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Whyvert Profile picture
Whyvert
@whyvert
Inquisitive and harmless wyvern. Interested in human nature and patterns of history. Otherwise known as Paul Cossins.
Mar 16 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
A new study: an LLM rates 600k social science abstracts since 1960

-near absence of right-of-center works

-economics: 16% of works were rated 0–4 (right-leaning)
-all other disciplines: 0-6% of works were rated 0-4

Overall mean on 0-10 scale: 5.7-7.6, or left-leaning: Image Source: The ideological orientation of academic social science research 1960–2024

Jan 11 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
Late 2024, David Reich and team published a paper disproving the established party line and received wisdom of anti-hereditarians that there have been no recent human genetic changes.

Almost 1 standard deviation reduction in PGS (polygenic score) for schizophrenia Image 2 standard deviation reduction in polygenetic score for dark skin Image
Dec 13, 2025 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
New study of national differences in groupishness: prosocial feelings only to your group (often kin) vs prosocial feelings to all (the green countries).

Treat group members better than non-members vs treating all the same.

The same map as corruption, cheating, etc. Image This study uses the World Values Survey to look at three facets of groupishness (conformity, discrimination, exclusion). Image
Sep 10, 2025 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Article on decisions that led to the Boriswave of migration in the UK.

1. Boris Johnson. Wanted to give subsidies to universities (more student visas) and low-wage employers (cheap labor).

Outright gifts to special interests. Image 2. Previously, the Home Office's job had been to counterbalance other departments lobbying on behalf of their associated special interest groups.

Priti Patel failed to do this. Plus, officials failed to forecast the huge surge of migrants.
Clear failure. Image
Aug 23, 2025 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
It is AD 2025 and still ONLY Europeans, Anglo settlers, East Asians and Israelis have created rich countries (over $50k per capita).
Nobody else. Absolutely none.
(Oil states don't count.) Image 40 years ago the rich countries were NW Europe, Anglo settler, Japan.

In the last 40 years, ONLY about 10+ countries joined their ranks, all of them in Europe, East Asia, and Israel.

Again, oil doesn't count. Image
Aug 10, 2025 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
The future prospects of classical liberalism:
Marian Tupy asks if mass immigration of illiberal peoples will mean the end of classical liberalism.
Tyler Cowen accepts this is a problem and says he doesn't know what to do about it.
How about ending mass immigration? Image Marian Tupy and Tyler Cowen discuss classical liberalism
humanprogress.org/tyler-cowen-pr…
Jun 14, 2025 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
New study: more evidence of very low human capital in Africa.

Basic numeracy mostly unchanged from 1950 to 1990 birth cohorts, despite much more schooling.

NB: basic numeracy is very, very basic = people know their own age, don't round it up or down (called "age heaping".) Image Some exceptions. Basic numeracy in Ghana has trended upwards Image
Mar 13, 2025 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
It's false that Africa's states and borders are arbitrary. But it is a useful lie: blames Europeans for African political problems.

Colonies often followed precolonial states, as is visible below.

Because African rulers signed protectorate agreements. Image The northern border of Nigeria follows the Sokoto Caliphate boundary.

Rwanda and Burundi were separate precolonial states.

Most borders in Africa are not straight lines. Those that are straight are mostly in deserts.
Jan 26, 2025 • 11 tweets • 3 min read
A story in 5 parts:

1. In 2023 an article "Black Metallurgists and the Making of the Industrial Revolution" (by Jenny Bulstrode) claimed that 18th-century English ironmaster Henry Cort stole his revolutionary ironrolling process from enslaved metalworkers in Jamaica.

2. Anton Howes in a Substack listed several claims that Bulstrode made and for which she provides no evidence.

3. Oliver Jelf then published a paper showing that not only that she provides no evidence but that the sources do not say what Bulstrode claims, i.e. that she fabricates evidence.

4. The editors of History and Technology who published Bulstrode declared their "unreserved support" for the article and defended it at length.

All that was in 2023.

5. Now Jelf has a new paper responding in detail to the editors and Bulstrode showing that she has provided no evidence for her claim of theft and on several occasions she misrepresents and misquotes the sources: This is Anton Howes' overview of the case to the end of 2023:
ageofinvention.xyz/p/age-of-inven…
Jan 23, 2025 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
The Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez encapsulates today's leftism:
-advocates EU action to end anonymity on social media
-very high immigration
-leading to a housing crisis and high youth unemployment
-ranting about a techno-caste Image The housing crisis caused by high immigration he proposes to deal with by regulating the housing market such as restricting AirBnB and taxing foreign buyers
Jan 16, 2025 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Yesterday, once again the challenge: define wokeism!

It's not hard to do.

Finnish scholars have a 7-item scale for assessing wokeness.
It boils down to 2 points:
1. Extreme anti-racism.
2. Extreme transgenderism.
Plus hostility to free speech. Image The Finnish scholars also have an 11-item scale of woke attitudes.
It also boils down to two factors: extreme anti-racism and extreme transgenderism, with restricting free speech a weapon.
Anti-woke has to refute extreme anti-racism and transgenderism and support free speech. Image
Jan 6, 2025 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Norway: the Progress Party forced Statistics Norway to release ethnic crime data.

Almost half of young Somali men in Oslo (483 out of 1000) got caught and charged with violent crime.

Prosecution rate for violent crime in Oslo among men age 15-24, 2021-23. Image Similar story for drug crimes:
Somalis 441 per 1000
Ethiopians 371 per 1000
Iraqis 342 per 1000

Between a third and half of Iraqi, Ethiopian, and Somali young men in Oslo got caught and charged with drug offenses.
Jan 6, 2025 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
How well did academia address the rape gang child sex slave issue?
From @knrd_z thread below, looks like:
1. Used scare quotes to imply it is a fake thing.
2. Insinuated Muslims are the real victims.
There should be an inquiry into anti-white racism in academia. Image 3. Feminists write a vast amount on "rape culture". But faced with a real gang rape and child sex slave culture, they were largely silent.
Dec 21, 2024 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Artists Komar & Melamid commissioned surveys to create "most wanted" (landscape) and "least wanted" (abstract) paintings.

I suspect elites like abstraction not for its own sake but because the populace dislikes it. It allows them to distinguish themselves as better. Image Why do people like landscapes with trees, lake, hills? My guess is that it is naturally evolved: these are the places a hunter-gatherer will desire to live.

These artists did this in the 90s in several countries with similar results.

awp.diaart.org/km/painting.ht…Image
Dec 14, 2024 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Countries with high rates of consanguineous marriage.

Pakistan 57.9%
Sudan 49.5%
Libya 48.4%
Kuwait 48.2%
Mauritania 47.2%
Afghanistan 46.2%
Iran 38.6%
Saudi Arabia 33.6%
Yemen 33.9%
Iraq 33.0%

(Note that these numbers are in reality estimates.) Source. Image
Dec 8, 2024 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Interesting new paper!

1520-1720 elite human capital became obsessed with religion (and likely high in religiosity) then 200 years later suddenly changed to be less religious.

As shown by density of the words God, Jesus, and Christ (vernacular and Latin) in books. Image After 1720, elite human capital becomes much more interested in science (and probably more secular in outlook).

As shown by the prevalence in books of these words: medicine, astronomy, mathematics, geometry, philosophy, hypothesis, logic, experiment (vernacular and Latin) Image
Nov 16, 2024 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Third Worldist ideology reflects the character of the Third World itself:

-resent rich ethnic minorities both globally (whites) and within their countries

-ethnic favoritism: demand favors for their own ethnic group

-low in both human capital and prosociality The ideology has gone by various names such as
"Third Worldism"
"nonaligned movement"
"South-South solidarity"
"multipolarism"
"BRICS perspective"
Oct 15, 2024 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Yet another case of the persistence of status!

Sierra Leone has had several coups and a long civil war.
But old elites of (a) Krio or Creole (American blacks who had sided with the British in 1776) and (b) chiefs are still more common in elite occupations.
Name analysis shows. Image Krio/Creole are more in business and professional elite jobs, the chiefs more in political elite positions.

The Krio were originally 1200 Americans blacks plus later freed slaves. They must have been a highly selected group.
Oct 14, 2024 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
Most wars seem to be irrational.

Some generally agreed causes of war reflect underlying low rationality: 🧵

1. Leaders insulated from the costs of violence will be more likely to start wars.

But, rational people will make leaders accountable. Image 2. It is generally agreed, groups that desire vengeance, dominance, imposing Allah's will, or revolution will be more likely to start wars.

Yet, more intelligent and rational groups will realize that other desires are better pursued.
Oct 5, 2024 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
Books below on ethnicity and nationality. But they only give a Blank Slate view.

Here's a contrast of Evo vs Blank Slate: 🧵

1. Evo says there are naturally evolved desires for ethnic affiliation. Blank Slate says any such desires are constructed or fabricated or invented. 2. Evo says the desire for ethnic affiliation keeps popping up throughout history. Ethnies rarely had their own states (nation-states) because of violent imperialism: small states either got smashed or (if victors) became the core ethnie of an bigger empire.
Aug 22, 2024 • 9 tweets • 3 min read
Why is the world turning into a circus sideshow?

Visibly tattooed people used to be a freak show attraction.

(In the past, respectable people sometimes had discreet hidden tattoos.)

"The Tattooed Greek Prince" captured by Chinese Tartars and tattooed against his will: Image 1. Decline of paternalism.

Elites used to be more paternalist, outlawing things like gambling and tattoo shops that people with low self-control are tempted by.

New York City had a ban on tattoo shops. Now there are hundreds of them. Image