Also worth noting that you're picking largely smart and good faith contrarians here, whereas there are even more popular contrarians (weinstiens, Joe Rogan, etc.) who are even less reliably correct but way more popular. I'm always shocked by how certain people like that in the contrarian space have nearly no filter for bullshit so long as it's anti-consensus.
I usually think of contrarianism as being wrong most of the time but helping on the margin because it brings light to positions that are underrated due to social conformity factors. I think most meta-contrarians would admit that they’re wrong most of the time. It would be quite silly to take the meta contrarian point and think you are right most of the time just due to the philosophical literature on rational disagreement (or lack thereof).
I think this is right, but there are also some contrarian views that have turned out to be correct in a big way, a couple of examples:
-Trump was not actually working with the Russians (this was pretty contrary to conventional wisdom for a long time)
-Non-pharmaceutical interventions (mask mandates, social distancing mandates, school closures) probably have near-zero effect on SARS/CoV2 transmission
-Bad US health outcomes are mostly not due to our lack of a socialized healthcare system
Tbh the pattern I see here is that contrarian arguments that buttress politically radical takes tend to turn out wrong but contrarian arguments that militate against more-radical takes are often right. But that last bit is probably a biased assessment on my part.
Neither Caplan's views on education or Hanson's views on medicine are described correctly. Caplan argues that signaling is the primary explanation for the wage premium, not that it's the only one. Education, especially primary and secondary, results in skill building and such especially for mathematics and English.
I went through this same process 15 years ago. My conclusions from 2009
"contrarianism is a cheap way of allowing ideological hacks to think of themselves as fearless, independent thinkers, while never challenging (in fact reinforcing) the status quo ...To sum up my current view: “contrarianism” is mostly contrary to reality, the “conventional wisdom” is probably wiser than the typical unconventional alternative, and “politically incorrect” views are almost always incorrect in every way: literally, scientifically and morally.
"Most of the people who believe the gap is environmental don’t much want to argue about it, so almost all the people who write things about it are people who believe the genetic explanation of the gap." Why wouldn't they argue about it?, it would improve their reputation among the mainstream and their own audience in many cases. Could it not be that they don't argue against hereditarianism, because they don't think they could make reasonable sounding arguments as to it being false or they in fact believe in it.
That even prior to Scott having his old emails leaked where he said "HBD is probably partially correct or at least very non-provably not-correct." and "NEVER TELL ANYONE I SAID THIS ..." it was obvious that the absence of evidence of him believing in hereditarianism was evidence of non absence of such beliefs. And of course if you are unable figure out what people actually believe on certain issues, then it's hard to say you're not the contrarian.
The Joe M piece you cited isn't nearly enough to override the mountain of evidence against the gap being genetic. A few adoption studies with low n values doesn't discount that, while IQ correlates at r = .86 for identical twins, but between r = .19 and .24 for adoptees and their foster parents (Bluchard & McGue, 1981, pp. 1057-58).* We'd never see such if it were primarily environmental.
It's exactly like arguing for creationism versus evolution. You don't have the luxury of dismissing a small number of studies. You have to dismiss the overwhelming majority of gathered knowledge of entire fields.
"Sam is right, yet I think he understates the problem. There are various topics where arguing for one side of them is inherently interesting, yet arguing for the other side is boring. There are a lot of people who read Austian economics blogs, yet no one reads (or writes) anti-Austrian economics blogs. " I'm not sure I agree with the example or the generalization from it (if it were true). In the vast majority of urban educated upper middle class social circles in America, doing things like arguing against the minimum wage will just get you subtle or not so subtle scowls. Admittedly, you (and I ) might lurk in corners of the internet where this is reversed. But even in the other subculture that we both probably asspciate with (Effective Altruism), the opposite is true. In fact, there are systematic reasons why we should expect center-left positions to be less true than they appear to be - given so much of the elite and urban mass affluent population wants badly not to stray from this part of the spectrum. But sure, if you find yourself in a very specific bubble, it's fair to take a haircut on the contrarian positions that dominate within that bubble.
I disagree with most of the examples. details below.
but contrarianism is wrong many times, of course!
1. Caplan on education.
Caplan literature review on education isn't a "public intellectual polemic". but rather an in-depth literature review much more comprehensive than the one Atis linked to.
I think Atis never read Caplan book. and by error assumed it to be just some blog post shallow opinion. (which Caplan can produce of course!)
can one argue "my literature review is better than Caplan"? sure. but Caplan is no less qualified.
and the signalling theory is education isn't a fringe view either. it's an old debate in economics.
2. Scott Alexander Vs Hanson. turns out it's far from conclusive. Scott original refutation seems to have interpreted Hanson much more expansively than Hanson intended (per Hanson). they went back and forth 4 posts. I don't think it's very conclusive!
3. COVID lab Vs raccoon dogs.
first, great example of where the whole "trust boring autists" is irrelevant.
the "system" intentionally lied. boring autists where forced to toe the party line and social media companies censored any mention of lab leak.
Moreover, many of those "boring autists" themselves thought it might well be lab leak.
at the end, the lied enforced on us might've turned out to be true. but originally "the experts" lied shamelessly.
4. Guezy in sleep.
Guezy made TWO claims:
A. the main claim. the book "why we sleep " is dishonest, unreliable and can't be considered "science based"
this is what went viral. is still true. was never refuted.
B. Guezy "bro feeling" opinion:
"I don't think we really need that much sleep".
his personal opinion. not evidence based. and he changed his mind later.
5. genes and IQ.
this is a policed topic.
who in his right mind would trust Chinese citizens about the veracity of Xi Yinping thought?
if you work in a university, or any public institution, you cannot say that Racial gaps in intelligence are of genetic origin.
therefore, it's "boring autists on a leash with a gun pointed to their head" Vs free People.
this doesn't prove the hereditarians right. but the reliability of university employed experts here equals that of OJ Simpson lawyers.
the example cited on adoption says
"I conclude that, while much of the data is low quality and no conclusive judgments can be made, most of the data is compatible with a primarily environmental explanation of the gap.". no slam dunk.
it's a debate with many lines of evidence. this guy choose one of them and didn't find a smoking gun.
6. Caplan is not even wrong re mental illnesses. I agree. but a much weaker version of his view might be true.
TLDR.
1. contrarianism is high risk. lots of incorrect views. obviously don't start by trusting everything contrarians say.
2. lots of the "refuting examples" in the blog aren't convincing.
3. whenever the system enforces a view using censorship/penalties, it's no contest. I'm not trusting Pravda. even though it's sometimes telling the truth.
IQ, racial issues, lab leak etc.
enforced dishonesty.
the contrarians aren't always right. but they are your only honest source.
Your understanding of the lab leak hypothesis is laughably naive. Your understanding of HBD is similar. I suppose in both situations its probably for the best that you stick to consensus since you don't seem able to evaluate the claims yourself.
Just to pick up on something in your second sentence, I not only think that "diets don't work" is pretty generally correct, I also don't think it's a contrarian position; I think that's the establishment medical view.
Every single “deep-dive” into the literature on schooling will make you think it works for the simple reason that it will always be individually rational to get a degree as long as society uses this credential as a way to gauge your earning potential/skills. Add this to an incredibly deeply-seated aversion to talking about genes and IQ and you get the literature we have.
The relevant Caplanian question is how much smarter / capable schooling makes you and therefore impacts your earnings _independently_ of signaling value. The commonsensical answer: very little beyond some fairly basic concepts we could conceivably learn in a quicker format or on the job. Get a boring job and you’ll very quickly realize that your earnings potential can’t be very related to how much you studied for your colonial history exam.
Speaking of IQ, it’s funny you don’t talk about it. That IQ matters is one of the most seriously contrarian opinions there are, but it is basically omnipresent on this side of the internet. Whatever structural forces make contrarians equivocate, they aren’t strong enough for them to be wrong on this. Unless you believe IQ doesn’t matter…
Re: the leak hypothesis. It’s striking that a bunch of establishment-type boring people ended up buying into it. My guess is that it’s just superficially extremely plausible and some contrarians bought into it, that’s all.
Finally, for the hereditarian hypothesis in racial gaps… are you serious? There are ENORMOUS structural incentives to lie about this. I mean, actual political coalitions and formulas depend almost entirely on it. Of course there’s going to be clever people arguing this stuff isn’t true, there are enormously clever people arguing that the Soviet Union was a complete success (do you think the average communist is more stupid than the average person?). It’s an open secret that a bunch of very smart people hold or flirt with this belief in secret (Scott, Pinker) and, yes, the explanatory power of this idea is the closest equivalent to a Theory of Everything the social sciences can ever produce.
I'm not going to venture a guess on whether contrarianism is wrong in general - I don't know. But I think your description of the racial gaps debate is inaccurate. First, the view that genetic factors partially explain racial inequality in cognitive ability is only contrarian in the broader society. According to the most recent surveys on the topic, a majority of intelligence researchers agree that genetic factors at least partly explain racial gaps in cognitive ability.
Second, I've read Jay's blog in detail and I do like it, but he relies on older studies with severe methodological shortcoming - studies with small sample sizes and unknown selection bias - and never confronts the newer, more compelling evidence that the gaps have a genetic origin. For that, I would recommend Russell Warne's In the Know or, if you want a short piece on the topic, then: https://gwern.net/doc/iq/2021-warne-2.pdf
Also worth noting that you're picking largely smart and good faith contrarians here, whereas there are even more popular contrarians (weinstiens, Joe Rogan, etc.) who are even less reliably correct but way more popular. I'm always shocked by how certain people like that in the contrarian space have nearly no filter for bullshit so long as it's anti-consensus.
I usually think of contrarianism as being wrong most of the time but helping on the margin because it brings light to positions that are underrated due to social conformity factors. I think most meta-contrarians would admit that they’re wrong most of the time. It would be quite silly to take the meta contrarian point and think you are right most of the time just due to the philosophical literature on rational disagreement (or lack thereof).
I think this is right, but there are also some contrarian views that have turned out to be correct in a big way, a couple of examples:
-Trump was not actually working with the Russians (this was pretty contrary to conventional wisdom for a long time)
-Non-pharmaceutical interventions (mask mandates, social distancing mandates, school closures) probably have near-zero effect on SARS/CoV2 transmission
-Bad US health outcomes are mostly not due to our lack of a socialized healthcare system
Tbh the pattern I see here is that contrarian arguments that buttress politically radical takes tend to turn out wrong but contrarian arguments that militate against more-radical takes are often right. But that last bit is probably a biased assessment on my part.
This would also be the contrarian’s take if they spent too much time among contrarians.
I actually discussed this with Econ profs and afaict the evidence *for* benefits of education is mostly at high school level
The FDA is incredibly slow in letting people try drugs for fatal diseases like mine: https://bessstillman.substack.com/p/please-be-dying-but-not-too-quickly . I think that’s an essentially contrarian opinion but it’s also one that many insiders seem to silently agree with.
Neither Caplan's views on education or Hanson's views on medicine are described correctly. Caplan argues that signaling is the primary explanation for the wage premium, not that it's the only one. Education, especially primary and secondary, results in skill building and such especially for mathematics and English.
I went through this same process 15 years ago. My conclusions from 2009
"contrarianism is a cheap way of allowing ideological hacks to think of themselves as fearless, independent thinkers, while never challenging (in fact reinforcing) the status quo ...To sum up my current view: “contrarianism” is mostly contrary to reality, the “conventional wisdom” is probably wiser than the typical unconventional alternative, and “politically incorrect” views are almost always incorrect in every way: literally, scientifically and morally.
"Most of the people who believe the gap is environmental don’t much want to argue about it, so almost all the people who write things about it are people who believe the genetic explanation of the gap." Why wouldn't they argue about it?, it would improve their reputation among the mainstream and their own audience in many cases. Could it not be that they don't argue against hereditarianism, because they don't think they could make reasonable sounding arguments as to it being false or they in fact believe in it.
That even prior to Scott having his old emails leaked where he said "HBD is probably partially correct or at least very non-provably not-correct." and "NEVER TELL ANYONE I SAID THIS ..." it was obvious that the absence of evidence of him believing in hereditarianism was evidence of non absence of such beliefs. And of course if you are unable figure out what people actually believe on certain issues, then it's hard to say you're not the contrarian.
The Joe M piece you cited isn't nearly enough to override the mountain of evidence against the gap being genetic. A few adoption studies with low n values doesn't discount that, while IQ correlates at r = .86 for identical twins, but between r = .19 and .24 for adoptees and their foster parents (Bluchard & McGue, 1981, pp. 1057-58).* We'd never see such if it were primarily environmental.
It's exactly like arguing for creationism versus evolution. You don't have the luxury of dismissing a small number of studies. You have to dismiss the overwhelming majority of gathered knowledge of entire fields.
* Thanks, Russell T. Warne!
"Sam is right, yet I think he understates the problem. There are various topics where arguing for one side of them is inherently interesting, yet arguing for the other side is boring. There are a lot of people who read Austian economics blogs, yet no one reads (or writes) anti-Austrian economics blogs. " I'm not sure I agree with the example or the generalization from it (if it were true). In the vast majority of urban educated upper middle class social circles in America, doing things like arguing against the minimum wage will just get you subtle or not so subtle scowls. Admittedly, you (and I ) might lurk in corners of the internet where this is reversed. But even in the other subculture that we both probably asspciate with (Effective Altruism), the opposite is true. In fact, there are systematic reasons why we should expect center-left positions to be less true than they appear to be - given so much of the elite and urban mass affluent population wants badly not to stray from this part of the spectrum. But sure, if you find yourself in a very specific bubble, it's fair to take a haircut on the contrarian positions that dominate within that bubble.
I disagree with most of the examples. details below.
but contrarianism is wrong many times, of course!
1. Caplan on education.
Caplan literature review on education isn't a "public intellectual polemic". but rather an in-depth literature review much more comprehensive than the one Atis linked to.
I think Atis never read Caplan book. and by error assumed it to be just some blog post shallow opinion. (which Caplan can produce of course!)
can one argue "my literature review is better than Caplan"? sure. but Caplan is no less qualified.
and the signalling theory is education isn't a fringe view either. it's an old debate in economics.
2. Scott Alexander Vs Hanson. turns out it's far from conclusive. Scott original refutation seems to have interpreted Hanson much more expansively than Hanson intended (per Hanson). they went back and forth 4 posts. I don't think it's very conclusive!
3. COVID lab Vs raccoon dogs.
first, great example of where the whole "trust boring autists" is irrelevant.
the "system" intentionally lied. boring autists where forced to toe the party line and social media companies censored any mention of lab leak.
Moreover, many of those "boring autists" themselves thought it might well be lab leak.
at the end, the lied enforced on us might've turned out to be true. but originally "the experts" lied shamelessly.
4. Guezy in sleep.
Guezy made TWO claims:
A. the main claim. the book "why we sleep " is dishonest, unreliable and can't be considered "science based"
this is what went viral. is still true. was never refuted.
B. Guezy "bro feeling" opinion:
"I don't think we really need that much sleep".
his personal opinion. not evidence based. and he changed his mind later.
5. genes and IQ.
this is a policed topic.
who in his right mind would trust Chinese citizens about the veracity of Xi Yinping thought?
if you work in a university, or any public institution, you cannot say that Racial gaps in intelligence are of genetic origin.
therefore, it's "boring autists on a leash with a gun pointed to their head" Vs free People.
this doesn't prove the hereditarians right. but the reliability of university employed experts here equals that of OJ Simpson lawyers.
the example cited on adoption says
"I conclude that, while much of the data is low quality and no conclusive judgments can be made, most of the data is compatible with a primarily environmental explanation of the gap.". no slam dunk.
it's a debate with many lines of evidence. this guy choose one of them and didn't find a smoking gun.
6. Caplan is not even wrong re mental illnesses. I agree. but a much weaker version of his view might be true.
TLDR.
1. contrarianism is high risk. lots of incorrect views. obviously don't start by trusting everything contrarians say.
2. lots of the "refuting examples" in the blog aren't convincing.
3. whenever the system enforces a view using censorship/penalties, it's no contest. I'm not trusting Pravda. even though it's sometimes telling the truth.
IQ, racial issues, lab leak etc.
enforced dishonesty.
the contrarians aren't always right. but they are your only honest source.
Your understanding of the lab leak hypothesis is laughably naive. Your understanding of HBD is similar. I suppose in both situations its probably for the best that you stick to consensus since you don't seem able to evaluate the claims yourself.
Just to pick up on something in your second sentence, I not only think that "diets don't work" is pretty generally correct, I also don't think it's a contrarian position; I think that's the establishment medical view.
Every single “deep-dive” into the literature on schooling will make you think it works for the simple reason that it will always be individually rational to get a degree as long as society uses this credential as a way to gauge your earning potential/skills. Add this to an incredibly deeply-seated aversion to talking about genes and IQ and you get the literature we have.
The relevant Caplanian question is how much smarter / capable schooling makes you and therefore impacts your earnings _independently_ of signaling value. The commonsensical answer: very little beyond some fairly basic concepts we could conceivably learn in a quicker format or on the job. Get a boring job and you’ll very quickly realize that your earnings potential can’t be very related to how much you studied for your colonial history exam.
Speaking of IQ, it’s funny you don’t talk about it. That IQ matters is one of the most seriously contrarian opinions there are, but it is basically omnipresent on this side of the internet. Whatever structural forces make contrarians equivocate, they aren’t strong enough for them to be wrong on this. Unless you believe IQ doesn’t matter…
Re: the leak hypothesis. It’s striking that a bunch of establishment-type boring people ended up buying into it. My guess is that it’s just superficially extremely plausible and some contrarians bought into it, that’s all.
Finally, for the hereditarian hypothesis in racial gaps… are you serious? There are ENORMOUS structural incentives to lie about this. I mean, actual political coalitions and formulas depend almost entirely on it. Of course there’s going to be clever people arguing this stuff isn’t true, there are enormously clever people arguing that the Soviet Union was a complete success (do you think the average communist is more stupid than the average person?). It’s an open secret that a bunch of very smart people hold or flirt with this belief in secret (Scott, Pinker) and, yes, the explanatory power of this idea is the closest equivalent to a Theory of Everything the social sciences can ever produce.
I'm not going to venture a guess on whether contrarianism is wrong in general - I don't know. But I think your description of the racial gaps debate is inaccurate. First, the view that genetic factors partially explain racial inequality in cognitive ability is only contrarian in the broader society. According to the most recent surveys on the topic, a majority of intelligence researchers agree that genetic factors at least partly explain racial gaps in cognitive ability.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289619301886
Second, I've read Jay's blog in detail and I do like it, but he relies on older studies with severe methodological shortcoming - studies with small sample sizes and unknown selection bias - and never confronts the newer, more compelling evidence that the gaps have a genetic origin. For that, I would recommend Russell Warne's In the Know or, if you want a short piece on the topic, then: https://gwern.net/doc/iq/2021-warne-2.pdf