Are Empirical Generalizations Really Bias?
Posted by M. C. on July 18, 2023
What is an empirical generalization? It stems from observation. People note, for example, that men are on average taller than women. Does this mean that all men have greater height than all women? Of course not. Milton Friedman stood at about five feet, while Brittney Griner, a WNBA All-Star recently released from Russia, is 6’9”.
https://substack.com/inbox/post/135074068
According to the New York Times, Karith Foster, a black woman, addressed a leadership summit meeting of the very woke Woodward company specializing in aerospace. She was brought in so as to change this firm’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) program, which wasn’t working satisfactorily, to something called “Belonging.” In the course of her remarks, she challenged her audience as follows:
“Had they ever locked the car when a Black man walked by? Had they thought, yes, Jewish people really are good with money?” Had they questioned the intelligence of someone with a thick Southern accent?”
Pretty much everyone in the audience, including the speaker herself, acknowledged remorse by raising their hands to indicate they were guilty of these offenses. She then claimed that acting in this manner, holding these beliefs, was an instance of bias, which must be eradicated if we are to attain a just society.
Let us consider each of these three challenges.
My friend of many years, the late Walter E. Williams, is a black man well over six feet tall. He once told me that often, when he walked into an elevator, the white men already on board exhibited concern, and the white women held their purses closer to their bodies. He said he well understood this behavior, and did not resent it. It was due to the fact that the black crime rate was much higher than that of any other demographic group.
He knew full well that he wasn’t going to mug anyone on the elevator (he was a distinguished economics professor at George Mason University; the only people he mugged, intellectually, were socialists and interventionists), but appreciated that the other occupants of the elevator were merely judging him on the basis of limited information; on what they could see of him: a tall powerful looking black man. Were these white people biased? Of course not: they were merely and justifiably basing their assessments, and their behavior, on empirical generalizations.
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MCViewPoint 
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