the protestant genome and the spirit of capitalism

I've started reading A Farewell to Alms, a book about the economic history and macrosociology of the last two thousand years. It received an enthusiastic write-up in the New York Times (here), and I think its publication date might have been accelerated as a result.

The moral and political implications of the book's argument, either if it is true or if it comes to be regarded as true, are so breathtaking as to be hard to understate, especially in a hastily written blog post by someone who is moving.

The argument, most briefly, is that part of what led to the Industrial Revolution was a more longstanding improvement of the species over the preceding several hundred years, and, although the book is coy about saying this improvement could be either "cultural" or "genetic," it's clear that author's inclination is "genetic." The seemingly obvious implication if that were true--although I am uncertain from the 30-odd pages I've read so far whether the author will actually connect the dots he draws right there on the page--is genetic variation among people with ancestry from different parts of the world on traits pertinent to socioeconomic attainment. Good to have ancestry from the regions of the world that were the leaders of the Industrial Revolution or otherwise socially close to it, and bad to be from regions that were not close. In this respect, the argument could be interpreted as providing the historical backstory for The Bell Curve. So, it's important, especially given that it is by an economist and all the recent hoopla for economics as the enterprise that has the apparatus to uncover hidden insights into social affairs and the independent-mindedness to speak unpopular "truths."

As I said, I haven't read enough of the book to be able to begin to evaluate its evidence, and moving isn't exactly allowing great focused cognitive space for reading. I'm approaching the book with a lot more skepticism than the author of the NYT article. I know I post perhaps surprisingly little about the substance of social science on this blog, but it doesn't get more substantive than the history of human organization and the causes of social inequalities, so I'm putting y'all on alert about this book if you haven't heard about it.

harry potter and the doubly helix

I'd always presumed muggle-born wizards in the Harry Potter books were the result of a genetic mutation. J.K. Rowling is answering all kinds of questions now about the series, and she says I'm wrong:

Katie Mosher: How exactly do muggleborns receive magical ability?

J.K. Rowling: Muggle-borns will have a witch or wizard somewhere on their family tree, in some cases many, many generations back. The gene re-surfaces in some unexpected places.

This is very perplexing, because magic ability otherwise gives all indications of being an autosomal dominant gene (get the gene from one parent, and you have the trait), but now she's talking about it like it is recessive and so can just lurk around unexpressed in your family tree for generations. Harry had a muggle-born mother, so if the gene was recessive, he'd have had only a 50% chance of being a wizard. Same thing with each Hermione and Ron's two children (assuming Ron is really the real father; if, as is at least as likely, Harry is the real father, then the kids would have only a 25% chance of being a wizard.) There are no indications in the book that when people marry muggle-born wizards they consider there to be a 50% chance they'll have a squib kid.

I feel cheated. I feel like the Harry Potter books are no longer scientifically realistic.

Update: Ugh, I've only had this post up a few minutes and already a friend has e-mailed to correct me. I feel like a disgrace to Ravenclaw. Obviously, if the gene is recessive, Harry needs two copies, and so he has the same probability of having wizard spawn as any other wizard, and squibhood is the mutation. (Squibs who breed with a slumming wizard would have a 50% chance of having a wizard child.) Rowling's still not right, though. The muggle-born wizard has to have a wizard somewhere on each side of the family tree.

friends, you can stop forwarding me the links to this story. i've read it.

NYT story today: Genes Take Charge, and Diets Fall by the Wayside

Yes, I am interested in genetics. Yes, my diet has recently fallen by the wayside. Yes, I plan on getting back on the diet wagon, regardless of whatever my genes say. No, probably not today.

I might be more forlorn if I thought my problem was that I had a slower metabolism, and so my body would inch upward even when I ate a reasonable number of calories. Instead, my problem is that I seem to want to eat more food than other people--and, for that matter, almost all other large mammals--do. The appetite may well have genetic origins, but it provides more hope for intervention.

farewell, pebbles! farewell, little mermaid! farewell, daphne from scooby-doo!

Via Dan: Will redheads be extinct by 2100? (Or, at least, extinct in terms of new redheaded children being born.) Barring intervention, it really is just a question of when, and offhand 2100 doesn't seem implausible to me. A question is, as red hair becomes rarer, will those remaining be want their kids to have red hair, or want their kids not to have red hair? If the latter, dissortative mating could bring the end of the auburn world as we know it even sooner.

My guess is there will be more of an effort to save blonde hair and, even more, blue eyes.

I have nieces with red hair and blonde hair, but the six identically brown-haired kids produced by my parents would lead me to suspect only one parent has recessive genes for hair lurking within (my father, since I have redheaded cousins on that side). My own brown eyes seem weirdly like they have become a bit greenish in recent years, which I've attributed to the DNA effects of the unfortunate latch on my microwave.