[erikb]

It annoys me a little that

a) Someone thinks so many people can be divided into just two groups

b) the idea that validating an assumption should also automatically validate the reason. People in the north might be more individualistic than in the south, and yes they grow wheat and not rice but that doesn't mean one depends on the other. It just doesn't seem all too scientific to confuse correlation with cause.

[thaumasiotes]

Your point (a) is ridiculous. For example, I could fruitfully divide the population of China into two groups, male and female. They're different in ways that are often useful to know.

North and South Chinese have been obviously different for many centuries. One of my favorite stories about this concerns the development of affirmative action in the late 14th / early 15th century:

> In 1370, the first Emperor of the Dynasty, Chu Yüan-chang, who expelled the Mongols in 1368, reinstituted the great Civil Service Examinations, which had been suspended by the Mongols. In 1371, 75% of the degrees from the national examination had gone to candidates from the South of China. This displeased the Emperor, who believed, with many traditionalists, that Northerners were morally more worthy -- from the area where Chinese civilization had begun. The examinations were thus suspended until 1385, but then the geographical division of those who passed did not change. At a special Palace examination in 1397, all of the 52 candidates who passed were Southerners. Borrowing from the Josef Stalin school of bureaucracy, the Emperor had two of the examiners executed. In a subsequent retesting, all the successful candidates were Northerners.

> By 1425 it was decided that places in the national examinations would be reserved by region, with 35% for the North, 55% for the South, and 10% for some places in the middle.

(sourced from http://www.friesian.com/discrim.htm)

[dmoy]

It's worth noting that modern day China still has quite a bit of affirmative action. College entrance exam scores, for example, give bonus points to ethnic minorities.

[thaumasiotes]

I didn't know that, but I was aware that college applications are binned by geographic region of the applicant (i.e., before getting any applications, they decide "we'll have 200 from 山东, 100 from 北京, etc"). (numbers invented)

Do you have an english-language source for this? I'd be very interested to read about it.

[erikb]

From a logical point of view your argument makes a lot of sense. If you go to China it doesn't help you much though, because if you have 4 Chinese friends there you have to learn 4 different cultures and they speak 4 different dialects. I always feel that culturally China is comparable to the European Union, not to a single country. Just that they already made the decision to have a unified language.

[Retric]

A population the size of China is going to have plenty of people that don't fit the M/F choice. For an extreme example a fully functional hermaphrodite could be both or self identify as one or the other. Some people are XXY genotype or even XXXY so even genetic testing can be ambiguous.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex

[thaumasiotes]

You do realize XXY and XXXY are genetically male...?

[Retric]

There mostly male, but often with significant female secondary sexual characteristics and sterility. This is of-course ignoring Mosaic people which have two set's of DNA so you can be XXY and XX at the same time... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosaic_(genetics)

[threatofrain]

Perhaps it shocks your moral sensibility to generalize across humans, but it is perfectly legitimate for anyone who is seeking the truth to do these things. For them, the primary question must be "to what degree is a generalization meaningful?".

When we say things like, "The African American population in the US is materially disadvantaged.", that statement does generalize across many individuals. But it's also potentially very useful or actionable.

Also, anyone who says they judge people as individuals is probably bullshitting to the max. It sounds cognitively overburdening and wasteful.