43 Comments

Intelligence has not hit peak woke.

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"Some are now making plans to start a new journal."

Do this only as a last resort. It's one thing to start a new journal. It's quite another to get university libraries to subscribe to it. There's also the issue of name recognition.

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I don't think university library subscriptions matter that much. Substack offers a much better model.

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It depends on your target audience. If you're targeting academics, you should publish in a journal they can access at their library. Sure, they can access anything on the Internet, like Substack, but they'll have trouble citing such material in a publishable paper.

Ultimately, your aim is to be taken seriously. You won't achieve that aim if you publish your findings in a blog that no one will cite.

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I honestly do not think that it is worth targeting academics.

Virtually all academics with open minds on the issue are dead or retired (like me). Younger researchers are far more hostile to open inquiry, particularly on issues like this, and they will try to capture any future academic journal.

Substack is growing very fast. It is much better to target serious readers on Substack and have access to a much bigger audience than to try to rescue a dying industry.

I am not opposed to keeping an old academic journal like "Intelligence" going, only trying to start a new one (which will very likely suffer the same fate).

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Belief change is driven by a pipeline that begins in academia. I see little evidence that this has changed or is on the point of changing.

What evidence do you have to the contrary? So far, your arguments have been only self-referential: "I don't think" and "I honestly do not think."

Could you please point to concrete evidence that academia is playing a declining role in validating and legitimizing publicly held beliefs?

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There are plenty of public opinion polls showing a very big drop in trust for universities:

https://thehill.com/opinion/education/5039094-public-confidence-higher-education/

I believe this is just the tip of the iceberg of the coming transition.

And you gave no “concrete evidence that academia” plays a dominant role “ in validating and legitimizing publicly held beliefs,” so it is not clear that your beliefs are any more based on evidence than mine.

I think your beliefs on the importance of traditional academic journals in shaping publicly held beliefs are based on what used to be, not where the trend is going.

I would also add that non-academics are far more open to genetic causation than academics. For most people, it is common sense, thought they do not think through the implications. For most academics, it is heresy.

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Let's not wander from the original question. Would the academic community have more trust in a Substack blog than in a recognized academic journal?

OK, I hear you. Let's wander a tiny bit. Would the general public have more trust in a Substack blog than in a recognized academic journal?

This question has been examined by a recent PNAS paper:

"U.S. public confidence in science, the scientific community, and leaders of scientific communities is high relative to other civic, cultural, and governmental institutions for which researchers regularly collect such data. However, confidence in these institutions has fallen during the previous 5 years. Science’s decline, while real, is similar to or less than that in the other groups." https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2319488121

So there has been a general decline of public trust in all institutions. How does that justify giving up a recognized academic journal and replacing it with a Substack blog?

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"There are plenty of public opinion polls showing a very big drop in trust for universities"

Who or what will fill the role that universities used to play and still should?

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Does anyone still care about actual physical journals?

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I do.

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This not naming the new editors thing is silly. It’s a newsworthy event in a field you’re covering. Why are you hiding their names?

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I understand that their names will be announced in January. I am more concerned with the behaviour of the publisher, and the possible reasons for it, than with naming specific individuals.

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You can be more or less concerned with them as individuals but who they are is part of the story.

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It might make it easier for the journal to back down if the names are not yet public.

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I'd have to agree with Hanania, for what it's worth. Name and shame them. This is an utter disgrace.

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This also stood out as odd to me. I appreciate the reporting regardless.

EDIT: In response to my Twitter post about this ( https://x.com/tracewoodgrains/status/1867668765506515313 ), several people expressed concern that Haier was being pushed out. I think it would be useful to clarify in the post that his retirement was planned ( https://x.com/rexjung/status/1867590239637651657 ).

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Noah, thanks for the info.

"Mass resignations at the journal Intelligence

Numerous members of the editorial board resign after publisher installs new editors-in-chief."

This is sad news for me, as I am a big fan of the Journal Intelligence. But it does not surprise me...the anti-truth, anti-fact, and anti-science crowd does not believe in free speech.

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Oh, they believe in free speech all right, but it’s

THEIR version of “free speech.”

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This is why we can't have nice things.

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Sounds like an attempted Woke institutional capture.

Don’t put up with this crap!

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"Don’t put up with this crap!"

What do you suggest?

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Go public, and if that does not change their behavior, start a new journal. In the digital world, there are always other options. Competition works.

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Every journal has its new editor chosen by Elsevier, so this won't change a darn thing.

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Elsevier cannot force a website journal to appoint a specific person as editor.

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So that invites the question, why did Intelligence allow itself to be the subject of a woke takeover?

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I understand why intelligence researchers develop a cautious disposition given how often their research is interpreted by the public and used to advance controversy. It makes sense that they would be quiet and reserved scholars. I imagine most researchers in the field are invested despite these things and largely want to help build a better understanding of the world.

However, if the flagship journal in the field is at risk of succumbing to anti-intellectual impulses of the current cultural milieu, then the justification for quiet just-keep-your-head-down-and-do-your-work is over for a moment. If the publisher appears committed to degrade the integrity of the institution, then even if they back down it should ring alarm bells. Time to find or build alternatives.

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Looks like Elsevier should be sued. Doesn’t matter if they own the magazine. Sorry

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It sounds like Intelligence is going communist.

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as in pharma, journals/publishers are whores. follow the money.

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"as in pharma, journals/publishers are whores. follow the money."

It does appear that rapaciousness has taken over the West.

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We have passed peak woke? I suspect Nathan Cofnas is saying, 'This suggests not and I told you so'.

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I've never heard of this publication. Should I have?

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"I've never heard of this publication. Should I have?"

Yes, if you are interested in honest research on intelligence.

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Does anyone know what the painting at the top is?

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There’s a significant chance that it’s AI. Doesn’t especially look it, but they are commonly used on substack.

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Possible. While AI does have a default style, it's capable of doing other styles if you ask it to.

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It would be hilarious (in a dark way) if Kevin Bird and Rebecca Sear are the new editors-in-chief of Intelligence.

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I can confirm they are not the new editors-in-chief.

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I'd laugh if I wasn't so furious.

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Bird does not want it, neither does Sear.

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