East Asian personality may stem from Ice Age Siberia 20000 yrs ago
30 comments
·March 14, 2025nostromo
jklinger410
Science has more than just a replication issue. One of many reasons that public trust in institutions has been almost entirely eroded.
shadowgovt
Sorry, I don't follow. The man has no track record of previous research and applied to several Ph.D programs; of course he was rejected.
Good on him for sticking with his hypothesis far enough to research it thoroughly, write it up, and publish it in a peer-reviewed journal, and now that he has done that work, he might start to turn heads in a Ph.D program. But otherwise, rejection from Ph.D programs after applying with an idea and no credentials is a bit like saying "Based on my new theory of radiation-proof ultra-thin materials, I applied to NASA, ESA, and JAXA for a head researcher position but was unceremoniously rejected." Of course you were, mate. You have no demonstrable history in the field. They want to see at least a working spacesuit prototype first.
like_any_other
> The man has no track record of previous research and applied to several Ph.D programs; of course he was rejected.
He was specifically told he was rejected for doing forbidden research. Sure he might have been rejected anyway even if he had been researching something else, but let's not overlook the reasons he was given.
jdminhbg
> The man has no track record of previous research and applied to several Ph.D programs
Isn't the PhD program where you're supposed to generate the track record of research?
harvey9
If the issue is his credentials why was there so much mention of the topic of research being a problem? Your post seems disingenuous.
yimby2001
It’s a PhD program, not a job and also you are completely ignoring the reasons he was given for his rejection
shermantanktop
Is it? Maybe this is just a terrible paper that reads like 19th century theories about Aryans. Those responses sound like they are pointing to a climate of intellectual repression, but...there's a reason we don't have endowed chairs in phrenology or palmistry or astral projection. And if someone proposed such a thing, the responses might not look too open-minded.
As they say, it's good to be open-minded, but not so open-minded that your brain falls out.
tredre3
What you're doing by comparing it to phrenology and astral projection is just reductio ad absurdum.
It's not controversial that some personality traits might have genetic roots. It's also not controversial that humans who evolved in different regions have slightly different genetics.
His research combines the two.
shermantanktop
He's setting up a choice between the content of his paper vs. intellection repression. And I'm choosing not to take the bait. It's possible that he is experiencing intellectual repression AND his paper is not great.
baq
Yeah but ‘racism bad’ and even suggesting that race might have any meaningful impact on anything at all is unacceptable politically, even if obviously true or impossible to disprove.
shadowgovt
But at first glance at the thesis of the research project, there's every reason to doubt the two combined would make any sense here. Among the immediate initial questions it raises is "Most East Asians don't live in subzero temperatures any more, so why do they still act that way?"
One has to remember how many absolute crackpots institutions of higher learning have write in every year. Now that he's done the heavy lifting on his own, there's a paper that can be discussed, but no shame on any institution that saw a nobody in the field coming in with an idea likely to fail to hold any water that went "Yeah, we're going to invest zero resources into that."
Comparison to phrenology, for an unknown quantity, isn't absurd; it's kind of the status quo for universities getting solicitations from strangers. That channel of communication is where the perpetual motion machines, time cubes, and proposals to go find the resting place of Atlantis come from.
like_any_other
It's not really a 'climate', but official policy that that area of research is off-limits, to the point that tax-funded genetic datasets are withheld if it is suspected one is doing said research: https://www.city-journal.org/article/dont-even-go-there
zasz
I too have read Never in Anger, the ethnography mentioned in this blog post, and the way I found it was by reading a survey of egalitarian societies called Hierarchy in the Forest, by Christopher Boehm. Many of the personality traits that the author seems to think are special about people who share the East Asian phenotype are actually common amongst fiercely egalitarian societies. It is normal to highly police socio-emotional expression and to regard angry tribe members with suspicion. The !Kung San live in a hot climate and are like this. The Montenegro Serbs live in the Balkans, a rather different climate, and are also like this. I finished Hierarchy in the Forest with the strong impression that no member of any modern society could tolerate the lack of personal expression required to suppress any would-be chiefs.
This person could've spent a lot less time going down a rabbit hole with a couple introductory anthropology classes and by asking themselves if there were any societies with these same traits in a warm climate. It is poor scientific reasoning not to check for examples of this personality type in hot climates. Not exactly PhD material.
like_any_other
Something can be special without being unique. That there exist a handful of other cultures with similar traits, does not disprove those traits are not also selected-for by cold climates, or (in at least some cases) genetic in origin.
nis0s
The claims are poorly substantiated, it’s not enough to make assumptions about something and read about it. You must directly validate a claim by rigorously defining the traits in question, and then find some way to perform measurements—indirect evidence isn’t appropriate to make statements about psychological and personality similarities.
Note that genetic testing or evidence will be insufficient for proving the type of claim this paper is making because there are too many confounding factors which override biological similarities—that’s the whole issue with nature vs. nurture.
pavel_lishin
> I then wondered, is this mere coincidence, or do extreme cold/polar environments cause this in people? I recalled Russia had gas workers in the Arctic regions and tried to look up papers on it. It led me down a rabbit hole of discovering entire troves of scientific literature from various nations that had polar programs, with tons of data on polar personnel psychology, most conveniently refined into personnel selection criteria that shows which traits are the most desirable in candidates for polar work or expeditions.
Cause it in individuals? Or select for it through evolution?
If the former, there's no genetic component here, and the effect should vanish as soon as you get somewhere warm.
If it's the latter, then it can't cause it in individuals who happen to work there over local-winter, right?
s1artibartfast
Culture can persist for millennia.
If it is genetically influenced psychology, it can still be a good predictor of performance in a short term job.
bondarchuk
Direct link to the article this is about: https://psycnet.apa.org/fulltext/2025-88410-001.html ("Arctic Instincts? The Late Pleistocene Arctic Origins of East Asian Psychology")
fliglr
Per David Reich: >10-20% of the ancestors of Eurasian people are neanderthal
>West African populations have up to 19% "Ghost DNA", belonging to an extinct species their ancestors interbred with
>Southeast Asians have DNA of the extinct Denisovan species, as much as 3-5% in the aboriginal people of Papua New Guinea, Australia, the Philippines
>These aboriginals also have DNA belonging to a now extinct, but not yet discovered hominid species
I'm sure the implications of all these findings have not yet been discovered but it's exciting to see them explored
kelvinjps10
But peruvians are not cold and their personality/culture is not similar to east Asian?
ChrisArchitect
Title is: The Origins of Arcticism Theory: A Fateful Encounter in Peru
paulluuk
I can't judge whether this is a good paper or not, and I think it's really cool that someone with only a bachelors degree (like myself) can get a paper published without first doing a PhD.
However, the anti-"woke" part of this article seems so odd to me. Given all the wacky "science" from Nazi scientists that "research" differences between races leading to genocide, it seems completely logical to me that you jump through several hoops and make sure your research is really sound before you publish a paper that explores exactly that topic.
nh23423fefe
science research lead to genocide? why did you make that up? why do imagine some paper review is the bulwark against mass killing?
KingLancelot
[dead]
> I enthusiastically applied to various PhD programs, but was unceremoniously rejected, and upon reaching out was met with “…engaging in outdated notions of environmental determinism.” “…you’re playing with fire by suggesting evolved cognitive differences… ” “The political climate on our campus is highly unfavorable for these areas of research.” “…this is probably the worst time in history to be studying such topics.” “…you will likely encounter extreme difficulties in securing grants.”
This is incredibly sad.