All people who create a calorie deficit via diet and exercise lose weight.

Given that various mental disorders are heritable, it's not clearly impossible for psychological properties to be selected for.

However, unlike dark or light skin (which matters for dealing with sunlight or the lack of it), mental ability is generally useful for survival and success in all climates and regions of the world. Every physical and social setting has problems to figure out; friendships and relationships to negotiate; language to acquire; mates to charm; rivals to overcome or pacify; resources that can be acquired through negotiation, deception, or wit; and so on. This means that all human populations will be subject to some selection pressure for mental ability; whereas with skin color there are pressures in opposite directions in different climates.

So why is this such a troublesome subject?

The problem with the subject is that there's an ugly history behind it — of people trying to explain away historical conditions (like "who conquered whom" or "who is richer than whom") in terms of psychological variation. And this, in turn, has been used as a way of justifying treating people badly ... historically, sometimes very badly indeed.

Classifications don't exist for themselves; they exist in order for people to do things with them. People don't go around classifying things (or people) and then not doing anything with the classification. But sometimes people make particular classifications in order to do horrible things, or to convince other people to do horrible things.

"Earthmen are not proud of their ancestors, and never invite them round to dinner." —Douglas Adams

I don't think this is a stupid question, but everyone else seems to—that is, the immediate reaction to it is usually "there's obviously no difference." I've struggled with this question a lot, and the commonly accepted answer just doesn't sit well with me.

If different races have different skin, muscle/bone structure, genetics, and maybe other things, shouldn't it follow that different races could have different brains, too?

I know this is taboo, and feel the following sort of disclaimer is obligatory: I'm not racist, nor do I think any difference would necessarily be something drastic or significant, but the existence of a difference is something that seems probable to me.

Edit: Though it's obviously included, I'm not talking specifically about intelligence!

I do not care at all about watching other people play sports. It's super boring.

Playing sports ball with people you enjoy being around is quite rewarding.

I assume you mean that you specifically find it boring/rewarding.

It took us 1400 years of civil wars and bloodshed to get to where we are now.

On that time scale WW2 was yesterday. So tell me, where did it take you 1400 years to get to?

Here, most people would also say no - they'd want the "bonus" for children to be equal for low- and high-income families, but they do not want the "penalty" for lacking children to be the high for same and low income.

Note typo.

Great post! I actually started trying to argue against your analysis here in the child tax example, based on my own intuition. Then I realized I was being a sophist. I had good reasons for both preferences, but the reason for the progressive penalty wasn't applied to the flat bonus, nor vice versa.

I might have to be careful about how this 'politics' thing affects my thinking.

I think his point was a fairly critical "money is the unit of actually caring". Donating your clothes or some soup kitchen time is the thing you do if you want to feel good about yourself. But if you actually care about getting shit done, money is the unit of how much of that you did.

This may or may not be fair, and may or may not be a useful framing to consider whether it's fair or not.

Sorry, I'm a bit confused. Not being fully versed in the terminology of utilitarians, I may be somewhat in the dark...

... but, is the point of this piece "Money should be the unit of caring" or "Money is the unit of caring"? I expected it to be the latter, but it reads to me like the former, with examples as to why it currently isn't. That is, if money were actually the unit of caring—if people thought of how much money they spend on something as synonymous with how much they care about something—then a lawyer would hire someone to work five hours at a soup kitchen instead of working there for an hour.

It sounds like, as it is now, money isn't the unit of caring and you think it should be. But the end again reads more like the latter statement. Which one was your intent?

Until and unless they do make the technology work, they are selling fantasy.

I really like this idea, but I can't tell whether I failed the test, I passed the test, or the article-selection for this test was bad.

• I very much felt the "condemnation of the hated telecoms" (and a bit of victory-hope). I think this means I've failed the test.
• It took no time to realize that I was reading a debate over a definition and its purpose. I think this means I've passed the test.
• I feel like the above realization was trivial. I didn't consciously think "I am reading a debate of definition. " In the same way that, when I'm playing a scary game, I don't think "I am playing a scary game." I thought the whole point of the article was to emphasize a debate of definition, why said debate is happening, and what side "won". I think this means that the article was a bad one for the purposes of this test (that is: using this article feels more like a test of reading comprehension than rationality).

Which is the most appropriate result?

(To reiterate, though, I think this idea is an awesome one.)

Edit: I also don't think the article failed to give information on what the reason behind said definition-changing was:

The FCC was having this debate because Congress requires it to determine whether broadband is being deployed to Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion. The first step is determining what speeds allow for broadband access. Congress made it clear in the Telecommunications Act of 1996 that broadband isn’t the bare minimum needed to use the Internet. Instead, it is “advanced telecommunications capability” that “enable[s] users to originate and receive high-quality voice, data, graphics, and video telecommunications using any technology.”

Edit 2: Now THIS article doesn't emphasize the point that it's purely a matter of definition: http://arstechnica.com/business/2015/01/tons-of-att-and-verizon-customers-may-no-longer-have-broadband-tomorrow/ The article in the OP feels like "We've changed the definition of broadband to increase broadband access." The above-linked article feels like "THEY'RE TAKING AWAY OUR BROADBAND!!!" Does this seem like a reasonable differentiation, or am I being biased?