_root_id_A":"cgrnv13","c_root_id_B":"cgrty0v","created_at_utc_A":1397433711,"created_at_utc_B":1397447867,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"First off, you're going to want to separate your question into two different questions--you seem to be wondering if suburbanites are 1. more susceptible to social influence, and 2. more likely to form tighter-knit social circles than city dwellers.  Those two effects on their own (susceptibility to social influence and the tendency to form close social circles) might be correlated, but it is unlikely that they are mutually inclusive.  It seems to me that you should start out with finding research to actually support those ideas. It could very well be a product of the particular community or time period that you grew up in, not a general effect of living in a suburb (which is why anecdotes are not considered valid data).  If you can establish that both of those effects are present, then you can start looking into why (which, if you look at any scientific literature, will be the subject of some speculation in the discussion section).","human_ref_B":"I reckon a good place to start would be by asking the question: is the phenomenon real?  I haven't been to NYC, but I have lived in a few cities. One of the first things people try to do is establish tight social circles which have a village-like mentality. At the same time, people in the suburbs often value their independence.  My anecdotal evidence is worth the same as yours. I wouldn't assume what I have seen has a great deal of truth to it.  I could also speculate as to why we have these observations, and the result may say more about ourselves than about the places we go. I grew up in a suburb famous for its village feel; I moved into urban areas to depart that feel. The last time I lived in a big city, I was raising a child; the experience was much more socially tight.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14156.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"22xeb8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How come people from places like NYC tend to have a culture of independence while suburban areas have a feel of tight social circles\/village-like mentality I have a hard time describing this so try to bare with me.    I notice people in NYC, a city where people can remain anonymous, have a lot more comfort of doing things alone such as; going to eat out alone, making friends alone, leading a sex life where they don't feel their social status will be jeopardize, etc.     I grew up in the suburbs and notice there are more tight knit social circles. People rely more on their friends to make decisions and social status is more important.    With comparing colleges I have a different feel with colleges from places like Boston and NYC than I do with colleges that are in the suburban parts of Connecticut. (like UCONN which is more rural which I feel makes the cliques tighter) Living in both NYC and CT and traveling around I can't really put my finger on the different mindset but I want to find out how it exist and be more aware of it.    I know this is a generalization but there is something in the culture of these areas that promote these values I can't describe it in words. I feel like there would be a book on this topic.","c_root_id_A":"cgrnv13","c_root_id_B":"cgrps2v","created_at_utc_A":1397433711,"created_at_utc_B":1397438279,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"First off, you're going to want to separate your question into two different questions--you seem to be wondering if suburbanites are 1. more susceptible to social influence, and 2. more likely to form tighter-knit social circles than city dwellers.  Those two effects on their own (susceptibility to social influence and the tendency to form close social circles) might be correlated, but it is unlikely that they are mutually inclusive.  It seems to me that you should start out with finding research to actually support those ideas. It could very well be a product of the particular community or time period that you grew up in, not a general effect of living in a suburb (which is why anecdotes are not considered valid data).  If you can establish that both of those effects are present, then you can start looking into why (which, if you look at any scientific literature, will be the subject of some speculation in the discussion section).","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Gemeinschaft_and_Gesellschaft  I don't have a better article than wikipedia, but this sounds like the type of thing you're talking about, if anyone else wants to go in depth on what the concept is getting at this looks like it is what you wanted.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4568.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"7l0m58","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Where can I learn about different time-periods, cultures, and their understanding of childhood? I would imagine for instance that the idea of childhood in modern Western culture (and even in a more global sense) is longer, that it extends past the age of maturity. Though it seems to me this has not always been the case (considering the age gap between married couples in pre-modern Europe)?  Where can I learn about a more detailed account of these differences, and, very importantly, some factors that explain these differences? (economics, life expectancy, etc.)     ~Thank youu","c_root_id_A":"drjns6r","c_root_id_B":"drlc3re","created_at_utc_A":1513813724,"created_at_utc_B":1513896529,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"My wife likes Childhood in America, edited by Paula S. Fass and Mary Ann Mason","human_ref_B":"Yes, as my husband, \/u\/OriginalStomper, says, I do highly recommend Childhood in America. It is a collection of essays from historians who specialize in different time periods. All together, the book shows the evolution of childhood and the perception of childhood through the history of North America and the United States. I'm not sure it will answer all of your questions, but it is a good place to start.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":82805.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1lpwfv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Is the stigma against incest cultural or is there another origin?","c_root_id_A":"cc1lvdn","c_root_id_B":"cc1mlgs","created_at_utc_A":1378311159,"created_at_utc_B":1378313244,"score_A":5,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"It is largely cultural. When I took my intro level course to Cultural Anthropology my teachers comment was that it could very well be the closest thing to a cultural universal.   The incest taboo is also largely defined by its culture. Some smaller communities (I believe the Inuit) just hold the taboo to immediate families while others believe that any sort of inter clan\/phratry marriage would be incest (many other indigenous American groups have similar traditional kinship relations).  Incest taboos also seem to be done as a way to force exogamy or outside of the group marriage. This could be done to broaden the community and make sure that kinship ties are widely spread. It also somewhat makes sense because when you look at groups who don't have incest taboos there is something being preserved that prevents the person from marriage outside the group. This is more along the lines of what the Egyptians and European royalty thought.  Sorry for a lack of sources, I'm on my phone currently and recalling much of this from my lectures as an anthropology major.   edit:  Nanda, S., & Warms, R. L. (2009). Culture Counts: A Concise Introduction to Cultural Anthropology. Belmont, CA: Cengage Learning\/Wadsworth.  Pages 145-151","human_ref_B":"It has been observed that children that grow up together (even if not related) will avoid each other as sexual partners. A theory to explain this is that, since they mature in close proximity to each other, they develop similar histocompatibility complexes, which makes them undesirable to each other as sexual partners. So in this sense, there is some biological motivation for incest avoidance, and it may help inform cultural stigmas.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2085.0,"score_ratio":4.6}
{"post_id":"1lpwfv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Is the stigma against incest cultural or is there another origin?","c_root_id_A":"cc1ni24","c_root_id_B":"cc1lvdn","created_at_utc_A":1378315849,"created_at_utc_B":1378311159,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Is it possible for a 'stigma' to be anything but cultural?","human_ref_B":"It is largely cultural. When I took my intro level course to Cultural Anthropology my teachers comment was that it could very well be the closest thing to a cultural universal.   The incest taboo is also largely defined by its culture. Some smaller communities (I believe the Inuit) just hold the taboo to immediate families while others believe that any sort of inter clan\/phratry marriage would be incest (many other indigenous American groups have similar traditional kinship relations).  Incest taboos also seem to be done as a way to force exogamy or outside of the group marriage. This could be done to broaden the community and make sure that kinship ties are widely spread. It also somewhat makes sense because when you look at groups who don't have incest taboos there is something being preserved that prevents the person from marriage outside the group. This is more along the lines of what the Egyptians and European royalty thought.  Sorry for a lack of sources, I'm on my phone currently and recalling much of this from my lectures as an anthropology major.   edit:  Nanda, S., & Warms, R. L. (2009). Culture Counts: A Concise Introduction to Cultural Anthropology. Belmont, CA: Cengage Learning\/Wadsworth.  Pages 145-151","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4690.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"2960lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"[Economics] How can governments make sure people will have a job in the future in the face of growing automation of many tasks? Is the future of jobs at stake? Everywhere around me (I live in Italy) there are layoffs, government cuts, increases in poverty and general economic malaise.   What *realistic* measures are there to improve the situation and curtail unemployment?","c_root_id_A":"cihtxmd","c_root_id_B":"cihv34e","created_at_utc_A":1403810086,"created_at_utc_B":1403812290,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"This may sound like a very round about answer but I am trying to give some good historical context to back-up any assertions that I make later on, sorry for the long read   Historically, several countries have found labour saving technology profitable to implement. E.g. Industrial revolution in the UK. Bob Allen found that the UK was \"labour expensive and coal cheap\" so technological breakthroughs saved loads in terms of costs of production. This meant that they got quickly adopted. 1  This led to the massive increase in growth in the industrial and early victorian period. While an era of slower growth followed (the late victorian era) it was not due to the unemployment resulting from labour saving technology. The labour saving technology facilitated labour moving to other areas of the economy and by boosting output. i.e. if making a metre of fabric took half the labour it previously did, we now produced more than twice the fabric. This meant that employment increased. This additional output was exported around the world. The other main reason employment did not fall was the movement into other industries. The UK has been specialising in services for decades 2. Services are much more labour intensive as jobs are not homogenous and automation is difficult (although not impossible e.g. self service check-outs). So, countries specialised in areas that were more labour intensive. This was true of the post-industrial UK which moved into shipping and financial services during the late victorian period. General reading  Now to move away from industrial revolution history. Labour saving technology is very similar to the era of cheap labour that we are still experiencing. This is somewhat more tenuous that the history lesson so I will try and Explain like I'm five years old. When globalisation happened and transport costs dramatically fell, we were exposed to cheap labour from asia (e.g. chinese sweatshops, call centres in India etc...) This all meant that labour in the UK and the USA was much more expensive, so we replaced labour in these countries with labour elsewhere. This is equivalent to labour saving technology as it essentially replaced jobs in the UK\/USA. This was not dramatically bad in the long term employment situation for several reasons, some of which are similar to the post industrial example.   * specialisation in more labour intensive areas such as technological development (quarternary sector) or financial sector growth3 4  * increased labour market flexibility\/competition (i.e. we cut regulation in the UK) 5 6  * increased isolationism (this is bad in the long run as it increases consumer prices but can be used effectively in the short run by implementing an optimal tariff) 7 inter-war example 8 9 optimal tariffs  * changes to the quality of product produced. ~Back to the industrial\/victorian example for a short amount of time. In the victorian period the US started outcompeting the UK in terms of cheap labour, consequently the UK maintained the use of mule spinning whilst the US used the cheaper ring spinning method. Mule spinning did give higher quality yarns so the UK effectively separated the market into low quality goods (the US) and higher quality goods (the UK). These goods will have different price elasticities of demand and can effectively be separated allowing for the UK to still make a decent margin even if the US was cheaper 10~  * changes in branding  * increases in domestic demand (works well with isolationism)   So how does this all relate to labour saving technologies and changes in employment. Well we can collate all this information to work out our best guest of what will happen.  Imagine technology like 3D printing kills of manufacturing (slightly unrealistic but let's just run with it). Why might employment not fall?  1. manufactured goods are cheaper, this facilitates higher demand for that good which may boost output by more than the labour saving nature of technology (see fabric analysis earlier)  2. The increased demand for these goods boosts the higher tech jobs such as CAD designers for the 3D printers. These jobs are higher value so while employment in this sector may fall a bit, the total value of work may be higher. This may facilitate higher consumption which in turn will increase demand for other goods and consequently boost overall employment  3. We may specialise elsewhere. Liberated by the lower labour requirements of manufacturing, more workers could enter higher value jobs in services or other sectors. (this is similar to the globalisation argument)  4. if we relax the ceteris paribus assumption, we can see changes in demand are likely. Labour saving technology are more likely as time goes on, as time goes on it is also likely that developing countries will grow and there will be higher consumption. This higher consumption abroad will facilitate higher demand for goods in the UK\/USA\/Everywhere. This in turn will boost the output we produce, then much like argument 2, the higher output will counteract labour saving effects  So it is possible\/probably the government has to do pretty much nothing but in case you are an economic advisor for a major government there are a few things that can facilitate and ensure higher employment. (using a lettering system as I've already used bullet points and numbers soz). In fact these are less to ensure high employment more just like general guidelines for good governance  a. infrastructure projects. These provide direct jobs (via building) and indirect jobs (via easier market access)  b. better training and education (whether this means cheaper university fees or more vocational courses\/apprenticeships)   c. increased public service provision in the form of healthcare (or education). This works in several ways. First, better healthcare means fewer days lost to sickness as everyone can afford easy access to treatment. Second, it provides stable employment as public services are difficult to automate and demand is fairly stable.  d. stable inflation or NGDP targeting. This allows for grounded expectations which reduces uncertainty which in turn allows for better employment prospects. This is almost certainly done by the central bank  e. decent levels of regulation, this reduces the size and frequency of bubbles and helps mitigate any big crashes. This is good for keeping unemployment short term as long term unemployment can lead to hysteresis which is super awful.  the rest is pretty much common sense.   I could probably think of a few more arguments but I'm very sleep deprived. I'll have a think and get back to you. On a related note I have recently done a blog post on the very very very long run nature of growth please have a read here if you're interested.  TL;DR don't really worry about unemployment, it'll all be okay","human_ref_B":"Italy\u2019s economic problems are not much related to automation. They\u2019re the result of a low-skilled labor force, high levels of corruption, a failure to adequately reform labor markets, and extremely high public debt.  The EC and IMF have been offering up reform suggestions for quite some time. The Italian government just needs to get its act together.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2204.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"vqnke","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How different would America be if they never abolished the draft? It doesn't necessarily mean that every American would get shipped to Afghanistan at the age of 18, but how different would the American society be if everybody was forced to serve x amount of time to either the army (in combatant and non-combat positions) or society (hospitals, jails, schools)? Earning a symbolic salary, of course, think of a lighter version of the Israeli draft.  I personally think that it would be incredibly beneficial for several reasons, but it probably would be against the constitution.","c_root_id_A":"c56v5ak","c_root_id_B":"c56v3m4","created_at_utc_A":1340906195,"created_at_utc_B":1340906032,"score_A":10,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"And yet in July 2011 Germany ended its own mandatory civil\/military service program.   What is the purpose of such a program? Cultural cohesion, cheap labor, job training? You have to anwser those questions before you can talk about benefits.  Does anyone have a more in-depth analysis of why Germany suspended the program? I'm not entirely convinced that Israel is the best example of a \"Western\" mandatory service regime when thinking about the US. It seems to me that America lacks both the divided populace (Isr.\/Pal.) and the concrete external threats ala Iran that Israel faces.","human_ref_B":"When there is a draft, there is more outrage over wars the public doesn't support; because now you aren't sending people who want to fight, you are sending people who specifically don't and are morally opposed to it. You are not only affected those people, but families that also are opposed.  There would be a lot less wars if we had a draft, and the War in Iraq would probably never have happened, or would have ended almost immediately.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":163.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"vqnke","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How different would America be if they never abolished the draft? It doesn't necessarily mean that every American would get shipped to Afghanistan at the age of 18, but how different would the American society be if everybody was forced to serve x amount of time to either the army (in combatant and non-combat positions) or society (hospitals, jails, schools)? Earning a symbolic salary, of course, think of a lighter version of the Israeli draft.  I personally think that it would be incredibly beneficial for several reasons, but it probably would be against the constitution.","c_root_id_A":"c56v3m4","c_root_id_B":"c56wsyp","created_at_utc_A":1340906032,"created_at_utc_B":1340912201,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"When there is a draft, there is more outrage over wars the public doesn't support; because now you aren't sending people who want to fight, you are sending people who specifically don't and are morally opposed to it. You are not only affected those people, but families that also are opposed.  There would be a lot less wars if we had a draft, and the War in Iraq would probably never have happened, or would have ended almost immediately.","human_ref_B":"A friendly reminder from a crashing bore: what you and I believe is not science. Reliable sources on the other hand, they're great!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6169.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"vqnke","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How different would America be if they never abolished the draft? It doesn't necessarily mean that every American would get shipped to Afghanistan at the age of 18, but how different would the American society be if everybody was forced to serve x amount of time to either the army (in combatant and non-combat positions) or society (hospitals, jails, schools)? Earning a symbolic salary, of course, think of a lighter version of the Israeli draft.  I personally think that it would be incredibly beneficial for several reasons, but it probably would be against the constitution.","c_root_id_A":"c56v3m4","c_root_id_B":"c56yjau","created_at_utc_A":1340906032,"created_at_utc_B":1340918345,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"When there is a draft, there is more outrage over wars the public doesn't support; because now you aren't sending people who want to fight, you are sending people who specifically don't and are morally opposed to it. You are not only affected those people, but families that also are opposed.  There would be a lot less wars if we had a draft, and the War in Iraq would probably never have happened, or would have ended almost immediately.","human_ref_B":"We've actually never abolished the draft. To this day, men over the age of 18 still have to register for the Selective Service System and may be potentially drafted during times of war. While I'm not qualified to answer your question I think framing it in a slightly different way (\"What effects would mandatory military service have on the US?\") might help people answer. Also, I'd take a look at posting in \/r\/historicalwhatif since answering this question might require some speculation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12313.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1vgcdt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"INTRODUCING ASKSOCIALSCIENCE FEATURES: Friday Free-for-All Like AskHistorians, we've decided to introduce a few weekly threads for open discussions with relatively light moderation. They should be posted around 10 AM Eastern Time (7 AM Pacific, 3 PM GMT, 2:00 AM on Tuesday AEDT) as we normally get a peak traffic between 12 PM and 1:00 PM Eastern. This one is up late but next week it should be all automated.  TODAY:   This is for social science related outpourings that are not necessarily questions.  Minor questions that you feel don't need or merit their own threads are welcome too. Discovered a great new book, documentary, article or blog? Has your Ph.D. application been successful? Have you made an sociological discovery while at the supermarket? Did you find an anecdote about Milton Freedman telling a joke to B. F. Skinner? Tell us all about it.  Moderation in this thread will be relatively non-existent -- jokes, anecdotes and light-hearted banter are welcome.  *Previously in this series*:  Monday Reading and Research: focusing on exactly that: the social science you have been reading this week and the research you've been working on. It's also the prime thread for requesting books or articles on a particular subject.  Theory Wednesdays: An academic\/professional free for all.","c_root_id_A":"cesiufr","c_root_id_B":"ces0cms","created_at_utc_A":1390024116,"created_at_utc_B":1389979086,"score_A":10,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Submitted my application for graduation for my PhD today! *moonwalk* Of course, that doesn't mean shit if I don't finish and defend my dissertation, but... y'know. Celebrating the little moments. The end is near!  Edit: Didn't even type \"PhD\" properly. If they find out, they might take it away!","human_ref_B":"I've been thinking about how behavioral economics and psychology are distinguished recently.  It's pretty easy to explain the difference between behavioral and neoclassical economics. Relax the rationality constraint and call it a day.  Sometimes I have to explain it to psychologist though, and the conversations get weird.  The way I'm thinking about it now is that economics looks at external forces that shape decision making. So a price change is due to a shift in supply or demand (or the underlying market structure) not to a shift in agents themselves.  I like how Stigler and Becker put it:  > Our title seems to us to be capable of another and preferable interpretation: that tastes neither change capriciously nor differ importantly between people. On this interpretation one does not argue over tastes for the same reason that one does not argue over the Rocky Mountains-both are there, will be there next year, too, and are the same to all men.   > The difference between these two viewpoints of tastes is fundamental. On the traditional view, an explanation of economic phenomena that reaches a difference in tastes between people or times is the terminus of the argument: the problem is abandoned at this point to whoever studies and explains tastes (psychologists? anthropologists? phrenologists'? sociobiologists?). On our preferred interpretation, one never reaches this impasse: the economist continues to search for differences in prices or incomes to explain any differences or changes in behavior.  To me, this explains a lot of how behavioral economics is used in policy. The idea behind a \"nudge\" is to alter small contextual details of a situation, in order to change behavior.  I'd be interested in hearing from psychologist on this distinction - am I missing something?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":45030.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"1vgcdt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"INTRODUCING ASKSOCIALSCIENCE FEATURES: Friday Free-for-All Like AskHistorians, we've decided to introduce a few weekly threads for open discussions with relatively light moderation. They should be posted around 10 AM Eastern Time (7 AM Pacific, 3 PM GMT, 2:00 AM on Tuesday AEDT) as we normally get a peak traffic between 12 PM and 1:00 PM Eastern. This one is up late but next week it should be all automated.  TODAY:   This is for social science related outpourings that are not necessarily questions.  Minor questions that you feel don't need or merit their own threads are welcome too. Discovered a great new book, documentary, article or blog? Has your Ph.D. application been successful? Have you made an sociological discovery while at the supermarket? Did you find an anecdote about Milton Freedman telling a joke to B. F. Skinner? Tell us all about it.  Moderation in this thread will be relatively non-existent -- jokes, anecdotes and light-hearted banter are welcome.  *Previously in this series*:  Monday Reading and Research: focusing on exactly that: the social science you have been reading this week and the research you've been working on. It's also the prime thread for requesting books or articles on a particular subject.  Theory Wednesdays: An academic\/professional free for all.","c_root_id_A":"ces74ku","c_root_id_B":"cesiufr","created_at_utc_A":1389993620,"created_at_utc_B":1390024116,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"What is, or what should be, the role of simple, Mankiw-chapter-4 supply and demand in economics discussions?  S&D is the backbone of economics, and we often use it informally and apply it to a variety of situations. But whenever something contentious comes up -- healthcare, low-wage markets, and finance come to mind -- we say \"oh, S&D isn't what we want here.\"  I think it sends a bad signal when we throw away our most basic intellectual framework the minute something awkward comes up. I say this even though I know, and teach, that S&D isn't appropriate in all situations.  I did the obligatory \"day of micro review\" yesterday for my Macro 101 class. I told my freshmen that *supply and demand is rarely the best model to use, but it's almost always the second-best. Economists will often start with S&D when analyzing a situation, but will shift into a more detailed model when pressed. These more detailed models will bring in institutional details from the particular market or situation to be analyzed, and oftentimes S&D will get the direction of various effects right, while the detailed model will give more precision. Occasionally, the detailed model will overturn the conclusions from simple S&D.*  I think there's a bundle of issues here that I haven't fully sorted out yet. Just something that's been bugging me.","human_ref_B":"Submitted my application for graduation for my PhD today! *moonwalk* Of course, that doesn't mean shit if I don't finish and defend my dissertation, but... y'know. Celebrating the little moments. The end is near!  Edit: Didn't even type \"PhD\" properly. If they find out, they might take it away!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":30496.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1vgcdt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"INTRODUCING ASKSOCIALSCIENCE FEATURES: Friday Free-for-All Like AskHistorians, we've decided to introduce a few weekly threads for open discussions with relatively light moderation. They should be posted around 10 AM Eastern Time (7 AM Pacific, 3 PM GMT, 2:00 AM on Tuesday AEDT) as we normally get a peak traffic between 12 PM and 1:00 PM Eastern. This one is up late but next week it should be all automated.  TODAY:   This is for social science related outpourings that are not necessarily questions.  Minor questions that you feel don't need or merit their own threads are welcome too. Discovered a great new book, documentary, article or blog? Has your Ph.D. application been successful? Have you made an sociological discovery while at the supermarket? Did you find an anecdote about Milton Freedman telling a joke to B. F. Skinner? Tell us all about it.  Moderation in this thread will be relatively non-existent -- jokes, anecdotes and light-hearted banter are welcome.  *Previously in this series*:  Monday Reading and Research: focusing on exactly that: the social science you have been reading this week and the research you've been working on. It's also the prime thread for requesting books or articles on a particular subject.  Theory Wednesdays: An academic\/professional free for all.","c_root_id_A":"cesiufr","c_root_id_B":"ces9zmw","created_at_utc_A":1390024116,"created_at_utc_B":1389999942,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Submitted my application for graduation for my PhD today! *moonwalk* Of course, that doesn't mean shit if I don't finish and defend my dissertation, but... y'know. Celebrating the little moments. The end is near!  Edit: Didn't even type \"PhD\" properly. If they find out, they might take it away!","human_ref_B":"Does anyone have any recommendations on books regarding corporate anthropology (marketing, market research, advertising, consumer behavior)?   Yesterday I was looking into 'Advertising & Anthropology' by Morais & de Waal but I'm not 100% convinced given it only has a handful of reviews. I have a BS in Marketing and MSc in Social and Cultural Anthro.   I'm looking for interdisciplinary material that has been tried and tested and is considered crucial reading for a career in this area.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24174.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1vgcdt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"INTRODUCING ASKSOCIALSCIENCE FEATURES: Friday Free-for-All Like AskHistorians, we've decided to introduce a few weekly threads for open discussions with relatively light moderation. They should be posted around 10 AM Eastern Time (7 AM Pacific, 3 PM GMT, 2:00 AM on Tuesday AEDT) as we normally get a peak traffic between 12 PM and 1:00 PM Eastern. This one is up late but next week it should be all automated.  TODAY:   This is for social science related outpourings that are not necessarily questions.  Minor questions that you feel don't need or merit their own threads are welcome too. Discovered a great new book, documentary, article or blog? Has your Ph.D. application been successful? Have you made an sociological discovery while at the supermarket? Did you find an anecdote about Milton Freedman telling a joke to B. F. Skinner? Tell us all about it.  Moderation in this thread will be relatively non-existent -- jokes, anecdotes and light-hearted banter are welcome.  *Previously in this series*:  Monday Reading and Research: focusing on exactly that: the social science you have been reading this week and the research you've been working on. It's also the prime thread for requesting books or articles on a particular subject.  Theory Wednesdays: An academic\/professional free for all.","c_root_id_A":"cesiufr","c_root_id_B":"ces8wyh","created_at_utc_A":1390024116,"created_at_utc_B":1389997441,"score_A":10,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Submitted my application for graduation for my PhD today! *moonwalk* Of course, that doesn't mean shit if I don't finish and defend my dissertation, but... y'know. Celebrating the little moments. The end is near!  Edit: Didn't even type \"PhD\" properly. If they find out, they might take it away!","human_ref_B":"In my mind, \"religion\" is not just a way to view and explain the natural world - which is how it is often argued against. Instead, it is a universal human institution that has many different functions; shared worldviews, rules that provide cohesion to a community, symbols that are understood and shared by groups, etc. The particular social needs that religion fulfills will be met by other means if there were no religion (take civil religion, for example. It provides holidays, rituals, shared rules and expectations, etc.).   I am taking a Psychology and Religion class right now, and am reading a book by Francis Collins called *The Language of God*. In this book, he talks about some of the arguments against religion - citing such notables as Richard Dawkins. This made me think (as I have many times before), \"Why do natural scientists think they are qualified to act as social science experts?\". What can we, as social scientists, do to change the perception that anyone can be an \"expert\"?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":26675.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1vgcdt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"INTRODUCING ASKSOCIALSCIENCE FEATURES: Friday Free-for-All Like AskHistorians, we've decided to introduce a few weekly threads for open discussions with relatively light moderation. They should be posted around 10 AM Eastern Time (7 AM Pacific, 3 PM GMT, 2:00 AM on Tuesday AEDT) as we normally get a peak traffic between 12 PM and 1:00 PM Eastern. This one is up late but next week it should be all automated.  TODAY:   This is for social science related outpourings that are not necessarily questions.  Minor questions that you feel don't need or merit their own threads are welcome too. Discovered a great new book, documentary, article or blog? Has your Ph.D. application been successful? Have you made an sociological discovery while at the supermarket? Did you find an anecdote about Milton Freedman telling a joke to B. F. Skinner? Tell us all about it.  Moderation in this thread will be relatively non-existent -- jokes, anecdotes and light-hearted banter are welcome.  *Previously in this series*:  Monday Reading and Research: focusing on exactly that: the social science you have been reading this week and the research you've been working on. It's also the prime thread for requesting books or articles on a particular subject.  Theory Wednesdays: An academic\/professional free for all.","c_root_id_A":"ces8wyh","c_root_id_B":"ces9zmw","created_at_utc_A":1389997441,"created_at_utc_B":1389999942,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"In my mind, \"religion\" is not just a way to view and explain the natural world - which is how it is often argued against. Instead, it is a universal human institution that has many different functions; shared worldviews, rules that provide cohesion to a community, symbols that are understood and shared by groups, etc. The particular social needs that religion fulfills will be met by other means if there were no religion (take civil religion, for example. It provides holidays, rituals, shared rules and expectations, etc.).   I am taking a Psychology and Religion class right now, and am reading a book by Francis Collins called *The Language of God*. In this book, he talks about some of the arguments against religion - citing such notables as Richard Dawkins. This made me think (as I have many times before), \"Why do natural scientists think they are qualified to act as social science experts?\". What can we, as social scientists, do to change the perception that anyone can be an \"expert\"?","human_ref_B":"Does anyone have any recommendations on books regarding corporate anthropology (marketing, market research, advertising, consumer behavior)?   Yesterday I was looking into 'Advertising & Anthropology' by Morais & de Waal but I'm not 100% convinced given it only has a handful of reviews. I have a BS in Marketing and MSc in Social and Cultural Anthro.   I'm looking for interdisciplinary material that has been tried and tested and is considered crucial reading for a career in this area.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2501.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1va3uc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"INTRODUCING ASKSOCIALSCIENCE FEATURES: Theory Wednesdays | Professional\/Academic Free-for-All Like AskHistorians, we've decided to introduce a few weekly threads for open discussions with relatively light moderation. They should be posted around 10 AM Eastern Time (7 AM Pacific, 3 PM GMT, 2:00 AM on Tuesday AEDT) as we normally get a peak traffic between 12 PM and 1:00 PM Eastern. This one is up late but next week it should be all automated.  TODAY:   **Theory Wednesday** topics include:   * Social science in academia     * Famous debates   * Questions about methods and data sources   * Philosophy of social science   * and so on.  Do you wonder about choosing a dissertation topic?  Finding think tank work?  Want to learn about natural language processing?  Have a question about the academic applications of Marxian theories or social network analysis?  The history of a theory?  This is the place!  While this thread will be lightly moderated, it is not a total free for all--hold off those until Friday.  *Previously* in this series:  **Monday Reading and Research**: focusing on exactly that: the social science you have been reading this week and the research you've been working on. It's also the prime thread for requesting books or articles on a particular subject.  *Later in the week*:    **Friday Free-For-All**: It's Friday, Friday.  Gotta get down on Friday.  Even more than than the others, this is what you make it.  We're modelling these roughly on three of AskHistorians features (Saturday Reading and Research, Theory Thursday, and Friday Free-For-All).  While we're trying to adapt them to social science, you can click those links and see what the other sub has done with them.  And we're always open to suggestions.","c_root_id_A":"ceqcaa5","c_root_id_B":"ceq6xcd","created_at_utc_A":1389813323,"created_at_utc_B":1389801899,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm trying to figure out the best way to interpret a lab experiment.  Individuals are given two continuous, and one dichotomous parameters. Based on this information, they make a binary choice, and got feedback as to whether they got it right or wrong. This was repeated 20 times, and over time the choices got more accurate.  I'm pretty sure that there must be something in the learning\/Bayesian updating literature that would help me on interpretation how the subjects changed their estimates as they got feedback. I've been poking around that literature, and haven't found anything that was especially tractable. I also don't want to spend too much time teching up to understand this - this is for a policy paper, not a theory paper. I just would love to have one or two tables using a learning model. Can anyone point me at a paper or model to read on this?","human_ref_B":"I'll put this here to start it off.    I need volunteers for a research study.  I've been pissed off about a paper whose econometric model was incorrectly specificed, but yet the paper's top line result got major press in the US with regards to its findings of  potential discrimination.   Correctly specifying the paper's model removes alot of the finding and oomph.   But I want to thoroughly deep six it.  Which means I need both the correct modeling technique but also the correct data collection technique applied.  How can you help?  I need people who like coffee, and who won't mind ordeirng coffee at their local coffee shops, are able to record a few bits and bob about the coffee shop experience when they order, and can enter data into a google doc.    You don't get anything except a list of detailed instructions, but credit to all research helpers will be specifically given on page 1 of the paper.   Just reply if you are interested with your username, I will contact you later on.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11424.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1va3uc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"INTRODUCING ASKSOCIALSCIENCE FEATURES: Theory Wednesdays | Professional\/Academic Free-for-All Like AskHistorians, we've decided to introduce a few weekly threads for open discussions with relatively light moderation. They should be posted around 10 AM Eastern Time (7 AM Pacific, 3 PM GMT, 2:00 AM on Tuesday AEDT) as we normally get a peak traffic between 12 PM and 1:00 PM Eastern. This one is up late but next week it should be all automated.  TODAY:   **Theory Wednesday** topics include:   * Social science in academia     * Famous debates   * Questions about methods and data sources   * Philosophy of social science   * and so on.  Do you wonder about choosing a dissertation topic?  Finding think tank work?  Want to learn about natural language processing?  Have a question about the academic applications of Marxian theories or social network analysis?  The history of a theory?  This is the place!  While this thread will be lightly moderated, it is not a total free for all--hold off those until Friday.  *Previously* in this series:  **Monday Reading and Research**: focusing on exactly that: the social science you have been reading this week and the research you've been working on. It's also the prime thread for requesting books or articles on a particular subject.  *Later in the week*:    **Friday Free-For-All**: It's Friday, Friday.  Gotta get down on Friday.  Even more than than the others, this is what you make it.  We're modelling these roughly on three of AskHistorians features (Saturday Reading and Research, Theory Thursday, and Friday Free-For-All).  While we're trying to adapt them to social science, you can click those links and see what the other sub has done with them.  And we're always open to suggestions.","c_root_id_A":"ceq85c4","c_root_id_B":"ceqcaa5","created_at_utc_A":1389804606,"created_at_utc_B":1389813323,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I have been trying to find transcripts\/good sources on the John Dewey\/Leon Trotsky debate. I've been told by various sources in life that they recall their read of the debate being pretty interesting, but they never have the transcript available and the details are a bit muddied.  Anybody familiar with this debate, how it went, what themes were represented, and possibly a link to the transcripts? A good book recommendation on the topic would be appreciated as well!","human_ref_B":"I'm trying to figure out the best way to interpret a lab experiment.  Individuals are given two continuous, and one dichotomous parameters. Based on this information, they make a binary choice, and got feedback as to whether they got it right or wrong. This was repeated 20 times, and over time the choices got more accurate.  I'm pretty sure that there must be something in the learning\/Bayesian updating literature that would help me on interpretation how the subjects changed their estimates as they got feedback. I've been poking around that literature, and haven't found anything that was especially tractable. I also don't want to spend too much time teching up to understand this - this is for a policy paper, not a theory paper. I just would love to have one or two tables using a learning model. Can anyone point me at a paper or model to read on this?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8717.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"rxwa93","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"Question about why Big 5 Personality Test response varies by gender I teach a high school psychology class and we are learning about personality. I have the students take the Big 5 Personality test and it asks for their gender. I always told students that gender wasn\u2019t factored into their results, but an enterprising student took the test and gave the same answers with the only variation being the gender. The results were not the same. I tried it myself and sure enough the test answers vary by gender selected.   It feels like this decreases the validity of the test. Is the results supposed to be gendered? Can you help me and my students understand this?","c_root_id_A":"hrlr0lz","c_root_id_B":"hrl91qp","created_at_utc_A":1641536117,"created_at_utc_B":1641527056,"score_A":30,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Seeing your source from your other comment explains the reason why. \/u\/ebolaRETURNS linked one of the International Personality Item Pool scales, and actually so did you, but the one you linked is an IPIP item pool attempting to replicate the NEO-PI-R, a personality test developed by Costa and McCrae. Incidentally, the NEO-PI-R is designed to measure the Five Factor Model, which is a similar but distinct model of personality functioning from Goldberg's Big Five model. There's honestly a lot of overlap between the two, but they are technically different and were developed in different ways. The terms we use to describe various models of personality are a bit messy, but it's important to note that there are several five factor models of personality and then there's the Five Factor Model. That doesn't mean it's the first or necessarily the best; they just happened to snag the name.   Anyway, many personality inventories no longer score differently based on gender, but it was pretty common in the past. The NEO-PI-R was published in the early 90s, and does score differently based on gender. This has to do with how gender was distinguished when the test norms were created. For better or worse, that's just how it's scored. If you want one that doesn't use gender norms, I'd recommend choosing something else.  The International Personality Item Pool is a public domain collection of personality test items created by Dr. Goldberg (and others) and maintained by the Oregon Research Institute. There are a lot of measures and models that are replicated using that item pool. It's pretty cool!  Edit: corrected a couple links","human_ref_B":"Let's see if I can get away with a clarifying question without getting auto-modded.  Which Big 5 test was it?  The Big Five theory classifies via a set of 5 factors or meta-factors based on earlier replicated statistical study, and a bunch of people have made various tests based on these factors, so none really deserves to be called \"The Big Five Test\" with a definite article.  Honestly, just naively, that seems like it shouldn't happen.  Instead, gender patterns should fall out (or not) from data that are scored uniformly.  Maybe the particular test you used isn't that good.  (one such test https:\/\/ipip.ori.org\/new_ipip-50-item-scale.htm)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9061.0,"score_ratio":1.5789473684}
{"post_id":"u6lm0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Economically speaking what's the justification of \"Buy One Get One Free\" deals? Is it just that the price of one covers the production cost for both or is is an attempt to get rid of inventory?","c_root_id_A":"c4sx1lo","c_root_id_B":"c4sw4ku","created_at_utc_A":1338129539,"created_at_utc_B":1338119820,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It's what's called a 'loss leader'. They don't make money off BOGOF deals, but the deal will entice you to come to their store and purchase other products you wouldn't have otherwise. It's also useful to think of it as a 50% discount across the board rather than getting anything free.","human_ref_B":"The Theory:  Usually you don't see BOGOF on everyday use items, and these usually stick to the specialty items, i.e. scented candles, kidney beans, ice cream.  When looking at specialty items you are also looking at a 20-25% cost per item, and so your goal is to match sales on the first item, and attempted to do better than cover cost on the second.  This means you don't actually have to double sales, but you are cutting your profitability per item.  If you are only looking at profitability per item, then you see this as taking a loss.  If you look at over all week to week sales minus costs, then you are making money.  This assumes that cost involves labor dollars.  The Math:  You make a widget for $.25, and you sell 100 in a week.  it costs you $25, and you profit $75.  You do a BOGOF your cost per sale is $.50, and you sell 175.  Your cost is $87.5, and your profit is $87.5.  While profit per item is smaller, you overall profit has gone up $12.5.  In the process you have gained new fans that will now use your widget over my widget, and you weekly sales after the BOGO are now 110 per week.  Was the BOGO worth it?  This will show what kind of businessman you are.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9719.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"u6lm0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Economically speaking what's the justification of \"Buy One Get One Free\" deals? Is it just that the price of one covers the production cost for both or is is an attempt to get rid of inventory?","c_root_id_A":"c4szr8m","c_root_id_B":"c4sw4ku","created_at_utc_A":1338146255,"created_at_utc_B":1338119820,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Most retailers do this because it increases their total profit and they can get away with it (they have market power).  The loss leader and other stories posted so far may be true, but one standard way of explaining this behavior is in the context of \"minimum purchase obligations\". From Boccard's textbook:  > Suppose you'd pay up to $14 for a first pizza but only $7 for a second one. Then the BOGO package at $18 (buy one for $18, get the second one free) will appeal to you and leave a handsome profit to the restaurant. Selling pizzas at $9 apiece (same average price as BOGO) will trigger only one sale, thereby halving the profit!  In other words, if the producer has sufficient control over the price (ie, market power), they can extract more money from you, the consumer, by doing such deals. In the previous example, they can either just sell pizzas one at a time for one set price, or they can sell two for another set price. You (hypothetically) are willing to pay $14 for the first and $7 for the second. So if they set a single price, you'd only buy two if the price is lower than $7. Then their total revenue would be $14. But if they offer one pizza for $14 and two for $18, they'll sell you two pizzas for $18, $4 more than if they just had one set price.  Link to that textbook: Industrial Organization, by Boccard","human_ref_B":"The Theory:  Usually you don't see BOGOF on everyday use items, and these usually stick to the specialty items, i.e. scented candles, kidney beans, ice cream.  When looking at specialty items you are also looking at a 20-25% cost per item, and so your goal is to match sales on the first item, and attempted to do better than cover cost on the second.  This means you don't actually have to double sales, but you are cutting your profitability per item.  If you are only looking at profitability per item, then you see this as taking a loss.  If you look at over all week to week sales minus costs, then you are making money.  This assumes that cost involves labor dollars.  The Math:  You make a widget for $.25, and you sell 100 in a week.  it costs you $25, and you profit $75.  You do a BOGOF your cost per sale is $.50, and you sell 175.  Your cost is $87.5, and your profit is $87.5.  While profit per item is smaller, you overall profit has gone up $12.5.  In the process you have gained new fans that will now use your widget over my widget, and you weekly sales after the BOGO are now 110 per week.  Was the BOGO worth it?  This will show what kind of businessman you are.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":26435.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"a8fd5y","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Societies evolve internally and also evolve through competition with other societies. In biological evolution we understand the kind of parameters that affect species evolution, but by what parameters do societies evolve and compete? As far as I know there is no accepted theory or much conjecture as to how societies compete in an evolutionary sense. In the past there have been theories that the competition is in part related to war and uderlying that it is related to economic growth and strength. But my question is, is there any conceptual framework beyond this that looks at, for example the competition between different value systems and how that, in turns affects the allocation of resources. This comes close to being equivalent to economic power and economic efficiency. But I do not know if there is any theory on how values compete within and between societies to bring upon evolution of societies.","c_root_id_A":"ecawztg","c_root_id_B":"ecbcyde","created_at_utc_A":1545458548,"created_at_utc_B":1545479783,"score_A":5,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Check out the work of Joseph Henrich, Ara Norenzayan, Azim Shariff and others.  Also, here\u2019s a (totally free, and funny!) MOOC I produced for UBC that touches quite a bit on this topic:  https:\/\/www.edx.org\/course\/science-religion-ubcx-religionx","human_ref_B":"There's some complex systems stuff that gets into this territory. I've mostly seen it associated with the Santa Fe Institute and tends to involve a lot of game theory simulations.   The oldest work i know of was Samuel Bowles work on artificial histories. Bowles found in his simulations that you couldn't get large societies to form without a population of parochial altruists, basically people with high ingroup affiliation and hostile outgroup relations. This brought back the theory of group selection, renamed multilevel selection, because highly cooperating groups could outcompete less cooperative groups by exterminating or incorporating them. Whether or not this is what happen in early warfare is another question, especially given that honor societies don't always fight for territory or to eliminate enemies but rather for prestige and tit for tat violence (blood feuds).   More recently Simon DeDeo, Jessica Flack  and others have started to look at violence as a kind of collective computation that constructs social niches in the same way that niche construction functions in ecological systems. It's an interesting theory but so far the work has been a bit underwhelming as papers and it's a bit easier to get a sense of the big shape of this work in less formal talks and presentations. Like a lot of this kind of multidisciplinary science it's tough to get good data sets and hard to draw strong conclusions from what you can find. So for example Dedeo did a bunch of work on wikipedia edit wars and then applied those techniques to the French Revolution looking at how certain words and concepts 'thrive' in the fitness context of politics.   Anyways all this is to say you probably won't find a grand theory about this. It's mostly a bunch of work that's still in the weeds. It's still interesting stuff and i like to keep an eye on it.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21235.0,"score_ratio":2.8}
{"post_id":"4f9xt7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Are there any peer reviewed studies for Trickle-Down Economics? Are there any LEGIT peer reviewed studies that show Trickle-Down has ANY merit to it whatsoever?","c_root_id_A":"d27lmj9","c_root_id_B":"d27bjjq","created_at_utc_A":1460993510,"created_at_utc_B":1460970337,"score_A":21,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"\"Trickle down\" is a political term, and generally a pejorative.  Are you asking if tax cuts are expansionary? Are you asking if cutting taxes increases work, investment, etc, etc? Or are you just looking for reg GDP trickle_down?","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/restud.oxfordjournals.org\/content\/64\/2\/151.short   It's almost 20 years old but here is something. Try looking for things about supple side economics as well.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":23173.0,"score_ratio":5.25}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9lid7h","c_root_id_B":"c9ln2hg","created_at_utc_A":1366781990,"created_at_utc_B":1366810637,"score_A":6,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Production and markets depend on investment into capital. If there is no power in the government and corrupt officials then the producers will not invest as the investment would be risky. You would not pay to build a factory if the next day it could be taken over by corrupt government officials or rebels, pirates etc. Another example is copyright and intellectual property rights, you would not spend money to innovate if your innovations could be stolen by competitors at no cost. Government provides law enforcement and intellectual and physical property rights that add security to investment.  another point is that a functioning economy is dependent partially on public goods like roads, education, clean air, water, etc. If there is no government then there is no way to facilitate the cumulative investment in public goods (taxation and government spending). without roads anything that is produced can't be transported, and without education there is a very short supply of skilled labour.   there are many other reasons. These were the most relevant examples I could think of at present.","human_ref_B":">  Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?   In a word, no. Where did you get that idea?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":28647.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9lk1ni","c_root_id_B":"c9ln2hg","created_at_utc_A":1366790625,"created_at_utc_B":1366810637,"score_A":5,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"the absence of a centralized government does not mean the absence of a localized one, i.e. warlords.","human_ref_B":">  Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?   In a word, no. Where did you get that idea?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20012.0,"score_ratio":2.2}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9limzf","c_root_id_B":"c9ln2hg","created_at_utc_A":1366783059,"created_at_utc_B":1366810637,"score_A":2,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"> Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?  Only the most out-there anarchists would suggest that.  Mainstream and many heterodox schools of economic thought certainly believe that markets don't always provide optimal results, and that state intervention *can* improve things - and as for \"free market\" justice and laws? \/r\/Anarcho_capitalists would have you believe that that'd all just work out fine and dandy, but in practice you get Somalia. The rest of the world is happy to admit that the state implementing and enforcing a common legal framework is quite the opposite of a deadweight loss.","human_ref_B":">  Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?   In a word, no. Where did you get that idea?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":27578.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9ln2hg","c_root_id_B":"c9lmecg","created_at_utc_A":1366810637,"created_at_utc_B":1366807862,"score_A":11,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":">  Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?   In a word, no. Where did you get that idea?","human_ref_B":"Mainstream economists, as opposed to libertarians, readily accept that there are some functions that a government best fulfills. Provision of public goods, such as national defense, law courts, a police force, piped water, a road system.  Places such as Somalia show how neccesary those functions are.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2775.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9ls1h4","c_root_id_B":"c9lid7h","created_at_utc_A":1366825018,"created_at_utc_B":1366781990,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"No.  I specialize in failed states and there are two major misconceptions that you have.  1. Government intervention is associated with pure deadweight loss. No. Government is very important for setting up the institutions necessary to enable free market. Infrastructure, defense, and property rights, for instance, cannot be provided by the market because the market needs these things to operate. Government intervention can crowd out or interfere with market activities, but that is not something you apply to all government activities, its something you apply to market activities being regulated by the government or replaced by the government.  2. Failed states should work better because they have no government. No. Since the government cannot provide necessary institutions to enable market behavior, the market cannot work. Somalia is an amazing example of this. The state fails. No police to protect you from raiding. No maintenance of roads to trade from one place to next. No defense of your borders, so warlords come and try and take over and western countries start dumping hazardous waste in your territory, killing your natural resources.  An example of a failed state where success can be seen is Lagos, Nigeria. The mayor lives in London after he withdrew all the city money from the bank and now lives on it. The city police operate because they are bribed enough to make a living. People are actually moving there from the Nigerian countryside so that they can make a living in the city. There is lots of opportunity for business and innovation. The city is getting cleaned up and new businesses are propping up. It is a huge experiment that civil engineers all over the world are watching in suspense.","human_ref_B":"Production and markets depend on investment into capital. If there is no power in the government and corrupt officials then the producers will not invest as the investment would be risky. You would not pay to build a factory if the next day it could be taken over by corrupt government officials or rebels, pirates etc. Another example is copyright and intellectual property rights, you would not spend money to innovate if your innovations could be stolen by competitors at no cost. Government provides law enforcement and intellectual and physical property rights that add security to investment.  another point is that a functioning economy is dependent partially on public goods like roads, education, clean air, water, etc. If there is no government then there is no way to facilitate the cumulative investment in public goods (taxation and government spending). without roads anything that is produced can't be transported, and without education there is a very short supply of skilled labour.   there are many other reasons. These were the most relevant examples I could think of at present.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":43028.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9lk1ni","c_root_id_B":"c9ls1h4","created_at_utc_A":1366790625,"created_at_utc_B":1366825018,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"the absence of a centralized government does not mean the absence of a localized one, i.e. warlords.","human_ref_B":"No.  I specialize in failed states and there are two major misconceptions that you have.  1. Government intervention is associated with pure deadweight loss. No. Government is very important for setting up the institutions necessary to enable free market. Infrastructure, defense, and property rights, for instance, cannot be provided by the market because the market needs these things to operate. Government intervention can crowd out or interfere with market activities, but that is not something you apply to all government activities, its something you apply to market activities being regulated by the government or replaced by the government.  2. Failed states should work better because they have no government. No. Since the government cannot provide necessary institutions to enable market behavior, the market cannot work. Somalia is an amazing example of this. The state fails. No police to protect you from raiding. No maintenance of roads to trade from one place to next. No defense of your borders, so warlords come and try and take over and western countries start dumping hazardous waste in your territory, killing your natural resources.  An example of a failed state where success can be seen is Lagos, Nigeria. The mayor lives in London after he withdrew all the city money from the bank and now lives on it. The city police operate because they are bribed enough to make a living. People are actually moving there from the Nigerian countryside so that they can make a living in the city. There is lots of opportunity for business and innovation. The city is getting cleaned up and new businesses are propping up. It is a huge experiment that civil engineers all over the world are watching in suspense.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":34393.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9ls1h4","c_root_id_B":"c9limzf","created_at_utc_A":1366825018,"created_at_utc_B":1366783059,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"No.  I specialize in failed states and there are two major misconceptions that you have.  1. Government intervention is associated with pure deadweight loss. No. Government is very important for setting up the institutions necessary to enable free market. Infrastructure, defense, and property rights, for instance, cannot be provided by the market because the market needs these things to operate. Government intervention can crowd out or interfere with market activities, but that is not something you apply to all government activities, its something you apply to market activities being regulated by the government or replaced by the government.  2. Failed states should work better because they have no government. No. Since the government cannot provide necessary institutions to enable market behavior, the market cannot work. Somalia is an amazing example of this. The state fails. No police to protect you from raiding. No maintenance of roads to trade from one place to next. No defense of your borders, so warlords come and try and take over and western countries start dumping hazardous waste in your territory, killing your natural resources.  An example of a failed state where success can be seen is Lagos, Nigeria. The mayor lives in London after he withdrew all the city money from the bank and now lives on it. The city police operate because they are bribed enough to make a living. People are actually moving there from the Nigerian countryside so that they can make a living in the city. There is lots of opportunity for business and innovation. The city is getting cleaned up and new businesses are propping up. It is a huge experiment that civil engineers all over the world are watching in suspense.","human_ref_B":"> Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?  Only the most out-there anarchists would suggest that.  Mainstream and many heterodox schools of economic thought certainly believe that markets don't always provide optimal results, and that state intervention *can* improve things - and as for \"free market\" justice and laws? \/r\/Anarcho_capitalists would have you believe that that'd all just work out fine and dandy, but in practice you get Somalia. The rest of the world is happy to admit that the state implementing and enforcing a common legal framework is quite the opposite of a deadweight loss.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":41959.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9ls1h4","c_root_id_B":"c9lqfrg","created_at_utc_A":1366825018,"created_at_utc_B":1366820715,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"No.  I specialize in failed states and there are two major misconceptions that you have.  1. Government intervention is associated with pure deadweight loss. No. Government is very important for setting up the institutions necessary to enable free market. Infrastructure, defense, and property rights, for instance, cannot be provided by the market because the market needs these things to operate. Government intervention can crowd out or interfere with market activities, but that is not something you apply to all government activities, its something you apply to market activities being regulated by the government or replaced by the government.  2. Failed states should work better because they have no government. No. Since the government cannot provide necessary institutions to enable market behavior, the market cannot work. Somalia is an amazing example of this. The state fails. No police to protect you from raiding. No maintenance of roads to trade from one place to next. No defense of your borders, so warlords come and try and take over and western countries start dumping hazardous waste in your territory, killing your natural resources.  An example of a failed state where success can be seen is Lagos, Nigeria. The mayor lives in London after he withdrew all the city money from the bank and now lives on it. The city police operate because they are bribed enough to make a living. People are actually moving there from the Nigerian countryside so that they can make a living in the city. There is lots of opportunity for business and innovation. The city is getting cleaned up and new businesses are propping up. It is a huge experiment that civil engineers all over the world are watching in suspense.","human_ref_B":"There are several levels of wrong here.  * >Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?  No. Modern economics holds that state intervention that corrects for externalities removes dead-weight loss.  * Just because somewhere like Somalia is a failed state with no central government doesn't mean there's not a government. In fact, there are dozens of governments within the territory. A warlord exercising his power over local trade is no different from a legally recognized state exercising the same power.  * Many failed states do have strong economies, but the entirety of the economy is in the black market.  * Economic efficiency has little relation with somewhere being a good place to live.  This just seems like a poorly thought out straw-man against libertarianism.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4303.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9ls1h4","c_root_id_B":"c9lmecg","created_at_utc_A":1366825018,"created_at_utc_B":1366807862,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"No.  I specialize in failed states and there are two major misconceptions that you have.  1. Government intervention is associated with pure deadweight loss. No. Government is very important for setting up the institutions necessary to enable free market. Infrastructure, defense, and property rights, for instance, cannot be provided by the market because the market needs these things to operate. Government intervention can crowd out or interfere with market activities, but that is not something you apply to all government activities, its something you apply to market activities being regulated by the government or replaced by the government.  2. Failed states should work better because they have no government. No. Since the government cannot provide necessary institutions to enable market behavior, the market cannot work. Somalia is an amazing example of this. The state fails. No police to protect you from raiding. No maintenance of roads to trade from one place to next. No defense of your borders, so warlords come and try and take over and western countries start dumping hazardous waste in your territory, killing your natural resources.  An example of a failed state where success can be seen is Lagos, Nigeria. The mayor lives in London after he withdrew all the city money from the bank and now lives on it. The city police operate because they are bribed enough to make a living. People are actually moving there from the Nigerian countryside so that they can make a living in the city. There is lots of opportunity for business and innovation. The city is getting cleaned up and new businesses are propping up. It is a huge experiment that civil engineers all over the world are watching in suspense.","human_ref_B":"Mainstream economists, as opposed to libertarians, readily accept that there are some functions that a government best fulfills. Provision of public goods, such as national defense, law courts, a police force, piped water, a road system.  Places such as Somalia show how neccesary those functions are.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17156.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9lk1ni","c_root_id_B":"c9limzf","created_at_utc_A":1366790625,"created_at_utc_B":1366783059,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"the absence of a centralized government does not mean the absence of a localized one, i.e. warlords.","human_ref_B":"> Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?  Only the most out-there anarchists would suggest that.  Mainstream and many heterodox schools of economic thought certainly believe that markets don't always provide optimal results, and that state intervention *can* improve things - and as for \"free market\" justice and laws? \/r\/Anarcho_capitalists would have you believe that that'd all just work out fine and dandy, but in practice you get Somalia. The rest of the world is happy to admit that the state implementing and enforcing a common legal framework is quite the opposite of a deadweight loss.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7566.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9limzf","c_root_id_B":"c9lqfrg","created_at_utc_A":1366783059,"created_at_utc_B":1366820715,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"> Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?  Only the most out-there anarchists would suggest that.  Mainstream and many heterodox schools of economic thought certainly believe that markets don't always provide optimal results, and that state intervention *can* improve things - and as for \"free market\" justice and laws? \/r\/Anarcho_capitalists would have you believe that that'd all just work out fine and dandy, but in practice you get Somalia. The rest of the world is happy to admit that the state implementing and enforcing a common legal framework is quite the opposite of a deadweight loss.","human_ref_B":"There are several levels of wrong here.  * >Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?  No. Modern economics holds that state intervention that corrects for externalities removes dead-weight loss.  * Just because somewhere like Somalia is a failed state with no central government doesn't mean there's not a government. In fact, there are dozens of governments within the territory. A warlord exercising his power over local trade is no different from a legally recognized state exercising the same power.  * Many failed states do have strong economies, but the entirety of the economy is in the black market.  * Economic efficiency has little relation with somewhere being a good place to live.  This just seems like a poorly thought out straw-man against libertarianism.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":37656.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1czpu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Economics] If government intervention is inefficient, why isn't Foreign Policy's \"Failed States List\" a roster of the world's greatest places? [\"Common characteristics of a failing state include a central government so weak or ineffective that it has little practical control over much of its territory; non-provision of public services; widespread corruption and criminality; refugees and involuntary movement of populations; and sharp economic decline.\" Why are the first two items on that list implicitly related to the third and fourth, as opposed to being related to efficient markets? Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss? Shouldn't failure of public provision of goods result in stronger economies?","c_root_id_A":"c9lqfrg","c_root_id_B":"c9lmecg","created_at_utc_A":1366820715,"created_at_utc_B":1366807862,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There are several levels of wrong here.  * >Doesn't modern economics hold that state intervention in the economy is associated with pure deadweight loss?  No. Modern economics holds that state intervention that corrects for externalities removes dead-weight loss.  * Just because somewhere like Somalia is a failed state with no central government doesn't mean there's not a government. In fact, there are dozens of governments within the territory. A warlord exercising his power over local trade is no different from a legally recognized state exercising the same power.  * Many failed states do have strong economies, but the entirety of the economy is in the black market.  * Economic efficiency has little relation with somewhere being a good place to live.  This just seems like a poorly thought out straw-man against libertarianism.","human_ref_B":"Mainstream economists, as opposed to libertarians, readily accept that there are some functions that a government best fulfills. Provision of public goods, such as national defense, law courts, a police force, piped water, a road system.  Places such as Somalia show how neccesary those functions are.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12853.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1ttds5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"How long is the wait for Trickle Down Economics to take a good turn for the middle class, and why is it so long? Title says it all, really.  A friend of mine (who majored\/mastered in Accounting) has stated that Reaganomics is an amazing economic plan that doesn't get it's chance because it's a long term plan, which sucks in the short term but balances out later. He has also stated that Keynesian Economics is a good short term plan, but has no substance when it comes to long term.  My understanding is that Reagan implemented Trickle-down economics, and they were sustained through Bush Sr.   When Clinton came into office, a fair amount of political science majors will tell you that he undid the tax plan of the last 10-12 years, and implemented Keynesian-based economics within his first year or two as president, and by the end of his 8 years had completely turned the economy around.  So my question is: Was 12-ish years too short to see the real effects of Reaganomics, and if so, how long would we have to wait to see the long-term plan come into effect, and start a reduction of tax issues for middle-class\/poor citizens as well?","c_root_id_A":"ceb8j4r","c_root_id_B":"ceba16r","created_at_utc_A":1388165008,"created_at_utc_B":1388168734,"score_A":5,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"Can I ask a clarifying question before replying?  What is Reagonomics?  Is it the economic policy that was enacted during Reagan's term, or was it the economic policy advocated by Reagan and his advisers, which was partially but not fully, enacted during his term?","human_ref_B":"First of all, it's worth mentioning that words like \"Reaganomics\" and \"trickle-down economics\" rarely appear in the academic economics discourse (for example, try a Google Scholar search of those words, and look for publications in top economics journals; you won't find many). I suspect this is because they aren't really well-defined and because policy is rarely discretely implemented in a way that so neatly fits into categories like that; instead, many policy decisions are made on continua (e.g. tax rates, subsidies, some regulations). So, when we talk about Reaganomics and trickle-down economics, we want to carefully define what we're talking about. Generally, those terms refer to reduced taxes for upper income brackets (both income and capital gains taxes), reduced government spending, and reduced regulation.  Next, it's important to remember that policy has a small impact on the economy relative to what happens in the private sector. In most countries, growth (and contraction) is dominated by what happens in the private sector (see, for example: http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/2564727). Obviously, policy can make a difference, but I think most people overestimate the effect that policy has. For instance, you say that economic policies implemented in the Clinton era \"completely turned the economy around.\" In contrast, academic discussion attributes the huge growth of the U.S. economy in the 90s pretty much entirely to private sector changes like the growth of IT (see for example: http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/2667350 and http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/3083263).  Now, it's finally time to address your question. This paper provides a good analysis of what you're asking about (and it provides a notable counter-example to my point in the first paragraph). The mechanism they focus on is capital accumulation, so that wraps in anything that lets rich people accumulate wealth (including lower taxes). Here's the end of the abstract: >First, when the rate of capital accumulation is sufficiently high, the economy converges to a unique invariant wealth distribution. Second, even though the trickle-down mechanism can lead to a unique steady-state distribution under laissez-faire, there is room for government intervention: in particular, redistribution of wealth from rich lenders to poor and middle-class borrowers improves the production efficiency of the economy both because it brings about greater equality of opportunity and also because it accelerates the trickle-down process. Third, the process of capital accumulation initially has the effect of widening inequalities but in later stages it reduces them: in other words, this model can generate a Kuznets curve.  In summary, they say that trickle-down economics can improve growth, but there is still a role for government intervention (so the blind ambition of many partisans to reduce the size of government isn't well-founded). Furthermore, they mention that inequality will widen then fall as the growth takes place (this is the Kuznets curve). This is a theoretical model, so they don't lay down a specific time length, but it may be that 12 years is not long enough (and in that sense, your friend may be right). However, they make it clear that the government can speed up the process with redistribution policies. So, we don't have to just sit and wait to reap the benefits.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3726.0,"score_ratio":5.8}
{"post_id":"awtjz5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What do left wing social thinkers mean by commodification? I was listening to a left wing podcast (Ashes Ashes) and they were talking a lot about commodification of human relationships. I get broadly that it means turning things into something like an economic transaction, but I wonder if someone could give me a more in-depth explanation and link to further reading.","c_root_id_A":"ehpv8g4","c_root_id_B":"ehp3iij","created_at_utc_A":1551642810,"created_at_utc_B":1551619073,"score_A":38,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"The first reliable source I could find is the 6th-8th paragraphs under the heading \"Criticisms of markets\" in this article from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. These paragraphs also include references for further study.  My understanding mirrors yours: commodification entails turning something into a good to be bought and sold. I think what's important to understand is that what can or should be bought and sold isn't objective, it is something we agree on as a society. Some societies treated things as commodities that we don't (e.g. brides, slaves), and vice versa (e.g. wombs, work, prayer). This understanding leads us to acknowledge that we are free to determine what should and shouldn't be commodified.  I have three examples that have helped my understanding.  1) Gneezy and Rustichini  did a study on parents picking up their children late from day-cares. Basically, most parents used to pick their children up on time, but some were occasionally late, forcing the teachers to stay late. The day-cares introduced a fine for late-coming. This surprisingly led to more parents coming late, perhaps because the fine was interpreted as a price, whereas before parents had made an effort to arrive on time out of a sense of obligation or regard for the rules. Interestingly, when the fine was removed, the rate for late-coming did not revert to its previous lows, suggesting that commodification of the social obligation had permanently damaged the relationship between parents and teachers.  2) In some cases, commodification seems to \"corrupt\" what is being commodified. For example, would you consider a relationship where one party paid another for their company to be a friendship? Would a rent-a-friend be a true friend?  3) Marxists speak of the process of alienation, where the workers are alienated from their labour through commodification. For example, imagine a family farm where everyone works for the sustenance and betterment of their family. Then the farm is sold, and the family members have to find work on commercial farms. They will be doing the same things as before, tilling the land, caring for the animals, mending clothes, etc. but they are no longer working for themselves, but for wages. The commodification of their labour has alienated them from their work.","human_ref_B":"\u201cIn still other words: all the systems of exchange that organize patriarchal societies and all the modalities of productive work that are recognized, valued, and rewarded in these societies are men\u2019s business. The production of women, signs, and commodities is always referred back to men (when a man buys a girl, he \u201cpays\u201d the father or the brother, not the mother \u2026 ), and they always pass from one man to another, from one group of men to another. The work force is thus always assumed to be masculine, and \u201cproducts\u201d are objects to be used, objects of transaction among men alone.\u201d This is from a  text written by feminist philosopher Luce Irigaray titled Women on the Market, where she further explains the commodification of women. It\u2019s a fascinating read.   Edit: added the title of the text.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":23737.0,"score_ratio":3.4545454545}
{"post_id":"awtjz5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What do left wing social thinkers mean by commodification? I was listening to a left wing podcast (Ashes Ashes) and they were talking a lot about commodification of human relationships. I get broadly that it means turning things into something like an economic transaction, but I wonder if someone could give me a more in-depth explanation and link to further reading.","c_root_id_A":"ehp9mky","c_root_id_B":"ehpv8g4","created_at_utc_A":1551625848,"created_at_utc_B":1551642810,"score_A":7,"score_B":38,"human_ref_A":"Could you provide a clear example of it being used?  This is a term that is used in many different circles with various meanings.","human_ref_B":"The first reliable source I could find is the 6th-8th paragraphs under the heading \"Criticisms of markets\" in this article from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. These paragraphs also include references for further study.  My understanding mirrors yours: commodification entails turning something into a good to be bought and sold. I think what's important to understand is that what can or should be bought and sold isn't objective, it is something we agree on as a society. Some societies treated things as commodities that we don't (e.g. brides, slaves), and vice versa (e.g. wombs, work, prayer). This understanding leads us to acknowledge that we are free to determine what should and shouldn't be commodified.  I have three examples that have helped my understanding.  1) Gneezy and Rustichini  did a study on parents picking up their children late from day-cares. Basically, most parents used to pick their children up on time, but some were occasionally late, forcing the teachers to stay late. The day-cares introduced a fine for late-coming. This surprisingly led to more parents coming late, perhaps because the fine was interpreted as a price, whereas before parents had made an effort to arrive on time out of a sense of obligation or regard for the rules. Interestingly, when the fine was removed, the rate for late-coming did not revert to its previous lows, suggesting that commodification of the social obligation had permanently damaged the relationship between parents and teachers.  2) In some cases, commodification seems to \"corrupt\" what is being commodified. For example, would you consider a relationship where one party paid another for their company to be a friendship? Would a rent-a-friend be a true friend?  3) Marxists speak of the process of alienation, where the workers are alienated from their labour through commodification. For example, imagine a family farm where everyone works for the sustenance and betterment of their family. Then the farm is sold, and the family members have to find work on commercial farms. They will be doing the same things as before, tilling the land, caring for the animals, mending clothes, etc. but they are no longer working for themselves, but for wages. The commodification of their labour has alienated them from their work.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16962.0,"score_ratio":5.4285714286}
{"post_id":"71ttat","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is nationalism left or right wing? On this thread on r\/AskHistorians, some people used nationalism as proof of Nazism being right wing, but isn't China also very nationalist?  I don't really know all that much about the topic, so sorry if it's a dumb question. Also, I myself do agree that Nazism is right wing, I was only looking that up to try and convince a friend of it.","c_root_id_A":"dndirg9","c_root_id_B":"dndm0yg","created_at_utc_A":1506118341,"created_at_utc_B":1506122796,"score_A":9,"score_B":68,"human_ref_A":"Mao Zedong himself espoused nationalist views and consequently Maoist communism has nationalist elements to it, and there was such a thing as National Bolshevism in 1930s Germany which attempted to align the more conservative communists and nationalists who were against the Treaty of Versailles, although Wikipedia lists it as a \"Third Position\" ideology and (at least in the US) third position politics are typically aligned with white nationalist politics.","human_ref_B":"Left and right wing is a messy concept. I would rather look at it as progressive and reactionary nationalism.     In the first world, most nationalism means xenophobia, white supremacy, subjugation of women and clinging on to old traditions.     In the third world, nationalism often takes on other characteristics such as anti-imperialism, economic nationalism, equality for all through the abolition of old relations and independence. I would consider that progressive. This isnt always the case though.     I look at it through a perspective of historical processes where third world nationalism brings a country out of feudal oppression and in the first world tries to regress back into it or intensify current oppression.     An example of left wing or progressive nationalism would in my opinion be China during and before the revolution, Bolshevism, Sankara in Burkina Faso and the like. Reactionary or right wing nationalists would be Donald Trump, UKIP, Front National in France, and other right wing groups.    Im not sure if I need to post sources for this if thats a rule but most of my reasoning comes from Stalins \"The National Question\" and other marxist writers, especially about neo-colonialism.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4455.0,"score_ratio":7.5555555556}
{"post_id":"71ttat","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is nationalism left or right wing? On this thread on r\/AskHistorians, some people used nationalism as proof of Nazism being right wing, but isn't China also very nationalist?  I don't really know all that much about the topic, so sorry if it's a dumb question. Also, I myself do agree that Nazism is right wing, I was only looking that up to try and convince a friend of it.","c_root_id_A":"dndllnq","c_root_id_B":"dndm0yg","created_at_utc_A":1506122206,"created_at_utc_B":1506122796,"score_A":2,"score_B":68,"human_ref_A":"I know top level comments are supposed to be high content, but the question is a little unclear to me. Are you interested primarily in the sources of ethnic and civil nationalisms?","human_ref_B":"Left and right wing is a messy concept. I would rather look at it as progressive and reactionary nationalism.     In the first world, most nationalism means xenophobia, white supremacy, subjugation of women and clinging on to old traditions.     In the third world, nationalism often takes on other characteristics such as anti-imperialism, economic nationalism, equality for all through the abolition of old relations and independence. I would consider that progressive. This isnt always the case though.     I look at it through a perspective of historical processes where third world nationalism brings a country out of feudal oppression and in the first world tries to regress back into it or intensify current oppression.     An example of left wing or progressive nationalism would in my opinion be China during and before the revolution, Bolshevism, Sankara in Burkina Faso and the like. Reactionary or right wing nationalists would be Donald Trump, UKIP, Front National in France, and other right wing groups.    Im not sure if I need to post sources for this if thats a rule but most of my reasoning comes from Stalins \"The National Question\" and other marxist writers, especially about neo-colonialism.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":590.0,"score_ratio":34.0}
{"post_id":"71ttat","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is nationalism left or right wing? On this thread on r\/AskHistorians, some people used nationalism as proof of Nazism being right wing, but isn't China also very nationalist?  I don't really know all that much about the topic, so sorry if it's a dumb question. Also, I myself do agree that Nazism is right wing, I was only looking that up to try and convince a friend of it.","c_root_id_A":"dndqltj","c_root_id_B":"dndirg9","created_at_utc_A":1506129490,"created_at_utc_B":1506118341,"score_A":13,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Nationalism doesn't inherently have much to say about social policy or individuals power relationship to the state. Rather than a coherent governing philosophy, it's best characterized as a set of communications and movement building tactics that can be applied to a variety of governing systems.  However, if you friend is looking for some reason to avoid calling Nazism right wing, I have bad news for them. Fascism, while at times departing from conservative ideas (individual rights, notably), has considerable overlap with the xenophobic strain of conservatism, as practiced today on Fox News, but dating back to the origins of Movement Conservatism. The triumph of corporate titans, with the state limited to matters of military and policing, is a goal shared by fascists and American conservatives; likewise the deliberate othering of racial and ethnic minorities to secure political wins plays well in both. Historian Richard Hofsteader called this The Paranoid Style in American Politics way back in 1964, in an essay that reads like a warning.   https:\/\/harpers.org\/archive\/1964\/11\/the-paranoid-style-in-american-politics\/","human_ref_B":"Mao Zedong himself espoused nationalist views and consequently Maoist communism has nationalist elements to it, and there was such a thing as National Bolshevism in 1930s Germany which attempted to align the more conservative communists and nationalists who were against the Treaty of Versailles, although Wikipedia lists it as a \"Third Position\" ideology and (at least in the US) third position politics are typically aligned with white nationalist politics.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11149.0,"score_ratio":1.4444444444}
{"post_id":"71ttat","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is nationalism left or right wing? On this thread on r\/AskHistorians, some people used nationalism as proof of Nazism being right wing, but isn't China also very nationalist?  I don't really know all that much about the topic, so sorry if it's a dumb question. Also, I myself do agree that Nazism is right wing, I was only looking that up to try and convince a friend of it.","c_root_id_A":"dndllnq","c_root_id_B":"dndqltj","created_at_utc_A":1506122206,"created_at_utc_B":1506129490,"score_A":2,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"I know top level comments are supposed to be high content, but the question is a little unclear to me. Are you interested primarily in the sources of ethnic and civil nationalisms?","human_ref_B":"Nationalism doesn't inherently have much to say about social policy or individuals power relationship to the state. Rather than a coherent governing philosophy, it's best characterized as a set of communications and movement building tactics that can be applied to a variety of governing systems.  However, if you friend is looking for some reason to avoid calling Nazism right wing, I have bad news for them. Fascism, while at times departing from conservative ideas (individual rights, notably), has considerable overlap with the xenophobic strain of conservatism, as practiced today on Fox News, but dating back to the origins of Movement Conservatism. The triumph of corporate titans, with the state limited to matters of military and policing, is a goal shared by fascists and American conservatives; likewise the deliberate othering of racial and ethnic minorities to secure political wins plays well in both. Historian Richard Hofsteader called this The Paranoid Style in American Politics way back in 1964, in an essay that reads like a warning.   https:\/\/harpers.org\/archive\/1964\/11\/the-paranoid-style-in-american-politics\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7284.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"71ttat","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is nationalism left or right wing? On this thread on r\/AskHistorians, some people used nationalism as proof of Nazism being right wing, but isn't China also very nationalist?  I don't really know all that much about the topic, so sorry if it's a dumb question. Also, I myself do agree that Nazism is right wing, I was only looking that up to try and convince a friend of it.","c_root_id_A":"dne4j3m","c_root_id_B":"dndllnq","created_at_utc_A":1506158401,"created_at_utc_B":1506122206,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There are countless 'types' of nationalism. The main split is ethnic and civic, in which you could say ethnic is more right wing and civic left wing (Scotland is a great example of civic nationalism). But there is also anti-colonial nationalism (more on the left usually), state-centric nationalism (often more on the tight), post or trans nationalism (more like cosmopolitanism) and loads more.  So basically, it really depends which type of nationalism you mean - what does the nationalism you're talking about look like?","human_ref_B":"I know top level comments are supposed to be high content, but the question is a little unclear to me. Are you interested primarily in the sources of ethnic and civil nationalisms?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":36195.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"lyp9l8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How prevalent is suicide among transgender individuals? Over time I have been led to believe that transgender people have a very high suicide rate. However, a family member of mine told me that this was a myth, and sent me these links which heavily dispute that idea. However, I did my own research and I'm not confident that these websites are run impartially or by experts. To my knowledge the last one is run by a sculptor.  With that in mind, do these articles have a  point, or are they misrepresenting the issue?   (https:\/\/4thwavenow.com\/2018\/10\/23\/attempted-suicide-by-american-lgbt-adolescents\/)  (https:\/\/4thwavenow.com\/2018\/12\/19\/the-theatre-of-the-body-a-detransitioned-epidemiologist-examines-suicidality-affirmation-and-transgender-identity\/)  (https:\/\/www.transgendertrend.com\/stonewall-school-report-what-does-suicide-rate-mean\/)","c_root_id_A":"gpu8i63","c_root_id_B":"gpv11ux","created_at_utc_A":1614992424,"created_at_utc_B":1615002694,"score_A":20,"score_B":83,"human_ref_A":"\u201cRates of suicide attempts are particularly high in trans populations. Estimated lifetime prevalence of suicide attempts in trans populations ranges from 26% to 45% (e.g., Clements-Nolle, Marx, & Katz, 2006; Grant et al., 2011) compared to 2% to 9% in the general population (Nock et al., 2008)\u201d  Source: https:\/\/www.apa.org\/pubs\/journals\/features\/cou-cou0000152.pdf","human_ref_B":"4thwavenow and transgendertrend are anti-trans hate sites. They absolutely are not reputable sources of information. They're on par with getting information about gay people from Focus on the Family.  The infamously high suicide attempt statistics for trans people refer specifically to rates of suicide attempts *before transition.* The highest estimates put this rate at about 40%, though many other estimates find lower rates. Either way, most of these attempts fail and the person survives.  *After* transition rates of suicide attempts fall drastically. When able to transition young, with access to appropriate transition-related medical care, and spared abuse and discrimination, trans people are as psychologically healthy as the general public.  It's amazing what access to desperately needed medical care, and not being treated like shit, will do for one's mental health.  --- **Citations on the transition's dramatic reduction of suicide risk while improving mental health and quality of life, with trans people able to transition young and spared abuse and discrimination having mental health and suicide risk on par with the general public:**  * **Bauer, et al., 2015**: Transition vastly reduces risks of suicide attempts, and the farther along in transition someone is the lower that risk gets  * **Moody, et al., 2013**: The ability to transition, along with family and social acceptance, are the largest factors reducing suicide risk among trans people  * **Young Adult Psychological Outcome After Puberty Suppression and Gender Reassignment**. A clinical protocol of a multidisciplinary team with mental health professionals, physicians, and surgeons, including puberty suppression, ... cross-sex hormones and gender reassignment surgery, provides trans youth the opportunity to develop into well-functioning young adults. All showed significant improvement in their psychological health, and they had notably lower rates of internalizing psychopathology than previously reported among trans children living as their natal sex. **Well-being was similar to or better than same-age young adults from the general population.**  * The only disorders more common among trans people are those associated with abuse and discrimination - mainly anxiety and depression. Early transition **virtually eliminates these higher rates of depression and low self-worth**, and **dramatically improves trans youth's mental health**. **Trans kids who socially transition early and not subjected to abuse are comparable to cisgender children in measures of mental health.**  * **Dr. Ryan Gorton**: \u201cIn a cross-sectional study of 141 transgender patients, Kuiper and Cohen-Kittenis found that after medical intervention and treatments, suicide fell from 19% to 0% in transgender men and from 24% to 6% in transgender women\u201d  * **Murad, et al., 2010**: \"Significant decrease in suicidality post-treatment. The average reduction was from 30 percent pretreatment to 8 percent post treatment.  * **De Cuypere, et al., 2006**: Rate of suicide attempts dropped from 29.3 percent to 5.1 percent after receiving medical treatment among Dutch patients treated from 1986-2001.  * **UK study - McNeil, et al., 2012**: \"Suicidal ideation and actual attempts reduced after transition, with 63% thinking about or attempting suicide more before they transitioned and only 3% thinking about or attempting suicide more post-transition.  * **Smith Y, 2005**: Participants improved on 13 out of 14 mental health measures after treatment  * **Lawrence, 2003**: Surveyed post-op trans folk: \"Participants reported overwhelmingly that they were happy with their SRS results and that SRS had greatly improved the quality of their lives  * **Reduction in Mental Health Treatment Utilization Among Transgender Individuals After Gender-Affirming Surgeries: A Total Population Study** - \"***Conclusions:*** *\"... the longitudinal association between gender-affirming surgery and reduced likelihood of mental health treatment lends support to the decision to provide gender-affirming surgeries to transgender individuals who seek them.\"*  There are a ***lot*** of **studies** showing that **transition** **improves** **mental health** and **quality of life** while **reducing dysphoria**.   Not to mention **this 2010 meta-analysis** of 28 different studies, which found that transition is extremely effective at reducing dysphoria and improving quality of life.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10270.0,"score_ratio":4.15}
{"post_id":"1hpu0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why does the gender ratio in the south and lower Midwest skew so heavily female? Here's a map. I have a few anecdotal theories but I was hoping y'all would have insights too. Thank you in advance. :)","c_root_id_A":"cawxfz1","c_root_id_B":"cawvvl2","created_at_utc_A":1373100349,"created_at_utc_B":1373091257,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Can we compare this image to a similar one showing proportion of the population over (say) 70? Areas may skew female if they also skew old.","human_ref_B":"I'm having some trouble understanding the actual numbers. Red can't possibly mean a ratio of 1 male to 91 females, can it? That seems unlikely. Can someone explain them to me?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9092.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"1hpu0n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why does the gender ratio in the south and lower Midwest skew so heavily female? Here's a map. I have a few anecdotal theories but I was hoping y'all would have insights too. Thank you in advance. :)","c_root_id_A":"cawvvl2","c_root_id_B":"cax23xo","created_at_utc_A":1373091257,"created_at_utc_B":1373128321,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm having some trouble understanding the actual numbers. Red can't possibly mean a ratio of 1 male to 91 females, can it? That seems unlikely. Can someone explain them to me?","human_ref_B":"As a baseline, it might be worth noting, from https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Demographics_of_the_United_States#Sex_ratios  > total population: 0.97 male(s)\/female (2010 est.)  So an area has to get below 97 men per 100 women to be unusually female overall.  In the map above, that's basically the dark pink and red areas. The light pink areas encompass the mean ratio.  So the real outliers are the mid-blue and dark blue areas, which skew heavily male.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":37064.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"i9u3h4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Are gay divorces higher than heterosexual ones as this article claims? https:\/\/www.nationalreview.com\/2012\/05\/gay-divorcees-charles-c-w-cooke\/","c_root_id_A":"g1iellq","c_root_id_B":"g1hxx77","created_at_utc_A":1597456775,"created_at_utc_B":1597447448,"score_A":21,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"As a premise, I would like to point out that the author's (Cooke's) reasoning is shaky *at best*. Marriage and divorce rates do not by themselves provide information on \"enthusiasm\", and there are many factors to be accounted for in understanding different rates between different social groups (e.g. social support, social acceptance, the sociodemographics of same-sex and opposite-sex who get married, etc.). It is at least naive to assume that because marriage is legal, then same-sex couples have the same experiences as opposite-sex couples, and therefore any differences in rates boils down to their attitudes and dispositions toward marriage\/divorce.  ---  That established, about the claims made in that article you shared. Well, to begin, I would consider the fact it was published in 2012. Whatever was true then, is not necessarily true today: we are not talking about static phenomena. On the topic of trends, Kolk and Andersson (2020) recently published a paper analyzing two decades (1995-2012) of same-sex marriage in Sweden. Per the abstract:  >We find some convergence of divorce risks across union types at the end of our study period: **male same-sex unions have the same divorce risk levels as opposite-sex marriages**, and **the elevated risks of divorce in female same-sex unions appear to have stabilized at somewhat lower levels than those observed in the late 1990s.**   In regard to having to consider several factors, consider the following:  > In particular, **we are interested in whether reforms related to the legal recognition of parental rights in same-sex unions or those related to the status and label of marriage as such may have mattered the most for the dynamics of same-sex marriage formation and divorce. Our evidence suggests that the former factor appears to matter greatly**, while the latter factor largely goes unnoticed in terms of any relation to same-sex family-demographic trends. It also becomes clear that **the impact of changing policy and legal frameworks seems much more pronounced in the family dynamics of female couples than in couples of two men.** The policy change in 2003\u2014the first time that parental rights of two persons of the same sex were explicitly acknowledged in the law\u2014indeed appears to have been crucial. It supported the practice of second-parent adoption, which like other procedures for adoption in Sweden, requires that the two partners are married (or in a registered partnership). The subsequent policy change in 2005 provided additional regulation and procedures for parenthood that offered additional incentives for prospective parents to get married. **Following the introduction of these reforms, the rates of female same-sex marriage formation began its long-term increase; the divorce risks in couples of two women were also lower than before the reforms.**  They also note:  >**Divorce levels in general differ across contexts without much bearing for the status of marriage in those contexts** (Andersson and Philipov 2002; Andersson et al. 2017). To put our results on divorce risks in international context, **we note that the elevated divorce risks in female same-sex marriages in Sweden are similar to the risks observed for spouses in opposite-sex marriages in the United States.**  Regarding the US context, I quote Andrew Gelman's 2014 Washington Post article titled \"Same-sex divorce rate not as low as it seemed\" (commenting on a Williams Institute report):  >Given the evidence available, **the dissolution rate of same-sex marriages seems comparable to, not lower than, the divorce rate of traditional marriages.**  >**In any case, as I noted in my earlier post, the statistics on same-sex marriages are likely to change rapidly over the next decade, as the population of people getting married changes.**  >For now, though, let me retract the earlier headline (\u201cSame-sex couples less likely to get divorced than straight couples . . .\u201d) and replace it with \u201c**Same-sex couples about as likely to get divorced than straight couples** . . .\u201d).  Wiik et al. (2014) do find the sort of results described by Cooke in Norway, but...:  >**Our results further confirmed that same-sex couples still have a higher divorce risk relative to opposite-sex couples and that female couples are more divorce prone than their male counterparts.** Alternative models confirmed that **there have been no major changes in the divorce risks of male and female couples over the study period.** To be sure, with the exception of same-sex marriages entered in 2009 and 2010 (n=552,16% of the same-sex couples included in the current study), we compared same-sex registered partnership with opposite-sex marriages. **Although registered partnerships and marriages are legally equal in Norway, married same-sex couples could receive higher levels of social sup-port than registered partners, as was found in a study of Dutch same-sex couples** (Badgett, 2009). In other words, **it could be the potential qualitative difference between the two union types, and not sexual orientation per se, that accounts for same-sex couples\u2019 higher divorce rates.** Given that same-sex couples were given the right to marry only recently, it is still too early to assess whether same-sex married couples are more similar to opposite-sex married couples than same-sex registered partners.  They also discuss, for example, how having children lowers the risk of divorce, adding however caveats concerning male couples in which case children do not seem to be a protective factor. On the topic of gay couples, they highlight the difficulties for male same-sex couples to become parents, both formal and informal (e.g. attitudes toward gay male parenting versus lesbian female parenting). My point is to stress that if we wish to understand all of this, we have to embrace complexity instead of naively assuming that, hey, marriage is legal, therefore everything is equal and we can straightforwardly compare two different kinds of couples!  ---  **Tldr**: The answer to your main question is: Yes, No, it depends on *where* and *when* you are measuring, *which* couples you are comparing and *what* you are taking into account. In any case, the article's author is making or implying hasty\/unwarranted conclusions.  (As a side-note, consider the following as \"food for thought\": what is the interest behind differences in marriage rates divorce rates? to some degree, it is likely to be linked with attitudes toward \"traditional families\" and the sacralization of marriage. The often implied is that, for example, divorce is inherently bad\/undesirable. Sometimes, perhaps often, we should also ask: what *is* the purpose of the question?)  ---  Aarskaug Wiik, K., Seierstad, A., & Noack, T. (2014). Divorce in Norwegian same\u2010sex marriages and registered partnerships: the role of children. Journal of Marriage and Family, 76(5), 919-929.  Kolk, M., & Andersson, G. (2020). Two Decades of Same-Sex Marriage in Sweden: A Demographic Account of Developments in Marriage, Childbearing, and Divorce. Demography, 57(1), 147-169.","human_ref_B":"The More or Less podcast had a short episode on this a little while ago. It's not sufficient for a top level post but within the podcast you can hear from some of the people who worked on compiling those numbers and what statistical distortions are at play.    https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/programmes\/p06n2nfl","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9327.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"1nlbij","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Could individuals who were furloughed due to the US government shutting down sue congress for their loss of wages? I am just wondering if this is at all a possibility and what the implications could be.","c_root_id_A":"ccjn1ox","c_root_id_B":"ccjmoob","created_at_utc_A":1380734772,"created_at_utc_B":1380733822,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Probably not.  If their salary isn't in law, but rather within agency HR policy or something, it is discretionary spending.  Discretionary spending is subject to appropriations, if congress has appropriated the money you can spend it, if not you can't.  If you have a contract, depends on the contract, but again unlikely.  Federal Unions have promised to try and get back pay.  These efforts were successful during the shutdown in the 90s.  Employees performing excepted services are still working, and won't be paid until a new appropriation is made, but as \/u\/blackbird17k said, they must be paid because employees \"volunteering\" isn't allowed (relevant statute).   If the salary\/payment is in law, like congressional reps, federal judges, or the president, it is direct spending or mandatory spending.  Failure to disburse this money to eligible individuals\/institutions **is** grounds for a lawsuit and many law firms offer this service (see e.g.).  Virtually all direct spending is Social Security and Medicare(caid).    I wrote this comment earlier today explaining the difference, but wikipedia has a better summary.","human_ref_B":"Probably not. At least, I don't know of a way that that could be done.  But those who work without pay probably have to be paid due to the Anti-Deficiency Act of 1884, which prohibits people from \"volunteering\" to work for the Federal government without pay.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":950.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"13akdv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why can't Hospitals have transparent pricing that is the same for everyone? Specifically I am asking why someone hasn't made that a law yet and what unintended consequences it could have.  A related question would be why insurers are apparently currently incapable of putting downward pricing pressure on hospitals so that they become more efficient.","c_root_id_A":"c72ajkj","c_root_id_B":"c72g0de","created_at_utc_A":1353077365,"created_at_utc_B":1353097325,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Most industrialized countries have implemented government price controls to accomplish what you're suggesting. Here is a good blog post on the subject, though I would encourage you to look into more rigorous sources.","human_ref_B":"Medical biller here. Hospitals and other providers do have one fee schedule. Legally, they have to.  When you have insurance (if your provider is contracted or \"in-network\" with your insurance), they bill their standard rates to the insurer, with whom they have an agreement.   Let's say you have Blue Cross and your provider is contracted. You get a service that your provider bills your insurance $300 for. Blue Cross has an allowed amount of $150 for that service. You have a $50 co-pay. So, Blue Cross pays your provider $100, your provider bills you $50 (for your co-pay), and the other $150 they have to write off, as their agreement with Blue Cross mandates the provider to accept the allowed amount in full and not bill you for that other $150.   For cash, they bill you for that $300, but often offer hardship agreements, payment plans, or discounts if you can pay a majority of the charge up-front (so, say you can pay $250 right away, they may waive that extra $50).  I'm not an economist, but suffice to say that insurers are making money by trying to take in more in premiums than they pay out in claims and they have a myriad of ways of doing that. Meanwhile, providers have their own ways of maximizing reimbursement from insurers through certain billing tricks. It's pretty complicated, IMHO, but feel free to ask any questions that come to mind.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19960.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"13akdv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why can't Hospitals have transparent pricing that is the same for everyone? Specifically I am asking why someone hasn't made that a law yet and what unintended consequences it could have.  A related question would be why insurers are apparently currently incapable of putting downward pricing pressure on hospitals so that they become more efficient.","c_root_id_A":"c72g0de","c_root_id_B":"c72fkt2","created_at_utc_A":1353097325,"created_at_utc_B":1353095826,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Medical biller here. Hospitals and other providers do have one fee schedule. Legally, they have to.  When you have insurance (if your provider is contracted or \"in-network\" with your insurance), they bill their standard rates to the insurer, with whom they have an agreement.   Let's say you have Blue Cross and your provider is contracted. You get a service that your provider bills your insurance $300 for. Blue Cross has an allowed amount of $150 for that service. You have a $50 co-pay. So, Blue Cross pays your provider $100, your provider bills you $50 (for your co-pay), and the other $150 they have to write off, as their agreement with Blue Cross mandates the provider to accept the allowed amount in full and not bill you for that other $150.   For cash, they bill you for that $300, but often offer hardship agreements, payment plans, or discounts if you can pay a majority of the charge up-front (so, say you can pay $250 right away, they may waive that extra $50).  I'm not an economist, but suffice to say that insurers are making money by trying to take in more in premiums than they pay out in claims and they have a myriad of ways of doing that. Meanwhile, providers have their own ways of maximizing reimbursement from insurers through certain billing tricks. It's pretty complicated, IMHO, but feel free to ask any questions that come to mind.","human_ref_B":"What do you mean? They do.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1499.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1d6ntf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How Do You Think the 2007 Recession Will Affect the Study of Macroeconomics? As anyone who has studied macroeconomics knows, the classical theory dominated until proven wrong by the Great Depression.  Then the Keynesian Theory dominated until proven wrong by stagflation in the 1970s.  Now a combination of New Keynesian and New Classical dominate.  What new macro theories do you think will spawn from the 2007 financial collapse\/mega-recession?","c_root_id_A":"c9nsz25","c_root_id_B":"c9nhwqp","created_at_utc_A":1367083742,"created_at_utc_B":1367028261,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Very little.  This recession didn't really challenge conventional macroeconomics. Everything has worked well within current theory. No one was denying that recessions happened before the crisis, and nno one was denying it after.  I can see some changes coming within macroeconomic *policy*. We Bayesian updated the parameters of how often to expect a recession (and how big they can be). I could see some of the unconventional policies discussed in the last few years (like QE or NGDP targeting) becoming more standard.  The heterodox schools have gotten a bit more attention in the last few years from non-economists, but I really don't see that lasting long.","human_ref_B":"Well it kinda seems like the question is asking for completely new macroeconomic theories, which I will definitely not be providing here, as I am far from a highly qualified economist.  I will say, however, that the 2007 recession will likely just necessitate choosing one economic philosophy and sticking with it.  I do disagree with the premise that either the depression or the stagnation of the 70's completely disproved either theory- that's why we have both theories now in a revised form; neither theory disappeared, they just changed a bit to fit the new economies.  That said, I believe that the recession was clearly a result of neoliberal thought.  Most of the problems that led to the recession can be traced back to extreme deregulation of huge banks and (in Europe) privatization of formerly public industries, which are the main concepts of neoliberal thought.  My hope is that the recession discourages any further propagation of neoliberal ideology, which seems to have failed everywhere it has been implemented.    As for new macro theories moving forward, it's really hard to say where the international community will move.  It seems that the first world will continue to implement neoliberal policies in the third world, as such policies clearly benefit multinational corporations while exploiting the resources of third world nations as much as possible.  It's more difficult to say what kinds of policies will be adopted in the US and Europe.  It seems like some combination of Neo-Keynsian and Neo-Classical will continue, because people like to do what's comfortable, and the people that we've left to write the new laws are the same people that were in place before the recession took place.  I don't think that the austerity measures failed quite badly enough to completely delegitimize neoclassical thought, and no country really tried a keynesian approach to dealing with the recession, so it's really impossible to say what will win out moving forward.  Choosing both is simply not an option, however, as was seen in the United States.  Obama tried to implement both Keynesian and Classical policies at the same time, and it failed miserably.  Cutting taxes while implementing a half-hearted stimulus package isn't how you fix an economy with high unemployment and low wages.  Again, I'm not a PhD in economics, so I'm not about to offer a new macro theory at this point, but I can say that we should choose one guiding theory and stick with it, because the stuff we've been doing clearly hasn't worked out that well.    Edit:  Just came back to this and noticed the questions about sources.  I didn't really think that anything I was saying really required sources, because I assumed that the history of neoliberalism was documented well enough through most social sciences that it's become common knowledge.  I also thought that I was posting in \/r\/AskReddit, I forgot this was \/r\/asksocialscience (oops!).  If you're looking for sources on neoliberalism, look at the Harvey book that zawamark mentioned, or check out these interviews with Harvey.  The book and the interviews pretty clearly show how the deregulation and privatization advocated by neoliberals from the 80's through the early 2000's directly led to the '08 recession.  If you're interested in this stuff, you might also want to check out Why Voice Matters by Nick Couldry.  It's not as directly related to my point, but it gives a pretty good analysis of the effects of neoliberal politics and economics.  As for my claims about Obama's approach not being effective, look at this article from Krugman, or this interview with Stiglitz.  Basically, the issue was that the \"stimulus package\" wasn't really a Keynsian stimulus- it was much smaller than it needed to be, and much of the package involved extending tax cuts on those least impacted by the recession.  The issue with the tax cuts was that they counteract the point of a stimulus, because the money people saved went right into savings accounts rather than back into the economy.   I'm happy to provide more sources if you're interested in a particular thing I said.  Most of this isn't anything new for someone who's spent time studying the social sciences.  The history of neoliberalism has been covered in just about every upper level social science course I've taken in any discipline.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":55481.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"1d6ntf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How Do You Think the 2007 Recession Will Affect the Study of Macroeconomics? As anyone who has studied macroeconomics knows, the classical theory dominated until proven wrong by the Great Depression.  Then the Keynesian Theory dominated until proven wrong by stagflation in the 1970s.  Now a combination of New Keynesian and New Classical dominate.  What new macro theories do you think will spawn from the 2007 financial collapse\/mega-recession?","c_root_id_A":"c9nlgx9","c_root_id_B":"c9nsz25","created_at_utc_A":1367041010,"created_at_utc_B":1367083742,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"MMT has been making a lot of headway since the start of the crisis.  The essential bits of MMT is that bond markets don't move against currency issuers, and so there's no recession that you cannot spend your way out of (and no inflationary crisis you cannot withdraw spending via surpluses to end) and that provided you don't overheat demand, inflation is not going to prevent you from mobilising labor today (best introduction to this imo is this parable).  Additionally MMT argues that there isn't a great deal of difference between adding bonds to circulation and adding cash to circulation, both increase the net financial assets (and therefore buying power) of the rest of economy by the same amount. Both allow the non-government to bid up prices to a greater extent. Considering that a) the government sets the interest on its own short-term debt (a point well driven home here) and b) can sell as much of that debt as it likes - even to the point it's becoming inflationary - printing bonds has just so many parallels to printing cash that it doesn't surprise me that they have much the same effect, and the same limitations, which is what MMT argues. Mainstream argues though that printing $1bn worth of paper assets in the form of bonds and adding them to circulation is less inflationary than printing $1bn worth of paper assets in the form of cash and adding them to circulation, and I've never heard a clear argument as to why these should be so different. MMT says they're not, and that QE as a result is largely non-inflationary - and what do we see today? A market growing wise to just that.  I believe Krugman's been steadily moving towards the MMT school, although he doesn't like to admit it. He acknowledges that today bonds and cash are near equivalent substitutes - that the government can print either to fund its deficit, the effect would be much the same. He acknowledges that bond markets don't move against currency issuers, but that instead if anything, the exchange rate slips (growing the export sector + granting the associated multiplier from that injection of income) here, directly contrary to his earlier thoughts on the matter.  The only real difference standing between him and MMT today is that he believes that outside of liquidity traps, banks are not limited by the number of credit-worthy customers that can afford interest rates set by the Fed, but rather that they are reserve-constrained. This article makes little sense to an MMTer, as he's supposing that introducing money in boom times will lead to further loaning - even if interest rates don't change (and they needn't - the Fed can keep them constant throughout by paying interest on reserves or via open market operations). But that will likely change - the evidence that the money multiplier as taught is uninformative is mounting (I link them a lot, but when central bankers are coming to the conclusion that banks are demand-constrained and not reserve-constrained it really is a big thing, Fed here, BIS here - both recent, excellent papers that I do not believe Krugman has read).  I realise Krugman doesn't represent all of mainstream or anything - but it does show the headways MMT are making as of late.  Regardless of MMT or not, I do believe this crisis has revealed that understanding of economics was mighty flawed before and during the crisis, and that a lot of old models are going to be pretty much thrown out in the aftermath. I certainly agree with you there. There's just so much that mainstream struggles to explain. Why Japan gets the world cheapest lending despite being over 100% of GDP more in debt than when the Euro members fell. Why bonds of many highly indebted nations go for real negative interest. Why despite all this \"money printing\" inflation is struggling to even reach what the Fed promises it will. Why a nation can be in a situation where 60% of its population *wants* to work more, but can't. For me MMT explains all these problems quite simply, and I'm yet to see a counter-example to any of its predictions or any reasonable argument against it that doesn't end up being a straw man, a beat-down of a misrepresentation of the school.  In any case, the post-mortem of this crisis is going to be truly fascinating.","human_ref_B":"Very little.  This recession didn't really challenge conventional macroeconomics. Everything has worked well within current theory. No one was denying that recessions happened before the crisis, and nno one was denying it after.  I can see some changes coming within macroeconomic *policy*. We Bayesian updated the parameters of how often to expect a recession (and how big they can be). I could see some of the unconventional policies discussed in the last few years (like QE or NGDP targeting) becoming more standard.  The heterodox schools have gotten a bit more attention in the last few years from non-economists, but I really don't see that lasting long.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":42732.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"vue8s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"People in ancient times were able to build vast canal networks. Would it be possible to build them today in Africa to increase arable land? It was certainly done quite effectively in ancient times.  I guess cost would be a factor, but there would be the advantage of future profitability.  Couldn't low-tech methods be employed to keep costs down further?","c_root_id_A":"c57rabc","c_root_id_B":"c57sfi2","created_at_utc_A":1341080980,"created_at_utc_B":1341087033,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"It is, but it comes down to politics. Before a civilization would control a vast majority of land, but now divided into different countries makes things difficult. Plus as it was stated before, Africa is huge and inequal in both development, climate and land.","human_ref_B":"Sure, but the limitation is in available water.  Water can be used to create arable land - most commonly through the use of plumbing to feed sprinkler irrigation - but this requires a *lot* of water, because of the amount that is lost to evaporation.  It's possible to avoid all of the evaporation loss by farming inside, but building structures requires materials and labor.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6053.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"vue8s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"People in ancient times were able to build vast canal networks. Would it be possible to build them today in Africa to increase arable land? It was certainly done quite effectively in ancient times.  I guess cost would be a factor, but there would be the advantage of future profitability.  Couldn't low-tech methods be employed to keep costs down further?","c_root_id_A":"c57rabc","c_root_id_B":"c57tc8a","created_at_utc_A":1341080980,"created_at_utc_B":1341091843,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It is, but it comes down to politics. Before a civilization would control a vast majority of land, but now divided into different countries makes things difficult. Plus as it was stated before, Africa is huge and inequal in both development, climate and land.","human_ref_B":"I think the greatest problem would be political and economic stability.  In order to create and then maintain a complicated hydraulic landscape you need a high level of administrative organisation and stability.  Canals need clearing, damns and bunds need repairing and reinforcing, tanks need dredging, and locks need fixing.   Thus, even if a significant foreign investment created a hydraulic system capable of collecting, storing, and transporting enough water to irrigate a significant area of land within an arid environment - you'd then need some level of stability and continued investment in order to keep that irrigation working.  A secondary problem would be whether enough regular rainfall exists in such arid environments to make such a system workable - I don't know much about the climate of arid Africa and so can;t really comment on that one.  Tl;dr - simply building a system of canals and reservoirs would be unlikely to work unless you can also bring greater political and economic stability to the region.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10863.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"qm3mf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the clear and undeniable social and economic benefits for mandating contraceptive coverage?","c_root_id_A":"c3yo0th","c_root_id_B":"c3ynvq0","created_at_utc_A":1331151196,"created_at_utc_B":1331150454,"score_A":10,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I'm not an expert on this either, but I found this study conducted for the West Virginia Legislature's Joint Committee on Government and Finance which has a number of interesting, if not unexpected results. They suggest that, in one year, the potential direct cost savings just from obstetrical or delivery costs was about $981,000. Additional direct cost savings might come from prenatal care, which they estimate could range from a $2.50 to $7 cost savings for each dollar invested in the program. They also mention that, since average birth costs were used, they may not reflect the additional costs that would be incurred by women undergoing Caesarean sections or caring for babies of low birthweight; costs in these cases are exponentially higher than in normal births, so cost savings would be commensurately higher.   The authors also mention a good study by Hoffman (2006) who found that early teen births reduce the lifetime earnings of the resulting children by about $810 per year, or about $35,000 over the course of a lifetime.   It's important to note that the sample size for this study is VERY small. Their data examine dependent minors, and the number of eligible women was obtained from the PEIA (Public Employees Insurance Agency); it's unclear whether the numbers are for all minor dependents in the state or just minor dependents covered by the PEIA itself. They also assumed a participation rate of 20% (that is, 20% of eligible dependent minors actually took contraception). Either way, their assumption was a sample size of 2,625. So these numbers reflect a VERY small sample population compared to a larger geographical area or a higher participation rate, and are probably conservative even for this small sample size.   Whether these numbers are directly applicable to a larger population is a bit unclear; for example, as they point out, costs vary widely depending on the ease of the birth, and the age of the parent is directly correlated with this (for example, minors are more likely to have babies of low birthweight, with commensurately high costs as mentioned above). However, most likely they're at least in the ballpark. At the very base of all this is the fact that contraception coverage is extremely cheap for insurers (dollars per person), whereas covering the birth, prenatal and post-natal care of a child costs in the thousands of dollars. The economics on that end is fairly simple.","human_ref_B":"I take it you're referring to the recent debate in the US. In that case, I highly recommend you read the source of the contraceptive mandate idea, a report from the Institutes of Medicine that attempted to outline what the best preventive practices for women are from both a health and cost-effectiveness standpoint. You can read the report online here.  In brief, you can see here that access to contraception is part of a broader package of women's health. The benefits are manifold - proper family planning allows women to better plan their careers and other major lifestyle decisions (economic benefit); put more space between their pregnancies, which has been shown to lead to better outcomes for children; and reduce the rate of unintended pregnancies: currently, ~49% of pregnancies in America are unintended, and I'm sure you can imagine the negative consequences of that figure, which is much higher than other developed countries.  I hope that gives you an idea to start with, but like I said reading the report is the best way to go. The relevant section starts on page 102.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":742.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"qm3mf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the clear and undeniable social and economic benefits for mandating contraceptive coverage?","c_root_id_A":"c3yo0th","c_root_id_B":"c3ynrjc","created_at_utc_A":1331151196,"created_at_utc_B":1331149867,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'm not an expert on this either, but I found this study conducted for the West Virginia Legislature's Joint Committee on Government and Finance which has a number of interesting, if not unexpected results. They suggest that, in one year, the potential direct cost savings just from obstetrical or delivery costs was about $981,000. Additional direct cost savings might come from prenatal care, which they estimate could range from a $2.50 to $7 cost savings for each dollar invested in the program. They also mention that, since average birth costs were used, they may not reflect the additional costs that would be incurred by women undergoing Caesarean sections or caring for babies of low birthweight; costs in these cases are exponentially higher than in normal births, so cost savings would be commensurately higher.   The authors also mention a good study by Hoffman (2006) who found that early teen births reduce the lifetime earnings of the resulting children by about $810 per year, or about $35,000 over the course of a lifetime.   It's important to note that the sample size for this study is VERY small. Their data examine dependent minors, and the number of eligible women was obtained from the PEIA (Public Employees Insurance Agency); it's unclear whether the numbers are for all minor dependents in the state or just minor dependents covered by the PEIA itself. They also assumed a participation rate of 20% (that is, 20% of eligible dependent minors actually took contraception). Either way, their assumption was a sample size of 2,625. So these numbers reflect a VERY small sample population compared to a larger geographical area or a higher participation rate, and are probably conservative even for this small sample size.   Whether these numbers are directly applicable to a larger population is a bit unclear; for example, as they point out, costs vary widely depending on the ease of the birth, and the age of the parent is directly correlated with this (for example, minors are more likely to have babies of low birthweight, with commensurately high costs as mentioned above). However, most likely they're at least in the ballpark. At the very base of all this is the fact that contraception coverage is extremely cheap for insurers (dollars per person), whereas covering the birth, prenatal and post-natal care of a child costs in the thousands of dollars. The economics on that end is fairly simple.","human_ref_B":"I'm not qualified to post in this sub, but can some who is contemplate the effects it would have on the cost of abortions, etc, when answering this?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1329.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"qm3mf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the clear and undeniable social and economic benefits for mandating contraceptive coverage?","c_root_id_A":"c3ynrjc","c_root_id_B":"c3ynvq0","created_at_utc_A":1331149867,"created_at_utc_B":1331150454,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I'm not qualified to post in this sub, but can some who is contemplate the effects it would have on the cost of abortions, etc, when answering this?","human_ref_B":"I take it you're referring to the recent debate in the US. In that case, I highly recommend you read the source of the contraceptive mandate idea, a report from the Institutes of Medicine that attempted to outline what the best preventive practices for women are from both a health and cost-effectiveness standpoint. You can read the report online here.  In brief, you can see here that access to contraception is part of a broader package of women's health. The benefits are manifold - proper family planning allows women to better plan their careers and other major lifestyle decisions (economic benefit); put more space between their pregnancies, which has been shown to lead to better outcomes for children; and reduce the rate of unintended pregnancies: currently, ~49% of pregnancies in America are unintended, and I'm sure you can imagine the negative consequences of that figure, which is much higher than other developed countries.  I hope that gives you an idea to start with, but like I said reading the report is the best way to go. The relevant section starts on page 102.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":587.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"qm3mf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the clear and undeniable social and economic benefits for mandating contraceptive coverage?","c_root_id_A":"c3ynrjc","c_root_id_B":"c3yq7nh","created_at_utc_A":1331149867,"created_at_utc_B":1331163164,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I'm not qualified to post in this sub, but can some who is contemplate the effects it would have on the cost of abortions, etc, when answering this?","human_ref_B":"Less sick days for those whose diseases or conditions would be lessened by contraceptives, including those with \"off-label\" uses.  Fluke (the person criticized by Rush Limbaugh) discussed a friend with polycystic ovarian syndrome, or PCOS, who had multiple cysts in her ovaries, but was denied the coverage of birth control pills, even though her physician specifically noted she needed them to manage PCOS. This is a common, off-label use. Ironically, she could not afford the much higher price of the pills without coverage, and developed a massive cyst - and lost one of her ovaries. It's possible she may not be able to have a child at all, as a result.   I've had two ruptured ovarian cysts. On a scale of 1 to 10, I would unabashedly rank them as \"11\" (sorry, Nigel). You feel like your guts are tearing apart from within. Needless to say on both occasions I had to leave the workplace and was unable to return immediately, and I was one of the many lucky women who did not develop an infection or have a more serious cyst rupture.   I cannot imagine the pain and suffering of someone whose ovaries are constantly producing cysts - but I can confirm that she is unable to function at her best in her workplace. With key members of various work teams potentially unable to control their health problems in safe, effective ways, this could have a ripple effect in many workplaces.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13297.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"qm3mf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the clear and undeniable social and economic benefits for mandating contraceptive coverage?","c_root_id_A":"c3ynrjc","c_root_id_B":"c3ytss2","created_at_utc_A":1331149867,"created_at_utc_B":1331184203,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm not qualified to post in this sub, but can some who is contemplate the effects it would have on the cost of abortions, etc, when answering this?","human_ref_B":"The history of contraceptives is inextricably bound up in the fate of the women's rights movement. The development of the birth control pill was revolutionary and has impacted the lives of women everywhere in more ways than can be counted. Now, as opposed to before, women have the ability to control, post-pone, and (if they so desire) permanently inhibit being impregnated. When used correctly, oral contraceptives are 99% effective in preventing pregnancy. Women can delay pregnancy until after finishing their college educations and establishing a career if they so choose, giving them a more even footing in the work force to compete with men for jobs that were previously only held by men. The birth control pill is also liberating for women; if they want to have sex without the fear of becoming pregnant and suffering the life-altering consequences of that, they can (a right that has always been available to men, I might add). The birth control pill gives women everywhere autonomy over their sexual lives without having to worry about becoming pregnant (obviously, the pill can't prevent STIs or STDs, this is what condoms are for). It's highly inexpensive, and should not even be a problem for insurance companies to pay for, as there are so many generic forms of it. The only reason, in my opinion, that this is even newsworthy is because it is an election year, and women's reproductive rights always come under fire from the right during election years.  A great book with more on this topic is \"When Everything Changed\" by Gail Collins. This article is also a good demonstration of the way things were before abortion was legal, but can also illustrate why contraceptive pills are so important in helping women lead healthy, productive, and self-fulfilling lives: http:\/\/motherjones.com\/politics\/2004\/09\/way-it-was?page=all","labels":0,"seconds_difference":34336.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"qm3mf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the clear and undeniable social and economic benefits for mandating contraceptive coverage?","c_root_id_A":"c3ytss2","c_root_id_B":"c3yrew0","created_at_utc_A":1331184203,"created_at_utc_B":1331170446,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The history of contraceptives is inextricably bound up in the fate of the women's rights movement. The development of the birth control pill was revolutionary and has impacted the lives of women everywhere in more ways than can be counted. Now, as opposed to before, women have the ability to control, post-pone, and (if they so desire) permanently inhibit being impregnated. When used correctly, oral contraceptives are 99% effective in preventing pregnancy. Women can delay pregnancy until after finishing their college educations and establishing a career if they so choose, giving them a more even footing in the work force to compete with men for jobs that were previously only held by men. The birth control pill is also liberating for women; if they want to have sex without the fear of becoming pregnant and suffering the life-altering consequences of that, they can (a right that has always been available to men, I might add). The birth control pill gives women everywhere autonomy over their sexual lives without having to worry about becoming pregnant (obviously, the pill can't prevent STIs or STDs, this is what condoms are for). It's highly inexpensive, and should not even be a problem for insurance companies to pay for, as there are so many generic forms of it. The only reason, in my opinion, that this is even newsworthy is because it is an election year, and women's reproductive rights always come under fire from the right during election years.  A great book with more on this topic is \"When Everything Changed\" by Gail Collins. This article is also a good demonstration of the way things were before abortion was legal, but can also illustrate why contraceptive pills are so important in helping women lead healthy, productive, and self-fulfilling lives: http:\/\/motherjones.com\/politics\/2004\/09\/way-it-was?page=all","human_ref_B":"Mandating on-the-spot excutions for DUI offenses would DRASTICALLY reduce the amount of drunk driving and deaths resulting from it, but does that make it a good idea?  Yeah, contraceptives are cheaper than an unwanted pregnancy. But's it's not the government's place to tell insurance companies what they have to cover.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13757.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1akf2a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the prominent success stories, if any, of economic austerity policies? Please only reply if you can cite sources other than political talking point websites. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8ye9z7","c_root_id_B":"c8yd7dr","created_at_utc_A":1363692079,"created_at_utc_B":1363682126,"score_A":23,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Without getting too much into specific isolated cases, the IMF has recently been saying:  1: Austerity is generally a failure because of increases in the multiplier effect (ie, austerity is bad because it causes sharp recessions...no surprise there)  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2013\/wp1367.pdf  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2013\/wp1301.pdf   2: Studies that say that Austerity can be good fore the economy are generally biased.  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2011\/wp11158.pdf","human_ref_B":"Germany had an austerity program in the early 2000s, especially to reduce social spending and to restructure the social safety net. The social democratic gov't of the time lost the election over it. Today it is recognized as being one of the main reasons for the good shape of the current German economy (source: all over the news, even the conservative party acknowledged it).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9953.0,"score_ratio":1.6428571429}
{"post_id":"1akf2a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the prominent success stories, if any, of economic austerity policies? Please only reply if you can cite sources other than political talking point websites. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8yaipe","c_root_id_B":"c8ye9z7","created_at_utc_A":1363667872,"created_at_utc_B":1363692079,"score_A":8,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"This should be 2 questions I think  1. Have austerity programs been shown to save countries in a PIIGS like crisis? (minus the monetary end)  2. Have austerity programs dampened the business cycle in times of hectic boom to calm down an overheating economy?","human_ref_B":"Without getting too much into specific isolated cases, the IMF has recently been saying:  1: Austerity is generally a failure because of increases in the multiplier effect (ie, austerity is bad because it causes sharp recessions...no surprise there)  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2013\/wp1367.pdf  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2013\/wp1301.pdf   2: Studies that say that Austerity can be good fore the economy are generally biased.  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2011\/wp11158.pdf","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24207.0,"score_ratio":2.875}
{"post_id":"1akf2a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the prominent success stories, if any, of economic austerity policies? Please only reply if you can cite sources other than political talking point websites. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8ye9z7","c_root_id_B":"c8y8wl5","created_at_utc_A":1363692079,"created_at_utc_B":1363662902,"score_A":23,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Without getting too much into specific isolated cases, the IMF has recently been saying:  1: Austerity is generally a failure because of increases in the multiplier effect (ie, austerity is bad because it causes sharp recessions...no surprise there)  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2013\/wp1367.pdf  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2013\/wp1301.pdf   2: Studies that say that Austerity can be good fore the economy are generally biased.  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2011\/wp11158.pdf","human_ref_B":"Arguably New Zealand, at least at first. However, the austerity remains extremely unpopular with the public, even 30 years on.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29177.0,"score_ratio":11.5}
{"post_id":"1akf2a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the prominent success stories, if any, of economic austerity policies? Please only reply if you can cite sources other than political talking point websites. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8ybifb","c_root_id_B":"c8ye9z7","created_at_utc_A":1363671745,"created_at_utc_B":1363692079,"score_A":2,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"I read in this quarters Foriegn Affairs that the Revenue Act if 1964 cut taxes yet tax receipts went up.  From what I've learned through economics a country that has a trade surplus can have austerity without it being contractionary. Examples of this are Germany in 2010 and Sweden as mentioned by \/u\/10over6.  A short analysis can be found here by Leonhardt","human_ref_B":"Without getting too much into specific isolated cases, the IMF has recently been saying:  1: Austerity is generally a failure because of increases in the multiplier effect (ie, austerity is bad because it causes sharp recessions...no surprise there)  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2013\/wp1367.pdf  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2013\/wp1301.pdf   2: Studies that say that Austerity can be good fore the economy are generally biased.  http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2011\/wp11158.pdf","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20334.0,"score_ratio":11.5}
{"post_id":"1akf2a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the prominent success stories, if any, of economic austerity policies? Please only reply if you can cite sources other than political talking point websites. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8yaipe","c_root_id_B":"c8yd7dr","created_at_utc_A":1363667872,"created_at_utc_B":1363682126,"score_A":8,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"This should be 2 questions I think  1. Have austerity programs been shown to save countries in a PIIGS like crisis? (minus the monetary end)  2. Have austerity programs dampened the business cycle in times of hectic boom to calm down an overheating economy?","human_ref_B":"Germany had an austerity program in the early 2000s, especially to reduce social spending and to restructure the social safety net. The social democratic gov't of the time lost the election over it. Today it is recognized as being one of the main reasons for the good shape of the current German economy (source: all over the news, even the conservative party acknowledged it).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14254.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"1akf2a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the prominent success stories, if any, of economic austerity policies? Please only reply if you can cite sources other than political talking point websites. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8yd7dr","c_root_id_B":"c8y8wl5","created_at_utc_A":1363682126,"created_at_utc_B":1363662902,"score_A":14,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Germany had an austerity program in the early 2000s, especially to reduce social spending and to restructure the social safety net. The social democratic gov't of the time lost the election over it. Today it is recognized as being one of the main reasons for the good shape of the current German economy (source: all over the news, even the conservative party acknowledged it).","human_ref_B":"Arguably New Zealand, at least at first. However, the austerity remains extremely unpopular with the public, even 30 years on.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":19224.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"1akf2a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the prominent success stories, if any, of economic austerity policies? Please only reply if you can cite sources other than political talking point websites. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8yd7dr","c_root_id_B":"c8ybifb","created_at_utc_A":1363682126,"created_at_utc_B":1363671745,"score_A":14,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Germany had an austerity program in the early 2000s, especially to reduce social spending and to restructure the social safety net. The social democratic gov't of the time lost the election over it. Today it is recognized as being one of the main reasons for the good shape of the current German economy (source: all over the news, even the conservative party acknowledged it).","human_ref_B":"I read in this quarters Foriegn Affairs that the Revenue Act if 1964 cut taxes yet tax receipts went up.  From what I've learned through economics a country that has a trade surplus can have austerity without it being contractionary. Examples of this are Germany in 2010 and Sweden as mentioned by \/u\/10over6.  A short analysis can be found here by Leonhardt","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10381.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"1akf2a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What are the prominent success stories, if any, of economic austerity policies? Please only reply if you can cite sources other than political talking point websites. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c8y8wl5","c_root_id_B":"c8yaipe","created_at_utc_A":1363662902,"created_at_utc_B":1363667872,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Arguably New Zealand, at least at first. However, the austerity remains extremely unpopular with the public, even 30 years on.","human_ref_B":"This should be 2 questions I think  1. Have austerity programs been shown to save countries in a PIIGS like crisis? (minus the monetary end)  2. Have austerity programs dampened the business cycle in times of hectic boom to calm down an overheating economy?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4970.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"3lpkjt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Comparing Poverty between First world & Third? I see people often mention \"If you're poor in America then you shouldn't complain because it's nothing like it is in Latin America\". While on it's face sure, they probably aren't comparable to parts of Latin America, but in what ways are they similar? If anyone could explain and provide a resource or two, that would be great.","c_root_id_A":"cv8c5l7","c_root_id_B":"cv8f407","created_at_utc_A":1442785787,"created_at_utc_B":1442790534,"score_A":4,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"This might be useful for your definition, too - relative poverty (ie people in a developed world who are in poverty compared to other people in the developed world) vs absolute poverty (ie people who have nothing at all - like in your developing countries). http:\/\/study.com\/academy\/lesson\/poverty-in-the-united-states-definitions-of-relative-absolute-poverty.html","human_ref_B":"One problem with answering this question is that the poverty can be incomparable in a rather literal way, as in the circumstances are so different that there just aren't useful points of comparison. For example, \"subsistence affluence\" is a well known if controversial concept use in development and anthropology, particularly in the Pacific Islands. It describes areas that, from a formalist economics perspective, are in grindingly impoverished conditions unthinkable in the US or any developed nation, but where people are actually doing pretty well and are generally happy. Due to strong communal support networks and effective sustainable food gathering their material needs are secure. Absent the vagaries of capitalist market systems there is no real potential for wealth accumulation, but they are also free from the instabilities. A discussion of the rather contested term from a (mostly) formalist\/neoclassical perspective can be found here.  Granted this particular set of circumstances is ever diminishing, but it illustrates the complexities of trying to compare very different lifestyles.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4747.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"3lpkjt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Comparing Poverty between First world & Third? I see people often mention \"If you're poor in America then you shouldn't complain because it's nothing like it is in Latin America\". While on it's face sure, they probably aren't comparable to parts of Latin America, but in what ways are they similar? If anyone could explain and provide a resource or two, that would be great.","c_root_id_A":"cv8f407","c_root_id_B":"cv8amgg","created_at_utc_A":1442790534,"created_at_utc_B":1442783328,"score_A":9,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"One problem with answering this question is that the poverty can be incomparable in a rather literal way, as in the circumstances are so different that there just aren't useful points of comparison. For example, \"subsistence affluence\" is a well known if controversial concept use in development and anthropology, particularly in the Pacific Islands. It describes areas that, from a formalist economics perspective, are in grindingly impoverished conditions unthinkable in the US or any developed nation, but where people are actually doing pretty well and are generally happy. Due to strong communal support networks and effective sustainable food gathering their material needs are secure. Absent the vagaries of capitalist market systems there is no real potential for wealth accumulation, but they are also free from the instabilities. A discussion of the rather contested term from a (mostly) formalist\/neoclassical perspective can be found here.  Granted this particular set of circumstances is ever diminishing, but it illustrates the complexities of trying to compare very different lifestyles.","human_ref_B":"I would check out Gap Minder. It's a great resources for visually analyzing all types of data globally, including lots of data related to poverty and development.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7206.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"1i6v7o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Which field of study best encompasses my specific interest; the daily lives of peoples living in ancient cultures? I am most interested in studying ancient cultures. I have my favorites, of course (Japan, Greece, Egypt, and Native Americans), but will gladly learn more about any culture. Specifically, though, I am most interested in the daily lives of people living in these cultures. I want to know what that bowl was made of, how it was made, why they chose those materials, why they decorated it so, what was put in it, how it was used and cleaned and cared for. I care about what rituals and habits they had and why, what animals they kept as pets, how they named their children. I'd love to read actual or theoretical accounts of their days, from the moment they wake to the moment they sleep. How they lived fascinates me.  I can't possibly be the only one with this interest; otherwise, historical fiction wouldn't exist. I want to follow a scholarly path in this interest, but I don't know what field it is. I had thought anthropology, but now I'm not sure; my interests seem quite specific, and don't really seem, to me, to fit into any of the four sub-fields I know of. What do you say, Reddit? What field of study best fits my particular interest?  While I'm at it, if anyone knows of any documentaries, books, articles, et cetera along the lines of this interest, I would love to know about it!  Thank you in advance for any input, and thank you for reading! If this would be better located elsewhere, please let me know. :)  Cross-posted from \/r\/answers, where it seems to have gotten lost in the sea of questions.","c_root_id_A":"cb1nalk","c_root_id_B":"cb1lu3o","created_at_utc_A":1373688827,"created_at_utc_B":1373683728,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"If you're interested in interpreting ancient cultures by examining their material remains then archaeology is for you.  Many universities offer this as a field of concentration within their anthropology departments.","human_ref_B":"James A. Michener has written a ton of books that describe cultures in exactly this manner. I have read Mexico and thought it was fantastic. It is a fictional account of several different groups that come together to make up the culture in Mexico. He jumps around in time starting with a narrative about the Olmecs and moving into the present with a journalist following the current trend of matadors and comparing the Spanish style of bullfighting to the indigenous Mexican style. I recommend any of his books.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5099.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"1i6v7o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Which field of study best encompasses my specific interest; the daily lives of peoples living in ancient cultures? I am most interested in studying ancient cultures. I have my favorites, of course (Japan, Greece, Egypt, and Native Americans), but will gladly learn more about any culture. Specifically, though, I am most interested in the daily lives of people living in these cultures. I want to know what that bowl was made of, how it was made, why they chose those materials, why they decorated it so, what was put in it, how it was used and cleaned and cared for. I care about what rituals and habits they had and why, what animals they kept as pets, how they named their children. I'd love to read actual or theoretical accounts of their days, from the moment they wake to the moment they sleep. How they lived fascinates me.  I can't possibly be the only one with this interest; otherwise, historical fiction wouldn't exist. I want to follow a scholarly path in this interest, but I don't know what field it is. I had thought anthropology, but now I'm not sure; my interests seem quite specific, and don't really seem, to me, to fit into any of the four sub-fields I know of. What do you say, Reddit? What field of study best fits my particular interest?  While I'm at it, if anyone knows of any documentaries, books, articles, et cetera along the lines of this interest, I would love to know about it!  Thank you in advance for any input, and thank you for reading! If this would be better located elsewhere, please let me know. :)  Cross-posted from \/r\/answers, where it seems to have gotten lost in the sea of questions.","c_root_id_A":"cb1mw2l","c_root_id_B":"cb1nalk","created_at_utc_A":1373687415,"created_at_utc_B":1373688827,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I second the \"historical anthropology\" suggestion, and I must add that some archaeology programs allow (or even stimulate!) students to do \"armchair\/theoretical\/museum\" archaeology - specially those universities with\/nearby big museums (some of which have lots of artifacts waiting for someone to study them).","human_ref_B":"If you're interested in interpreting ancient cultures by examining their material remains then archaeology is for you.  Many universities offer this as a field of concentration within their anthropology departments.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1412.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"39ba14","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.98,"history":"What's the academic reputation of Dave Grossman's work, such as On Killing? I'd be interested in hearing from anyone but esp those who work in psychology and military studies. Even a copy of a JSTOR review would be appreciated.","c_root_id_A":"cs24fuv","c_root_id_B":"cs20gnu","created_at_utc_A":1433964568,"created_at_utc_B":1433959118,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"You can search specifically for reviews in JSTOR.  Go to JSTOR.com, click \"advanced search\", type in your search terms, and before you press \"search\" look down below \"NARROW BY:\" and see the \"ITEM TYPE\" and then tick the \"Review\" box.  It's actually quite a well-designed system.  Obviously only works with works old enough to make it into JSTOR's system, but with a book as old as Grossman's, it's no sweat.  That said, the only book review of it that I see is the one that \/u\/haalidoodi already found. Several other book reviews mention it, however.    Wikipedia also points to the article:  Engen, Robert. \"Killing for Their Country: A New Look At 'Killology'\". *Canadian Military Journal* 9 (2), and Grossman's response to that article in the same journal.","human_ref_B":"Here's your JSTOR review. You can view it for free from what I can tell, as long as you register.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5450.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"9c0cnp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Can you please give me a direction on politics? I don't know if it's the right sub to ask this, if not, I'd be grateful If you indicate me a proper one.  First of all, sorry for my bad english, it's not my primary language.  I'm a brazilian psychology student who recently has been philosophically more interested in the truth and beliefs. I've read Nietzsche and then morals became very interesting to me, altough that made me often nihilistic in my moral positions. It's very frustrating but I face it as a necessary evil to have a better understanding about the existence of being. Now politics is becomming more and more yelling.  If you know my country situation, you may know that it's chaotic. We live in a huge economic crisis, corruption schemes are becoming more and more evident. Corrupt politicians are judged and arrested, then a few months later they are released. Our ex president Lula is arrested, but compete is still a possibility for him and he has the majority of voting intentions. The main opositor supports torture, consecrates the military dictatorship we had in the history of our country and he's a machine gun of ignorance.   On one side I see the new age girl with tons of bought arguments saying only women can speak on abortion and only black people can speak on racism. On the other side there's the ones who say  \"a good bandit is a dead bandit\" and that everything is a communist conspiracy.  I've watched a few thinkers on the internet to give me a few insights but when I hear or see people saying what I mentioned before in such a simplistic and convincing way it just pisses me off. I know they don't understand anything they're doing or talking about, but I can't position myself because I don't know either, I can't articulate my thinking because I don't really understand it. I think I can't judge them by what they're feeling, they might have their reasons, but I know they're just wrong on their thinking.   So, about the thinkers I've seen on internet, this video (https:\/\/youtu.be\/1r3H9--2nS0) set me a goal and brought me here. What's the path to see the big picture like them? What's the path to see the whole? To understand? To make constructive questions and constructive arguments? Which books should I read? Can you recommend them for me? Do you have a bibliographic list? Do you know where should I look for it? A site, a sub or anything?  If You guys help me I'd be really grateful! Sorry for the long post and sorry for the tone of outburst.   Thank you anways.","c_root_id_A":"e5793uj","c_root_id_B":"e57gi7y","created_at_utc_A":1535785339,"created_at_utc_B":1535801632,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"II. Questions should be novel and specific and answerable. No \"what if\" questions that require speculative answers. Please search first.  VII. This subreddit is not intended to help with personal issues or school work. Please direct those questions to professionals or appropriate subreddits. For homework questions, we suggest \/r\/HomeworkHelp or \/r\/econhw instead.`","human_ref_B":"This is a little too open ended and general for this sub. I would recommend a subreddit like \/r\/NeutralPolitics\/. But here is my answer anyway.  The guy in that video got to where he is because he is someone who has read quite a good amount of several topics. Coming here is a great start, but getting to that point will take a lot of reading and understanding multiple topics. I would seek out sources that focus on real debate and honest discussion. Just be careful to not mistake people who are effective at arguing their point for people who know what they are talking about. It's ok for them to have a side just make sure they are willing to call their own side out for doing the wrong thing or making bad arguments  Check ideas against data. Many well known 'thinkers' these days are really just cheerleaders for their side. If they mention a study take a look at it. People often misrepresent studies or spin them to match their view when in reality they don't say anything about that.   Learn about the most common argument tactics. It has become a war of ideas lately and it's caused people to use faulty logic when they can't find good data to support their ideas. A quick google search found this list. The main one I would watch out for is \"Correlation is not causation\". That one tends to be the most used bad argument in my experience.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16293.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"qlsl6v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Any studies on how Japan achieves such high amounts of social compliance? I read (on Reddit!) that teachers, even of very young children, in Japan are very emotionally abusive to enforce conformity.  Are there any formal studies about this?  I've also heard of \"Shame Culture\"?","c_root_id_A":"hj6acsa","c_root_id_B":"hj6tuy6","created_at_utc_A":1635960889,"created_at_utc_B":1635968346,"score_A":18,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"Preschool in Three Cultures: Japan, China and the United States (and the follow up study) tap into this quite well imo. It's an academically reviewed book with quite an extensive study behind it (as I remember). There is also some form of documentary, but I don't recall the details.  Their are benefits and drawbacks to how the Japanese approach teaching young students. As you can imagine it's a really a complicated series of interwoven priorities, values, and biases. Here's a link to the follow up work.  \\*Edited link","human_ref_B":"I recommend *The Enigma of Japanese Power* by Karl Van Wolferen. The book is dated and a product of its time. It is an unabashedly etic ethnographic study; the author is very upfront about writing from a Western-centric perspective. That said, it's valuable in that Van Wolferen aims to be objective and stick to facts, and stay away from opinions, feelings, or hunches, and he provides sources for the facts he reports scrupulously.  The key to understanding Japanese society, is that it is inherently a military culture, like ancient Sparta. It was Emperor Meiji's explicit wish that Japan become fully militarized as a society, as a more effective way of dodging foreign domination than isolationism. Ever since then, every Japanese citizen is non-voluntarily a member of the Japanese military, for life. But the military in Japan has been repurposed for export manufacturing and projection of soft power abroad, rather than waging war.  Think about it \u2014 where *do* you see levels of social discipline, highly synchronized cooperation, everyone accountable to someone, and people operating in lock-step like a well-oiled machine, as pervasively as in Japan? In any militarily strong country's military culture, of course.  A militarized society requires \u2014 or at the very least greatly benefits from \u2014 a commonly held sense of a common enemy, a common fighting mission. Since the demilitarization of Japan after WWII, that rallying cry is that the West and China want to run roughshod over Japan's unique and fragile-but-functional way of life and cultural values. They may not be entirely wrong on this, but that's beside the point, which is that the Japanese public's view of the rest of humanity is inherently, and preemptively, adversarial. And it needs to be that way, to keep everyone there indefinitely motivated to band together, put their personal hopes and dreams and wishes aside, and give it all for the greater good.  Schooling in Japan has a similar social function to basic training in militaries. There is a breaking down of individual ego (\"On your own, you're nothing. Worthless. A burden.\") and a building back up (\"But there is a way to gain value as a person, by submitting and contributing to, this collective project.\").","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7457.0,"score_ratio":1.4444444444}
{"post_id":"1yp8ev","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What potential public policy solutions does research support as being the most helpful in alleviating the effects of poverty? Let's pretend researchers somehow were placed into a position of power where their suggestions would be immediately put into action. They still have to consider things such as feasibility\/program cost, but otherwise they are given free reign. What would they suggest to a) lower the number of those in poverty, and b) lessen the negative impact of those in poverty?   (If you need more specifics, I probably wouldn't be able to help out -- I'm not very knowledgeable in this subject. I just sort of want to learn about what research has shown to be the most effective at helping those in poverty. Thanks!)","c_root_id_A":"cfmjgn8","c_root_id_B":"cfmj0td","created_at_utc_A":1393165472,"created_at_utc_B":1393163678,"score_A":18,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Check out the work of the Poverty Action Lab at MIT: http:\/\/www.povertyactionlab.org\/search\/apachesolr_search?filters=type:evaluation  In a nutshell, they do randomized trials of poverty alleviation interventions around the world.","human_ref_B":"Studies show a correlation between education and income, http:\/\/www.bostonpic.org\/sites\/default\/files\/Fiscal_Returns_to_Completing_High_School.pdf  It may be that education improves income or intelligence improves education.  To establish a cause a random control trial would be needed which is difficult to perform. One way a random contol trial could be done is in a college scholarship program.  Removal of children from their homes and being placed in foster care leads to lower incomes, http:\/\/www.mit.edu\/~jjdoyle\/doyle_fosterlt_march07_aer.pdf  > Children assigned to investigators with higher removal rates are more likely to be placed in foster care themselves, and they are found to have higher delinquency rates, along with some evidence of higher teen birth rates and lower earnings.  Children raised in single parent households are more likely to not complete high school and have lower earnings, http:\/\/apps.olin.wustl.edu\/macarthur\/working%20papers\/wp-mclanahan2.htm","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1794.0,"score_ratio":2.5714285714}
{"post_id":"jhs5vz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"To what extent do politicians shape public opinion rather than respond to it? To some extent, politicians have to be responsive to public opinion; their job depends on it.  But I'm curious whether and to what extent people have changed their minds on political issues because of what a particular politician says or does.  Is there any way to quantify this?","c_root_id_A":"ga2dz1o","c_root_id_B":"ga21gu4","created_at_utc_A":1603640056,"created_at_utc_B":1603633578,"score_A":18,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Politicians absolutely shape public opinion! They do this in a variety of ways - from their rhetoric and the policies they advance to the actual work they do organising and taking action.   However, this power does not exist in a vacuum! The effectiveness of opinion-shaping strategies is largely dependent on material social conditions - including the total 'social location' of the people they are trying to convince - along with existing cultural beliefs, attitudes, and perceptions of the political party, internal party management, and of course the efforts of other preference shapers (media, churches, social movements, trade unions, etc).  When parties are in government their ability to shape preferences becomes even greater, as they tend to have greater weight given to their rhetoric and, crucially, their actions can actually alter social conditions to make people more favourable to their views. Classic examples of this include the Thatcher government selling off council houses, turning traditionally Labour-voting council tenants into homeowners who may be more inclined to support the Conservatives, or the Swedish social democrats, who after being elected by an alliance of farmers & urban workers crafted policies which more permanently tied the interests of these groups together, cementing their electoral coalition.  Citations (Afraid they're mostly UK-centric):  Dunleavy & Husbands, *British Democracy at the Crossroads*  Evans & Tilley, *The New Politics of Class* https:\/\/books.google.co.uk\/books\/about\/The_New_Politics_of_Class.html?id=Xa3_DQAAQBAJ&source=kp_book_description&redir_esc=y  Archer, *Leading Labour*  Goodwin & Ford, *Revolt on the Right*  Esping-Anderson, *Politics Against Markets*","human_ref_B":"Seems like a job for Manufacturing Consent (Herman, Edward S.; Chomsky, Noam. Manufacturing Consent. New York: Pantheon Books)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6478.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"jhs5vz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"To what extent do politicians shape public opinion rather than respond to it? To some extent, politicians have to be responsive to public opinion; their job depends on it.  But I'm curious whether and to what extent people have changed their minds on political issues because of what a particular politician says or does.  Is there any way to quantify this?","c_root_id_A":"ga3fejo","c_root_id_B":"ga2m1m8","created_at_utc_A":1603655635,"created_at_utc_B":1603644388,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"There are entire lines of research on the topic of public opinion formation, responsiveness, whether political elites pander to the public and\/or shape public attitudes, etc. Broadly speaking, it is a complex topic: your mileage may vary depending on where, who, when, what, etc. To begin, it is important not to take for granted that politicians are responsive to the public, because their responsiveness also depends on the *public's* responsiveness. To quote Visser et al. (2007):  >**The simple notion that citizens elect representatives who implement policies with which they agree is central to democratic theory**  ...]  >**On close inspection, however, this process is far from simple. It depends critically on a number of fairly demanding steps.** It first requires that **at least a substantial majority of citizens carefully attend to political events on the local, state, and national stages.**   >Further, **citizens must consolidate the constant stream of political information provided by the news media, advocacy groups, and other individuals within the social environment, and they must store this information in memory for later use.** From this elaborate and diverse set of stored information, citizens must derive attitudes on salient issues of the day that reflect their interests and other core predispositions.  >**Citizens must then discriminate among various candidates for political office**, identifying those who hold issue positions closest to their own, and they must cast ballots in support of those candidates during elections.   >**This can be difficult, because candidates often do not clearly and consistently state their positions on issues** (Page, 1978), and **the media do not make special efforts to communicate candidates\u2019 positions to the public** (Patterson & McClure, 1976; Graber, 1980; Patterson, 1980). Finally, **citizens must monitor the actions of their elected officials, holding them accountable for pursuing the appropriate policies and in other ways serving the citizens\u2019 goals and interests.**  And to quote Wliezen and Soroka (2016):  >We have thus far concentrated on policy representation\u2014the effect of public opinion on public policy. But **policy representation ultimately requires that the public notices and responds to what policymakers do. Without such responsiveness, policymakers would have little incentive to represent what the public wants in policy**\u2014there would be no real benefit for doing so, and there would be no real cost for not doing so. Moreover, expressed preferences would be of little use even to those politicians motivated to represent the public for other reasons.  As an intermediary conclusion, there *is* a relationship between opinion and policy, but there is appreciable variation.  ---  To provide some concrete examples, I would refer to research on criminal justice policy, regarding which there is a good amount of discussion on the relationship between policies and public attitudes. According to van Kesteren (2009), there is no clear-cut *global* relationship between penal policies and public attitudes:  >**Although in many developing countries the public favours prison sentences, actual sentencing policies tend to be comparatively more lenient.** This is notably the case in countries such as Paraguay, India, Mexico, Argentina and the Philippines. **In contrast, sentencing tariffs tend to be fairly severe in several Western countries where public attitudes are comparatively lenient**, e.g. Austria, Spain, Poland, Hungary and Rumania. **In countries like the USA and New Zealand, sentencing tariffs are very severe while public attitudes are only moderately severe.**  In his paper on determinants of penal policies, Tonry (2007) argues:  >**The most prominent national risk factors include** conflict political systems, elected judges and prosecutors, particular forms of sensationalist journalism, Anglo-Saxon political cultures, and **a predominant view that criminal justice policy falls appropriately within the province of public opinion and partisan politics.**  Concerning the US context, he relates the American political system (conflict-based, partisan-based, etc.) and the constant race to be tough(er)-on-crime, and both with the mass use of incarceration. Concerning the growth of incarceration in the US, Enns (2014) concludes:  >**Although the evidence overwhelmingly suggests that political elites responded to the public\u2019s shifting support for being tough on crime, we should not conclude that political elite rhetoric never matters.**  In regard to the latter, he remarks:  >We should also keep in mind that news coverage of crime is not the only factor influencing the public\u2019s attitudes. Although the results were less consistent, **we saw some evidence that** television crime dramas and **political elite rhetoric might reinforce the public\u2019s punitiveness.** Furthermore, **these relationships may vary over time.** In her analysis of public perceptions of whether crime is the most important problem, Beckett (1997) finds different patterns for 1964 through 1974 and 1985 through 1992. Indeed, **the changing media environment, strengthening partisan attachments, and evolving tough-on-crime rhetoric could all influence the strength of the relationships observed in this chapter.**   To conclude with Pickett's (2019) review, he agrees that **public opinion matters to public officials, at least in the US.** That said:  >**Aggregate support for specific criminal justice policies appears to have little effect on incarceration rates or crime spending** (Schneider 2006, Soroka & Wlezien 2010, Wlezien 2004; but see Rhodes 1990). **However, generalized punitiveness both drives policy outcomes, mainly through rational anticipation by public officials rather than electoral turnover, and mediates the effects of crime rates.**  Finally:  >Second, has the responsiveness of criminal justice policy and practice to public opinion changed over time? Will it change in the future? **There is some evidence in other fields suggesting that public officials\u2019 responsiveness to public opinion has varied during different time periods and potentially has declined in recent decades** (Ansolabehere et al. 2001, Jacobs & Shapiro 2000). In the current context of increasing political polarization (Iyengar & Westwood 2015), changes in responsiveness to public mood seem especially likely. As Erikson et al. (2002b, p. 81) explained, \u201cwhere policy is polarized, there is little nuance, and the signal of a bundled public opinion, such as mood, should be all the stronger.\u201d Therefore, one priority area for future work should be to test whether the effects of public opinion on policy-relevant outcomes like execution rates, court decision-making, and prison admissions vary over time.  (I would add that the topic of polarization is also complex, as there are multiple kinds, with different implications. [See here for an in-depth discussion.)  ---  In regard to your main question, and to cite recent examples, according to Matsubayashi's (2012) analysis of American National Election Study data between 1956 and 2004:  >These findings support the view that **politicians actively seek to alter their constituents\u2019 policy positions. However the opinion linkage between the elite and the masses is much more complicated than traditional studies of representation suggest.** Politicians have strong incentive to persuade constituents to adopt their political views in order to mitigate the electoral costs of pursuing favoured policies. Consistent with the works of Dunleavy and Ward and by Gerber and Jackson, moreover, the evidence also indicates that the assumption of fixed and exogenous voter preferences in the Downsian theory of party competition is unrealistic. **We cannot simply expect that politicians will conform to what the median voter demands. Downs himself notes that parties will \u2018attempt to move voters towards their own location, thus altering it\u2019.** This highlights the importance of modelling party competition by treating voter preferences as an endogeneous variable.  According to Carlsson et al.'s (2016) study of attitudes towards the policies of small parties in Sweden:  >Our paper provides some of the first causal evidence that **public attitudes are influenced by which political parties are elected to power** ...] political representation can alter citizen\u2019s attitudes in ways that can improve (or hurt) future election success. **Additionally, our results indicate the power politicians have to alter attitudes depends at least in part on outside forces, with the media playing an important mediating role in the framing of a political party and their message.**  Lastly, per [Mullinix:  >**When political parties take stands on policies and endorse candidates, they provide short-cuts to help us make sense of politics. People seem quite eager to follow their party\u2019s lead** and our willingness to follow our party can, at times, make us look foolish. And as noted above, **these effects are accentuated when parties are polarized on the issue.**  >**Yet, the influence of political parties on public opinion is not without limits.** The mass public is not merely an obedient dog on a leash controlled by political parties; we seem, at times, capable of slipping our partisan collars. When people believe that a policy proposal may impact their daily lives, they can shirk their party\u2019s endorsement and focus on the substantive merits of a policy proposal.  [Reference list next comment]","human_ref_B":"The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere by Habermas. Habermas lays out the foundation of how to understand the relationship between public opinions and how they are shaped, with political and economic structures.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11247.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1vyd2o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Can someone please explain this concept from \"Debt\" by David Graeber? \"In 1694, a consortium of English bankers made a loan of $1,200,000 to the king.In return they received a royal monopoly on the issuance of banknotes. What this meant in practice was that they had the right to advance IOUs for a portion of the money the king now owed them to any inhabitant of the kingdom willing to borrow from them, or willing to deposit their own money in the bank--in effect, to circulate or \"monetize\" the newly created royal debt. This was a great deal for the bankers (they got to charge the kind 8 percent annual interest for the original loan and simultaneously charge interest on the same money to the clients who borrowed it), but it only worked as long as the original loan remained outstanding. To this day, this loan has never been paid back. It cannot be. If it ever were, the entire monetary system of Great Britain would cease to exist.\" p 49   I understand the economics behind what happened but I can't grasp how this loan could still be the entire basis for the financial system today. Also, is there a reason that the 1.2 million pounds was given as a loan to the government and then the government debt was distributed from the \"central bank\" rather than the government just having the bankers loan out the 1.2 million pounds to the people directly? Is it so that the 8% interest on the loan would expand the 'size' of the economy? Anyone who can explain the situation in detail would be owed a large debt!!!!","c_root_id_A":"cex3qni","c_root_id_B":"cewyesu","created_at_utc_A":1390509301,"created_at_utc_B":1390498449,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Saying that this is the entire basis for the banking system today is technically entirely false. I believe that what the author means (though I have not read this specific book) is that from this beginning today's monetary system has arisen. He is using a little bit of hyperbole to emphasize the importance of this event.  > is there a reason that the 1.2 million pounds was given as a loan to the government and then the government debt was distributed from the \"central bank\" rather than the government just having the bankers loan out the 1.2 million pounds to the people directly?  The government did not charter the Bank of England in order to ease credit in the economy. They chartered it to give their lenders an incentive to lend to the government. Remember that governments then did not have a good credit rating (they never paid the loan back!) so providing a monopoly on banking (which cost the government nothing) was the incentive given in turn for offering the loan.  A convenient side effect of chartering the bank, and remember that banks were basically entirely experimental at that time, was the introduction of paper money and the development of the monetary system.  Think of it like this -  The government traded a monopoly on banking to whomever would charter a bank with 1.2 million pounds (this is equity, a liability) and then lend 1.2 million pounds to them (this is their only asset). Initially (ie on day one) it wasn't really a bank - it was a 100% equity backed investment vehicle that owned government debt. It evolved into a bank because they were able to take money on deposit (another liability) to lever their equity contribution and then lend to private businesses and the government.  There were other 'banks' at the same time that were unauthorized to bank working under other corporate shells (in a time when there were very few corporations legally chartered). One such company is the Hollow  Sword Blade Company. I would start my own bank and call it the Hollow Blade Sword Company but unfortunately the initials are HSBC which are the same as the initials of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC).  If you read the wikipedia article about the Hollow Blade Sword Company you will see that the 'cost' of getting the company chartered was... making a loan to the government! They had quite a racket going whereby any company seeking to be chartered needed to make a loan to the government (which would be equity financed) and then would be able to pursue their own business. The incentive for the equity holders was to raise debt to lever their equity and then find lending opportunities with a higher return than lending to the government. The HSBC bought farms in Ireland, for instance, using publicly raised funds (the structure was perhaps something along the lines of preferred equity?).  Please let me know if that is not clear enough.","human_ref_B":"This isn't sourced enough to be an answer, so I guess followup question... Could it be that this \"principal\" has evolved from \"solid cash backing\" to \"the power of fiat\" over generations of fractional reserve? The idea of having a currency be a \"demand note\" seems to me to have become antiquated, as the actual WEALTH involved has become more closely and stably associated with the currency itself, rather than the \"underlying assets\". Is this thought even a little right? Or just a further wrong?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10852.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"4ybsw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Where to go from Foucault's biopolitics? From the birth of biopolitics, are there any texts by either Foucault or anyone else that can be recommended? Be it a contemporary extension or some fundamental text that influenced the man","c_root_id_A":"d6mjuay","c_root_id_B":"d6miycf","created_at_utc_A":1471526981,"created_at_utc_B":1471525441,"score_A":14,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"You could read up Giorgio Agamben's writings on the state of exception and camps- specifically his concept of bare life. It's an extension of bio politics as it specifies how governments construct their subjects as both political animals and bare humans, the latter of which is used to justify indefinite detention of terrorists (e.g. at Guantanamo).","human_ref_B":"\"Discipline and Punish\" & \"The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality\"","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1540.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"4ybsw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Where to go from Foucault's biopolitics? From the birth of biopolitics, are there any texts by either Foucault or anyone else that can be recommended? Be it a contemporary extension or some fundamental text that influenced the man","c_root_id_A":"d6mvvxh","c_root_id_B":"d6nfwor","created_at_utc_A":1471542507,"created_at_utc_B":1471568716,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Silvia Federici's \"Calbian and the Witch\" leans heavily on Foucault's biopolitics, as well as Marx's historiography, to build a history of the modern foundations of misogyny and racism.","human_ref_B":"Achille Mbembe's essay on necropolitics and Mitchell Dean's book on governmentality.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26209.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"4ybsw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Where to go from Foucault's biopolitics? From the birth of biopolitics, are there any texts by either Foucault or anyone else that can be recommended? Be it a contemporary extension or some fundamental text that influenced the man","c_root_id_A":"d6nfwor","c_root_id_B":"d6miycf","created_at_utc_A":1471568716,"created_at_utc_B":1471525441,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Achille Mbembe's essay on necropolitics and Mitchell Dean's book on governmentality.","human_ref_B":"\"Discipline and Punish\" & \"The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality\"","labels":1,"seconds_difference":43275.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"4ybsw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Where to go from Foucault's biopolitics? From the birth of biopolitics, are there any texts by either Foucault or anyone else that can be recommended? Be it a contemporary extension or some fundamental text that influenced the man","c_root_id_A":"d6mkr64","c_root_id_B":"d6nfwor","created_at_utc_A":1471528419,"created_at_utc_B":1471568716,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"One timely contemporary extension is the application of this type of thinking to the power and politics around the construction of citizens and the exploration of 'semi-citizens'--the documentation and bureaucratization of birth, death, and belonging. Elizabeth F. Cohen's body of work stands out here (her book is 'Semi-Citizenship in Democratic Politics', but has many more targeted articles on immigration, migration, children, felons, etc)","human_ref_B":"Achille Mbembe's essay on necropolitics and Mitchell Dean's book on governmentality.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":40297.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"4ybsw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Where to go from Foucault's biopolitics? From the birth of biopolitics, are there any texts by either Foucault or anyone else that can be recommended? Be it a contemporary extension or some fundamental text that influenced the man","c_root_id_A":"d6mvvxh","c_root_id_B":"d6miycf","created_at_utc_A":1471542507,"created_at_utc_B":1471525441,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Silvia Federici's \"Calbian and the Witch\" leans heavily on Foucault's biopolitics, as well as Marx's historiography, to build a history of the modern foundations of misogyny and racism.","human_ref_B":"\"Discipline and Punish\" & \"The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality\"","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17066.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"4ybsw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Where to go from Foucault's biopolitics? From the birth of biopolitics, are there any texts by either Foucault or anyone else that can be recommended? Be it a contemporary extension or some fundamental text that influenced the man","c_root_id_A":"d6mvvxh","c_root_id_B":"d6mkr64","created_at_utc_A":1471542507,"created_at_utc_B":1471528419,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Silvia Federici's \"Calbian and the Witch\" leans heavily on Foucault's biopolitics, as well as Marx's historiography, to build a history of the modern foundations of misogyny and racism.","human_ref_B":"One timely contemporary extension is the application of this type of thinking to the power and politics around the construction of citizens and the exploration of 'semi-citizens'--the documentation and bureaucratization of birth, death, and belonging. Elizabeth F. Cohen's body of work stands out here (her book is 'Semi-Citizenship in Democratic Politics', but has many more targeted articles on immigration, migration, children, felons, etc)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14088.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"4ybsw8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Where to go from Foucault's biopolitics? From the birth of biopolitics, are there any texts by either Foucault or anyone else that can be recommended? Be it a contemporary extension or some fundamental text that influenced the man","c_root_id_A":"d6miycf","c_root_id_B":"d6mkr64","created_at_utc_A":1471525441,"created_at_utc_B":1471528419,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"\"Discipline and Punish\" & \"The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality\"","human_ref_B":"One timely contemporary extension is the application of this type of thinking to the power and politics around the construction of citizens and the exploration of 'semi-citizens'--the documentation and bureaucratization of birth, death, and belonging. Elizabeth F. Cohen's body of work stands out here (her book is 'Semi-Citizenship in Democratic Politics', but has many more targeted articles on immigration, migration, children, felons, etc)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2978.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1psuvj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"In your experience, what is a great skill to complement a major in the social sciences?","c_root_id_A":"cd5u632","c_root_id_B":"cd5udq8","created_at_utc_A":1383500571,"created_at_utc_B":1383501145,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'd say Philosophy, with a focus on logic\/problem solving. See if you can pick up a minor in writing too. While math is an excellent suggestion, I think philosophy's ancillary skills are often overlooked.","human_ref_B":"I've found that in international relations you need one of two skill sets, both if possible.  (1) An understanding of history and historical processes\/methodology. You'll notice that many early IR scholars were in fact professional historians, and a great deal of critical theory is based on historical observations (Marx, Gramsci, Cox, etc). History lends context when formulating policy, or explanatory theories of state\/population behaviour.  (2) Math\/Stats. Especially true of American IR schools, statistical analysis lends itself more to hardcore positivistic analysis popular in the states and in some (but certainly not all) American-style programs.  If you can grasp both, congratulations. I myself lean towards the history and theoretical edge of the field only because math and I have a long history of abuse.  Edit - Now that I think about it, IR really benefits from lots of inter-disciplinary inclusion, not just history. Geography, psychology, anthropology, sociology are also very welcome aboard the IR train.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":574.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1psuvj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"In your experience, what is a great skill to complement a major in the social sciences?","c_root_id_A":"cd5whpr","c_root_id_B":"cd5u632","created_at_utc_A":1383506476,"created_at_utc_B":1383500571,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"For a \"one-off\" skill, I'd say basic computer programming, like CS 101-- just enough to get the fundamentals that you'd pick up in a semester of Java or C++.  I have an MA in sociology, did some work in business intelligence, and now work in survey analysis and reporting. Knowing the fundamentals of programming (control loops, variable construction, etc.) has been MASSIVELY helpful in advanced programming in statistical software-- especially SAS-- as well as writing macros in Excel that make data-manipulation tons easier for everyone in my department.","human_ref_B":"I'd say Philosophy, with a focus on logic\/problem solving. See if you can pick up a minor in writing too. While math is an excellent suggestion, I think philosophy's ancillary skills are often overlooked.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5905.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1psuvj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"In your experience, what is a great skill to complement a major in the social sciences?","c_root_id_A":"cd5whpr","c_root_id_B":"cd5vdd6","created_at_utc_A":1383506476,"created_at_utc_B":1383503710,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"For a \"one-off\" skill, I'd say basic computer programming, like CS 101-- just enough to get the fundamentals that you'd pick up in a semester of Java or C++.  I have an MA in sociology, did some work in business intelligence, and now work in survey analysis and reporting. Knowing the fundamentals of programming (control loops, variable construction, etc.) has been MASSIVELY helpful in advanced programming in statistical software-- especially SAS-- as well as writing macros in Excel that make data-manipulation tons easier for everyone in my department.","human_ref_B":"I would highly, highly recommend some regression analysis coursework.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2766.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1psuvj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"In your experience, what is a great skill to complement a major in the social sciences?","c_root_id_A":"cd5vlrl","c_root_id_B":"cd5whpr","created_at_utc_A":1383504274,"created_at_utc_B":1383506476,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Learning to do statistics in SPSS\/PASW, including the programming part of it (Or R, etc).","human_ref_B":"For a \"one-off\" skill, I'd say basic computer programming, like CS 101-- just enough to get the fundamentals that you'd pick up in a semester of Java or C++.  I have an MA in sociology, did some work in business intelligence, and now work in survey analysis and reporting. Knowing the fundamentals of programming (control loops, variable construction, etc.) has been MASSIVELY helpful in advanced programming in statistical software-- especially SAS-- as well as writing macros in Excel that make data-manipulation tons easier for everyone in my department.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2202.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1psuvj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"In your experience, what is a great skill to complement a major in the social sciences?","c_root_id_A":"cd5whpr","c_root_id_B":"cd5vyl8","created_at_utc_A":1383506476,"created_at_utc_B":1383505143,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"For a \"one-off\" skill, I'd say basic computer programming, like CS 101-- just enough to get the fundamentals that you'd pick up in a semester of Java or C++.  I have an MA in sociology, did some work in business intelligence, and now work in survey analysis and reporting. Knowing the fundamentals of programming (control loops, variable construction, etc.) has been MASSIVELY helpful in advanced programming in statistical software-- especially SAS-- as well as writing macros in Excel that make data-manipulation tons easier for everyone in my department.","human_ref_B":"Depends on what side of the social sciences you're looking to do. Statistics (maybe focus on GIS if you want a really unique skill set) are great if you're leaning more towards quantitative sides of sociology, economics, geography or physiology. If you're going on the more qualitative\/critical side, maybe spend some energy learning philosophy.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1333.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"28svdp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Are there other nations that have a national ethos like the US has the American Dream? Hopefully question is self explanatory. I wanted to know if a national ethos exists in other countries like Germany, China, etc.","c_root_id_A":"cie7pcm","c_root_id_B":"cie7h5m","created_at_utc_A":1403463676,"created_at_utc_B":1403463161,"score_A":15,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"There is an official Chinese Dream, but I wouldn't describe it as an ethos.  To me, the German national ethos today seems to be largely defined in terms oppositional to their history. Germany's desire to repudiate its role in the two World Wars has driven policy in a lot of areas: economic integration with Europe, giving up the DM for currency union, continued resistance to Bundeswehr deployment abroad, support for Israel, etc. Not to mention Germany's allergic reaction to anything that smells of inflation, which of course stems from Weimar Republic.","human_ref_B":"This concept originally had less to do with a social ethos on a personal level, and more on a socioeconomic level, but the Dutch have what we call the polder model:  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Polder_model  > the acclaimed Dutch version of consensus-based economic and social policy making (...) The term quickly took on a wider meaning, to denote similar cases of consensus decision-making in the Dutch fashion. It is described with phrases like \"a pragmatic recognition of pluriformity\" and \"cooperation despite differences\".  Sources (in Dutch):  * Pleij, Herman, Erasmus en het poldermodel - essay, uitg. Bert Bakker, Amsterdam (2005) ISBN 90-351-2737-4  * Hoelen, Herman, Beschouwingen over het poldermodel, uitg. Koninklijke Van Gorcum, Assen (2001) ISBN 90-232-3730-7  * Steinmetz, Bert, Ruud Lubbers: peetvader van het poldermodel, uitg. Prometheus, Amsterdam (2000) ISBN 90-5333-770-9  * Bos, Dennis, Ebben, Maurits & Te Velde, Henk, (red.) Harmonie in Holland: het poldermodel van 1500 tot nu, uitg. Bert Bakker, Amsterdam (2007) ISBN 978-90-351-3149-1  This \"polder model\" summarises the Dutch ethos very well. Being a seafaring people, the Dutch have traditionally been in close contact with many different cultures, and pride themselves on being open to ethnic and social diversity. A current example is the fact that Rotterdam, one of the nation's largest cities and the \"mouth of Europe\", is home to more than 170 ethnicities and has a Moroccan, Muslim mayor. The nation was also the first in the world to legalise marriage equality (in 2001) for marriages between people of the same sex and\/or gender.   Overall, it's a national \"live and let live\" attitude based on direct and very frank communication, with consensus usually being the desired outcome.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":515.0,"score_ratio":1.875}
{"post_id":"rz416","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why is poverty and crime so prevalent in \"inner city\" areas in the US? This has been bugging me for years. I was born and raised in Stockholm, Sweden. Here the inner city is one of the most expensive places to live. Why is it that inner city areas in the US, at least the way they are depicted in tv\/movies, are violent poverty stricken ghettos?","c_root_id_A":"c49tcno","c_root_id_B":"c49t1fe","created_at_utc_A":1333893721,"created_at_utc_B":1333890531,"score_A":24,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/White_flight  this should be a good start  That said, the new trend is a \"re-urbanization\", and over all, crime is WAY down since its peak in the late 80's and early 90's. For example Brooklyn is now known for \"hipsters\", whereas in the 80's and 70's it was far more dangerous","human_ref_B":"I study BSc Criminology and Sociological studies in the UK and we were taught about the zone of transition in Chicago. To sum up Burgess and Park's work (*and this really is from the top of my head*) a city has certain zones within it. Towards the centre is the zone of transition where as soon as someone arrives at the city (such as immigrants) they end up there as it's cheap housing, close to the centre of work etc. They however quickly want to move out due to the bad conditions there as soon as they get a decent job etc. (although not all end up moving). What this ends up with is an area in a city where people are constantly moving in and out of, which creates social disorganisation. These people don't bond with their neighbours and it creates an area of approved delinquent behaviour: where the children get caught up in deviant cultures and get taught how to 'do' crime which is passed on from older people.  Not sure if this directly answers your questions and bearing in mind I haven't graduate yet it sort of sums up their theory.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3190.0,"score_ratio":1.4117647059}
{"post_id":"rz416","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why is poverty and crime so prevalent in \"inner city\" areas in the US? This has been bugging me for years. I was born and raised in Stockholm, Sweden. Here the inner city is one of the most expensive places to live. Why is it that inner city areas in the US, at least the way they are depicted in tv\/movies, are violent poverty stricken ghettos?","c_root_id_A":"c49tcno","c_root_id_B":"c49ta50","created_at_utc_A":1333893721,"created_at_utc_B":1333893060,"score_A":24,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/White_flight  this should be a good start  That said, the new trend is a \"re-urbanization\", and over all, crime is WAY down since its peak in the late 80's and early 90's. For example Brooklyn is now known for \"hipsters\", whereas in the 80's and 70's it was far more dangerous","human_ref_B":"After the War, middle class whites moved out of the inner city urban areas where most immigrants and minorities lived and established suburban neighborhoods on the periphery of the city where most of the big businesses had went.  What was left behind was a center of poverty with little income being generated in it.  Many of these minorities and immigrants (probably most) were uneducated, so the unbreakable cycle of poverty perpetuated itself for generations and still shows no signs of stopping.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":661.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"rz416","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why is poverty and crime so prevalent in \"inner city\" areas in the US? This has been bugging me for years. I was born and raised in Stockholm, Sweden. Here the inner city is one of the most expensive places to live. Why is it that inner city areas in the US, at least the way they are depicted in tv\/movies, are violent poverty stricken ghettos?","c_root_id_A":"c49t0a0","c_root_id_B":"c49tcno","created_at_utc_A":1333890158,"created_at_utc_B":1333893721,"score_A":2,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"I won't try to explain why this happens as I haven't studied it in depth, but I'd just like to point out that this happens in Ireland too. Some of the worst streets in the country are in Dublin's north inner city. If I am correct in my observations, London and Paris also experience this.  I should also point out that the inner city *is* also a very expensive place to live here. You have expensive modern apartments a few streets away from squalid run-down flats. The fact that these apartments are located near poor, crime-ridden areas is outweighed by the convenience of living in the centre of the city.","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/White_flight  this should be a good start  That said, the new trend is a \"re-urbanization\", and over all, crime is WAY down since its peak in the late 80's and early 90's. For example Brooklyn is now known for \"hipsters\", whereas in the 80's and 70's it was far more dangerous","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3563.0,"score_ratio":12.0}
{"post_id":"rz416","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why is poverty and crime so prevalent in \"inner city\" areas in the US? This has been bugging me for years. I was born and raised in Stockholm, Sweden. Here the inner city is one of the most expensive places to live. Why is it that inner city areas in the US, at least the way they are depicted in tv\/movies, are violent poverty stricken ghettos?","c_root_id_A":"c49t0a0","c_root_id_B":"c49t1fe","created_at_utc_A":1333890158,"created_at_utc_B":1333890531,"score_A":2,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"I won't try to explain why this happens as I haven't studied it in depth, but I'd just like to point out that this happens in Ireland too. Some of the worst streets in the country are in Dublin's north inner city. If I am correct in my observations, London and Paris also experience this.  I should also point out that the inner city *is* also a very expensive place to live here. You have expensive modern apartments a few streets away from squalid run-down flats. The fact that these apartments are located near poor, crime-ridden areas is outweighed by the convenience of living in the centre of the city.","human_ref_B":"I study BSc Criminology and Sociological studies in the UK and we were taught about the zone of transition in Chicago. To sum up Burgess and Park's work (*and this really is from the top of my head*) a city has certain zones within it. Towards the centre is the zone of transition where as soon as someone arrives at the city (such as immigrants) they end up there as it's cheap housing, close to the centre of work etc. They however quickly want to move out due to the bad conditions there as soon as they get a decent job etc. (although not all end up moving). What this ends up with is an area in a city where people are constantly moving in and out of, which creates social disorganisation. These people don't bond with their neighbours and it creates an area of approved delinquent behaviour: where the children get caught up in deviant cultures and get taught how to 'do' crime which is passed on from older people.  Not sure if this directly answers your questions and bearing in mind I haven't graduate yet it sort of sums up their theory.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":373.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"rz416","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"Why is poverty and crime so prevalent in \"inner city\" areas in the US? This has been bugging me for years. I was born and raised in Stockholm, Sweden. Here the inner city is one of the most expensive places to live. Why is it that inner city areas in the US, at least the way they are depicted in tv\/movies, are violent poverty stricken ghettos?","c_root_id_A":"c49ta50","c_root_id_B":"c49t0a0","created_at_utc_A":1333893060,"created_at_utc_B":1333890158,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"After the War, middle class whites moved out of the inner city urban areas where most immigrants and minorities lived and established suburban neighborhoods on the periphery of the city where most of the big businesses had went.  What was left behind was a center of poverty with little income being generated in it.  Many of these minorities and immigrants (probably most) were uneducated, so the unbreakable cycle of poverty perpetuated itself for generations and still shows no signs of stopping.","human_ref_B":"I won't try to explain why this happens as I haven't studied it in depth, but I'd just like to point out that this happens in Ireland too. Some of the worst streets in the country are in Dublin's north inner city. If I am correct in my observations, London and Paris also experience this.  I should also point out that the inner city *is* also a very expensive place to live here. You have expensive modern apartments a few streets away from squalid run-down flats. The fact that these apartments are located near poor, crime-ridden areas is outweighed by the convenience of living in the centre of the city.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2902.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3j8wl6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Is there any literature on the existence (or lack thereof) of \"reverse racism?\" This has become a hugely sensationalized topic and I wanted to know if there has been any sociological or psychological research done on whether it \"exists\" or not.   Granted, I'm sure it depends on how \"reverse racism\" is operationalized, as I see a lot of flaws in the logic of laypeople.","c_root_id_A":"cunbxau","c_root_id_B":"cund6pm","created_at_utc_A":1441135490,"created_at_utc_B":1441137386,"score_A":7,"score_B":51,"human_ref_A":"From a social psychological perspective, the question is neither difficult nor interesting.    Reverse racism is not a term used in the science of stereotyping and prejudice, because it implies that racism is by definition that of White people towards Black people. The reasons why this is the protypical American experience of racism are not difficult to fathom, but that this does not encompass all racial prejudice is trivially obvious.  There is nothing special about White people that endows a unique capacity for racism.  Most would agree the foundation of racism is self-categorization and the derivation of self-esteem from group membership.  All people see the world as \"us\" and \"them\" in various ways, and we have powerful motivations to see us as better than them.       But, does prejudice against White people exist?  Yes.  It is completely predictable and easily demonstrable that some people have racial attitudes towards Whites that are at least less positive than racial attitudes towards other groups.  There are harder questions: how prevalent is it?  In what ways is it the same or different than other racism?  How does it relate to social hierarchies?  But \"does it exist\" is an easy question.  Of course.  To suggest otherwise is to claim there is not and has never been a Black person with prejudice against White people, which is ridiculous.        Edit to add: Yes, there's research.  For example, here's a relevant paper.  Olson, M. A., & Crawford, M. T., & Devlin, W. (2009).  Evidence for the underestimation of implicit in-group favoritism among low status groups. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 45, 1111-1116.","human_ref_B":"well there's a whole discipline called race studies which essentially denies 'reverse racism' as a possibility, a position that accepted in sociology and cultural studies also. Since racism is a social construct rooted in inequalities of power and expressed as social hierarchies of race, to argue 'reverse racism' can exist is to deny race on that basis. To accept reverse racism is to purge the social oppression implicit in the historical constructions of race, it is to assume a blank slate, to assume no inequalities no hierarchy, ultimately no (constructed) difference; 'things can just be reversed'. It is to deny race. Those who defend 'reverse racism' usually badly understand race as 'being nasty to someone on the basis of race', yet they take as given what needs explaining (i.e. take racial categories, constructs). And once we understand the history behind the differences that define race the inability to simply interchange 'races' becomes obvious. Race is what creates the differences, not merely one which describes them. You can be nasty, a bully, hurtful and so on to people based on the perceive colour of their skin and so on, but you can be racist to those racial categories that aren't grouped as inferior. Hierarchy is implicit in race, it isn't differentiation without a cause. Reverse racism sees all races as 'equal'..again that's simply a denial of the existence of race.   Individual acts such as comments to people on the basis of race are racist only insofar as they are specific expression of social ideologies and constructs. The expressions themselves aren't the root, origin or basis of racism, merely expressions of it. The reason comparing blacks to monkeys is racist is because of the history of blackness being socially connected on that basis historically. Calling a white person any animal has no similar effect because whites have never historically be subjected to those constructions (because whiteness was always superior, and generally was the frame against which all other races where authoritatively constructed).  See this article by the famous race theorist Noel Ignatiev The Point Is Not To Interpret Whiteness But To To Abolish It or his interesting book: *How the Irish Became White*. You can also look into Critical Race Theory. Also look into theorists such as Paul Gilroy and Stuart Hall.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1896.0,"score_ratio":7.2857142857}
{"post_id":"56knwg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Plan on getting a Masters in Public Policy, but not for a few years. What can I be reading to prepare? Looking for \"required reading\" on public policy and policy analysis. For those of you who have graduate degrees, or are graduate students, what's the literature like? For those in the field, what's considered a good basis?","c_root_id_A":"d8kjww5","c_root_id_B":"d8kcped","created_at_utc_A":1476029329,"created_at_utc_B":1476014461,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"People suggesting a bunch of stats, programming, and economics\/econometrics? Maybe for a doctoral program but most non-top 10 MPP programs require an easy research methods a course (basic SPSS, Stata, or maybe SAS) and a very basic stats sequence most people satisfy with undergraduate study. I wouldn't think you'd need any Econ beyond standard undergrad micro and macro unless you want to focus in that area.  I'd wait til you get there since you'll have plenty to read, but it's really not that bad.","human_ref_B":"Having just finished an MPP in Berlin, I'd advise getting real comfortable with basic economics and statistics. This will give you a big head start. It sort of depends on your level what books are appropriate.  I'd say rather than reading any particular text, set aside 1 or 2 hours a week to learn R. Coursera has an introduction and swirlstats can really help you out. You can use these skills in practically every assignment and especially in your thesis.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14868.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1knw19","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Why is the economy of Bhutan so strong? The economy of Bhutan has been growing very strongly in recent years.Its GDP per capita is $2400, while the GDP of Nepal is only $700, Laos has $1400 and Cambodia $950. Why?","c_root_id_A":"cbqxy0w","c_root_id_B":"cbr0nwb","created_at_utc_A":1376930521,"created_at_utc_B":1376939533,"score_A":6,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"One of many, they have a unique policy in place for tourist. There's a mandated minimum price all tourists have to pay each day while in the country. The country is run like Disney Land. $200-250 per day per person, on top of other fees, charges, and royalties. A five day trip to Bhutan for you and your SO costs maybe $2500 minimum, not including discretionary expenses and airfare. You can live like a king for that in Cambodia. Or even the US.   Places like Laos and Cambodia on the other hand, have no such social planning and policy in effect. The governments, in many ways, could not be more opposing. From my experience in Cambodia, they let the country run wild, with little to no provisions for public assistance. It's as corrupt as corrupt can be without simply pillaging your own people. The standards of living and overall economic development may be (or have been) similar, but more than anything else it's the direction and focus of each country's policies.","human_ref_B":"I know nothing about this topic, so pretend I'm unflaired for this answer, but the answers in this thread are...lacking...so I tried to do some digging. Here's what I could find:  >While many countries faced declining GDP in 2008, Bhutan had the fastest GDP growth rate in the world at 21.4%, says the CIA World Factbook. Bhutan used to be among the poorest countries in the world in the 1980s. But galloping economic growth for two decades took its per capita GDP in 2008 to a respectable $ 1900, almost double neighboring India's $ 1070. This fabulous GDP growth was not spurred by the pursuit of happiness, but by giant hydropower projects India has been building in Bhutan's steep mountains for two decades. Bhutan's current hydropower capacity is 1,480 MW, and it plans additional projects to generate 10,000 MW of power by 2020, almost entirely for export to India, which provides all the financing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9012.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"14u5tc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"[Economics] How did Singapore have a trade to GDP ratio of 284%? http:\/\/trade.ec.europa.eu\/doclib\/docs\/2006\/september\/tradoc_113443.pdf","c_root_id_A":"c7ghutc","c_root_id_B":"c7gi2gp","created_at_utc_A":1355497138,"created_at_utc_B":1355498139,"score_A":6,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"It seems that in this GDP measure value added is measured(as is usual),  while in the import\/export measures the total value of the goods that is imported and exported is taken. When then something is imported and without to much value added is exported the addition to import and export is much higher than the addition to GDP.   Singapore is a very large harbor with relatively few industry. Therefore the above scenario occurs a lot causing higher than 100% trade to GDP ratios.   TL;DR GDP is calculated in value added, trade in full value.","human_ref_B":"If Singapore imports car parts for $16,000, and exports a finished car for $20,000, its GDP--the amount of value created in Singapore--is $4,000. But its exports plus its imports are $36,000. So you get the apparent paradox that its trade is bigger than its GDP.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1001.0,"score_ratio":2.8333333333}
{"post_id":"x2qqk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"[economics] Why are the poor countries poor? Bad government? Social relationships? Economic system? Exploitation from other countries? Something else?  What's the economists' answer?","c_root_id_A":"c5ip43u","c_root_id_B":"c5ip9tn","created_at_utc_A":1343149993,"created_at_utc_B":1343150537,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Oh boy, this is a biggie. It's kind of a combo of a lot of factors.  David Landes wrote a good book on the subject, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations  Some of it can be due to government leadership, some due to actual availability of natural resources. It's really a case by case basis, and some countries that are poor may actually be successful with some minor changes, or if certain things happened years earlier.  If you have a case you are interested in, ask away.","human_ref_B":"First off - you're asking the wrong question. Poverty is the natural state of man. As Hobbes said:  > In such condition, there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no instruments of moving, and removing, such things as require much force; no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; no arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.  The better formulation is \"Why are some countries rich?\". The answer to that seems to be \"Good political institutions\". Daron Acemoglu has some of the best work on this. I'd suggest his recent book Why Nations Fail, and here's a paper on Africa specifically, and here's one presenting the empirical evidence for the theory.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":544.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"x2qqk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"[economics] Why are the poor countries poor? Bad government? Social relationships? Economic system? Exploitation from other countries? Something else?  What's the economists' answer?","c_root_id_A":"c5ip43u","c_root_id_B":"c5j116b","created_at_utc_A":1343149993,"created_at_utc_B":1343195569,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Oh boy, this is a biggie. It's kind of a combo of a lot of factors.  David Landes wrote a good book on the subject, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations  Some of it can be due to government leadership, some due to actual availability of natural resources. It's really a case by case basis, and some countries that are poor may actually be successful with some minor changes, or if certain things happened years earlier.  If you have a case you are interested in, ask away.","human_ref_B":"Probably going to get buried, but here goes:   In the long run, countries are rich or poor depending on GDP growth. GDP, the amount an economy can produce, depends on capital (factories, roads), labor (workers, managers), human capital (training, education, experience), raw materials and technology. Given this, GDP growth depends on investment, the educational system, population growth, and technological progress.   What determines how much the population saves and invests; how much education and training people pursue; how much effort is spent on developing better ways of doing things and improving technology?   A generally accepted view is that much depends on *access* and *incentives*. Can you save and invest, and are you allowed to keep the product of your investment? Is education available, and does it allow you to earn more? Are you in a position to develop, and can you benefit from innovating new technologies?  Daron Acemoglu, an MIT economist who specializes in economic growth, argues that nations fail economically when they have authoritarian extractive governments that serve the elite; while economic success follows from participatory governments that hold in check the exploitative tendencies of the elite, and allow broader access to economic progress for the entire population.  Jared Diamond has written a readable review of Acemoglu's latest book, *Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty*.   The conclusion to Acemoglu's widely respected text book *Introduction to Modern Economic Growth* is available online. (Warning: Not for the faint hearted or unprepared.)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":45576.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"x2qqk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"[economics] Why are the poor countries poor? Bad government? Social relationships? Economic system? Exploitation from other countries? Something else?  What's the economists' answer?","c_root_id_A":"c5j116b","c_root_id_B":"c5ire9z","created_at_utc_A":1343195569,"created_at_utc_B":1343157679,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Probably going to get buried, but here goes:   In the long run, countries are rich or poor depending on GDP growth. GDP, the amount an economy can produce, depends on capital (factories, roads), labor (workers, managers), human capital (training, education, experience), raw materials and technology. Given this, GDP growth depends on investment, the educational system, population growth, and technological progress.   What determines how much the population saves and invests; how much education and training people pursue; how much effort is spent on developing better ways of doing things and improving technology?   A generally accepted view is that much depends on *access* and *incentives*. Can you save and invest, and are you allowed to keep the product of your investment? Is education available, and does it allow you to earn more? Are you in a position to develop, and can you benefit from innovating new technologies?  Daron Acemoglu, an MIT economist who specializes in economic growth, argues that nations fail economically when they have authoritarian extractive governments that serve the elite; while economic success follows from participatory governments that hold in check the exploitative tendencies of the elite, and allow broader access to economic progress for the entire population.  Jared Diamond has written a readable review of Acemoglu's latest book, *Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty*.   The conclusion to Acemoglu's widely respected text book *Introduction to Modern Economic Growth* is available online. (Warning: Not for the faint hearted or unprepared.)","human_ref_B":"Sorry my friend, but easiest will be to read books about economic growth theory. \"why nations fail\" suggested by besttrousers is great.  If few words it's mixture of longterm stability, good institutions, geography, openness.   This is fun: http:\/\/ideas.repec.org\/p\/nbr\/nberwo\/6252.html Here is list of variables with mostly negative (hey, you asked for poor ones not for rich ones!) impact on country growth rate:  * is from Latin America? * is from Sahara? * revolutions and coups * primary goods exports in 1970 * fraction of protestant * defense spending share * public consumption share  What conclusions draw from this? I honestly don't know.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":37890.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"x2qqk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"[economics] Why are the poor countries poor? Bad government? Social relationships? Economic system? Exploitation from other countries? Something else?  What's the economists' answer?","c_root_id_A":"c5j116b","c_root_id_B":"c5iswau","created_at_utc_A":1343195569,"created_at_utc_B":1343162904,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Probably going to get buried, but here goes:   In the long run, countries are rich or poor depending on GDP growth. GDP, the amount an economy can produce, depends on capital (factories, roads), labor (workers, managers), human capital (training, education, experience), raw materials and technology. Given this, GDP growth depends on investment, the educational system, population growth, and technological progress.   What determines how much the population saves and invests; how much education and training people pursue; how much effort is spent on developing better ways of doing things and improving technology?   A generally accepted view is that much depends on *access* and *incentives*. Can you save and invest, and are you allowed to keep the product of your investment? Is education available, and does it allow you to earn more? Are you in a position to develop, and can you benefit from innovating new technologies?  Daron Acemoglu, an MIT economist who specializes in economic growth, argues that nations fail economically when they have authoritarian extractive governments that serve the elite; while economic success follows from participatory governments that hold in check the exploitative tendencies of the elite, and allow broader access to economic progress for the entire population.  Jared Diamond has written a readable review of Acemoglu's latest book, *Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty*.   The conclusion to Acemoglu's widely respected text book *Introduction to Modern Economic Growth* is available online. (Warning: Not for the faint hearted or unprepared.)","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/askscience\/comments\/x2oma\/why_are_the_poor_countries_poor\/c5ipkag","labels":1,"seconds_difference":32665.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"14hggs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What exactly is the fiscal cliff? What does it mean that we are approaching it?  How are we approaching it?  I hear all the political pundits discussing it, and honestly, it doesn't sound like anyone knows what they are talking about.  Economists, help me out here.  I just need to be educated before I have to go home for Christmas and have to hear my family rant about something they don't understand either.","c_root_id_A":"c7d34ut","c_root_id_B":"c7d3cpy","created_at_utc_A":1354942684,"created_at_utc_B":1354943736,"score_A":7,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"Short version:  Congress passed legislation that mandates across the board budget cuts and tax rate increases in the event that they fail to come to a consensus on a fiscal policy for the upcoming year.  The goal of past-congress was to provide then-future-congress, now-present-congress a strong incentive to work toward a solution.","human_ref_B":"It refers to an agreement by Congress to pass deficit reduction measures or certain cuts, mostly to defense, and tax increases, mostly to payroll, will automatically kick in next year. If you just realized this means the fiscal cliff is the stipulation that \"Congress must agree to tax increases and spending cuts or else there are going to be tax increases and spending cuts,\" congratulations, you're paying attention.  \"Fiscal cliff\" is a journalistic term designed to lower your political IQ and create the notion there is something worth discussing. There have been three or four other \"fiscal cliff\" type deals reached in the last half-century (1996, 1994 and 1982) and in each case the general solution by Congress was to ignore them. This is almost entirely an ordinary budget discussion rendered artificially riveting by certain rhetorical choices, nothing else.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1052.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"14hggs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What exactly is the fiscal cliff? What does it mean that we are approaching it?  How are we approaching it?  I hear all the political pundits discussing it, and honestly, it doesn't sound like anyone knows what they are talking about.  Economists, help me out here.  I just need to be educated before I have to go home for Christmas and have to hear my family rant about something they don't understand either.","c_root_id_A":"c7d34ut","c_root_id_B":"c7d3ith","created_at_utc_A":1354942684,"created_at_utc_B":1354944577,"score_A":7,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Short version:  Congress passed legislation that mandates across the board budget cuts and tax rate increases in the event that they fail to come to a consensus on a fiscal policy for the upcoming year.  The goal of past-congress was to provide then-future-congress, now-present-congress a strong incentive to work toward a solution.","human_ref_B":"The fiscal cliff is several things:  * $180 billion in tax increases from the Bush tax cuts expiring * $120 billion in tax increases from Obama's payroll tax cut from the stimulus expiring * $160 billion in spending cuts, like a 27% cut in Medicare payments to doctors and expiration of long-term unemployment insurance * $110 billion in spending cuts in defense and domestic spending  The first three points are all problems Congress had to deal with anyways since they were programs that were expiring, often with Congress punting for several months to a year so it didn't have to offer a permanent fix. The last point is what is called the \"sequester\", where Congress agreed to automatic spending cuts in programs that both sides liked (defense for Republicans and social programs for the Democrats) to make them agree to a (slightly more) balanced budget. Since they never passed a budget for this fiscal year, the cuts remain. No one likes them, but it is too difficult for them to find a way to agree to a budget. These budget cuts will happen gradually as the government spends less throughout next year, but the first three points happen immediately.  The result? A slow austerity crisis in which unemployment will go up over 9% and GDP shrinks 0.5% in the next 4 quarters, with at least two quarters of negative growth (the definition of a recession). On top of that, all three credit rating companies are threatening to downgrade the country's credit rating, which S&P already did once in 2011. Fitch says even resolving the fiscal cliff problem may not save the US credit rating. A lower credit rating can mean higher interest rates on US debt, which have been at all-time lows for a long time now. The good news is that the economy would be expected to recover in 2014 and unemployment would be down to 5.7% by 2018!  Sources: Bank of America estimates, CBO estimates, Reuters","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1893.0,"score_ratio":2.2857142857}
{"post_id":"19h456","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"I would like to know about keynesian economics and Austrian economics right from the basics I recently watched a video of Glenn Jacobs and Gary on keynesian vs Austrian Economics. It sounded interesting and intelligent, but I don't quite get them completely.  Can someone please explain it from scratch","c_root_id_A":"c8nz5qk","c_root_id_B":"c8nz0v4","created_at_utc_A":1362163729,"created_at_utc_B":1362163345,"score_A":19,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Let's start with the very basics.  1. *Where do business cycles come from?*    * Keynesians think that business cycles are the result of swings in investor and consumer confidence, manifested in financial \/ stock market booms and busts. When investor confidence falters, for whatever reason, the economy plunges into recession.     * Austrians think that erratic Federal Reserve interest rate policy causes recessions. The Fed will reduce interest rates to spark a boom, but this leads investors to over-commit capital  to risky projects in their chase for yield. Austrians call this phenomenon \"malinvestment.\" These malinvestments then go bad, leading to recession. The boom contains the seeds of its own destruction.  2. *What should we do about it?*     * Keynesians think that active government policy can manage aggregate demand. In the simplest story, when investor confidence falters, the government can step in and fill the demand gap. When investor spirits are high, the government cuts back. This leads to stability in overall expenditure, thus smoothing out the business cycle.     * Austrians think we need tight restrictions on the Federal Reserve, because it's the Fed's fault to begin with for trying to engineer a boom. Thus we need to put restrictions in place, such as some kind of commodity standard to \"tie the Fed's hands\" and make sure it can't do anything too awful to the economy.     * Austrians also believe that countercyclical policy is wrongheaded: if the government steps in to prop up demand, then those malinvestments won't be liquidated, and one just prolongs the imbalance. If the Fed does screw up and plunge us into recession, the best course of action is to let the recession ride out and clear up any malinvestment. Engaging in countercyclical policy just prolongs the bleeding.  There's an intro. Let me know if you want more information. Neither of these schools of thought is right, in my estimation. :)","human_ref_B":"The Keynesian school believes in something called \"active, counter-cyclical stabilization policy.\" Basically this means that when the economy is doing poorly, the government should take steps to improve the economy. Likewise, when the economy is growing too quickly, the government should take steps to slow it down.  Steps that the government takes include raising or lowering taxes, or raising or lowering government spending.  The reason government do this is because the main economic indicator of a country is its Gross Domestic Product, or GDP. GDP is made up of four components:  * C - Consumer spending * I - Investment * G - Government spending * (X - M) - Net exports (exports minus imports)  You can write this algebraically as GDP = C + I + G + (X - M)  When taxes are raised or lowered, consumer spending decreases or increases ('C' goes down or up) respectively. When government spending is raised or lowered, 'G' goes up or down, respectively. That's the basis of the Keynesian school of thought (in terms of fiscal policy; monetary policy is an entirely different demon to tackle).  Austrians, on the other hand, believe that economies are largely subject to causes and effects that are outside the control of those in the economy. In other words, the Austrian school maintains that the economy will self-correct. Moreover, any interference in the free market only serves to hinder it further.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":384.0,"score_ratio":6.3333333333}
{"post_id":"19h456","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"I would like to know about keynesian economics and Austrian economics right from the basics I recently watched a video of Glenn Jacobs and Gary on keynesian vs Austrian Economics. It sounded interesting and intelligent, but I don't quite get them completely.  Can someone please explain it from scratch","c_root_id_A":"c8occew","c_root_id_B":"c8nz0v4","created_at_utc_A":1362212860,"created_at_utc_B":1362163345,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Almost everyone is a Keynesian, they just don't know it. At it's most basic, Keynesianism is the idea that large changes in demand affect macroeconomic activity in a country.  Does it should probable to you that if a large company (IBM let's say) decides to build a lot of new buildings in several states, this increases economic activity in the nation as a whole? What if the US government decides to build a bunch of new bridges in several states?   If you think that the above is likely to increase production and employment (at least for this year), then you're a Keynesian.   For more details, see the entry on Keynesian Economics in the Concise Encyclopedia of Economics: http:\/\/www.econlib.org\/library\/Enc\/KeynesianEconomics.html","human_ref_B":"The Keynesian school believes in something called \"active, counter-cyclical stabilization policy.\" Basically this means that when the economy is doing poorly, the government should take steps to improve the economy. Likewise, when the economy is growing too quickly, the government should take steps to slow it down.  Steps that the government takes include raising or lowering taxes, or raising or lowering government spending.  The reason government do this is because the main economic indicator of a country is its Gross Domestic Product, or GDP. GDP is made up of four components:  * C - Consumer spending * I - Investment * G - Government spending * (X - M) - Net exports (exports minus imports)  You can write this algebraically as GDP = C + I + G + (X - M)  When taxes are raised or lowered, consumer spending decreases or increases ('C' goes down or up) respectively. When government spending is raised or lowered, 'G' goes up or down, respectively. That's the basis of the Keynesian school of thought (in terms of fiscal policy; monetary policy is an entirely different demon to tackle).  Austrians, on the other hand, believe that economies are largely subject to causes and effects that are outside the control of those in the economy. In other words, the Austrian school maintains that the economy will self-correct. Moreover, any interference in the free market only serves to hinder it further.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":49515.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"17v243","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What are the psychologic reasons for people to share content in social media? What motivates people to share content in social media channels like twitter, facebook, quora, reddit, etc.   Bonus-question (might be needed to explain the concepts anyway): What motivates people to share content in general (incl. email, word of mouth etc)  I am not speaking of \"over-sharing\" or any other negatively biased concepts. I am genuinely interested to know why people share.   Are there any archetypes of people who share and common reasons known why they share when, what kind of content.","c_root_id_A":"c894im6","c_root_id_B":"c897mej","created_at_utc_A":1359989499,"created_at_utc_B":1360000861,"score_A":11,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Sherry Turkle gives a fantastic argument in this TED talk about the psychology behind our present day need to share our lives via social media. She discusses a \"I share, therefore I am\" concept, meaning that folks are looking for living experiences in order to share them, rather than the other way around. She then talks about the dangers of such culture.   I highly recommend to watch!  http:\/\/www.ted.com\/talks\/sherry_turkle_alone_together.html","human_ref_B":"tl;dr -- People are motivated by all sorts of things, like what audience they imagine will read their stuff, but collapsing all those motivations into 'sharing' is unhelpful.  First off, there are two points I'd like to distinguish and articulate further in the question, before trying to answer it: the first is around the term 'psychologic' and the second 'share'. Motivations might not necessarily fit under what social scientists have delineated in our disciplines as 'psychology', so I just want to make that distinction before continuing, emphasizing that most of my citations are coming from the social sciences but not necessarily from that arena of thought.  More importantly, though, I think it's necessary to unpack what we mean when we say \"share\" on networked technological infrastructures, whether 'social media' (which I identify as my main area of research, though it's still such a vague term) or some other form of networked communication. That we've adopted the term \"share\", I think, is particularly subcultural, generated by the industrial complex of the Web 2.0 \"era\". If you're interested in diving down that hole, start with From Counterculture to Cyberculture: Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the Rise of Digital Utopianism by Fred Turner. From there, you should definitely check out Alice Marwick's dissertation on self-branding in Web 2.0 -- Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity, and Self-Branding in Web 2.0 for a look at the contemporary industry in relation to audiences and attention. I think the point is particularly important beyond this cultural connection, though, because increasingly we're seeing practices that counter the \"sharing paradigm,\" such as content reposting without attribution to mass audiences on platforms like Reddit, Tumblr, 9gag, etc., which you can't really describe accurately as \"sharing.\"  While you hear people say that works by people like Clay Shirky [1] [2] and Sherry Turkle [1] provide good overviews of this area, I tend to disagree, because they're at most anecdotal musings on the subject. I think a better, more theoretically sound work -- and new to boot -- would be Jenkins, Ford, & Green's new book, Spreadable Media: Creating Value and Meaning in a Networked Culture, which draws from a lot of gift economy literature.  I think what's more helpful is looking more deeply at how networked technologies provoke individuals and groups to think more deeply about networked audiences (imagined audiences, unintentional audiences, etc.) and how -- and here's probably more where the psychology comes in -- that affects their mental state and personal feelings as they see others react.  Of course, just looking at the tons of data that we can get from APIs doesn't necessarily get us at the answers you're looking for, although there are countless studies of information diffusion on social networking sites (eg., Want to be Retweeted? Large Scale Analytics on Factors Impacting Retweet in Twitter Network by Ed Chi and others). For what I've found to be a helpful overview of the kinds of embedded motivations underlying digital data around content circulation, check Tweet, Tweet, Retweet: Conversational Aspects of Retweeting on Twitter by boyd, Golder, & Lotan (2010). If you're interested in less of a taxonomy of practices and motivations and want to look more generally as how people think of audiences before they circulate information, definitely look at I Tweet Honestly, I Tweet Passionately: Twitter Users, Context Collapse, and the Imagined Audience -- it's one of my favorite contextual pieces in this area of research.  For an exploration of how individuals are rethinking the openness that Web 2.0 rhetoric has emphasis as the status quo of social networking sites, try Social Privacy in Networked Publics: Teens\u2019 Attitudes, Practices, and Strategies by boyd & Marwick, 2011.  And if you're particularly interested in how content circulation practices are shaped by technological ecosystems, Computers can't give credit: How automatic attribution falls short in an online remixing community is an excellent new-ish piece. But, remember to read Lessig's Code 2.0 first.  Also, just to be clear, it's REALLY hard to collapse content distribution over social media into also \"word of mouth,\" as you ask in the prompt. There's a ton of computer-mediated communication theory (eg., SIDE, SIP), hyperpersonal, etc.) that attempts, usually successfully, to draw a line between the two types of communication and how it subsequently impacts information practices.  I feel like this is a pretty weak overview, but I hope it provides some reading material.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11362.0,"score_ratio":1.1818181818}
{"post_id":"17v243","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What are the psychologic reasons for people to share content in social media? What motivates people to share content in social media channels like twitter, facebook, quora, reddit, etc.   Bonus-question (might be needed to explain the concepts anyway): What motivates people to share content in general (incl. email, word of mouth etc)  I am not speaking of \"over-sharing\" or any other negatively biased concepts. I am genuinely interested to know why people share.   Are there any archetypes of people who share and common reasons known why they share when, what kind of content.","c_root_id_A":"c894480","c_root_id_B":"c897mej","created_at_utc_A":1359987534,"created_at_utc_B":1360000861,"score_A":2,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Sharing with intent to connect with other people, is how human-society has become.  Our species is stronger largely in part of our socialization, rather than physical-survival features (ie. teeth, tough skin, double-eyelids).  Social connections makes our species stronger.","human_ref_B":"tl;dr -- People are motivated by all sorts of things, like what audience they imagine will read their stuff, but collapsing all those motivations into 'sharing' is unhelpful.  First off, there are two points I'd like to distinguish and articulate further in the question, before trying to answer it: the first is around the term 'psychologic' and the second 'share'. Motivations might not necessarily fit under what social scientists have delineated in our disciplines as 'psychology', so I just want to make that distinction before continuing, emphasizing that most of my citations are coming from the social sciences but not necessarily from that arena of thought.  More importantly, though, I think it's necessary to unpack what we mean when we say \"share\" on networked technological infrastructures, whether 'social media' (which I identify as my main area of research, though it's still such a vague term) or some other form of networked communication. That we've adopted the term \"share\", I think, is particularly subcultural, generated by the industrial complex of the Web 2.0 \"era\". If you're interested in diving down that hole, start with From Counterculture to Cyberculture: Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the Rise of Digital Utopianism by Fred Turner. From there, you should definitely check out Alice Marwick's dissertation on self-branding in Web 2.0 -- Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity, and Self-Branding in Web 2.0 for a look at the contemporary industry in relation to audiences and attention. I think the point is particularly important beyond this cultural connection, though, because increasingly we're seeing practices that counter the \"sharing paradigm,\" such as content reposting without attribution to mass audiences on platforms like Reddit, Tumblr, 9gag, etc., which you can't really describe accurately as \"sharing.\"  While you hear people say that works by people like Clay Shirky [1] [2] and Sherry Turkle [1] provide good overviews of this area, I tend to disagree, because they're at most anecdotal musings on the subject. I think a better, more theoretically sound work -- and new to boot -- would be Jenkins, Ford, & Green's new book, Spreadable Media: Creating Value and Meaning in a Networked Culture, which draws from a lot of gift economy literature.  I think what's more helpful is looking more deeply at how networked technologies provoke individuals and groups to think more deeply about networked audiences (imagined audiences, unintentional audiences, etc.) and how -- and here's probably more where the psychology comes in -- that affects their mental state and personal feelings as they see others react.  Of course, just looking at the tons of data that we can get from APIs doesn't necessarily get us at the answers you're looking for, although there are countless studies of information diffusion on social networking sites (eg., Want to be Retweeted? Large Scale Analytics on Factors Impacting Retweet in Twitter Network by Ed Chi and others). For what I've found to be a helpful overview of the kinds of embedded motivations underlying digital data around content circulation, check Tweet, Tweet, Retweet: Conversational Aspects of Retweeting on Twitter by boyd, Golder, & Lotan (2010). If you're interested in less of a taxonomy of practices and motivations and want to look more generally as how people think of audiences before they circulate information, definitely look at I Tweet Honestly, I Tweet Passionately: Twitter Users, Context Collapse, and the Imagined Audience -- it's one of my favorite contextual pieces in this area of research.  For an exploration of how individuals are rethinking the openness that Web 2.0 rhetoric has emphasis as the status quo of social networking sites, try Social Privacy in Networked Publics: Teens\u2019 Attitudes, Practices, and Strategies by boyd & Marwick, 2011.  And if you're particularly interested in how content circulation practices are shaped by technological ecosystems, Computers can't give credit: How automatic attribution falls short in an online remixing community is an excellent new-ish piece. But, remember to read Lessig's Code 2.0 first.  Also, just to be clear, it's REALLY hard to collapse content distribution over social media into also \"word of mouth,\" as you ask in the prompt. There's a ton of computer-mediated communication theory (eg., SIDE, SIP), hyperpersonal, etc.) that attempts, usually successfully, to draw a line between the two types of communication and how it subsequently impacts information practices.  I feel like this is a pretty weak overview, but I hope it provides some reading material.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13327.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"17v243","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What are the psychologic reasons for people to share content in social media? What motivates people to share content in social media channels like twitter, facebook, quora, reddit, etc.   Bonus-question (might be needed to explain the concepts anyway): What motivates people to share content in general (incl. email, word of mouth etc)  I am not speaking of \"over-sharing\" or any other negatively biased concepts. I am genuinely interested to know why people share.   Are there any archetypes of people who share and common reasons known why they share when, what kind of content.","c_root_id_A":"c894480","c_root_id_B":"c894im6","created_at_utc_A":1359987534,"created_at_utc_B":1359989499,"score_A":2,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Sharing with intent to connect with other people, is how human-society has become.  Our species is stronger largely in part of our socialization, rather than physical-survival features (ie. teeth, tough skin, double-eyelids).  Social connections makes our species stronger.","human_ref_B":"Sherry Turkle gives a fantastic argument in this TED talk about the psychology behind our present day need to share our lives via social media. She discusses a \"I share, therefore I am\" concept, meaning that folks are looking for living experiences in order to share them, rather than the other way around. She then talks about the dangers of such culture.   I highly recommend to watch!  http:\/\/www.ted.com\/talks\/sherry_turkle_alone_together.html","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1965.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"1nhu4d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"What is the estimated cost of the US government shutdown? I keep hearing some estimates thrown around that the shutdown is going to cost almost as much, if not more, than Obamacare itself. How fair of an assumption is that? What are some other estimated costs after:  -3 days  -1 week  -2 weeks  -1 month","c_root_id_A":"ccix2sr","c_root_id_B":"cciv5xb","created_at_utc_A":1380644246,"created_at_utc_B":1380638500,"score_A":13,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'd like to provide some general orienting remarks.  Primarily, I want to know what \"cost\" means. What does it mean for the shutdown to \"cost\" \"the economy\"?  Here's one definition.  1. Figure out what GDP would have been in October without the shutdown (a counterfactural) 2. Figure out what GDP actually was in October, given the shutdown 3. The difference is the \"output loss\" from the shutdown. More precisely, the short-run output cost.  Here are some ways to quantify that cost.  * Government employees are being furloughed. That is, government workers *would be* employed, producing useful goods and services (like the freaking employment report, but I digress).  These goods and services are not being produced. That is a cost. * Due to the shutdown, government services are understaffed. This leads to a lack of government services, which throws wrenches in various sectors of the economy. Anyone who depends on Federal services will be impacted, and in the most general sense *trade and commerce that would have happened absent a shutdown, won't happen.*  Student loan disbursements might be delayed - that implies a cost for students, who would otherwise see those disbursements earlier (and presumably are credit-constrained). Processing for new home loans will be delayed - another source of lost trade. The national parks will be closed - anyone who wished to vacation to the parks in early October will be affected. Some of these effects are small; some are more substantial. All of them are important when trying to figure out the economic cost of the shutdown.  * Increased fiscal uncertainty leads to a drag on financial markets, which can spill over into real economic activity. Markets were down about one-half of 1% over the weekend. That's not small. (They have since recovered somewhat, which is why I think the long-run effects will be small. I cover long-run costs below.)  I don't think that calculating government revenue\/spending numbers is a good way to go about this, even as a rough approximation. Those are fundamentally not the right variables. GDP is, and perhaps employment.  One can also ask about long-run costs. Does anyone here think that GDP will be lower in 2014 because of the shutdown? 2015? 2020? Probably not. The long-run effects are probably very small, barring an overall collapse of American governance. That doesn't detract from the very real short-run costs, but it's useful for perspective.  As a final note, the longer the shutdown affects employment, output, and inflation, the more pressure will be on the Fed to step in with more aggressive QE. Remember, they tied QE to an unemployment target, so they darn well better live up to the claim. I'm not suggesting that Fed policy can 1-for-1 offset the fiscal effects of the shutdown, but Fed policy could plausibly mitigate some of the shutdown's broader impact on GDP and employment.  Somewhere downthread, the cost is estimated to be $55bn. I have no idea where they get that number, but let's run with it: GDP in 2013 will be $55bn lower than otherwise. In a $15 trillion economy, that represents an output loss of about 0.3% of GDP. One-third of one percent. That's not huge, but it's not small potatoes either. For reference, in macroeconomics, \"1% of GDP\" is considered a quantitatively significant number in terms of output losses, deadweight losses, etc.","human_ref_B":"\"The total economic impact is likely to be at least 10 times greater than the simple calculation of wages lost by federal workers, said Brian Kessler, economist with Moody's Analytics. His firm estimates that a three to four week shutdown will cost the economy about $55 billion. \"  http:\/\/money.cnn.com\/2013\/09\/30\/news\/economy\/shutdown-economic-impact\/index.html","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5746.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"1yv0gy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why Does Authoritarianism Tend to Persist in the Middle East? After the Arab Spring it looked like many states were moving towards free democracies. But now many have reverted back to authoritarian regimes. Why can't the Middle East shake this trend? Oil? Religion? Western interference?","c_root_id_A":"cfo57yo","c_root_id_B":"cfo6xtp","created_at_utc_A":1393314070,"created_at_utc_B":1393323640,"score_A":5,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Religion is out... Al Stepan has a good article \"An 'Arab' More Than a 'Muslim' Democracy Gap\", which argues that when controlling for things like development, the non-Arab Muslim world overperforms on democracy and the Arab World underperforms.  One thing important to realize is that Arab Authoritarianism hasn't been the same since the 1950's when many of the Republics were founded.  Stephen Heydemann wrote a great report for Brookings called \"Upgrading Authoritarianism in the Arab World\" (the report's like forty pages, but the executive summary is only like a page or two).  This \"upgrading\" started mostly in the 80's right around when the Third Wave of Democratization was going strong (and when other countries, like Turkey, were dramatic changing as well to deal with changing realities in the world economic system).  Since 1989, however, there's been relatively little democratization.  There's been talk of a \"fourth wave\" (starting with the color revolutions, or the Arab Uprisings), but most things since Eastern Europe democratized have been pretty two steps forward, one and a half steps back.    The oil monarchies in the Gulf are probably in a different situation from the Republics (how monarchies like Jordan and Morocco are is a different matter), especially since these monarchies 1) generally don't collect much taxes from people, making it harder for people to demand a \"say\", 2) they can buy off their populations (Asef Bayat and others have argued that the recent Uprisings should be seen as \"bread riots\" or \"revolts against neoliberalism\", depending on ones inclination), 3) they can buy militaries that will be loyal to the regime (Sharon Nepstad has a good article about how different Bahrain, Syria, and Egypt are in to what degree the regime can buy off the military).  In the Republics, the Israel issue probably has played some historic role in that resisting Israel has given the regime some legitimacy and popular support, but it's hard to disentangle that out.","human_ref_B":"There are a number of different theories of why it has been so hard for democracy to take root in the Middle East, with various studies pointing to factors like poverty, lack of education, inequality, interference by colonial powers and\/or the Cold War powers, or a lack of established civil society. All of these factors no doubt contribute to making it difficult for democracy to arise and thrive.  However Eva Bellin's paper The Robustness of Authoritarianism in the Middle East argues that none of those factors seem to adequately explain the situation in the Middle East, especially in light of the relative success of democracy in places like sub-Saharan Africa:  > The transition to democracy accomplished by sub-Saharan African states  that typically rank as poorly as if not worse than many Middle Eastern and North African states on standard socioeconomic indicators, proximity to successful democracy, and the vigor of civil society makes this point clear.  Bellin argues that the one thing differentiating the Middle East is that their authoritarian governments are just exceptionally good at suppressing dissent and holding onto power:  > In short, the strength, coherence, and effectiveness of the state's coercive apparatus distinguish among cases of successful revolution, revolutionary failure, and nonoccurrence. The same might be said of democratic transition. Democratic transition can be carried out successfully only when the state's coercive apparatus lacks the will or capacity to crush it. Where that coercive apparatus remains intact and opposed to political reform, democratic transition will not occur.   This actually ties in well with an article referenced by \/u\/yodatsracist in his\/her reply, called Upgrading Authoritarianism in the Arab World, which discusses all the ways that authoritarian regimes in the Arab world have solidified their power and worked to suppress movements for democracy.  In short, there are a large number of factors which make establishing democratic systems in the Middle East very difficult, but the decisive factor seems to be that the authoritarian governments in the Middle East are just *really good at staying in power*. As long as these authoritarian regimes are able to so effectively hold onto power, the all-important transition to democracy cannot occur.  Edit: If you're looking for a more complete, lengthy (book-length) treatment, Authoritarianism In The Middle East: Regimes And Resistance is excellent.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9570.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1yv0gy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why Does Authoritarianism Tend to Persist in the Middle East? After the Arab Spring it looked like many states were moving towards free democracies. But now many have reverted back to authoritarian regimes. Why can't the Middle East shake this trend? Oil? Religion? Western interference?","c_root_id_A":"cfo4cpy","c_root_id_B":"cfo6xtp","created_at_utc_A":1393310697,"created_at_utc_B":1393323640,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Somewhat relevant, albeit in one sector of society:   Why Arabs lose Wars, although you should note that the author's suggested big picture change to reverse the negative aspects of arab culture is more democracy.   Also somewhat relevant, Dutch Disease\/Resource Curse theory.  Basically if you have large oil reserves, you don't need to go to the people for consent to your rule.   Historically liberty and democracy have emerged as (short term, or so the ruler believes at the time) solutions to tax revolts.","human_ref_B":"There are a number of different theories of why it has been so hard for democracy to take root in the Middle East, with various studies pointing to factors like poverty, lack of education, inequality, interference by colonial powers and\/or the Cold War powers, or a lack of established civil society. All of these factors no doubt contribute to making it difficult for democracy to arise and thrive.  However Eva Bellin's paper The Robustness of Authoritarianism in the Middle East argues that none of those factors seem to adequately explain the situation in the Middle East, especially in light of the relative success of democracy in places like sub-Saharan Africa:  > The transition to democracy accomplished by sub-Saharan African states  that typically rank as poorly as if not worse than many Middle Eastern and North African states on standard socioeconomic indicators, proximity to successful democracy, and the vigor of civil society makes this point clear.  Bellin argues that the one thing differentiating the Middle East is that their authoritarian governments are just exceptionally good at suppressing dissent and holding onto power:  > In short, the strength, coherence, and effectiveness of the state's coercive apparatus distinguish among cases of successful revolution, revolutionary failure, and nonoccurrence. The same might be said of democratic transition. Democratic transition can be carried out successfully only when the state's coercive apparatus lacks the will or capacity to crush it. Where that coercive apparatus remains intact and opposed to political reform, democratic transition will not occur.   This actually ties in well with an article referenced by \/u\/yodatsracist in his\/her reply, called Upgrading Authoritarianism in the Arab World, which discusses all the ways that authoritarian regimes in the Arab world have solidified their power and worked to suppress movements for democracy.  In short, there are a large number of factors which make establishing democratic systems in the Middle East very difficult, but the decisive factor seems to be that the authoritarian governments in the Middle East are just *really good at staying in power*. As long as these authoritarian regimes are able to so effectively hold onto power, the all-important transition to democracy cannot occur.  Edit: If you're looking for a more complete, lengthy (book-length) treatment, Authoritarianism In The Middle East: Regimes And Resistance is excellent.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12943.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1yv0gy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Why Does Authoritarianism Tend to Persist in the Middle East? After the Arab Spring it looked like many states were moving towards free democracies. But now many have reverted back to authoritarian regimes. Why can't the Middle East shake this trend? Oil? Religion? Western interference?","c_root_id_A":"cfo4cpy","c_root_id_B":"cfo57yo","created_at_utc_A":1393310697,"created_at_utc_B":1393314070,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Somewhat relevant, albeit in one sector of society:   Why Arabs lose Wars, although you should note that the author's suggested big picture change to reverse the negative aspects of arab culture is more democracy.   Also somewhat relevant, Dutch Disease\/Resource Curse theory.  Basically if you have large oil reserves, you don't need to go to the people for consent to your rule.   Historically liberty and democracy have emerged as (short term, or so the ruler believes at the time) solutions to tax revolts.","human_ref_B":"Religion is out... Al Stepan has a good article \"An 'Arab' More Than a 'Muslim' Democracy Gap\", which argues that when controlling for things like development, the non-Arab Muslim world overperforms on democracy and the Arab World underperforms.  One thing important to realize is that Arab Authoritarianism hasn't been the same since the 1950's when many of the Republics were founded.  Stephen Heydemann wrote a great report for Brookings called \"Upgrading Authoritarianism in the Arab World\" (the report's like forty pages, but the executive summary is only like a page or two).  This \"upgrading\" started mostly in the 80's right around when the Third Wave of Democratization was going strong (and when other countries, like Turkey, were dramatic changing as well to deal with changing realities in the world economic system).  Since 1989, however, there's been relatively little democratization.  There's been talk of a \"fourth wave\" (starting with the color revolutions, or the Arab Uprisings), but most things since Eastern Europe democratized have been pretty two steps forward, one and a half steps back.    The oil monarchies in the Gulf are probably in a different situation from the Republics (how monarchies like Jordan and Morocco are is a different matter), especially since these monarchies 1) generally don't collect much taxes from people, making it harder for people to demand a \"say\", 2) they can buy off their populations (Asef Bayat and others have argued that the recent Uprisings should be seen as \"bread riots\" or \"revolts against neoliberalism\", depending on ones inclination), 3) they can buy militaries that will be loyal to the regime (Sharon Nepstad has a good article about how different Bahrain, Syria, and Egypt are in to what degree the regime can buy off the military).  In the Republics, the Israel issue probably has played some historic role in that resisting Israel has given the regime some legitimacy and popular support, but it's hard to disentangle that out.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3373.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"yqv9i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"What would happen if the purchasing of Residential Property was restricted to 1 house per person? What effect would this have on both the micro\/macro scale, and how would it affect individuals and families? Would we see people just making more affluent, large castle-like housing? Would people just start absorbing neighbouring blocks to make their single property as large as they could? Would it actually make housing cheaper for first-time buyers?","c_root_id_A":"c5y1nb8","c_root_id_B":"c5y1fti","created_at_utc_A":1345813832,"created_at_utc_B":1345812616,"score_A":11,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"There would be visible increase in home ownership of infants. There would be doors between apartments that would make them count as one. etc. etc.  Impact on market would be very low. People would find legal or illegal ways to find way around this law.","human_ref_B":"Hotels aren't counted as residential are they?  I think you would see a glut of 'hotels' open up which would serve the same function as apartments.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1216.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"2m0m0m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"So if stereotype threat exists, have any studies shown a \"stereotype bonus\"? Do men do better when told it's a math test etc.","c_root_id_A":"clzxnqe","c_root_id_B":"clzzclw","created_at_utc_A":1415754402,"created_at_utc_B":1415757815,"score_A":5,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Quick clarification on your question, the inverse of stereotype threat would not be men doing better because they're told it's a math test, it would be men doing better because they're told men are better at math.","human_ref_B":"What you're directly asking about, and what the article \/r\/_ChampionOfTheSun is describing, is called *stereotype boost* - positive stereotypes about a group increasing performance of group members.  You might also be interested in *stereotype lift* - it's similar, but is actually activated when exposed to negative stereotypes about outgroup members (e.g. men being told that women are bad at math) - sort of like downward social comparison. And so when people are told that these stereotypes are untrue, the performance of the stereotyped group goes up, but the performance of the ingroup decreases slightly - here's a link to the Walton & Cohen meta-analysis, if you're interested.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3413.0,"score_ratio":3.6}
{"post_id":"2afhpw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What are the benefits of the War on Drugs? I know very little about the subject, but see mostly negative framing of the issue. Are there practical or beneficial effects of the drug policies of the U.S. and elsewhere? If so, for who?","c_root_id_A":"ciumgly","c_root_id_B":"ciulnwt","created_at_utc_A":1405097556,"created_at_utc_B":1405096233,"score_A":40,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"I assume that you mean beneficial effects for Americans as a whole and not for the typical drug dealer\/mafioso, as they generally have much to gain from prohibition (see Bootleggers and Baptists for more).  Generally speaking, there seems to be evidence that prohibitions are capable of reducing supply.   For example, here's a chart examing Per Capita Consumption of Alcoholic Beverages (Gallons of Pure Alcohol) from 1910-1929. As you can see, as states individually began prohibiting alcohol, there is a gradual decline met with a sharp drop in consumption as alcohol was banned federally.   This occurs because black markets are met with a variety of costs incurred that do not exist in legal markets. Some of these include concealing activities, bribing officials, protecting their product from rival cartels and\/or the law etc.  Here's another chart I found regarding marijuana consumption. As we can see, when President Reagan began more aggressively targeting marijuana users through acts such as creating mandatory minimum sentencing and forfeiture of cash\/real estate drug offenses, consumption did decline.  As evident by this, prohibition may also be able to decrease demand by enacting penalties for consumption of the prohibited product or respect of citizens for the law.  However, as we can see by what happened with both alcohol and marijuana, these marginal decreases in demand and supply often are generally small and somewhat temporary in nature.  It's far more important in my opinion to consider at what unintended costs that these shifts occur.   If you want solid write up on the subject, here's a lecture outline on Harvard Economist Jeffrey A. Miron's analysis on the costs\/benefits of a prohibition (as an aside, Miron himself addresses the issue from a libertarian perspective, but it is a fantastic write-up regardless of what political beliefs one may hold).","human_ref_B":"I've never met an economist or political scientist who wasn't against the War on Drugs (though I understand that a few exist). It has benefits for drug companies in terms of removing competition, of course, and to various bureaucracies in enhancing their scope and budgets, but as far as public health benefits there are none to speak of. The main opposition comes from public health groups, who tend not to go further beyond \"drugs are bad\" in the analysis, which is why we have economists and political scientists. The Global Commission on Drug Policy had a decent report in 2011.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1323.0,"score_ratio":2.3529411765}
{"post_id":"2afhpw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What are the benefits of the War on Drugs? I know very little about the subject, but see mostly negative framing of the issue. Are there practical or beneficial effects of the drug policies of the U.S. and elsewhere? If so, for who?","c_root_id_A":"ciuz2wh","c_root_id_B":"ciux3bp","created_at_utc_A":1405120876,"created_at_utc_B":1405116767,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The US government spends ~$500 per *second* on the war on drugs. Between cops, prisons, federal investigators and all the logistics supporting these it's a *massive* jobs program. Personally I doubt it's net positive though.","human_ref_B":"\"War on Drugs\" in its contemporary sense is hard to assess within a larger historical view (private prison, dark projects, financial markets, big pharma). But overall drug-use, commerce, and attempt to control distribution and consumption can.   Briefly the British-Chinese 1800's Opium Wars to alcoholism among native Americans, and of course clergical interpretations on the use of drugs.  The problem is mainly of abuse (by users and vendors) and miscomprehension (religious use, depence-disease, social stigma).   Drug (including alcohol) abuse, usually coincides with social insitituional collapse. eg: Soviet collapse met with a spike in alcohol and opiate consumption in all eastern European nations.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4109.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2afhpw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What are the benefits of the War on Drugs? I know very little about the subject, but see mostly negative framing of the issue. Are there practical or beneficial effects of the drug policies of the U.S. and elsewhere? If so, for who?","c_root_id_A":"ciuz2wh","c_root_id_B":"ciump69","created_at_utc_A":1405120876,"created_at_utc_B":1405097952,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The US government spends ~$500 per *second* on the war on drugs. Between cops, prisons, federal investigators and all the logistics supporting these it's a *massive* jobs program. Personally I doubt it's net positive though.","human_ref_B":"From *Border Games* by Peter Andreas: employment and resources for US Border Services and the DEA. Also, political candidates of any stripe can often benefit from touting a tough-on-crime agenda in their election platforms.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22924.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2afhpw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What are the benefits of the War on Drugs? I know very little about the subject, but see mostly negative framing of the issue. Are there practical or beneficial effects of the drug policies of the U.S. and elsewhere? If so, for who?","c_root_id_A":"ciump69","c_root_id_B":"ciux3bp","created_at_utc_A":1405097952,"created_at_utc_B":1405116767,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"From *Border Games* by Peter Andreas: employment and resources for US Border Services and the DEA. Also, political candidates of any stripe can often benefit from touting a tough-on-crime agenda in their election platforms.","human_ref_B":"\"War on Drugs\" in its contemporary sense is hard to assess within a larger historical view (private prison, dark projects, financial markets, big pharma). But overall drug-use, commerce, and attempt to control distribution and consumption can.   Briefly the British-Chinese 1800's Opium Wars to alcoholism among native Americans, and of course clergical interpretations on the use of drugs.  The problem is mainly of abuse (by users and vendors) and miscomprehension (religious use, depence-disease, social stigma).   Drug (including alcohol) abuse, usually coincides with social insitituional collapse. eg: Soviet collapse met with a spike in alcohol and opiate consumption in all eastern European nations.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18815.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"jucmk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Dear r\/A.S.S: Is there any interest in a \"Introduction to Sociology [or other disciplines]\" reading list? One of the great things about this subreddit is that it provides opportunity for dialogue and the chance to pose questions. Yet one thing that I think may be useful are lists of suggested readings for people who are interested in our various disciplines.   I'm imagining series of reading lists recommended by our panel of experts with input from the community. Each list would contain around a dozen (too many? too few?) sources that represent some of the more important\/prominent ideas and theories that pertain to each of the social sciences and sub-fields, perhaps with summaries and a brief note explaining why the particular source is important. I think it would serve as a good starting point for people who want to go beyond the Wikipedia page for a particular discipline but do not know where to start. Ideally, such sources would be available online, accessible, and something people who are unfamiliar with the methods and workings of social science could understand.   Of course, I cannot speak for other people, as it would require effort from numerous people in this subreddit and across many fields. However, if there is a consensus that something like this is a good idea, I would be willing to put together a list or two pertaining to Sociology. So I guess my questions are: Does this sound like a good idea? Do you think it would be useful to people and helpful for this subreddit? If so, is anyone willing to put together something representing their discipline? Or am I just being ridiculous with this idea?","c_root_id_A":"c2f6pmj","c_root_id_B":"c2f6f0m","created_at_utc_A":1314304757,"created_at_utc_B":1314302802,"score_A":17,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm sorry I didn't think the subreddit acronym through here.","human_ref_B":"Sounds good to me, and I would be happy to contribute.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1955.0,"score_ratio":5.6666666667}
{"post_id":"yzmjf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How important is a liberal immigration policy and cultural integration to a nations economic prosperity? I've always been a rather staunch conservative when it comes to immigration policy... \"build a wall and arm it with machine guns\" kinda guy.  However, over the last few years, i've been reading a lot of \"liberal\" literature, and i'm beginning to see a correlation between a very open immigration policy with economic prosperity.  Countries like Japan sort of throw that theory a curve ball though.  I'm also not sure if that correlation I feel i'm seeing (if it's a real thing) is applicable to the current situation in the US.  One of the fastest growing populations in New England, for example, is hispanic\/Puerto Ricans.  Unlike past waves of immigrants, they seem to be bucking the trend of quick integration\/assimilation.  I suppose there's not one solid question i'm asking here, but just hoping someone with more knowledge on these issues can help inform my opinion.","c_root_id_A":"c60e88y","c_root_id_B":"c6099rl","created_at_utc_A":1346229572,"created_at_utc_B":1346204817,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"From a Demographics perspective, immigration is sorely needed by many developed countries. For example you cite Japan as an example of an economically prosperous country with very little immigration. But, Japan is now facing serious problems because of their restrictionist immigration policies. The current TFR (total fertility rate or number of births per woman) is 1.39 in Japan. The TFR needed to maintain the population is 2.1. This means the population is getting older and older and too few young people are being born to support them. Demographers typically measure this via the Old-age dependency ratio, which basically is the ration of people of working age compared to the number 65 and older. Currently Japan's OADR is .32 (so about 3 working people for every one retired person) while the US OADR is only .19 (5 workers to 1 retired) and we are still worried about maintaining social security. But wait, it gets worse, by 2050, Japan is predicted to have an OADR of .66 in 2050 if they continue current policies. That means they will have more retired people than children in the country which has never happened in human history. Basically their economy is going to stagnate and pensions will have to be slashed. The only way to increase fertility enough to fix Japans problems would be to let in lots of immigrants. Young immigrants working in Japan would help support older Japanese people. You can already see the effects in rural japan, communities are literally disappearing because of declining populations and no tax base.","human_ref_B":"There's a new article in the Winter 2012 CATO Journal by Hanson which probably provides a good overview of the benefits of immigration. Of course, being from CATO, I would expect some confirmation bias there.  An article by Zoysa (2006) in Contemporary Politics discusses how the US compares favorably to Europe for the US' relatively liberal immigration policy and its effects on economic growth and multiculturalism.  Other articles I have seen do mention the depression of wages and increased unemployment of natives, at least in the short term.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24755.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"yzmjf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How important is a liberal immigration policy and cultural integration to a nations economic prosperity? I've always been a rather staunch conservative when it comes to immigration policy... \"build a wall and arm it with machine guns\" kinda guy.  However, over the last few years, i've been reading a lot of \"liberal\" literature, and i'm beginning to see a correlation between a very open immigration policy with economic prosperity.  Countries like Japan sort of throw that theory a curve ball though.  I'm also not sure if that correlation I feel i'm seeing (if it's a real thing) is applicable to the current situation in the US.  One of the fastest growing populations in New England, for example, is hispanic\/Puerto Ricans.  Unlike past waves of immigrants, they seem to be bucking the trend of quick integration\/assimilation.  I suppose there's not one solid question i'm asking here, but just hoping someone with more knowledge on these issues can help inform my opinion.","c_root_id_A":"c608w5w","c_root_id_B":"c60e88y","created_at_utc_A":1346203348,"created_at_utc_B":1346229572,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"This might be of interest to you:  http:\/\/pubs.aeaweb.org\/doi\/pdfplus\/10.1257\/jep.25.3.83","human_ref_B":"From a Demographics perspective, immigration is sorely needed by many developed countries. For example you cite Japan as an example of an economically prosperous country with very little immigration. But, Japan is now facing serious problems because of their restrictionist immigration policies. The current TFR (total fertility rate or number of births per woman) is 1.39 in Japan. The TFR needed to maintain the population is 2.1. This means the population is getting older and older and too few young people are being born to support them. Demographers typically measure this via the Old-age dependency ratio, which basically is the ration of people of working age compared to the number 65 and older. Currently Japan's OADR is .32 (so about 3 working people for every one retired person) while the US OADR is only .19 (5 workers to 1 retired) and we are still worried about maintaining social security. But wait, it gets worse, by 2050, Japan is predicted to have an OADR of .66 in 2050 if they continue current policies. That means they will have more retired people than children in the country which has never happened in human history. Basically their economy is going to stagnate and pensions will have to be slashed. The only way to increase fertility enough to fix Japans problems would be to let in lots of immigrants. Young immigrants working in Japan would help support older Japanese people. You can already see the effects in rural japan, communities are literally disappearing because of declining populations and no tax base.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26224.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"yzmjf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How important is a liberal immigration policy and cultural integration to a nations economic prosperity? I've always been a rather staunch conservative when it comes to immigration policy... \"build a wall and arm it with machine guns\" kinda guy.  However, over the last few years, i've been reading a lot of \"liberal\" literature, and i'm beginning to see a correlation between a very open immigration policy with economic prosperity.  Countries like Japan sort of throw that theory a curve ball though.  I'm also not sure if that correlation I feel i'm seeing (if it's a real thing) is applicable to the current situation in the US.  One of the fastest growing populations in New England, for example, is hispanic\/Puerto Ricans.  Unlike past waves of immigrants, they seem to be bucking the trend of quick integration\/assimilation.  I suppose there's not one solid question i'm asking here, but just hoping someone with more knowledge on these issues can help inform my opinion.","c_root_id_A":"c6099rl","c_root_id_B":"c608w5w","created_at_utc_A":1346204817,"created_at_utc_B":1346203348,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There's a new article in the Winter 2012 CATO Journal by Hanson which probably provides a good overview of the benefits of immigration. Of course, being from CATO, I would expect some confirmation bias there.  An article by Zoysa (2006) in Contemporary Politics discusses how the US compares favorably to Europe for the US' relatively liberal immigration policy and its effects on economic growth and multiculturalism.  Other articles I have seen do mention the depression of wages and increased unemployment of natives, at least in the short term.","human_ref_B":"This might be of interest to you:  http:\/\/pubs.aeaweb.org\/doi\/pdfplus\/10.1257\/jep.25.3.83","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1469.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"6uh0ln","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Looking for books on terrorist motivation [BOTH Islamic and otherwise] etc https:\/\/www.newscientist.com\/article\/mg23531390-700-anatomy-of-terror-what-makes-normal-people-become-extremists\/  After reading the above article, I'm interested in learning more about the motivations and factors behind both individual terrorists and terrorist organastions as a whole [BOTH Islamic\/Religious and other types e.g. American \"lone wolf\" school shooters].   Can anyone please recommend a book discussing the causes of terrorism [from individual religious insanity to cultist behaviour towards self-inflicted anti-USA attitudes]. I know that terrorism is more than religious fanaticism, and I'd like to learn more about the personal motivations and the wider socioeconomic factors involved. The following link seems a good place to start, but only covers Islamic events since 9\/11.   Thanks for the help.  https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Anatomy-Terror-Death-Laden-Islamic\/dp\/0393241173","c_root_id_A":"dlsqen5","c_root_id_B":"dlsqgkp","created_at_utc_A":1503063287,"created_at_utc_B":1503063353,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I took a class in college about terrorists. We read something call \"What makes a terrorist\". I'll see if I can find it for you.   EDIT: \"What Makes a Terrorist\" by Alan B. Kruger","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/books\/2010\/oct\/24\/scott-atran-talking-to-the-enemy-review This book is an ethnography of radicalization and the social networks they occur in.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":66.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"6uh0ln","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Looking for books on terrorist motivation [BOTH Islamic and otherwise] etc https:\/\/www.newscientist.com\/article\/mg23531390-700-anatomy-of-terror-what-makes-normal-people-become-extremists\/  After reading the above article, I'm interested in learning more about the motivations and factors behind both individual terrorists and terrorist organastions as a whole [BOTH Islamic\/Religious and other types e.g. American \"lone wolf\" school shooters].   Can anyone please recommend a book discussing the causes of terrorism [from individual religious insanity to cultist behaviour towards self-inflicted anti-USA attitudes]. I know that terrorism is more than religious fanaticism, and I'd like to learn more about the personal motivations and the wider socioeconomic factors involved. The following link seems a good place to start, but only covers Islamic events since 9\/11.   Thanks for the help.  https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Anatomy-Terror-Death-Laden-Islamic\/dp\/0393241173","c_root_id_A":"dlsqen5","c_root_id_B":"dlss86e","created_at_utc_A":1503063287,"created_at_utc_B":1503065493,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I took a class in college about terrorists. We read something call \"What makes a terrorist\". I'll see if I can find it for you.   EDIT: \"What Makes a Terrorist\" by Alan B. Kruger","human_ref_B":"Making Sense of Suicide Missions, by D. Gambetta. It goes back a fair bit.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2206.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"6uh0ln","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Looking for books on terrorist motivation [BOTH Islamic and otherwise] etc https:\/\/www.newscientist.com\/article\/mg23531390-700-anatomy-of-terror-what-makes-normal-people-become-extremists\/  After reading the above article, I'm interested in learning more about the motivations and factors behind both individual terrorists and terrorist organastions as a whole [BOTH Islamic\/Religious and other types e.g. American \"lone wolf\" school shooters].   Can anyone please recommend a book discussing the causes of terrorism [from individual religious insanity to cultist behaviour towards self-inflicted anti-USA attitudes]. I know that terrorism is more than religious fanaticism, and I'd like to learn more about the personal motivations and the wider socioeconomic factors involved. The following link seems a good place to start, but only covers Islamic events since 9\/11.   Thanks for the help.  https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Anatomy-Terror-Death-Laden-Islamic\/dp\/0393241173","c_root_id_A":"dlss86e","c_root_id_B":"dlsqqpj","created_at_utc_A":1503065493,"created_at_utc_B":1503063707,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Making Sense of Suicide Missions, by D. Gambetta. It goes back a fair bit.","human_ref_B":"'Debating terrorism and counterterrorism' by stuart gottlieb(ed); 'contemporary debates on terrorism' by jackson and sinclair (eds) and terrorism and counterterrorism by birgitte nacos. All good introductions to various aspects and viewpoints backed with notes and references for further study.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1786.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1kqy6o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Middle\/High School Survey -- how do I get into a public school to do a survey? I am researching cyberbullying and trying to do a survey on middle and high school students at public schools in Wisconsin. So far I've tried calling up a few school districts but am getting shut down. Can anyone help with whom to contact (there seems to be a lot of bureaucracy to navigate) and strategies to get a survey in the school? I was hoping to have a survey set up by the end of the summer and ready to go when the semester starts in fall.","c_root_id_A":"cbrviet","c_root_id_B":"cbrsiyt","created_at_utc_A":1377037484,"created_at_utc_B":1377029778,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It is **very** difficult to get into schools.  I have done a survey in a school before but I was lucky; my faculty adviser was on the board of a local charter school.  Talk with your faculty advisers on what to do and they can likely help you find an alternate way of reaching your sample.  But, again, getting into a school is going to be near impossible so I would suggest a different kind of sample if possible.","human_ref_B":"Does it have to be in a school? It sounds like it can most easily be done online. For example, ask the guys from \/r\/SampleSize","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7706.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"2s2r2r","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Request: Looking to learn the different schools of thought on alleviating poverty, can anyone recommend a place to start? I know some economists say sending aid to poor countries is counter productive.  I'd like to understand the basics of the schools of thought in economics for alleviating poverty. Both in poor countries and within richer countries.  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cnlmekv","c_root_id_B":"cnlu2wh","created_at_utc_A":1421000186,"created_at_utc_B":1421012800,"score_A":2,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"The brrokings institute has very high quality articles that can be sorted by theme. And I would also consider going to MIT open course ware and Stanford's open courses and reading the materials from their introductory first weeks.  A textbook really is the best thing for the table setting you are looking for.  Even more easy to digest would be khan academy videos.    I am still feeling my way through antipoverty science, and the work is conflicted and often statistically and methodologically imatture, so take everything with a grain of salt. That is Parr of why I suggest very rigorous sources.    For a flavor, a common theme seems to be rthe interrelated needs of education, job opportunity, Basic sanitation, and security.    Poverty fighting in the west seems to be about how to get better returns from the programs, and also about the large disconnect between the political conversation and the evidence.","human_ref_B":"What is your background? I'll suggest books for the educated non-economist.  I can't speak to rich countries, but I can give you some recommendations regarding poor ones.  *Poor Economics* by Banerjee and Duflo is both readable and recently influential. I think it's a good and accurate introduction to the field.  If you're specifically interested in aid-versus-no-aid, you might be interested in the Sachs\u2013Easterly debate.   * Jeff Sachs is usually dragged out as the pro-aid champion. *The End of Poverty* is his clarion call to action. * Bill Easterly is usually dragged out as Sachs's anti-aid arch-nemesis. *The White Man's Burden* is his response. * Dambisa Moyo is a more recent aid skeptic who made some waves. *Dead Aid* is her bestseller.  Another related debate is why some countries are poor and others are rich. We could call this the Acemoglu\/Robinson\u2013Diamond debate.  * Jared Diamond (not an economist) thinks it's geography. He lays out his case in *Guns, Germs, and Steel*. * Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson think it's institutions. (If you're wondering what \"institutions\" are, you're not alone. Institutions are tricky to define.) They lay out their case in *Why Nations Fail*.  This matters because determining the cause of poverty could inform its effective alleviation. The geography hypothesis is associated with the aid response. The institutions hypothesis is associated with the no-aid (or less-aid, or aid-in-subtle-ways) response.  The debates and their respective proponents are not nearly as clean-cut as I've made them sound. For example, Jeff Sachs absolutely believes that institutions matter. Nevertheless, I think it's a reasonable framework on which to hang your thoughts.  All these people have numerous TED talks and public debates on YouTube if you don't feel up to reading books.  Let me end with a cautionary note. You will run across self-confident people who lay out a compelling narratives with nice clean punchlines. \"We were doing aid in thus-and-such stupid way, and then we invented a miraculous intervention that works perfectly! Hurrah!\" These people are often intelligent, and you should listen to them, but you should not believe them. We lack evidence that microfinance\/deworming\/sanctions\/democracy\/emigration\/UCTs\/CCTs\/socialism\/whatever is the silver bullet. We do not know of a silver bullet. Poverty is a difficult problem.  edit: Stanford Social Innovation Review offers The Top 10 Books on the Economics of Poverty: A suggested reading list to provide a foundation for understanding development, aid, and poverty. It's a very good list, by which I mean that it overlaps with my list. :-) Most such lists are going to overlap a lot.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12614.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"10s2lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Slippery slopes... why are they so reviled in policy discussions? Whether its fiscal policy, social policy, gun laws, security, etc.  Why are 'slippery slope' arguments typically dismissed and looked down upon?  A few examples:  * Following 9\/11, the increases in authority by the US police and security organizations will inevitably have a negative impact on personal liberties and freedom.  * By banning firearms magazines greater than 20 rounds, what is to stop further restrictions down to 15 rounds?  Or 10?  * When you start giving people free housing, free money, free food, then what is stopping you from giving them free education, healthcare, etc.?  It appears to me that one should acknowledge the potential long-term path certain policy decisions may end up taking.  Other concepts, like the Overton Window come into play, where one can push the limit of public policies until they become acceptable, are perfect examples of 'moving goalposts' in terms of policy reach and scope.  An example for this is: Today, the TSA is quite a common sight at airports and publicly acceptable (much to the chagrin of Reddit), which allows for the expansion of TSA presence into train and bus stations, further increasing the reach and scope of the organization.  Once this becomes commonplace, then the TSA will expand further and further.  As a freedom-loving human being, I think the utmost caution needs to be taken with any broad stroke public policy which deals with our healthcare, education, safety, and security.  Any increase in power and scope of Gov't authority needs to be weighed heavily and be difficult to accomplish.  --------------------- Thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"c6g5yi1","c_root_id_B":"c6g7cth","created_at_utc_A":1349127464,"created_at_utc_B":1349132964,"score_A":2,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"See also \"but what if the greater evil wins?\" Scare tactics, used by those scared of change.","human_ref_B":"the problem is that slippery slope arguments usually lack any rational foundation.  let me ignore your examples and provide a hypothetical example of my own.  let's take speed limits.  let's say there's a state highway that has a speed limit of 45.  the local government does some research and determines that a speed limit of 55 would create a lot of efficiency benefits but with negligible safety drawbacks.  the slippery slope argument is \"why don't you just raise the speed limit to 65! or 75!  hell, we're just step away from making it 100!\"  i hope the idiocy of this argument is apparent, but i'll explain why it is so.  the slippery slope argument ignores the obvious fact that the cost-benefit analysis changes as the policy changes.  they attempt to short-circuit the argument by saying \"x+10 fails the cost\/benefit test, therefore x does too!\"  your firearms magazine hypothetical is very similar to this.  there may be policy considerations that apply to magazines of a certain size that do not apply in the same way to magazines of a lower size.  therefore you cannot just assume that such further regulation would be an inevitable consequence of the current proposal.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5500.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"10s2lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Slippery slopes... why are they so reviled in policy discussions? Whether its fiscal policy, social policy, gun laws, security, etc.  Why are 'slippery slope' arguments typically dismissed and looked down upon?  A few examples:  * Following 9\/11, the increases in authority by the US police and security organizations will inevitably have a negative impact on personal liberties and freedom.  * By banning firearms magazines greater than 20 rounds, what is to stop further restrictions down to 15 rounds?  Or 10?  * When you start giving people free housing, free money, free food, then what is stopping you from giving them free education, healthcare, etc.?  It appears to me that one should acknowledge the potential long-term path certain policy decisions may end up taking.  Other concepts, like the Overton Window come into play, where one can push the limit of public policies until they become acceptable, are perfect examples of 'moving goalposts' in terms of policy reach and scope.  An example for this is: Today, the TSA is quite a common sight at airports and publicly acceptable (much to the chagrin of Reddit), which allows for the expansion of TSA presence into train and bus stations, further increasing the reach and scope of the organization.  Once this becomes commonplace, then the TSA will expand further and further.  As a freedom-loving human being, I think the utmost caution needs to be taken with any broad stroke public policy which deals with our healthcare, education, safety, and security.  Any increase in power and scope of Gov't authority needs to be weighed heavily and be difficult to accomplish.  --------------------- Thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"c6g7i13","c_root_id_B":"c6g5yi1","created_at_utc_A":1349133562,"created_at_utc_B":1349127464,"score_A":17,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"A slippery slope argument is typically, though not always correctly, seen as a type of reductio ad absurdium.","human_ref_B":"See also \"but what if the greater evil wins?\" Scare tactics, used by those scared of change.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6098.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"10s2lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Slippery slopes... why are they so reviled in policy discussions? Whether its fiscal policy, social policy, gun laws, security, etc.  Why are 'slippery slope' arguments typically dismissed and looked down upon?  A few examples:  * Following 9\/11, the increases in authority by the US police and security organizations will inevitably have a negative impact on personal liberties and freedom.  * By banning firearms magazines greater than 20 rounds, what is to stop further restrictions down to 15 rounds?  Or 10?  * When you start giving people free housing, free money, free food, then what is stopping you from giving them free education, healthcare, etc.?  It appears to me that one should acknowledge the potential long-term path certain policy decisions may end up taking.  Other concepts, like the Overton Window come into play, where one can push the limit of public policies until they become acceptable, are perfect examples of 'moving goalposts' in terms of policy reach and scope.  An example for this is: Today, the TSA is quite a common sight at airports and publicly acceptable (much to the chagrin of Reddit), which allows for the expansion of TSA presence into train and bus stations, further increasing the reach and scope of the organization.  Once this becomes commonplace, then the TSA will expand further and further.  As a freedom-loving human being, I think the utmost caution needs to be taken with any broad stroke public policy which deals with our healthcare, education, safety, and security.  Any increase in power and scope of Gov't authority needs to be weighed heavily and be difficult to accomplish.  --------------------- Thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"c6g5yi1","c_root_id_B":"c6g87r3","created_at_utc_A":1349127464,"created_at_utc_B":1349136488,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"See also \"but what if the greater evil wins?\" Scare tactics, used by those scared of change.","human_ref_B":"Used on their own, they're a way of ignoring the issue and arguing against a ridiculous extension of the debate.   Using your examples: If there's a proposal to add security to an airport, you should be arguing the relative benefits of what the security adds compared to its cost. While it's fine to be on either side of this issue, it's not fair to say that airport security is a bad idea because putting checkstops at every intersection is a bad idea: that ignores the benefits of airport security and uses incredibly exaggerated costs as a drawback.   Similarly, if you're arguing about the benefits of banning concealed automatic machine guns, it's a distraction to talk about banning hunting shotguns. By arguing about how banning shotguns for hunting is overblown, you're ignoring the entire idea of what banning concealed machine guns would bring.  If a 'slippery slope' argument is used as part of a series of arguments in favour or against an idea, it's not nearly as reviled usually.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9024.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"10s2lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Slippery slopes... why are they so reviled in policy discussions? Whether its fiscal policy, social policy, gun laws, security, etc.  Why are 'slippery slope' arguments typically dismissed and looked down upon?  A few examples:  * Following 9\/11, the increases in authority by the US police and security organizations will inevitably have a negative impact on personal liberties and freedom.  * By banning firearms magazines greater than 20 rounds, what is to stop further restrictions down to 15 rounds?  Or 10?  * When you start giving people free housing, free money, free food, then what is stopping you from giving them free education, healthcare, etc.?  It appears to me that one should acknowledge the potential long-term path certain policy decisions may end up taking.  Other concepts, like the Overton Window come into play, where one can push the limit of public policies until they become acceptable, are perfect examples of 'moving goalposts' in terms of policy reach and scope.  An example for this is: Today, the TSA is quite a common sight at airports and publicly acceptable (much to the chagrin of Reddit), which allows for the expansion of TSA presence into train and bus stations, further increasing the reach and scope of the organization.  Once this becomes commonplace, then the TSA will expand further and further.  As a freedom-loving human being, I think the utmost caution needs to be taken with any broad stroke public policy which deals with our healthcare, education, safety, and security.  Any increase in power and scope of Gov't authority needs to be weighed heavily and be difficult to accomplish.  --------------------- Thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"c6g5yi1","c_root_id_B":"c6g9783","created_at_utc_A":1349127464,"created_at_utc_B":1349140512,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"See also \"but what if the greater evil wins?\" Scare tactics, used by those scared of change.","human_ref_B":"Slippery slope arguments can be acceptable as long as you can point to small, logical and interlinked steps that will lead to your conclusion. Slippery slope arguments are looked down upon because the people making them don't do this. Instead a slippery slope argument to evoke an emotional response by inferring a small change will eventually result in something extreme and unpalatable. Without any real evidence, the argument you are actually making is: (A) is a thing I think is bad, (B) is a worse version of that thing, so (A) will automatically lead to (B). No reason for that to happen.   Often a slippery slope is used to make absurd arguments like \"If we legalise gay marriage, soon people will be able to marry their dogs\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13048.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"10s2lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Slippery slopes... why are they so reviled in policy discussions? Whether its fiscal policy, social policy, gun laws, security, etc.  Why are 'slippery slope' arguments typically dismissed and looked down upon?  A few examples:  * Following 9\/11, the increases in authority by the US police and security organizations will inevitably have a negative impact on personal liberties and freedom.  * By banning firearms magazines greater than 20 rounds, what is to stop further restrictions down to 15 rounds?  Or 10?  * When you start giving people free housing, free money, free food, then what is stopping you from giving them free education, healthcare, etc.?  It appears to me that one should acknowledge the potential long-term path certain policy decisions may end up taking.  Other concepts, like the Overton Window come into play, where one can push the limit of public policies until they become acceptable, are perfect examples of 'moving goalposts' in terms of policy reach and scope.  An example for this is: Today, the TSA is quite a common sight at airports and publicly acceptable (much to the chagrin of Reddit), which allows for the expansion of TSA presence into train and bus stations, further increasing the reach and scope of the organization.  Once this becomes commonplace, then the TSA will expand further and further.  As a freedom-loving human being, I think the utmost caution needs to be taken with any broad stroke public policy which deals with our healthcare, education, safety, and security.  Any increase in power and scope of Gov't authority needs to be weighed heavily and be difficult to accomplish.  --------------------- Thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"c6g5yi1","c_root_id_B":"c6gbzmr","created_at_utc_A":1349127464,"created_at_utc_B":1349153864,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"See also \"but what if the greater evil wins?\" Scare tactics, used by those scared of change.","human_ref_B":"Hello, child of gay parents here!  The number one slippery slope argument I've seen that makes me skeptical is the idea that, by legalizing gay marriage, things like humans marrying animals will become legal.  Generally, I think you've got a healthily skeptical regard for governmental policy, but I have to interject: The more ridiculous the leap is, the less I trust the slippery slope statement.  Besides, there are better ways to argue. Don't like what the TSA is doing? Don't like what powers they have? Uncomfortable? Speak up about the powers they have now. Talking about the here-and-now makes you sound like an adroit commentator, whereas talking about the could-be makes you out to be a conspiracy theorist. Example: McCarthyism was bad because it was xenophobic in and of itself, completely separate from what it could have become, potentially.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26400.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"10s2lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Slippery slopes... why are they so reviled in policy discussions? Whether its fiscal policy, social policy, gun laws, security, etc.  Why are 'slippery slope' arguments typically dismissed and looked down upon?  A few examples:  * Following 9\/11, the increases in authority by the US police and security organizations will inevitably have a negative impact on personal liberties and freedom.  * By banning firearms magazines greater than 20 rounds, what is to stop further restrictions down to 15 rounds?  Or 10?  * When you start giving people free housing, free money, free food, then what is stopping you from giving them free education, healthcare, etc.?  It appears to me that one should acknowledge the potential long-term path certain policy decisions may end up taking.  Other concepts, like the Overton Window come into play, where one can push the limit of public policies until they become acceptable, are perfect examples of 'moving goalposts' in terms of policy reach and scope.  An example for this is: Today, the TSA is quite a common sight at airports and publicly acceptable (much to the chagrin of Reddit), which allows for the expansion of TSA presence into train and bus stations, further increasing the reach and scope of the organization.  Once this becomes commonplace, then the TSA will expand further and further.  As a freedom-loving human being, I think the utmost caution needs to be taken with any broad stroke public policy which deals with our healthcare, education, safety, and security.  Any increase in power and scope of Gov't authority needs to be weighed heavily and be difficult to accomplish.  --------------------- Thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"c6g9kqm","c_root_id_B":"c6gbzmr","created_at_utc_A":1349143637,"created_at_utc_B":1349153864,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Slipperly slope is frowned upon in FORMAL LOGIC, the mathematical side of the field.  People who are just smart enough to have some exposure to formal logic believe think formal logic is 100% applicable to policy decisions. I don't agree with that.  The problem is that Policy Decisions are more subjective than is allowed for in Formal Logic.","human_ref_B":"Hello, child of gay parents here!  The number one slippery slope argument I've seen that makes me skeptical is the idea that, by legalizing gay marriage, things like humans marrying animals will become legal.  Generally, I think you've got a healthily skeptical regard for governmental policy, but I have to interject: The more ridiculous the leap is, the less I trust the slippery slope statement.  Besides, there are better ways to argue. Don't like what the TSA is doing? Don't like what powers they have? Uncomfortable? Speak up about the powers they have now. Talking about the here-and-now makes you sound like an adroit commentator, whereas talking about the could-be makes you out to be a conspiracy theorist. Example: McCarthyism was bad because it was xenophobic in and of itself, completely separate from what it could have become, potentially.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10227.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"10s2lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Slippery slopes... why are they so reviled in policy discussions? Whether its fiscal policy, social policy, gun laws, security, etc.  Why are 'slippery slope' arguments typically dismissed and looked down upon?  A few examples:  * Following 9\/11, the increases in authority by the US police and security organizations will inevitably have a negative impact on personal liberties and freedom.  * By banning firearms magazines greater than 20 rounds, what is to stop further restrictions down to 15 rounds?  Or 10?  * When you start giving people free housing, free money, free food, then what is stopping you from giving them free education, healthcare, etc.?  It appears to me that one should acknowledge the potential long-term path certain policy decisions may end up taking.  Other concepts, like the Overton Window come into play, where one can push the limit of public policies until they become acceptable, are perfect examples of 'moving goalposts' in terms of policy reach and scope.  An example for this is: Today, the TSA is quite a common sight at airports and publicly acceptable (much to the chagrin of Reddit), which allows for the expansion of TSA presence into train and bus stations, further increasing the reach and scope of the organization.  Once this becomes commonplace, then the TSA will expand further and further.  As a freedom-loving human being, I think the utmost caution needs to be taken with any broad stroke public policy which deals with our healthcare, education, safety, and security.  Any increase in power and scope of Gov't authority needs to be weighed heavily and be difficult to accomplish.  --------------------- Thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"c6g5yi1","c_root_id_B":"c6g9kqm","created_at_utc_A":1349127464,"created_at_utc_B":1349143637,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"See also \"but what if the greater evil wins?\" Scare tactics, used by those scared of change.","human_ref_B":"Slipperly slope is frowned upon in FORMAL LOGIC, the mathematical side of the field.  People who are just smart enough to have some exposure to formal logic believe think formal logic is 100% applicable to policy decisions. I don't agree with that.  The problem is that Policy Decisions are more subjective than is allowed for in Formal Logic.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16173.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"oyrjw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Will we one day speak a common language? With human civilization growing more and more globalized and interconnected, will barriers between language eventually break down completely?    Would this new common language closely resemble English, or would it be something of a melting pot between many world languages?  Guesses as to how long the process will take?","c_root_id_A":"c3l6gvf","c_root_id_B":"c3l78om","created_at_utc_A":1327669723,"created_at_utc_B":1327676857,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Theoretical physicist (and all-around dreamy genius) Michio Kaku thinks we are just about there already with English.   He touches on it in this Youtube clip.","human_ref_B":"Linguist here. No, definitely not. Even if, by some weird coincidence, everyone woke up tomorrow only able to speak some standard variety of English, it wouldn't be long before regional dialects would begin to form. In time, the dialects would diverge to the point of not being mutually intelligible any longer, and they would be considered different languages.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7134.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"oyrjw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Will we one day speak a common language? With human civilization growing more and more globalized and interconnected, will barriers between language eventually break down completely?    Would this new common language closely resemble English, or would it be something of a melting pot between many world languages?  Guesses as to how long the process will take?","c_root_id_A":"c3l728b","c_root_id_B":"c3l78om","created_at_utc_A":1327675503,"created_at_utc_B":1327676857,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"No.   Language is too closely connected with national\/cultural roots, and you can't realistically expect a country (or its population) to abandon their linguistic roots for anything.  Take a look at something like Gaelic\/Low Scots\/Celtic\/Welsh\/Cornish\/Manx. Spoken by quite a minority of the population, yet for the Irish, the ethnically Irish in Northern Ireland and the Scots, it is a defining characteristic, more specifically being a \"Non-Englishman\". Maintaining, or even teaching, these languages makes no sense linguistically, because everyone you will likely encounter on a day-to-day basis will speak English. (Or something remniscent of English but just not quite for Glaswegian, Scousers and Geordies.)   Still, the languages are an inherent part of the culture, due to its Non-Englishness.  And the same goes for former colonies. English, French or Spanish tend to be the official (and administrative) languages in former colonies, yet the native languages are maintained, because of their Non-Colonialness. It is an inherent part of nationalism, simple as that.","human_ref_B":"Linguist here. No, definitely not. Even if, by some weird coincidence, everyone woke up tomorrow only able to speak some standard variety of English, it wouldn't be long before regional dialects would begin to form. In time, the dialects would diverge to the point of not being mutually intelligible any longer, and they would be considered different languages.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1354.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"oyrjw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Will we one day speak a common language? With human civilization growing more and more globalized and interconnected, will barriers between language eventually break down completely?    Would this new common language closely resemble English, or would it be something of a melting pot between many world languages?  Guesses as to how long the process will take?","c_root_id_A":"c3lipnz","c_root_id_B":"c3l728b","created_at_utc_A":1327765469,"created_at_utc_B":1327675503,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"On a related note, I made this map to display the distribution of the 6 UN languages. English in green, French in Red, Russian in blue, Spanish in yellow, Chinese in purple, Arabic in brown. The darker shades mean >50% of the population speaks the language as a mother tongue. The lighter shades mean >50% speak the language as either a mother tongue or foreign language. If there is a darker shade somewhere, the lighter shades are not shown.","human_ref_B":"No.   Language is too closely connected with national\/cultural roots, and you can't realistically expect a country (or its population) to abandon their linguistic roots for anything.  Take a look at something like Gaelic\/Low Scots\/Celtic\/Welsh\/Cornish\/Manx. Spoken by quite a minority of the population, yet for the Irish, the ethnically Irish in Northern Ireland and the Scots, it is a defining characteristic, more specifically being a \"Non-Englishman\". Maintaining, or even teaching, these languages makes no sense linguistically, because everyone you will likely encounter on a day-to-day basis will speak English. (Or something remniscent of English but just not quite for Glaswegian, Scousers and Geordies.)   Still, the languages are an inherent part of the culture, due to its Non-Englishness.  And the same goes for former colonies. English, French or Spanish tend to be the official (and administrative) languages in former colonies, yet the native languages are maintained, because of their Non-Colonialness. It is an inherent part of nationalism, simple as that.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":89966.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"ahqmhq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Are Durkheim theories about suicide outdated today? Hello, I'm a sociology student and I'm working on the basis of the subject. As a quick reminder, for Durkheim the causes of suicide are not based at all on climate, nor to race, heredity, mental health, or imitation, but they are based on social powers (religious, domestic and political environments). Are this theory still relevant today? Or scientific consensus is elsewhere?  Thank you for your answers.  Ps: Sorry for my bad english","c_root_id_A":"eeibmmx","c_root_id_B":"eej9z1d","created_at_utc_A":1547965009,"created_at_utc_B":1547995672,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'd be interested in reading some research that actually links social powers with mental health and its connection to suicide. Just straight off the bat it seems like that'd be an obvious connection but I don't really have any idea.  Anyone know of anything on the topic worth reading?","human_ref_B":"His ideas are still relevant. Here\u2019s a lecture from a Harvard sociologist who specializes in medical sociology.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":30663.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1ybqwv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Question: The Sociology of the Lost Space Colonies Sci-Fi in the '70's and early 80's. Okay, this is a bit hard to put into a title, and it requires a bit of an explanation. I'm not sure if this is the right subreddit to ask it in, but I figure that there must be some sociologists out there who have studied the 70's and early 80's and like sci-fi, so here goes:  Having grown up in the 1970's and early 80's, I was a big fan of sci-fi from that era. A few years ago, I started revisiting a lot of those old shows for nostalgia's sake, and I realized something: the 70's sci-fi shows (and early 80's) seemed to be absolutely full of this one particular theme: lost space colonies.  You know what I mean: people who are the descendants of lost space colonies, reverted into barbarism and\/or ignorance. Technology portrayed as something magical to them, having lost all references and records to where they came from or what technology actually is.  I've seen it in many episodes of Doctor Who during the 70's, series like Logan's Run, and many other shows (including the infamously bad \"The Starlost\"). And it wasn't just TV shows either, but books as well (such as Ben Bova's Exiles trilogy), as well as even one of the biggest and most well known AD&D modules of all time (S3: Expedition to the Barrier Peaks - which some thought ruined AD&D for a long time).  It just appears to have been a big running sci-fi theme for a few years and pretty much entrenched in the entire sci-fi genre of the time. But it has mostly since vanished as a major theme in sci-fi today (at least, it seems that it has).  I'm wondering: why is it that it was so big back then? What sociological events were around to make it something which people suddenly found absolutely fascinating? It obviously must have been a big hit of a theme, as it was repeated in many shows, books, series, movies and the like. I'm fully aware that it might have been some sort of combination of factors regarding the rejection of classical religious views and the popularization of more and more sci-fi stuff, but I can't imagine that this was the only reason of the success of this genre of sci-fi.  If I'm asking in the wrong place, please let me know. :) It just struck me last night as something which I really ought to find an answer to. Why? Just curiosity, I suppose.","c_root_id_A":"cfjkwkq","c_root_id_B":"cfjl39h","created_at_utc_A":1392847499,"created_at_utc_B":1392847852,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Not a sociologist but I'd lean towards it being a conceptual cousin to post-apocalyptic themes wherein the proliferation of technology backfires and either devastates all or some of civilization as it stands.  Within a colony the concept can be played out without undermining the rest of civilization. Edit: \"Because of the fears inherent in the cold war.\"","human_ref_B":"This is a tough question, but exciting! Thanks for asking it! And thanks to LeftoverNoodles for describing the 'Lost Colony' trope!  In the book Dark Horizons, the authors discuss in the first chapter about this very idea. In the chapter, there is a discussion about the qualities and development of a revival of new utopian thought in Science Fiction in the 70's:  >Against this dystopian tide, the oppositional political culture of the late 1960s and 1970s occasioned a revival of distinctly eutopiantheir spelling] writing, the first major revival since the end of the nineteenth century.The imaginative exploration of better, rather than worse, places found a new form in the \"Critical Utopia\".  This 'critical utopia' is the \"awareness of the limitations of the utopian tradition... rejecting utopia as a blueprint while preserving it as a dream\".  It is difficult to say why this method of writing would begin, but I believe one of the more prominent progenitors of 'critical utopia' in science fiction was the show *Star Trek* (1967). While it is difficult to assess the full impact of such a show, I think it goes without saying that the impact of *Star Trek* is far reaching in the science fiction community.  I would argue it is, also, an example of this idea of the 'critical utopia'. The show was a critique of the modern world, discussing gender, race, politics, war, etc. David Gerrold, a writer for the series, [stated:  >The stories are about twentieth century man's attitudes in a future universe. The stories are about us.  Of course, this is only one of many different science fiction pieces that would be influential to the post 60's science fiction community, so I wouldn't simply say \"Star Trek made Critical Utopia\". However, I would point that it is likely a very contributing factor.  I know others have also pointed to *Doctor Who* as a phenomenal influence in a similar vein, but I will leave that to someone more versed in that franchise (I have it on my Netflix queue, but I have other things in the way).  Returning to the trope, the 'Lost Colony' happens to provide for writers a specific function. It allows for the comparison and contrast of the a possible future with our more 'primitive' brethren. It permits a critique of who we are, who we were, and, more importantly, who we can be. It is a trope seeped in the concept of the 'Critical Utopia'.  However, this focus on a possible utopia wouldn't remain the case. Returning to Dark Horizons:  >In the 1980s, this utopian tendency came to an abrupt end. In the face of economic restructuring, right-wing politics, and a cultural milieu informed by an intensifying fundamentalism and commodification, sf writers revived and reformulated the dystopian genre.  However, it wasn't simply a return to previous dystopian forms. Constance Penley] (http:\/\/iafa.highpoint.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/03\/Penley-Time-Travel.pdf) describes the idea of the 'critical dystopia': Using a dystopic future, writers are able to develop a critique of a particular aspect of the current culture. The example Penley uses is *The Terminator* as a critique of, \"decisions about technology, warfare, and social behavior that are being made today\".  So we see that there has been, instead, an evolution of ideas. The idea of using SF to criticize specific aspects of our culture, demonstrating who we are and who we could be, is still alive and well. However, it is more likely, nowadays, to be used to describe what we can be if we continue down our current path: Destruction of the environment, Capitalist Oligarchies, super military-industrial complex, etc.  This doesn't mean the trope isn't in use. [TVTropes describes *Star Trek: Enterprise* as having an episode with this theme. I also want to finish by saying this is indeed a generalization, and at the individual level, things might look a bit different. These are models, not facts. There is a difference.  Thanks for the question! Hope I gave you at least a bit of an answer!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":353.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"bs0xj9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Is 'millenial' a relevant term for science? Do sociologists and other social scientists pay attention to the term 'millenial'? Do they think it's a thing? Do they even believe that 'generations' are a thing? Or it's just a marketing word to get clicks on social media?","c_root_id_A":"eoi7kfm","c_root_id_B":"eoi0zmu","created_at_utc_A":1558612731,"created_at_utc_B":1558606652,"score_A":20,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Hi- Sociologist here! There is a whole \u2018sociology of generations\u2019. The earliest and perhaps most prominent theorist here would be Karl Mannheim. Here is the wiki page for his work - https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Theory_of_generations  Centrally, historical and contemporary debates on generations centre on how we can understand them (how each generation is split up) and how people experience them.  In my field, we have been studying generations post- trauma I.e 9\/11 and deindustrialisation. How they are used to mark experiences I.e those who lived before and after the event.   Hope this is helpful as an intro and overview.","human_ref_B":"There isn't really such a thing as a 'generation' in any objective sense. As such, millennial is an equally scientifically vague term.  https:\/\/slate.com\/technology\/2018\/04\/the-evidence-behind-generations-is-lacking.html","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6079.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"bs0xj9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Is 'millenial' a relevant term for science? Do sociologists and other social scientists pay attention to the term 'millenial'? Do they think it's a thing? Do they even believe that 'generations' are a thing? Or it's just a marketing word to get clicks on social media?","c_root_id_A":"eoi0zmu","c_root_id_B":"eoiudic","created_at_utc_A":1558606652,"created_at_utc_B":1558627494,"score_A":8,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"There isn't really such a thing as a 'generation' in any objective sense. As such, millennial is an equally scientifically vague term.  https:\/\/slate.com\/technology\/2018\/04\/the-evidence-behind-generations-is-lacking.html","human_ref_B":"There *are* social scientists who make use of generational theory and terms such as 'millennials' or 'generation x'. *However*, I would suggest that \/u\/Tnznn  is correct and would not suggest that these represent the majority of social scientists, especially if one accounts for the fact these are mostly Americentric concepts and that European social scientists use it even less than Americans. In any case, there are criticisms which I would argue are warranted, at least for the idea that the label can be used meaningfully beyond a *descriptor* of \"people born in these and these years\".  ---  For example, if we measure the attitudes, behaviors and other characteristics of Americans who are supposed to represent millennials, and measure the same qualities among people born in the same years in Europe, there are noteworthy differences. See for example what the Pew Research Center found (who are Europe's millennials? and U.S. and European Millennials differ on their views of fate, future).  To account for these differences, rather than to refer to 'generation', it would be more appropriate and useful to make distinctions based on, for example, age, culture, SES, etc. The heart of the issue is that the concept of 'generations' is both over generalizing and reductive. Furthermore, the contours of a generation can be murky and arbitrary: can it be affirmed that there is a substantial difference between being born *1980* and *1981*? Is there a difference whether you experienced 9\/11 at age 21 rather than at age 22?  ---  Now, the concept of ***cohorts*** exists, is meaningful and is frequently used in scientific research. Quoting Ryder:  >**A cohort may be defined as the aggregate of individuals (within some population definition) who experienced the same event within the same time interval.** In almost all cohort research to date the defining event has been birth, but this is only a special case of the more general approach.   It *is* recognized that it is important to take into account history and that people born in different years are affected by macro-level (historical) events such as, say, the Vietnam War or the War on Terror to understand attitudes, beliefs, ideologies and to interpret data. But the notion that *generations* allow to validly and reliably capture the differences between groups of people is debatable.   ---  For example, Trzesniewski and Donnellan analyzed data of a nationally representative sample of \"high-school seniors from the mid-1970s to the mid-2000s\":  >In general, **we found little reason to conclude that the average member of Generation Me is dramatically different from members of previous generations. Today\u2019s youth seem to be no more egotistical than previous generations, and they appear to be just as happy and satisfied as previous generations.** In fact, today\u2019s youth seem to have psychological profiles that are remarkably similar to youth from the past 30 years. However, we did find that more recent generations have higher expectations for their educational careers and are more cynical and distrusting than previous generations. Nonetheless, using the MTF data sets, **we found little evidence to support deep concerns about the current generation of youth, especially in terms of their feelings of self-worth, egotism, and rates of misery** (see also Trzesniewski et al., 2008a).  >All in all, these other findings along with the present results from the MTF data set converge to paint a much less dramatic picture of cohort-linked changes over the last 30 years. **As such, we have tentatively concluded that concerns over the characteristics of Generation Me may not be well founded. In sum, our analyses using the MTF study cast considerable doubt on the idea that there is anything singular about the generation born in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, especially in light of the considerable amount of within-cohort variability.**  Another example is provided by Costanza et al.'s meta-analysis of \"research on generational differences in work-related attitudes\":  >**The results of the meta-analysis generally do not support the notion that there are systematic, substantive differences among generations in work-related outcomes.**  >Overall, we found **little support for differences between groups of individuals based on generational membership**. Comparing the results obtained from the present meta-analysis and those of related primary studies and meta-analytic efforts supports this conclusion. Further, **the results for studies using generations and those using age were very similar, suggesting that chronological age, or some other variable, is likely responsible for the small effects that were observed.**   The point is that it is necessary to look at more than just an age cohort, by taking into account also other characteristics (culture, gender, SES, ...). As Ryder stated, the cohort is an aggregate of individuals \"within some population definition\".  ---  Coming back to Ryder, he had some strong criticism towards generationism:  >Many writers have used the succession of cohorts as the foundation for theories of sociocultural dynamics. This approach has been aptly labelled \"generationism,\" because the **writers mistakenly transfer from the generation to the cohort a set of inappropriate associations**. Some generationists maintain that there is a periodicity to sociocultural change caused by the biological fact of the succession of generations at thirty-year (father-son) intervals. There is no such periodicity. Other generationists develop a conflict theory of change, pitched on the opposition between the younger and the older \"generations\" in society, as in the family. But a society reproduces itself continuously. The age gap between father and son disappears in the population at large, through the comprehensive overlapping of life cycles. The fact that social change produces intercohort differentiation and thus contributes to intergenerational conflict cannot justify a theory that social change is produced by that conflict. **Generationists have leaped from inaccurate demographic observation to inaccurate social conclusion without supplying any intervening causality**. All these works suggest arithmetical mysticism, and the worst of them, as Troeltsch said, are \"reine Kabbala.\"   The aforementioned Costanza wrote a Slate article with several criticisms that can be levied towards the concept of generation, both methodological and empirical.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20842.0,"score_ratio":2.125}
{"post_id":"4fvvg7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What is the most interesting theory on how people interact? I appreciate the broadness and perceptiveness of the nature of the question, but I am curious as to what the \/r\/AskSocialScience community think in their own opinion.  Specifically, potentially relating to either what separates \"man\" from \"animal\", or even the opposite end of the spectrum which can potentially show the inherent natural\/elemental facets of how people interact (as either individuals or collectives) on a very instinctual level i.e. we are not so different from other living things of the animal kingdom.  I am basically looking to expand my exposure to social theories on how individuals and collectives interact, and am looking forward to hearing your thoughts!","c_root_id_A":"d2d74v3","c_root_id_B":"d2d6gqs","created_at_utc_A":1461341339,"created_at_utc_B":1461340429,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If there's an important lesson to be learned about what social science tells us about how people interact it's that there is no monolithic theory. How people will interact depends on either A) the people, B) the situation, or C) both... depending on who you ask.   Advocates of the Personality Trait approach argue that you have to look to the personalities of the individuals to understand how they will interact. Advocates of the Situationist approach argue that you have to look to what the situation demands of the individuals to understand how they will interact. And finally, advocates of the Interactionist approach argue that both personality and situation *interact* to determine the outcome.  In any case, your question is difficult to answer without more information.   **Who are the people?**  **What is the situation?**  If you ask me, the \"most interesting\" theories are often ones that overclaim and are most likely to be wrong. They're very interesting, but not very useful.  --- https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Person%E2%80%93situation_debate  http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0092656605000541","human_ref_B":"Last one I'll do- Expectation states theory should be mentioned here just due to how thoroughly it has been studied. There are different levels of status within society. For example, being a CEO has more status than being a janitor. Being black has lower status than being white. Being female has lower status than being male. Being ugly has lower status than being good-looking. Etc, etc.... The first thing we do when we interact with someone is to figure out who we are interacting with. Based on who I am interacting with, my behavior will change. Hence, I interact differently with a man than I do a woman.   Expectation states looks at how people will interact in group settings (2-20 people) when they have a group task. What the theory has overwhelmingly found is that within these groups, there is a power structure that always forms and is very hard to change the structure once it has formed. For example, the 1st person in the power structure typically controls around 40% of the speaking time, even if there are 20 people in the group. People typically look at and communicate to the 1st person when they are speaking as well. People at the bottom of the structure tend to barely speak.  When a group of individuals first meet, all the status characteristics that people have- like their race, gender, how they talk, what they are wearing- become salient. The power structure typically forms almost immediately. The only times it doesn't is when two individuals have similar status characteristics and then there is a \"battle\" over a position in the structure that is resolved within a few minutes based on what the group thinks of their performances. People are aware of their position within the structure and act accordingly.  Hence, depending on the status characteristics of the group, the same person could be number 1 or number 20. These findings are particularly important because this is exactly how juries interact. This is also the reason why men are overwhelming the foremen and have the most influence within the juries.  Edit: a source","labels":1,"seconds_difference":910.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1c5l11","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"[Psychology] tip-of-my-tongue: What's that hypothesis called where a person's name determines personality traits? I came across this hypothesis online a while ago but forgot the name. Sounds like pseudoscience to me but I'd like to do more research on it. Can anyone tell me the name please?","c_root_id_A":"c9dc9ju","c_root_id_B":"c9d989e","created_at_utc_A":1365719152,"created_at_utc_B":1365711396,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I think you're after [nomative determinism] (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Nominative_determinism), or [aptronym] (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Aptronym). Note they are considered different phenomena, where as in nomative determinism, it is believed that a name can affect the career path. In contrast, an aptronym is simply a profession suited to the person's name. Nomative determinism as you suggest is believed to be hokum, although it was once seriously considered.  Edit: I misread the question and was thinking of career rather than personality. Regardless, nomative determinism and aptronyms consider character as well as profession.","human_ref_B":"It isn't that a person's name determines their personality.  Rather, it's that researchers notice some odd correlations. Not huge ones, but statistically significant ones. Like people whose first name begins with the letter 'D' are significantly more likely to become dentists.  It's called the name-letter effect.  The only real explanation for it is that people are drawn to what they like - and people like what is familiar to them, including things like alphabetical letters (and peoples' initials are likely going to stick out the most\/have the most meaning). While most people don't *consciously* have \"favorite letters,\" they'll often explicitly state having a \"favorite\" number.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7756.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd2x2ic","c_root_id_B":"cd2vpu7","created_at_utc_A":1383143958,"created_at_utc_B":1383139940,"score_A":14,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Basic regression modelling start with OLS regression, which is the starting point of a lot statistical analysis in the social sciences. Get comfortable with this technique and its assumptions (e.g. what are the consequences of them breaking down). Learn a statistical software package and practice the methods on various datasets. For instance, UCLA has some great data analysis examples using different software packages where you can easily download the data and work through the examples yourself.  Just so you know ahead: If you at some point wish to gain a deeper understanding of the estimation techniques you are using, you can't get around math. And when I say math, I mean a decent understanding of multivariate calculus and linear algebra.","human_ref_B":"I do mostly finance\/accounting research. For 95% of my research, its t-tests and multivariate regression. Everything after that (robust standard errors, bootstrapping, IV, SEM, etc) are one-off methods of analysis that I use as needed based on specific data issues that arise.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4018.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd2w6jw","c_root_id_B":"cd2x2ic","created_at_utc_A":1383141421,"created_at_utc_B":1383143958,"score_A":6,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"multivariate regressions, fit,  t-tests and most importantly the coefficients. People look for p-values too much because they want to find some relationship and not realize that the coefficients tell what the relationship is!","human_ref_B":"Basic regression modelling start with OLS regression, which is the starting point of a lot statistical analysis in the social sciences. Get comfortable with this technique and its assumptions (e.g. what are the consequences of them breaking down). Learn a statistical software package and practice the methods on various datasets. For instance, UCLA has some great data analysis examples using different software packages where you can easily download the data and work through the examples yourself.  Just so you know ahead: If you at some point wish to gain a deeper understanding of the estimation techniques you are using, you can't get around math. And when I say math, I mean a decent understanding of multivariate calculus and linear algebra.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2537.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd2xb9d","c_root_id_B":"cd2vpu7","created_at_utc_A":1383144602,"created_at_utc_B":1383139940,"score_A":8,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Econometrician here.  Spend your time understanding where ols goes wrong, and what the techniques are when it goes wrong  It is well worth spending time understanding the assumptions of the modeling technique are, rather than other factors.    Know the assumptions","human_ref_B":"I do mostly finance\/accounting research. For 95% of my research, its t-tests and multivariate regression. Everything after that (robust standard errors, bootstrapping, IV, SEM, etc) are one-off methods of analysis that I use as needed based on specific data issues that arise.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4662.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd2w6jw","c_root_id_B":"cd2xb9d","created_at_utc_A":1383141421,"created_at_utc_B":1383144602,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"multivariate regressions, fit,  t-tests and most importantly the coefficients. People look for p-values too much because they want to find some relationship and not realize that the coefficients tell what the relationship is!","human_ref_B":"Econometrician here.  Spend your time understanding where ols goes wrong, and what the techniques are when it goes wrong  It is well worth spending time understanding the assumptions of the modeling technique are, rather than other factors.    Know the assumptions","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3181.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd2xb9d","c_root_id_B":"cd2x9tt","created_at_utc_A":1383144602,"created_at_utc_B":1383144497,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Econometrician here.  Spend your time understanding where ols goes wrong, and what the techniques are when it goes wrong  It is well worth spending time understanding the assumptions of the modeling technique are, rather than other factors.    Know the assumptions","human_ref_B":"Well, I'm going to go ahead and assume you've got a solid statistical background.  If you don't, then I would definitely brush up on the basic statistical concepts, then go into learning the basics of linear regressions.  Learning what parameters, residuals, variances, and standard errors (and the difference between standard deviations and standard errors) will help you have a basic grasp of econometrics.  Further, knowing how to compile a data set in a csv or excel file is crucial as well, and knowing how to import that file into Stata and learning how to using the sum and reg functions on Stata.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":105.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd2vpu7","c_root_id_B":"cd31tae","created_at_utc_A":1383139940,"created_at_utc_B":1383155481,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I do mostly finance\/accounting research. For 95% of my research, its t-tests and multivariate regression. Everything after that (robust standard errors, bootstrapping, IV, SEM, etc) are one-off methods of analysis that I use as needed based on specific data issues that arise.","human_ref_B":"Time-series econometrician here. Agreeing with everyone else that   ### OLS  is your bread and butter. Everything else in econometrics is properly described as \"what to do when OLS won't work.\"  That said, one more bit of encouragement. Behind OLS, you need to have a good understanding of probability. The most important concepts in probability boil down to  * Expectation * Covariance * the Law of Large Numbers * the Central Limit Theorem  Basically, the skill \"econometrics\" rests on top of the skill \"probability.\" If you want to learn 'metrics in 20 hours, you need to first learn probability in 20 hours. Math's sequential like that.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15541.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd2w6jw","c_root_id_B":"cd31tae","created_at_utc_A":1383141421,"created_at_utc_B":1383155481,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"multivariate regressions, fit,  t-tests and most importantly the coefficients. People look for p-values too much because they want to find some relationship and not realize that the coefficients tell what the relationship is!","human_ref_B":"Time-series econometrician here. Agreeing with everyone else that   ### OLS  is your bread and butter. Everything else in econometrics is properly described as \"what to do when OLS won't work.\"  That said, one more bit of encouragement. Behind OLS, you need to have a good understanding of probability. The most important concepts in probability boil down to  * Expectation * Covariance * the Law of Large Numbers * the Central Limit Theorem  Basically, the skill \"econometrics\" rests on top of the skill \"probability.\" If you want to learn 'metrics in 20 hours, you need to first learn probability in 20 hours. Math's sequential like that.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14060.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd2xock","c_root_id_B":"cd31tae","created_at_utc_A":1383145547,"created_at_utc_B":1383155481,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"As others have mentioned, linear regression and t-tests are the work horses of econometrics. However, before you get started with anything specific like that, I think you'd be better off getting a thorough understanding of what p-values actually mean. A lot of econometrics boils down to people wanting p-values, and everyone can understand that p < 0.05 is generally accepted to be \"significant,\" but if we don't know what a p-value really means, we can't appreciate the significance of significance.   Here's the first sentence of the Wikipedia article for p-values:  > In statistical significance testing, the p-values are the probability of obtaining a test statistic at least as extreme as the one that was actually observed, assuming that the null hypothesis is true.  Until you understand all the terminology in that sentence and have a good mental picture of what it means, t-tests and regressions aren't really meaningful.  It's also worth mentioning, though, that p-values should not be the be-all and end-all of econometric analysis (I bring up p-values as important because they give good insight into what econometrics does). People tend to obsess over p-values and the minute assumptions of models, but the most important thing when doing econometric analysis is big picture stuff. Check out what Andrew Gelman has to say (source):  > Validity. Most importantly, the data you are analyzing should map to the research question you are trying to answer. This sounds obvious but is often overlooked or ignored because it can be inconvenient...  Once you've gotten a decent hold on the basics, check out this classic text: http:\/\/www.international.ucla.edu\/media\/files\/Leamer_article.pdf. It's called \"Let's take the Con out of Econometrics\", and everyone I know who has ever taken a class in econometrics has read it at least once.","human_ref_B":"Time-series econometrician here. Agreeing with everyone else that   ### OLS  is your bread and butter. Everything else in econometrics is properly described as \"what to do when OLS won't work.\"  That said, one more bit of encouragement. Behind OLS, you need to have a good understanding of probability. The most important concepts in probability boil down to  * Expectation * Covariance * the Law of Large Numbers * the Central Limit Theorem  Basically, the skill \"econometrics\" rests on top of the skill \"probability.\" If you want to learn 'metrics in 20 hours, you need to first learn probability in 20 hours. Math's sequential like that.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9934.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd2x9tt","c_root_id_B":"cd31tae","created_at_utc_A":1383144497,"created_at_utc_B":1383155481,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Well, I'm going to go ahead and assume you've got a solid statistical background.  If you don't, then I would definitely brush up on the basic statistical concepts, then go into learning the basics of linear regressions.  Learning what parameters, residuals, variances, and standard errors (and the difference between standard deviations and standard errors) will help you have a basic grasp of econometrics.  Further, knowing how to compile a data set in a csv or excel file is crucial as well, and knowing how to import that file into Stata and learning how to using the sum and reg functions on Stata.","human_ref_B":"Time-series econometrician here. Agreeing with everyone else that   ### OLS  is your bread and butter. Everything else in econometrics is properly described as \"what to do when OLS won't work.\"  That said, one more bit of encouragement. Behind OLS, you need to have a good understanding of probability. The most important concepts in probability boil down to  * Expectation * Covariance * the Law of Large Numbers * the Central Limit Theorem  Basically, the skill \"econometrics\" rests on top of the skill \"probability.\" If you want to learn 'metrics in 20 hours, you need to first learn probability in 20 hours. Math's sequential like that.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10984.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd2x9tt","c_root_id_B":"cd2xock","created_at_utc_A":1383144497,"created_at_utc_B":1383145547,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Well, I'm going to go ahead and assume you've got a solid statistical background.  If you don't, then I would definitely brush up on the basic statistical concepts, then go into learning the basics of linear regressions.  Learning what parameters, residuals, variances, and standard errors (and the difference between standard deviations and standard errors) will help you have a basic grasp of econometrics.  Further, knowing how to compile a data set in a csv or excel file is crucial as well, and knowing how to import that file into Stata and learning how to using the sum and reg functions on Stata.","human_ref_B":"As others have mentioned, linear regression and t-tests are the work horses of econometrics. However, before you get started with anything specific like that, I think you'd be better off getting a thorough understanding of what p-values actually mean. A lot of econometrics boils down to people wanting p-values, and everyone can understand that p < 0.05 is generally accepted to be \"significant,\" but if we don't know what a p-value really means, we can't appreciate the significance of significance.   Here's the first sentence of the Wikipedia article for p-values:  > In statistical significance testing, the p-values are the probability of obtaining a test statistic at least as extreme as the one that was actually observed, assuming that the null hypothesis is true.  Until you understand all the terminology in that sentence and have a good mental picture of what it means, t-tests and regressions aren't really meaningful.  It's also worth mentioning, though, that p-values should not be the be-all and end-all of econometric analysis (I bring up p-values as important because they give good insight into what econometrics does). People tend to obsess over p-values and the minute assumptions of models, but the most important thing when doing econometric analysis is big picture stuff. Check out what Andrew Gelman has to say (source):  > Validity. Most importantly, the data you are analyzing should map to the research question you are trying to answer. This sounds obvious but is often overlooked or ignored because it can be inconvenient...  Once you've gotten a decent hold on the basics, check out this classic text: http:\/\/www.international.ucla.edu\/media\/files\/Leamer_article.pdf. It's called \"Let's take the Con out of Econometrics\", and everyone I know who has ever taken a class in econometrics has read it at least once.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1050.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1pjbl3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the most important, commonly used, skills to learn and practice first in Econometrics? Inspired by the post on how to learn anything in 20 hours, I thought it would be great to start getting up to speed on econometrics (I'm not expecting to be finished in 20 hours!).  Subby summarised the first step in rapid learning as:  *\"Deconstruct the skill: Break down the parts and find the most important things to practice first. If you were learning to play a musical instrument, for example, knowing just a few chords gives you access to tons of songs. If you want to learn a new language, learn the most common 2,000 words and you'll have 80% text coverage.\"*  What are some of the things in econometrics that I should learn that I can use all the time when analysing data?  Thanks!  PS.  This is the post on rapid learning: http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/DecidingToBeBetter\/comments\/1pggbd\/how_to_acquire_any_new_skill_in_20_hours_or_less\/cd238q5","c_root_id_A":"cd35zme","c_root_id_B":"cd2x9tt","created_at_utc_A":1383164936,"created_at_utc_B":1383144497,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Other people have given you skills, but if you want data to play with, you can download the General Social Social Survey right now for STATA or SPSS, and test for all sorts of things.  (If you don't know what the GSS is, learn about it from the University of Chicago here or Wiki here).  I like it because, since it's all people, it's often quite intuitive what you have to control for (which is basically where you start with OLS).  If I want to know about how being white or a minority affects of education on attitudes towards evolution, first thing you'll do is just find the variables.   Then check that they're coded correctly (scales start at zero, education is continuous enough). Then find the correlation between the two.  Then start controlling for things, gender is an obvious one (make sure one of the values is set to zero-may and remember which one it is), religion (RELTRAD is a nonminal variable so dummy it), race (here you have to make some coding choices, likely, but again remember to dummy it out).  Now you have to decide, education is already in your model, do you want to control for income?  Probably not, because you'd need a theory why it would matter.   But hey, maybe you want to control for father's SES or something like that.  But you might want to think a little bit about peer influence, and so you add region (which isn't a very fine level of peer influence), or as it's normally done, you just make a dummy variable for the South.  What about age, do you think age has an affect?  Should you include that in your model?  You have to make these decisions.  Now you realize that you're using all the data (1972-2012), do you want to control for year, or do you assume that the effects are equal across?  Etc.  And we haven't even gotten to interactions yet.  The point is, just starting with a question and thinking \"Shit, what could affect this relationship?  What data do I have to control for this relationship?\" is one of the great things about learning stats with the GSS just because it has *so many variables*.  One note: pay attention to what years you have the variable for, as some questions were only asked once, or every ten years, or whatever.  Watch things like sample size, figure out about cleaning and recoding data, etc.  The stuff you have to do before you can even do OLS.","human_ref_B":"Well, I'm going to go ahead and assume you've got a solid statistical background.  If you don't, then I would definitely brush up on the basic statistical concepts, then go into learning the basics of linear regressions.  Learning what parameters, residuals, variances, and standard errors (and the difference between standard deviations and standard errors) will help you have a basic grasp of econometrics.  Further, knowing how to compile a data set in a csv or excel file is crucial as well, and knowing how to import that file into Stata and learning how to using the sum and reg functions on Stata.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20439.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"lpp6i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is there a subreddit where we can post study opportunities (i.e. recruiting subjects for online surveys, with or without compensation for participating)?","c_root_id_A":"c2uq1vi","c_root_id_B":"c2urhfs","created_at_utc_A":1319667376,"created_at_utc_B":1319677509,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"That could be really helpful for student researchers. Something like r\/researchhelp or something. A built in survey group.","human_ref_B":"\/r\/beermoney loves doing surveys for money.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10133.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"178l5p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Psychology] Why do people talk to themselves?","c_root_id_A":"c83bo38","c_root_id_B":"c83qebx","created_at_utc_A":1359116774,"created_at_utc_B":1359167293,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I talk myself through hypothetical conversations all day long. I do it out loud, complete with gestures and expressions, if there's nobody around.  It's how I keep myself company.","human_ref_B":"I found a really great article delving into why we talk to ourselves: http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/1988\/02\/04\/us\/health-psychology-thearapists-see-need-for-security-blanket-throughout-life.html?src=pm Personally, I practice arguments when I'm upset about something or recite my grocery list to help remember it...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":50519.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"192ofb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some schools with good Middle Eastern Studies\/Politics grad programs? I'm just finishing up my undergrad in political science and I'm looking to do a grad degree afterwards. My focus was international relations, and within that I've always been very interested in two areas: Russian\/former Soviet\/European politics and Middle Eastern politics. I've applied to some good grad programs for the former, but haven't really found too much for the latter. I'm Canadian, but I'm open to applying just about anywhere (I've studied\/worked in Europe and would love to do a masters there). What suggestions do you have?","c_root_id_A":"c8k8vfl","c_root_id_B":"c8kaggw","created_at_utc_A":1361618366,"created_at_utc_B":1361632213,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"In the UK - Kings, LSE, School of Oriental African Studies, Exeter, Durham and Edinburgh - aside for Oxford and Cambridge, of course.","human_ref_B":"i think \/u\/sleepsucks is being a little harsh, but to get into a really good school you should be familiar with the major researchers in that field and be able to discuss the most important questions in the field in your statement. Where the biggest concentration of top researchers are, you'll usually find the best programs.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13847.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"192ofb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some schools with good Middle Eastern Studies\/Politics grad programs? I'm just finishing up my undergrad in political science and I'm looking to do a grad degree afterwards. My focus was international relations, and within that I've always been very interested in two areas: Russian\/former Soviet\/European politics and Middle Eastern politics. I've applied to some good grad programs for the former, but haven't really found too much for the latter. I'm Canadian, but I'm open to applying just about anywhere (I've studied\/worked in Europe and would love to do a masters there). What suggestions do you have?","c_root_id_A":"c8k9oj8","c_root_id_B":"c8kaggw","created_at_utc_A":1361626924,"created_at_utc_B":1361632213,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"If you can't find the answer to this through more appropriate means, you probably shouldn't be in grad school.","human_ref_B":"i think \/u\/sleepsucks is being a little harsh, but to get into a really good school you should be familiar with the major researchers in that field and be able to discuss the most important questions in the field in your statement. Where the biggest concentration of top researchers are, you'll usually find the best programs.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5289.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"192ofb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some schools with good Middle Eastern Studies\/Politics grad programs? I'm just finishing up my undergrad in political science and I'm looking to do a grad degree afterwards. My focus was international relations, and within that I've always been very interested in two areas: Russian\/former Soviet\/European politics and Middle Eastern politics. I've applied to some good grad programs for the former, but haven't really found too much for the latter. I'm Canadian, but I'm open to applying just about anywhere (I've studied\/worked in Europe and would love to do a masters there). What suggestions do you have?","c_root_id_A":"c8ka5ck","c_root_id_B":"c8kaggw","created_at_utc_A":1361630365,"created_at_utc_B":1361632213,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"IMHO The Middle East Centre which is attached to St Antony's College, Oxford is the best place to base yourself as a post-grad for Middle Eastern Studies.  Fantastic resources.","human_ref_B":"i think \/u\/sleepsucks is being a little harsh, but to get into a really good school you should be familiar with the major researchers in that field and be able to discuss the most important questions in the field in your statement. Where the biggest concentration of top researchers are, you'll usually find the best programs.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1848.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"192ofb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What are some schools with good Middle Eastern Studies\/Politics grad programs? I'm just finishing up my undergrad in political science and I'm looking to do a grad degree afterwards. My focus was international relations, and within that I've always been very interested in two areas: Russian\/former Soviet\/European politics and Middle Eastern politics. I've applied to some good grad programs for the former, but haven't really found too much for the latter. I'm Canadian, but I'm open to applying just about anywhere (I've studied\/worked in Europe and would love to do a masters there). What suggestions do you have?","c_root_id_A":"c8k9oj8","c_root_id_B":"c8k8vfl","created_at_utc_A":1361626924,"created_at_utc_B":1361618366,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If you can't find the answer to this through more appropriate means, you probably shouldn't be in grad school.","human_ref_B":"In the UK - Kings, LSE, School of Oriental African Studies, Exeter, Durham and Edinburgh - aside for Oxford and Cambridge, of course.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8558.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1p58s4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is there a difference between competition and the economic bubble? (Craft beer bubble) What I'm trying to get at. Is the craft beer a potential bubble? It is inevitable, that the industry cannot sustain all the breweries that are operating and planning, because at the end of the day, resources are scarce and there is only so many styles of beer that can be successfully made. If I go into a store, and I see a pale ale for $9.99 for a reputable brewery and then essentially the same beer from a new brewery, I'd rather spend my money on the one I'm familiar with. This would be ok in moderation, but there are over 2,000 breweries in operation and over 1,500 planned. There just isn't time\/money to try them all.  I hope I worded this right as to what I'm trying to ask haha.  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"ccyvvxf","c_root_id_B":"ccyvdqh","created_at_utc_A":1382647106,"created_at_utc_B":1382645896,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It's important to realize the concept of a 'bubble' in itself is an open question. The idea of an overpriced asset as a bubble is commonly used in politics and journalism, and it may seem like common sense (especially in hindsight of market crashes). But it makes a big claim, that there exists a value of an asset beyond willingness-to-pay upon which we can say that it is 'over' valued. In other words, it says that there exists some real value of an asset, rather than saying its value is dynamic and derived simply from the willingness to pay and ability to supply that is captured in supply and demand.   If value is people are willing to pay for something, how can something ever be 'overvalued'? Rather, we can simply say that value is flexible and will change given people's preferences and the information they have. In assets whose value is based on future events (e.g. investments), it's a little less clear and maybe we can say bubbles exist when those who demand something do so beyond reasonable expectations. But that just isn't the case with craft beers, whose value is very much derived from immediate preferences.   What you're really interested in is more a question of market saturation and the mechanism of equilibrium (i.e. the point where the marginal costs of firms become too high given the diminishing willingness of customers' to pay for new craft beers).","human_ref_B":"A \"bubble\" is economic jargon for an overpriced asset.  Housing bubble, dotcom bubble - all were (in hindsight) mispriced too high and came crashing down.  So by definition, your liquor store shelves are not a bubble because of the extreme competition.  What is more likely happening is a \"rate war\" which is a race to the bottom as more competitors compete for the same slice of the pie.  This happened recently with books and was accelerated by amazon (Borders bankruptcy).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1210.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"10t8x4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Is American society a culture in decline, or is there just a wide rift in values between the old and the young?","c_root_id_A":"c6gl32l","c_root_id_B":"c6gh483","created_at_utc_A":1349203854,"created_at_utc_B":1349190068,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Culture is not in decline, it's dificult to define what a decline in culture is anyway. But you are right to assume the values are different between generations, and while it's true that some old people will complain about younger generations simply for acting as such, we have to understand that the social and political landscape were vastly different 40 or 50 years ago and that has an impact on what values people consider important to keep society and culture from \"declining\".","human_ref_B":"Frank Rich published an article with *The New Yorker* on the idea of American decline earlier this year. I think you would be interested. \"Mayberry R.I.P.\"","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13786.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"ljy12","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Has there ever been a true communist country?  Drawing only on first year sociology it my understanding that Communism is something that would spontaneously emerge after the proleteriat would overthrow the ruling elite and a free society would follow. No class divisions or government would exist and we would live in some sort of utopian society.  Looking at what a called communist counries (Soviet Russia, China, Cuba, Vietnam etc.) I see what looks like an authoritarian regime ruled by an elite ruling party. Isn't that the exact thing that communism is said to replace? I dont really get it. Maybe this should be under EL5, but thats just splitting hairs if you ask me","c_root_id_A":"c2ta8ut","c_root_id_B":"c2tcf72","created_at_utc_A":1319208468,"created_at_utc_B":1319222748,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"In real communism people are free, but that wasn't the case in Soviet Russia and etc... In all these countries communism was forced, it didn't appear spontaneously as you say.   Maybe Yugoslavia was close? They had a pretty good standard of living and fell apart because of nationalism.  I have read online that some say that Sweden is a type of communist country, but maybe that is exaggeration.","human_ref_B":"Not in the true sense. If you read what Marx wrote his hopes seemed quite high that the Paris Commune was on the right track, but that was unfortunately crushed. In the real world, no, we've never had anything except really appalling attempts that I'm certain Marx would be repulsed by.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14280.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"ljy12","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Has there ever been a true communist country?  Drawing only on first year sociology it my understanding that Communism is something that would spontaneously emerge after the proleteriat would overthrow the ruling elite and a free society would follow. No class divisions or government would exist and we would live in some sort of utopian society.  Looking at what a called communist counries (Soviet Russia, China, Cuba, Vietnam etc.) I see what looks like an authoritarian regime ruled by an elite ruling party. Isn't that the exact thing that communism is said to replace? I dont really get it. Maybe this should be under EL5, but thats just splitting hairs if you ask me","c_root_id_A":"c2tcf72","c_root_id_B":"c2takag","created_at_utc_A":1319222748,"created_at_utc_B":1319210811,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Not in the true sense. If you read what Marx wrote his hopes seemed quite high that the Paris Commune was on the right track, but that was unfortunately crushed. In the real world, no, we've never had anything except really appalling attempts that I'm certain Marx would be repulsed by.","human_ref_B":"If you look at what actually happened during the various 'revolutions' in those countries, they are not really what Marx had in mind. It was supposed to be a mass overthrow. Lenin's 1917 revolution to overthrown Kerensky (the Czar's democratic successor) was done  with only about 100 people. The years that followed that were unbearably brutal and strange perversions of Marxist ideas.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11937.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"a68h5x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Are older voters more conservative than younger voters primarily because of cohort effects or age effects? We know that older people tend to embrace conservative ideals and vote for conservative parties more than younger people. The question is, is this mostly an age effect or mostly a generational effect? To put it another way, are the young voters of today further left than the young voters of the past were? If so, is this to a greater extent than these current voters will be more conservative when they get older?","c_root_id_A":"ebtfljq","c_root_id_B":"ebsz0qt","created_at_utc_A":1544839205,"created_at_utc_B":1544823726,"score_A":31,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I'm going to try rephrasing your question to make sure I undersand it. Are you asking if older voters actually change their beliefs as they get older to become more conservative relative to their younger selves, or do they stay static while younger generations get progressively more liberal?","human_ref_B":"this paper was discussed here and here recently.  it makes the argument for age effects.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15479.0,"score_ratio":3.1}
{"post_id":"2a53m2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"WRT the people gave money to the guy's potato salad Kickstarter after seeing his story on the news and how he had far exceeded his target; what motivated them to still donate to him as opposed to another cause at that point?","c_root_id_A":"ciro91s","c_root_id_B":"cirpdu2","created_at_utc_A":1404836113,"created_at_utc_B":1404838250,"score_A":12,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Seems like a pretty good example of The Bandwagon Effect.","human_ref_B":"You can go to the comments and see what people who contributed are saying: https:\/\/www.kickstarter.com\/projects\/324283889\/potato-salad\/comments  A significant % of people are saying they're backing it for irony or because they think it's funny. For example:  > Donating the extra money to charity would be nice but that's not why I backed this project. I'm backing because I thought it was a hilarious joke and I wanted to be in on it. I don't care if he gives the excess to charity, sends himself to school or throws a massive party. I'm happy as long as he pulls the joke off in style","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2137.0,"score_ratio":1.0833333333}
{"post_id":"9l4k7f","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Do animals have ritual, or is ritual a specifically human phenomenon?","c_root_id_A":"e7437p6","c_root_id_B":"e741wkg","created_at_utc_A":1538600025,"created_at_utc_B":1538598982,"score_A":28,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"The answer really depends on how strictly\/arbitrarily you want to restrict the word \"ritual.\"   Broadly many social\/mammalian animals have behaviors around funerals\/death rights: Elephants, Chimpanzees, and Canines are a few examples.   Now is this behavior taught generation to generation? Is that required? I have no idea.","human_ref_B":"Bees Dance","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1043.0,"score_ratio":4.6666666667}
{"post_id":"9l4k7f","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Do animals have ritual, or is ritual a specifically human phenomenon?","c_root_id_A":"e748fmt","c_root_id_B":"e741wkg","created_at_utc_A":1538604499,"created_at_utc_B":1538598982,"score_A":15,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"It might not be your go-to definition of 'ritual,' but in terms of \"doing something that holds no biological value,\" the psychologist B.F. Skinner was able to induce superstitions in pigeons.   https:\/\/psychclassics.yorku.ca\/Skinner\/Pigeon\/","human_ref_B":"Bees Dance","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5517.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"9l4k7f","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Do animals have ritual, or is ritual a specifically human phenomenon?","c_root_id_A":"e741wkg","c_root_id_B":"e74b1gm","created_at_utc_A":1538598982,"created_at_utc_B":1538606863,"score_A":6,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Bees Dance","human_ref_B":"Other animals (people are animals) have rituals.  Whale song comes to mind.  Chimpanzees, elephants and magpies have been witnessed conducting mourning rituals.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7881.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"a4v2e7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"What are the main theories of nation states? I'm looking for theories that explain what a nation state is.   - What is a nation state?  - How does it form?  - What are the boundaries determined?","c_root_id_A":"ebi17vo","c_root_id_B":"ebhu31i","created_at_utc_A":1544456720,"created_at_utc_B":1544449858,"score_A":19,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I posted this reply in a different thread. It was more about national identity that nation states, but the topics are very closely relate so I think the same sources will be useful to you too (at least as a start):  > If you're into more academic (but still very readable) literature, these are three very fundamental books on nationalism. They represent the modernist\/constructivist school on nationalism, which posits that much of what we nowadays consider 'national identity' is not a natural product of history, biology and culture, but to a large extent either coincidental or socially and politically engineered. These theorists are highly respected and considered the main leaders of thought in the field. > > *Ernest Gellner, \"Nations and Nationalism\" (1983, but I think there are revised editions)* > > ^ Gellner is considered the main guy introducing the theory that 'nations' are not simply a natural phenomenon, but a product of modernization in the 19th century (at least in Europe). Before the 19th century, national identification did not exist in the same way as we know it today. It emerged as a result of industrialization and urbanisation, Romanticism and political opportunism. Very good theoretical framework and will make you think differently about the world once you read it. > > *Benedict Anderson, \"Imagined Communities\" (1983 - yup, it was a good year for nationalism studies)* > > ^ Anderson dives into a more conceptual discussion of what a nation is. Is it an extended family, is it a community of language or culture? He claims that it is a community that we believe to be a community, an 'imagined' one. It is a good companion to Gellner. Anderson focuses on the role of language and the emergence of print in creating communities of people that feel connected. This sometimes happened intentionally, and sometimes as a random historical development (if putting it a bit simplified). >  > *E.J. Hobsbawm, T. Ranger, \"The Invention of Tradition\" (1983 - I'm not making this up)* > >^ This one is less fundamental for nationalism studies but provides alot of useful examples of constructed and reproduced memory. It talks about how many traditions that we believe and assume to be ancient oftentimes orignate from much more recent times, and are developed with different, more instrumental purposes. A classic example is the Scottish tartan, which historically had a very different meaning than we (and even most Scots) think today. > > *M. Billig, \"Banal Nationalism\" (1995)* > >^ This is a response to the dominance of (above) 'elite-led constructivism' theories, and the idea that nationalism only takes place in moments of crisis and war. Billig proposed instead the view that 'nationalism' can manifest itself in very everyday means, through which normal people like you and me are constantly reminded which nation were are (not) part of. Very important development in the field!","human_ref_B":"look into Benedict Anderson's Imagined Communities and Thongchai Winichakul's Siam Mapped","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6862.0,"score_ratio":3.8}
{"post_id":"8jtjmo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Is traveling fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness? Hello,  Mark Twain wrote that \u201cTravel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow\\-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts\". I am, however, not convinced. I have been living abroad in various countries for the last 8 years and meet a lot of travelers \\(and people living abroad\\) who are far from being open\\-minded. I am wondering if there is any research on this.","c_root_id_A":"dz2eqmk","c_root_id_B":"dz2e6p8","created_at_utc_A":1526468653,"created_at_utc_B":1526467607,"score_A":42,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"In social psychology, that quote can be translated into Allport's intergroup contact theory according to which, depending on some conditions \\(i.e. equal status\\), interpersonal contacts between a majority and a minority group are an effective way to reduce prejudice.  According to Pettigrew's meta\\-analysis, contact through travel and tourism has weak \\(in fact, the weakest among other contexts for contact\\) effects on prejudice. It does something, but not much. Its relatively weak effects might be due to the intensity and length of contacts in the context of tourism.","human_ref_B":"There are plenty of people who travel places and maintain all their prior prejudices. I also live abroad and I meet many people who have bigoted views. I also meet people who travel abroad and remain incredibly ignorant or simply unaware. That's all to say, travel is a huge industry and people can travel however they want. You don't have to speak the language, meet the locals (besides those working in tourist agencies\/companies), leave your comfort zone, or any of that.   I don't know if there's research to support this. You can of course look at Said's Orientalism. Entire academic disciplines can revolve around distilled, repackaged experiences for Western consumers. Even serious academics who travel to the region they study are guilty of orientalist views and opinions. This isn't just limited to academia. I'm on mobile, but Teju Cole (NYTimes) had an article on Steve McCurry called like \"Too Perfect a Picture\" or something that's also a good relevant read. That's hardly the exact answer you're looking for but I largely agree with both Said and Cole here.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1046.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1aiukj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Is James Frazer's The Golden Bough 'true?' In other words, are its representations of ancient magic and religion accurate? [x-posted from AskHistorians] If you have any books or articles on the topic for further reading I would very much appreciate it.","c_root_id_A":"c8xwdq4","c_root_id_B":"c8xv6w5","created_at_utc_A":1363628068,"created_at_utc_B":1363624359,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"No, it's not.  Well, it depends on what part you're talking about, and which edition; it faithful quote ethnographic material in parts, but the overall question is flawed.  Check out the article \"When the Bough Breaks\" by Jonathan Z. Smith, which is the best explanation of Frazer's project and why it fails.  If you want to continue, the next place to go would be Mary Beard\u2019s \u201cFrazer, Leach, and Virgil: The Popularity (and Unpopularity) of the Golden Bough\u201d (which is a response to a pretty dumb  short article that Edmund Leach called \"Reflections on Nemi--Did Frazer get it wrong?\", which is sad because decades earlier he wrote a great anthropological work *Political Systems of Highland Burma*, which is still a classic).","human_ref_B":"I like this course from the Modern Scholar titled Religion, Myth, and Magic. I think they have it on audible and other places...","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3709.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1aiukj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Is James Frazer's The Golden Bough 'true?' In other words, are its representations of ancient magic and religion accurate? [x-posted from AskHistorians] If you have any books or articles on the topic for further reading I would very much appreciate it.","c_root_id_A":"c8xwdq4","c_root_id_B":"c8xsz14","created_at_utc_A":1363628068,"created_at_utc_B":1363616395,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"No, it's not.  Well, it depends on what part you're talking about, and which edition; it faithful quote ethnographic material in parts, but the overall question is flawed.  Check out the article \"When the Bough Breaks\" by Jonathan Z. Smith, which is the best explanation of Frazer's project and why it fails.  If you want to continue, the next place to go would be Mary Beard\u2019s \u201cFrazer, Leach, and Virgil: The Popularity (and Unpopularity) of the Golden Bough\u201d (which is a response to a pretty dumb  short article that Edmund Leach called \"Reflections on Nemi--Did Frazer get it wrong?\", which is sad because decades earlier he wrote a great anthropological work *Political Systems of Highland Burma*, which is still a classic).","human_ref_B":"I second that request!(Sorry vertexoflife that this is not the reply you're expecting...)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11673.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1aiukj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Is James Frazer's The Golden Bough 'true?' In other words, are its representations of ancient magic and religion accurate? [x-posted from AskHistorians] If you have any books or articles on the topic for further reading I would very much appreciate it.","c_root_id_A":"c8xztup","c_root_id_B":"c8xv6w5","created_at_utc_A":1363637702,"created_at_utc_B":1363624359,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Fraizer is notable as one of the first scholarly comparative works in that area (mythology and religion) - like yodatsracist said, the ethnography is nice and neat to read, but it's similar to Frued's work in that it was more of a prescient for future work in the field, and its merit depends on that historical context. It also influenced and inspired a lot of literature at the time (and down the road), and so that sort of thing resonantes even today. But that doesn't mean he was right.","human_ref_B":"I like this course from the Modern Scholar titled Religion, Myth, and Magic. I think they have it on audible and other places...","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13343.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1aiukj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Is James Frazer's The Golden Bough 'true?' In other words, are its representations of ancient magic and religion accurate? [x-posted from AskHistorians] If you have any books or articles on the topic for further reading I would very much appreciate it.","c_root_id_A":"c8xv6w5","c_root_id_B":"c8xsz14","created_at_utc_A":1363624359,"created_at_utc_B":1363616395,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I like this course from the Modern Scholar titled Religion, Myth, and Magic. I think they have it on audible and other places...","human_ref_B":"I second that request!(Sorry vertexoflife that this is not the reply you're expecting...)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7964.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1aiukj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Is James Frazer's The Golden Bough 'true?' In other words, are its representations of ancient magic and religion accurate? [x-posted from AskHistorians] If you have any books or articles on the topic for further reading I would very much appreciate it.","c_root_id_A":"c8xsz14","c_root_id_B":"c8xztup","created_at_utc_A":1363616395,"created_at_utc_B":1363637702,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I second that request!(Sorry vertexoflife that this is not the reply you're expecting...)","human_ref_B":"Fraizer is notable as one of the first scholarly comparative works in that area (mythology and religion) - like yodatsracist said, the ethnography is nice and neat to read, but it's similar to Frued's work in that it was more of a prescient for future work in the field, and its merit depends on that historical context. It also influenced and inspired a lot of literature at the time (and down the road), and so that sort of thing resonantes even today. But that doesn't mean he was right.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21307.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"11o5lf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"How often the basic supply-and-demand curve model shown in 100-level economics courses used in real-world economic research\/analysis?","c_root_id_A":"c6o83aj","c_root_id_B":"c6o9e1e","created_at_utc_A":1350549925,"created_at_utc_B":1350563069,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"It's rare that anyone will actually draw a simple supply\/demand model to work anything out because it's basic intuition of equilibrium being reached following a change in supply or demand is so ingrained in people who have learned it. The effects of changes in the slope of the curves can actually be used to show the effects of fairly complex things like product differentiation and changes in firm competition.  The slightly more complex version of the model, where the downwards slope of the demand curve is justified through looking at the indifference curves of a consumer and the supply curve is justified through a firm (or group of firms) maximising their profit given their costs and revenue, is still very informative to practitioners.  The logic that changes in price have both an effect arising from the change in a consumers overall income and another from them substituting away or towards the good whose price changed is a very important thing to understand.  On the supply side of things, the different models of how markets are organised (firms setting quantity in Cournot, price in Bertrand, etc.) are central to microeconomics and very much used in both practice and research.  These things all arise from an only very slightly complicated supply\/demand model and even the basic model teaches the intuition and mindset of most economists.","human_ref_B":"Researchers in Industrial Organization estimate demand curves all the time.  Researchers in labor and in macro are very interested in the slope of the labor supply curve at various levels of aggregation.  In macro we are often interested in estimating the slopes of the Phillips Curve or the dynamic IS curve, which amounts to AS\/AD. We use basic S&D for our labor market analysis before jumping into a more complicated searching\/matching story.  Most of the time you touch up the paper with general equilibrium or game theory, but when you're practically doing research the idea almost always starts with a nugget of intuition gleaned from supply & demand.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13144.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"bahgvl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"What is the accuracy of a typical Autism Spectrum Diagnosis? I ask because I saw a recent study which found a correlation with 'anandimide' deficiency and *p*<0.0001.   So if a typical person is diagnosed with ASD, what are the chances of his *one* diagnosis being incorrect?  (Like maybe he actually has ADHD, SAD, or just a bad week).","c_root_id_A":"ekcxzr0","c_root_id_B":"ekcvphg","created_at_utc_A":1554688682,"created_at_utc_B":1554686869,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The terms you need to google are \u201csensitivity\u201d and \u201cspecificity.\u201d These reflect the probability that someone who is truly autistic will test positive (sensitivity), and one who is not will test negative (specificity).  This article claims the DSM V criteria were about 60% sensitive and 95% specific.  Further googling of those terms for autism diagnosis might yield more information.  In an ideal world we\u2019d have tests that were 100% sensitive and specific. In the real world, this often entails a trade off. The more sensitive we make the test (I.e.  to catch more of the actual cases) the more we run the risk for false positives (which reduces specificity). Often the judgment call weighs which is the worse error to make - false positive or false negative - and adjusts the criteria accordingly.   Note that you can have an easy test that\u2019s 100% sensitive: simply label everyone who walks through the door autistic. You\u2019ll absolutely correctly diagnose every true case. The specificity, of course, would be horrible.  As far as the p-value you cite: without knowing the magnitude of the correlation, that p value has no practical utility.  All it means is that the correlation is reliably non-zero, but says nothing by itself about the strength of the association.","human_ref_B":"I'm not able to answer, but why does the low p-value make you interested in this question?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1813.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"wu85c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Why is 'some inflation' good? So central banks target a rate of inflation of ~2%. I read this helps slightly with the concept of sticky wages in labor markets but is this the only reason? Does it act as a 'buffer' to deflation, i.e. if CBs targeted zero inflation it may result in slight deflation, and would deflation of 0.5% really be disastrous to an economy? Are there other reasons?","c_root_id_A":"c5gmldd","c_root_id_B":"c5gk1j4","created_at_utc_A":1342756032,"created_at_utc_B":1342745232,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Another way to view inflation is to consider it a tax on money. One of the results that comes out of the literature on optimal taxation is that in a world with no lump-sum taxes, the tax rates on all goods will be non-zero. (Note the use of the word *rates* --- there will be different rates for different goods, but the rates will all be strictly positive.) One of the goods that will be taxed is the very strange good we call money.  For more, see Ch 13 in Vol 3 of the Handbook of Monetary Economics. If you don't have access to an academic library, this draft version will do.","human_ref_B":"Previous commenters have explained the stickiness aspect. There's another factor, which is that there's normally a tradeoff between unemployment and inflation (a generally asymptotic curve called the Philips curve.  Trying to get inflation down to zero generally means making unemployment too high, while trying to get unemployment down to zero (or as close as it can be) generally means letting inflation get out of hand. So if you accept a little inflation, you can keep unemployment down to an acceptable level.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10800.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"rm90c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why does cost of living increase? The fact that the cost of living here in Sweden (and most of the world, as far as I know?) is rising instead of the opposite seems so counter-intuitive to me. The constant evolution of technology and effectivisation should make living cheaper, but it doesn't. Why is it so?","c_root_id_A":"c46ynvy","c_root_id_B":"c46ynhc","created_at_utc_A":1333197902,"created_at_utc_B":1333197743,"score_A":10,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"One problem is that *standard* of living is also increasing. The cost of living like people did 100 years ago is a hell of a lot lower than the cost of living like modern people do.  (I say \"problem\", but I'm not exactly complaining)","human_ref_B":"I'm not an expert but I think it depends on what exactly you consider 'cost  of living'.   Most countries have a central bank that is in charge of many things, including controlling inflation. Most central banks can therefore control how much the cost of living rises. Currently most first world central banks try to achieve about 2% inflation yearly, they could, if they so wished, try to achieve a lower rate. I'm not sure if this is what you are referring to though.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":159.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"rm90c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Why does cost of living increase? The fact that the cost of living here in Sweden (and most of the world, as far as I know?) is rising instead of the opposite seems so counter-intuitive to me. The constant evolution of technology and effectivisation should make living cheaper, but it doesn't. Why is it so?","c_root_id_A":"c46ynhc","c_root_id_B":"c4715pp","created_at_utc_A":1333197743,"created_at_utc_B":1333218970,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I'm not an expert but I think it depends on what exactly you consider 'cost  of living'.   Most countries have a central bank that is in charge of many things, including controlling inflation. Most central banks can therefore control how much the cost of living rises. Currently most first world central banks try to achieve about 2% inflation yearly, they could, if they so wished, try to achieve a lower rate. I'm not sure if this is what you are referring to though.","human_ref_B":"The cost of living is actually decreasing - just as you would think. But you cannot simply look at the prices. The prices rise - which is the same as to say that the money is less worth. This is what you call inflation and it is a good thing. (A main point why it is good is because the opposite is horrible - deflation, meaning an increase in the value of the money (and that again is the same as a decrease in prices) makes people and especially firms decrease their demand. They will wait until things get cheaper for them.  So we have inflation (which is around 2 %) and things get more and more expensive. But at the same time wages and incomes rise also. And they rise faster than prices in general (which are measured by the price of a fixed basket of goods).  So it is just as you assumed! You just cannot look at prices but you have to look on the relation between income and prices - which is to say you have to look on real incomes. (Just checked for you in Sweden: Between 1903 and 2009 average Real income rose 8,6-fold. This is to say for the average income you can now buying 8,6 times more than your grandmother in her days of 1903)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21227.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"xghkq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Economists, if nobody spent any money or consumed any goods\/services over the weekend what would happen to the economy.  I thought about this question a couple of days ago and wondered what would happen.  In my example, everyone for two days (the weekend) decides that they don't want to go out to a restaurant, to a bar, the cinema or literally anything at all, other than sit at home and watch a film or read a book which they purchase a couple of months ago but never found the time for.  They also don't buy any food and just eat those cans that have sat in the back of the cupboard for the last year, they don't use any gas in their car, the only resources consumed are electricity, heating, water and gas for the house they spend the entire two days in.   So no one buys anything online, any food, goes to the mall, restaurants, sporting activities, uses public transport or flights and taxis, any goods or services for a whole weekend.   I suppose in this instance anyone who works at the weekend running these services still does their job but they all walk to work and bring their own lunch so consume no goods\/services themselves, however the businesses themselves still have to fund their overheads.   What would happen to the economy? If that isn't a long enough time frame for much affect, what would happen if it happened for a week?","c_root_id_A":"c5m5rdr","c_root_id_B":"c5m64nq","created_at_utc_A":1343758505,"created_at_utc_B":1343759781,"score_A":10,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"There would be a demand shock. Temporary drops in demand for goods and services (in this case, a two day drop to 0 demand) are called demand shocks.","human_ref_B":"I don't think much would happen.  Deferring consumption doesn't mean you have actually stopped consumption.  If everyone puts off their toilet paper purchases for two days, there's still the same demand for toilet paper - it just gets shifted two days into the future.  The worst that happens is that Wal-Mart and other stores have to pay workers to do nothing for two days, but in terms of volume everyone who didn't buy toilet paper on Saturday and Sunday comes into the store on Monday to buy it - so workers are bored for two days and then they're busy as hell on the third day.  I think besides annoying workers not much happens in the larger economy.   If everyone defers consumption I don't see much impact.  Maybe if everyone simply doesn't consume toilet paper during that period you see some minor shock, but again I don't see how it's much of one.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1276.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1erlr4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What would happen if the United States abolished all corporate income taxes? Assuming all other taxes, such as individual income tax, sales tax,  excise taxes applied to purchases, etc. stayed the same, what would the effect be on government revenue and economic growth?","c_root_id_A":"ca35np9","c_root_id_B":"ca32rk0","created_at_utc_A":1369159764,"created_at_utc_B":1369152146,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Many economists argue for this. Story from NPR's Planet Money.  >I asked our panel: Aren't there some taxes that we can cut or get rid of? They all agreed: Get rid of the corporate tax!  >Another hard sell. Right now, President Obama and Mitt Romney are advocating lower corporate taxes, but nothing?  >It may sound unfair. But two of the most liberal economists on our panel agreed.  >\"The corporate income tax makes no sense whatsoever,\" said Robert Frank, a professor at Cornell. \"We don't want to prevent Microsoft and General Motors ... from investing more and improving their product line,\" Baker said. \"That's a good thing in my view.\"  >Our economists said if you want to tax rich people as public policy, then tax rich people \u2014 tax the people who own corporations. But taxing the corporation itself is taxing the thing that really does create jobs.  For reference about how much money the US Government collects in corporate tax compared to other sources of revenue, see this.","human_ref_B":"Alot of money made by multinationals would come back to the US.  E.g. if a US based company makes money in Thailand and is taxed at 25% in Thailand, in order to bring that money home, it would have to pay an additional 10% on the money in order to meet the 35% corporate tax rate (sans any loop holes or deductions).  Since they continue to do business in the country, it makes little financial sense to bring the money back to the US.    A 0% rate would allow for a glut of money, likely increasing dividends, buybacks, and management compensations increases in multinationals.  This would also increase tax revenue on this side (though reduced from the initial corporate tax side) since the money dolled out would be taxed (the exception is are the sharebuybacks).    Revenue on the govt side would likely take an immediate hit as most companies are not multi-nationals, however, it would leave significant money in the hands of business owners.  It would reduce frivolous investment and attempts at tax dodging  since the rate will be 0%.  Cuts would likely be needed to the federal budget, or an increase in deficit spending (since all other taxes as you mentioned are to remain the same).  I.E. initially revenue for the govt would decrease, but theoretically increase through increased corporate growth and spending of the non taxed money by the business owner (either through investment or consumption from their increased income - which would be taxed as well).  edit: In regards to taxation of investments, what I mean is, while the business owner may not pay taxes on the money invested, that money will be subject to tax on the recipient's side whether it's buying a new building or increasing wages.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7618.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2r0r5b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What could happen if robots takeover undesirable jobs? I was wondering what realistic implications there will be on day-to-day life in the future if computers\/robots\/machines start to replace people doing 'undesirable' jobs such as waiting staff in a restaurant, cashiers (currently only really in large chain supermarkets but will likely eventually happen in most shops), etc.  Continuing the thought, what would happen if all jobs were to be replaced?  Sidenote: if you know of a better sub-reddit to ask this in please say, was going to go with writing prompts but theres a good chance most replies would end up sounding like the matrix","c_root_id_A":"cnbmqbh","c_root_id_B":"cnbmicg","created_at_utc_A":1420158140,"created_at_utc_B":1420157699,"score_A":26,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":">Continuing the thought, what would happen if all jobs were to be replaced?  According to Marx, if jobs are completely replaced by robots and automation then a new economic system will emerge. Because capitalism relies on a relationship, Capital <-> Labor, if one side is replaced by a different entity (such as robots) to keep producing goods and making surplus value, then capitalism will evolve into a different form of economic system.  From: *On the Realm of Necessity and the Realm of Freedom*  Also, if we reach a 'higher form of society' via automation of labor, Marx believes that humans will have **more time** to spend in the **realm of freedom**, any activity that is an end in itself such as leisure, hobby, and artistic exploration. On the other hand, humans will spend **less time** in the **realm of necessity**, any activity that is a means toward the end such as working.","human_ref_B":"Remember to cite sources in your answers.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":441.0,"score_ratio":5.2}
{"post_id":"225wfn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What has the impact of feminism been on economics? What has the impact of feminism been on economics? What I know is that there is a branch of economics called feminist economics. Also, that compared to sociology, the impact of feminism has on economics is less noticeable.","c_root_id_A":"cgjpnin","c_root_id_B":"cgjpx0w","created_at_utc_A":1396589290,"created_at_utc_B":1396590215,"score_A":10,"score_B":31,"human_ref_A":"Are you asking whether feminism has had any economic effect or whether feminism has influenced the discipline itself?","human_ref_B":"Labor economics has certainly been impacted by feminism, which is something that can be broken down even further into family economics and political economy (I know not quite the same).  There is also feminist economics, which looks at the informal marketplace, and critiques mainstream economics of only examining and using data from the narrowly defined formal economy. Unpaid work and production that is traditional dismissed as not being \"work\" are encouraged to examine and to provide economic analysis on.  Feminist economics can actually be easily applied to ethnic conflicts and developmental economics, and is certainly not limited to gender in any way. Since it really takes a look at what it means to have an economy, where goods and services can be produced informally (and without any transaction), it has a large ability to enrich economic understanding and create theories and models that can applied to improving the lives of people more directly.  While it is considered heterodox, it is taken seriously as an academic subject. There is the Journal of Feminist Economics that is pretty prestigious.  http:\/\/www.feministeconomics.org  There are other ways that feminism has impacted economics, but the creation of a new discipline is something definitely worth mentioning as well. I wish some other user chimes and and contributes, I'm not as knowledgable about how it has impacted mainstream economics.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":925.0,"score_ratio":3.1}
{"post_id":"225wfn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What has the impact of feminism been on economics? What has the impact of feminism been on economics? What I know is that there is a branch of economics called feminist economics. Also, that compared to sociology, the impact of feminism has on economics is less noticeable.","c_root_id_A":"cgjtkjx","c_root_id_B":"cgk0utd","created_at_utc_A":1396610591,"created_at_utc_B":1396630222,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The answer would seem to be: not as much as it could \/ should.  Richmond Fed: Where are the Women?","human_ref_B":"There is a massive scope of very feminist inspired economics. And because it's economics, and has to fit within the fairly strict empirical\/rationalist model of academic economics, it's some of the best feminist work out there.  Fantastic intrafamily bargaining models that expand beyond the unitary household model.   http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0167268199000542  Labour supply models that compare the relative market incomes of men and women to help explain the relationship between gender and labour market participation.   http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/discover\/10.2307\/136271?uid=3739400&uid=2&uid=3737720&uid=4&sid=21103603231241  A look at boys \"falling behind\" in primary\/secondary school:  http:\/\/faculty.arts.ubc.ca\/nfortin\/LeavingBoysBehind.pdf  And then basically anything written by Betsey Stevenson:  http:\/\/users.nber.org\/~bstevens\/research.php  Or basically anything written by Justin Wolfers. Particularly, the economics of happiness has been pioneered by feminist economics:  http:\/\/users.nber.org\/~jwolfers\/research.php","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19631.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"tjvkq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"In all seriousness, what do you guys think of Social Darwinism? I discovered yesterday that my brother is in favor of it. I always considered it inhumane and unreasonable to think it could be done humanely but my brother disagrees. He says, in theory, it would work very well, making sure our species evolves in the \"best\" way to prevent something like Idiocracy from happening. I think his view of the future of humanity is myopic and doesn't consider the increasing technology that could lead to genetic engineering and\/or give way to Kurweil's prediction that we'll all be digital entities. I think we should put value on cultural evolution rather than biological evolution.  He also thinks that people of \"good\" genetics should reproduce more than people of \"bad\" genetics -- not forced, but people should make the choice themselves. I think it's unreasonable to assume we can determine which genes are best for the future of humanity. I think the future is far too chaotic and unpredictable to think we will know what's best for us.  Our argument was inspired by watching X-men 2. He told me he would be on Magneto's side, because they favor allowing mutants to live according to their mutation, e.g., a pyro living as a pyrotechnical, whereas Professor Xavier thinks mutants should simply live side by side non-mutants. All this on the premise that mutants are the next step in human evolution. I respond that evolution is too chaotic to determine what the \"next step\" is.  Also, my brother thinks people shouldn't be forced, but that people should do what they are genetically best at doing. I think this disregards the plasticity of the brain and our choices and skills, the social constructs that influence our social position and mobility, and the effect ecology can have on nurturing our biology.  What do you think?  And I realize this may not be suitable for AskSocialScience, and for that I'm sorry. Kindly direct me to a more appropriate reddit. Thank you.","c_root_id_A":"c4n8xsv","c_root_id_B":"c4n8ubt","created_at_utc_A":1336848973,"created_at_utc_B":1336848388,"score_A":21,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Evolution does not work that way. Both Imperialist Europe and Nazi Germany used Social Darwinism as a pretext for much of their actions; Arendt analyzed the historical development from a politically indifferent scientific Darwinism via social Darwinist ethics to racist ideology, while imperialist Europe saw Africans as being \"socially stunted\". Additionally, Darwin did not necessarily define the fittest as the strongest, or most clever, but recognized that the fittest could be those who cooperated with each other. In many animal societies, struggle is replaced by cooperation.  It's a bunk theory that is all too often used as a cover for racism, IMO.","human_ref_B":"My problem with that argument is that what is \"good\" isn't defined. If the only criteria for \"goodness\" is who can do \"X\" the best, then let's all just kill ourselves once we create the machines that outperform us on any task.  I'm not saying we can't do that (as morbid as it may be), but I like to think that human existence consists of progress on more than measurable criteria (e.g., how much \"stuff\" we have or can do). Fairness, egalitarianism, and equality matter, and I think they too constitute to the \"goodness\" of being human. By ignoring those ideals, we might be objectively better, but what sort of people would we be then?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":585.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"tjvkq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"In all seriousness, what do you guys think of Social Darwinism? I discovered yesterday that my brother is in favor of it. I always considered it inhumane and unreasonable to think it could be done humanely but my brother disagrees. He says, in theory, it would work very well, making sure our species evolves in the \"best\" way to prevent something like Idiocracy from happening. I think his view of the future of humanity is myopic and doesn't consider the increasing technology that could lead to genetic engineering and\/or give way to Kurweil's prediction that we'll all be digital entities. I think we should put value on cultural evolution rather than biological evolution.  He also thinks that people of \"good\" genetics should reproduce more than people of \"bad\" genetics -- not forced, but people should make the choice themselves. I think it's unreasonable to assume we can determine which genes are best for the future of humanity. I think the future is far too chaotic and unpredictable to think we will know what's best for us.  Our argument was inspired by watching X-men 2. He told me he would be on Magneto's side, because they favor allowing mutants to live according to their mutation, e.g., a pyro living as a pyrotechnical, whereas Professor Xavier thinks mutants should simply live side by side non-mutants. All this on the premise that mutants are the next step in human evolution. I respond that evolution is too chaotic to determine what the \"next step\" is.  Also, my brother thinks people shouldn't be forced, but that people should do what they are genetically best at doing. I think this disregards the plasticity of the brain and our choices and skills, the social constructs that influence our social position and mobility, and the effect ecology can have on nurturing our biology.  What do you think?  And I realize this may not be suitable for AskSocialScience, and for that I'm sorry. Kindly direct me to a more appropriate reddit. Thank you.","c_root_id_A":"c4n8xsv","c_root_id_B":"c4n8xre","created_at_utc_A":1336848973,"created_at_utc_B":1336848967,"score_A":21,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Evolution does not work that way. Both Imperialist Europe and Nazi Germany used Social Darwinism as a pretext for much of their actions; Arendt analyzed the historical development from a politically indifferent scientific Darwinism via social Darwinist ethics to racist ideology, while imperialist Europe saw Africans as being \"socially stunted\". Additionally, Darwin did not necessarily define the fittest as the strongest, or most clever, but recognized that the fittest could be those who cooperated with each other. In many animal societies, struggle is replaced by cooperation.  It's a bunk theory that is all too often used as a cover for racism, IMO.","human_ref_B":"The impossibility of arguing for any particular person or entity's right to administer the selection process makes Social Darwinism impossible. You can't make an *objectively* valid claim for anyone being better fit than anyone else. Or, at least I would count it practically impossible to do so.  I wrote this on the topic a few days ago  One might imagine a distant (dystopic) future where a super AI would calculate the \"most fit\" individuals according to axioms that we choose in consensus. If we could guarantee both consistency of that AI as well as that those axioms are indeed consensual then we may have a \"working Social Darwinistic society\".   I leave coming up with the correct emotional response towards such notion as an exercise for the reader.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6.0,"score_ratio":4.2}
{"post_id":"ybflk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Dear Political scientists: What are the precedents for revoking an embassies diplomatic protections and raiding it? How big a deal is this threat? Referring to the British government threatening to enter the Ecuadorian embassy to remove Julian Assange by force.","c_root_id_A":"c5u2sqm","c_root_id_B":"c5u2oad","created_at_utc_A":1345129783,"created_at_utc_B":1345129317,"score_A":17,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Well, remember the Tehran embassy incident? Things have been pretty interesting between Iran and the US since then...","human_ref_B":"It is a very big deal, it is essentially an invasion of foreign soil. The purpose of an embassy is to say \"listen: let's be on good terms, you can have some of our land and call it yours, and we can have some of yours and call it ours, and make a relationship\"  Another way to think of it would be the violation of trust between roommates, a roommate entering your private space without an invitation and by force... it alters the relationship.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":466.0,"score_ratio":1.1333333333}
{"post_id":"ybflk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Dear Political scientists: What are the precedents for revoking an embassies diplomatic protections and raiding it? How big a deal is this threat? Referring to the British government threatening to enter the Ecuadorian embassy to remove Julian Assange by force.","c_root_id_A":"c5u5fg1","c_root_id_B":"c5u3dea","created_at_utc_A":1345138905,"created_at_utc_B":1345131835,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It's a pretty serious ordeal. In order to enter the embassy without the (Ecuadorians') permission and without breaking the Vienna Convention. the UK would first need to revoke the credentials of that embassy. In effect, the embassy would cease being an 'embassy' and return to it's state as British government property.  This would probably lead to the end of diplomatic relations between the two countries. This is why I think it's a bunch of saber-rattling if anything, I don't think the British government is prepared to end diplomatic relations with Ecuador - unless they know something that we (the public) do not.","human_ref_B":"Embassies are the territory of their respective nation states, it amounts to \"invasion\" at least in terms of a targeted operation i.e. bin Laden that goes beyond borders but doesn't really mean a declaration of war, etc. I was a Marine embassy guard for three years before getting my PolSci degree, and I can tell you that overrunning an embassy isn't THAT easy. Like Tehran, it would rest on the Chief of Mission surrendering, in response to threat of violence or by cutting off supplies. In other words, can the SAS get in and get him out at will? Probably not. But, if the brits put the squeeze on the personnel they may get them to give him up.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7070.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"6hwb7q","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What were the consequences of the occupy protest movement? Were there any?","c_root_id_A":"dj1zbdh","c_root_id_B":"dj27t99","created_at_utc_A":1497760830,"created_at_utc_B":1497782896,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I wrote my undergraduate thesis on this subject, so if you have more specific questions, ask away.  I would credit the Occupy movement with popularizing the idea of income inequality in the US, as well as the term \"livestreaming\".  Occupy is also a step forward in protest tactics for a number of reasons.    The uprising in Tahrir Square in Iran in 2009 was covered in the media with a heavy reliance on Twitter and live video feeds, as there was no Western media to report on events.  Occupy took this much further, and by the end, had a very sophisticated media machine that rivaled or even supplanted mainstream coverage.  Now its commonplace for a movement like #blacklivesmatter or the Standing Rock protests to cover themselves, but Occupy was really the first time social media was used in this way by a protest movement in the U.S.  Occupy was a big advance in citizen journalism- if the mainstream media won't report on you or doesn't report the way you like, report on yourself instead.  The Occupy movement also helped form and popularize resistance to student debt.  This is one issue where organizations formed in Occupy greatly outlasted the original movement.  There are other impacts as well, but I'd say those are the big ones the movement should be remembered for.  You see echoes of Occupy in movements that followed, like the occupation of space as a resistance tactic a la Standing Rock and other environmental blockades across the world.  Self reporting by protesters is also huge, and is essentially the foundation of the #blacklivesmatter movement, for example.","human_ref_B":"see Endnotes' The Holding Pattern: The ongoing crisis and the class struggles of 2011-2013. It mainly focuses on the 'movement of the squares' of which Occupy was a major part [along with the Arab Spring].","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22066.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1055gs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Are our economic problems coming from increased efficiency? Here's a Flex app that visualizes US occupations over time, from 1850-2000. The most striking statistic is that in 1850, *half* the US population was employed as farmers or farm laborers. By 2000, it was barely 1%, even though that 1% produces more than enough food for the rest of us. Various technological advances have allowed a small number of workers to do the work of many.  Virtually all occupations related to the production of goods are in decline since their peak, as a percentage of the population. You don't need fifty guys with pickaxes in a mine when one guy with a remote controlled drill can do the same work in less time. And service jobs are threatened as well: you don't need 12 cashiers if you have 12 self-checkout aisles.  The trend looks to continue into the future. Right at this moment, Google has cars driving themselves on public streets (albeit with humans as backups). In twenty years will we still need bus and taxi drivers?  From the 50,000 foot view, this looks fantastic. Six day weekends for everyone! All tedious jobs handled by robots!  Unfortunately, if you replace your bus drivers with a fleet of robots, you have a very efficient transportation system but now those drivers can't afford the fare because their job is gone.   Historically, we've been pretty adept at creating new jobs to fill in the gaps. But there's no economic law that says this will always be the case. As technology reduces the need for simple labor, the remaining jobs will require increased specialization and longer learning curves. The unemployed bus driver cannot become a \"robot bus driver mechanic\" in a month, and even if she could, there won't be enough of those jobs to go around.  My question: Is increasing efficiency creating a drag on the economy, and if so, how could we fix it?","c_root_id_A":"c6aiiju","c_root_id_B":"c6am9nl","created_at_utc_A":1348077954,"created_at_utc_B":1348091787,"score_A":8,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I like the premise, it's one I've thought about before. What happens when everything can be provided by robots - how would we divide up their production?  But no, this isn't the case now. You, like the many countries at the moment simply have a demand failing in the economy. If we ignore politics and debt, appropriate fiscal policy could fix it in a heartbeat.  At the moment you only really have the Fed trying to get things moving - unfortunately the Fed is only really good at dampening spending, by raising rates. It's pretty powerless once rates are at zero leaving you where you are now - with a demand failing in your economy, and insufficient jobs to keep the populace employed.","human_ref_B":"This is a question that is highly contested with various economists split  mainly along their respective ideological lines. Posters *MiMuM* and *eliterandomaccount* hint at one view given by \"conservative\" leaning economists: that increases in productivity will ultimately not yield any adverse effects on the structural employment rate. *MiMuM* cites the often stated line that technological unemployment is a \"fallacy.\" Any flat out assertion like this should be treated with some guarded skepticism and investigated further to determine whether or not it is, in fact, a fallacy. First, note that the article on Wikipedia is still under contention and that one of the major arguments going on behind the scenes is over this issue. Second, The Economist gives credence to the notion in an online article entitled *Technological unemployment: Race against the machine*. So, perhaps there is more to it after all.  It is true that at one time productivity gains fostered growth, cheaper goods, and ultimately new employment opportunities. Work that was once labor intensive no longer was and that freed up labor for use in other areas, including those in newly developing areas. No one is arguing against that. But, many contemporaries note that as time has moved on productivity has continued to rise and its adverse effects now outpace new employment opportunities. Many new sectors in high tech require little in the way of labor. Added to that, jobs in the service sector are steadily replacing those in manufacturing. The rising concern is that as technology has provided greater gains in productivity it is displacing more workers than are created in its pursuit. Some economists, such as those in the article, state that this might lead to structural unemployment for groups of people in the labor force.  *Edited for grammar and clarity.  If you are looking for more info on this there is a full-length NPR interview with Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee of MIT that can be found at: http:\/\/onpoint.wbur.org\/2011\/11\/02\/when-machines-do-the-work\/player","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13833.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"1055gs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Are our economic problems coming from increased efficiency? Here's a Flex app that visualizes US occupations over time, from 1850-2000. The most striking statistic is that in 1850, *half* the US population was employed as farmers or farm laborers. By 2000, it was barely 1%, even though that 1% produces more than enough food for the rest of us. Various technological advances have allowed a small number of workers to do the work of many.  Virtually all occupations related to the production of goods are in decline since their peak, as a percentage of the population. You don't need fifty guys with pickaxes in a mine when one guy with a remote controlled drill can do the same work in less time. And service jobs are threatened as well: you don't need 12 cashiers if you have 12 self-checkout aisles.  The trend looks to continue into the future. Right at this moment, Google has cars driving themselves on public streets (albeit with humans as backups). In twenty years will we still need bus and taxi drivers?  From the 50,000 foot view, this looks fantastic. Six day weekends for everyone! All tedious jobs handled by robots!  Unfortunately, if you replace your bus drivers with a fleet of robots, you have a very efficient transportation system but now those drivers can't afford the fare because their job is gone.   Historically, we've been pretty adept at creating new jobs to fill in the gaps. But there's no economic law that says this will always be the case. As technology reduces the need for simple labor, the remaining jobs will require increased specialization and longer learning curves. The unemployed bus driver cannot become a \"robot bus driver mechanic\" in a month, and even if she could, there won't be enough of those jobs to go around.  My question: Is increasing efficiency creating a drag on the economy, and if so, how could we fix it?","c_root_id_A":"c6am9nl","c_root_id_B":"c6ajxw9","created_at_utc_A":1348091787,"created_at_utc_B":1348083276,"score_A":9,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"This is a question that is highly contested with various economists split  mainly along their respective ideological lines. Posters *MiMuM* and *eliterandomaccount* hint at one view given by \"conservative\" leaning economists: that increases in productivity will ultimately not yield any adverse effects on the structural employment rate. *MiMuM* cites the often stated line that technological unemployment is a \"fallacy.\" Any flat out assertion like this should be treated with some guarded skepticism and investigated further to determine whether or not it is, in fact, a fallacy. First, note that the article on Wikipedia is still under contention and that one of the major arguments going on behind the scenes is over this issue. Second, The Economist gives credence to the notion in an online article entitled *Technological unemployment: Race against the machine*. So, perhaps there is more to it after all.  It is true that at one time productivity gains fostered growth, cheaper goods, and ultimately new employment opportunities. Work that was once labor intensive no longer was and that freed up labor for use in other areas, including those in newly developing areas. No one is arguing against that. But, many contemporaries note that as time has moved on productivity has continued to rise and its adverse effects now outpace new employment opportunities. Many new sectors in high tech require little in the way of labor. Added to that, jobs in the service sector are steadily replacing those in manufacturing. The rising concern is that as technology has provided greater gains in productivity it is displacing more workers than are created in its pursuit. Some economists, such as those in the article, state that this might lead to structural unemployment for groups of people in the labor force.  *Edited for grammar and clarity.  If you are looking for more info on this there is a full-length NPR interview with Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee of MIT that can be found at: http:\/\/onpoint.wbur.org\/2011\/11\/02\/when-machines-do-the-work\/player","human_ref_B":"During the industrial revolution in Britain there was a group called the Luddites (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Luddite). They basically said that machines would destroy their livelyhood by making workers obsolete. This is pretty much what you are saying? The same notion has been around many times since industrialization and mechanization began in the 15th century.  The notion is a fallacy (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Technological_unemployment). However as the wikipedia article explains there will be a divergence in payment. basically because labour loses value in certain occupations.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8511.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"1055gs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Are our economic problems coming from increased efficiency? Here's a Flex app that visualizes US occupations over time, from 1850-2000. The most striking statistic is that in 1850, *half* the US population was employed as farmers or farm laborers. By 2000, it was barely 1%, even though that 1% produces more than enough food for the rest of us. Various technological advances have allowed a small number of workers to do the work of many.  Virtually all occupations related to the production of goods are in decline since their peak, as a percentage of the population. You don't need fifty guys with pickaxes in a mine when one guy with a remote controlled drill can do the same work in less time. And service jobs are threatened as well: you don't need 12 cashiers if you have 12 self-checkout aisles.  The trend looks to continue into the future. Right at this moment, Google has cars driving themselves on public streets (albeit with humans as backups). In twenty years will we still need bus and taxi drivers?  From the 50,000 foot view, this looks fantastic. Six day weekends for everyone! All tedious jobs handled by robots!  Unfortunately, if you replace your bus drivers with a fleet of robots, you have a very efficient transportation system but now those drivers can't afford the fare because their job is gone.   Historically, we've been pretty adept at creating new jobs to fill in the gaps. But there's no economic law that says this will always be the case. As technology reduces the need for simple labor, the remaining jobs will require increased specialization and longer learning curves. The unemployed bus driver cannot become a \"robot bus driver mechanic\" in a month, and even if she could, there won't be enough of those jobs to go around.  My question: Is increasing efficiency creating a drag on the economy, and if so, how could we fix it?","c_root_id_A":"c6al089","c_root_id_B":"c6am9nl","created_at_utc_A":1348087110,"created_at_utc_B":1348091787,"score_A":5,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I would argue that our economic problems are coming from debt and inefficiency.   Increases in economic efficiency will only cause short term economic problems due to changes in labor supply and demand. If we are producing more goods and services per person, then it seems reasonable that we would work less hours to maintain the same quality of life. This has not happened. Instead we are working a similar amount (from lets say WW2) but the quantity and quality of the goods we consume has gone way up. For example people are buying bigger homes that operate more efficiently and last longer. Cars will go 200k miles and last 20 years versus 100k and ten years. Instead of having 1 TV we have one in every room, and a computer, and a cell phone, and surround sound. You get the idea.    When goods and services are produced more efficiently less human capital is needed. So what happens to these folks? There are two good possibilities and a third bad one.   1. They share the work but work less hours, or  2. Some of the workers move on to provide additional goods or services. 3. They do nothing and become a leach on society, (someone that is able bodied and mind, contributes nothing to society, and consumes economic resources over the long term).  Debt causes economic problems by 1. Artificially stimulating growth, and 2. Increasing risk.  1. When an individual, company, or government borrows money it makes a bet that the future will have a positive outcome and that they will be able to repay the dept and come out ahead economically. The borrowed money is spent on good and services that stimulate the economy. This works most of the time but occasionally the future doesn't go as planned and any one of countless factors can cause it to break down. Some examples could be the economy taking on too much debt, risky dept, bad weather or natural disaster, war, or a disruption of a commodity supply. When the debtor can't repay for any reason the lender is at a loss. Since the lender got its money from providing goods and services there is a net economic loss.  2. Too much debt increases risk to unsustainable levels. A certain amount of risk is necessary however if the economy on the whole is \"betting the farm\" (i.e. taking on so much debt that there is a negative net worth) eventually there will be a cascading affect of defaults. This causes a disruption in the money supply which means the demand for goods and services is disrupted thus leading to economic problems.","human_ref_B":"This is a question that is highly contested with various economists split  mainly along their respective ideological lines. Posters *MiMuM* and *eliterandomaccount* hint at one view given by \"conservative\" leaning economists: that increases in productivity will ultimately not yield any adverse effects on the structural employment rate. *MiMuM* cites the often stated line that technological unemployment is a \"fallacy.\" Any flat out assertion like this should be treated with some guarded skepticism and investigated further to determine whether or not it is, in fact, a fallacy. First, note that the article on Wikipedia is still under contention and that one of the major arguments going on behind the scenes is over this issue. Second, The Economist gives credence to the notion in an online article entitled *Technological unemployment: Race against the machine*. So, perhaps there is more to it after all.  It is true that at one time productivity gains fostered growth, cheaper goods, and ultimately new employment opportunities. Work that was once labor intensive no longer was and that freed up labor for use in other areas, including those in newly developing areas. No one is arguing against that. But, many contemporaries note that as time has moved on productivity has continued to rise and its adverse effects now outpace new employment opportunities. Many new sectors in high tech require little in the way of labor. Added to that, jobs in the service sector are steadily replacing those in manufacturing. The rising concern is that as technology has provided greater gains in productivity it is displacing more workers than are created in its pursuit. Some economists, such as those in the article, state that this might lead to structural unemployment for groups of people in the labor force.  *Edited for grammar and clarity.  If you are looking for more info on this there is a full-length NPR interview with Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee of MIT that can be found at: http:\/\/onpoint.wbur.org\/2011\/11\/02\/when-machines-do-the-work\/player","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4677.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"1055gs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Are our economic problems coming from increased efficiency? Here's a Flex app that visualizes US occupations over time, from 1850-2000. The most striking statistic is that in 1850, *half* the US population was employed as farmers or farm laborers. By 2000, it was barely 1%, even though that 1% produces more than enough food for the rest of us. Various technological advances have allowed a small number of workers to do the work of many.  Virtually all occupations related to the production of goods are in decline since their peak, as a percentage of the population. You don't need fifty guys with pickaxes in a mine when one guy with a remote controlled drill can do the same work in less time. And service jobs are threatened as well: you don't need 12 cashiers if you have 12 self-checkout aisles.  The trend looks to continue into the future. Right at this moment, Google has cars driving themselves on public streets (albeit with humans as backups). In twenty years will we still need bus and taxi drivers?  From the 50,000 foot view, this looks fantastic. Six day weekends for everyone! All tedious jobs handled by robots!  Unfortunately, if you replace your bus drivers with a fleet of robots, you have a very efficient transportation system but now those drivers can't afford the fare because their job is gone.   Historically, we've been pretty adept at creating new jobs to fill in the gaps. But there's no economic law that says this will always be the case. As technology reduces the need for simple labor, the remaining jobs will require increased specialization and longer learning curves. The unemployed bus driver cannot become a \"robot bus driver mechanic\" in a month, and even if she could, there won't be enough of those jobs to go around.  My question: Is increasing efficiency creating a drag on the economy, and if so, how could we fix it?","c_root_id_A":"c6ajxw9","c_root_id_B":"c6aoah5","created_at_utc_A":1348083276,"created_at_utc_B":1348100049,"score_A":4,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"During the industrial revolution in Britain there was a group called the Luddites (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Luddite). They basically said that machines would destroy their livelyhood by making workers obsolete. This is pretty much what you are saying? The same notion has been around many times since industrialization and mechanization began in the 15th century.  The notion is a fallacy (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Technological_unemployment). However as the wikipedia article explains there will be a divergence in payment. basically because labour loses value in certain occupations.","human_ref_B":"So a few people have answered why this is NOT the cause of today's problems, and I agree with them.  However, I would like to engage the reality that is productivity is greatly increased and what are the consequences.   I've thought about this for a while, and these are my conclusions (I'm sure I'm not the first to come to these conclusions).  In the long-term, new jobs will be created such that we can have full employment. The reason for this is that as productivity increases, labor is freed up to do more useful things, such as invent goods unthinkable in the past. probably these new jobs will require much higher education, which is a good argument for state funding of education at the college level. The second response as a society will be to take more leisure. It needs to become a norm. In the past people worked 7 days a week, more than 8 hours a day. Now 5 days a week and 9-5 is the norm. As productivity increases, we will see ever increasing leisure as norms change (we've seen this in Germany already). Remember that with more leisure, it will also create demand for leisure based goods.   However, in the short-term, we will have unemployment. Obviously not every unemployed factory worker or bus driver can become reeducated and start working one of the new jobs created. And of course the new fields and technologies will take time to start up. So yes, there will be people who get shafted by the system. But there always have been people who lost out to industrialization and modernization. To remedy this problem, we ought to facilitate their reentry into the emerging markets, and, in my opinion, provide them with some form of welfare in the name of fairness.   **TL;DR**: In the long term, people reallocate into new sectors and take more time off. Everyone wins. In the short term, not everyone can reallocate into new sectors and so there will be economic losers. But there always have been. As a society, we ought to try and reeducate or at least support these people.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16773.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1055gs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Are our economic problems coming from increased efficiency? Here's a Flex app that visualizes US occupations over time, from 1850-2000. The most striking statistic is that in 1850, *half* the US population was employed as farmers or farm laborers. By 2000, it was barely 1%, even though that 1% produces more than enough food for the rest of us. Various technological advances have allowed a small number of workers to do the work of many.  Virtually all occupations related to the production of goods are in decline since their peak, as a percentage of the population. You don't need fifty guys with pickaxes in a mine when one guy with a remote controlled drill can do the same work in less time. And service jobs are threatened as well: you don't need 12 cashiers if you have 12 self-checkout aisles.  The trend looks to continue into the future. Right at this moment, Google has cars driving themselves on public streets (albeit with humans as backups). In twenty years will we still need bus and taxi drivers?  From the 50,000 foot view, this looks fantastic. Six day weekends for everyone! All tedious jobs handled by robots!  Unfortunately, if you replace your bus drivers with a fleet of robots, you have a very efficient transportation system but now those drivers can't afford the fare because their job is gone.   Historically, we've been pretty adept at creating new jobs to fill in the gaps. But there's no economic law that says this will always be the case. As technology reduces the need for simple labor, the remaining jobs will require increased specialization and longer learning curves. The unemployed bus driver cannot become a \"robot bus driver mechanic\" in a month, and even if she could, there won't be enough of those jobs to go around.  My question: Is increasing efficiency creating a drag on the economy, and if so, how could we fix it?","c_root_id_A":"c6al089","c_root_id_B":"c6aoah5","created_at_utc_A":1348087110,"created_at_utc_B":1348100049,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would argue that our economic problems are coming from debt and inefficiency.   Increases in economic efficiency will only cause short term economic problems due to changes in labor supply and demand. If we are producing more goods and services per person, then it seems reasonable that we would work less hours to maintain the same quality of life. This has not happened. Instead we are working a similar amount (from lets say WW2) but the quantity and quality of the goods we consume has gone way up. For example people are buying bigger homes that operate more efficiently and last longer. Cars will go 200k miles and last 20 years versus 100k and ten years. Instead of having 1 TV we have one in every room, and a computer, and a cell phone, and surround sound. You get the idea.    When goods and services are produced more efficiently less human capital is needed. So what happens to these folks? There are two good possibilities and a third bad one.   1. They share the work but work less hours, or  2. Some of the workers move on to provide additional goods or services. 3. They do nothing and become a leach on society, (someone that is able bodied and mind, contributes nothing to society, and consumes economic resources over the long term).  Debt causes economic problems by 1. Artificially stimulating growth, and 2. Increasing risk.  1. When an individual, company, or government borrows money it makes a bet that the future will have a positive outcome and that they will be able to repay the dept and come out ahead economically. The borrowed money is spent on good and services that stimulate the economy. This works most of the time but occasionally the future doesn't go as planned and any one of countless factors can cause it to break down. Some examples could be the economy taking on too much debt, risky dept, bad weather or natural disaster, war, or a disruption of a commodity supply. When the debtor can't repay for any reason the lender is at a loss. Since the lender got its money from providing goods and services there is a net economic loss.  2. Too much debt increases risk to unsustainable levels. A certain amount of risk is necessary however if the economy on the whole is \"betting the farm\" (i.e. taking on so much debt that there is a negative net worth) eventually there will be a cascading affect of defaults. This causes a disruption in the money supply which means the demand for goods and services is disrupted thus leading to economic problems.","human_ref_B":"So a few people have answered why this is NOT the cause of today's problems, and I agree with them.  However, I would like to engage the reality that is productivity is greatly increased and what are the consequences.   I've thought about this for a while, and these are my conclusions (I'm sure I'm not the first to come to these conclusions).  In the long-term, new jobs will be created such that we can have full employment. The reason for this is that as productivity increases, labor is freed up to do more useful things, such as invent goods unthinkable in the past. probably these new jobs will require much higher education, which is a good argument for state funding of education at the college level. The second response as a society will be to take more leisure. It needs to become a norm. In the past people worked 7 days a week, more than 8 hours a day. Now 5 days a week and 9-5 is the norm. As productivity increases, we will see ever increasing leisure as norms change (we've seen this in Germany already). Remember that with more leisure, it will also create demand for leisure based goods.   However, in the short-term, we will have unemployment. Obviously not every unemployed factory worker or bus driver can become reeducated and start working one of the new jobs created. And of course the new fields and technologies will take time to start up. So yes, there will be people who get shafted by the system. But there always have been people who lost out to industrialization and modernization. To remedy this problem, we ought to facilitate their reentry into the emerging markets, and, in my opinion, provide them with some form of welfare in the name of fairness.   **TL;DR**: In the long term, people reallocate into new sectors and take more time off. Everyone wins. In the short term, not everyone can reallocate into new sectors and so there will be economic losers. But there always have been. As a society, we ought to try and reeducate or at least support these people.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12939.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"1055gs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Are our economic problems coming from increased efficiency? Here's a Flex app that visualizes US occupations over time, from 1850-2000. The most striking statistic is that in 1850, *half* the US population was employed as farmers or farm laborers. By 2000, it was barely 1%, even though that 1% produces more than enough food for the rest of us. Various technological advances have allowed a small number of workers to do the work of many.  Virtually all occupations related to the production of goods are in decline since their peak, as a percentage of the population. You don't need fifty guys with pickaxes in a mine when one guy with a remote controlled drill can do the same work in less time. And service jobs are threatened as well: you don't need 12 cashiers if you have 12 self-checkout aisles.  The trend looks to continue into the future. Right at this moment, Google has cars driving themselves on public streets (albeit with humans as backups). In twenty years will we still need bus and taxi drivers?  From the 50,000 foot view, this looks fantastic. Six day weekends for everyone! All tedious jobs handled by robots!  Unfortunately, if you replace your bus drivers with a fleet of robots, you have a very efficient transportation system but now those drivers can't afford the fare because their job is gone.   Historically, we've been pretty adept at creating new jobs to fill in the gaps. But there's no economic law that says this will always be the case. As technology reduces the need for simple labor, the remaining jobs will require increased specialization and longer learning curves. The unemployed bus driver cannot become a \"robot bus driver mechanic\" in a month, and even if she could, there won't be enough of those jobs to go around.  My question: Is increasing efficiency creating a drag on the economy, and if so, how could we fix it?","c_root_id_A":"c6al089","c_root_id_B":"c6ajxw9","created_at_utc_A":1348087110,"created_at_utc_B":1348083276,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I would argue that our economic problems are coming from debt and inefficiency.   Increases in economic efficiency will only cause short term economic problems due to changes in labor supply and demand. If we are producing more goods and services per person, then it seems reasonable that we would work less hours to maintain the same quality of life. This has not happened. Instead we are working a similar amount (from lets say WW2) but the quantity and quality of the goods we consume has gone way up. For example people are buying bigger homes that operate more efficiently and last longer. Cars will go 200k miles and last 20 years versus 100k and ten years. Instead of having 1 TV we have one in every room, and a computer, and a cell phone, and surround sound. You get the idea.    When goods and services are produced more efficiently less human capital is needed. So what happens to these folks? There are two good possibilities and a third bad one.   1. They share the work but work less hours, or  2. Some of the workers move on to provide additional goods or services. 3. They do nothing and become a leach on society, (someone that is able bodied and mind, contributes nothing to society, and consumes economic resources over the long term).  Debt causes economic problems by 1. Artificially stimulating growth, and 2. Increasing risk.  1. When an individual, company, or government borrows money it makes a bet that the future will have a positive outcome and that they will be able to repay the dept and come out ahead economically. The borrowed money is spent on good and services that stimulate the economy. This works most of the time but occasionally the future doesn't go as planned and any one of countless factors can cause it to break down. Some examples could be the economy taking on too much debt, risky dept, bad weather or natural disaster, war, or a disruption of a commodity supply. When the debtor can't repay for any reason the lender is at a loss. Since the lender got its money from providing goods and services there is a net economic loss.  2. Too much debt increases risk to unsustainable levels. A certain amount of risk is necessary however if the economy on the whole is \"betting the farm\" (i.e. taking on so much debt that there is a negative net worth) eventually there will be a cascading affect of defaults. This causes a disruption in the money supply which means the demand for goods and services is disrupted thus leading to economic problems.","human_ref_B":"During the industrial revolution in Britain there was a group called the Luddites (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Luddite). They basically said that machines would destroy their livelyhood by making workers obsolete. This is pretty much what you are saying? The same notion has been around many times since industrialization and mechanization began in the 15th century.  The notion is a fallacy (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Technological_unemployment). However as the wikipedia article explains there will be a divergence in payment. basically because labour loses value in certain occupations.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3834.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"9kt9ic","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Recommended reading for a layperson interested in cultural narratives? I'm interested in narratives. Specifically things like political narratives (whether true or untrue) e.g. \"The founding fathers believed x until y years ago, when z ideology began fighting against it and now we are in this age etc. etc. etc.\" Any narrative structure that people believe explain what society was like in the past, where it is now, and where it is headed. Is there such thing as a sort of \"narrative analysis\" where one analyzed the scope of a narrative, who the actors are, how the narrative has changed with time, etc.?   I am a layperson with basically no social science background whatsoever. I got interested in this by thinking about reactionary YouTubers (I know, not the best\/brightest people) who make claims like \"Western Civilization was like x until liberals came along and now we live in a society that believes y\" and also things like the mythologies surrounding early American political figures (things like Washington and the cherry tree). The thing that most interests me is how their scope may expand e.g. one narrative might be about politics in recent decades but may be changed and modified to tell a story spanning the history of \"Western Civilization\" (I realize that is not a well-defined term).","c_root_id_A":"e727nqz","c_root_id_B":"e71rtut","created_at_utc_A":1538525334,"created_at_utc_B":1538510986,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It\u2019s probably not exactly what your looking for but \u201cThe Invention of Tradition\u201d by Eric Hobspawm talks about something very similar to this.","human_ref_B":"Theres a pretty original book by (I think) Alex de Toqueville (?) called Democracy in America. Read it for a political science class. Its not the comparisons you wanted, but some of the things discussed are either inherent of our political\/social system or a blatant difference between what we have now. Also anything on overall timeline based supreme court rulings would probably prove to be beneficial to your purpose. I know its more political than social, but its about as close as I can recommend.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14348.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"9kt9ic","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Recommended reading for a layperson interested in cultural narratives? I'm interested in narratives. Specifically things like political narratives (whether true or untrue) e.g. \"The founding fathers believed x until y years ago, when z ideology began fighting against it and now we are in this age etc. etc. etc.\" Any narrative structure that people believe explain what society was like in the past, where it is now, and where it is headed. Is there such thing as a sort of \"narrative analysis\" where one analyzed the scope of a narrative, who the actors are, how the narrative has changed with time, etc.?   I am a layperson with basically no social science background whatsoever. I got interested in this by thinking about reactionary YouTubers (I know, not the best\/brightest people) who make claims like \"Western Civilization was like x until liberals came along and now we live in a society that believes y\" and also things like the mythologies surrounding early American political figures (things like Washington and the cherry tree). The thing that most interests me is how their scope may expand e.g. one narrative might be about politics in recent decades but may be changed and modified to tell a story spanning the history of \"Western Civilization\" (I realize that is not a well-defined term).","c_root_id_A":"e71vxd9","c_root_id_B":"e727nqz","created_at_utc_A":1538514284,"created_at_utc_B":1538525334,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Check out a book called textures of time. It's an interesting  insight into how history and the past is imagined by pre colonial societies and how colonial interventions alters that hybridizing with it to create new forms of imagination.","human_ref_B":"It\u2019s probably not exactly what your looking for but \u201cThe Invention of Tradition\u201d by Eric Hobspawm talks about something very similar to this.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11050.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"9kt9ic","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Recommended reading for a layperson interested in cultural narratives? I'm interested in narratives. Specifically things like political narratives (whether true or untrue) e.g. \"The founding fathers believed x until y years ago, when z ideology began fighting against it and now we are in this age etc. etc. etc.\" Any narrative structure that people believe explain what society was like in the past, where it is now, and where it is headed. Is there such thing as a sort of \"narrative analysis\" where one analyzed the scope of a narrative, who the actors are, how the narrative has changed with time, etc.?   I am a layperson with basically no social science background whatsoever. I got interested in this by thinking about reactionary YouTubers (I know, not the best\/brightest people) who make claims like \"Western Civilization was like x until liberals came along and now we live in a society that believes y\" and also things like the mythologies surrounding early American political figures (things like Washington and the cherry tree). The thing that most interests me is how their scope may expand e.g. one narrative might be about politics in recent decades but may be changed and modified to tell a story spanning the history of \"Western Civilization\" (I realize that is not a well-defined term).","c_root_id_A":"e71vxd9","c_root_id_B":"e72wklt","created_at_utc_A":1538514284,"created_at_utc_B":1538556924,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Check out a book called textures of time. It's an interesting  insight into how history and the past is imagined by pre colonial societies and how colonial interventions alters that hybridizing with it to create new forms of imagination.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Battle_for_God","labels":0,"seconds_difference":42640.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"299a4u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is there an economics 101 podcast or resource you can recommend for someone who is woefully inept? I majored in natural sciences and I realized recently that I haven't the faintest grasp of even basic economics. I'm going back to grad school for a degree that will deal with economics and I'd like to go into it with some understanding. Concepts such as \"equity,\" \"stock options,\" and what ramifications the Fed lowering interest rates will have are foreign to me.   I'm looking for something that will allow me to *speak* economics. Freakonomics and Planet Money, correct me if I'm wrong, seem to be about economic issues, but not economics itself. I guess I'd love the equivalent of a freshman Intro to Economics course. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"ciiormx","c_root_id_B":"ciipq4r","created_at_utc_A":1403893504,"created_at_utc_B":1403895472,"score_A":6,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"For a really quick and dirty analog intro to an AP subject, I'd try Princeton Review. Economics is a bit difficult to get through without visualizations, so I'd probably recommend something free off iTunes U or just going through the Khan Academy sequence.","human_ref_B":"I really can't recommend Khan Academy enough.  Macro  Micro  Short intro video","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1968.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"299a4u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Is there an economics 101 podcast or resource you can recommend for someone who is woefully inept? I majored in natural sciences and I realized recently that I haven't the faintest grasp of even basic economics. I'm going back to grad school for a degree that will deal with economics and I'd like to go into it with some understanding. Concepts such as \"equity,\" \"stock options,\" and what ramifications the Fed lowering interest rates will have are foreign to me.   I'm looking for something that will allow me to *speak* economics. Freakonomics and Planet Money, correct me if I'm wrong, seem to be about economic issues, but not economics itself. I guess I'd love the equivalent of a freshman Intro to Economics course. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"ciip9u5","c_root_id_B":"ciipq4r","created_at_utc_A":1403894543,"created_at_utc_B":1403895472,"score_A":2,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"If you want an interessting overview over macroeconomics ( which is maybe more interessting for a layman than micro) i would recommend you \"Macroeconomics\" by Davi Miles, Andrew Scott and Francis Breedon.  http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Macroeconomics-Understanding-Economy-David-Miles\/dp\/1119995728  For microeconomics i would recommend you the Taylor-Mankiw.  http:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Economics-Mark-P-Taylor\/dp\/1408093790\/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1403894421&sr=1-2&keywords=taylor+mankiw","human_ref_B":"I really can't recommend Khan Academy enough.  Macro  Micro  Short intro video","labels":0,"seconds_difference":929.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"1y3fe0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Has a law ever been passed that sets a legally enforceable social policy targets. For instance, in 20 years the child poverty must fall by 20%?","c_root_id_A":"cfh5rq0","c_root_id_B":"cfh1zyy","created_at_utc_A":1392605105,"created_at_utc_B":1392596113,"score_A":14,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"In education policy it happens all the time. In the US, this is probably one of the most memorable: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act  For each year the students at a school failed to meet standardized testing requirements, the government would have more and more power to intervene until eventually they could start firing people.","human_ref_B":"It never became law, but in Canada the Kelowna Accord is something that comes to mind. This was a policy developed after a series of negotations between the federal, provincial and territorial levels of government, along with representatives of the Indigenous population. It had a number of different goals which are summarized on this page  Edit: I may have misunderstood your question","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8992.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"1y3fe0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Has a law ever been passed that sets a legally enforceable social policy targets. For instance, in 20 years the child poverty must fall by 20%?","c_root_id_A":"cfh5rq0","c_root_id_B":"cfh5n8t","created_at_utc_A":1392605105,"created_at_utc_B":1392604812,"score_A":14,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"In education policy it happens all the time. In the US, this is probably one of the most memorable: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act  For each year the students at a school failed to meet standardized testing requirements, the government would have more and more power to intervene until eventually they could start firing people.","human_ref_B":"Closest I can think of is social impact bonds. Financial instruments that only are paid out if some social goal is met.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":293.0,"score_ratio":2.8}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rfig7","c_root_id_B":"c4rhbbf","created_at_utc_A":1337789381,"created_at_utc_B":1337797314,"score_A":27,"score_B":29,"human_ref_A":"any specific 'Western assumptions' you'd like to test?  This is a good question. Providing counterexamples to our assumptions about what it means to be human is one of the roles of Anthropology as a discipline, but there is a danger in it of exoticising other cultures (which Anthropology is sometimes guilty of). 'The West' is no less diverse, and we can often find the counterexamples we're looking for nearer to home than you might expect.  social activity on some corners of the internet, for example, might force us to re-examine what we think a society should look like.","human_ref_B":"Linguist here. During my BA methods course my professor (William B. McGregor) told us about an aboriginal tribe that wouldn't speak their native language because they no longer owned the land they lived on. This was because, according to them, the language belonged to whomever owned the land, and since they no longer owned the land they weren't allowed to speak the language. My professor was trying to get to do field work on this particular language (can't remember which though) but he couldn't find a single member of the tribe who was willing to admit to being able to speak the language, even though it was their native language. Getting explicit permission from the land owner was easy, but even so they refused to speak it and provide him with data of their soon-to-be extinct language. :(","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7933.0,"score_ratio":1.0740740741}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rhbbf","c_root_id_B":"c4rgoee","created_at_utc_A":1337797314,"created_at_utc_B":1337794596,"score_A":29,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Linguist here. During my BA methods course my professor (William B. McGregor) told us about an aboriginal tribe that wouldn't speak their native language because they no longer owned the land they lived on. This was because, according to them, the language belonged to whomever owned the land, and since they no longer owned the land they weren't allowed to speak the language. My professor was trying to get to do field work on this particular language (can't remember which though) but he couldn't find a single member of the tribe who was willing to admit to being able to speak the language, even though it was their native language. Getting explicit permission from the land owner was easy, but even so they refused to speak it and provide him with data of their soon-to-be extinct language. :(","human_ref_B":"I would be interested to hear of societies that reverse the wisdom-age relationship--whereas (generally) in the west those who are young are seen as pure, but are there societies in which those who are younger are seen as \"wiser\" which then lessens with age\/life experience?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2718.0,"score_ratio":4.8333333333}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rm61h","c_root_id_B":"c4rl6ux","created_at_utc_A":1337818694,"created_at_utc_B":1337813940,"score_A":15,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"As an American, I always find the place of poetry in Arab culture to be a really striking thing. The way poetry is quoted in daily life or recited on stage in American Idol style competitions is just such a different role from the way poetry is so rarefied in the US.   As an aside, I had a Canadian professor as an undergrad who did a book on US Civil War re-enactors. Guess we all have our own oddball practices.","human_ref_B":"I would say the Mosuo people in China probably fit the bill for what you're interestied in. They practice a \"walking marriage\" wherein sexual partners (even longterm ones) do not live together. Men typically climb into their partner's house through the window to stay the night. Children are then raised by the family of the mother. So the brothers and uncles of a woman typically help her raise her children, instead of the father. It's a really interesting take on the idea of a family.  In practice, it isn't as promiscuous as you might imagine, and there are still pretty long-term relationships and whatnot. The wiki gives a pretty good overview.  Despite the fact that they're a very interesting and distinct cultural grouping, the Chinese government just lumps them in with the Naxi in official classifications. The PRC's political relationship with ethnicity is a weird thing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4754.0,"score_ratio":1.1538461538}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rl6ux","c_root_id_B":"c4rj5i6","created_at_utc_A":1337813940,"created_at_utc_B":1337804967,"score_A":13,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would say the Mosuo people in China probably fit the bill for what you're interestied in. They practice a \"walking marriage\" wherein sexual partners (even longterm ones) do not live together. Men typically climb into their partner's house through the window to stay the night. Children are then raised by the family of the mother. So the brothers and uncles of a woman typically help her raise her children, instead of the father. It's a really interesting take on the idea of a family.  In practice, it isn't as promiscuous as you might imagine, and there are still pretty long-term relationships and whatnot. The wiki gives a pretty good overview.  Despite the fact that they're a very interesting and distinct cultural grouping, the Chinese government just lumps them in with the Naxi in official classifications. The PRC's political relationship with ethnicity is a weird thing.","human_ref_B":"A lot of melanesian tribes believe that in order to grow strong, a kid must drink a lot of semen from adults. Basically, they have institutionalized pederasty, much like Spartans did. I'm on the phone so finding sources is a PITA, but I'm sure you could find them with a quick google, if you are interested.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8973.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rl6ux","c_root_id_B":"c4rgoee","created_at_utc_A":1337813940,"created_at_utc_B":1337794596,"score_A":13,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would say the Mosuo people in China probably fit the bill for what you're interestied in. They practice a \"walking marriage\" wherein sexual partners (even longterm ones) do not live together. Men typically climb into their partner's house through the window to stay the night. Children are then raised by the family of the mother. So the brothers and uncles of a woman typically help her raise her children, instead of the father. It's a really interesting take on the idea of a family.  In practice, it isn't as promiscuous as you might imagine, and there are still pretty long-term relationships and whatnot. The wiki gives a pretty good overview.  Despite the fact that they're a very interesting and distinct cultural grouping, the Chinese government just lumps them in with the Naxi in official classifications. The PRC's political relationship with ethnicity is a weird thing.","human_ref_B":"I would be interested to hear of societies that reverse the wisdom-age relationship--whereas (generally) in the west those who are young are seen as pure, but are there societies in which those who are younger are seen as \"wiser\" which then lessens with age\/life experience?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":19344.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rl6ux","c_root_id_B":"c4rklof","created_at_utc_A":1337813940,"created_at_utc_B":1337811208,"score_A":13,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I would say the Mosuo people in China probably fit the bill for what you're interestied in. They practice a \"walking marriage\" wherein sexual partners (even longterm ones) do not live together. Men typically climb into their partner's house through the window to stay the night. Children are then raised by the family of the mother. So the brothers and uncles of a woman typically help her raise her children, instead of the father. It's a really interesting take on the idea of a family.  In practice, it isn't as promiscuous as you might imagine, and there are still pretty long-term relationships and whatnot. The wiki gives a pretty good overview.  Despite the fact that they're a very interesting and distinct cultural grouping, the Chinese government just lumps them in with the Naxi in official classifications. The PRC's political relationship with ethnicity is a weird thing.","human_ref_B":"Im not an expert in this area, but I have done a bit of reading on the [Ik people]( http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ik_people) in Uganda.  They often times expell their children from their home at the age of 3.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2732.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rj5i6","c_root_id_B":"c4rm61h","created_at_utc_A":1337804967,"created_at_utc_B":1337818694,"score_A":6,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"A lot of melanesian tribes believe that in order to grow strong, a kid must drink a lot of semen from adults. Basically, they have institutionalized pederasty, much like Spartans did. I'm on the phone so finding sources is a PITA, but I'm sure you could find them with a quick google, if you are interested.","human_ref_B":"As an American, I always find the place of poetry in Arab culture to be a really striking thing. The way poetry is quoted in daily life or recited on stage in American Idol style competitions is just such a different role from the way poetry is so rarefied in the US.   As an aside, I had a Canadian professor as an undergrad who did a book on US Civil War re-enactors. Guess we all have our own oddball practices.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13727.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rgoee","c_root_id_B":"c4rm61h","created_at_utc_A":1337794596,"created_at_utc_B":1337818694,"score_A":6,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"I would be interested to hear of societies that reverse the wisdom-age relationship--whereas (generally) in the west those who are young are seen as pure, but are there societies in which those who are younger are seen as \"wiser\" which then lessens with age\/life experience?","human_ref_B":"As an American, I always find the place of poetry in Arab culture to be a really striking thing. The way poetry is quoted in daily life or recited on stage in American Idol style competitions is just such a different role from the way poetry is so rarefied in the US.   As an aside, I had a Canadian professor as an undergrad who did a book on US Civil War re-enactors. Guess we all have our own oddball practices.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24098.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rlw8t","c_root_id_B":"c4rm61h","created_at_utc_A":1337817350,"created_at_utc_B":1337818694,"score_A":6,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"4chan, and by extension, Anonymous.  No persistent identity of any meaningful sort, and a culture that intentionally flies in the face of western culture.  Doesn't seem that strange to us denizens of the internet, but as someone who has studied and written about them at length to even a more progressive academic audience, they're an interesting case to say the least.","human_ref_B":"As an American, I always find the place of poetry in Arab culture to be a really striking thing. The way poetry is quoted in daily life or recited on stage in American Idol style competitions is just such a different role from the way poetry is so rarefied in the US.   As an aside, I had a Canadian professor as an undergrad who did a book on US Civil War re-enactors. Guess we all have our own oddball practices.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1344.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rklof","c_root_id_B":"c4rm61h","created_at_utc_A":1337811208,"created_at_utc_B":1337818694,"score_A":3,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Im not an expert in this area, but I have done a bit of reading on the [Ik people]( http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ik_people) in Uganda.  They often times expell their children from their home at the age of 3.","human_ref_B":"As an American, I always find the place of poetry in Arab culture to be a really striking thing. The way poetry is quoted in daily life or recited on stage in American Idol style competitions is just such a different role from the way poetry is so rarefied in the US.   As an aside, I had a Canadian professor as an undergrad who did a book on US Civil War re-enactors. Guess we all have our own oddball practices.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7486.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rm5ho","c_root_id_B":"c4rm61h","created_at_utc_A":1337818617,"created_at_utc_B":1337818694,"score_A":3,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Subincision as practiced by some Australian aboriginal groups could be considered a pretty unusual practice by western standards.","human_ref_B":"As an American, I always find the place of poetry in Arab culture to be a really striking thing. The way poetry is quoted in daily life or recited on stage in American Idol style competitions is just such a different role from the way poetry is so rarefied in the US.   As an aside, I had a Canadian professor as an undergrad who did a book on US Civil War re-enactors. Guess we all have our own oddball practices.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":77.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rlw8t","c_root_id_B":"c4rklof","created_at_utc_A":1337817350,"created_at_utc_B":1337811208,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"4chan, and by extension, Anonymous.  No persistent identity of any meaningful sort, and a culture that intentionally flies in the face of western culture.  Doesn't seem that strange to us denizens of the internet, but as someone who has studied and written about them at length to even a more progressive academic audience, they're an interesting case to say the least.","human_ref_B":"Im not an expert in this area, but I have done a bit of reading on the [Ik people]( http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ik_people) in Uganda.  They often times expell their children from their home at the age of 3.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6142.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rklof","c_root_id_B":"c4ro08n","created_at_utc_A":1337811208,"created_at_utc_B":1337827664,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Im not an expert in this area, but I have done a bit of reading on the [Ik people]( http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ik_people) in Uganda.  They often times expell their children from their home at the age of 3.","human_ref_B":"You may find this lecture by Wade Davis interesting. My favorite example he uses comes around 10:15 when he was discussing (in general) differences of indigenous peoples in regards to their relationship with the earth, but really I think the entire lecture is laden with exactly what you were asking for.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16456.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rm5ho","c_root_id_B":"c4ro08n","created_at_utc_A":1337818617,"created_at_utc_B":1337827664,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Subincision as practiced by some Australian aboriginal groups could be considered a pretty unusual practice by western standards.","human_ref_B":"You may find this lecture by Wade Davis interesting. My favorite example he uses comes around 10:15 when he was discussing (in general) differences of indigenous peoples in regards to their relationship with the earth, but really I think the entire lecture is laden with exactly what you were asking for.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9047.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rrxff","c_root_id_B":"c4rklof","created_at_utc_A":1337855867,"created_at_utc_B":1337811208,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Historical practice in the Philippines, imbuing oneself with power (which as all scholars of South East Asia will know is a concrete, material 'thing' as opposed to Western conceptions of power) by burying a dead baby for a year or so in a tube then drinking the juices that are left over after that year of uhm fermenting. That one pushed my moral relativism to its limits. I'll try and find the citation.","human_ref_B":"Im not an expert in this area, but I have done a bit of reading on the [Ik people]( http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ik_people) in Uganda.  They often times expell their children from their home at the age of 3.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":44659.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"u13f6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"For Anthropologists: What are the most unusual (from the Western perspective) societies\/practices that you have come across? Having heard about fraternal polyandry and languages that involve clicks to even the Doma people and their \"ostrich feet\" I was wondering about the true extent of human cultural (or even genetic) diversity.  What examples do you have of cultures that most go against Western assumptions about how society should be?","c_root_id_A":"c4rm5ho","c_root_id_B":"c4rrxff","created_at_utc_A":1337818617,"created_at_utc_B":1337855867,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Subincision as practiced by some Australian aboriginal groups could be considered a pretty unusual practice by western standards.","human_ref_B":"Historical practice in the Philippines, imbuing oneself with power (which as all scholars of South East Asia will know is a concrete, material 'thing' as opposed to Western conceptions of power) by burying a dead baby for a year or so in a tube then drinking the juices that are left over after that year of uhm fermenting. That one pushed my moral relativism to its limits. I'll try and find the citation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":37250.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"17mkoa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Is fractional reserve banking inflationary? I understand that it increases broader measures of the money supply but I do not understand how it can increase the M0 (i.e. amount of physical coins\/notes) in an economy. The additional money supply is all stored in deposit accounts, whilst the amount of coins in circulation remains the same (I remember someone saying it is akin to two people having a claim on a coin at one time). Taking this into account, how can it cause inflation, by which I mean an increase in prices?","c_root_id_A":"c86xu1f","c_root_id_B":"c86z0ap","created_at_utc_A":1359649675,"created_at_utc_B":1359653373,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Any time you have more money chasing the same stock of goods, there will be a tendency toward price inflation.","human_ref_B":"It is inflationary, but I think what is missing from so much of the conversation of fractional reserve banking is that it is predictably inflationary.  So it is relatively easy to target inflation in normal times.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3698.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"19m7hg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Did the United States' history of slavery contribute to its modern day wealth? It seems to me that most of the modern day economic success of the United States can be traced to the industrial revolution and not to our past agrarian systems, but is there some way that slavery contributed to the dynamics that saw the United States reach the level of wealth it has?","c_root_id_A":"c8peb7a","c_root_id_B":"c8pbojr","created_at_utc_A":1362382878,"created_at_utc_B":1362372059,"score_A":27,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Going into the American Revolution, slavery was thought to be going extinct. The over planting of tobacco had exhausted southern soils, and plantations were suffering.  In the 1790s, however, new inventions began to appear in England. Utilizing steam power, they spun and wove textiles on an industrial scale. Factory owners scrambled to buy up whatever cotton was available, and its price shot up.  Eli Whitney's invention of the cotton gin in 1793 was no coincidence. It had been common knowledge that the South was ideal for growing cotton for a long time, but there was no incentive to do so. Now, cotton was in demand and profitable.  Remember when slavery was becoming *un*profitable? Well now states like Virginia had a huge surplus of slave labor, but its climate (cotton needs 200 days without frost) was unsuitable for growing the new cash crop. A new system arose. Enslaved individuals, becoming increasingly valuable, were shipped from the Upper to the Deep South. There, they were forced to produce valuable cotton for export to England's industrializing textile markets.  The significance of the new cotton industry cannot be overstated. By 1840 cotton comprised over half of all US exports. Tariffs helped fuel public projects in the North such as the building of roads and canals (not to mention that about 25% of Southern cotton was going into *their* growing textile industries).  So in many ways, the institution of slavery fueled the economic success of, not only the United States, but Britain as well. Textile industries are commonly the first stage in the industrialization of any nation. Here's a quote from Marx writing in the 1840s:  \"Slavery is the pivot of our industrialism today as much as machinery, credit, etc. . . . Without slavery you have no cotton, without cotton you have no modern industry.\"   If you want more info\/clarification, try these:  American Slavery: 1619-1877 by Peter Kolchin Pg. 94-96  The Political Economy of the Cotton South: Households, Markets, and Wealth in the Nineteenth Century by Gavin Wright can't give you pg. numbers at the moment, sorry.","human_ref_B":"In some ways, it aided in that it forced a bunch of people to move here, albeit against their will.    There are some institutional economics paper that discuss slavery.  One example is Barzel (Property Rights) who looked at the occurrence of slaves buying their freedom and concluded that some (few) slaves were able to accumulate some money through being provide a reward structure (I hate to explain this as I make it sound quite insensitive). I believe Douglas Allen also talks about it in The Institutional Revolution.  Some studies have looked at the historical 'profitability' of slaves as a capital investment (http:\/\/www.nber.org\/chapters\/c0606.pdf)  Also from Wikipedia  > In his books, Time on the Cross and Without Consent or Contract: the Rise and Fall of American Slavery, Robert Fogel maintains that slavery was in fact a profitable method of production, especially on bigger plantations growing cotton that fetched high prices in the world market. It gave whites in the South higher average incomes than those in the North, but most of the money was spent on buying slaves and plantations.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10819.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"1rb2t8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Cimate scientists call for drastic cuts in energy consumption. Is that feasible in our growth based economy? http:\/\/www.alternet.org\/environment\/we-have-consume-less-scientists-call-radical-economic-overhaul-avert-climate-crisis","c_root_id_A":"cdlf0d2","c_root_id_B":"cdlhktn","created_at_utc_A":1385244598,"created_at_utc_B":1385251820,"score_A":5,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"While it's hard to predict, wouldn't global climate change potentially be more damaging?","human_ref_B":"There is a good presentation by Canadian economist Peter Victor at INET Berlin that covers this. You can watch it here  In short form, if we continue under the current policy paradigm it is impossible to stay under the  2 C warming target. It's actually impossible now just because we've done so little to decarbonize. As your link states we are on target, in a conservative case, for 3.8 C warming (this is also restated by the IEA report that came out this week).   According to Victor if global growth continues on trend the maximum it's not possible to grow without expanding per capita emissions under the current paradigm. In 2007 global economies were operating on an average of 268 g\/carbon per dollar of growth. To stay under the IPCC target of 450 ppm we would have to get down to a global average of 36 g\/carbon \/ dollar growth. With 11 billion people we would have to reduce even further to 30 g\/$GDP. To raise the bottom billions out of poverty would require a further reduction to 16g\/$GDP. And then to continue growth at 2% per year for everyone we would have to reduce down to 6g\/$GDP or a 130 x improvement by 2050. And simply trying to avoid this outcome by not growing is disastrous.  Typically ecological economists will make the distinction between extensive growth (growth that requires increases in material and energy throughput) and intensive growth (growth that occurs through network properties and social interaction). This is also sometimes framed as growth vs. development. The main idea is that if economic development is shifted to intensive growth, for example arts and culture and electronic decoupling, the economy can grow without increasing material throughput. However, Robert Ayres and Benjamin Warr, argue that this service economy runs on top of the extensive economy and a reduction in extensive growth will reduce the capacity of the service economy fill that growth niche. The metaphor here is an iphone app that creates value with very little material and energy throughput but requires an energy and materially intensive pocket computer to run. This pocket computer and it's OS are also designed to make older handsets obsolete in two or three product cycles and are only marginally recyclable. So in order to have that decoupled app you need the associated emissions and material throughput of the technology platform.   So what is effectively needed is a new paradigm. Intensive and development decoupling models will play a role but it has to be done in a new way where the primary goal is reduction of material and energy throughput. Bill Mollison's definition of sustainability, \"A system is sustainable if, over its lifetime, it produces or stores more energy than it consumes\"* is probably the best heuristic to apply to judge whether or not something is working towards a sustainable outcome or is just greenwashing that is hiding it's extensive footprint. In Victors model this is achieved by the following. Population and labour force need to be stabilized. A shorter work year. Balance of trade needs to be neutral (ie. largely local economies). There has to be a carbon price. Reduced net investment. More generous anti-poverty programs.  Additionally most ecological economics and sustainability converges on a few points additional points. First off population has to be stabilized at no more than 2 children per couple globally. Agriculture has to be shifted to restorative models such as ecological agroforestry and perennial plant and grazer focused diets. More local and home scale gardening. Stabilization of industrial output, control policies for pollution, soil erosion and depletion protocol of nonrenewable resources.  So it is (or maybe was) possible to achieve a virtuous outcome where we don't hit the wall and can transition to a less carbon intensive model of growth but with every day that passes it becomes increasingly unlikely. As well the political will and popular support for these types of policies, for the most part, simply doesn't exist. At best they are very marginal making the possibility of timely changing very unlikely.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7222.0,"score_ratio":5.6}
{"post_id":"1rb2t8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Cimate scientists call for drastic cuts in energy consumption. Is that feasible in our growth based economy? http:\/\/www.alternet.org\/environment\/we-have-consume-less-scientists-call-radical-economic-overhaul-avert-climate-crisis","c_root_id_A":"cdlha4a","c_root_id_B":"cdlhktn","created_at_utc_A":1385250969,"created_at_utc_B":1385251820,"score_A":4,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"\"Growth\" as in \"economic growth\" does not necessarily imply using more resources or creating more output.  We could use less resources more efficiently to get more output, or use the same resources and create higher quality output. Both would be ideal.   It seems silly calling for \"less growth\" when what they really want is lower CO2 emissions. They should be calling for more growth in renewable energy sectors and higher efficiency in pollution-reducing technologies. De-growth movements are often ill branded.","human_ref_B":"There is a good presentation by Canadian economist Peter Victor at INET Berlin that covers this. You can watch it here  In short form, if we continue under the current policy paradigm it is impossible to stay under the  2 C warming target. It's actually impossible now just because we've done so little to decarbonize. As your link states we are on target, in a conservative case, for 3.8 C warming (this is also restated by the IEA report that came out this week).   According to Victor if global growth continues on trend the maximum it's not possible to grow without expanding per capita emissions under the current paradigm. In 2007 global economies were operating on an average of 268 g\/carbon per dollar of growth. To stay under the IPCC target of 450 ppm we would have to get down to a global average of 36 g\/carbon \/ dollar growth. With 11 billion people we would have to reduce even further to 30 g\/$GDP. To raise the bottom billions out of poverty would require a further reduction to 16g\/$GDP. And then to continue growth at 2% per year for everyone we would have to reduce down to 6g\/$GDP or a 130 x improvement by 2050. And simply trying to avoid this outcome by not growing is disastrous.  Typically ecological economists will make the distinction between extensive growth (growth that requires increases in material and energy throughput) and intensive growth (growth that occurs through network properties and social interaction). This is also sometimes framed as growth vs. development. The main idea is that if economic development is shifted to intensive growth, for example arts and culture and electronic decoupling, the economy can grow without increasing material throughput. However, Robert Ayres and Benjamin Warr, argue that this service economy runs on top of the extensive economy and a reduction in extensive growth will reduce the capacity of the service economy fill that growth niche. The metaphor here is an iphone app that creates value with very little material and energy throughput but requires an energy and materially intensive pocket computer to run. This pocket computer and it's OS are also designed to make older handsets obsolete in two or three product cycles and are only marginally recyclable. So in order to have that decoupled app you need the associated emissions and material throughput of the technology platform.   So what is effectively needed is a new paradigm. Intensive and development decoupling models will play a role but it has to be done in a new way where the primary goal is reduction of material and energy throughput. Bill Mollison's definition of sustainability, \"A system is sustainable if, over its lifetime, it produces or stores more energy than it consumes\"* is probably the best heuristic to apply to judge whether or not something is working towards a sustainable outcome or is just greenwashing that is hiding it's extensive footprint. In Victors model this is achieved by the following. Population and labour force need to be stabilized. A shorter work year. Balance of trade needs to be neutral (ie. largely local economies). There has to be a carbon price. Reduced net investment. More generous anti-poverty programs.  Additionally most ecological economics and sustainability converges on a few points additional points. First off population has to be stabilized at no more than 2 children per couple globally. Agriculture has to be shifted to restorative models such as ecological agroforestry and perennial plant and grazer focused diets. More local and home scale gardening. Stabilization of industrial output, control policies for pollution, soil erosion and depletion protocol of nonrenewable resources.  So it is (or maybe was) possible to achieve a virtuous outcome where we don't hit the wall and can transition to a less carbon intensive model of growth but with every day that passes it becomes increasingly unlikely. As well the political will and popular support for these types of policies, for the most part, simply doesn't exist. At best they are very marginal making the possibility of timely changing very unlikely.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":851.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"1k7j8w","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Question: Why do societies form?","c_root_id_A":"cbmaanb","c_root_id_B":"cbm7v5y","created_at_utc_A":1376332780,"created_at_utc_B":1376326738,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This is a pretty complicated question that you need to be a little more precise with. At what level of organization do you consider it a society? Are you talking about small village and clan level organization, tribal societies or nation states? I'll try to give a bit of an answer but this is a bit outside my area so take it with a grain of salt.  Small groups of humans forming villages isn't really surprising as we are communal animals like most primates (all maybe?). Tribes are typically understood as forming as a means of settling disputes and sharing the labor necessary for agriculture. This can also happen in areas where there is enough abundance to provide without agriculture like the Pacific Northwest. Restrictive terrain can also help to drive higher levels of order like you see on some Pacific islands, valleys in rigged mountains and desert regions like Mesopotamia. People constrained have to learn to deal with each other because its harder to just move away.  Making the next step to modern nation state is a bit trickier in isolation. Most of the world's modern nation states are a result of copying best practices from extant nation states. A tribal society faced a threat from a better organized nation state nearby and copied their institutions to fend them off. China was arguably the first modern nation state that had self perpetuating institutions that weren't based on family. It's thought that they made the transition when others didn't because of the constant high intensity wars forced higher level organization. Religion is also cited as a factor in forming more complicated states but I'm not versed in that at all.  Not sure if that's what you were looking for but a good book on this topic is Francis Fukuyama's The Origins of Political Order Part 1.","human_ref_B":"I think the question is misleading. We don't ask how ant societies form, do we? Ants are social animals. So are humans. Or maybe I'm missing the point.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6042.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"712x7o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"I want to understand Germany current state. What books\/articles do you recommend? Let's assume I have a historical background of Germany. I want to understand how they are doing in economics, equiality, politics, current affairs topics.","c_root_id_A":"dn8atly","c_root_id_B":"dn85p9r","created_at_utc_A":1505852382,"created_at_utc_B":1505847099,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The official educational site of Germany is the federal center for political education accessible via www.bpb.de (covering mainly it's system of government; equality; current affairs) . If you prefer something less officious (and in English) you are better off taking any book on the particular topic you want to know more about by a reputable academic publisher such as, for instance, the cambridge university press.","human_ref_B":"For economics, there is the \"Sachverst\u00e4ndigenrat f\u00fcr Wirtschaft\", it's similar to the Council of Economic Advisors in the US. Among other things, they publish an annual report that discusses current economic issues.  The Bundesbank also publishes reports but with a stronger focus on monetary policy and related issues.  The IMF and OECD also have reports that discuss various economic issues.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5283.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"12jcyk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Political Science] Does international law \"constrain\" state behavior? So far I have two cases in mind: *Nicaragua v. the United States* and *the United Kingdom v. Albania*(otherwise known as *the Corfu Channel Case*).   There are two views of state compliance and international law: the international relations, and the international legal scholarship. The former argues that compliance has relatively nothing to do with international law, because states do what they want anyway.  The selection bias (meaning, states choose to enter treaties\/agreements that reflects behavior they would have adopted anyway) is not affected by international law.  For IR scholars, to show the treaty has some constrain on state behavior, one must prove that states follow through with international law when it isn't consistent with their interest.  International legal scholars argue that states enter into treaties that are in their interest. They see that states sign on because of the long-term benefits versus the short-term benefits of defection.  Furthermore, international legal scholars would argue that there is a \"compliance pull\" of the legal norm, meaning the stronger the legitimacy of the rule, the stronger is the pull to comply. Lastly, they argue there is fear of reciprocity: states will retaliate against one another if there is defection.  Knowing retaliation is possible *deters* defection.   Which view (IR v. IL scholars), in light of the two cases I'm examining, is correct, and why?  If you want to know where I'm getting the information on the different views of state compliance and international law, see *Principles of International Law* by Sean D. Murphy.","c_root_id_A":"c6vlxp3","c_root_id_B":"c6vlejp","created_at_utc_A":1351908017,"created_at_utc_B":1351905670,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"> There are two views of state compliance and international law: the international relations, and the international legal scholarship. The former argues that compliance has relatively nothing to do with international law, because states do what they want anyway. The selection bias (meaning, states choose to enter treaties\/agreements that reflects behavior they would have adopted anyway) is not affected by international law. For IR scholars, to show the treaty has some constrain on state behavior, one must prove that states follow through with international law when it isn't consistent with their interest.  I'd just like to point out, that your characterization of how IR literature views international law is incorrect. IR scholarship is pretty diverse in the way it views international law. Realists and neo-realists tend to adopt the line of reasoning you've laid out, but not all IR scholars fall under this category. A lot of constructivists (yeah I know...lol constructivists) and some institutionalists tend to have a less grim view of international law and other international regimes. Robert Keohane's After Hegemony is a good example of this type of scholarship.  Anyway, to answer your question, both of the cases you selected favor a the first group of theorists, at least in the way you describe them. In Nicaragua v. United States, the US ignored the ruling of the ICJ, arguing that the ICJ didn't have jurisdiction. The ICJ ordered the US to pay reparations, the US rejected the decision and changed it's policy regarding the ICJ. In United Kingdom v. Albania, a similar string of events occurred. The ICJ ordered Albania to pay the UK reparations. Albania refused. Britain responded through other means.","human_ref_B":"Absolutely! Well, as well as any legal system without a comprehensive enforcement mechanism can. It's important to remember that the subjects of international law so too are the ones that change and develop the it.  Your question and what follows seems to by and large ignore customary international law and *jus cogens*, and is also very broad. For instance, it the impact that a prohibitive rule of international law may have on a subject of international law may vary, depending on the relationship between national and international law. Namely, whether the subject's legal system is monist or dualist.  Also, Nicaragua was the self-defence action, and Corfu was the mine clearing case, right? (little rusty)  EDIT] Re: Nicaragua, this was an exercise of CL self defence, or was held to be, and IIRC Corfu resulted in the UK paying reparations for their mine-clearing inside the territorial waters of Albania, which the UK did, so certainly in the second instance this may not be evidence of constraint, per se, but ultimately there was deference to IL principles. Perhaps in looking at state immunities, very early IL case-law, constraint can be most clearly seen, or was the focus of your question more in terms of use of force?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2347.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"rd734i","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Anarchic international relations In my social sciences class our professor dropped the hot take: \"We can't determine the rationality of international actors and terror organizations can hurt states. This is why international relations are fundamentally anarchic.\" I can't really see the rationale of this thesis, can someone explain please?","c_root_id_A":"ho0ryh6","c_root_id_B":"ho0chnl","created_at_utc_A":1639163009,"created_at_utc_B":1639156914,"score_A":17,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"It's a position that bore that origins of modern day constructivist theory, which posits that an interlocking of structure (how things are organized) and process (how things are taught) help shape the political order in which states find themselves.  Assuming I'm reading your prof correctly, they're effectively explaining - in very simple terms - two challenges to prevailing neorealist and neoliberal arguments in international theory. I want to simply explain anarchy: anarchy is not chaos, but simply an archos, or \"without governance.\" What then, drives states to act the way they do? The answer depends on the theory, and I think your prof has folded in answer and critique into two of the major camps.  If you're unfamiliar with neorealism and neoliberalism, the former can be summarized as a focus on security that governs the sovereign wellbeing of the state against others, while the latter emphasizes positive-sum institutions and juridical spaces as rulemaking and normative systems that states abide by.  For the former, a state's focus is to govern itself based upon the threats around it, it's a theory of international relations which emerged most clearly during the Cold War, where both America and the USSR percieved any movement against their interests as threats to their political domain (see, \"Domino Theory\"). Thus, to neorealists, a state's desire to preserve its own wellbeing security-wise can be seen as a \"rational\" move, that it will also pursue the option that is least destructive to its interests. Jarvis' Four Worlds of Securitization, for example, gives a bit of insight into how a 'rational' actor might if it focuses purely on securitizing.  For the latter, it looks at how institutions and rulemaking, especially through material benefits, uplifts all involved actors, thus giving every actor an incentive to maintain the pre-existing order. The reconstruction of Japan can be seen as an example of neoliberal theory: the United States needed a significant player in the pacific to act as a bulwark against potential Soviet Aggression, so they had an incentive to shape Japan as a pro-democratic, wealthy neoliberal state while simultaneously placing, say, war criminals at its helm.  To both neorealists and neoliberals, while the world is \"anarchic\" in the sense that there is no real governing body that dictates the global realm, there are structures which can stand as a guiding mechanism: for neorealists, the states' interest in its own self-preservation against its foes will always dictate how it behaves. For neoliberals, institutions, money, and rulemaking are what determine how states operate.  Your prof's critique strikes at two major blind sides in both theories: one, international actors are not always rational. Iran's recent nuclear agreement with the Obama administration, for instance, demonstrates that security is not only a militarily existential concern, but also extends economically. Thus, what is presumed \"security\" can vary wildly between states. To a neorealist, Iran should have continued pursuing researching nuclear technology, especially after what happened to Ghaddafi and Libya. Second, terror organizations undermine neoliberal rulemaking rhetoric because they - by their nature as nonstate actors - cannot abide nor benefit from interstate rules. Al Qaeda, for instance, will never be allowed at any bargaining table because it is not a state, cannot bargain as a state, and is not beholden to state rules in an international sense. Yet, at the same time, these organizations (as we see in Boko Haram, the Taliban, and ISIS) can still play a role in shaping state behaviour. They cannot, in effect, be \"chained down\" by rules and norms the same ways states can.  In short, both presumptions about how to control states don't really work. To most neorealists and neoliberals, they may work in \"in general,\" but part of understanding the cases that fail demands understanding why they fail. I think your prof is probably drawing from Alexander Wendt's constructivist critique of anarchy in Anarchy is What States Make of It, where Wendt argues that not only is anarchy partly ideational (in that an order is imagined by its actors), but that anarchy is natural simply because state organization is collective, and such collectives can be hugely shaped by assumptions about goals, positions, and iterative practices which might not be shared globally.  To expand further on this discussion of anarchy, it is important to note that Wendt's concept of anarchy is siginficant in that anarchy has no clear value except what its actors pour into it. He uses the example of how when we think of anarchy, we might think of biker gangs, but we often don't think of monasteries, of which can be considered another form of \"an archos.\" The idea that the international system is \"anarchic\" does not mean that it is by default an innately dangerous or unruly place, but rather that nothing actually can govern the global order which we think of as the \"world\". \"States are not rational\" and \"terror organizations exist\" are two primary examples that hamper the emergence of any truly capable global order. I'd argue, with the emergence of global computation (such as Bratton's 'Black Stack'), we might see major corporations - especially tech companies - as further wrenches, not answers, to global anarchy.   Sorry if I made it more unclear. I wrote this on my phone so it's probably very garbled.","human_ref_B":"While this isn't directly a discourse of anarchic society, I think there is some parallels here to concepts of an agonistic society. The essential concept of an agonistic society is that there cannot be a universal consensus between states and powers, and that people will fundamentally always disagree on things; Scholars such as chantelle mouffe argues that it is essentially na\u00efve to believe people can just arrive at a happy consensus but that we should work to maintain a space for agonistic conflicts.  Personally, I find this is a much better ideal for micro interactions and expanding this to an international scale leaves far too many holes and flaws. Nonetheless, there is certain logics to this thinking.  Mouffe C. Democracy in a Multipolar World. Millennium. 2009;37(3):549-561. doi:10.1177\/0305829809103232","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6095.0,"score_ratio":4.25}
{"post_id":"7gzlwy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Essential reading for migration\/refugees Looking for some essential reading on this topic in the field of social or political science. At this point I have no specific interest, although something that deals with the role of international institutions like the UN etc and delves into some theory migration would be ideal.  Thanks in advance.","c_root_id_A":"dqnjzsg","c_root_id_B":"dqns893","created_at_utc_A":1512217234,"created_at_utc_B":1512231285,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Rosenblum, M and Tichenor, D (eds). 2012. The Oxford Handbook of the Politics of International Migration. New York: Oxford University Press.  Hatton, T and J. Williamson. 2005. Global Migration and World Economy. Two Centuries of Policy and Performance. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.  Moses, J.W. 2011. Emigration and Political Development. New York: Cambridge University Press.  Kapur, D. 2010. Diaspora, Development, and Democracy: The Domestic Impact of International Migration from India. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.  Solimano, A. 2010. International Migration in the Age of Crisis and Globalization: New York: Cambridge University Press.  http:\/\/www.lse.ac.uk\/resources\/calendar\/courseGuides\/IR\/2017_IR347.htm","human_ref_B":"I would suggest Agambens Homo Sacer and We Refugee. He provides valuable insight into the relationship between the nation state, sovereignty, and refugees. He also addresses the uselessness of the UN as an institution, which aims to uphold the rights of refugees, but cannot.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14051.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"7gzlwy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Essential reading for migration\/refugees Looking for some essential reading on this topic in the field of social or political science. At this point I have no specific interest, although something that deals with the role of international institutions like the UN etc and delves into some theory migration would be ideal.  Thanks in advance.","c_root_id_A":"dqnklnz","c_root_id_B":"dqns893","created_at_utc_A":1512218741,"created_at_utc_B":1512231285,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I recommend Leslie Page Moch's \"Moving Europeans\"  https:\/\/books.google.no\/books\/about\/Moving_Europeans.html?id=96zOZiiOKXgC&redir_esc=y Highly credited and cited. It's a great leadin to the field of historical migration studies, which should give you some context on political, social and legislative reactions to migration. Look for Leo Lucassen's publications as well. Lucassen is an esteemed migration scholar and has tons of interesting perspectives as well as some solidly edited publications gathering perspectives from a broad range of fields.","human_ref_B":"I would suggest Agambens Homo Sacer and We Refugee. He provides valuable insight into the relationship between the nation state, sovereignty, and refugees. He also addresses the uselessness of the UN as an institution, which aims to uphold the rights of refugees, but cannot.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12544.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1rvd07","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Why aren't there many large scale cooperatives? In theory cooperatives should be a more attractive business model if the profits are shared more equally. However, traditional stock holder corporations are clearly dominant. Is this because of an inherent inefficiency of cooperatives or barriers to entry from the existing economic structure?","c_root_id_A":"cdrmsmz","c_root_id_B":"cdrlx11","created_at_utc_A":1385979588,"created_at_utc_B":1385973910,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"It's a bigger business in the UK, where the idea initially emerged. The Co-Operative Group has sales of over 12 billion GBP, with its fingers in banking, insurance, groceries, undertaking, and legal services. It is going through a lot of trouble now, but this is related to a crack-addled chairman and poor investment decisions, not anything to do with its co-operative model.   You also have other large, employee-owned businesses in the UK, like John Lewis, a major department store.   It's difficult to say why there are large co-ops in the UK and very few in the US and elsewhere. I'm sure there are some peculiarities of UK corporate law that makes it easier to run them. Given that the concept has a 150 year history in the UK, there might also be a greater cultural acceptance of them, including workers, managers, and consumers.","human_ref_B":"I spent a lot of time and research in my BA in econ learning about worker ownership and cooperatives. The reason I was so interested in it was because I genuinely believe that if\/as more businesses become worker owned, many of the ills of capitalism naturally just go away.  What would happen if all businesses negotiated a percentage of partnership\/ownership with their employees rather than giving them a fixed salary\/wage?  There are costs and benefits on both the micro and macro scale.  On par though, I think this would be an extremely good thing for markets and capitalism in general.    On the micro-level businesses would have a selective pressure on hiring unnecessarily.  This is because each new hire in a purely worker-owned business would dilute the overall stock that each existing employee has.  This would mean that the business would require that the value added to profits by bringing on a new hire would in absolute terms be greater than the amount they cost the business in stock ownership. In theory that's a simple equation, in actual practice it's no simple task to facilitate. Especially for a business that is experiencing economies of scale.  There are other benefits though to this model of business. Giving people a piece of the pie would mean people wouldn't feel so exploited as they would own a more honest chunk of the growth they created (profit).  Not only would this motivate them to take more seriously the interests of the businesses they worked for, it would also mean that they have a great say in the practices of that business.  This would eliminate a lot of conflicts between management and workers.  Indeed there would be a lot less need for management.  The motivation to work more cooperatively naturally increases when you stand to benefit from profits and suffer from losses.  Management can obviously exist in the same way it does, but I think there would be a lot less problems in this respect. Plus, there would be very little need for unions (and all the mess they create) if workers has a proportional say at stockholder meetings according to what they contribute as workers.  To me worker-ownership offers a benefit to capitalism on a macro-scale that makes it even more worth-while.  The more businesses become worker-owned, the more they offer a more automatic method for generating competition in markets.  Let me explain...  If you've ever played monopoly, you know the game ends.  Well capitalism isn't much different (I actually think it's most similar in analogy to the game Osmos).  In any given market, competitors tend to consolidate over time.  Sometimes the competition merges\/gets bought out.  Other times they get outcompeted and the \"winners\" buy up their assets when they go under.  Furthermore, as firms tend to consolidate they get more market power and are able to influence policies that increase barriers for new competition to enter their market and compete with them. Either way, it's merely a matter of time that all markets will wind up in a state of oligopoly or monopoly.    When this happens, we have too little competition (the driving force of how markets create social benefit), and we have to get the government to break up firms to create new competition with anti-trusts.  The market is supposed to awesome because it's supposed to be automatic.  If competition is necessary for markets to work (the more competition the more social benefit), then how come markets tend to lose competition over time.  And how come the only mechanism we have for creating new competition is by having a very \"visible hand\" come in and arbitrarily break up large firms to keep markets merely at a minimum of competition?    Now think about an economy where most businesses were worker owned.  For one a monopoly in this case would be more responsive to the public, because its shareholders (its workers) are themselves a larger part of the public than the shareholders of typical modern corporation.  But more importantly the fact that people own equity in the corporations they helped build and grow, means that they have capital.  This equity can be sold and taken elsewhere to create new businesses.  If a large percentage of employees disagree with their company's policies or choices on any level, they are free to sell\/cash-in on their equity and start a new firm that competes with their old firm along with the co-workers that agree with them.  Thus creating not just new competition, but meaningful and useful competition!  Furthermore on the macro-level, if workers were also owners, there wouldn't be much of an under-class that is paid stagnant wages while a few fat-cats at the top scoop off all the cream on top.  Everyone would have a piece of that cream according to how much they contributed to the business!  There are downsides to worker ownership.  Risk is a big one.  Many people don't want to be liable for losses of the businesses they work for.  And as such they are willing to forego the potential large profits they create for the companies they work for so that they can have a guaranteed paycheck every week.  Since there is so much willing labor available, these sorts of standards become a standard that has become accepted over time.  A race to the bottom if you will. Certainly there is a happy medium we can take between some form of guaranteed income (wage\/salary) and a percentage of ownership (stocks).    There are other downsides that I don't have time to go into now, but all of them are at a point outweighed by the benefits of worker-ownership. This point is the sweet-spot where worker-ownership can grow and ameliorate capitalism.  When I was fascinated with all this stuff I visited an organization called the NCEO \\(National Center for Employee Ownership\\) in Oakland, CA.  I spoke with gentleman named Loren Rodgers there who works as a consultant\/researcher for employee-owned businesses and others looking to find out more about worker-ownership.  He told me that from his research the modern literature not only described the comparative (relative) advantages of worker-ownership but the emergent consensus was that ceteris paribus (meaning \"all things equal\"), worker owned businesses have a competitive (absolute) advantage.  That means that a business that operates under some form of worker-ownership will tend to accordingly do better than the same business without the worker-ownership.  If this is true, then it is merely a matter of time before worker-owned businesses flourish in capitalism.  Lastly, I would like to point out that in the formative years of early industrialization within the US, there was a large and prolific movement of worker-ownership.  The book The Practical Utopians does a good job of documenting this part of our forgotten history.    This post now reads like an infomercial for worker-ownership, but I am happy to get into some of the more technical aspects of this conversation as well as list any sources of my research.  But I always get excited to make the case for worker-ownership (especially with the current state of affairs being what they are) when possible, and a I really just would like to get the conversation going.  Plus it's really late and I'm a bit tipsy at the moment.  TLDR; Worker-ownership where workers are stockholders according to their contribution to a firm, solves a lot of problems with capitalism on both the micro and macro levels. To name a few on the micro-level... reducing unnecessary management, increasing internal cooperation and motivation, as well as decreasing the need for unions within firms. To name a few on the macro-level... creating an automatic mechanism for creating new competition within markets, and reducing income disparity by giving labor their fair share of the equity\/growth they created through the ownership of profits\/stocks.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5678.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"2ihafy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Do private schools exist in socialist countries? In the United States, there are public schools which are subsidized by the government and private schools that are not, and typically are much, much more expensive than pubic schools.  In countries with free University education, or socialist countries, are there private schools?  If so, are they more expensive or are they also subsidized?  Thanks","c_root_id_A":"cl2kiso","c_root_id_B":"cl2ifd3","created_at_utc_A":1412655663,"created_at_utc_B":1412651096,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Denmark has free universities and public schools.  There are private schools - they are subsidized by the state, which pays half of what they pay the public schools (pr. student), and the parent pays the rest (from $120 to $1600 pr. month). The Royal family has used *Krebs Skole* for generations, where the price is $320\/month.  There are no private universities.  There is something called *Efterskoler* - a type of boarding school which mostly has a dual academic and social focus.  Krebs Skole, price   Copenhagen international scool, fees   Solsideskolen, apparently the cheapest school","human_ref_B":"India was very socialist for much of its post-independence history and had private schools and colleges, including plenty of Catholic schools. For example:  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/St._Xavier's_College,_Mumbai","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4567.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"2ihafy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Do private schools exist in socialist countries? In the United States, there are public schools which are subsidized by the government and private schools that are not, and typically are much, much more expensive than pubic schools.  In countries with free University education, or socialist countries, are there private schools?  If so, are they more expensive or are they also subsidized?  Thanks","c_root_id_A":"cl2ifd3","c_root_id_B":"cl2osll","created_at_utc_A":1412651096,"created_at_utc_B":1412672837,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"India was very socialist for much of its post-independence history and had private schools and colleges, including plenty of Catholic schools. For example:  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/St._Xavier's_College,_Mumbai","human_ref_B":"I live in China, which is not exactly socialist, but still covers much of the same ground (if not more) in terms of state ownership and governing of education institutions.   Yes, there are private schools although, in fact, most public schools also require tuition, though it in no way approaches that of american schools. Poorer students, especially if they are from minority areas (read: western china), can and often do get government or government-related humanitarian aid to cover the school fees. There has actually been a significant effort to fund Western Chinese students (especially Tibetans and Uygurs, see Andrew Fischer, 2013) although many of these efforts have been in vain because literacy rates and tertiary education still comes in way worse than national average.   in addition to that, there are two types of schools that approach the notion of \"private\" schools here. The first, \"minority schools\" are similar to private schools in that they are not exactly Ordinary public schools, and students do (usually) have at least a nominal choice to attend them if they don't want to go to the \"majority\" school in town. Some of these schools have been established by distant (and even foreign) donors (e.g. Hong Kong, France) and 'specialize' in funding minority students. The same might be true for other populations (e.g. kindergartens) for which the government does not supply adequate resources.   The only, far more common type of private school in china is what is known as a \"training school.\" This is where (typically rich) parents send their children either full-time or, more commonly, on weekends to receive additional instruction, often in English, in hopes of acing the college entrance examination (the gaokao - there's a TED talk and tons of news about it). These schools can be extremely expensive, but many foreign teachers who are looking to teach english and make money will try for these schools because they usually only involve teacher 2 days each week for rougly 4-5000RMB. This leaves the rest of the week for a different job or taking classes, if the foreign teacher is so inclined.   Finally, China is still unusual compared to many 'socialist' countries in that the government does control or at least oversee a truly high percentage of educational implementation - to the extent that even textbooks and things are often 'nationalized.' So, the distinction between public and private is not exactly the same as it in the states, but there definitely are some 'independent\/entrepreneurial educational initiatives' which, in many cases are hugely lucrative for their founders (e.g. Crazy English).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21741.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2ihafy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Do private schools exist in socialist countries? In the United States, there are public schools which are subsidized by the government and private schools that are not, and typically are much, much more expensive than pubic schools.  In countries with free University education, or socialist countries, are there private schools?  If so, are they more expensive or are they also subsidized?  Thanks","c_root_id_A":"cl2o1fp","c_root_id_B":"cl2osll","created_at_utc_A":1412668443,"created_at_utc_B":1412672837,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"In Sweden, all schools are free of charge. Most schools are run by the township (kommunen), but there are also schools run by private companies. Both types of schools are funded completely by taxes.","human_ref_B":"I live in China, which is not exactly socialist, but still covers much of the same ground (if not more) in terms of state ownership and governing of education institutions.   Yes, there are private schools although, in fact, most public schools also require tuition, though it in no way approaches that of american schools. Poorer students, especially if they are from minority areas (read: western china), can and often do get government or government-related humanitarian aid to cover the school fees. There has actually been a significant effort to fund Western Chinese students (especially Tibetans and Uygurs, see Andrew Fischer, 2013) although many of these efforts have been in vain because literacy rates and tertiary education still comes in way worse than national average.   in addition to that, there are two types of schools that approach the notion of \"private\" schools here. The first, \"minority schools\" are similar to private schools in that they are not exactly Ordinary public schools, and students do (usually) have at least a nominal choice to attend them if they don't want to go to the \"majority\" school in town. Some of these schools have been established by distant (and even foreign) donors (e.g. Hong Kong, France) and 'specialize' in funding minority students. The same might be true for other populations (e.g. kindergartens) for which the government does not supply adequate resources.   The only, far more common type of private school in china is what is known as a \"training school.\" This is where (typically rich) parents send their children either full-time or, more commonly, on weekends to receive additional instruction, often in English, in hopes of acing the college entrance examination (the gaokao - there's a TED talk and tons of news about it). These schools can be extremely expensive, but many foreign teachers who are looking to teach english and make money will try for these schools because they usually only involve teacher 2 days each week for rougly 4-5000RMB. This leaves the rest of the week for a different job or taking classes, if the foreign teacher is so inclined.   Finally, China is still unusual compared to many 'socialist' countries in that the government does control or at least oversee a truly high percentage of educational implementation - to the extent that even textbooks and things are often 'nationalized.' So, the distinction between public and private is not exactly the same as it in the states, but there definitely are some 'independent\/entrepreneurial educational initiatives' which, in many cases are hugely lucrative for their founders (e.g. Crazy English).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4394.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"10nups","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What happens if say 20 five-year-old children are left unsupervised? More specifically, if the children are left in a place where there is no adult supervision, but there are things like toys to play with, some snacks laid out, beds, etc. Any case studies? As a kindergarten teacher, I imagine they would literally just go insane.","c_root_id_A":"c6f745w","c_root_id_B":"c6f2yvi","created_at_utc_A":1348943356,"created_at_utc_B":1348916094,"score_A":23,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"As a kindergarten teacher myself, I'd imagine at that age they'd actually probably get along pretty well. If one kid or a few acted out, the others would just shun them and play together, with other play groups breaking off on their own. If a kid or several were bullied, they'd probably cry and sulk for a bit before gradually rejoining a play group, as they do if I don't interfere.  Of course, with longer-term isolation from adults, the dynamics would get a lot more messed up. 5 year olds are incapable of caring for themselves, long-term planning, or even conceiving of true independence. They would be unable to collect any food that wasn't literally lying waiting for them or coordinate plans and would likely die of neglect and starvation.  I honestly think if they were totally isolated from adults permanently, with no hope of rejoining them, many if not all would weep and tantrum, and then completely break down, lying down in a fetal position until they died. At least for the first-world, privileged kids I have taught, they were unable to conceive of an existence where everything wasn't given to them and they had adults to help them.  There may be case studies you can read about where very young children escaping massacres and other violent events that eliminate their caretakers or cause them to be lost from them.","human_ref_B":"I KNOW I have seen a documentary about exactly this, as a social experiment. It's maybe 8 years ago or something so I can't remember the name of the documentary.   I remember parts of it. They went completley insane trashing the house, a lot of bullying, choccolate for dinner etc.   EDIT: found an article about it: http:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/news\/uknews\/2603181\/Channel-4-condemned-over-documentary-putting-children-in-house-alone.html","labels":1,"seconds_difference":27262.0,"score_ratio":2.0909090909}
{"post_id":"tf791","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Game theory for Political Science? Hello everyone.  I'm a Bachelor student of Political Science and Law in his third year at a university in Europe. I specialize on International Relations and Security and am currently writing my thesis about the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union.  Because I'm reading quite a lot outside of university about IR, security etc. I sometimes come across references to game theory and how it is apparently also used outside of economics, e.g. for political science. In my courses at uni, game theory was never even mentioned and I recently started worrying if that is a bad thing.  So, wise AskSocialScience community, I turn to you and ask: how relevant is game theory for my specialization and does not knowing it by heart constitute a knowledge gap that I ought to close as fast and thoroughly as possible? And if the answer is yes, where should I start, what are some good resources to read up on game theory in general and its applications for political\/social science in particular?  After my Bachelor I plan to go on and pursue a Master's in either IR, international security and\/or law. I'm still flexible for my possible career path, but government service or research in academic as well as non-academic institutes are the highest up on the list.  I hope I provided all the necessary information you need to help me out. Thanks for your time in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c4m4o5i","c_root_id_B":"c4m3pm2","created_at_utc_A":1336598521,"created_at_utc_B":1336594732,"score_A":17,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'm not totally surprised by the lack of attention to such rationalist perspectives if you're studying in Europe. Game theory, like much formal modelling and rationalism in IR, has traditionally been an American pursuit (i.e. a heavily positivist enterprise).   I think it is worth studying up on, especially if you intend to pursue a scholarly career in the field of IR and are open to positions in North America. I have little doubt you will confront it - however critically - at the Master's level where ever you end up, so even if you don't plan on an academic position, it would be useful to gain some familiarity now.   Here are a couple - less than recent - recommendations from a graduate level course two years back. They concern game theory and rational choice approaches more generally:  Glenn H. Snyder and Paul Diesing, *Conflict Among Nations: Bargaining, Decision Making, and System Structure in International Crises* Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977. (esp. chapters 2 and 3).   Christopher Achen and Duncan Snidal, \u201cRational Deterrence Theory and Comparative Case Studies,\u201d *World Politics*, 41 (1989): 143-69.   Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and David Lahman, *War and Reason: Domestic and International Imperatives*. Yale University Press, 1992.   For some debate see:   Donald Green and Ian Shapiro, *Pathologies of Rational Choice Theory: A Critique of Applications in Political Science*. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994. (esp. pp. 13-46).   Martin Hollis and Steve Smith, \"Games that Nations Play\" in *Explaining and Understanding International Relations*. Oxford University Press, 1990. See pp. 119-142.   Stephen M. Walt, \u201cRigor or Rigor Mortis? Rational Choice and Security Studies,\u201d International Security, 23 4 (Spring 1999), pp. 5-48. AND also see the critical articles by Bueno de Mesquita and Morrow, Powell, Zagare and then Walt's response in *International Security* 24 2 (Fall 1999).  edit: I accidentally a word.","human_ref_B":"I know my Intro to Game Theory classes always used the Tragedy Of the Commons as a leap frog to Public Policy.  Defense spending was also covered, since there are usually two split groups, people who want to spend on defense, and people who don't. Even though there are people who don't want defense or spending money on it, they still take advantage of the security defense spending grants them. This falls along the Free-Rider Problem.  Short hand I would say, yes, Game Theory is probably a fairly relevant aspect of what you want to do. Unfortunately, I've only taken an Intro to Game Theory, and some applied classes (IO, Public Choice), so I'm sure there are some people out there who can give you a better starting point then I. I'll see if I can scour anything up for you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3789.0,"score_ratio":3.4}
{"post_id":"tf791","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Game theory for Political Science? Hello everyone.  I'm a Bachelor student of Political Science and Law in his third year at a university in Europe. I specialize on International Relations and Security and am currently writing my thesis about the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union.  Because I'm reading quite a lot outside of university about IR, security etc. I sometimes come across references to game theory and how it is apparently also used outside of economics, e.g. for political science. In my courses at uni, game theory was never even mentioned and I recently started worrying if that is a bad thing.  So, wise AskSocialScience community, I turn to you and ask: how relevant is game theory for my specialization and does not knowing it by heart constitute a knowledge gap that I ought to close as fast and thoroughly as possible? And if the answer is yes, where should I start, what are some good resources to read up on game theory in general and its applications for political\/social science in particular?  After my Bachelor I plan to go on and pursue a Master's in either IR, international security and\/or law. I'm still flexible for my possible career path, but government service or research in academic as well as non-academic institutes are the highest up on the list.  I hope I provided all the necessary information you need to help me out. Thanks for your time in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c4m3yww","c_root_id_B":"c4m4o5i","created_at_utc_A":1336595728,"created_at_utc_B":1336598521,"score_A":3,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Honestly, when I was getting my Bachelors in PoliSci, game theory was always the most fun. Check out anything to do with Cold War game theory, even though everything I've seen written on it is US-centric (American university, so take it with a grain of salt), it was real-world examples of politicians applying game theory to political policy.    While I'm not sure that it would constitute a *problem* to not know game theory as a political scientist, it's really interesting, so why not?","human_ref_B":"I'm not totally surprised by the lack of attention to such rationalist perspectives if you're studying in Europe. Game theory, like much formal modelling and rationalism in IR, has traditionally been an American pursuit (i.e. a heavily positivist enterprise).   I think it is worth studying up on, especially if you intend to pursue a scholarly career in the field of IR and are open to positions in North America. I have little doubt you will confront it - however critically - at the Master's level where ever you end up, so even if you don't plan on an academic position, it would be useful to gain some familiarity now.   Here are a couple - less than recent - recommendations from a graduate level course two years back. They concern game theory and rational choice approaches more generally:  Glenn H. Snyder and Paul Diesing, *Conflict Among Nations: Bargaining, Decision Making, and System Structure in International Crises* Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977. (esp. chapters 2 and 3).   Christopher Achen and Duncan Snidal, \u201cRational Deterrence Theory and Comparative Case Studies,\u201d *World Politics*, 41 (1989): 143-69.   Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and David Lahman, *War and Reason: Domestic and International Imperatives*. Yale University Press, 1992.   For some debate see:   Donald Green and Ian Shapiro, *Pathologies of Rational Choice Theory: A Critique of Applications in Political Science*. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994. (esp. pp. 13-46).   Martin Hollis and Steve Smith, \"Games that Nations Play\" in *Explaining and Understanding International Relations*. Oxford University Press, 1990. See pp. 119-142.   Stephen M. Walt, \u201cRigor or Rigor Mortis? Rational Choice and Security Studies,\u201d International Security, 23 4 (Spring 1999), pp. 5-48. AND also see the critical articles by Bueno de Mesquita and Morrow, Powell, Zagare and then Walt's response in *International Security* 24 2 (Fall 1999).  edit: I accidentally a word.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2793.0,"score_ratio":5.6666666667}
{"post_id":"tf791","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Game theory for Political Science? Hello everyone.  I'm a Bachelor student of Political Science and Law in his third year at a university in Europe. I specialize on International Relations and Security and am currently writing my thesis about the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union.  Because I'm reading quite a lot outside of university about IR, security etc. I sometimes come across references to game theory and how it is apparently also used outside of economics, e.g. for political science. In my courses at uni, game theory was never even mentioned and I recently started worrying if that is a bad thing.  So, wise AskSocialScience community, I turn to you and ask: how relevant is game theory for my specialization and does not knowing it by heart constitute a knowledge gap that I ought to close as fast and thoroughly as possible? And if the answer is yes, where should I start, what are some good resources to read up on game theory in general and its applications for political\/social science in particular?  After my Bachelor I plan to go on and pursue a Master's in either IR, international security and\/or law. I'm still flexible for my possible career path, but government service or research in academic as well as non-academic institutes are the highest up on the list.  I hope I provided all the necessary information you need to help me out. Thanks for your time in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c4m4g11","c_root_id_B":"c4m4o5i","created_at_utc_A":1336597600,"created_at_utc_B":1336598521,"score_A":2,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"I'm an Econ major and a poly sci major, but Game theory has been in every single political science class I have taken. I would suggest looking into it. Plus it's super fun!","human_ref_B":"I'm not totally surprised by the lack of attention to such rationalist perspectives if you're studying in Europe. Game theory, like much formal modelling and rationalism in IR, has traditionally been an American pursuit (i.e. a heavily positivist enterprise).   I think it is worth studying up on, especially if you intend to pursue a scholarly career in the field of IR and are open to positions in North America. I have little doubt you will confront it - however critically - at the Master's level where ever you end up, so even if you don't plan on an academic position, it would be useful to gain some familiarity now.   Here are a couple - less than recent - recommendations from a graduate level course two years back. They concern game theory and rational choice approaches more generally:  Glenn H. Snyder and Paul Diesing, *Conflict Among Nations: Bargaining, Decision Making, and System Structure in International Crises* Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977. (esp. chapters 2 and 3).   Christopher Achen and Duncan Snidal, \u201cRational Deterrence Theory and Comparative Case Studies,\u201d *World Politics*, 41 (1989): 143-69.   Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and David Lahman, *War and Reason: Domestic and International Imperatives*. Yale University Press, 1992.   For some debate see:   Donald Green and Ian Shapiro, *Pathologies of Rational Choice Theory: A Critique of Applications in Political Science*. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994. (esp. pp. 13-46).   Martin Hollis and Steve Smith, \"Games that Nations Play\" in *Explaining and Understanding International Relations*. Oxford University Press, 1990. See pp. 119-142.   Stephen M. Walt, \u201cRigor or Rigor Mortis? Rational Choice and Security Studies,\u201d International Security, 23 4 (Spring 1999), pp. 5-48. AND also see the critical articles by Bueno de Mesquita and Morrow, Powell, Zagare and then Walt's response in *International Security* 24 2 (Fall 1999).  edit: I accidentally a word.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":921.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"tf791","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Game theory for Political Science? Hello everyone.  I'm a Bachelor student of Political Science and Law in his third year at a university in Europe. I specialize on International Relations and Security and am currently writing my thesis about the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union.  Because I'm reading quite a lot outside of university about IR, security etc. I sometimes come across references to game theory and how it is apparently also used outside of economics, e.g. for political science. In my courses at uni, game theory was never even mentioned and I recently started worrying if that is a bad thing.  So, wise AskSocialScience community, I turn to you and ask: how relevant is game theory for my specialization and does not knowing it by heart constitute a knowledge gap that I ought to close as fast and thoroughly as possible? And if the answer is yes, where should I start, what are some good resources to read up on game theory in general and its applications for political\/social science in particular?  After my Bachelor I plan to go on and pursue a Master's in either IR, international security and\/or law. I'm still flexible for my possible career path, but government service or research in academic as well as non-academic institutes are the highest up on the list.  I hope I provided all the necessary information you need to help me out. Thanks for your time in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c4m5jdm","c_root_id_B":"c4m3pm2","created_at_utc_A":1336602266,"created_at_utc_B":1336594732,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"As it relates to IR I see game theory as informing, in particular, the neo-realist and neo-liberal schools of thought. The basic conclusion of a single 'game' (i.e the Prisoner's dilemma) is that, although it may be beneficial to both parties, actors will not cooperate if there are gains to be made by 'defecting' (betraying the other actor). This may be seen as analogous to a neo-realist line of thought wherein, despite the mutual benefit of peaceful relations, countries will continue to develop their military capacity to defend against \/ threaten their rivals.  Arguably neo-liberal thinking can equally be placed in a game-theoretic framework, as a slightly more sophisticated understanding of game theory tells us that in infinitely recurring games (as if after one round  of the prisoner's dilemma the actors did the same thing again with the knowledge of how the other actor acted in the last game, repeating this ad infinitum) you can in fact achieve a cooperative outcome. This is based on the fact that one actor may promise cooperation in the first game, with the understanding that if the other actor defects then in every following game they will defect also, returning to the low-payoff outcome and potentially leaving both worse off. Thus a potential defector might see that even though in the short run it benefits them to defect (for example by attacking another  country) in the long run the 'punishment' more than outweighs the benefit.   Consequently even self-interested actors might achieve cooperation under the right  conditions, as is the case in a neo-liberal framework. Anyway, that's just my understanding of one of the political applications of game theory. As others have said it's an interesting area, and the basics aren't too difficult to grasp. Excuse the essay; I'm in the middle of revision so this is as much a clarification of my thoughts for my own sake as anything.","human_ref_B":"I know my Intro to Game Theory classes always used the Tragedy Of the Commons as a leap frog to Public Policy.  Defense spending was also covered, since there are usually two split groups, people who want to spend on defense, and people who don't. Even though there are people who don't want defense or spending money on it, they still take advantage of the security defense spending grants them. This falls along the Free-Rider Problem.  Short hand I would say, yes, Game Theory is probably a fairly relevant aspect of what you want to do. Unfortunately, I've only taken an Intro to Game Theory, and some applied classes (IO, Public Choice), so I'm sure there are some people out there who can give you a better starting point then I. I'll see if I can scour anything up for you.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7534.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"tf791","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Game theory for Political Science? Hello everyone.  I'm a Bachelor student of Political Science and Law in his third year at a university in Europe. I specialize on International Relations and Security and am currently writing my thesis about the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union.  Because I'm reading quite a lot outside of university about IR, security etc. I sometimes come across references to game theory and how it is apparently also used outside of economics, e.g. for political science. In my courses at uni, game theory was never even mentioned and I recently started worrying if that is a bad thing.  So, wise AskSocialScience community, I turn to you and ask: how relevant is game theory for my specialization and does not knowing it by heart constitute a knowledge gap that I ought to close as fast and thoroughly as possible? And if the answer is yes, where should I start, what are some good resources to read up on game theory in general and its applications for political\/social science in particular?  After my Bachelor I plan to go on and pursue a Master's in either IR, international security and\/or law. I'm still flexible for my possible career path, but government service or research in academic as well as non-academic institutes are the highest up on the list.  I hope I provided all the necessary information you need to help me out. Thanks for your time in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c4m3yww","c_root_id_B":"c4m5jdm","created_at_utc_A":1336595728,"created_at_utc_B":1336602266,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Honestly, when I was getting my Bachelors in PoliSci, game theory was always the most fun. Check out anything to do with Cold War game theory, even though everything I've seen written on it is US-centric (American university, so take it with a grain of salt), it was real-world examples of politicians applying game theory to political policy.    While I'm not sure that it would constitute a *problem* to not know game theory as a political scientist, it's really interesting, so why not?","human_ref_B":"As it relates to IR I see game theory as informing, in particular, the neo-realist and neo-liberal schools of thought. The basic conclusion of a single 'game' (i.e the Prisoner's dilemma) is that, although it may be beneficial to both parties, actors will not cooperate if there are gains to be made by 'defecting' (betraying the other actor). This may be seen as analogous to a neo-realist line of thought wherein, despite the mutual benefit of peaceful relations, countries will continue to develop their military capacity to defend against \/ threaten their rivals.  Arguably neo-liberal thinking can equally be placed in a game-theoretic framework, as a slightly more sophisticated understanding of game theory tells us that in infinitely recurring games (as if after one round  of the prisoner's dilemma the actors did the same thing again with the knowledge of how the other actor acted in the last game, repeating this ad infinitum) you can in fact achieve a cooperative outcome. This is based on the fact that one actor may promise cooperation in the first game, with the understanding that if the other actor defects then in every following game they will defect also, returning to the low-payoff outcome and potentially leaving both worse off. Thus a potential defector might see that even though in the short run it benefits them to defect (for example by attacking another  country) in the long run the 'punishment' more than outweighs the benefit.   Consequently even self-interested actors might achieve cooperation under the right  conditions, as is the case in a neo-liberal framework. Anyway, that's just my understanding of one of the political applications of game theory. As others have said it's an interesting area, and the basics aren't too difficult to grasp. Excuse the essay; I'm in the middle of revision so this is as much a clarification of my thoughts for my own sake as anything.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6538.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"tf791","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Game theory for Political Science? Hello everyone.  I'm a Bachelor student of Political Science and Law in his third year at a university in Europe. I specialize on International Relations and Security and am currently writing my thesis about the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union.  Because I'm reading quite a lot outside of university about IR, security etc. I sometimes come across references to game theory and how it is apparently also used outside of economics, e.g. for political science. In my courses at uni, game theory was never even mentioned and I recently started worrying if that is a bad thing.  So, wise AskSocialScience community, I turn to you and ask: how relevant is game theory for my specialization and does not knowing it by heart constitute a knowledge gap that I ought to close as fast and thoroughly as possible? And if the answer is yes, where should I start, what are some good resources to read up on game theory in general and its applications for political\/social science in particular?  After my Bachelor I plan to go on and pursue a Master's in either IR, international security and\/or law. I'm still flexible for my possible career path, but government service or research in academic as well as non-academic institutes are the highest up on the list.  I hope I provided all the necessary information you need to help me out. Thanks for your time in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c4m4g11","c_root_id_B":"c4m5jdm","created_at_utc_A":1336597600,"created_at_utc_B":1336602266,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I'm an Econ major and a poly sci major, but Game theory has been in every single political science class I have taken. I would suggest looking into it. Plus it's super fun!","human_ref_B":"As it relates to IR I see game theory as informing, in particular, the neo-realist and neo-liberal schools of thought. The basic conclusion of a single 'game' (i.e the Prisoner's dilemma) is that, although it may be beneficial to both parties, actors will not cooperate if there are gains to be made by 'defecting' (betraying the other actor). This may be seen as analogous to a neo-realist line of thought wherein, despite the mutual benefit of peaceful relations, countries will continue to develop their military capacity to defend against \/ threaten their rivals.  Arguably neo-liberal thinking can equally be placed in a game-theoretic framework, as a slightly more sophisticated understanding of game theory tells us that in infinitely recurring games (as if after one round  of the prisoner's dilemma the actors did the same thing again with the knowledge of how the other actor acted in the last game, repeating this ad infinitum) you can in fact achieve a cooperative outcome. This is based on the fact that one actor may promise cooperation in the first game, with the understanding that if the other actor defects then in every following game they will defect also, returning to the low-payoff outcome and potentially leaving both worse off. Thus a potential defector might see that even though in the short run it benefits them to defect (for example by attacking another  country) in the long run the 'punishment' more than outweighs the benefit.   Consequently even self-interested actors might achieve cooperation under the right  conditions, as is the case in a neo-liberal framework. Anyway, that's just my understanding of one of the political applications of game theory. As others have said it's an interesting area, and the basics aren't too difficult to grasp. Excuse the essay; I'm in the middle of revision so this is as much a clarification of my thoughts for my own sake as anything.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4666.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"tf791","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Game theory for Political Science? Hello everyone.  I'm a Bachelor student of Political Science and Law in his third year at a university in Europe. I specialize on International Relations and Security and am currently writing my thesis about the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union.  Because I'm reading quite a lot outside of university about IR, security etc. I sometimes come across references to game theory and how it is apparently also used outside of economics, e.g. for political science. In my courses at uni, game theory was never even mentioned and I recently started worrying if that is a bad thing.  So, wise AskSocialScience community, I turn to you and ask: how relevant is game theory for my specialization and does not knowing it by heart constitute a knowledge gap that I ought to close as fast and thoroughly as possible? And if the answer is yes, where should I start, what are some good resources to read up on game theory in general and its applications for political\/social science in particular?  After my Bachelor I plan to go on and pursue a Master's in either IR, international security and\/or law. I'm still flexible for my possible career path, but government service or research in academic as well as non-academic institutes are the highest up on the list.  I hope I provided all the necessary information you need to help me out. Thanks for your time in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c4m4sux","c_root_id_B":"c4m5jdm","created_at_utc_A":1336599063,"created_at_utc_B":1336602266,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Steven Brams does a lot of work with game theory, specifically 'theory of moves,' which I have very interesting.","human_ref_B":"As it relates to IR I see game theory as informing, in particular, the neo-realist and neo-liberal schools of thought. The basic conclusion of a single 'game' (i.e the Prisoner's dilemma) is that, although it may be beneficial to both parties, actors will not cooperate if there are gains to be made by 'defecting' (betraying the other actor). This may be seen as analogous to a neo-realist line of thought wherein, despite the mutual benefit of peaceful relations, countries will continue to develop their military capacity to defend against \/ threaten their rivals.  Arguably neo-liberal thinking can equally be placed in a game-theoretic framework, as a slightly more sophisticated understanding of game theory tells us that in infinitely recurring games (as if after one round  of the prisoner's dilemma the actors did the same thing again with the knowledge of how the other actor acted in the last game, repeating this ad infinitum) you can in fact achieve a cooperative outcome. This is based on the fact that one actor may promise cooperation in the first game, with the understanding that if the other actor defects then in every following game they will defect also, returning to the low-payoff outcome and potentially leaving both worse off. Thus a potential defector might see that even though in the short run it benefits them to defect (for example by attacking another  country) in the long run the 'punishment' more than outweighs the benefit.   Consequently even self-interested actors might achieve cooperation under the right  conditions, as is the case in a neo-liberal framework. Anyway, that's just my understanding of one of the political applications of game theory. As others have said it's an interesting area, and the basics aren't too difficult to grasp. Excuse the essay; I'm in the middle of revision so this is as much a clarification of my thoughts for my own sake as anything.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3203.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"tf791","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Game theory for Political Science? Hello everyone.  I'm a Bachelor student of Political Science and Law in his third year at a university in Europe. I specialize on International Relations and Security and am currently writing my thesis about the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union.  Because I'm reading quite a lot outside of university about IR, security etc. I sometimes come across references to game theory and how it is apparently also used outside of economics, e.g. for political science. In my courses at uni, game theory was never even mentioned and I recently started worrying if that is a bad thing.  So, wise AskSocialScience community, I turn to you and ask: how relevant is game theory for my specialization and does not knowing it by heart constitute a knowledge gap that I ought to close as fast and thoroughly as possible? And if the answer is yes, where should I start, what are some good resources to read up on game theory in general and its applications for political\/social science in particular?  After my Bachelor I plan to go on and pursue a Master's in either IR, international security and\/or law. I'm still flexible for my possible career path, but government service or research in academic as well as non-academic institutes are the highest up on the list.  I hope I provided all the necessary information you need to help me out. Thanks for your time in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c4m4g11","c_root_id_B":"c4m8ujs","created_at_utc_A":1336597600,"created_at_utc_B":1336618150,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm an Econ major and a poly sci major, but Game theory has been in every single political science class I have taken. I would suggest looking into it. Plus it's super fun!","human_ref_B":"I have a TA who created some pretty good IR Game Theory explanations.  You can find some here, and more on youtube.   http:\/\/wjspaniel.wordpress.com\/on-youtube\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20550.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"tf791","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Game theory for Political Science? Hello everyone.  I'm a Bachelor student of Political Science and Law in his third year at a university in Europe. I specialize on International Relations and Security and am currently writing my thesis about the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union.  Because I'm reading quite a lot outside of university about IR, security etc. I sometimes come across references to game theory and how it is apparently also used outside of economics, e.g. for political science. In my courses at uni, game theory was never even mentioned and I recently started worrying if that is a bad thing.  So, wise AskSocialScience community, I turn to you and ask: how relevant is game theory for my specialization and does not knowing it by heart constitute a knowledge gap that I ought to close as fast and thoroughly as possible? And if the answer is yes, where should I start, what are some good resources to read up on game theory in general and its applications for political\/social science in particular?  After my Bachelor I plan to go on and pursue a Master's in either IR, international security and\/or law. I'm still flexible for my possible career path, but government service or research in academic as well as non-academic institutes are the highest up on the list.  I hope I provided all the necessary information you need to help me out. Thanks for your time in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c4m4sux","c_root_id_B":"c4m8ujs","created_at_utc_A":1336599063,"created_at_utc_B":1336618150,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Steven Brams does a lot of work with game theory, specifically 'theory of moves,' which I have very interesting.","human_ref_B":"I have a TA who created some pretty good IR Game Theory explanations.  You can find some here, and more on youtube.   http:\/\/wjspaniel.wordpress.com\/on-youtube\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19087.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"tf791","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Game theory for Political Science? Hello everyone.  I'm a Bachelor student of Political Science and Law in his third year at a university in Europe. I specialize on International Relations and Security and am currently writing my thesis about the Common Security and Defence Policy of the European Union.  Because I'm reading quite a lot outside of university about IR, security etc. I sometimes come across references to game theory and how it is apparently also used outside of economics, e.g. for political science. In my courses at uni, game theory was never even mentioned and I recently started worrying if that is a bad thing.  So, wise AskSocialScience community, I turn to you and ask: how relevant is game theory for my specialization and does not knowing it by heart constitute a knowledge gap that I ought to close as fast and thoroughly as possible? And if the answer is yes, where should I start, what are some good resources to read up on game theory in general and its applications for political\/social science in particular?  After my Bachelor I plan to go on and pursue a Master's in either IR, international security and\/or law. I'm still flexible for my possible career path, but government service or research in academic as well as non-academic institutes are the highest up on the list.  I hope I provided all the necessary information you need to help me out. Thanks for your time in advance!","c_root_id_A":"c4m76em","c_root_id_B":"c4m8ujs","created_at_utc_A":1336610121,"created_at_utc_B":1336618150,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"As ADG_Esquire suggested, game theory seems to be more common in American political science. I know little about IR theory outside of the Anglophone world (except, say, applications of French\/German social theory), but I've gotten the impression that the English School and European IR generally eschewed American scholars' penchant for positivism and formal models.   It also seems that in the last two decades or so game theory has lost a lot of its prestige, even in the US--I've only seen it taken *seriously* in economics and philosophy departments (as rational choice theory), although this is, of course, just my experience.  Based on the above, it would seem you aren't in too bad a position. It might be interesting, and perhaps even useful, but I shouldn't think it's something worth too much worry.","human_ref_B":"I have a TA who created some pretty good IR Game Theory explanations.  You can find some here, and more on youtube.   http:\/\/wjspaniel.wordpress.com\/on-youtube\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8029.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5kfz3d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Academic sources on feminist concepts like rape culture, toxic \/ hegemonic masculinity and patriarchy Papers please.   Seriously, though, I'm specifically interested in academic papers, or books which are considered go-to or at least widely recognised sources on these subjects, if they exist. I tried to search on my own and I got a lot of pop articles and forum posts, neither of which suffice and I don't know what else to do since I'm in a completely irrelevant field. I want to read something well structured and abstract on these issues.   Brief explanations welcome (as they may be helpful) but not required.","c_root_id_A":"dbo4xvu","c_root_id_B":"dbnwkrb","created_at_utc_A":1482818417,"created_at_utc_B":1482804665,"score_A":26,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"More empirical: see journals like  * Sex Roles * Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment * Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment, and Trauma * Men and Masculinities * Psychology of Men and Masculinity * Psychology of Violence * Archives of Sexual Behavior * Trauma, Violence, and Abuse * Journal of Interpersonal Violence * Journal of Family Violence * Violence & Victims * Aggression & Violent Behavior * Journal of Sexual Aggression * Journal of Sex Research  You will find hundreds or thousands of empirical (and sometimes not empirical) articles on those topics in the journals above, though the journals do not deal exclusively in those topics.  Of course you can also try using Google Scholar (or Web of Science or PsycInfo or EbscoHost if you have access to these) to search the phrases in your post. There's a lot out there, but you will have to do at least a little work in sifting through it. This is a very multidisciplinary field, including contributions from (at least) psychology, sociology, political science, criminology\/criminal justice, social work, public health, anthropology, and non-social science (or more fuzzy-boundary social science) fields like history, critical theory, postmodern studies, cultural studies, etc.","human_ref_B":"Are you using Google Scholar to search?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13752.0,"score_ratio":1.04}
{"post_id":"5kfz3d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Academic sources on feminist concepts like rape culture, toxic \/ hegemonic masculinity and patriarchy Papers please.   Seriously, though, I'm specifically interested in academic papers, or books which are considered go-to or at least widely recognised sources on these subjects, if they exist. I tried to search on my own and I got a lot of pop articles and forum posts, neither of which suffice and I don't know what else to do since I'm in a completely irrelevant field. I want to read something well structured and abstract on these issues.   Brief explanations welcome (as they may be helpful) but not required.","c_root_id_A":"dbo1c3u","c_root_id_B":"dbo4xvu","created_at_utc_A":1482811836,"created_at_utc_B":1482818417,"score_A":10,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"Simone De Beauvoir, the second sex. Read the whole thing. You'll never regret it.","human_ref_B":"More empirical: see journals like  * Sex Roles * Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment * Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment, and Trauma * Men and Masculinities * Psychology of Men and Masculinity * Psychology of Violence * Archives of Sexual Behavior * Trauma, Violence, and Abuse * Journal of Interpersonal Violence * Journal of Family Violence * Violence & Victims * Aggression & Violent Behavior * Journal of Sexual Aggression * Journal of Sex Research  You will find hundreds or thousands of empirical (and sometimes not empirical) articles on those topics in the journals above, though the journals do not deal exclusively in those topics.  Of course you can also try using Google Scholar (or Web of Science or PsycInfo or EbscoHost if you have access to these) to search the phrases in your post. There's a lot out there, but you will have to do at least a little work in sifting through it. This is a very multidisciplinary field, including contributions from (at least) psychology, sociology, political science, criminology\/criminal justice, social work, public health, anthropology, and non-social science (or more fuzzy-boundary social science) fields like history, critical theory, postmodern studies, cultural studies, etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6581.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"5kfz3d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Academic sources on feminist concepts like rape culture, toxic \/ hegemonic masculinity and patriarchy Papers please.   Seriously, though, I'm specifically interested in academic papers, or books which are considered go-to or at least widely recognised sources on these subjects, if they exist. I tried to search on my own and I got a lot of pop articles and forum posts, neither of which suffice and I don't know what else to do since I'm in a completely irrelevant field. I want to read something well structured and abstract on these issues.   Brief explanations welcome (as they may be helpful) but not required.","c_root_id_A":"dbnn6wd","c_root_id_B":"dbo4xvu","created_at_utc_A":1482789577,"created_at_utc_B":1482818417,"score_A":4,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"A good source on the patriarchy is *The Gender Knot* by Johnson.","human_ref_B":"More empirical: see journals like  * Sex Roles * Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment * Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment, and Trauma * Men and Masculinities * Psychology of Men and Masculinity * Psychology of Violence * Archives of Sexual Behavior * Trauma, Violence, and Abuse * Journal of Interpersonal Violence * Journal of Family Violence * Violence & Victims * Aggression & Violent Behavior * Journal of Sexual Aggression * Journal of Sex Research  You will find hundreds or thousands of empirical (and sometimes not empirical) articles on those topics in the journals above, though the journals do not deal exclusively in those topics.  Of course you can also try using Google Scholar (or Web of Science or PsycInfo or EbscoHost if you have access to these) to search the phrases in your post. There's a lot out there, but you will have to do at least a little work in sifting through it. This is a very multidisciplinary field, including contributions from (at least) psychology, sociology, political science, criminology\/criminal justice, social work, public health, anthropology, and non-social science (or more fuzzy-boundary social science) fields like history, critical theory, postmodern studies, cultural studies, etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":28840.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"5kfz3d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Academic sources on feminist concepts like rape culture, toxic \/ hegemonic masculinity and patriarchy Papers please.   Seriously, though, I'm specifically interested in academic papers, or books which are considered go-to or at least widely recognised sources on these subjects, if they exist. I tried to search on my own and I got a lot of pop articles and forum posts, neither of which suffice and I don't know what else to do since I'm in a completely irrelevant field. I want to read something well structured and abstract on these issues.   Brief explanations welcome (as they may be helpful) but not required.","c_root_id_A":"dbnzcnn","c_root_id_B":"dbo4xvu","created_at_utc_A":1482808873,"created_at_utc_B":1482818417,"score_A":2,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"\"Delusions of Gender\" by Cordelia Fine","human_ref_B":"More empirical: see journals like  * Sex Roles * Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment * Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment, and Trauma * Men and Masculinities * Psychology of Men and Masculinity * Psychology of Violence * Archives of Sexual Behavior * Trauma, Violence, and Abuse * Journal of Interpersonal Violence * Journal of Family Violence * Violence & Victims * Aggression & Violent Behavior * Journal of Sexual Aggression * Journal of Sex Research  You will find hundreds or thousands of empirical (and sometimes not empirical) articles on those topics in the journals above, though the journals do not deal exclusively in those topics.  Of course you can also try using Google Scholar (or Web of Science or PsycInfo or EbscoHost if you have access to these) to search the phrases in your post. There's a lot out there, but you will have to do at least a little work in sifting through it. This is a very multidisciplinary field, including contributions from (at least) psychology, sociology, political science, criminology\/criminal justice, social work, public health, anthropology, and non-social science (or more fuzzy-boundary social science) fields like history, critical theory, postmodern studies, cultural studies, etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9544.0,"score_ratio":13.0}
{"post_id":"5kfz3d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Academic sources on feminist concepts like rape culture, toxic \/ hegemonic masculinity and patriarchy Papers please.   Seriously, though, I'm specifically interested in academic papers, or books which are considered go-to or at least widely recognised sources on these subjects, if they exist. I tried to search on my own and I got a lot of pop articles and forum posts, neither of which suffice and I don't know what else to do since I'm in a completely irrelevant field. I want to read something well structured and abstract on these issues.   Brief explanations welcome (as they may be helpful) but not required.","c_root_id_A":"dbnwkrb","c_root_id_B":"dbnn6wd","created_at_utc_A":1482804665,"created_at_utc_B":1482789577,"score_A":25,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Are you using Google Scholar to search?","human_ref_B":"A good source on the patriarchy is *The Gender Knot* by Johnson.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15088.0,"score_ratio":6.25}
{"post_id":"5kfz3d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Academic sources on feminist concepts like rape culture, toxic \/ hegemonic masculinity and patriarchy Papers please.   Seriously, though, I'm specifically interested in academic papers, or books which are considered go-to or at least widely recognised sources on these subjects, if they exist. I tried to search on my own and I got a lot of pop articles and forum posts, neither of which suffice and I don't know what else to do since I'm in a completely irrelevant field. I want to read something well structured and abstract on these issues.   Brief explanations welcome (as they may be helpful) but not required.","c_root_id_A":"dbo1c3u","c_root_id_B":"dbnn6wd","created_at_utc_A":1482811836,"created_at_utc_B":1482789577,"score_A":10,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Simone De Beauvoir, the second sex. Read the whole thing. You'll never regret it.","human_ref_B":"A good source on the patriarchy is *The Gender Knot* by Johnson.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22259.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"5kfz3d","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Academic sources on feminist concepts like rape culture, toxic \/ hegemonic masculinity and patriarchy Papers please.   Seriously, though, I'm specifically interested in academic papers, or books which are considered go-to or at least widely recognised sources on these subjects, if they exist. I tried to search on my own and I got a lot of pop articles and forum posts, neither of which suffice and I don't know what else to do since I'm in a completely irrelevant field. I want to read something well structured and abstract on these issues.   Brief explanations welcome (as they may be helpful) but not required.","c_root_id_A":"dbo1c3u","c_root_id_B":"dbnzcnn","created_at_utc_A":1482811836,"created_at_utc_B":1482808873,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Simone De Beauvoir, the second sex. Read the whole thing. You'll never regret it.","human_ref_B":"\"Delusions of Gender\" by Cordelia Fine","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2963.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"17awfj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Did children suffer the same emotional damage in societies where pederasty was normal? Pedophiles are demonized in today's society. We know that children need to be protected, and what kind of lasting damage can be done to someone who's been sexually victimized. But this isn't something that's universal. In ancient Greece, it was normal for a man to choose a boy lover. Without the same stigmas, would those children react any differently to those experiences?","c_root_id_A":"c83yei0","c_root_id_B":"c84467c","created_at_utc_A":1359215319,"created_at_utc_B":1359238001,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"As far as I know -after reading some university of oxford or cambridge press book on the history of sex- for the greeks the main virtue of a man was self control when dealing with sex. In the sense that sleeping with your pupils was not 'sleeping' (wink-wink), but sharing the same bed.  But you could of course praise the beauty of certain boys - as did Socrates. But sex was not supposed to be a part of it.","human_ref_B":"Imagine being sold into slavery right now, with your modern beleifs in liberty, freedom, and all men are created equal. Now imagine being born into slavery a thousand years ago, from slave parents, and you are told that that is normal and fair. I'm guessing you wouldn't really enjoy it, but it would hardly be as bad as the first scenario. Also, I think it wouldn't be very logical that generations of Greek men were traumatized by pederasty and then practiced it with boys when they grew older, unless we are going for the \"if you are raped as a child, you are more likely to grow up being a pedophile\" idea, which I do not know if it holds any weight.  Wikipedia cites Aeschines in a paragraph that says:   Pederasty was the idealized form of an age-structured homoeroticism that had other, less idealized manifestations, such as prostitution or the sexual use of slave boys. Paying free youths for sex was prohibited. Free youths who did sell their favors were ridiculed, and later in life might be prohibited from performing certain official functions.  So, we could even imagine certain situations where pederasty was seen as \"bad\", and some, systematically actually, as good. If you grow up being told that something is good, it will probably not traumatize you.  This link has some interesting info on the subject, it discusses things like how the relations had to be approved by the minor's parents, and how we really can't compare their concept with modern pedophilia.  https:\/\/kb.osu.edu\/dspace\/bitstream\/handle\/1811\/37221\/James_Gentr?sequence=1","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22682.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"j3mpdn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Computational social sciences Hello, everybody  After trying to find an application for data science in an area of my interest, I discovered computational social sciences. Basically it means the use of computation to research in social sciences, but after read an article in the Nature's blog, a few questions popped up in my mind. The computation social scientists can have a very distinct background, for example there are some from a social science background and others from natural sciences or computer science background. The ones with a background in social science claims that the others work have problem because the often don't use social science theory. In its turn, researchers from natural sciences \/ computer science affirms that the traditional social science theory is not sufficient to understand large amounts of data. What do you think about that question? Is there a \"winner\" in this discussion? Is traditional social science theory still important to the understanding of the big data or new theories must be created?  &#x200B;  Thank you very much in advance!","c_root_id_A":"g7d1f22","c_root_id_B":"g7d2dbw","created_at_utc_A":1601607824,"created_at_utc_B":1601608375,"score_A":4,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"A big part of the appeal of computational social science is that you can do things that are really hard with traditional methods. Here's an example of a theory from social psychology getting mass-scale observation validation of its core predictions.   Concreteness and psychological distance in natural language use  The point being that theory plus good data is better than just data, or just theory no data.","human_ref_B":"Hi  there - I don't know that anyone has declared a winner in this  discussion. I am a social scientist trained in computational social  sciences, and I think it's important that CSS practitioners respond to  social science theory, even if the CSS practitioners have a valid point  that a given theory is insufficient to the data. The trick with CSS is  that your models have to be informed by a good idea of how the real  world works, in order to make valid inference. Anything else is just toy  models - not actual science.  It's  important to appreciate that theory tells you what kind of questions  are important and where to look for the answers, more than how to answer  them. People like Robert Axelrod and Duncan Watts have done pioneering  work in computational social science, but always informed by theory. In fact, I can't think of a single, significant CSS result that is not informed by social science theories.  This  isn't exactly a CSS example, but its comes from complexity studies via  the Santa Fe Institute - complexity and CSS are closely related. There's  a biologist named Ian Couzin who studies how schools of fish make 'decisions'; there's no leader in these schools, so they operate as sort  of a rough democracy. He published a paper titled, \"Uninformed  Individuals Promote Democratic Consensus In Animal Groups\"\\* - which you  would think has obvious consequences for human democracies. And  certainly, Dr. Couzin has talked about his research in many forums as  having implications for human democracies.  The  problem is that fish don't talk, and humans do - and there's a good  body of research that shows that human democracies don't behave anything  like Dr. Couzin's fish. I was at a lecture he gave, and an expert - a  social scientist - explained to him at length this body of research, and  why it was inaccurate to suggest his fish had implications for human  research. But Dr. Couzin has continued to - as far as I know, still does -  suggest his research is meaningful for human society.  At the very least, social science theory allows us to differentiate fish from humans.  \\*Couzin, et al (2011). \"Uninformed Individuals Promote Democratic Consensus In Animal Grousp.\" (*Science*\u00a016 Dec 2011: Vol. 334, Issue 6062, pp. 1578-1580DOI: 10.1126\/science.1210280","labels":0,"seconds_difference":551.0,"score_ratio":3.25}
{"post_id":"4zhiug","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Q: What can be done to cope with the rise of the \"obsoletariat\"? It has recently become very apparent to me that many jobs will become automated, and many (often well-paid) workers will be simply left on the curb. For example, there are 3.5 million professional truck drivers in the US. Between retail salespersons and cashiers are over 7.5 million jobs. Amazon makes them unnecessary. Of course all of these jobs will not disappear, but they are at risk of being automated out of existence. And I think by definition their next job will pay less than the one they lost (otherwise they would have switched voluntarily).  I don't believe they will simply be able to just find another job, either. There may be more people than jobs, which is what I'm asking about. With the approaching reality of artificial intelligence becoming a reality, more and more professions are at risk every year. More and more people are at risk of being pushed out of good paying jobs and into jobs with inferior pay, worse hours, or both.  My question is, what economic policies can the US government enact to mitigate this? One answer I have heard is a basic income. Are there other solutions?","c_root_id_A":"d6wpto8","c_root_id_B":"d6wijuo","created_at_utc_A":1472163681,"created_at_utc_B":1472154094,"score_A":8,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"A lot of the posts here seem to be debating whether or not the premise of the question is correct.  On that topic, here's a good radio broadcast on this very topic by Freakonomics Radio:  http:\/\/freakonomics.com\/2015\/01\/29\/how-safe-is-your-job-full-transcript\/  The radio segment goes over two opposing points of view by economists.  Some economists think that the future will be as it was in the past.  Creative destruction has destroyed many jobs yes, but it creates an equal number of jobs.  But some economists are saying, No, This Time It's Different.  This time, technology is destroying more jobs than it will create, and\/or the jobs that the new technology creates is all very high knowledge high training jobs, that are far out of the reach of the people who just lost their jobs.  Me frankly, I'm leaning towards the second camp of economists.  Maybe this time it just is different.  Given enough time, technology will inevitably good enough at everything that most people won't have jobs.  I don't see where the limit is to technology getting smarter and smarter, and until someone convinces me that there's a real hard limit, it just seems inevitable that we could produce pretty much anything with only some or no human labor, and the rest of the population would be left jobless, or if we could train them all to take on the high end jobs, then people would be producing far more stuff than humanity could possibly use, and what's the point of that.  Maybe it won't even happen this century, but some day it will.  What can be done about this?  In the long long run, I don't see any options other than a universal basic income, or as a guy in the radio segment calls it, a \"guaranteed minimum income\".    Other than that, what could help us for the foreseeable future is if society really spent resources to help people retrain and retool for the jobs that our modern technological economy needs.  I'd be all for the government heavily funding trade schools, associate degrees, community colleges, continuing education, adults going back to college, school in general.  Drive the tuitions down to nothing or very low.    Can't think of anything else, for the long run or for the foreseeable future, any other ideas would be welcome.","human_ref_B":"Your premise is not accepted by the majority of economists.  See Autor 2015. Summary:  > Clearly, the past two centuries of automation and technological progress have not made human labor obsolete: the employment\u2010to\u2010population ratio rose during the 20th century even as women moved from home to market; and although the unemployment rate fluctuates cyclically, there is no apparent long-run increase.  > ...   > In this essay, I begin by identifying the reasons that automation has not wiped out a majority of jobs over the decades and centuries. Automation does indeed substitute for labor\u2014as it is typically intended to do. However, automation also complements labor, raises output in ways that lead to higher demand for labor, and interacts with adjustments in labor supply. Indeed, a key observation of the paper is that journalists and even expert commentators tend to overstate the extent of machine substitution for human labor and ignore the strong complementarities between automation and labor that increase productivity, raise earnings, and augment demand for labor.  > ...  > I argue that the interplay between machine and human comparative advantage allows computers to substitute for workers in performing routine, codifiable tasks while amplifying the comparative advantage of workers in supplying problem-solving skills, adaptability, and creativity. The frontier of automation is rapidly advancing, and the challenges to substituting machines for workers in tasks requiring flexibility, judgment, and common sense remain immense. In many cases, machines both substitute for and complement human labor. Focusing only on what is lost misses a central economic mechanism by which automation affects the demand for labor: raising the value of the tasks that workers uniquely supply","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9587.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1nxsrx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"How bad would it be if the U.S government defaults on its loans? I've heard everything from \"next great depression\" to \"nothing bad at all.\" Does anyone really know?","c_root_id_A":"ccn4jpo","c_root_id_B":"ccn3kj9","created_at_utc_A":1381191902,"created_at_utc_B":1381189166,"score_A":18,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"EDIT: This is a good answer.  What I can safely say is that it would be very, very bad. The reason for this is because of the US's standing in the world. The United States is the financial capital of the world. When an investor wants not just a solid investment, but the best investment, it's with the US (its bonds).  However, by not raising the debt ceiling, which causes all the default fun, this will cause massive, massive reactionary spending cuts to kick into effect, sending us back into a recession (Krugman has some more pieces on possibilities but he points to the $600 billion spending cut) and essentially our rating goes from the status as the rock and the hard place to, well, not. What that means is that investors #1 safe investment no longer is safe and that this now safe investment also just dipped into another massive recession in an already iffy economy (we're not in a recession but things such as unemployment are still lagging behind). The very backbone of the entire financial system is now broken.   Your next question might be \"So where do investors turn to?\" The problem is that there is nothing else. The EU isn't safe enough, Asian countries certainly aren't, so with all that, the system goes into chaos. The backbone has been broken and there's no real replacement.   In terms of actions by bondholders, what would most likely happen is nearly every single US bond holder in the world (i.e. everyone involved in investing) will want to get rid of them as fast as they can and, if you didn't already figure it out, cause an enormous financial panic that makes 2008 look like a joke. Unemployment, panic, cash hoarding, etc... It's hard to speculate on a lot of this however since this is the financial backbone to the world. I can't think of another time in history of the financial leader of the world was just like \"Yeah nah.\"  But hey we have until October 16th at 11:59 PM so I'm rooting for Congress.","human_ref_B":"I've got a related question:  What if Congress basically said, \"Fuck you, we're not paying!\"? Could Congress even say that?  I'm asking this because I read an article on Vice that was debating on whether or not the entirety of the world's armies could overpower the US... Perhaps we could solve the US economic crisis with the middle finger?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2736.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"1itanb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"How is it okay\/justifiable that all countries have public debt? [Economics]","c_root_id_A":"cb7vmer","c_root_id_B":"cb80a1w","created_at_utc_A":1374510517,"created_at_utc_B":1374522075,"score_A":8,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"The classic paper on this is Diamond, 1965.  It made the list of the 20 top articles published in the AER. Here's the summary:  > Building on Paul Samuelson\u2019s seminal work concerning consumption loans  between individuals of different generations, this paper pioneered the analysis  of overlapping generations (OLG) models with durable capital goods. It illuminated the properties of such models through two fundamental contributions. First,  it demonstrated that the competitive equilibria of infinite horizon OLG models  can be inefficient, even in the absence of conventional market failures. Second,  it identified the mechanisms through which both external and internal debt can  potentially reduce the capital stock. In clarifying the general equilibrium effects  of displacing physical capital with government debt in individuals\u2019 portfolios, it  resolved a long-standing debate concerning the feasibility of using internal debt to  shift the burden of paying for public expenditures to future generations.","human_ref_B":"Countries run government deficits (the accumulation of which is the public debt) for a variety of reasons.  Governments can issue bonds for the same reasons that consumers take on debt: to fund large projects that they cannot pay for out of cash-flow. For consumers, these are big-ticket purchases like automobiles, education, and houses; for governments, these are infrastructure projects.  [Source: public finance literature, particularly when thinking about local governments raising bond issues to fund projects.]  There are other reasons that the government could run budget deficits. For one, because the government \"lives forever,\" it can continue to roll its debt over and only pay interest, not principal. So long as the debt level doesn't grow too fast, the government can run deficits and thereby lower the average tax burden.   A third reason is that there is an active demand for government debt.  This is where the macro-public finance link comes in to play. Governments nearly always pay their debts, so government debt is essentially risk-free. There is consumer and investor demand for risk-free nominally-denominated assets. One can actually solve for an optimal level of government debt to optimally fulfill that demand. Diamond (1965) is the key resource here; besttrousers linked to it. Diamond's paper contains the minimally complete set of model elements that I think are necessary to analyze government debt: overlapping generations and capital accumulation.  [Relatedly, Sameulson's '53 paper also shows one use of government debt as social insurance. But I think Diamond does it better.]  The above three are public-finance or long-run macro reasons to run deficits. There are also cyclical reasons to run a deficit, related to both systematic policy (automatic stabilizers) and to discretionary policy (\"stimulus\").  So there are four \"justifications\" of public debt.  How is it \"okay\"? Well, let's start easy: supply and demand. Governments sell their debt on public markets, and people buy that debt at a price. These are willing mutual transactions, so the onus is on you to tell me why these agents should not be trading.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11558.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"1itanb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"How is it okay\/justifiable that all countries have public debt? [Economics]","c_root_id_A":"cb7vmer","c_root_id_B":"cb7utrw","created_at_utc_A":1374510517,"created_at_utc_B":1374508376,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The classic paper on this is Diamond, 1965.  It made the list of the 20 top articles published in the AER. Here's the summary:  > Building on Paul Samuelson\u2019s seminal work concerning consumption loans  between individuals of different generations, this paper pioneered the analysis  of overlapping generations (OLG) models with durable capital goods. It illuminated the properties of such models through two fundamental contributions. First,  it demonstrated that the competitive equilibria of infinite horizon OLG models  can be inefficient, even in the absence of conventional market failures. Second,  it identified the mechanisms through which both external and internal debt can  potentially reduce the capital stock. In clarifying the general equilibrium effects  of displacing physical capital with government debt in individuals\u2019 portfolios, it  resolved a long-standing debate concerning the feasibility of using internal debt to  shift the burden of paying for public expenditures to future generations.","human_ref_B":"Your question needs to be much more specific to get any meaningful answer. Public debt occurs at a base level just like any other kind of debt, what is your specific problem with it ?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2141.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1itanb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"How is it okay\/justifiable that all countries have public debt? [Economics]","c_root_id_A":"cb80a1w","c_root_id_B":"cb7yo3j","created_at_utc_A":1374522075,"created_at_utc_B":1374518142,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Countries run government deficits (the accumulation of which is the public debt) for a variety of reasons.  Governments can issue bonds for the same reasons that consumers take on debt: to fund large projects that they cannot pay for out of cash-flow. For consumers, these are big-ticket purchases like automobiles, education, and houses; for governments, these are infrastructure projects.  [Source: public finance literature, particularly when thinking about local governments raising bond issues to fund projects.]  There are other reasons that the government could run budget deficits. For one, because the government \"lives forever,\" it can continue to roll its debt over and only pay interest, not principal. So long as the debt level doesn't grow too fast, the government can run deficits and thereby lower the average tax burden.   A third reason is that there is an active demand for government debt.  This is where the macro-public finance link comes in to play. Governments nearly always pay their debts, so government debt is essentially risk-free. There is consumer and investor demand for risk-free nominally-denominated assets. One can actually solve for an optimal level of government debt to optimally fulfill that demand. Diamond (1965) is the key resource here; besttrousers linked to it. Diamond's paper contains the minimally complete set of model elements that I think are necessary to analyze government debt: overlapping generations and capital accumulation.  [Relatedly, Sameulson's '53 paper also shows one use of government debt as social insurance. But I think Diamond does it better.]  The above three are public-finance or long-run macro reasons to run deficits. There are also cyclical reasons to run a deficit, related to both systematic policy (automatic stabilizers) and to discretionary policy (\"stimulus\").  So there are four \"justifications\" of public debt.  How is it \"okay\"? Well, let's start easy: supply and demand. Governments sell their debt on public markets, and people buy that debt at a price. These are willing mutual transactions, so the onus is on you to tell me why these agents should not be trading.","human_ref_B":"Federal\/public debt really isn't the same as personal debt. Other countries aren't going to call in debt all at once - the debt helps regulate markets and currencies. Also, when foreign debt numbers are shown people rarely look at debt HELD against debt OWED - which is a more total picture. Krugman has a good blog post a while back explaining how much this is misunderstood - http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2012\/01\/02\/opinion\/krugman-nobody-understands-debt.html?_r=1&  Also, and this is not really a great site to link but the sources are valid, Cracked did a piece on economic myths that points out some of these things in an easy-to-read fashion. http:\/\/www.cracked.com\/article_20454_5-scary-myths-you-probably-believe-about-economy.html","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3933.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"1itanb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"How is it okay\/justifiable that all countries have public debt? [Economics]","c_root_id_A":"cb80a1w","c_root_id_B":"cb7utrw","created_at_utc_A":1374522075,"created_at_utc_B":1374508376,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Countries run government deficits (the accumulation of which is the public debt) for a variety of reasons.  Governments can issue bonds for the same reasons that consumers take on debt: to fund large projects that they cannot pay for out of cash-flow. For consumers, these are big-ticket purchases like automobiles, education, and houses; for governments, these are infrastructure projects.  [Source: public finance literature, particularly when thinking about local governments raising bond issues to fund projects.]  There are other reasons that the government could run budget deficits. For one, because the government \"lives forever,\" it can continue to roll its debt over and only pay interest, not principal. So long as the debt level doesn't grow too fast, the government can run deficits and thereby lower the average tax burden.   A third reason is that there is an active demand for government debt.  This is where the macro-public finance link comes in to play. Governments nearly always pay their debts, so government debt is essentially risk-free. There is consumer and investor demand for risk-free nominally-denominated assets. One can actually solve for an optimal level of government debt to optimally fulfill that demand. Diamond (1965) is the key resource here; besttrousers linked to it. Diamond's paper contains the minimally complete set of model elements that I think are necessary to analyze government debt: overlapping generations and capital accumulation.  [Relatedly, Sameulson's '53 paper also shows one use of government debt as social insurance. But I think Diamond does it better.]  The above three are public-finance or long-run macro reasons to run deficits. There are also cyclical reasons to run a deficit, related to both systematic policy (automatic stabilizers) and to discretionary policy (\"stimulus\").  So there are four \"justifications\" of public debt.  How is it \"okay\"? Well, let's start easy: supply and demand. Governments sell their debt on public markets, and people buy that debt at a price. These are willing mutual transactions, so the onus is on you to tell me why these agents should not be trading.","human_ref_B":"Your question needs to be much more specific to get any meaningful answer. Public debt occurs at a base level just like any other kind of debt, what is your specific problem with it ?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13699.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1itanb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"How is it okay\/justifiable that all countries have public debt? [Economics]","c_root_id_A":"cb7yo3j","c_root_id_B":"cb7utrw","created_at_utc_A":1374518142,"created_at_utc_B":1374508376,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Federal\/public debt really isn't the same as personal debt. Other countries aren't going to call in debt all at once - the debt helps regulate markets and currencies. Also, when foreign debt numbers are shown people rarely look at debt HELD against debt OWED - which is a more total picture. Krugman has a good blog post a while back explaining how much this is misunderstood - http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2012\/01\/02\/opinion\/krugman-nobody-understands-debt.html?_r=1&  Also, and this is not really a great site to link but the sources are valid, Cracked did a piece on economic myths that points out some of these things in an easy-to-read fashion. http:\/\/www.cracked.com\/article_20454_5-scary-myths-you-probably-believe-about-economy.html","human_ref_B":"Your question needs to be much more specific to get any meaningful answer. Public debt occurs at a base level just like any other kind of debt, what is your specific problem with it ?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9766.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"67upgl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"\"Individualist\" Westerners vs \"conformist\" Asians - any basis in reality or just a stereotype? It is sometimes said - often by people in the West - that countries in the \"West\" - that is to say, the Americas, Europe, Australia, etc - people are individualistic whilst in the \"East\" they are conformist.  For example, people sometimes say that the Japanese are a very conformist society and that people who are visibly \"different\" for reasons of style or manner are shunned or face negative social consequences.  A purported Asian conformity instinct is also sometimes given as an explanation for Chinese and North Korean \"acceptance\" (!) of the dictatorship in those nations, and various other features (or purported featues) of Asian politics and culture, such as public approval for Duterte's drug murders or racism.  Sometimes this can take quite a nasty tinge - videos on r\/wtf or \/r\/MorbidReality etc of people being injured or doing stupid things in places like China are often accompanied by comments to the effect that \"the Chinese don't value human life the way we [presumably Americans] do\".  A less ethnocentric version - and one advanced by some Asian scholars themselves - would be that Asia conceives of human rights as being rights in society rather than the individual as in the political West.    Does the idea that Westerners are individualistic whilst Asians are conformist have any social scientific basis, or is it just a stereotype?    My own \"instinct\" would be to say nonsense - I don't really believe in \"national characters\", because they've always had the reek of 19th-century racialism to me, but I don't have any basis for this view so thought I'd ask the experts on here.  Thanks","c_root_id_A":"dgtkfjz","c_root_id_B":"dgtk25l","created_at_utc_A":1493301543,"created_at_utc_B":1493301084,"score_A":45,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"As others have noted, there's a huge literature on collectivist (not conformist) vs. individualistic cultures.   A few important things to note.    1) we're talking about averages between countries, so people within the country may be relatively more or less collectivist or individualistic.  2) it's not binary.  People \/ countries aren't 100% one way or the other.  There is gradients between the poles.  (It may not even be bipolar, that is being high in one does not necessarily mean you are low in the other, but don't quote me on that)  3) It has changed over time. China, for example is less collectivist than it was 30 years ago.  Here's a good summary paper   https:\/\/link.springer.com\/chapter\/10.1007\/978-1-349-08120-2_3","human_ref_B":"This is a thorough answer to your question. But the short answer is that you're wrong. Culture exists and it changes the way people think.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":459.0,"score_ratio":5.625}
{"post_id":"sj9g4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"As a naive freshman, \"Guns, Germs, and Steel\" was very enlightening. Then I heard about criticisms of it. What are these criticisms?","c_root_id_A":"c4el2jw","c_root_id_B":"c4el2ad","created_at_utc_A":1334938212,"created_at_utc_B":1334938178,"score_A":7,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Among other things, Diamond's a biologist and you can tell that by the way he constructs the narrative, which is presented as THE process by which history was shaped. It's an interesting book and it shouldn't be just cast aside, but it should be taken with mountainous piles of salt.","human_ref_B":"For what it's worth, environmental determinism is the most frequent complaint I've heard.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":34.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"sj9g4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"As a naive freshman, \"Guns, Germs, and Steel\" was very enlightening. Then I heard about criticisms of it. What are these criticisms?","c_root_id_A":"c4eptoh","c_root_id_B":"c4eljbl","created_at_utc_A":1334960409,"created_at_utc_B":1334940364,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I credit GGS with convincing me to go back to college to study anthropology, but rereading it now that I almost have a degree in anthropology\/biology I see huge mistakes.  Diamond assumes that empires and nation-states are inevitable, promoting then old theories of savagery->barbarism->civilization that have humanity always marching forward, with the definition of \"forward\" being Western civilization.   He assumes that empires always spring out of riverine cereal crop production, despite the massive and advanced population centers of Peru and Central America that did not.   He ignores a lot of the highly-productive crops of the New World and downplays some of them unnecessarily.","human_ref_B":"A rival book seems to be Culture and Carnage. Politically its more right wing. I have problems with the idea that a single culture spans thousands of years and across hundreds of countries.  But hey you choose your politics and you choose your history.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20045.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"sj9g4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.97,"history":"As a naive freshman, \"Guns, Germs, and Steel\" was very enlightening. Then I heard about criticisms of it. What are these criticisms?","c_root_id_A":"c4eow0s","c_root_id_B":"c4eptoh","created_at_utc_A":1334955474,"created_at_utc_B":1334960409,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"As Diamond is a geographer, the Geography subreddit got into this discussion a few months back. It was pretty interesting and ended up with an a disagreement between myself and another redditor, but it ended up being a good discussion (i think). I take the view, as do many other geographers that there are hints of environmental determinism throughout the book. My initial statement about disliking it was a bit rash but I tried to back up my argument as did the other redditor who did a nice job as well. Check it out here. - http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/geography\/comments\/m5nu4\/i_love_geography_but_i_need_some_guidance_what\/","human_ref_B":"I credit GGS with convincing me to go back to college to study anthropology, but rereading it now that I almost have a degree in anthropology\/biology I see huge mistakes.  Diamond assumes that empires and nation-states are inevitable, promoting then old theories of savagery->barbarism->civilization that have humanity always marching forward, with the definition of \"forward\" being Western civilization.   He assumes that empires always spring out of riverine cereal crop production, despite the massive and advanced population centers of Peru and Central America that did not.   He ignores a lot of the highly-productive crops of the New World and downplays some of them unnecessarily.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4935.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"sfvge","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the best articles or books to fully understand the European crisis? [Economics] As people much more versed on macroeconomics than I am, which resources would you recommend to fully grasp the economical situation in Europe, and where it is heading?  My impression, based on what I can see around me, is that the austerity policies that are being implemented are not only broadening the gap in wealth distribution, but also sinking the economy of the countries themselves even more (which was what they were supposed to counter in the first place).  Thing is, for now, I only have my own analysis based on limited experience and a lot of biased opinion pieces showing just the statistics which support their authors' point. I woud like to be able to understand the topic more deeply to be able to form my own informed opinions, propose solutions and foresee the effects that they (and those proposed by others) would have on the economy.  Probably the best way is to study economics for 5 years, but as a plan B, which articles \/ books \/ blogs do you think would be most useful for that matter? Note that I'm OK with them even if they contradict my initial views, and they needn't be divulgative (I can look up obscure technical concepts if I have to). I just would like them to be accurate and as unbiased as possible.","c_root_id_A":"c4dwkdl","c_root_id_B":"c4dwtoe","created_at_utc_A":1334788202,"created_at_utc_B":1334789566,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Here are a few that I would highly recommend. Definitely start with the first one on the list, it was written in year 2000 and accurately predicts all of this.   Niall Ferguson and Laurence J. Kotlikoff, \u201cThe Degeneration of EMU\u201d Foreign Affairs March \/April 2000.   Martin Wolf, \"The grasshoppers and the ants \u2013 a modern fable\" Financial Times, May 25 2010.    Nouriel Roubini and Arnab Das, \"Solutions for a crisis in its sovereign stage\" Financial Times, May 31 2010.  Paul Krugman, \"A Money Too Far\" New York Times, May 7, 2010.  Dani Rodrik, \"Who Lost Europe?\" Project Syndicate, June 9th 2010.","human_ref_B":"Paul Krugman has a nice summary here. Experts will disagree about how Krugman begins his analysis, and where he goes, but I think this is as good a place to begin as any. A longer treatment, but a more controversial one, is Boomerang by Michael Lewis.  <Aside> I think it is controversial because of the way Lewis paints citizens of any one country with the same brush. Claiming Germans have characteristic X while Greeks have characteristic Y, and the interaction of X and Y contributed to the Euro crisis is not exactly a formal treatment of the subject. That said, his ability to tell an interesting story about boring things like the IMF and fiscal policy is astounding. <\/Aside>  Once you've finished the Krugman piece, I think The Economist](www.economist.com) is the good place to keep up with current events. (See [this for example.)  Moving beyond journalism, I would browse through the articles at VoxEU. While I wouldn't call the work there popular writing, it is certainly accessible. (As an example, this piece on Spain is worth a read.)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1364.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1b03ut","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Is there thoughts as to why certain religions retain longevity (Hinduism, Judaism) and not others (Zoroastrianism)? I'm sure it's for a multitude of reasons but I'm interested in how it is approached.  Due to the appeal in the ideals? Ability to remain reform to changing social states? Relation to political power? or simply each religions' individual history?","c_root_id_A":"c92eo8y","c_root_id_B":"c92lbqb","created_at_utc_A":1364258377,"created_at_utc_B":1364281170,"score_A":8,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"Your question is ok, but not your examples. Zoroastrians still exist. They are called Parsis, nowadays. Freddy Mercury, for example, was one of them. They live mostly in India, but I think some still remain in Iran.","human_ref_B":"Likely, the relation to political power proved crucial.    Christianity, in Constantine's time, was probably about 10-20% of the population.  Within a few centuries, almost everyone (and then everyone who invaded or neighbored them, like the Saxons, Franks, and Slavs).  After \"Islam's early expansion\", it took decades for those formerly Christian areas to actually become Muslim (see Bulliet's *Conversion to Islam in the medieval period: an essay in quantitative history*).  There were many reasons to convert, but the way that inheritance worked in parts of the Muslim world, if one relative converted, they could claim the full inheritance.  Thus, if one person in a family converted, this might set off a chain reaction of conversions.  Likewise, there were tax benefits for conversion, and in places complex rules around slavery and intermarriage.  The South Asian and Ottoman situations are more complex, and quite frankly, I don't have that much to say about it other than two things: 1) the states had various forms of tolerances not available in Christian Europe, and 2) I don't know of any case where Muslims never achieved more than about 10-20% by proselytizing alone in South Asia, except in the Bengal and Punjab, where they apparently basically brought previously non-Vedic \"traditional\" groups into the (then) modern state system (see Richard Eaton's work on this--actually Eaton's work is fantastic and I bet you'll like it).  Eaton describes Islam as \"a religion of the plow\" in these regions, not a religion of the sword.  Eaton also focuses on how important individual, charismatic Sufi holy men (and their tombs) were.  Likewise, in Southeast Asia (and in non-conquest Mughal), Islam was a \"religion of tradesmen\" until it got taken up by the local courts.  Sufis played a similarly important role.  All of the religions that have survived have also changed hugely.  The Hinduism today is not the religion of the Vedas.  Judaism today is clearly not the religion of the Hebrew Bible (for one, no temple, no priests).  Judaism's survival in Europe (and the Christian and Jewish survival in parts of the Muslim world, like Egypt and Armenia) can probably be partially tied to it being the \"older brother\/creepy uncle\" of Christianity.  Judaism was also designed and redesigned to work as a diaspora religion.  Zoroastrian history is something I'm shaky on, but the lost of state support must have been huge blow.  Here's Bulliet's graph showing the conversion of Iran to Islam.  IF I recall correctly, he goes into more details in that chapter.  There's also a whole Wikipedia page about the Persecution of the Zoroastrians.  For what it's worth, Jews and Christians survive in Iran in comparable numbers to Zoroastrians (that is, they're basically a rounding error away from zero).  The Safavids were intense (this is the period when the Parsi's left, for instance).  So it's not just the cutting off of state support (and the subsequent state support for another religion), but unequal laws (especially in the realm of inheritance, property, and taxes) and outright persecution that mattered.  Not mentioned here, but not only national politics, but *international* politics matter.  There's an article called \"The Puzzle of Korean Christianity\" which argues that geopolitics were crucial for Christianity's success in Korea and failure in China and Japan (there are many problems with the article but it's on to something).  As another example of this, the Sassanind Empire (aka the last Zoroastrian Persian state) encouraged Christianity--but specifically Nestorian Christianity, Christianity opposed to the Christianity of their major geopolitical rival Byzantium.  Likewise, the two states to convert large sections of the elite to Judaism were \"coincidentally\" between Christian and Zoroastrian (the Himyarite Kingdom) or Christian and Muslim (the Khazars) superpowers, where Judaism provided a \"neutral\" alternative.    I wrote this to try to deal with sleeplessness, I'm sorry it's so scattered.  I wrote a detailed summary of some of the major theories of religious change for AskHistorians a month ago.  While it mainly deals with the question of secularization, it's probably also applicable to this question of religious change and survival.    tl;dr: all of these events are overdetermined and you identified many of the mechanism in your question.  There's no single monocausal independent variable leading to the dependent variable \"religious disappearance\", though political power is necessary variable but not sufficient variable.  If you were to look at one thing, it would be relationship with political power.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22793.0,"score_ratio":2.625}
{"post_id":"1b03ut","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Is there thoughts as to why certain religions retain longevity (Hinduism, Judaism) and not others (Zoroastrianism)? I'm sure it's for a multitude of reasons but I'm interested in how it is approached.  Due to the appeal in the ideals? Ability to remain reform to changing social states? Relation to political power? or simply each religions' individual history?","c_root_id_A":"c92lbqb","c_root_id_B":"c92e7a3","created_at_utc_A":1364281170,"created_at_utc_B":1364257025,"score_A":21,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Likely, the relation to political power proved crucial.    Christianity, in Constantine's time, was probably about 10-20% of the population.  Within a few centuries, almost everyone (and then everyone who invaded or neighbored them, like the Saxons, Franks, and Slavs).  After \"Islam's early expansion\", it took decades for those formerly Christian areas to actually become Muslim (see Bulliet's *Conversion to Islam in the medieval period: an essay in quantitative history*).  There were many reasons to convert, but the way that inheritance worked in parts of the Muslim world, if one relative converted, they could claim the full inheritance.  Thus, if one person in a family converted, this might set off a chain reaction of conversions.  Likewise, there were tax benefits for conversion, and in places complex rules around slavery and intermarriage.  The South Asian and Ottoman situations are more complex, and quite frankly, I don't have that much to say about it other than two things: 1) the states had various forms of tolerances not available in Christian Europe, and 2) I don't know of any case where Muslims never achieved more than about 10-20% by proselytizing alone in South Asia, except in the Bengal and Punjab, where they apparently basically brought previously non-Vedic \"traditional\" groups into the (then) modern state system (see Richard Eaton's work on this--actually Eaton's work is fantastic and I bet you'll like it).  Eaton describes Islam as \"a religion of the plow\" in these regions, not a religion of the sword.  Eaton also focuses on how important individual, charismatic Sufi holy men (and their tombs) were.  Likewise, in Southeast Asia (and in non-conquest Mughal), Islam was a \"religion of tradesmen\" until it got taken up by the local courts.  Sufis played a similarly important role.  All of the religions that have survived have also changed hugely.  The Hinduism today is not the religion of the Vedas.  Judaism today is clearly not the religion of the Hebrew Bible (for one, no temple, no priests).  Judaism's survival in Europe (and the Christian and Jewish survival in parts of the Muslim world, like Egypt and Armenia) can probably be partially tied to it being the \"older brother\/creepy uncle\" of Christianity.  Judaism was also designed and redesigned to work as a diaspora religion.  Zoroastrian history is something I'm shaky on, but the lost of state support must have been huge blow.  Here's Bulliet's graph showing the conversion of Iran to Islam.  IF I recall correctly, he goes into more details in that chapter.  There's also a whole Wikipedia page about the Persecution of the Zoroastrians.  For what it's worth, Jews and Christians survive in Iran in comparable numbers to Zoroastrians (that is, they're basically a rounding error away from zero).  The Safavids were intense (this is the period when the Parsi's left, for instance).  So it's not just the cutting off of state support (and the subsequent state support for another religion), but unequal laws (especially in the realm of inheritance, property, and taxes) and outright persecution that mattered.  Not mentioned here, but not only national politics, but *international* politics matter.  There's an article called \"The Puzzle of Korean Christianity\" which argues that geopolitics were crucial for Christianity's success in Korea and failure in China and Japan (there are many problems with the article but it's on to something).  As another example of this, the Sassanind Empire (aka the last Zoroastrian Persian state) encouraged Christianity--but specifically Nestorian Christianity, Christianity opposed to the Christianity of their major geopolitical rival Byzantium.  Likewise, the two states to convert large sections of the elite to Judaism were \"coincidentally\" between Christian and Zoroastrian (the Himyarite Kingdom) or Christian and Muslim (the Khazars) superpowers, where Judaism provided a \"neutral\" alternative.    I wrote this to try to deal with sleeplessness, I'm sorry it's so scattered.  I wrote a detailed summary of some of the major theories of religious change for AskHistorians a month ago.  While it mainly deals with the question of secularization, it's probably also applicable to this question of religious change and survival.    tl;dr: all of these events are overdetermined and you identified many of the mechanism in your question.  There's no single monocausal independent variable leading to the dependent variable \"religious disappearance\", though political power is necessary variable but not sufficient variable.  If you were to look at one thing, it would be relationship with political power.","human_ref_B":"Here's a pretty detailed write-up focusing on Christianity  Looking forward to some experts chiming in on this thread...this has long been a curiosity of mine!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24145.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1b03ut","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Is there thoughts as to why certain religions retain longevity (Hinduism, Judaism) and not others (Zoroastrianism)? I'm sure it's for a multitude of reasons but I'm interested in how it is approached.  Due to the appeal in the ideals? Ability to remain reform to changing social states? Relation to political power? or simply each religions' individual history?","c_root_id_A":"c92lbqb","c_root_id_B":"c92j6f1","created_at_utc_A":1364281170,"created_at_utc_B":1364271537,"score_A":21,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Likely, the relation to political power proved crucial.    Christianity, in Constantine's time, was probably about 10-20% of the population.  Within a few centuries, almost everyone (and then everyone who invaded or neighbored them, like the Saxons, Franks, and Slavs).  After \"Islam's early expansion\", it took decades for those formerly Christian areas to actually become Muslim (see Bulliet's *Conversion to Islam in the medieval period: an essay in quantitative history*).  There were many reasons to convert, but the way that inheritance worked in parts of the Muslim world, if one relative converted, they could claim the full inheritance.  Thus, if one person in a family converted, this might set off a chain reaction of conversions.  Likewise, there were tax benefits for conversion, and in places complex rules around slavery and intermarriage.  The South Asian and Ottoman situations are more complex, and quite frankly, I don't have that much to say about it other than two things: 1) the states had various forms of tolerances not available in Christian Europe, and 2) I don't know of any case where Muslims never achieved more than about 10-20% by proselytizing alone in South Asia, except in the Bengal and Punjab, where they apparently basically brought previously non-Vedic \"traditional\" groups into the (then) modern state system (see Richard Eaton's work on this--actually Eaton's work is fantastic and I bet you'll like it).  Eaton describes Islam as \"a religion of the plow\" in these regions, not a religion of the sword.  Eaton also focuses on how important individual, charismatic Sufi holy men (and their tombs) were.  Likewise, in Southeast Asia (and in non-conquest Mughal), Islam was a \"religion of tradesmen\" until it got taken up by the local courts.  Sufis played a similarly important role.  All of the religions that have survived have also changed hugely.  The Hinduism today is not the religion of the Vedas.  Judaism today is clearly not the religion of the Hebrew Bible (for one, no temple, no priests).  Judaism's survival in Europe (and the Christian and Jewish survival in parts of the Muslim world, like Egypt and Armenia) can probably be partially tied to it being the \"older brother\/creepy uncle\" of Christianity.  Judaism was also designed and redesigned to work as a diaspora religion.  Zoroastrian history is something I'm shaky on, but the lost of state support must have been huge blow.  Here's Bulliet's graph showing the conversion of Iran to Islam.  IF I recall correctly, he goes into more details in that chapter.  There's also a whole Wikipedia page about the Persecution of the Zoroastrians.  For what it's worth, Jews and Christians survive in Iran in comparable numbers to Zoroastrians (that is, they're basically a rounding error away from zero).  The Safavids were intense (this is the period when the Parsi's left, for instance).  So it's not just the cutting off of state support (and the subsequent state support for another religion), but unequal laws (especially in the realm of inheritance, property, and taxes) and outright persecution that mattered.  Not mentioned here, but not only national politics, but *international* politics matter.  There's an article called \"The Puzzle of Korean Christianity\" which argues that geopolitics were crucial for Christianity's success in Korea and failure in China and Japan (there are many problems with the article but it's on to something).  As another example of this, the Sassanind Empire (aka the last Zoroastrian Persian state) encouraged Christianity--but specifically Nestorian Christianity, Christianity opposed to the Christianity of their major geopolitical rival Byzantium.  Likewise, the two states to convert large sections of the elite to Judaism were \"coincidentally\" between Christian and Zoroastrian (the Himyarite Kingdom) or Christian and Muslim (the Khazars) superpowers, where Judaism provided a \"neutral\" alternative.    I wrote this to try to deal with sleeplessness, I'm sorry it's so scattered.  I wrote a detailed summary of some of the major theories of religious change for AskHistorians a month ago.  While it mainly deals with the question of secularization, it's probably also applicable to this question of religious change and survival.    tl;dr: all of these events are overdetermined and you identified many of the mechanism in your question.  There's no single monocausal independent variable leading to the dependent variable \"religious disappearance\", though political power is necessary variable but not sufficient variable.  If you were to look at one thing, it would be relationship with political power.","human_ref_B":"The reason why Zoroastrianism went downhill was because virtually every area in which it flourished was conquered by Islam, which had varying degrees of tolerance.  Further, Christianity and Judaism, unlike Zoroastrianism, were considered Religions of the Book. Zoroastrian did get some credit for being monotheistic, but it never regained its losses, because Islamic authorities made it illegal to convert to Zoroastrianism, but highly advantageous to convert to Islam.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9633.0,"score_ratio":7.0}
{"post_id":"1b03ut","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Is there thoughts as to why certain religions retain longevity (Hinduism, Judaism) and not others (Zoroastrianism)? I'm sure it's for a multitude of reasons but I'm interested in how it is approached.  Due to the appeal in the ideals? Ability to remain reform to changing social states? Relation to political power? or simply each religions' individual history?","c_root_id_A":"c92e7a3","c_root_id_B":"c92eo8y","created_at_utc_A":1364257025,"created_at_utc_B":1364258377,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Here's a pretty detailed write-up focusing on Christianity  Looking forward to some experts chiming in on this thread...this has long been a curiosity of mine!","human_ref_B":"Your question is ok, but not your examples. Zoroastrians still exist. They are called Parsis, nowadays. Freddy Mercury, for example, was one of them. They live mostly in India, but I think some still remain in Iran.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1352.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"rtqoy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Do all graduate programs in Political Economy require Marxist Theory courses? My professor cites a lot of things that I have not been able to verify. One thing he has claimed is that all Political Economics graduate programs in Europe and South America require Marxist Theory courses, whereas graduate programs in the US rarely do.","c_root_id_A":"c48l4ja","c_root_id_B":"c48o4kr","created_at_utc_A":1333583973,"created_at_utc_B":1333599356,"score_A":6,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"You should be able to do some research on this fairly easily.  Most universities will have degree requirements online, US or foreign.","human_ref_B":"I don't know if that is strictly true, but if you are doing a political economy course that doesn't at least look at Marxism, then it is clearly a very sub standard course. It's like doing a course in maths, but ignoring multiplication.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15383.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"x1874","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"If Bush had to pay for everything he spent, what would the taxes have been like? Bush increased spending on wars, social programs and bailouts by trillions of dollars, yet he cut taxes.  If Bush had spent the same amount on all of that, yet under the mandate that he increase taxes correspondingly to pay for them, what would rates have been like at the end of his time in office?  I know there are lots of ways to structure a tax system, so obviously this question can't be answered precisely, but feel free to speculate!","c_root_id_A":"c5igkw8","c_root_id_B":"c5igtrn","created_at_utc_A":1343101509,"created_at_utc_B":1343102513,"score_A":5,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq cost about $1.5 trillion.   In 2000, the CBO projected that we would have a $5.5 trillion cumulative surplus between 2001 and 2010 if the Clinton budget had remained unchanged.   So, Bush didn't actually need to raise taxes to pay for the wars, *if other budget policies remained unchanged*.   The fact that the US ended up with a $6 trillion cumulative deficit rather than a $5.5 trillion surplus under Bush was because, apart from the wars, there were also the three Bush tax cuts (in 2001, 2002 and 2003) and Medicare Part D extension; and of course tax revenues fell starting in 2007 because of the Great Recession.","human_ref_B":"Here are the budget numbers for those years, in millions of dollars:  Year|Receipts|Outlays|Surplus or Deficit ---:|---:|---:|---: 2001|1,991,082|1,862,846|128,236 2002|1,853,136|2,010,894|-157,758 2003|1,782,314|2,159,899|-377,585 2004|1,880,114|2,292,841|-412,727 2005|2,153,611|2,471,957|-318,346 2006|2,406,869|2,655,050|-248,181 2007|2,567,985|2,728,686|-160,701 2008|2,523,991|2,982,544|-458,553  This includes off-budget items. According to the IRS (PDF), 250,379,000 tax returns were filed in 2008. So unless my math is off (which is certainly a possibility), just that year, each person and corporation that filed a tax return that year would have had to pay an average of $1831 more that year to balance the budget. That is just for that year. Note that the same data for 2009 (Obama\u2019s first year) would be $5973. Corrections to this info are welcome.  (Source: http:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/omb\/budget\/Historicals)  EDIT: I got my years wrong at first.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1004.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"x1874","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"If Bush had to pay for everything he spent, what would the taxes have been like? Bush increased spending on wars, social programs and bailouts by trillions of dollars, yet he cut taxes.  If Bush had spent the same amount on all of that, yet under the mandate that he increase taxes correspondingly to pay for them, what would rates have been like at the end of his time in office?  I know there are lots of ways to structure a tax system, so obviously this question can't be answered precisely, but feel free to speculate!","c_root_id_A":"c5idg1p","c_root_id_B":"c5igtrn","created_at_utc_A":1343088938,"created_at_utc_B":1343102513,"score_A":4,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"ITT: no one actually answers OP's question.  I'll start: \"high.\"      (I tried to look up \"government spending\/tax revenue during bush years\" etc but I just got a bunch of rhetoric and no numbers, anyone got a good source?)","human_ref_B":"Here are the budget numbers for those years, in millions of dollars:  Year|Receipts|Outlays|Surplus or Deficit ---:|---:|---:|---: 2001|1,991,082|1,862,846|128,236 2002|1,853,136|2,010,894|-157,758 2003|1,782,314|2,159,899|-377,585 2004|1,880,114|2,292,841|-412,727 2005|2,153,611|2,471,957|-318,346 2006|2,406,869|2,655,050|-248,181 2007|2,567,985|2,728,686|-160,701 2008|2,523,991|2,982,544|-458,553  This includes off-budget items. According to the IRS (PDF), 250,379,000 tax returns were filed in 2008. So unless my math is off (which is certainly a possibility), just that year, each person and corporation that filed a tax return that year would have had to pay an average of $1831 more that year to balance the budget. That is just for that year. Note that the same data for 2009 (Obama\u2019s first year) would be $5973. Corrections to this info are welcome.  (Source: http:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/omb\/budget\/Historicals)  EDIT: I got my years wrong at first.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13575.0,"score_ratio":2.25}
{"post_id":"x1874","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"If Bush had to pay for everything he spent, what would the taxes have been like? Bush increased spending on wars, social programs and bailouts by trillions of dollars, yet he cut taxes.  If Bush had spent the same amount on all of that, yet under the mandate that he increase taxes correspondingly to pay for them, what would rates have been like at the end of his time in office?  I know there are lots of ways to structure a tax system, so obviously this question can't be answered precisely, but feel free to speculate!","c_root_id_A":"c5ig5lv","c_root_id_B":"c5igtrn","created_at_utc_A":1343099819,"created_at_utc_B":1343102513,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Isn't this easy to answer by just looking at the deficits and adding that much in taxes?","human_ref_B":"Here are the budget numbers for those years, in millions of dollars:  Year|Receipts|Outlays|Surplus or Deficit ---:|---:|---:|---: 2001|1,991,082|1,862,846|128,236 2002|1,853,136|2,010,894|-157,758 2003|1,782,314|2,159,899|-377,585 2004|1,880,114|2,292,841|-412,727 2005|2,153,611|2,471,957|-318,346 2006|2,406,869|2,655,050|-248,181 2007|2,567,985|2,728,686|-160,701 2008|2,523,991|2,982,544|-458,553  This includes off-budget items. According to the IRS (PDF), 250,379,000 tax returns were filed in 2008. So unless my math is off (which is certainly a possibility), just that year, each person and corporation that filed a tax return that year would have had to pay an average of $1831 more that year to balance the budget. That is just for that year. Note that the same data for 2009 (Obama\u2019s first year) would be $5973. Corrections to this info are welcome.  (Source: http:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/omb\/budget\/Historicals)  EDIT: I got my years wrong at first.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2694.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"x1874","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"If Bush had to pay for everything he spent, what would the taxes have been like? Bush increased spending on wars, social programs and bailouts by trillions of dollars, yet he cut taxes.  If Bush had spent the same amount on all of that, yet under the mandate that he increase taxes correspondingly to pay for them, what would rates have been like at the end of his time in office?  I know there are lots of ways to structure a tax system, so obviously this question can't be answered precisely, but feel free to speculate!","c_root_id_A":"c5idg1p","c_root_id_B":"c5igkw8","created_at_utc_A":1343088938,"created_at_utc_B":1343101509,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"ITT: no one actually answers OP's question.  I'll start: \"high.\"      (I tried to look up \"government spending\/tax revenue during bush years\" etc but I just got a bunch of rhetoric and no numbers, anyone got a good source?)","human_ref_B":"The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq cost about $1.5 trillion.   In 2000, the CBO projected that we would have a $5.5 trillion cumulative surplus between 2001 and 2010 if the Clinton budget had remained unchanged.   So, Bush didn't actually need to raise taxes to pay for the wars, *if other budget policies remained unchanged*.   The fact that the US ended up with a $6 trillion cumulative deficit rather than a $5.5 trillion surplus under Bush was because, apart from the wars, there were also the three Bush tax cuts (in 2001, 2002 and 2003) and Medicare Part D extension; and of course tax revenues fell starting in 2007 because of the Great Recession.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12571.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"x1874","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"If Bush had to pay for everything he spent, what would the taxes have been like? Bush increased spending on wars, social programs and bailouts by trillions of dollars, yet he cut taxes.  If Bush had spent the same amount on all of that, yet under the mandate that he increase taxes correspondingly to pay for them, what would rates have been like at the end of his time in office?  I know there are lots of ways to structure a tax system, so obviously this question can't be answered precisely, but feel free to speculate!","c_root_id_A":"c5igkw8","c_root_id_B":"c5ig5lv","created_at_utc_A":1343101509,"created_at_utc_B":1343099819,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq cost about $1.5 trillion.   In 2000, the CBO projected that we would have a $5.5 trillion cumulative surplus between 2001 and 2010 if the Clinton budget had remained unchanged.   So, Bush didn't actually need to raise taxes to pay for the wars, *if other budget policies remained unchanged*.   The fact that the US ended up with a $6 trillion cumulative deficit rather than a $5.5 trillion surplus under Bush was because, apart from the wars, there were also the three Bush tax cuts (in 2001, 2002 and 2003) and Medicare Part D extension; and of course tax revenues fell starting in 2007 because of the Great Recession.","human_ref_B":"Isn't this easy to answer by just looking at the deficits and adding that much in taxes?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1690.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1r50xt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"[Economics] Arguments for and against the legitimacy of Price Discrimination? Currently looking at the legitimacy of Price Discrimination but struggling to find a lot of arguments on either side (mostly finding economists supporting it but with the same arguments repeatedly).  I have found Marcoux's \"Much Ado About Price Discrimination\" and Juan M. Elegido's \"The Ethics of Price Discrimination\" vaguely useful.  Any tips on good bits of reading that could help?  Thanks a lot guys","c_root_id_A":"cdjnbnt","c_root_id_B":"cdjpzeg","created_at_utc_A":1385045608,"created_at_utc_B":1385052013,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"What do you mean by \"legitimacy\"?","human_ref_B":"Price discrimination isn't really taking advantage of the consumer if you consider that group of consumers that is targeted for the price discrimination actually is willing to pay more for a particular product. It's turning what would have been a consumer surplus into a producer surplus.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6405.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1r50xt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"[Economics] Arguments for and against the legitimacy of Price Discrimination? Currently looking at the legitimacy of Price Discrimination but struggling to find a lot of arguments on either side (mostly finding economists supporting it but with the same arguments repeatedly).  I have found Marcoux's \"Much Ado About Price Discrimination\" and Juan M. Elegido's \"The Ethics of Price Discrimination\" vaguely useful.  Any tips on good bits of reading that could help?  Thanks a lot guys","c_root_id_A":"cdjnbnt","c_root_id_B":"cdjrlvi","created_at_utc_A":1385045608,"created_at_utc_B":1385055562,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"What do you mean by \"legitimacy\"?","human_ref_B":"The laws regarding Price Discrimination are found in common law surrounding the Robinson Putnam Act (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Robinson\u2013Patman_Act).  Price discrimination between consumers of end products is generally not illegal.  Movies give discounts to students, children and seniors, for example.  Laws around price discrimination are primarily focussed on intermediate products - selling between firms.  A monopolist could potentially use price discrimination to raise the cost of some downstream firms (buyers) in order to monopolize that market.  This is in part the strategy of Rockefeller and SONJ.  Price discrimination in this sense is illegal because it is a means to monopolize (the verb, not the noun).    Ethically, price discrimination for society is a mixed bag.  In many cases, it increases social welfare, and in others it lowers it.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9954.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1r50xt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"[Economics] Arguments for and against the legitimacy of Price Discrimination? Currently looking at the legitimacy of Price Discrimination but struggling to find a lot of arguments on either side (mostly finding economists supporting it but with the same arguments repeatedly).  I have found Marcoux's \"Much Ado About Price Discrimination\" and Juan M. Elegido's \"The Ethics of Price Discrimination\" vaguely useful.  Any tips on good bits of reading that could help?  Thanks a lot guys","c_root_id_A":"cdjnbnt","c_root_id_B":"cdjy4z7","created_at_utc_A":1385045608,"created_at_utc_B":1385069614,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"What do you mean by \"legitimacy\"?","human_ref_B":"Are you generally aware of consumer and producer surplus?  For example, a consumer is indifferent about buying a product at $20 and the producer is indifferent about selling it at $10. If they negotiate a price of $12, then the consumers gets $8 more utility than he paid for, and the producer gets 2$ more than he needed to be okay with the transaction. Overall the economy is $10 \"richer\" for the transaction having taken place. If it sold for $17 dollars instead, the economy would still be $10 richer, but the consumer surplus would decrease from $8 of extra utility to $3 of more utility than paid for, but the producer's surplus would increase from $2 to $7.  Taking a step closer to actual markets, consumers have different reserve prices. People willing to spend time clipping coupon, for example, might not buy something for $16, while someone who values their time more might be willing to pay $19. The increases in total revenues don't simply fund production for consumers with less money, but help accurately signal what products should have resources allocated toward their production.  Presumably more transactions occurring that lead to a net increase in utility increases social welfare. Maybe clipping coupons is a nonproductive use of time though, or maybe that barrier is the most effective way to accurately gauge reserve prices.  Hopefully that's a start for thinking through what happens with price discrimination.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24006.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"278q2o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What's AskSocialScience's opinion on the book \"Willpower\" by Baumeister and Tierney? The book is about self-control. It's about 75% light scientific talk on the concept of willpower and 25% advice.  A lot of the research seems to have been done by the authors themselves. I don't know a lot about psychology, but the methods seem pretty legit. What is the psychological community's take on it?  http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Willpower-Rediscovering-Greatest-Human-Strength\/dp\/0143122231","c_root_id_A":"chyp0tf","c_root_id_B":"chyjt0d","created_at_utc_A":1401858198,"created_at_utc_B":1401844636,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I don't know about the book, but I know a bit about the research on willpower, and it has been very strongly criticized (for not making any physiological sense, for not making any psychological sense, and for not replicating). Here's a relevant blog post with links to the primary literature:  http:\/\/www.psychologytoday.com\/blog\/mind-design\/201108\/willpower-is-not-resource  See also:  http:\/\/www.epjournal.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/ep08244259.pdf","human_ref_B":"I have not read his book, but there is a lot of research on will power and resource depletion that was spawned mostly from Baumeister's original work. I've done some research with it and 'willpower' seems to be a tangible resource we can deplete in the short-term, although what exactly it is is still up for debate. Some of the methods for inducing depletion seem to be a little fickle and our brain seems like it can circumvent depletion if it is motivated enough to spend the resources to do so, but I dont know how much he would cover those as that is getting deeper into the research than I would assume the book's audience needs to know. Overall I would say its well accepted in the social-cognitive psychology fields that this phenomena exists, but there is still a lot to be discovered in terms of how it actually works. I would be interested to hear what a neuroscientist thinks about it as they may have a different view on the topic.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":13562.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"11d0tu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Why is marginalism such a big improvement over subjectivism in economics? It is my understanding that the subjective theory of value, has a long history before Adam Smith that can be traced from Aristotle to certain Scholastics and then Turgot and the physiocrats. So the idea that subjective utility, psychological preferences and supply and demand determines prices was advocated long before the Marginal Revolution of Jevons, Walras, Menger.  So my question is what was the big deal about marginal utility? From the wikipedia article it seems that the main thing is that you look at the individual units at the margins instead of the product as a whole. Why is this so much more useful than just saying subjective utility determines prices? Whats the big deal about the \"marginal unit\"? And why did this change economics so much?  Well, I notice economics becomes much more mathematical after Jevons, so is the main thing that it becomes easier to apply concrete mathematical calculus and quantification to economics?  Can someone explain why subjective marginal utility of the late 1800s was so revolutionary and transformative to the field of economics, compared to old fashioned subjectivism?","c_root_id_A":"c6leted","c_root_id_B":"c6lf67m","created_at_utc_A":1350051773,"created_at_utc_B":1350053387,"score_A":9,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"One of the reasons if was a bit important was because it resolved the paradox of value. To quote from Adam Smith: \"Nothing is more useful than water: but it will purchase scarce anything; scarce anything can be had in exchange for it. A diamond, on the contrary, has scarce any use-value; but a very great quantity of other goods may frequently be had in exchange for it.\" Basically, how can you reconcile a subjective theory of value with the real world observation that diamonds are more valuable than water when water is a neccesity of life while a diamond isn't.   Marginalism resolves this by arguing that what you must compare is the marginal quantity of water and the marginal quantity of diamonds, water is less valuable than diamonds because most people are not dying of thirst when they buy water, but reasonably hydrated so the marginal utility of drinking another cup of water isn't really high.","human_ref_B":"Great question!  I'll address this first:  > Well, I notice economics becomes much more mathematical after Jevons, so is the main thing that it becomes easier to apply concrete mathematical calculus and quantification to economics?  While it's true that economics became much more mathematical, I don't think it's true that marginal utility was just a mathematical convenience. My understanding is that Dupuit is the first economist to really get the ball rolling with marginal utility. He was trained as an engineer, so his mathematical knowledge certainly influenced his ability to formulate the notion of marginal utility in a rigorous way, but he was also able to develop the idea in prose, so I don't think it was just a byproduct of mathematics ( source )  > Can someone explain why subjective marginal utility of the late 1800s was so revolutionary and transformative to the field of economics, compared to old fashioned subjectivism?  I'll answer this in two ways. They're related, but they're distinct enough that they both shed light on the issue.  The first is the diamond\/water paradox. This is probably THE classic example of the benefits of marginalism.  **Observation:** The price of diamonds is much higher than the price of water.  **Paradox:** People need water to survive, but they do not need diamonds to survive; even if utility is subjective, it must be higher for water than for diamonds. However, observed prices do not match that notion.  **Resolution:** At some level of consumption, the utility of water is higher than the utility of diamonds. In fact, the TOTAL UTILITY of water at any given level of consumption will be higher than the TOTAL utility of diamonds. However, most people consume well above the amount of water that is required to survive (the water that gives the most utility.) So, the utility of getting ONE MORE glass of water to drink is less than the utility of getting ONE MORE diamond to decorate your body. That is, the MARGINAL UTILITY of diamonds is higher than the MARGINAL UTILITY of water at given levels of consumption.  The second benefit of marginalism is it provides a natural way to think about and construct supply and demand curves. There are ways to construct downward-sloping demand curves and upward-sloping supply curves without marginal utility (Gary Becker has a paper about this; I can't remember the name.) However, decreasing marginal benefit and increasing marginal cost provide a very reasonable motivation for the classical supply-and-demand model. And, the supply-and-demand model is probably the best model in economics; it's extraordinarily simple, it's abstract enough to be useful in many contexts, and it's predictive power is pretty much unparalleled in social sciences.  Feel free to ask follow-up questions.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1614.0,"score_ratio":2.4444444444}
{"post_id":"9ntcpr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What references exist that can inform to what degree knowledge was (not) shared in communities before specialisation? I am currently pursuing research in the area of architecture and design, and the question of how past social practices functioned before formal specialisation occured is of interest to me.  From limited readings, I was led to believe that knowledge was shared openly as per necessity, but I am aware that this may also not be the case. What is the current stance in the r\/AskSocialScience community regarding the (in)accuracy of this?   Are there any notable literature references that can shed light on this era before specialisation occured? Or any extended research on how it may inform the context of an increasingly globalised community today with potential for open-source\/sharing of knowledge despite progressive specialisation?  Looking forward to your responses as they are much appreciated - and thank you!","c_root_id_A":"e7paipi","c_root_id_B":"e7pcdx0","created_at_utc_A":1539452472,"created_at_utc_B":1539454256,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'm a little confused on what you mean by \"formal specialization\". Are you referring specifically to before centers of education for architecture appeared? Or are you referring to craft specialization as a whole, not just in architecture?","human_ref_B":"Your question needs a bit of refinement.   First, it\u2019s not clear what you mean by the \u201cera before specialization occurred.\u201d Trivially, humans have specialized their labor since the invention of agriculture. I *think* you mean a more formal codification of specialty like craft\/artisan guilds, correct? If so, you should also specify the era you mean as well as the culture (Europe? China?).    So a rewording of your question (if I\u2019m inferring your intent correctly) might be: *what do we know about the constraints and affordances for sharing specialized {craft name} craft knowledge in {region} before, during, and after the establishment of formal specialization?*  \u201cFormal specialization\u201d needs clarification. It can be as simple as a shared social recognition of someone\u2019s expertise by simply naming it (\u201cJoe\u2019s a good blacksmith\u201d), or something more structured (\u201cJoe is a Master Blacksmith in the guild\u201d).  I think this distinction will be critical for understanding how knowledge is shared.   Also, my \u201cbefore, during, and after\u201d assumes some common agreement about said eras. Blacksmithing is a specialty, but one could argue the significance of guild membership has long since waned. Front-end web service design is right now a continually evolving specialty, etc.  In the social sciences, getting the question right is half the battle.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1784.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"38di7f","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"With Neil Smith's Rent-Gap Theory, what actually causes the gap between actual rent price and potential value? From what I gather, there are a few main theories in what drives gentrification. One revolves around changes in preferences and family structure (dual-income households, delay in having children etc, people wanting to live in the city rather than commute etc.), whilst the other is rent-gap theory in which gentrifiers capitalize on a potential value of a property in it's 'ideal use' compared to it's current rent value.  What actually causes this gap? If it is the aforementioned changes in family structure and cultural preferences then aren't the two theories basically just the same thing?  Hope that makes sense, and thanks in advance!","c_root_id_A":"cruf3hb","c_root_id_B":"cruf9f6","created_at_utc_A":1433355937,"created_at_utc_B":1433356183,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Imagine that you own property in a run down neighbourhood in the inner city. Its hard to raise the rent because the housing quality sucks and the current tenants are poor, but the location is great. You know that the neighbourhood next to yours, has rents double what you can charge. There is then a gap between what you are getting and what you could be getting. The only difference is the housing stock and the current tenants. What you need to do is upgrade the housing stock, and bring in some wealthy residents. Fortunately, land is cheap.  You being the smart businessperson you are, realize that the land is devalued, so you buy up as many properties as you can. Once you have most of them, you start renovating and driving up the rents. Now that these crappy old houses are renovated, cool white often gay hipsters move in paying higher rents then the previous tenants poor often racialized tenants. Since there is now competition for this area, the old residents can no longer afford to pay their rent, so they are forced to leave to make way for more yuppies.   What happened was you (capital) exploited the gap in current rents from possible rents to evict, renovate, and ultimately gentrify a neighbourhood for profit.","human_ref_B":"Great question.  So for terminology sake, typically the changing preferences for urban living argument is referred to as the 'demand-side' explanation for gentrification while the rent-gap is referred to as the 'supply-side' explanation.  It is (the mostly theoretical) gap between the price of urban land today (imagine a vacant building) and its price if it were brought up to its \"highest and best use\" (imagine a shiny new apartment building).  It might be useful to think about it as a signal to developers\/assorted capitalists that the land is now ripe for profit extraction.  I want to point out that Smith, the supply-side rent gap theorist and his demand-side contemporaries yelled and screamed about which was the definitive theory of gentrification - a feud that actually led to published articles in which they resorted to ridiculous name-calling for example and another example.  In truth, as you say, a theory of gentrification involves both supply and demand-side dynamics.    Consider the value of land is a function of local amenities and disamenities like crime, access to employment and retail centers and distance to parks and transit amenities.  Thus, according to the rent gap theory, holding demand constant, if an area experienced a dramatic decrease in crime, then we should expect a rent gap to emerge.  However, without changing preferences for urban living and an aggregate increase in demand for city locations, then the rent gap would not be a particularly useful signal for developers.    Lastly, I'll just mention that what makes the rent gap so difficult to identify is the fact the term 'highest and best use' is so vague.  Consider that a flock of investors who are all very experienced real estate developers with ninja like discounted cash flow skills will likely never agree on the value of that land in the next 5, 10 or 15 years.  Why? Because highest and best use in Manhattan for instance, in 2015 is not what it was in 2005 and likely not what it will be in 2030.  For a different theory of gentrification - see this piece here","labels":0,"seconds_difference":246.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1jqz4x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What is the current accepted opinion on the legitimacy of Behaviorism? I came across this quotation recently: \"Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select--doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief, and, yes, even beggarman and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors. I am going beyond my facts and I admit it, but so have the advocates of the contrary and they have been doing it for many thousands of years.\" \u2013John B. Watson, Behaviorism, 1930  Is behavioral psychology still considered a legitimate theory of learning?  If so, can it be applied to one's self?  How?","c_root_id_A":"cbhpmku","c_root_id_B":"cbhuq9d","created_at_utc_A":1375749091,"created_at_utc_B":1375763370,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"In terms of therapy, behavioral methods have very much merged with cognitive therapy. Having said that you can use quite a few behavioral methods for self improvement without the cognitive component.  For example, you can use applied relaxation techniques for a phobia without working through the automatic negative thoughts that subsume the phobia (in other words you don't have to understand your thought process or how the phobia developed).  So while behavioralism may be insufficient by itself in explaining human cognition, behavioralism is still quite effective in terms of affecting change, especially when combined with cognitive therapy.","human_ref_B":"**Part 1 of 2:**  Behaviorism currently sits in an awkward position where its basic tenets are accepted as the uncontroversial foundations of psychology but the term itself is rejected due to the many misconceptions that are held about it. There's a good discussion by cognitive psychologist Henry Roediger here: What Happened to Behaviorism?:  >Perhaps the most radical answer to the question I posed is that behaviorism is less discussed and debated today because it actually won the intellectual battle. In a very real sense, all psychologists today (at least those doing empirical research) are behaviorists. Even the most cognitively oriented experimentalists study behavior of some sort. They might study effects of variables of pushing buttons on computers, or filling out checklists, or making confidence ratings, or patterns of bloodflow, or recalling words by writing them on sheets of paper, but they almost always study objectively verifiable behavior. (And even subjective experiences, such as confidence ratings, can be replicated across people and across conditions). This step of studying objectively verifiable behavior represents a huge change from the work of many psychologists in 1904. Today the fields of cognitive psychology and cognitive neuroscience are highly behavioral (if one includes neural measures of behavior). True, there is nothing necessarily inherently interesting about pushing buttons on computers, but on the other hand, the basic laws of behavior in the animal lab were worked out on rats pushing levers and navigating runways, or pigeons pecking keys \u2013 not exactly riveting behaviors in their own right. In all these cases, the scientist\u2019s hope is to discover fundamentally interesting principles from simple, elegant experimental analyses. The cognitive researcher goes further and seeks converging evidence from behavioral observations on internal workings of the mind\/brain systems. But as experimentalists, both cognitive and behavioral researchers study behavior. Behaviorism won.  So if the principles of behaviorism are well-accepted, why do people speak so negatively about behaviorism? Well, since its inception behaviorism appears to be plagued by misconceptions and misrepresentations - some are in part due to mistakes made by behaviorists, and some by the misunderstandings of others.   **Blank Slatism:** For example, the Watson quote you present is often presented as an example of how behaviorism presented a blank slate view of the mind. Yet, this would be strange given that Watson started out, and worked, as an ethologist studying innate behaviors, and even dedicated chapters of his books on behaviorism to instincts. And even the other major figure in behaviorism, B.F.Skinner, based his work heavily on the importance of biological components to behavior when he consistently argued in all of his books (as clarified in \"About Behaviorism\") that it's absurd to try to understand behavior without looking at biology.  Steven Pinker is guilty of perpetuating this myth in his book \"The Blank Slate\", and he received a fair amount of criticism from psychologists for his polemical stance and for playing a bit fast and loose with facts. For example, there's a good rebuttal of his comments on behaviorism here: Not So Fast Mr.Pinker: A Behaviorist Looks at the Blank Slate. It turns out, no behaviorist has ever adopted a blank slate position and the 12 infants quote, when read in context, was in fact a critical comment on how blank slatism isn't a reasonable position to hold.  **Rejection of mind:** Part of the problems are arguably caused by the behaviorists' language as well. Watson's form of behaviorism (methodological behaviorism) sought to reject mental states as explanations of behavior, and this stance is often confused with the claim that the mind doesn't exist or that mental states don't affect behavior. In reality, the MB's argument was simply that, at the time, since there was no way of scientifically studying what was going on inside the mind, it made no sense to just make things up and call them explanations. As such, their rejection of the mind as a scientific explanation was purely pragmatic.  Skinner then made the mistake of rejecting this position but retaining the behaviorist title. That is, Skinner's entire philosophy was based around the fact that cognition is an important causal influence of behavior. In all of his books, like \"Science and Human Behavior\" or \"About Behaviorism\", you find him dedicating entire chapters to the importance of cognition - and this is why his brand of behaviorism was termed \"radical\", as he attempted to bring the mind back into behaviorism.   His mistake, however, was sticking with the title 'behaviorism' as it had become associated with a rejection of the mind. Lump that in with the qualifier \"radical\", and you get the common laymen misconception that \"radical behaviorism\" means \"an extreme rejection of the mind\". This simply makes no sense though - if radical behaviorism was the rejection of the mind, how would it be any different from methodological behaviorism?  **Explaining behavior without recourse to the mind:** One of the common knee-jerk reactions to the discovery that radical behaviorism was all about the importance of cognition is to link to the first few sentences in the wikipedia entry on behaviorism. Yes, it's true that Skinner made many arguments about behavior not needing to be explained in terms of the mind, *but this is not a rejection of the mind*.  This argument is one about levels of explanation and establishing behavior analysis as a field of study in itself. When he says that behavior can be understood without recourse to the mind (and even underlying physiology) he is not rejecting the idea that these influence behavior. The claim is simply that we can scientifically study behavior by looking at the environment and that it is not *necessary* to make claims about cognition or biology.   As a comparison, chemistry is a field that can be understood without recourse to physics. We don't need to understand all of the physical interactions in order to conduct chemistry experiments. However, this position does not mean that understanding physics does not aid our understanding of chemistry, or that interdisciplinary work should not be done in order to best understand the world we live in. This is the same for behavior and cognition.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14279.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1jqz4x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What is the current accepted opinion on the legitimacy of Behaviorism? I came across this quotation recently: \"Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select--doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief, and, yes, even beggarman and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors. I am going beyond my facts and I admit it, but so have the advocates of the contrary and they have been doing it for many thousands of years.\" \u2013John B. Watson, Behaviorism, 1930  Is behavioral psychology still considered a legitimate theory of learning?  If so, can it be applied to one's self?  How?","c_root_id_A":"cbhpmku","c_root_id_B":"cbhuqg7","created_at_utc_A":1375749091,"created_at_utc_B":1375763388,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"In terms of therapy, behavioral methods have very much merged with cognitive therapy. Having said that you can use quite a few behavioral methods for self improvement without the cognitive component.  For example, you can use applied relaxation techniques for a phobia without working through the automatic negative thoughts that subsume the phobia (in other words you don't have to understand your thought process or how the phobia developed).  So while behavioralism may be insufficient by itself in explaining human cognition, behavioralism is still quite effective in terms of affecting change, especially when combined with cognitive therapy.","human_ref_B":"**Part 2 of 2:**   **If that's not behaviorism, then what is?** Behaviorism, as described by William Baum in \"Understanding Behaviorism\", is simply the idea that a science of behavioral and cognitive processes is possible. The reason why people think that behaviorism can't be that uncontroversial is because they've heard a lot about how \"wrong\" it is, and don't actually look at what it says. It seems so uncontroversial and trivially true now because at the time it was being developed it had to deal with scientists who didn't believe that the scientific study of behavior or the mind could occur.   The most popular form of behaviorism these days is radical behaviorism and that does make more specific claims, but these too aren't overly controversial. For example, it claims that cognition can be conceptualised as a form of behavior. To be clear, this isn't to say that external behaviors are cognition (e.g. \"being sad\" is just \"crying, moping around, and saying I'm sad\") but rather that cognition is an process performed by an organism which has measurable causes and effects.   The radical behaviorists also reject what are known as \"explanatory fictions\" (discussed heavily in Skinner's \"Beyond Freedom and Dignity\"), which are proposed explanations for a behavior which simply appear to be explanations despite it just being a reformulation of the problem. For example, answering the question \"Why did the rat press the lever?\" with \"Because it was hungry\". This is an explanatory fiction because the reason we're claiming it's hungry is because it worked for food, which was the question we were trying to answer. In other words, the explanation actually says: \"The rat worked for food because it worked for food\".   Radical behaviorism also demands that we treat introspection carefully, and to see it more as verbal behavior rather than a report on the inner workings of the mind. That is, when someone is asked to describe themselves in a personality psychology experiment, we treat that response as a verbal report that is subject to external influences like biases and social pressure, rather than a pure, unfiltered report on what is going on inside. This, again, is pretty uncontroversial these days and all areas of psychology treat introspection in this way.  Some resources on the common misconceptions of behaviorism:  On Chomsky's review of Skinner's Verbal Behavior  College students\u2019 misconceptions about behavior analysis   On misconceptions about behavior analysis among university students and teachers.  Misconception and miseducation: Presentations of radical behaviorism in psychology textbooks  On to your questions:  >Is behavioral psychology still considered a legitimate theory of learning?  There's a bit of confusion here. Behavioral psychology =\/= behaviorism. Behavioral psychology is a field of science, whereas behaviorism is a philosophy of science. Behaviorism is not limited to behavioral psychology, and there are a large number of behaviorists in other fields like cognitive, social, personality, neuro psychology, etc.   Behavioral psychology, the field of science, is *the* field of study for learning. All theories of learning either come from the field directly, or are interdisciplinary efforts that are based largely on the principles from behavioral psychology.  >If so, can it be applied to one's self? How?  The principles of behavioral psychology certainly can be applied to yourself, but there are so many it's difficult to figure out where to start. If you are having self-control issues, then I recommend Howard Rachlin's book \"The Science of Self-Control\", where he discusses the variables underpinning self-control issues - one of the key findings being that impulsive behaviors can be reduced through the use of a pre-commitment.   If you are having issues with things like anxiety or depression, then CBT is a behavioral treatment and that can be applied to yourself (although it's recommended to see a therapist). For example, there are some evidence-based computer programs like MoodGym.   If you are having problems with phobias, then try treating yourself with systematic desensitisation.   If you have a behavioral or learning problem, there will likely be a behavioral treatment for it and many you can apply yourself (but again, I recommend seeing a professional for anything serious).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14297.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"1jqz4x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"What is the current accepted opinion on the legitimacy of Behaviorism? I came across this quotation recently: \"Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I'll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select--doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief, and, yes, even beggarman and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors. I am going beyond my facts and I admit it, but so have the advocates of the contrary and they have been doing it for many thousands of years.\" \u2013John B. Watson, Behaviorism, 1930  Is behavioral psychology still considered a legitimate theory of learning?  If so, can it be applied to one's self?  How?","c_root_id_A":"cbj5cci","c_root_id_B":"cbhpmku","created_at_utc_A":1375920328,"created_at_utc_B":1375749091,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"In my field of psychology (developmental disabilities) behaviorism is considered the most legitimate application of psychology.   It's changed a bit since Watson's day, but it's highly credible. Check out Appled Behavior Analysis. This is an application of behaviorism and is the only empirically proven intervention for children and adults with developmenral disabilities.","human_ref_B":"In terms of therapy, behavioral methods have very much merged with cognitive therapy. Having said that you can use quite a few behavioral methods for self improvement without the cognitive component.  For example, you can use applied relaxation techniques for a phobia without working through the automatic negative thoughts that subsume the phobia (in other words you don't have to understand your thought process or how the phobia developed).  So while behavioralism may be insufficient by itself in explaining human cognition, behavioralism is still quite effective in terms of affecting change, especially when combined with cognitive therapy.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":171237.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"swyaz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Is there any language which is truly (or almost completely) gender free? One for which there is no modification of adjectives for gender (like there is in Romance languages), a single gender pronoun, and no assigning of gender to nouns (not only lacking masculine and feminine nouns, as there are in Romance languages, but also lacking nouns which specify for gender, ie, having a single word for \"sibling\" instead of \"brother\" and \"sister\").   If there is, has there been any speculation as to how this has affected the development of gender and sexuality roles in the society?","c_root_id_A":"c4hooy1","c_root_id_B":"c4hoop5","created_at_utc_A":1335636511,"created_at_utc_B":1335636472,"score_A":15,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The closest is perhaps Basque. Basque has no grammatical gender and no noun classes. Morphological sex-marking is almost absent, except that the sex of an addressee addressed with the intimate second-person singular pronoun is sometimes (not always) marked in the verb.  The scant selection of words for differently gendered nouns is limited to familial relations like mother\/father. There is also a variety of loanwords from Romance languages which have gender but they are generally avoided.","human_ref_B":"I can't speak absolutely, but Indonesian\/Malay, which I do speak, is pretty non-gendered. The only third-person pronoun is '*dia*', or 'they'. It doesn't have a single word for sibling, but the two words it does have, '*adik*' and '*kaka*' translate to 'younger sibling' and 'older sibling' respectively. To say 'younger sister', you would use '*adik perempuan*', or 'younger sibling'+'female'.   I don't know anything about how the Malay language's development interrelates with gender roles, but if you're looking, it might be a good starting point.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":39.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"484v8f","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Who are the latino people primarily descended from? Hi, just wondering, genetically speaking where did the latino people come from? Who are their ancestors? Most races can be traced back thousands of years into the past - blacks from Africa, caucasians from Europe, asians from...Asia, etc, but the latino people seemed to just spontaneously appear at some point in the last couple hundred years. Who are they?","c_root_id_A":"d0hemvj","c_root_id_B":"d0hhklo","created_at_utc_A":1456702528,"created_at_utc_B":1456707457,"score_A":19,"score_B":41,"human_ref_A":"I think you're nitpicking from a historical timeline. If we know homo sapiens originated from what is now Africa and then migrated and evolved into different races over millions of years, then we don't need a separate answer for your question. Additionally, I believe you are confusing a politicized American term that deals with language with the genetic origins and further genetic differentiation of almost an entire continent.   That being said...the current populations of not just Latin America but North America (including Mexico) are shown to have started with Asian migration through the Bering Strait, into the Americas and then diversifying into indigenous groups, followed by colonization which resulted in mixing with both white Europeans and the slaves they brought with them.   https:\/\/www.ucdavis.edu\/news\/native-americans-descended-single-ancestral-group-dna-study-confirms","human_ref_B":"Your question is unfortunately based on incorrect assumptions.  \"Latino\" does not refer to a genetic distinction, it refers only to a cultural one. There are Latinos out there that are of 100% European descent (white if you prefer), 100% African descent (black if you prefer), and 100% American Indian, among others.  I suspect the Latino individuals you have most likely interacted with are those of mixed European and American Indian descent, though of course I can't say for certain.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4929.0,"score_ratio":2.1578947368}
{"post_id":"484v8f","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Who are the latino people primarily descended from? Hi, just wondering, genetically speaking where did the latino people come from? Who are their ancestors? Most races can be traced back thousands of years into the past - blacks from Africa, caucasians from Europe, asians from...Asia, etc, but the latino people seemed to just spontaneously appear at some point in the last couple hundred years. Who are they?","c_root_id_A":"d0hc3sf","c_root_id_B":"d0hhklo","created_at_utc_A":1456698425,"created_at_utc_B":1456707457,"score_A":5,"score_B":41,"human_ref_A":"Just to add to this, why have indigenous peoples been so assimilated into the gene pool in so many Latin American countries? Not that they weren't in the US, or Argentina or whatever, but this seems to have happened on a much larger scale in say, Mexico.   Is it due to lower European immigration? Larger pre-existing populations meaning that more survived the waves of smallpox and such that decimated native populations?  I find this interesting as I usually think of Latin Americans as mostly white, whereas Americans seem to be confused by this - I'd imagine people of Mexican extraction being who they're most exposed to distorts things.  Thanks!","human_ref_B":"Your question is unfortunately based on incorrect assumptions.  \"Latino\" does not refer to a genetic distinction, it refers only to a cultural one. There are Latinos out there that are of 100% European descent (white if you prefer), 100% African descent (black if you prefer), and 100% American Indian, among others.  I suspect the Latino individuals you have most likely interacted with are those of mixed European and American Indian descent, though of course I can't say for certain.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9032.0,"score_ratio":8.2}
{"post_id":"484v8f","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Who are the latino people primarily descended from? Hi, just wondering, genetically speaking where did the latino people come from? Who are their ancestors? Most races can be traced back thousands of years into the past - blacks from Africa, caucasians from Europe, asians from...Asia, etc, but the latino people seemed to just spontaneously appear at some point in the last couple hundred years. Who are they?","c_root_id_A":"d0hemvj","c_root_id_B":"d0hc3sf","created_at_utc_A":1456702528,"created_at_utc_B":1456698425,"score_A":19,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I think you're nitpicking from a historical timeline. If we know homo sapiens originated from what is now Africa and then migrated and evolved into different races over millions of years, then we don't need a separate answer for your question. Additionally, I believe you are confusing a politicized American term that deals with language with the genetic origins and further genetic differentiation of almost an entire continent.   That being said...the current populations of not just Latin America but North America (including Mexico) are shown to have started with Asian migration through the Bering Strait, into the Americas and then diversifying into indigenous groups, followed by colonization which resulted in mixing with both white Europeans and the slaves they brought with them.   https:\/\/www.ucdavis.edu\/news\/native-americans-descended-single-ancestral-group-dna-study-confirms","human_ref_B":"Just to add to this, why have indigenous peoples been so assimilated into the gene pool in so many Latin American countries? Not that they weren't in the US, or Argentina or whatever, but this seems to have happened on a much larger scale in say, Mexico.   Is it due to lower European immigration? Larger pre-existing populations meaning that more survived the waves of smallpox and such that decimated native populations?  I find this interesting as I usually think of Latin Americans as mostly white, whereas Americans seem to be confused by this - I'd imagine people of Mexican extraction being who they're most exposed to distorts things.  Thanks!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4103.0,"score_ratio":3.8}
{"post_id":"1he1qs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"if the 1960's was about a 'let it all hang out' era and yearning for authenticity; a reaction to the 1950's, then what is the present era 'about'?","c_root_id_A":"catmph1","c_root_id_B":"catfw81","created_at_utc_A":1372657919,"created_at_utc_B":1372635785,"score_A":50,"score_B":31,"human_ref_A":"History wasn't really about grouping things by decade until after WW2, with the exception of publications about \"The Roaring Twenties\" since that economic boom fit so nicely into ten years, ending so sharply right at 1929.  Since WW2 is broadly understood to have begun in 1939, yet again delineating the end of a decade (AND the Great Depression), post-war popular history starts encapsulating every 20th century event into decades after 1945.  To the point where all of the 40s inherit the War, much of what we consider \"the 50s\" actually happened after 1945, and much of what we consider \"the 60s\" *really* happened in the 50s (Beat culture and the like).  On the whole, while history-by-decade is great marketing and there's no question that modern decades will inevitably get the same treatment within pop culture, in practice this is a terrible way to look at history.  The combination of shoehorning and oversimplification casts a kind of Hollywood haze over a historical time period that turns it more into a mythological story than an honest reflection of the times.  Will the 10s and the Aughts get nicknames and\/or a single encapsulating storyline?  Absolutely.  *Is* such a thing really there?  Absolutely not.","human_ref_B":"Globalization?  Moving toward a global culture in terms of music, movies, food, language. Also in ecomonics, in terms of where we get things and who makes the different parts of them. I'm reading \"The World is Flat\" right now, so that's influencing my answer.  Also, with politics. We're starting to see how the internet can change politics. Obama's first election would have been very different without the internet. Also, the Arab Spring I'd argue as an even more profound example. It may not even have happened were it not for the internet. Or at least would have happened differently. And again, we're just \"starting to see\". Not saying that these forces are in full effect yet.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22134.0,"score_ratio":1.6129032258}
{"post_id":"1he1qs","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"if the 1960's was about a 'let it all hang out' era and yearning for authenticity; a reaction to the 1950's, then what is the present era 'about'?","c_root_id_A":"catlu69","c_root_id_B":"catmph1","created_at_utc_A":1372654636,"created_at_utc_B":1372657919,"score_A":10,"score_B":50,"human_ref_A":"Sorry, I don't know if maybe this comes from a field I'm not familiar with. Why do you believe the 1960's was the era of 'let it all hang out' and authenticity?  Further, is there a reason to suspect that time periods have themes?","human_ref_B":"History wasn't really about grouping things by decade until after WW2, with the exception of publications about \"The Roaring Twenties\" since that economic boom fit so nicely into ten years, ending so sharply right at 1929.  Since WW2 is broadly understood to have begun in 1939, yet again delineating the end of a decade (AND the Great Depression), post-war popular history starts encapsulating every 20th century event into decades after 1945.  To the point where all of the 40s inherit the War, much of what we consider \"the 50s\" actually happened after 1945, and much of what we consider \"the 60s\" *really* happened in the 50s (Beat culture and the like).  On the whole, while history-by-decade is great marketing and there's no question that modern decades will inevitably get the same treatment within pop culture, in practice this is a terrible way to look at history.  The combination of shoehorning and oversimplification casts a kind of Hollywood haze over a historical time period that turns it more into a mythological story than an honest reflection of the times.  Will the 10s and the Aughts get nicknames and\/or a single encapsulating storyline?  Absolutely.  *Is* such a thing really there?  Absolutely not.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3283.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"25zjby","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Is there a natural tendency for firms to increase market power over time and thereby a general market tendency towards oligopolistic and\/or monopolistic control? I have a BA in economics and I've never heard anyone provide any evidence or further research that would suggest that such a tendency does not exist.  It seems a pretty intuitive theory given that firms will either merge or outcompete their competitors and then acquire their assets and capital stock over time.    Is this a generally accepted tendency by most schools of thought?   Does this make antitrust laws essential for all modern capitalist economies to ensure a minimum standard of competition?  Thanks in advance for your replies.","c_root_id_A":"chm8t1l","c_root_id_B":"chmgbth","created_at_utc_A":1400548289,"created_at_utc_B":1400568286,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I can't speak for all economic schools, but the Marxian one takes this pretty seriously and essentially says some of what you're saying. Businesses outcompete others and swallow them whole for more property ownership.  Private ownership of the means of production + economic growth lead to a concentration of production and property among a smaller and smaller group of people. Marx goes into this in *Capital* and argues that monopoly is a natural behavior of capitalism.","human_ref_B":"There probably are such tendencies, and there are also opposing tendencies. Your question is quite general, but FWIW there are some ways we can try to measure competition and its development over time. See for example the Deloitte Shift Index metrics (pdf), figure 18 on the firm topple rate and figure 23 on the economy-wide Herfindahl-Hirschman-index for the US.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19997.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7gpbcv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Can you point me toward some sources that discuss the \"normalization\" of white experiences? (xpost from \/r\/askhistorians)  I'm a high school teacher. A student of mine is writing a paper arguing that the \"standard narrative\" of women in the workplace -- that the labor needs of WWII brought women in and changed cultural mores about their participation -- overlooks the experiences of black women, who had been working outside the home in large numbers since Reconstruction.  She'd like to talk about the problem of \"normalizing\" the experiences of white women, by which she means assuming that white experience is the \"default\" or \"normal\" experience, such that the story of white women becomes in popular understanding the story of women as a whole. I am trying to help her by locating sources that will discuss that issue, but I don't know where to look, and \"normalize\" doesn't seem to be the right term for this sort of discussion.   Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"dql0nqt","c_root_id_B":"dql289s","created_at_utc_A":1512085548,"created_at_utc_B":1512087393,"score_A":7,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"IIRC \"White Fragility\" gives a great explanation of that phenomenon. I'm on mobile so formatting is wonky, but it's easily found online. If you can't find it, PM me and I'll send it to you.  EDIT: author is Robin DiAngelo","human_ref_B":"Nell Irvin Painter's The History of White People documents the history of the concept of whiteness from the early modern era to the present. The whole thing might be too big for one high school paper, but you can probably pick out useful chapters if you want to use it.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1845.0,"score_ratio":2.1428571429}
{"post_id":"7gpbcv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Can you point me toward some sources that discuss the \"normalization\" of white experiences? (xpost from \/r\/askhistorians)  I'm a high school teacher. A student of mine is writing a paper arguing that the \"standard narrative\" of women in the workplace -- that the labor needs of WWII brought women in and changed cultural mores about their participation -- overlooks the experiences of black women, who had been working outside the home in large numbers since Reconstruction.  She'd like to talk about the problem of \"normalizing\" the experiences of white women, by which she means assuming that white experience is the \"default\" or \"normal\" experience, such that the story of white women becomes in popular understanding the story of women as a whole. I am trying to help her by locating sources that will discuss that issue, but I don't know where to look, and \"normalize\" doesn't seem to be the right term for this sort of discussion.   Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"dqlrw3d","c_root_id_B":"dql0nqt","created_at_utc_A":1512129759,"created_at_utc_B":1512085548,"score_A":8,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"First of all, I'm beyond impressed by the critical thinking skills of the next generation! We are embarking on a generation of scholars. Please point your young thinker to \"The Black Woman's Manifesto\" an early Black feminist publication which articulates this phenomenon in erudite detail!  https:\/\/dukelibraries.contentdm.oclc.org\/digital\/api\/collection\/p15957coll6\/id\/857\/page\/0\/inline\/p15957coll6_857_0","human_ref_B":"IIRC \"White Fragility\" gives a great explanation of that phenomenon. I'm on mobile so formatting is wonky, but it's easily found online. If you can't find it, PM me and I'll send it to you.  EDIT: author is Robin DiAngelo","labels":1,"seconds_difference":44211.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"7gpbcv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Can you point me toward some sources that discuss the \"normalization\" of white experiences? (xpost from \/r\/askhistorians)  I'm a high school teacher. A student of mine is writing a paper arguing that the \"standard narrative\" of women in the workplace -- that the labor needs of WWII brought women in and changed cultural mores about their participation -- overlooks the experiences of black women, who had been working outside the home in large numbers since Reconstruction.  She'd like to talk about the problem of \"normalizing\" the experiences of white women, by which she means assuming that white experience is the \"default\" or \"normal\" experience, such that the story of white women becomes in popular understanding the story of women as a whole. I am trying to help her by locating sources that will discuss that issue, but I don't know where to look, and \"normalize\" doesn't seem to be the right term for this sort of discussion.   Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"dqlrw3d","c_root_id_B":"dqli0bv","created_at_utc_A":1512129759,"created_at_utc_B":1512106611,"score_A":8,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"First of all, I'm beyond impressed by the critical thinking skills of the next generation! We are embarking on a generation of scholars. Please point your young thinker to \"The Black Woman's Manifesto\" an early Black feminist publication which articulates this phenomenon in erudite detail!  https:\/\/dukelibraries.contentdm.oclc.org\/digital\/api\/collection\/p15957coll6\/id\/857\/page\/0\/inline\/p15957coll6_857_0","human_ref_B":"It doesn't focus on normalizing the experience of white women specifically, but Richard Dyer's *The Matter of Whiteness* would be a great place to start.  It's short enough that your student will be able to get a good feel for the argument without having to delve too deep.  Just google \"the matter of whiteness dyer,\" I'm sure there's a pdf floating out there.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":23148.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"7gpbcv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Can you point me toward some sources that discuss the \"normalization\" of white experiences? (xpost from \/r\/askhistorians)  I'm a high school teacher. A student of mine is writing a paper arguing that the \"standard narrative\" of women in the workplace -- that the labor needs of WWII brought women in and changed cultural mores about their participation -- overlooks the experiences of black women, who had been working outside the home in large numbers since Reconstruction.  She'd like to talk about the problem of \"normalizing\" the experiences of white women, by which she means assuming that white experience is the \"default\" or \"normal\" experience, such that the story of white women becomes in popular understanding the story of women as a whole. I am trying to help her by locating sources that will discuss that issue, but I don't know where to look, and \"normalize\" doesn't seem to be the right term for this sort of discussion.   Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"dqlrw3d","c_root_id_B":"dqlmgx8","created_at_utc_A":1512129759,"created_at_utc_B":1512115424,"score_A":8,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"First of all, I'm beyond impressed by the critical thinking skills of the next generation! We are embarking on a generation of scholars. Please point your young thinker to \"The Black Woman's Manifesto\" an early Black feminist publication which articulates this phenomenon in erudite detail!  https:\/\/dukelibraries.contentdm.oclc.org\/digital\/api\/collection\/p15957coll6\/id\/857\/page\/0\/inline\/p15957coll6_857_0","human_ref_B":"Evelyn Nakano Glenn\u2019s \u201cFrom Servitude to Service Work\u201d also addresses this.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14335.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1nswj1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Has any country ever attempted to inflate another countries currency for adversarial reasons whether through lax banking, counterfeit security, etc..?","c_root_id_A":"cclr4er","c_root_id_B":"cclpibr","created_at_utc_A":1381010580,"created_at_utc_B":1381005245,"score_A":32,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"North Korea counterfeits american currency.  Full quote: Forging $100 bills obviously gels with the regime\u2019s febrile anti-Americanism and its aim to undercut U.S. global power, in this case by sowing doubts about our currency. State-level counterfeiting is a kind of slow-motion violence committed against an enemy, and it has been tried many times before. During the Revolutionary War, the British printed fake continentals to undermine the fragile colonial currency. Napoleon counterfeited Russian notes during the Napoleonic Wars, and during World War II the Germans forced a handful of artists and printing experts in Block 19 of the Sachsenhausen concentration camp to produce fake U.S. dollars and British pounds sterling. (Their story is the basis of 2007 film The Counterfeiters, which won an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.)  Cite: http:\/\/business.time.com\/2012\/02\/24\/how-the-u-s-could-pressure-north-korea-tomorrow-quit-the-100-bill\/","human_ref_B":"Not exactly what you're looking for, but there is an instance of a country overvaluing its currency via an interesting method...  The Big Mac Index.  The Big Mac Index was a comical index first put forth by *The Economist* in the 80s to outline the strength of currencies based on a popular food item; McDonald's Big Mac.  Argentina's government decided that this was a great way to do some manipulating and make themselves look good.  Argentina has come under fire for \"Cooking its books\" by intentionally pricing the Big Mac at a low price, so low, that it \"[minimizes] the country\u2019s boiling inflation rate.\"  This isn't exactly what you're looking for, \/u\/goodbyoil, but it is one way in recent history that a country manipulated data to change the appearance of its currency value.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5335.0,"score_ratio":8.0}
{"post_id":"1nswj1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Has any country ever attempted to inflate another countries currency for adversarial reasons whether through lax banking, counterfeit security, etc..?","c_root_id_A":"cclruf2","c_root_id_B":"cclt87v","created_at_utc_A":1381013008,"created_at_utc_B":1381017688,"score_A":6,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I remember reading an article around the beginning of the War in Afghanistan which claimed that the US ordered the printing of massive quantities of Afghanis (the currency) in order to cause inflation and weaken the purchasing power of the various warlords.  However, I can't find the source right now...  Edit: Ehsan accused the firm of sending new shipments of Afghani notes to ousted president Burhanuddin Rabbani in northern Takhar province. The exchange rate at the time of Ehsan's announcement was 21,000 Afghani to the U.S. dollar The Northern Alliance then had banknotes produced in Russia which were sold on the markets of Kabul at half their value.[citation needed].","human_ref_B":"NK forges US currency.   During the US Civil War, the Union printed huge numbers of Confederate currency, trying to destabilize the Southern economy. Since the fake bills were better quality, the Confederates just switched to using them instead.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4680.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1nswj1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Has any country ever attempted to inflate another countries currency for adversarial reasons whether through lax banking, counterfeit security, etc..?","c_root_id_A":"cclt87v","c_root_id_B":"cclpibr","created_at_utc_A":1381017688,"created_at_utc_B":1381005245,"score_A":10,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"NK forges US currency.   During the US Civil War, the Union printed huge numbers of Confederate currency, trying to destabilize the Southern economy. Since the fake bills were better quality, the Confederates just switched to using them instead.","human_ref_B":"Not exactly what you're looking for, but there is an instance of a country overvaluing its currency via an interesting method...  The Big Mac Index.  The Big Mac Index was a comical index first put forth by *The Economist* in the 80s to outline the strength of currencies based on a popular food item; McDonald's Big Mac.  Argentina's government decided that this was a great way to do some manipulating and make themselves look good.  Argentina has come under fire for \"Cooking its books\" by intentionally pricing the Big Mac at a low price, so low, that it \"[minimizes] the country\u2019s boiling inflation rate.\"  This isn't exactly what you're looking for, \/u\/goodbyoil, but it is one way in recent history that a country manipulated data to change the appearance of its currency value.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12443.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1nswj1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Has any country ever attempted to inflate another countries currency for adversarial reasons whether through lax banking, counterfeit security, etc..?","c_root_id_A":"cclruf2","c_root_id_B":"cclpibr","created_at_utc_A":1381013008,"created_at_utc_B":1381005245,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I remember reading an article around the beginning of the War in Afghanistan which claimed that the US ordered the printing of massive quantities of Afghanis (the currency) in order to cause inflation and weaken the purchasing power of the various warlords.  However, I can't find the source right now...  Edit: Ehsan accused the firm of sending new shipments of Afghani notes to ousted president Burhanuddin Rabbani in northern Takhar province. The exchange rate at the time of Ehsan's announcement was 21,000 Afghani to the U.S. dollar The Northern Alliance then had banknotes produced in Russia which were sold on the markets of Kabul at half their value.[citation needed].","human_ref_B":"Not exactly what you're looking for, but there is an instance of a country overvaluing its currency via an interesting method...  The Big Mac Index.  The Big Mac Index was a comical index first put forth by *The Economist* in the 80s to outline the strength of currencies based on a popular food item; McDonald's Big Mac.  Argentina's government decided that this was a great way to do some manipulating and make themselves look good.  Argentina has come under fire for \"Cooking its books\" by intentionally pricing the Big Mac at a low price, so low, that it \"[minimizes] the country\u2019s boiling inflation rate.\"  This isn't exactly what you're looking for, \/u\/goodbyoil, but it is one way in recent history that a country manipulated data to change the appearance of its currency value.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7763.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1d05qi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is there a correlation between social status and happiness?","c_root_id_A":"c9lq8qm","c_root_id_B":"c9lq5lg","created_at_utc_A":1366820199,"created_at_utc_B":1366819963,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Relative ranking within your social group is much more important than absolute social status. I've read a few of these types of papers -- they are true both for wealth -- the successful local businessman in his poor rural town vs. someone who is \"just\" making a few hundred k in their wealthy NY of SF suburb -- and social status, but the economy ones are obviously easier to objectively measure:   http:\/\/www.teachit.so\/index_htm_files\/Happiness_boyce_brown_moore.pdf","human_ref_B":"Interesting.  In this study income, was related to happiness (as measured by the Satisfaction with Life Scale), but it was mediated by *perceived* social class.  I found in another study that social participation was more influential in regard to happiness.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":236.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"chu9il","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Who are the major scholars on deviance?  What are some key scholars or authors on deviance? In particular, does anyone know of research that looks at how deviance and sanctions might relate to group identity formation, especially when the group in question is not in good standing with mainstream society? So far, Bourdieu's Distinction and Durkheim's The Elementary Forms of Religious Life come to mind. Who are other important scholars on this topic?","c_root_id_A":"euy6pt0","c_root_id_B":"euyb7wd","created_at_utc_A":1564096278,"created_at_utc_B":1564098755,"score_A":7,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Sutherland\u2019s theory of differential association and Bandura and Aker\u2019s Social Learning Theory are really important \u2014 deviance is learned behavior! And we learn it, mostly, by osmosis.  One of the most important things a deviant learns how to do is how to excuse their behavior. Sykes and Matza\u2019s neutralization Theory is really interesting here \u2014 they classify these excuses into five categories:  1) Deny responsibility \u2014 It wasn\u2019t my fault! 2) Deny injury \u2014 And I barely touched her! 3) Deny victim \u2014 And she deserved it anyway! 4) Condemn the condemner \u2014 And who are you to judge? 5) Appeal to a higher loyalty \u2014 I was just following orders!  Becker\u2019s labeling theory is important too. And all of this grows out of Herbert Mead\u2019s social interactionism.","human_ref_B":"The first person who comes to mind is Howard S. Becker and his 1963 \"Outsiders\". You might be able to run a reverse citation search on that book. I'm pretty certain that at least the chapter on \"Marihuana Smokers\" was published as a journal article.      Additionally, Erving Goffman's \"Stigma\" (funnily enough, published in the same year) is still considered one of the foremost and unique examinations of social deviance at the Micro\/Mezzo layers. I found it extremely useful in my thesis.     Then there's Robert K. Merton's Deviance Typology and the general theory surrounding it. His work was quite broad, but his deviance theories were particularly influencial in criminology circles.     https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Robert\\_K.\\_Merton#Theory\\_of\\_deviance      The field is rich, and gets even more fascinating once you go down the rabbitholes around queer, disabled, feminist, etc. theory, where you start getting very reflexive and personal examinations of societal deviance and what such deviance means in terms of lived experience.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2477.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"chu9il","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Who are the major scholars on deviance?  What are some key scholars or authors on deviance? In particular, does anyone know of research that looks at how deviance and sanctions might relate to group identity formation, especially when the group in question is not in good standing with mainstream society? So far, Bourdieu's Distinction and Durkheim's The Elementary Forms of Religious Life come to mind. Who are other important scholars on this topic?","c_root_id_A":"euxzvh5","c_root_id_B":"euy6pt0","created_at_utc_A":1564093759,"created_at_utc_B":1564096278,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"This is outside of my realm of expertise, but I recall that Mead and Benedict both suggested that \"deviance\" was culturally constructed. I'm thinking of Mead's \"Sex and Temperament in Four Primitive Societies\" and Benedict's *Patterns of Culture.*    Also check out P. Bourgois's work.","human_ref_B":"Sutherland\u2019s theory of differential association and Bandura and Aker\u2019s Social Learning Theory are really important \u2014 deviance is learned behavior! And we learn it, mostly, by osmosis.  One of the most important things a deviant learns how to do is how to excuse their behavior. Sykes and Matza\u2019s neutralization Theory is really interesting here \u2014 they classify these excuses into five categories:  1) Deny responsibility \u2014 It wasn\u2019t my fault! 2) Deny injury \u2014 And I barely touched her! 3) Deny victim \u2014 And she deserved it anyway! 4) Condemn the condemner \u2014 And who are you to judge? 5) Appeal to a higher loyalty \u2014 I was just following orders!  Becker\u2019s labeling theory is important too. And all of this grows out of Herbert Mead\u2019s social interactionism.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2519.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"chu9il","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Who are the major scholars on deviance?  What are some key scholars or authors on deviance? In particular, does anyone know of research that looks at how deviance and sanctions might relate to group identity formation, especially when the group in question is not in good standing with mainstream society? So far, Bourdieu's Distinction and Durkheim's The Elementary Forms of Religious Life come to mind. Who are other important scholars on this topic?","c_root_id_A":"euyb7wd","c_root_id_B":"euxzvh5","created_at_utc_A":1564098755,"created_at_utc_B":1564093759,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The first person who comes to mind is Howard S. Becker and his 1963 \"Outsiders\". You might be able to run a reverse citation search on that book. I'm pretty certain that at least the chapter on \"Marihuana Smokers\" was published as a journal article.      Additionally, Erving Goffman's \"Stigma\" (funnily enough, published in the same year) is still considered one of the foremost and unique examinations of social deviance at the Micro\/Mezzo layers. I found it extremely useful in my thesis.     Then there's Robert K. Merton's Deviance Typology and the general theory surrounding it. His work was quite broad, but his deviance theories were particularly influencial in criminology circles.     https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Robert\\_K.\\_Merton#Theory\\_of\\_deviance      The field is rich, and gets even more fascinating once you go down the rabbitholes around queer, disabled, feminist, etc. theory, where you start getting very reflexive and personal examinations of societal deviance and what such deviance means in terms of lived experience.","human_ref_B":"This is outside of my realm of expertise, but I recall that Mead and Benedict both suggested that \"deviance\" was culturally constructed. I'm thinking of Mead's \"Sex and Temperament in Four Primitive Societies\" and Benedict's *Patterns of Culture.*    Also check out P. Bourgois's work.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4996.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"chu9il","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Who are the major scholars on deviance?  What are some key scholars or authors on deviance? In particular, does anyone know of research that looks at how deviance and sanctions might relate to group identity formation, especially when the group in question is not in good standing with mainstream society? So far, Bourdieu's Distinction and Durkheim's The Elementary Forms of Religious Life come to mind. Who are other important scholars on this topic?","c_root_id_A":"euz3p9z","c_root_id_B":"euyi14q","created_at_utc_A":1564112787,"created_at_utc_B":1564102807,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":">I'm thinking at the level of a deviant group though. For example, a nazi network.   Before replying I read through the thread, and saw your replies which prompt me to point out that you should review your terminology\/vocabulary.   Why? Because deviant groups include *much more* than White supremacist groups such as the KKK or far-right groups such as (Neo-)Nazi (and in context, the original Nazis were not deviant in Nazi Germany). Secret societies are also a specific kind of social group, which may not necessarily be *deviant*. Secrecy is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for deviancy (is the CIA deviant in the US context?).  ---  For example, criminology is an entire interdisciplinary field which is often defined as studying criminals, criminal behavior and social reactions to both, but it is better defined as the study of antisocial behavior, its consequences and social reactions to this behavior.   After all, crime is a specific kind of antisocial behavior which has been formally recognized and *criminalized*, and what is criminal in one place is not necessarily criminal in another place. Therefore, criminology is actually studying crime, delinquency and more broadly ***deviance***.  For example, another user cited Sykes and Matza, which are considered criminologists, and Becker's *Outsiders* is the basis for Labeling theory which also has a place among criminological theories. Likewise Sutherland's dfferential association theory and Aker and Burgess's version of social learning theory are also criminological theories. If you were interested in *deviance*, then you should peruse criminology's body of literature, as there are many other influential and important theories, such as rational choice theory), social control theory, self-control theory, etc.   ---  Then there are also studies on group dynamics, with social psychological theories which can be very pertinent when studying social groups, their identities, and their dynamics, see for example how people categorize and self-categorize and the outcomes of these processes (e.g. social identity approach). Deviancy is defined relative to a norm and to majority and minority groups, after all. But deviancy does not necessarily entail outright rejection and ejection from the group. Deviant *group members* exist, and can be useful for the group (which might evoke, for example, what Durkheim and Becker have to say on crime and deviancy).  ---  My bottom line would be that there is a lot out there, and if you are interested in deviancy, there are many authors who might be considered \"key authors\", much more or much less depending on specifics and what kind of theories you are interested in. But if you are something actually much more specific, then it will behoove you to rethink terms and definitions.","human_ref_B":"Albert Ogien, Howard Becker, Georg Simmel!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9980.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"too8h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Would you be interested in replacing the minimum wage with a basic income guarantee? > In 1968, James Tobin, Paul Samuelson, John Kenneth Galbraith and another 1,200 economists signed a document calling for the US Congress to introduce in that year a system of income guarantees and supplements.  It appears that support for a minimum wage has increased significantly among economists since 1970s.  In 1978 90% of economists surveyed thought it increased unemployment.  In 1992 79%  In 2000 45.6% (fully)  Reweighted 1990 survey 62.4%  > A similar survey in 2006 by Robert Whaples polled PhD members of the American Economic Association. Whaples found that 37.7% of respondents supported an increase in the minimum wage, 14.3% wanted it kept at the current level, 1.3% wanted it decreased, and 46.8% wanted it completely eliminated.  The 1992 study by Card and Krueger (and this expansions on this study) found that an increase in the  minimum wage increased employment (in New Jersey restaurants).  This study has been very controversial as it goes against classical economic theory.  It seems that there are two opposing fractions, those who want a guaranteed basic income (and do away with the minimum wage) and those who want an increase in the minimum wage.  What does \/r\/AskSocialScience think would be a better solution?   Wikipedia Articles:  Basic Income Guarantee  Minimum Wage","c_root_id_A":"c4of4kb","c_root_id_B":"c4og3g4","created_at_utc_A":1337113384,"created_at_utc_B":1337117462,"score_A":5,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"It depends on what your goals are.  Minimum wage laws tend to only affect young people working for supplemental income.  A basic income would more broadly support the entire working poor.  Combining a basic income and universal health care would probably be incredibly beneficial to promoting business growth and innovation.  Struggling small businesses would have less payroll to worry about.  Entrepreneurs could also create new businesses without the fear of losing their health care.","human_ref_B":"In the UK we have minimum wage and guaranteed income for those that work x amount of hours a week (depending on circumstance) in the form of Tax Credits, which is a kind of misleading name as it's essentially cash paid directly to you by the government to top your income up.  You have to work over so many hours a week to qualify, like for couples (married or otherwise) it's over 24 hours between the two of you of which 16 have to be from one person (they just recently increased those hours, it used to be less). Single parents are quite a bit less, I think maybe 16 total (though they also pay for childcare in order for you to work, same for couples who are both working with children).  It's all based off government calculations on an idea that you need x amount of money to get by. It's a good system in my opinion though obviously it could be improved.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4078.0,"score_ratio":2.4}
{"post_id":"too8h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Would you be interested in replacing the minimum wage with a basic income guarantee? > In 1968, James Tobin, Paul Samuelson, John Kenneth Galbraith and another 1,200 economists signed a document calling for the US Congress to introduce in that year a system of income guarantees and supplements.  It appears that support for a minimum wage has increased significantly among economists since 1970s.  In 1978 90% of economists surveyed thought it increased unemployment.  In 1992 79%  In 2000 45.6% (fully)  Reweighted 1990 survey 62.4%  > A similar survey in 2006 by Robert Whaples polled PhD members of the American Economic Association. Whaples found that 37.7% of respondents supported an increase in the minimum wage, 14.3% wanted it kept at the current level, 1.3% wanted it decreased, and 46.8% wanted it completely eliminated.  The 1992 study by Card and Krueger (and this expansions on this study) found that an increase in the  minimum wage increased employment (in New Jersey restaurants).  This study has been very controversial as it goes against classical economic theory.  It seems that there are two opposing fractions, those who want a guaranteed basic income (and do away with the minimum wage) and those who want an increase in the minimum wage.  What does \/r\/AskSocialScience think would be a better solution?   Wikipedia Articles:  Basic Income Guarantee  Minimum Wage","c_root_id_A":"c4of4kb","c_root_id_B":"c4oh2vr","created_at_utc_A":1337113384,"created_at_utc_B":1337121744,"score_A":5,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"It depends on what your goals are.  Minimum wage laws tend to only affect young people working for supplemental income.  A basic income would more broadly support the entire working poor.  Combining a basic income and universal health care would probably be incredibly beneficial to promoting business growth and innovation.  Struggling small businesses would have less payroll to worry about.  Entrepreneurs could also create new businesses without the fear of losing their health care.","human_ref_B":"I recently had the thought that if you gave everyone a basic guaranteed income more people might work less (30-35) hours per week and others might take on a part time job or two doing what interests them to elevate their standard of living above just what the government checks give them.  I think this would lead to a general increase in happiness among low-income people.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8360.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"too8h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Would you be interested in replacing the minimum wage with a basic income guarantee? > In 1968, James Tobin, Paul Samuelson, John Kenneth Galbraith and another 1,200 economists signed a document calling for the US Congress to introduce in that year a system of income guarantees and supplements.  It appears that support for a minimum wage has increased significantly among economists since 1970s.  In 1978 90% of economists surveyed thought it increased unemployment.  In 1992 79%  In 2000 45.6% (fully)  Reweighted 1990 survey 62.4%  > A similar survey in 2006 by Robert Whaples polled PhD members of the American Economic Association. Whaples found that 37.7% of respondents supported an increase in the minimum wage, 14.3% wanted it kept at the current level, 1.3% wanted it decreased, and 46.8% wanted it completely eliminated.  The 1992 study by Card and Krueger (and this expansions on this study) found that an increase in the  minimum wage increased employment (in New Jersey restaurants).  This study has been very controversial as it goes against classical economic theory.  It seems that there are two opposing fractions, those who want a guaranteed basic income (and do away with the minimum wage) and those who want an increase in the minimum wage.  What does \/r\/AskSocialScience think would be a better solution?   Wikipedia Articles:  Basic Income Guarantee  Minimum Wage","c_root_id_A":"c4oh2vr","c_root_id_B":"c4ogitx","created_at_utc_A":1337121744,"created_at_utc_B":1337119259,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I recently had the thought that if you gave everyone a basic guaranteed income more people might work less (30-35) hours per week and others might take on a part time job or two doing what interests them to elevate their standard of living above just what the government checks give them.  I think this would lead to a general increase in happiness among low-income people.","human_ref_B":"minimum wage in the classical sense is a price floor on that has a very real effect on labor (i doubt anyone would argue illegal immigrants are hired for any reason other than lower than legal labor costs), this creates a vicious cycle against laborers who need income to survive.  One can get into a debate of capitalists accomodating laborers vs exploiting them; at the end of the day, there would be less people in the labor force with a basic income, which fundamentally affects quantity and cost of labor.   The big issue i found in my own research into basic income is the cost.  There are 240million Americans elligible to join the labor force, assuming we only offer it to 16+ yr olds (in my mind this is would be ideal with other changes that arent as relevant in this context), even 10,000\/yr with no criteria and discrimination would cost trillions.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2485.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"2zh8gm","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is Thomas Sowell considered a legitimate and respected academic? He has some interesting beliefs that have been criticized as anti-Black, such as that current problems in the African American community come from a 19th century imitation of Scots-Irish Protestants in the South.","c_root_id_A":"cpjs3v8","c_root_id_B":"cpk6gw8","created_at_utc_A":1426765899,"created_at_utc_B":1426792302,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Sowell is essentially a journalist with mild academic credentials. Most of his books and commentary are on topics off which he is supposedly an 'expert'. As such his books are very much journalistic in flavour (with the obviously polemicism). In the capacity of a public figure he is therefore given a better academic rating than would otherwise be (just as other public figures get academic posts etc. without the relative experience). Sowell has contributed little if anything to any academic field, and without his partisan public presence wouldn't be notable at all or as popular a contributor to universities. Though I dislike Krugman at lot, to compare him to Sowell is completely disingenuous. Krguman has made substantial and recognised contributions to various fields of economics and social theory, it is from that that he has made a public career and **not** vice versa.","human_ref_B":"No REPEC footprint; minimal google scholar footprint.  He's a pundit who uses Chicago School ideas and rhetoric to advance political ideas. There's nothing *wrong* with that (I think that popularizers should have more respect within academic economics), but I wouldn't consider him to be a serious researcher.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26403.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"bfpz66","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Are there proven\/well researched methods that are deemed to have greater effectiveness for social change than other methods? People seem to employ numerous methods to enact social change, from violent uprising, to riots, to peaceful protest, to pamphets, and more.    Is there any method\/s that are known to be more effective than the others?","c_root_id_A":"elfh3t9","c_root_id_B":"elfq0w1","created_at_utc_A":1555861638,"created_at_utc_B":1555867631,"score_A":7,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"I just want to say that this is a really hard question. You have a lot of variables that we would naively expect to matter:  &#x200B;  1) What is the current state of the nation? Is it a democracy? A monarchy? Authoritarian?  2) What extent of change are we interested in it? Minor changes to a few policies? Major changes to policies? Entirely rebuilding the institutions of power?  3) Who is interested in change? Are they a marginalized group? Are they a large group? Small?   4) Who is interested in the status-quo?   5) What is the cultural understanding of how change is made? Is petition culturally acceptable? Is protest?","human_ref_B":"Yes, there is (a lot of) research in social influence and persuasion (see below), social marketing and public information and health campaigns dedicated to determining what makes for effective messages.   However, it is a lot of literature to cover, as in there is a lot of pertinent theories and models. And the effectiveness of different approaches and considerations depend on *several* factors, such that saying that one model or approach is generally effective could be said to be disingenuous.   I will share some models that can be applied to understand how and when attitude can be changed, just to give an overview of the research and show how rich the literature is and how complex persuasion and social influence is as a topic:  * Elaboration likelihood model  * Theory of reasoned action   * Theory of planned behavior  * Social norms approach  * Nudge theory  * Fear appeal  You can go to this older thread for a reply I gave going a bit deeper into the specific case of how **minorities** can influence people (and I also touch upon the matter of different *kinds of influence*). You can also read this other reply on the same topic but focused on the question of violence.  Cialdini is a famous social psychologist specialized in persuasion, and according to his research there are six shortcuts that inform human behavior and decision-making: **reciprocity** (people tend to feel obliged to return favors), **scarcity** (people tend to like what is limited in availability or difficult to get), **authority** (people tend to defer to power, status, expertise), **consistency** (people tend to want to behave consistently, i.e. foot-in-the-door), **liking** (people are likelier to be persuaded by whom they find attractive), **consensus** (people tend to want to follow the majority, as it provides 'information').   Social psychological research in general shows that it is more complicated than just applying these six principles, as these rely on **heuristics** (see the **elaboration likelihood model**). For example, people do not always defer to experts (see climate change and vaccinations). There are many other factors to consider, such as the person's **motivation** and **cognitive resources** (e.g. willing and being able to dedicate time to think about something).  Nudge theory](https:\/\/www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk\/sites\/default\/files\/publications\/MINDSPACE.pdf ) could be considered complimentary to Cialdini's principles and seems to be popular lately, based on the idea of making things **easy** (reduce the effort to make an action, to understand a message, etc.), making it **attractive** (e.g. using rewards and sanctions to incentivize and de-incentive behavior), making it **social** (e.g. using social norms and encouraging people to make commitments to others) and making it **timely** (e.g. considering the importance of when an offer is made and taking into account that people like immediate results).  To conclude, [Macron's victory could be considered an example of how doing research and learning from other campaigns, having a good strategy (deciding the message), carrying it (the strategy and the message) out, can be effective.  Edit: This reply I gave on the impact of advertisement on attitude change might also be an interesting read, as I detail how **different messages work better with different kinds of people**, and how attempts at **persuasion can backfire**.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5993.0,"score_ratio":3.5714285714}
{"post_id":"21n066","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What is an 'eastern mindset'? In analysis of our current confrontation with Russia, many note that Russia 'is influenced by both western and eastern thinking'. What do they mean? I like to travel and I feel that I have a pretty comfortable grasp of the differences of worldviews between north americans, UK people, french, german, italians, scandinavians, etc, but the farthest east I've traveled is Czech Republic and I'm not exactly sure what commenters mean when they refer to Russia's \"eastern influence\".  Are they talking about a preference for collectivism? A preference for strong central control? What does that have to do with the current conflict which seems to be about territorial maintenance in the face of former satellite countries that are becoming more closely aligned with the west?","c_root_id_A":"cgesk87","c_root_id_B":"cgern38","created_at_utc_A":1396076961,"created_at_utc_B":1396072701,"score_A":21,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":">>Are they talking about a preference for collectivism? A preference for strong central control? What does that have to do with the current conflict which seems to be about territorial maintenance in the face of former satellite countries that are becoming more closely aligned with the west?  We can talk all we want about Tsarism or the tradition Russian state or debate the insights of Dostoyevsky into the Russian mind but in reality the causes are much more immediate. Most Russians today are really pissed off over what happened since the fall of the Soviet Union and have seen their country fall from superpower status into the chaos and depression of the 90s into what is today at best a declining regional power. There is a very strong sense of resentment by the ordinary Russian towards the west for what it sees as betrayal.  What is actually hard to westerners to grasp is what it feels like to be on the losing end of a geopolitical struggle (because the west as a whole have being top-dogs since the mid 19th century if not the 18th) and seeing your country literally fall apart into a dozen pieces. Imagine if the US fell apart into like 10 different parts and you were a citizen in rump US 20 years later. There's a pretty good chance you'd be cheering at rump US reconquering the seceded area of California or whatever.  Crimea is something which most Russians sees as Russian because lots and lots of Russian blood has being shed over it in the 19th (Crimean war) and 20th centuries (WW2) and is historically Russian (as oppose to Ukrainian). Whereas most of the other areas former USSR has either 1) too many people of the wrong ethnicity (central Asia, western Ukraine) to consider reabsorbing or 2) Is on friendly terms with Russia and looks like its going to be part of Russia\/Russian led Eurasian Union anyway (Belarus).  So basically it sort of comes down to Crimea is historically Russian territory whom the ordinary Russian has a good deal of emotional attachment to and really wants to get back. This has very little to do Russian philosophy or w\/e but is mostly just Revanchism for lost territories.  P.S Putin don't actually expects anyone to believe the story about \"self-defense\" forces taking over the Crimea. They are basically just using this as an opening negotiating position with the west. This makes a lot more sense once you realize Russians sees western rhetoric about human rights in the exactly same way and as a tool to beat down their country.","human_ref_B":"From a Philosophy perspective there is a divide in between Eastern and Western Philosophers most definitely in the material they handled and the way they thought about things. http:\/\/www.autodidactproject.org\/my\/great-divide.html   There's a pretty interesting article that does a good job dividng the two, when it comes specifically to how this is affecting Russian thinking I have no comments, but maybe this article can give you the tools to make some of your own insights. Hope I helped!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4260.0,"score_ratio":5.25}
{"post_id":"21n066","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What is an 'eastern mindset'? In analysis of our current confrontation with Russia, many note that Russia 'is influenced by both western and eastern thinking'. What do they mean? I like to travel and I feel that I have a pretty comfortable grasp of the differences of worldviews between north americans, UK people, french, german, italians, scandinavians, etc, but the farthest east I've traveled is Czech Republic and I'm not exactly sure what commenters mean when they refer to Russia's \"eastern influence\".  Are they talking about a preference for collectivism? A preference for strong central control? What does that have to do with the current conflict which seems to be about territorial maintenance in the face of former satellite countries that are becoming more closely aligned with the west?","c_root_id_A":"cgeymwv","c_root_id_B":"cgern38","created_at_utc_A":1396108663,"created_at_utc_B":1396072701,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"You can find a simple history of Russia and the west in Marshall Poe's *The Russian Moment in World History*  For a classic exposition of cultural 'backwardness' in Russia, see Alexander Gershenkron's *Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspective*. He argues, as some others have mentioned, that Russians have a love for peasant life that holds them back from sensible courses of economic development.  For a more recent--and perhaps more measured--attempt at making at similar argument see *Russia's Road to Democracy: Parliament, Communism and Traditional Culture* by Victor Sergeyev and Nikolai Biryukov. Those authors try to explain some apparent failures the late-Soviet reforms through cultural values like 'sobornost' which some commenters have given as 'collectivism.'  IMO, though, those arguments are BS.  If you read 19th century authors like JS Mill 'eastern mindset' is a nice way for saying that everyone acts and thinks alike; its just more subtle racism than came before. Russia has its own culture and while that may not incline them toward 'democratic institutions' as we understand it, that does not mean their history, their culture, and their values don't have elements that people can draw on, together, to realize their collective vision of democratic life.","human_ref_B":"From a Philosophy perspective there is a divide in between Eastern and Western Philosophers most definitely in the material they handled and the way they thought about things. http:\/\/www.autodidactproject.org\/my\/great-divide.html   There's a pretty interesting article that does a good job dividng the two, when it comes specifically to how this is affecting Russian thinking I have no comments, but maybe this article can give you the tools to make some of your own insights. Hope I helped!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":35962.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"16b4a0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why do police still use sobriety tests when more objective and accurate breath testing machines are available?","c_root_id_A":"c7ugd59","c_root_id_B":"c7uf7oq","created_at_utc_A":1357831702,"created_at_utc_B":1357826735,"score_A":23,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Police officer here:   There is a lot of speculation in this thread that is incorrect when applied to US law. The reason is twofold.   One, a breathalyzer does not show impairment, only the level of alcohol in your blood. However, you are being arrested first and foremost for driving impaired. In court, the primary argument being made is that it was unsafe for this person to be driving. You can still get a DUI and be under 0.08.  Two, you cannot legally force someone to blow in a breathalyzer. You have to arrest them first for driving under the influence.   The standardized field sobriety tests are very accurate at determining when someone is above 0.1 when performed by people have been trained in them. NHTSA has performed many large scale field trials validating them.","human_ref_B":"As someone with experience working with Law Enforcement in Australia (New South Wales), contrary to one_request, we do use sobriety tests. As I'll continue to explain, sobriety tests are used as a form of archaic broad ranging test for drugs other than alcohol in the absence of modern drug testing equipment.  If the average street Police officer wishes to test the presence of intoxicating substances (liquor or otherwise) in a person he has two options; Breath tests and blood tests. Alcohol is an easy one. The Police officer conducts a routine road side breath test which gives an approximation of the presence of intoxicating liquor in the subjects breath. Failing a breath test then gives the officer power to arrest the subject for the purpose of a Breath Analysis test for alcohol. It is important to note that failing a routine breath test is not an offence but rather provides the grounds for arrest for a Breath Analysis test, which it is an offence to fail.  If you suspect on reasonable grounds someone to be under the influence of an intoxicating substance but the subject returns a reading of zero on a road side breath test, the Police officer then gains the power to submit that person to a test of sobriety. If the person fails the test of sobriety it, in conjunction with the Police officers observations, gives the Police officer grounds to arrest the subject for the purpose of a Blood Analysis test for drugs other than alcohol. It is important to note that failing a test of sobriety is not an offence but rather provides the grounds for arrest for a Blood Analysis test, which it is an offence to fail.  In conclusion, in the state of New South Wales, in the absence of modern day oral drug tests utilised by specially trained staff the use of sobriety tests acts as a broad purpose routine test for gaining reasonable grounds for the arrest of suspects for tests to show the presence of drugs other than alcohol in the same way that routine road side breath tests are used for alcohol.  EDIT: Source: Division 5, Road Transport (Safety and Traffic Management) Act 1999","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4967.0,"score_ratio":1.2105263158}
{"post_id":"16b4a0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why do police still use sobriety tests when more objective and accurate breath testing machines are available?","c_root_id_A":"c7uf42c","c_root_id_B":"c7ugd59","created_at_utc_A":1357826196,"created_at_utc_B":1357831702,"score_A":6,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"as i understand it, because they're subjective and give the officer the ability to arrest a person based on probable cause. A person with blood alcohol of .079 can't be arrested, but may act exactly the same in a field sobriety test as a person with blood alcohol of .081.   that's my guess.","human_ref_B":"Police officer here:   There is a lot of speculation in this thread that is incorrect when applied to US law. The reason is twofold.   One, a breathalyzer does not show impairment, only the level of alcohol in your blood. However, you are being arrested first and foremost for driving impaired. In court, the primary argument being made is that it was unsafe for this person to be driving. You can still get a DUI and be under 0.08.  Two, you cannot legally force someone to blow in a breathalyzer. You have to arrest them first for driving under the influence.   The standardized field sobriety tests are very accurate at determining when someone is above 0.1 when performed by people have been trained in them. NHTSA has performed many large scale field trials validating them.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5506.0,"score_ratio":3.8333333333}
{"post_id":"16b4a0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why do police still use sobriety tests when more objective and accurate breath testing machines are available?","c_root_id_A":"c7ugd59","c_root_id_B":"c7ufqjw","created_at_utc_A":1357831702,"created_at_utc_B":1357829198,"score_A":23,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Police officer here:   There is a lot of speculation in this thread that is incorrect when applied to US law. The reason is twofold.   One, a breathalyzer does not show impairment, only the level of alcohol in your blood. However, you are being arrested first and foremost for driving impaired. In court, the primary argument being made is that it was unsafe for this person to be driving. You can still get a DUI and be under 0.08.  Two, you cannot legally force someone to blow in a breathalyzer. You have to arrest them first for driving under the influence.   The standardized field sobriety tests are very accurate at determining when someone is above 0.1 when performed by people have been trained in them. NHTSA has performed many large scale field trials validating them.","human_ref_B":"Do you mean the \"Walk-a-Line\"-type physical test used to ascertain a driver's impairment prior to arrest? In MD, the field Sobriety breath tester results are inadmissible as evidence (though a judge can ask what the reading was in court). The legally-ordained tester is back at the barrack or station house, blood is drawn (in more serious cases) at the local hospital.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2504.0,"score_ratio":7.6666666667}
{"post_id":"16b4a0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why do police still use sobriety tests when more objective and accurate breath testing machines are available?","c_root_id_A":"c7uft38","c_root_id_B":"c7ugd59","created_at_utc_A":1357829485,"created_at_utc_B":1357831702,"score_A":2,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"In the US, you can refuse a breath test, but still be detained for suspicion of driving under the influence.","human_ref_B":"Police officer here:   There is a lot of speculation in this thread that is incorrect when applied to US law. The reason is twofold.   One, a breathalyzer does not show impairment, only the level of alcohol in your blood. However, you are being arrested first and foremost for driving impaired. In court, the primary argument being made is that it was unsafe for this person to be driving. You can still get a DUI and be under 0.08.  Two, you cannot legally force someone to blow in a breathalyzer. You have to arrest them first for driving under the influence.   The standardized field sobriety tests are very accurate at determining when someone is above 0.1 when performed by people have been trained in them. NHTSA has performed many large scale field trials validating them.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2217.0,"score_ratio":11.5}
{"post_id":"16b4a0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Why do police still use sobriety tests when more objective and accurate breath testing machines are available?","c_root_id_A":"c7uf7oq","c_root_id_B":"c7uf42c","created_at_utc_A":1357826735,"created_at_utc_B":1357826196,"score_A":19,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"As someone with experience working with Law Enforcement in Australia (New South Wales), contrary to one_request, we do use sobriety tests. As I'll continue to explain, sobriety tests are used as a form of archaic broad ranging test for drugs other than alcohol in the absence of modern drug testing equipment.  If the average street Police officer wishes to test the presence of intoxicating substances (liquor or otherwise) in a person he has two options; Breath tests and blood tests. Alcohol is an easy one. The Police officer conducts a routine road side breath test which gives an approximation of the presence of intoxicating liquor in the subjects breath. Failing a breath test then gives the officer power to arrest the subject for the purpose of a Breath Analysis test for alcohol. It is important to note that failing a routine breath test is not an offence but rather provides the grounds for arrest for a Breath Analysis test, which it is an offence to fail.  If you suspect on reasonable grounds someone to be under the influence of an intoxicating substance but the subject returns a reading of zero on a road side breath test, the Police officer then gains the power to submit that person to a test of sobriety. If the person fails the test of sobriety it, in conjunction with the Police officers observations, gives the Police officer grounds to arrest the subject for the purpose of a Blood Analysis test for drugs other than alcohol. It is important to note that failing a test of sobriety is not an offence but rather provides the grounds for arrest for a Blood Analysis test, which it is an offence to fail.  In conclusion, in the state of New South Wales, in the absence of modern day oral drug tests utilised by specially trained staff the use of sobriety tests acts as a broad purpose routine test for gaining reasonable grounds for the arrest of suspects for tests to show the presence of drugs other than alcohol in the same way that routine road side breath tests are used for alcohol.  EDIT: Source: Division 5, Road Transport (Safety and Traffic Management) Act 1999","human_ref_B":"as i understand it, because they're subjective and give the officer the ability to arrest a person based on probable cause. A person with blood alcohol of .079 can't be arrested, but may act exactly the same in a field sobriety test as a person with blood alcohol of .081.   that's my guess.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":539.0,"score_ratio":3.1666666667}
{"post_id":"10h8sa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Fair Tax, what are the pros and cons? So I've asked my facebook friends and the only answers I got were kind of vague pro responses from my 3 very conservative friends. So I'm kind of taking from this that liberals aren't as enthusiastic or interested in this concept? I think I had a few libertarian friends who pushed this stuff back when Ron Paul was in the primaries. I'm pretty damn liberal myself, but what tiny bit I know about this concept intrigues me. Anyone have a solid pros and cons list for this?","c_root_id_A":"c6dlj37","c_root_id_B":"c6dkbkb","created_at_utc_A":1348640472,"created_at_utc_B":1348633954,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The main pro is that it **eliminates taxes on saving and investment.** That's a Good Thing in a variety of economic models and situations. I'll go into detail if you want. Corollary: public finance economists and macroeconomists agree that you really want to be taxing consumption, not income.  The main con is that a flat tax at point of sale is **the single worst way to go about taxing consumption.** There are better ways, ways that are progressive and not borderline regressive, ways that induce progressivity without messy questions of how to put \"extra taxes\" on \"luxury items\". I'll go into detail about that too, if you want.","human_ref_B":"The best place to go is the (http:\/\/www.Fairtax.org) website.   I have read the book and read quite a bit on the site. You get to keep all of your income. All of the deductions your employer takes out and sends to the government are gone. There is a 23% Inclusive tax on retail goods and services. While permitting no exemptions, the FairTax (HR25\/S13) provides a monthly universal prebate to ensure that each family unit can consume tax free at or beyond the poverty level, with the overall effect of making the FairTax progressive in application.  You can find some pro\/con lists out there but most of the cons I read were pretty week.   I am a married father of four with a household income right smack dab in the middle class.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6518.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"10h8sa","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Fair Tax, what are the pros and cons? So I've asked my facebook friends and the only answers I got were kind of vague pro responses from my 3 very conservative friends. So I'm kind of taking from this that liberals aren't as enthusiastic or interested in this concept? I think I had a few libertarian friends who pushed this stuff back when Ron Paul was in the primaries. I'm pretty damn liberal myself, but what tiny bit I know about this concept intrigues me. Anyone have a solid pros and cons list for this?","c_root_id_A":"c6dkbkb","c_root_id_B":"c6dn10b","created_at_utc_A":1348633954,"created_at_utc_B":1348655701,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The best place to go is the (http:\/\/www.Fairtax.org) website.   I have read the book and read quite a bit on the site. You get to keep all of your income. All of the deductions your employer takes out and sends to the government are gone. There is a 23% Inclusive tax on retail goods and services. While permitting no exemptions, the FairTax (HR25\/S13) provides a monthly universal prebate to ensure that each family unit can consume tax free at or beyond the poverty level, with the overall effect of making the FairTax progressive in application.  You can find some pro\/con lists out there but most of the cons I read were pretty week.   I am a married father of four with a household income right smack dab in the middle class.","human_ref_B":"The FairTax is a proposed replacement of most federal taxes with a 30% federal sales tax, together with a fixed monthly payment to all households. The Wikipedia article on FairTax is pretty good (it's a *featured article*).   From the lead:   ... would be progressive on consumption, but would also be regressive on income at higher income levels (as consumption falls as a percentage of income). Opponents argue this would accordingly decrease the tax burden on high-income earners and increase it on the middle class. Supporters contend that the plan would effectively tax wealth, increase purchasing power, and decrease tax burdens by broadening the tax base.  The plan's supporters believe that a consumption tax would have a positive effect on savings and investment, that it would ease tax compliance, and that the tax would result in increased economic growth, incentives for international business to locate in the U.S., and increased U.S. competitiveness in international trade. ... Opponents contend that a consumption tax of this size would be extremely difficult to collect, and would lead to pervasive tax evasion. They also argue that the proposed sales tax rate would raise less revenue than the current tax system, leading to an increased budget deficit.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21747.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"9qjxcn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What is the difference between \"social science\" and \"hard science?\" Isn't all science the same or am I missing something?","c_root_id_A":"e8aa1hd","c_root_id_B":"e89wig5","created_at_utc_A":1540279278,"created_at_utc_B":1540261408,"score_A":8,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I agree with OP that the same scientific method is used in the social sciences and in the so-called hard sciences. In both areas, scientists formulate theories, derive hypotheses, and test them empirically. In both areas, theoretical models are simplifications of the complex reality and, thus, never predict everything with 100% correctness. In both areas, there is measurement error (see Wikipedia). In both areas, empirical research is complemented by philosphical discussions, e.g., of the nature of time and causality in physics and of the nature of happiness and well-being in Psychology. Thus, it is misleading to label only one of the two areas as \"hard\".  An actual difference between \"hard\" and social sciences is that the measurement error in the social sciences tends to be higher, because e.g. a person's intelligence is harder to quantify exactly than the Planck constant. A second difference is that the social sciences study humans, their culture, and their societies, whereas the \"hard\" sciences study the physical (chemical etc.) world. A third difference is that most laypersons readily admit that they don't know much about physics and chemistry, but everybody thinks that they are \"experts\" on how the human mind works, how societies function etc.. So there is a lot more pseudo-science by self-proclaimed experts in the social sciences than in the \"hard\" sciences, even though there is a great amount of physics-related pseudo-science as well (see Wikipedia).","human_ref_B":"This book is a good book on the topic.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17870.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1gzgfj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"If virtual reality was realistic and available for everyone (so you could live out any scenario possible), would there have to be made laws for what you could and couldn't do? Sorry if this is too imaginative or if it's the wrong subreddit, by the way.   If a kind of virtual reality that was just like real life existed and was available for everyone (like the Internet is now), would there have to be made laws for things you could and couldn't do in your virtual reality?   Things like murder and child pornography come to mind, because obviously in real life they're huge offenses since they affect REAL people, but would the moral aspect of it make it necessary for the government to create laws against virtualizing these things? I hope it makes sense, otherwise feel free to ask me to elaborate.","c_root_id_A":"capduy2","c_root_id_B":"capgwq1","created_at_utc_A":1372105779,"created_at_utc_B":1372113871,"score_A":7,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"What would be the worst possible things that you could do with this technology?  Maybe child porn.  Maybe things like planning and practicing terrorist attacks in VR.  I could still see some things being illegal although I would be prepared to argue that nothing should be illegal.","human_ref_B":"Read page 40-50 of Robert Nozick's *Anarchy, State, and Utopia*. He talks about this thing called the \"experience machine\" which is pretty similar to your description of virtual reality. Rawls is cool too.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8092.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"1gzgfj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"If virtual reality was realistic and available for everyone (so you could live out any scenario possible), would there have to be made laws for what you could and couldn't do? Sorry if this is too imaginative or if it's the wrong subreddit, by the way.   If a kind of virtual reality that was just like real life existed and was available for everyone (like the Internet is now), would there have to be made laws for things you could and couldn't do in your virtual reality?   Things like murder and child pornography come to mind, because obviously in real life they're huge offenses since they affect REAL people, but would the moral aspect of it make it necessary for the government to create laws against virtualizing these things? I hope it makes sense, otherwise feel free to ask me to elaborate.","c_root_id_A":"capcg03","c_root_id_B":"capgwq1","created_at_utc_A":1372102195,"created_at_utc_B":1372113871,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Depends. With the right set of skills you can do anything with todays video games, and they aren't very regulated. However, politicians loves to jump on a bandwagon. And if VR was involved in some sort of controversy you could be completely sure that they would get regulated. Like, if someone killed their boss in VR and then did it IRL.","human_ref_B":"Read page 40-50 of Robert Nozick's *Anarchy, State, and Utopia*. He talks about this thing called the \"experience machine\" which is pretty similar to your description of virtual reality. Rawls is cool too.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11676.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1gzgfj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"If virtual reality was realistic and available for everyone (so you could live out any scenario possible), would there have to be made laws for what you could and couldn't do? Sorry if this is too imaginative or if it's the wrong subreddit, by the way.   If a kind of virtual reality that was just like real life existed and was available for everyone (like the Internet is now), would there have to be made laws for things you could and couldn't do in your virtual reality?   Things like murder and child pornography come to mind, because obviously in real life they're huge offenses since they affect REAL people, but would the moral aspect of it make it necessary for the government to create laws against virtualizing these things? I hope it makes sense, otherwise feel free to ask me to elaborate.","c_root_id_A":"capdrm2","c_root_id_B":"capgwq1","created_at_utc_A":1372105551,"created_at_utc_B":1372113871,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"You know, it's funny there was a grad seminar in my program this year called \"Science and Justice\" - this sounds like the sort of question that would have been posed.   I'm not a political theorist, so I can't give you an exact answer. But I can suggest some reading. Really when you break the question down, it's just a modern re-framing of old Ideal Theory questions. Rather than imagining the idea, you supplant it with the idea of a virtual reality ideal.  Gianluigi Palombella, \"The Rule of Law as an Institutional Ideal,\" *Comparative Sociology* 9.1 (2010): 4-39.  And most stuff by John Rawls should be a good start too. These scholars may not answer the question directly, but they could give you the framework to conjure your own answers. See, political philosophy isn't about having an empirically 'correct' answer, the goal is to develop your own thoughts based on the literature that you both agree with, and disagree with or even a bit of both.  Are there any political theorists around who can help me out?","human_ref_B":"Read page 40-50 of Robert Nozick's *Anarchy, State, and Utopia*. He talks about this thing called the \"experience machine\" which is pretty similar to your description of virtual reality. Rawls is cool too.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8320.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1gzgfj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"If virtual reality was realistic and available for everyone (so you could live out any scenario possible), would there have to be made laws for what you could and couldn't do? Sorry if this is too imaginative or if it's the wrong subreddit, by the way.   If a kind of virtual reality that was just like real life existed and was available for everyone (like the Internet is now), would there have to be made laws for things you could and couldn't do in your virtual reality?   Things like murder and child pornography come to mind, because obviously in real life they're huge offenses since they affect REAL people, but would the moral aspect of it make it necessary for the government to create laws against virtualizing these things? I hope it makes sense, otherwise feel free to ask me to elaborate.","c_root_id_A":"capcg03","c_root_id_B":"capduy2","created_at_utc_A":1372102195,"created_at_utc_B":1372105779,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Depends. With the right set of skills you can do anything with todays video games, and they aren't very regulated. However, politicians loves to jump on a bandwagon. And if VR was involved in some sort of controversy you could be completely sure that they would get regulated. Like, if someone killed their boss in VR and then did it IRL.","human_ref_B":"What would be the worst possible things that you could do with this technology?  Maybe child porn.  Maybe things like planning and practicing terrorist attacks in VR.  I could still see some things being illegal although I would be prepared to argue that nothing should be illegal.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3584.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1gzgfj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"If virtual reality was realistic and available for everyone (so you could live out any scenario possible), would there have to be made laws for what you could and couldn't do? Sorry if this is too imaginative or if it's the wrong subreddit, by the way.   If a kind of virtual reality that was just like real life existed and was available for everyone (like the Internet is now), would there have to be made laws for things you could and couldn't do in your virtual reality?   Things like murder and child pornography come to mind, because obviously in real life they're huge offenses since they affect REAL people, but would the moral aspect of it make it necessary for the government to create laws against virtualizing these things? I hope it makes sense, otherwise feel free to ask me to elaborate.","c_root_id_A":"capdrm2","c_root_id_B":"capduy2","created_at_utc_A":1372105551,"created_at_utc_B":1372105779,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"You know, it's funny there was a grad seminar in my program this year called \"Science and Justice\" - this sounds like the sort of question that would have been posed.   I'm not a political theorist, so I can't give you an exact answer. But I can suggest some reading. Really when you break the question down, it's just a modern re-framing of old Ideal Theory questions. Rather than imagining the idea, you supplant it with the idea of a virtual reality ideal.  Gianluigi Palombella, \"The Rule of Law as an Institutional Ideal,\" *Comparative Sociology* 9.1 (2010): 4-39.  And most stuff by John Rawls should be a good start too. These scholars may not answer the question directly, but they could give you the framework to conjure your own answers. See, political philosophy isn't about having an empirically 'correct' answer, the goal is to develop your own thoughts based on the literature that you both agree with, and disagree with or even a bit of both.  Are there any political theorists around who can help me out?","human_ref_B":"What would be the worst possible things that you could do with this technology?  Maybe child porn.  Maybe things like planning and practicing terrorist attacks in VR.  I could still see some things being illegal although I would be prepared to argue that nothing should be illegal.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":228.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1gzgfj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"If virtual reality was realistic and available for everyone (so you could live out any scenario possible), would there have to be made laws for what you could and couldn't do? Sorry if this is too imaginative or if it's the wrong subreddit, by the way.   If a kind of virtual reality that was just like real life existed and was available for everyone (like the Internet is now), would there have to be made laws for things you could and couldn't do in your virtual reality?   Things like murder and child pornography come to mind, because obviously in real life they're huge offenses since they affect REAL people, but would the moral aspect of it make it necessary for the government to create laws against virtualizing these things? I hope it makes sense, otherwise feel free to ask me to elaborate.","c_root_id_A":"capcg03","c_root_id_B":"capkq07","created_at_utc_A":1372102195,"created_at_utc_B":1372125111,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Depends. With the right set of skills you can do anything with todays video games, and they aren't very regulated. However, politicians loves to jump on a bandwagon. And if VR was involved in some sort of controversy you could be completely sure that they would get regulated. Like, if someone killed their boss in VR and then did it IRL.","human_ref_B":"I think this is more of a philosophical question than a scientific question. I don't see any reason why the government should create those kind of laws.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22916.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1gzgfj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"If virtual reality was realistic and available for everyone (so you could live out any scenario possible), would there have to be made laws for what you could and couldn't do? Sorry if this is too imaginative or if it's the wrong subreddit, by the way.   If a kind of virtual reality that was just like real life existed and was available for everyone (like the Internet is now), would there have to be made laws for things you could and couldn't do in your virtual reality?   Things like murder and child pornography come to mind, because obviously in real life they're huge offenses since they affect REAL people, but would the moral aspect of it make it necessary for the government to create laws against virtualizing these things? I hope it makes sense, otherwise feel free to ask me to elaborate.","c_root_id_A":"capdrm2","c_root_id_B":"capkq07","created_at_utc_A":1372105551,"created_at_utc_B":1372125111,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"You know, it's funny there was a grad seminar in my program this year called \"Science and Justice\" - this sounds like the sort of question that would have been posed.   I'm not a political theorist, so I can't give you an exact answer. But I can suggest some reading. Really when you break the question down, it's just a modern re-framing of old Ideal Theory questions. Rather than imagining the idea, you supplant it with the idea of a virtual reality ideal.  Gianluigi Palombella, \"The Rule of Law as an Institutional Ideal,\" *Comparative Sociology* 9.1 (2010): 4-39.  And most stuff by John Rawls should be a good start too. These scholars may not answer the question directly, but they could give you the framework to conjure your own answers. See, political philosophy isn't about having an empirically 'correct' answer, the goal is to develop your own thoughts based on the literature that you both agree with, and disagree with or even a bit of both.  Are there any political theorists around who can help me out?","human_ref_B":"I think this is more of a philosophical question than a scientific question. I don't see any reason why the government should create those kind of laws.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19560.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1gzgfj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"If virtual reality was realistic and available for everyone (so you could live out any scenario possible), would there have to be made laws for what you could and couldn't do? Sorry if this is too imaginative or if it's the wrong subreddit, by the way.   If a kind of virtual reality that was just like real life existed and was available for everyone (like the Internet is now), would there have to be made laws for things you could and couldn't do in your virtual reality?   Things like murder and child pornography come to mind, because obviously in real life they're huge offenses since they affect REAL people, but would the moral aspect of it make it necessary for the government to create laws against virtualizing these things? I hope it makes sense, otherwise feel free to ask me to elaborate.","c_root_id_A":"capkq07","c_root_id_B":"capk2b9","created_at_utc_A":1372125111,"created_at_utc_B":1372123244,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I think this is more of a philosophical question than a scientific question. I don't see any reason why the government should create those kind of laws.","human_ref_B":"There would still be people who got their jollies off of hurting others and without actually causing pain would not enjoy it. So it think there would be things that were still illegal.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1867.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"10mii0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"How viable are the results from Stanford Prison study?  I have always heard a lot about this experiment and how it shows the effects of situation on human behavior. But was it a good study or just shoddy research?","c_root_id_A":"c6er9l5","c_root_id_B":"c6eqm6f","created_at_utc_A":1348854170,"created_at_utc_B":1348851782,"score_A":17,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I have two minutes to share an anecdotal response -  One of my undergrad sociology professors was himself an undergraduate at Stanford when the Stanford Prison Experiment was conducted.  He did teach about the experiment in some of his classes, and I would agree that the general findings of the experiment probably have merit.  That said, he was also skeptical of taking the outcome of the study to mean too much, and he was skeptical whether other groups of subjects would behave in the same way, mostly for one reason - the subjects of the experiment were all undergrad fraternity-members at Stanford in the 70's.  It's no secret that hazing was certainly a part of fraternity life at the time, so these subjects were already conditioned, at least at some level, to accept dehumanizing experiences.   Would other students have taken their assigned roles so far, so fast?  Sadly, we will probably never know.  Shoot, now I'm late for work....","human_ref_B":"I think it would be tough to tell since nobody worth their salt will ever try to replicate it. Since we can't replicate it, nobody can tell if the ways in which the study could be flawed (selection bias, interventions by the research staff, etc)  tainted the results to a sufficient degree that we shouldn't trust the overall conclusion that we all play the roll to which we are assigned.  Still one of my favorite research studies (right after the equally questionable Milgram experiment).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2388.0,"score_ratio":8.5}
{"post_id":"10mii0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"How viable are the results from Stanford Prison study?  I have always heard a lot about this experiment and how it shows the effects of situation on human behavior. But was it a good study or just shoddy research?","c_root_id_A":"c6er9rl","c_root_id_B":"c6eqm6f","created_at_utc_A":1348854188,"created_at_utc_B":1348851782,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Many people do not think the results are \"viable\" at all (that's a weird word to use, but basically I mean that you can't take much away from the study). It was a study with massive methodological problems, most notably huge experimenter-expectancy biases (Zimbardo was the \"prison superintendent\" and gave the guards explicit instructions regarding how they could treat the prisoners). The experiment was called off early and its methods have never been evaluated in any kind of official capacity (i.e., the Stanford Prison Experiment has never undergone peer review of any kind).  Basically, the thing is a huge mess of an experiment that makes for an interesting anecdote but should not be treated as a valid study.","human_ref_B":"I think it would be tough to tell since nobody worth their salt will ever try to replicate it. Since we can't replicate it, nobody can tell if the ways in which the study could be flawed (selection bias, interventions by the research staff, etc)  tainted the results to a sufficient degree that we shouldn't trust the overall conclusion that we all play the roll to which we are assigned.  Still one of my favorite research studies (right after the equally questionable Milgram experiment).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2406.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"10mii0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"How viable are the results from Stanford Prison study?  I have always heard a lot about this experiment and how it shows the effects of situation on human behavior. But was it a good study or just shoddy research?","c_root_id_A":"c6eqm6f","c_root_id_B":"c6esd9k","created_at_utc_A":1348851782,"created_at_utc_B":1348858217,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I think it would be tough to tell since nobody worth their salt will ever try to replicate it. Since we can't replicate it, nobody can tell if the ways in which the study could be flawed (selection bias, interventions by the research staff, etc)  tainted the results to a sufficient degree that we shouldn't trust the overall conclusion that we all play the roll to which we are assigned.  Still one of my favorite research studies (right after the equally questionable Milgram experiment).","human_ref_B":"If you look at photos if what happened in Abu Gharib and the photos if the experiment they are eerily similar. I'm not sure how you would classify something as 'viable' though.   The study is well respected amongst most psychology professionals....however like most studies it has its fair share of issues.   People here have stated a few...and I'm sure they'll tell you more. But I think that if you speak to prisoners or prison staff they would tell you it's not all that inconceivable.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6435.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1fius9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What did John Maynard Keynes mean by 'animal spirits'? Basically what it says in the title - my very rough understanding is he meant that when coming up with an economic system, you had to bear in mind people's innate irrationality. It's probably a lot more complicated than this though.   Cheers.","c_root_id_A":"caap8uq","c_root_id_B":"caatnnn","created_at_utc_A":1370191499,"created_at_utc_B":1370205839,"score_A":14,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"From the Economist's economics A-Z: >The colourful name that Keynes gave to one of the essential ingredients of economic prosperity: confidence. According to Keynes, animal spirits are a particular sort of confidence, \"naive optimism\". He meant this in the sense that, for entrepreneurs in particular, \"the thought of ultimate loss which often overtakes pioneers, as experience undoubtedly tells us and them, is put aside as a healthy man puts aside the expectation of death\". Where these animal spirits come from is something of a mystery. Certainly, attempts by politicians and others to talk up confidence by making optimistic noises about economic prospects have rarely done much good.  http:\/\/www.economist.com\/economics-a-to-z#node-21529484","human_ref_B":"So, Keynes wrote this awesome but mammoth book about macroeconomics, called \"The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money.\" Everyone who reads it can tell that he figure out something deep about economics, but it's taken us some time to understand how and *when* to apply Keynes' ideas to macroeconomic policy (and some people would say that we're still missing some things Keynes wrote about). Then another economist named Hicks wrote down a little mathematical model of macroeconomics based on the work of Keynes. It contained a simple version what we now call the IS-LM model, based on Keynes ideas.   (Aside: Then, some economists in the 1930s argued back and forth about whether Hicks' version was really a good interpretation of Keynes', which led them to introduce the concept of a liquidity trap. After the Depression was over, most economists forgot about the liquidity trap and worked based on the Depression-free version of the ISLM model, until Japan's recession in the 1980s or, for some economists, now.)  But there's an important piece missing from the simple IS-LM model: expectations. If people expect something to happen, they will react differently to it than if they do not expect it. Robert Lucas showed us how to incorporate expectations into a macroeconomic model, and his model made spot-on predictions for the stagflation of the economy, succeeding where the simple Keynesian model did not. So then macroeconomists were like, \"wow, expectations matter!\"  Make no mistake, though. Keynes himself knew expectations mattered. Some of what he wrote about expectations got lost in the shuffle when Hicks \"interpreted\" the *General Theory*. Relatedly, there's a problem with Lucas's model: the model assumes that individuals have rational expectations, that is they understand with exact accuracy what the future states of the world look like, and how the macroeconomy will look in those states of the world. A state of the world is just a mathematical construct for a possible future outcome. The model further assumes that individuals are expected-utility maximizers, that is that they act to maximize their probability-weighted utility in different states of the world.  So this assumption obviously has some problems, but it makes the model way simpler and it was borne out by the data in the 1970s. So economists stuck with it.  But Keynes had anticipated this discussion! In the *General Theory*, he wrote:  >\"Even apart from the instability due to speculation, there is the instability due to the characteristic of human nature that a large proportion of our positive activities depend on spontaneous optimism rather than mathematical expectations, whether moral or hedonistic or economic. Most, probably, of our decisions to do something positive, the full consequences of which will be drawn out over many days to come, can only be taken as the result of animal spirits\u2014a spontaneous urge to action rather than inaction, and not as the outcome of a weighted average of quantitative benefits multiplied by quantitative probabilities.\"  He's saying he thinks rational expectations is bullshit! Even though he was writing 30 to 40 years prior to Lucas's putting rational expectations in a macroeconomic theory (expected utility theory itself does date back to Keynes's time). So some people would describe animal spirits as \"non-rational expectations.\" But one can't define a term like animal spirits according to what it's *not*, because that's way too vague.  We're getting close (are you still with me?). So there is real uncertainty about the future. It makes investment volatile, and it can make recessions persist for longer than they have to (the basic insight of New Keynesian economics are the concepts of \"stickiness\" and \"frictions\", which formalize how the Lucasian New Classical model would fail to match the data, but that's a little off our presently beaten path). How do people confront uncertainty? Rational expectations models were the first attempt at answering that question. The 1970s taught us (modern economists, at least) that that expectations matter, but it's still a mystery exactly *how*.  Enter behavioral economics. Since Kahneman and Tversky, we have known that people make weird decisions in the presence of uncertainty. Keynes didn't write about behavioral economics, but his use of the term \"animal spirits\" anticipates a lot of the questions about judgement under uncertainty that persist modern macroeconomics. \"Animal spirits\" now is used informally to describe all kinds of hypotheses, having to do with expectations being formed. It's got something to do with how the bizarre properties of expectations can affect the macroeconomy. But we're still trying to figure out how that works.  Did that answer your question?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14340.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"1fius9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What did John Maynard Keynes mean by 'animal spirits'? Basically what it says in the title - my very rough understanding is he meant that when coming up with an economic system, you had to bear in mind people's innate irrationality. It's probably a lot more complicated than this though.   Cheers.","c_root_id_A":"caatnnn","c_root_id_B":"caaowe3","created_at_utc_A":1370205839,"created_at_utc_B":1370190300,"score_A":18,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"So, Keynes wrote this awesome but mammoth book about macroeconomics, called \"The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money.\" Everyone who reads it can tell that he figure out something deep about economics, but it's taken us some time to understand how and *when* to apply Keynes' ideas to macroeconomic policy (and some people would say that we're still missing some things Keynes wrote about). Then another economist named Hicks wrote down a little mathematical model of macroeconomics based on the work of Keynes. It contained a simple version what we now call the IS-LM model, based on Keynes ideas.   (Aside: Then, some economists in the 1930s argued back and forth about whether Hicks' version was really a good interpretation of Keynes', which led them to introduce the concept of a liquidity trap. After the Depression was over, most economists forgot about the liquidity trap and worked based on the Depression-free version of the ISLM model, until Japan's recession in the 1980s or, for some economists, now.)  But there's an important piece missing from the simple IS-LM model: expectations. If people expect something to happen, they will react differently to it than if they do not expect it. Robert Lucas showed us how to incorporate expectations into a macroeconomic model, and his model made spot-on predictions for the stagflation of the economy, succeeding where the simple Keynesian model did not. So then macroeconomists were like, \"wow, expectations matter!\"  Make no mistake, though. Keynes himself knew expectations mattered. Some of what he wrote about expectations got lost in the shuffle when Hicks \"interpreted\" the *General Theory*. Relatedly, there's a problem with Lucas's model: the model assumes that individuals have rational expectations, that is they understand with exact accuracy what the future states of the world look like, and how the macroeconomy will look in those states of the world. A state of the world is just a mathematical construct for a possible future outcome. The model further assumes that individuals are expected-utility maximizers, that is that they act to maximize their probability-weighted utility in different states of the world.  So this assumption obviously has some problems, but it makes the model way simpler and it was borne out by the data in the 1970s. So economists stuck with it.  But Keynes had anticipated this discussion! In the *General Theory*, he wrote:  >\"Even apart from the instability due to speculation, there is the instability due to the characteristic of human nature that a large proportion of our positive activities depend on spontaneous optimism rather than mathematical expectations, whether moral or hedonistic or economic. Most, probably, of our decisions to do something positive, the full consequences of which will be drawn out over many days to come, can only be taken as the result of animal spirits\u2014a spontaneous urge to action rather than inaction, and not as the outcome of a weighted average of quantitative benefits multiplied by quantitative probabilities.\"  He's saying he thinks rational expectations is bullshit! Even though he was writing 30 to 40 years prior to Lucas's putting rational expectations in a macroeconomic theory (expected utility theory itself does date back to Keynes's time). So some people would describe animal spirits as \"non-rational expectations.\" But one can't define a term like animal spirits according to what it's *not*, because that's way too vague.  We're getting close (are you still with me?). So there is real uncertainty about the future. It makes investment volatile, and it can make recessions persist for longer than they have to (the basic insight of New Keynesian economics are the concepts of \"stickiness\" and \"frictions\", which formalize how the Lucasian New Classical model would fail to match the data, but that's a little off our presently beaten path). How do people confront uncertainty? Rational expectations models were the first attempt at answering that question. The 1970s taught us (modern economists, at least) that that expectations matter, but it's still a mystery exactly *how*.  Enter behavioral economics. Since Kahneman and Tversky, we have known that people make weird decisions in the presence of uncertainty. Keynes didn't write about behavioral economics, but his use of the term \"animal spirits\" anticipates a lot of the questions about judgement under uncertainty that persist modern macroeconomics. \"Animal spirits\" now is used informally to describe all kinds of hypotheses, having to do with expectations being formed. It's got something to do with how the bizarre properties of expectations can affect the macroeconomy. But we're still trying to figure out how that works.  Did that answer your question?","human_ref_B":"In terms of pure economics, the private sector is said to depend, among other things, on the expectation of firms. This is also called Keynes' animal spirits: If firms are feeling confident, both about their future sales outlook and that the price of their output will be higher in the future, then they are more likely to invest now.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15539.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1fius9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What did John Maynard Keynes mean by 'animal spirits'? Basically what it says in the title - my very rough understanding is he meant that when coming up with an economic system, you had to bear in mind people's innate irrationality. It's probably a lot more complicated than this though.   Cheers.","c_root_id_A":"caaowe3","c_root_id_B":"caap8uq","created_at_utc_A":1370190300,"created_at_utc_B":1370191499,"score_A":6,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"In terms of pure economics, the private sector is said to depend, among other things, on the expectation of firms. This is also called Keynes' animal spirits: If firms are feeling confident, both about their future sales outlook and that the price of their output will be higher in the future, then they are more likely to invest now.","human_ref_B":"From the Economist's economics A-Z: >The colourful name that Keynes gave to one of the essential ingredients of economic prosperity: confidence. According to Keynes, animal spirits are a particular sort of confidence, \"naive optimism\". He meant this in the sense that, for entrepreneurs in particular, \"the thought of ultimate loss which often overtakes pioneers, as experience undoubtedly tells us and them, is put aside as a healthy man puts aside the expectation of death\". Where these animal spirits come from is something of a mystery. Certainly, attempts by politicians and others to talk up confidence by making optimistic noises about economic prospects have rarely done much good.  http:\/\/www.economist.com\/economics-a-to-z#node-21529484","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1199.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"draxluo","c_root_id_B":"drap90y","created_at_utc_A":1513366895,"created_at_utc_B":1513358491,"score_A":11,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Here's some that might be of interest:  \"Trafficking in Men: The Anthropology of Masculinity\" by Matthew Gutmann (a good, but outdated, review article) (He also has a few books that might be of interest to you, especially *The Meanings of Macho* and *Fixing Men*).  *Female Masculinity* by J. Halberstam  *A Critical Introduction to Queer Theory* by Nikki Sullivan  *Dude, You're a Fag* by CJ Pascoe  *The New Arab Man* by Marcia Inhorn","human_ref_B":"The subreddit seems defunct now, unfortunately, but there may be some material of interest in the posts of \/r\/MensLibrary  You could also try asking more directly on \/r\/menslib. It's a general purpose sub, not academically focused, but may be useful regardless.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8404.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drar06c","c_root_id_B":"draxluo","created_at_utc_A":1513360241,"created_at_utc_B":1513366895,"score_A":5,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Betty Friedman - Feminine Mystique","human_ref_B":"Here's some that might be of interest:  \"Trafficking in Men: The Anthropology of Masculinity\" by Matthew Gutmann (a good, but outdated, review article) (He also has a few books that might be of interest to you, especially *The Meanings of Macho* and *Fixing Men*).  *Female Masculinity* by J. Halberstam  *A Critical Introduction to Queer Theory* by Nikki Sullivan  *Dude, You're a Fag* by CJ Pascoe  *The New Arab Man* by Marcia Inhorn","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6654.0,"score_ratio":2.2}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"draxluo","c_root_id_B":"drasxvy","created_at_utc_A":1513366895,"created_at_utc_B":1513362175,"score_A":11,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Here's some that might be of interest:  \"Trafficking in Men: The Anthropology of Masculinity\" by Matthew Gutmann (a good, but outdated, review article) (He also has a few books that might be of interest to you, especially *The Meanings of Macho* and *Fixing Men*).  *Female Masculinity* by J. Halberstam  *A Critical Introduction to Queer Theory* by Nikki Sullivan  *Dude, You're a Fag* by CJ Pascoe  *The New Arab Man* by Marcia Inhorn","human_ref_B":"Amy Allen's Feminist Perspectives on Power is an good place to start. I think if you're looking at any kind of theories of masculinity it's important to be grounded in a solid and nuanced understanding of power that goes beyond a simplistic power as domination model.   Other than that bell hooks recent work on men such as The Will to Change is highly recommended. You might also be interested in Sylivia Federicci's Caliban and the Witch which is a marxist geneology of the rise of patriarchy in Europe and it's intersection with the emergent capitalist\/colonial enclosures. It's both an ethnography, history, political tract and deconstruction of the philosophy of domination.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4720.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"draxluo","c_root_id_B":"drasqwe","created_at_utc_A":1513366895,"created_at_utc_B":1513361979,"score_A":11,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Here's some that might be of interest:  \"Trafficking in Men: The Anthropology of Masculinity\" by Matthew Gutmann (a good, but outdated, review article) (He also has a few books that might be of interest to you, especially *The Meanings of Macho* and *Fixing Men*).  *Female Masculinity* by J. Halberstam  *A Critical Introduction to Queer Theory* by Nikki Sullivan  *Dude, You're a Fag* by CJ Pascoe  *The New Arab Man* by Marcia Inhorn","human_ref_B":"Anything by Judith Butler","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4916.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"draxluo","c_root_id_B":"drasy6q","created_at_utc_A":1513366895,"created_at_utc_B":1513362184,"score_A":11,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Here's some that might be of interest:  \"Trafficking in Men: The Anthropology of Masculinity\" by Matthew Gutmann (a good, but outdated, review article) (He also has a few books that might be of interest to you, especially *The Meanings of Macho* and *Fixing Men*).  *Female Masculinity* by J. Halberstam  *A Critical Introduction to Queer Theory* by Nikki Sullivan  *Dude, You're a Fag* by CJ Pascoe  *The New Arab Man* by Marcia Inhorn","human_ref_B":"Refusing to be a man by John Stoltenberg","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4711.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drbpg7q","c_root_id_B":"drap90y","created_at_utc_A":1513403455,"created_at_utc_B":1513358491,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Ann Fausto-Sterling (Sex\/Gender, Sexing the Body, Myths of Gender) if you're interested in biological research.","human_ref_B":"The subreddit seems defunct now, unfortunately, but there may be some material of interest in the posts of \/r\/MensLibrary  You could also try asking more directly on \/r\/menslib. It's a general purpose sub, not academically focused, but may be useful regardless.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":44964.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drbpg7q","c_root_id_B":"drar06c","created_at_utc_A":1513403455,"created_at_utc_B":1513360241,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Ann Fausto-Sterling (Sex\/Gender, Sexing the Body, Myths of Gender) if you're interested in biological research.","human_ref_B":"Betty Friedman - Feminine Mystique","labels":1,"seconds_difference":43214.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drbpg7q","c_root_id_B":"drasxvy","created_at_utc_A":1513403455,"created_at_utc_B":1513362175,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Ann Fausto-Sterling (Sex\/Gender, Sexing the Body, Myths of Gender) if you're interested in biological research.","human_ref_B":"Amy Allen's Feminist Perspectives on Power is an good place to start. I think if you're looking at any kind of theories of masculinity it's important to be grounded in a solid and nuanced understanding of power that goes beyond a simplistic power as domination model.   Other than that bell hooks recent work on men such as The Will to Change is highly recommended. You might also be interested in Sylivia Federicci's Caliban and the Witch which is a marxist geneology of the rise of patriarchy in Europe and it's intersection with the emergent capitalist\/colonial enclosures. It's both an ethnography, history, political tract and deconstruction of the philosophy of domination.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":41280.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drbpg7q","c_root_id_B":"drb0dix","created_at_utc_A":1513403455,"created_at_utc_B":1513369782,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Ann Fausto-Sterling (Sex\/Gender, Sexing the Body, Myths of Gender) if you're interested in biological research.","human_ref_B":"ALSO - not books but the Tough Guise documentaries look a lot a hegemonic masculinity, I\u2019m sure Jackson Katz has some written work out there too","labels":1,"seconds_difference":33673.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drb37qg","c_root_id_B":"drbpg7q","created_at_utc_A":1513372827,"created_at_utc_B":1513403455,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Check out anything by Michael Kimmel.  http:\/\/www.michaelkimmel.com\/works\/","human_ref_B":"Ann Fausto-Sterling (Sex\/Gender, Sexing the Body, Myths of Gender) if you're interested in biological research.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":30628.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drasqwe","c_root_id_B":"drbpg7q","created_at_utc_A":1513361979,"created_at_utc_B":1513403455,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Anything by Judith Butler","human_ref_B":"Ann Fausto-Sterling (Sex\/Gender, Sexing the Body, Myths of Gender) if you're interested in biological research.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":41476.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drbpg7q","c_root_id_B":"drasy6q","created_at_utc_A":1513403455,"created_at_utc_B":1513362184,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Ann Fausto-Sterling (Sex\/Gender, Sexing the Body, Myths of Gender) if you're interested in biological research.","human_ref_B":"Refusing to be a man by John Stoltenberg","labels":1,"seconds_difference":41271.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drbpg7q","c_root_id_B":"drayg1c","created_at_utc_A":1513403455,"created_at_utc_B":1513367753,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Ann Fausto-Sterling (Sex\/Gender, Sexing the Body, Myths of Gender) if you're interested in biological research.","human_ref_B":"There is a new Handbook on the Sociology of Gender coming out early next year that has short pieces going over all the different theories by some of the leading theorists out there. It is edited by Barbara Risman.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":35702.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drazx5t","c_root_id_B":"drbpg7q","created_at_utc_A":1513369307,"created_at_utc_B":1513403455,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Gender Failure by Rae Spoon and Ivan Coyote changed my life","human_ref_B":"Ann Fausto-Sterling (Sex\/Gender, Sexing the Body, Myths of Gender) if you're interested in biological research.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":34148.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drar06c","c_root_id_B":"drap90y","created_at_utc_A":1513360241,"created_at_utc_B":1513358491,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Betty Friedman - Feminine Mystique","human_ref_B":"The subreddit seems defunct now, unfortunately, but there may be some material of interest in the posts of \/r\/MensLibrary  You could also try asking more directly on \/r\/menslib. It's a general purpose sub, not academically focused, but may be useful regardless.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1750.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drap90y","c_root_id_B":"drb37qg","created_at_utc_A":1513358491,"created_at_utc_B":1513372827,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The subreddit seems defunct now, unfortunately, but there may be some material of interest in the posts of \/r\/MensLibrary  You could also try asking more directly on \/r\/menslib. It's a general purpose sub, not academically focused, but may be useful regardless.","human_ref_B":"Check out anything by Michael Kimmel.  http:\/\/www.michaelkimmel.com\/works\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14336.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drb37qg","c_root_id_B":"drasxvy","created_at_utc_A":1513372827,"created_at_utc_B":1513362175,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Check out anything by Michael Kimmel.  http:\/\/www.michaelkimmel.com\/works\/","human_ref_B":"Amy Allen's Feminist Perspectives on Power is an good place to start. I think if you're looking at any kind of theories of masculinity it's important to be grounded in a solid and nuanced understanding of power that goes beyond a simplistic power as domination model.   Other than that bell hooks recent work on men such as The Will to Change is highly recommended. You might also be interested in Sylivia Federicci's Caliban and the Witch which is a marxist geneology of the rise of patriarchy in Europe and it's intersection with the emergent capitalist\/colonial enclosures. It's both an ethnography, history, political tract and deconstruction of the philosophy of domination.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10652.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drasxvy","c_root_id_B":"drasqwe","created_at_utc_A":1513362175,"created_at_utc_B":1513361979,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Amy Allen's Feminist Perspectives on Power is an good place to start. I think if you're looking at any kind of theories of masculinity it's important to be grounded in a solid and nuanced understanding of power that goes beyond a simplistic power as domination model.   Other than that bell hooks recent work on men such as The Will to Change is highly recommended. You might also be interested in Sylivia Federicci's Caliban and the Witch which is a marxist geneology of the rise of patriarchy in Europe and it's intersection with the emergent capitalist\/colonial enclosures. It's both an ethnography, history, political tract and deconstruction of the philosophy of domination.","human_ref_B":"Anything by Judith Butler","labels":1,"seconds_difference":196.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drb0dix","c_root_id_B":"drb37qg","created_at_utc_A":1513369782,"created_at_utc_B":1513372827,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"ALSO - not books but the Tough Guise documentaries look a lot a hegemonic masculinity, I\u2019m sure Jackson Katz has some written work out there too","human_ref_B":"Check out anything by Michael Kimmel.  http:\/\/www.michaelkimmel.com\/works\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3045.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drasqwe","c_root_id_B":"drb0dix","created_at_utc_A":1513361979,"created_at_utc_B":1513369782,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Anything by Judith Butler","human_ref_B":"ALSO - not books but the Tough Guise documentaries look a lot a hegemonic masculinity, I\u2019m sure Jackson Katz has some written work out there too","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7803.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drasy6q","c_root_id_B":"drb0dix","created_at_utc_A":1513362184,"created_at_utc_B":1513369782,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Refusing to be a man by John Stoltenberg","human_ref_B":"ALSO - not books but the Tough Guise documentaries look a lot a hegemonic masculinity, I\u2019m sure Jackson Katz has some written work out there too","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7598.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drb0dix","c_root_id_B":"drayg1c","created_at_utc_A":1513369782,"created_at_utc_B":1513367753,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"ALSO - not books but the Tough Guise documentaries look a lot a hegemonic masculinity, I\u2019m sure Jackson Katz has some written work out there too","human_ref_B":"There is a new Handbook on the Sociology of Gender coming out early next year that has short pieces going over all the different theories by some of the leading theorists out there. It is edited by Barbara Risman.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2029.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drazx5t","c_root_id_B":"drb0dix","created_at_utc_A":1513369307,"created_at_utc_B":1513369782,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Gender Failure by Rae Spoon and Ivan Coyote changed my life","human_ref_B":"ALSO - not books but the Tough Guise documentaries look a lot a hegemonic masculinity, I\u2019m sure Jackson Katz has some written work out there too","labels":0,"seconds_difference":475.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drb37qg","c_root_id_B":"drasqwe","created_at_utc_A":1513372827,"created_at_utc_B":1513361979,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Check out anything by Michael Kimmel.  http:\/\/www.michaelkimmel.com\/works\/","human_ref_B":"Anything by Judith Butler","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10848.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drb37qg","c_root_id_B":"drasy6q","created_at_utc_A":1513372827,"created_at_utc_B":1513362184,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Check out anything by Michael Kimmel.  http:\/\/www.michaelkimmel.com\/works\/","human_ref_B":"Refusing to be a man by John Stoltenberg","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10643.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drb37qg","c_root_id_B":"drayg1c","created_at_utc_A":1513372827,"created_at_utc_B":1513367753,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Check out anything by Michael Kimmel.  http:\/\/www.michaelkimmel.com\/works\/","human_ref_B":"There is a new Handbook on the Sociology of Gender coming out early next year that has short pieces going over all the different theories by some of the leading theorists out there. It is edited by Barbara Risman.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5074.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"7k0sp5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"What should I read on gender? I'm currently wrapping up an MA in anthropology, and am interested (more out of personal interest than any relationship to my career goals) in social theory related to gender and sex in general.  I'm also interested in anything related to masculinities and resistance to hegemonic masculinity, whether that's in the form of history books, ethnography, political writing, or any other *pro-feminist* men's liberation work.  I'm not sure if this is the best place to ask but I don't know of any academically-inclined subreddits that would be more appropriate.","c_root_id_A":"drb37qg","c_root_id_B":"drazx5t","created_at_utc_A":1513372827,"created_at_utc_B":1513369307,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Check out anything by Michael Kimmel.  http:\/\/www.michaelkimmel.com\/works\/","human_ref_B":"Gender Failure by Rae Spoon and Ivan Coyote changed my life","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3520.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"17kbx5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"[Economics(?)] If free trade zones brought prosperity to China (because of cheap labour) why don't african countries create free trade zones?","c_root_id_A":"c86gpo4","c_root_id_B":"c86jy7o","created_at_utc_A":1359579660,"created_at_utc_B":1359588497,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Glib answer: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/African_Free_Trade_Zone","human_ref_B":"It is strange that none of the answers address the key issue - Africa suffers from dysfunctional and often kleptocratic governments. These are not the kinds of Governments that one can reasonably expect to create zones where their power is reduced or to create the institutions that would be required to make these zones a success. Whatever the merits or demerits of such zones are, the reason they are not being created is mainly due to a lack of motivation and know-how amongst rulers.  That said, among some of the better-run African countries, particularly along the West Coast, there is now a movement to explore the option. We may see it sooner than you think.   Source: I am involved in the development of such zones.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8837.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"17kbx5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"[Economics(?)] If free trade zones brought prosperity to China (because of cheap labour) why don't african countries create free trade zones?","c_root_id_A":"c86iobb","c_root_id_B":"c86jy7o","created_at_utc_A":1359584834,"created_at_utc_B":1359588497,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"China doesn't just have free trade zones.  They have a reputation for being good places to do business.  Africa does not.  The Chinese government is corrupt, but reasonably so and more importantly is stable.  it does not seize foreign assets or nationalize industry, or tell you how to run your company.  Now, to be fair, 30 years ago china did not have this reputation, but developing it takes time and consistency, and african governments have proven especially terrible at consistency.  No one wants to build a factory somewhere where a coup might oust the guy they bribed and replace him with someone who wants to nationalize the factory \"for the people\"","human_ref_B":"It is strange that none of the answers address the key issue - Africa suffers from dysfunctional and often kleptocratic governments. These are not the kinds of Governments that one can reasonably expect to create zones where their power is reduced or to create the institutions that would be required to make these zones a success. Whatever the merits or demerits of such zones are, the reason they are not being created is mainly due to a lack of motivation and know-how amongst rulers.  That said, among some of the better-run African countries, particularly along the West Coast, there is now a movement to explore the option. We may see it sooner than you think.   Source: I am involved in the development of such zones.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3663.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"17kbx5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"[Economics(?)] If free trade zones brought prosperity to China (because of cheap labour) why don't african countries create free trade zones?","c_root_id_A":"c86jy7o","c_root_id_B":"c86j77v","created_at_utc_A":1359588497,"created_at_utc_B":1359586321,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It is strange that none of the answers address the key issue - Africa suffers from dysfunctional and often kleptocratic governments. These are not the kinds of Governments that one can reasonably expect to create zones where their power is reduced or to create the institutions that would be required to make these zones a success. Whatever the merits or demerits of such zones are, the reason they are not being created is mainly due to a lack of motivation and know-how amongst rulers.  That said, among some of the better-run African countries, particularly along the West Coast, there is now a movement to explore the option. We may see it sooner than you think.   Source: I am involved in the development of such zones.","human_ref_B":"Free trade zones didn't \"bring prosperity to China\". China just had a series of misfortunes in the early modern era which removed them from the position in the global economy that they occupied before them. (For a very, very long time.) So, China's \"prosperity\" is more along the lines of a return to a norm. Through most of recorded history China has had the largest single economy in the world. Starting in the late Middle Ages, Europe pulled ahead because China's system of government was so obsessively controlling it put it at a disadvantage in technology. And its arguable that their governments obsession with control still leaves them with problems that must eventually resolve despite them. But a look at human history shows China as always occupying a very significant role, its not a new development by any means.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2176.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"157fjc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Is whining in children an innate or learned behavior? And, if innate, what evolutionary advantages may have been conferred upon children who did whine? I've done a number of google searches about this question, and the only answers I can find are those on parenting sites and seem anecdotal rather than scientific.  Worse still, there's conflicting information among these sites. Some say whining is a learned behavior, others say it's innate, while still others called upon science to verify that whining is \"one of the most annoying sounds\", while straddling the fence about the nature\/nurture aspect of the behavior.  So I'm hoping those here might have some deeper knowledge about these questions. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"c7k0bln","c_root_id_B":"c7k6472","created_at_utc_A":1356072209,"created_at_utc_B":1356109675,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'd venture to say that it is, at least in its essence, an innate behavior, simply because similar behaviors are seen in other creatures (kittens \"mewing\" just as one example).  What is probably \"learned\" behavior is what limits are placed on it -- in other words, whether the behavior is tolerated in public or merely in private, at what ages it is tolerated versus frowned upon, etc.","human_ref_B":"I actually came across something relevant recently while looking in to autism in an article by Badcock & Crespi. It mentioned that children with greater genetic imprinting from the father were more demanding of the mother's resources, including attention. This expressed itself in greater birth-weight (harder on the mother, but good for the child), but also in psychological characteristics: autism is linked to imprinting from the father's side, while behavioural passivity is linked to imprinting from the mother's side.  They talk about an area on chromosome 15 which can be either paternally or maternally biased. The paternal bias produces Angelman syndrome, characterised by high activity and attention-seeking behaviour; the maternal bias produces Prader-Willi syndrome, which produces almost the exact opposite - a calm, undemanding child during infancy which expresses unusual independent food-seeking behaviour once it is physically capable.   The advantage of whining is that it gets the kid more attention and care - unpleasant as it may be for the care-givers - and that's better for the father than for the mother for... well, a bunch of sexual evolutionary reasons that are a bit much to get in to here. The main thing is that mothers tend to take care of kids more, so being demanding of care will get stronger babies at the cost of the mother's fitness, while the father can theoretically still produce more children just as easily.  So, there you have an example of 'whining', i.e. demand for care, being either promoted or suppressed by epi-genetic factors. That's not to say that the specifics of whining behaviour are biologically determined, but it does point in that direction.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Imprinted_brain_theory and its listed sources should point you in the right direction if you'd like to take a closer look at the imprinting theory. Research is not extensive about this particular subject within evolutionary psychology though.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":37466.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"157fjc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Is whining in children an innate or learned behavior? And, if innate, what evolutionary advantages may have been conferred upon children who did whine? I've done a number of google searches about this question, and the only answers I can find are those on parenting sites and seem anecdotal rather than scientific.  Worse still, there's conflicting information among these sites. Some say whining is a learned behavior, others say it's innate, while still others called upon science to verify that whining is \"one of the most annoying sounds\", while straddling the fence about the nature\/nurture aspect of the behavior.  So I'm hoping those here might have some deeper knowledge about these questions. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"c7k6472","c_root_id_B":"c7k0opr","created_at_utc_A":1356109675,"created_at_utc_B":1356074073,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I actually came across something relevant recently while looking in to autism in an article by Badcock & Crespi. It mentioned that children with greater genetic imprinting from the father were more demanding of the mother's resources, including attention. This expressed itself in greater birth-weight (harder on the mother, but good for the child), but also in psychological characteristics: autism is linked to imprinting from the father's side, while behavioural passivity is linked to imprinting from the mother's side.  They talk about an area on chromosome 15 which can be either paternally or maternally biased. The paternal bias produces Angelman syndrome, characterised by high activity and attention-seeking behaviour; the maternal bias produces Prader-Willi syndrome, which produces almost the exact opposite - a calm, undemanding child during infancy which expresses unusual independent food-seeking behaviour once it is physically capable.   The advantage of whining is that it gets the kid more attention and care - unpleasant as it may be for the care-givers - and that's better for the father than for the mother for... well, a bunch of sexual evolutionary reasons that are a bit much to get in to here. The main thing is that mothers tend to take care of kids more, so being demanding of care will get stronger babies at the cost of the mother's fitness, while the father can theoretically still produce more children just as easily.  So, there you have an example of 'whining', i.e. demand for care, being either promoted or suppressed by epi-genetic factors. That's not to say that the specifics of whining behaviour are biologically determined, but it does point in that direction.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Imprinted_brain_theory and its listed sources should point you in the right direction if you'd like to take a closer look at the imprinting theory. Research is not extensive about this particular subject within evolutionary psychology though.","human_ref_B":"Also, is human whining analogous to other animal whining?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":35602.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"157fjc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"Is whining in children an innate or learned behavior? And, if innate, what evolutionary advantages may have been conferred upon children who did whine? I've done a number of google searches about this question, and the only answers I can find are those on parenting sites and seem anecdotal rather than scientific.  Worse still, there's conflicting information among these sites. Some say whining is a learned behavior, others say it's innate, while still others called upon science to verify that whining is \"one of the most annoying sounds\", while straddling the fence about the nature\/nurture aspect of the behavior.  So I'm hoping those here might have some deeper knowledge about these questions. Thanks.","c_root_id_A":"c7k6472","c_root_id_B":"c7k22bq","created_at_utc_A":1356109675,"created_at_utc_B":1356084124,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I actually came across something relevant recently while looking in to autism in an article by Badcock & Crespi. It mentioned that children with greater genetic imprinting from the father were more demanding of the mother's resources, including attention. This expressed itself in greater birth-weight (harder on the mother, but good for the child), but also in psychological characteristics: autism is linked to imprinting from the father's side, while behavioural passivity is linked to imprinting from the mother's side.  They talk about an area on chromosome 15 which can be either paternally or maternally biased. The paternal bias produces Angelman syndrome, characterised by high activity and attention-seeking behaviour; the maternal bias produces Prader-Willi syndrome, which produces almost the exact opposite - a calm, undemanding child during infancy which expresses unusual independent food-seeking behaviour once it is physically capable.   The advantage of whining is that it gets the kid more attention and care - unpleasant as it may be for the care-givers - and that's better for the father than for the mother for... well, a bunch of sexual evolutionary reasons that are a bit much to get in to here. The main thing is that mothers tend to take care of kids more, so being demanding of care will get stronger babies at the cost of the mother's fitness, while the father can theoretically still produce more children just as easily.  So, there you have an example of 'whining', i.e. demand for care, being either promoted or suppressed by epi-genetic factors. That's not to say that the specifics of whining behaviour are biologically determined, but it does point in that direction.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Imprinted_brain_theory and its listed sources should point you in the right direction if you'd like to take a closer look at the imprinting theory. Research is not extensive about this particular subject within evolutionary psychology though.","human_ref_B":"When babies are born, their only way of communicating that they need something is by crying. They act upset until their need (food, comforting, etc.) is filled.  Whining is, in some ways, the first behavior.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25551.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"73ek54","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Does promiscuity lead to worse, later romantic partnerships? My roommate and I were having a discussion about the relationship between promiscuity and romantic partnerships. My roommate believes that a systematically promiscuous sex life - particularly 'no-strings-attached', borderline anonymous sex - would negatively impact an individual's ability to form meaningful, committed monogamous romantic relationships later on. I'm sceptical of this claim.  What kind of research has been done on this subject? I did a cursory search on the PsycINFO search engine with no obvious results, but I'm not very knowledgeable on the subject or the most relevant search terms.  Thanks in advance!","c_root_id_A":"dnpu1g5","c_root_id_B":"dnpzxvo","created_at_utc_A":1506782741,"created_at_utc_B":1506790814,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"An American Hook Up talks about promiscuity in college, specifically hook up culture. Guyland talks about it too. Neither found that those engaged in hook up culture in college had trouble with long term relationships later in life. I doubt you'd find any study that says they would.","human_ref_B":"The Gottman Institute has done a lot of research on marriage success. Maybe they have an answer to your question.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8073.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"z4w2s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.65,"history":"Many redditors are pro gun control.  What are the reasons you believe in gun control and what are your thoughts on how gun control helps reduce murders? Many redditors are pro gun control.  What are the reasons you believe in gun control and how does gun control help reduce murders?  I tend to believe that weapon related murders are a symptom of an unhealthy society rather than the problem.  I also believe that legislation preventing the ownership of weapons is similar to outlawing weed, cocaine, etc.  It doesn't prevent it from existence and usage because it's a systemic sociological issue rather than the legality of the item itself.    What are your thoughts and experiences?","c_root_id_A":"c61hvaz","c_root_id_B":"c61keo1","created_at_utc_A":1346428958,"created_at_utc_B":1346438083,"score_A":8,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"We've discussed this previously. See here.","human_ref_B":"Something that I think deserves discussion and exploration beyond the perceived benefits and detriments of gun control is the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution, and the initial reasoning behind it. Of course the Constitution was designed to be a fluid document and interpretations can change over the years (\"it's what the forefathers would have wanted\" is not an argument that generally holds much water for me), but historical context is also important to consider.  The impression I've been given about the Second Amendment is that its purpose was similar to that of the Third (no quartering of soldiers in civilian homes). Both functioning to keep the government from getting out of line, the Third being more preventative and the Second being more as a recourse for the population. This was in the days when a civilian militia and popular uprising could  have at least done significant damage to the United States Military and Government. In modern times this idea is of course laughable (taking the non-trivial assumption that the army would listen to orders to attack the populace). Arguments can of course be made about guerrilla warfare and significant popular support hiding them. I would respond to that by saying if it has gotten to that point, the Constitution would have been so torn up by those in power that what it says about gun ownership would be irrelevant.  There are modern justifications for the Second Amendment, but that is another discussion entirely. Also, as OP stated, the real discussion should be about inhibiting people from killing other people, but I think it is important to realize that the original justification for this Amendment is not really applicable any more. The reason I say this is to shift the burden of justification to those that are proponents of private gun ownership. The reason we used to do this is no longer applicable, what is the new reasoning?  Of course those arguments already have been, and will continue to be well hashed out by others, but more context is never a bad thing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9125.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"z4w2s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.65,"history":"Many redditors are pro gun control.  What are the reasons you believe in gun control and what are your thoughts on how gun control helps reduce murders? Many redditors are pro gun control.  What are the reasons you believe in gun control and how does gun control help reduce murders?  I tend to believe that weapon related murders are a symptom of an unhealthy society rather than the problem.  I also believe that legislation preventing the ownership of weapons is similar to outlawing weed, cocaine, etc.  It doesn't prevent it from existence and usage because it's a systemic sociological issue rather than the legality of the item itself.    What are your thoughts and experiences?","c_root_id_A":"c61keo1","c_root_id_B":"c61igjs","created_at_utc_A":1346438083,"created_at_utc_B":1346431076,"score_A":10,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Something that I think deserves discussion and exploration beyond the perceived benefits and detriments of gun control is the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution, and the initial reasoning behind it. Of course the Constitution was designed to be a fluid document and interpretations can change over the years (\"it's what the forefathers would have wanted\" is not an argument that generally holds much water for me), but historical context is also important to consider.  The impression I've been given about the Second Amendment is that its purpose was similar to that of the Third (no quartering of soldiers in civilian homes). Both functioning to keep the government from getting out of line, the Third being more preventative and the Second being more as a recourse for the population. This was in the days when a civilian militia and popular uprising could  have at least done significant damage to the United States Military and Government. In modern times this idea is of course laughable (taking the non-trivial assumption that the army would listen to orders to attack the populace). Arguments can of course be made about guerrilla warfare and significant popular support hiding them. I would respond to that by saying if it has gotten to that point, the Constitution would have been so torn up by those in power that what it says about gun ownership would be irrelevant.  There are modern justifications for the Second Amendment, but that is another discussion entirely. Also, as OP stated, the real discussion should be about inhibiting people from killing other people, but I think it is important to realize that the original justification for this Amendment is not really applicable any more. The reason I say this is to shift the burden of justification to those that are proponents of private gun ownership. The reason we used to do this is no longer applicable, what is the new reasoning?  Of course those arguments already have been, and will continue to be well hashed out by others, but more context is never a bad thing.","human_ref_B":"Ideally, I want a system in which legal, responsible gun owners can buy and own a gun with minimal hassle while making gun crime as easy to prosecute and prevent as possible.  So for me, the ideal system is having each gun registered to its owner like a car, and making the ownership of unregistered guns a crime with fairly stiff penalties. I think a system like microstamping, which leaves a gun-specific \"fingerprint\" on each bullet or shell casing, facilitating lookup in the gun registration database, is a good idea, too.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7007.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"z4w2s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.65,"history":"Many redditors are pro gun control.  What are the reasons you believe in gun control and what are your thoughts on how gun control helps reduce murders? Many redditors are pro gun control.  What are the reasons you believe in gun control and how does gun control help reduce murders?  I tend to believe that weapon related murders are a symptom of an unhealthy society rather than the problem.  I also believe that legislation preventing the ownership of weapons is similar to outlawing weed, cocaine, etc.  It doesn't prevent it from existence and usage because it's a systemic sociological issue rather than the legality of the item itself.    What are your thoughts and experiences?","c_root_id_A":"c61i1ln","c_root_id_B":"c61hvaz","created_at_utc_A":1346429596,"created_at_utc_B":1346428958,"score_A":10,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I don't think it's quite like Marijuana or even Cocaine. You can't grow a gun in your backyard. They don't really come from natural resources in the same way. Yes there are plenty of illegal guns on the market, but almost all of those were manufactured for legal sale, probably for the US. Most of them probably were legal at one point, but were stolen\/sold illegally.   As far as social science goes, my background is in Anthropology and I'm not more qualified to comment on this than your average relatively informed citizen. But it makes sense to me that if you restrict sales of legal guns, in this case you directly restrict the availability of illegal ones.         Personally I'm for a certain measure of gun control. I'm with you in your thinking that the homicide problem in the US is a symptom of a much deeper problem. And I understand the logic of the saying, \"guns don't kill people, people do.\" ...People have, and maybe will always occasionally kill people. But guns make that process happen much quicker. And I don't think that the average person is emotionally mature enough to carry something like that around in public, and have that as sort of a fall-back option during every personal interaction. It should almost never be on the table.","human_ref_B":"We've discussed this previously. See here.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":638.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"bor0uf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"How influential is Amartya Sen in development economics? How influential is Amartya Sen in development economics?   Also, who are the other major voices in the area?","c_root_id_A":"enk3qcr","c_root_id_B":"enkv3xm","created_at_utc_A":1557890419,"created_at_utc_B":1557903054,"score_A":5,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Might get more answers in r\/economichistory","human_ref_B":"If you check out Econtalk Sen is a regular guest and the host, Russ Roberts, is pretty good about addressing disagreements within his guests area.  You can listen to the podcast and then look at the page where other topics they discussed or articles they mention are linked. Sen's been on a few times and comes up in a lot of the develoment econ people's talks so there are a lot of links.     https:\/\/search.econlib.org\/search\/#tbFYrFuTF47mCMmiJdhUQ6Z-dns=","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12635.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"bor0uf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"How influential is Amartya Sen in development economics? How influential is Amartya Sen in development economics?   Also, who are the other major voices in the area?","c_root_id_A":"enkv3xm","c_root_id_B":"enkbqj0","created_at_utc_A":1557903054,"created_at_utc_B":1557893830,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"If you check out Econtalk Sen is a regular guest and the host, Russ Roberts, is pretty good about addressing disagreements within his guests area.  You can listen to the podcast and then look at the page where other topics they discussed or articles they mention are linked. Sen's been on a few times and comes up in a lot of the develoment econ people's talks so there are a lot of links.     https:\/\/search.econlib.org\/search\/#tbFYrFuTF47mCMmiJdhUQ6Z-dns=","human_ref_B":"Someone have a term paper due?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9224.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"5inasf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Are the IMF and the World Bank actually contributing to Global Development? I understand that these institutions were set up to rebuilding the economies post WW2, but I see that debt is being used as an instrument to implement neoliberal policies that act in the favour of the West, and it almost feels like they are neo-colonialists.","c_root_id_A":"db9lx4i","c_root_id_B":"db9vnz9","created_at_utc_A":1481890834,"created_at_utc_B":1481906407,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Stiglitz's book *Globalisation and its discontents* is very good on this. There was essentially a political revolution under Reagan and Thatcher which made jobs hard to get unless you were part of a certain ideological stream. He has a great essay out too: http:\/\/evonomics.com\/joseph-stiglitz-inequality-unearned-income\/  I  think you're right, that neoliberalism or market fundamentalism or whatever you want to call it is destroying economies and in turning a blind eye to tax avoidance it's disproportionately hurting developing economies. But the IMF  isn't a single monolithic organisation and its intellectual wing has been sounding the alarm for a while, the political wing has not responded beyond local political convenience. http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/fandd\/2016\/06\/ostry.htm https:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/wp\/2013\/wp1301.pdf  Ultimately these are institutions subservient to the interests of the most powerful governments that they deal with. They'll change when the politicians do.","human_ref_B":"It should not be surprising that these institutions promote a form of development (economic modernization) through integration into a global capitalist market. Critics for a few decades now have been describing these as neo-colonialist and you're correct, debt is the primary mechanism through which these policies get implemented. You may want to read Richard Jolly's \"Adjustment with a Human Face\" which was published by UNICEF in the 1980s. He documents the evidence of harmful consequences of the IMF's structural adjustment conditionalities in terms of health and poverty. Since this publication, the IMF as well as the World Bank have modified their lending policies, and in some instances have gone as far as to rebrand structural adjustment. For instance, if I'm remembering correctly, the IMF now calls these \"Poverty Strategy Reduction\" loans. The underlying finance ministry agenda remains. The World Bank has also increased lending in the health and reproductive sector, while at the same time continuing harmful structural adjustment lending. You may also want to look into Catherine Weaver's book \"Hypocrisy Trap - World Bank and the Poverty of Reform\" which provides some reasons why the WB continues to pursue these dual and sometimes contradictory lending strategies (it has a lot to do with trying to satisfy conflicting demands from various external institutional constraints placed on the WB as well as its internal culture where economics run the show). Sorry that I cannot provide more links\/references but I am on mobile.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15573.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"voxfms","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Does positivism dominate in sociology? As I look for programmes in this field, I find that a lot of faculties seem to have the quantitative approach and try to make sociology a \"practical\" or at least scientific field. Would you agree? What are the renown strongholds of interpretative sociology these days?","c_root_id_A":"iehbpbo","c_root_id_B":"ieitcmj","created_at_utc_A":1656698939,"created_at_utc_B":1656722788,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The premise of the question is not entirely accurate, but sounds like you are looking for cultural sociologists?   But all sociology, insofar as it is good sociology, is scientific.","human_ref_B":"It depends where you are exactly. I'm not an expert myself (I'm only a student) But from what I've been told from my lecturers, generally the USA follows a Quantative approach, whereas Europe and other places can have much more acceptance towards Qualitative, Mixed Methods, or Critical Theory, but as the USA has a big influence, Qunatitative is ultimately the most 'influential' I would agree say. But for example my uni, Victoria University of Wellington (https:\/\/www.wgtn.ac.nz\/sacs\/about\/staff\/criminology-staff), has a lot of criminologists that lean towards Critical Theory or Qualitative methods (Though they use Quantative too, they just view it as having limitations in the social sciences.) I'm not sure how NZ is vs rest of the world in rep, but I'd say Vic has a lot of good interpretive and critical sociology in my experience.  I'd defintely disagree though with the notion that Qualitative or Critical theory are not 'scientific'. They are all fundamentally Empirical and use the Scientific Method, they just disagree on ontological and epistomological grounds. And I think there's good reason for that, though I very much lean towards an interperative school myself so I have a bias, I think there's very much an argument to be made that when analysing the social world, and the social actions of people, their causes and reasoning, quantiative methods can fall short in understanding something as complex as human actions, and qualitative, despite having issues in terms of the complexity and how expensive big qualitative studies are, are a lot better at getting to the 'core' of people's actions, and all the complex reasons for it, even if it does not mean we get simple 'statistical' data the sciences sometimes desire.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23849.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"at733x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why does commericalisation tend to make things bland? Sorry for the vague question, but it's just an inkling I have rather than a fleshed-out idea.  &#x200B;  It seems there is often a trend where something starts out niche and interesting, and then business spots an opportunity, but in the process makes it bland. The web is one example - it used to be common to come across interesting sites by people with a particular passion. Now things seem to be consolidated into a few big media and tech companies. Another example is music - the most popular music tends to be bland in comparison with more niche music.   &#x200B;  I'm wondering if there is any social scientific work on this phenomenon - whether it's real, what might cause it, etc.","c_root_id_A":"egzn07p","c_root_id_B":"egzke0o","created_at_utc_A":1550790361,"created_at_utc_B":1550788490,"score_A":22,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Companies work to capture the largest percentage of the market. They do this in two ways, established products seek to differentiate themselves from other products to maximize customers, new products seek to replicate established products to take away their customers. It is obvious why replicating other products makes things bland, but I'll give an example of how differentiation can too.  &#x200B;  Imagine two established chocolate companies names Coke and Pepsi. People have a preference for what percentage of cocoa they want in their chocolate. Coke starts with 20% coca, Pepsi starts with 80%. Coke realizes if they make theirs with 79% coca they'll get all the people who like less than 80% cocoa chocolate. When this happens, Pepsi starts losing money, but realizes if they make 78% cocoa chocolate they'll get almost as much of the market as Coke had from moving to 79%. This continues back and forth until they end up at 50% and 51% cocoa, where no one can get more of the market by changing their product.","human_ref_B":"I feel like a lot of this may fall more into discussions about economics and capitalism, and things like personal taste and opinion.     Like, this might not be 100% on the topic, as it's discussing commercialization of *research* in the fields of art, humanities, and social sciences, but down on page 20 it starts to talk about the reasons for commercialization. Things like additional funding to support their research, a desire to make themselves more relevant to communities and government, facilitating collaborative efforts with others outside of their organizations, etc. Like I said, it isn't specifically about the topic of art or web design, but it talks about some of the benefits of commercialization for that field.      If anyone has something more direct than that, I'm also all ears.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1871.0,"score_ratio":7.3333333333}
{"post_id":"at733x","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Why does commericalisation tend to make things bland? Sorry for the vague question, but it's just an inkling I have rather than a fleshed-out idea.  &#x200B;  It seems there is often a trend where something starts out niche and interesting, and then business spots an opportunity, but in the process makes it bland. The web is one example - it used to be common to come across interesting sites by people with a particular passion. Now things seem to be consolidated into a few big media and tech companies. Another example is music - the most popular music tends to be bland in comparison with more niche music.   &#x200B;  I'm wondering if there is any social scientific work on this phenomenon - whether it's real, what might cause it, etc.","c_root_id_A":"egzke0o","c_root_id_B":"eh08i76","created_at_utc_A":1550788490,"created_at_utc_B":1550806875,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I feel like a lot of this may fall more into discussions about economics and capitalism, and things like personal taste and opinion.     Like, this might not be 100% on the topic, as it's discussing commercialization of *research* in the fields of art, humanities, and social sciences, but down on page 20 it starts to talk about the reasons for commercialization. Things like additional funding to support their research, a desire to make themselves more relevant to communities and government, facilitating collaborative efforts with others outside of their organizations, etc. Like I said, it isn't specifically about the topic of art or web design, but it talks about some of the benefits of commercialization for that field.      If anyone has something more direct than that, I'm also all ears.","human_ref_B":"Read Adorno and Horkheimer's \"The Culture Industry.\"    \"The striking unity of microcosm and macrocosm presents men with a model of their culture: the false identity of the general and the particular. Under monopoly all mass culture is identical, and the lines of its artificial framework begin to show through.\"     Under capitalism thinks start to become universal, they start to become similar. Replication becomes the imperative. A copy of a copy. Something might begin as original, but once it becomes viable it is then mass produced, and in that becomes a patters, a sameness.      \" In the culture industry this imitation finally becomes absolute. Having ceased to be anything but style, it reveals the latter\u2019s secret: obedience to the social hierarchy. \"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18385.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"z8xsu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"[Economics] Reading the classics - where would you start? My background is in mechanical engineering.  I took micro and macro, and that was a very, very long time ago.  Yet whenever I read Mauldin, whenever I read Reich, whenever I read anybody \"modern\" they always throw around Von Mises, Keynes, etc.  I have never read any of them, and I figure I probably should.  So if you were to pick, say, five classics of economics that have been influential on economic thinking and policy over the past fifty years, which five would they be?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c62ixr5","c_root_id_B":"c62lggt","created_at_utc_A":1346626165,"created_at_utc_B":1346637213,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"May I recommend reading The Clash of Economic Ideas by Lawrence H. White. Its a history of economic thoughts and debates of the last century, and I just finished reading it. I though the book gave an excellent overview of all the major economic areas as well as many small autobiographies of the great thinkers. The author is more libertarian, and it does come out in the book, but the reasons I reccommend it are:   1. He covers all the main arguments modern economics is based on. So whenever anyone references economists, youll know.  2. It would be inefficient and unproductive to try and read the author's original works (assuming you're a casual reader) because the works have probably been disproved or otherwise refined, they may also be somewhat inaccessible to a lay audience.  3. The book does a FANTASTIC job of citing EVERY source the author used. So if youre reading and become interested in a certain area, each chapter has upwards of 30 other sources you could look into for more detail.   And, to answer your question, here are the top 20 articles of the past hundred years:    http:\/\/pubs.aeaweb.org\/doi\/pdfplus\/10.1257\/aer.101.1.1","human_ref_B":"Not an economist by any stretch, but I wrote my thesis on economic development, and the interaction between states and markets. A lot of what I could recommend would deal with the rise of economic systems in various countries at different points in history -- an examination of which informs and influences a great deal of modern international economic policy. Little in the way of macro- or microeconomic thought (would gladly defer to other posters for their recommendations of Keynes and Schumpeter's \"Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy\" -- an excellent book), but a lot of policy applications and developmental economics.  Most of these books have applications within political science, but the line between poli sci and economics can be delightfully muddy. There's very little math involved, but quite a bit of history. To be fair, I can't think of many economists that would cite these guys in conversations about economic theory, but talk to a comparative political scientist or someone who knows developmental economics, and you can hold your own in a conversation after these books. Doesn't explain the how of economics, but gives you a fantastic grasp on **why**.  * **Capitalism and Freedom**, Milton Friedman.   An examination of the role free-market capitalism can play in a liberal society. Can an economy be free when a society is not? What about the inverse? Also looks at the role of business in society.  * **The Passions and the Interests**, Albert Hirschman.   An attempt to explain why the activities of merchants and bankers, long considered sinful, were eventually accepted and praised by Western society.   * **The Origin of Capitalism**, Ellen Meiskins Wood.   An easily-digestible Marxist critique of the inevitability of capitalism. Wood argues primarily against the \"commercialization model\" of capitalism, where an individual's basic desire to barter or trade leads to increased division of labor and technological improvements, which in turn lead to urbanization and increased commerce.  * **A Wealth of Nations**, Adam Smith.     As a United States citizen, I found Book V to be a surprisingly progressive and informed suggestion for government involvement in the market. Books II and III lay the groundwork that Marx and future economic thinkers would build upon, and Smith outlines a \"natural Progress of Opulence\" that still runs as an undercurrent in modern developmental economic thought (that you can grow economies if you follow this pattern: agriculture -> manufacturing\/urbanization -> foreign trade). Interestingly, Smith admits that this progression is primarily theoretical, basing it only on the experience of the American colonies (who had enormous developmental assistance from Britain) **Spoiler**: Book IV reads very much as a critique of modern capitalism. Adam Smith, patron saint of the market, makes a strong case why the rise of a middle class benefits the rich and powerful at the expense of the poor, and why this is a bad thing.  * **The Great Transformation**, Karl Polyani.   Argues that national markets\/economies, rather than evolving naturally from local\/town markets as Smith theorized, arose from state intervention. The economy was solely an evolutionary byproduct of the institutions present in society. Probably my favorite economic\/political book, and the closest thing you'll find to an anti-\"Wealth of Nations\" book. **Spoiler**: The big takeaway here is what Polyani terms a \"double movement.\" At the same time that countries foster and encourage a self-regulating market via market expansion \u2013 the tools with which to do so being legislation and philosophical regulations \u2013 they also move to limit the effects of self-regulation by enacting legislative reforms and administrative actions. Polanyi argues that this social protectionism is put in place as a necessary consequence of humans\u2019 desire for self-preservation.  * *Institutions*, Douglass North.   Not a book, but an article published in a journal in 1991. Compared to Polyani, North holds instead that the institutions and innovations that allowed the economy to grow were themselves products of two fundamental economic forces \u2013 the economies of scale from growth in trade, and the means to secure lower transaction costs. Compared to Smith, North believed that individual-level checks and balances were insufficient to regulate a self-sustaining economy, and a stronger player would invariably be required as the economy grew.  I'd add more books to this list, but the Breaking Bad season finale is on in 10. Will edit\/add later if there's more interest.  **Edit**: *More for you, kleinbl00.*  After the foundations of the previous books, these next ones are more policy-oriented, and answer the question of \"Why do some states 'get' economic development, and some lag behind?\" This is one of the most important questions for policy makers, historians, and economists to answer, in my honest opinion.  * **Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspective**, Alexander Gerschenkron.   Why does economic backwardness matter (especially from a policy perspective)? Which is more likely to determine if a country will develop backwardly: the economic timing, or the socio-economic conditions in place when the country begins to develop? Draws strong parallels to Polyani, extrapolates to the problem of development in backwards countries.  * *The Myths of the Market and the Common History of Late Developers*, Kirin Chaudry.   Another article, looks at why the prevailing theories of economic-state development (such as neoliberalism) fail to answer why late developers were\/are unable to create functional national markets at their outset.  * *Predatory, Developmental, and other Apparatuses: A Comparative Political Economy Perspective on Third World States*, Peter Evans.   Article, again. Examines the difference in sociopolitical structure between late-developing countries. Why did the Weberian bureaucracy of Zaire fail to bring about the same levels of economic development as the bureaucratic system in Japan, where both countries were relatively late to the development game? What are the different roles of the state in developing countries?  * **Kicking Away the Ladder**, Ha-Joon Chang.   **If you read one book on LDCs (lesser-developed countries), make it this one.** Mirrors the argument from Evans about why More Developed Countries (MDCs) like Japan succeeded -- a strong central state with aggressively progressive social reform. Noticeable departure in examining why backwards countries still exist: argues that the institutions we recommend to the LDCs like the IMF or World Bank are products, not causes, of the development of MDCs. Despite the fact that most LDCs have more social and political institutional structures at their stage of development (when the US was at Mexico\u2019s current stage of development, it did not provide suffrage to women or minorities, have a centralized bank, enforce competition law, etc.), the NDCs impose free-trade policies on the LDCs, forcing them to lower tariffs and trade restrictions rather than allow LDCs to protect infant industry.   **TL:DR; Developed countries change the rules once they develop, making it harder for other countries to catch up.**  * **One Economics, Many Recipes**, Dani Rodrik. (Specifically Chs. 2, 3, & 6)   Despite what any of the previous 4 authors think, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Fairly similar to Polyani or North in his prescription -- institutions are the most significant hindrance to LDC development, and since societies differ in institutions and market failures, Rodrik claims that there is no single blueprint for successfully embedding an economy in society.  * **Adam Smith in Beijing**, Giovanni Arrighi.   Using the example of China, Arrighi demonstrates why Adam Smith's \"Natural Progress of Opulence\" (see above) was right all along! **MINDFUCK.** Arrighi views China\u2019s massive growth in exports as a manifestation, not a cause, of economic growth, and argues that the role the Chinese state has played in managing market reforms has served to aid the growth of the economy and is itself a tribute to Smithian ideals of using government action to counteract capitalist power.  _______________________________ **TL:DR;** So to break it down:   *Classical authors*: Smith, Polyani, Friedman, Wood (or Marx), North.   Everyone else listed is a modern author drawing on those five in some regard.  Hopefully this helps you in your quest to learn more about developmental economic theory and policy, and there's enough conflicting viewpoints there to help you form your own researched opinion.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11048.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"z8xsu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"[Economics] Reading the classics - where would you start? My background is in mechanical engineering.  I took micro and macro, and that was a very, very long time ago.  Yet whenever I read Mauldin, whenever I read Reich, whenever I read anybody \"modern\" they always throw around Von Mises, Keynes, etc.  I have never read any of them, and I figure I probably should.  So if you were to pick, say, five classics of economics that have been influential on economic thinking and policy over the past fifty years, which five would they be?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c62n1io","c_root_id_B":"c62ixr5","created_at_utc_A":1346643600,"created_at_utc_B":1346626165,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Von Mises is popularly cited by libertarians, but not so much for academic economists. But if you are interested, *Human Action* is his magnum opus.  Keynes *General Theory of Employment* is pretty boring, but that is the foundation of his economic ideas.  I should note that reading all these old books isn't that useful to understanding modern economics. Keynes\/Friedman\/Hayek all were very influential but so were Darwin\/Newton for science. Newton's Principia mathematica or Darwin's Origin of Species are largely irrelevant compared to modern textbooks in Mathematics or Biology. New research and theoretical foundations partly refute or alter the basis of their ideas.  I should also note Robert Reich is not an academic economist. He has no PhD.  Also, with regards to how Keynes is used in modern parlance. Conservatives like to use Keynes to describe any government spending (i.e. Obama's Keynesian policies). However, the truth is conservatives pursue Keynesian policy too whenever they pursue tax cuts. Using demand-side policies to influence economic growth is essentially 'Keynesian.'  I'll still give you five influential economic books:  *Capitalism and Freedom* by Milton Friedman  *The Road to Serfdom* by Friedrich Hayek (though this is 70 years old)  *The Affluent Society* by John Kenneth Galbraith. Or maybe the Great Crash of 1929. Galbraith is one of the most influential economists of the past century  *The Conscience of a Liberal* by Paul Krugman  *The General Theory of Employment* by John Maynard Keynes  Older books include those by Adam Smith, Thorstein Veblein, and Alfred Marshall.","human_ref_B":"May I recommend reading The Clash of Economic Ideas by Lawrence H. White. Its a history of economic thoughts and debates of the last century, and I just finished reading it. I though the book gave an excellent overview of all the major economic areas as well as many small autobiographies of the great thinkers. The author is more libertarian, and it does come out in the book, but the reasons I reccommend it are:   1. He covers all the main arguments modern economics is based on. So whenever anyone references economists, youll know.  2. It would be inefficient and unproductive to try and read the author's original works (assuming you're a casual reader) because the works have probably been disproved or otherwise refined, they may also be somewhat inaccessible to a lay audience.  3. The book does a FANTASTIC job of citing EVERY source the author used. So if youre reading and become interested in a certain area, each chapter has upwards of 30 other sources you could look into for more detail.   And, to answer your question, here are the top 20 articles of the past hundred years:    http:\/\/pubs.aeaweb.org\/doi\/pdfplus\/10.1257\/aer.101.1.1","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17435.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"z8xsu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"[Economics] Reading the classics - where would you start? My background is in mechanical engineering.  I took micro and macro, and that was a very, very long time ago.  Yet whenever I read Mauldin, whenever I read Reich, whenever I read anybody \"modern\" they always throw around Von Mises, Keynes, etc.  I have never read any of them, and I figure I probably should.  So if you were to pick, say, five classics of economics that have been influential on economic thinking and policy over the past fifty years, which five would they be?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"c62ixr5","c_root_id_B":"c62pobe","created_at_utc_A":1346626165,"created_at_utc_B":1346655802,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"May I recommend reading The Clash of Economic Ideas by Lawrence H. White. Its a history of economic thoughts and debates of the last century, and I just finished reading it. I though the book gave an excellent overview of all the major economic areas as well as many small autobiographies of the great thinkers. The author is more libertarian, and it does come out in the book, but the reasons I reccommend it are:   1. He covers all the main arguments modern economics is based on. So whenever anyone references economists, youll know.  2. It would be inefficient and unproductive to try and read the author's original works (assuming you're a casual reader) because the works have probably been disproved or otherwise refined, they may also be somewhat inaccessible to a lay audience.  3. The book does a FANTASTIC job of citing EVERY source the author used. So if youre reading and become interested in a certain area, each chapter has upwards of 30 other sources you could look into for more detail.   And, to answer your question, here are the top 20 articles of the past hundred years:    http:\/\/pubs.aeaweb.org\/doi\/pdfplus\/10.1257\/aer.101.1.1","human_ref_B":"I am surprised no one recommended Heilbroner's The Worldly Philosophers.  It's a fast and simple overview of many of the great economists and a good place to get a basic understanding of the main thoughts people who are interested in Political Economy spring forth from.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":29637.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1h3423","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"What is the difference between Anthropology and Sociology? I've done a Google search, but in general they seem to say they are in fact quite similar, with the difference that Sociology prefers using statistical data, and Anthropology prefers fieldwork but that hardly seems to do much identify what seems to me very different methods, vocabulary, and key figures in the two fields.  Was wondering if someone could elaborate further on the difference, or at the very least, on a university curriculum basis?","c_root_id_A":"caqinzm","c_root_id_B":"caqjunv","created_at_utc_A":1372247016,"created_at_utc_B":1372252719,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"As both disciplines evolve the line is becoming more obscure.   However in very general terms Anthro is about observation and description with an interest in personal relationships, belief systems and symbolics and ideologies. Anthro is also the traditional domain of the ethnography which is both a research method (observation\/experience of a culture\/society) and the product\/way of writing up that experience as a descriptive story about a people\/group. They were, originally, interested in what it means to be human. It also traditionally looks outward with the assumption that knowing about others will help discover some kind of universal truths (we've come a long way from that point).   Sociology, on the other hand, is about structures and institutions - interested in how and why society functions - it is more explanatory than descriptive. Sociology, in the States, has a strong quantitative focus but that is not the case across the board. Many early sociologists did a lot of pure theory and observation (the sociological equivalent of ethnography). Sociology is also traditionally more interested in local political and state matters and more likely to use their own experience and various media as data rather than going elsewhere for their research topics. They are interested in how and why society works.  One easy way to show the difference is when you ask people from each discipline what they're working on\/researching. Anthropologists will often answer with a place or a specific people\/group e.g. \"people in rural Peru\" or the \"ritual healing for the Maori people of New Zealand\". While a sociologists will often answer with a topic, theory or broad interest like \"political organisation structures\" or \"modern urban subcultures\" or \"gender in education\" or \"cat ownership and health\".","human_ref_B":"I think about them like two brothers (or sisters):  They look a lot alike, maybe they even sound the same, share similar mannerisms, and share some of the same hobbies and interest, but they are each unique and have different substantive interests. Maybe one is a baseball nut because he loves the numbers, while the other prefers a more one-on-one game such as tennis.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5703.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3mzdv9","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Is the motif of an angsty teen playing a game like Call of Duty and then joining the military as a result an actual, documented social phenomena, or is it just popular rhetoric? It's something that I've seen float around the internet and RL for years, but it mostly sounds like a popular narrative.","c_root_id_A":"cvjszcm","c_root_id_B":"cvjt4wt","created_at_utc_A":1443649834,"created_at_utc_B":1443650076,"score_A":11,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"Seems like a really impossible thing to test. You'd have a selection effect (Those people who are into the military play CoD like games) as well as a mass effect (Everyone* has played CoD like games [undernote; most gamers = everyone]) so the noise would be insane.","human_ref_B":"I'm not an academic, but I can cite a relevant primary source.  America's Army is a First Person Shooter (like Call of Duty) developed by the US Army in order to recruit people.  I cannot speak to it's efficacy.  What I can say is that they cared far more about realism than games like Call of Duty, and in order to unlock the medit kits you have to actually watch someone give a lecture with a powerpoint then fill out a multiple choice test all while in the same FPS framework.  The wikipedia article includes 'Academic References'.  I've copied some of them here for your convenience:  >\"Changing the Game: How Video games are Transforming the Future of Business October, 2008.\" David Edery, Microsoft Xbox executive and research affiliate of the MIT Comparative Media Studies Program, and Ethan Mollick, researcher at the MIT Sloan School of Management, investigate the future of video games. They cite the combat medic training received by Paxton Galvanek to save a life as \"tangible evidence of the power of games to educate\". (p. 97) Furthermore, the book praises America's Army by saying \"Far-sighted companies are using games to recruit, train, motivate, and make employees more productive\" (p. 97) and includes research that supports this point: \"30% of all Americans age 16 to 24 had a more positive impression of the Army because of the game and, even more amazingly, the game had more impact on recruits than all other forms of Army advertising combined.\" (p. 141)  >\"Watch This, Listen Up, Click Here: Inside the 300 Billion Dollar Business Behind the Media You Constantly Consume April, 2007.\" David Verklin, CEO of Carat, and Bernice Kanner, marketing expert, test the stability of old, traditional media and find they're collapsing under pressure from online services. Highlights the U.S. Army video game as the 21st century's recruitment poster. \"America's Army has proven to be such powerful weaponry that an official game store does brisk business selling collectible action figures, clothes, coffee mugs, and other doodads emblazoned with the logo.\" (p. 90)  >\"Experience the Message: How Experiential Marketing Is Changing the Brand World by Max Lendermann, creative director of GMR Marketing, December, 2005.\" Cites AA advergaming success and rollout to an experiential marketing campaign. \"The America's Army experience is an advergaming juggernaut, an empire that is looked to enviably by the rest of the advergaming nations.\" (p. 218) \"Not only do players get a fun and exciting experience, they also get as close to the real thing of being in the army as possible, without actually getting a buzz cut and general-issue fatigues.\" (p. 222)  >\"Authenticity: What Consumers Really Want by James H. Gilmore and B. Joseph Pine II, co-founders of Strategic Horizons LLP, September 2007.\" http:\/\/authenticitybook.com\/ Published by Harvard Business School Press, this book cites America's Army as one of the most innovative and successful examples of virtual placemaking and Col. Wardynski's efforts in establishing new and better metric analyses. \"According to the director of the program, Colonel Casey Wardynski, 20 percent of those matriculating at West Point in 2005 had played America's Army, along with 20 to 40 percent of enlisted soldiers recruited that year.\" (p. 168) \"America's Army director Colonel Wardynski uses the metric 'cost per person hour', estimating in 2005 that the million the Army puts into the program each year results in 'a cost per person hour of 10 cents, vers to for TV'.\" (p. 173)  >\"Career Innovation Case Study of the U.S. Army as part of the \"Digital Generation Initiative\"\" Case study analyzed the Army Game Project efforts and concluded the following: First, to reach the Digital Generation, content must be engaging and authentic. Employers will have to adopt a much more open and transparent approach to communicating information and allowing contact with employees than is currently the norm. Second, the Digital Generation will expect to be able to virtually explore and even \"test drive\" jobs and organizations. The Army's experience shows the potential and importance of virtual tools and capabilities in shaping the brand image of employers. Third, games and simulations can play a role in preparing new hires for the job. And finally, employers should treat investments in games and simulations as a platform to support a wide range of recruiting, learning and performance development activities and goals. Virtual simulators are cheaper than real ones in many instances.  >\"The Potential of America's Army as Civilian-Military Public Sphere\" extensive February 2004 thesis (149 pages) by graduate student Zhan Li for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology - includes ethnographic analysis of Soldiers who play the game during the invasion of Iraq, and interviews with West Point directors of the America's Army project.  >\"Social Realism in Gaming academic analysis of AA in terms of \"Social realism\" by Alexander R. Galloway\" a book author and Assistant Professor at New York University. Alexander R. Galloway, an associate professor at New York University notes that, \"What is interesting about America's Army, is not the debate over whether it is thinly-veiled propaganda or a legitimate recruitment tool, for it is unabashedly and decisively both, but rather that the central conceit of the game is one of mimetic realism.\" In his analysis, Galloway concludes that AA, despite being a fairly realistic game, with real-life settings, does not make even the least attempt to achieve narrative realism\u2014that is, accurately representing what serving a tour in the Army would actually be like. Instead, it simply expresses a nationalistic sentiment under the guise of realism, being little more than a \"na\u00efve and unmediated or reflective conception of aesthetic construction.\" \"Video Games, Manipulation and the U.S. Military: A Comparative Analysis of America's Army and SOCOM II: US Navy SEALs\" academic analysis of America's Army and SOCOM II: U.S. Navy SEALs in terms of \"Visual Discourse\" by Caroline S. Brooks, a PhD candidate at East Carolina University. \"America's Army PC Game - Vision and Realization,\" published by the MOVES Institute and the US Army, February 2004, 40 pages.  >Michael Zyda, Alex Mayberry, Jesse McCree, and Margaret Davis \u201cFrom Viz-Sim to VR to Games: How We Built a Hit Game-Based Simulation,\u201d in W.B. Rouse and K.R. Boff (Eds.) Organizational Simulation: From Modeling & Simulation to Games & Entertainment, New York: Wiley Press, 2005,pp., ISBN 0-471-68163-6. Margaret Davis, Russell Shilling, Alex Mayberry, Jesse McCree, Phillip Bossant, Scott Dossett, Christian Buhl, Christopher Chang, Evan Champlin, Travis Wiglesworth and Michael Zyda \"Researching America\u2019s Army,\" in Design Research: Methods and Perspectives, edited by Brenda Laurel, MIT Press, 1 October 2003, ISBN 0-262-12263-4, 268-275.  >Russ Shilling, Michael Zyda and E. Casey Wardynski, \"Introducing Emotion into Military Simulation and Videogame Design: America's Army Operations and VIRTE,\" in the Proceedings of the GameOn Conference, London, 30 November 2002, pp. 151\u2013154.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":242.0,"score_ratio":2.3636363636}
{"post_id":"lpwqlz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is consuming pornography good or bad for society?  I dont know if this question goes here, but here it goes.  The  subject is that recently I've been thinking about this question, and I  got to some positive points and some negatives. So I would like to know  what other people think about it.  Also, this is about all porn: staged, amateur, homemade, hentai, etc. It is all related through websites, ads and interests after all.  The positives:  Porn  media help to normalize sexuality, wich is a toxic taboo in our  society, because can, and do, make people feel bad, ashame, etc, about  something that is natural and normal. Only this can be its own topic so  I'm letting it there.  Studies have  shown that porn consumition decreases sexual assaults. I havent seem  much of this matter, but I've seen this affimation in several pages. If I  recall correctly It has to do with sexual impulses being released  through porn instead of the real thing.  The negatives:  Porn  is not something that isn't fully regulated, as almost everything on  the internet, but with porn things get a little more intense. It can be  cases of people dragged to the world of porn filming, against their  will, totally or partially.  It can  even be seen as a form of the problem of prostitution, where people get  in a situation where they cant get out, and find themselves trapped and  you could say even enslaved.  Also there is the case of pornographic content of people upload against their will.  All of this is very aggravated by how sex is something very intimate in our society  My conclusions:  Maybe  the consumition of porn would help destroy the taboo. This could help  to make it more a regulated thing, a less obscure part of the internet.  It could also help to  diminish the type of enslavery I talked about,  and also, it would be less of an intimate thing, wich would make all  kind of sexual aggresion less painful (I'm talking about what I already  said but also all kinds of it).  In  the other hand just not consuming that type of content would simply  diminish the demand, and so, the problems that comes with it, but maybe  the more obscure the matter becomes the worst.  So  here I am, I think this is a real problem for some people and I would  like do the right thing, even if it just helps a little.","c_root_id_A":"godsrek","c_root_id_B":"goeecf1","created_at_utc_A":1614027426,"created_at_utc_B":1614037390,"score_A":10,"score_B":50,"human_ref_A":"Some studies find that violent pornography may be an important component of men's perceptions of their own sexual aggression likelihood, https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1002\/ab.20157 , and contribute to objectification of women: https:\/\/doi.apa.org\/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fmen0000058 .","human_ref_B":"I believe we should begin by acknowledging that pornography is a morally charged object, so are the debates (and controversies) surrounding it and its presumed effects. Whether it is \"good\" or \"bad\" depends also on the eye of the beholder, i.e. on individual and societal norms, beliefs, values, etc.  That established, I would suggest moving away from thinking about pornography in a dichotomous fashion, such as it either having potentially desirable outcomes, or having potentially undesirable outcomes. Although there is still further research needed\u2122, the effects of pornography (as with many other things) likely depends on multiple factors, both concerning the contexts in which pornography is produced and consumed, and users.  ---  A recently published article by Grubbs and Kraus (2021) is relevant to your query. Per the abstract: \"Collectively, **the current research related to pornography use suggests** that it is of interest to multiple domains in psychological science and **that its effects can range from positive to neutral to negative.**\"  In the article proper, these two authors highlight research finding **negative relational (romantic) outcomes concerning sexual satisfaction, sexual aggression, sexual objectification and so forth.** However, as noted, they warn against concluding that pornography must *only* have *negative* outcomes. **Positive outcomes may include sexual novelty and variety in couples, and sexual closeness.**   Similar conclusions are made regarding adolescent use, regarding which they argue:  >In short, **pornography use in adolescence does seem to be linked to concerning attitudinal and behavioral outcomes. Even so, it is unclear whether pornography\u2019s effects are universally negative** ...]  >Thus, although there are certainly links between pornography use and concerning outcomes in adolescence, **it remains undetermined whether such associations are common and whether positive effects might also occur.**  By \"concerning attitudinal and behavioral outcomes\" they mean: \"**greater casual sexual behavior, greater sexual objectification of partners, greater risk of sexual aggression, more permissive views of sex, and more stereotypical beliefs about gender roles**.\"  They also discuss clinical concerns regarding pornography, while also arguing the following:  >**As we noted above, pornography use\u2014even at high levels\u2014is most often not problematic. Conversely, for some people, pornography use\u2014even at quite low levels\u2014 is robustly associated with self-reports of dysregulation, distress, and addiction** (Grubbs, Lee, et al., 2020). A sizable body of literature now suggests that **another potential avenue by which pornography use may become problematic is actually more related to interpretations of that use rather than the use itself.** Specifically, **religious qualms about pornography and moral disapproval of pornography seem to shape self-interpretations of pornography users** (Grubbs, Perry, et al., 2019) [...]  >In sum, **moral and religious objections to pornography use seem to predict both a greater likelihood of self-reporting addiction to pornography and a greater likelihood of supporting regulatory action against pornography.**  ---  Therefore, although Grubbs and Kraus highlight several outcomes which many would consider negative or undesirable, they also acknowledge that there is much that remains unknown, and they discourage concluding that pornography only has negative effects.  I will now add some (further) caveats to the above. In regard to sexual aggression,[ I point to my other comment in this thread for further insights. Although Kraus and his colleagues tend to conclude that pornography consumption affects aggression (see Wright et al., 2016), many other researchers disagree that there is an established causal relationship, and some have even suggested that pornography might contribute to *reduce* certain kinds of criminal behaviors. In any case, to quote Ferguson and Hartley (2020):   >In conclusion, **the current pool of empirical studies is unable to support beliefs linking pornography to sexual aggression. It is possible that this conclusion might change with more rigorous, standardized, preregistered studies.** However, given the moral valence of this topic, we suspect debates about pornography effects will continue into the foreseeable future. **We suggest that scholars would do well to be more cautious in asserting causal effects of pornography until a pool of highly rigorous studies become available.**   Concerning objectification, Vandenbosch and van Oosten (2017) conducted a longitudinal study in the Netherlands involving 1,947 adolescents and young adults, concluding that **porn literacy education (i.e. learning about porn in sex education at school) may reduce the relationship between pornography consumption and the objectification of women.** In regard to education, and the potential for media literacy programs to moderate the negative effects of pornography on attitudes, it is worthwhile to consider the age of exposure, and more broadly the fact **some adolescents and young adults turn to pornography for sexual information or education and might do so without properly assessing how informative pornography may or may not be** (e.g. Dawson et al., 2017, Litsou et al., 2019, Rothman et al., 2021).  ---  To conclude, I quote Vangeel et al.'s (2020) longitudinal study of a sample of Belgian adolescents concerning the relationship between consuming online pornography, and music television, and sexual stereotypes. Although **they found a relationship between exposure to music television and acceptance of rape myths (which in turn was associated with acceptance of gendered sexual roles), they failed to find these relationships in regard to exposure to online pornography**. They conclude:  >**These results show, in combination with the mixed finding of prior research, that the full extent of the media\u2019s impact on sexual stereotypes is still unclear.** Both long- and short-term associations were studied in an attempt to shed more light on these mixed fndings, but uncertainties about these processes remain. **Prior researchers have concluded that young people\u2019s sexuality is a complex process and that the media\u2019s role in this process may depend on several conditions, including developmental diferences and preexisting cognitions** (Ward, 2003, 2016; Wright, 2011). Overall, **the study suggests that a long-term impact of media use on sexual attitudes is possible, but further research is needed to understand the conditions in which such associations occur**.  In addition to more research, I would reiterate Ferguson and Hartley's call for more rigorous research including better distinguishing different kinds of pornography, and different manners of being exposed to pornography, which limits advancement on the topic of its effects (Kohut et al., 2020). In the meanwhile, I would be wary of strong causal claims about pornography. Likewise, I would keep in mind that it is a controversial, value-laden, topic, and to maintain a critical outlook.  ---  P.S. Also, keep in mind that the above concerns primarily the psychological and criminological aspects of pornography, especially its potential effects on individual consumers. There are also other topics to consider, such as the pornographic industry, the treatment of sex workers, etc.  ---  Dawson, K., Nic Gabhainn, S., & MacNeela, P. (2019). Dissatisfaction with school sex education is not associated with using pornography for sexual information. Porn Studies, 6(2), 245-257.  Kohut, T., Balzarini, R. N., Fisher, W. A., Grubbs, J. B., Campbell, L., & Prause, N. (2020). Surveying pornography use: A shaky science resting on poor measurement foundations. The Journal of Sex Research, 57(6), 722-742.  Litsou, K., Byron, P., McKee, A., & Ingham, R. (2020). Learning from pornography: Results of a mixed methods systematic review. Sex Education, 1-17.  Rothman, E. F., Beckmeyer, J. J., Herbenick, D., Fu, T. C., Dodge, B., & Fortenberry, J. D. (2021). The Prevalence of Using Pornography for Information About How to Have Sex: Findings from a Nationally Representative Survey of US Adolescents and Young Adults. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 1-18.  Vandenbosch, L., & van Oosten, J. M. (2017). The relationship between online pornography and the sexual objectification of women: The attenuating role of porn literacy education. Journal of Communication, 67(6), 1015-1036.  Vangeel, L., Eggermont, S., & Vandenbosch, L. (2020). Does adolescent media use predict sexual stereotypes in adolescence and emerging adulthood? Associations with music television and online pornography exposure. Archives of sexual behavior, 1-15.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9964.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"1v4al3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"INTRODUCING ASKSOCIALSCIENCE FEATURES: Monday Reading and Research Like AskHistorians, we've decided to introduce a few weekly threads for open discussions with relatively light moderation.  They should be posted around 10 AM Eastern Time (7 AM Pacific, 3 PM GMT, 2:00 AM on Tuesday AEDT) as we normally get a peak traffic between 12 PM and 1:00 PM Eastern.  This one is up late but next week it should be all automated.  SO WHAT ARE THESE THREADS?  They're open discussions where we can discuss things.  **MONDAY RESEARCH AND READING**: Monday Reading and Research will focus on exactly that: the history you have been reading this week and the research you've been working on. It's also the prime thread for requesting books or articles on a particular subject. As with all our weekly features, this thread will be lightly moderated.  So, encountered an recently that changed article recently that changed how you thought about nationalism? Or pricing? Or anxiety? Cross-cultural communication? Did you have to read a horrendous piece of mumbo-jumbo that snuck through peer-review and want to tell us about how bad it was? Need help finding the literature on topic Y and don't even know how where to start?  Is there some new trend in the literature that you're noticing and want to talk about? Then this is the thread for you!  *Later This Week*:   **Theory Wednesdays**: Where you can freely discuss topics related to academic or professional life.  Favorite debates between greats.  Advice on that draft article.  Even just celebrating the fact that you defend your dissertation proposal.  **Friday Free-For-All**: It's Friday, Friday.  Gotta get down on Friday.  Even more than than the others, this is what you make it.  We're modelling these roughly on three of AskHistorians features (Saturday Reading and Research, Theory Thursday, and Friday Free-For-All).  While we're trying to adapt them to social science, you can click those links and see what the other sub has done with them.  And we're always open to suggestions.","c_root_id_A":"ceoleba","c_root_id_B":"ceol1sy","created_at_utc_A":1389637713,"created_at_utc_B":1389636940,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"In 2013, I presented the following paper at multiple conferences.  This led to revisions from using MSA level data to individual level data, but thankfully both the theoretical model and empirical model results are consistent and significant in both.  A substantial body of research in regional science assumes that the population which is being distributed across cities and regions is either homogenous or differentiated only by human capital (years of education and work experience). This paper illustrates that other fundamental human characteristics, specifically obesity, is distributed over space in ways that can be explained using economic theory. Because obesity influences so much of human behavior, ignoring it in regional models can result in problematic inferences.    We combine data on health characteristics of MSAs from a 2010 Gallup Survey, 2010 US Census data, 2010 American Fitness Index Parks and Recreation data, and 2010 NOAA climate data, illustrating that selection into location is potentially driven by these unobserved characteristics. We adapt a theoretical model of location into a MSA dependent on heterogeneous characteristics. The theoretical model illustrates that, dependent on climate characteristics of the MSA and unobserved idiosyncratic error, location into an MSA is partially influenced by that individual`s health characteristics (BMI) and how those health characteristics influence their climatic preference. From our descriptive model, we find that warmer winters and cooler summers decrease the percent of persons of obese weight relative to the percent of persons of healthy weight. Obviously global warming will not cure obesity. The inverse association of BMI and winter temperature is due to the differential attraction cold climates for the obese.   Our paper provides evidence that, despite accounting for observable differences in education, age, and other demographic variables, individuals are systematically different across MSAs due to unobserved characteristics, of which BMI is one example. Results of the study are robust as additional demographic controls are added.   *This study was redone using individual level data and its findings of a differential attraction of bmi types to climate was corroborated.","human_ref_B":"During my literature research looking for articles mood and social dilemma games, I was able to find one, only a single one that tackled the topic like I wanted. And what did I have to find?   >The following article from the March 2003 issue **is being withdrawn at the request of the first author Lawrence J. Sanna**, who stated that **\u201cthe data were invalid\u201d**: Sanna, L. J., Parks, C. D., & Chang, E. C. (2003). The author provided no further statement other than to note that co-authors Craig D. Parks and Edward C. Chang were in no way responsible. Nature reported (July 12, 2012) that Uri Simonsohn had raised concerns about the data in the article with Sanna and his co-authors in the summer and fall of 2011, and the University of North Carolina, where the research had been conducted, formed a committee to investigate the concerns. The committee findings were never made public. **However, Sanna resigned from his then current university, the University of Michigan, in May of 2012.** The reason for his resignation was not made public.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":773.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2ixygr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What is Islamic exceptionalism? Who was the first to coin that term and what did he mean by that? I was reading an article and there is a term \"Islamic exceptionalism\" that basically says Islam is not compatible with democracy because the religion hinder the required progress of democracy. The article didn't say much further about it.  What is Islamic exceptionalism actually? From the sound it, it sounds like an outdated theory but I'm not expert. How is it received now?  And the most important, who coined the term the first time? I heard it was Bernard Lewis, I tried googling but nothing written by Bernard Lewis came up. What did he mean by that?","c_root_id_A":"cl6lvz0","c_root_id_B":"cl6ngaw","created_at_utc_A":1413045612,"created_at_utc_B":1413049324,"score_A":3,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Can you link to the article?","human_ref_B":"There have been several arguments about it, but empirically there's actually not great evidence for it.  Check out \"An 'Arab' More Than 'Muslim' Democracy Gap\".  That article argues that, with just one sensible control (income as a proxy for development, etc.), you find that non-Arab Muslim countries are *more* democratic than predicted while Arab-majority countries dramatically under-perform.   Whatever issue there is, it is one that is found in the Arab world rather than the Muslim world more generally.  Of the competing explanations for the Arab world, I think the one that I have found the most convincing is Michael Ross's \"Oil, Islam, and Women\".  Edit: oops, I just realize I linked the wrong Michael Ross article.   I meant \"Does Oil Hinder Democracy?\".  He actually finds a significant effect for Islam in addition to resources (though oil and minerals have a much larger effect on regime type), but notes that the simple correlations between Islam and oil in his data set is .44, which is a pretty strong correlation.  He tries to get around this in various ways, but that's just a data problem out there in the world.  I'll leave the original link up because I actually find that article more interesting.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3712.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1axmkk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What is your thoughts on social science lacking \"science\" in research how do you combat this? Or do you?  I work in our research office at school. At my university social science research by undergraduate students is few and far between. Much of this stems from ideas that social sciences lack \"research\" and the ideas of research are usually attributed to the \"harder\" sciences. In a discussion with an anthropology professor they even conveyed to me they try to make their work not quantifiable in terms of numbers and instead takes a very postmodernist approach to her cultural work. So I want to know what are some of your ideas towards this?","c_root_id_A":"c91qtih","c_root_id_B":"c91pvs1","created_at_utc_A":1364168984,"created_at_utc_B":1364165981,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Not everything can be quantified. Numbers can often confuse things more than clarify them. The Popperian idea that \"science\" is only about numbers and formulas is fairly recent, and does come out of the hard sciences as well as \"physics envy\" among social sciences.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying numbers aren't useful - they are great for some things, but they quiet often can't capture the whole story, and can almost always be manipulated to tell multiple different stories. Quantitative research is great and useful, especially in comparative work, but real social science isn't chemistry class - there's simply no way to boil down the billions of moving parts of the real world into a formula you can play with.  In the social sciences, a firm grasp of logic is almost always a more appropriate tool than mathematical models. Even when quantitative research is needed, it's a complement to reasoned narrative - not a substitute.","human_ref_B":">In a discussion with an anthropology professor they even conveyed to me they try to make their work not quantifiable in terms of numbers and instead takes a very postmodernist approach to her cultural work.  I am not sure what you are trying to say about this professor with this sentence. When you write \"try to make their work not quantifiable\" are you talking about choices of research designs?  >Much of this stems from ideas that social sciences lack \"research\" and the ideas of research are usually attributed to the \"harder\" sciences.   Are you saying that students don't do research because they think social science lacks research -- it's not clear who you are hearing these ideas from. There are journals upon journals of social science research. It ought to not be difficult to disabuse someone of the idea. In my field we have plenty of quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods designs. These studies have different assumptions and are evaluated as research accordingly.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3003.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"1axmkk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What is your thoughts on social science lacking \"science\" in research how do you combat this? Or do you?  I work in our research office at school. At my university social science research by undergraduate students is few and far between. Much of this stems from ideas that social sciences lack \"research\" and the ideas of research are usually attributed to the \"harder\" sciences. In a discussion with an anthropology professor they even conveyed to me they try to make their work not quantifiable in terms of numbers and instead takes a very postmodernist approach to her cultural work. So I want to know what are some of your ideas towards this?","c_root_id_A":"c9247c6","c_root_id_B":"c91pvs1","created_at_utc_A":1364229093,"created_at_utc_B":1364165981,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I feel qualified to answer this, but Senator Colburn just helped pass an amendment which basically declared Political Science not a science so I am going to abstain since the federal government doesn't recognize my work.  No angry at all.","human_ref_B":">In a discussion with an anthropology professor they even conveyed to me they try to make their work not quantifiable in terms of numbers and instead takes a very postmodernist approach to her cultural work.  I am not sure what you are trying to say about this professor with this sentence. When you write \"try to make their work not quantifiable\" are you talking about choices of research designs?  >Much of this stems from ideas that social sciences lack \"research\" and the ideas of research are usually attributed to the \"harder\" sciences.   Are you saying that students don't do research because they think social science lacks research -- it's not clear who you are hearing these ideas from. There are journals upon journals of social science research. It ought to not be difficult to disabuse someone of the idea. In my field we have plenty of quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods designs. These studies have different assumptions and are evaluated as research accordingly.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":63112.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"1axmkk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What is your thoughts on social science lacking \"science\" in research how do you combat this? Or do you?  I work in our research office at school. At my university social science research by undergraduate students is few and far between. Much of this stems from ideas that social sciences lack \"research\" and the ideas of research are usually attributed to the \"harder\" sciences. In a discussion with an anthropology professor they even conveyed to me they try to make their work not quantifiable in terms of numbers and instead takes a very postmodernist approach to her cultural work. So I want to know what are some of your ideas towards this?","c_root_id_A":"c9247c6","c_root_id_B":"c91v9zi","created_at_utc_A":1364229093,"created_at_utc_B":1364182770,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I feel qualified to answer this, but Senator Colburn just helped pass an amendment which basically declared Political Science not a science so I am going to abstain since the federal government doesn't recognize my work.  No angry at all.","human_ref_B":"As a psychologist, I find the idea that I'm not doing \"hard\" science to be rather offensive. I work exclusively with quantifiable data, and the majority of my research uses experimental methods (although I do use some survey and longitudinal methods to study some things that are difficult to capture in a laboratory setting.) In some ways, we are the odd ones out within social science, although neighboring disciplines have some common traits-- many sociologists are expert statisticians, and political scientists are starting to run experiments these days.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":46323.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1axmkk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What is your thoughts on social science lacking \"science\" in research how do you combat this? Or do you?  I work in our research office at school. At my university social science research by undergraduate students is few and far between. Much of this stems from ideas that social sciences lack \"research\" and the ideas of research are usually attributed to the \"harder\" sciences. In a discussion with an anthropology professor they even conveyed to me they try to make their work not quantifiable in terms of numbers and instead takes a very postmodernist approach to her cultural work. So I want to know what are some of your ideas towards this?","c_root_id_A":"c9247c6","c_root_id_B":"c9206qq","created_at_utc_A":1364229093,"created_at_utc_B":1364212359,"score_A":7,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I feel qualified to answer this, but Senator Colburn just helped pass an amendment which basically declared Political Science not a science so I am going to abstain since the federal government doesn't recognize my work.  No angry at all.","human_ref_B":"I don't see anything wrong with anthropologists taking a \"softer\" approach, as long as the ethnography is well done and the theory is used creatively and originally. Basically, I think the hard\/soft science dichotomy is a little silly, especially in anthropology, which is the \"big tent\" of the sciences in so many ways. So yes, when the American Anthropological Associations drops the word \"science\" from their professional statements, I think that's self-defeating in today's world.   But when evolutionary psychologists and the Selfish Gene crowd thinks that anyone who produces a theory of meaning is a mushy post-modernist, I'm inclined to believe they're just not curious or smart enough to understand the extremely challenging and rigorous terrain of the humanist and philological heritage (of which post-modernism is a part) that shaped the social sciences.   Indeed, cultural anthropology is kind of the last refuge within the social sciences for this sort of thinking, which goes back through Compte and Kant all the way to Augustine and Plato. The fact that things have become so polarized that people can make their careers exploiting this division (like Napoleon Chagnon) is a tragedy for the field. But don't be fooled, and don't let your undergraduates be fooled, into thinking the humanistic tradition is any less rigorous in its methods than the \"harder\" stuff.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16734.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"1axmkk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"What is your thoughts on social science lacking \"science\" in research how do you combat this? Or do you?  I work in our research office at school. At my university social science research by undergraduate students is few and far between. Much of this stems from ideas that social sciences lack \"research\" and the ideas of research are usually attributed to the \"harder\" sciences. In a discussion with an anthropology professor they even conveyed to me they try to make their work not quantifiable in terms of numbers and instead takes a very postmodernist approach to her cultural work. So I want to know what are some of your ideas towards this?","c_root_id_A":"c9206qq","c_root_id_B":"c91v9zi","created_at_utc_A":1364212359,"created_at_utc_B":1364182770,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I don't see anything wrong with anthropologists taking a \"softer\" approach, as long as the ethnography is well done and the theory is used creatively and originally. Basically, I think the hard\/soft science dichotomy is a little silly, especially in anthropology, which is the \"big tent\" of the sciences in so many ways. So yes, when the American Anthropological Associations drops the word \"science\" from their professional statements, I think that's self-defeating in today's world.   But when evolutionary psychologists and the Selfish Gene crowd thinks that anyone who produces a theory of meaning is a mushy post-modernist, I'm inclined to believe they're just not curious or smart enough to understand the extremely challenging and rigorous terrain of the humanist and philological heritage (of which post-modernism is a part) that shaped the social sciences.   Indeed, cultural anthropology is kind of the last refuge within the social sciences for this sort of thinking, which goes back through Compte and Kant all the way to Augustine and Plato. The fact that things have become so polarized that people can make their careers exploiting this division (like Napoleon Chagnon) is a tragedy for the field. But don't be fooled, and don't let your undergraduates be fooled, into thinking the humanistic tradition is any less rigorous in its methods than the \"harder\" stuff.","human_ref_B":"As a psychologist, I find the idea that I'm not doing \"hard\" science to be rather offensive. I work exclusively with quantifiable data, and the majority of my research uses experimental methods (although I do use some survey and longitudinal methods to study some things that are difficult to capture in a laboratory setting.) In some ways, we are the odd ones out within social science, although neighboring disciplines have some common traits-- many sociologists are expert statisticians, and political scientists are starting to run experiments these days.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29589.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"we589","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"How would population density change without immigration laws? And as a follow-up, a less social-sciency 'why do we even have immigration laws?'","c_root_id_A":"c5ckbd6","c_root_id_B":"c5clb3h","created_at_utc_A":1342030086,"created_at_utc_B":1342033670,"score_A":10,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Initially, there would be a sea of immigrants to wealthy countries with high purchasing power parity. Whether they stay or not is an open question, but most likely the largest and wealthiest cities would continue to grow, while cities that were already on the decline or were not the largest in their market would be abandoned. Eventually, per capita purchasing power would move back in line with world GDP growth, instead of being skewed to the only the wealthiest countries. Initially, this would be demographically stressful, but in the long run, it would be extremely beneficial.  We have immigration laws because the people who are currently wealthy and politically influential will see a substantial drop in their own purchasing power, initially, perhaps for a generation. That's it, outside of racist and nativist sentiment.","human_ref_B":"I asked a similar question recently and got some really interesting replies. Here's the link if you're interested http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/urkz1\/if_we_abolished_all_borders_and_made_travelling\/?sort=confidence","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3584.0,"score_ratio":1.1}
{"post_id":"we589","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"How would population density change without immigration laws? And as a follow-up, a less social-sciency 'why do we even have immigration laws?'","c_root_id_A":"c5clb3h","c_root_id_B":"c5ckc1l","created_at_utc_A":1342033670,"created_at_utc_B":1342030155,"score_A":11,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I asked a similar question recently and got some really interesting replies. Here's the link if you're interested http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AskSocialScience\/comments\/urkz1\/if_we_abolished_all_borders_and_made_travelling\/?sort=confidence","human_ref_B":"Every barrier works to stop people from passsing it, right? So we'd see move from bad to good countries (not necessary rich! some people wouldn't want to live in Norway for example).  If we're talking about long term then we can think about that using concept of steady-state economy. In this theory there is one point of equilibrium when gains and looses are equal. IF we're under this level then thing that we measure grows, if above then it shrinks. Right? Imagine this as a lake with one river flowing in and other flowing out.  So, in country that would loose population it won't do anything to steady state, so in long term there won't be difference.  In country where people are coming we'll see increase of population, but with same equilibrium we can see gradual reversion back to steady state. If there are differences in culture between cultures of host country and immigrants then we can suppose there would be difference in equilibrium state and probably long term increase in population density.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3515.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"we589","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"How would population density change without immigration laws? And as a follow-up, a less social-sciency 'why do we even have immigration laws?'","c_root_id_A":"c5cpsfm","c_root_id_B":"c5crb24","created_at_utc_A":1342050978,"created_at_utc_B":1342057563,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"This interpretation says it would be beneficial in the long-term: \"The Biggest Idea in Development that Nobody Really Tried\"","human_ref_B":"People in this thread and the previous ones answering similar questions are completely ignoring the ties people have to space and place.  Why do you suppose people currently live in harsh climates, hm?  Perhaps they cannot afford to move, regardless of restrictions on immigration.  Many have ties to the land itself, spiritual or otherwise.  Still others will remain where they bury their dead.  There's a reason most people think twice before moving if, for example, offered a better job.  To think that people will simply seek out areas of opportunity is not only ethnocentric, but wrong.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6585.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"we589","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"How would population density change without immigration laws? And as a follow-up, a less social-sciency 'why do we even have immigration laws?'","c_root_id_A":"c5crb24","c_root_id_B":"c5ckc1l","created_at_utc_A":1342057563,"created_at_utc_B":1342030155,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"People in this thread and the previous ones answering similar questions are completely ignoring the ties people have to space and place.  Why do you suppose people currently live in harsh climates, hm?  Perhaps they cannot afford to move, regardless of restrictions on immigration.  Many have ties to the land itself, spiritual or otherwise.  Still others will remain where they bury their dead.  There's a reason most people think twice before moving if, for example, offered a better job.  To think that people will simply seek out areas of opportunity is not only ethnocentric, but wrong.","human_ref_B":"Every barrier works to stop people from passsing it, right? So we'd see move from bad to good countries (not necessary rich! some people wouldn't want to live in Norway for example).  If we're talking about long term then we can think about that using concept of steady-state economy. In this theory there is one point of equilibrium when gains and looses are equal. IF we're under this level then thing that we measure grows, if above then it shrinks. Right? Imagine this as a lake with one river flowing in and other flowing out.  So, in country that would loose population it won't do anything to steady state, so in long term there won't be difference.  In country where people are coming we'll see increase of population, but with same equilibrium we can see gradual reversion back to steady state. If there are differences in culture between cultures of host country and immigrants then we can suppose there would be difference in equilibrium state and probably long term increase in population density.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":27408.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"we589","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"How would population density change without immigration laws? And as a follow-up, a less social-sciency 'why do we even have immigration laws?'","c_root_id_A":"c5cr2lm","c_root_id_B":"c5crb24","created_at_utc_A":1342056548,"created_at_utc_B":1342057563,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"One thing that would likely happen is that there would be a shift in population from poorly governed societies to well governed ones. This would then open up more competition between governments to attract and retain citizens. The result would be a spread of 'best practices' in governance and a decrease in rent-seeking and rights abusing behavior.","human_ref_B":"People in this thread and the previous ones answering similar questions are completely ignoring the ties people have to space and place.  Why do you suppose people currently live in harsh climates, hm?  Perhaps they cannot afford to move, regardless of restrictions on immigration.  Many have ties to the land itself, spiritual or otherwise.  Still others will remain where they bury their dead.  There's a reason most people think twice before moving if, for example, offered a better job.  To think that people will simply seek out areas of opportunity is not only ethnocentric, but wrong.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1015.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"we589","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"How would population density change without immigration laws? And as a follow-up, a less social-sciency 'why do we even have immigration laws?'","c_root_id_A":"c5cpsfm","c_root_id_B":"c5ckc1l","created_at_utc_A":1342050978,"created_at_utc_B":1342030155,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This interpretation says it would be beneficial in the long-term: \"The Biggest Idea in Development that Nobody Really Tried\"","human_ref_B":"Every barrier works to stop people from passsing it, right? So we'd see move from bad to good countries (not necessary rich! some people wouldn't want to live in Norway for example).  If we're talking about long term then we can think about that using concept of steady-state economy. In this theory there is one point of equilibrium when gains and looses are equal. IF we're under this level then thing that we measure grows, if above then it shrinks. Right? Imagine this as a lake with one river flowing in and other flowing out.  So, in country that would loose population it won't do anything to steady state, so in long term there won't be difference.  In country where people are coming we'll see increase of population, but with same equilibrium we can see gradual reversion back to steady state. If there are differences in culture between cultures of host country and immigrants then we can suppose there would be difference in equilibrium state and probably long term increase in population density.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20823.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1sllci","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What would happen if Bill Gates cashed out and burnt all his money? Hypothetical deflationary value of $1?","c_root_id_A":"cdys3mg","c_root_id_B":"cdyvgk9","created_at_utc_A":1386728045,"created_at_utc_B":1386735347,"score_A":9,"score_B":36,"human_ref_A":"Not much. His total net worth according to Forbes is 72 billion dollars. Compare this to the US economy which is currently somewhere around 16.66 trillion dollars. This means his net worth is equal to .4 percent of the US economy. Even with his immense wealth, Bill Gates could only potentially have a small effect on the overall economy of the US, never mind that of the entire world.","human_ref_B":"Not to detract from the hypothetical deflationary effects (I agree with \/u\/dailydouble56 that the effect would be pretty small), but I think the practical mechanisms behind such a cash out would have pretty significant impact. Why? Because nearly all of Gates's fortune is in Microsoft stock. With 4.5% of the total shares outstanding, Gates is the largest single shareholder, and liquidating them all at the same time can have some pretty big impacts.  To understand why, you have to understand how stock market trades work. As of today, Microsoft has 8.35 billion shares outstanding. With 4.5%, that means Gates owns about 375,750,000 shares of Microsoft stock.   Stock market transactions in shares of companies like Microsoft occur between buyers and sellers. Sets of buyers put out offers at different prices, and sellers do the same. When a buyer and seller meet in price (or more precisely when the highest offer to buy meets the lowest offer to sell, with the difference going to those making the exchange happen), they make the exchange and leave the market. The price of a stock changes depending on how many of each group there are in the market, and at what prices they want to make transactions at. If there are more buyers than sellers, then buyers will run out of people to transact with at the current price, so they must be willing to pay more for the stock to match with sellers demanding a higher price. When that happens, the price of stock will rise. If more people want to sell than buy, the price must drop to bring those people willing to buy only at the lower price, and the market price falls.   Now what does this mean for Microsoft and Bill Gates? The number of shares traded in a day is referred to as volume. While the volume for a stock on any given day changes depending on how many traders there are, the daily average for Microsoft over the last 3 months was about 44 million shares. Remember, Gates has over 375 million shares. This means that if he were to immediately try to sell his shares, he would need to find enough individuals to purchase every single one. Yet on any given day, only 44 million shares of Microsoft are traded. Gates would put up his shares on the market for sale and, absent an anomalous day of high volume trading, he would exhaust the entire pool of people willing to buy at the market price. In order to sell he would have to reach out and locate more individuals willing to buy at lower prices. This would result in lower and lower prices as Gates attempted to sell all of his shares, and Microsoft's share price would plummet.   You may be wondering how far the Microsoft share price would drop. It's unclear. It could drop just a little if buyers stepped up to purchase the shares around market price, or it could plummet almost to zero as no one would be willing to buy at any price due to the huge number of shares available in the open market. I doubt it would fall that far, but no matter the degree, Microsoft would greatly fall in value. This price plummet would affect not only Microsoft, but also every index fund the stock is a part of as well as the many mutual funds and other institutional investors that own the stock as part of a larger portfolio.   When it comes down to it, I think the liquidation of Gates's fortune would cause some big ripples in the equities market. Whether they are permanent is another story, but the effects need not last forever to have some big impacts.   Hope this helps!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7302.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"15l4qd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"What would happen if Turkey joined the European Union? Of course, this is only under the assumption that the other countries would accept them. How would their economy change? Would it be beneficial for them or should they just avoid it all together?","c_root_id_A":"c7nr29u","c_root_id_B":"c7no1ao","created_at_utc_A":1356779916,"created_at_utc_B":1356759443,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"It is also worth mentioning that Turkey is starting to loose interest in joining the European Union. The AKP government is more interested in becoming a \"strong power in the Middle East\" rather than just to be part of a Union, which is right now pretty strong influenced by the politics of Germany and France. Therefore, Turkey is more interested in relations with the USA and its neighbor states...or even Russia (they are building new pipe lines through the black sea to Turkey).","human_ref_B":"George Friedman has written a bunch about Turkey - basically he sees them becoming a superpower during this century.  Regarding the EU question - if they get admitted it would be amazing for Europe and amazing for Turkey. It seems unlikely right now but let's face facts, so did a united Germany, a single currency and so on.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20473.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"lynxv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"What would happen if a significant number of customers closed their bank accounts in a short amount of time? This is an economics question about the current call to close your bank accounts. I'm sorry if this is too political of a question, but I was curious as to what would happen if a significant number of people pulled their money out from the big banks and opened accounts with credit unions. Specifically, what would be the potential economic impact if a) the banks lose all that money and, b) local credit unions receive all this money.  Please keep your opinions on the OWS movement out of this. Though OWS inspired this question, that's not what this is about.","c_root_id_A":"c2wpwmd","c_root_id_B":"c2wnuki","created_at_utc_A":1320329815,"created_at_utc_B":1320302272,"score_A":9,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"So as has been pointed out, there will be a Liquidity Crisis as well as a Bank Run, but there will also be larger fall out from a run on the banks as well.  If the bank that has the run on it is one of the larger banks, BoA, Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, Capitol One, etc. there would be larger issues at stake than peoples college funds.  These banks aren't your local credit union and have global reach.  Thanks to deregulation these banks not only are where you but your lemonade stand money, but large corporations get their loans as well as investors get collateral for major Wall Street transactions.  They also hold massive amounts of bonds, stocks, and other financial abstracts.  If people made a run on these banks, they would be forced to sell off these assets in order to acquire the hard cash the customers would need in order to move their funds.  Now because they would be dumping hundreds of millions or even up to a billion dollars onto the market in the span of a few hours or days, the markets would spiral.    It can go either way at this point on Wall Street.  Either the investors can snap up those assets coming onto the market driving the prices up, which means the index goes up, so the bank ends up cushioning the impact, though there will be an impact...  If the opposite happens and a panic occurs, we have a problem.  The bank begins to dump its assets, since no investor wants to be left holding the bag on assets being dumped, they start selling too.  Soon several hundred million of specific assets in everything from chicken farming to aero-space technology takes a hit, which means peoples 401ks, other banks assets, investment firms, etc. all take a major hit.  Because these stocks take a major hit, other related stocks (tractors for the chicken farms) also get hit.  Now, because one of the major banks is getting rolled, the others are going to panic too.  They might dump some assets onto the market in order to be able to handle any runs they have which can severely aggravate the issue.  Soon the Fed and the FDIC as well as the FBI will come swooping in.  They will probably order the bank to close shop for a few days in order to \"cool them off\". The FDIC and FBI as well as other Treasury Agents will come in and start securing the bank.  Their job will be to try to keep that bank afloat long enough to either shore it up and keep it alive in some manner or seize it and sell it off in a controlled manner.   You will have the local police sitting outside the local branches doing crowd control.  Bloomberg T.V., the Wall Street Journal, Fox, CNN, MSNBC, would jump on this like a ravenous pack of zombies (no political commentary intended).  This would exasperate the crisis.   There would be major statements from the bank, the Fed, the Treasury, the White House, a few Congressmen, the punditry would light up like crazy.  Glen Becks head would likely explode...mixed reactions to this would occur.  Now, because these larger banks are global players and hold assets for several international corporations, as well as foreign governments, this would spiral into other international markets.  There would be very little good times had by all.","human_ref_B":"The bank would have a Liquidity Crisis. It's probably one of the surest ways to crowd source a hurt on a bank.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":27543.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"6hhejl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Which institutions or academics have most thoroughly researched the democratic effects of different electoral systems? including things like districting, the voting age, proportional representation, election frequency, etc. Hello  Are there any notable institutions or academics that have thoroughly researched and assessed modern electoral systems and for sake of a better term democratic responsiveness. I'm interested in the effects of districting (how certain districts were established, and research into districting by accessibility to make for ease of voting), effects of proportional representation vs first past the post, research into what the optimal voting age would be, effects of the citizenship process on electorates (effect of immigrants, and whether easier paths to citizenship lead to more democratic involvement), along with research into optimal election frequency.   Best","c_root_id_A":"diz1s6s","c_root_id_B":"diyjnfa","created_at_utc_A":1497591891,"created_at_utc_B":1497564998,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Almost all of the things that you mentioned in your post are actually areas of active research in political science with loads of active researchers investigating them. (The main exception is optimal voting age because just about any operationalization of \"optimal\" will be very normatively based and will probably be more speculative than scientific) Surveying these fields would be a encyclopedic effort and I'm, to be candid, too lazy to do that. However, I will link to some of the articles I've come across in grad school thusfar. I highly recommend looking at the references (especially in the review articles) or checking out the articles since that have cited them via Google Scholar. That'll help you dive down the rabbit hole: (Edited for spelling and formatting)  **Election Systems:**  *Feree et al. 2014  *Benoit 2007  *Cox 2015  *Grofman 2016  **Redistricting**  *La Raja 2009  *Altman et al. 2005  *Lublin and McDonald 2006  **Immigration**  *Togeby 2010  *Ramakrishnan and Epenshade 2001  *Maxwell 2009  *Junn 2000  *DeSipio 1996  *Aleksynska 2010  **Election Timing\/Frequency**  *Amacher and Boyes 1978   *Boyd 1986  **Bonus: Electoral Reform**  *Scheiner 2008  Again, this is all just the tip of the iceberg. Enjoy!","human_ref_B":"I'm sure there has been a lot work done in this field but one thing that comes to mind is Kenneth Arrow's \"impossibility\" theorem. It states that no ranked voting electoral system can convert the ranked preferences of individuals into a community-wide ranking while also meeting a pre-specified set of criteria.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":26893.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1nkp98","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"In which type of environment do people thrive the best? Where are people the happiest? Urban, rural, something in between? Hi, AskSocialScience!  I come from a rather rural place, lived there for quite a few years, but due to university studies I had to move in to a city. As a somewhat reclusive person, it's no wonder I liked it better back in my rural town: less people, more animals, less asphalt, more nature and the feeling of community (though, to be honest, the lack of a) anonymity and b) of new faces were quite influential in my decision to get out of there).  But that's me. How about humans in general? What does social science have to say about it?   **TL;DR:** I myself enjoy rural settings more than urban, but generally, what type of human settlement do people thrive in the most?   PS: Oh, and if anyone has any recommended literature, fire away!","c_root_id_A":"ccjjg3e","c_root_id_B":"ccjmduu","created_at_utc_A":1380725161,"created_at_utc_B":1380733043,"score_A":4,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Your question makes it sound simple, but reality is probably much too complex for a simple answer.  For example, this study (see cite) by Iwasaki and colleagues, looking at social correlates of mortality, finds interactions between urban\/rural living and different types of social connections on mortality. The same type of social support had different effects in the city and the country.  In general, there are just so many variables. You don't mention the role of poverty, social organization, livability of urban\/places places, war, and so on. It's one thing to ask whether American middle class white people in good health with strong social ties to family, friends, and community are happier and healthier in a prosperous, livable city or in a peaceful small town. It's another question to ask whether economically marginal persons in Afghanistan do better as subsistence farmers in the country or in a slum at the edge of a city.   Iwasaki M, Otani T, Ohta A, Yosiaki S, Kuroiwa M, Suzuki S. Rural-urban differences in sociodemographic, social network and lifestyle factors related to mortality of middle-aged Japanese men from the Komo-Ise cohort study. Journal Of Epidemiology \/ Japan Epidemiological Association. March 2002;12(2):93-104.","human_ref_B":"This paper here claims that life satisfaction is higher in rural areas in 27 EU member states, this other paper however claims there's no substantial difference.  S\u00f8rensen, Jens F. L. 2013. Rural\u2013Urban Differences in Life Satisfaction: Evidence from the European Union. Regional Studies.  Shucksmith, M., Cameron, S., Merridew, T. and Pichler, F. 2009. Urban\u2013rural differences in quality of life across the European Union. Regional Studies, 43: 1275\u20131289.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7882.0,"score_ratio":3.75}
{"post_id":"1nkp98","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"In which type of environment do people thrive the best? Where are people the happiest? Urban, rural, something in between? Hi, AskSocialScience!  I come from a rather rural place, lived there for quite a few years, but due to university studies I had to move in to a city. As a somewhat reclusive person, it's no wonder I liked it better back in my rural town: less people, more animals, less asphalt, more nature and the feeling of community (though, to be honest, the lack of a) anonymity and b) of new faces were quite influential in my decision to get out of there).  But that's me. How about humans in general? What does social science have to say about it?   **TL;DR:** I myself enjoy rural settings more than urban, but generally, what type of human settlement do people thrive in the most?   PS: Oh, and if anyone has any recommended literature, fire away!","c_root_id_A":"ccjjeiw","c_root_id_B":"ccjmduu","created_at_utc_A":1380725030,"created_at_utc_B":1380733043,"score_A":2,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"If you take lifespan as a proxy for well-being, which is a reasonable thing to do, urban areas are doing rather well lately.","human_ref_B":"This paper here claims that life satisfaction is higher in rural areas in 27 EU member states, this other paper however claims there's no substantial difference.  S\u00f8rensen, Jens F. L. 2013. Rural\u2013Urban Differences in Life Satisfaction: Evidence from the European Union. Regional Studies.  Shucksmith, M., Cameron, S., Merridew, T. and Pichler, F. 2009. Urban\u2013rural differences in quality of life across the European Union. Regional Studies, 43: 1275\u20131289.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8013.0,"score_ratio":7.5}
{"post_id":"1nkp98","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"In which type of environment do people thrive the best? Where are people the happiest? Urban, rural, something in between? Hi, AskSocialScience!  I come from a rather rural place, lived there for quite a few years, but due to university studies I had to move in to a city. As a somewhat reclusive person, it's no wonder I liked it better back in my rural town: less people, more animals, less asphalt, more nature and the feeling of community (though, to be honest, the lack of a) anonymity and b) of new faces were quite influential in my decision to get out of there).  But that's me. How about humans in general? What does social science have to say about it?   **TL;DR:** I myself enjoy rural settings more than urban, but generally, what type of human settlement do people thrive in the most?   PS: Oh, and if anyone has any recommended literature, fire away!","c_root_id_A":"ccjjg3e","c_root_id_B":"ccjjeiw","created_at_utc_A":1380725161,"created_at_utc_B":1380725030,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Your question makes it sound simple, but reality is probably much too complex for a simple answer.  For example, this study (see cite) by Iwasaki and colleagues, looking at social correlates of mortality, finds interactions between urban\/rural living and different types of social connections on mortality. The same type of social support had different effects in the city and the country.  In general, there are just so many variables. You don't mention the role of poverty, social organization, livability of urban\/places places, war, and so on. It's one thing to ask whether American middle class white people in good health with strong social ties to family, friends, and community are happier and healthier in a prosperous, livable city or in a peaceful small town. It's another question to ask whether economically marginal persons in Afghanistan do better as subsistence farmers in the country or in a slum at the edge of a city.   Iwasaki M, Otani T, Ohta A, Yosiaki S, Kuroiwa M, Suzuki S. Rural-urban differences in sociodemographic, social network and lifestyle factors related to mortality of middle-aged Japanese men from the Komo-Ise cohort study. Journal Of Epidemiology \/ Japan Epidemiological Association. March 2002;12(2):93-104.","human_ref_B":"If you take lifespan as a proxy for well-being, which is a reasonable thing to do, urban areas are doing rather well lately.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":131.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"x5uig","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Pros and Cons of Auditing the Fed. I'd like to hear thoughts on the recent bill from some economists.","c_root_id_A":"c5jgn8s","c_root_id_B":"c5jhc7x","created_at_utc_A":1343267780,"created_at_utc_B":1343270398,"score_A":10,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"Pros: transparency. The more The People know about what its leaders are doing (to a certain extent), the better.   Cons: the Fed officials need to have the ability to have frank conversations and be constructively argumentative with each other in establishing monetary policy. Knowing you will be watched can lead people to change their behaviors away from what they think is optimal in achieving a goal (ie, kick starting the economy with monetary policy) and towards discussions that will have more personal benefits (ie, if one of the bankers hopes for a future in politics). Also, the Fed may undertake loans to bail out struggling banks that, should the loan be made public, would cause the bank to fail when it would not fail otherwise.  Overall, I think the transactions the Fed undertakes should be audited and the details should be made public. There are some issues and discussions which should remain private for a certain period of time (as they do now, where they release the minutes of the Fed meeting on a substantial delay), but in general, more transparency is normatively better than less transparency.","human_ref_B":"It's a tough issue because it's at the intersection of 2 important, popular beliefs and some question whether they can coexist in this case. Those 2 beliefs are:  1. That transparency is generally a good thing. 2. That the Fed should remain immune to short term political pressures.  While some people maintain that the Fed can be transparent and still remain immune to political pressures, many people question why you would audit an institution if you have no desire to influence it in any way. What if the audit turns up something that is politically unpopular and a politician decides to exploit it for political gain? Another argument is that transparency is inherently a form of influence.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2618.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"qa4iym","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"How much weight to give one study? (See description) &#x200B;  Often, when the media reports on social science findings, they will cite a single study as evidence for a claim. I do not come from a social science background, but I do remember being told in Psychology 101 that no single study is authoritative. Given, that average people like me do not have time to read a multitude of studies and determine where the consensus lies, how can we have confidence in any  assertion about the findings of social science?  \\*If this isn't the right subreddit for this question, where should I post it?","c_root_id_A":"hh157lf","c_root_id_B":"hh11qpe","created_at_utc_A":1634504903,"created_at_utc_B":1634503451,"score_A":12,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The media tends to report studies which have been press-released. Notoriously unreliable (and not just for being single studies) but you shouldn't be using the media as a source of scientific information in the first place.  Systematic reviews aim to identify all the relevant studies published (and sometimes also unpublished) of a particular question and consider the body of evidence as a whole, with meta-analysis where populations and outcomes are sufficiently similar to combine. The Campbell Collaboration specialises in this sort of work for social science, following the lead of the Cochrane Collaboration (for medical and health research).  As well as the Campbell Collaboration site, you could try <topic key words> plus \"systematic review\" in Google Scholar.","human_ref_B":"I don't know enough about the subject to give an in-depth answer, but you're right to be wary about media reporting on social science claims. The social sciences have been going through a replication crisis in which a large proportion of studies fail to produce consistent results when repeated. And media reporting on social science is often just... bad.  You might find this article by Kelsey Piper at Vox worth reading. It provides a summary of the replication crisis, discusses research on simple checks to predict whether a study is replicable as well as research into how good laypeople are at predicting whether a study will replicate.  Stuart Ritchie also recently published a book called *Science Fictions: Exposing Fraud, Bias, Negligence and Hype in Science*, which might help give you a sense for which studies are trustworthy and which are not. I've only read the first couple of chapters but it seems quite good so far.  Personally, I don't think there's any single trick to calibrating your views well. It's a mixture of thinking about whether the claim seems plausible on its face, understanding the incentives for media to publish certain kinds of stories, and figuring out the degree to which you trust certain sources of information. Plus a mysterious spidey-sense for spotting bullshit always helps.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1452.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"ar1lek","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Any advice on where to find LatAm election data?","c_root_id_A":"egkdqct","c_root_id_B":"egkh3g7","created_at_utc_A":1550274652,"created_at_utc_B":1550277572,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Try \/r\/datasets","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/libguides.princeton.edu\/elections\/foreign  https:\/\/virginiaoliveros.com\/data\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2920.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"wfhvu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"GDP per capita vs Average Income, do they account for children\/the elderly? So, the US GDP per capita (Nominal) is about ($48,000 Source).  The median household income is about $50,000 (Source).  My impression of GDP per capita is that it equals GDP\/population, not adjusted for the fact that kids and the elderly are out of the workforce.  So why is household income so similar?  Shouldn't it be like 2-3 times higher, since that is how many people are in the average household.  What gives?","c_root_id_A":"c5cx2p6","c_root_id_B":"c5cwhrm","created_at_utc_A":1342093226,"created_at_utc_B":1342086682,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Household incomes and GDP are not directly related.  GDP is the market value of all goods and services produced\/rendered in the country.    Since people's incomes may be saved and goods may be sold or purchased from other countries the discrepancy is not surprising.  I'll make up a simple example to illustrate.  We have a median household where both earners make $25,000.  They are the only people in the country.  Each worker makes $48,000 worth of widgets per year for the company.  In this example the household income of the \"country\" is $50,000 and the GDP per capita is $48,000.","human_ref_B":"I'd assume it's because the GDP per capita is a mean while the household income figure is a median. The income distribution is skewed towards the top, so the median is lower than the mean once you adjust for household size.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6544.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1vva6u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"The word \"economics\" came from the word \"\u0153conomicus,\" mainly earliest (I think) cited by Thomas Aquinas or Al Ghazali, but I was unable to find source on Thomas Aquinas citing Al Ghazali, nonetheless any sources on Xenophon\/Aristotle\/Plato\/Socrates with the words \u0153conomicus. Any help?","c_root_id_A":"cewa70o","c_root_id_B":"cew7a4r","created_at_utc_A":1390428145,"created_at_utc_B":1390422559,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Xenophon, (430 to 352 B.C.) - Wrote the Oeconomicus as a guide to public and private affairs.   Kennedy, Christopher. The evolution of great world cities: Urban wealth and economic growth. University of Toronto Press, 2011. Page 113.  Also see - Ekelund Jr. and Hebert, Robert. A History of Economic Theory and Method: Sixth Edition. 2012. Page 10.   Now for the good stuff - My understanding is that oikonomics in Xenophon mainly referred to the management of household finances. There was another greek word referring to public business affairs, from which oikonomics was rather rigidly split for a number of centuries. Will dig up a reference when I'm not at work...","human_ref_B":"I am not sure I understand what you're asking, but you can find the etymology of the word 'economic' here: http:\/\/etymonline.com\/index.php?term=economic&allowed_in_frame=0","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5586.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1j2163","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Is there a social scientific equivalent to what A Brief History of Time is to popular science? I have some friends who are getting me interested in science writings like Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! and A Brief History of Time. Basically, science writing for the general population. Is there a social scientific equivalent to what these books are? Something I could recommend to a math major to get him interested and to understand the basic principles of social science?","c_root_id_A":"cbaknw9","c_root_id_B":"cbaizb3","created_at_utc_A":1374819617,"created_at_utc_B":1374813292,"score_A":22,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Despite its many criticisms, *Guns Germs and Steel* and other mass-media publications by Jared Diamond probably fits the criteria. His work is geared more toward the anthropology and human geography side of the social sciences.","human_ref_B":"Q is a bit too broad--As Brief History is about, as I understand it, mainly physics\/astrophysics, not all the \"hard sciences,\" so there is no book that covers all social sciences.   For Marxist sociology\/Historical sociology, I'd recommend Zinn's People's History of the U.S.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6325.0,"score_ratio":1.8333333333}
{"post_id":"1j2163","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Is there a social scientific equivalent to what A Brief History of Time is to popular science? I have some friends who are getting me interested in science writings like Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! and A Brief History of Time. Basically, science writing for the general population. Is there a social scientific equivalent to what these books are? Something I could recommend to a math major to get him interested and to understand the basic principles of social science?","c_root_id_A":"cbaknw9","c_root_id_B":"cbaguat","created_at_utc_A":1374819617,"created_at_utc_B":1374806619,"score_A":22,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Despite its many criticisms, *Guns Germs and Steel* and other mass-media publications by Jared Diamond probably fits the criteria. His work is geared more toward the anthropology and human geography side of the social sciences.","human_ref_B":"Within economics there are a lot of 'publicly written' books. Authors within fields like developmental economics are quite common among this batch (Paul Collier's \"The Bottom Billion\" and William Easterly's \"The White Man's Burden\" among others!).   More general books like Steven Landsburg's \"The Armchair Economist\" and \"More Sex is Safer Sex\" have been relatively popular. There are also books like \"Freakonomics,\" which generally get a thrashing but talk about a variety of economic studies in laymen terms.   I've sadly stayed further away from the pop economics books, but they're certainly out there.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12998.0,"score_ratio":2.4444444444}
{"post_id":"1j2163","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Is there a social scientific equivalent to what A Brief History of Time is to popular science? I have some friends who are getting me interested in science writings like Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! and A Brief History of Time. Basically, science writing for the general population. Is there a social scientific equivalent to what these books are? Something I could recommend to a math major to get him interested and to understand the basic principles of social science?","c_root_id_A":"cbaizb3","c_root_id_B":"cbaguat","created_at_utc_A":1374813292,"created_at_utc_B":1374806619,"score_A":12,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Q is a bit too broad--As Brief History is about, as I understand it, mainly physics\/astrophysics, not all the \"hard sciences,\" so there is no book that covers all social sciences.   For Marxist sociology\/Historical sociology, I'd recommend Zinn's People's History of the U.S.","human_ref_B":"Within economics there are a lot of 'publicly written' books. Authors within fields like developmental economics are quite common among this batch (Paul Collier's \"The Bottom Billion\" and William Easterly's \"The White Man's Burden\" among others!).   More general books like Steven Landsburg's \"The Armchair Economist\" and \"More Sex is Safer Sex\" have been relatively popular. There are also books like \"Freakonomics,\" which generally get a thrashing but talk about a variety of economic studies in laymen terms.   I've sadly stayed further away from the pop economics books, but they're certainly out there.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6673.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8qus9c","c_root_id_B":"c8quw2c","created_at_utc_A":1362591994,"created_at_utc_B":1362592314,"score_A":6,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I'm all for a discussion of what needs to be cited. In the thread you linked to about the minimum wage, there's nothing to cite. No one has tried the policy that was proposed, no one has even written about it to my knowledge, so the best you can do is give an informed opinion. People ask a lot of questions like this about economic policy. For the min-wage question, there a few papers that I can think of on enforcement of tax policy that would be relevant, but it's only tangential.  I share the opinion that personal experience is relevant. People ask a lot of questions here that you can't really cite academic papers on. We should either tighten the definition of the type of questions that are legitimate--i.e. a \"speculative\" tag on posts--or allow people to bring in personal experience or speculation. Is there a way for posters to label their comments as \"speculative\", \"personal\/anecdotal\", or \"academic\"?","human_ref_B":"One of the most important tenets of science is falsification, not verification. Anecdotes and personal experiences are not useful when it comes to building a body of knowledge, this is only achieved through theory-testing. Of course personal experience has value and induction can be useful but if the purpose of this sub is to provide the best possible answers, anecdotes and stories are not relevant IMHO. I think we should ask ourselves, does it improve the quality of this sub for people to tell stories and share personal experiences? Personally, I think not. It makes everyone feel like an armchair expert or a backseat scientist when that isn't the case. A well-researched, well-cited response is not the same as someone's personal experience - if our goal is to find out the Truth of an event or phenomenon. If we equate stories with cited responses, we're essentially saying they are equal, when this shouldn't be the case.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":320.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8quq3i","c_root_id_B":"c8quw2c","created_at_utc_A":1362591811,"created_at_utc_B":1362592314,"score_A":3,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I believe that personal experience is a form of empirical data. However, like all data it needs to be triangulated, peer reviewed, and be observable. So yes, I think it is appropriate for personal experience to be shared here, but that it is our jobs as scientists to verify, discuss, and situate that experience before we accept it as valid.","human_ref_B":"One of the most important tenets of science is falsification, not verification. Anecdotes and personal experiences are not useful when it comes to building a body of knowledge, this is only achieved through theory-testing. Of course personal experience has value and induction can be useful but if the purpose of this sub is to provide the best possible answers, anecdotes and stories are not relevant IMHO. I think we should ask ourselves, does it improve the quality of this sub for people to tell stories and share personal experiences? Personally, I think not. It makes everyone feel like an armchair expert or a backseat scientist when that isn't the case. A well-researched, well-cited response is not the same as someone's personal experience - if our goal is to find out the Truth of an event or phenomenon. If we equate stories with cited responses, we're essentially saying they are equal, when this shouldn't be the case.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":503.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8qtin9","c_root_id_B":"c8quw2c","created_at_utc_A":1362588066,"created_at_utc_B":1362592314,"score_A":2,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Personal experiences can always be posted as sub top level comments.    It is a little weird to find 3\/4 of the top level comments deleted - surely there's got to be some research out there?  Even citing a more general study of paleness, which could then be enhanced by subsequent comments drawing from personal experience.","human_ref_B":"One of the most important tenets of science is falsification, not verification. Anecdotes and personal experiences are not useful when it comes to building a body of knowledge, this is only achieved through theory-testing. Of course personal experience has value and induction can be useful but if the purpose of this sub is to provide the best possible answers, anecdotes and stories are not relevant IMHO. I think we should ask ourselves, does it improve the quality of this sub for people to tell stories and share personal experiences? Personally, I think not. It makes everyone feel like an armchair expert or a backseat scientist when that isn't the case. A well-researched, well-cited response is not the same as someone's personal experience - if our goal is to find out the Truth of an event or phenomenon. If we equate stories with cited responses, we're essentially saying they are equal, when this shouldn't be the case.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4248.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8quq3i","c_root_id_B":"c8qus9c","created_at_utc_A":1362591811,"created_at_utc_B":1362591994,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I believe that personal experience is a form of empirical data. However, like all data it needs to be triangulated, peer reviewed, and be observable. So yes, I think it is appropriate for personal experience to be shared here, but that it is our jobs as scientists to verify, discuss, and situate that experience before we accept it as valid.","human_ref_B":"I'm all for a discussion of what needs to be cited. In the thread you linked to about the minimum wage, there's nothing to cite. No one has tried the policy that was proposed, no one has even written about it to my knowledge, so the best you can do is give an informed opinion. People ask a lot of questions like this about economic policy. For the min-wage question, there a few papers that I can think of on enforcement of tax policy that would be relevant, but it's only tangential.  I share the opinion that personal experience is relevant. People ask a lot of questions here that you can't really cite academic papers on. We should either tighten the definition of the type of questions that are legitimate--i.e. a \"speculative\" tag on posts--or allow people to bring in personal experience or speculation. Is there a way for posters to label their comments as \"speculative\", \"personal\/anecdotal\", or \"academic\"?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":183.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8qus9c","c_root_id_B":"c8qtin9","created_at_utc_A":1362591994,"created_at_utc_B":1362588066,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'm all for a discussion of what needs to be cited. In the thread you linked to about the minimum wage, there's nothing to cite. No one has tried the policy that was proposed, no one has even written about it to my knowledge, so the best you can do is give an informed opinion. People ask a lot of questions like this about economic policy. For the min-wage question, there a few papers that I can think of on enforcement of tax policy that would be relevant, but it's only tangential.  I share the opinion that personal experience is relevant. People ask a lot of questions here that you can't really cite academic papers on. We should either tighten the definition of the type of questions that are legitimate--i.e. a \"speculative\" tag on posts--or allow people to bring in personal experience or speculation. Is there a way for posters to label their comments as \"speculative\", \"personal\/anecdotal\", or \"academic\"?","human_ref_B":"Personal experiences can always be posted as sub top level comments.    It is a little weird to find 3\/4 of the top level comments deleted - surely there's got to be some research out there?  Even citing a more general study of paleness, which could then be enhanced by subsequent comments drawing from personal experience.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3928.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8qxc1j","c_root_id_B":"c8r18b1","created_at_utc_A":1362599477,"created_at_utc_B":1362610740,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"If ethnographies are not embraced, the name of the sub should not be \"social science\".   The sidebar mentions \"history\", \"law\", \"criminology\", \"philospophy\" &\"anthropology\" among others. Many of these bodies of knowledge are vocational, and\/or rely on \"experience accounts\" as evidence.   Someone trained by authorities in one of these fields might reasonably expect to use personal experience in the context of social science, as the authorities in these fields do themselves.","human_ref_B":"Hi, Adenil. As the mod who erased a lot of comments this morning (prompting this discussion) I thought I should chime in.  **First**, thanks for giving the feedback! I think people generally overestimate how much power the mods have over the subreddit, relative to the community. It's incredibly important that the mods and the community have broad agreement over the subreddit's goal and policies. Mods can delete posts and ban people, which are two powerful, but unsubtle tools. I'd much rather the community post\/ask for citations. If people don't like the subreddit's policies, they should tell us. We only instituted the hard rule set after receiving lots of META] posts calling for it.  **Second**, I think that we really should try make this a communuity that is based on the academic research. If you want to hear a random person on the internet's opinion there are already lots of options available (most germaine to us is of course r\/askreddit)! I don't know of anywhere else on the internet where you can ask a question and get answer from social scientists in many fields. I think its a great resource. - lets keep it that way.  **Third**, you *can* post personal experience. However we ask that you either do it as:  * A verified expert panelist * In addition to a summary of the academic research * In a second tier comment  I think that's appropriate. Note that the[thread you linked in your post is (IMHO) in much better condition now, post-speculation removal. The top comment now contains a reference in *addition* to personal experience. This allows people to verify the chain of reasoning that led to the opinion. And check out this post which ties in language and genetics! It isn't the case that this was an area \"no one has really studied\". Once it was made clear that we expect citations, citations appeared. If there aren't citations, a verified expert can give some background knowledge and theory that might help the OP.  **Finally**, I feel like a lot of the feedback I've been getting is that people want us to remove to \"bad\" speculation, but keep the \"good\" speculation. Unfortunately, given the fractious state of the social sciences the mods can't necesarily distinguish one from the other! I can tell when someone knows what they're talking about in an economics post, and I'm 50\/50 for psychology. But I'm lost with regards to sociology, anthropology, polisci etc. I think its better for moderators to work under a well-defined rule (\"top level comments much have sources unless they are from a verified expert\") than pick and choose comments to remove or approve based on subjective impulses.  (Also, I didn't see the economics post you reference. Specualtion that is \"common sense\" in economics should be removed as well. There's a lot of responses we get that are from someone who \"ran a business\" or \"took economics 101\" that is at-odds with the academic literature. Those shouldn't be top-level responses unless thy have citations.)  ***  Again, thanks for the feedback! If the community think we should take a different approach to moderating, we'd love to hear it, and certainly will consider making any suggested changes.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11263.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8quq3i","c_root_id_B":"c8r18b1","created_at_utc_A":1362591811,"created_at_utc_B":1362610740,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I believe that personal experience is a form of empirical data. However, like all data it needs to be triangulated, peer reviewed, and be observable. So yes, I think it is appropriate for personal experience to be shared here, but that it is our jobs as scientists to verify, discuss, and situate that experience before we accept it as valid.","human_ref_B":"Hi, Adenil. As the mod who erased a lot of comments this morning (prompting this discussion) I thought I should chime in.  **First**, thanks for giving the feedback! I think people generally overestimate how much power the mods have over the subreddit, relative to the community. It's incredibly important that the mods and the community have broad agreement over the subreddit's goal and policies. Mods can delete posts and ban people, which are two powerful, but unsubtle tools. I'd much rather the community post\/ask for citations. If people don't like the subreddit's policies, they should tell us. We only instituted the hard rule set after receiving lots of META] posts calling for it.  **Second**, I think that we really should try make this a communuity that is based on the academic research. If you want to hear a random person on the internet's opinion there are already lots of options available (most germaine to us is of course r\/askreddit)! I don't know of anywhere else on the internet where you can ask a question and get answer from social scientists in many fields. I think its a great resource. - lets keep it that way.  **Third**, you *can* post personal experience. However we ask that you either do it as:  * A verified expert panelist * In addition to a summary of the academic research * In a second tier comment  I think that's appropriate. Note that the[thread you linked in your post is (IMHO) in much better condition now, post-speculation removal. The top comment now contains a reference in *addition* to personal experience. This allows people to verify the chain of reasoning that led to the opinion. And check out this post which ties in language and genetics! It isn't the case that this was an area \"no one has really studied\". Once it was made clear that we expect citations, citations appeared. If there aren't citations, a verified expert can give some background knowledge and theory that might help the OP.  **Finally**, I feel like a lot of the feedback I've been getting is that people want us to remove to \"bad\" speculation, but keep the \"good\" speculation. Unfortunately, given the fractious state of the social sciences the mods can't necesarily distinguish one from the other! I can tell when someone knows what they're talking about in an economics post, and I'm 50\/50 for psychology. But I'm lost with regards to sociology, anthropology, polisci etc. I think its better for moderators to work under a well-defined rule (\"top level comments much have sources unless they are from a verified expert\") than pick and choose comments to remove or approve based on subjective impulses.  (Also, I didn't see the economics post you reference. Specualtion that is \"common sense\" in economics should be removed as well. There's a lot of responses we get that are from someone who \"ran a business\" or \"took economics 101\" that is at-odds with the academic literature. Those shouldn't be top-level responses unless thy have citations.)  ***  Again, thanks for the feedback! If the community think we should take a different approach to moderating, we'd love to hear it, and certainly will consider making any suggested changes.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18929.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8r18b1","c_root_id_B":"c8qtin9","created_at_utc_A":1362610740,"created_at_utc_B":1362588066,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Hi, Adenil. As the mod who erased a lot of comments this morning (prompting this discussion) I thought I should chime in.  **First**, thanks for giving the feedback! I think people generally overestimate how much power the mods have over the subreddit, relative to the community. It's incredibly important that the mods and the community have broad agreement over the subreddit's goal and policies. Mods can delete posts and ban people, which are two powerful, but unsubtle tools. I'd much rather the community post\/ask for citations. If people don't like the subreddit's policies, they should tell us. We only instituted the hard rule set after receiving lots of META] posts calling for it.  **Second**, I think that we really should try make this a communuity that is based on the academic research. If you want to hear a random person on the internet's opinion there are already lots of options available (most germaine to us is of course r\/askreddit)! I don't know of anywhere else on the internet where you can ask a question and get answer from social scientists in many fields. I think its a great resource. - lets keep it that way.  **Third**, you *can* post personal experience. However we ask that you either do it as:  * A verified expert panelist * In addition to a summary of the academic research * In a second tier comment  I think that's appropriate. Note that the[thread you linked in your post is (IMHO) in much better condition now, post-speculation removal. The top comment now contains a reference in *addition* to personal experience. This allows people to verify the chain of reasoning that led to the opinion. And check out this post which ties in language and genetics! It isn't the case that this was an area \"no one has really studied\". Once it was made clear that we expect citations, citations appeared. If there aren't citations, a verified expert can give some background knowledge and theory that might help the OP.  **Finally**, I feel like a lot of the feedback I've been getting is that people want us to remove to \"bad\" speculation, but keep the \"good\" speculation. Unfortunately, given the fractious state of the social sciences the mods can't necesarily distinguish one from the other! I can tell when someone knows what they're talking about in an economics post, and I'm 50\/50 for psychology. But I'm lost with regards to sociology, anthropology, polisci etc. I think its better for moderators to work under a well-defined rule (\"top level comments much have sources unless they are from a verified expert\") than pick and choose comments to remove or approve based on subjective impulses.  (Also, I didn't see the economics post you reference. Specualtion that is \"common sense\" in economics should be removed as well. There's a lot of responses we get that are from someone who \"ran a business\" or \"took economics 101\" that is at-odds with the academic literature. Those shouldn't be top-level responses unless thy have citations.)  ***  Again, thanks for the feedback! If the community think we should take a different approach to moderating, we'd love to hear it, and certainly will consider making any suggested changes.","human_ref_B":"Personal experiences can always be posted as sub top level comments.    It is a little weird to find 3\/4 of the top level comments deleted - surely there's got to be some research out there?  Even citing a more general study of paleness, which could then be enhanced by subsequent comments drawing from personal experience.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22674.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8qw2u1","c_root_id_B":"c8r18b1","created_at_utc_A":1362595835,"created_at_utc_B":1362610740,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"**Scientist**: *\"Through the work of Max Planck, Albert Einstein, Louis de Broglie, Arthur Compton, Niels Bohr, and many others, current scientific theory holds that all particles also have a wave nature (and vice versa).[1] This phenomenon has been verified not only for elementary particles, but also for compound particles like atoms and even molecules. For macroscopic particles, because of their extremely small wavelengths, wave properties usually cannot be detected.\"*  **Layperson**: *\"Is a wave a thing or a concept? Is it what something is or what something does? How does a particle wave?\"*  **Scientist**: \u0ca0_\u0ca0 *\"WHAT ARE YOUR CREDENTIALS?\"*","human_ref_B":"Hi, Adenil. As the mod who erased a lot of comments this morning (prompting this discussion) I thought I should chime in.  **First**, thanks for giving the feedback! I think people generally overestimate how much power the mods have over the subreddit, relative to the community. It's incredibly important that the mods and the community have broad agreement over the subreddit's goal and policies. Mods can delete posts and ban people, which are two powerful, but unsubtle tools. I'd much rather the community post\/ask for citations. If people don't like the subreddit's policies, they should tell us. We only instituted the hard rule set after receiving lots of META] posts calling for it.  **Second**, I think that we really should try make this a communuity that is based on the academic research. If you want to hear a random person on the internet's opinion there are already lots of options available (most germaine to us is of course r\/askreddit)! I don't know of anywhere else on the internet where you can ask a question and get answer from social scientists in many fields. I think its a great resource. - lets keep it that way.  **Third**, you *can* post personal experience. However we ask that you either do it as:  * A verified expert panelist * In addition to a summary of the academic research * In a second tier comment  I think that's appropriate. Note that the[thread you linked in your post is (IMHO) in much better condition now, post-speculation removal. The top comment now contains a reference in *addition* to personal experience. This allows people to verify the chain of reasoning that led to the opinion. And check out this post which ties in language and genetics! It isn't the case that this was an area \"no one has really studied\". Once it was made clear that we expect citations, citations appeared. If there aren't citations, a verified expert can give some background knowledge and theory that might help the OP.  **Finally**, I feel like a lot of the feedback I've been getting is that people want us to remove to \"bad\" speculation, but keep the \"good\" speculation. Unfortunately, given the fractious state of the social sciences the mods can't necesarily distinguish one from the other! I can tell when someone knows what they're talking about in an economics post, and I'm 50\/50 for psychology. But I'm lost with regards to sociology, anthropology, polisci etc. I think its better for moderators to work under a well-defined rule (\"top level comments much have sources unless they are from a verified expert\") than pick and choose comments to remove or approve based on subjective impulses.  (Also, I didn't see the economics post you reference. Specualtion that is \"common sense\" in economics should be removed as well. There's a lot of responses we get that are from someone who \"ran a business\" or \"took economics 101\" that is at-odds with the academic literature. Those shouldn't be top-level responses unless thy have citations.)  ***  Again, thanks for the feedback! If the community think we should take a different approach to moderating, we'd love to hear it, and certainly will consider making any suggested changes.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":14905.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8quq3i","c_root_id_B":"c8qxc1j","created_at_utc_A":1362591811,"created_at_utc_B":1362599477,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I believe that personal experience is a form of empirical data. However, like all data it needs to be triangulated, peer reviewed, and be observable. So yes, I think it is appropriate for personal experience to be shared here, but that it is our jobs as scientists to verify, discuss, and situate that experience before we accept it as valid.","human_ref_B":"If ethnographies are not embraced, the name of the sub should not be \"social science\".   The sidebar mentions \"history\", \"law\", \"criminology\", \"philospophy\" &\"anthropology\" among others. Many of these bodies of knowledge are vocational, and\/or rely on \"experience accounts\" as evidence.   Someone trained by authorities in one of these fields might reasonably expect to use personal experience in the context of social science, as the authorities in these fields do themselves.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7666.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8qtin9","c_root_id_B":"c8qxc1j","created_at_utc_A":1362588066,"created_at_utc_B":1362599477,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Personal experiences can always be posted as sub top level comments.    It is a little weird to find 3\/4 of the top level comments deleted - surely there's got to be some research out there?  Even citing a more general study of paleness, which could then be enhanced by subsequent comments drawing from personal experience.","human_ref_B":"If ethnographies are not embraced, the name of the sub should not be \"social science\".   The sidebar mentions \"history\", \"law\", \"criminology\", \"philospophy\" &\"anthropology\" among others. Many of these bodies of knowledge are vocational, and\/or rely on \"experience accounts\" as evidence.   Someone trained by authorities in one of these fields might reasonably expect to use personal experience in the context of social science, as the authorities in these fields do themselves.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11411.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8qxc1j","c_root_id_B":"c8qw2u1","created_at_utc_A":1362599477,"created_at_utc_B":1362595835,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If ethnographies are not embraced, the name of the sub should not be \"social science\".   The sidebar mentions \"history\", \"law\", \"criminology\", \"philospophy\" &\"anthropology\" among others. Many of these bodies of knowledge are vocational, and\/or rely on \"experience accounts\" as evidence.   Someone trained by authorities in one of these fields might reasonably expect to use personal experience in the context of social science, as the authorities in these fields do themselves.","human_ref_B":"**Scientist**: *\"Through the work of Max Planck, Albert Einstein, Louis de Broglie, Arthur Compton, Niels Bohr, and many others, current scientific theory holds that all particles also have a wave nature (and vice versa).[1] This phenomenon has been verified not only for elementary particles, but also for compound particles like atoms and even molecules. For macroscopic particles, because of their extremely small wavelengths, wave properties usually cannot be detected.\"*  **Layperson**: *\"Is a wave a thing or a concept? Is it what something is or what something does? How does a particle wave?\"*  **Scientist**: \u0ca0_\u0ca0 *\"WHAT ARE YOUR CREDENTIALS?\"*","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3642.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"19s3r8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Meta] Can we allow exemplary personal experience? I was reading through [this thread and I realized that only allowing discussion that has citations associated with it can be too limiting. The OP has asked a question that, apparently, no one has really studied. The top comment was apparently well received before it was deleted. The author of the comment says that he or she lived the experience discussed.   This subreddit has already acknowledged that there are many ways to be an expert. We should also acknowledge that there are many ways to gain expert knowledge. Living the experiences first hand may be one way.   I am also bringing this up because I feel that our fine economics folks often get around the issue of citations, simply because their knowledge is viewed as common. See here. We may need to question what is and is not common knowledge, as well as what is common to different people.   I was around this sub prior to the switch, and I do agree that there was too much conjecture and not enough proof. But I think we need to find a balance, not outlaw it directly. Perhaps insisting that all conjecture is obvious would help? We could ask posters to be clear in what is simply personal experience by stating it directly.","c_root_id_A":"c8quq3i","c_root_id_B":"c8qtin9","created_at_utc_A":1362591811,"created_at_utc_B":1362588066,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I believe that personal experience is a form of empirical data. However, like all data it needs to be triangulated, peer reviewed, and be observable. So yes, I think it is appropriate for personal experience to be shared here, but that it is our jobs as scientists to verify, discuss, and situate that experience before we accept it as valid.","human_ref_B":"Personal experiences can always be posted as sub top level comments.    It is a little weird to find 3\/4 of the top level comments deleted - surely there's got to be some research out there?  Even citing a more general study of paleness, which could then be enhanced by subsequent comments drawing from personal experience.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3745.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"c6arey","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Did the Equal Pay Act of 1963 fail? I'm 19, so 2020 will be my first presidential election. I'm going to try to keep up with things so I actually know what I'm doing come election day. I am watching a VoD of the first democratic debate, and the wage gap got brought up.     I googled it, and it turns out that the Equal Pay Act of 1963 exists.   The only explanations I can think of for people thinking about a wage gap at all even though it's a law on the books are:  1) It's been five decades, so modern Americans have just forgotten the fact that it existed.  2) People know about it, but it was so poorly implemented that it essentially failed and a new version is needed.     So, people of r\/AskSocialScience, was the Equal Pay Act of 1963 a failure, thus making the wage gap such a hot button issue? Or have we just forgotten about it and let that lapse of collective memory impact America for the worse?","c_root_id_A":"es887bu","c_root_id_B":"es88lgl","created_at_utc_A":1561690202,"created_at_utc_B":1561690462,"score_A":8,"score_B":24,"human_ref_A":"There is evidence that the Equal Pay Act reduced, but did not eliminate, the difference in wages between men and women in the United States.   Here is the most compelling piece of evidence: the difference in wages fell in the 30 years after the adoption of the Equal Pay Act, and continued to fall, but more slowly, after that time.   Granted, correlation does not prove causation, but there is a correlation.    That's the opening salvo for the social science analysis.   In addition there's a legal analysis, which is that there is an enormous set of exceptions to the Equal Pay Act, including explicitly, seniority and \"(iv) a pay] differential based on any other factor other than sex\"  So short of literally having an explicit rule that \"Men get paid $X, but women get paid $X-z\", it is not simple to prove a violation of the Equal Pay Act, and basing pay difference on literally any factor that is not explicitly sex, *including those that are highly correlated with sex* such as (explicitly!) seniority, availability after hours, occupation segregation, or education.    The following is speculation, but it seems plausible that the Equal Pay Act reduced but did not eliminate the disparity in pay between men and women, because it reduced overt bias in salary setting, and over time enhanced an HR culture in the United States that discouraged sex discrimination in setting pay, but it did not address all issues affecting pay for women, [especially the impacts of child-rearing.","human_ref_B":"The question reflects a very understandable confusion. The standard measure of the pay gap (eg 81 cents on the dollar) does not refer to the difference in earnings for men and women working the exact same job. That difference - the one made illegal by the Equal Pay Act - is much smaller and has always been much smaller (though not zero). Rather, the 81 cents refers to the difference in average wages of women and men who work full time, but not controlling for industry, occupation, years of experience, place in the hierarchy (eg management\/promotions), education, and so on. Most of the discrimination women face takes place in terms of hiring or promotion, or in the devaluation of women\u2019s work (eg nursing, pre-k teaching, etc) compared to similar men\u2019s work. None of that is covered by the Equal Pay Act (though some of that discrimination is covered by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which has been poorly enforced).  For an excellent summary of recent research on the wage gap, check out: https:\/\/equitablegrowth.org\/research-paper\/gender-wage-inequality\/","labels":0,"seconds_difference":260.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"ttriqd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.65,"history":"Is multiculruralism or one national identity better for a country? I live in central Europe and I find myself debating over this all the time","c_root_id_A":"i2zkucn","c_root_id_B":"i2zs2am","created_at_utc_A":1648823744,"created_at_utc_B":1648826670,"score_A":4,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"Do you mean in terms of social cohesion?  These findings arguably reflect the adverse effect of population diversity on interpersonal trust, its contribution to divergence in preferences for public goods and redistributive policies, and its impact on the degree of fractionalization and polarization across ethnic, linguistic, and religious groups.  Also, check out Alesina's work:  https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/abs\/pii\/S0304387804001129  https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w8524","human_ref_B":"\"Better\" is not something social science will answer for you - as social science is indeed, a science. Normative questions belong in the field of political philosophy.  You could rephrase your question to add a goal. For example, is multiculturalism or one national identity better for social cohesion? (see u\/barrygoldwaterlover's answer) Which one of them leads to higher GDP? Which one of them leads to a better standard of life? Etc. Unless you do that, the tools of social science will not be able to answer your question, and you will need to turn to political philosophy.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2926.0,"score_ratio":4.75}
{"post_id":"1orhcc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"What would a \"climate change averting\" world economy look like? If we are to take the assumption that the IPCC's estimates are correct, and we need to bring our net carbon emissions to zero in the next 50 years in order to stabilize climate - what would the world economy look like?    Understood that there are a lot of uncertainties, but what are some of the trends that we can expect?","c_root_id_A":"ccuxxhd","c_root_id_B":"ccuuibc","created_at_utc_A":1382187676,"created_at_utc_B":1382162020,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Pretty similar to today's. We would just need to invest more money in research of alternative energy sources. If we invested half the money spent in \"succuring access to oil\" (wars, military bases, etc) into research for more efficient and cheaper production of solar, wind and water energy, and build 10 instead of one ITER, it would bring us probably very close to the target, without having to change much in our economies otherwise.","human_ref_B":"The question as you put it may be a little too open-ended to really answer concretely.  There are already quite a few different policy approaches proposed that would all look different.  Approaching it strictly through strong pricing of emissions as compared to a more modest tax whose revenues are put directly into energy R&D & deployment, adaptation and efficiency projects, etc., for example.  Do you have a source for the net-zero emissions statement, by the way?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25656.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"d4b4ka","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Who's the Franz Boas or Emile Durkheim of modern political science? A lot of other social sciences have their own mythologized pantheons of their discipline's \"founding fathers\": Adam Smith for economics, Franz Boas for anthropology, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber for sociology, even Leopold von Ranke for history. Is there an equivalent pantheon of disciplinary founders for political science?","c_root_id_A":"f09bbt4","c_root_id_B":"f09dni4","created_at_utc_A":1568497535,"created_at_utc_B":1568498918,"score_A":9,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"I always thought it was Weber, but I'm a sociologist.","human_ref_B":"I've always thought that Niccolo Machiavelli was considered *the* founder of modern political science. Both the internet and my political science professors tell me this. Furthermore, his \"The Prince\" book really laid out the foundations of realpolitik, Western philosophy, and many other subfields of political Science that we know (and love) today.  A case could be made, however, for the Greeks to be the founders of political science, such as Aristotle, Socrates, Plato, Thucydides, etc. I personally consider them as the founders of *political theory*, however.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1383.0,"score_ratio":2.8888888889}
{"post_id":"d4b4ka","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Who's the Franz Boas or Emile Durkheim of modern political science? A lot of other social sciences have their own mythologized pantheons of their discipline's \"founding fathers\": Adam Smith for economics, Franz Boas for anthropology, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber for sociology, even Leopold von Ranke for history. Is there an equivalent pantheon of disciplinary founders for political science?","c_root_id_A":"f09fyft","c_root_id_B":"f0cmi84","created_at_utc_A":1568500353,"created_at_utc_B":1568542354,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure if this is quite what you are asking for, but I'm certain I've read in a few textbooks (I'm sorry, I can't remember which - probably Giddens *Sociology*) that Durkheim's notion of Value Consensus had a profound impact on modern politics. It was, and still is seen as necessary by those in politics, particularly in the West, that value consensus is a major necessisty in any stable society. Active steps are taken by governments to ensure that there is a strong value consesus within these societies.   For example, I see this in practice every day in education (for me, in a college - but it is the same across any school in the UK) - there is a huge amount of effort put into reproducing and reinforcing *British Values*. This is done through posters, which are generally in every room and corridoor outlining what is meant by values such as 'Respect', 'Democracy' and 'Tolerance for Diversity'. Furthermore, it is part of the professional teaching standards in the UK to reinforce this. By this, I mean that it is a criteria which you are measured against by Ofsted (Office for Standards in Education) - when Ofsted inspect a government-funded school or college, there is an expectation that British Values will be reinforced as a core part of the ethos of the institution. This is generally measured through lesson observation - and it is expected (though this can vary slightly between each institution) that British Values will be considered, explicitly or implicitly, as a part of any and every individual session. For me, this is simple, because I teach Sociology and Social Policy (we literally evaluate British Values implicitly in almost every discussion). Observers, both external (such as Ofsted) and internal will enquire about how this is done if they do not witness it explicitly - and if you do not satisfy the requirement then there can be action taken to ensure this improves. Technically, there is the potential for a school or college to be placed under 'special measures', or even shut down if it does not comply - though this would be extreme and I am not aware this happening simply due to issues with reinforcing Brtitish Values (usually there would be a myriad of problems that lead to such action being taken).   Anyway, I recognise that you are not looking for the person who had a profound impact on politics itself, but rather for someone who had a profound impact on those who study politics and the ideas they ground much of their analysis in. Nonetheless, I hope this provides at least some level of value to your search.","human_ref_B":"I\u2019d say Max Weber. His *Politics as a Vocation* was the first to separate politics from economics, government, and Weber\u2019s own primary field of sociology.   There is a case to be made for Machiavelli, but also for Aquinas, Augustine of Hippo, Plato, Aristotle, or even the Enlightenment triumvirate of Hobbes\/Locke\/Rousseau.   But I choose Weber since he is the first to refer to *politicians* instead of rulers, elites, princes, or citizens.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":42001.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"d4b4ka","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Who's the Franz Boas or Emile Durkheim of modern political science? A lot of other social sciences have their own mythologized pantheons of their discipline's \"founding fathers\": Adam Smith for economics, Franz Boas for anthropology, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber for sociology, even Leopold von Ranke for history. Is there an equivalent pantheon of disciplinary founders for political science?","c_root_id_A":"f0cmi84","c_root_id_B":"f09dnxh","created_at_utc_A":1568542354,"created_at_utc_B":1568498925,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I\u2019d say Max Weber. His *Politics as a Vocation* was the first to separate politics from economics, government, and Weber\u2019s own primary field of sociology.   There is a case to be made for Machiavelli, but also for Aquinas, Augustine of Hippo, Plato, Aristotle, or even the Enlightenment triumvirate of Hobbes\/Locke\/Rousseau.   But I choose Weber since he is the first to refer to *politicians* instead of rulers, elites, princes, or citizens.","human_ref_B":"Well, history has lots of thinkers that poli sci draws upon. Plato, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread, as well as Aristotle, are the big two early political philosophers.  If we're looking for something more modern, then we're probably talking about enlightenment era thinkers like Locke, Hobbes, and Rousseau.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":43429.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"57dogq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Graduate Help: MA in Sociology or Cultural Anthropology? Yes, I know, no graduate degree unless you need it for your the career you want. That being said, I have been strongly leaning towards a career in research and\/or higher education. I've explored options with my advisors and have a working concept of what I'd like to do.   My issue is that I'm torn between sociology and cultural anthropology. I could see myself pursuing either and it's been an ordeal for me to narrow down. Does anyone have any advice on which to pursue? What would be the difference in experience from getting either degree? I know the difference between the fields, so no need to link me to operational definitions. I tend to straddle the border on qualitative and quantitative method preference as well.   My main research interests are poverty, institutional power and social issues, human cooperation\/altruism,  and social movements.   I'd only like to look at salary as a tie breaker, but lately it seems that may be what it comes down to. So many jobs I see myself doing seem to be virtually cross listed between the degrees. I'm not sure what other practical (theoretical aspects won't matter to me, as I favour parts of each) differences they may have, kind of at a stalemate. Anything helps!","c_root_id_A":"d8rfhgx","c_root_id_B":"d8reqlc","created_at_utc_A":1476425592,"created_at_utc_B":1476423807,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"You're talking about very broad buckets of concepts. I can't think of a single field of social science (or quite a lot of hard science for that matter) that wouldn't allow you the room to study things like institutional power, human cooperation and social movements","human_ref_B":"Not quite what you're asking, but have you considered social work? We do research as well in the areas you mention, and it is a *very* flexible career in a field begging for workers, so excellent job security in most areas.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1785.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1k5225","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Does radical activism help or hinder the progress of a fringe social movement? Is there any evidence or theory about radical activism helping or hindering a fringe social movement?   For example, the animal right movement and the group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA)   Some people claim that this groups radical activism is detrimental to the progress of the movement as a whole, gives the movement a bad name, etc. Other people claim that this type of radical activism is a beneficial and necessary part of a fringe social movement.   Do either of these claims have any merit in real social science? Outside of opinions, anecdotes, personal politics or layman speculation?  Is there any actual evidence that radical activism actually does hinder the progress of a movement? Are there any prevailing theories surrounding radical activism and it's effect on the progress of social movements?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cblhyf2","c_root_id_B":"cblglr6","created_at_utc_A":1376233276,"created_at_utc_B":1376226806,"score_A":24,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"I've heard this discussed in terms of framing effects. One interesting interpretation is that framing effects can be used as a behavioral nudge. Basically how this works is if you have a set of items priced at $10, $100, $1000 most people will go for the $100 item. However if you remove the $1000 item people are then more likely to buy the $10 item. So radical politics is sort of like the $1000 item on the menu. Most people won't buy it but it nudges people towards the political position but with a more centrist stance. It defines the edge of the discourse.   I did find a paper that discusses framing effects and social movements but it's pay walled so I'm not sure if this specific example is discussed.   http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/discover\/10.2307\/223459?uid=3739464&uid=2460338175&uid=2460337935&uid=2&uid=3737720&uid=4&uid=83&uid=63&sid=21102543589753","human_ref_B":"I don't think you're going to get a concrete answer. For starters, any definition of \"radical\" will be imperfect, especially considering that the term is often applied by opponents.  There are cases when unconventional methods seem to have worked. ACT UP's involvement during the early years of the HIV\/AIDS crisis are probably one of the better examples when it comes to direct measurable results.  Figuring out how an outcome was produced is also tricky in the political arena. If a big environmental bill passed, was it the result of pressure applied by \"radicals\", persuasion from more conventional advocacy groups, inside dealing by legislators, or something else? Most likely some combination of all those, but how do you sort  out the proportions?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6470.0,"score_ratio":1.7142857143}
{"post_id":"1k5225","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Does radical activism help or hinder the progress of a fringe social movement? Is there any evidence or theory about radical activism helping or hindering a fringe social movement?   For example, the animal right movement and the group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA)   Some people claim that this groups radical activism is detrimental to the progress of the movement as a whole, gives the movement a bad name, etc. Other people claim that this type of radical activism is a beneficial and necessary part of a fringe social movement.   Do either of these claims have any merit in real social science? Outside of opinions, anecdotes, personal politics or layman speculation?  Is there any actual evidence that radical activism actually does hinder the progress of a movement? Are there any prevailing theories surrounding radical activism and it's effect on the progress of social movements?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cblhyf2","c_root_id_B":"cblh6ye","created_at_utc_A":1376233276,"created_at_utc_B":1376229972,"score_A":24,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I've heard this discussed in terms of framing effects. One interesting interpretation is that framing effects can be used as a behavioral nudge. Basically how this works is if you have a set of items priced at $10, $100, $1000 most people will go for the $100 item. However if you remove the $1000 item people are then more likely to buy the $10 item. So radical politics is sort of like the $1000 item on the menu. Most people won't buy it but it nudges people towards the political position but with a more centrist stance. It defines the edge of the discourse.   I did find a paper that discusses framing effects and social movements but it's pay walled so I'm not sure if this specific example is discussed.   http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/discover\/10.2307\/223459?uid=3739464&uid=2460338175&uid=2460337935&uid=2&uid=3737720&uid=4&uid=83&uid=63&sid=21102543589753","human_ref_B":"I can't speak for social movements as a whole but I believe PETA is not very representative of a \"radical\" organisation, the \"radical\" association is largely self-promotion. Most criticism against PETA is reasonably justified but none of it is against them being radical but against their soundbite media sensationalism, inconsistent positions, irrational arguments, conflicts of interest and unethical behaviour (including killing\/harming animals when it promotes their cause).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3304.0,"score_ratio":12.0}
{"post_id":"1k5225","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Does radical activism help or hinder the progress of a fringe social movement? Is there any evidence or theory about radical activism helping or hindering a fringe social movement?   For example, the animal right movement and the group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA)   Some people claim that this groups radical activism is detrimental to the progress of the movement as a whole, gives the movement a bad name, etc. Other people claim that this type of radical activism is a beneficial and necessary part of a fringe social movement.   Do either of these claims have any merit in real social science? Outside of opinions, anecdotes, personal politics or layman speculation?  Is there any actual evidence that radical activism actually does hinder the progress of a movement? Are there any prevailing theories surrounding radical activism and it's effect on the progress of social movements?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cbljslc","c_root_id_B":"cblh6ye","created_at_utc_A":1376239646,"created_at_utc_B":1376229972,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As others have said, there is no way to really answer your question because research would have to be framed around determining factors including:  * How to measure the success of a \"social movement\" - it usually takes a long time for social movements to be incorporated into society to the point where we no longer even recognize their influence (ie women's suffrage). Especially with regards to modern movements and issues, the timeframe is probably too short.  * Identifying the social movement as a cohesive body with the \"radical\" elements as something separate - a major concern of what is discussed in social movement theory and related literature is about the *identity*  of the movement and who defines what the characteristics of it are; goals, stakes, methods, etc. Dissecting a \"mainstream\" animal rights movement from PETA ignores the effects such a group has on the whole and the internal dynamics of said movements.   Instead, it may be worth thinking about how \"radical\" (as you term it) activism differs from other forms of activism, in terms of strategies (non-violence, direct action, advocacy, awareness building, protests, petitions, etc), position points (extremeness of expectations and beliefs), membership (demographics of people involved), popular approval (likeliness that people not involved in movement will approve of organization's actions and beliefs), and so on - and then delineating results between radical and non-radical groups, and measuring their effectiveness at meeting their goals.","human_ref_B":"I can't speak for social movements as a whole but I believe PETA is not very representative of a \"radical\" organisation, the \"radical\" association is largely self-promotion. Most criticism against PETA is reasonably justified but none of it is against them being radical but against their soundbite media sensationalism, inconsistent positions, irrational arguments, conflicts of interest and unethical behaviour (including killing\/harming animals when it promotes their cause).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9674.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2mkh3u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Are high import duties just another way to tax citizens? Where do you draw the line on protectionism? I live in a country with DUTY and VAT applied to almost all goods that are imported. As the economy grows, we import more, which has to mean a lot more government revenue in the form of duties paid by importers.   The general population doesn't realize this and assumes the importers are making the most money.  The tax rate is fairly low and most people earn below the threshold to pay taxes. I'm assuming a large amount just don't file taxes, either.   Some duties are imposted to 'protect' local manufacturers, but IMO, they are getting out of hand. 61% duty is applied to imported chicken, however, the local processors cannot keep up with demand, they just increase their prices knowing the costs of the alternative imported chicken has gone up.  So, no one thinks they are paying much taxes. I think this is a reason they don't really demand improvements that are being neglected. They don't realize the increased prices for goods and groceries are inflated and that they ARE kind of paying a lot more for stuff they buy.   Any thoughts on this? Am I right in thinking this?","c_root_id_A":"cm5b18w","c_root_id_B":"cm56u0k","created_at_utc_A":1416257760,"created_at_utc_B":1416249878,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I think you're partially right in that VAT is less visible than income tax. But another factor is that VAT and duty are much easier to enforce. There are choke points in the distribution of goods where governments can assess and verify compliance. On the contrary, compelling the whole population to report income tax and file the appropriate forms is more difficult and expensive.  Here's an excerpt from a paper that partially covers this subject:  > The invoice-credit value-added tax is self-enforcing because a business needs to see that its suppliers paid the tax. [...]      > Replacing both personal and corporate income taxes with a federal value-added tax would eliminate the government's costs of enforcing compliance with the income tax, but would create new costs for enforcing the value-added tax. Economists estimate that this would, however, probably lead to an overall savings in total compliance costs.  EDIT: added citation.","human_ref_B":"There are many other factors at play than simple taxation.  I think one of the best references for your argument is Adam Smith.  Smith argued that free trade is for the benefit of all nations involved.  I country 1 is better at making product A, and country 2 is better at making product B, than exchanging goods is to the mutual benefit of both countries.  In theory this is a good and fair statement, but that assume that both countries are exporting and importing.  If country 1 is constantly importing and not exporting, then there is a decreased benefit to country 1, because money is leaving the country and not being returned.  If your country is increasing exportation of another product, while increasing importation of Chicken, then a balance can be reached.  If a balance can be reached, then it is to the benefit to decrease import taxation, because that will allow other countries to ease restrictions on their importation of your countries exported goods.  If your country is importing at a faster rate than it is exporting, then the government needs to somehow artificially rebalance your import and export through taxation of goods, or by increasing exportation somehow.  Since most governments can't create industry they choose taxation in hopes that they can increase the cost of imported goods to a high enough level that local farmers are able to complete with import pricing, and to spur others to take up the farming trade to hopefully increase local availability.    > Am I right in thinking this?  We can't answer this question.  The balance of economy is such a delicate operation that without all the factors there is no possibility of a correct answer.  Even if we had all the variables we are basically talking theory, which means that any answer someone gives you is an educated guess.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7882.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2mkh3u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Are high import duties just another way to tax citizens? Where do you draw the line on protectionism? I live in a country with DUTY and VAT applied to almost all goods that are imported. As the economy grows, we import more, which has to mean a lot more government revenue in the form of duties paid by importers.   The general population doesn't realize this and assumes the importers are making the most money.  The tax rate is fairly low and most people earn below the threshold to pay taxes. I'm assuming a large amount just don't file taxes, either.   Some duties are imposted to 'protect' local manufacturers, but IMO, they are getting out of hand. 61% duty is applied to imported chicken, however, the local processors cannot keep up with demand, they just increase their prices knowing the costs of the alternative imported chicken has gone up.  So, no one thinks they are paying much taxes. I think this is a reason they don't really demand improvements that are being neglected. They don't realize the increased prices for goods and groceries are inflated and that they ARE kind of paying a lot more for stuff they buy.   Any thoughts on this? Am I right in thinking this?","c_root_id_A":"cm57inj","c_root_id_B":"cm5b18w","created_at_utc_A":1416251134,"created_at_utc_B":1416257760,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Barbados?   A lot of this is to do with foreign exchange reserves, and pressure on pegged currencies. We need to ensure that we're bringing in enough fx from tourists to kind of balance out what we spend, as we of course need to buy the products from abroad in foreign currency. Taxing imports creates a disincentive to spend this fx. I'm no expert on this, but you could try checking wikipedia:    Foreign-exchange reserves (also called forex reserves or FX reserves) are assets held by central banks and monetary authorities, usually in different reserve currencies, mostly the United States dollar, and to a lesser extent the Euro, the Pound sterling, and the Japanese yen, and used to back its liabilities, e.g., the local currency issued, and the various bank reserves deposited with the central bank, by the government or financial institutions.[1]    http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Foreign-exchange_reserves","human_ref_B":"I think you're partially right in that VAT is less visible than income tax. But another factor is that VAT and duty are much easier to enforce. There are choke points in the distribution of goods where governments can assess and verify compliance. On the contrary, compelling the whole population to report income tax and file the appropriate forms is more difficult and expensive.  Here's an excerpt from a paper that partially covers this subject:  > The invoice-credit value-added tax is self-enforcing because a business needs to see that its suppliers paid the tax. [...]      > Replacing both personal and corporate income taxes with a federal value-added tax would eliminate the government's costs of enforcing compliance with the income tax, but would create new costs for enforcing the value-added tax. Economists estimate that this would, however, probably lead to an overall savings in total compliance costs.  EDIT: added citation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6626.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"14hyef","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.96,"history":"[Economics] Is sustained economic growth possible in a country with a declining population? I was wondering this following the news that Germany might head into a recession. In countries like Germany and Japan, with lower birth rates and a growing proportion of aged dependents, and stagnant or declining population despite migration - can you expect economic growth when your viable workforce is not growing? Do you even need it?","c_root_id_A":"c7d7fz0","c_root_id_B":"c7d7mnf","created_at_utc_A":1354977890,"created_at_utc_B":1354979170,"score_A":6,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Yes. Technological change causes long-run economic growth. So does population growth. Lower population growth will lead to lower long-run growth, though, all else equal.","human_ref_B":"If technology allows worker productivity to increase at a greater rate than the absolute value of the rate of decline of population, then we will see continued growth of economic output of that country.  This is a poor metric to use here, in my opinion.  You should look at per capita metrics to determine if such an economy is advancing.  Total output is often a red herring.  If the standard of living of the ordinary citizen in a given nation is improving, there's very little argument to be made that the economy is not advancing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1280.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1891we","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What is the perception of wikipedia in the academic world?","c_root_id_A":"c8cp0c9","c_root_id_B":"c8cpfbq","created_at_utc_A":1360514727,"created_at_utc_B":1360516314,"score_A":39,"score_B":68,"human_ref_A":"Hit or miss.  Some topics are actually pretty well summarized with a good amount of direct source links.  Others are crap.  To students, I have no problem with them using it to break the ice on a new topic, though it should only be trusted as far as it can be confirmed through 'legitimate' (peer-reviewed or high level) sources.    Think of it as consulting an older uncle with life experience.  He probably can give you a good account of Vietnam and has lots of interesting facts to look into.  But be careful about everything he tells you being 100% accurate.","human_ref_B":"As a reference librarian-in-training at a university, Wikipedia is great for answering quick little questions like \"When was Alexander the Great born?\" (what we would consider \"ready reference\") and has almost completely replaced any hard-copy or subscription encyclopedias for that purpose. There is only one other general reference source I use at work which is called \"Credo Reference,\" but it's subscription, only librarians know about it, and honestly it's not even as good as Wikipedia.   But should you be citing it in a college level paper though? Hell-to-the-no. But you shouldn't be citing World Book or Britannica either. All of these encyclopedia-level sources are not \"academic\" enough for a college-level paper, even undergrads should be going deeper in their research.   Wikipedia is a great place to start your research, so long as you don't stop there.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1587.0,"score_ratio":1.7435897436}
{"post_id":"1891we","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What is the perception of wikipedia in the academic world?","c_root_id_A":"c8csxi5","c_root_id_B":"c8csq4e","created_at_utc_A":1360528224,"created_at_utc_B":1360527553,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"As a graduate student, I regard Wikipedia as an excellent source medium. Wikipedia says Y about X subject? Well, let me look at the source. *Goes to source*  Well, the source says essentially the same thing.  For instance, I remember doing preliminary research about the water erosion theory for the Great Sphynx of Egypt and found a source about the researcher who brought this theory to light. Wikipedia gave me the quote, but more importantly, a usable and fully appropriate source for me to find the actual source.  I've been told that on the whole, Wikipedia is a better source of information than traditional encyclopedias and it is in the aforementioned context that this fact really shines.","human_ref_B":"I would argue that Wikipedia is fantastic for most mathematics topics.  When it comes to social sciences, it is mediocre.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":671.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"c2x8ea","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Are lower-class people more racist\/homophobic\/xenophobic? I've been meaning to ask this question for multiple reasons, I'll try to word it without coming across as classist\/offensive. This is purely anecdotal, and I'm wondering if it has any merit \/ if there are any studies into this topic.  In Hungary, we have an lmbtq pride annually. Most of my friends, family, coworkers are either very supportive of it, or don't really care. I'm upper middle class, and most of my social network is either middle or upper-middle as well.   Because of this, homophobia wasn't something I came across in person - of course I'd hear it on the internet, but nobody was homophobic to me in person.   Fast forward to last years Pride, there's a significant, but small and vocal group of people chanting homophobic\/transphobic slurs (that I would rather not even write here). One thing that was common with them, is they were all working class people (judging by their appearance and language used), and also from rural areas. Whereas people from the capital are mostly accepting of the parade (even old people), people come to our city from their small towns to offend us \/ the people in the parade.   These are also the same people (mostly far right, nationalists) who are strictly against Muslims, and any kind of migrants who aren't white. They'll say horrible stuff, are racist against Romas and all the good stuff.   I have observed so much more of this stuff, but I'm trying to keep this short. **I guess my question is, is there a correlation between one's class, and being bigoted against different people?**","c_root_id_A":"ernvhww","c_root_id_B":"erntghc","created_at_utc_A":1561062015,"created_at_utc_B":1561060686,"score_A":25,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Firstly, it's good to remember that historically, the alleged deviancy or bigotry of the poor has been used as a foil by the middle classes and those dominating media production to highlight or promote their own values or ideas of virtue or \"good\"ness. Homosexuality is actually a good example of seeing this in action. Today, homophobia is something associated with the bigoted working class, whereas progressive tolerance and acceptance of homosexuality is a distinctively middle class trait. Yet it might surprise you to learn that in the early 20th century, homosexuality was strongly associated with the working class, which was commonly portrayed as sexually degenerate in contrast to the proper and sexually healthy middle class family. Of course, this doesn't mean that over the last century, working class folks have transformed from degraded homosexuals to violent homophobes. In reality, middle class values shifted (away from 19th century bourgeois \"family\" values and towards a social progressivism), and so the foil, namely, the image of the poor, had to change.^1  Of course, the one poll that I was able to find does suggest that support for e.g. gay marriage does increase with income, though this is a simple poll, and not a sophisticated study that controls for other factors.   It's also worth noting that fascism or far-right authoritarianism, with its associated social phobias (foreigners, homosexuals, women, minorities, and so on) is historically and today more a middle-class (typically lower-middle-class) phenomenon, rather than a lower-class movement. This was certainly true of Nazi Germany,^2 where the lower classes were largely either politically apathetic or left-wing, especially in the cities. In America, the poor actually generally lean left compared to the general population, and Trump's rallies are often packed with middle-class and suburban professionals rather than the archetypal Appalachian hick. One of Trump's best-performing regions in Florida, a key swing-state, is a massive community of well-off retirees that plainly prioritize his cultural over his economic policies when asked why they like him.  **TL;DR: In general, be skeptical of portrayal of poor, especially rural people as holding views antithetical to the middle classes at any given moment, as these are just as likely to be cultural foils designed to help the middle classes define themselves; in general, far right authoritarian movements and associated bigotries, to put it unscientifically, are middle class, rather than working class, phenomena.**  ---  ^1 Certain lower class professions, such as sailors, were so strongly associated with homosexuality that the stereotype remains to this day. See e.g.: *Rednecks, Queers, and Country Music* by Nadine Hubbs  ^2 Historians have pointed out that especially in their cultural values, the Nazis rhetorically claimed to be digging deep into Germanic history, into the medieval period and earlier, when in reality their cultural preferences much more closely mirrored conservative \"bourgeois\" beliefs about e.g. the family, the nation, and women from the 19th century. See e.g.: *Nazi Culture* by George Mosse","human_ref_B":"This question should not and cannot be answered simplistically with either a positive or negative answer concerning the correlation between 'social and\/or economic class' and 'prejudice'. There is a fundamental complexity stemming from the fact that:  * There are different kinds of prejudicial attitudes (i.e. explicit and implicit attitudes, old-fashioned and modern racism, etc.).  * Social and economic classes are social constructs which do not confer by themselves an attribute to those who are categorized according to a class.   * It is better to think in terms of risk factors which may increase the likelihood of prejudicial attitudes and protective factors which may decrease the likelihood of the same attitudes.  Lower-class people *may* accumulate *certain* risk factors, but are not necessarily those who demonstrate more explicit racism. For example, according to a recent poll by Protection Approaches:  >Our poll found that many of **those who hold negative attitudes towards minorities cannot be described as coming from a socio-economic background commonly attributed to Britain\u2019s \u2018left behind.\u2019** A **significant proportion** of those who consider minorities to be a threat to Britain **are both financially secure and educated beyond GCSE\/O level**; a majority feel satisfied with their lives, able to influence decisions that affect them and feel valued in their local communities. They are less likely to have experienced identity-based attack and are disproportionately over 65. Our poll did find that **those who voted to leave the European Union in 2016 are more likely to hold negative attitudes towards minority groups, however these respondents have varied household incomes and are from across Britain.**   >**While those with  lower household  incomes  and educational  qualifications  are slightly more likely to hold negative views of minorities, it significant that about one in four of those who are significantly well off and educated also hold these views**. This  suggests  that  **many  who  consider  Muslims,  immigrants,  Roma,  Gypsy  or Travellers to be a \u2018threat to Britain\u2019s success and prosperity\u2019 could be described as the \u2018winners\u2019 of the past decades** rather than Britain\u2019s \u2018left behind\u2019.  That said, what follows below are the results of some of the many social psychological studies on the topic, presented from less to more recent.  ---  Based on a nationwide survey conducted by the National Opinion Research Center, Maykovich found the following:  >Correlates of prejudice toward blacks are examined at two levels, social and psychological. **On the social level, three interacting variables\u2014region, age, and education\u2014account for a greater amount of variance in prejudice than other variables** such as sex, income, occupation, mobility, urbanicity, political and religious affiliation, and others. **Social roles exert pressure upon individuals**. Being a Southerner and poorly educated are found to be conducive to prejudice toward blacks. On the other hand, if a person is outside the South where blacks are less accepted, and if the former is young and college educated, fostering flexibility in outlook, he is less likely to be prejudiced against blacks.  Therefore context is important (i.e. where one grew up and lives in), plus age and education, the latter being often found to be associated with prejudice, whereas economic factors which might classify someone as lower-class are less explanatory.  Pettigrew and Meertens studied 'blatant' and 'subtle' prejudice \"u]sing data from seven  independent national  samples from western Europe\". Besides finding evidence supporting intergroup contact theory, there are other results that are pertinent to your question:   >**Group relative deprivation  contributed significantly to the prediction  of blatant prejudice in six samples**. But it **attained statistical significance in only two samples as a predictor of subtle  prejudice**.  **Individual  relative deprivation did not relate with either type** of racism. This **latter finding casts doubt on \u2018riff-raff and mass society theories of prejudice-namely, that prejudice flourishes largely among the deprived and alienated pockets of industrial societies.** Moreover, a five-item scale of political efficacy failed to correlate with either  the  Blatant or Subtle Scales (analyses not shown). To be sure, **the less educated and less politically interested are more prone to prejudice; but these relationships are not dominant in Table 3**. For subtle prejudice especially, there is no indication that the prejudiced are marginal segments of their societies. The specification of the correlates of prejudice made possible by this differentiated approach is enhanced when analyses are done with the five subscales. **Conservatives score higher on  the  Subtle Prejudice Scale, because  they are defending traditional values against  the new  ways of the  outgroup. Older  people  score  higher  on  the Blatant  Prejudice Scale, because of their  fear of intimacy with the outgroup**. And those respondents with  many  types of friends are unusually open to intimacy with the outgroup,  and more readily report having felt admiration and sympathy  for outgroup member.  According to the above results, \"those who feel that people  like themselves are slipping behind  the  minority group  are more blatantly prejudiced across all samples\", being older also contributes to blatant prejudice, whereas being conservative contributes to subtle prejudice.  This paper by [Altemeyer is one example among many on the relationship between religious fundamentalism (which is not to be confused or conflated with religiosity in general) and prejudice. As he explains:  >Studies are reported of university students, and of their parents, that found that **religious fundamentalism correlated quite highly with religious ethnocentrism, as well as with\u2014to lesser degrees\u2014hostility toward homosexuals and prejudice against various racial\u2013ethnic minorities**.   Finally, Connor et al. very recently explicitly focused on the relationship between income and prejudice and found mixed results:  >In  sum,  **our  findings  suggested  a  small  effect  of  income  inequality  on  explicit  racial  bias**  but  **did  not  clearly  support  an  effect  of  income  inequality  on  implicit bias or Internet searches**. This is consistent with multiple  possible  explanations,  and  **the  size  of  the  observed  effects  suggests  that  changes  in  income  inequality  are  unlikely  to  substantially  affect  overall  downward trends on indices of explicit bias.**   ---  Therefore, it does not appear that economic factors are particularly important in terms of either 'blatant' or 'subtle' prejudice. Applying the social identity approach, these might have some (weak) effect, although I would stress the importance of considering the evaluations\/perceptions of these people regarding their situation and their context (see for example Pettigrew and Meerten's results regarding group *relative* deprivation). If members of the working class perceive themselves as being in worse economic conditions *relative* to the 'out-group' and are galvanized to see *them* as a problem, then they might indeed be more blatantly racist towards *them* because of perceived greater intergroup conflict (keeping in mind that the perception of different groups promotes in-group favoritism).  Context matters (think the importance of socialization and culture), and in either case, other factors such as education and ideologies (i.e. political beliefs, religious beliefs, etc.) are more important than income. It can be the case that 'working-class' people are (on average) less educated, more conservative and more religious, but that is *not* a given and these are *not* attributes conferred by their label (i.e. 'working-class' or 'lower-class'). For example, according to this British survey, most church goers in the UK are middle class rather than working class (take this just as an example, because it is not that simple to determine religiosity).  To conclude, I suggest also checking my reply to this question on the causes of far-right extremism to understand the personality traits that can contribute to prejudice and discrimination, and their determinants.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1329.0,"score_ratio":8.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1iabam","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"What would become of a nation if the entirety of it's citizens debt was erased? My friend and I were musing on the ending to the movie adaptation of Fight Club and I thought it would be cool to see what you guys thought.","c_root_id_A":"cb2oziq","c_root_id_B":"cb2qpy4","created_at_utc_A":1373845070,"created_at_utc_B":1373850531,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Ok so no one is saying this, but I suspect it would provide a huge short term economic boost if it happened in the usa or Western Europe. I'll talk about the USA since I both know more about it and it's simpler because we don't have to worry about optimal currency issues and how the elimination of debt might spread throughout the eu.  So basically right now the United States is trapped in a demand based recession because the private sector borrowed too much money too quickly in the 2005-2008 period. Now too many people are saving money to pay off their debts and this has caused the demand for loanable funds to go so low that a real interest rate below zero is necessary to create an equilibrium of supply and demand.   This lack of equilibrium is essentially what is causing the recession. So assuming that the elimination of debt was a one time event that everyone could be totally sure would never happen again, the elimination of debt would enable demand to increase in the broader economy as the debt overhang that we are taking years and years to escape from was eliminated.","human_ref_B":"Moral Hazard.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Moral_hazard","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5461.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"20is7p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Can you have healthy economy that doesn't grow? I'm out of my element here, but it seems to me like economies like growth and you need resources for growth. Right now it seems like the one resource we don't need any more of (need way less of) is human capitol, but it also seems to be the one resource that's on an up trend.  I am sure that science will prevail in sustaining the organic and raw resources necessary to sustain a huge population, but can an economy thrive in an environment where computers are cheaper laborers than humans (and we keep finding out more and more ways to use them) and we have more humans than we've ever had before? So can there be some sort of economy that just chills? Doesn't sound like it to me, and I know very little about economics.  TL;DR  How\/will an economy work in the future when we have the highest population ever and the need for human labor seems to already be on a steep decline.","c_root_id_A":"cg3y1i1","c_root_id_B":"cg3xsa8","created_at_utc_A":1394980377,"created_at_utc_B":1394979465,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'm not an economist, but way back in my undergrad days (shakes cane vigorously), I remember reading about a concept called the Steady State Economy put forth by Herman Daly.  If I remember correctly, the idea was that in a world of finite resources, we would eventually need to come to a place where our economy was in a steady equilibrium, not growing all the time.  It looks like he has a whole website here:  http:\/\/steadystate.org\/category\/herman-daly\/, and there's a wikipedia article here http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Steady_state_economy that has some great sources linked.","human_ref_B":"I don't know, but I do know that economic growth is NOT necessarily linked to resource use.   Take intellectual property, for example.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":912.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"aodd2n","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"So... sensitive topic incoming: Does 'Affirmative Action' actually work? Most of the discussion I see about it is ideological: \"*is Affirmative Action a form of reverse-racism?*\", and that sort of thing.  What are the stats, if any? And importantly, how are these stats interpreted by those in the profession? Is there a consensus? If not, what are the arguments for\/against?  Thank you in advance.","c_root_id_A":"eg02y7r","c_root_id_B":"eg02m4t","created_at_utc_A":1549605143,"created_at_utc_B":1549604744,"score_A":26,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"It might help if you clarify what you mean by \"work\", i.e., what objectives and metrics you are interested in. Then you can get more specific responses to your question.","human_ref_B":"This is worth taking a look at for various arguments, legal and philosophical, and the history as well as effectiveness: https:\/\/plato.stanford.edu\/entries\/affirmative-action\/","labels":1,"seconds_difference":399.0,"score_ratio":1.3684210526}
{"post_id":"3fhjzv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"How does sending children to boarding schools affect them? Are their any differences between children(or adults) who go to a boarding school versus those who did not?","c_root_id_A":"ctox4pm","c_root_id_B":"ctovqkq","created_at_utc_A":1438529812,"created_at_utc_B":1438526711,"score_A":21,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Here is a study (not sure if this is peer reviewed, probably not), conducted by The Association of Boarding Schools (TABS).  The study is self-reported impressions of 2500 attendees of US boarding schools, private day schools and public schools.    The study finds:  * Boarding students were reported their high school experience to be more academically challenging, with more time spent on homework than other kinds of students.  * Boarding students reported more physical activity (sports and exercise), more hobby and club activities, and less television.   * Boarders reported more opportunities for leadership and more support during high school.  * Boarders reported significantly less cheating.  * 50% of boarding school graduates earn advanced degrees, compared to 36% of private day and 21% of public school alumni  * Boarders were more likely to obtain jobs in \"top management\" by \"mid-career\"  (44% vs. 27 - 33% for other types of schools)  * Boarders are more likely to give to charity after graduation.  (Edits: clarifications)","human_ref_B":"Going to boarding school is not a social science source.   Edit: That was intended as a reminder that anecdotal evidence isn't sufficient for a citation, not a criticism of the question.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3101.0,"score_ratio":1.2352941176}
{"post_id":"1hl15u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Regarding Egypt...Can what's currently happening truly be called a coup d'etat? There's been some ambiguity in the news coming out of Cairo, but from what I've read, two things stick out:  * The military appeared to set clear guidelines to Morsi and his party in the lead up to today. * The military appears to be acting on behalf of, at the very least, a plurality of the Egyptian people.  If Morsi knew that the military was going to act, and that millions of Egyptian citizens were demanding a fairer balance of power, can what's happening in Egypt really be called a coup d'etat?","c_root_id_A":"cavhap8","c_root_id_B":"cavg6zp","created_at_utc_A":1372891045,"created_at_utc_B":1372887782,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"While it technically is, the US State Department won't call it a coup, because they are legally required to sever all aid to countries that have just been couped. And given the long history between the United States and the Egyptian military, and the desire to keep the peace between Egypt and Israel, the United States won't call this a coup.","human_ref_B":"Another question: why wasn't\/isn't the Egyptian revolution two years ago treated\/viewed as a coup d'etat?  Was US aid put on hold that time?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3263.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"p8u068","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Are there any good articles on systematic racism\/sexism? I'm trying to find good articles on systematic racism\/sexism but none of what I've found seem particularly convincing. Are there any good and comprehensive researches on this topic?","c_root_id_A":"h9tfkj5","c_root_id_B":"h9u26eq","created_at_utc_A":1629570826,"created_at_utc_B":1629581303,"score_A":10,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Here are some big\/good works covering a few (not all) dimensions of systemic racism:  Eduardo Bonilla-Silva (2003) *Racism without Racists: Color-Blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in America* Rowman & Littlefield  Douglas Massey and Nancy Denton (1993) *American Apartheid: Segregation and the Making of the Underclass.* Harvard University Press  Robert D. Bullard (1990) *Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class, and Environmental Quality* Routledge.   Richard Rothstein. (2017) *The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America.* Norton.   Patrick Sharkey (2008) \"The Intergenerational Transmission of Context.\" American Journal of Sociology.   Lincoln Quillian and Devah Pager (2001) \"Black Neighbors, Higher Crime? The Role of Racial Stereotypes in Evaluatuons of Neighborbood Crime.\" American Journal of Sociology.  David Williams and Chiquita Collins. (2001) \"Racial Residential Segregation: A Fundamental Cause of Racial Disparitiea in Health.\" Public Health Reports  Edit: Just noticed you included sexism in your question. Systemic racism and sexism share some features and mechanisms in common, but do not operate in exactly the same way. The topic of institutionalized or systemic sexism probably deserves its own thread.","human_ref_B":"I believe that to fully appreciate why there is widespread agreement among social scientists about the reality of concepts such as systemic racism requires acknowledging the wealth of research - *both* quantitative *and* qualitative - produced by a variety of disciplines within the social sciences (anthropology, history, psychology, sociology, etc.). The nature of the concept itself cannot be boiled down to a selection of articles (or even books).  ---  I would begin by making sure to be clear on what is and is not \"race.\"  Then I would look into the conceptualization of institutional, structural, and systemic racism. Your mileage may vary according to author and discipline, but broadly speaking these are not synonymous concepts, although they are strongly interrelated. See here and here. Followed by:  **Sociohistorical perspectives on \"race\" and racism** ---  * RACE: Are we so different? by biological anthropologist Alan Goodman and colleagues  * Superior: The Return of Race Science by science journalist Angela Saini  * The Invention of Race in the European Middle Ages by Professor of Literature Geraldine Heng  Alongside the topic of...  **Health and medicine** ---  * Race and Biology by Beth Baker (Editor of BioScience)  * Systemic racism can get under our skin and into our genes by genetic anthropologist Connie Mulligan  * Myths about physical racial differences were used to justify slavery \u2014 and are still believed by doctors today by Linda Villarosa  * Why Racism, Not Race, Is a Risk Factor for Dying of COVID-19 by medical anthropologist Clarence Gravlee interviewing epidemiologist Camara Phyllis Jones  * Systemic racism and U.S. health care by sociologists Feagin & Bennefield  * Racism and Health: Evidence and Needed Research by sociologist of public health Williams) and colleagues  * Structural racism is a fundamental cause and driver of ethnic disparities in health by physician Razai and colleagues  * How Structural Racism Works \u2014 Racist Policies as a Root Cause of U.S. Racial Health Inequities by social epidemiologist Bailey and colleagues  * Environmental racism: time to tackle social injustice30219-5\/fulltext) by The Lancet Planetary Health (Editorial)  * Measures of Racism, Sexism, Heterosexism, and Gender Binarism for Health Equity Research: From Structural Injustice to Embodied Harm\u2014An Ecosocial Analysis by social epidemiologist Nancy Krieger  Having dealt with common essentialist beliefs about racialized groups, I would then branch out onto other specific topics such as:  **The Criminal Justice System** ---  * Criminal justice journalist Radley Balko's list of studies on policing   * Behavioral economist Mike Shor's list of studies on policing  * Why Statistics Don\u2019t Capture The Full Extent Of The Systemic Bias In Policing by Laura Bronner (formerly FiveThirtyEight's quantitative editor)  * The New Jim Crow by civil rights advocate Michelle Alexander  **Economic outcomes (mobility, employment, wealth, ...)** ---  * Race and Economic Opportunity in the United States: an Intergenerational Perspective by economist Chetty and colleagues    * Race and economic opportunity in the United States by Chetty et al. (VoxEU)   * The massive new study on race and economic mobility in America, explained by Dylan Matthews (Vox)   * Extensive Data Shows Punishing Reach of Racism for Black Boys by Badger and colleagues (New York Times)  * Intergenerational Wealth Mobility and Racial Inequality by sociologists Pfeffer & Killewald   * Associated animations illustrating their main points  * Comparative Perspectives on Racial Discrimination in Hiring: The Rise of Field Experiments by sociologists Quillian & Midtb\u00f8en  **Housing and Education** ---  * The Color of Law by historian Richard Rothstein  * Affluent and Black, and Still Trapped by Segregation by Eligon and Gebeloff (New York Times)  * Schools are still segregated, and black children are paying a price by Emma Garc\u00eda (Economic Policy Institute)  * 65 years after Brown v. Board of Education, school segregation is getting worse by P.R. Lockhart (Vox)  * Systemic racism in higher education (open letter published by *Science*)  ---  This is far from exhaustive, and there is a mix of peer-reviewed papers, editorials, and opinion pieces. My objective here is to provide some entry points (which can lead to other relevant readings) while promoting a multidisciplinary perspective which embraces the complexity of the topic (and the problem) and also highlighting the fact that there are multiple independent lines of research which support the existence of systemic racism in countries such as (not exclusively) the US. This being a popular topic, you can find a lot more spread around other threads in this subreddit, for which I would suggest hunting.  ---  (I am aware you are also interested in sexism. The fundamental points of my response apply, but the details differ. I agree with u\/MildManneredCat that it deserves its own thread, as it is not the *same* thing. There are different histories, different targets, ...)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10477.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"p8u068","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Are there any good articles on systematic racism\/sexism? I'm trying to find good articles on systematic racism\/sexism but none of what I've found seem particularly convincing. Are there any good and comprehensive researches on this topic?","c_root_id_A":"h9u26eq","c_root_id_B":"h9tdvz7","created_at_utc_A":1629581303,"created_at_utc_B":1629570054,"score_A":15,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I believe that to fully appreciate why there is widespread agreement among social scientists about the reality of concepts such as systemic racism requires acknowledging the wealth of research - *both* quantitative *and* qualitative - produced by a variety of disciplines within the social sciences (anthropology, history, psychology, sociology, etc.). The nature of the concept itself cannot be boiled down to a selection of articles (or even books).  ---  I would begin by making sure to be clear on what is and is not \"race.\"  Then I would look into the conceptualization of institutional, structural, and systemic racism. Your mileage may vary according to author and discipline, but broadly speaking these are not synonymous concepts, although they are strongly interrelated. See here and here. Followed by:  **Sociohistorical perspectives on \"race\" and racism** ---  * RACE: Are we so different? by biological anthropologist Alan Goodman and colleagues  * Superior: The Return of Race Science by science journalist Angela Saini  * The Invention of Race in the European Middle Ages by Professor of Literature Geraldine Heng  Alongside the topic of...  **Health and medicine** ---  * Race and Biology by Beth Baker (Editor of BioScience)  * Systemic racism can get under our skin and into our genes by genetic anthropologist Connie Mulligan  * Myths about physical racial differences were used to justify slavery \u2014 and are still believed by doctors today by Linda Villarosa  * Why Racism, Not Race, Is a Risk Factor for Dying of COVID-19 by medical anthropologist Clarence Gravlee interviewing epidemiologist Camara Phyllis Jones  * Systemic racism and U.S. health care by sociologists Feagin & Bennefield  * Racism and Health: Evidence and Needed Research by sociologist of public health Williams) and colleagues  * Structural racism is a fundamental cause and driver of ethnic disparities in health by physician Razai and colleagues  * How Structural Racism Works \u2014 Racist Policies as a Root Cause of U.S. Racial Health Inequities by social epidemiologist Bailey and colleagues  * Environmental racism: time to tackle social injustice30219-5\/fulltext) by The Lancet Planetary Health (Editorial)  * Measures of Racism, Sexism, Heterosexism, and Gender Binarism for Health Equity Research: From Structural Injustice to Embodied Harm\u2014An Ecosocial Analysis by social epidemiologist Nancy Krieger  Having dealt with common essentialist beliefs about racialized groups, I would then branch out onto other specific topics such as:  **The Criminal Justice System** ---  * Criminal justice journalist Radley Balko's list of studies on policing   * Behavioral economist Mike Shor's list of studies on policing  * Why Statistics Don\u2019t Capture The Full Extent Of The Systemic Bias In Policing by Laura Bronner (formerly FiveThirtyEight's quantitative editor)  * The New Jim Crow by civil rights advocate Michelle Alexander  **Economic outcomes (mobility, employment, wealth, ...)** ---  * Race and Economic Opportunity in the United States: an Intergenerational Perspective by economist Chetty and colleagues    * Race and economic opportunity in the United States by Chetty et al. (VoxEU)   * The massive new study on race and economic mobility in America, explained by Dylan Matthews (Vox)   * Extensive Data Shows Punishing Reach of Racism for Black Boys by Badger and colleagues (New York Times)  * Intergenerational Wealth Mobility and Racial Inequality by sociologists Pfeffer & Killewald   * Associated animations illustrating their main points  * Comparative Perspectives on Racial Discrimination in Hiring: The Rise of Field Experiments by sociologists Quillian & Midtb\u00f8en  **Housing and Education** ---  * The Color of Law by historian Richard Rothstein  * Affluent and Black, and Still Trapped by Segregation by Eligon and Gebeloff (New York Times)  * Schools are still segregated, and black children are paying a price by Emma Garc\u00eda (Economic Policy Institute)  * 65 years after Brown v. Board of Education, school segregation is getting worse by P.R. Lockhart (Vox)  * Systemic racism in higher education (open letter published by *Science*)  ---  This is far from exhaustive, and there is a mix of peer-reviewed papers, editorials, and opinion pieces. My objective here is to provide some entry points (which can lead to other relevant readings) while promoting a multidisciplinary perspective which embraces the complexity of the topic (and the problem) and also highlighting the fact that there are multiple independent lines of research which support the existence of systemic racism in countries such as (not exclusively) the US. This being a popular topic, you can find a lot more spread around other threads in this subreddit, for which I would suggest hunting.  ---  (I am aware you are also interested in sexism. The fundamental points of my response apply, but the details differ. I agree with u\/MildManneredCat that it deserves its own thread, as it is not the *same* thing. There are different histories, different targets, ...)","human_ref_B":"lol, yes there are tons, but these are broad topics. Racism and sexism in the workplace? In domestic life? In political life? Racism and sexism in relation to queerness? Is this for your personal reading or for an essay? There are tons of articles for each of these, give me some context, what do you need it for?     Edit: If you are just wanting to read about racism and sexism in general, bell hooks is always a great place to start.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11249.0,"score_ratio":1.875}
{"post_id":"p8u068","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Are there any good articles on systematic racism\/sexism? I'm trying to find good articles on systematic racism\/sexism but none of what I've found seem particularly convincing. Are there any good and comprehensive researches on this topic?","c_root_id_A":"h9u26eq","c_root_id_B":"h9tjujj","created_at_utc_A":1629581303,"created_at_utc_B":1629572806,"score_A":15,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I believe that to fully appreciate why there is widespread agreement among social scientists about the reality of concepts such as systemic racism requires acknowledging the wealth of research - *both* quantitative *and* qualitative - produced by a variety of disciplines within the social sciences (anthropology, history, psychology, sociology, etc.). The nature of the concept itself cannot be boiled down to a selection of articles (or even books).  ---  I would begin by making sure to be clear on what is and is not \"race.\"  Then I would look into the conceptualization of institutional, structural, and systemic racism. Your mileage may vary according to author and discipline, but broadly speaking these are not synonymous concepts, although they are strongly interrelated. See here and here. Followed by:  **Sociohistorical perspectives on \"race\" and racism** ---  * RACE: Are we so different? by biological anthropologist Alan Goodman and colleagues  * Superior: The Return of Race Science by science journalist Angela Saini  * The Invention of Race in the European Middle Ages by Professor of Literature Geraldine Heng  Alongside the topic of...  **Health and medicine** ---  * Race and Biology by Beth Baker (Editor of BioScience)  * Systemic racism can get under our skin and into our genes by genetic anthropologist Connie Mulligan  * Myths about physical racial differences were used to justify slavery \u2014 and are still believed by doctors today by Linda Villarosa  * Why Racism, Not Race, Is a Risk Factor for Dying of COVID-19 by medical anthropologist Clarence Gravlee interviewing epidemiologist Camara Phyllis Jones  * Systemic racism and U.S. health care by sociologists Feagin & Bennefield  * Racism and Health: Evidence and Needed Research by sociologist of public health Williams) and colleagues  * Structural racism is a fundamental cause and driver of ethnic disparities in health by physician Razai and colleagues  * How Structural Racism Works \u2014 Racist Policies as a Root Cause of U.S. Racial Health Inequities by social epidemiologist Bailey and colleagues  * Environmental racism: time to tackle social injustice30219-5\/fulltext) by The Lancet Planetary Health (Editorial)  * Measures of Racism, Sexism, Heterosexism, and Gender Binarism for Health Equity Research: From Structural Injustice to Embodied Harm\u2014An Ecosocial Analysis by social epidemiologist Nancy Krieger  Having dealt with common essentialist beliefs about racialized groups, I would then branch out onto other specific topics such as:  **The Criminal Justice System** ---  * Criminal justice journalist Radley Balko's list of studies on policing   * Behavioral economist Mike Shor's list of studies on policing  * Why Statistics Don\u2019t Capture The Full Extent Of The Systemic Bias In Policing by Laura Bronner (formerly FiveThirtyEight's quantitative editor)  * The New Jim Crow by civil rights advocate Michelle Alexander  **Economic outcomes (mobility, employment, wealth, ...)** ---  * Race and Economic Opportunity in the United States: an Intergenerational Perspective by economist Chetty and colleagues    * Race and economic opportunity in the United States by Chetty et al. (VoxEU)   * The massive new study on race and economic mobility in America, explained by Dylan Matthews (Vox)   * Extensive Data Shows Punishing Reach of Racism for Black Boys by Badger and colleagues (New York Times)  * Intergenerational Wealth Mobility and Racial Inequality by sociologists Pfeffer & Killewald   * Associated animations illustrating their main points  * Comparative Perspectives on Racial Discrimination in Hiring: The Rise of Field Experiments by sociologists Quillian & Midtb\u00f8en  **Housing and Education** ---  * The Color of Law by historian Richard Rothstein  * Affluent and Black, and Still Trapped by Segregation by Eligon and Gebeloff (New York Times)  * Schools are still segregated, and black children are paying a price by Emma Garc\u00eda (Economic Policy Institute)  * 65 years after Brown v. Board of Education, school segregation is getting worse by P.R. Lockhart (Vox)  * Systemic racism in higher education (open letter published by *Science*)  ---  This is far from exhaustive, and there is a mix of peer-reviewed papers, editorials, and opinion pieces. My objective here is to provide some entry points (which can lead to other relevant readings) while promoting a multidisciplinary perspective which embraces the complexity of the topic (and the problem) and also highlighting the fact that there are multiple independent lines of research which support the existence of systemic racism in countries such as (not exclusively) the US. This being a popular topic, you can find a lot more spread around other threads in this subreddit, for which I would suggest hunting.  ---  (I am aware you are also interested in sexism. The fundamental points of my response apply, but the details differ. I agree with u\/MildManneredCat that it deserves its own thread, as it is not the *same* thing. There are different histories, different targets, ...)","human_ref_B":"Most papers I\u2019ve found use the term \u201cinstitutional\u201d rather than \u201csystemic,\u201d but they mean the same thing. Off the top of my head we can see examples of (and responses to) institutional racism in the form of the civil rights movement in the 20th century United States and apartheid in South Africa (and the attacks targeting white South African farmers which began soon after South Africa became a democracy), while we can see examples of institutional sexism in Afghanistan with the return of the Taliban, and more broadly across large swathes of the Arab world.  If all you\u2019re trying to do is get a general overview of the topic, I\u2019d recommend OpenStax\u2019s Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition. (In particular I\u2019d focus on Chapter 11: Race and Ethnicity and Chapter 12: Gender, Sex, and Sexuality)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8497.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"p8u068","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Are there any good articles on systematic racism\/sexism? I'm trying to find good articles on systematic racism\/sexism but none of what I've found seem particularly convincing. Are there any good and comprehensive researches on this topic?","c_root_id_A":"h9tfkj5","c_root_id_B":"h9tdvz7","created_at_utc_A":1629570826,"created_at_utc_B":1629570054,"score_A":10,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Here are some big\/good works covering a few (not all) dimensions of systemic racism:  Eduardo Bonilla-Silva (2003) *Racism without Racists: Color-Blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in America* Rowman & Littlefield  Douglas Massey and Nancy Denton (1993) *American Apartheid: Segregation and the Making of the Underclass.* Harvard University Press  Robert D. Bullard (1990) *Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class, and Environmental Quality* Routledge.   Richard Rothstein. (2017) *The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America.* Norton.   Patrick Sharkey (2008) \"The Intergenerational Transmission of Context.\" American Journal of Sociology.   Lincoln Quillian and Devah Pager (2001) \"Black Neighbors, Higher Crime? The Role of Racial Stereotypes in Evaluatuons of Neighborbood Crime.\" American Journal of Sociology.  David Williams and Chiquita Collins. (2001) \"Racial Residential Segregation: A Fundamental Cause of Racial Disparitiea in Health.\" Public Health Reports  Edit: Just noticed you included sexism in your question. Systemic racism and sexism share some features and mechanisms in common, but do not operate in exactly the same way. The topic of institutionalized or systemic sexism probably deserves its own thread.","human_ref_B":"lol, yes there are tons, but these are broad topics. Racism and sexism in the workplace? In domestic life? In political life? Racism and sexism in relation to queerness? Is this for your personal reading or for an essay? There are tons of articles for each of these, give me some context, what do you need it for?     Edit: If you are just wanting to read about racism and sexism in general, bell hooks is always a great place to start.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":772.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"90bi2e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Can someone give me a list of maths knowledge I should consolidate for Economics\/Econometrics I'm doing a Masters in September and 2 of my modules are very math based. I'm looking into Khan Academy but would love to tailor my study towards Economics so I have a clear focus. If someone can outline a pathway that I could follow it would be great.(For an indication of my level, I scraped a pass in both Statistics and Quantitative Economics for my undergraduate) The Masters in question is too good to turn down(and isn't expensive..I'm in Europe) so I have to take the risk and go for it.","c_root_id_A":"e2p9hb2","c_root_id_B":"e2pakxk","created_at_utc_A":1532051714,"created_at_utc_B":1532052897,"score_A":3,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"What textbooks are they using? Should give you a good idea of the difficulty and where to start from there. I'd say differential and integral calculus are a must with some multivariate optimization and linear algebra if possible.","human_ref_B":"I can't stress statistics enough.  Economists are paid for their math which is mostly in stats.  Not many are paid for their knowledge in economic history.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1183.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"90bi2e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Can someone give me a list of maths knowledge I should consolidate for Economics\/Econometrics I'm doing a Masters in September and 2 of my modules are very math based. I'm looking into Khan Academy but would love to tailor my study towards Economics so I have a clear focus. If someone can outline a pathway that I could follow it would be great.(For an indication of my level, I scraped a pass in both Statistics and Quantitative Economics for my undergraduate) The Masters in question is too good to turn down(and isn't expensive..I'm in Europe) so I have to take the risk and go for it.","c_root_id_A":"e2p9hb2","c_root_id_B":"e2purs7","created_at_utc_A":1532051714,"created_at_utc_B":1532084407,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"What textbooks are they using? Should give you a good idea of the difficulty and where to start from there. I'd say differential and integral calculus are a must with some multivariate optimization and linear algebra if possible.","human_ref_B":"I would strongly recommend becoming more comfortable with statistics to the point that the math behind it feels intuitive; a lot of attention is given to various linear models but you'll find logistic modeling underpins a majority of econometric treatments. Refresh your calculus, particularly derivatives. Depending on what kind of economics you're doing, ordinary differential equations may also be worth learning now. If you don't already, I would recommend you code in R to help in your understanding of what math is actually happening behind a broad command you'd see on a software like Stata. If your Masters is going to teach\/expect you to know R, then taking some time now to wrap your head around arrays and matrix algebra may also be useful. Good luck!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":32693.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"29f9nz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Is my economics book still useful? I've recently picked up an economics textbook at a thrift shop for just 2 bucks - it's \"Economics, 6th edition\" by Richard G. Lipsey and Peter O. Steiner. The book is from 1981 - do you people think it's still useful? Thirty years seems like quite some time, but then again, maybe not so much has changed since then; at least in terms of undergrad intro-economics.","c_root_id_A":"cikhleb","c_root_id_B":"cikef6z","created_at_utc_A":1404093053,"created_at_utc_B":1404085045,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"1981?  You can pick up a more recent copy of other good econ books for cheap as well.  From 1981, the micro chapters won't change that much, but the discussion in the Macro will be different.  You're missing the years where the US had the early 80's recession, the 90's expansion and dot-com boom, etc...","human_ref_B":"It is still useful, but remember your critical thinking skills. That is to say  think about what you are reading and reflect on where it comes from. Just like Lipsey and Steiner, all new literature is based upon (at least in part) on more classic literature.   That being said, it is a good idea to be well versed in not only the modern literature, but also the classic to understand the full progression of theories from development to applications and tests of applications.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8008.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1b1at4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"How does being a soldier effect criminals? I was wondering if there have been any studies about criminals that have gone to war.    At the moment the media in Denmark is in an uproar, because gang members are going to Syria, to join the civil war. The media seems to believe that it will escalate their crime when they get back. So I'd like to know if there is any foundation for this concern.","c_root_id_A":"c92uxj4","c_root_id_B":"c92tvlo","created_at_utc_A":1364324493,"created_at_utc_B":1364321591,"score_A":11,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Effects of war may vary. Definitions of the word Soldier may vary too. Are they joining well regulated, regimented, paid modern military forces to perform the services of a Soldier or are they mobbing up into undisciplined militias to wage guerilla warfare?  Does the returning criminal return to a country with veterans benefits and programs to help integrate them back into society or will he be returning to the same criminality and low-opportunity he left to enter the war?   Military life has turned MANY teenage delinquents into upstanding citizens, but it has a lot to do with learning a regimented lifestyle and access to resources upon reintegration into society.  People waging a guerilla campaign with loosely affiliated militias in a region of anarchy will likely not benefit from those aspects of the soldier experience.","human_ref_B":"A recent study shows that everyone returning from a conflict zone is moee violent, http:\/\/m.bbc.co.uk\/news\/uk-18902195","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2902.0,"score_ratio":2.2}
{"post_id":"1pvmli","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What is the best way to stop poaching? Thinking specifically about the rhino.  Banning trade often backfires, the commodity becomes more valuable, and people take greater risks to acquire it.  But banning the trade of ivory actually seems to have worked.  How did banning ivory tamp down demand? Would banning rhino horn do the same?","c_root_id_A":"cd6iohl","c_root_id_B":"cd6izbq","created_at_utc_A":1383580180,"created_at_utc_B":1383580996,"score_A":6,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"This is way outside my area of expertise, just something I've been curious about for a while.  I've tried to source this somewhat, but as always, feel free to dispute\/question anything.  Actually, trade in rhino horn is currently banned already.  But this is a pretty good question and there is no straight forward answer to whether trading rhino horns should be legalized or not.  One advantage to a blanket ban is that any horn in commerce is an illegal one, so smugglers can't claim to have legitimate horns. But it hasn't stopped poachers\/smugglers thus far.    Some advocated legalizing trade \"ranching\" rhinos and selling the harvested horns - evidently you can remove the horn in a way that it grows back.  This way it is in certain people's economic interest to keep rhinos alive so as to benefit from their horn.   Others have argued that publishing values of rhino horns encouraged poaching and farming rhinos pretty much ensures poachers get the wild ones, decreases genetic variability, and selective breeding will turn rhinos into large cows (source).    You have examples on both sides.  Legalizing trade of tiger products hasn't helped them rebound and their wild numbers have continued to drag near extinction.  Legalizing ivory trade was done poorly and didn't work.  Banning ivory trade worked for a time]() but [poaching has risen dramatically and some are advocating a lift on the ban (others oppose). One-time firesales have both increased & decreased prices, so that isn't clear either.  There are other, more dramatic, proposals.  One is to dye & poison the horns so those consuming them would get sick.  A few years ago, there was suggestion to preemptively remove rhino horns without killing the rhinos, so poachers can't get the horns, but it appears poachers will still kill the animal for the nub.   So the answer is I don't know, but there are reasonable people on all sides of the debate.","human_ref_B":"Privatization\/fiduciary trusteeship of public lands and encouraging wildlife ranching. \\[1\\] \\[2\\]  Prohibition reduces supply of the prohibited good. When you reduce the supply of a good, the price goes up, bidding new producers into the market for that good. Banning ivory *hasn't* worked - poaching is up. \\[1\\] \\[2\\] \\[3\\]  The white rhino has already been saved by ranching once. Check out this podcast with resource economist Mike \u2019t Sas-Rolfes:  >In 1900, the southern white rhinoceros was the most endangered of the five rhinoceros species. Less than 20 rhinos remained in a single reserve in South Africa. By 2010, white rhino numbers had climbed to more than 20,000, making it the most common rhino species on the planet.  >Saving the white rhino from extinction can be attributed to a change in policy that allowed private ownership of wildlife. While protecting the rhinos encouraged breeding, the ranchers were able to profit by limited trophy hunting.  >Poaching for rhino horn, which is in high demand for medicinal and ornamental purposes, had also devastated the rhino population. CITES banned the commercial sale of rhino horn, which caused black market sales to sky rocket and encouraged poaching. If the ban were lifted, ranchers are ready to supply the market by harvesting the horns humanely, which then regrow just like fingernails.  >Strong property rights and market incentives have provided a successful model for rhino conservation, despite the negative impact of command-and-control approaches that rely on regulations and bans that restrict wildlife use.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":816.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1pvmli","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What is the best way to stop poaching? Thinking specifically about the rhino.  Banning trade often backfires, the commodity becomes more valuable, and people take greater risks to acquire it.  But banning the trade of ivory actually seems to have worked.  How did banning ivory tamp down demand? Would banning rhino horn do the same?","c_root_id_A":"cd6izbq","c_root_id_B":"cd6ioxj","created_at_utc_A":1383580996,"created_at_utc_B":1383580214,"score_A":26,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Privatization\/fiduciary trusteeship of public lands and encouraging wildlife ranching. \\[1\\] \\[2\\]  Prohibition reduces supply of the prohibited good. When you reduce the supply of a good, the price goes up, bidding new producers into the market for that good. Banning ivory *hasn't* worked - poaching is up. \\[1\\] \\[2\\] \\[3\\]  The white rhino has already been saved by ranching once. Check out this podcast with resource economist Mike \u2019t Sas-Rolfes:  >In 1900, the southern white rhinoceros was the most endangered of the five rhinoceros species. Less than 20 rhinos remained in a single reserve in South Africa. By 2010, white rhino numbers had climbed to more than 20,000, making it the most common rhino species on the planet.  >Saving the white rhino from extinction can be attributed to a change in policy that allowed private ownership of wildlife. While protecting the rhinos encouraged breeding, the ranchers were able to profit by limited trophy hunting.  >Poaching for rhino horn, which is in high demand for medicinal and ornamental purposes, had also devastated the rhino population. CITES banned the commercial sale of rhino horn, which caused black market sales to sky rocket and encouraged poaching. If the ban were lifted, ranchers are ready to supply the market by harvesting the horns humanely, which then regrow just like fingernails.  >Strong property rights and market incentives have provided a successful model for rhino conservation, despite the negative impact of command-and-control approaches that rely on regulations and bans that restrict wildlife use.","human_ref_B":"Not so sure banning ivory works like you think.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":782.0,"score_ratio":13.0}
{"post_id":"1pvmli","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What is the best way to stop poaching? Thinking specifically about the rhino.  Banning trade often backfires, the commodity becomes more valuable, and people take greater risks to acquire it.  But banning the trade of ivory actually seems to have worked.  How did banning ivory tamp down demand? Would banning rhino horn do the same?","c_root_id_A":"cd6is79","c_root_id_B":"cd6izbq","created_at_utc_A":1383580459,"created_at_utc_B":1383580996,"score_A":2,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"Perhaps you missed this.  Edit:  Education is the only way to eradicate poaching, by the way.  Education eliminates the superstitions that fuel the trade.  Education makes people understand that once these magnificent creatures are gone, they're gone, and we can't get them back.  Education makes people understand that these creatures are worth more alive than dead.  As tourist draws.  As members of a functioning and healthy biosphere.","human_ref_B":"Privatization\/fiduciary trusteeship of public lands and encouraging wildlife ranching. \\[1\\] \\[2\\]  Prohibition reduces supply of the prohibited good. When you reduce the supply of a good, the price goes up, bidding new producers into the market for that good. Banning ivory *hasn't* worked - poaching is up. \\[1\\] \\[2\\] \\[3\\]  The white rhino has already been saved by ranching once. Check out this podcast with resource economist Mike \u2019t Sas-Rolfes:  >In 1900, the southern white rhinoceros was the most endangered of the five rhinoceros species. Less than 20 rhinos remained in a single reserve in South Africa. By 2010, white rhino numbers had climbed to more than 20,000, making it the most common rhino species on the planet.  >Saving the white rhino from extinction can be attributed to a change in policy that allowed private ownership of wildlife. While protecting the rhinos encouraged breeding, the ranchers were able to profit by limited trophy hunting.  >Poaching for rhino horn, which is in high demand for medicinal and ornamental purposes, had also devastated the rhino population. CITES banned the commercial sale of rhino horn, which caused black market sales to sky rocket and encouraged poaching. If the ban were lifted, ranchers are ready to supply the market by harvesting the horns humanely, which then regrow just like fingernails.  >Strong property rights and market incentives have provided a successful model for rhino conservation, despite the negative impact of command-and-control approaches that rely on regulations and bans that restrict wildlife use.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":537.0,"score_ratio":13.0}
{"post_id":"1pvmli","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What is the best way to stop poaching? Thinking specifically about the rhino.  Banning trade often backfires, the commodity becomes more valuable, and people take greater risks to acquire it.  But banning the trade of ivory actually seems to have worked.  How did banning ivory tamp down demand? Would banning rhino horn do the same?","c_root_id_A":"cd6l81f","c_root_id_B":"cd6ioxj","created_at_utc_A":1383586601,"created_at_utc_B":1383580214,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Planet Money did a good podcast on the subject and looked at a few different options to stop the poaching of rhino horns for export (generally as a hocus pocus cure-all in parts of Asia): Legalize it (the horns do grow back) and regulate the trade; Burn it, just like Kenya did 25 years ago; Or *poison* it - infuse some proprietary chemical into the horn which doesn't hurt the rhino but will cause anyone who ingests the horn to become seriously ill.  Here's the link - check it out!","human_ref_B":"Not so sure banning ivory works like you think.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6387.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1pvmli","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What is the best way to stop poaching? Thinking specifically about the rhino.  Banning trade often backfires, the commodity becomes more valuable, and people take greater risks to acquire it.  But banning the trade of ivory actually seems to have worked.  How did banning ivory tamp down demand? Would banning rhino horn do the same?","c_root_id_A":"cd6is79","c_root_id_B":"cd6l81f","created_at_utc_A":1383580459,"created_at_utc_B":1383586601,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Perhaps you missed this.  Edit:  Education is the only way to eradicate poaching, by the way.  Education eliminates the superstitions that fuel the trade.  Education makes people understand that once these magnificent creatures are gone, they're gone, and we can't get them back.  Education makes people understand that these creatures are worth more alive than dead.  As tourist draws.  As members of a functioning and healthy biosphere.","human_ref_B":"Planet Money did a good podcast on the subject and looked at a few different options to stop the poaching of rhino horns for export (generally as a hocus pocus cure-all in parts of Asia): Legalize it (the horns do grow back) and regulate the trade; Burn it, just like Kenya did 25 years ago; Or *poison* it - infuse some proprietary chemical into the horn which doesn't hurt the rhino but will cause anyone who ingests the horn to become seriously ill.  Here's the link - check it out!","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6142.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1pvmli","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What is the best way to stop poaching? Thinking specifically about the rhino.  Banning trade often backfires, the commodity becomes more valuable, and people take greater risks to acquire it.  But banning the trade of ivory actually seems to have worked.  How did banning ivory tamp down demand? Would banning rhino horn do the same?","c_root_id_A":"cd6tj0z","c_root_id_B":"cd6ioxj","created_at_utc_A":1383605718,"created_at_utc_B":1383580214,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I would try to enact a program to change the ideology behind the demand. One of the reasons rhinos killed is for the medicinal properties the Chinese associate with their horns. There's a HUGE demand for them. The horns are credited with curing everything from sexual dysfunction to typhoid. Save the Rhino has some great info on this. Perhaps finding a substitution for the horn and presenting it as a cheaper alternative would be more effective than outlawing trade. After all the War on Drugs outlawed the industry but it did nothing to stop the demand.","human_ref_B":"Not so sure banning ivory works like you think.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25504.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1pvmli","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What is the best way to stop poaching? Thinking specifically about the rhino.  Banning trade often backfires, the commodity becomes more valuable, and people take greater risks to acquire it.  But banning the trade of ivory actually seems to have worked.  How did banning ivory tamp down demand? Would banning rhino horn do the same?","c_root_id_A":"cd6is79","c_root_id_B":"cd6tj0z","created_at_utc_A":1383580459,"created_at_utc_B":1383605718,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Perhaps you missed this.  Edit:  Education is the only way to eradicate poaching, by the way.  Education eliminates the superstitions that fuel the trade.  Education makes people understand that once these magnificent creatures are gone, they're gone, and we can't get them back.  Education makes people understand that these creatures are worth more alive than dead.  As tourist draws.  As members of a functioning and healthy biosphere.","human_ref_B":"I would try to enact a program to change the ideology behind the demand. One of the reasons rhinos killed is for the medicinal properties the Chinese associate with their horns. There's a HUGE demand for them. The horns are credited with curing everything from sexual dysfunction to typhoid. Save the Rhino has some great info on this. Perhaps finding a substitution for the horn and presenting it as a cheaper alternative would be more effective than outlawing trade. After all the War on Drugs outlawed the industry but it did nothing to stop the demand.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25259.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5veayf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Why do most for-profit colleges deliver such poor outcomes? On the face of it, profit motive isn't inherently bad for education. Some for-profit colleges are good and a few, like Digipen, even have some degree of renown.  Most, however, are middling, and many are just bad. Some have even been shut down due to allegations of predatory practices and defrauding the American student loan system. Many are unaccredited and don't seem to provide any meaningful value to the consumer at all (diploma mills). Others are accredited, but laughed at and have poor reputations.  Are there any theories on why for-profit colleges are of such poor quality?","c_root_id_A":"de2h60j","c_root_id_B":"de1pktr","created_at_utc_A":1487777906,"created_at_utc_B":1487727183,"score_A":10,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"TL;DR  For-profits tend to have poor outcomes because they are 1) primarily distance-based, which is extremely difficult and is often the choice of people with external stressors that inhibit their ability to focus and succeed, and 2) have a habit of putting a lot of money into acquisition and retention and not so much on instruction. (This is changing, though, as I can tell you about my personal experiences with National, AMU, Capella, and Northcentral).   Long Version:   I can talk about higher education in America since that's the topic of my PhD.   Take a look at the 2012 Harkin Report, a study that was done in the US Senate about for-profit schools.  From the report, it became enormously evident that Americans were feeling like they were not getting a return on investment with regard to for-profit colleges.  These were more expensive, had worse overall persistence and completion rates, and were generally regarded (thanks to aggressive marketing tactics) as diploma mills.  Americans were dropping out at higher rates, raking up student loan debt, and getting angry that their hard-earned degrees were not leading to high-paying jobs like the American dream had promised them.   Is this because for-profits are all \"diploma mills\"?   Universities like Capella, for example, are accredited by the same institution that accredits Ivy League institutions.  The place I'm getting my PhD is a for-profit, online institution, and is accredited by the same entity that accredits all state universities and colleges in the southeast United States.  Perception of for-profits tends to be abysmal for anyone not privy to how higher education actually works in society.  Some think getting a degree is a guarantee--a guarantee that you will become gainfully employed, be able to support a family, and retire with a good pension.  This is the great lie that we've all been told, left over from the Industrial Revolution.  Remember when we told our kids you could get into a factory job out of high school and make enough money to support a family, buy a car, buy a house, and retire?  Those days are gone, and it's not higher education's fault.  Unfortunately, higher education is the most tangible thing to blame: I spent years getting a degree and now I can't find a job--it MUST be education's fault! (People really think this)  It doesn't help that there are studies supporting this notion with regards to employment.  Sometimes people think that having attended a for-profit college makes an applicant less worthy, but the reality of the situation is that for-profit students tend to be non-traditional (i.e., not right out of high school, tend to have dependents, tend to have one or more jobs, etc).  More on this in the next section.   So no, for-profits are not \"diploma mills,\" since they are accredited by the same entity that is accrediting that school that is being sold as \"better\" than the online institution you were thinking about attending.   So are for-profits just preying on people to rack up student loan debt?   Yes, unfortunately, but not because for-profit education is inherently bad.  These institutions recognized a gap in public education and filled it, using the principles of free market capitalism to make money and serve students.  Think of it like this:  public institutions have a gatekeeping process that weeds out people who otherwise would have not attended college anyway, and for-profit colleges tend to have very open admissions policies.  This means that for-profits are going to enroll people who would have never gone to college in the first place, creating a population of people hyped up on marketing tactics but generally unprepared for the rigors of higher education.  Combine this with a primarily distance-based pedagogy and you have a recipe for failure.   The 2012 Harkin Report identified some troubling statistics about for-profit higher education, one of which was that for-profit schools spend upwards of 50+% of their expenditures on marketing alone.  In my opinion, this was unsettling to the Senate committee because it was a hard look at how capitalism solves problems.  Again, we have to remember that for-profits didn't just appear out of nowhere; there was a void created by public institutions that for-profits came in and filled.    So why are outcomes at for-profits so abysmal?   For-profits attract non-traditional adult learners, who have a unique learning style.  On top of that, students who choose to attend for-profit schools tend to rationalize their choices for many reasons, one of which being that they feel more in control of their return on investment.    However, the open admissions policy coupled with distance education format is a recipe for outcomes disaster.  Due to correspondence schools of yesteryear being scammy, distance education has been traditionally disregarded as less \"genuine\" and less respectable than in-person alternatives.  However, as people with degrees from online schools do more and more great things, the perception of value for primarily distance education based schools is beginning to level out.  The recipe for disaster--online education coupled with open admissions policies--is why for-profit outcomes are so abysmal.  Distance education is extremely tough; I've earned a BA, MA, and now I'm working on a PhD entirely online, while taking care of three kids, working a full-time job, and actively writing and publishing.  People are, in my opinion, scared about people like me because I'm a non-traditional PhD: I'm not teaching as a stipulation of my matriculation (and subsequently, undergraduates and graduate students are not being taught by a master's level practitioner, a huge problem in traditional universities); I've got a really successful book out there and in the works on another one; I'm a strong leader at the institution I work at... I've met plenty of people with motivation and ambition who can succeed in a distance education model, earn a degree, and go on and do what they want.  I've also met people who are not intrinsically motivated, think a degree is going to solve whatever problems they're having in life, and then get disappointed when they are in debt and now can't find a job.    Speaking of graduate students teaching at universities: this is a cost-saving feature.  Why have your PhD teach a class when one of that PhD's students can teach it instead?  Public institutions are cutting costs this way and through the adjunctivisation of higher education all the time, but we punish for-profits for navigating the capitalist rules of a free market and not public universities.  Almost hypocritical, don't you think?","human_ref_B":"this economics professor covers it in the middle of this podcast: http:\/\/www.democracyatwork.info\/eu_real_economic_journalism","labels":1,"seconds_difference":50723.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"1ki8lb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Can anyone suggest some books\/resources for learning economic model development? I have a BA in economics, and now work in the economics department of a large bank. I took an econometrics class in college and understand the basics of regression analysis, but never had a forecasting class, and haven't used statistical analysis in quite some time. I'd like to learn about forecasting, and perhaps learn to build a model for something like a predicted local economic growth rate given a US growth rate.  Note, I have an idea of how to do this intuitively; a simple regression on the local growth rate and national growth rate historically should give me a way to take a forecasted US growth rate and return a local growth rate.  This seems overly simplified, though, and I'm sure there are other, more sophisticated ways of doing it. This is just an example of what I'd like to learn :-).  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cbp8rbk","c_root_id_B":"cbpbo2s","created_at_utc_A":1376686192,"created_at_utc_B":1376694545,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Did your econometrics class cover time-series?  What types of models are used in your workplace? E.g. DSGEs?","human_ref_B":"Mostly Harmless Econometrics  and  The Signal and the Noise  are my recommendations for an introduction into more advanced topics in econometrics. If you want more of a textbook Th3Plot_inYou's suggestion is good (I still have mine from my class).  Edit: Signal and the Noise is more theoretical about forecasting in general.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8353.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1ki8lb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Can anyone suggest some books\/resources for learning economic model development? I have a BA in economics, and now work in the economics department of a large bank. I took an econometrics class in college and understand the basics of regression analysis, but never had a forecasting class, and haven't used statistical analysis in quite some time. I'd like to learn about forecasting, and perhaps learn to build a model for something like a predicted local economic growth rate given a US growth rate.  Note, I have an idea of how to do this intuitively; a simple regression on the local growth rate and national growth rate historically should give me a way to take a forecasted US growth rate and return a local growth rate.  This seems overly simplified, though, and I'm sure there are other, more sophisticated ways of doing it. This is just an example of what I'd like to learn :-).  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cbpbo2s","c_root_id_B":"cbpanah","created_at_utc_A":1376694545,"created_at_utc_B":1376691509,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Mostly Harmless Econometrics  and  The Signal and the Noise  are my recommendations for an introduction into more advanced topics in econometrics. If you want more of a textbook Th3Plot_inYou's suggestion is good (I still have mine from my class).  Edit: Signal and the Noise is more theoretical about forecasting in general.","human_ref_B":"You can Google \"Introductory Econometrics Wooldridge download\" and there should be a link or two that directs you to a free download for the second edition. I used it for my econometrics class but didn't end up going through the whole book because there's a massive amount of information on econometrics. Very thorough book. I recommend this one.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3036.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1fl0b0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Can anyone suggest required reading on the permanent worldwide decrease of jobs due to advancement in technology? Books, articles, whatever.  I'm talking about the plethora of discussions, some of which, for example, are touched upon in this article.  Also discussions of solutions, such as Guaranteed Minimum Income.  Is there a term for this overall subject?  Something to make finding additional resources on this subject easier?","c_root_id_A":"cabkbxg","c_root_id_B":"cablfpo","created_at_utc_A":1370300253,"created_at_utc_B":1370303489,"score_A":3,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Who Owns the Future by Jaron Lanier.  \"Much of the book looks at the way Internet technology threatens to destroy the middle class by first eroding employment and job security, along with various \u201clevees\u201d that give the economic middle stability.\"  From Salon.","human_ref_B":"I'd start by reading About the lump of labor fallacy","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3236.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"281kob","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"Did Boris Yeltsin's alcoholism have an effect on the Russian Federation during his presidency?","c_root_id_A":"ci6qfwy","c_root_id_B":"ci6ia33","created_at_utc_A":1402682354,"created_at_utc_B":1402664015,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If you don't get good answers here you could ask \/r\/AskHistorians","human_ref_B":"No, it didn't as he wasn't ruling the country anyway. The https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Semibankirschina were in charge.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18339.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"8oncd2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Plausibility of mass exits from US labor force for disability rolls in the 2000s? Fact-checking a book. (X-posted r\/askeconomics) I'm reading *The War on Normal People* by Andrew Yang, a US Democratic 2020 candidate whose platform hinges on UBI. The book warns of the perils of automation, and one particular narrative completely jars me. Yang suggests that \"More than 5 million manufacturing workers lost their jobs after 2000.\" Sounds plausible. Then, \u201cOne Department of Labor survey in 2012 found that 41 percent of displaced manufacturing workers between 2009 and 2011 were either still unemployed or dropped out of the labor market within three years of losing their jobs.\u201d Sure.  But then he says this: \u201cHow do the 40 percent of displaced manufacturing workers who don\u2019t find new jobs survive? The short answer is that many became destitute and applied for disability benefits. Disability rolls shot up starting in 2000, rising by 3.5 million, with the numbers increasing dramatically in Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and other manufacturing\\-heavy states. In Michigan, about half of the 310,000 residents who left the workforce between 2003 and 2013 went on disability. Many displaced manufacturing workers essentially entered a new underclass of government dependents who have been left behind.\u201d  I think that this is Yang's original research, and unfortunately he's not too transparent about how he arrives at this conclusion. Does this sound plausible\u2014or better yet, verifiable? Furthermore, some cursory Googling indicates that manufacturing\\-heavy states do have high disability enrollment precisely because manufacturing jobs often leave people physically injured, unfortunately. Thoughts?","c_root_id_A":"e04rbe0","c_root_id_B":"e04xj0c","created_at_utc_A":1528170018,"created_at_utc_B":1528178927,"score_A":12,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"I remember This American Life had an episode on it.   https:\/\/www.thisamericanlife.org\/490\/trends-with-benefits","human_ref_B":"Yang is right- disability applications rise and fall with unemployment rate. There was also a huge jump in disability insurance applications after Clinton's welfare reform and after the 2008-9 crash. A lot of conditions that qualify people for SSI\/ SSDI are sufficiently broad that functionally \"able-bodied\" people can qualify for them. Thus a large number of people that qualify will never be on it. One might assume the opposite is true as well- but for a lot of people, receiving disability benefits is a better alternative than working a minimum wage service sector job after losing a high-salary manufacturing job. Back pain, autoimmune diseases, diabetes, and relatively-minor mental illnesses can all qualify someone for disability benefits, and many of those things, even if present, are often treatable and not always barriers to working.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8909.0,"score_ratio":1.0833333333}
{"post_id":"21sv6e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"If i wanted to figure out my own political leanings, which key topics should i educate myself on to make an informed decision? i.e. What are the main political ideologies at play today, not just in the US, but in the world, and what are the key issues that separate them? Without seeking to be an expert on any one topic, what sort of things should i read up on to figure out where i stand?","c_root_id_A":"cggjl2h","c_root_id_B":"cggic65","created_at_utc_A":1396284526,"created_at_utc_B":1396281914,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Even considering the validity of all other comments here, please do one thing: be willing to be flexible. Don't just say \"well I think this, so I'm a Republican.\" Sometimes, especially in the case of people just starting to explore political ideology, you have opinions based on unscrutinized, reactionary, not-very-thought-out feelings that are just a first response. I was \"against\" gay marriage for my first 5-6 years as an adult, because I never engaged in a conversation with someone who was for it. I wasn't *adamantly* against it, but if\/when it was a ballot issue, I voted no. I favored smoking bans in restaurants until someone explained property rights to me. I was against drug legalization until a religious discussion on the importance of agency made me realize that it is more important that a man fuck up his life by his own free will than to live a clean and happy life by the force of law.  Once you get to the more polarizing issues, and you start digging your heels in, just look and see where your heels are digging and that'll be your political identity.","human_ref_B":"There are some good answers here, but I didn't find what I would respond, so here we are.  No matter your interest level in politics (mild to PhD) I really think there is little value in knowing how you compare to others (left\/right is the most obvious).  I really like \/u\/Halosar's point about incorporating statistics, but I still think there is little need to see where you fall based on others' views.   As a political scientist there is a need to be objective, but I think that translates into one's own political views.  Once you tie yourself down to a party\/ideology you might be compromising some of your beliefs.  Certainly researching party and ideology can be valuable, because it gives you a familiarity with a candidate's point of view prior to learning more about them, but your opinions on policy might vary greatly from party to party and candidate to candidate.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2612.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"21sv6e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"If i wanted to figure out my own political leanings, which key topics should i educate myself on to make an informed decision? i.e. What are the main political ideologies at play today, not just in the US, but in the world, and what are the key issues that separate them? Without seeking to be an expert on any one topic, what sort of things should i read up on to figure out where i stand?","c_root_id_A":"cggcxpc","c_root_id_B":"cggjl2h","created_at_utc_A":1396266009,"created_at_utc_B":1396284526,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would doubt that you would need to be doing empirical research. Politics is about value judgements on certain issues. Who you side with in distributional conflicts as well as how you think society should be governed.","human_ref_B":"Even considering the validity of all other comments here, please do one thing: be willing to be flexible. Don't just say \"well I think this, so I'm a Republican.\" Sometimes, especially in the case of people just starting to explore political ideology, you have opinions based on unscrutinized, reactionary, not-very-thought-out feelings that are just a first response. I was \"against\" gay marriage for my first 5-6 years as an adult, because I never engaged in a conversation with someone who was for it. I wasn't *adamantly* against it, but if\/when it was a ballot issue, I voted no. I favored smoking bans in restaurants until someone explained property rights to me. I was against drug legalization until a religious discussion on the importance of agency made me realize that it is more important that a man fuck up his life by his own free will than to live a clean and happy life by the force of law.  Once you get to the more polarizing issues, and you start digging your heels in, just look and see where your heels are digging and that'll be your political identity.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18517.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"21sv6e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"If i wanted to figure out my own political leanings, which key topics should i educate myself on to make an informed decision? i.e. What are the main political ideologies at play today, not just in the US, but in the world, and what are the key issues that separate them? Without seeking to be an expert on any one topic, what sort of things should i read up on to figure out where i stand?","c_root_id_A":"cggplu0","c_root_id_B":"cggic65","created_at_utc_A":1396296441,"created_at_utc_B":1396281914,"score_A":5,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"If you want to have a more informed opinion about what governments should be doing, learn more about the things governments do. Spend time learning about criminal law, business regulations, civil law, funding of government agencies, international trade agreements and regulations, and responses to humanitarian crises. Don't worry so much about having an opinion. Focus on being informed, instead.","human_ref_B":"There are some good answers here, but I didn't find what I would respond, so here we are.  No matter your interest level in politics (mild to PhD) I really think there is little value in knowing how you compare to others (left\/right is the most obvious).  I really like \/u\/Halosar's point about incorporating statistics, but I still think there is little need to see where you fall based on others' views.   As a political scientist there is a need to be objective, but I think that translates into one's own political views.  Once you tie yourself down to a party\/ideology you might be compromising some of your beliefs.  Certainly researching party and ideology can be valuable, because it gives you a familiarity with a candidate's point of view prior to learning more about them, but your opinions on policy might vary greatly from party to party and candidate to candidate.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14527.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"21sv6e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"If i wanted to figure out my own political leanings, which key topics should i educate myself on to make an informed decision? i.e. What are the main political ideologies at play today, not just in the US, but in the world, and what are the key issues that separate them? Without seeking to be an expert on any one topic, what sort of things should i read up on to figure out where i stand?","c_root_id_A":"cggplu0","c_root_id_B":"cggcxpc","created_at_utc_A":1396296441,"created_at_utc_B":1396266009,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If you want to have a more informed opinion about what governments should be doing, learn more about the things governments do. Spend time learning about criminal law, business regulations, civil law, funding of government agencies, international trade agreements and regulations, and responses to humanitarian crises. Don't worry so much about having an opinion. Focus on being informed, instead.","human_ref_B":"I would doubt that you would need to be doing empirical research. Politics is about value judgements on certain issues. Who you side with in distributional conflicts as well as how you think society should be governed.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":30432.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"21sv6e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"If i wanted to figure out my own political leanings, which key topics should i educate myself on to make an informed decision? i.e. What are the main political ideologies at play today, not just in the US, but in the world, and what are the key issues that separate them? Without seeking to be an expert on any one topic, what sort of things should i read up on to figure out where i stand?","c_root_id_A":"cggplu0","c_root_id_B":"cggorlb","created_at_utc_A":1396296441,"created_at_utc_B":1396294850,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If you want to have a more informed opinion about what governments should be doing, learn more about the things governments do. Spend time learning about criminal law, business regulations, civil law, funding of government agencies, international trade agreements and regulations, and responses to humanitarian crises. Don't worry so much about having an opinion. Focus on being informed, instead.","human_ref_B":"I hear these arguments from liberals as much as I do Trotskyists and other left communists, who strangely repeat bourgeois propaganda of the cold war.   I don't think we'll see fully developed communism (stateless, classless society) in our lifetime either, but it's sure as hell worth fighting for, if only for the short-terms gains made for workers along the way. I feel guilty leaving future generations to deal with\/suffer from this mess.  As to whether it's a possibility, Marxism holds that it's an historical inevitability, but it isn't going to happen if we just sit around and wait for it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1591.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"21sv6e","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"If i wanted to figure out my own political leanings, which key topics should i educate myself on to make an informed decision? i.e. What are the main political ideologies at play today, not just in the US, but in the world, and what are the key issues that separate them? Without seeking to be an expert on any one topic, what sort of things should i read up on to figure out where i stand?","c_root_id_A":"cggic65","c_root_id_B":"cggcxpc","created_at_utc_A":1396281914,"created_at_utc_B":1396266009,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There are some good answers here, but I didn't find what I would respond, so here we are.  No matter your interest level in politics (mild to PhD) I really think there is little value in knowing how you compare to others (left\/right is the most obvious).  I really like \/u\/Halosar's point about incorporating statistics, but I still think there is little need to see where you fall based on others' views.   As a political scientist there is a need to be objective, but I think that translates into one's own political views.  Once you tie yourself down to a party\/ideology you might be compromising some of your beliefs.  Certainly researching party and ideology can be valuable, because it gives you a familiarity with a candidate's point of view prior to learning more about them, but your opinions on policy might vary greatly from party to party and candidate to candidate.","human_ref_B":"I would doubt that you would need to be doing empirical research. Politics is about value judgements on certain issues. Who you side with in distributional conflicts as well as how you think society should be governed.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15905.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3ttnvw","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"How does daycare or preschool affect a child's development later in life? Is there any evidence to say that daycare helps children in school later in life? Is there a correlation between high school graduation rates, or their future employment? What about social skills in kids that went to pre-school or daycare?","c_root_id_A":"cx9eqi7","c_root_id_B":"cx9euv7","created_at_utc_A":1448228451,"created_at_utc_B":1448228638,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"In addition to the links included below, there are a number of other observations, or analogous situations suggesting even minor differences during these crucial developmental years are of great measurable significance. Even mild and in utero environmental effects, like those during the Dutch Hunger Winter, have a notable impact on health outcomes. Anyway, to your question, here are some publicly available articles and abstracts of relevance:  In a study of the same group of people over time, exclusively high-risk infants were assessed (thus controlling for some socioeconomic causal variance) and the researchers concluded that, \"Preschool treatment was associated with educationally meaningful effect sizes on reading and math skills that persisted into adulthood. School-age treatment served to maintain preschool benefits for reading, but by itself, the effects were generally weaker than those of the preschool program. Statistically significant differences in the attainment of full economic independence were not found at this stage, but would not be expected among young adults still attending school.\" http:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1207\/S1532480XADS0601_05  \"Relative to the comparison group receiving the usual services, program participation was independently linked to higher educational attainment, income, socioeconomic status (SES), and health insurance coverage, as well as lower rates of justice-system involvement and substance abuse. \" http:\/\/www.sciencemag.org\/content\/333\/6040\/360.short  If you require full articles, PM me and I'll see what can be done.  I hope this was helpful.","human_ref_B":"To be fair, I did encounter other literature which suggested that sending children to shitty, poorly funded, poorly run, pre-k\/daycare programs doesn't produce any good long-term results.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":187.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"4ut8ga","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Does crime cause poverty or does poverty cause crime? I'm in disagreement with a friend of mine who's quite insistent that poverty doesn't cause crime, that it's the other way around. Is there much truth to this?","c_root_id_A":"d5stsfn","c_root_id_B":"d5so6nv","created_at_utc_A":1469620070,"created_at_utc_B":1469602309,"score_A":17,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Neither. According to Quinney, in The Social Reality of Crime (1970), he argues that social inequality rooted in class conflict creates both poverty and crime. He also writes about this more thoroughly in Class, State, and, Crime (can't remember year, sorry). Poverty (the have nots) is a state of deprivation that is perpetuated or recreated by social, economic, political, and legal institutions dominated by the haves. Those in power shape the law in ways that (to use a common phrase) protect and serve their interests. Definitions of crime, and the criminal justice system, serve as a key mechanism of social control which recreates social inequality.","human_ref_B":"There's more to crime than poverty and more to poverty than just crime. Both do share a positive correlation, though. Here are some stats http:\/\/www.bjs.gov\/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=5137","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17761.0,"score_ratio":1.1333333333}
{"post_id":"1gyav5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"How does a norm such as tipping get established, and how could it be eliminated? I recently read this article and am sympathetic with the idea of getting rid of tipping. I am unsure of how something like this could be accomplished. Of course, the government could overnight decide to make the minimum wage a living wage, and thus end the need for servers to live off tips, but would the norm change as well?","c_root_id_A":"cap5hm9","c_root_id_B":"capcdiy","created_at_utc_A":1372082506,"created_at_utc_B":1372102015,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm curious about how tipping first came about, too, but when it comes to abolishment - postwar, the culture of tipping has diminished ~~here~~ in Denmark, which coincided with a law, the wording of which essentially was \"prices must be displayed including tax, including service charges\".  But I can't say (and I can't find many credible sources) if the culture came first and the law came second, or if it was the other way around.","human_ref_B":"From a Goffmanian perspective (and American culture) in many ways the tip is less so for the waiter than it is a status symbol. One socially significant sign of a \"good wealthy person\" is the large tips they are reputed to leave, with wealthy people who are \"cheap\" losing social status in certain situations.  This would indicate that the actual pay scale of the waiter may not be as significant a factor as the social situation. I can see a reduction in the tip given to a pizza delivery person, but the wine steward at \"Chez Romantique\" will always be tipped well (and visibly).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19509.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2to4re","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Is \"Prejudice + Power = Racism\" given preference or credence in academia? I have heard racism defined this way by many outside of academia, but I am unaware of its accepted validity within academia.  It seems there are a number of ways racism could be defined, and I am unsure of what function it would serve to define it this way.  It seems like that definition would suggest that an impoverished southern male that held discriminative beliefs, being less powerful than those with financial security, would be considered *less* racist than anyone above their economic status that held the same beliefs.","c_root_id_A":"co0z9o4","c_root_id_B":"co0znzu","created_at_utc_A":1422247528,"created_at_utc_B":1422248385,"score_A":14,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"It's not quite what you're getting at, but Manuel Castells developed a typology of identity formation based on power relations.  Briefly:  * *Legitimating identity*: promoted by the dominant institutions of society as legitimate  * *Resistance identity*: promoted by groups who feel marginalized and devalued by current social conditions  * *Project identity*: promoted by groups trying to build new identities as well as transform the whole social structure  Castells wouldn't argue that legitimating identities are necessarily more racist than resistance identities, because this typology talks about power relations without reference to objective right and wrong.  For example, \"American citizen\" and \"free market capitalist\" might be a legitimating identities, whereas \"freedom fighter,\" \"Confederate,\" \"Black Panther,\" and \"global jihadist\" can all be considered resistance identities.  However, Castells would probably argue that \"(institutionalized) racism,\" \"reverse racism,\" and \"anti-racism\" are all substantively different phenomena, e.g. legitimating, resistance, and project identities respectively.  Manuel Castells, *The Power of Identity*, 2nd edition. (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2004)","human_ref_B":"It is a relatively useful shorthand.  Different fields will look at race in different ways but adding the element of power is pretty universal in my experience.  Public Health is my social science of choice right now, and a pretty common definition that we use is: \"the exploitive and oppressive social relationships that simultaneously define racial\/ethnic groups and cause a system of inequalities that become embodied as racial\/ethnic health inequities\"  cite here.  The article has been cited >800 times so this is relatively mainstream definition of structural racism.  While this is a little more in depth than power+prejudice, it is basically of the same form.  It focuses on health as the outcome because public health.  The key is that it isn't looking at individuals but overall systems of power, and how they operate in society to create disparities.  Racism in my field generally focuses on structural racism, that is we don't really care so much about individuals who we colloquially would call racist.  This is where the power element comes in.  Looking at social structures (power structures) is where most of the attention is focused.  Your example of the poor white southern male as opposed to the richer man with the same beliefs  misses the broader social apparatuses at play.  Labeling an individual as a racist has little social social science application.  However, looking at how collective perceptions among groups lead to systemic inequalities, is very important. For example studies showing how resumes are treated depending on the ethnicity of the name. Race is a social construct. see here for a health related discussion  The way in which races are constructed is through power relations.  Franz Fanon's Black Skin White Masks isn't the most up to date on racism (I like McWhorter personally) but it really gives you a good idea of the general context.  When race is recognized as a social construct (a function of power) the ways in which races are constructed becomes important.  Dictionary definitions take race as a given.  Social sciences do (or at least should) not because they change, are not homogeneous throughout the world and have no biological backing.  When looking at race as a variable, it is quite often shorthand for a large number of things, such as socioeconomic status, religion, housing, relationships with criminal justice, economic opportunity etc.  See for example the recent Harvard paper on conceptualizing race as a bundle of sticks here.    Here is a rough example, a state gives extra money to a clinic based on the number of minority patients (lots of states do stuff like this).  Using the colloquial definition along the lines of \"treating people differently based on race\" this appears to be racist.  However, if one uses a definition that accounts for power e.g. \"the exploitive and oppressive social relationships that simultaneously define racial\/ethnic groups and cause a system of inequalities that become embodied as racial\/ethnic health inequities\" you would have to look at the whole social system involved in healthcare, which includes poor housing, segregation, uninsurance rates, white flight, poor working conditions, health disparities, education etc. etc.  Using this definition, this policy is no longer \"racist\" but part of a remedy for systemic racism.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":857.0,"score_ratio":1.7857142857}
{"post_id":"1vqcwi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Is this a legitimate study? In an argument with an old teacher, he tells me my source is trash but it looks legitimate to me. However, I'm 20 and suck at economics so I might be retarded. OFFICIAL QUESTION: Is this article legitimate evidence of an instance in which raising the minimum wage lowered unemployment? http:\/\/davidcard.berkeley.edu\/papers\/njmin-aer.pdf","c_root_id_A":"ceuxprn","c_root_id_B":"ceuwjud","created_at_utc_A":1390291893,"created_at_utc_B":1390287057,"score_A":12,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"That was an excellent paper when it came out, because it was part of the \"credibility revolution\" in economics, pushing the use of natural experiments for identifying causal links.   However, with the understanding we have about the difference-in-differences estimator today, this particular paper is not very trustworthy. The problem arises from there being only two time periods and two regions. First, this is a problem because the difference-in-differences method requires the assumption of parallell trends in the treatment and control groups in the absence of treatment, but because there is only one pre-treatment time period, this can't be tested. Second, as discussed in this excellent paper, specifically section 6.5.3 (but read all of the dif-in-dif section from page 67 on), no consistent estimator exists in this case. This is because group-level errors will never average out.  However, there has been a lot of subsequent research on this question, including a book and further papers by Card and Krueger, and while there is still no consensus, my superficial reading of the literature is that there is a lot of strong evidence for moderate minimum wage increases having negligible effects on employment in the US. A good starting place for digging deeper in this is to read the Wikipedia page linked in another comment.  Edit: As some other commenters have pointed out, Card and Krueger are extremely well respected researchers in applied labor economics, and both are possible future Nobel Prize candidates. While this paper has not aged as well as some of their other work, it is a part of the work that built their reputation, so calling it \"trash\" is a bit harsh.","human_ref_B":"Short answer, yes. The Card and Krueger study is legitimate and well respected. The Wikipedia page on minimum wage provides quite a good discussion of it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4836.0,"score_ratio":2.4}
{"post_id":"3nmpcr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Academic literature on (the psychology of) admitting error? In searching the usual avenues, I found a lot of articles that look at *institutions*' accepting and admitting error (like, say, how academic economists could be more honest and open about cherished economic models that have failed, or how errors could be better prevented in aviation); but I've actually had a hard time finding more \"personal\" psychological research, that examines cognitive barriers to admitting error, details the process of how people do (or should) work through error; the outcome, etc.  I realize that a lot of this research would overlap with that that looks at specific cognitive errors themselves, like confirmation bias; but I'm less interested in the specific errors people make and more so how people deal with error *in general*.  If anyone has any good academic article\/essay recommendations, I'd be grateful!","c_root_id_A":"cvpq4ri","c_root_id_B":"cvpo106","created_at_utc_A":1444102107,"created_at_utc_B":1444098647,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Check out Mistakes Were Made (but not by me) by Tavris and Aronson","human_ref_B":"I don't have a specific article to recommend, but a related field to what you're asking about is apology theory, so you could maybe find some relevant stuff by looking into that.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3460.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"a75sw6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Can anyone tell me why the researchers behind this study used a regression on deviations from the mean to show correlation? Here is the paper. I also had some other questions, such as, how do they define \u201cfixed effects\u201d here? Is it considered fixed effects because they\u2019re using the whole population or is it some other more technical statistical definition? Why are they using r instead of r-squared values? How exactly did they establish causality and not just correlation?  I\u2019m trying to brush up on stats and get used to how social science research is done so I can read the research itself rather than just articles about it. This particular study was mentioned in a Washington Post article.","c_root_id_A":"ec103ig","c_root_id_B":"ec0z6ss","created_at_utc_A":1545109525,"created_at_utc_B":1545108493,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"They did not do a regression on the standard deviations. They plotted them out in the figure you are referencing in order to show that the violent crime rate per state was trending upwards over time. They also mention them in the context of standardized betas. This is a way to get a sense of which variables offer the greatest substantive impact by comparing what would happen to the Y if each IV was increased by one standard deviation.  Fixed effects are effectively dummy variables. Their purpose is to control for the invariant effects that each state has on the overall national violent crime rate (some states have more\/less violent crime due to laws and social practices) and the number of illegal aliens (which will vary based on things like laws and geography). The years are there because some years have more\/fewer crimes due to the state of the economy and\/or random fluctuation.  In this case, 50 for the states plus DC and one for all of the years covering their data -1. (The -1 for the states and the years is to avoid multicollinearity).   They do use R^2 in the regressions. They use a series of bivariate correlations mostly as illustration, which is why you see the R there.   Their claim to \"causality\" could most credibly come from the fact that they control for past activity in the form of a lag variable. However, econometricians will often do things like Granger Causality tests and various spin-offs to better argue causality. I may have missed it, but I didn't see such a test here.","human_ref_B":"I suggest reading some type of brief overview about fixed effect models. Learning more about this approach will explain why means are being compared, how they are drawing conclusions about causality, and what they mean by fixed effects.   The r is not for the regressions but for correlations (pearson's r).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1032.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"12i99s","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Is there a possibility that a group of people living in a remote place have not been discovered yet?","c_root_id_A":"c6v9cb3","c_root_id_B":"c6v9c6h","created_at_utc_A":1351852390,"created_at_utc_B":1351852343,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"They are still finding isolated tribes in the amazon that never encountered western civilization.","human_ref_B":"There's been some ariel footage of some uncontacted tribes in the Amazon.Harvard ethnobotanist and National Geographic's Wade Davis states that there are many 'undiscovered' tribes and groups living in the Amazon.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":47.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"9pe0w0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What language is easiest to adopt as a *first* language? Is there a meaningful difference in the speed and fluency of primary language adoption? If there is, which language(s) are considered the most difficult to adopt as a primary language? The easiest?  &#x200B;  I've struggled for some time to find any answers to these questions, so any insights would be appreciated :)","c_root_id_A":"e8120ux","c_root_id_B":"e815ht0","created_at_utc_A":1539903635,"created_at_utc_B":1539907032,"score_A":22,"score_B":37,"human_ref_A":"Might want to ask \/r\/linguistics.","human_ref_B":"There's not any good evidence that the answer is anything other than \"all are the same\".  The reason is that the way these sorts of things are quantified are often quite selective. So for example you could make a case that written Chinese is more difficult to pick up as a native Mandarin learning child than written Italian as a native Italian learning child, based on the age at which school children become proficient at certain tasks, but that's only looking at one fairly minor part of the language.  For actually speaking, there has not been any convincing argument made within Linguistics for any language to be inherently more difficult for native learners to acquire. If anything, consensus is that all are equivalent.  A major reason for this is that two requirements must be more or less held in balance for a language to remain in regular use. One is that it must be complex enough to get the job done, and the other is that it can't remain so complex that it's needlessly cumbersome. When languages simplify in one area, such as for example sounds merge in the phonology, they always become more complex in some other area to accommodate. Otherwise too much ambiguity is introduced and the language would not be functional any more. In the example of simplifying phonologies, a common way languages accommodate is development of tone systems. Happened with Tai (Thai), Burmese, Chinese, Vietnamese etc. It's happening with some Korean dialects as well since around the 1950s as sounds like \u3142 and \u3143 merge in terms of articulation, but differ in pitch.  Take away the notion of formalised literary registers of a language that the average speaker never uses, e.g. the way two humanities professors might discuss their field in, and all languages are really basically the same. That's the default view that's more or less taken for granted in the field of Linguistics based on the complexity\/change issue I just described, witnessed across areas (syntax, lexicon, phonology, semantics etc) throughout the world's languages.  Arguments that certain languages are objectively much more complex than others aren't being made by actual linguistics, but rather armchair linguists who are full of opinions about language but rarely actually have the background to make the claim, nor the data\/methodology to back it up.  You're welcome to post on r\/linguistics as well (I'm a mod there). Just be wary of rampant speculation + opinion masquerading as fact from armchair 'experts', as is always the case when asking about linguistics stuff on popular internet forums. You'll get more of it there than here only because r\/linguistics is pretty big these days.  (edited for formatting)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3397.0,"score_ratio":1.6818181818}
{"post_id":"4xw4kv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"3 questions about jail population, voting, and slavery Hi! This is for my novel, \"Occupy Shrugged\", forthcoming, 10\/31\/16, so it doesn't have to be exact. 1. How many people in jail can't vote? 2. What percentage of the US population is that? Of those people who cannot vote, how many, in real numbers and as a percentage of the voting population, are African American (in other words could with some certainty be the descendants of slaves? Thanks so much!!","c_root_id_A":"d6izx4x","c_root_id_B":"d6izi43","created_at_utc_A":1471304185,"created_at_utc_B":1471303550,"score_A":10,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"If you're interested in this topic in more depth, *The New Jim Crow* by Alexander has good discussion of this topic.","human_ref_B":"1. 6 million as of 2012  2. >Approximately 2.5 percent of the total US voting age population\u20141 of every 40 adults\u2014is disenfranchised due to a current or previous felony conviction  3. >nearly 8 percent of voting-age black Americans (1 in 13) is disenfranchised, compared with roughly 2 percent of their non-black counterparts. In three states\u2014Florida, Kentucky, and Virginia, at least 1 in 5 black Americans will be out of luck come Election Day","labels":1,"seconds_difference":635.0,"score_ratio":1.1111111111}
{"post_id":"11bbim","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"If the tax rate changed year by year to pay off the previous year's budget, would that be beneficial? Basically, Congress approves a FY 2013 budget. At the end of FY 2013 everyone submits a tax return that lists their gross income, etc. The tax rates are set so that the tax revenue equals the deficit from the previous year (minus any payments already made through excise, etc), payments\/refunds are calculated and bills\/checks sent out. Taxes (income, interest, etc) are assessed throughout the year based on the last rate calculated. If the economy improves, people get money back. If it gets worse, people pay more.  Additionally, the tax rates would still be graduated, but each tax bracket would be responsible for a particular portion of the deficit. Everyone making under $10k, for example, must collectively pay 10% of the deficit, so the calculation becomes (deficit * 10%) \/ (sum of gross income minus deductions\/exemptions) = tax rate.  Some amount of borrowing would be allowed, but it would be limited to a specific % of GDP each year instead of \"whatever the difference is\".  This way, the argument isn't what tax rate would finance our spending but rather what spending we could afford or would lower the tax rate. It would make the effect of needless spending more apparent to the public as they'd only have to compare last year to this year, and it would balance the budget.","c_root_id_A":"c6kz633","c_root_id_B":"c6l2zyx","created_at_utc_A":1349975879,"created_at_utc_B":1349988774,"score_A":2,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"The difference between that and now is merely who pays the taxes. We already match taxation to spending, but we do so by taxing the future generations via national debt. We tax our children and the unborn so that we may spend more now than we otherwise could.  Why?  Because politicians don't like to be responsible for taxes going up in the here and now. It's much harder to look back over the last 30 years and lay blame to individuals for decisions they made in office a long time ago. National debts don't paint a giant target on the politician.  So, the benefit of a system where we must pay with taxes in the here and now is that politicians will be constrained by the balance of their image as the guy who doesn't raise taxes on the poor and middle class, and their desire to spend other peoples' money to please their donors.  This isn't too far off what a gold standard or other backed currency does. I guess the answer depends also on whether borrowing is still allowed.  Of course, what would be better is if the spending rate changed year to year to reflect taxes collected.","human_ref_B":"You're essentially proposing a balanced budget law, where the government is never allowed to have a deficit or carry debt.  You already figured out the basics of what would happen: >If the economy improves, people get money back. If it gets worse, people pay more.  The problem with that is it reverses the idea of government spending running counter-cyclical to business cycles.  Now government spending would be running in sync with business cycles, doing a lot of spending during economic booms and very little spending during busts and recessions.  So instead of trying to smooth out economic activity and create stability, this would exacerbate the highs and lows and create a lot of economic instability.  So let's look at would happen.  Normally the economy is in somewhat of a steady state, with around 5% unemployment and growing GDP.  Now let's say a recession happens, like in 2008.  Unemployment rises and tax revenues fall.  Because of your law, government spending would have to decrease as well, or taxes would have to increase.  If you look at things in equation form, Y=C+I+G, and you're decreasing G when you reduce government spending, or decreasing C if you're raising taxes.  That means Y decreases as well, further lowing GDP and employment.  Which means that your tax revenues fall again, causing you to reduce government spending\/raise taxes again, which further lowers GDP, employment, and tax revenues... and hopefully you see by now what's happening.  It's basically a spiral of economic collapse being driven by the government.  Let's also look at the case of an economy that's growing.  Unemployment is low and GDP is growing, so each year the government collects more in tax revenue.  This means the government can spend more or tax less, further raising GDP and employment.  This may sound good, but there are some issues with growing an economy too fast.  It would lead to higher inflation as more and more money is moving around.    It could lead to crowding out if unemployment is so low that government spending encroaches on the private sector.  The biggest and most unforeseen problem is that it might lead to an economic bubble that pops and sends you into a recession.  And boy, now you probably wish that you were raising money during the economic boom so that you could spend it during the recession.  You're also probably wondering how you got stuck in the 1920's and Great Depression, when instead you could have been in the 1990's and ridden out the recession like it wasn't no thang.  Edit: I should add that even if you allow some amount of borrowing, setting any kind of cap would inevitably trigger spending cuts(after all, that's the point of this type of law).  We kinda already have this in the form of the debt ceiling, but the limit is determined by politicians, not computers, who constantly raise it.  The reason everyone was freaking out in summer 2011 was because congress threatened to not allow any more borrowing, meaning spending cuts and contracting the economy.  Same thing with the upcoming 'fiscal cliff', only due to automatic spending and tax cut expirations and congress not being able to pass a bill to extend them.  The only true economic limit of borrowing money is the ability to find financing, or people who will buy bonds.  The greater the risk of default, the greater the interest rate people will demand.  Right now interest rates for 1 month treasure bills are 0.12% and 30 year treasury bills are 2.86%, suggesting that investors consider US debt to be very safe and are willing to accept very low yields when buying.  The Federal Reserve does also have a part in buying US debt and depressing interest rates, but they work through the secondary market, buying bonds from people that already bought them from the treasury.  A real debt crisis would look like Greece, where interest rates soar through the roof because of a continually contracting the economy, no central bank as a lender of last resort to stabilize financial markets, and a currency they don't control.  There is no such thing as 'can't afford' when you control your own currency, the only issue is inflation.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":12895.0,"score_ratio":10.5}
{"post_id":"101tfq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"[Linguistics] Is the racial etymology of \"gypped\" obscure enough to render the word inoffensive? Most people who hear that the word \"gyp\" (meaning *to swindle or cheat*) is a pejurative truncation of the word \"gypsy\" are surprised by the racist history of the term.   Is there a point where ignorance of the root meaning of a slur becomes pervasive enough that the term can no longer be considered hurtful, hateful, or insensitive?   If so, has \"gypped\" passed that point?","c_root_id_A":"c69rfrh","c_root_id_B":"c69rd55","created_at_utc_A":1347941826,"created_at_utc_B":1347941546,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Why take the chance of offending someone when there are other words available to express the same thing","human_ref_B":"Where are you from that most people don't know the etymology of \"gypped\"?  And regardless, I think we've still got a long time to wait before its socialy acceptable.  I mean, even words like \"niggardly\" with no racial etymology often cause people offense because of their own assumptions as to its origins.  For a word with genuine racial etymology...  And this isn't even getting into the ethical aspect of using the word.  Even if its origins become lost to all but yourself, wouldn't it still be unethical to use a word with such an ignorant and offensive origin?  It's not as if the word fulfills any special need in the english language, without which people would be unable to effectively communicate their point.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":280.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"x3p0a","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"How is \"Obamacare\" supposed to save money?  Economics, Political Science, Public Policy] I just recently read an [article that is being trumpeted by r\/politics that says the US budget office claims that the new health care law will save even more. I have never understood how the law was supposed to save money. There are lots of numbers thrown around 1.3 trillion 1.2 trillion 89 billion, but I haven't managed to figure out how the law is supposed to save money. The best thing is can figure out is the more people we have on insurance the less the government spends on medical bankruptcies.","c_root_id_A":"c5iwqij","c_root_id_B":"c5iwp4l","created_at_utc_A":1343177679,"created_at_utc_B":1343177522,"score_A":37,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"A little-known fact about health policy is that it's not the overall amount of money we spend on health care that is the primary problem. Of course, we spend roughly twice as much as equivalent countries, so that is a problem in its own right. But, the real issue is that health care spending has been rising, and is projected to continue to rise, much faster than the rate of inflation \u2013 usually in the range of 7-8% per year.   The Affordable Care Act (\"Obamacare\") is designed to address that in several ways. First, by expanding insurance coverage, people will be more likely to get regular checkups, use birth control, and other preventative measures that should see cost savings in the long run. There is some debate as to whether preventative care is that much cheaper, but overall it should help rather than hurt.  Second, the ACA established the Independent Payment Advisory Board, whose mission is to analyze Medicare spending and find ways to reduce costs without sacrificing quality of care. A tall order, to be sure, but the goal is to eliminate redundancies and encourage the most efficient care. One way it will probably do this is by encouraging \"bundled\" spending, where physicians receive payment based on the overall care a patient is receiving rather than on a per-service basis.   The ACA will also cut about $200 billion in Medicare spending over 10 years, mostly from Medicare Advantage, a privately-run Medicare alternative.  Finally, keep in mind that \"reduce the deficit\" is not always the same as \"save money.\" There are tax increases in the ACA as well. You can find more here:  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Patient_Protection_and_Affordable_Care_Act#Summary_of_funding","human_ref_B":"It also saves money within the medical arena - uninsured people are less likely to have routine check-ups or see doctors for small problems (or early on), and thus are more likely to put off care until the problem is more advanced, worse, and thus, more expensive to treat. Many uninsured people also have no primary care physician and go to the ER for all medical problems, which is more expensive. As it is now, the cost of health insurance takes these cases into account - the way bad drivers make insurance rates higher for all drivers. If more people have access to preventative care, hospitals and insurers will have to absorb fewer of these unnecessarily expensive (and unpaid-for) treatments.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":157.0,"score_ratio":4.625}
{"post_id":"1evvmu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"What careers are there for someone who majored in economics? Besides the obvious ones like professor and writer, what career options are available for economics majors these days?","c_root_id_A":"ca4a0pg","c_root_id_B":"ca4a35c","created_at_utc_A":1369284730,"created_at_utc_B":1369284966,"score_A":3,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I just finished my first year as an Economics major.  I would like to eventually work for a think tank.  Economics is such a broad field; you can serve in the public sector on boards and such, or you can work in the  private sector doing all sorts of things for businesses just to name a few options.  A lot of people go on to study law and public policy, business, or continue to specialize in research.  Rutger's offers some example careers for Econ majors.","human_ref_B":"If you know a little programming, a little economic modeling, and a little econometrics, it will go a long way.  Here are a couple of routes.  1. Work for the Fed, FDIC, or other quasi-government organizations. This works best if you find out that you like macro, money, banking, or finance.  2. Work for international financial institutions (IFI's), like the World Bank, IMF, etc. This works best if you find out that you like international econ. 3. Work as a statistical analyst for the BEA, BLS, Census, EIA, or DoJ. A common fallback position, but a rewarding and highly-compensated one.  4. Work for market research companies like Kantar, Nielsen, or Aribtron. These companies merge and dissolve monthly, so I don't have an up-to-date list, but wiki'ing Neilsen and poking around will give you some idea of the options. These guys consult for the supply side and try to tease out info on the demand side. 5. Think tanks: Urban, Brookings, Innovations for Poverty Action, American Enterprise Institute, Economic Policy Institute. Many of these have an applied micro focus; some are a bit \"political\". 6. Private basic research: American Institutes for Research (AIR), Research Triangle Institute (RTI), U Chicago's National Opinion Research Center (NORC), Abt Associates, Westat, U Michigan's Survey Research Center (SRC). These are amazing companies that work closely with the government's statistical agencies. They also do applied research in health, education, energy, and welfare. 7. Other applied groups, since I'm still looking: Mathematica Policy Research, RAND Corp, etc. 8. Banking and finance: you can go into Goldman Sachs and whatever other investment banks are still hanging around. You can work as an analyst for banks, from BofA and HSBC down to your local bank. 9. Consulting. This is trickier right out of undergrad, but doable. 10. An economics degree is great undergraduate preparation for a professional degree in business (MBA), law (JD) or public policy (MPA). 11. Grad school! It's a long road, full of mathematics, but is the right choice for some (maybe 2% of econ majors).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":236.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1evvmu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"What careers are there for someone who majored in economics? Besides the obvious ones like professor and writer, what career options are available for economics majors these days?","c_root_id_A":"ca4a0pg","c_root_id_B":"ca4aipe","created_at_utc_A":1369284730,"created_at_utc_B":1369286581,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I just finished my first year as an Economics major.  I would like to eventually work for a think tank.  Economics is such a broad field; you can serve in the public sector on boards and such, or you can work in the  private sector doing all sorts of things for businesses just to name a few options.  A lot of people go on to study law and public policy, business, or continue to specialize in research.  Rutger's offers some example careers for Econ majors.","human_ref_B":"Any ideas for someone who specifically does not see themselves going into academia or to grad school? What exactly can you do with just a BA in econ?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1851.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"9e6aq2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.69,"history":"Articles\/books from scholars outside of WEIRD countries and\/or non-white scholars. Every now and then I stumble upon an article about discrimination in academia, mainly how non-white and scholairs outside of Western countries lack visibility among other things. I must admit I could hardly name 10 contemporary social science scholars who aren't white western ones. I'm not here to discuss the reasons, implications, and why I believe it should change, others have one it better.  I'm looking for some databases, journals or websites and\/or specific articles\/books that could expand my ressources in such a way. My main interests are the cultural industry (Pok\u00e9mon mostly) , online communities and audience, emotion. Also interested in anything related to \"education studies\".   I can read English and French mostly.   As for the last article that reminded me of the issue : https:\/\/activisthistory.com\/2018\/08\/29\/academic-racism-the-repression-of-marginalized-voices-in-academia\/","c_root_id_A":"e5mrj6n","c_root_id_B":"e5mr60z","created_at_utc_A":1536443220,"created_at_utc_B":1536442872,"score_A":11,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The American Sociological Association has a new letter called *Footnotes*. It periodically prints small pieces from about the sociological debates happening in other countries. Here\u2019s one about neighborhood pressure in Turkey. You can search their website for \u201cinternational perspectives\u201d (with quotation marks) or just paste the following into google:  >\u201cInternational Perspectives\u201d site:http:\/\/www.asanet.org\/footnotes\/  They\u2019re not in every issue but I feel like this search doesn\u2019t actually effectively pull up all of them.   In some areas, local scholars and American scholars talk frequently. In Turkey, for instance, most of the best economists, and some of the best sociologists and anthropologists working on the country are ethnically Turkish (all that come to mind got their degrees abroad and most continue to work outside the country).","human_ref_B":"What are WEIRD countries?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":348.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6h8tug","c_root_id_B":"c6ha4h2","created_at_utc_A":1349304989,"created_at_utc_B":1349309834,"score_A":10,"score_B":64,"human_ref_A":"More equality between the sexes, relating to childcare and employment opportunities - more choice about these things rather than an expectation that women are the primary child carers.","human_ref_B":"A little further down the road (but not much!), we're going to have to figure out social policy for cybernetics enhanced individuals. There's already been a little discussion about using artificial legs in the olympics.  Say Jim has a eyesight based video recorder. Jim happens to witness a terrorist suicide bombing. Mike, also similarly equipped, didn't catch the attack, but he has video proof that Jim had a good angle. Is Jim allowed to, if he chooses, not provide his video evidence to the police? Will his refusal be seen as suspicious?  If a blind man gets special battery powered bionic eyes installed, should he be allowed to drive? Should he be legally required not to drive if his battery is running low?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4845.0,"score_ratio":6.4}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6h93ua","c_root_id_B":"c6ha4h2","created_at_utc_A":1349306029,"created_at_utc_B":1349309834,"score_A":3,"score_B":64,"human_ref_A":"I think we will see a move for further inclusion for people with special needs.","human_ref_B":"A little further down the road (but not much!), we're going to have to figure out social policy for cybernetics enhanced individuals. There's already been a little discussion about using artificial legs in the olympics.  Say Jim has a eyesight based video recorder. Jim happens to witness a terrorist suicide bombing. Mike, also similarly equipped, didn't catch the attack, but he has video proof that Jim had a good angle. Is Jim allowed to, if he chooses, not provide his video evidence to the police? Will his refusal be seen as suspicious?  If a blind man gets special battery powered bionic eyes installed, should he be allowed to drive? Should he be legally required not to drive if his battery is running low?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3805.0,"score_ratio":21.3333333333}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hdcoe","c_root_id_B":"c6has9i","created_at_utc_A":1349322111,"created_at_utc_B":1349312405,"score_A":45,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"That's a loaded series of questions; the juxtaposition of the 2nd question with the 1st implies that generational movements are based in a will to un-taboo certain practices or behaviors. I don't think that's the case. Movements take shape because they have humanitarian goals and civil rights, and I think the fact that some of the causes deal with taboo issues is just a secondary data point.   With that said, here's a few of the causes that I think will play a large part in our future:  * **Religion in politics reforms**, or rather, the lack thereof. Atheists are getting more directly involved in politics, and even though politicians are still pandering, I think a lot of people (even the religious) are getting tired of the focus of what should be a private matter. * **Political office reforms**, in the sense that a lot of people are growing more and more disillusioned with the status quo of our government, which is filled with rich, old, sell-outs. Think term-limits, limited or transparent lobbying, campaign financing reform, etc. * **Prison reforms**, in light of the growing mountains of evidence that not only do prisons fail at deterring crime, they actually dehumanize the prisoners to the point that most can't make it on the outside after serving their time. There's very little effort given to rehabilitation, and it's usually too little too late. There will probably also be some movement over who should actually be there; for instance, do prostitutes and potheads belong among the likes of violent career criminals? * **Foreign policy**, given that the populace seems to be getting more and more jaded by our wanton propensity to jump into the middle of any spat in the world, only to end up bankrolling a trillon-dollar effort that is just as likely to blow up in our face as it is to do anything meaningful for the world. Afghanistan is the current generation's Vietnam; nobody really knows why we're there (other than the boogeyman-like Taliban\/Al Qaeda links), we've been there forever, and we've actually lost the \"war\". And, just like Vietnam, we've nothing to show for it but tons of killed and wounded, vets who're too wounded to ever hold a real job and who're committing suicide at alarming rates, and to top it off -- no jobs for those that make it home and are fit and able to work. * **Mexico.** Yes, this could go under the above bucket, but it deserves its own bullet point due to the fact that the Mexican Drug War (not the \"War on Drugs\", though very closely related) is the most bloody ongoing conflict in the world (if you go by 2011's numbers). These are our direct neighbors, and the best we've been able to do is to try and segregate ourselves from them with walls, unmanned drones, and gunboats patrolling the Rio Grande. Sure, we throw them money and try to help, but it really seems like a half-assed effort. The problem of the cartels and the violence that lurks just around our corners -- they've already made inroads into Texas, Arizona, California, and Florida (among others) and considering their near-bottomless war chests and the allure of even more money, it's not a problem that's going to go away anytime soon. But it affects all of us, and will only grow in pertinence as the problem rages out of control.","human_ref_B":"I'm positive someone said this exact same thing about marijuana legalization in the 70s...","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9706.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hdcoe","c_root_id_B":"c6hbj1w","created_at_utc_A":1349322111,"created_at_utc_B":1349315398,"score_A":45,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"That's a loaded series of questions; the juxtaposition of the 2nd question with the 1st implies that generational movements are based in a will to un-taboo certain practices or behaviors. I don't think that's the case. Movements take shape because they have humanitarian goals and civil rights, and I think the fact that some of the causes deal with taboo issues is just a secondary data point.   With that said, here's a few of the causes that I think will play a large part in our future:  * **Religion in politics reforms**, or rather, the lack thereof. Atheists are getting more directly involved in politics, and even though politicians are still pandering, I think a lot of people (even the religious) are getting tired of the focus of what should be a private matter. * **Political office reforms**, in the sense that a lot of people are growing more and more disillusioned with the status quo of our government, which is filled with rich, old, sell-outs. Think term-limits, limited or transparent lobbying, campaign financing reform, etc. * **Prison reforms**, in light of the growing mountains of evidence that not only do prisons fail at deterring crime, they actually dehumanize the prisoners to the point that most can't make it on the outside after serving their time. There's very little effort given to rehabilitation, and it's usually too little too late. There will probably also be some movement over who should actually be there; for instance, do prostitutes and potheads belong among the likes of violent career criminals? * **Foreign policy**, given that the populace seems to be getting more and more jaded by our wanton propensity to jump into the middle of any spat in the world, only to end up bankrolling a trillon-dollar effort that is just as likely to blow up in our face as it is to do anything meaningful for the world. Afghanistan is the current generation's Vietnam; nobody really knows why we're there (other than the boogeyman-like Taliban\/Al Qaeda links), we've been there forever, and we've actually lost the \"war\". And, just like Vietnam, we've nothing to show for it but tons of killed and wounded, vets who're too wounded to ever hold a real job and who're committing suicide at alarming rates, and to top it off -- no jobs for those that make it home and are fit and able to work. * **Mexico.** Yes, this could go under the above bucket, but it deserves its own bullet point due to the fact that the Mexican Drug War (not the \"War on Drugs\", though very closely related) is the most bloody ongoing conflict in the world (if you go by 2011's numbers). These are our direct neighbors, and the best we've been able to do is to try and segregate ourselves from them with walls, unmanned drones, and gunboats patrolling the Rio Grande. Sure, we throw them money and try to help, but it really seems like a half-assed effort. The problem of the cartels and the violence that lurks just around our corners -- they've already made inroads into Texas, Arizona, California, and Florida (among others) and considering their near-bottomless war chests and the allure of even more money, it's not a problem that's going to go away anytime soon. But it affects all of us, and will only grow in pertinence as the problem rages out of control.","human_ref_B":"class struggle is still central, especially as neoliberal austerity chips away at the gains the labor movement made in the last 120 years.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6713.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hdcoe","c_root_id_B":"c6hahs4","created_at_utc_A":1349322111,"created_at_utc_B":1349311283,"score_A":45,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"That's a loaded series of questions; the juxtaposition of the 2nd question with the 1st implies that generational movements are based in a will to un-taboo certain practices or behaviors. I don't think that's the case. Movements take shape because they have humanitarian goals and civil rights, and I think the fact that some of the causes deal with taboo issues is just a secondary data point.   With that said, here's a few of the causes that I think will play a large part in our future:  * **Religion in politics reforms**, or rather, the lack thereof. Atheists are getting more directly involved in politics, and even though politicians are still pandering, I think a lot of people (even the religious) are getting tired of the focus of what should be a private matter. * **Political office reforms**, in the sense that a lot of people are growing more and more disillusioned with the status quo of our government, which is filled with rich, old, sell-outs. Think term-limits, limited or transparent lobbying, campaign financing reform, etc. * **Prison reforms**, in light of the growing mountains of evidence that not only do prisons fail at deterring crime, they actually dehumanize the prisoners to the point that most can't make it on the outside after serving their time. There's very little effort given to rehabilitation, and it's usually too little too late. There will probably also be some movement over who should actually be there; for instance, do prostitutes and potheads belong among the likes of violent career criminals? * **Foreign policy**, given that the populace seems to be getting more and more jaded by our wanton propensity to jump into the middle of any spat in the world, only to end up bankrolling a trillon-dollar effort that is just as likely to blow up in our face as it is to do anything meaningful for the world. Afghanistan is the current generation's Vietnam; nobody really knows why we're there (other than the boogeyman-like Taliban\/Al Qaeda links), we've been there forever, and we've actually lost the \"war\". And, just like Vietnam, we've nothing to show for it but tons of killed and wounded, vets who're too wounded to ever hold a real job and who're committing suicide at alarming rates, and to top it off -- no jobs for those that make it home and are fit and able to work. * **Mexico.** Yes, this could go under the above bucket, but it deserves its own bullet point due to the fact that the Mexican Drug War (not the \"War on Drugs\", though very closely related) is the most bloody ongoing conflict in the world (if you go by 2011's numbers). These are our direct neighbors, and the best we've been able to do is to try and segregate ourselves from them with walls, unmanned drones, and gunboats patrolling the Rio Grande. Sure, we throw them money and try to help, but it really seems like a half-assed effort. The problem of the cartels and the violence that lurks just around our corners -- they've already made inroads into Texas, Arizona, California, and Florida (among others) and considering their near-bottomless war chests and the allure of even more money, it's not a problem that's going to go away anytime soon. But it affects all of us, and will only grow in pertinence as the problem rages out of control.","human_ref_B":"I hope like hell it is Privacy.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10828.0,"score_ratio":2.8125}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hdcoe","c_root_id_B":"c6h8tug","created_at_utc_A":1349322111,"created_at_utc_B":1349304989,"score_A":45,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"That's a loaded series of questions; the juxtaposition of the 2nd question with the 1st implies that generational movements are based in a will to un-taboo certain practices or behaviors. I don't think that's the case. Movements take shape because they have humanitarian goals and civil rights, and I think the fact that some of the causes deal with taboo issues is just a secondary data point.   With that said, here's a few of the causes that I think will play a large part in our future:  * **Religion in politics reforms**, or rather, the lack thereof. Atheists are getting more directly involved in politics, and even though politicians are still pandering, I think a lot of people (even the religious) are getting tired of the focus of what should be a private matter. * **Political office reforms**, in the sense that a lot of people are growing more and more disillusioned with the status quo of our government, which is filled with rich, old, sell-outs. Think term-limits, limited or transparent lobbying, campaign financing reform, etc. * **Prison reforms**, in light of the growing mountains of evidence that not only do prisons fail at deterring crime, they actually dehumanize the prisoners to the point that most can't make it on the outside after serving their time. There's very little effort given to rehabilitation, and it's usually too little too late. There will probably also be some movement over who should actually be there; for instance, do prostitutes and potheads belong among the likes of violent career criminals? * **Foreign policy**, given that the populace seems to be getting more and more jaded by our wanton propensity to jump into the middle of any spat in the world, only to end up bankrolling a trillon-dollar effort that is just as likely to blow up in our face as it is to do anything meaningful for the world. Afghanistan is the current generation's Vietnam; nobody really knows why we're there (other than the boogeyman-like Taliban\/Al Qaeda links), we've been there forever, and we've actually lost the \"war\". And, just like Vietnam, we've nothing to show for it but tons of killed and wounded, vets who're too wounded to ever hold a real job and who're committing suicide at alarming rates, and to top it off -- no jobs for those that make it home and are fit and able to work. * **Mexico.** Yes, this could go under the above bucket, but it deserves its own bullet point due to the fact that the Mexican Drug War (not the \"War on Drugs\", though very closely related) is the most bloody ongoing conflict in the world (if you go by 2011's numbers). These are our direct neighbors, and the best we've been able to do is to try and segregate ourselves from them with walls, unmanned drones, and gunboats patrolling the Rio Grande. Sure, we throw them money and try to help, but it really seems like a half-assed effort. The problem of the cartels and the violence that lurks just around our corners -- they've already made inroads into Texas, Arizona, California, and Florida (among others) and considering their near-bottomless war chests and the allure of even more money, it's not a problem that's going to go away anytime soon. But it affects all of us, and will only grow in pertinence as the problem rages out of control.","human_ref_B":"More equality between the sexes, relating to childcare and employment opportunities - more choice about these things rather than an expectation that women are the primary child carers.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":17122.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hdcoe","c_root_id_B":"c6hanaw","created_at_utc_A":1349322111,"created_at_utc_B":1349311871,"score_A":45,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"That's a loaded series of questions; the juxtaposition of the 2nd question with the 1st implies that generational movements are based in a will to un-taboo certain practices or behaviors. I don't think that's the case. Movements take shape because they have humanitarian goals and civil rights, and I think the fact that some of the causes deal with taboo issues is just a secondary data point.   With that said, here's a few of the causes that I think will play a large part in our future:  * **Religion in politics reforms**, or rather, the lack thereof. Atheists are getting more directly involved in politics, and even though politicians are still pandering, I think a lot of people (even the religious) are getting tired of the focus of what should be a private matter. * **Political office reforms**, in the sense that a lot of people are growing more and more disillusioned with the status quo of our government, which is filled with rich, old, sell-outs. Think term-limits, limited or transparent lobbying, campaign financing reform, etc. * **Prison reforms**, in light of the growing mountains of evidence that not only do prisons fail at deterring crime, they actually dehumanize the prisoners to the point that most can't make it on the outside after serving their time. There's very little effort given to rehabilitation, and it's usually too little too late. There will probably also be some movement over who should actually be there; for instance, do prostitutes and potheads belong among the likes of violent career criminals? * **Foreign policy**, given that the populace seems to be getting more and more jaded by our wanton propensity to jump into the middle of any spat in the world, only to end up bankrolling a trillon-dollar effort that is just as likely to blow up in our face as it is to do anything meaningful for the world. Afghanistan is the current generation's Vietnam; nobody really knows why we're there (other than the boogeyman-like Taliban\/Al Qaeda links), we've been there forever, and we've actually lost the \"war\". And, just like Vietnam, we've nothing to show for it but tons of killed and wounded, vets who're too wounded to ever hold a real job and who're committing suicide at alarming rates, and to top it off -- no jobs for those that make it home and are fit and able to work. * **Mexico.** Yes, this could go under the above bucket, but it deserves its own bullet point due to the fact that the Mexican Drug War (not the \"War on Drugs\", though very closely related) is the most bloody ongoing conflict in the world (if you go by 2011's numbers). These are our direct neighbors, and the best we've been able to do is to try and segregate ourselves from them with walls, unmanned drones, and gunboats patrolling the Rio Grande. Sure, we throw them money and try to help, but it really seems like a half-assed effort. The problem of the cartels and the violence that lurks just around our corners -- they've already made inroads into Texas, Arizona, California, and Florida (among others) and considering their near-bottomless war chests and the allure of even more money, it's not a problem that's going to go away anytime soon. But it affects all of us, and will only grow in pertinence as the problem rages out of control.","human_ref_B":"Anti-statism.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10240.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hdcoe","c_root_id_B":"c6hbo4y","created_at_utc_A":1349322111,"created_at_utc_B":1349315918,"score_A":45,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"That's a loaded series of questions; the juxtaposition of the 2nd question with the 1st implies that generational movements are based in a will to un-taboo certain practices or behaviors. I don't think that's the case. Movements take shape because they have humanitarian goals and civil rights, and I think the fact that some of the causes deal with taboo issues is just a secondary data point.   With that said, here's a few of the causes that I think will play a large part in our future:  * **Religion in politics reforms**, or rather, the lack thereof. Atheists are getting more directly involved in politics, and even though politicians are still pandering, I think a lot of people (even the religious) are getting tired of the focus of what should be a private matter. * **Political office reforms**, in the sense that a lot of people are growing more and more disillusioned with the status quo of our government, which is filled with rich, old, sell-outs. Think term-limits, limited or transparent lobbying, campaign financing reform, etc. * **Prison reforms**, in light of the growing mountains of evidence that not only do prisons fail at deterring crime, they actually dehumanize the prisoners to the point that most can't make it on the outside after serving their time. There's very little effort given to rehabilitation, and it's usually too little too late. There will probably also be some movement over who should actually be there; for instance, do prostitutes and potheads belong among the likes of violent career criminals? * **Foreign policy**, given that the populace seems to be getting more and more jaded by our wanton propensity to jump into the middle of any spat in the world, only to end up bankrolling a trillon-dollar effort that is just as likely to blow up in our face as it is to do anything meaningful for the world. Afghanistan is the current generation's Vietnam; nobody really knows why we're there (other than the boogeyman-like Taliban\/Al Qaeda links), we've been there forever, and we've actually lost the \"war\". And, just like Vietnam, we've nothing to show for it but tons of killed and wounded, vets who're too wounded to ever hold a real job and who're committing suicide at alarming rates, and to top it off -- no jobs for those that make it home and are fit and able to work. * **Mexico.** Yes, this could go under the above bucket, but it deserves its own bullet point due to the fact that the Mexican Drug War (not the \"War on Drugs\", though very closely related) is the most bloody ongoing conflict in the world (if you go by 2011's numbers). These are our direct neighbors, and the best we've been able to do is to try and segregate ourselves from them with walls, unmanned drones, and gunboats patrolling the Rio Grande. Sure, we throw them money and try to help, but it really seems like a half-assed effort. The problem of the cartels and the violence that lurks just around our corners -- they've already made inroads into Texas, Arizona, California, and Florida (among others) and considering their near-bottomless war chests and the allure of even more money, it's not a problem that's going to go away anytime soon. But it affects all of us, and will only grow in pertinence as the problem rages out of control.","human_ref_B":"There are a number of people advocating for \"Earth Rights\".  The idea is that individuals (and corporations) have either human\/civil\/fundamental rights under the law. This gives them the opportunity to litigate when their rights are infringed by others.  Animals\/nature has no such ability, and as a result environmental NGOs have a much more difficult time litigating against those who are damaging the earth\/nature.  See the Mother Earth Movement out of South America (including Evo Morales) and the Eradicating Ecocide movement out of the UK (by Polly Higgins). Also Wild Law which started in South Africa (with Cormac Cullinan) and is gaining ground in the UK.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6193.0,"score_ratio":15.0}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hdcoe","c_root_id_B":"c6h93ua","created_at_utc_A":1349322111,"created_at_utc_B":1349306029,"score_A":45,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"That's a loaded series of questions; the juxtaposition of the 2nd question with the 1st implies that generational movements are based in a will to un-taboo certain practices or behaviors. I don't think that's the case. Movements take shape because they have humanitarian goals and civil rights, and I think the fact that some of the causes deal with taboo issues is just a secondary data point.   With that said, here's a few of the causes that I think will play a large part in our future:  * **Religion in politics reforms**, or rather, the lack thereof. Atheists are getting more directly involved in politics, and even though politicians are still pandering, I think a lot of people (even the religious) are getting tired of the focus of what should be a private matter. * **Political office reforms**, in the sense that a lot of people are growing more and more disillusioned with the status quo of our government, which is filled with rich, old, sell-outs. Think term-limits, limited or transparent lobbying, campaign financing reform, etc. * **Prison reforms**, in light of the growing mountains of evidence that not only do prisons fail at deterring crime, they actually dehumanize the prisoners to the point that most can't make it on the outside after serving their time. There's very little effort given to rehabilitation, and it's usually too little too late. There will probably also be some movement over who should actually be there; for instance, do prostitutes and potheads belong among the likes of violent career criminals? * **Foreign policy**, given that the populace seems to be getting more and more jaded by our wanton propensity to jump into the middle of any spat in the world, only to end up bankrolling a trillon-dollar effort that is just as likely to blow up in our face as it is to do anything meaningful for the world. Afghanistan is the current generation's Vietnam; nobody really knows why we're there (other than the boogeyman-like Taliban\/Al Qaeda links), we've been there forever, and we've actually lost the \"war\". And, just like Vietnam, we've nothing to show for it but tons of killed and wounded, vets who're too wounded to ever hold a real job and who're committing suicide at alarming rates, and to top it off -- no jobs for those that make it home and are fit and able to work. * **Mexico.** Yes, this could go under the above bucket, but it deserves its own bullet point due to the fact that the Mexican Drug War (not the \"War on Drugs\", though very closely related) is the most bloody ongoing conflict in the world (if you go by 2011's numbers). These are our direct neighbors, and the best we've been able to do is to try and segregate ourselves from them with walls, unmanned drones, and gunboats patrolling the Rio Grande. Sure, we throw them money and try to help, but it really seems like a half-assed effort. The problem of the cartels and the violence that lurks just around our corners -- they've already made inroads into Texas, Arizona, California, and Florida (among others) and considering their near-bottomless war chests and the allure of even more money, it's not a problem that's going to go away anytime soon. But it affects all of us, and will only grow in pertinence as the problem rages out of control.","human_ref_B":"I think we will see a move for further inclusion for people with special needs.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16082.0,"score_ratio":15.0}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6has9i","c_root_id_B":"c6hahs4","created_at_utc_A":1349312405,"created_at_utc_B":1349311283,"score_A":25,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"I'm positive someone said this exact same thing about marijuana legalization in the 70s...","human_ref_B":"I hope like hell it is Privacy.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1122.0,"score_ratio":1.5625}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6has9i","c_root_id_B":"c6h8tug","created_at_utc_A":1349312405,"created_at_utc_B":1349304989,"score_A":25,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I'm positive someone said this exact same thing about marijuana legalization in the 70s...","human_ref_B":"More equality between the sexes, relating to childcare and employment opportunities - more choice about these things rather than an expectation that women are the primary child carers.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7416.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hanaw","c_root_id_B":"c6has9i","created_at_utc_A":1349311871,"created_at_utc_B":1349312405,"score_A":9,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"Anti-statism.","human_ref_B":"I'm positive someone said this exact same thing about marijuana legalization in the 70s...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":534.0,"score_ratio":2.7777777778}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6h93ua","c_root_id_B":"c6has9i","created_at_utc_A":1349306029,"created_at_utc_B":1349312405,"score_A":3,"score_B":25,"human_ref_A":"I think we will see a move for further inclusion for people with special needs.","human_ref_B":"I'm positive someone said this exact same thing about marijuana legalization in the 70s...","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6376.0,"score_ratio":8.3333333333}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hahs4","c_root_id_B":"c6hbj1w","created_at_utc_A":1349311283,"created_at_utc_B":1349315398,"score_A":16,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I hope like hell it is Privacy.","human_ref_B":"class struggle is still central, especially as neoliberal austerity chips away at the gains the labor movement made in the last 120 years.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4115.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hbj1w","c_root_id_B":"c6h8tug","created_at_utc_A":1349315398,"created_at_utc_B":1349304989,"score_A":18,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"class struggle is still central, especially as neoliberal austerity chips away at the gains the labor movement made in the last 120 years.","human_ref_B":"More equality between the sexes, relating to childcare and employment opportunities - more choice about these things rather than an expectation that women are the primary child carers.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10409.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hanaw","c_root_id_B":"c6hbj1w","created_at_utc_A":1349311871,"created_at_utc_B":1349315398,"score_A":9,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Anti-statism.","human_ref_B":"class struggle is still central, especially as neoliberal austerity chips away at the gains the labor movement made in the last 120 years.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3527.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hbj1w","c_root_id_B":"c6h93ua","created_at_utc_A":1349315398,"created_at_utc_B":1349306029,"score_A":18,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"class struggle is still central, especially as neoliberal austerity chips away at the gains the labor movement made in the last 120 years.","human_ref_B":"I think we will see a move for further inclusion for people with special needs.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9369.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hahs4","c_root_id_B":"c6h8tug","created_at_utc_A":1349311283,"created_at_utc_B":1349304989,"score_A":16,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I hope like hell it is Privacy.","human_ref_B":"More equality between the sexes, relating to childcare and employment opportunities - more choice about these things rather than an expectation that women are the primary child carers.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6294.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hahs4","c_root_id_B":"c6h93ua","created_at_utc_A":1349311283,"created_at_utc_B":1349306029,"score_A":16,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I hope like hell it is Privacy.","human_ref_B":"I think we will see a move for further inclusion for people with special needs.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5254.0,"score_ratio":5.3333333333}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6h8tug","c_root_id_B":"c6henx1","created_at_utc_A":1349304989,"created_at_utc_B":1349327846,"score_A":10,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"More equality between the sexes, relating to childcare and employment opportunities - more choice about these things rather than an expectation that women are the primary child carers.","human_ref_B":"Well, just to stay in the realm of marriage, there's no good reason to prevent polygamous marriages.  I'm not just talking about Mormons or their splinter groups.  If 3 or more people choose to form a legal union (property, children, etc.), they should be allowed the right to do so.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22857.0,"score_ratio":1.3}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hanaw","c_root_id_B":"c6henx1","created_at_utc_A":1349311871,"created_at_utc_B":1349327846,"score_A":9,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Anti-statism.","human_ref_B":"Well, just to stay in the realm of marriage, there's no good reason to prevent polygamous marriages.  I'm not just talking about Mormons or their splinter groups.  If 3 or more people choose to form a legal union (property, children, etc.), they should be allowed the right to do so.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15975.0,"score_ratio":1.4444444444}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6henx1","c_root_id_B":"c6heftj","created_at_utc_A":1349327846,"created_at_utc_B":1349326749,"score_A":13,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Well, just to stay in the realm of marriage, there's no good reason to prevent polygamous marriages.  I'm not just talking about Mormons or their splinter groups.  If 3 or more people choose to form a legal union (property, children, etc.), they should be allowed the right to do so.","human_ref_B":"I'm pretty sure its going to be related to sentience and animal life. Already we have extremely uncomfortable hints that a lot of animals feel a whole lot more than we like to believe they do. The next generation will, I think, need to confront that head on, challenging many of our assumptions about the uniqueness of human life.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1097.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hbo4y","c_root_id_B":"c6henx1","created_at_utc_A":1349315918,"created_at_utc_B":1349327846,"score_A":3,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"There are a number of people advocating for \"Earth Rights\".  The idea is that individuals (and corporations) have either human\/civil\/fundamental rights under the law. This gives them the opportunity to litigate when their rights are infringed by others.  Animals\/nature has no such ability, and as a result environmental NGOs have a much more difficult time litigating against those who are damaging the earth\/nature.  See the Mother Earth Movement out of South America (including Evo Morales) and the Eradicating Ecocide movement out of the UK (by Polly Higgins). Also Wild Law which started in South Africa (with Cormac Cullinan) and is gaining ground in the UK.","human_ref_B":"Well, just to stay in the realm of marriage, there's no good reason to prevent polygamous marriages.  I'm not just talking about Mormons or their splinter groups.  If 3 or more people choose to form a legal union (property, children, etc.), they should be allowed the right to do so.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11928.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hejvv","c_root_id_B":"c6henx1","created_at_utc_A":1349327284,"created_at_utc_B":1349327846,"score_A":5,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"As a lesbian I wish I had the confidence you do about this issue because I really don't.","human_ref_B":"Well, just to stay in the realm of marriage, there's no good reason to prevent polygamous marriages.  I'm not just talking about Mormons or their splinter groups.  If 3 or more people choose to form a legal union (property, children, etc.), they should be allowed the right to do so.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":562.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6henx1","c_root_id_B":"c6h93ua","created_at_utc_A":1349327846,"created_at_utc_B":1349306029,"score_A":13,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Well, just to stay in the realm of marriage, there's no good reason to prevent polygamous marriages.  I'm not just talking about Mormons or their splinter groups.  If 3 or more people choose to form a legal union (property, children, etc.), they should be allowed the right to do so.","human_ref_B":"I think we will see a move for further inclusion for people with special needs.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21817.0,"score_ratio":4.3333333333}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6he5i2","c_root_id_B":"c6henx1","created_at_utc_A":1349325447,"created_at_utc_B":1349327846,"score_A":2,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"I really like the post about the cybernetically  enhanced human beings, but as an occasional ent, I have to really hope that in the shorter term the next thing that everyone will consider is the legalization of marijuana.  It's often compared with alcohol prohibition in America's past, and I think that one day we'll look back and wonder how people were ever so daft as to make pot illegal.","human_ref_B":"Well, just to stay in the realm of marriage, there's no good reason to prevent polygamous marriages.  I'm not just talking about Mormons or their splinter groups.  If 3 or more people choose to form a legal union (property, children, etc.), they should be allowed the right to do so.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2399.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hen2q","c_root_id_B":"c6henx1","created_at_utc_A":1349327725,"created_at_utc_B":1349327846,"score_A":2,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Capitalism is a system of oppression. Wage labor is slavery. Consumerism creates social alienation. Civilization is unsustainable. These are, and have always been the real problems, since humanity first domesticated plants and animals during the Neolithic revolution. Revolution is the solution.","human_ref_B":"Well, just to stay in the realm of marriage, there's no good reason to prevent polygamous marriages.  I'm not just talking about Mormons or their splinter groups.  If 3 or more people choose to form a legal union (property, children, etc.), they should be allowed the right to do so.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":121.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6h93ua","c_root_id_B":"c6hanaw","created_at_utc_A":1349306029,"created_at_utc_B":1349311871,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"I think we will see a move for further inclusion for people with special needs.","human_ref_B":"Anti-statism.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5842.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6heftj","c_root_id_B":"c6hbo4y","created_at_utc_A":1349326749,"created_at_utc_B":1349315918,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm pretty sure its going to be related to sentience and animal life. Already we have extremely uncomfortable hints that a lot of animals feel a whole lot more than we like to believe they do. The next generation will, I think, need to confront that head on, challenging many of our assumptions about the uniqueness of human life.","human_ref_B":"There are a number of people advocating for \"Earth Rights\".  The idea is that individuals (and corporations) have either human\/civil\/fundamental rights under the law. This gives them the opportunity to litigate when their rights are infringed by others.  Animals\/nature has no such ability, and as a result environmental NGOs have a much more difficult time litigating against those who are damaging the earth\/nature.  See the Mother Earth Movement out of South America (including Evo Morales) and the Eradicating Ecocide movement out of the UK (by Polly Higgins). Also Wild Law which started in South Africa (with Cormac Cullinan) and is gaining ground in the UK.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10831.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6heftj","c_root_id_B":"c6h93ua","created_at_utc_A":1349326749,"created_at_utc_B":1349306029,"score_A":6,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm pretty sure its going to be related to sentience and animal life. Already we have extremely uncomfortable hints that a lot of animals feel a whole lot more than we like to believe they do. The next generation will, I think, need to confront that head on, challenging many of our assumptions about the uniqueness of human life.","human_ref_B":"I think we will see a move for further inclusion for people with special needs.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20720.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6heftj","c_root_id_B":"c6he5i2","created_at_utc_A":1349326749,"created_at_utc_B":1349325447,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'm pretty sure its going to be related to sentience and animal life. Already we have extremely uncomfortable hints that a lot of animals feel a whole lot more than we like to believe they do. The next generation will, I think, need to confront that head on, challenging many of our assumptions about the uniqueness of human life.","human_ref_B":"I really like the post about the cybernetically  enhanced human beings, but as an occasional ent, I have to really hope that in the shorter term the next thing that everyone will consider is the legalization of marijuana.  It's often compared with alcohol prohibition in America's past, and I think that one day we'll look back and wonder how people were ever so daft as to make pot illegal.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1302.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hbo4y","c_root_id_B":"c6hejvv","created_at_utc_A":1349315918,"created_at_utc_B":1349327284,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"There are a number of people advocating for \"Earth Rights\".  The idea is that individuals (and corporations) have either human\/civil\/fundamental rights under the law. This gives them the opportunity to litigate when their rights are infringed by others.  Animals\/nature has no such ability, and as a result environmental NGOs have a much more difficult time litigating against those who are damaging the earth\/nature.  See the Mother Earth Movement out of South America (including Evo Morales) and the Eradicating Ecocide movement out of the UK (by Polly Higgins). Also Wild Law which started in South Africa (with Cormac Cullinan) and is gaining ground in the UK.","human_ref_B":"As a lesbian I wish I had the confidence you do about this issue because I really don't.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11366.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6h93ua","c_root_id_B":"c6hejvv","created_at_utc_A":1349306029,"created_at_utc_B":1349327284,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I think we will see a move for further inclusion for people with special needs.","human_ref_B":"As a lesbian I wish I had the confidence you do about this issue because I really don't.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":21255.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6he5i2","c_root_id_B":"c6hejvv","created_at_utc_A":1349325447,"created_at_utc_B":1349327284,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I really like the post about the cybernetically  enhanced human beings, but as an occasional ent, I have to really hope that in the shorter term the next thing that everyone will consider is the legalization of marijuana.  It's often compared with alcohol prohibition in America's past, and I think that one day we'll look back and wonder how people were ever so daft as to make pot illegal.","human_ref_B":"As a lesbian I wish I had the confidence you do about this issue because I really don't.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1837.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6he5i2","c_root_id_B":"c6hfzx0","created_at_utc_A":1349325447,"created_at_utc_B":1349336367,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I really like the post about the cybernetically  enhanced human beings, but as an occasional ent, I have to really hope that in the shorter term the next thing that everyone will consider is the legalization of marijuana.  It's often compared with alcohol prohibition in America's past, and I think that one day we'll look back and wonder how people were ever so daft as to make pot illegal.","human_ref_B":"A good barometer to judge these things is to firstly understand that *perpectives* change over time. It was okay to keep blacks as slaves and to keep women from voting at a point in history because no one really thought about it. It wasnt thought of as being 'a little mean' or anything. But something that is *so common* that no one thought about it. Or perhaps did but cognitive dissonance kicked in. (I'm talking about the majority here of course)  Look at our society today and see what is widely accepted, something that the public at large would not object to, something that is commonplace, *but* if you think about it, is wrong. And most of us, deep down, know it. What you see being written in this thread (cyborgs, transgender rights, prison reform etc) is what most of us would accept even today. Whereas the major 'movement' type issues are ones which, down the years, even some so-called liberals and progressives would have a hard time accepting back in the day. Because our mind-set and perspectives would be different.  One such thing that exists today is veganism. It will not happen in the next generation however. It will take longer than that.   Why veganism? Because just like previous struggles (civil rights, feminism, gay rights etc.) there is simply too much overwhelming logic in favour of veganism. And like those previous struggles, there is a lot of cognitive dissonance in relation to this matter existing within society at large at this time.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10920.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"10wcas","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? \"So everyone knows gays will be allowed to get married eventually, just a matter of time. but what's the next generation's whole \"movement\" gonna be? What the hell is left to be taboo anymore?\"  This is taken from Redditor cjcolt's comment in a askreddit thread and someone suggest it be asked here and since I'd love to know the answer myself I took the liberty to post it.","c_root_id_A":"c6hfzx0","c_root_id_B":"c6hen2q","created_at_utc_A":1349336367,"created_at_utc_B":1349327725,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"A good barometer to judge these things is to firstly understand that *perpectives* change over time. It was okay to keep blacks as slaves and to keep women from voting at a point in history because no one really thought about it. It wasnt thought of as being 'a little mean' or anything. But something that is *so common* that no one thought about it. Or perhaps did but cognitive dissonance kicked in. (I'm talking about the majority here of course)  Look at our society today and see what is widely accepted, something that the public at large would not object to, something that is commonplace, *but* if you think about it, is wrong. And most of us, deep down, know it. What you see being written in this thread (cyborgs, transgender rights, prison reform etc) is what most of us would accept even today. Whereas the major 'movement' type issues are ones which, down the years, even some so-called liberals and progressives would have a hard time accepting back in the day. Because our mind-set and perspectives would be different.  One such thing that exists today is veganism. It will not happen in the next generation however. It will take longer than that.   Why veganism? Because just like previous struggles (civil rights, feminism, gay rights etc.) there is simply too much overwhelming logic in favour of veganism. And like those previous struggles, there is a lot of cognitive dissonance in relation to this matter existing within society at large at this time.","human_ref_B":"Capitalism is a system of oppression. Wage labor is slavery. Consumerism creates social alienation. Civilization is unsustainable. These are, and have always been the real problems, since humanity first domesticated plants and animals during the Neolithic revolution. Revolution is the solution.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8642.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1hr2c4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"If you had to recommend one economic forecasting text, which would it be?","c_root_id_A":"caxckdl","c_root_id_B":"cax9imo","created_at_utc_A":1373164487,"created_at_utc_B":1373153768,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Nate Silver's the signal and the noise is a great book about general forecasting principles","human_ref_B":"If you're looking for a more rigorous approach I highly recommend Box-Jenkins.  http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Applied-Econometric-Series-Probability-Statistics\/dp\/0470505397","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10719.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1hr2c4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"If you had to recommend one economic forecasting text, which would it be?","c_root_id_A":"caxckdl","c_root_id_B":"cax6nyp","created_at_utc_A":1373164487,"created_at_utc_B":1373143707,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Nate Silver's the signal and the noise is a great book about general forecasting principles","human_ref_B":"Keynes' Economic Posibilities for our Grandchildren.  Read this in my economic classes, and it was a facinating perspective on what the economy was going to be like in 100 years (from Keynes' time period). While we haven't hit the 100 year mark, he was surprisingly on point with his prediction. It also leads to think of how we might reach or maintain this leisure society and what it might look like.  I recommend this to everyone I know even slightly interested in economic forecasting. I just love looking how people from a long time ago predicted what now would be like.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20780.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1hr2c4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"If you had to recommend one economic forecasting text, which would it be?","c_root_id_A":"cax84gn","c_root_id_B":"caxckdl","created_at_utc_A":1373148826,"created_at_utc_B":1373164487,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Huh. I always thought economic forecasting was universally recognised as  out-of-sample econometric estimation. Today I learned.","human_ref_B":"Nate Silver's the signal and the noise is a great book about general forecasting principles","labels":0,"seconds_difference":15661.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1hr2c4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"If you had to recommend one economic forecasting text, which would it be?","c_root_id_A":"cax6nyp","c_root_id_B":"cax9imo","created_at_utc_A":1373143707,"created_at_utc_B":1373153768,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Keynes' Economic Posibilities for our Grandchildren.  Read this in my economic classes, and it was a facinating perspective on what the economy was going to be like in 100 years (from Keynes' time period). While we haven't hit the 100 year mark, he was surprisingly on point with his prediction. It also leads to think of how we might reach or maintain this leisure society and what it might look like.  I recommend this to everyone I know even slightly interested in economic forecasting. I just love looking how people from a long time ago predicted what now would be like.","human_ref_B":"If you're looking for a more rigorous approach I highly recommend Box-Jenkins.  http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Applied-Econometric-Series-Probability-Statistics\/dp\/0470505397","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10061.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1hr2c4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"If you had to recommend one economic forecasting text, which would it be?","c_root_id_A":"cax84gn","c_root_id_B":"cax9imo","created_at_utc_A":1373148826,"created_at_utc_B":1373153768,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Huh. I always thought economic forecasting was universally recognised as  out-of-sample econometric estimation. Today I learned.","human_ref_B":"If you're looking for a more rigorous approach I highly recommend Box-Jenkins.  http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Applied-Econometric-Series-Probability-Statistics\/dp\/0470505397","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4942.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"643xi6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Recommendation for a good overview book as well as PodCast on Cultural Anthropology Hiya, (hope Friday Free For All is still open).  could anyone recommend a good overview book on Cultural Anthropology? I am tempted to just get the cur -1 (current minus one edition) college textbook from a bookstore.   Also, are there any C.A. podcasts? I thought that this had been asked, but I must have missed it in my scans of the postings.","c_root_id_A":"dfzhs42","c_root_id_B":"dfzhyk1","created_at_utc_A":1491623741,"created_at_utc_B":1491624073,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The Society for Cultural Anthropology has a podcast, appropriately called \"AnthroPod:\" https:\/\/culanth.org\/conversations\/24-anthropod-the-sca-podcast","human_ref_B":"You might check out \"Core Concepts in Cultural Anthropology\" by Robert Lavenda & Emily Schultz. It's a pretty decent and accessible overview of the field.  The only podcast I'm aware of is called \"AnthroPod\" put out by the Society for Cultural Anthropology. I have only listened to one episode (I don't listen to many podcasts), so I can't really attest to its quality, but they interview some really great anthropologists in some of the episodes so you will probably get a good sense of what kinds of work cultural anthropologists are currently engaged in.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":332.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1e32ws","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How were Gender Studies courses taught before 1987? I have recently become very interested in the history of the development of Gender Studies in America. It often seems that the first time scholars were seriously discussing gender was in 1987 when West and Zimmerman wrote \"Doing Gender,\" at least in the sociology community. However, even a cursory glance at history tells me that Women's Studies programs (which developed into Gender Studies programs) existed as early as the 1960s.  So my question is not *did* we teach about gender before West and Zimmerman's piece, but *how* did we do it? West and Zimmerman open their article by discussing the perils of teaching gender without a firm theoretical basis.   In particular I'm interested in reading articles and books that were widely used during the period before 1987. I've found a few special issues in Teaching Sociology and I will gladly share if anyone is interested. In addition, if you or someone you know has syllabi from that time period I would love to see that part of history as well. Feel free to PM me, too, if you're worried about your post being too anecdotal.","c_root_id_A":"c9wc3e3","c_root_id_B":"c9wcxar","created_at_utc_A":1368215221,"created_at_utc_B":1368217601,"score_A":4,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"You might enjoy Gayle Rubin, most notably *The Traffic in Women*.","human_ref_B":"On the linguistic side of things, Robin Lakoff in the 70's was pretty influential in getting the ball rolling for the study of gender in sociolinguistics with the publishing of *Language and Women's Place*.  There's a good, brief summary of the book on her Wikipedia page.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2380.0,"score_ratio":1.75}
{"post_id":"fnj9nt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.93,"history":"Do economic downturns increase crime?","c_root_id_A":"fla2r1y","c_root_id_B":"fla88a0","created_at_utc_A":1584975340,"created_at_utc_B":1584978704,"score_A":4,"score_B":23,"human_ref_A":"Section 3 of Draca and Machin and Section 5 of Chalfin and McCrary review the literature on the (legal) labor market and crime--to the extent that downturns weaken the labor market, you can think of this as a channel by which downturns may increase crime. (The Draca and Machin piece covers economic incentives more generally)","human_ref_B":"It depends. To begin: against the expectations of many, including criminologists, the Great Recession did not increase crime rates. In Rosenfeld's introduction to a special issue on the Crime and the Great Recession:  >**When the Great Recession hit in early 2008, it was widely assumed that crime rates would increase.** That was a reasonable expectation. **Robbery and property crime rates generally rise during recessions and fall during recoveries** (Bushway, Cook, & Phillips, 2013). **Some evidence suggests homicide and assault rates do as well** (Lauritsen & Heimer, 2010; Rosenfeld, 2009). **But the Great Recession was different. Crime rates fell in the United States and in most other developed nations hit by the financial collapse and recession.**  The short story is that the relationship between economic factors and crime is complex. We have to consider the big picture, but also remember that the devil is in the details, i.e.:  >... the possibility has been raised that] **the relationship between economic conditions and crime is not invariant; other factors influence it.**  ---  To expand further: [Rosenfeld in his 2013 book about Crime and the Economy argues:  >Despite ample indications that economic considerations may be a source of personal distress and criminal behaviour, **research on the relationship between crime and the economy tells a more complex story** ...]  >But **even the association between economic conditions and street crime turns out to be more complex than it first appears** [...]  >In an example [of moderating factors] from our own research, **we presented evidence that the relationship between unemployment and burglary is moderated by the strength of the welfare state.**  [In another 2013 book - Economics and Youth Violence - Baumer, Rosenfeld and Wolff ask whether \"...] the Criminogenic Consequences of Economic Downturns [are] Conditional?\":  >**Much of the extant research on the link between indicators of economic downturns and crime rates has focused on estimating main effects**, typically evaluating the general hypothesis that declining economic conditions yield elevated crime rates. **We propose that this was an overly simplistic approach.**  >[...] one clear conclusion that emerges from our study is that **the relationship between economic conditions and crime rates is complex. Simple assessments of the link between macroeconomic conditions and crime rates are likely to yield misleading results**  Thus, for example, the effect of unemployment depends on inflation rates;  >These findings underscore the general **need to consider conditional relationships when assessing the role of economic conditions on crime** and to **challenge simplistic views of the implications for crime levels of significant economic downturns such as the most recent recession, which has thus far been accompanied by relatively low levels of inflation and therefore may not yield substantial increases in crime, even with a doubling of the unemployment rate in many areas.**  ---  Therefore, it is important to consider mediating and moderating factors (e.g. the context and all which comes with!) and it is valuable to consider cross-national studies. For illustration, see the following three studies. Per [Lauritsen et al.'s analysis of the relationship between violence and economic conditions in the USA between 1973 and 2011:  >As our findings show, **relationships between economic conditions and violence are affected by historical context and therefore subject to change, both in the most recent period and of course in the future.**   In 2012 edition of *Criminology in Europe* - the official newsletter of the European Society of Criminology - Rodriguez and Larrauri conclude in regard to **Spain**:  >Our data reflect trends only until 2010. **According to these data, most violent and property crime rates did not increase during the recession.** Why these types of crimes did not increase **might have to do with sociodemographic changes, with the persistence of the welfare state in Spain, or with other related factors that require additional research.** Whether this decrease will continue in the future is hard to predict.  And per Xenakis and Cheliotis's review of research on **Greece**:  >As suggested by this brief review, **the relationship between crime and the financial crisis in Greece has been non-linear, irregular, and complex**.  To quote a paper they published in 2013:  >Second, **the criminogenic impact of financial crisis may lack linearity and uniformity, not just in terms of common property and violent offences and white-collar crime, as previous research has suggested, but also as regards illicit political violence.** In the Greek case, whilst illicit violence identified as emanating from far-left or anarchist groups initially rose but then fell, mass public unrest did not gather momentum, and violence perpetrated by the police and far-right groups saw an ascent.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3364.0,"score_ratio":5.75}
{"post_id":"29nbi6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Does Europe have differing attitudes toward blackface than the US? I know Europe is a large and varied place but I can't think about anywhere specific. I've seen this claim bandied around on Reddit but I'm not so sure about it. Whatever the reason is, could you also explain the social and historical reasons for it? I'm sorry for my poor and vague wording.","c_root_id_A":"cimsgrr","c_root_id_B":"cimm7w9","created_at_utc_A":1404323465,"created_at_utc_B":1404310922,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The difference between how some European countries see blackface and how the US sees it is mostly embedded in the differing cultures and histories.  For example, the Belgian character of Zwarte Piet (Black Peter) was originally introduced in Christmas folklore as the companion to Saint Nicholas. Of course, being introduced in the 19th century, it wasn't considered controversial that the character was a close parallel to American blackface, which saw its earliest incarnations around the same time. But unlike the US, Belgium didn't abolish slavery in its colonial territories until 1909, whereas it was abolished in the US in 1860. After the abolition in the US, it was still legal to discriminate against people of African descent, and for a century afterwards, they were subjected to racial discrimination, violence, etc.  In a country where a significant percentage of the population is black, the struggle for equal rights, and the symbols that defined decades of oppression, are much more stark and polarizing in the US than they are in most European countries. This is why Zwarte Piet is still easy to find in many celebrations in Belgium and the Netherlands, although it has come under increased scrutiny in the Netherlands in recent years as the government and the society become more mindful of these sorts of things.  **TL;DR**: Negative depictions of blackface are more polarizing in the US, as more of its population is black, and suffered through centuries of slavery and oppression, whereas most of the oppression by European countries was colonial, meaning that it didn't happen 'at home'.","human_ref_B":"Would you explain term blackface? English is not my native language.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12543.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"29nbi6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"Does Europe have differing attitudes toward blackface than the US? I know Europe is a large and varied place but I can't think about anywhere specific. I've seen this claim bandied around on Reddit but I'm not so sure about it. Whatever the reason is, could you also explain the social and historical reasons for it? I'm sorry for my poor and vague wording.","c_root_id_A":"cimsgrr","c_root_id_B":"cimn4yl","created_at_utc_A":1404323465,"created_at_utc_B":1404312976,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The difference between how some European countries see blackface and how the US sees it is mostly embedded in the differing cultures and histories.  For example, the Belgian character of Zwarte Piet (Black Peter) was originally introduced in Christmas folklore as the companion to Saint Nicholas. Of course, being introduced in the 19th century, it wasn't considered controversial that the character was a close parallel to American blackface, which saw its earliest incarnations around the same time. But unlike the US, Belgium didn't abolish slavery in its colonial territories until 1909, whereas it was abolished in the US in 1860. After the abolition in the US, it was still legal to discriminate against people of African descent, and for a century afterwards, they were subjected to racial discrimination, violence, etc.  In a country where a significant percentage of the population is black, the struggle for equal rights, and the symbols that defined decades of oppression, are much more stark and polarizing in the US than they are in most European countries. This is why Zwarte Piet is still easy to find in many celebrations in Belgium and the Netherlands, although it has come under increased scrutiny in the Netherlands in recent years as the government and the society become more mindful of these sorts of things.  **TL;DR**: Negative depictions of blackface are more polarizing in the US, as more of its population is black, and suffered through centuries of slavery and oppression, whereas most of the oppression by European countries was colonial, meaning that it didn't happen 'at home'.","human_ref_B":"Basically, yes. In the US blackface was done for amazingly racist reasons, but in Europe blackface is older than colonialism and doesn't really have any racial context. There are some examples in that article of Europeans using blackface for racist reasons, but the more common examples of blackface in Europe and just tradition","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10489.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"19pxkk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"What literature is out there on the cause of political radicalization? I've been thinking of undertaking a survey of leftwing radicals in my city on what, precisely, caused them to move from deciding the system needed to be reformed to deciding an entirely new system is needed. I'm trying to find already existing literature on this topic so I can make sure I'm not covering old ground, but Google Scholar turns up tons and tons of articles that mainly have to do with religious radicalization and what few studies that I can find with promising abstracts are usually hidden behind paywalls. Are there any accessible studies on this topic? Also, as a secondary question, what are your views on why it is people become leftwing political radicals (namely communists and anarchists)?","c_root_id_A":"c8qfev9","c_root_id_B":"c8q9h7r","created_at_utc_A":1362526273,"created_at_utc_B":1362509951,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I don't know of any studies, but the book \"Bombs, Beards, and Barricades\" provides an overview of youth revolution\/radicalization from the 1820's to the 1970's.  It was written in the 70's so it might be kind of out of date, but might also be a good starting point in terms of picking up the historical trail.","human_ref_B":"this seems like a useful guide","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16322.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"px91k8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Question about content analysis - sample representativeness Hi, I am using content analysis approach to understand themes in comments of some Youtube videos. I am figuring out whether my methodology makes sense, especially in terms of sample representativeness.   For context, the number of comments each video received varied a lot, and due to bandwidth issues, my collaborators and I are not able to code all of the comments under these videos. So we decided to perform content analysis on a subset of the comments - for less popular videos we sampled all of their comments, for more popular videos we randomly sampled part of their comments and set a maximum. With this sampling strategy, we are able to tweak the comment distribution such that our results will not be dominated by comments from the most popular Youtube video.   My question is: The theme distribution on this coded sample is very likely to be different than that on the original dataset (all comments of the given Youtube videos). Is it an issue?   My collaborators and I are not content analysis experts. I have read some papers in my field that applied the content analysis approach and did not find much reference - because all of them coded all of their corpus and did not do the sampling. So I really want to know your advice. Thank you so much.","c_root_id_A":"hen0owl","c_root_id_B":"hen62mw","created_at_utc_A":1632861054,"created_at_utc_B":1632863321,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"What do you mean by bandwidth issues? Do you mean scraping comments?","human_ref_B":"PhD candidate in sociology here; I did qualitative content analysis for my master's paper and I teach research methods as an instructor of record for undergrads.  Your overall approach will probably work just fine, but given that I don't know your research question and whatnot I can't comment with too many specifics. Basically, the overall methodology you're using \\_can\\_ be a sound one, but your execution of it might not be itself sound.  I have a couple of concerns with your sampling.  1) This has to do with sampling the comments. You said it was random--is it truly random, or do you kinda run your finger down the list and where it stops, it stops? True random selection (i.e., give every comment a number and then have a computer pick a random number) will work as long as the videos are similar (or dissimilar) in the ways that are important to your research question.  2) This has to do with sampling the videos. How do you decide what is more popular and what is less popular? How do you decide which videos to include in the first place? Many people use popularity itself as a metric for inclusion\/exclusion; you don't have to but there are often problems with bias when you are selecting pieces for analysis. You have two entry points for bias here: one in your video selection process, and one in your comment selection process. You should be able to justify both sets of your selections.  3) If it works for your research question, consider numbering all of the comments and randomly selecting from \\_all\\_ of them, not just from the more popular ones. If this isn't practical, you can use a form of stratified sampling to ensure representation from the less popular ones: you can either cluster some of the less popular ones together, or use a large enough sample so that enough of the smaller videos will show up and make a substantive difference in your analysis.  4) Also: if you are engaging in fully qualitative analysis, your sampling does not have to follow the same kind of rigor around randomness that quantitative analysis requires in order to avoid sampling error. Just as your research question can change things about your methodology, your analysis will also change things. I'd have to know how you're planning on coding in order to really critique your sampling.  You can try this paper on for size, too:  Kim, H., Jang, S. M., Kim, S. H., & Wan, A. (2018). Evaluating sampling methods for content analysis of Twitter data. *Social Media+ Society*, 4(2), 2056305118772836.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2267.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"tbhr1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"So what are the economics behind the U.S. switching to a gold standard currency?  And from there I suppose, the definition of money\/currency?  Since your understanding of that decides how you interpret inflation,deflation, etc.","c_root_id_A":"c4l7lu4","c_root_id_B":"c4l6l6m","created_at_utc_A":1336419256,"created_at_utc_B":1336414844,"score_A":16,"score_B":14,"human_ref_A":"We've discussed the gold standard several times, most recently here.","human_ref_B":"None. No theory that has not been absolutely discredited states that having a gold standard currency is good\/beneficial.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4412.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"dgsmyf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Looking for a book that describes British society I'd like to know more about my country. I was wondering if there is a book that gives an overview of the UK from a social science perspective. Convering things like how class works here, what the economy is like, different cultural and ethnic groups, the variety of political views etc. Kind of like an encyclopedia entry but book length and focused on social science topics. Or like a social science textbook but focused on the UK.","c_root_id_A":"f3f1rnm","c_root_id_B":"f3efks2","created_at_utc_A":1570888488,"created_at_utc_B":1570874128,"score_A":13,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"&#x200B;  * Fox, K (2005\/2014) *Watching the English.* Hodder and Stoughton. * O'Connor, Kaori (2013) *The English Breakfast: The Biography of a National Meal*\\*, with Recipes\\*. London: Bloomsbury Publishers. * Rapport, Nigel (2002) *An Anthropology of Britain.* Berg Publishers. * Fryer, P (1984) *Staying Power: The History of Black People in Britain.* Pluto. * Littlewood, R. & Lipsedge, M. (1982) *Aliens and Alienists: Ethnic Minorities and Psychiatry.* * Solomos, J (1989) *Race and Racism in Contemporary Britain.* * Visram, R (1986) *Ayahs, lascars and Princes: Indians in Britain, 1700-1947*. Pluto. * Degnen, C. & Tyler, K. (2017) *Bringing Britain into Being: Sociology, Anthropology and British Lives.* The Sociological Review. * Paxman, J. (2007) *The English: A Portrait of the People.* Penguin. * Akala (2018) *Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire.* * Jenkins, S (2011) *A Short History of England.* Amazon Media. * Talling, P (2019) *Derelict London.* Amazon Media. * Thompson, E. P. (2002) *The Making of the English Working Class.* Penguin Modern Classics. * The Secret Barrister (2019) *The Secret Barrister: Stories of the Law and How it's Broken.* Picadore. * Kennedy, H. (1993) *Eve Was Framed: Women and British Justice.* Vintage. (Including '*Eve Was Shamed: How The British Justice System is Failing Women',* and, *'Misjustice: How British Law is Failing Women').* * Shaw, A. (1988) *A Pakistani Community in Britain*. Wiley-Blackwell. * Okley, J. (Prof.) (1983) *The Traveller-Gypsies.* Cambridge University Press.  >*You can also find her fieldnotes, articles, journals, etc online.*  * Richardson, J. & Ryder, A. (2012) *Gypsies and Travellers.* Policy Press. * Dillion, E. (2013) *Gypsy Empire.* Transworld Ireland. * Oakley, A. (2015) *Sex, Gender and Society.* Routledge. * Haulbrooke, R. *Death, Religion and the Family in England, 1480-1750.* Oxford Studies in Social History. * Apetrei, S. *Women, Feminism and Religion in Early Enlightenment England.* Cambridge Studies in Early Modern British History. * Cressy, D. *Religion and Society in Early Modern England.* * Moran, M. (2015) *Politics and Governance in the UK.* * Griffiths, S. (2018) *British Politics.* Macmillan Education. * Jones, B. *British Politics: The Basics* and *Politics UK.* * Garnett, M. *Exploring British Politics.* * Vernon, J. *Modern Britain.*  Some others:  * *The Good Immigrant, B*rit(ish), Insurgent Empire, Black and British: A Forgotten History (and many more).  >Thesis and case studies:   >   >Vietnamese Londoners: Transnational Identities Through Community Networks   >   >Vietnamese Populas in the UK Review   >   >An Ethnographic Account of Reiki   >   >'A Casestudy of Homelessness: An Ethnographic Study'   >   >Trends in Attitudes Towards Politics   >   >LGBT in Britain   >   >Inequality among lesbian, gay bisexual and transgender groups in the UK: a review of evidence   >   >Hate crimes against trans people: assessing emotions,  behaviors and attitudes towards criminal justice agencies   >   >Violence Against Women in the UK   >   >The gendered nature of domestic violence \u2013 facts and figures   >   >National LGBT Survey Report   >   >BEING BLACK IN A WHITE WORLD: UNDERSTANDING RACISM IN BRITISH UNIVERSITIES   >   >Race Rights in the UK   >   >Race, Ethnicity & Equality in UK History   >   >Xenophobia and Radicalism in the UK (2017)   >   >Xenophobia Britannica? Anti-immigrant attitudes in the UK are among the strongest in Europe   >   >The impact of Brexit on far-right groups in the UK   >   > Inside the Hidden World of Britain's Hasidic Ultra-Orthodox Jewish Communities","human_ref_B":"Mike Savage\u2019s Social Class in the 21st Century is my go to. It goes beyond the traditional class system into much more detail & explains complex differences between emerging classes. Biressi & Nunn\u2019s Class & Contemporary British Culture may be worth a look too. Basically, class is pretty central to understanding British society.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14360.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"yvawn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What determines the way a person types through text messaging, Facebook, the Internet in general, etc.? I'm curious to know how people get their 'typing habits', so to say. Why do some people type correctly, with spelling and punctuation present while other people use little\/no punctuation and words spelled differently?  I used to think that people who tiped liek dis were younger people but I've seen older people, including adults, who type like that. I also thought perhaps education was a factor but I've seen plenty of instances where educated folks type jumbled messes. My ex-gf's mom, a nurse, once sent me a text that said 'hus fone is dis'. It wasn't a surprise that her daughter typed the same way as her and every now and then, whenever she'd text me, I'd have to reread her texts to figure out what she was saying or ask her to clarify because of the way she spelled things and the lack of punctuation. On the other end of the spectrum, I know people who dropped out of high school who type correctly.  Are people more inclined to type correctly\/incorrectly depending on what they're doing\/who they're talking to? I think it's a no-brainer that even people who type hard-to-read sentences on Facebook\/Youtube, etc will make an effort to spell correctly and use proper punctuation when writing a paper, for example but when talking to friends on Facebook and such, they'll type 'freely'. Maybe it's due to laziness? Apathy? Or some people think it feels too formal?   I have a friend who I text often and sometimes it takes me a second to figure out what she's saying. On Facebook, she types normally.  On various websites, you'll come across many different 'typing styles'. On reddit, it seems like almost everyone types\/spells correctly and uses proper punction, or at least people generally try to do so. On Youtube and Facebook, you'll probably find a mix of both. Is this due to the target audience\/demographics of the sites? Facebook and Youtube seem to appeal to everyone from every walks of life; I think I saw somewhere that most of reddit are 20-somethings that are in college\/college-educated.  I frequent a general aviation forum (Pilots of America) and everyone there seems to type\/spell correctly. Most general aviation pilots are older folks and it's definitely an expensive hobby; perhaps that could have some sort of influence? I'm just speculating here.","c_root_id_A":"c5z5u57","c_root_id_B":"c5z5ycl","created_at_utc_A":1346021476,"created_at_utc_B":1346021977,"score_A":6,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"I'd say that at least PART of how you type comes from how important you think good typing is, as said below.  If you don't make the connection that your typing style is the first impression people get of you on the internet, then you might be more relaxed about your typing.  If you don't believe that typing skills are important, you're less likely to work on developing them, and end up using more lazy typing.  (Skipping letters, abbreviating too much, ect).  Also, this might be unrelated, but I find that people who learn English as a second language, often type very well.  They may misuse a word or the sentence might be a bit awkward (if they haven't been speaking English long) but they rarely use txtspk or not capitalize anything.","human_ref_B":"I think it's very similar to code switching, but in typed form.  I'm a fairly middle class Londoner, but put me in a situation with a working class Londoner and I will often consciously or unconsciously start using using an amended dialect, which typically aids communication with that person or group.  I feel this is analogous with online speaking, with various dialects at play. Here's some combinations I've brainstormed:  * Personal email - personal, focused, considerate * Business email - functional, abbreviated, focused * Marketing language - urgent, call to action, focused * Website language - static, considered, focused * Fiction - descriptive, considered, paced * Blog language - fluid, stream of conciousness, emotional * Serious forum discussion - though it may often fail, considered, accurate, tactical * Less serious forum discussion - flippant, larger than life, some text speak * Twitter speak - abbreviated, charged, tactical * Text speak - functional, abbreviated, varied levels of seriousness * Facebook status - functional, tactical, flippant * Youtube - anonymous, tactical, attention seeking * 4chan(?) - anonymous, anarchic, avant-guard  Now everyone 'lives' visiting these different streams of digital communication types and so has so many influences. A lot of the one to one streams such as personal email and text messages are unregulated by community or business expectations and so need only be functional as far as the involved parties are involved.  When you add an audience like on a forum, the requirement to not only convey information, but to do so knowing your reader may  * Have a varying level of English * Be unfamiliar with specific sayings and ways of acting a close personal group is * Is invited to make a response to follow up on an issue, should they choose to * Wants that sweet, sweet karma  So what I'm saying is having a larger audience for your communication increases its objective quality.  I just shame people who text me poorly by quoting their 'messages' back to them in full pointing out the ambiguity, unnecessary abbreviations and such, making it clear the level of communication they're putting in is insufficient for me to give a fuck.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":501.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"2egvwo","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Is there a noticeable wage gap men and women aged 18-24?","c_root_id_A":"cjzk2tv","c_root_id_B":"cjzn26a","created_at_utc_A":1408927740,"created_at_utc_B":1408934452,"score_A":7,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"All I know is that women without children have wages that are much closer to men's.  http:\/\/www.asanet.org\/images\/members\/docs\/pdf\/featured\/motherwage.pdf","human_ref_B":"It's more complicated than the prior answers suggest. See this article.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6712.0,"score_ratio":1.4285714286}
{"post_id":"1n670u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.76,"history":"Before the Berbers, were Black people the primary inhabitants of North Africa?","c_root_id_A":"ccg1ci5","c_root_id_B":"ccfufkw","created_at_utc_A":1380232385,"created_at_utc_B":1380213429,"score_A":6,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'm on my phone so can't back this up right now, but there are a couple issues here.  The first one is that Berbers are not a homogenous group at all. They are very much like Arabs, meaning that there are black Berbers and white Berbers. They are extremely mixed ethnically.  Secondly, the reason for this mixture is the same reason all north African populations are mixed. It is the backflow from Europe over 12,000 years ago known as the \"back to Africa\" migration. Most north Africans are descended from groups indigenous to north Africa, but with significant admixture from Europe and the near east. Studies of Y-haplogroup lineage by Zalloua, Cruciani, Abu Amero, Luis, Wood, and others have shown that between 20-40% of modern Egyptians come from groups outside of Africa.   So while you might be thinking ok, all these people came back to Africa, before that everyone was \"black\", this is not accurate. It's wrong to think of Berbers as one homogenous ethnic group and it's wrong to think of north Africans as having arrived from elsewhere. The truth is that the region is extremely mixed and has been invaded countless times, and the original inhabitants have mixed and intermarried with various immigrant populations. The back to Africa haplogroups that we're talking about arrived more than 12,000 years ago, with significant numbers arriving even further back into history, making it difficult to distinguish what was \"out of Africa\" and what was \"back to Africa\". The point is that these north African groups have always been very mixed people, with white populations existing in northern Egypt since the dynastic period and earlier.","human_ref_B":"Thr Carthraginians were N. AFRICAN and of Phonecian (Semitic) descent. I imagine more came from around the Med than through the Sahara.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18956.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"1ew9nu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Under international law when can one country invade the other? I was watching a Hitchens debate the other day and he stated theat there 4 ways a coutry can lose its sovereignty: violating the Genocide Convention, violating of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, granting safe harbour for terrorists, and invading another territory. I couldnt find andy crecidble sources supporting this claim, however if it were true wouldnt the Iraq war be a just war?","c_root_id_A":"ca4hbez","c_root_id_B":"ca4juuc","created_at_utc_A":1369321763,"created_at_utc_B":1369328490,"score_A":7,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"I'd just like to point out that a few IR-scholars (at least Wheeler) see a difference between \"just wars\" and \"legal wars\".  I'm unable to check my litterature at the moment so I'll try not to give any uncited answers. I can however give a reading tip; Saving Strangers by Nicholas Wheeler is about humanitarian intervention and deals with this topic.","human_ref_B":"The UN charter prohibits the use of force with two exceptions: self-defense (including anticipatory and mutual self-defense) and with the authorization of the UN security council. Any other invasion or attack is technically illegal under international law.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6727.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"18yfff","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.64,"history":"In what proportion do the rich and poors participate to the state income ? I am always puzzled by the argument of fairness vs unfairness of a flat tax rate. But is the argument of the richest valid ? Do they participate really more than the poors ? Do they pay more globally than the poorers ? Is there somewhere to look for these kind of data ?  I mean: if the 1% richests own x% of wealth, do their taxes account also for x% of the state income ? Are there any place to find this info ?","c_root_id_A":"c8j7caw","c_root_id_B":"c8j4bwp","created_at_utc_A":1361471315,"created_at_utc_B":1361462296,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Other answers seem to be showing tax rates, not % or revenue coming from various income groups, which I believe was OP's question.  This only shows federal income tax, and is from 2009, so may not be a completely accurate depiction of total current taxation: http:\/\/taxfoundation.org\/article\/summary-latest-federal-individual-income-tax-data-0  On chart 1, compare columns \"Groups Share of Total AGI\" to \"Groups share of Income taxes.\"  At least at the federal level, the US appears to have a fairly progressive income tax structure, with the rich paying a higher proportion of taxes than the proportion of income they make.  Of course, the rich tend to make more of their money from investments compared to income than do the poor, so take this with a grain of salt.","human_ref_B":"~~ctrl+f \"Tax Burden by Household Income\"~~  EDIT: Covers State and Federal(last page)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9019.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"f57has","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is it anticompetitive when Amazon manipulates the search algorithm to favor its own products?","c_root_id_A":"fhxau00","c_root_id_B":"fhxpwq5","created_at_utc_A":1581949781,"created_at_utc_B":1581959773,"score_A":2,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Can you give an example?","human_ref_B":"I recently listened to a Planet Money podcast (an NPR podcast about economics). It discusses this topic and looks at anti-trust in modern day tech companies- give it a listen!   https:\/\/www.npr.org\/sections\/money\/2019\/02\/22\/697170790\/antitrust-3-big-tech","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9992.0,"score_ratio":7.5}
{"post_id":"f57has","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Is it anticompetitive when Amazon manipulates the search algorithm to favor its own products?","c_root_id_A":"fhykn7p","c_root_id_B":"fhxau00","created_at_utc_A":1581977868,"created_at_utc_B":1581949781,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I can warmly recommend Lina Khan's Amazon's Antritrust Paradox., Yale Law Review, Vol. 126, Issue 3.                 In short, it is not anticompetitive under US law, ever since Bork, but it would be under EU law if Amazon had significant market dominance, which it does not (yet) have in many EU countries.","human_ref_B":"Can you give an example?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":28087.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"7igr44","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Was alienation a real event? By \"alienation\" I mean a shift in goals from providing for one's community and having a sense of belong or meaning in one's societal role with producing as much value as possible. Apparently this was a big enough problem that two major political platforms were raised in opposition to the status quo which indirectly lead to WWII.  However, was this ever a real thing? Did people in \"ye olden times\" really produce good primarily because they wanted to be a part of a local community? It seems a bit hard for me to buy into the idea of serfs finding their work fulfilling because they are participating in a community endeavor when a large chunk of those efforts were utilized by landed gentry. The intuition here is to see it as a shift in how we view labor, sort of as an extension of romantic visions of the past that were popular in the late 19th century.  So, was alienation a real social phenomenon, or does it require an unscientific \/ non-historical understanding of how goods were produced in pre-industrial society? I realize that there may not be much data here, but I figure it's worth a shot since this sort of gets at the roots of the social sciences as a discipline.","c_root_id_A":"dqz3hy2","c_root_id_B":"dqzb7xk","created_at_utc_A":1512776021,"created_at_utc_B":1512786328,"score_A":7,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"Well, when you describe a shift in societal values from community standing to wealth, the thing that naturally comes to my mind isn't the interbellum period, but the decline of feudalism and the rise of the merchant class. Or perhaps the urbanization following the industrial revolution, which saw the whole serf-landowner relationship dissolved for a large portion of the population.  As for \"is] alienation a real social phenomenon\", well, there are a few ways you could look at it:  - Firstly, as a social phenomenon, one could argue it's real as long as people believe it's real. If people may feel alienated, then yes, you could say alienation is real. Nostalgia is a well-known theme in literary and media stretching back centuries, so even lacking any hard statistical evidence at hand, I think I can safely say it's a real phenomena. (Whether it fits your specific definition of alienation is another thing entirely).  - Secondly, as an economic phenomenon, there's a term called \"[creative destruction\". This is possibly a more concrete example of alienation. In decades, entire careers or fields of employments can be radically altered or destroyed in favour of others. For example, the Dutch Sawing Guilds being replaced by Windmill-driven saw operators, architects, and builders. Or factory laborers being replaced by machine engineers and maintenance technicians with the rise of automation.   While obviously it's difficult to measure alienation itself, I think we can safely infer that if you spend 2\/3rds of your waking life performing a task, and suddenly you can't do it anymore, that it can be a big shock to someone's state of mind. Especially when the income you lose may change the remaining 1\/3rd of your waking life by forcing you to change your leisure pursuits, what types of products you can consume, and where you can live, etc. In other words, the prolonged loss of employment upsets not only what you do for a living, but your entire material life. So one could make the argument that anyone unemployed for long periods could very well feel alienated, or at least vulnerable.","human_ref_B":"The technical meaning of alienation in this context (which sounds like it comes from Marx) is being able to sell something for money. For example if something is alienable it means it can be sold and transferred to new ownership. It's not the modern context of the term like an 'alienated teenager' (if only these could be transferred to new ownership). Marx uses this term in part to get at his concept of abstract labour or labour which is a commodity and is simply purchased as part of the production process. Prior to the industrial revolution it was far more typical to sell finished goods but not labour itself. It's also important to remember how scarce money was through much of this period. Tally sticks were more often used for settling accounts in rural England than coin money and and settling accounts was part of festivals that were a common part of village life (Graeber, 2011).    Alienable labour came into common use in europe through the manor system. Villeins would customarily work a set number of days for the manor lord as payment for rent. As money became more common wealthier peasants began paying in cash rather than through customary labour. This created a split between wealthy farmers and subsistence farmers who still paid land rents in labour. As cash rent became common more and more subsistence farmers became dispossessed from their lands as manor lords became accustomed to cash payments for rent. For villeins there were many ways to resist having their labour appropriated by a lord. Villeins typically would arrive late or not at all, spend most of the day chatting or resting and do the bare minimum of labour on the required work days. Holidays, which there were many, were also a means of resistance as villeins would often protest any labour obligations that fell on a traditional holiday, no matter how obscure. So the landed gentry had less of a great source of labour appropriation than a giant pain in the ass. The reemergence of the cash economy and cash rents changed this.    At the same time the enclosure movements were talking place so formerly common lands were being appropriated by lords and stiff penalties for poaching, foraging and wood gathering (all of which were customary common rights) were enacted. This meant land less peasants had little choice but to sell their labour in order to make a living. Prior to this moment most people simply lived off the land and the commons (or were part of artisan classes who worked in the guild structure). The emerging capitalists used this labour force to undermine the power of village guilds or set up in 'greenfield' sites such as Manchester that had no established guild structure. Wage labour however was extremely frowned upon. 'Gerrard Whistanley, leader of the diggers, declared that it did not make any difference if one lived under the enemy or lived under one's brother if one worked for the wage.' (Federici, 2014). The Diggers or Levelers were so named because they would organize to dig up or level the enclosing hedges.   So yes unalienated labour was a thing. Most people sold the products of their labour but not labour itself. Most of rural life was subsistence farming and people who were able to be self sufficient had no reason and a deep resentment for the conditions of waged labour (aka alienated labour). It took breaking the artisan class and the peasant class for a reserve army of industrial labour to be created and wage labour to become the norm.   Works cited  Federci, Silvia \"Caliban and the Witch\" 2014  Graeber, David \"Debt: The First 5000 Thousand Years\" 2014  Marx, Karl \"Capital, A Critique of Political Economy\" 1867","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10307.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"13n4lr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.75,"history":"Dear economists what is your personal prediction for the future of the Euro? Personally, I think that the Euro's collapse is imminent. Unless for some magical reason the Eurozone decides to form a common government (fiscal union), or Greece (and others) leaving the Euro and inflating their debt or most likely just defaulting, there is no straightforward way to recovery for the PIIGS, but slowly also France and the rest.","c_root_id_A":"c75erkd","c_root_id_B":"c75mooa","created_at_utc_A":1353634687,"created_at_utc_B":1353686830,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"The ECB has been functioning as a fiscal union.  However, I honestly don't think there's any scenario that ends up keeping Greece within the union.  The challenge is to help Greece exit in a manner that doesn't make waves within Italy or Spain.","human_ref_B":"if economists could accurately predict the future, they'd be a lot richer than they are.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":52143.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"81396j","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"What are the major camps of Political Ethics As the title says, what are the major camps of thinking about political ethics?  Preferably, I'd like to know a primary text or author that explains how that camp works, and a short description of what distinguishes that camp from the others.  As far as I know, there are only two camps.  * 1) Ethics in the political field does not exist.  * 2) Ethics does exist in the political field.  I imagine that many people have come up with far more on political ethics than those two axioms. I want to know what camps are out there.  To clarify what I mean by political ethics... say you're a king of some country. Under what circumstances can you kill one of your own citizens, while still being a good king? When and how much can you collect taxes, while still being a good king? When can you go to war, while still being a good king? If another king was slaughtering their own people, under what circumstances would a good king do something, and what would they do? When do you allow your citizens to murder one another, what attempts can you make to stop them, and what are the limits to these attempts if you want to remain a good king? And can you, and how much can you, and in what ways can you, as a good king, prevent your people or other people from removing your kingship? Possibly more questions can be added.  In the first camp, you'd say the king can do literally everything in all scenarios with no limit whatsoever and they are still a good king irrespective of their actions. In the second camp, there are some limits in some scenarios on what a good king can do. If a king violated ant of those limits, that king would be not be a good king.  Simply put, if you know of any authors who wrote about some viewpoint (related to those questions), a very brief overview and their name would be precisely what I am looking for. Alternatively, if there are entire camps with proper names concerning this subject, that camp's name and a very brief overview of what distinguishes their belief from others would be excellent.","c_root_id_A":"dv0efwy","c_root_id_B":"dv3j5bf","created_at_utc_A":1519904665,"created_at_utc_B":1520034770,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I'm currently reading 'After Virtue' by Alasdair MacIntyre which is one of the most influential texts from the 20th century on moral philosophy in a public context - this is definitely a good place to start. Also, 'Justice' by Michael J. Sandel provides a good introduction of what is 'just' in political society.   In terms of different camps I think you'd be looking at the Utilitarians (Bentham, Mill etc.), the Aristotelians and the Kantians.  I think the thing is that you're coming at this subject from an antiquated perspective - moral philosophy nowadays seems to focus on the individual and society rather than rulers. But, as other people have mentioned some classic texts such as The Prince by Machiavelli, Leviathan by Hobbes and the Second Treatise of Government by Locke all deal with these questions.","human_ref_B":"A lot of very very poor answers here. Many of them are conflating moral philosophy and political philosophy, which some consider quite intimately related, but are not synonymous (Nozick for instance asserted that we derive political philosophical principles from moral principles, Rawls in his later career thought they were unrelated fields).  In contemporary political philosophy there are 4 major 'camps' you will generally see, with many minor, historical, or branching 'camps.'  These major camps are Egalitarianism (Rawls and Dworkin are the most famous in this camp), Libertarianism (Nozick, Hayek), Communitarianism (Sandel, MacIntyre, Walzer, and Taylor), and Marxism (Wolff, Cohen, Reiman, Roemer). Each of these have their own subdivisions within them, but this comment would be multiple volumes if I included them all.  If you are unable to dedicate yourself to reading primary sources: For a good overview of contemporary political philosophy, I highly recommend Will Kymlicka's *Contemporary Political Philosophy: An Introduction*, which is partly where I derive my list from.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":130105.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c967alu","c_root_id_B":"c964hjw","created_at_utc_A":1364799248,"created_at_utc_B":1364788383,"score_A":20,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"Double majored in econ and psychology. Now I work in construction and landscaping. I hate everyday of my life.","human_ref_B":"I got a BA in econ\/math, and now I'm getting a PhD in economics!  Of my friends with econ majors, about 2\/3rds went into business (and are planning on getting or are currently in the process of getting MBAs), 1\/4th went into law, and the rest are in grad programs.  The ones in business are either doing financey-type stuff, or basic data analyst work.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10865.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c967alu","c_root_id_B":"c966phg","created_at_utc_A":1364799248,"created_at_utc_B":1364796204,"score_A":20,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Double majored in econ and psychology. Now I work in construction and landscaping. I hate everyday of my life.","human_ref_B":"I'm, um, working as a graphic designer and copywriter for a software firm. So I'm basically doing absolutely nothing related to my degree at all.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3044.0,"score_ratio":1.8181818182}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c964mcj","c_root_id_B":"c967alu","created_at_utc_A":1364788776,"created_at_utc_B":1364799248,"score_A":8,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"Econ grad 2011, was unemployed for 1.5 years, couldn't find anything in finance or business. Now I am a college campus manager. If I am fortunate to work here long enough I'll get tuition reimbursement and my master's degree. I wouldn't mind becoming a professor eventually.","human_ref_B":"Double majored in econ and psychology. Now I work in construction and landscaping. I hate everyday of my life.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10472.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c965lr9","c_root_id_B":"c967alu","created_at_utc_A":1364791839,"created_at_utc_B":1364799248,"score_A":5,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I got a BS in Econ and went on to get my MS in Econ as well.  I now work as a Credit Risk Analyst.","human_ref_B":"Double majored in econ and psychology. Now I work in construction and landscaping. I hate everyday of my life.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7409.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c966bss","c_root_id_B":"c967alu","created_at_utc_A":1364794527,"created_at_utc_B":1364799248,"score_A":4,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I got a BA in Econ\/Math, will soon be studying at a Marketing PhD program.  Put in the effort and an Economics degree can pay off well.","human_ref_B":"Double majored in econ and psychology. Now I work in construction and landscaping. I hate everyday of my life.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4721.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c9670ed","c_root_id_B":"c967alu","created_at_utc_A":1364797682,"created_at_utc_B":1364799248,"score_A":5,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I'm about to finish my BA in Economics. Afterwards I will be doing a two-year research stint at a Federal Reserve branch, after which I plan to apply to PhD programs in economics.  Most people from my university with an Economics BA are either in finance or consulting.","human_ref_B":"Double majored in econ and psychology. Now I work in construction and landscaping. I hate everyday of my life.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1566.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c964zd5","c_root_id_B":"c967alu","created_at_utc_A":1364789872,"created_at_utc_B":1364799248,"score_A":3,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"I can comment for two of my close friends. One double majored in comp sci and does project management for a top firm after getting a masters in engineering management. The other is in a masters of accounting program with me (a sociology major).","human_ref_B":"Double majored in econ and psychology. Now I work in construction and landscaping. I hate everyday of my life.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9376.0,"score_ratio":6.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c967alu","c_root_id_B":"c965l1z","created_at_utc_A":1364799248,"created_at_utc_B":1364791775,"score_A":20,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Double majored in econ and psychology. Now I work in construction and landscaping. I hate everyday of my life.","human_ref_B":"BA in Econ\/Math and BS in Psych  Currently getting a PhD in Marketing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7473.0,"score_ratio":6.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c964mcj","c_root_id_B":"c966phg","created_at_utc_A":1364788776,"created_at_utc_B":1364796204,"score_A":8,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Econ grad 2011, was unemployed for 1.5 years, couldn't find anything in finance or business. Now I am a college campus manager. If I am fortunate to work here long enough I'll get tuition reimbursement and my master's degree. I wouldn't mind becoming a professor eventually.","human_ref_B":"I'm, um, working as a graphic designer and copywriter for a software firm. So I'm basically doing absolutely nothing related to my degree at all.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7428.0,"score_ratio":1.375}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c965lr9","c_root_id_B":"c966phg","created_at_utc_A":1364791839,"created_at_utc_B":1364796204,"score_A":5,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"I got a BS in Econ and went on to get my MS in Econ as well.  I now work as a Credit Risk Analyst.","human_ref_B":"I'm, um, working as a graphic designer and copywriter for a software firm. So I'm basically doing absolutely nothing related to my degree at all.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4365.0,"score_ratio":2.2}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c966bss","c_root_id_B":"c966phg","created_at_utc_A":1364794527,"created_at_utc_B":1364796204,"score_A":4,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"I got a BA in Econ\/Math, will soon be studying at a Marketing PhD program.  Put in the effort and an Economics degree can pay off well.","human_ref_B":"I'm, um, working as a graphic designer and copywriter for a software firm. So I'm basically doing absolutely nothing related to my degree at all.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1677.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c966phg","c_root_id_B":"c964zd5","created_at_utc_A":1364796204,"created_at_utc_B":1364789872,"score_A":11,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm, um, working as a graphic designer and copywriter for a software firm. So I'm basically doing absolutely nothing related to my degree at all.","human_ref_B":"I can comment for two of my close friends. One double majored in comp sci and does project management for a top firm after getting a masters in engineering management. The other is in a masters of accounting program with me (a sociology major).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6332.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c966phg","c_root_id_B":"c965l1z","created_at_utc_A":1364796204,"created_at_utc_B":1364791775,"score_A":11,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm, um, working as a graphic designer and copywriter for a software firm. So I'm basically doing absolutely nothing related to my degree at all.","human_ref_B":"BA in Econ\/Math and BS in Psych  Currently getting a PhD in Marketing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4429.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c965lr9","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364791839,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"I got a BS in Econ and went on to get my MS in Econ as well.  I now work as a Credit Risk Analyst.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":49250.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c969bbw","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364819153,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"BA\/MA\/MPhil\/ABD Economics  Senior Gov't Economist now.  Basically, what Integralds wants to be but isnt yet  * Writing the D","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21936.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c966bss","c_root_id_B":"c96es7r","created_at_utc_A":1364794527,"created_at_utc_B":1364841089,"score_A":4,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I got a BA in Econ\/Math, will soon be studying at a Marketing PhD program.  Put in the effort and an Economics degree can pay off well.","human_ref_B":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":46562.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c9670ed","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364797682,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"I'm about to finish my BA in Economics. Afterwards I will be doing a two-year research stint at a Federal Reserve branch, after which I plan to apply to PhD programs in economics.  Most people from my university with an Economics BA are either in finance or consulting.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":43407.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c964zd5","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364789872,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"I can comment for two of my close friends. One double majored in comp sci and does project management for a top firm after getting a masters in engineering management. The other is in a masters of accounting program with me (a sociology major).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":51217.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c965l1z","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364791775,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"BA in Econ\/Math and BS in Psych  Currently getting a PhD in Marketing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":49314.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c9686co","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364808506,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"Bscsoc in Economics, now doing my teacher training year for secondary school mathematics.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":32583.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c968hu8","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364811986,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"BSc Economics, interned as a Credit Analyst in a large bank, now staying with the same bank and joining as a Graduate Analyst looking at Credit Risk from a Portfolio perspective.  Unsure about future career moves, depends on the opportunities within the bank vs public sector \"doing good\"","labels":1,"seconds_difference":29103.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c969auz","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364819065,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"My economics degree is a BSc (I think BScs might be more common than BAs for economics in the UK) and I got an MSc right after in Industrial Economics (as British people call Industrial Organisation).  I'm on a PhD course right now, still within the field of I.O. The people from my BSc went on to do a very wide variety of things but all of the people from my masters course are still in grad school or have directly relevant jobs either in government or business (mainly consulting).  The job market for Industrial Organisation specialists is frankly fantastic nowadays. In academia, government and the private sector there's a huge demand for the skills. If somebody is good at microeconomics and interested in specialising then I'd definitely recommend it.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22024.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96a1f0","c_root_id_B":"c96es7r","created_at_utc_A":1364823269,"created_at_utc_B":1364841089,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"BA in Econ.  Work as a financial analyst for an investment newsletter company, basically a lot of stock picking, company research, and writing.","human_ref_B":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17820.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96a6rg","c_root_id_B":"c96es7r","created_at_utc_A":1364823951,"created_at_utc_B":1364841089,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I have a masters in econ but I work in IT. Ha.","human_ref_B":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17138.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c967jid","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364800795,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"Graduating in the May with Econ\/math, start at a DC think tank as a research analyst in June. Expect to do that for 2-3 years, then pursue a PhD.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":40294.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c969dhq","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364819549,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"I work in SEM advertising. Google and bing ads writing and bidding. It was a great fit because it, like the economics degree itself requires creativity and solid technical skills.  Found the job by searching for analyst jobs on monster.com","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21540.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c969dmx","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364819577,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"Recently graduated with a BSc in Econ and Financial Markets.   I'm not an entrepreneur creating data oriented collaboration software.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":21512.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969hbq","c_root_id_B":"c96es7r","created_at_utc_A":1364820226,"created_at_utc_B":1364841089,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Currently working remotely from Saigon for an American headhunting firm specializing in pharmaceuticals and biotech. Plan to join the State Dept. eventually as a Foreign Service Officer.","human_ref_B":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20863.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c969hzy","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364820339,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"I got an Econ degree with minor in comp sci. I currently work as an insurance underwriter.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":20750.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969kat","c_root_id_B":"c96es7r","created_at_utc_A":1364820715,"created_at_utc_B":1364841089,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I have a BS in econ, and I'm an economic consultant. think management consulting without the travel and with a lot more quantitative work. for me, it was a good blend between doing something that involved econ and something businessy.","human_ref_B":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":20374.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969vbu","c_root_id_B":"c96es7r","created_at_utc_A":1364822423,"created_at_utc_B":1364841089,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"I got a BSc in Econ, and am now a masters student in economics effectively simultaneously through course work finishing up a math major I started as an undergrad, and getting a comp sci minor in the process. I hope to upgrade into the PhD program at the school I'm at next fall, else go into private enterprise probably doing economic\/business consulting.","human_ref_B":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":18666.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c96aco4","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364824704,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"Business Analysis  I help business owners (usually the government) make decisions by organizing requirements and data modeling. There is a lot of face time with the clients, so good customer service skills are required.  I work in the Health Infrastructure IT field. I actually got into it through a contact at the World Bank who diverted me to this industry. Right now I'm going through the 5 years of experience needed to move into a more independent position, hopefully getting into policy advisory.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":16385.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c96as6v","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364826531,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"BS econ and political science, minor in math.  I start law school in the fall.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":14558.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96bne2","c_root_id_B":"c96es7r","created_at_utc_A":1364829700,"created_at_utc_B":1364841089,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"BA Econ with a minor in Maths. I'm currently working as a Statistical Analyst at a regulator.  I still need to take at least differential equations and a real analysis course before I seriously think about grad school. On the plus side, they'll let me do that and if I can argue that it's job related they'll pay 50%.","human_ref_B":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11389.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96es7r","c_root_id_B":"c96cfsj","created_at_utc_A":1364841089,"created_at_utc_B":1364832277,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I was a dual major in economics and political science. After spending three years teaching English in China I got my MS in education (I have  special education and  social studies teaching certificates).   I am currently unemployed because there are very few teaching jobs where I live.","human_ref_B":"BA in Econ in 2010, now doing market analysis for an energy consulting firm.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8812.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c965lr9","c_root_id_B":"c964zd5","created_at_utc_A":1364791839,"created_at_utc_B":1364789872,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I got a BS in Econ and went on to get my MS in Econ as well.  I now work as a Credit Risk Analyst.","human_ref_B":"I can comment for two of my close friends. One double majored in comp sci and does project management for a top firm after getting a masters in engineering management. The other is in a masters of accounting program with me (a sociology major).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1967.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c965lr9","c_root_id_B":"c965l1z","created_at_utc_A":1364791839,"created_at_utc_B":1364791775,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I got a BS in Econ and went on to get my MS in Econ as well.  I now work as a Credit Risk Analyst.","human_ref_B":"BA in Econ\/Math and BS in Psych  Currently getting a PhD in Marketing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":64.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c966bss","c_root_id_B":"c969bbw","created_at_utc_A":1364794527,"created_at_utc_B":1364819153,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I got a BA in Econ\/Math, will soon be studying at a Marketing PhD program.  Put in the effort and an Economics degree can pay off well.","human_ref_B":"BA\/MA\/MPhil\/ABD Economics  Senior Gov't Economist now.  Basically, what Integralds wants to be but isnt yet  * Writing the D","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24626.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c964zd5","c_root_id_B":"c969bbw","created_at_utc_A":1364789872,"created_at_utc_B":1364819153,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I can comment for two of my close friends. One double majored in comp sci and does project management for a top firm after getting a masters in engineering management. The other is in a masters of accounting program with me (a sociology major).","human_ref_B":"BA\/MA\/MPhil\/ABD Economics  Senior Gov't Economist now.  Basically, what Integralds wants to be but isnt yet  * Writing the D","labels":0,"seconds_difference":29281.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969bbw","c_root_id_B":"c965l1z","created_at_utc_A":1364819153,"created_at_utc_B":1364791775,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"BA\/MA\/MPhil\/ABD Economics  Senior Gov't Economist now.  Basically, what Integralds wants to be but isnt yet  * Writing the D","human_ref_B":"BA in Econ\/Math and BS in Psych  Currently getting a PhD in Marketing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":27378.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c9686co","c_root_id_B":"c969bbw","created_at_utc_A":1364808506,"created_at_utc_B":1364819153,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Bscsoc in Economics, now doing my teacher training year for secondary school mathematics.","human_ref_B":"BA\/MA\/MPhil\/ABD Economics  Senior Gov't Economist now.  Basically, what Integralds wants to be but isnt yet  * Writing the D","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10647.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c968hu8","c_root_id_B":"c969bbw","created_at_utc_A":1364811986,"created_at_utc_B":1364819153,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"BSc Economics, interned as a Credit Analyst in a large bank, now staying with the same bank and joining as a Graduate Analyst looking at Credit Risk from a Portfolio perspective.  Unsure about future career moves, depends on the opportunities within the bank vs public sector \"doing good\"","human_ref_B":"BA\/MA\/MPhil\/ABD Economics  Senior Gov't Economist now.  Basically, what Integralds wants to be but isnt yet  * Writing the D","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7167.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969auz","c_root_id_B":"c969bbw","created_at_utc_A":1364819065,"created_at_utc_B":1364819153,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"My economics degree is a BSc (I think BScs might be more common than BAs for economics in the UK) and I got an MSc right after in Industrial Economics (as British people call Industrial Organisation).  I'm on a PhD course right now, still within the field of I.O. The people from my BSc went on to do a very wide variety of things but all of the people from my masters course are still in grad school or have directly relevant jobs either in government or business (mainly consulting).  The job market for Industrial Organisation specialists is frankly fantastic nowadays. In academia, government and the private sector there's a huge demand for the skills. If somebody is good at microeconomics and interested in specialising then I'd definitely recommend it.","human_ref_B":"BA\/MA\/MPhil\/ABD Economics  Senior Gov't Economist now.  Basically, what Integralds wants to be but isnt yet  * Writing the D","labels":0,"seconds_difference":88.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969bbw","c_root_id_B":"c967jid","created_at_utc_A":1364819153,"created_at_utc_B":1364800795,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA\/MA\/MPhil\/ABD Economics  Senior Gov't Economist now.  Basically, what Integralds wants to be but isnt yet  * Writing the D","human_ref_B":"Graduating in the May with Econ\/math, start at a DC think tank as a research analyst in June. Expect to do that for 2-3 years, then pursue a PhD.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18358.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c966bss","c_root_id_B":"c9670ed","created_at_utc_A":1364794527,"created_at_utc_B":1364797682,"score_A":4,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I got a BA in Econ\/Math, will soon be studying at a Marketing PhD program.  Put in the effort and an Economics degree can pay off well.","human_ref_B":"I'm about to finish my BA in Economics. Afterwards I will be doing a two-year research stint at a Federal Reserve branch, after which I plan to apply to PhD programs in economics.  Most people from my university with an Economics BA are either in finance or consulting.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3155.0,"score_ratio":1.25}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c966bss","c_root_id_B":"c964zd5","created_at_utc_A":1364794527,"created_at_utc_B":1364789872,"score_A":4,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I got a BA in Econ\/Math, will soon be studying at a Marketing PhD program.  Put in the effort and an Economics degree can pay off well.","human_ref_B":"I can comment for two of my close friends. One double majored in comp sci and does project management for a top firm after getting a masters in engineering management. The other is in a masters of accounting program with me (a sociology major).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4655.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c965l1z","c_root_id_B":"c966bss","created_at_utc_A":1364791775,"created_at_utc_B":1364794527,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"BA in Econ\/Math and BS in Psych  Currently getting a PhD in Marketing.","human_ref_B":"I got a BA in Econ\/Math, will soon be studying at a Marketing PhD program.  Put in the effort and an Economics degree can pay off well.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2752.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c964zd5","c_root_id_B":"c9670ed","created_at_utc_A":1364789872,"created_at_utc_B":1364797682,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I can comment for two of my close friends. One double majored in comp sci and does project management for a top firm after getting a masters in engineering management. The other is in a masters of accounting program with me (a sociology major).","human_ref_B":"I'm about to finish my BA in Economics. Afterwards I will be doing a two-year research stint at a Federal Reserve branch, after which I plan to apply to PhD programs in economics.  Most people from my university with an Economics BA are either in finance or consulting.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7810.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c9670ed","c_root_id_B":"c965l1z","created_at_utc_A":1364797682,"created_at_utc_B":1364791775,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm about to finish my BA in Economics. Afterwards I will be doing a two-year research stint at a Federal Reserve branch, after which I plan to apply to PhD programs in economics.  Most people from my university with an Economics BA are either in finance or consulting.","human_ref_B":"BA in Econ\/Math and BS in Psych  Currently getting a PhD in Marketing.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5907.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c967jid","c_root_id_B":"c9686co","created_at_utc_A":1364800795,"created_at_utc_B":1364808506,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Graduating in the May with Econ\/math, start at a DC think tank as a research analyst in June. Expect to do that for 2-3 years, then pursue a PhD.","human_ref_B":"Bscsoc in Economics, now doing my teacher training year for secondary school mathematics.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7711.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c967jid","c_root_id_B":"c968hu8","created_at_utc_A":1364800795,"created_at_utc_B":1364811986,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Graduating in the May with Econ\/math, start at a DC think tank as a research analyst in June. Expect to do that for 2-3 years, then pursue a PhD.","human_ref_B":"BSc Economics, interned as a Credit Analyst in a large bank, now staying with the same bank and joining as a Graduate Analyst looking at Credit Risk from a Portfolio perspective.  Unsure about future career moves, depends on the opportunities within the bank vs public sector \"doing good\"","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11191.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969auz","c_root_id_B":"c967jid","created_at_utc_A":1364819065,"created_at_utc_B":1364800795,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"My economics degree is a BSc (I think BScs might be more common than BAs for economics in the UK) and I got an MSc right after in Industrial Economics (as British people call Industrial Organisation).  I'm on a PhD course right now, still within the field of I.O. The people from my BSc went on to do a very wide variety of things but all of the people from my masters course are still in grad school or have directly relevant jobs either in government or business (mainly consulting).  The job market for Industrial Organisation specialists is frankly fantastic nowadays. In academia, government and the private sector there's a huge demand for the skills. If somebody is good at microeconomics and interested in specialising then I'd definitely recommend it.","human_ref_B":"Graduating in the May with Econ\/math, start at a DC think tank as a research analyst in June. Expect to do that for 2-3 years, then pursue a PhD.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18270.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96a1f0","c_root_id_B":"c967jid","created_at_utc_A":1364823269,"created_at_utc_B":1364800795,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA in Econ.  Work as a financial analyst for an investment newsletter company, basically a lot of stock picking, company research, and writing.","human_ref_B":"Graduating in the May with Econ\/math, start at a DC think tank as a research analyst in June. Expect to do that for 2-3 years, then pursue a PhD.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22474.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96a1f0","c_root_id_B":"c969dhq","created_at_utc_A":1364823269,"created_at_utc_B":1364819549,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA in Econ.  Work as a financial analyst for an investment newsletter company, basically a lot of stock picking, company research, and writing.","human_ref_B":"I work in SEM advertising. Google and bing ads writing and bidding. It was a great fit because it, like the economics degree itself requires creativity and solid technical skills.  Found the job by searching for analyst jobs on monster.com","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3720.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969dmx","c_root_id_B":"c96a1f0","created_at_utc_A":1364819577,"created_at_utc_B":1364823269,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Recently graduated with a BSc in Econ and Financial Markets.   I'm not an entrepreneur creating data oriented collaboration software.","human_ref_B":"BA in Econ.  Work as a financial analyst for an investment newsletter company, basically a lot of stock picking, company research, and writing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3692.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969hbq","c_root_id_B":"c96a1f0","created_at_utc_A":1364820226,"created_at_utc_B":1364823269,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Currently working remotely from Saigon for an American headhunting firm specializing in pharmaceuticals and biotech. Plan to join the State Dept. eventually as a Foreign Service Officer.","human_ref_B":"BA in Econ.  Work as a financial analyst for an investment newsletter company, basically a lot of stock picking, company research, and writing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3043.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96a1f0","c_root_id_B":"c969hzy","created_at_utc_A":1364823269,"created_at_utc_B":1364820339,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA in Econ.  Work as a financial analyst for an investment newsletter company, basically a lot of stock picking, company research, and writing.","human_ref_B":"I got an Econ degree with minor in comp sci. I currently work as an insurance underwriter.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2930.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96a1f0","c_root_id_B":"c969kat","created_at_utc_A":1364823269,"created_at_utc_B":1364820715,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"BA in Econ.  Work as a financial analyst for an investment newsletter company, basically a lot of stock picking, company research, and writing.","human_ref_B":"I have a BS in econ, and I'm an economic consultant. think management consulting without the travel and with a lot more quantitative work. for me, it was a good blend between doing something that involved econ and something businessy.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2554.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969vbu","c_root_id_B":"c96a1f0","created_at_utc_A":1364822423,"created_at_utc_B":1364823269,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I got a BSc in Econ, and am now a masters student in economics effectively simultaneously through course work finishing up a math major I started as an undergrad, and getting a comp sci minor in the process. I hope to upgrade into the PhD program at the school I'm at next fall, else go into private enterprise probably doing economic\/business consulting.","human_ref_B":"BA in Econ.  Work as a financial analyst for an investment newsletter company, basically a lot of stock picking, company research, and writing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":846.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c967jid","c_root_id_B":"c96a6rg","created_at_utc_A":1364800795,"created_at_utc_B":1364823951,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Graduating in the May with Econ\/math, start at a DC think tank as a research analyst in June. Expect to do that for 2-3 years, then pursue a PhD.","human_ref_B":"I have a masters in econ but I work in IT. Ha.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23156.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969dhq","c_root_id_B":"c96a6rg","created_at_utc_A":1364819549,"created_at_utc_B":1364823951,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I work in SEM advertising. Google and bing ads writing and bidding. It was a great fit because it, like the economics degree itself requires creativity and solid technical skills.  Found the job by searching for analyst jobs on monster.com","human_ref_B":"I have a masters in econ but I work in IT. Ha.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4402.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96a6rg","c_root_id_B":"c969dmx","created_at_utc_A":1364823951,"created_at_utc_B":1364819577,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I have a masters in econ but I work in IT. Ha.","human_ref_B":"Recently graduated with a BSc in Econ and Financial Markets.   I'm not an entrepreneur creating data oriented collaboration software.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4374.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969hbq","c_root_id_B":"c96a6rg","created_at_utc_A":1364820226,"created_at_utc_B":1364823951,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Currently working remotely from Saigon for an American headhunting firm specializing in pharmaceuticals and biotech. Plan to join the State Dept. eventually as a Foreign Service Officer.","human_ref_B":"I have a masters in econ but I work in IT. Ha.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3725.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969hzy","c_root_id_B":"c96a6rg","created_at_utc_A":1364820339,"created_at_utc_B":1364823951,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I got an Econ degree with minor in comp sci. I currently work as an insurance underwriter.","human_ref_B":"I have a masters in econ but I work in IT. Ha.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3612.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c969kat","c_root_id_B":"c96a6rg","created_at_utc_A":1364820715,"created_at_utc_B":1364823951,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I have a BS in econ, and I'm an economic consultant. think management consulting without the travel and with a lot more quantitative work. for me, it was a good blend between doing something that involved econ and something businessy.","human_ref_B":"I have a masters in econ but I work in IT. Ha.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3236.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1beam7","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Redditors with a BA in Economics, what do you do? Hi all, just wanting to strike up a discussion on post-school options for those who are exploring a BA in Economics.","c_root_id_A":"c96a6rg","c_root_id_B":"c969vbu","created_at_utc_A":1364823951,"created_at_utc_B":1364822423,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I have a masters in econ but I work in IT. Ha.","human_ref_B":"I got a BSc in Econ, and am now a masters student in economics effectively simultaneously through course work finishing up a math major I started as an undergrad, and getting a comp sci minor in the process. I hope to upgrade into the PhD program at the school I'm at next fall, else go into private enterprise probably doing economic\/business consulting.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1528.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2gf7lc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"What are some modern day example of Samuel Huntington's \"Clash of Civilizations\" theory? Was introduced to Huntington's theory in my political science class last week and we got into talking about how the world has changed since then. We weren't able to delve to deep into the discussion, but I have been racking my brain around it this weekend and came up with two possible examples. One would be the Islamic State, since it is composed of Sunni Muslims looking to establish a place in the world for themselves, and they are combating any who look to oppose them.  The other, that I am not so confident about, would be the Israel\/Palestine conflict, specifically what has gone on lately with the Palestinians fighting to stay in their home of Gaza and having no place to turn. I was wondering what r\/AskSocialScience's opinion was on the matter, and if there were any other conflicts in the past 20 years that would be other prime examples.","c_root_id_A":"ckikdf6","c_root_id_B":"ckimop1","created_at_utc_A":1410749095,"created_at_utc_B":1410754313,"score_A":3,"score_B":28,"human_ref_A":"The IS example can actually serve as something of a counter-example to Huntington's thesis. One of the big criticisms levied against him is that he bases his taxonomy of civilizations on religion, which is a much too simplistic view for describing the conflicts today. If you've been keeping up, you should see that IS's primary goal is to promote their vision of Islam, and their violent actions have been targeted primarily at other Muslims (recent beheadings of journalists aside). As such, IS is much more an example of strife within the \"Muslim world\" (if you can say such a thing exists), rather than conflict between the Muslim world and other civilizations.       If I had to play devil's advocate and find evidence in support of Huntington, I would point to the conflict between Russia, Ukraine, and the West. This could be described as a case of two \"civilizations\" clashing, as the EU and Russia each tried to draw Ukraine into its sphere of influence, resulting in the proxy conflict we see today. Of course, this is still a pretty muddy case, as the bulk of this violent conflict is largely playing out within the Orthodox civilization. This further highlights the problem I mentioned above: Huntington's thesis is too clean-cut, whereas the actual nature of modern conflicts is messy.  Edit in response to request for sources: While both of the conflicts I'm discussing are a bit too recent for any real academic sources in this context, I suppose I can provide some quick and dirty resources for general problems with Huntington's thesis.  Huntington's use of overly broad generalizations attacked by Ed Said: http:\/\/www.thenation.com\/article\/clash-ignorance?page=0,2  Adding some context to Huntington's assertions about the Muslim world: http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2011\/03\/04\/opinion\/04brooks.html?_r=0  One of many empirical tests of Huntington's thesis, which finds no supporting data for the theory: http:\/\/www.hks.harvard.edu\/fs\/pnorris\/Acrobat\/Chiozza_Clash.pdf  Huntington's response to criticisms: http:\/\/www.foreignaffairs.com\/articles\/49414\/samuel-p-huntington\/if-not-civilizations-what-samuel-huntington-responds-to-his-crit","human_ref_B":"No discussion of Clash of Civilizations is complete without a discussion of The Clash of Ignorance. Huntington's definition of what comprises a civilization is blunt, static, and arbitrary; and completely ignores commonality of interest of different groups across the competing 'civilizations'. I strongly recommend you to read and watch the debate between Samuel Huntington and Edward Said on the matter.  Some questions for you to consider:  - Re: your Palestine question, what is different now from 20 years ago?  - Re: your IS question - how is it different from Mujahideen and Taliban from back then? If you can stomach it for a few minutes, look up IS accounts on Twitter (these are kids raised in the West). How do you characterize this?  - Can you identify some great cultural splits with what he calls Western Civilizations (even just within America), within what he calls Orthodox civilizations (hint: Ukraine), and major splits between what he calls Islamic civilization.  - The only thing different now I guess is that all the countries in what Huntington calls the Islamic civilization has a common enemy in IS. This hasn't happened really happened before.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5218.0,"score_ratio":9.3333333333}
{"post_id":"3oe6n8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Why is everything so polorized in American politics? I'm aware of other parties. But it seems like everything is super polarized. Pretty much all democrats believe in all democratic ideas, most conservatives believe in most conservative ideas.  It's very rare that you will find a democrat that is anti-gay, or a republican that's anti-gun. Why is that?","c_root_id_A":"cvwgc1d","c_root_id_B":"cvws5zn","created_at_utc_A":1444613326,"created_at_utc_B":1444644889,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Are you asking about normal people or about politicians? That is, when you say \"it's very rare that you will find a democrat that is anti-gay, or a republican that's anti-gun,\" do you mean it's rare to find a normal person who is a democrat and anti-gay, or it's rare to find a politician who is democrat and anti-gay?","human_ref_B":"You may be interested in this Times article by Steven Pinker looking at the question of why social and political beliefs tend to cluster. To quote his introduction: \"Why, if you know a person\u2019s position on gay marriage, can you predict that he or she will want to increase the military budget and decrease the tax rate...?\"  In short the hypothesis is that there are two competing cohesive views of human nature that one can adopt, call them the Tragic Vision and the Utopian Vision. The extent to which each is at work in a given person determines whether they skew conservative or liberal respectively across a wide variety of social issues.  Some, including Pinker, believe that genetic factors influence how strongly each of these two modes of thinking is expressed in any given individual. Predictably this is hotly debated.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":31563.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"3lp8a5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"Social sciences formulas explained - or recommendations on what to read to understand them I have been reading \"Capitalism and social democracy\" by Adam Przeworski and have stumbled upon some formulas I have a bit of trouble understanding. I'd like to ask for advice on how to get what the author means or, alternatively, good recommendations on good introductory texts to the use of this sort of mathematics in the social sciences. I can read and understand statistics pretty well in most cases (mainly political sciences, public health, but this goes a bit over my head).  Here are the fragments I was having a bit of trouble with: http:\/\/i.imgur.com\/YR4jiH2.jpg   http:\/\/i.imgur.com\/7d0iAJV.jpg  I understand that the interest of the party is to recruit working class votes from the pool of working class people who did not vote for them in the last election: X(t+1)-W(t), and their efficiency in recruiting them would be p[X(t+1)-W(t)].  If the proportion of middle-class people who votes for the party is N, and as soon as the party starts getting their support this undermines working class support, the author says you end up with: ^W=p[X(t+1)-W(t)]-dN(t).  I don't understand what is the \"d\" representing? The \"difference\" between previous middle class support and the current one (and so, the \"change\" you would have in working class support from adding that middle class support, even if you're getting more support from working class voters, the fact that you're also getting middle class supporters \"slows down\" your gains in the working class electorate?).  And then we get to the footnotes and that is gibberish for me:  http:\/\/i.imgur.com\/0Q6eHUc.jpg What does the extended formula at footnote 3 mean? And what does exactly W* represent and how do you get it? How do you \"solve\" for W(t)=W*? What would the explanation of the model be?  Thanks a lot for the explanation and again, if this sounds like very amateur questions, feel free to point me in the direction of any good textbooks or tutorials on this topic. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cv88qln","c_root_id_B":"cv8aenf","created_at_utc_A":1442780483,"created_at_utc_B":1442782991,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Edit: I'm going to say read \/u\/mynchnm 's reply.","human_ref_B":"The authors postulate that there is a linear relationship between the proportion of middle class allies N(t) and the recruitment rate among working class voters \u0394W(t). The coefficient for this linear relationship is -d. So if d = 0.3, then for every 1% of the population that the party targets who are middle class allies, they lose 0.3% of the population in potential working-class recruits per time period.  The main thing here is to learn to read equations as if they were any other language. The equation itself plainly states what d is, even if the author didn't explain it in the prose.   The 3rd footnote is addressing a potential complaint that the model in equation (2) is too simplistic. We can ignore the middle part and just focus on \u0394W(t) = p[X(t+1) - W(t)] - dN(t)X(t+1). Notice that this is almost the same as equation (2), they just multiplied the \"middle class ally\" penalty (which was previously -dN(t)) by a factor of X(t+1). The complaint that this addresses is that the middle-class-ally penalty really ought to be proportional to the number of actual working class peoples. That is, if only 1% of the population is working class, then it really should not be the case that recruiting middle class allies costs the party 3% of the population in potential working class votes.  W* is the \"stationary point\" of W(t). This is a concept from calculus. In other words, W(t) is initially growing as a function of t, but at some point it reaches its optimum and stops growing. W* is the optimal value attained by W(t).  The technique they use to find W* is called \"solving for critical points\". To find the optimal value attained by W(t) we look for the time when W stops growing: in other words, the value of t when \u0394W(t) = 0.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2508.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"wjs5k","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Has anyone ever tried to tie economics directly to energy exchange? I'm not exactly well read in the field of economics, but I've developed a bit of an interest over the last couple of years. Has anyone ever made an attempt to tie the study of economics to the exchange of energy\/matter in a scientific way? (In other words tying the real value of goods to the energy and materials required to produce them, tying services to the food and other requirements of the workers to produce them, etc.) This would, of course, tie economics into the laws of conservation of matter and energy with currency acting as an exchangeable placeholder for matter\/energy.  If anyone has insight to give, please take to mind that I'm only a novice at best in matters of economics. Further suggestions for reading would be appreciated.","c_root_id_A":"c5e1jke","c_root_id_B":"c5dxwy5","created_at_utc_A":1342297391,"created_at_utc_B":1342278964,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"There are flaws in your thinking although it sounds attractive initially. Ultimately the human economy serves mans ends, man's ends do not directly translate to the immediate physical reality and it's qualities.   Think of it this way, our ideas of property are associated with our (wrong) perspective that the things around us are solid, which we know scientifically to be inaccurate, the result of evolutionary adaptation to our apparent environment which is neither very very small nor very very large. So I sit in your sand pit which is your property, when I get up and leave I take particles\/atoms of sand with me on my butt, did I steal your property? Was it diminished? You see now that these questions are not as cut and dried as \"scientific fact\" 'needs' to be.    Another mistake\/difficulty is that value is not cardinal but ordinal, which is to say that you can't translate value between people. IE people can tell you of ice-cream, licorice and soda that they prefer ice-cream but they can't tell you that they prefer ice-cream 288 units\/270% more than your second choice licorice which is itself 120 units\/150% more than your third choice, so if we can't do that with a single person, imagine comparing different peoples choices. etc. etc.","human_ref_B":"I think you'll find Georges Bataille's \"The Accursed Share\" to be pretty interesting. He basically approaches the study of economics \/ society from an understanding of the way energy is used in the universe.  Mind you, he's pretty far out there but he makes for some damned interesting reading.   http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/The_Accursed_Share","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18427.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1kb1te","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"How will the building and completion of Elon Musk's Hyperloop affect real estate prices in the Bay Area and LA?","c_root_id_A":"cbn71vd","c_root_id_B":"cbn8e9d","created_at_utc_A":1376438122,"created_at_utc_B":1376442246,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"They'll both go up as a additional service\/feature is being provided to the residents which is seen as a positive to living in SF\/LA. Taxes may also go up in order to pay for it but yeah I believe they would go up.","human_ref_B":">How will the building....  There are no plans for it to be built so that is a rather bold assumption.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4124.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1wyh9l","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Does the tax revenue from cigarette and other tobacco taxes offset their cost in health care and other expenses?","c_root_id_A":"cf6mooe","c_root_id_B":"cf6mmm6","created_at_utc_A":1391498155,"created_at_utc_B":1391497912,"score_A":24,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"I digged up a reply I made a year ago, and tweaked it a bit:   This article quotes a Vanderbilt University, a University of Chicago, and even a Dutch study. Long story short, smokers are **fiscally neutral** for a country, because smokers die earlier but not too early (on average, they already are on pension), causing many years of pension costs can be saved, while they did contribute to the system while working, and paid tobacco taxes while smoking. This neutralizes the higher medical costs associated with treatment of smoking-related diseases, especially if you add the tax revenue from tobacco taxes, and you take into account that a tobacco addict can have a completely productive career, contrary to for example heavy alcohol addicts. (Try working after drinking 10 beers in a row, versus working after smoking 10 cigarettes in a row.)  So from a public budget point of view, the effect would be neutral. Average life expectancy would go up if your population successfully kicks its nicotine addiction , but that doesn't necessarily mean that you can't get chronically ill 10 years later from other sources (pollution, unhealthy diet, lack of exercise, what have you).","human_ref_B":"From the article http:\/\/theincidentaleconomist.com\/wordpress\/the-cost-of-smoking-iv-external-costs\/  >In sum, our results show that while smokers could be expected to pay around $0.76\/pack in excise taxes, the costs their smoking imposes on society is higher. This yields our net external cost estimate of around $1.50\/pack.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":243.0,"score_ratio":2.4}
{"post_id":"rq4z5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Why has GDP advanced beyond pre-recession levels, while tax receipts have not? GDP has surpassed pre-recession levels, yet tax revenue has not as seen here..  What are the possible explanations for this?  Could this simply be from payroll tax cuts?  I thought theoretically those were supposed to increase the amount of tax collections over time (Laffer curve?).  Or is this an example of ever increasing tax loopholes, capital flight, and evasion?","c_root_id_A":"c47zebu","c_root_id_B":"c489d1f","created_at_utc_A":1333464512,"created_at_utc_B":1333512092,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"When a company or investor loses money one year (since they pay taxes on profit, or revenue minus cost), they are able to roll losses over into the next year (or several years? I'm not sure on the fine points.). This means that a large negative shock will result in lower taxes for several years. There have also been some changes in tax law, but my guess is the first factor outweighs the second.","human_ref_B":"Another important chunk of it: the lion's share of federal tax receipts come from income tax (47.4% of total revenue from income vs 7.9% from corporation, and 6.1% from 'other', including capital gains [source: http:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/sites\/default\/files\/omb\/budget\/fy2013\/assets\/hist02z3.xls]), and the recovery has been incredibly lopsided in composition.  Corporate profits have returned to, and have exceeded pre-recession levels [source: http:\/\/research.stlouisfed.org\/fred2\/series\/CP\/]. Corporate profits contribute around 1\/10th of GDP, but because of their low effective tax rates, not a whole lot goes to federal revenue.   Going back to income tax, the vast, vast majority of growth for individuals coming out of this recession has gone towards (don't crucify me!) the top percentiles of income earners. In 2010, income gains to 1%ers grew by 11.6%, while 99%ers grew by 0.2% [source: http:\/\/elsa.berkeley.edu\/~saez\/saez-UStopincomes-2010.pdf]. Consider what an 11% gain looks like to someone in the 1% - a pretty large addition of wealth. The vast majority of income gains for 1%ers come from capital gains, which are taxed at about half that of a 1%er's income. Combine this with continued unemployment in the middle class, and you get a pretty abysmal increase in tax revenue, compared to a substantial jump in over-all growth.  I'm just an econ undergrad, and there could be flaws in my reasoning, but this is what I suspect is another issue on top of the ones discussed already.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":47580.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"rq4z5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Why has GDP advanced beyond pre-recession levels, while tax receipts have not? GDP has surpassed pre-recession levels, yet tax revenue has not as seen here..  What are the possible explanations for this?  Could this simply be from payroll tax cuts?  I thought theoretically those were supposed to increase the amount of tax collections over time (Laffer curve?).  Or is this an example of ever increasing tax loopholes, capital flight, and evasion?","c_root_id_A":"c489d1f","c_root_id_B":"c4875xh","created_at_utc_A":1333512092,"created_at_utc_B":1333500998,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Another important chunk of it: the lion's share of federal tax receipts come from income tax (47.4% of total revenue from income vs 7.9% from corporation, and 6.1% from 'other', including capital gains [source: http:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/sites\/default\/files\/omb\/budget\/fy2013\/assets\/hist02z3.xls]), and the recovery has been incredibly lopsided in composition.  Corporate profits have returned to, and have exceeded pre-recession levels [source: http:\/\/research.stlouisfed.org\/fred2\/series\/CP\/]. Corporate profits contribute around 1\/10th of GDP, but because of their low effective tax rates, not a whole lot goes to federal revenue.   Going back to income tax, the vast, vast majority of growth for individuals coming out of this recession has gone towards (don't crucify me!) the top percentiles of income earners. In 2010, income gains to 1%ers grew by 11.6%, while 99%ers grew by 0.2% [source: http:\/\/elsa.berkeley.edu\/~saez\/saez-UStopincomes-2010.pdf]. Consider what an 11% gain looks like to someone in the 1% - a pretty large addition of wealth. The vast majority of income gains for 1%ers come from capital gains, which are taxed at about half that of a 1%er's income. Combine this with continued unemployment in the middle class, and you get a pretty abysmal increase in tax revenue, compared to a substantial jump in over-all growth.  I'm just an econ undergrad, and there could be flaws in my reasoning, but this is what I suspect is another issue on top of the ones discussed already.","human_ref_B":"Two reasons. I don't know of empirical evidence that evaluates the relative importance of both, though it would really be nice to know which is more important...  First tax cuts:  >I thought theoretically those were supposed to increase the amount of tax collections over time (Laffer curve?).  You thought wrong, and I'm sad to say you probably thought wrong because of Republicans rather than economists. The Laffer curve only says that lower tax rates will increase revenue when tax rates are sufficiently high to begin with. Most of the research on responses to the tax cuts suggests that this is far from the case for recent tax cuts. A NYT article by Christina Romer (who knows her stuff) that's based on the same research as the survey paper I linked to can be found here.  Second, carry-forwards:  Corporations are taxed on their profits (revenues less wage cost, capital deduction expenses, interest payments on debt,etc). Corporations who sustain losses in a given year do not pay tax. Corporations who sustain losses can also carry those losses forward to offset profits up to seven years in advance for tax purposes. This system is in place so that corporations who take losses in some years and are in danger of failing don't lose subsequent profits to taxation (so that they still end up bankrupt). So it ends up affecting revenues after a recession, because corporations that are finally making money are carrying forward previous losses to reduce their tax liability. This law is the same law, incidentally, that's gotten people all upset about corporations making accounting profits and then not paying tax in the last couple years (it's hardly the \"secretive loophole\" that journalists claim it is).  Edit: It's occurred to me that immediate expense deductions for firms buying capital, which became law in 2010 as a stimulus measure, could also act to reduce corporations' tax liability. This provision of the tax code basically allows firms to claim capital input costs right way instead of gradually over time. So this could be involved in decreases in remittances from corporations as well.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11094.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1nwlu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Do gas prices have more to do with speculation or refining capacity. I often hear cases made for both but never know which is the truth. Im sure both play a role but to what extent? It seems to me if refineries were where everything bottle necks this would control the supply side of speculation. Is that right?","c_root_id_A":"ccmrpou","c_root_id_B":"ccmrtxg","created_at_utc_A":1381157867,"created_at_utc_B":1381158241,"score_A":7,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"Gas prices are determined by supply and demand, as are most prices. In general, that should be your default assumption - you should only switch your expectations to bubbles or manipulation in the face of evidence.","human_ref_B":"oil prices, like most prices, are affected by both supply and demand. decompositions of the relative importance of demand and supply shocks suggest that the 90's were a time of cheap oil due to positive supply shocks, while the 2000s were a time of high prices due to positive demand shocks (http:\/\/libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org\/2013\/03\/a-new-approach-for-identifying-demand-and-supply-shocks-in-the-oil-market.html). speculation appears to contribute significantly to volatility in oil prices (http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0140988309001480).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":374.0,"score_ratio":2.2857142857}
{"post_id":"1nwlu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Do gas prices have more to do with speculation or refining capacity. I often hear cases made for both but never know which is the truth. Im sure both play a role but to what extent? It seems to me if refineries were where everything bottle necks this would control the supply side of speculation. Is that right?","c_root_id_A":"ccmrtxg","c_root_id_B":"ccmrfco","created_at_utc_A":1381158241,"created_at_utc_B":1381156935,"score_A":16,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"oil prices, like most prices, are affected by both supply and demand. decompositions of the relative importance of demand and supply shocks suggest that the 90's were a time of cheap oil due to positive supply shocks, while the 2000s were a time of high prices due to positive demand shocks (http:\/\/libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org\/2013\/03\/a-new-approach-for-identifying-demand-and-supply-shocks-in-the-oil-market.html). speculation appears to contribute significantly to volatility in oil prices (http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0140988309001480).","human_ref_B":"When we are on the subject of gas prices I was always interested in what is a \"real\" price of gas? For example gas is much cheaper in US than in Europe, so is it artificially cheap in US or artificially expensive in Europe?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1306.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1nwlu4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Do gas prices have more to do with speculation or refining capacity. I often hear cases made for both but never know which is the truth. Im sure both play a role but to what extent? It seems to me if refineries were where everything bottle necks this would control the supply side of speculation. Is that right?","c_root_id_A":"ccmrfco","c_root_id_B":"ccmrpou","created_at_utc_A":1381156935,"created_at_utc_B":1381157867,"score_A":6,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"When we are on the subject of gas prices I was always interested in what is a \"real\" price of gas? For example gas is much cheaper in US than in Europe, so is it artificially cheap in US or artificially expensive in Europe?","human_ref_B":"Gas prices are determined by supply and demand, as are most prices. In general, that should be your default assumption - you should only switch your expectations to bubbles or manipulation in the face of evidence.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":932.0,"score_ratio":1.1666666667}
{"post_id":"52mark","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How has Marxism influenced the study of International Organizations?","c_root_id_A":"d7liiy0","c_root_id_B":"d7lk2bs","created_at_utc_A":1473799618,"created_at_utc_B":1473801566,"score_A":5,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Don't have time for a full-fat answer here, but if you look into Hardt & Negri's work, you'll find an attempt to make Marxist theory work in a Postmodern paradigm.   Fredric Jameson's Postmodernism, or The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism is a more Marxian bent, also verging into Postmodernism.   Another text I tend to refer people to is George Crane's reader:The Theoretical Evolution of International Political Economy.","human_ref_B":"Primarily, you see Marxian thought influencing the study of the international organizations underpinning the Washington consensus\/post-Breton Woods international economic order. For a brief blog posting that does a fair job (and that touches on other theories of IR, too) see: https:\/\/thepoliticalp.wordpress.com\/2014\/01\/14\/how-realism-liberalism-and-marxism-relate-to-the-international-political-economy\/   but largely I would recommend the book by Robert Gilpin, Global Political Economy, that is cited in that section, as well as point to other neo-Gramscian works as the key entry point.  Further, you see quasi-Marxian\/class-based critiques particularly of notions of 'global civil society' and international organizations, such as applying E.E. Schattschneider's critique that \"the flaw in the pluralist heaven is that the heavenly chorus sings with a strong upper-class accent\" to both intergovernmental and transnational associations.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1948.0,"score_ratio":2.2}
{"post_id":"2lyi19","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"Where can I find the inflation rates for the next 3 or 4 years for Europe? A source would help too","c_root_id_A":"clzpfo3","c_root_id_B":"clzcyi0","created_at_utc_A":1415738678,"created_at_utc_B":1415713619,"score_A":11,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"As you may be realizing, you can't really find inflation rates for the future. You can find predictors of them, as that's usually what is calculated for interest rates. A nominal interest rate is a function of the real interest rate and expected inflation. You can find a bit more info here: http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Fisher_equation","human_ref_B":"[Here you are.]( http:\/\/www.ecb.europa.eu\/stats\/prices\/indic\/forecast\/html\/table_hist_hicp.en.html)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25059.0,"score_ratio":1.1}
{"post_id":"x3y5v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Where can I find economic stats? I am looking for a website that shows world economic statistics such as discount rate and other interesting indicators.","c_root_id_A":"c5izkh5","c_root_id_B":"c5iz1c2","created_at_utc_A":1343189010,"created_at_utc_B":1343186908,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/data.worldbank.org\/indicator","human_ref_B":"economagic","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2102.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"x3y5v","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"Where can I find economic stats? I am looking for a website that shows world economic statistics such as discount rate and other interesting indicators.","c_root_id_A":"c5izcvx","c_root_id_B":"c5izkh5","created_at_utc_A":1343188164,"created_at_utc_B":1343189010,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The IMF compiles what they call the \"World Economic Outlook.\"   http:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/weo\/2012\/01\/index.htm  I found it pretty interesting","human_ref_B":"http:\/\/data.worldbank.org\/indicator","labels":0,"seconds_difference":846.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"i3wf05","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"what happens if the census is totally wrong? Suppose the census bureau gets done counting up all the returns they receive and the number is clearly totally wrong. As an example, suppose they count 200 million people in the US, so 100 million fewer than there were 10 years ago. What options do they have? Can they provide an educated guess \/ statistical estimate instead of the number directly counted? Can they ask to re-do all or part of the census?","c_root_id_A":"g0evnku","c_root_id_B":"g0f4e3s","created_at_utc_A":1596602600,"created_at_utc_B":1596609995,"score_A":21,"score_B":53,"human_ref_A":"I suggest also asking this on \/r\/legaladviceofftopic because this feels a lot more like a question of law than a question of science, especially when it comes to re-doing the census; that won't be decided by scientists, it will be decided by the US government.  The same applies to providing estimates\/guesses for a lot of the legal consequences of the census like adjusting voting districts.  EDIT: I asked the question there","human_ref_B":"Spoiler alert: it already is.   This is my field, so I hope the mods leave the thread up, but I'll understand if they delete it.    The long answer to the question is that the Census has long used statistical methods, particularly relying on other sources of information, in its process.  As early as the 19th century, the Census incorporated state\/county data on who \"should\" be counted or would ask a neighbor if a particular person was not home when the Census taker arrived. According to the Census Bureau itself:  > In 1980, approximately 761,000 persons were added to the final count through imputation (U.S. Census Bureau 2001d). After the 1980 Census, the State of Indiana unsuccessfully sued the Census Bureau as the use of count imputation shifted a seat from Indiana to Florida (Orr v. Baldrige 1985).   (Cantwell, Hogan, and Styles 2005)  By the 2000 Census, the Bureau was using methods in impute the \"likely\" household size and racial composition based on community characteristics for non-responsive households where the Post Office or state agencies claimed there were active residents.  This included cross-validation of datasets (e.g. if the Census form indicated 10 people lived at a residence, but state records indicated it was a summer home not occupied year-round, the Census could adjust those reports). The Supreme Court approved the use of statistical methods to account for non-response in *Utah v Evans* (2002), which effectively transferred a Congressional district from Utah to North Carolina based on the 2000 Census.  This year, the Census had long planned on expanding the use of these computational methods, in no small part out of a pre-existing fear of a repeat of 2010, when (due to the financial crash), the budget had been extensively cut--the Census had actually suggested moving to an \"American Community Survey (ACS)-Only\" census, but President Obama pushed for a full count and put the funds in the Recovery Act. The American Community Survey is the replacement for the old Long Form of the Census (the one that has things like how many toilets are in your house and where everyone in the household works; there is no current \"Long Form\" of the Census).  Keller (2015) evaluates the 2010 imputation formula, and looks at potential improvements for 2020, particularly in dealing with the perpetual problems of overcounting college students\/people with multiple homes and undercounting immigrants, especially undocumented ones. The Census' own plan (2020 Census Operation Plan) adopts use of Keller's recommendation to link Administrative Records (ARs) from state and federal sources to missing Census data, as well as surveys the statistical methods to impute information for non-responsive households. While COVID has put some of the more experimental segments on hold, most of that data was collected before 2020, and even the early parts of the Census itself started well before April (e.g. \"group quarters\" counts were conducted in February, before lock downs started).  So, the answer is that there isn't going to be underreporting on that scale because (worst case scenario), the Census will fill in the missing data themselves if necessary. There are pretty well-established methods of doing it, and it's why raw census form data often isn't a perfect match to the reported data in the first place. Finally, the Courts, for their part, have acknowledged the limitations of Census data (see *Evenwell v Abbott*) but nevertheless continue to use it--however imputed--as the basis for their apportionment\/redistricting decisions post-*Baker v Carr* (and even more post-*Reynolds v Sims*).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7395.0,"score_ratio":2.5238095238}
{"post_id":"1q29lk","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What predictions can the social sciences make with high certainty? Apologies if the question is overly broad. I know many people criticize the social sciences for being too \"soft\" or \"fuzzy\". Where it that entirely not the case?","c_root_id_A":"cd8lqvc","c_root_id_B":"cd8l127","created_at_utc_A":1383796826,"created_at_utc_B":1383794748,"score_A":19,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"An increase in price will decrease quantity demanded.","human_ref_B":"I come at this from a political science perspective, but I think the reason that the social sciences generally fall victim to this criticism is because they are, for the most part focussing on modelling extremely complex, multi variable interactions between people with different cultures, religions, upbringings, in different time periods, in different locations, and so forth.  An additional problem is the ambiguity of concepts that social scientists generally have to model. So, for example, what is democracy as a concept? How do we design models to test the concept? What observations do we define as indicative of democracy?  Even if we can establish a basic research design to test these concepts, how do we link democracy to other societal outcomes? Essentially, what can one semi-ambiguous term, tell us about another often ambiguous idea? For example, how does democracy affect happiness in a society?   And even when social scientists come up with fantastic studies that tell us a lot about democracy, other experts within the field might come along with a different definition of democracy, and different indicators and even disagree with the findings of other experts, based on their own understanding of the concept. To an outsider, this can make the whole discipline seem kind of soft \/ fuzzy.   Another issue with the social sciences, is that there is a strong scientific, or positivist influence which often encourages academics (if they want to be succesful and get tenure) in the field to conduct experiments, or develop research questions that are generalizable to a larger population. The problem with such an approach in the social sciences, is that many problems are often vary nuanced, and there are very few (if any) universal rules in the social sciences.  Things are constantly changing, which is less true in the natural sciences, where theories are generally extremely accurate and are not subjective in the same way that human interaction in the social sciences are. The resulting pressure of trying to make your models as broad in scope as you can, generally means that you are forced to test a few variables across a huge number of cases, rather than focussing your attention on one or two case studies. In a sense then, you are forced to sacrifice nuanced and causal understandings of smaller issues, for a general probabilistic understanding of a situation.   With that said, when social scientists do approach a case study that is relatively small, with a specific case study in mind, they do have the methodological tools to make highly accurate predictions.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2078.0,"score_ratio":1.1176470588}
{"post_id":"zf0lp","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"How Much Gold would we need to go back on the Gold standard. I am looking for a number more than advice on why it is a good or bad idea. My question is about feasiblity not desirablity.","c_root_id_A":"c6458ox","c_root_id_B":"c646rwy","created_at_utc_A":1346904562,"created_at_utc_B":1346911907,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"There are four and a half tons of gold in Fort Knox. This is about eleven million dollars.  The federal reserve owns $11 billion in gold certificates.   The US Economy is about $15trillion.  A fair amount of our economy is debt, and the point of a gold standard would be to curb inflation. I don't know a precise answer to your question, but hope this is helpful!","human_ref_B":"As of December 31, 2011. There was $1.1 trillion dollars (source) in circulation.   The current price of gold is $1,698.00 per oz. Gold is usually measured in Troy ounces, and there are 32,150.7466 troy ounces per tonne of gold putting the price of a tonne of gold at $54,591,967.73.   If there are 1.1 trillion dollars of currency on the market and the price of gold is $54,591,967.73 per ton.   Total value of currency divided by price of one tonne of gold = 20,149.48 tonnes.   Total gold world reserves (held by nations) 34,913.7  We would need to use 57.71% of gold reserves held by the worlds nations just to get the US back onto the gold standard.  Another way to look at it:  In 2008, world production of gold was 2,260 tonnes. At that rate it would take almost all the gold production of the next 9 years to supply the US with the needed gold.   Also, as of 2009, 165,000 tonnes of gold have ever been mined. So for the US to get back on the gold standard we would need to put in reserve apx 8.19% of all the gold ever mined.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7345.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"k4wgj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"Are corporate taxes passed down to the consumer\/employee? I've heard this multiple times as an argument in favor of zero or low corporate taxation. Is this true? Why\/why not?","c_root_id_A":"c2hkv05","c_root_id_B":"c2hjzph","created_at_utc_A":1315205676,"created_at_utc_B":1315196309,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It depends on the elasticity of the labor curves. The most elastic curves (whether it's demand or supply) will always avert the tax raise on the inelastic one, and this effect becomes stronger as it become more elastic. The logic for a subsidy is derivable.  This rule works for any kind of market, so if you subsidize pork, you can only predict the result by interpretation of the demand and supply for pork.  edit: an easy example of an inelastic demand are cigarettes or some new vaccin. So if you would raise a 1 $ tax, whether on the shop or on the customer you will always end up with the costumer paying a larger share of the extra dollar as he is more inelastic.","human_ref_B":"Corporate profits can be used for one of two things. First they can be invested in capital and growth in the expectation of greater future profits. Keep in mind this can include investments in human capital such as hiring more employees or increasing wages and benefits. Otherwise, the profits can be distributed to shareholders. This can be done directly through dividends or indirectly through the inclusion of the value of retained earnings in the stock price. So, in theory, the answer to your question is yes. Corporate income taxes would otherwise make their way to individuals. The more important question to consider is who those individuals are. In an interesting article (That I found on reddit earlier today) in the New York Time by Robert Reich has an infographic showing the growth in productivity relative to the growth in average hourly wages and compensation. Since the early 80s productivity has grown 80% while wages have grown only 8%. Higher productivity means lower cost and higher profit. Moreover, the distribution of corporate equity ownership is this country is highly skewed toward the very wealthy. The median value of stock holdings among the top 10% income earners in 75 thousand dollars. For the next lowest 10% it is only 15 thousand (2007 Survey of Consumer Finances). Large corporations are more profitable than ever before they those profits remain among a select few. Since the incidence of this tax falls primarily on the wealthy it is preferable to an overall increase in taxes. However, it may be more beneficial to reduce the corporate income tax rate and greatly increase the marginal income tax for high tax brackets and increase capital gains taxes.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9367.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"k4wgj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"Are corporate taxes passed down to the consumer\/employee? I've heard this multiple times as an argument in favor of zero or low corporate taxation. Is this true? Why\/why not?","c_root_id_A":"c2hkv05","c_root_id_B":"c2hkt6v","created_at_utc_A":1315205676,"created_at_utc_B":1315205048,"score_A":7,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It depends on the elasticity of the labor curves. The most elastic curves (whether it's demand or supply) will always avert the tax raise on the inelastic one, and this effect becomes stronger as it become more elastic. The logic for a subsidy is derivable.  This rule works for any kind of market, so if you subsidize pork, you can only predict the result by interpretation of the demand and supply for pork.  edit: an easy example of an inelastic demand are cigarettes or some new vaccin. So if you would raise a 1 $ tax, whether on the shop or on the customer you will always end up with the costumer paying a larger share of the extra dollar as he is more inelastic.","human_ref_B":"Corporate taxes tend to be a bad idea because they can disincentivize corporations from investing in (human or physical) capital, which is important for economic growth. Whether corporate taxes can be passed down to the consumer or employee depends on the price elasticity of demand and the labor supply elasticity of employees in that sector. Relative elasticity on the corporation's part allows the tax burden to be shifted onto others (see the wiki on tax incidence to get the intuition). But the incidence stuff is different from why corporate taxes are a bad idea, as I see it. Capital accumulation is important.  Edit: I know little about public economics and taxation so someone please correct me if I'm wrong.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":628.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"k4wgj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"Are corporate taxes passed down to the consumer\/employee? I've heard this multiple times as an argument in favor of zero or low corporate taxation. Is this true? Why\/why not?","c_root_id_A":"c2hmc3d","c_root_id_B":"c2hjzph","created_at_utc_A":1315231915,"created_at_utc_B":1315196309,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"It depends on elasticity of supply and demand (for goods & labor) and other market dynamics.    The more elastic the demand, more likely firms are to absorb the tax or close up shop.  Producers of less elastic goods are more likely to pass along the cost (e.g. insulin producers can pass along the cost because insulin consumers will need the same amount regardless).    Elasticity depends on many other things - substitutes, complements, income, necessity, etc - so indirectly all of those affect how much of the tax is passed along.   Regarding market dynamics, in a perfectly competitive market, 100% of the tax is passed on because P = MC already.  In a monopoly\/oligopoly, the firm absorbs some of the tax to maximize profits.    Writ large, I don't know how much gets passed along, that's an empirical question I haven't read about.  Corporate tax does bring in a relatively small chunk of revenue for the government, but the impact of corporate taxes on the distribution of wealth is really an open question.","human_ref_B":"Corporate profits can be used for one of two things. First they can be invested in capital and growth in the expectation of greater future profits. Keep in mind this can include investments in human capital such as hiring more employees or increasing wages and benefits. Otherwise, the profits can be distributed to shareholders. This can be done directly through dividends or indirectly through the inclusion of the value of retained earnings in the stock price. So, in theory, the answer to your question is yes. Corporate income taxes would otherwise make their way to individuals. The more important question to consider is who those individuals are. In an interesting article (That I found on reddit earlier today) in the New York Time by Robert Reich has an infographic showing the growth in productivity relative to the growth in average hourly wages and compensation. Since the early 80s productivity has grown 80% while wages have grown only 8%. Higher productivity means lower cost and higher profit. Moreover, the distribution of corporate equity ownership is this country is highly skewed toward the very wealthy. The median value of stock holdings among the top 10% income earners in 75 thousand dollars. For the next lowest 10% it is only 15 thousand (2007 Survey of Consumer Finances). Large corporations are more profitable than ever before they those profits remain among a select few. Since the incidence of this tax falls primarily on the wealthy it is preferable to an overall increase in taxes. However, it may be more beneficial to reduce the corporate income tax rate and greatly increase the marginal income tax for high tax brackets and increase capital gains taxes.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":35606.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"k4wgj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"Are corporate taxes passed down to the consumer\/employee? I've heard this multiple times as an argument in favor of zero or low corporate taxation. Is this true? Why\/why not?","c_root_id_A":"c2hmc3d","c_root_id_B":"c2hlmtw","created_at_utc_A":1315231915,"created_at_utc_B":1315219411,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It depends on elasticity of supply and demand (for goods & labor) and other market dynamics.    The more elastic the demand, more likely firms are to absorb the tax or close up shop.  Producers of less elastic goods are more likely to pass along the cost (e.g. insulin producers can pass along the cost because insulin consumers will need the same amount regardless).    Elasticity depends on many other things - substitutes, complements, income, necessity, etc - so indirectly all of those affect how much of the tax is passed along.   Regarding market dynamics, in a perfectly competitive market, 100% of the tax is passed on because P = MC already.  In a monopoly\/oligopoly, the firm absorbs some of the tax to maximize profits.    Writ large, I don't know how much gets passed along, that's an empirical question I haven't read about.  Corporate tax does bring in a relatively small chunk of revenue for the government, but the impact of corporate taxes on the distribution of wealth is really an open question.","human_ref_B":"In short words, it depends on a product. For some product it doesn't and for some it does. You need to study supply and demand curves for that exact product and for employees to get a better overview.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12504.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"k4wgj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"Are corporate taxes passed down to the consumer\/employee? I've heard this multiple times as an argument in favor of zero or low corporate taxation. Is this true? Why\/why not?","c_root_id_A":"c2hkt6v","c_root_id_B":"c2hmc3d","created_at_utc_A":1315205048,"created_at_utc_B":1315231915,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Corporate taxes tend to be a bad idea because they can disincentivize corporations from investing in (human or physical) capital, which is important for economic growth. Whether corporate taxes can be passed down to the consumer or employee depends on the price elasticity of demand and the labor supply elasticity of employees in that sector. Relative elasticity on the corporation's part allows the tax burden to be shifted onto others (see the wiki on tax incidence to get the intuition). But the incidence stuff is different from why corporate taxes are a bad idea, as I see it. Capital accumulation is important.  Edit: I know little about public economics and taxation so someone please correct me if I'm wrong.","human_ref_B":"It depends on elasticity of supply and demand (for goods & labor) and other market dynamics.    The more elastic the demand, more likely firms are to absorb the tax or close up shop.  Producers of less elastic goods are more likely to pass along the cost (e.g. insulin producers can pass along the cost because insulin consumers will need the same amount regardless).    Elasticity depends on many other things - substitutes, complements, income, necessity, etc - so indirectly all of those affect how much of the tax is passed along.   Regarding market dynamics, in a perfectly competitive market, 100% of the tax is passed on because P = MC already.  In a monopoly\/oligopoly, the firm absorbs some of the tax to maximize profits.    Writ large, I don't know how much gets passed along, that's an empirical question I haven't read about.  Corporate tax does bring in a relatively small chunk of revenue for the government, but the impact of corporate taxes on the distribution of wealth is really an open question.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":26867.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"18imv4","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Study on the consumer's loss due to giftcards? Hola AskSocialScience,  While I was making breakfast this morning I was reminding myself that I have two giftcards to use sometime and I was trying to figure out when best to use them cause they're both for places that aren't in my immediate proximity.    That got me thinking, how much money do you think consumers lose every year in the U.S. due to gift cards?  Has there ever been a study on this?    I only ask because surely I can't be the only one that has either forgotten about giftcards for years on end, completely lost them, or just didn't use their full value.  If even a few hundred thousand people do this (say, because they are more forgetful\/busy than the general population) for maybe 5-10 times in their life we're talking about a few million dollars that went straight to retailers with no product returned.    Ideas?  \/r\/Economics might be a better place for this question but figured I'd ask here first.    Cheers!","c_root_id_A":"c8f8ney","c_root_id_B":"c8fbeit","created_at_utc_A":1360869827,"created_at_utc_B":1360877978,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Technically, it's a loss for the consumer and the firm for the first few years of non-use. Accounting standards aren't very defined when it comes to gift cards, but it starts out as a liability as unearned revenue.   http:\/\/www.nysscpa.org\/cpajournal\/2007\/1107\/essentials\/p28.htm  Scroll down to \"Current accounting for gift cards.\"","human_ref_B":"I can't answer for the U.S.(although this article estimates that 25% of cards aren't used), but here in some parts of Canada it is now illegal for gifts cards to expire.  They are considered just another form of cash.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8151.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1621ti","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Do false tip earnings reported by servers distort economic figures? (at least in the USA, but interested in other countries as well) I have been a server for several years, and everywhere I work my employers recommend that I say I earn approximately half of what I actually earn in tips so that I don't have to pay taxes on it. In the US, this trick slips under the radar because the government can't expect the average person to tip well, and so they set their flag slightly less than 10% of your sales.   This is a widespread custom, and I am pretty sure servers make up a huge percentage of the working force who generate income. And most of our income comes from people who work in the country. So it seems as if a large part of the money circulating around should just get \"lost\" in a way? I am really curious how this affects statistics and the likes.","c_root_id_A":"c7s1n3e","c_root_id_B":"c7sb9iu","created_at_utc_A":1357489427,"created_at_utc_B":1357520152,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I worked at Domino's for a while, and usually I would average between ~10-17\/hour depending on the time, day, etc ($5\/hour base pay, $1 per delivery, $x amount in tips). At the end of the day, it was custom for us only to report minimum wage, often what was just reported on credit card receipts was enough, in which case \"we only received $1 in cash tips,\" or some equivalent.  The only statistics this really affects is IRS data, and probably some of the people who report income to the census or CPS survey's, but I bet since those don't have tax ramifications people are more honest there. But, realistically, these type of jobs *do not* make up a large percent of the overall workforce, probably no more than 5% all else considered. If we included all food service jobs, probably far more, but the main culprits here are waiters and drivers for delivery based enterprises.","human_ref_B":"Yes!  Undeclared tips would count as economic activity in the so called 'shadow' or 'underground' economy that is not always capture in the reported GDP statistics.   A number of studies try to estimate the missing income for various countries as a % of GDP.  Europe's shadow economy estimates   Review of Estimates for many countries including the U.S.   Most estimates of the U.S. shadow economy is somewhere around 8-20% of GDP. According to the SFU study above, unrecorded wages (like lying on tips) was estimated to account for 2.3% of 'missing' GDP.   The estimate of GDP using the income method (adding up wages, investment income, interest income, etc) is always lower than measuring expenditures (retail sales, government spending, investment spending, imports\/exports) because of the reporting discrepancy.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":30725.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1nl8gz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Question about history of \"news\" organizations and their biased presentations. Please tell me if something like this actually happened or if I merely dreamed it up.  I was under the impression that around 30 years ago there had been a court case that changed the rules regarding what \"news\" needed to include.  I thought that before this ruling, \"news\" organizations needed to present both sides of an argument, but after they were allowed to present only one side of an argument but still be called news organizations.  I thought this gave rise to media organizations like Fox News.  Again, I might be making everything up, or there might be HUGE misunderstandings on my part.  But can someone tell me if anything like this ever happened?","c_root_id_A":"ccjmd7g","c_root_id_B":"ccjm88i","created_at_utc_A":1380732996,"created_at_utc_B":1380732639,"score_A":7,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"You're thinking of the fairness doctrine, an FCC policy that required broadcasters to present matters of public interest and do so in a way the FCC thought was equitable and balanced.  Note this policy didn't affect print media, cable, or anything that didn't use public airwaves (i.e. the internet, had it existed then).  At most, it required broadcasters to allow time for a counterpoint, the policy never disallowed any speech.  The policy was discarded by the FCC in the 80s on the grounds it was a violation of free speech, gave the FCC too much influence over news, and treated various forms of media differently.  The policy wasn't actually taken off the books until 2011 (source).    Your question seems to be asking whether Fox News could operate as is under the fairness doctrine.  First, yes of course because Fox News is available over cable rather than public broadcast airwaves, this policy wouldn't have been applicable to Fox News.  Second, if Fox News was broadcast as is when the fairness doctrine was enforced, the answer isn't obvious.  The policy was enforced infrequently and primarily in higher profile cases.  I won't speculate on what would or wouldn't have been problematic.","human_ref_B":"You're speaking of the fairness doctrine. One of the original purposes of the law was to address situations where a community had a very limited number of tv or radio stations.  Remember, back then a suburb of New York City would get ~5 tv stations with news. Rural communities could get less. So the intent was to ensure that folks didn't just have a couple different biased stations to choose from.   These days, that's a non-issue, as there are news sources galore that everyone has access to, even rural communities.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":357.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"6bvywy","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What would be the modern equivalent of 'The Prince'? Is there a modern handbook to the dark arts of political technology?","c_root_id_A":"dhpxj5q","c_root_id_B":"dhpyu4i","created_at_utc_A":1495114098,"created_at_utc_B":1495115769,"score_A":4,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"I don't know if you'll find a modern text with advice as specific as the Prince, but perhaps these may come close. As you probably know Machiavelli is often described in political science as an early example of a 'realist' - although such a term did not exist back then. The modern realist (specifically a classical realist) Hans Morgenthau wrote Politics Among Nations, which offers similar-ish advice to policy makers on how to properly manage a state. More recently, a fairly influential book is John Mearsheimer's (an offensive realist) The Tragedy of Great Power Politics. There are many others, but these are at least pretty influential.","human_ref_B":"The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior is Almost Always Good Politics (2012)","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1671.0,"score_ratio":4.75}
{"post_id":"27luk0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Hypothetically, what should I name my child to afford him or her the greatest opportunity and advantage in life?","c_root_id_A":"ci23zle","c_root_id_B":"ci2465i","created_at_utc_A":1402227070,"created_at_utc_B":1402228219,"score_A":9,"score_B":73,"human_ref_A":"Here is a video that covers the topic (Freakanomics on names).  Edit:  That's not the full video.  I can't seem to find the full segment.  If you have Netflix, I believe the have the entire movie.  Maybe someone else can point it out for us.  There is a segment int he movie that discusses how names play a roll and some of the biases against certain names.  It's very interesting.","human_ref_B":"You definitely want to name your kid with a white-sounding name. Bertrand and Mullainathan sent out made-up resumes with exact same details except for the names which were divided into either a black-sounding or a white-sounding name. Despite of the resume having the exact same information other than the name, the resumes with the white-sounding name had to send out fewer number of resumes than ones with the black-sounding name. So, if you want your child to have a higher chance of getting employed than others with similar resume, make sure your kid's name is white.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1149.0,"score_ratio":8.1111111111}
{"post_id":"27luk0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"Hypothetically, what should I name my child to afford him or her the greatest opportunity and advantage in life?","c_root_id_A":"ci23zle","c_root_id_B":"ci2aaj7","created_at_utc_A":1402227070,"created_at_utc_B":1402249131,"score_A":9,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Here is a video that covers the topic (Freakanomics on names).  Edit:  That's not the full video.  I can't seem to find the full segment.  If you have Netflix, I believe the have the entire movie.  Maybe someone else can point it out for us.  There is a segment int he movie that discusses how names play a roll and some of the biases against certain names.  It's very interesting.","human_ref_B":"If you'd like your child to go into academia, consider changing your surname to something that comes earlier in the alphabet - Einav and Yariv have shown that an academic's success is associated with how far through the alphabet their surname is, probably because credit and citations for multi-author academic papers tend to be in alphabetical order (I imagine Yariv is a little bitter about this).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":22061.0,"score_ratio":1.8888888889}
{"post_id":"1kex1p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How, in basic terms, is the minimum wage calculated? Can anyone give me a brief intuitive summary of how the minimum wage is calculated? My immediate thought is that it is based on calculations of the amount required to purchase a basket of basic goods, but I'm presuming that's too simplistic.","c_root_id_A":"cbo8kau","c_root_id_B":"cboaqd7","created_at_utc_A":1376572289,"created_at_utc_B":1376579141,"score_A":4,"score_B":22,"human_ref_A":"I assume you mean \"living wage\"?  Minimum wage (in the US) is an entirely political construct that doesn't have much to do with the cost of anything relevant to consumers.  http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Living_wage","human_ref_B":"I don't think there's a formula.  I do have some pretty pictures, though, which should give you context.  First, here is the minimum wage since 1938 along with the average hourly  wage (for non-supervisory employees) since 1964 (data limitations, sorry).  That's not super-helpful but it sets context. The vertical axis is dollars per hour.  Second, here is the nominal minimum wage and the *real* minimum wage, that is, the minimum wage adjusted for inflation. Note that it hovers around $7.5 dollars per hour, in real terms, throughout the post-1964 period. Also, since 1980, the minimum wage has been increased substantially whenever its real value has fallen below $6.25\/hour.  Third, here is the minimum wage relative to the average hourly wage.  The units now are percentages: 0.4 means that the minimum wage is 40% of the average hourly wage. Since 1980, whenever the min wage has fallen below one-third of the average hourly wage, Congress has bumped it up to about 40% of the average hourly wage. In the 1960s and 1970s, the minimum wage reached highs of 50% of the average hourly wage.  Finally, here is the real minimum wage and the real average wage through time. This isn't *total compensation*, it's just hourly earnings, but it's fun to look at. The vertical axis is dollars per hour.  I hope that helps a bit.  ------------  Sources:  I used this site to get the minimum wage data.  I used FRED to get the CPI and average wage data.  Graphs were made in Stata 11.2.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6852.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"1kex1p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How, in basic terms, is the minimum wage calculated? Can anyone give me a brief intuitive summary of how the minimum wage is calculated? My immediate thought is that it is based on calculations of the amount required to purchase a basket of basic goods, but I'm presuming that's too simplistic.","c_root_id_A":"cboaqd7","c_root_id_B":"cbo8ldd","created_at_utc_A":1376579141,"created_at_utc_B":1376572413,"score_A":22,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"I don't think there's a formula.  I do have some pretty pictures, though, which should give you context.  First, here is the minimum wage since 1938 along with the average hourly  wage (for non-supervisory employees) since 1964 (data limitations, sorry).  That's not super-helpful but it sets context. The vertical axis is dollars per hour.  Second, here is the nominal minimum wage and the *real* minimum wage, that is, the minimum wage adjusted for inflation. Note that it hovers around $7.5 dollars per hour, in real terms, throughout the post-1964 period. Also, since 1980, the minimum wage has been increased substantially whenever its real value has fallen below $6.25\/hour.  Third, here is the minimum wage relative to the average hourly wage.  The units now are percentages: 0.4 means that the minimum wage is 40% of the average hourly wage. Since 1980, whenever the min wage has fallen below one-third of the average hourly wage, Congress has bumped it up to about 40% of the average hourly wage. In the 1960s and 1970s, the minimum wage reached highs of 50% of the average hourly wage.  Finally, here is the real minimum wage and the real average wage through time. This isn't *total compensation*, it's just hourly earnings, but it's fun to look at. The vertical axis is dollars per hour.  I hope that helps a bit.  ------------  Sources:  I used this site to get the minimum wage data.  I used FRED to get the CPI and average wage data.  Graphs were made in Stata 11.2.","human_ref_B":">it is based on calculations of the amount required to purchase a basket of basic goods  This describes how inflation is calculated, not minimum wage. See here.  Minimum wage is not calculated by rather set by Congress (assuming you're talking about the US). See for example the most recent minimum wage change.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6728.0,"score_ratio":5.5}
{"post_id":"1js10o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What happens when academics turn the lens on themselves? I'm a student in science about to finish up undergrad and start a PhD in my field, and recently I've read a few articles on the sociology of science - it's interesting to see us observed by 'outsiders', although those trained to observe relatively rigorously.  I've also noticed that it seems that a lot of topics social scientists talk about only apply to segments or aspects of society that, it seems to me, academia as a whole is relatively distant from.  To what depth have social scientists studied themselves?  What are some seminal works on the sociology of science, the sociology of social science, the sociology of psychology, the sociology of other areas of academia?  Who are academics?  Are we upper-middle-class?  Socially liberal?  Economically all over the map?  How does this differ by discipline?  What do academics tend to be and do on average more than the general population?  How do established professors, associate professors, assistant professors, non-tenure-track professors, postdocs, grad students, and upper-level research-involved undergrads differ in these aspects?","c_root_id_A":"cbi4u6c","c_root_id_B":"cbi11lq","created_at_utc_A":1375807471,"created_at_utc_B":1375796750,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This was a big topic among social psychologists a few years back focusing on a liberal bias among social psychologists and why this is not a good thing for the field NY Times article  Link to his page including critiques of his argument","human_ref_B":"There have been some of these types of papers in Criminology. Ill try to dig them up when I get in the office.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10721.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1js10o","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What happens when academics turn the lens on themselves? I'm a student in science about to finish up undergrad and start a PhD in my field, and recently I've read a few articles on the sociology of science - it's interesting to see us observed by 'outsiders', although those trained to observe relatively rigorously.  I've also noticed that it seems that a lot of topics social scientists talk about only apply to segments or aspects of society that, it seems to me, academia as a whole is relatively distant from.  To what depth have social scientists studied themselves?  What are some seminal works on the sociology of science, the sociology of social science, the sociology of psychology, the sociology of other areas of academia?  Who are academics?  Are we upper-middle-class?  Socially liberal?  Economically all over the map?  How does this differ by discipline?  What do academics tend to be and do on average more than the general population?  How do established professors, associate professors, assistant professors, non-tenure-track professors, postdocs, grad students, and upper-level research-involved undergrads differ in these aspects?","c_root_id_A":"cbi4u6c","c_root_id_B":"cbi31pc","created_at_utc_A":1375807471,"created_at_utc_B":1375802859,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This was a big topic among social psychologists a few years back focusing on a liberal bias among social psychologists and why this is not a good thing for the field NY Times article  Link to his page including critiques of his argument","human_ref_B":"Pierre Bourdieu's homo academicus is the best place to start. Bourdieu describes how the French academic system, starting with the high school exams which determine which university you go to and up to the structure of academic departments, serves to reproduce the elite French cultural system. His major point is always that the researcher brings with him or her their own cultural background to what they study and that this must be accounted for as they try to understand other societies or groups. Some of his other works and essay collections, such as Sociology as a Martial Art also dwell on the need for sociologists to understand themselves.   More broadly there's work on 'reflexivity,' where the researcher performs a self-examination to understand their own biases going into their research and, more importantly, to understand how their race, class, education, age, gender and other aspects will affect how they are treated in the field. This work emerged out of Feminist theory, which asked how well women, particularly marginalized and racialized women, could be studied by middle class men who graduated from top universities. This kind of work argues that researchers must team up with locals to conduct research, in essence to train community members to help them conduct research to ensure that the data they gather isn't biased by respondents' perceptions of who they are talking to.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4612.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"6r4rby","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Political science blogs by political scientists? Does anyone know of any blogs written by political science professors? The only one I know is Tom Pepinsky's blog, which I enjoy. Project Syndicate and Political Violence at a Glance are also good and frequently have political scientists featured. Specifically, I would be interested in more comparative politics oriented blogs, but I'm not too picky if the quality is good.","c_root_id_A":"dl2en6y","c_root_id_B":"dl2potl","created_at_utc_A":1501691591,"created_at_utc_B":1501702534,"score_A":8,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"I like the Duck of Minerva blog which has interesting posts from a number of contributors focused on political science and related topics. Duck of Minerva","human_ref_B":"The Monkey Cage is a a blog where all the contributers are political scientists, some of which are even at the top of the field.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":10943.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"6r4rby","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Political science blogs by political scientists? Does anyone know of any blogs written by political science professors? The only one I know is Tom Pepinsky's blog, which I enjoy. Project Syndicate and Political Violence at a Glance are also good and frequently have political scientists featured. Specifically, I would be interested in more comparative politics oriented blogs, but I'm not too picky if the quality is good.","c_root_id_A":"dl2potl","c_root_id_B":"dl2e0cn","created_at_utc_A":1501702534,"created_at_utc_B":1501690952,"score_A":12,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"The Monkey Cage is a a blog where all the contributers are political scientists, some of which are even at the top of the field.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/mischiefs-of-faction  While now on Vox, this blog started independently. It focuses on the American party-system. The primary contributors are political scientists: Seth Masket from the University of Denver, Julie Anzsari from Marquette, John Patty from the University of Chicago, and several others.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":11582.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"6r4rby","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Political science blogs by political scientists? Does anyone know of any blogs written by political science professors? The only one I know is Tom Pepinsky's blog, which I enjoy. Project Syndicate and Political Violence at a Glance are also good and frequently have political scientists featured. Specifically, I would be interested in more comparative politics oriented blogs, but I'm not too picky if the quality is good.","c_root_id_A":"dl2potl","c_root_id_B":"dl2gvrh","created_at_utc_A":1501702534,"created_at_utc_B":1501693839,"score_A":12,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"The Monkey Cage is a a blog where all the contributers are political scientists, some of which are even at the top of the field.","human_ref_B":"https:\/\/warontherocks.com is also good","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8695.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"6r4rby","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Political science blogs by political scientists? Does anyone know of any blogs written by political science professors? The only one I know is Tom Pepinsky's blog, which I enjoy. Project Syndicate and Political Violence at a Glance are also good and frequently have political scientists featured. Specifically, I would be interested in more comparative politics oriented blogs, but I'm not too picky if the quality is good.","c_root_id_A":"dl2e0cn","c_root_id_B":"dl2en6y","created_at_utc_A":1501690952,"created_at_utc_B":1501691591,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/mischiefs-of-faction  While now on Vox, this blog started independently. It focuses on the American party-system. The primary contributors are political scientists: Seth Masket from the University of Denver, Julie Anzsari from Marquette, John Patty from the University of Chicago, and several others.","human_ref_B":"I like the Duck of Minerva blog which has interesting posts from a number of contributors focused on political science and related topics. Duck of Minerva","labels":0,"seconds_difference":639.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"10b31h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"[Political Science] Why isn't the US Congress getting along any more? I've heard, though not seen sources, that we saw a rise in bi-partisanship in the mid-20th century, and that this might just be Congress getting back to normal. I still have no idea why, or whether this is true.","c_root_id_A":"c6bx0md","c_root_id_B":"c6bxlgw","created_at_utc_A":1348341375,"created_at_utc_B":1348344291,"score_A":8,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"The rise in bipartisanship you're referring to happened during Eisenhower's presidency. LBJ was the majority leader in the Senate, and he and Eisenhower worked together on a lot of things, like civil rights and the freeway system. LBJ was able to keep Senate Democrats from defecting, and it fostered a somewhat more cooperative environment than one one might expect from a divided government (GOP presidency and  Democratic Congress). I think this period was probably one of the few in American history where the two major parties weren't too hostile towards one another; while they still had major disagreements, the atmosphere wasn't so toxic as it was in the years before or after. It could definitely be credited to the personalities that were leading their respective parties. LBJ was a skilled and pragmatic politician who understood the importance of compromise in a democratic system, while Eisenhower had a strong moderate streak that created some middle ground for them to work off of.  However, I'm still an undergraduate in Political Science, so I'm sure there is someone who can answer with something a little more detailed.","human_ref_B":"One of the explanations I've heard offered is that people are becoming less and less likely to declare a major party. Gallup estimates put the percentage of Americans who consider themselves independent at a record 40% at the end of 2011. By comparison, in 2000, 2004, and 2008 that number hovered closer to a third.  The median voter theorem tells us that in a two party election, the candidate whose views most closely match that of the median voter tends to win elections.  This kinda works in the primaries as well. Typically the candidate who wins a primary will be the candidate who best matches the median voter in their respective party.  This is where the growth of independents tends to be an issue. Usually independents tend to be more moderate. This means that the growth of the independents is probably coming out of the centrist parts of both parties. As a result, the median inside the parties shifts to the outside and candidates on the ballot for the general become more liberal or conservative respectively.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2916.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"10b31h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"[Political Science] Why isn't the US Congress getting along any more? I've heard, though not seen sources, that we saw a rise in bi-partisanship in the mid-20th century, and that this might just be Congress getting back to normal. I still have no idea why, or whether this is true.","c_root_id_A":"c6bwvbc","c_root_id_B":"c6bxlgw","created_at_utc_A":1348340638,"created_at_utc_B":1348344291,"score_A":8,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Why is a more difficult matter. As for whether or not it's true, seems like it is.","human_ref_B":"One of the explanations I've heard offered is that people are becoming less and less likely to declare a major party. Gallup estimates put the percentage of Americans who consider themselves independent at a record 40% at the end of 2011. By comparison, in 2000, 2004, and 2008 that number hovered closer to a third.  The median voter theorem tells us that in a two party election, the candidate whose views most closely match that of the median voter tends to win elections.  This kinda works in the primaries as well. Typically the candidate who wins a primary will be the candidate who best matches the median voter in their respective party.  This is where the growth of independents tends to be an issue. Usually independents tend to be more moderate. This means that the growth of the independents is probably coming out of the centrist parts of both parties. As a result, the median inside the parties shifts to the outside and candidates on the ballot for the general become more liberal or conservative respectively.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3653.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"10b31h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"[Political Science] Why isn't the US Congress getting along any more? I've heard, though not seen sources, that we saw a rise in bi-partisanship in the mid-20th century, and that this might just be Congress getting back to normal. I still have no idea why, or whether this is true.","c_root_id_A":"c6c5q79","c_root_id_B":"c6byqlm","created_at_utc_A":1348387891,"created_at_utc_B":1348349879,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If you're interested in polarization of parties, you should look at this video.","human_ref_B":"In short, the Democrats won the House and the Senate majorities in the 2008 election which gave them full control over the Congressional agenda.  The only way the Republicans could succeed in implementing their policies was through riders or amendments to major pieces of legislation.  That is how the Keystone XL came up for a vote because it was attached to unrelated legislation (which begs a completely different question about the political process.)  The controlling Democrats saw this happening and, because they controlled the docket (and still do in the Senate,) disallowed votes on Republican proposed amendments.  After the death of Ted Kennedy, the Democrats lost their ability in the Senate to invoke cloture. To retaliate for being cut off from submitting amendments during the Democrat supermajority, the minority Republicans in the Senate decided to filibuster every Democratic legislative effort.  What will likely happen if the Democrats keep their majority in the Senate this year is that they will allow Republicans to submit as many amendments as they want and they will just force votes on all of them.  If the Dems still have the majority, then none of the amendments will fly anyway and the republicans will be out of excuses for being obstructive.  Also, the Senate Dems are much younger than the Senate Reps and would likely force votes on all amendments at once (which would force them to be in session for, potentially, days consecutively and there is no way the Republican senators can last that long.)","labels":1,"seconds_difference":38012.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"10b31h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"[Political Science] Why isn't the US Congress getting along any more? I've heard, though not seen sources, that we saw a rise in bi-partisanship in the mid-20th century, and that this might just be Congress getting back to normal. I still have no idea why, or whether this is true.","c_root_id_A":"c6c5q79","c_root_id_B":"c6c1l0d","created_at_utc_A":1348387891,"created_at_utc_B":1348363889,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If you're interested in polarization of parties, you should look at this video.","human_ref_B":"I'm just going to remind OP that, in the past, members of Congress have physically assaulted one another in session. That hasn't happened for a while.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":24002.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"10b31h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"[Political Science] Why isn't the US Congress getting along any more? I've heard, though not seen sources, that we saw a rise in bi-partisanship in the mid-20th century, and that this might just be Congress getting back to normal. I still have no idea why, or whether this is true.","c_root_id_A":"c6c5q79","c_root_id_B":"c6c1ua1","created_at_utc_A":1348387891,"created_at_utc_B":1348365122,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If you're interested in polarization of parties, you should look at this video.","human_ref_B":"the parties used to be more regional and ethnic coalitions rather than ideological ones, so you'd get the west and south to vote against the north east and Catholics, or whatever.  There was just as much conflict, it is just that wasn't across party lines.  today, the coalitions are ideological.  But it is important to note that american parties are still, by international standards, very weak and heterogeneous.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":22769.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2rzklq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"[Economics] Is 'New Keynesian' economics actually Keynesian? I ask because Post-Keynesian economists claim New Keynesians aren't Keynesian at all.","c_root_id_A":"cnkzxcb","c_root_id_B":"cnkq7rd","created_at_utc_A":1420936971,"created_at_utc_B":1420918750,"score_A":16,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Modern New Keynesian models derive from multiple sources, some harkening back to Keynes in the 1930s, but most emerging out of the work of the 1970s. To fix ideas, let's use Woodford's and Gali's books as prototypes.  The basic building blocks of a standard three-equation New Keynesian model are:  1. Milton Friedman's permanent income hypothesis, as interpreted in Robert Hall's intertemporal optimizing consumer. This part is Monetarist, almost chapter and verse. (Friedman 1957, Hall 1978 JPE, 1988 JPE)  2. A model of firms' pricing decisions that combines elements of imperfect competition, forward-looking behavior, and price stickiness. This part is largely \"Keynesian,\" though most writers accept some form of sluggish nominal adjustment. It is the key piece that differentiates New Keynesian models from their New Classical and RBC cousins. (Dixit-Stiglitz 1977, Taylor 1977, Calvo 1983, Rotemberg 1982). [Later edit: imperfect competition is *the fundamental thing* that separates NK macro from New Classical macro. Sluggish price adjustment is *the fundamental thing* that separates NK macro from RBC macro. More comments on request.]  3. A monetary rule that focuses exclusively on interest-rate adjustment and focuses on feedback rules. This part is truly \"Keynesian\" in multiple senses.  (Taylor 1993)  4. A focus on rules over discretion, which is largely a holdover from New Classical thought. (Friedman 1968, Kydland-Prescott 1977, Barro-Gordon 1983)   5. Rational expectations, largely taken from the New Classicals. (Lucas 1972, Lucas 1975)  6. The key macroeconomic mismatch being deviations of the interest rate from its natural rate. This part harkens all the way back to Wicksell.  7. Macroeconomic fluctuations as emanating from both \"real\" and \"nominal\" sources. Half of this part emerges from the real business cycle literature; the other half from the nascent New Keynesian literature of the late 1970s and early 1980s. (Kydland-Prescott 1982 (real), Taylor 1980 (nominal))  One could certainly call New Keynesian macroeconomics \"New Wicksellean macroeconomics\" without much loss of substance. Similarly, about two-thirds of New Keynesian economics is monetarist (the consumption block is all Friedman, the Phillips Curve is half Friedman, and the Taylor Rule is half Friedman).  However, New Keynesian economics is \"Keynesian\" in the sense that it recognizes the importance of coordination failure, price stickiness, real rigidities, and other imperfections that can lead output to deviate from full-employment equilibrium. It is *not* Keynesian in that NK economics does not have a role for *permanent* deviations of output from full-employment equilibrium (though the adjustment process can take time). It is not Keynesian in that NK economics requires inflexible wages and\/or prices to generate welfare-relevant business cycles, while Keynes believed that there could be welfare-relevant business cycles even in a situation of fully flexible wages and prices.   Nontechnical readings:  1. DeLong, \"The Triumph of Monetarism,\" JEP 2000. 2. Woodford, \"Revolution and Evolution in Twentieth-Century Macroeconomics,\" 1999. 3. Woodford, *Interest and Prices,* 2003, chapter 1. He spends a bit too much time distancing himself from New Classical and Real Business Cycle theories, but the history of thought in his introduction is useful.","human_ref_B":"Following Keynes book \"The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money\" the first formal mathematical treatment of it was by a guy named Hicks who a year later published this paper, which was the first IS-LM model that is taught in undergraduate macroeconomics courses. Keynes wasn't particularly pleased with this interpretation as far as I can tell. However, for the most part, the Hicks interpreation dominated the academic literature on the topic due to it's formalism compared to Keynes original writing. Thus the traditional post-war Keynesianism (1945-1970's) was dominated by large structural models.  Modern New Keynesianism is a mix of these sort of structural models and the counter arguments that were formulated against it in the 70's and 80's. As for the idea that the Post-Keynesians are \"actually\" Keynesian, I'm not well enough versed in their literature to tell. However, at face value, the thing strikes me a bit as a \"no true Scotsman\" issue.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":18221.0,"score_ratio":5.3333333333}
{"post_id":"xdli0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is the higher risk of genetic defect by itself enough to justify a ban on incestuous marriages? I understand that there are other reasons to ban incestuous marriages of course. I would think that this alone isn't enough to ban it though from a utilitarian standpoint since it would mean anyone who might be a carrier of a genetic defect would be banned from being married as well. It would mean that we would have to examine everyone and there would be medical exams as a requirement to get married and\/or have children.","c_root_id_A":"c5linx9","c_root_id_B":"c5lgprp","created_at_utc_A":1343648954,"created_at_utc_B":1343629833,"score_A":13,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"\"...enough to justify a ban...\"  You are asking a question grounded in values, and the answer can't be arrived at scientifically.  Is there a subreddit for ethics?","human_ref_B":"No, from what I remember the reason is actualy cultural, it's like so it \"forces\" a sort of \"trade\" in men\/women form familes. I seem to remember that the genetics actualy aren't really a problem. If you observe different cultures through the world you will see that the \"limits\" aren't the same every were, plus those limits were fixed at a time were I think genetics were pretty much un-known.  Source: my time in university, anthropology\/biology. It was some time ago so it's wage.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":19121.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"xdli0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"Is the higher risk of genetic defect by itself enough to justify a ban on incestuous marriages? I understand that there are other reasons to ban incestuous marriages of course. I would think that this alone isn't enough to ban it though from a utilitarian standpoint since it would mean anyone who might be a carrier of a genetic defect would be banned from being married as well. It would mean that we would have to examine everyone and there would be medical exams as a requirement to get married and\/or have children.","c_root_id_A":"c5ljhys","c_root_id_B":"c5lgprp","created_at_utc_A":1343655150,"created_at_utc_B":1343629833,"score_A":8,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I think we need some sources around here.  Here is a relevant NY Times article - the tl;dr is that the children of first cousins will be *slightly* more likely to suffer from certain birth defects, but we are talking about a 1-3% higher likelihood of certain illnesses, which the author argues is insufficient to discourage first cousins from coupling.  I was actually looking for another NY Times article that mentioned that the children of 40+year-old mothers are actually more likely to suffer from birth defects than the child of two first cousins.  Obviously we don't discourage middle-aged women from having children, so, scientifically speaking, there is little reason for discouraging cousins from procreating.  edit:  here is another NY Times article that states that the risk of birth defects is actually rather low for the offspring of first cousins.  (NOTE:  I skimmed but did not read this second article)","human_ref_B":"No, from what I remember the reason is actualy cultural, it's like so it \"forces\" a sort of \"trade\" in men\/women form familes. I seem to remember that the genetics actualy aren't really a problem. If you observe different cultures through the world you will see that the \"limits\" aren't the same every were, plus those limits were fixed at a time were I think genetics were pretty much un-known.  Source: my time in university, anthropology\/biology. It was some time ago so it's wage.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":25317.0,"score_ratio":1.6}
{"post_id":"tbo3p","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"What are the consequences of a country defaulting on its loans? For example, what would happen to Greece if she defaulted on loans, and what happened to Argentine when it did in 2001?  By defaulting, I guess that you give your country some breathing room; a chance to fix a broken economy, perhaps increasing exports as your currency plummets.  However, in the end, once the country is ready to yet again take part in the world economy, won't the old creditors wait outside the doors with the old debts and unpaid interests piled up? How can defaulting be a viable alternative?  As you may understand, I know little to nothing of macro economics.","c_root_id_A":"c4l9b58","c_root_id_B":"c4l91bg","created_at_utc_A":1336426476,"created_at_utc_B":1336425311,"score_A":8,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Very generally, you have the hang of the advantages. If a country believes they are too far in debt and can't recover, they can default to \"fix their broken economy\" etc. instead of worrying about paying back their loans.   You're a bit off on the second part though...the whole idea of defaulting on your loans means you basically tell creditors to screw themselves and refuse to pay them back. Of course, your next logical question would be who would ever lend money to a country after they've defaulted on their loans? Thus, the most obvious disadvantage to default is that in the future, creditors will either refuse or be much more wary (and charge far higher interest rates) to loan money to your country. However, depending on how far in debt you are, it might be a good (or more accurately the least bad) alternative.  The above description was based on the idea of a total default. In reality, there are a myriad of more structured ways a country can partially default on their debt and repay creditors a fraction of their loans, without totally leaving them out to dry.   If you look at how this has affected Argentina, I'd say that it is generally viewed as a beneficial move for them (although others might disagree). Here is the Economist's latest figures on interest rates; you can see that while Argentina is clearly paying higher rates than many other countries (13% for a 3-month rate) creditors haven't abandoned the country. Keep in mind that there are a million other factors that can affect the interest rate. Here is a basic look at Argentina's economy. Clearly, declaring bankruptcy led to a collapse in their economy, but growth soon returned so it didn't destroy them by any means.  Finally, nobody can really agree on what will happen to Greece. Nobody knows exactly how they would\/will declare bankruptcy, and their case is made immensely more complicated by whether they will leave the Euro, and exactly how this will be handled (which nobody really knows). Best case scenario for Greece would be something like what happened to Argentina. On the other hand, leaving the Euro could lead to capital flight and inflation, and depending on how this is handled, prospects likely look much worse. It's really hard to say though.","human_ref_B":"*Really good planet money podcast on the argentinian case *some more info","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1165.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1c3eve","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How are mentally or physically disabled people viewed in undeveloped countries?","c_root_id_A":"c9cst9b","c_root_id_B":"c9cp6k6","created_at_utc_A":1365650254,"created_at_utc_B":1365640454,"score_A":10,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Your question reminded me of the [development of nicaraguan sign language]( http:\/\/news.bbc.co.uk\/2\/hi\/science\/nature\/3662928.stm).  From what I understand (others please correct me if I'm mistaken) , the government of Nicaragua in the 70s and 80s basically treated deaf people as invalids and so deaf kids got sent to this school where they were kind of forgotten about and weren't taught any sign language.  The beauty of the situation was that the children began developing a signing creole to communicate which eventually turned into a complex language by the time their kids came to the school.  It ended up providing amazing insight into signed languages for linguists.  There's a great documentary about it, but unfortunately I can't remember what it's called and I'm on my phone.","human_ref_B":"I'm not an expert on this subject, especially since it is so broad, but I have this interesting article about mental health in Ghana that I think you would be interested in reading about.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":9800.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"2l9mpv","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"If capitalism constantly creates value, why can we no longer afford what we used to? I recently listened to Wolfgang Streeck's lecture for the LSE (it's available on their podcast: \"Buying Time: the delayed crisis of democratic capitalism \") and one of the arguments Streeck made is that countries such as Sweden and the UK are transitioning from a society in which certain services are given on the basis of citizenship to a more privatized society in which services are given on a payment basis. He said this transition is inevitable because the right-by-citizenship basis of offering services was no longer affordable.  This is a classic austerity argument and I have never understood it, possibly because I'm not an economist by training. But surely the idea of modern capitalism is that we constantly create more capital stock that in turn provides greater value to society as a whole. If this is the case, shouldn't we always be able to afford more in the future for less (given other energy\/resource constraints stay equal)? If so, why is it that in the 1970s these nations could afford universal healthcare but they no longer can?","c_root_id_A":"clt03eq","c_root_id_B":"clt1njs","created_at_utc_A":1415135251,"created_at_utc_B":1415137843,"score_A":13,"score_B":30,"human_ref_A":"In countries effected by the baby boom you have a situation where more  people are retiring and those that are retiring are living longer. This means less taxpayers and more people collecting benefits for longer periods of time. Healthcare spending specifically skews heavily toward the aged even if they have not retired. Sweden's economy is growing, albeit by a slower rate than say the US. This is caused by a combination of the social democratic economic model and the recent sovereign debt crisis in Europe.","human_ref_B":"When people say capitalism \"creates value\", what they mean is that you can get *more stuff in general* from the same amount of resources, it doesn't mean you can get *more of everything* from those resources. The services that are being removed from public provision are those that suffer from Baumol's cost disease: they are not the kinds of things that productivity makes cheaper and so their opportunity cost continues to rise. But even the poor have bigger TVs.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2592.0,"score_ratio":2.3076923077}
{"post_id":"1l7sjn","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"If the WTO already ensures free trade, what is the point of further trade agreements like NAFTA or the EU?","c_root_id_A":"cbwnju0","c_root_id_B":"cbwm1eb","created_at_utc_A":1377649675,"created_at_utc_B":1377645381,"score_A":6,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"To make a long answer short, bilateral trade and investment treaties go much further than the provisions of the WTO. The WTO is not so much about 'freeing' trade. Under the WTO, countries are still allowed to have relatively high tariffs. Basically, when countries become members of the WTO they set their bound tariff rates, which is the highest rate they are allowed to raise their tariff. They also set an applied tariff, which is the actual tariff rate and usually substantially lower than the bound tariff. Having a bound \/ applied tariff gives a country room to adjust their tariff policies in the event of some domestic issues, shock to commodity prices, etc. Anyway, the WTO is primarily about getting countries to stop using non-tariff barriers to trade (so things like local content requirements or not applying international patent laws). By ridding countries of 'unfair' or 'distortionary' non-tariff barriers to trade, the WTO tries to confine the international trade regime to one focused on tariffs.  Bilateral and multilateral free trade agreements and investment treaties go much further than the WTO. They include detailed provisions on non-tariff barriers which are MORE stringent than those of the WTO in addition to requiring lower tariffs. Even though these agreements reduce a country's policy space to choose their optimal trade policy (and trade policy is a very important tool for development - virtually all developed countries used these now forbidden non-tariff barriers to build their own manufacturing base), they provide better than market access to the other country than can be achieved through the WTO. This makes bilateral\/multilateral trade agreements attractive even though it may hurt a country's ability to protect and nurture its own industries.  See: Kenneth C. Shadlen (2005). Exchanging development for market access? Deep integration and industrial policy under multilateral and bilateral trade agreements. Review of International Political Economy, Vol. 12 (5).    http:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/09692290500339685#.Uh4Cx2RNZsw","human_ref_B":"The WTO and the enforcement mechanism through the dispute settlement mechanism was created following the Uruguay Round. The current institutional mechanism only address this multilateral negotiations. Free trade agreements such as Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), ASEAN-Austrialia Free Trade Agreement (AAFTA) and the Australian-US Free Trade Agreement (AUSFTA) are considered WTO Plus Agreements.  Over the last half decade or so, the next round of trade negotiations (Doha Round) has stalled. The Doha Round was set to further liberalize the trade in services and establish stronger intellectual property protection. Given the failure to reach consensus with Doha, state have gone out and entered into agreements that meet their specific trade priorities and objectives that may surpass or counter Doha.    These agreements may also establish their own dispute settlements or, if I remember correctly, be \"registered\" with the WTO for enforcement purposes.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4294.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1nfe87","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"How do you 'Choose a Model?' I'm taking an economics course where we're to write an empirical paper.   So as an example, I'm thinking about studying the effects of the ASEAN free trade agreement on the 'standards of living' on the general population. I know some of the data I want: GDP\/capita pre&post agreement, unemployment rates pre&post agreement, gini coefficients p&p, and purchasing parity: how much could a unit of currency purchase pre& post agreement.  But how do social scientists know where to go? What do I do with all this data? If I want to look at the changes in Malaysia's GDP\/capita over through 20 years, do I compare that against a neighboring non-ASEAN country? Do I compare changes between other ASEAN countries? Should I just feed my data through a pre-existing model (like the Solow model)? I'm lost where to go from here. Any help is appreciated.","c_root_id_A":"cci75ir","c_root_id_B":"cci5yzb","created_at_utc_A":1380552822,"created_at_utc_B":1380548491,"score_A":11,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Maybe this isn't saying much, but generally you want it to be:  * parsimonious (just the main variables, keep the frilly crap to a minimum)  * supported by theory (or better yet, have rival models that are supported by different theories, that way you'll be able to chose which one tells the best story)  * answering the main questions you want to look at (every model is actually telling a story... so...what story do you intend to tell)  * econometrically sound. This part can get very detailed if you let it. make sure to quote your textbook as faithfully as possible.","human_ref_B":"Study the data carefully for what you have, region by region, country by country to see if you can easily see any significant differences in those participant countries and non-participants. This will help in identifying if there are truly differences between areas that are attributable to the ASEAN agreement or not.   For the model, it would be a good idea to check first and see if the data support any existing economic growth model (check assumptions, etc), check to see what the current literature says, and then work to extend the model if time permits.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4331.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"1nizo8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.8,"history":"In retrospect - how accurate were long-term demography projections in the past?","c_root_id_A":"ccj46ng","c_root_id_B":"ccj3xlf","created_at_utc_A":1380663039,"created_at_utc_B":1380662361,"score_A":13,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I know the US census bureau's old projections weren't accurate at all. I was planning on linking you to some stuff from a couple from old Census Statistical Abstracts but census.gov is down with the shutdown.  edit: Dug up some on Google Books. [Here's] (http:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=qe0bAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA1&lpg=PA1&dq=census+bureau+population+projections+1950s+abstracts&source=bl&ots=BryNUxqWzZ&sig=3wjHqGTyVrJyDjk4BXrlySLQcHw&hl=en&sa=X&ei=SD5LUr_YEbG14AORpIG4Dg&ved=0CE4Q6AEwBTgK#v=onepage&q=census%20bureau%20population%20projections%201950s%20abstracts&f=false) a recent one from 1988 that's horribly inaccurate even on a timescale of just 20  years. They predicted 282 million people by 2010 and it's actually closer to 310 million.  edit 2: [Here's] (http:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=9R9qqJHSVd4C&pg=PP2&dq=census+abstract+projection&hl=en&sa=X&ei=f0BLUvDHMLGy4APu_IC4BA&ved=0CEcQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=census%20abstract%20projection&f=false) an interesting, if dated, paper on the subject that happened to turn up while looking for the abstracts on Google.","human_ref_B":"I think a classic example would be Malthus's predictions, which coined the term \"the dismal science\" for economics. Malthus predicted the population growth will always outstrip food production therefore binding the vast majority of the world at a subsistence level.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":678.0,"score_ratio":2.6}
{"post_id":"l588b","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How much foreign debt does the US own? (x-post from r\/AskReddit) I'm having a hard time figuring out how much is owed TO the US, or owned domestically. I know it is not 0, and I'm not asking about our foreign debt here. It seems that the answer isn't so straightforward, but any insight is appreciated","c_root_id_A":"c2pxhxw","c_root_id_B":"c2pxdnp","created_at_utc_A":1318114074,"created_at_utc_B":1318112997,"score_A":11,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I hope you appreciate this, because it took me about an hour to find it.  http:\/\/www.treasury.gov\/resource-center\/data-chart-center\/tic\/Pages\/fpis.aspx#usclaims  http:\/\/www.treasury.gov\/resource-center\/data-chart-center\/tic\/Pages\/ticsec.aspx","human_ref_B":"It depends on (a) what you define as \"debt\", (b) what you define as \"foreign\", and (c) what you define as \"owned by the U.S.\". As with most macro-level statistics, the devil is in the definitions.  In any case, the balance of payments tables on the BEA website are a good place to start.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1077.0,"score_ratio":3.6666666667}
{"post_id":"4k1qy2","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Are patents good or bad for innovation? The way I see it: What better way to create the best solution than to allow anyone to improve on it? How can an idea be linked to one person - a lot of people get the same ideas.. Why do people feel such ownership of ideas, when it's just a random thought that didn't take much effort?","c_root_id_A":"d3bjkjo","c_root_id_B":"d3cg8oy","created_at_utc_A":1463664342,"created_at_utc_B":1463711250,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Former patent examiner here.   Regarding best solutions, anyone is free to file patents for improvements or new applications of currently patented technology, even technology they haven't been explicitly allowed to use.  While they wouldn't be free to practice their invention due to reliance on other patented technology, they could prevent the owners of the original technology from adopting their improvement.  Ideally, this leads to a negotiation of a licensing deal between the company that owns the original technology and the company that owns the improvement.  Edit: This paper which I found through the wiki on cross-licensing, provides an example. Hon hai was a company being excluded from the EMS industry. They ramped up their patent filings to cover improvements on the technology, and were able to parlay this into a cross-licensing deal.  Regarding multiple independent inventors, while many people can conceive of an idea at once, the right is only conferred to a person or group of people that takes the trouble to \"disclose\" the idea to the general public. In essence, the right is conferred because the filing inventor taught the public about their technology, which is more important than simply inventing a technology. If someone came up with the idea first, they do have ways to challenge the validity of a granted patent in court if they can prove that they conceived of the idea in sufficient detail at an earlier date. This is however, a painful process.  Alternatively, there is a process called interference Whig is also.very expensive and painful, wherein two similar pending patent applications have a fight over who invented something first. I don't know how much this has changed since the US switched to a \"first to file\" system though.  Edit: The US moved to a first to file system only a few years ago. Previously, we were on a \"first-to-invent\" system. The linked article is an old duke law review article, explaining the pros and cons of the US first to invent system.  Since then we've implemented a first to file system, as of 2012 or so. Having trouble finding a scholarly article speaking directly to the moral benefit of first to file however.  Thirdly, you are underestimating the complexity, expense, time, and labor required to develop a viable technology in such a way that the description of that technology would enable one of ordinary skill in the art to practice an innovation. (Having said that, there are exceptions, both in the simplicity of some patented ideas, and in the existence of overly broad patents that slip through the cracks. These tend to be the ones that make the news rather than the usual, highly specific, and properly limited patents that make up the bulk of issued patents.)  Edit: This paper shows regression models for the correlation between R&D expenditure and patent applications. While it varies between countries, the basic formulas are showing that R&D is linearly proportional to patent filings, and the constants show that the expense per patent is between 1 and 10 million spent on business focused R&D in the countries they checked.","human_ref_B":"I'll copy and paste something I wrote a couple days ago:  We're still trying to figure out exactly how intellectual property rights matter.  Like anything in economics,  it seems like there isn't really going to be one answer.  Instead it's going to depend on the particulars of the industry itself.    Looking at a more aggregate level the evidence that patents support innovation is complicated.  Qian(2007)  finds no evidence that patents alone increase innovation but does  find evidence that patents increase innovation when paired with things like education and economic freedom.   Aghion  et al. (2015) find some evidence that patents when combined with a suitable level of  competion can increase innovation.  There's also this newish AER paper that I haven't read yet that finds evidence that stronger pharmaceutical patents lead to better drug availability.   I'd say over all cross country comparisons haven't been very clear.   That said Budish, Rodin and Williams(2015) have a really cool paper looking at, among other things, how firms research varies with patent length by looking at drug development in cancer research.  The idea is that to get a drug to market you have to first get it through clinical trials and show that it is effective.    For cancer this means that you need to show that it improves survival rates, which involves giving a bunch of people your drug and waiting long enough to see if average mortality changes.   Thus trials for more lethal diseases can be conducted faster because people tend to die faster.  Since your patent starts at the beginning of your clinical trial  the faster you can get your drug to market the longer you can sell under a patent enforce monopoly.  Budish et al. use this variation and find that more lethal diseases with longer effective patents get more research.  Which means that patents work as we think they do.  By offering monopoly profits they support innovation and the longer the patent length the more innovation you get.    There's also a growing consensus that patents in some cases can hurt innovation if they are too strong.   If I need to rely on an invention in the past to make something today patents can make this sort of innovation harder by forcing me to negotiate with patent holders of inventions that I want to use to make my product.  There's a new wave of empirical papers that find evidence that these barriers exist and matter.    Probably the most famous of these is Williams(2013)  that found that genes that were first licensed by a private pharmaceutical company where less likely to see have research down on them and to have products make it to market.  There's also Galasso and Schankerman(2016) who exploit the random assignment of patents to judges to find that patents assigned to judges who had a history of striking down patents saw more innovation.  Lastly there's Murray et al. work on licenses for  mice research.  That found that easier licensing  of a certain type of mice model lead to an increase in research.  Overall I'd say there tends to a consensus that patents have a clear benefit of giving companies an incentive to innovate.  But that they also tend to impose some costs on follow up innovation.   Which effect dominates is still an open question and will probably vary by industry.  There's a bit of a feeling now that software patents are to strong and bio patents too weak but it's hard to actually do a full benefit cost analysis.   For further reading, there's two good JEPs on this stuff.  Scotchmer (1991)  is the classic article on the economics of follow up innovation.  Boldrin and Levine(2013) have a good write up of the case against patents.  There's also a good NBER round up on patents.  Lastly A Fine Theorem blogs about this stuff frequently.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":46908.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1wdami","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"Suggestions to record telephone interviews? I will soon be starting to conduct in depth research interviews over the phone, and I'm looking for a reliable method of recording them (They'll be asked for informed consent).  I have an android phone, but it seems many of the call recording apps are spotty at best. The best option I've come up with so far is to use the recording feature from freeconferencecall.com. The only downside is that my interviewees will need to call in to the conference call themselves.  Does anyone have any suggestions from projects you've done?  Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cf0xi9y","c_root_id_B":"cf115ie","created_at_utc_A":1390921252,"created_at_utc_B":1390929884,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"There is no good solution to recording calls from a cell phone. There are hardware based limitations on cell phone (iPhone for sure, I'm not sure about android) that prevent apps from recording calls and like you said, having interviewees call into a number is less than ideal.   Using Skype is a popular option. I used Call Recorder, a Skype Plugin that saves calls as MP3s or MPEGs. The sound quality is lower than a regular phone call, but it's good enough for transcription as long as you have a good microphone set up for your computer.   The other tried and true method is just to use the speakerphone and a regular recorder near by. Sound quality suffers, but it's the least complicated and less likely to fail.","human_ref_B":"Do you need to hear your end of the interview or just the respondents? If the latter, use an audio splitter. Run one cable to your headphones and another cable to the mic input on an MP3 sound recorder.   Edit: Oh! I just thought of something else I forgot. Google Voice can record phone calls made through your phone. Just press 4 on the dial pad and it starts recording. You can then extract the audio from your desktop. You can set it up on any phone.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8632.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2g35pz","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Books on comparative economic theory? I'm a student looking for book recommendations comparing different economic theories\/paradigms in detail? Orthodox or hetrodox (or orthodox and hetrodox!). Anything comparing models, fundamental categories, value theory, strengths\/weaknesses etc.","c_root_id_A":"ckf9uw3","c_root_id_B":"ckf87f9","created_at_utc_A":1410439964,"created_at_utc_B":1410433503,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"\/u\/Integralds has recommended Snowden and Vane. I worked through about half of i over Christmas last year.","human_ref_B":"*Contending Economic Theories* by Richard Wolff and Stephen Resnick is worth checking out. It walks through brief histories and the ideologies of classical\/neoclassical, Keynesian, Marxian, and Late Neoclassical theories.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":6461.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2a9knb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Is Freakonomics a good introduction into economics? I recently bought a university economics text book off the internet (*Principles of Microeconomics*, second edition, by *N. G. Mankiw*) based on the recommended reading list at \/r\/economics and elsewhere, but I also bumped into a copy of Freakonomics at a used book shop for a good price. At the very least it will make a nice gift or coffee table book, but I'm wondering if it'll soften the blow of delving right into 'proper' economics. I'm not a student of the dicipline and I don't intend to be, but I am heading to be either a Politics or history student at university, and am currently doing A-level German, History, Politics and Philosophy so it'll be a worthy and not entirely alien supplement of knowledge.   TL;DR: bought heavy econ text book, worried it's going to be too hard to understand.   * Should I read a more casual book to ease me first?   * Would Freakonomics be a good stand alone book even without intending to delve in further?  * Would it be good reading even if you *have* read further?","c_root_id_A":"cisztxz","c_root_id_B":"cisxfh4","created_at_utc_A":1404947122,"created_at_utc_B":1404942344,"score_A":17,"score_B":11,"human_ref_A":"Freakonomics is not a good introduction to economic thinking. It is a good standalone book, but it won't teach you economics at all. It is a series of vignettes where economics is applied to different situations. Some parts of Freakonomics are based on solid published research that tries to tease out causation. It is not merely a bunch of correlational studies.   Mankiw's principles of micro (any edition) is an easy read and a good introduction to economics. I have used it at a variety of schools, ranked ~100 to ~1. Students enjoy and understand it at every institution.   I second other people here in suggesting Landsburg's Armchair Economist. I also really enjoyed Hidden Order by David Friedman. Both of these books are much more 'economics of everyday life' than Freakonomics.","human_ref_B":"Freakonomics is generally regarded as having high entertainment value and some general economic thinking value but little to no actual academic value, but its fun to read, just be sure to take everything with a grain of salt. A lot of conflation between causation and correlation. Essentially they try to draw connections between things and point out a single cause for some result, when in reality everything in the real world is almost assuredly the result of many smaller causes and you cant just point the finger at a single cause","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4778.0,"score_ratio":1.5454545455}
{"post_id":"2a9knb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Is Freakonomics a good introduction into economics? I recently bought a university economics text book off the internet (*Principles of Microeconomics*, second edition, by *N. G. Mankiw*) based on the recommended reading list at \/r\/economics and elsewhere, but I also bumped into a copy of Freakonomics at a used book shop for a good price. At the very least it will make a nice gift or coffee table book, but I'm wondering if it'll soften the blow of delving right into 'proper' economics. I'm not a student of the dicipline and I don't intend to be, but I am heading to be either a Politics or history student at university, and am currently doing A-level German, History, Politics and Philosophy so it'll be a worthy and not entirely alien supplement of knowledge.   TL;DR: bought heavy econ text book, worried it's going to be too hard to understand.   * Should I read a more casual book to ease me first?   * Would Freakonomics be a good stand alone book even without intending to delve in further?  * Would it be good reading even if you *have* read further?","c_root_id_A":"cisztxz","c_root_id_B":"cisvkvc","created_at_utc_A":1404947122,"created_at_utc_B":1404938772,"score_A":17,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Freakonomics is not a good introduction to economic thinking. It is a good standalone book, but it won't teach you economics at all. It is a series of vignettes where economics is applied to different situations. Some parts of Freakonomics are based on solid published research that tries to tease out causation. It is not merely a bunch of correlational studies.   Mankiw's principles of micro (any edition) is an easy read and a good introduction to economics. I have used it at a variety of schools, ranked ~100 to ~1. Students enjoy and understand it at every institution.   I second other people here in suggesting Landsburg's Armchair Economist. I also really enjoyed Hidden Order by David Friedman. Both of these books are much more 'economics of everyday life' than Freakonomics.","human_ref_B":"It is a good read (as well as all of their other books), but be cautious in blindly accepting for fact some of the connections that they present. It is the old correlation versus causation argument that gets easily misinterpreted by many in this situation.   \/u\/wellmanicuredman makes good suggestions in reading both, as well as The Undercover Economist.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8350.0,"score_ratio":4.25}
{"post_id":"2a9knb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Is Freakonomics a good introduction into economics? I recently bought a university economics text book off the internet (*Principles of Microeconomics*, second edition, by *N. G. Mankiw*) based on the recommended reading list at \/r\/economics and elsewhere, but I also bumped into a copy of Freakonomics at a used book shop for a good price. At the very least it will make a nice gift or coffee table book, but I'm wondering if it'll soften the blow of delving right into 'proper' economics. I'm not a student of the dicipline and I don't intend to be, but I am heading to be either a Politics or history student at university, and am currently doing A-level German, History, Politics and Philosophy so it'll be a worthy and not entirely alien supplement of knowledge.   TL;DR: bought heavy econ text book, worried it's going to be too hard to understand.   * Should I read a more casual book to ease me first?   * Would Freakonomics be a good stand alone book even without intending to delve in further?  * Would it be good reading even if you *have* read further?","c_root_id_A":"cisxfh4","c_root_id_B":"cisvkvc","created_at_utc_A":1404942344,"created_at_utc_B":1404938772,"score_A":11,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Freakonomics is generally regarded as having high entertainment value and some general economic thinking value but little to no actual academic value, but its fun to read, just be sure to take everything with a grain of salt. A lot of conflation between causation and correlation. Essentially they try to draw connections between things and point out a single cause for some result, when in reality everything in the real world is almost assuredly the result of many smaller causes and you cant just point the finger at a single cause","human_ref_B":"It is a good read (as well as all of their other books), but be cautious in blindly accepting for fact some of the connections that they present. It is the old correlation versus causation argument that gets easily misinterpreted by many in this situation.   \/u\/wellmanicuredman makes good suggestions in reading both, as well as The Undercover Economist.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3572.0,"score_ratio":2.75}
{"post_id":"11fywf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Could the USPS provide high-speed fiber Internet at a reasonable cost? Not sure if this the correct subreddit for a discussion of this idea. Today I learned about the Postal Clause in the Constitution. The Postal Clause was added to the Constitution primarily to facilitate interstate communication, as well as to create a source of revenue for the US.    It seems to me that a liberal interpretation of this clause could mandate the USPS provides fiber or some other wireless technology to enable high speed Internet to the entire nation at a reasonable cost. Think how it costs 46\u00a2 to send a letter and $41 for that same envelope via FedEx. Maybe we could get +100Mbps for $10 p\/m? And save the institution of the USPS to boot. However, laws would need to be written preventing the government interfering with the content  on the fiber... What say you? Would Congress ever allow a infrastructure spending project like this to be run by the USPS?","c_root_id_A":"c6m579n","c_root_id_B":"c6m6woq","created_at_utc_A":1350186872,"created_at_utc_B":1350194768,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Although it would accomplish the same goal, it would require entirely different expertise. The people at the top know nothing about IT deployment, the people at the bottom are not technicians.   And, despite it's lessened role, someone still needs to carry the mail. I think government sponsored, coast to coast Fiber would be a great investment, but we're not going to do it because *Socialism*. Even if we did, the PO would not be the entity to carry it out.","human_ref_B":"considering that it can't even provide mail at a reasonable cost, I doubt it.  >Think how it costs 46\u00a2 to send a letter and $41 for that same envelope via FedEx.  this is not accurate.  first, it costs a lot more to send that letter than 46 cents.  the post office is losing money by the billions.  Second, fedex sends that letter overnight.  the post office will take a week to get it to its location.  time is money, and all that.  Third, fedex is prohibited by law from offering regular mail service, which is why it is set up the way it is, and why it is relatively expensive to send letters through it.  If it was allowed to do mail service, it would set that up differently and have a different cost structure.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7896.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"ljelt","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.91,"history":"Black or African-American? Which is better to use in academic settings?","c_root_id_A":"c2t6ie4","c_root_id_B":"c2t627p","created_at_utc_A":1319164794,"created_at_utc_B":1319161450,"score_A":18,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"African American describes Africans who now live in America.  Black describes black people, including the above, and also South Americans in the United States, Africans and Africa, and any combination of any race of people who are black and their current geographical location.  It really shouldn't be hard to grasp the correct use of these terms, and I feel bad for people who are afraid of saying \"black.\"  One describes black people of any race, region, or culture. The other is an extremely specific description of persons from Africa who now are located in America.","human_ref_B":"Depends on the context.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3344.0,"score_ratio":3.6}
{"post_id":"ue9x6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"How does US nuclear policy make sense? Sorry if I come off as really ignorant. I mostly just read the news, so I'm lacking a lot of analysis background.  Basically, I can see how it's in the USA's best interest to stop unallied nations from getting nuclear arms. However, how does this make international sense? How can you justify pressuring a country to drop nuclear ambitions while carrying the world's largest nuclear arsenal and missile system?   Thanks guys, and if you guys have good analysts or authors to recommend me, I'd really appreciate that!","c_root_id_A":"c4uq9j0","c_root_id_B":"c4uohvj","created_at_utc_A":1338506360,"created_at_utc_B":1338498351,"score_A":7,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I'm really disappointed this question isn't getting a more serious response, so I'm going to take a stab at it.  The nuclear weapons policy of the United States (and, indeed, of all nuclear powers) is predicated on a concept known as Mutually Assured Destruction. Basically, the idea is that nuclear weapons can serve as a powerful deterrent without actually being used. The Cold War is a classic example: the USA and the USSR both had access to enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world many times over, and it is for that reason that these weapons were never utilized.  But the principles of MAD fall apart if any party is behaving in a fundamentally irrational fashion. When you see the horrible starvation and oppression in North Korea, it's hard to argue that the regime implementing those policies is behaving rationally. When you hear statements by Iran's president about wanting to wipe Israel off the face of the earth, it's hard to argue that's a rational statement. When you hear about Islamic fundamentalists engaging in suicide attacks, it's hard to argue that they are rational actors.  Whether these regimes and actors would actually behave as recklessly with nuclear weapons as some of their statements suggest is up for debate. The fact of the matter is as long as the American public believes this is the case, it is politically untenable for policymakers to allow those states to gain nuclear weapons. Therefore, their policies are generally geared towards nuclear non-proliferation - despite the fact that the US and its allies have substantial nuclear weapons stockpiles.  Hope that helps.","human_ref_B":"Here.  The simplest answer is that the USA, right or wrong, developed them and used them on Imperial Japan.  The proliferation of nuclear arms after that, between the USSR and the USA, fundamentally changed the geopolitical landscape to be haves and have nots regarding nuclear weapons.  The nuclear armed nations have *intense* interests in making sure non-armed nations do not get nuclear weapons for lots of reasons (see link) and as such negotiate with those nations to pass on ownership with a carrot\/stick model.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8009.0,"score_ratio":1.4}
{"post_id":"ue9x6","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"How does US nuclear policy make sense? Sorry if I come off as really ignorant. I mostly just read the news, so I'm lacking a lot of analysis background.  Basically, I can see how it's in the USA's best interest to stop unallied nations from getting nuclear arms. However, how does this make international sense? How can you justify pressuring a country to drop nuclear ambitions while carrying the world's largest nuclear arsenal and missile system?   Thanks guys, and if you guys have good analysts or authors to recommend me, I'd really appreciate that!","c_root_id_A":"c4uprdy","c_root_id_B":"c4uq9j0","created_at_utc_A":1338504015,"created_at_utc_B":1338506360,"score_A":2,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"It is, by the way, not just the United States, and not just non-allied nations. The major nuclear nations of the world (US, France, UK, Russia, China) all would prefer not to have any other nuclear powers, regardless of whether they are allies of ours or not. We just often disagree about how to enforce the NPT.","human_ref_B":"I'm really disappointed this question isn't getting a more serious response, so I'm going to take a stab at it.  The nuclear weapons policy of the United States (and, indeed, of all nuclear powers) is predicated on a concept known as Mutually Assured Destruction. Basically, the idea is that nuclear weapons can serve as a powerful deterrent without actually being used. The Cold War is a classic example: the USA and the USSR both had access to enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world many times over, and it is for that reason that these weapons were never utilized.  But the principles of MAD fall apart if any party is behaving in a fundamentally irrational fashion. When you see the horrible starvation and oppression in North Korea, it's hard to argue that the regime implementing those policies is behaving rationally. When you hear statements by Iran's president about wanting to wipe Israel off the face of the earth, it's hard to argue that's a rational statement. When you hear about Islamic fundamentalists engaging in suicide attacks, it's hard to argue that they are rational actors.  Whether these regimes and actors would actually behave as recklessly with nuclear weapons as some of their statements suggest is up for debate. The fact of the matter is as long as the American public believes this is the case, it is politically untenable for policymakers to allow those states to gain nuclear weapons. Therefore, their policies are generally geared towards nuclear non-proliferation - despite the fact that the US and its allies have substantial nuclear weapons stockpiles.  Hope that helps.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2345.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"13gre5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"Are humans\/primates pre-disposed to hierarchy? Arguing with internet communists is a favorite past time of mine, and the concept of hierarchy being \"natural\" or even beneficial in an evolutionary sense comes up from time to time.  Can we make these claims?  Is there evidence?","c_root_id_A":"c73vxup","c_root_id_B":"c73uvh3","created_at_utc_A":1353363405,"created_at_utc_B":1353359890,"score_A":12,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"One of the basic coarse grained features of pretty much all Complex Adaptive Systems is that they form branching hierarchal networks. You see this as a basic structure of almost any system from food webs, to social networks, to vascular systems, to trees, to mycelia, even Deleuze's famous rhizome is a branching hierarchy at certain scales. Allometric scaling laws are everywhere in natural and you see the same basic structures in human organizational systems. To imagine this think of a river system where tiny rivulets form into streams which form into brooks which form into streams and river and finally the main river channel that flows to the ocean.   Most human social behaviour can be characterized by the structures you see over and over again in natural systems. It forms long tail distributions based on power laws. It emerges through the interaction of emergent behaviour in networks. Complexity arises to solve problems or design greater access for flows of goods, information, people or energy against resistive surfaces. If you consider a city as a naturally evolving human system you see the same allometric scaling but at a different constant.   So in a sense you can say that since human social systems are natural systems they tend to evolve in the same ways as natural systems, through branching hierarchal networks. Why? Because that's what seems to be the most effective way to scale a network.   If you are wondering about coercive hierarchy that's a bigger question but structural hierarchy as a branching network that connects to larger and larger channels until there is a single central channel seems to be pretty fundamental to all natural and evolving systems.   I know there's some Santa Fe institute research going on about the emergence of the state that is probably a bit less hand wavy than this post but in broad strokes egalitarian human social systems tend to only really occur at small scales.","human_ref_B":"In very broad brush strokes: in Marxian thought, hierarchy emerges out of the division of labor.  So from a gendered division of labor in pre-agrarian societies to the very complex division of labor and linear dominance\/social hierarchies we have in late capitalist societies.    A cursory google search is likely to find a lot of information on how prevalent various forms of hierarchy are among social animals.  Unfortunately the wikipedia article on dominance hierarchies is not well cited.    The distinction here is that humans can become aware of and investigate the various kinds of hierarchies we form.  We are not with out choice or agency.  It is not as if we are helplessly enslaved to a deterministic biology.  Even irrefutable empirical evidence that certain kinds of hierarchy were important or even vital to our evolution over the last 75,000 years, wouldn't translate to saying that those same kinds of hierarchies are socially beneficial today.    In short, we can decide and make rational decisions about whether certain kinds of hierarchy are beneficial or not.  Some anti-authoritarians may argue that all hierarchy is inherently unbeneficial.  Other leftists may see the benefit in certain kinds of hierarchy (Lenin and the vanguard of the proletariat).","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3515.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"13gre5","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"Are humans\/primates pre-disposed to hierarchy? Arguing with internet communists is a favorite past time of mine, and the concept of hierarchy being \"natural\" or even beneficial in an evolutionary sense comes up from time to time.  Can we make these claims?  Is there evidence?","c_root_id_A":"c73uvh3","c_root_id_B":"c73x2s6","created_at_utc_A":1353359890,"created_at_utc_B":1353367374,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"In very broad brush strokes: in Marxian thought, hierarchy emerges out of the division of labor.  So from a gendered division of labor in pre-agrarian societies to the very complex division of labor and linear dominance\/social hierarchies we have in late capitalist societies.    A cursory google search is likely to find a lot of information on how prevalent various forms of hierarchy are among social animals.  Unfortunately the wikipedia article on dominance hierarchies is not well cited.    The distinction here is that humans can become aware of and investigate the various kinds of hierarchies we form.  We are not with out choice or agency.  It is not as if we are helplessly enslaved to a deterministic biology.  Even irrefutable empirical evidence that certain kinds of hierarchy were important or even vital to our evolution over the last 75,000 years, wouldn't translate to saying that those same kinds of hierarchies are socially beneficial today.    In short, we can decide and make rational decisions about whether certain kinds of hierarchy are beneficial or not.  Some anti-authoritarians may argue that all hierarchy is inherently unbeneficial.  Other leftists may see the benefit in certain kinds of hierarchy (Lenin and the vanguard of the proletariat).","human_ref_B":"In primates, some species are hierarchal others are egalitarian. It depends on resources and food distribution. It is also worth noting that in many cases its the females, not the males that form stable long-term hierarchies. This is because in many primate groups the females are philopatric - meaning females stay within their natal groups and the male leave once they reach sexual maturity.  Ranks can be put into two broad categories - through kin lines or birth order. I.E. daughters inherit the ranks of their mothers or older females have higher ranks then younger females.   It's worth noting that the variation in social groupings, strength of hierarchies or even their existence varies incredibly within the primate order and are unlikely to give you any clear answer as to how this effects human pre-disposition to hierarchy ourselves.  We are particularly tricky because we have very complex culture which tends to muddle up what we would expect given what we observe in other primate species.  If you want to know more about other primates I would be happy to answer but seems to me you wanted to see if they correlated with us.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7484.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"15j4zr","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":1.0,"history":"What have been the main obstacles to UN Security Council Reform? It seems to me that the UN Security Council is outdated and does not accurately reflect the current military or political powers in the world. Countries like Brazil, India, Indonesia and the entire continent of Africa do not have permanent representation while Europe is overrepresented. Have there ever been concrete votes taken to reform the Security Council? If so what has stopped reform from happening? Hypothetically, through what procedure could reform take place (for instance, a general assembly vote?) ?","c_root_id_A":"c7mz9m9","c_root_id_B":"c7mwt56","created_at_utc_A":1356645934,"created_at_utc_B":1356637395,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Veto power of the P5 is what has stopped reform from happening.  The Economist has written about this subject frequently. The argument of \"if France has a P5 seat\/veto then why not X?\" betrays the reality that military power today is probably more concentrated than in 1945. Given how powerful the US is militarily (40% of world military spending, more than the next 20 countries combined), a \"give a veto to the powerful countries\" implementation today would result in one veto: the USA. Since any such solution would result in removing veto power from other countries, they would veto it. Expanding the security council non permanent membership (as happened in 1965) could happen again. Handing out more vetoes or allowing a supermajority to override a veto would dilute the power of the existing vetoes - so that gets vetoed.  http:\/\/www.economist.com\/node\/4064932  http:\/\/www.economist.com\/node\/17463443  Reform needs 2\/3 general assembly majority plus no veto from the P5. Short of a global war with very different winners or a smaller but cataclysmic war (e.g. India\/Pakistan nuclear war) exacerbated by SC intransigence or inflexibility, I can't imagine a peaceful reform that would remove a veto from a P5 or give out new vetoes.","human_ref_B":"The answer is simple: the five permanent members of the UNSC (United States, United Kingdom, France, Russia, and China) all have veto power over changing the voting structure of the institution. More veto powers is bad for the current veto powers, so any attempt to add more permanent members will be vetoed.  Maybe this will change if there is an absolutely ridiculous level power discrepancy, at which point the UNSC would have no sense of legitimacy. But we are no where near that point. Thus, the UNSC stays as it is.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8539.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2n93yg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Why are certain ethnic groups seemingly over-represented in porn? First, I ask this here because I hope for this question not to just turn into a disaster.  Second, I'm not talking about ethnic-oriented porn (like black porn, Asian porn, etc.) or some comparison between or with other genres. I mean why, for example, does there seem to be an increase in Eastern European women in mainstream online or American-produced porn? Or why does \"Asian\" porn predominantly feature Japanese and Thai women when they represent less than less than 6% of the population of South East Asia and East Asia combined (I actually looked it up)?   Is it economics? Economies with poor job opportunities versus the wages that can be earned in a globalized internet porn marketplace?   Is it cultural? Lower stigma makes choosing commercial sex work easier.  Is it the internet-ification of already large commercial sex worker populations?   What can explain the extreme outliers of certain ethnic groups in porn?  [And my apologies if I'm using the incorrect terms, this is not my area of expertise... well, porn maybe, not social sciences.]","c_root_id_A":"cmbkf5j","c_root_id_B":"cmbk6tq","created_at_utc_A":1416838356,"created_at_utc_B":1416837663,"score_A":12,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Note that producing and distributing porn is illegal in India. This partly explains why Indians would be underrepresented in Asian porn.  Here's some pornhub data on Indian porn-watching habits, it's only remotely relevant, but shows that two of the 3 most popular pornstars [according to pornhub searchs] in India, Prya Rai and Sunny Leone, while ethnic Indians, work in America.  By contrast, the Japanese almost only \"consume\" porn made in Japan. [citation needed, but I'm feeling pretty confident of that statement]","human_ref_B":"Can you backup your statement \"an increase in Eastern European women\" with any data or cite any statistics that shows certain ethnic groups are over-represented? Caused you used \"seemingly\" and \"seem to be\", maybe it's only your perception.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":693.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2n93yg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Why are certain ethnic groups seemingly over-represented in porn? First, I ask this here because I hope for this question not to just turn into a disaster.  Second, I'm not talking about ethnic-oriented porn (like black porn, Asian porn, etc.) or some comparison between or with other genres. I mean why, for example, does there seem to be an increase in Eastern European women in mainstream online or American-produced porn? Or why does \"Asian\" porn predominantly feature Japanese and Thai women when they represent less than less than 6% of the population of South East Asia and East Asia combined (I actually looked it up)?   Is it economics? Economies with poor job opportunities versus the wages that can be earned in a globalized internet porn marketplace?   Is it cultural? Lower stigma makes choosing commercial sex work easier.  Is it the internet-ification of already large commercial sex worker populations?   What can explain the extreme outliers of certain ethnic groups in porn?  [And my apologies if I'm using the incorrect terms, this is not my area of expertise... well, porn maybe, not social sciences.]","c_root_id_A":"cmbkf5j","c_root_id_B":"cmbjbnu","created_at_utc_A":1416838356,"created_at_utc_B":1416834641,"score_A":12,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Note that producing and distributing porn is illegal in India. This partly explains why Indians would be underrepresented in Asian porn.  Here's some pornhub data on Indian porn-watching habits, it's only remotely relevant, but shows that two of the 3 most popular pornstars [according to pornhub searchs] in India, Prya Rai and Sunny Leone, while ethnic Indians, work in America.  By contrast, the Japanese almost only \"consume\" porn made in Japan. [citation needed, but I'm feeling pretty confident of that statement]","human_ref_B":"If Asian porn does predominately feature Japanese and Thai women, I think we can rule out low economic opportunity as the factor. Japan is 25 on the Women's economic opportunity index. India is 98.   http:\/\/www.economist.com\/blogs\/graphicdetail\/2012\/03\/economic-opportunity-women","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3715.0,"score_ratio":6.0}
{"post_id":"2n93yg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Why are certain ethnic groups seemingly over-represented in porn? First, I ask this here because I hope for this question not to just turn into a disaster.  Second, I'm not talking about ethnic-oriented porn (like black porn, Asian porn, etc.) or some comparison between or with other genres. I mean why, for example, does there seem to be an increase in Eastern European women in mainstream online or American-produced porn? Or why does \"Asian\" porn predominantly feature Japanese and Thai women when they represent less than less than 6% of the population of South East Asia and East Asia combined (I actually looked it up)?   Is it economics? Economies with poor job opportunities versus the wages that can be earned in a globalized internet porn marketplace?   Is it cultural? Lower stigma makes choosing commercial sex work easier.  Is it the internet-ification of already large commercial sex worker populations?   What can explain the extreme outliers of certain ethnic groups in porn?  [And my apologies if I'm using the incorrect terms, this is not my area of expertise... well, porn maybe, not social sciences.]","c_root_id_A":"cmbk6tq","c_root_id_B":"cmbjbnu","created_at_utc_A":1416837663,"created_at_utc_B":1416834641,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Can you backup your statement \"an increase in Eastern European women\" with any data or cite any statistics that shows certain ethnic groups are over-represented? Caused you used \"seemingly\" and \"seem to be\", maybe it's only your perception.","human_ref_B":"If Asian porn does predominately feature Japanese and Thai women, I think we can rule out low economic opportunity as the factor. Japan is 25 on the Women's economic opportunity index. India is 98.   http:\/\/www.economist.com\/blogs\/graphicdetail\/2012\/03\/economic-opportunity-women","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3022.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"2ji4xi","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"Is leisure time a modern concept? Was there such thing as work-life balance when people weren't as busy as hell like today? Do hunter-gatherer societies know concept of leisure time?","c_root_id_A":"clc11a2","c_root_id_B":"clbyloj","created_at_utc_A":1413553285,"created_at_utc_B":1413544675,"score_A":27,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"Cross cultural studies indicate that hunter-gatherer societies where typified by much more social, gender and financial equality than their agricultural counterparts in addition to yielding more free time.  > Not only had hunter-gatherers enjoyed plenty of protein, not much fat and ample vitamins in their diet, but it also seems they did not have to work very hard. The Hadza of Tanzania \u201cwork\u201d about 14 hours a week, the !Kung of Botswana not much more.  It seems for most of our pre-industrial history we enjoyed shorter work hours and more holidays  >Consider a typical working day in the medieval period. It stretched from dawn to dusk (sixteen hours in summer and eight in winter), but, as the Bishop Pilkington has noted, work was intermittent - called to a halt for breakfast, lunch, the customary afternoon nap, and dinner. Depending on time and place, there were also midmorning and midafternoon refreshment breaks. These rest periods were the traditional rights of laborers, which they enjoyed even during peak harvest times. During slack periods, which accounted for a large part of the year, adherence to regular working hours was not usual. **According to Oxford Professor James E. Thorold Rogers[1], the medieval workday was not more than eight hours** ... The medieval calendar was filled with holidays. Official -- that is, church -- holidays included not only long \"vacations\" at Christmas, Easter, and midsummer but also numerous saints' and rest days. All told, holiday leisure time in medieval England took up probably about one-third of the year. And the English were apparently working harder than their neighbors. The ancien r\u00e8gime in France is reported to have guaranteed fifty-two Sundays, ninety rest days, and thirty-eight holidays. In Spain, travelers noted that holidays totaled five months per year.   Sources:  http:\/\/www.economist.com\/node\/10278703  http:\/\/groups.csail.mit.edu\/mac\/users\/rauch\/worktime\/hours_workweek.html","human_ref_B":"Hunter-gatherers spent a lot less time procuring food (about 15-20 hours a week) than people in agrarian societies. There, the amount of leisure time depended on wealth and rank -- nobles would obviously have more leisure time than people having to work for a living. But even farmers had time off -- especially during the winter, not so much during planting and harvest times, where everybody would be needed in the fields and orchards.   It's unclear, though, how much of that would've been leisure time in the modern sense ('sitting around doing nothing'), rather than 'sitting around telling stories and singing while still doing useful stuff' like spinning, weaving, knitting, repairing tools, mending clothes, weaving baskets etc. There was a strong tradition in rural Germany of girls gathering to spin during the winter though (while singing and telling stories), and when they were done with their quota for the day, the young men of the village would come by and play music, dance and generally have a good time for a while. The popularity of these gatherings declined after they got a bit too raucous to the point where they were banned and preached against in church for being places of sexual misconduct and general obscenity starting in the 16th century, but the tradition was alive and well until the early 20th century.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8610.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1g5mxj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"how do humans develop (non-sexual) desires? wondering where desire comes from - considering sociological, developmental, biological, emotional, spiritual factors that contribute to who we are as people. Specifically, any ideas about how adolescents develop desires (again, not sexual ones), would be so helpful!","c_root_id_A":"cagyu78","c_root_id_B":"cah2zfa","created_at_utc_A":1370993666,"created_at_utc_B":1371005007,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"I'm not sure I understand your question.  Are you asking why non-sexual desires become proxies for sexual desires or why people desire **anything** that isn't sex?","human_ref_B":"Are you perhaps asking how people develop aspirations beyond fulfilling biological needs?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":11341.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1bxfeg","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"Why does the body react so stressfully to telling a lie, even trivial ones like the questions they ask to calibrate a lie detector? I was watching this sports science clip of Daniel Negreanu (professional poker player) trying to play poker while strapped to a polygraph.  I understand why he gets stressed lying about his hand, but when calibrating the machine they ask him to lie about what he sees right in front of him. To me, the stressful part about lying is the fact that you're trying to cover something up or protect something important.  Do we just naturally feel really uncomfortable lying?","c_root_id_A":"c9b065z","c_root_id_B":"c9b0uro","created_at_utc_A":1365444171,"created_at_utc_B":1365445977,"score_A":22,"score_B":37,"human_ref_A":"Well, the problem is that it doesn't...reliably. I wish I had the time while at the office to search for my sources, but the meta-analysis (as well as some of the bigger single studies) show that a trained polygrapher only stands about a 60% chance of detecting a lie.  Now, let's remember, that's only 10% better than tossing a coin and being able to correctly guess heads or tails.  What is being tested is simply stress.  Let's say you are asked questions for a baseline about your name, address, etc.  These questions are usually highly unlikely to provide an emotional or physiological response.  Then, you are asked whether or not you recognize the dead woman in this crime scene photo, or asked if you've ever raped someone, etc.  These types of questions are very likely to provide a fair amount of physiological response because of the nature of the questions.  You can be called a liar because that picture disturbed you deeply or maybe because you were actually raped as a child and were recalling the troubling memories while answering that question.  In addition, there is a consistent running theme in polygraphy, that your body shows a response, even if you didn't lie, but actually didn't mention something because you had totally forgotten it happened!  For instance, you're asked if you've ever taken illegal drugs.  You say so, but the test shows an indication of lying.  You struggle and think about it for days or weeks on end, and then finally come to the conclusion that, oh yeah, you did try marijuana in high school 35 years ago.  Also troubling is that, based on word games or technicalities, polygraphers feel that they can phrase a question to weed out these word games or technicalities.  For instance, let's say you are on probation and are not allowed to drink alcohol.  You've been on probation almost three weeks and the polygrapher tells you he's going to ask if you've imbibed alcohol since you started probation.  You remember that you got drunk the day before you started probation and you tell him so.  He then asks something to the effect of, \"other than what you've told me, have you had alcohol in the last three weeks?\" or, \"have you imbibed alcohol in the last 20 days?\"  They feel that, because they added that tiny disclaimer or clarifying word(s), that now prevents them from getting any type of false positive.  The polygraph test is also highly likely to give false-positives.  This, for the innocent and truthful, is not so great.  Its use as a tool for interrogations can be great, but it's admissibility in a court setting isn't...depending on the jurisdiction. Some states\/countries outright forbid it's use\/admission as evidence.  The Supreme Court of the United States has disallowed its use as evidence in their court, but allows the states to determine the usage at that level on their own.","human_ref_B":"Your question includes a false premise; that polygraphs are effective. They aren't.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1806.0,"score_ratio":1.6818181818}
{"post_id":"ropuq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"Economics- How does unemployment act as a check on  inflation? According to the idea of the \"Non-Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment\", there is a point where the unemployment level is so low that inflation rises. How does unemployment have anything to do with inflation? I've tried reading through the Wikipedia entry, as well as many other sites, and it just doesn't make sense to me that unemployment would have any effect on inflation.  Additionally, what is that level of unemployment where inflation rises? Does that mean that unemployment, more so than people between jobs or just entering the workforce, is an element of market economies that exists by design?","c_root_id_A":"c47fyjw","c_root_id_B":"c47gfgs","created_at_utc_A":1333329768,"created_at_utc_B":1333332720,"score_A":3,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"problem is, if an economy has a very low level of unemployment, economic growth would imply a shift of the demand (more work demanded) that would increase the salary (if almost everyone is already employed, firms would need to offer more money to get the new people working), which would in term increase the cost of production and, given constant returns to the firms, and increase in the prices.  tl;dr more labor demand > higher salary > higher cost of production > higher prices  (for those who will also answer: am I right, or I'm missing a piece in this puzzle?)","human_ref_B":"Economist here. luiggi_oasis has the general intuition for the phenomenon right, but modern economists generally think there is much more to both the inflation and unemployment picture than the Phillips curve (or the concept of NAIRU).  However, the concept of a \"Natural Rate of Unemployment\" has been around for quite some time and has a strong grounding in economic theory.   The basic intuition goes like this: Even when the economy is in equilibrium, there are a certain number of people in every time period that are separated from their jobs. Perhaps they are poorly matched with their employers, perhaps they wish to move locations -- there are a number of reasons this could be true, and different models incorporate different sources of employment match destruction. Though there are jobs available for these newly unemployed people, it takes time for the employer and employee to find each other and agree on terms.   Therefore, there is a certain amount of unemployment caused merely by the \"churning\" of workers between employers.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2952.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"5m42o0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the essential papers\/works for an econ student? I am an undergrad econ student trying to expand my knowledge outside of the classrooms, so I am looking for papers and works that are considered \"essential\" to the field.  As to what degree of complexity I can (or I'm supposed to) handle, I have worked with basic DSGE models (RBC, Cash in Advance, very basic optimal monetary and fiscal policy) and intermediate econometrics and game theory.  (In the upcoming semester I will study growth macro models (Solow, Romer, etc.), international trade theory, and macro and finance theory, so I expect I will be able to handle something of that area in the next couple of months)  Thus far I've read Friedman's \"The Methodology of Positive Economics\" and just started Krugmans \"It's Baaack (...)\", besides several other papers for econ classes. So, what do you guys suggest?","c_root_id_A":"dc0pnxe","c_root_id_B":"dc0p9kq","created_at_utc_A":1483590665,"created_at_utc_B":1483590076,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Samuel Bowles Microeconomics: Behaviour, Institutions and Evolution. It's pretty much the new paradigm, though it may be years before the mainstream catches up.","human_ref_B":"I bought Krugman's principles of macro because I always studied micro in school. It's worth a read","labels":1,"seconds_difference":589.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"5m42o0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the essential papers\/works for an econ student? I am an undergrad econ student trying to expand my knowledge outside of the classrooms, so I am looking for papers and works that are considered \"essential\" to the field.  As to what degree of complexity I can (or I'm supposed to) handle, I have worked with basic DSGE models (RBC, Cash in Advance, very basic optimal monetary and fiscal policy) and intermediate econometrics and game theory.  (In the upcoming semester I will study growth macro models (Solow, Romer, etc.), international trade theory, and macro and finance theory, so I expect I will be able to handle something of that area in the next couple of months)  Thus far I've read Friedman's \"The Methodology of Positive Economics\" and just started Krugmans \"It's Baaack (...)\", besides several other papers for econ classes. So, what do you guys suggest?","c_root_id_A":"dc0p9kq","c_root_id_B":"dc12i3e","created_at_utc_A":1483590076,"created_at_utc_B":1483620774,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I bought Krugman's principles of macro because I always studied micro in school. It's worth a read","human_ref_B":"For a pretty comprehensive list of macro papers check out:  Reading List in Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics  When I was an undergraduate economics student, I would pick a topic of interest, find a couple articles of interest on it, read them, refer to the references, and repeat.  For example, my major research project, of 'undergrad thesis' was on how portfolio choice changes over one's life-time.  A lot of the literature for it was found using the above method.  Another thing - if you have an professor you get along with well - ask them the same question during office hours. They may be able to recommend some interesting papers at your skill level and it will demonstrate your interest in the field (important for reference letters if you want to go to graduate school).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":30698.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"5m42o0","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"What are the essential papers\/works for an econ student? I am an undergrad econ student trying to expand my knowledge outside of the classrooms, so I am looking for papers and works that are considered \"essential\" to the field.  As to what degree of complexity I can (or I'm supposed to) handle, I have worked with basic DSGE models (RBC, Cash in Advance, very basic optimal monetary and fiscal policy) and intermediate econometrics and game theory.  (In the upcoming semester I will study growth macro models (Solow, Romer, etc.), international trade theory, and macro and finance theory, so I expect I will be able to handle something of that area in the next couple of months)  Thus far I've read Friedman's \"The Methodology of Positive Economics\" and just started Krugmans \"It's Baaack (...)\", besides several other papers for econ classes. So, what do you guys suggest?","c_root_id_A":"dc0p9kq","c_root_id_B":"dc5ex98","created_at_utc_A":1483590076,"created_at_utc_B":1483860331,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I bought Krugman's principles of macro because I always studied micro in school. It's worth a read","human_ref_B":"You may want to try \/r\/askeconomics. Economics answers here can be...questionable...at times.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":270255.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"24662m","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"Must-knows of sociology? Suggestions? In 1 month i'll take a sociology exam. There are no lists of books or papers to read, so i am on my own. People who don't study sociology, like me, will take this exam and i think that questions won't require so much detailed information of sociology. I've read Weber, Durkheim, Marx, Comte, and know the basic concepts of Bourdieu, such as habitus and cultural capital.  Do you have any suggestions for me to read or take a look? What are the \"must-knows\" of sociology? I'd be glad if you could help me out. Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"ch3zx71","c_root_id_B":"ch40k20","created_at_utc_A":1398673942,"created_at_utc_B":1398678153,"score_A":6,"score_B":15,"human_ref_A":"I was surprised to not see Stanley Milgram's famous experiment mentioned: http:\/\/www.muskingum.edu\/~psych\/psycweb\/history\/milgram.htm. This link contains a quick overview of the experiment and its theoretic applications to real events.  Philip Zimbardo's Stanford Prison Experiment is another famous study often covered in Sociology 101 courses with applications to events such as the discovery of tortured prisoners in Abu Ghraib: http:\/\/www.prisonexp.org\/  Finally, I'd suggest a look at C. Wright Mills' \"The Sociological Imagination.\" It's a book often used in Intro to Sociology classes. His \"The Power Elite\" is also notable.","human_ref_B":"Based on what you've read, you're familiar with perspectives in sociology. But I would take a focused look at the perspectives themselves \u2013 interactionist, functionalist, conflict, and structuralist, for example \u2013 and how they affect research, or understanding, and their proponents.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4211.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1lap4u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"If a researcher uses themself as a source, are their results less reliable? I'm not sure whether this is the right subreddit for this question. If it isn't, I'll happily post this elsewhere.   I'm reading a research article (link, for the curious) in which the author references four of her own studies. I'm curious as to whether the fact that she used herself as a source makes her results less reliable. Is it common for researchers to reference their own studies in later studies? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cbxcjeb","c_root_id_B":"cbxcr0y","created_at_utc_A":1377736437,"created_at_utc_B":1377737060,"score_A":2,"score_B":31,"human_ref_A":"Why would it? The validity of the findings of the studies aren't contingent on who interprets those studies. Nor is the validity of an interpretation contingent on who did the study. They both stand on their own merit.","human_ref_B":"As usual, the answer is \"it depends.\"  Self-citation can mean one of a couple of things  1. The person is writing high-quality work in the field, and is citing themselves because it's high-quality work 2. The person is writing in a dead (or to be more positive, emerging) field, and is citing themselves because there's nobody else to cite 3. The person is eogistic, and citing themselves to self-promote 4. The work builds on previous work; it's natural to cite study A in study B if B is a followup to A.   Or, of course, a combination of the above. If I see someone self-citing heavily, I try more than usual to \"shop around\" and try to find different perspectives in the field before drawing conclusions.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":623.0,"score_ratio":15.5}
{"post_id":"1lap4u","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.9,"history":"If a researcher uses themself as a source, are their results less reliable? I'm not sure whether this is the right subreddit for this question. If it isn't, I'll happily post this elsewhere.   I'm reading a research article (link, for the curious) in which the author references four of her own studies. I'm curious as to whether the fact that she used herself as a source makes her results less reliable. Is it common for researchers to reference their own studies in later studies? Thanks!","c_root_id_A":"cbxgt58","c_root_id_B":"cbxcjeb","created_at_utc_A":1377748819,"created_at_utc_B":1377736437,"score_A":5,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"If the original research cited was peer reviewed, then it passed the test established for the field.  No reason not to cite it.","human_ref_B":"Why would it? The validity of the findings of the studies aren't contingent on who interprets those studies. Nor is the validity of an interpretation contingent on who did the study. They both stand on their own merit.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12382.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"106qx3","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.88,"history":"[Psychology] What's the deal with speed reading? Can I speed up my reading significantly while keeping comprehension? Is this something that could only be done for pleasure, or could it be done well enough to help read things for work and study?  Thanks!  EDIT: Links to where I can do so would also be appreciated. However, my own googling has yielded many places which will sell me methods for doing this with 'testimonials'... I would be looking for something that has actually be researched by psychologists (or whoever would research this?).","c_root_id_A":"c6b1u74","c_root_id_B":"c6b346t","created_at_utc_A":1348171357,"created_at_utc_B":1348175917,"score_A":2,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Most \"methods\" are all the same. Just buy a book on Half.com for reference and practice the techniques.","human_ref_B":"I have actually taken a speed reading class before.   You start out with a device that makes a beep every 10 seconds or so. You are suppose to read an entire line within that 10 seconds. Once you get good at that, you speed up the beeps to 9,8,7,6.. seconds.  Once you can read a line in say 1 second, you start to read the next line backwards. Its pretty crazy how you can teach yourself to not only read backwards, but speed read backwards.  The main concept is that your brain can turn all the text into pictures and\/or concepts and its not like reading anymore, its more like watching a movie in your head.   I was only able to get to a certain speed, some others in the class claimed they could read an entire page in under 10 seconds, but they never had great comprehension.   Hope this was at least a little helpful.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4560.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"1bhkyx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Are racially homogeneous societies \"better\" in any measurable way? It seems that a lot of horrible things have been done in the name of making societies racially \"pure\", but do societies that actually *are* racially homogeneous enjoy any real benefits - less unrest, better economy, better quality of life, anything tangible at all?   I was wondering this while watching a documentary recently that said Australia's \"White Australia\" immigration policy which reduced diversity had a negative economic effect as minority groups were generating a high proportion of economic activity. Interested if there is a good argument beyond ideology for racial homogeneity.","c_root_id_A":"c96y1zq","c_root_id_B":"c96xvu7","created_at_utc_A":1364911618,"created_at_utc_B":1364910965,"score_A":12,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"This question has been looked at indirectly in relation to sex education and laws on prostitution.   For example, check out the book *When Sex Goes to School* by Luker. In it she compares U.S. sex education to France's and concludes that France gives better sex education to its school-aged children because it is more homogenous. One way of being homogenous is race. France has only (relatively) recently had a large number of immigrants, and many are still European and probably still white.   Another example is *Temporarily Yours* by Bernstein. This book discusses prostitution in San Fransisco, Stockholm, and Amsterdam. The author indirectly concludes that the prostitution laws in Stockholm and Amsterdam are better, and one possible reason for this is their relative homogeneity.   It should be noted that it isn't because all these white people are \"enlightened\" or something similar. Rather, it's because in both cases everyone in the country can agree on what the laws and programs should look like. Both authors state that the reason the U.S. falls behind on these programs is because no one can agree on what they should look like, and so they are constantly changing. In this way, racial homogeneity may help. However, as others have noted, race does not necessarily equal an agreed upon set of definitions. Many people we would view as of the same race have different ethnic and social backgrounds, some of which put them at direct odds with each other. Since race is a social construct, it is likely that the more important factor is social upbringing.","human_ref_B":"It's not precisely what you're talking about, but you might be interested in the Arabic concept of asabiyya, as used by the generally awesome Ibn Khaldun.  Although far more subtle and nuanced, in simple terms it refers to a sense of social solidarity, cohesion, and group unity.  The historian Peter Turchin explored the role of asabiyya in the collapse if empires in his book *Historical Dynamics: Why States Rise & Fall*.  Effectively arguing that a key element of asabiyya is defined in opposition - i.e. it's defined against the *other*.  As empires expand, and become increasingly multi-cultural, not only is that unified cohesion diminished, but the *other* previously provided by neighbouring societies, cultures or empires also becomes too remote.  Thus the level of asabiyya decreases as the borders expand.  It's an interesting piece of work, with a number of flaws, but worth a read none the less.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":653.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1bhkyx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.78,"history":"Are racially homogeneous societies \"better\" in any measurable way? It seems that a lot of horrible things have been done in the name of making societies racially \"pure\", but do societies that actually *are* racially homogeneous enjoy any real benefits - less unrest, better economy, better quality of life, anything tangible at all?   I was wondering this while watching a documentary recently that said Australia's \"White Australia\" immigration policy which reduced diversity had a negative economic effect as minority groups were generating a high proportion of economic activity. Interested if there is a good argument beyond ideology for racial homogeneity.","c_root_id_A":"c96s02t","c_root_id_B":"c96y1zq","created_at_utc_A":1364876332,"created_at_utc_B":1364911618,"score_A":6,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"\"race\" is a dubious category.","human_ref_B":"This question has been looked at indirectly in relation to sex education and laws on prostitution.   For example, check out the book *When Sex Goes to School* by Luker. In it she compares U.S. sex education to France's and concludes that France gives better sex education to its school-aged children because it is more homogenous. One way of being homogenous is race. France has only (relatively) recently had a large number of immigrants, and many are still European and probably still white.   Another example is *Temporarily Yours* by Bernstein. This book discusses prostitution in San Fransisco, Stockholm, and Amsterdam. The author indirectly concludes that the prostitution laws in Stockholm and Amsterdam are better, and one possible reason for this is their relative homogeneity.   It should be noted that it isn't because all these white people are \"enlightened\" or something similar. Rather, it's because in both cases everyone in the country can agree on what the laws and programs should look like. Both authors state that the reason the U.S. falls behind on these programs is because no one can agree on what they should look like, and so they are constantly changing. In this way, racial homogeneity may help. However, as others have noted, race does not necessarily equal an agreed upon set of definitions. Many people we would view as of the same race have different ethnic and social backgrounds, some of which put them at direct odds with each other. Since race is a social construct, it is likely that the more important factor is social upbringing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":35286.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"1bbnwc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"20 years after gay marriage, what civil rights battle will we be fighting? In theast 50 years we've had battles over equal rights for women (still not entirely won, you may say) and racial equality (ditto) and now at last the rights of homosexuals seem to be catching up with those of heterosexuals. What's the next battle that we will be fighting? Is society getting anywhere near being fair, or are there still lots of mountains to climb?","c_root_id_A":"c95ekst","c_root_id_B":"c95j0uf","created_at_utc_A":1364682280,"created_at_utc_B":1364698505,"score_A":16,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"The T in LGBT will be the next battle.  I hope it doesn't last 20 years.  My feeling is that in 20 years, we will become aware of oppressed groups many of us didn't know about, in the same way that much of America was blind to the existence of a significant gay population.","human_ref_B":"The mentally ill.  Ideally, the battle for (saner) rights to the mentally ill. Realistically, they don't have a public defender, or a well organized movement to defend their rights in society and in clinical settings, and are unlikely to have so because of strong stigma or a simple lack of interest.  Think about it. Here's a quick list:   - The mentally ill are ashamed and afraid to come out (with good reason) just like gays.  - They are discriminated against because of their condition by society, even if they are treated or have been cured.  - They are discriminated against by doctors outside of the mental health specialty. - They are imprisoned against their will, without a trial and without resort, in facilities that are still very much medieval in their patient care (even with the introduction of neuroleptics). If the families don't come pick them up, they are left there for years -- or for the rest of their lives -- to rot, even if they have regained functionality.  - They have no chance of defending themselves against the psychiatrists if they are accused of being dangerously mentally ill, an accusation that has been used politically (people have been imprisoned\/interned for political reasons, for example, black activists were imprisoned with a fake diagnostic of schizophrenia in the 1970s) and it has been used for personal gain (husbands who want to get rid of wives they've fallen out of love, for one example).  - They are constantly negatively stereotyped on films -- schizophrenics are wrongly characterized as suffering from split personality (not what schizophrenia is) and as violent (schizophrenia doesn't make them more aggressive); psychopaths are always shown as highly intelligent, with high attention spans, conniving and, more markedly, as murderers (psychopaths aren't necessarily murderers, and this stereotype has been used as a justification to lock them up for life in institutions); of autists, only the savants are portrayed; psychosis, which isn't a mental illness, is portrayed as one; and so on. - They have been, in the recent past, selected to be murdered and forcefully sterilized. - Once they are marked as mentally ill and forced through the gears of the mental health system, it's very, very difficult to get back into society, even if they are fully recovered. The stigma itself can cause symptoms.   The list goes on and on, yet no one with influence has taken their cause. They're barely acknowledged as a civil rights cause, except in governmental victim statistics.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16225.0,"score_ratio":1.3125}
{"post_id":"1bbnwc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"20 years after gay marriage, what civil rights battle will we be fighting? In theast 50 years we've had battles over equal rights for women (still not entirely won, you may say) and racial equality (ditto) and now at last the rights of homosexuals seem to be catching up with those of heterosexuals. What's the next battle that we will be fighting? Is society getting anywhere near being fair, or are there still lots of mountains to climb?","c_root_id_A":"c95j0uf","c_root_id_B":"c95esfk","created_at_utc_A":1364698505,"created_at_utc_B":1364683093,"score_A":21,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"The mentally ill.  Ideally, the battle for (saner) rights to the mentally ill. Realistically, they don't have a public defender, or a well organized movement to defend their rights in society and in clinical settings, and are unlikely to have so because of strong stigma or a simple lack of interest.  Think about it. Here's a quick list:   - The mentally ill are ashamed and afraid to come out (with good reason) just like gays.  - They are discriminated against because of their condition by society, even if they are treated or have been cured.  - They are discriminated against by doctors outside of the mental health specialty. - They are imprisoned against their will, without a trial and without resort, in facilities that are still very much medieval in their patient care (even with the introduction of neuroleptics). If the families don't come pick them up, they are left there for years -- or for the rest of their lives -- to rot, even if they have regained functionality.  - They have no chance of defending themselves against the psychiatrists if they are accused of being dangerously mentally ill, an accusation that has been used politically (people have been imprisoned\/interned for political reasons, for example, black activists were imprisoned with a fake diagnostic of schizophrenia in the 1970s) and it has been used for personal gain (husbands who want to get rid of wives they've fallen out of love, for one example).  - They are constantly negatively stereotyped on films -- schizophrenics are wrongly characterized as suffering from split personality (not what schizophrenia is) and as violent (schizophrenia doesn't make them more aggressive); psychopaths are always shown as highly intelligent, with high attention spans, conniving and, more markedly, as murderers (psychopaths aren't necessarily murderers, and this stereotype has been used as a justification to lock them up for life in institutions); of autists, only the savants are portrayed; psychosis, which isn't a mental illness, is portrayed as one; and so on. - They have been, in the recent past, selected to be murdered and forcefully sterilized. - Once they are marked as mentally ill and forced through the gears of the mental health system, it's very, very difficult to get back into society, even if they are fully recovered. The stigma itself can cause symptoms.   The list goes on and on, yet no one with influence has taken their cause. They're barely acknowledged as a civil rights cause, except in governmental victim statistics.","human_ref_B":"The movement for transgender rights already has a start, but has a long, long way to go in many countries. Many countries that have legal protection for gays and lesbians, and same sex marriage, often are very lacking in their advance of trans rights, including legal changing of gender, discrimination in the workplace, healthcare, etc.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":15412.0,"score_ratio":3.5}
{"post_id":"1bbnwc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"20 years after gay marriage, what civil rights battle will we be fighting? In theast 50 years we've had battles over equal rights for women (still not entirely won, you may say) and racial equality (ditto) and now at last the rights of homosexuals seem to be catching up with those of heterosexuals. What's the next battle that we will be fighting? Is society getting anywhere near being fair, or are there still lots of mountains to climb?","c_root_id_A":"c95irur","c_root_id_B":"c95j0uf","created_at_utc_A":1364697609,"created_at_utc_B":1364698505,"score_A":5,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"I would not be surprised if problems of \"participant evolution\" (genetic manipulation, cybernetics, et al.) become the hot button topic of the middle 21st century. We already have problems where society and biology clash in places like embryonic stem cell research, but when we have adults radically modifying themselves beyond the point where they may or may not be considered \"human\" a lot of legal finagling will be required.","human_ref_B":"The mentally ill.  Ideally, the battle for (saner) rights to the mentally ill. Realistically, they don't have a public defender, or a well organized movement to defend their rights in society and in clinical settings, and are unlikely to have so because of strong stigma or a simple lack of interest.  Think about it. Here's a quick list:   - The mentally ill are ashamed and afraid to come out (with good reason) just like gays.  - They are discriminated against because of their condition by society, even if they are treated or have been cured.  - They are discriminated against by doctors outside of the mental health specialty. - They are imprisoned against their will, without a trial and without resort, in facilities that are still very much medieval in their patient care (even with the introduction of neuroleptics). If the families don't come pick them up, they are left there for years -- or for the rest of their lives -- to rot, even if they have regained functionality.  - They have no chance of defending themselves against the psychiatrists if they are accused of being dangerously mentally ill, an accusation that has been used politically (people have been imprisoned\/interned for political reasons, for example, black activists were imprisoned with a fake diagnostic of schizophrenia in the 1970s) and it has been used for personal gain (husbands who want to get rid of wives they've fallen out of love, for one example).  - They are constantly negatively stereotyped on films -- schizophrenics are wrongly characterized as suffering from split personality (not what schizophrenia is) and as violent (schizophrenia doesn't make them more aggressive); psychopaths are always shown as highly intelligent, with high attention spans, conniving and, more markedly, as murderers (psychopaths aren't necessarily murderers, and this stereotype has been used as a justification to lock them up for life in institutions); of autists, only the savants are portrayed; psychosis, which isn't a mental illness, is portrayed as one; and so on. - They have been, in the recent past, selected to be murdered and forcefully sterilized. - Once they are marked as mentally ill and forced through the gears of the mental health system, it's very, very difficult to get back into society, even if they are fully recovered. The stigma itself can cause symptoms.   The list goes on and on, yet no one with influence has taken their cause. They're barely acknowledged as a civil rights cause, except in governmental victim statistics.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":896.0,"score_ratio":4.2}
{"post_id":"1bbnwc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"20 years after gay marriage, what civil rights battle will we be fighting? In theast 50 years we've had battles over equal rights for women (still not entirely won, you may say) and racial equality (ditto) and now at last the rights of homosexuals seem to be catching up with those of heterosexuals. What's the next battle that we will be fighting? Is society getting anywhere near being fair, or are there still lots of mountains to climb?","c_root_id_A":"c95gg7p","c_root_id_B":"c95j0uf","created_at_utc_A":1364689407,"created_at_utc_B":1364698505,"score_A":2,"score_B":21,"human_ref_A":"There's a significant chance that section 5 of the Voting Rights Act will be struck down this year. There's also a significant chance that the Supreme Court will further scale back \"affirmative action.\"   During the 50s & 60s, the Supreme Court under Chief Justice Warren issued a number of ground breaking opinions that gave state and local governments a mandate to stop public segregation and voting discrimination. These decisions were almost immediately scaled back in the 70s. De facto segregation still exists today, at levels that are comparable to the immediate post-jim crow era. Several important civil rights era precedents will probably see their end during the Roberts court era.","human_ref_B":"The mentally ill.  Ideally, the battle for (saner) rights to the mentally ill. Realistically, they don't have a public defender, or a well organized movement to defend their rights in society and in clinical settings, and are unlikely to have so because of strong stigma or a simple lack of interest.  Think about it. Here's a quick list:   - The mentally ill are ashamed and afraid to come out (with good reason) just like gays.  - They are discriminated against because of their condition by society, even if they are treated or have been cured.  - They are discriminated against by doctors outside of the mental health specialty. - They are imprisoned against their will, without a trial and without resort, in facilities that are still very much medieval in their patient care (even with the introduction of neuroleptics). If the families don't come pick them up, they are left there for years -- or for the rest of their lives -- to rot, even if they have regained functionality.  - They have no chance of defending themselves against the psychiatrists if they are accused of being dangerously mentally ill, an accusation that has been used politically (people have been imprisoned\/interned for political reasons, for example, black activists were imprisoned with a fake diagnostic of schizophrenia in the 1970s) and it has been used for personal gain (husbands who want to get rid of wives they've fallen out of love, for one example).  - They are constantly negatively stereotyped on films -- schizophrenics are wrongly characterized as suffering from split personality (not what schizophrenia is) and as violent (schizophrenia doesn't make them more aggressive); psychopaths are always shown as highly intelligent, with high attention spans, conniving and, more markedly, as murderers (psychopaths aren't necessarily murderers, and this stereotype has been used as a justification to lock them up for life in institutions); of autists, only the savants are portrayed; psychosis, which isn't a mental illness, is portrayed as one; and so on. - They have been, in the recent past, selected to be murdered and forcefully sterilized. - Once they are marked as mentally ill and forced through the gears of the mental health system, it's very, very difficult to get back into society, even if they are fully recovered. The stigma itself can cause symptoms.   The list goes on and on, yet no one with influence has taken their cause. They're barely acknowledged as a civil rights cause, except in governmental victim statistics.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9098.0,"score_ratio":10.5}
{"post_id":"1bbnwc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"20 years after gay marriage, what civil rights battle will we be fighting? In theast 50 years we've had battles over equal rights for women (still not entirely won, you may say) and racial equality (ditto) and now at last the rights of homosexuals seem to be catching up with those of heterosexuals. What's the next battle that we will be fighting? Is society getting anywhere near being fair, or are there still lots of mountains to climb?","c_root_id_A":"c95irur","c_root_id_B":"c95lcat","created_at_utc_A":1364697609,"created_at_utc_B":1364707203,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I would not be surprised if problems of \"participant evolution\" (genetic manipulation, cybernetics, et al.) become the hot button topic of the middle 21st century. We already have problems where society and biology clash in places like embryonic stem cell research, but when we have adults radically modifying themselves beyond the point where they may or may not be considered \"human\" a lot of legal finagling will be required.","human_ref_B":"The rights of future generations. With implications to climate policy and natural resource laws in general.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":9594.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"1bbnwc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"20 years after gay marriage, what civil rights battle will we be fighting? In theast 50 years we've had battles over equal rights for women (still not entirely won, you may say) and racial equality (ditto) and now at last the rights of homosexuals seem to be catching up with those of heterosexuals. What's the next battle that we will be fighting? Is society getting anywhere near being fair, or are there still lots of mountains to climb?","c_root_id_A":"c95gg7p","c_root_id_B":"c95lcat","created_at_utc_A":1364689407,"created_at_utc_B":1364707203,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"There's a significant chance that section 5 of the Voting Rights Act will be struck down this year. There's also a significant chance that the Supreme Court will further scale back \"affirmative action.\"   During the 50s & 60s, the Supreme Court under Chief Justice Warren issued a number of ground breaking opinions that gave state and local governments a mandate to stop public segregation and voting discrimination. These decisions were almost immediately scaled back in the 70s. De facto segregation still exists today, at levels that are comparable to the immediate post-jim crow era. Several important civil rights era precedents will probably see their end during the Roberts court era.","human_ref_B":"The rights of future generations. With implications to climate policy and natural resource laws in general.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":17796.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"1bbnwc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"20 years after gay marriage, what civil rights battle will we be fighting? In theast 50 years we've had battles over equal rights for women (still not entirely won, you may say) and racial equality (ditto) and now at last the rights of homosexuals seem to be catching up with those of heterosexuals. What's the next battle that we will be fighting? Is society getting anywhere near being fair, or are there still lots of mountains to climb?","c_root_id_A":"c95gg7p","c_root_id_B":"c95irur","created_at_utc_A":1364689407,"created_at_utc_B":1364697609,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"There's a significant chance that section 5 of the Voting Rights Act will be struck down this year. There's also a significant chance that the Supreme Court will further scale back \"affirmative action.\"   During the 50s & 60s, the Supreme Court under Chief Justice Warren issued a number of ground breaking opinions that gave state and local governments a mandate to stop public segregation and voting discrimination. These decisions were almost immediately scaled back in the 70s. De facto segregation still exists today, at levels that are comparable to the immediate post-jim crow era. Several important civil rights era precedents will probably see their end during the Roberts court era.","human_ref_B":"I would not be surprised if problems of \"participant evolution\" (genetic manipulation, cybernetics, et al.) become the hot button topic of the middle 21st century. We already have problems where society and biology clash in places like embryonic stem cell research, but when we have adults radically modifying themselves beyond the point where they may or may not be considered \"human\" a lot of legal finagling will be required.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8202.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1bbnwc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.81,"history":"20 years after gay marriage, what civil rights battle will we be fighting? In theast 50 years we've had battles over equal rights for women (still not entirely won, you may say) and racial equality (ditto) and now at last the rights of homosexuals seem to be catching up with those of heterosexuals. What's the next battle that we will be fighting? Is society getting anywhere near being fair, or are there still lots of mountains to climb?","c_root_id_A":"c95gg7p","c_root_id_B":"c95q8r9","created_at_utc_A":1364689407,"created_at_utc_B":1364741186,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"There's a significant chance that section 5 of the Voting Rights Act will be struck down this year. There's also a significant chance that the Supreme Court will further scale back \"affirmative action.\"   During the 50s & 60s, the Supreme Court under Chief Justice Warren issued a number of ground breaking opinions that gave state and local governments a mandate to stop public segregation and voting discrimination. These decisions were almost immediately scaled back in the 70s. De facto segregation still exists today, at levels that are comparable to the immediate post-jim crow era. Several important civil rights era precedents will probably see their end during the Roberts court era.","human_ref_B":"In the US, it will be about poverty and income inequality. Right now, it is incredibly difficult for people to climb out of poverty, especially for blacks and latinos, who still face systematic discrimination. Though while race plays some role, it's mostly an economics issue. We are experiencing a trend of job loss that will never fully reverse. As more and more work is automated, we are going to have to start guaranteeing income to people. That's not something Americans are comfortable with right now, but it's really our only option.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":51779.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"kcx43","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Do little girls love having dolls of babies because of biological or sociological reasons? I see them everywhere, and I'm curious if it is something inherent in a female child, or if it is mostly a societal construct.","c_root_id_A":"c2j9jbe","c_root_id_B":"c2jbgvx","created_at_utc_A":1315826430,"created_at_utc_B":1315846253,"score_A":6,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Warning: the following is anecdotal. My daughter wasn't the slightest bit interested in human dolls until we had another baby, then she thought it was fun to pretend to be mommy. Before her brother showed up, she just liked playing with dinosaur toys or Sesame Street toys.  I never noticed her playing with toys to be in any way different from how I (her father) played with toys as a child. So, my guess would be that it is mostly societal. We didn't let her watch shows that perpetuated these gender stereotypes and instead just allowed her to watch Sesame Street, Dinosaur Train, and a few other mostly educational shows. Also, we avoid buying books which perpetuate those stereotypes.","human_ref_B":"This is a good question, and one of central interest to a range of social sciences. Unfortunately it is still very much an undecided one. It's difficult to test ethically, and it is often difficult to draw the line between biology and culture even in singular examples.  For instance, a mother has a three year old daughter and a 6 month old. The mother taking care of the baby is biological. Children wanting to imitate their parents is biological. The difference between a boy wanting to imitate the father and the girl wanting to imitate the mother and copy the nurturing of the baby could be either. Or it could be social that is overwhelmingly biologically influenced. For example, the daughter and mother both being female is biological. The daughter will probably eventually take on the caregiver role. The mother encouraging care giving imitation may be a social phenomenon rising out of the biological expectations of the mother.   It's difficult to decide. What is nearly certain is that anyone who says it's 100% either is either not informed or has some agenda behind their position (e.g. radical feminists and sexists).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":19823.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"kcx43","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Do little girls love having dolls of babies because of biological or sociological reasons? I see them everywhere, and I'm curious if it is something inherent in a female child, or if it is mostly a societal construct.","c_root_id_A":"c2jaf5v","c_root_id_B":"c2jbgvx","created_at_utc_A":1315837681,"created_at_utc_B":1315846253,"score_A":4,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"This isn't really my realm of interest, so I'm sure someone else might have more insight, but recent experiments on monkeys have suggested that male monkeys will more often exhibit interest in stereotypical 'male' toys, and females vice-versa, which the experimenters suggested may indicate that such sex specific preferences may origininate deeply in hominid history   http:\/\/academic.evergreen.edu\/curricular\/imagingthebody\/Handouts\/alexander_2002.pdf  That's not to say that a good segment of parents don't, in fact, force their children into specific gender roles, either through only providing gender specific toys, or through social conditioning.  As well, the suggested effect doesn't seem powerful enough to cause the apparently much stronger gender distinctions in, say, toy advertisement, which I think could be better explained by the effects of market forces that diminish the role of minority preferences.","human_ref_B":"This is a good question, and one of central interest to a range of social sciences. Unfortunately it is still very much an undecided one. It's difficult to test ethically, and it is often difficult to draw the line between biology and culture even in singular examples.  For instance, a mother has a three year old daughter and a 6 month old. The mother taking care of the baby is biological. Children wanting to imitate their parents is biological. The difference between a boy wanting to imitate the father and the girl wanting to imitate the mother and copy the nurturing of the baby could be either. Or it could be social that is overwhelmingly biologically influenced. For example, the daughter and mother both being female is biological. The daughter will probably eventually take on the caregiver role. The mother encouraging care giving imitation may be a social phenomenon rising out of the biological expectations of the mother.   It's difficult to decide. What is nearly certain is that anyone who says it's 100% either is either not informed or has some agenda behind their position (e.g. radical feminists and sexists).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8572.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"kcx43","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Do little girls love having dolls of babies because of biological or sociological reasons? I see them everywhere, and I'm curious if it is something inherent in a female child, or if it is mostly a societal construct.","c_root_id_A":"c2j99q5","c_root_id_B":"c2jbgvx","created_at_utc_A":1315820591,"created_at_utc_B":1315846253,"score_A":4,"score_B":10,"human_ref_A":"Same question applies to little boys and dolls of burly, grown men. Somehow that seems more creepy though.","human_ref_B":"This is a good question, and one of central interest to a range of social sciences. Unfortunately it is still very much an undecided one. It's difficult to test ethically, and it is often difficult to draw the line between biology and culture even in singular examples.  For instance, a mother has a three year old daughter and a 6 month old. The mother taking care of the baby is biological. Children wanting to imitate their parents is biological. The difference between a boy wanting to imitate the father and the girl wanting to imitate the mother and copy the nurturing of the baby could be either. Or it could be social that is overwhelmingly biologically influenced. For example, the daughter and mother both being female is biological. The daughter will probably eventually take on the caregiver role. The mother encouraging care giving imitation may be a social phenomenon rising out of the biological expectations of the mother.   It's difficult to decide. What is nearly certain is that anyone who says it's 100% either is either not informed or has some agenda behind their position (e.g. radical feminists and sexists).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":25662.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"kcx43","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Do little girls love having dolls of babies because of biological or sociological reasons? I see them everywhere, and I'm curious if it is something inherent in a female child, or if it is mostly a societal construct.","c_root_id_A":"c2jbgvx","c_root_id_B":"c2ja0ws","created_at_utc_A":1315846253,"created_at_utc_B":1315833602,"score_A":10,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"This is a good question, and one of central interest to a range of social sciences. Unfortunately it is still very much an undecided one. It's difficult to test ethically, and it is often difficult to draw the line between biology and culture even in singular examples.  For instance, a mother has a three year old daughter and a 6 month old. The mother taking care of the baby is biological. Children wanting to imitate their parents is biological. The difference between a boy wanting to imitate the father and the girl wanting to imitate the mother and copy the nurturing of the baby could be either. Or it could be social that is overwhelmingly biologically influenced. For example, the daughter and mother both being female is biological. The daughter will probably eventually take on the caregiver role. The mother encouraging care giving imitation may be a social phenomenon rising out of the biological expectations of the mother.   It's difficult to decide. What is nearly certain is that anyone who says it's 100% either is either not informed or has some agenda behind their position (e.g. radical feminists and sexists).","human_ref_B":"Also anecdotal, but from what I have seen and read it seems to be societal rather than inherent.   Small children, both boys and girls, will play with dolls, play family etc until they start identifying and categorizing themselves as belonging to the group female or male, and after that start separating between what is accepted to do as a member of either group.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12651.0,"score_ratio":5.0}
{"post_id":"kcx43","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Do little girls love having dolls of babies because of biological or sociological reasons? I see them everywhere, and I'm curious if it is something inherent in a female child, or if it is mostly a societal construct.","c_root_id_A":"c2j9jbe","c_root_id_B":"c2j99q5","created_at_utc_A":1315826430,"created_at_utc_B":1315820591,"score_A":6,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Warning: the following is anecdotal. My daughter wasn't the slightest bit interested in human dolls until we had another baby, then she thought it was fun to pretend to be mommy. Before her brother showed up, she just liked playing with dinosaur toys or Sesame Street toys.  I never noticed her playing with toys to be in any way different from how I (her father) played with toys as a child. So, my guess would be that it is mostly societal. We didn't let her watch shows that perpetuated these gender stereotypes and instead just allowed her to watch Sesame Street, Dinosaur Train, and a few other mostly educational shows. Also, we avoid buying books which perpetuate those stereotypes.","human_ref_B":"Same question applies to little boys and dolls of burly, grown men. Somehow that seems more creepy though.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5839.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"kcx43","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.85,"history":"Do little girls love having dolls of babies because of biological or sociological reasons? I see them everywhere, and I'm curious if it is something inherent in a female child, or if it is mostly a societal construct.","c_root_id_A":"c2ja0ws","c_root_id_B":"c2jaf5v","created_at_utc_A":1315833602,"created_at_utc_B":1315837681,"score_A":2,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"Also anecdotal, but from what I have seen and read it seems to be societal rather than inherent.   Small children, both boys and girls, will play with dolls, play family etc until they start identifying and categorizing themselves as belonging to the group female or male, and after that start separating between what is accepted to do as a member of either group.","human_ref_B":"This isn't really my realm of interest, so I'm sure someone else might have more insight, but recent experiments on monkeys have suggested that male monkeys will more often exhibit interest in stereotypical 'male' toys, and females vice-versa, which the experimenters suggested may indicate that such sex specific preferences may origininate deeply in hominid history   http:\/\/academic.evergreen.edu\/curricular\/imagingthebody\/Handouts\/alexander_2002.pdf  That's not to say that a good segment of parents don't, in fact, force their children into specific gender roles, either through only providing gender specific toys, or through social conditioning.  As well, the suggested effect doesn't seem powerful enough to cause the apparently much stronger gender distinctions in, say, toy advertisement, which I think could be better explained by the effects of market forces that diminish the role of minority preferences.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":4079.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"3imtie","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"Can war have economic benefits? When we think about WWII, for instance, we often think about it as revitalising the US economy because it sent the GDP up and the unemployment rate down. However, as authors like David Henderson argue, that's mostly an application of the \"broken window\" fallacy because the increase in GDP and decrease in unemployment went into industries that had no application after the war was over, such as arming and training soldiers. He makes a compelling case, but I do still have questions, and not enough of an economics background to really get a hold on the answer, so I'll ask. Can war have economic benefits? Is it fair to say that an increase in GDP is a bit of an illusion if the entire increase is going into war industries that have no application once the war is over?  As a secondary question, what about trade? Do wars generally have a positive or negative impact on trade, especially after the war is over?","c_root_id_A":"cuhva4o","c_root_id_B":"cuhwcdn","created_at_utc_A":1440707089,"created_at_utc_B":1440708668,"score_A":4,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"One key element that seems to be missing from your analysis is whether a nation is affected by the war directly. The seeming US prosperity and economic gains from WWII stem directly from the fact that US industry was largely supplying the actors in the war and only secondarily participating in the conflict directly. If you look at Germany instead of the US it is pretty easy to see that the war devastated their economy (same with Russia, France, England, etc.).  If you're selling arms then *someone else's* war can be profitable but in most fairly even conflicts the destruction of industrial capacity, let alone the reduction in the workforce due to death and injury, clearly have a much greater impact.  The wikipedia article on the Economic History of Germany has some salient information on the war's effect on their economy.","human_ref_B":"It's worth noting here that \"economic\" is a fairly broad term that encompasses far more than just monetary changes over time. Many of the costs of war are difficult to quantify. It's impossible to tell if any particular dead soldier(s) might have made outstanding long-run contributions to the advancement of technology (e.g. what if Turing had been drafted to the front?), or if those advancements might have happened anyway.  It also depends hugely on which parties you're talking about and what time scales you're talking about. Did the economy of Germany benefit from the first world war? In the 10-year time scale? Certainly not. In the 20 year time-scale? Depends on how you feel about the outcomes of Nazi economic policies (again...for ethnic Germans, not bad; for most others, not good). In the 30-year time scale? Certainly not if you see WW2 as a direct consequence of WW1. In the 80-year time scale? Maybe, insofar as Germany has a stunningly modern infrastructure with many sections of cities that are very young; good relations with just about all western countries; and a business-conducive legal and tax framework (also monetary in the pre-Euro years). Would the EU have happened if not for WW2? Has the EU been a good thing for the Germany economy in the short run? Depends on who you ask. Is the EU a long-run good thing for the German economy? It remains to be seen.  For countries that start a war in a somewhat stagnant macroeconomic position (as the US was in the mid-to-late 30s, though by war's start it was starting to improve considerably) and have relatively few infrastructure losses, a war can provide a major short-term manufacturing boost that pulls an economy out of a period of relatively low per-capita consumption. Is this always true? It's unclear. Can this sort of thing be sustained? Probably not.  What's probably true is that building an economic policy around making war is quite literally playing with fire. There is no guarantee how the war might impact a particular economy or what the short and long-term benefits and costs will be.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1579.0,"score_ratio":3.25}
{"post_id":"3imtie","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.68,"history":"Can war have economic benefits? When we think about WWII, for instance, we often think about it as revitalising the US economy because it sent the GDP up and the unemployment rate down. However, as authors like David Henderson argue, that's mostly an application of the \"broken window\" fallacy because the increase in GDP and decrease in unemployment went into industries that had no application after the war was over, such as arming and training soldiers. He makes a compelling case, but I do still have questions, and not enough of an economics background to really get a hold on the answer, so I'll ask. Can war have economic benefits? Is it fair to say that an increase in GDP is a bit of an illusion if the entire increase is going into war industries that have no application once the war is over?  As a secondary question, what about trade? Do wars generally have a positive or negative impact on trade, especially after the war is over?","c_root_id_A":"cuhvn4n","c_root_id_B":"cuhwcdn","created_at_utc_A":1440707629,"created_at_utc_B":1440708668,"score_A":2,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"I am curious to know about this too. When I think of war and the economy I think of drained wealth, disrupted markets, and depressed economic growth. The big things being inflation and capital depletion.  I would imagine the victors get to form and shape economic institutions and trade agreements in their favour. Assuming you can maintain peace and control over conquered regions of economic value, enough time may recoup the losses (or investment) in the war. That would constitute an economic benefit. However, what is the net impact of war?  Thinking of WW2, how much value was there in new and emerging technologies thanks to wartime advancements? Was there a significant impact through the employment of women? Due to the devastation on the production capabilities of a lot of major powers and crippling wartime economies, was America in a prime state\/key position to profiteer post-war?  I do not get a chance to ponder these kind of questions much but, they certainly are interesting once you get thinking about them. Hope you do not mind me piggybacking of your post, \/u\/Quouar .","human_ref_B":"It's worth noting here that \"economic\" is a fairly broad term that encompasses far more than just monetary changes over time. Many of the costs of war are difficult to quantify. It's impossible to tell if any particular dead soldier(s) might have made outstanding long-run contributions to the advancement of technology (e.g. what if Turing had been drafted to the front?), or if those advancements might have happened anyway.  It also depends hugely on which parties you're talking about and what time scales you're talking about. Did the economy of Germany benefit from the first world war? In the 10-year time scale? Certainly not. In the 20 year time-scale? Depends on how you feel about the outcomes of Nazi economic policies (again...for ethnic Germans, not bad; for most others, not good). In the 30-year time scale? Certainly not if you see WW2 as a direct consequence of WW1. In the 80-year time scale? Maybe, insofar as Germany has a stunningly modern infrastructure with many sections of cities that are very young; good relations with just about all western countries; and a business-conducive legal and tax framework (also monetary in the pre-Euro years). Would the EU have happened if not for WW2? Has the EU been a good thing for the Germany economy in the short run? Depends on who you ask. Is the EU a long-run good thing for the German economy? It remains to be seen.  For countries that start a war in a somewhat stagnant macroeconomic position (as the US was in the mid-to-late 30s, though by war's start it was starting to improve considerably) and have relatively few infrastructure losses, a war can provide a major short-term manufacturing boost that pulls an economy out of a period of relatively low per-capita consumption. Is this always true? It's unclear. Can this sort of thing be sustained? Probably not.  What's probably true is that building an economic policy around making war is quite literally playing with fire. There is no guarantee how the war might impact a particular economy or what the short and long-term benefits and costs will be.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1039.0,"score_ratio":6.5}
{"post_id":"1ob4q8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"How do companies avoid an arms race to $0 profits? It seems that if a market is at equilibrium, companies would have a desire to produce more goods than their competitors, which, while driving the total profits down, would increase their personal profit.  When other companies see this, they would attempt to increase their quantity supplied to level the playing field, which while creating equal profits, would lower the total profit again.    How do markets avoid this arms race to keep themselves at a mutually profitable area without colluding to keep the price at a certain amount?","c_root_id_A":"ccqms20","c_root_id_B":"ccql975","created_at_utc_A":1381638146,"created_at_utc_B":1381633051,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Product heterogeneity allows similar products to not be perfect substitutes for one another. The small differences (and sometimes more importantly, the marketing of these differences) allows companies to take surplus from subgroups of customers who will pay more for their specific product than close substitutes.   This argument does not apply to perfect substitutes, like commodities (base and precious metals, ag products, etcetera).","human_ref_B":"0 profit only happens in a perfectly competitive market. Firms differentiate themselves by making innovative products and marketing so they almost always have *some* level of monopoly power and profit.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5095.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1ob4q8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"How do companies avoid an arms race to $0 profits? It seems that if a market is at equilibrium, companies would have a desire to produce more goods than their competitors, which, while driving the total profits down, would increase their personal profit.  When other companies see this, they would attempt to increase their quantity supplied to level the playing field, which while creating equal profits, would lower the total profit again.    How do markets avoid this arms race to keep themselves at a mutually profitable area without colluding to keep the price at a certain amount?","c_root_id_A":"ccql43g","c_root_id_B":"ccqms20","created_at_utc_A":1381632589,"created_at_utc_B":1381638146,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"There are many mechanisms to prevent this from happening, but one is the tradeoff between paying the cost to produce the next unit of good and profiting more from the extra sale versus driving down the sale prices of the rest of your goods.  Here's an example of this mechanism in action using a simple two player game:  http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=UL6Kv88YXqQ","human_ref_B":"Product heterogeneity allows similar products to not be perfect substitutes for one another. The small differences (and sometimes more importantly, the marketing of these differences) allows companies to take surplus from subgroups of customers who will pay more for their specific product than close substitutes.   This argument does not apply to perfect substitutes, like commodities (base and precious metals, ag products, etcetera).","labels":0,"seconds_difference":5557.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"1ob4q8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"How do companies avoid an arms race to $0 profits? It seems that if a market is at equilibrium, companies would have a desire to produce more goods than their competitors, which, while driving the total profits down, would increase their personal profit.  When other companies see this, they would attempt to increase their quantity supplied to level the playing field, which while creating equal profits, would lower the total profit again.    How do markets avoid this arms race to keep themselves at a mutually profitable area without colluding to keep the price at a certain amount?","c_root_id_A":"ccql43g","c_root_id_B":"ccql975","created_at_utc_A":1381632589,"created_at_utc_B":1381633051,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"There are many mechanisms to prevent this from happening, but one is the tradeoff between paying the cost to produce the next unit of good and profiting more from the extra sale versus driving down the sale prices of the rest of your goods.  Here's an example of this mechanism in action using a simple two player game:  http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=UL6Kv88YXqQ","human_ref_B":"0 profit only happens in a perfectly competitive market. Firms differentiate themselves by making innovative products and marketing so they almost always have *some* level of monopoly power and profit.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":462.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"1ob4q8","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"How do companies avoid an arms race to $0 profits? It seems that if a market is at equilibrium, companies would have a desire to produce more goods than their competitors, which, while driving the total profits down, would increase their personal profit.  When other companies see this, they would attempt to increase their quantity supplied to level the playing field, which while creating equal profits, would lower the total profit again.    How do markets avoid this arms race to keep themselves at a mutually profitable area without colluding to keep the price at a certain amount?","c_root_id_A":"ccqno4a","c_root_id_B":"ccql43g","created_at_utc_A":1381641497,"created_at_utc_B":1381632589,"score_A":3,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Given there is no collusion, monopoly, and it is an otherwise perfectly competitive market, they don't. That, is not often the case, but also:  We may, however, suffer from survivorship bias in that we only see (think about) the companies that survived this race to $0 profits (there are plenty Kodak and Montgomery Ward's out there), at which point they may have found a new net positive revenue stream or circumstances otherwise changed to profitability.","human_ref_B":"There are many mechanisms to prevent this from happening, but one is the tradeoff between paying the cost to produce the next unit of good and profiting more from the extra sale versus driving down the sale prices of the rest of your goods.  Here's an example of this mechanism in action using a simple two player game:  http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=UL6Kv88YXqQ","labels":1,"seconds_difference":8908.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"127itx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What might civilization look like if the world's continents were still Pangaea? ...Concerning government, diseases, crops, and so forth?  (Sorry if this is a bad question, because I know it's all hypothetical and we can't know for certain, but I thought it would be interesting to discuss.)","c_root_id_A":"c6sup05","c_root_id_B":"c6su9lg","created_at_utc_A":1351420249,"created_at_utc_B":1351415085,"score_A":13,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Diseases - none of the 90%+ dieouts that happened to the new world and pacific island peoples from old world diseases.  No-one would have been blindsided by pathogens like that, as they would have been evolving (which means the most susceptible die) *with* the diseases.    Crops - would have spread dramatically faster.  All technology would have.  I'd wager that the world would be dramatically more technologically advanced at this point, assuming no nuclear\/etc. holocaust.  The fact that Pangea seems to have been a bit North-South orientated (so different growing seasons for different people) would have slowed down that spread of early farming (I can't use your seeds because the plants try to grow\/produce at the wrong times of year), but still.    That all is though- assuming humanity even started, and at the same time. Pangea was so far back, -before even mammals came to prominence!  There's the butterfly effect, and then there's completely changing the stage before even the *class* that humans belong to really came into prominence.    The little above I said assumes it's still humans - but probably, it wouldn't be.  It might be a world where human-level intelligence and tool making has yet to appear.  Or where far more intelligent animals came into prominence.  Who knows.","human_ref_B":"You might also want to put this is \/r\/HistoricalWhatIf . Interesting thoughts.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5164.0,"score_ratio":2.1666666667}
{"post_id":"127itx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What might civilization look like if the world's continents were still Pangaea? ...Concerning government, diseases, crops, and so forth?  (Sorry if this is a bad question, because I know it's all hypothetical and we can't know for certain, but I thought it would be interesting to discuss.)","c_root_id_A":"c6supl8","c_root_id_B":"c6susex","created_at_utc_A":1351420462,"created_at_utc_B":1351421467,"score_A":3,"score_B":4,"human_ref_A":"http:\/\/what-if.xkcd.com\/10\/ Not exactly what you're after, but still very interesting and well done.","human_ref_B":"* It'd be much easier for a horse lord to gather the local clans and sweep across the world and conquer everything (e.g. Genghis Khan, Muhammed). * Less biological diversity. * The possibility for overseas trade would be different. It can be argued that, historically, trade across the waters have been a major source of income (and therefore also motivated a lot of conflicts and tension). In this Pangea, would there be any huge lakes\/seas here and there or would it simply be a huge land mass?","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1005.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"q8sev","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.94,"history":"Economists, what is wrong with Japan? I often read about Japan's \"lost decade\" and 1990s economic \"meltdown\".  Yet when I look it up, I see employment has consistently remained at 2-5%.  Japan is in the top three for life expectancy, still seems ahead of the technological curve, and remains one of the most stable and democratic places on the continent.  When the country was hit by a treble tragedy last year of an earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear meltdown, it seemed to be able to pick up the pieces in a far better manner than the US or EU would have been able.  So if Japan and its people remain rich, healthy, and educated, why do we treat its economy like a basket case?","c_root_id_A":"c3vnru8","c_root_id_B":"c3vo5zy","created_at_utc_A":1330387690,"created_at_utc_B":1330389776,"score_A":5,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Good question. Krugman has many columns making this exact point!","human_ref_B":"Their aging population is a ticking bomb.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2086.0,"score_ratio":1.2}
{"post_id":"1fvaef","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Why did humans in Africa remain tribal for so long? I don't have much knowledge of african history, but it seems to me that the big pushes for society began in the mediterranean, india, china regions. Why wasn't middle and lower africa part of this push as well? Would they not have a head start over everyone else in terms of saturating the region with humans and forcing more pushes for societies?","c_root_id_A":"cae7dn9","c_root_id_B":"cae6468","created_at_utc_A":1370628223,"created_at_utc_B":1370625079,"score_A":38,"score_B":26,"human_ref_A":"Africa had many powerful civilizations. To begin, there was Egypt, Carthage, a handful of Caliphates in the Sahara, the Empires of Kush, Aksum, Mali, Fulani, Oyo, Sahelian, Buganda, Kongo etc and the list goes on.    These societies were highly stratified and very advanced, participating in large-scale economic trade.  There were a few impediments for sub-saharan Africa to develop technology on par with that of the industrial revolution, namely geography (rivers were vital in the beginning of the industrial revolution and Africa has relatively few rivers compared with Europe) and the presents of the tsetse fly which made it impossible for beasts of burden to survive. Ideas and people often flowed quite freely between civilizations, with the main players from outside the continent being Arab traders and conquerors.   In fact, Africa was so civilized that it was able to repel European conquerors from penetrating inland far longer than most of the world. The European 'Scramble for Africa' only took place roughly between 1881 and 1914, at a time where they finally possessed enough of an edge to do so.   All that to say Africa has many a complex society.","human_ref_B":"In school (southern California public education, about a decade ago) we were taught about the big three African kingdoms, those being Ghana, Mali, and Songhai. Clearly it is not accurate to assume that no civilizations emerged from the African continent, they just began to decline at a time that left them open to exploitation by their northern neighbors that happened to be on the up-swing when they were on the decline.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":3144.0,"score_ratio":1.4615384615}
{"post_id":"1fvaef","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.73,"history":"Why did humans in Africa remain tribal for so long? I don't have much knowledge of african history, but it seems to me that the big pushes for society began in the mediterranean, india, china regions. Why wasn't middle and lower africa part of this push as well? Would they not have a head start over everyone else in terms of saturating the region with humans and forcing more pushes for societies?","c_root_id_A":"caeklry","c_root_id_B":"cae9dtl","created_at_utc_A":1370668443,"created_at_utc_B":1370633163,"score_A":20,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I'm going to keep this short.  These answers are mostly subpar at best.  What makes something \"tribal\" or \"not tribal\" is the first question to ask. If Africa is or was tribal until recently, by many accounts, much of Southeast Asia (and obviously Central Asia and Southwest Asia and perhaps even much of Eastern Europe) were \"tribal\" through the 20th century, for example, and much of Africa was historically incorporated into things that were clearly *not* tribes (states, empires, the like).  Since this is \"AskSocialScience\", let's look at some actual social science that's not Jared Diamond (I, unlike most anthropologist, think Diamond might have something useful to add to the table, but only after we frame the terms of the argument).  The best place to start is almost certainly the article \"Talking about 'Tribe': Moving from Stereotypes to Analysis\".   It's freely available, an easy, edifying, and enjoyable read, and I wholeheartedly recommend it.  I know some of you won't click through, so let me just put the title of each section in bullet points.  Seriously though, most of these sections are only a paragraph or two, you can seriously bust through the whole thing in like ten to twenty minutes depending on how fast you read (even without any background in the subject).  Worth it.  **Section 1: What's Wrong with the word] \"Tribe?\"**   * Tribe has no coherent meaning.  * Tribe promotes a myth of primitive African timelessness, obscuring history and change.   * In the modern West, tribe often implies primitive savagery.   * Images of timelessness and savagery hide the modern character of African ethnicity, including ethnic conflict.   * Tribe substitutes a generalized illusion for detailed analysis of particular situations.   **Section 2: If \"Tribe\" Is So Useless, Why Is it So Common?**   * Tribe reflects once widespread but outdated 19th century social theory.   * Social theories of tribes resonated with classical and biblical education.   * Tribe became a cornerstone idea for European colonial rule in Africa.   **Section 3: But Why Not Use \"Tribe?\"** This section answers common objections like:   * In the United States no one objects to referring to Indian tribes.   * Africans themselves talk about tribes.   * African leaders see tribalism as a major problem in their countries.   * Avoiding the term tribe is just political correctness.  * Rejecting tribe is just an attempt to deny the reality of ethnic divisions.    Then there are several **case studies**:    * Zambia  * Hutu\/Tutsi  * Zulu Identity in South Africa   * The Yoruba People  **tl;dr** Tribe is probably wrong word to use.  A lot of what are called \"tribes\" in Africa would simply be called \"ethnic groups\" in other parts of the world.  The Yoruba \"tribe\" has *20 million people*.  The Swedish \"tribe\" only has 7-8 million people (the Catalan \"tribe\", who like the Yoruba lack an independent state, has about 8 million people in it).  We talk about African tribes for historical reasons (i.e. the first colonists talked about them like that), not for social scientific reasons.  Seriously though, if you're interested enough to check the tl;dr, you're probably interested enough to at least start the article I linked to.  Feel free to stop when you think it gets boring or BS-y, but I don't think you will.  If you're wondering why Africa is less economically developed than the rest of the world, I'd recommend look at \/r\/AskHistorians--they have a popular questions list, and one set of them is [\"Why is Africa 'less developed'?\" where you can browse through several questions that deal with the matter far better than I could.  Look out particularly for \/u\/khosikulu's contributions, as they are regularly in-depth, informed, and excellent, though he is certainly not the only one providing such explanations.  p.s. OP I think you asked a fair and important question, and if this came off as snooty, it's only because I'm a little frustrated at the quality of the answers that reek of \"common sense\" and pop explanations, rather than an appreciation of the current literature in any social science disciplines, which is what I assume you came here for.","human_ref_B":"While not immune to criticism, Guns Germs and Steel might be an informative, nonprofessional read about environmental differences that have possibly led to difference rates of advancement around the world.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":35280.0,"score_ratio":6.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2s45ry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is Piketty's 'Capital in the 21st century' comprehensible to non-economists ? I'm an engineering student and I don't know much about economics. I was thinking about reading Piketty's book. How hard would it be for me ?","c_root_id_A":"cnm3pmh","c_root_id_B":"cnm9oux","created_at_utc_A":1421030382,"created_at_utc_B":1421043559,"score_A":3,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Linguist here, and I found it pretty easy going, even as an audiobook listen. I have no training or background in economics.","human_ref_B":"you may also be interested in economist Joseph Stiglitz who believes that Thomas Piketty gets income inequality wrong.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":13177.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2s45ry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is Piketty's 'Capital in the 21st century' comprehensible to non-economists ? I'm an engineering student and I don't know much about economics. I was thinking about reading Piketty's book. How hard would it be for me ?","c_root_id_A":"cnm9oux","c_root_id_B":"cnm49r6","created_at_utc_A":1421043559,"created_at_utc_B":1421031497,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"you may also be interested in economist Joseph Stiglitz who believes that Thomas Piketty gets income inequality wrong.","human_ref_B":"Engineering student here. Super comprehensible, although I did have to stop and think every now and then. I read it about halfway through last year. Having a bit of a mathematics background (like an engineering degree :D) doesn't hurt either.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12062.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2s45ry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is Piketty's 'Capital in the 21st century' comprehensible to non-economists ? I'm an engineering student and I don't know much about economics. I was thinking about reading Piketty's book. How hard would it be for me ?","c_root_id_A":"cnm6g2r","c_root_id_B":"cnm9oux","created_at_utc_A":1421035952,"created_at_utc_B":1421043559,"score_A":2,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"Here he is on the econtalk podcast.","human_ref_B":"you may also be interested in economist Joseph Stiglitz who believes that Thomas Piketty gets income inequality wrong.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":7607.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"2s45ry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is Piketty's 'Capital in the 21st century' comprehensible to non-economists ? I'm an engineering student and I don't know much about economics. I was thinking about reading Piketty's book. How hard would it be for me ?","c_root_id_A":"cnmi9dp","c_root_id_B":"cnm3pmh","created_at_utc_A":1421075746,"created_at_utc_B":1421030382,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"You may want to check out EconTalk before diving into the book. It's a weekly podcast, and the host interviewed Piketty a few months ago. He also interviewed a few other people on similar topics, some as counter argument to Piketty.   The podcast is fairly accessible for the most part, but having a basic understanding of Freshman level economic concepts is helpful.","human_ref_B":"Linguist here, and I found it pretty easy going, even as an audiobook listen. I have no training or background in economics.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":45364.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2s45ry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is Piketty's 'Capital in the 21st century' comprehensible to non-economists ? I'm an engineering student and I don't know much about economics. I was thinking about reading Piketty's book. How hard would it be for me ?","c_root_id_A":"cnmi9dp","c_root_id_B":"cnm49r6","created_at_utc_A":1421075746,"created_at_utc_B":1421031497,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"You may want to check out EconTalk before diving into the book. It's a weekly podcast, and the host interviewed Piketty a few months ago. He also interviewed a few other people on similar topics, some as counter argument to Piketty.   The podcast is fairly accessible for the most part, but having a basic understanding of Freshman level economic concepts is helpful.","human_ref_B":"Engineering student here. Super comprehensible, although I did have to stop and think every now and then. I read it about halfway through last year. Having a bit of a mathematics background (like an engineering degree :D) doesn't hurt either.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":44249.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2s45ry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is Piketty's 'Capital in the 21st century' comprehensible to non-economists ? I'm an engineering student and I don't know much about economics. I was thinking about reading Piketty's book. How hard would it be for me ?","c_root_id_A":"cnmi9dp","c_root_id_B":"cnmg0p6","created_at_utc_A":1421075746,"created_at_utc_B":1421069873,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"You may want to check out EconTalk before diving into the book. It's a weekly podcast, and the host interviewed Piketty a few months ago. He also interviewed a few other people on similar topics, some as counter argument to Piketty.   The podcast is fairly accessible for the most part, but having a basic understanding of Freshman level economic concepts is helpful.","human_ref_B":"I'd say it *is* written for non-economists.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":5873.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2s45ry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is Piketty's 'Capital in the 21st century' comprehensible to non-economists ? I'm an engineering student and I don't know much about economics. I was thinking about reading Piketty's book. How hard would it be for me ?","c_root_id_A":"cnmi9dp","c_root_id_B":"cnm6g2r","created_at_utc_A":1421075746,"created_at_utc_B":1421035952,"score_A":8,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"You may want to check out EconTalk before diving into the book. It's a weekly podcast, and the host interviewed Piketty a few months ago. He also interviewed a few other people on similar topics, some as counter argument to Piketty.   The podcast is fairly accessible for the most part, but having a basic understanding of Freshman level economic concepts is helpful.","human_ref_B":"Here he is on the econtalk podcast.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":39794.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"2s45ry","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"Is Piketty's 'Capital in the 21st century' comprehensible to non-economists ? I'm an engineering student and I don't know much about economics. I was thinking about reading Piketty's book. How hard would it be for me ?","c_root_id_A":"cnm6g2r","c_root_id_B":"cnmg0p6","created_at_utc_A":1421035952,"created_at_utc_B":1421069873,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Here he is on the econtalk podcast.","human_ref_B":"I'd say it *is* written for non-economists.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":33921.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2fzojc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Disproved Sociology \/ Social Science Theories We got into an argument about rigor of proofs in sociology\/social science. So a question came up about disproved social science theories. If something can't be disproved how can it be proved.  My Google Fu has failed me in finding well known disproved sociological theories. I came across some documents claiming sociological theories can't be proved or disproved.  Are most social science \/ sociology theories neither provable or disprovable?  What are some of the most well known disproved sociology \/ social science theories?","c_root_id_A":"ckecjnn","c_root_id_B":"ckecfzy","created_at_utc_A":1410356078,"created_at_utc_B":1410355829,"score_A":12,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"There are a few old ideas that can be said to be totally disproven. Social Darwinism comes to mind. Maybe a bit more controversial is the Malthusianism perspective that said that population growth (for humans) will outstrip available resources. Technological and social innovations such as the green revolution have prevented the population bomb that many people predicted in the 1950s and 1960s.   In general, many social sciences like sociology, geography, and political science are moving away from trying to build all encompassing universal theories of everything towards more specific and contextualized frameworks to understand specific problems or issues. It's not that these perspectives can't be disproven, it's just that some might argue that they're not as effective at understand a situation as other possible explanations.","human_ref_B":"I think a main problem here is your misunderstanding of falsifiable. You say \"For a science to be valid it must have had one failed theory.\" Not true! A perfect science would be one that never has had a failed theory, but that does not make it not a science! Instead, it is whether or not the claims made by the science (the theory) have some ability to be falsified if they were to be tested.   For example, saying \"There is a god.\" Is not a falsifiable statement. I cannot prove there is not a God, and I cannot prove there is. On the other hand, \"Letting go of this pen in my hand will cause it to fall due to gravity\" is falsifiable. I can continually test this theory and (in theory) if the pen ever does not fall, I've proven it to be false. Just because science says this (and imagine it only said that) would not make it an invalid science.  To get to possible a secondary question -- is there a theory of social sciences which has been debunked -- I would say there are many. Piaget, for example, posited a stage theory of cognitive development. Many studies show this is not the case, development is continuous and age differences do not alone command cognitive ability. Kohlberg's stages of moral development fail when tested cross culturally (Schweder's Babaji study). Even behaviorism fails to account for cultural, systemic influences. Our basic notion of x causes y is inferior to catalytic conditions.  For Shewder's cross-cultural critique of moral development, see:  Shweder, R. A. Much, N. C.1987. Determinations of meaning\/ Discourse and moral socialization. In Moral development through social interaction. Kurtines, W. M. & Gewirtz, J. L. (Eds). New York: John Wiley & Sons. That is my copy at least. I found similar work done by Shweder on this topic under this link.  Criticism of Piaget here.  Catalytic models of causality you could go a few ways, but a nice historical discussion is in this chapter. Valsiner, J. 2014. Breaking The Arrows of Causality : The Idea of Catalysis in its Making. In The Catalyzing Mind - Beyond Models of Causality. Cabell, K. R. & Valsiner, J. (Eds). Springer. You can find it here.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":249.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"2fzojc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Disproved Sociology \/ Social Science Theories We got into an argument about rigor of proofs in sociology\/social science. So a question came up about disproved social science theories. If something can't be disproved how can it be proved.  My Google Fu has failed me in finding well known disproved sociological theories. I came across some documents claiming sociological theories can't be proved or disproved.  Are most social science \/ sociology theories neither provable or disprovable?  What are some of the most well known disproved sociology \/ social science theories?","c_root_id_A":"ckec6oq","c_root_id_B":"ckecjnn","created_at_utc_A":1410355162,"created_at_utc_B":1410356078,"score_A":3,"score_B":12,"human_ref_A":"Theories, regardless of field, are never proven. They can only be supported or unsupported.","human_ref_B":"There are a few old ideas that can be said to be totally disproven. Social Darwinism comes to mind. Maybe a bit more controversial is the Malthusianism perspective that said that population growth (for humans) will outstrip available resources. Technological and social innovations such as the green revolution have prevented the population bomb that many people predicted in the 1950s and 1960s.   In general, many social sciences like sociology, geography, and political science are moving away from trying to build all encompassing universal theories of everything towards more specific and contextualized frameworks to understand specific problems or issues. It's not that these perspectives can't be disproven, it's just that some might argue that they're not as effective at understand a situation as other possible explanations.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":916.0,"score_ratio":4.0}
{"post_id":"2fzojc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Disproved Sociology \/ Social Science Theories We got into an argument about rigor of proofs in sociology\/social science. So a question came up about disproved social science theories. If something can't be disproved how can it be proved.  My Google Fu has failed me in finding well known disproved sociological theories. I came across some documents claiming sociological theories can't be proved or disproved.  Are most social science \/ sociology theories neither provable or disprovable?  What are some of the most well known disproved sociology \/ social science theories?","c_root_id_A":"ckecfzy","c_root_id_B":"ckec6oq","created_at_utc_A":1410355829,"created_at_utc_B":1410355162,"score_A":9,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I think a main problem here is your misunderstanding of falsifiable. You say \"For a science to be valid it must have had one failed theory.\" Not true! A perfect science would be one that never has had a failed theory, but that does not make it not a science! Instead, it is whether or not the claims made by the science (the theory) have some ability to be falsified if they were to be tested.   For example, saying \"There is a god.\" Is not a falsifiable statement. I cannot prove there is not a God, and I cannot prove there is. On the other hand, \"Letting go of this pen in my hand will cause it to fall due to gravity\" is falsifiable. I can continually test this theory and (in theory) if the pen ever does not fall, I've proven it to be false. Just because science says this (and imagine it only said that) would not make it an invalid science.  To get to possible a secondary question -- is there a theory of social sciences which has been debunked -- I would say there are many. Piaget, for example, posited a stage theory of cognitive development. Many studies show this is not the case, development is continuous and age differences do not alone command cognitive ability. Kohlberg's stages of moral development fail when tested cross culturally (Schweder's Babaji study). Even behaviorism fails to account for cultural, systemic influences. Our basic notion of x causes y is inferior to catalytic conditions.  For Shewder's cross-cultural critique of moral development, see:  Shweder, R. A. Much, N. C.1987. Determinations of meaning\/ Discourse and moral socialization. In Moral development through social interaction. Kurtines, W. M. & Gewirtz, J. L. (Eds). New York: John Wiley & Sons. That is my copy at least. I found similar work done by Shweder on this topic under this link.  Criticism of Piaget here.  Catalytic models of causality you could go a few ways, but a nice historical discussion is in this chapter. Valsiner, J. 2014. Breaking The Arrows of Causality : The Idea of Catalysis in its Making. In The Catalyzing Mind - Beyond Models of Causality. Cabell, K. R. & Valsiner, J. (Eds). Springer. You can find it here.","human_ref_B":"Theories, regardless of field, are never proven. They can only be supported or unsupported.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":667.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"2fzojc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Disproved Sociology \/ Social Science Theories We got into an argument about rigor of proofs in sociology\/social science. So a question came up about disproved social science theories. If something can't be disproved how can it be proved.  My Google Fu has failed me in finding well known disproved sociological theories. I came across some documents claiming sociological theories can't be proved or disproved.  Are most social science \/ sociology theories neither provable or disprovable?  What are some of the most well known disproved sociology \/ social science theories?","c_root_id_A":"ckefnck","c_root_id_B":"ckexdkf","created_at_utc_A":1410362895,"created_at_utc_B":1410397680,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"The part of Maslow's Heirarchy of Human Needs that proposes that people don't engage in self-actualization until all their basic needs are met doesn't have any evidence to support it.    http:\/\/psychology.about.com\/b\/2011\/07\/05\/putting-maslows-hierarchy-of-needs-to-the-test.htm","human_ref_B":"I am surprised that nobody has mentioned phrenology yet.  http:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=Int6ozC_HLIC&pg=PA710","labels":0,"seconds_difference":34785.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2fzojc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Disproved Sociology \/ Social Science Theories We got into an argument about rigor of proofs in sociology\/social science. So a question came up about disproved social science theories. If something can't be disproved how can it be proved.  My Google Fu has failed me in finding well known disproved sociological theories. I came across some documents claiming sociological theories can't be proved or disproved.  Are most social science \/ sociology theories neither provable or disprovable?  What are some of the most well known disproved sociology \/ social science theories?","c_root_id_A":"ckec6oq","c_root_id_B":"ckexdkf","created_at_utc_A":1410355162,"created_at_utc_B":1410397680,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"Theories, regardless of field, are never proven. They can only be supported or unsupported.","human_ref_B":"I am surprised that nobody has mentioned phrenology yet.  http:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=Int6ozC_HLIC&pg=PA710","labels":0,"seconds_difference":42518.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"2fzojc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Disproved Sociology \/ Social Science Theories We got into an argument about rigor of proofs in sociology\/social science. So a question came up about disproved social science theories. If something can't be disproved how can it be proved.  My Google Fu has failed me in finding well known disproved sociological theories. I came across some documents claiming sociological theories can't be proved or disproved.  Are most social science \/ sociology theories neither provable or disprovable?  What are some of the most well known disproved sociology \/ social science theories?","c_root_id_A":"ckefhmb","c_root_id_B":"ckexdkf","created_at_utc_A":1410362579,"created_at_utc_B":1410397680,"score_A":2,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"I think the psychological models of partisanship have basically disproved economic models of partisanship.","human_ref_B":"I am surprised that nobody has mentioned phrenology yet.  http:\/\/books.google.com\/books?id=Int6ozC_HLIC&pg=PA710","labels":0,"seconds_difference":35101.0,"score_ratio":2.5}
{"post_id":"2fzojc","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Disproved Sociology \/ Social Science Theories We got into an argument about rigor of proofs in sociology\/social science. So a question came up about disproved social science theories. If something can't be disproved how can it be proved.  My Google Fu has failed me in finding well known disproved sociological theories. I came across some documents claiming sociological theories can't be proved or disproved.  Are most social science \/ sociology theories neither provable or disprovable?  What are some of the most well known disproved sociology \/ social science theories?","c_root_id_A":"ckefhmb","c_root_id_B":"ckefnck","created_at_utc_A":1410362579,"created_at_utc_B":1410362895,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I think the psychological models of partisanship have basically disproved economic models of partisanship.","human_ref_B":"The part of Maslow's Heirarchy of Human Needs that proposes that people don't engage in self-actualization until all their basic needs are met doesn't have any evidence to support it.    http:\/\/psychology.about.com\/b\/2011\/07\/05\/putting-maslows-hierarchy-of-needs-to-the-test.htm","labels":0,"seconds_difference":316.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"11t1wl","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.79,"history":"Clinicians of Reddit: can a narcissist\/sociopath gain self-awareness and recover? Or are the things they don't really feel destined to remain hollow?","c_root_id_A":"c6pg1t8","c_root_id_B":"c6pdb2v","created_at_utc_A":1350776452,"created_at_utc_B":1350763804,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"They can sure as shit pretend to. Don't you dare believe it.","human_ref_B":"Why do you ask?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":12648.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"1ch1ca","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How could our economic system be changed to be adapted to 0 growth? Lets say that either further economic growth is impossible or undesirable for  some reason. It doesn't seem that our current economic system is very well suited for a steady state economy with no growth. How could our system be changed to be more adapted to such a scenario?","c_root_id_A":"c9ggq4f","c_root_id_B":"c9gglz3","created_at_utc_A":1366140069,"created_at_utc_B":1366139772,"score_A":26,"score_B":16,"human_ref_A":"There is a whole area of research around this called steady state economics. This book is a good primer, with a discussion of how the transition could be made: http:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Enough-Is-Building-Sustainable-Resources\/dp\/0415820952","human_ref_B":"Even without growth there is room for movement to more optimal allocation of resources.  Since people have varying tastes and individuals' tastes vary over time, it is entirely possible that we would never reach an optimal allocation; we would be working toward an ever-changing goal, and thus be in dynamic of punctuated improvement.  Beyond this, the trend in developed nations (the nations where it is slightly more plausible to assume an end to economic growth) is for decreasing fertility rates to the point of a shrinking population.  In this case, stagnant growth can still lead to an improved standard of living.  In the case of a growing population, further economic growth would never be undesirable.  Stagnant growth and a growing population would necessarily mean a decreasing standard of living.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":297.0,"score_ratio":1.625}
{"post_id":"o1ol1","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.71,"history":"How does Keynesian stimulus work? If a government runs a fiscal deficit in order to stimulate the economy (e.g. by infrastructure spending), it can either borrow the money externally or internally from within the country itself.  If the government borrows the money from another government, then is this not exactly the same as the government printing money and spending it on infrastructure? Will it not simply result in inflation? Alternatively, if the government borrows the money from an internal source (say an investment bank), is this simply not just shuffling the money around as the bank would have spent the money elsewhere within the economy?  So how exactly does the stimulus work? Surely it either cancels out, as net spending is exactly the same, or deficit spending is akin to printing money?","c_root_id_A":"c3do7az","c_root_id_B":"c3dnwq1","created_at_utc_A":1325634623,"created_at_utc_B":1325632324,"score_A":9,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"To address your inflation concerns: a Keynesian-style stimulus is most effective when an economy is called a \"liquidity trap.\" This means that, for whatever reason, people aren't taking loans no matter how arbitrarily low the interest rate is. (For the record, the intrest rates on inflation-adjusted 10-year US treasury bonds are slightly *negative* right now)  Since the banks are willing to loan money and no one else is willing to take out a loan, the government doesn't need to \"print more money\" and if it does (which did in fact happen lately-- since 2008 or so the supply of US dollars has been roughly tripled) the economy is still too depressed to deal with inflation. Because we're in a liquidity trap now, the inflation rate has been at more or less average historic levels, around 2% annual.","human_ref_B":"I think the idea is that the money from the stimulus has a \"multiplier effect\". Suppose the government rolls out a stimulus package with large investments in infrastructure and what have you. The people who directly benefit from the stimulus (average construction worker Joe) now have a job and money to put food on the table. Him, and others like him, are now spending more, this increased demand allows firms to increase output, hiring more workers who then spend their money from their new jobs and so on and so forth. If they accumulate enough money and keep their savings in a bank account, these banks now have more money to lend out and finance other people's investments and spending, another way that aggregate demand is increased. The original amount of the stimulus package has effectively been \"multiplied\" by how the money is distributed and spent.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2299.0,"score_ratio":1.8}
{"post_id":"ty2kb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How much of the sub-prime mortgage crisis was caused by Fannie Mae? I seem to be running into the argument lately that Fannie Mae was the number one contributor to the recession, and that if Bush's attempt to make Fannie Mae more conservative with their lending would have gone through, then the recession would have been prevented.  How much, if any truth is there to this?","c_root_id_A":"c4qzifs","c_root_id_B":"c4qwdm7","created_at_utc_A":1337699738,"created_at_utc_B":1337672827,"score_A":9,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"This McClatchy link has some good information. For example:  > Between 2004 and 2006, ... Fannie and Freddie went from holding a high of 48 percent of the subprime loans that were sold into the secondary market to holding about 24 percent.  The reason for this was that private Wall St. firms got into subprime securitization in a big way in the 2000s (and were making money hand over fist, for a time).  Can't find the source ATM, but circa 2006 Fannie decided that the reason they were losing market share so fast to private firms was that their underwriting standards were higher. Consequently, they lowered their standards to compete. This was already well into the housing bubble.  The \"Carter\/Clinton caused the bubble via the CRA\" canard is another common talking point.  However, most of the subprime lenders of the 2000s were not subject to the CRA, which applies only to traditional banks (banks which actually weathered the recession well compared to other players in the mortgage industry).  The CRA never required banks to abandon proper lending standards, regardless.  Those who use this talking point never present evidence to back their claim.  Probably the best explanation of what the heck happened in the housing bubble is NPR's Peabody Award-winning broadcast, The Giant Pool of Money.  tl;dr version: in the 2000s, there was more demand (globally) for investment opportunities than there were viable investments. Wall St.'s way of meeting the demand was to go big on mortgage-backed securities. In order to create enough securities to meet the demand, more mortgage loans had to be issued.  Bad decisions snowballed from there, such as lowering lending standards down to nothing, leaning on rating agencies for AAA ratings, championing flawed formulas that masked the risk, etc.","human_ref_B":"'Subprime' referred to loans that Fanny and Freddie would not finance. The loans that met Fanny and Freddie's requirements were 'prime' loans. Hence, 'subprime' loans were those that could not financed through Fannie and Freddie, and were instead financed through Wall Street's mortgage backed securities.  Given this, how could Fanny and Freddie have been the main cause of the subprime crisis?","labels":1,"seconds_difference":26911.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"ty2kb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How much of the sub-prime mortgage crisis was caused by Fannie Mae? I seem to be running into the argument lately that Fannie Mae was the number one contributor to the recession, and that if Bush's attempt to make Fannie Mae more conservative with their lending would have gone through, then the recession would have been prevented.  How much, if any truth is there to this?","c_root_id_A":"c4qwdm7","c_root_id_B":"c4qvtm8","created_at_utc_A":1337672827,"created_at_utc_B":1337668155,"score_A":8,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"'Subprime' referred to loans that Fanny and Freddie would not finance. The loans that met Fanny and Freddie's requirements were 'prime' loans. Hence, 'subprime' loans were those that could not financed through Fannie and Freddie, and were instead financed through Wall Street's mortgage backed securities.  Given this, how could Fanny and Freddie have been the main cause of the subprime crisis?","human_ref_B":"In large there is not a clear cut answer to this. Sure F-mac and F-mae increased the number of home owners unable to pay their debt without increasing housing prices, but the systemic part of the crisis would still be there. The loan driven consumption demand in the US with very low interest rates expanded by abolishing laws demanding colletaral for loans (there were practically no consumer loans 20 years ago). The twin deficit would still be around and lurking for government debt. The euro crisis would too still happen at some point because the PIIGS (Greece and the gang) still got to sell their bond at unimagineably low interest rates. (The interest rate (cost for the governement) droppen from double digit to 2-3% practiacally overnight enabling partly corrupt governments to flush government jobs and benefits to everyone by taking on loans.) The construction of loan derivates on Wall st. following fairly new pricing models like the Black-Scholes (Black Hole in economist humor) resulted in the creation of a lot of \"financial vehicles\" that everyone percieved as riskless while they were in fact trash. At the same time of all of this the Fed in the US and CBs all over the world believed that by lowering interest rate to boost the activitylevel in the economy and theirby get inflation to the target level of 2% was fundamental. They all failed in doing this because all consumables price levels fell because of imports from China. The lowering of the interest rate just increased consumption and thereby imports and thereby reduced inflation.  So there were a lot of things going on at the same time. A financial system built on increasing indebtness and \"free\" money is basically unsustainable. The reason F&F seem so guilty is because the loan driven consumption had greatest impact in the housing market and this market was therefore the first to go.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":4672.0,"score_ratio":2.6666666667}
{"post_id":"ty2kb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How much of the sub-prime mortgage crisis was caused by Fannie Mae? I seem to be running into the argument lately that Fannie Mae was the number one contributor to the recession, and that if Bush's attempt to make Fannie Mae more conservative with their lending would have gone through, then the recession would have been prevented.  How much, if any truth is there to this?","c_root_id_A":"c4qz34p","c_root_id_B":"c4qzifs","created_at_utc_A":1337697499,"created_at_utc_B":1337699738,"score_A":7,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"Fanne Mae wasn't an important driver of the crisis. The housing bubble was driven by price increases between 2002- and 2005, the same period GSE-origninating loans was at a local minimum (alternate graph) and private loans surged (alternate graph).   I can certainly imagine a housing bubble that was driven by government backed mortgages, with limited oversight and moral hazard. I don't see any evidence that the 2008 crisis was one.","human_ref_B":"This McClatchy link has some good information. For example:  > Between 2004 and 2006, ... Fannie and Freddie went from holding a high of 48 percent of the subprime loans that were sold into the secondary market to holding about 24 percent.  The reason for this was that private Wall St. firms got into subprime securitization in a big way in the 2000s (and were making money hand over fist, for a time).  Can't find the source ATM, but circa 2006 Fannie decided that the reason they were losing market share so fast to private firms was that their underwriting standards were higher. Consequently, they lowered their standards to compete. This was already well into the housing bubble.  The \"Carter\/Clinton caused the bubble via the CRA\" canard is another common talking point.  However, most of the subprime lenders of the 2000s were not subject to the CRA, which applies only to traditional banks (banks which actually weathered the recession well compared to other players in the mortgage industry).  The CRA never required banks to abandon proper lending standards, regardless.  Those who use this talking point never present evidence to back their claim.  Probably the best explanation of what the heck happened in the housing bubble is NPR's Peabody Award-winning broadcast, The Giant Pool of Money.  tl;dr version: in the 2000s, there was more demand (globally) for investment opportunities than there were viable investments. Wall St.'s way of meeting the demand was to go big on mortgage-backed securities. In order to create enough securities to meet the demand, more mortgage loans had to be issued.  Bad decisions snowballed from there, such as lowering lending standards down to nothing, leaning on rating agencies for AAA ratings, championing flawed formulas that masked the risk, etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2239.0,"score_ratio":1.2857142857}
{"post_id":"ty2kb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How much of the sub-prime mortgage crisis was caused by Fannie Mae? I seem to be running into the argument lately that Fannie Mae was the number one contributor to the recession, and that if Bush's attempt to make Fannie Mae more conservative with their lending would have gone through, then the recession would have been prevented.  How much, if any truth is there to this?","c_root_id_A":"c4qvtm8","c_root_id_B":"c4qzifs","created_at_utc_A":1337668155,"created_at_utc_B":1337699738,"score_A":3,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"In large there is not a clear cut answer to this. Sure F-mac and F-mae increased the number of home owners unable to pay their debt without increasing housing prices, but the systemic part of the crisis would still be there. The loan driven consumption demand in the US with very low interest rates expanded by abolishing laws demanding colletaral for loans (there were practically no consumer loans 20 years ago). The twin deficit would still be around and lurking for government debt. The euro crisis would too still happen at some point because the PIIGS (Greece and the gang) still got to sell their bond at unimagineably low interest rates. (The interest rate (cost for the governement) droppen from double digit to 2-3% practiacally overnight enabling partly corrupt governments to flush government jobs and benefits to everyone by taking on loans.) The construction of loan derivates on Wall st. following fairly new pricing models like the Black-Scholes (Black Hole in economist humor) resulted in the creation of a lot of \"financial vehicles\" that everyone percieved as riskless while they were in fact trash. At the same time of all of this the Fed in the US and CBs all over the world believed that by lowering interest rate to boost the activitylevel in the economy and theirby get inflation to the target level of 2% was fundamental. They all failed in doing this because all consumables price levels fell because of imports from China. The lowering of the interest rate just increased consumption and thereby imports and thereby reduced inflation.  So there were a lot of things going on at the same time. A financial system built on increasing indebtness and \"free\" money is basically unsustainable. The reason F&F seem so guilty is because the loan driven consumption had greatest impact in the housing market and this market was therefore the first to go.","human_ref_B":"This McClatchy link has some good information. For example:  > Between 2004 and 2006, ... Fannie and Freddie went from holding a high of 48 percent of the subprime loans that were sold into the secondary market to holding about 24 percent.  The reason for this was that private Wall St. firms got into subprime securitization in a big way in the 2000s (and were making money hand over fist, for a time).  Can't find the source ATM, but circa 2006 Fannie decided that the reason they were losing market share so fast to private firms was that their underwriting standards were higher. Consequently, they lowered their standards to compete. This was already well into the housing bubble.  The \"Carter\/Clinton caused the bubble via the CRA\" canard is another common talking point.  However, most of the subprime lenders of the 2000s were not subject to the CRA, which applies only to traditional banks (banks which actually weathered the recession well compared to other players in the mortgage industry).  The CRA never required banks to abandon proper lending standards, regardless.  Those who use this talking point never present evidence to back their claim.  Probably the best explanation of what the heck happened in the housing bubble is NPR's Peabody Award-winning broadcast, The Giant Pool of Money.  tl;dr version: in the 2000s, there was more demand (globally) for investment opportunities than there were viable investments. Wall St.'s way of meeting the demand was to go big on mortgage-backed securities. In order to create enough securities to meet the demand, more mortgage loans had to be issued.  Bad decisions snowballed from there, such as lowering lending standards down to nothing, leaning on rating agencies for AAA ratings, championing flawed formulas that masked the risk, etc.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":31583.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"ty2kb","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"How much of the sub-prime mortgage crisis was caused by Fannie Mae? I seem to be running into the argument lately that Fannie Mae was the number one contributor to the recession, and that if Bush's attempt to make Fannie Mae more conservative with their lending would have gone through, then the recession would have been prevented.  How much, if any truth is there to this?","c_root_id_A":"c4qvtm8","c_root_id_B":"c4qz34p","created_at_utc_A":1337668155,"created_at_utc_B":1337697499,"score_A":3,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"In large there is not a clear cut answer to this. Sure F-mac and F-mae increased the number of home owners unable to pay their debt without increasing housing prices, but the systemic part of the crisis would still be there. The loan driven consumption demand in the US with very low interest rates expanded by abolishing laws demanding colletaral for loans (there were practically no consumer loans 20 years ago). The twin deficit would still be around and lurking for government debt. The euro crisis would too still happen at some point because the PIIGS (Greece and the gang) still got to sell their bond at unimagineably low interest rates. (The interest rate (cost for the governement) droppen from double digit to 2-3% practiacally overnight enabling partly corrupt governments to flush government jobs and benefits to everyone by taking on loans.) The construction of loan derivates on Wall st. following fairly new pricing models like the Black-Scholes (Black Hole in economist humor) resulted in the creation of a lot of \"financial vehicles\" that everyone percieved as riskless while they were in fact trash. At the same time of all of this the Fed in the US and CBs all over the world believed that by lowering interest rate to boost the activitylevel in the economy and theirby get inflation to the target level of 2% was fundamental. They all failed in doing this because all consumables price levels fell because of imports from China. The lowering of the interest rate just increased consumption and thereby imports and thereby reduced inflation.  So there were a lot of things going on at the same time. A financial system built on increasing indebtness and \"free\" money is basically unsustainable. The reason F&F seem so guilty is because the loan driven consumption had greatest impact in the housing market and this market was therefore the first to go.","human_ref_B":"Fanne Mae wasn't an important driver of the crisis. The housing bubble was driven by price increases between 2002- and 2005, the same period GSE-origninating loans was at a local minimum (alternate graph) and private loans surged (alternate graph).   I can certainly imagine a housing bubble that was driven by government backed mortgages, with limited oversight and moral hazard. I don't see any evidence that the 2008 crisis was one.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":29344.0,"score_ratio":2.3333333333}
{"post_id":"1rwqps","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What are the insurmountable flaws of deflationary currencies or economies? With all the talk about Bitcoin lately, the most legitimate worry about it is probably the eventual deflationary nature that is ingrained in the currency itself, and it is often used as a argument about why it is not possible for it to become a successful one (as a means of exchange for goods and services).  Now, I understand why it is important to encourage spending, as moving money helps create value, which is fundamental for healthy economies. However, I'm not all that sure that inflation is necessary for that (I'm not an economist, so I may very well be wrong).  What I observe in people around me (which I think can be extrapolated to most of us in developed societies), is that they spend money on things that they need to survive, plus occasional unnecessary expenditures when they can afford them; the rest (if any) is kept in the bank in form of savings. All of this process tends to be completely independent from the thought of money devaluing over time, so in the end inflation would only affect how the banks decide to move that money.  Now, as long as the deflation is not too steep, I can still see banks being able to invest and move money in a way that yields more gains than just sitting on it. And if those banks offer part of those gains to their clients, there is still an incentive for people to keep that extra money in them (in addition to the secure storage and insurances).  Other problems of deflation, like the debt appreciation for borrowers\/lenders, seem to apply only when payments are fixed in that currency, and even then it looks like they could be easily addressed by taking that deflation into account (as long as it is predictable) when deciding the payments.  What am I missing? What is the thought process behind considering inflation a necessity?","c_root_id_A":"cdrovva","c_root_id_B":"cdrpejd","created_at_utc_A":1385992797,"created_at_utc_B":1385994958,"score_A":4,"score_B":19,"human_ref_A":"The conventional argument against deflation relates to lending and investment. Deflation adds to the real interest rate you get from leaving your money in the bank instead of spending it. e.g. suppose your dollar will purchase 10% more next year than it will now, and you earn interest in the bank of 5%, your real interest rate is about 15% (more precisely 1.10*1.05 but yeah whatever).   Now suppose you, or the bank, is considering lending money for an investment project. It has to earn more back than you would get by leaving money safely in the bank. Deflation makes people not want to spend or invest. A little bit of predictable inflation helps grease the wheels of the economy a bit so people don't just sit on their cash.  > this process tends to be completely independent from the thought of money devaluing over time, so in the end inflation would only affect how the banks decide to move that money.  This is currently true because we in the developed world have not experienced hyper-inflation (or deflation) anytime in recent memory. And, even if it does just affect the banks, that can have a pretty huge impact on how well the economy functions.  In the context of bitcoin as a \"fringe\" currency this isn't such a big deal yet, because it's not what people purchase necessities with. However, there is that lingering problem -- if I have bitcoins and expect them to appreciate, why would I ever spend them, *unless* it's on something illegal that I can only purchase with bitcoin that I have no real intention of holding on to for the longterm anyway. Going a step further, if I'm a mainstream investor and expect that bitcoin will primarily be used for illegal purposes then I expect someday it will get shut down, one way or another, so my educated money stays out of that market -- too risky. So the people who are invested in bitcoins are either drug dealers or poorly-informed, and will lose their shirts when the currency eventually comes crashing down.  TLDR deflation is not in and of itself a problem for bitcoin, but deflation does make bitcoin more likely to become a bubble that will pop and make people invested in it lose lots of money.","human_ref_B":"I don't think you're necessarily 'missing' anything, but I'd say you're vastly underestimating the impact of the role of encouraging spending in a healthy economy.  You say that you observe people \"spending money on things that they need to survive, plus occasional unnecessary expenditures when they can afford them.\" This is making me guess you're in college or a young worker paying off debts, but regardless I'd challenge you to look around the world a little differently. Assuming you live in a city, think about the malls that have thousands of people a day spending their money in clothing shops, electronic stores and in the food court. Think about the bar district in your town that is packed for lunch and happy hour every day, or that fancy restaurant that's impossible to get a table at. Then extrapolate both of these to every mall\/department store and restaurants\/bars in every corner of your city. That should give you a different picture of what a lot of people spend a lot of their money on.  Now getting to deflation. The fear with deflation is always that you get a deflationary spiral. Here's a short video about it from the Khan Academy to give you the basics. Essentially, a deflationary spiral starts off small. Maybe deflation is small (due to your currency getting stronger), so you think you're money's going to be worth a little more next week so you delay some of your purchases. If a lot of people do that, then Walmart notices their revenue fell below expectations, so they lay off a few employees and drop their prices. Of course, this only makes things worse, as the lower prices lead to more deflation which makes people spend even less as they hoard more money, on top of which, the people that were laid off don't have any money to spend. With lower profits, companies all across the country reinvest less and hire fewer people and this process continues into a cycle. For an example, look at Japan over the past 12 years; they've been essentially caught in this trap.  An even bigger reason why economists are scared of deflation is that central banks are relatively powerless to stop a deflationary spiral once it has started. With other economic problems you have standard economic prescriptions (low growth --> lower interest rates\/fiscal spending; high inflation --> raise interest rates\/stop printing money) but there's not a whole lot to be done for deflation; even printing money, which you might normally expect to increase inflation, doesn't work if people are hanging onto their money. You end up with a velocity problem which can only be improved by changing people's attitudes.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2161.0,"score_ratio":4.75}
{"post_id":"1fkxjx","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.72,"history":"Why are some protesters in Turkey waving flags with Atat\u00fcrk on them? I'm curious if there are any modern Turkey experts out there that can explain the reasoning behind the people waving flags with Atat\u00fcrk on them? I thought that he was a single-party dictator and a persecutor of minorities, despite being the father of the modern country?","c_root_id_A":"cabgjh7","c_root_id_B":"cabgn85","created_at_utc_A":1370290202,"created_at_utc_B":1370290465,"score_A":6,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"This may be removed, but I went to Turkey a few weeks ago, before any rioting was going on. There were pictures of Ataturk everywhere, and our tour guide said everybody loved him. He isn't seen as a dictator by a huge majority of the population.","human_ref_B":"He is still admired for a variety of reasons.  He's relevant to the current protests because of his distinctly secular views on government.    Best I can do to cite a sources is to cite the book I read four-ish years ago on the subject named Crescent and Star by Stephen Kinzer.  It is a good book, and has an excellent discussion of Ataturk, Turkish nationalism and secularism.    I've also heard good things about Ataturk: An intellectual biography by M. Sukru Hanioglu if you're interested, haven't read it myself.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":263.0,"score_ratio":1.3333333333}
{"post_id":"rza54","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.87,"history":"A thought experiment. I call it the Big Pile Question.  This is a question I've had on my mind for some time. I'm a self-educated layman, so forgive me if my terminology is primitive, but here goes.   Say for the sake of argument that everything that is produced, food, clothes, boats, iPhones, everything, gets thrown into a Big Pile, and everyone that contributes to the pile can go in and get whatever they want out of it. This is a theoretical pile, so let's forget about the logistics of actually going to the pile to get what you want. Maybe everyone has a teleporter.   Assuming that everyone working right now stays at their job, all the factories and McDonald's stay open and produce at the same level they produce today, will the Pile grow or shrink over time? What are the social and economic ramifications?","c_root_id_A":"c49ye97","c_root_id_B":"c49zlun","created_at_utc_A":1333925076,"created_at_utc_B":1333931842,"score_A":3,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"I think you guys are missing the point here. jambarama is talking about China and the USSR but in our case we have everyone taking whatever they want, not the government deciding what everyone gets. However, the more important point is that the Big Pile will disappear immediately after it is constructed. I, for instance will go there and take whatever I want - which is everything (and don't counter me with \"rational people will never do that because...\" because I will do it given the chance and will the laugh really hard for about 2-3 hours).  Basically, even if you can put a limit on what people take there is no adequate price system. Just as Mises pointed out about communism you  cannot sustain an economy without a market price system. Moreover, you are assuming you have no market at all.  Still, in your thought experiment you say \"everyone working right now stays at their job, all the factories and McDonnald's stay open and produce the same level they produce today\". So you are basically asking if everything stays the same will everything stay the same. Clearly if everyone produces the same they produce now, the production will always stay on the same level...  Maybe what you are asking is \"If we have no markets and everyone took whatever they wanted would we die out of starvation?\" The answer then is \"yes we will\".  \"Socialism is not an alternative to capitalism; it is an alternative to any system under which men can live as human beings\" - Mises","human_ref_B":"I think this may be as simple as saying the pile is a common good and common goods tend to be overexploited.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":6766.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"17fw27","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Suggested reading for and against school vouchers? I'm looking for evidence-based work from people with credentials to take seriously, not entertainment pundits and propaganda. Not sure if this is a better fit for asksocialscience or ask_politics?","c_root_id_A":"c85ab6r","c_root_id_B":"c85d523","created_at_utc_A":1359417070,"created_at_utc_B":1359425823,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I like Charles Payne's _So Much Reform, So Little Change_ for a relatively balanced look at how various programs have played out.   *spoiler: all programs underestimate the importance of parental involvement.","human_ref_B":"For  Against  In the name of answering your question in balance, I will stop there.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":8753.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"17fw27","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Suggested reading for and against school vouchers? I'm looking for evidence-based work from people with credentials to take seriously, not entertainment pundits and propaganda. Not sure if this is a better fit for asksocialscience or ask_politics?","c_root_id_A":"c854w11","c_root_id_B":"c85d523","created_at_utc_A":1359401613,"created_at_utc_B":1359425823,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"No child left behind by abernathy","human_ref_B":"For  Against  In the name of answering your question in balance, I will stop there.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":24210.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"17fw27","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.74,"history":"Suggested reading for and against school vouchers? I'm looking for evidence-based work from people with credentials to take seriously, not entertainment pundits and propaganda. Not sure if this is a better fit for asksocialscience or ask_politics?","c_root_id_A":"c8552sh","c_root_id_B":"c85d523","created_at_utc_A":1359402156,"created_at_utc_B":1359425823,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Milton Friedman puts fourth an argument for school vouchers in his book Free to Choose. He cites trail runs performed in the US and claims that the general performance level increased and the gap between rich schools and poor schools shrunk.","human_ref_B":"For  Against  In the name of answering your question in balance, I will stop there.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":23667.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"2zijmd","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.89,"history":"What's wrong with 8-Bit Philosophy's presentation of Max Weber? This video was posted in \/r\/badsocialscience about a month ago and lampooned. I'm slightly concerned because I (not a soc major) am taking a course in classical theory and 8-Bit's version was fairly similar to what I was taught about Weber in class.","c_root_id_A":"cpjdebl","c_root_id_B":"cpjdrcm","created_at_utc_A":1426724290,"created_at_utc_B":1426724950,"score_A":8,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"The video isn't awful but it's a bit glib and confusing. I'd say in general the description of Weber's argument is too short, which creates some potential misinterpretations.   1.) The 'Turnip Field' example is confusing in that Weber's discussions of agricultural labor actually illustrate the opposite thing: it was difficult to make migrant workers into full-time proletarians because rural workers would simply make some money in the city and then go back to the farm. They preferred to maintain their current standard of living and have more free time, instead of advancing themselves. This is the opposite of the Protestant Ethic: Weber introduces that example as a contrasting case.    2.) The claim that workers are 'stripped of their very  humanity' is hyperbolic and really doesn't have any basis in what Weber wrote. He was pessimistic, but he was also very leery of drawing moral conclusions, partially because he thought capitalism determined large parts of our morality and vice versa.   3.) The meaning of the Iron Cage metaphor is contentious, but it's usually not understood to mean that workers in particular are trapped in their social position. It's meant to a refer to a broader argument that modernity is an inescapable and ubiquitous fact. It imposes harsh limits, but it's not a form of political repression.   4.) The claim about a 'workforce founded in religious principles' is likewise a misrepresentation. Weber isn't talking about a polity that would have principles, he's talking about a society that does certain empirical things. (There's a later argument about 'civil religion' that does claim something like the former.) The point is that we live in a secular society that no longer experiences religious upheavals, but that has a religious prehistory.   5.) More importantly, the next part mangles both the definition of the Protestant Ethic and the theology of Calvinism. The whole point of Calvinism and predestination is that you _cannot_ achieve salvation through good works (in fact, you can't be saved in your earthly lifetime, which is what distinguishes it from, say, Baptism) : the elect and the damned are distinguished from each other before birth by God. You can only _show_ that you _might_ be one of the elect. You're trapped in competition in social life because there's no hope of divine intercession. The video doesn't make this clear. Moreover, Capitalism is not a direct expression of Calvinist religiosity. There is a _very_ important part of Weber's argument towards the end of the book where he states that the original religious animus behind Calvinism has been lost: while Calvinism might have created the conditions for the accumulation of profit, people are no longer motivated by religious concerns in the same way as are Reformation-era Calvinists. But the inevitability and fixity of the iron cage we live in is a secularization of that very earlier idea of predestination which is now dead. We maintain the same obsession with appearances but we no longer know why. This is the _reason_ we don't know why we're anxious.","human_ref_B":"I was expecting to like this, but I think it's almost completely a misrepresentation of what's worthwhile about the *Protestant Ethic*.  The makers of this seems to have taken the *a priori* stance \"capitalism is bad for the worker\", and then tried to use dear Weber to support that position.    It has been five year since I read it last, but some of the huge overstatements that should be noted:   * It mentions \"American-style capitalism\".  While Weber does quote from Ben Franklin and some other Americans early in the work, I feel that they drop out of the narrative and he's primarily talking about Europe.   * \"working for a boss\".  I think this is a weird Marxist reading of Weber because I don't hardly remember Weber discussing workers at all.  *The Protestant Ethic* is about the bosses' motivations, first and foremost, not the workers'.  The little mouse-boss says, \"Work hard or go to hell.\"  In Weber, we have Calvinists going, \"Fuck, there are the damned and the elected, and G-d has predestined this stuff before I was born, but I want to be one of the elected, but nothing I can do in this world can change that.  How do I know, then, if I'm elected or damned?  Oh, I can look at *this world* and see how I'm doing, if I'm living a righteous life with righteous worldly rewards.\"  The Calvinists wanted worldly rewards not for worldly pleasure and power (as Weber argues, say, the Medicis might have), but as a sign of other worldly rewards.  This led to the Calvinists living ascetic lives (Weber later went on to do a lot of work on asceticism), and so their worldly rewards get *reinvested* rather than spent on pleasure, etc.  This is what makes capitalism--the making money is an end onto itself; money is not instrumentally accumulated for the pleasure it can provide.  This is the crux of Weber's capitalist story, one about *capitalists*, not a Marxist explanation of exploitation of the workers under capitalist society.  This is the essential problem with the piece--they're, as it were, reading Weber instrumentally to make essentially Marxist arguments which greatly contorts dear Weber to the point of being almost unrecognizable.     * I don't understand how they relate the Calvinist anxiety over predestined salvation with our own \"waking up each morning to make the morning commute\".     * Most important, they (like really all Marxists who try to use Weber) totally miss out on the mechanism here.  Especially in their little animations here, they make it seem like \"the bosses\" are using G-d to exploit the workers to this day (hence the little bubbles like, \"Work hard or you won't get to heaven,\" which isn't even something a Calvinist would say), but I believe Weber argues that this \"Spirit of capitalism\", though invented with the Calvinists, was secularized and then spread to others, meaning that by the time he's writing you could have Lutheran, Catholic, or atheist capitalists, as the \"spirit\" generalized (this is the part I remember the least).     * The things ends with all these \"American\" things, how we work hard, blah blah.  But if we still think that the Calvinist influence is the defining feature of modern capitalism (Weber, I believe, saw it more as the spark that started a chain of actions rather than an influence that continues directly to the present) what we'd expect is that other countries where Calvinism ruled (Scotland, the Netherlands, etc.) would display these same characters they point out in American society.  I'm not sure they do, but I think goes to show how this video was made not to explore Weber's thought, but rather condemn American capitalism.   * The \"Iron Cage\" is the condition of *modern* society, not capitalist society.  Which isn't to say it doesn't come from capitalism, but rather than capitalism is one influence among many--there's also rationalization, bureaucratization, secularization, etc.   I don't have that section in front of me, but when it's used today it's much more about bureaucratization than it is about capitalism writ large (see, for example, Powell and DiMaggio's \"The Iron Cage Revisited\").","labels":0,"seconds_difference":660.0,"score_ratio":1.125}
{"post_id":"bzm57h","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.86,"history":"Reliable information on North Korea Where can I find out how North Korea actually functions, what living conditions there are like and why, etc.? News reports often seem sensationalist - are there good academic sources, or a general expert consensus, on the country?","c_root_id_A":"eqtyl5e","c_root_id_B":"eqtu4af","created_at_utc_A":1560321878,"created_at_utc_B":1560319546,"score_A":16,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"38 North is great for news and analysis. Best source I've found.  Fact based, long form, neutral analysis with context.   https:\/\/www.38north.org\/","human_ref_B":"I like the articles by Andrei Lankov. He seems very knowledgeable and unbiased.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":2332.0,"score_ratio":5.3333333333}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3uwvpf","c_root_id_B":"c3uu2vw","created_at_utc_A":1330192290,"created_at_utc_B":1330159553,"score_A":47,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"I always figured the social reason for this was that we start out roughly 50\/50 with men vs. ladies, and the assumption is that a given society will tend to have more polygamous marriages of a specific gender layout (typically one man and many women).  Because of that, widespread polygamy would result in the less successful in society being unable to have children\/mate.  While that kind of thing is an effective selection and population control method for many species of pack animals, it does lead to a somewhat violent society where outcast young males that couldn't beat the current alpha are left to roam and attempt to take over other packs, or at least sneak in some mating with the females of the pack before getting mauled and chased out.  Dispelling violence in the younger generation is a big problem, perhaps *the* big problem, in societies.  The willingness of someone to sacrifice their lives for violence is going to go up if they aren't in a family and have no hope of being in one via disenfranchisement.  This kind of thing actually tends to give *more* power to those who already have wealth\/families in a society, since their \"extra\" young singles are getting themselves killed versus an external enemy rather than competing or making any potential changes to the status quo.  You can see this social structure in many tribal\/religiously ruled societies (e.g. Afghanistan), and you can also see it break down once a culture is more educated (e.g. the young in Iran, rebelling against their own government).  I know marriage isn't for everyone, but families are a big part of what keep people invested in society.  Innately keeping some people from marrying so via large scale polygamy does seem to be a threat to society.  If the number of married men\/women ended up being roughly equal that'd be an entirely different question, though.  I personally think having more spouses would result in more insular and less externally productive families, but that wouldn't be an objectively bad thing.","human_ref_B":"What if *everybody* was married to *everybody else*, man? .... and the world was just a big family... whoa","labels":1,"seconds_difference":32737.0,"score_ratio":1.7407407407}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3utzle","c_root_id_B":"c3uwvpf","created_at_utc_A":1330158382,"created_at_utc_B":1330192290,"score_A":6,"score_B":47,"human_ref_A":"There is no reason, but there's no point why one must lead to another. To demonstrate this, you can just as easily flip the slippery slope argument and say \"we must not ban gay marriage, because banning one type of marriage will eventually lead to banning all types of marriage\". Second of all, you can just define marriage as being between \"two people\" and that solves the problem, but as others point out there's no real good reason why it shouldn't be the case that any number of people can get married.","human_ref_B":"I always figured the social reason for this was that we start out roughly 50\/50 with men vs. ladies, and the assumption is that a given society will tend to have more polygamous marriages of a specific gender layout (typically one man and many women).  Because of that, widespread polygamy would result in the less successful in society being unable to have children\/mate.  While that kind of thing is an effective selection and population control method for many species of pack animals, it does lead to a somewhat violent society where outcast young males that couldn't beat the current alpha are left to roam and attempt to take over other packs, or at least sneak in some mating with the females of the pack before getting mauled and chased out.  Dispelling violence in the younger generation is a big problem, perhaps *the* big problem, in societies.  The willingness of someone to sacrifice their lives for violence is going to go up if they aren't in a family and have no hope of being in one via disenfranchisement.  This kind of thing actually tends to give *more* power to those who already have wealth\/families in a society, since their \"extra\" young singles are getting themselves killed versus an external enemy rather than competing or making any potential changes to the status quo.  You can see this social structure in many tribal\/religiously ruled societies (e.g. Afghanistan), and you can also see it break down once a culture is more educated (e.g. the young in Iran, rebelling against their own government).  I know marriage isn't for everyone, but families are a big part of what keep people invested in society.  Innately keeping some people from marrying so via large scale polygamy does seem to be a threat to society.  If the number of married men\/women ended up being roughly equal that'd be an entirely different question, though.  I personally think having more spouses would result in more insular and less externally productive families, but that wouldn't be an objectively bad thing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":33908.0,"score_ratio":7.8333333333}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3utyi9","c_root_id_B":"c3uwvpf","created_at_utc_A":1330158031,"created_at_utc_B":1330192290,"score_A":2,"score_B":47,"human_ref_A":"Would they even want to get married? I've always had the idea from interviews that they see the institution of marriage as outdated.","human_ref_B":"I always figured the social reason for this was that we start out roughly 50\/50 with men vs. ladies, and the assumption is that a given society will tend to have more polygamous marriages of a specific gender layout (typically one man and many women).  Because of that, widespread polygamy would result in the less successful in society being unable to have children\/mate.  While that kind of thing is an effective selection and population control method for many species of pack animals, it does lead to a somewhat violent society where outcast young males that couldn't beat the current alpha are left to roam and attempt to take over other packs, or at least sneak in some mating with the females of the pack before getting mauled and chased out.  Dispelling violence in the younger generation is a big problem, perhaps *the* big problem, in societies.  The willingness of someone to sacrifice their lives for violence is going to go up if they aren't in a family and have no hope of being in one via disenfranchisement.  This kind of thing actually tends to give *more* power to those who already have wealth\/families in a society, since their \"extra\" young singles are getting themselves killed versus an external enemy rather than competing or making any potential changes to the status quo.  You can see this social structure in many tribal\/religiously ruled societies (e.g. Afghanistan), and you can also see it break down once a culture is more educated (e.g. the young in Iran, rebelling against their own government).  I know marriage isn't for everyone, but families are a big part of what keep people invested in society.  Innately keeping some people from marrying so via large scale polygamy does seem to be a threat to society.  If the number of married men\/women ended up being roughly equal that'd be an entirely different question, though.  I personally think having more spouses would result in more insular and less externally productive families, but that wouldn't be an objectively bad thing.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":34259.0,"score_ratio":23.5}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3utzle","c_root_id_B":"c3uu2vw","created_at_utc_A":1330158382,"created_at_utc_B":1330159553,"score_A":6,"score_B":27,"human_ref_A":"There is no reason, but there's no point why one must lead to another. To demonstrate this, you can just as easily flip the slippery slope argument and say \"we must not ban gay marriage, because banning one type of marriage will eventually lead to banning all types of marriage\". Second of all, you can just define marriage as being between \"two people\" and that solves the problem, but as others point out there's no real good reason why it shouldn't be the case that any number of people can get married.","human_ref_B":"What if *everybody* was married to *everybody else*, man? .... and the world was just a big family... whoa","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1171.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3uu2vw","c_root_id_B":"c3utyi9","created_at_utc_A":1330159553,"created_at_utc_B":1330158031,"score_A":27,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"What if *everybody* was married to *everybody else*, man? .... and the world was just a big family... whoa","human_ref_B":"Would they even want to get married? I've always had the idea from interviews that they see the institution of marriage as outdated.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1522.0,"score_ratio":13.5}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3uxrzl","c_root_id_B":"c3uy6ze","created_at_utc_A":1330198184,"created_at_utc_B":1330200898,"score_A":18,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"Links possibly of interest:  - \"The puzzle of monogamous marriage\", Heinrich 2012 (emphasis added):      > \"The anthropological record indicates that approximately 85 per cent of human societies have permitted men to have more than one wife (polygynous marriage), and both empirical and evolutionary considerations suggest that large absolute differences in wealth should favour more polygynous marriages. Yet, monogamous marriage has spread across Europe, and more recently across the globe, even as absolute wealth differences have expanded. Here, we develop and explore the hypothesis that the norms and institutions that compose the modern package of monogamous marriage have been favoured by cultural evolution because of their group-beneficial effects\u2014promoting success in inter-group competition. In suppressing intrasexual competition and reducing the size of the pool of unmarried men, normative monogamy reduces crime rates, including rape, murder, assault, robbery and fraud, as well as decreasing personal abuses. By assuaging the competition for younger brides, *normative monogamy decreases (i) the spousal age gap, (ii) fertility, and (iii) gender inequality*. By shifting male efforts from seeking wives to paternal investment, *normative monogamy increases savings, child investment and economic productivity*. By increasing the relatedness within households, normative monogamy reduces intra-household conflict, leading to lower rates of child neglect, abuse, accidentaldeath and homicide. These predictions are tested using converging lines of evidence from across the human sciences.\" - my research notes on polyamory","human_ref_B":"I'll take a non-cultural stab.  Ethel marries Bob. They decide to add Gary into the relationship. Now you have a union of Ethel, Bob and Gary. Bob and Ethel decide to separate, does that mean that the entire union must be separated? Can Bob and Gary continue to have a union?      Why does this matter:   Fifteen years later you've got Bob married to Gary and Gary married to Ethel. Gary dies and didn't leave a will. Now Bob and Ethel both have \"equal\" shares of Gary's estate.       Even more fun:   Bob and Gary are married and Gary and Ethel are married. Ethel is also married to Sue and Bob is married to Sue. So it is Bob and Gary, Bob and Sue, Ethel and Gary, Ethel and Sue. Sue has two children, who exactly has parental rights if something happens to Sue? Can Gary pick up Sue's kids from the mall or demand weekend rights because Gary is in a relationship with someone Sue is in a relationship with? How far does that chain go?      The point I am making isn't that these problems are impossible to solve. The point I'm making is when people say \"Our current legal system has no way to support it\" they aren't just making up an excuse, figuring out this sort of stuff is not an overnight task. The only way I can think of resolving some of these issues is to have some sort of asset\/shareholder system.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":2714.0,"score_ratio":1.1111111111}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3utzle","c_root_id_B":"c3uy6ze","created_at_utc_A":1330158382,"created_at_utc_B":1330200898,"score_A":6,"score_B":20,"human_ref_A":"There is no reason, but there's no point why one must lead to another. To demonstrate this, you can just as easily flip the slippery slope argument and say \"we must not ban gay marriage, because banning one type of marriage will eventually lead to banning all types of marriage\". Second of all, you can just define marriage as being between \"two people\" and that solves the problem, but as others point out there's no real good reason why it shouldn't be the case that any number of people can get married.","human_ref_B":"I'll take a non-cultural stab.  Ethel marries Bob. They decide to add Gary into the relationship. Now you have a union of Ethel, Bob and Gary. Bob and Ethel decide to separate, does that mean that the entire union must be separated? Can Bob and Gary continue to have a union?      Why does this matter:   Fifteen years later you've got Bob married to Gary and Gary married to Ethel. Gary dies and didn't leave a will. Now Bob and Ethel both have \"equal\" shares of Gary's estate.       Even more fun:   Bob and Gary are married and Gary and Ethel are married. Ethel is also married to Sue and Bob is married to Sue. So it is Bob and Gary, Bob and Sue, Ethel and Gary, Ethel and Sue. Sue has two children, who exactly has parental rights if something happens to Sue? Can Gary pick up Sue's kids from the mall or demand weekend rights because Gary is in a relationship with someone Sue is in a relationship with? How far does that chain go?      The point I am making isn't that these problems are impossible to solve. The point I'm making is when people say \"Our current legal system has no way to support it\" they aren't just making up an excuse, figuring out this sort of stuff is not an overnight task. The only way I can think of resolving some of these issues is to have some sort of asset\/shareholder system.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":42516.0,"score_ratio":3.3333333333}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3uy6ze","c_root_id_B":"c3utyi9","created_at_utc_A":1330200898,"created_at_utc_B":1330158031,"score_A":20,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"I'll take a non-cultural stab.  Ethel marries Bob. They decide to add Gary into the relationship. Now you have a union of Ethel, Bob and Gary. Bob and Ethel decide to separate, does that mean that the entire union must be separated? Can Bob and Gary continue to have a union?      Why does this matter:   Fifteen years later you've got Bob married to Gary and Gary married to Ethel. Gary dies and didn't leave a will. Now Bob and Ethel both have \"equal\" shares of Gary's estate.       Even more fun:   Bob and Gary are married and Gary and Ethel are married. Ethel is also married to Sue and Bob is married to Sue. So it is Bob and Gary, Bob and Sue, Ethel and Gary, Ethel and Sue. Sue has two children, who exactly has parental rights if something happens to Sue? Can Gary pick up Sue's kids from the mall or demand weekend rights because Gary is in a relationship with someone Sue is in a relationship with? How far does that chain go?      The point I am making isn't that these problems are impossible to solve. The point I'm making is when people say \"Our current legal system has no way to support it\" they aren't just making up an excuse, figuring out this sort of stuff is not an overnight task. The only way I can think of resolving some of these issues is to have some sort of asset\/shareholder system.","human_ref_B":"Would they even want to get married? I've always had the idea from interviews that they see the institution of marriage as outdated.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":42867.0,"score_ratio":10.0}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3utzle","c_root_id_B":"c3uxrzl","created_at_utc_A":1330158382,"created_at_utc_B":1330198184,"score_A":6,"score_B":18,"human_ref_A":"There is no reason, but there's no point why one must lead to another. To demonstrate this, you can just as easily flip the slippery slope argument and say \"we must not ban gay marriage, because banning one type of marriage will eventually lead to banning all types of marriage\". Second of all, you can just define marriage as being between \"two people\" and that solves the problem, but as others point out there's no real good reason why it shouldn't be the case that any number of people can get married.","human_ref_B":"Links possibly of interest:  - \"The puzzle of monogamous marriage\", Heinrich 2012 (emphasis added):      > \"The anthropological record indicates that approximately 85 per cent of human societies have permitted men to have more than one wife (polygynous marriage), and both empirical and evolutionary considerations suggest that large absolute differences in wealth should favour more polygynous marriages. Yet, monogamous marriage has spread across Europe, and more recently across the globe, even as absolute wealth differences have expanded. Here, we develop and explore the hypothesis that the norms and institutions that compose the modern package of monogamous marriage have been favoured by cultural evolution because of their group-beneficial effects\u2014promoting success in inter-group competition. In suppressing intrasexual competition and reducing the size of the pool of unmarried men, normative monogamy reduces crime rates, including rape, murder, assault, robbery and fraud, as well as decreasing personal abuses. By assuaging the competition for younger brides, *normative monogamy decreases (i) the spousal age gap, (ii) fertility, and (iii) gender inequality*. By shifting male efforts from seeking wives to paternal investment, *normative monogamy increases savings, child investment and economic productivity*. By increasing the relatedness within households, normative monogamy reduces intra-household conflict, leading to lower rates of child neglect, abuse, accidentaldeath and homicide. These predictions are tested using converging lines of evidence from across the human sciences.\" - my research notes on polyamory","labels":0,"seconds_difference":39802.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3uxrzl","c_root_id_B":"c3utyi9","created_at_utc_A":1330198184,"created_at_utc_B":1330158031,"score_A":18,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"Links possibly of interest:  - \"The puzzle of monogamous marriage\", Heinrich 2012 (emphasis added):      > \"The anthropological record indicates that approximately 85 per cent of human societies have permitted men to have more than one wife (polygynous marriage), and both empirical and evolutionary considerations suggest that large absolute differences in wealth should favour more polygynous marriages. Yet, monogamous marriage has spread across Europe, and more recently across the globe, even as absolute wealth differences have expanded. Here, we develop and explore the hypothesis that the norms and institutions that compose the modern package of monogamous marriage have been favoured by cultural evolution because of their group-beneficial effects\u2014promoting success in inter-group competition. In suppressing intrasexual competition and reducing the size of the pool of unmarried men, normative monogamy reduces crime rates, including rape, murder, assault, robbery and fraud, as well as decreasing personal abuses. By assuaging the competition for younger brides, *normative monogamy decreases (i) the spousal age gap, (ii) fertility, and (iii) gender inequality*. By shifting male efforts from seeking wives to paternal investment, *normative monogamy increases savings, child investment and economic productivity*. By increasing the relatedness within households, normative monogamy reduces intra-household conflict, leading to lower rates of child neglect, abuse, accidentaldeath and homicide. These predictions are tested using converging lines of evidence from across the human sciences.\" - my research notes on polyamory","human_ref_B":"Would they even want to get married? I've always had the idea from interviews that they see the institution of marriage as outdated.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":40153.0,"score_ratio":9.0}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3utzle","c_root_id_B":"c3v09aq","created_at_utc_A":1330158382,"created_at_utc_B":1330214652,"score_A":6,"score_B":9,"human_ref_A":"There is no reason, but there's no point why one must lead to another. To demonstrate this, you can just as easily flip the slippery slope argument and say \"we must not ban gay marriage, because banning one type of marriage will eventually lead to banning all types of marriage\". Second of all, you can just define marriage as being between \"two people\" and that solves the problem, but as others point out there's no real good reason why it shouldn't be the case that any number of people can get married.","human_ref_B":"First of all, people will try to argue that polygamy could go either way, but let's face it: 95% of the time it's going to be one man with multiple women.  The problem with this set-up is that it creates a power imbalance.  It implies that one man is worth N women, but each woman is worth only 1\/N of a man.  It also creates a situation in which the women need to continually compete for the attention\/favour of their husband but the man doesn't need to compete at all.  Second, it creates a devastating gender imbalance in the dating pool.  Polygamous men are never removed from the dating pool, but their wives are, leading to a situation where there are much more available men on the dating scene than available women, creating a very bad situation for men who are single, and possibly leading to a situation where they feel they couldn't be with women without resorting to violence.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":56270.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3v09aq","c_root_id_B":"c3utyi9","created_at_utc_A":1330214652,"created_at_utc_B":1330158031,"score_A":9,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"First of all, people will try to argue that polygamy could go either way, but let's face it: 95% of the time it's going to be one man with multiple women.  The problem with this set-up is that it creates a power imbalance.  It implies that one man is worth N women, but each woman is worth only 1\/N of a man.  It also creates a situation in which the women need to continually compete for the attention\/favour of their husband but the man doesn't need to compete at all.  Second, it creates a devastating gender imbalance in the dating pool.  Polygamous men are never removed from the dating pool, but their wives are, leading to a situation where there are much more available men on the dating scene than available women, creating a very bad situation for men who are single, and possibly leading to a situation where they feel they couldn't be with women without resorting to violence.","human_ref_B":"Would they even want to get married? I've always had the idea from interviews that they see the institution of marriage as outdated.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":56621.0,"score_ratio":4.5}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3utyi9","c_root_id_B":"c3utzle","created_at_utc_A":1330158031,"created_at_utc_B":1330158382,"score_A":2,"score_B":6,"human_ref_A":"Would they even want to get married? I've always had the idea from interviews that they see the institution of marriage as outdated.","human_ref_B":"There is no reason, but there's no point why one must lead to another. To demonstrate this, you can just as easily flip the slippery slope argument and say \"we must not ban gay marriage, because banning one type of marriage will eventually lead to banning all types of marriage\". Second of all, you can just define marriage as being between \"two people\" and that solves the problem, but as others point out there's no real good reason why it shouldn't be the case that any number of people can get married.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":351.0,"score_ratio":3.0}
{"post_id":"q5176","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.84,"history":"I hate \"slippery slope\" arguments but what's to stop 3-plus-member marriages? Disregarding any gay\/straight issue.","c_root_id_A":"c3utyi9","c_root_id_B":"c3v4gcz","created_at_utc_A":1330158031,"created_at_utc_B":1330246060,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"Would they even want to get married? I've always had the idea from interviews that they see the institution of marriage as outdated.","human_ref_B":"WHO FUCKING CARES?  You wanna marry 50 frogs a donkey and your sister? Do it. I don't care.   Here's a checklist to see if I care: Is my life affected negatively? No.   Welp. That about wraps it up for this debate.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":88029.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"id79bu","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.92,"history":"[Q] What type of analysis to run on my study? Hello! I have been doing a research on how user privacy is compromised while using anonymous social media. My goal was to know whether the anonymous social media (like Sarahah) users are aware of the privacy intervention while using these sites. I collected the regarding data by an online survey which contained the demographic info, some close ended likert scale questions and some open ended question too ( by providing an \"other\" option alongside some pre-defined answers. If the user thinks of any other answer than the given one, he\/she can enter)   My variables were-  1. Age  2. Sex  3. Whether the person is a user of anonymous social media (Yes\/No)  4. If yes, what does he\/she thinks about data theft by these sites (Likert Scale)  5. Whether he\/she is concerned about the privacy intervention (likert scale).  6. Whether he\/she reads the terms and conditions (Yes\/ No)  7. Any thoughts about how to redeem this data theft( open ended)  &#x200B;  Now while analyzing this data, I am stuck. I don't know what statistical tests to perform to understand the significance between the variables. And being a CS major, I understand beginner-level statistics. Any help or direction would be much appreciated!","c_root_id_A":"g29acoa","c_root_id_B":"g28ku2s","created_at_utc_A":1597957917,"created_at_utc_B":1597947172,"score_A":4,"score_B":2,"human_ref_A":"It is important to respect the actual structure of your data. Most regression and machine learning techniques treat likert scores like actual numbers. This is wrong; the data is ordinal, not cardinal. While a linear regression can be a good starting point to tell the direction of the variable, the results will be biased when applied to ordinal data.  A good approach for likert scale data would be ordered logistic regression.","human_ref_B":"Do you know python? Or R? There are some great libraries in each that can help you with this depending on your existing knowledge. Here are three options for you to consider, hopefully the description helps you know what to research for more detail.   1) Try a simple linear regression first. This requires two variables and you can see if they are significantly correlated (but not necessarily causing each other). Sounds fun to see if gender makes a person more likely to read the terms or conditions, for example. For this ignore the open ended data.   2) For a more complicated approach throw all your first six (minus the open ended data) into an unsupervised model. This can help you find hidden correlations and relationships in your data. You can also view this in a correlation matrix. https:\/\/www.datarobot.com\/wiki\/unsupervised-machine-learning\/   3) So back to that open ended data. You can use natural language processing (NLP) to rate each comment on whether it's positive or negative. It's pretty easy and there are a few ways to do it you can experiment with. That will give you a quantitative number to do something with afterwards. Maybe head back to option 1, do men or women leave more positive comments?   Don't be afraid to be creative, school is for experimenting!","labels":1,"seconds_difference":10745.0,"score_ratio":2.0}
{"post_id":"uj69c","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"How do languages change so much over time? For example, from vulgar Latin came Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and many other languages. Back then, people in present-day Spain, France, etc would be speaking vulgar Latin more or less, but they changed the words, pronunciation, etc so that they formed their own language. There are features of Latin that are still present, but why do they feel the need to change certain features of the language?","c_root_id_A":"c4vvcpv","c_root_id_B":"c4vv9hi","created_at_utc_A":1338769206,"created_at_utc_B":1338768767,"score_A":5,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"People don't feel the need to change their language; it just sort of happens.  Vocabularies change for a number of reasons.  One of the most common is borrowings from other languages.  English has an extensive Latin-by-way-of-Old-French vocabulary that entered the language with the Norman Invasion.  Spanish has a ton of Arabic loanwords due to the influence of the Moors.  Etc.  Other new words come from combining parts of existing words (portmanteaux); coinings of entirely new words, maybe to fill a need like describing a new invention or maybe making up new slang that then becomes integrated into the language; and other reasons.  Another major source of difference between languages is sound change.  I don't know much about what triggers sound changes, but they're extremely regular and extremely common.  The language used by a particular groups of speakers changes over time and starts to diverge from the pronunciation of other speakers of the same language.  Think about the differences between, say, Scottish English and Midwestern American English.  They're both English, but the vowels are all different. (Consonants can be different, too: Scottish \"r\" sounds a lot different than American \"r\"; an even better example is that where speakers of most dialects of Spanish have a \"y\" sound, people from Argentina have something like \"zh\".)  Grammar changes, too.  Where there are irregularities in a language, speakers often end up regularizing them over time. Inflectional endings get changed or lost altogether.  (German, for example, has case-marking; English has lost its counterpart, except on pronouns.)  When case-marking is lost or simplified, word order becomes more important -- Latin had a much freer word order than most current Romance languages because the grammatical function of the words was clear from their inflection; now we often have to rely on word order to differentiate subjects and objects.  Over time, these changes add up.  The language of each group of speakers undergoes a different set of changes, and, without regular intermingling with other groups, eventually becomes unintelligible to outsiders.  Once the speakers can no longer understand each other, we say they speak different languages.  (More or less.  The distinction between dialects of the same language and different languages is often politically fraught.)","human_ref_B":"Just as a starting point: Your own language has changed from the language spoken by your parents. You probably didn't consciously \"feel the need\" to change it; it just happened. These changes are small, so you can still talk to people your parents' age, but over generations changes accumulate. People 1,000 years from now listening to a recording of you likely wouldn't be able to understand it very well.  Why does language change in the first place? There's no single, definitive reason -- more an interaction of reasons. Here are some broad ones, focusing on phonetics and phonology (the sounds of a language):  The physiology of the vocal tract:  This makes some pronunciations more \"natural\" than others. (I put this in quotes because it's a bad word and makes it seem like I'm making a value judgment, but I'm trying to avoid technical terms. No value judgment should be taken to be implied.) To give you an example, when you close your lips at the end of \"bob,\" you cut off the airstream, which means that it's harder for you to push air through your vibrating vocal chords. If you stop pushing air through your vibrating vocal chords at the end of the word you end up with \"bop.\" If enough speakers start saying \"bop\" instead, the language changes.   However, there is some pressure to keep pronouncing it as \"bob\" - we want to be understood by others, of course! In some languages, such a change doesn't stick, so \"bob\" and \"bop\" sound different, but in other languages, they both sound like \"bop.\"  Perception:   Single sounds (like the \"b\"s in \"bob\") can actually be broken down into collections of features. For example, to make a \"b\" sound, you close your lips and keep your vocal chords vibrating. If you change either of these features, you get a different sound. If close your velum instead, you get a \"g\" sound, and if you don't keep your vocal chords vibrating, you get a \"p\" sound.  If you're learning a language you don't necessarily learn that both of these features are equally important. Perhaps you focus on the fact that its the lips that close and the aistream stops, and say \"bop,\" or perhaps you focus on the fact that it's the lips that close and the vocal chords keep vibrating, and say \"bom.\"  This example is a bit artificially simple but I hope it communicates the idea.  Interaction between communities:  Different languages have different rules about how their sounds are arranged into syllables and words. In English, we can have the word \"bob\" or \"bop,\" but in Japanese you can't because you can't have those consonants at the end of a sylllable.   If you had a situation where a lot of English speakers and a lot of Japanese speakers were interacting, with perhaps a lot of bilingualism, the languages would begin to influence each other. You might find that English syllables get simplified, and that certain features of Japanese that English speakers find hard go away or change.   The history of English had a lot of this going on, given the UK's history of invasions. It can even happen within the same dialect--people who spoke different dialects of English came to the US, and in some areas these dialects mingled, with \"dialect leveling\" occurring -- the most difficult or uncommon features getting ironed away.  Social factors:  This is more about why changes catch on and spread, than why the first people make that change.  Speech isn't just for communication; it's also for identification. To a large degree, we model our speech on the speech of our community. This could be a regional community, it could be a class-based or ethnicity-based community, etc. We learn from our parents at first but once we're out in the world we actually learn more from our peers. If the people we identify with start doing something different, we're really likely to copy them. It can be completely unconscious.  So to sum up:  Small changes occur, they spread throughout the community, and over time changes accumulate.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":439.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1giuaf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.77,"history":"Why are 'swear words' so taboo? (NSWF language.) I've been trying to come up with a reason that certain words are so taboo? Why are words like shit, fuck, and cunt even considered \"NSFW\"? They're just slang terms for feces, sexual intercourse, and vagina.  Is there any study of why these and other words are censored and considered so...socially unacceptable?","c_root_id_A":"cakxzwd","c_root_id_B":"cakydqu","created_at_utc_A":1371519342,"created_at_utc_B":1371520399,"score_A":8,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"In addition to \/u\/ThornyPlebeian's very good answer and sources, I'll add this article which may provide some (light) insight into the research on swearing --- it's from 2005 though, and I'm not sure what's been going on in the field since then. Also the Wikipedia article on profanity may prove useful to you, if nothing else then as a starting point for finding further sources.  I will say, however, that taboo\/swear words aren't the same across languages. There are languages where speaking the names of the dead is considered taboo, and even languages where you have to use a specific vocabulary when speaking to e.g. your mother-in-law.","human_ref_B":"English curse words like Shit and Fuck are largely Germanic in origin. Vagina and feces are Latin based.   When William the Conqueror invaded Britain in 1044, his court spoke a contemporary version of French, while the average Briton of Angle and Saxon origin spoken their language derived from Germanic rooted languages.  So Latin words became associated with the noble court of William and his successors, while Germanic words were associated with uncouth or lower class behaviour. Slowly it evolved into the social understanding of 'swearing' that we have now.   Some sources,  Swearing: A social history of foul language, oaths and profanity in English by Geoffrey Hughes  Louise Pound, \"The Etymology of the English Expletive\" *Language* 3.2 (1927): 66-69.'  Note - I originally deleted my post because I felt awkward answering something outside my field. \/u\/lillesvin backed me up though, so I feel better about answering.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":1057.0,"score_ratio":2.125}
{"post_id":"217vhj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What causes religious extremism and terrorism? I live and work (most of the time) in Africa specifically, Kenya, South Africa and Nigeria.  Recently the spectre of religious extremism\/fundamentalism has started to rear its head, on the continent. Chad, Mali and the Central African Republic were in the headlines last year when extremists instigated near civil wars. Boko Haram and similar groups in Northern Nigeria have been increasing the intensity and frequency of their attacks \\(such as this on an army barracks\\). In Kenya we witnessed the horrific attacks last year on the shopping mall and lots of other smaller ones like this.   A couple of years ago when I was still in University the poverty based argument (that low income\/unemployed, politically repressed or under-represented groups are most susceptible) was falling out of favour.   My question is what is the academic thinking, on what causes extremism. Is it social, economic, political, religious, it seems to me we have spent the last decade \"fighting terrorism\" without figuring out what cause it in the first place.","c_root_id_A":"cgajuop","c_root_id_B":"cgajoyf","created_at_utc_A":1395670214,"created_at_utc_B":1395669754,"score_A":18,"score_B":13,"human_ref_A":"Firstly,  religious extremism and terrorism are two very different things.  There are peaceful religious extremists and there are non-religious terrorists. Terrorism is by definition a strategy or set of tactics based in asymmetric warfare,  often psychological and outside the conventions of standard warfare practices,  that can be utilized by any group. Martha Crenshaw's 1981 article is one of the best explanations of terrorism at this strategic level (I think it is called Causes of Terrorism and I think it was in Comparative Politics).    From a political science perspective,  everything I've read suggests that there is no clear link between poverty and terrorism.  Although there are certainly cases where poverty boosts recruitment,  looking at a global scale,  poverty is not a predictor of terrorism.  I  don't know sources off the top of my head,  but there are a lot of people doing work on political economy of terrorism.  From the psychological perspective,  Mark Sageman has a couple good books on  terrorism which support this ,  particularly one where he discusses European born jihadists.","human_ref_B":"According to these studies, terrorism does seem to be an effective way of advancing a political goal.  One can examine terrorism under rational choice theory, and it seems like a reasonable response when facing a superior military.    There is a huge scholarly debate over the rationality of terrorism since 9\/11, so it shouldn't be difficult to find a well-sourced answer here.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":460.0,"score_ratio":1.3846153846}
{"post_id":"217vhj","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.83,"history":"What causes religious extremism and terrorism? I live and work (most of the time) in Africa specifically, Kenya, South Africa and Nigeria.  Recently the spectre of religious extremism\/fundamentalism has started to rear its head, on the continent. Chad, Mali and the Central African Republic were in the headlines last year when extremists instigated near civil wars. Boko Haram and similar groups in Northern Nigeria have been increasing the intensity and frequency of their attacks \\(such as this on an army barracks\\). In Kenya we witnessed the horrific attacks last year on the shopping mall and lots of other smaller ones like this.   A couple of years ago when I was still in University the poverty based argument (that low income\/unemployed, politically repressed or under-represented groups are most susceptible) was falling out of favour.   My question is what is the academic thinking, on what causes extremism. Is it social, economic, political, religious, it seems to me we have spent the last decade \"fighting terrorism\" without figuring out what cause it in the first place.","c_root_id_A":"cgak3d7","c_root_id_B":"cgalpq0","created_at_utc_A":1395670872,"created_at_utc_B":1395674845,"score_A":3,"score_B":5,"human_ref_A":"It's been about 5-6 years since I last studied religious extremism and terrorism, so I'm not the most qualified to answer this question, but I can recommend Terror in the Mind of God by Mark Juergensmeyer. He does a good job of getting into some of the causes, as well as the mindset of those committing the acts of religious extremism and terrorism and their supporters.","human_ref_B":"I interned for a research institute that tried to answer the same questions you're asking - my group focused specifically on East Africa.  Scholars have proposed various explanations, and it seems like a lot agree that a lack of human development (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Human_development_(humanity)) and a feeling of hopelessness creates breeding grounds for violent extremism.  Sorry if this answer is too vague; I can dig up some more specific sources if necessary.  You can check out a bunch of free articles on the topic here: http:\/\/www.globalcenter.org\/publications-sorted-by-type\/?sort-publications-by-type=Articles&wpv_filter_submit=Search","labels":0,"seconds_difference":3973.0,"score_ratio":1.6666666667}
{"post_id":"1599gf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What makes a democracy, or rather what gives dictators their powers? So imagine North Korea, a known dictatorship. Kim Jong Un 'rules' over the people, but power comes from the generals supporting him who have power over the soldiers who have weapons and training. The soldiers on the other hand are normal citizens otherwise.  If the citizens simply decide not to support the dictatorship, the soldiers put down their arms or assassinate the generals, then they can go on living their lives, choosing a new government.  On the flip side of the coin, you have elections in countries that choose your leaders, they can make policies that the majority of the country doesn't agree with, but can do nothing non violent to change it.  Politics is weird","c_root_id_A":"c7kfad4","c_root_id_B":"c7kdl0n","created_at_utc_A":1356145494,"created_at_utc_B":1356137737,"score_A":15,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"There is a major coordination problem here. If everyone in North Korea were to wake up tomorrow and rebel, you are right--the government would be in deep trouble. But if you are the only one who shows up on the street corner to protest, you get sent away to a re-education camp. In that light, everyone staying at home is an equilibrium. (See a stag hunt.)  This reminds me of the fall of the Berlin Wall. A bureaucrat made the announcement that East Germany would soon allow East Germans to cross over into West Berlin. When a reporter asked when exactly this would happen, he looked at the note he was handed on the way into the press conference, saw nothing there, presumed it meant that day, and said \"immediately.\"  It was not supposed to be immediately--the guards at the Wall had not received any information about opening the Wall. But East German news kept repeating that part of the press conference. So everyone in East Berlin gathered at the Wall demanding to be let into West Berlin. The guards had no clue what was going on, realized there were more people gathered at the gates than bullets in their guns, and decided to let them through. And thus the Wall fell.  Note that everyone from East Germany could have gathered at the Wall ten years previously and forced the guards to lay down for the same reason. But no one ever did precisely because of the coordination problem.  Edit: Wikipedia page to show you I'm not crazy. http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/G%C3%BCnter_Schabowski","human_ref_B":"Read *The Dictator's Handbook* by Bruce Bueno de Mesquita. It answers both questions. You won't find a better or more cogent explanation elsewhere.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7757.0,"score_ratio":2.1428571429}
{"post_id":"1599gf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What makes a democracy, or rather what gives dictators their powers? So imagine North Korea, a known dictatorship. Kim Jong Un 'rules' over the people, but power comes from the generals supporting him who have power over the soldiers who have weapons and training. The soldiers on the other hand are normal citizens otherwise.  If the citizens simply decide not to support the dictatorship, the soldiers put down their arms or assassinate the generals, then they can go on living their lives, choosing a new government.  On the flip side of the coin, you have elections in countries that choose your leaders, they can make policies that the majority of the country doesn't agree with, but can do nothing non violent to change it.  Politics is weird","c_root_id_A":"c7kfad4","c_root_id_B":"c7kf9fu","created_at_utc_A":1356145494,"created_at_utc_B":1356145375,"score_A":15,"score_B":8,"human_ref_A":"There is a major coordination problem here. If everyone in North Korea were to wake up tomorrow and rebel, you are right--the government would be in deep trouble. But if you are the only one who shows up on the street corner to protest, you get sent away to a re-education camp. In that light, everyone staying at home is an equilibrium. (See a stag hunt.)  This reminds me of the fall of the Berlin Wall. A bureaucrat made the announcement that East Germany would soon allow East Germans to cross over into West Berlin. When a reporter asked when exactly this would happen, he looked at the note he was handed on the way into the press conference, saw nothing there, presumed it meant that day, and said \"immediately.\"  It was not supposed to be immediately--the guards at the Wall had not received any information about opening the Wall. But East German news kept repeating that part of the press conference. So everyone in East Berlin gathered at the Wall demanding to be let into West Berlin. The guards had no clue what was going on, realized there were more people gathered at the gates than bullets in their guns, and decided to let them through. And thus the Wall fell.  Note that everyone from East Germany could have gathered at the Wall ten years previously and forced the guards to lay down for the same reason. But no one ever did precisely because of the coordination problem.  Edit: Wikipedia page to show you I'm not crazy. http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/G%C3%BCnter_Schabowski","human_ref_B":"Going back to Weber, the state has the legitimate monopoly on violence.  The difference is that whether that is legitimized by elections, or legitimized by the ability to be violent.  Authoritarian states are a bit like a tautology, their legitimized monopoly on violence is legitimized because they can be violent.  Edit: As pointed out, I cannot spell names.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":119.0,"score_ratio":1.875}
{"post_id":"1599gf","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.82,"history":"What makes a democracy, or rather what gives dictators their powers? So imagine North Korea, a known dictatorship. Kim Jong Un 'rules' over the people, but power comes from the generals supporting him who have power over the soldiers who have weapons and training. The soldiers on the other hand are normal citizens otherwise.  If the citizens simply decide not to support the dictatorship, the soldiers put down their arms or assassinate the generals, then they can go on living their lives, choosing a new government.  On the flip side of the coin, you have elections in countries that choose your leaders, they can make policies that the majority of the country doesn't agree with, but can do nothing non violent to change it.  Politics is weird","c_root_id_A":"c7kf9fu","c_root_id_B":"c7kdl0n","created_at_utc_A":1356145375,"created_at_utc_B":1356137737,"score_A":8,"score_B":7,"human_ref_A":"Going back to Weber, the state has the legitimate monopoly on violence.  The difference is that whether that is legitimized by elections, or legitimized by the ability to be violent.  Authoritarian states are a bit like a tautology, their legitimized monopoly on violence is legitimized because they can be violent.  Edit: As pointed out, I cannot spell names.","human_ref_B":"Read *The Dictator's Handbook* by Bruce Bueno de Mesquita. It answers both questions. You won't find a better or more cogent explanation elsewhere.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":7638.0,"score_ratio":1.1428571429}
{"post_id":"alm2ya","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.7,"history":"What is the emic view of shame-honor based cultures? From what I understand of this concept, in guilt-innocence-based cultures (like the US), what prevents people from doing something wrong is an inherent sense of guilt.  And in shame-honor-based cultures (like Japan), what prevents people from doing something wrong is how others, or society in general, will view them.  And that people will commonly do things that are wrong as long as they are very sure they won't get caught.  I would never cheat on a test, because I would feel very guilty...regardless if I get caught or not.  But in a shame culture, people won't feel any guilt for cheating at all, as long as they're careful. Correct me if I'm wrong!  To my Western mind, it seems to me that guilt cultures are more sincere, more true, and that shame cultures are shallow, caring only about appearances.  But this is probably cultural bias!  So I'm wondering how do shame cultures feel about the fact they're shame cultures?  Do they find the whole thing insincere and\/or out-dated, or do they think it's better than guilt cultures?  Something I've been wondering about for a while.  Thank you for the insight!","c_root_id_A":"efg7gdg","c_root_id_B":"efgx3nz","created_at_utc_A":1548950492,"created_at_utc_B":1548967144,"score_A":2,"score_B":3,"human_ref_A":"I am curious whether the sociologists advocating this taxonomy have given any thought to is relation to Kohlberg's stages of moral development... https:\/\/en.m.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Lawrence_Kohlberg%27s_stages_of_moral_development","human_ref_B":"That's a great question!According to Tracy & Robins' model of shame (2006), publicity is not a necessary antecedent of shame. The problem is that there is some confusion between shame and embarassment (the latter does require the event to become public to be elicited). You can do something shameful and still feel ashamed while not being caught. A potential source of the confusion is that anthropologist and psychoanalysts and phemonologists did said that the public-dimension of shame was central in its definition. But data suggest it is not. The three appraisals eliciting shame are Internal blame, blaming the whole self (vs. a specific behavior), feeling that it is stable (vs. It will pass), and feeling that it is beyond our control (vs. I can change it). See also Tangney & Dearing, 2002, a really great book that offer good insights on the psychological differences between shame and guilt.So no, Shame is not shallow, or caring about appearance. It's actually a private emotion that only require that we internalize other's point of view. Which could also be said for guilt.  &#x200B;  EDIT: I'll might add that after talking with a Japanese about shame and guilt cultures, he was pretty proud to come from a shame culture. You see guilt is perceived as a more individualistic behavior (even kind of selfish), whereas shame serves the group, it's more devoted to your ingroup.","labels":0,"seconds_difference":16652.0,"score_ratio":1.5}
{"post_id":"127wwq","domain":"asksocialscience_train","upvote_ratio":0.95,"history":"What happens if a natural disaster affects election day? I know Hurricane Sandy should be done by election day, but what happens if people can't get out to vote because they evacuated or infrastructure is disturbed?","c_root_id_A":"c6sxudr","c_root_id_B":"c6sxgbr","created_at_utc_A":1351443928,"created_at_utc_B":1351442178,"score_A":23,"score_B":17,"human_ref_A":"Not a social scientist, but I work in elections and I stumbled across this post: it depends on the individual county election boards. They have the final say in certifying the results of the elections, and it's up to them whether or not they want to keep the results or throw them out and hold another election. In short, it will vary from county to county.","human_ref_B":"Hurricane Sandy will impact Northern Virginia more than the rest of the state.  Since Northern Virginia is the liberal portion of the state, and the state is already too close to call, I wouldn't be surprised if the storm has a material impact here.","labels":1,"seconds_difference":1750.0,"score_ratio":1.3529411765}