Einstein was a racist, but then he got better

It's an uncomfortable reality that we're all products of the system in which we're embedded as well as our own natural inclinations.

Depending on the details I think this story could be used to spin various narratives. One might be of crude hypocrisy. An even worse conclusion would be to justify present racism. The one I prefer is Einstein doing what any good scientist does : unavoidably starting out with his own prejudices (which influenced his interpretation of what he saw in foreign parts), he later came to make an evidenced-based change of opinion. As well the hypothesis itself he also considered and saw the effects of racism; perhaps, charitably, he'd hitherto never really actively considered it, but passively accepted it as everyone does about most of their beliefs.

Personally I don't want scientists dominating the political scene; scientists should first and foremost do science. But I would like a more scientific approach to the political system, where evidence at least sometimes trumps ideology when it comes to policy. Buggered if I know how to go about that, mind you.

You should also read J. Steven York's excellent commentary below.


Originally shared by J. Steven York

When considering historical figures, and even people of a certain age, it shouldn't be a surprise to anyone that many of them, maybe even most of them, were, to modern eyes, racists and sexists. It shouldn't be surprising because, for most them them, these attitudes were the default social norm. And what it is had for many people, especially the younger ones, to understand is that any positive deviation from those attitudes was a step OUTSIDE the norm, and not TOWARDS it. These people were making huge and often costly shifts, even if to our current sensibilities, those shifts were limited, flawed, and incomplete.

Enlightenment doesn't happen in a day, or even a generation, and I don't think it's entirely fair to judge people of the past based on the standards of the present. The enlightened attitudes many hold today where achieved in small increments by men and women who retained now-shocking blind spots and foibles. It may now seem logical to embrace that all people are equal, regardless of race, origin, gender or age, but that didn't all happen at once, and progress was slow and inconsistent, and continues today.

A few years ago I decided to go back and watch my way though "Magnum P.I.," an iconic show I'd somehow missed in first run (I think I worked nights through most of it). I got through a couple seasons before getting sidetracked.

It was good fun, and the show was an early running in having a regular, competent, admirable character in the form of helicopter pilot T.C. The show did a number of episodes dealing with discrimination against blacks, and while they were a bit ham-handed at times, and timid at others, it was good to see them trying. But running concurrent with this, the show's handling of Asian characters was rather horrific. There was yellow-face, stereotypes, and painfully tasteless humor. Asians were often portrayed as comic fools, or stock sneering villains. Somehow the progress reflected in relations with blacks didn't translate to Asian characters.

Because, of course it didn't. Women were often treated very poorly as well. And I doubt there were many jews, arabs or hispanics in evidence either, and certainly not LGBTQ characters. Small steps. Those changes in thinking would come later, or be achieved elsewhere.

We don't have to accept these old attitudes and presentations, but we need to recognise that they were the default of their times, and understand the value of progress that happened then, even when it was slow and fractured.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewfrancis/2018/06/18/what-should-we-think-about-albert-einsteins-racism/2/#7ebb43801a79