
Einstein: The Negro Question (1946) - juanplusjuan
http://www.onbeing.org/program/albert-einstein-the-negro-question-1946
======
schimmy_changa
If this moves you, follow Einstein's logic to today's world and join in the
struggle. There are marches today, consider this your invitation!

SF:
[https://www.facebook.com/events/675598982556580/](https://www.facebook.com/events/675598982556580/)

Oakland:
[https://www.facebook.com/events/858052834217501/](https://www.facebook.com/events/858052834217501/)

NYC:
[https://www.facebook.com/events/959630214065046/](https://www.facebook.com/events/959630214065046/)

Boston:
[https://www.facebook.com/events/1559794327598726/](https://www.facebook.com/events/1559794327598726/)

(and I'm sure there's one near where you live as well)

~~~
5F36B5F62640
Garner, from what we know, seems to be a man who did nothing seriously wrong
during his encounter with the police. It is quite disturbing that this
encounter resulted in his death. It's not even clear that he should have been
having an encounter with the police in the first place.

We can look at Garner, and see that a great injustice happened to him.

Compare to Brown. The police had a very good reason to stop him (walking in
the middle of the street, matches description of person who had just robbed a
nearby store and assaulted the shop keeper), and he attacked the police
officer and tried to take the officer's gun. The only thing it appears that
the police officer did wrong was letting Brown approach the car while the
officer was inside with his gun still holstered, which allowed Brown into a
position to attack.

Looking at Brown, we see a man who did something really stupid, and suffered
pretty much the same outcome that we'd expect for anyone in that situation.

Lumping Garner and Brown together, like these protestors are doing, seems to
me to be an insult to the memory of Eric Garner.

~~~
sillysaurus3
_he attacked the police officer and tried to take the officer 's gun._

I wish this single sentence was underscored and repeated every time this issue
comes up. Physical evidence confirms this sequence of events:
[http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/11/24/ferguso...](http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/11/24/ferguson-
grand-jury-deliberations/19474907/)

There would not be blood _inside_ the police car if Brown hadn't been reaching
into the car. In what scenario was it reasonable for Brown to reach inside the
police car? Are people seriously suggesting that Brown was casually leaning
into the cruiser, and the officer pulled out his gun and shot him? Why is
there blood inside the car if Brown wasn't wrestling for his gun?

But, no, we can't let a little thing like evidence and due process stop us.
Why people have chosen to make a violent individual who just robbed a store
into a martyr is beyond me. That store he robbed has now been looted, by the
way.

~~~
freddealmeida
He was just a child. It doesn't matter. We shouldn't be killing children.

~~~
of
This is a good point - why has everyone downvoted it?

~~~
sillysaurus3
17 year old Marines are some of the most efficient killing machines on the
planet. It's why we used them in WW2. Brown was 18.

Youth alone isn't relevant. For example,
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacklyn_H._Lucas#Marine_Corps_s...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacklyn_H._Lucas#Marine_Corps_service)

~~~
of
That's different, though. Michael Brown was not an "efficient killing machine"
who signed up for the marines at age 17.

------
kroy
This is really fascinating. This part particularly struck me:

"[Americans'] sense of equality and human dignity is mainly limited to men of
white skins. Even among these there are prejudices of which I as a Jew am
clearly conscious"

As a non-black person of color, this has been my access point to issues of
race and oppression. Thinking about the (relatively) minor prejudices and
indignities I've experienced made me a lot more receptive to the idea that
things just aren't right for a lot of people. That oppression is real. And
it's also made me aware of the privilege that I do enjoy as a college-educated
male who's the son of college educated parents.

This is a very prescient and relevant piece by Einstein. I'm glad it's on HN!

~~~
washedup
Couldn't agree more that the opposition is real. I have witnessed much of it
living in a divided city like Chicago. The most difficult question about it is
what we can do to shift government attention and resources? Not in the form of
police cameras, squad cars, or militarization, but in the form of education
and infrastructure projects. This is only a small part of the question,
however. A bigger issue is not where the government spends money, but zoning
laws, tax incentives to move to certain areas, and other laws that have been
built up and influenced over time to create the situation we have today.

People have been noticing this and pointing it out for a long, long time.
Surely Einstein would observe similar treatments as well, particularly because
of his fresh perspective.

~~~
doomlaser
One of the biggest peaceful protests on this issue is happening today, across
the nation, but you wouldn't know it from the Hacker News frontpage.

It's been troubling seeing any links about the Ferguson and Eric Garner
protests wiped from Hacker News before they attract very many upvotes. The
issues being debated encompass government action, fundamental technology and
privacy rights, as well as race, but they're being ignored here for the most
part and I don't understand exactly why.

[http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/14/us/thousands-march-in-
wash...](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/14/us/thousands-march-in-washington-
to-protest-deaths-by-police.html)

[http://www.theguardian.com/us-
news/live/2014/dec/13/police-k...](http://www.theguardian.com/us-
news/live/2014/dec/13/police-killings-protests-washington-new-york-live-
coverage)

~~~
dragonwriter
The intent of Hacker News is to be news of _particular_ interest to the
"hacker" (defined in a somewhat unclear and unusually broad way, but still)
community, not particularly news of general interests that is of interest to
members of that community for generally the same reason and to the same extent
as of the more general community.

There are plenty of other forums with different intended purposes where such
discussions are less ephemeral than on HN.

~~~
rockmeamedee
I argue that a good hacker would be interested in these things. First, hackers
care a lot about issues of justice, power and bias. Here people are being
strangled on camera and their murderers are getting away with it. And, even
the 'body cameras on all cops' idea we were clamoring for didn't help. That's
a conversation we have to have: bodycams won't be helpful if America keeps on
working this way.

Plus, how can we talk about wanting to have a 'diverse' Silicon Valley and
ignore black people getting killed in the streets?

------
mariodiana
The thing I like is the reference to Aristotle. Today, there are some people
who are too quick to brand anyone who disagrees with their enlightened views
as a "moron" or worse. There's no winning hearts and minds that way. It's
better to gently point out the mistakes of those who are otherwise worthy of
respect, in the hopes that this will spur others towards self-reflection, than
to castigate and put people on the defensive. We could use more of that.

~~~
lnanek2
I think the Aristotle point is a very bad one. People captured in war are flat
out inferior to people who won the war or battle. They lost and were enslaved
after all. It immediately makes the person arguing for equality have to start
falling back on, well, they are really equal in ability it is just they had
poor circumstances or luck, trust me even though they lost they are equal!

If we had everyone in the country run a race and the fastest were forced to
move to the west coast and the slowest forced to move to the east coast and we
waited a generation, people would start saying west coast people are fast in
general. And they wouldn't be incorrect. So I don't see anything wrong with
Aristotle saying the group of people who end up slaves are inferior, they
provably are because they've been tested and selected for failure.

Saying Greeks are superior to Iranians or some other general pronouncement
about ethnicity and attributes may not be correct, the DNA of the human race
is mostly the same between ethnicities anyway, but saying Greeks are superior
to the group of people they defeated in battle and enslaved in person is a
tautology.

~~~
anigbrowl
This is a fallacy of composition. Luck plays an important role in military
success - Napoleon famously said he was less concerned about a general's skill
than whether he was lucky - presumably meaning opportunist enough to seize an
advantage when one unexpectedly presented itself. Likewise, numbers matter; a
sufficiently large army will overwhelm many smaller ones not because of any
inferiority of fighting spirit among the defeated, but just by being
hopelessly outnumbered. Where small forces has famously resisted larger ones,
such as Leonidas' 300 Spartans or the British Army at Rorke's drift, it did so
because of the ability to exploit geographical or technological advantages

Your mistake here is to confuse a temporary _strategic_ superiority that
confers success in battle or even in war with some sort of moral or
intellectual superiority. Back in World War 2 Hitler undoubtedly displayed
strategic superiority at first (although the roots of German success go back
to the late stages of WW1, when German generals 'banked' some of their
military technology within newly Communist Russia, an arrangement which
evolved into the non-aggression pact between Hitler and Stalin). But Hitler,
like many conquerors before, fell victim to hubris and overreached when he
should have consolidated. Despite being a political and military genius, his
misplaced assumption of innate racial and cultural superiority (largely
adopted from Prussian _Kultur_ ) proved to be a strategic weakness.

------
lexcorvus
_Many a sincere person will answer: "Our attitude towards Negroes is the
result of unfavorable experiences which we have had by living side by side
with Negroes in this country. They are not our equals in intelligence, sense
of responsibility, reliability."

I am firmly convinced that whoever believes this suffers from a fatal
misconception._

Although it has clear political implications, the last part of the quote-
within-a-quote ("They are not our equals…") is a _scientific hypothesis_. Does
it strike you that people who take the opposite view of Einstein's—or who even
_consider its possibility_ —are treated as merely _mistaken_? As suffering
from a _misconception_? No—they are treated with opprobrium, condemned with
epithets ( _racist_ , _fascist_ , etc.), and purged from civil society.

No reasonable person denies that the ancestors of slaves were mistreated, but
as an explanation for group differences this is not mutually exclusive with
cultural or biological factors that may have nothing to do with past
oppression. Unfortunately, this subject is not treated as a scientific
matter—it has become a _political fight_. Einstein appears to be "ahead of his
time" not because of the triumph of his scientific arguments but because his
political allies have been consistently advancing.

~~~
lotsofmangos
It was ever a political fight.

That's what happens when you end up neighbors with the great great grandson of
the bloke your great great granddaddy paid to have kidnapped and shipped to
the country as a piece of equipment.

Sure you can argue over the details about what their family have been like to
be around in the intervening time, but don't be surprised if the conversation
gets back around to the question of who exactly kidnapped who in the first
place.

Is pretty pointless to winge about it being political.

~~~
peterfirefly
Plenty of people in my family emigrated to the US 1840-1890. They didn't bring
any slaves over from Africa. Lots of people emigrated from Scandinavia and
Germany/German states in that period.

Don't overestimate the original sin of current white Americans.

~~~
lotsofmangos
I'm not, it was Americans with Europeans with Africans, against the Africans,
Irish and Scottish concerned. Besides, the original sin of white Americans is
probably either cannibalism, or hanging Quakers. But even after slavery was
agreed as wrong, the idea that the freed slaves and their descendent's were
actually real people with equal political rights took a very long time to take
hold, and has still only had a limited spread.

------
lpsz
_What, however, can the man of good will do to combat this deeply rooted
prejudice?_

More diversity (in neighborhoods, in workplaces, in schools) would certainly
help -- the transition from "us" and "them" to a unified "us." And yet, it's
disappointing how segregated America still is today. One fairly in-depth study
[1] offers an example of how "today" came to be. (This report is not about any
current events, but rather a detailed account of city zoning over a few
decades.)

[1] [http://www.epi.org/publication/making-
ferguson/](http://www.epi.org/publication/making-ferguson/)

~~~
itg
"More diversity (in neighborhoods, in workplaces, in schools) would certainly
help"

I'm not so sure. I went to a very diverse and large high school in NJ and what
ends up happening is self segregation. All the ethnic groups would mostly end
up hanging out with their own types.

~~~
shaded2
That definately happens but is an underlying cause. I'm not sure what it is.
I've lived in other countries where this natural segregation does not happen.

~~~
semi-extrinsic
There's a fascinating example in computational studies that partly explains
this: if you have people of different groups moving around randomly on a
lattice, even a very slight preference (51%/49%) for being next to people in
the same group as oneself ends up leading to a self-segregated pattern.

EDIT: see e.g
[http://ccl.northwestern.edu/netlogo/models/Segregation](http://ccl.northwestern.edu/netlogo/models/Segregation)

------
pvnick
I hope what I have to say is not as controversial as I fear, but I don't think
that individual racist beliefs are as big a problem as we have been told. To
look at somebody and consciously judge them to be inferior based on their skin
color is so outdated and obsolete, that those who do so are fringe members of
society who are typically elderly and either changing their mindset or dying
out. We elected a black president in a landslide victory for God's sake.
Twice!

No, what is harmful is the vindictive, hyper-vigilant collectivist attitude
that persists in a ham-handed attempt at "leveling the playing field." The
idea that certain groups of people (blacks, women, gays, etc) need compulsory
protection at the expense of other groups (white males), induces a sort of
resentment as a response to what is perceived to be a witch hunt. For example,
certain events - such as the destruction of Paula Dean for admitting to saying
the word "nigger" in the past, or Brendan Eich's dismissal as CEO for his
donations against gay marriage - and certain policies - such as affirmative
action or the greatly lopsided outcomes of most child custody battles - evoke
an understandable, but completely irrational, feeling of resentment towards
those groups as a backlash for perceived unfair treatment. It's this "us vs.
them" victim mentality that's the problem in mainstream America. That's where
the real racist attitudes come from, not some sort of widespread, conscious
conclusion that certain groups are intrinsically inferior to others.

The answer is not collectivist protections or more anti-racism vigilance, it
is to look beyond our superficial differences and to consider all people as
individuals with an equal capacity to love and to be loved. Racism is an
outdated idea. Let it die on its own.

~~~
rockmeamedee
I disagree with your argument. Here are my thoughts why. We have been 'looking
beyond our superficial differences' for a while and it hasn't done anything. I
actually think 'not seeing race' is itself a form of racism, because a lot of
our racism is subconscious, or cultural.

We don't have a racism of segregation anymore. It's a racism of omission.
Instead there are pay gaps, unfair justice, stereotypes and erasure. EG: It's
not that we censor out black music on the radio, we just prefer it when a
white person sings it (macklemore, iggy azalea, eminem, miley, etc).

It works the same way as telling woman: "oh I don't see you as a woman in the
workplace. I don't expect you to get pregnant or have health issues different
from men. I expect you to have someone at home who takes care of your kids
(like a wife would). And then I will subconsciously expect you to be more
caring and nice than your male coworkers (if you disagree with anything I say
I will call you a frigid bitch)". The roles we put women in are gendered, like
EG: we don't expect a secretary to be a woman but if she is, she'll get very
different treatment from a male secretary (who is more likely to be called
Operations, won't have to pick up everybody's laundry and order lunch, etc.
This happens for real).

Back to racism. Racism is still a _big_ problem for a lot of people. Police
can strangle black people _on camera_ and get away without even a trial. Cops
drove up to a black child with a toy gun, shot him, then did not even call an
ambulance or provide emergency CPR. Police officers barged into a house and
shot a 7 year old black girl while she was sleeping. (They said they had the
wrong house). No repercussions. Not a settlement, not an apology, no reaction.

Young black men are 21 more times more likely to be shot by a police officer
than their white counterparts.

When you tell someone 'I don't see you black' what you are saying is "I am
ignoring the struggles you face on a daily basis and also will continue to
subconsciously treat you negatively". Ask a black person how many times they
get called Bro, homie, or 'my nigga' by people 'who don't see them as black'.
And in the public consciousness, black people are seen as demons, monsters,
thugs. (further reading: the blue eye brown eye experiment
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZKWkhnSb5k](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZKWkhnSb5k))

> The idea that certain groups of people (blacks, women, gays, etc) need
> compulsory protection at the expense of other groups (white males), induces
> a sort of resentment as a response to what is perceived to be a witch hunt.

White males have been oppressing these marginalized groups for millennia.
White male culture is homophobic, transphobic, misogynistic, and racist too.
If you would like examples I can give plenty. If you want stats I can give
those too.

Brendan Eich's dismissal isn't irrational. A group of people decided that they
didn't want a homophobic CEO.

I think the reason these events might seen incoherent is because they look
like small, one time things that bring up a large public reaction, one
person's slip-up here or a wrong sentence uttered here. But:

1) The things said reflect a deep hatred of the group they are against. You
have really hate black people to nigger like Paula Dean did. Eich is clearly
homophobic if he donates to anti gay marriage groups.

2) They might seem like one group is targeted out of the blue, but to the
oppressed group these events are another thing on the long list of violence
done against them. For example, if you were a woman at a tech conference and
heard a thousand different dongle jokes, POSIX forking references, images of
naked women, etc, on the thousand and oneth dongle joke you might get angry
too. That might be seen as irrational, because hey, it's just a joke... It's
not. Culture is the sum total of our collective experiences, it's made of a
gajillion little things put together. People have the right to complain about
these little things, like t-shirts that don't fit women at conferences. If
everywhere you looked you found 'little' examples of people like you getting
the short end of the stick, you wouldn't be too happy either.

3) Sometimes these things might seem out of the blue because of the way
collective consciousness works. Recently twitter directed a lot of attention
at a company called Strange Fruit PR. The words Strange Fruit refer to a song
about lynchings, where trees in the South 'bear strange fruit', aka dead black
men. If we saw a PR company called Holocaust PR or something like "arbeit
macht frei" PR (a common sign posted in nazi concentration camps that said
"work makes you free") we'd also freak out. Strange Fruit is two years old and
it just came to twitter's attention, so it seems out of the blue, but it's
just happened now because a critical mass of people found out about it
recently. Sometimes it takes a while to build the political momentum to have a
conversation on something.

> It's this "us vs. them" victim mentality that's the problem in mainstream
> America.

Black people in the US have as a group been enslaved, raped, economically
enslaved, lynched, raped, denied votes, denied education, denied space in the
community, denied housing, denied loans (see redlining), ignored, shot by the
police, etc for the entire history of America (those where random examples). I
don't think it's very human to tell them to ignore the past (and ongoing
racism) and that there is no longer a 'us' and a 'them'.

If you disagree I would like to know why you don't think the above applies.

~~~
pvnick
Thank you for your thoughtful reply. I agree that human history is filled with
all sorts of atrocities, and slavery and race-influenced violence is among the
worst. However, within the past couple decades, we are finally reaching a
point where "true" equality is attainable, and I think that the only way we're
going to get there is to see people first and foremost as _human beings_ , not
as part of some arbitrary _collective_ (race/gender/sexual orientation/etc).
We can appreciate those superficial differences, but when we let those
differences define us then human nature is to qualitatively favor/disfavor
certain groups.

As for the justice system, yes it is heavily skewed towards punishing
minorities, particularly because of the drug war. I don't know how we fix
that, but I do think ending the war on drugs would go a long way.

Your post can be summarized as believing we have not made as much progress as
I think we have, but I am a bit more optimistic, and we need to begin
converging on a permanent state of affairs, being carful not to over correct,
lest we increase racial tension and regress. The only way towards true
equality is to learn from our history, but at the same time look to the future
while being careful not to make the same mistakes. This means that modern
individuals belonging to historically disenfranchised groups should not
receive preferential treatment just because their ancestors were mistreated.
We need a healing process, not pay-back. It's the quickest, most painless way
we're going to eventually reach true harmony as a species.

~~~
rockmeamedee
The reason I don't want to think of everyone as human beings first is this:

Everyone is part of an arbitrary collective of traits (most of us here are
white, male, American, etc) and each trait affects how we see each other. For
example, women are seen as more caring, or bitchy if they have power,
whatever. Those stereotypes are bad, and we can't ignore that they still
happen.

The way we get rid of these biases things is by recognizing that when we think
a woman is being bitchy (or, say a black man angry) it's likely to be our
ingrained sexism (/racism). Seeing people as human beings first erases their
identities and _removes the opportunity to fix our prejudices_. You and I are
both prejudiced, we have to recognize that, and work to remove it from our
minds.

Then, on the optimism/pessimism thing. Just keep on investigating the
experiences of black people and I think you might become less optimistic about
where we are.

It's sometimes tough to see how other people could be disadvantaged (that's
called privilege). But when this list of benefits white people have over black
people
[http://amptoons.com/blog/files/mcintosh.html#daily](http://amptoons.com/blog/files/mcintosh.html#daily)
doesn't hold any more, _then_ we can get rid of black history month.

We can't overcorrect yet, because, broadly, our institutions themselves are
still racist. (See [http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/07/15/884649/-Why-
there-s...](http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/07/15/884649/-Why-there-s-no-
such-thing-as-Reverse-Racism) or [http://femmagazine.com/reverse-racism-and-
reverse-sexism-don...](http://femmagazine.com/reverse-racism-and-reverse-
sexism-dont-exist/)) You don't punch someone in the face then repent with "I'm
sorry that happened to you, but it's in the past, you need to heal". That's
not true equality. True equality is you apologize, pay for their hospital
bills and help them get their life back and recover from what was done to them
in the past. That's a true "healing process". Some people see affirmative
action as getting punched back, but it's not. Marginalized people's ancestors
being mistreated puts them where they are now and we are _continuing_ to
mistreat them by not helping them recover from that.

------
markgarity
"It would be foolish to despise tradition. But with our growing self-
consciousness and increasing intelligence we must begin to control tradition
and assume a critical attitude toward it, if human relations are ever to
change for the better. We must try to recognize what in our accepted tradition
is damaging to our fate and dignity—and shape our lives accordingly."

Key takeaway, in my opinion, and this extends beyond racial prejudices.

~~~
bostik
What you quoted above gives credence that another quote attributed to Einstein
_actually is his_. I can even recognise the tone in the segment about
Aristotle and his views about slavery.

The quote in question? "Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired
by age eighteen." \- Albert Einstein

Even if it was misattributed, it's still one hell of a motto to live by.

~~~
Fishkins
That quote was correctly attributed to Einstein (although it's unclear whether
we used those exact words) [http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/04/29/common-
sense/](http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/04/29/common-sense/)

------
moron4hire
Racism will continue to be a problem as long as it serves as a useful
distraction for the people to prevent us from really scrutinizing the ruling
class and the complete disparity between the goals of the super-rich people
and the needs of the rest of us who are just trying to get by.

Racism, sexism, homophobia, drugs, guns, taxes, war, spying, all of it are
just distractions because whether the issue goes left or right won't matter to
most people. What really matters is whether or not people can feed their
children, have a roof over their heads, have something meaningful to do with
their time, be warm in the winter, be free from violence. These are the things
that matter, but we're all caught up in bikeshedding over how to get there.

And in the process, a very small group of people get to come in and
unilaterally take action to fill their own pockets. Everything else that
happens is the rest of us playing Lord of the Flies.

Isms will end when the majority takes up the cause of the minority, because in
actuality, it's their/our cause, too.

~~~
_almosnow
Totally agree with your view of how things work on a higher scale.

Isms will always exist because not all of us are equal and we will never be;
and I'm not saying that with a discriminating tone, what I mean is that you
have to be completely retarded (excuse me, but it's true) to actually believe
and state that we are all the same. We all like different stuff, we all have
different ways to achieve our goals, we even have (VERY) different moral
foundations to asses whether something should be right or wrong.

On the other hand, most of us are used to live under the terrible premise to
puts oneself (and thus, its kind) before others. Put these two facts together
and everything that has happened (and will continue to happen) throughout our
history becomes obvious.

------
pcthrowaway
While Einstein only fully stopped eating animals shortly before his death,
there is some indication he also felt uneasy accepting the general attitude on
animals as food for some time before that. This is prejudice that that most of
us have yet to shake still.

~~~
RivieraKid
It's subjective, I don't feel that eating animals is wrong.

~~~
pcthrowaway
Do you feel that it would be wrong to kill a healthy dog for food? While I get
that morality is subjective, I think people would have said similar things
about black people back when Einstein wrote this.

------
blazespin
I was always impressed by his stand against zionism.

[http://www.newdemocracyworld.org/old/einstein.htm](http://www.newdemocracyworld.org/old/einstein.htm)

~~~
swatow
Interesting that his views on race in America are now mainstream, while his
views on Zionism are rarely voiced outside the far left or far right. It seems
to me that his views are based on a consistent application of principals,
while American politics isn't.

~~~
Retra
Most mainstream Americans' political principles are variations on "defend your
side at all costs." An ideology without a (real) problem to solve is a very
dangerous thing.

~~~
vacri
Viewing the US from the outside, it really is puzzling that in that land of
freedom - where the ability of the individual to express themself is prized
above all others - happens to be a place where people are pigeonholed by which
one of two political parties they vote for, and it's frequently considered to
be all you need to know to know everything about a person's opinions. "Well he
would say that, he's a Democrat" kind of thing.

------
revscat
What makes this discussion so much more frustrating today is that the racial
biases are inherent in the system. While the laws are structured to be.
Entrap, their application is decidedly not. While I, a white male, choose to
do as Einstein here suggests and live a life of example, and teach my children
the destructiveness of racism, my actions do not directly help those in my
country who are suffering from official and unofficial forms of
discrimination.

I want to do more, but... "What can men do in the face of such reckless hate?"

~~~
palimpsests
I think this starts to address your question:

[http://qz.com/250701/12-things-white-people-can-do-now-
becau...](http://qz.com/250701/12-things-white-people-can-do-now-because-
ferguson/)

And I think this article is really helpful for perspective:

[http://www.timwise.org/2014/12/we-dont-need-nice-we-need-
jus...](http://www.timwise.org/2014/12/we-dont-need-nice-we-need-justice-
racism-and-the-moral-blindness-of-white-america/)

------
vixen99
Relevant to the subject Einstein addresses I strongly recommend the writing of
Thomas Sowell.

[http://www.tsowell.com/](http://www.tsowell.com/)

~~~
mikeyouse
Sowell has some interesting things to say but it's mixed in with the heavy
portion of nonsensical wharrgarbl.. He spends a lot of time calling for the
bombing of Iran (so that the US doesn't surrender to them after they nuke us
of course), claiming that Obama hates America (going so far as to compare to
him to Hitler for creating an oil spill fund), advocating bizarre Federal
Reserve conspiracy theories, and all sorts of other strange ideas.

It's hard to take the rest of what he says seriously with all that baggage..

------
vinceguidry
Anyone interested in this topic should read Karen Armstrong's _Fields of
Blood_

[http://www.amazon.com/Fields-Blood-Religion-History-
Violence...](http://www.amazon.com/Fields-Blood-Religion-History-
Violence/dp/0307957047/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1418494474&sr=8-1&keywords=fields+of+blood)

The first chapter gives a very good rationale for where hatred and subjugation
of the 'other' comes from and the book traces how this kind of socialized
violence evolved over the ages.

~~~
iamdave
Two hours from hopping on a ten hour train ride, thanks for the reading
material!

------
sethbannon
"I can escape the feeling of complicity in it only by speaking out."

Sadly on the matter of unequal race relations these words ring nearly as true
in 2014 as they did in 1946.

------
queensnake
Such self-fondling pabulum around here. If Aristotle can be wrong, so can
Einstein. See: IQ data.

I bet at least the number of people who posted want to say the same thing, but
have refrained from posting. I bet frikkin' Paul Graham thinks the same thing
(maybe gentler) - he's alluded to 'inexpressible ideas about race'
(paraphrase) in one essay.

~~~
pas
Hm, I might be misinterpreting your "IQ data" pointer, but just to be clear:
variance of IQ in groups is much larger than between them.

------
arielm
Einstein's simplification of this situation, even though it was made in a time
where political correctness wasn't common, is a fresh view that reminds me how
important it is to stop pronouncing racism and instead to each do our part in
extinguishing it by action.

------
desdiv
I highly recommend Jane Elliott's "Blue Eyes Brown Eyes" lesson for anyone who
have not seen it yet:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=uQ...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=uQAmdZvKf6M#t=41)

In any discussion about racism, the stratified-by-race-IQ-chart invariably
gets brought up (crtl-f for "itjustdontwork" for its latest rendition in this
thread). Jane Elliott's video helped me to find a new perspective on the IQ
chart data.

------
aik
Very interesting. There are some other articles by Einstein there as well. The
Science and Religion one is particularly interesting:

[http://www.onbeing.org/program/einstein039s-god-
einstein039s...](http://www.onbeing.org/program/einstein039s-god-
einstein039s-ethics/extra/einstein-science-and-religion-1940/1986)

------
jxm262
love this.

"A large part of our attitude toward things is conditioned by opinions and
emotions which we unconsciously absorb as children from our environment. In
other words, it is tradition—besides inherited aptitudes and qualities—which
makes us what we are. We but rarely reflect how relatively small as compared
with the powerful influence of tradition is the influence of our conscious
thought upon our conduct and convictions"

just wow. This gives me alot to reflect on and goes much deeper than racial
prejudices. This can be applied to alot of areas in my life. I was one of the
top in my high school class for math, and skated through college pretty
easily. Came out being kind of cocky then learned pretty quickly how little I
actually knew. The past few years have really really given me perspective.
Speaking for myself, I seem to grow much faster when I humble myself and
acknowledge my areas that need improvement.

~~~
sysk
I was about to quote the same paragraph. It is the one thing in this text that
is truly timeless.

------
jamesblonde
Way ahead of his time

~~~
earleybird
I believe it is a mistake to think that we're somehow smarter or better than
those who have gone before us.

~~~
markgarity
As individual human parts perhaps, but as a collective humanity we surely are.

------
phazelift
Amazingly great thinker with a great heart too, we are so in need of people
like him..

------
fsloth
I am humbled by the sincerity and humanity of this writing. Thanks for
sharing.

------
33223332323
> The ancient Greeks also had slaves. They were not Negroes but white men who
> had been taken captive in war. There could be no talk of racial differences.

As Slavic I find this inaccurate and bit offensive :-)

~~~
vixen99
A bit offensive? Why?

~~~
xxxyy
Because there are racial-alike tensions within the Caucasian people, such as
Nazi/Jews, West/Slavic, Protestant/Catholic.

~~~
throwaway90446
Unable to reply to your other flagkilled comment, so I'll reply here.

It's amusing that bringing up facts in a community ostensibly self-selected to
prize discovery and reason is sufficient cause to be silenced.

pg and the community he fostered has come a long way since this:
[http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html)

~~~
xxxyy
Yes, that is absolutely correct. And I find it sad that such thoughtless
mechanisms are exactly what powered the worst forms of racism in the history.

Edit: would just like to point out that I was flagkilled before any response
came, so currently my post is invisible in this thread.

------
subdane
In addition to the wonderful piece, I enjoyed the fact that he appears to be
wearing a bad-assed, black leather jacket in the photo.

------
nobrains
All men are created equal. Except Blacks. And Muslims. And non-Americans. And
Native Americans.

------
mathu7
this is the part of Einstein's legacy that I wish more people knew about

------
UhUhUhUh
Bottom line, then and now, to be a racist you need either be stupid or have
serious psychological issues or a combination of both. On a side note, I
always admired Einstein for his tremendous ability to abstract problems. I
believe he is the co-inventor of the "thought experiment" with Mach. You can
always feel this ability in his writings.

~~~
peterfirefly
Galileo has a brilliant thought experiment in De Motu about heavy and light
falling bodies, possibly connected with a string.

I think Bacon (both Roger and Francis) also used thought experiments to great
effect.

