Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader decided that we have to break this out to a new post.

You know… Your Maximum Leader’s suggestion for a debate format for Bush and Kerry would be equally applicable to the Smallholder.

Allow a little mild fisking:

Once again my opponent is trying to adjust the world into a black and white resolution. If my esteemed leader was conversant with scientific principles and inquiry, he would know that NOTHING is ever 100% certain in science. The article I linked to is yet one more piece of the complex puzzle of sexual orientation.

Perhaps the Smallholder isn’t quite as conversant with scientific principles as he thinks. If you consider mathematics a science then things can be known with 100% certainty.

That isue aside, the sometimes-good Minister of Agriculture really
likes to break your Maximum Leader down into black and white issues. (This is probably a result of his native squishyness and inability to nail down a cogent set of core beliefs for himself.) Your Maximum Leader has never claimed that human genetics are a black or white issue. The article linked by the Smallholder isn’t really a piece of anything. It is a short reduction of semi-salient points derived from a larger study. (The larger study itself is not linked.)

Next point:

The Maximum Leader keeps focusing on the single gene issue, a position I have never held. Diabetes isn’t a single-gene issue either. But we don’t advocate discrimination against diabetes sufferers. Depression isn’t a single-gene issue but we acknowledge that there is a genetic component at the heart of many people’s struggle with theis mental illness. What shocks, yes shocks, the Smallholder is the intensity with which people will deny emerging scientific consensus in order to avoid cognitive dissonance and the necessity of rethinking predetermined positions.

Your Maximum Leader has never focused on the single gene theory. In his post he happened to highlight a line that addressed single gene theory. He also highlighted another line that the Smallholder neglects to mention. Allow your Maximum Leader to quote it in full:”The researchers discovered that women tend to have more children when they inherit the same - as yet unidentified - genetic factors linked to homosexuality in men.” What part of that last line fills any sentient person with certitude? Unidentified genetic factors and tendencies. Now your Maximum Leader would have to look at the actual study to figure out how uncertain the researchers actually are, but they sound pretty darned uncertain.

Also notice if you will the reliance by the Smallholder on the “emerging scientific consensus.” This point relates to the next Smallholder item:

To return to depression, scientists have found that depression “tends to” run in families and may be a result of a cluster of genes impacting brain chemistry. We don’t understand the whole mechanism as yet. Genetic research is in its infancy. But no one seriously disputes that there is indeed a genetic component. The same applies to a host of other issues and diseases. Single-gene causation like sickle-cell is the exception to the rule.

Emergent scientific consensus in a field of inquiry that is in its infancy and in which its practitioners recognize we don’t understand very much of what there is to understand. The discussion of depression is telling here. There are observable tendencies which may be the result of genetics. They also may not be. There isn’t enough evidence to know.

This is the crux of this disagreement. As your Maximum Leader has said before, he is skeptical, the Smallholder is willing to move ahead without further consideration. Your Maximum Leader is concerned here with the level of skepticism - a factor that doesn’t seem to concern the Smallholder in the least.

More:

My favorite part, however, is when he poses as a
critical skeptic of research. It is interesting that the skeptic part ONLY applies to science that undermines his political position.

What is so absolutely hilarious about this statement is that the Smallholder doesn’t want to talk about any science that isn’t politically charged. He’s never been quick to engage in discussion of the science behind “rouge waves.” Here is an empirically observable phenomenon which until just recently scientists dismissed. In fact, scientists dismissed it with much more certainty that currently exists over genetics.

Of course, I suppose all of us have points on which we are intellectually ineffective. But isn’t this the age of Enlightenment? Shouldn’t people of good will be willing o change their positions based on new evidence?

Last time your Maximum Leader checked, the age of Enlightenment ended in the late 18th Century. And your Maximum Leader is quite open minded. When evidence, not conjecture, is presented it can be reviewed, evaluated, tested and knowledge gained; then policy decisions - which is really the heart of the Smallholders argument - can be made. At that point your Maximum Leader would be happy to re-evaluate his position. Would the Smallholder be willing to do the same if the evidence pointed to no correlation?

And finally, the Smallholder still doesn’t care to address the issue of free will in this whole discussion.

Carry on.