This reads like the scientific version of a stereotype.
Maybe kind of interesting, but extremely prone to misinterpetation, over-generalization, and potentially prejudice.
Maybe kind of interesting, but extremely prone to misinterpetation, over-generalization, and potentially prejudice.
http://www.spsp.org/news-center/blog/stereotype-accuracy-res...
Conclusions should take additional care, but populations are different in important ways.
I agree -- they might be onto something here, but you have to be careful or your reasoning can be misled.
These questions are complex. The premises and framing are critical. The surrounding evidence that's not measured is probably much more important than whatever the scientist is able to actually measure.
All living beings, including humans, are a mix of strengths and weaknesses in careful balance. If a martian scientist were to look at humans they would probably say something like:
"Not very strong, not very fast, eats a lot, no armor, horns, or poison. Can't fly. We predict that wolves will hunt them to extinction in a few decades."
But obviously the martians didn't measure our brains. Evolution of living beings tends to create these exceptions that throw off simpistic analysis.
What are you forgetting to measure that will completely throw off your conclusions?
> It should be noted that the magnitude of the effects is generally quite small and the overall explanatory power of the models is modest. However, complex psychological phenomena, such as personality, are likely to be influenced by hundreds, if not thousands, of factors, so small effects are to be expected especially when examined in the uncontrolled context of real-world settings ... our research shows that an increase of one standard deviation in mountainousness is associated with a change of approximately 1% in personality, which may seem insignificant. However, when scaled to hundreds of thousands of people, such an increase would translate into substantial changes ...