March 1999 Archives

I guess I haven't told you about this theory yet, have I? :) It recently came up again in a conversation, so I might as well write it down here.

As grand as it might sounds, it's a very informal analogy of a distribution curve to characteristics of a society, mostly used to compare a homogeneous and a diverse society. You all remember a typical distribution curve that looks like a bell in high school, right? In any distribution, you always talk about a mean and a standard deviation. The mean is a statistical average and the standard deviation is how far away the samples are from the mean. In case of bell-like curves, graphically the mean can be thought of as where the peak is and the standard deviation can be thought of as the "thickness" of the curve.

So, for a homogeneous society, the deviation would be small (the curve will be narrow) and for a diverse one, large. My observation and analogy is that when the deviation is small, there tends to be less samples in the extremities. And in converse, a diverse group will have more extremities. And the important thing to note is the extremities are on the both ends.

I find it quite useful and seems to apply quite well when comparing societies such as Korea and the United States. So, a very homogeneous country like Korea has a very small deviation and slightly higher mean, I guess. The force trying to keep the deviation to a certain limit, is very strong, so it is very stable with little change. It usually has a good base, translated to a slightly higher mean. What this means is that it has a fewer "geniuses", along with less "sociopaths." On the other hand, with a very diverse country such as the States, there are more "geniuses," but as many "sociopaths" (e.g., serial killers).

I often use this to point out that there is no perfect society when people starts to argue about which is better or "advanced." They are just different and one can be more successful than another in a certain situation, but not always and not for everyone.

I was reading an issue of BusinessWeek some time ago and found an interesting article ("It's All in the Genes? Ha!," BusinessWeek, March 16, 1999, pp. 100-102). It's about the theory that challenges the established genetics community which believes that the genes are the only agents that transfer the traits from the previous generation to the next. Basically, several biologist have confirmed the occurrence of a heredity transfer without the involvements of DNA, in this case, the shapes of proteins.

It's such an idea that fascinates me and in some aspects makes me "happy". I was somehow dissatisfied by the notion that what we are based on only depends on the sequences in these 46 chromosomes, just like a deterministic program would be. Of course, they can bring a complex variation, but still the thought of a single class of agents determining the whole system in the real world sounded too simple to be true.