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For the purposes of this discussion, I'll go ahead and assume that this is true, that there are multiple studies that have found this, and that they have all successfully made it through peer review[1].

Admittedly the Autism example is not the best, however I believe that it does a decent job of getting the point across. The studies linking autism to Atheism are not of the highest quality, however a clear correlation has been demonstrated. Additionally, there is theory as to why high functioning autistic people would be more likely to be atheists than neurotypical people. Having a theory and having demonstrated a correlation is at least supporting evidence that Autism is causative of Atheism, but I agree that currently the research is not capable of proving causation. I do believe that a more sophisticated study will demonstrate that Autism has a causative relationship with Atheism.  As far as citations go, here are some links and relevant snippets from them:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2011/09/atheism-as-mental-deviance/

These two figures illustrate two results:

1) Among two equivalent demographic samples differentiated by autism diagnosis state, the high functioning autistics are much more likely to be atheists.

2) Among a sample of autistics and neurotypicals those who are atheists have the highest “autism quotient.”

http://www.scienceonreligion.org/index.php/news-research/research-updates/490-autism-and-ir-religiosity

In four separate studies, Norenzayan, Gervais, and Trzesniewski measured volunteers for autistic traits, mentalizing abilities, and belief in God. In the first study, the researchers actually recruited both autistics and non-autistics from the Miami area, while in subsequent studies volunteers simply filled out surveys that measured their empathic abilities and tendencies toward autism. (Autism is typically measured on a spectrum, so that even neurotypical people may show some  autistic tendencies.)

In all four studies, men showed less belief in God than women, and greater autistic tendencies were strongly correlated with nonbelief. In statistical analysis, the researchers found that the both correlations were mediated by impaired mentalizing abilities. In other words, the reason that both men and autistic people were less likely to believe in God was at least partially because they were less likely to see the world as being made up of personalities. Instead, autistics – and, to an extent, males – were more likely to see the world as being composed of impersonal objects and patterns.

This research implies that these cognitive patterns extend to the metaphysical, or “big picture,” level. That is, people with strong mentalizing abilities are more likely to see the cosmos as being somehow fundamentally personal, while those with reduced mentalizing abilities are more likely to experience it as being more impersonal and abstract.

The researchers tried to control for several other possible explanations for their findings, including the possibility that autistic people, who can be intimidated by social gatherings, may be less likely to go to church. According to this model, autistic people would believe less in God not because of reduced mentalizing abilities, but because they would be exposed less often to social conditioning that encourages belief in God. However, the connection between autism, weakened mentalizing abilities, and reduced religious belief held true even after the researchers controlled for religious attendance. The same was found when the results were controlled for interest in math and science. And finally, intelligence – as measured by I.Q. – was found to have no correlation with religious belief one way or another.

The best explanation for the researchers’ findings, then, appears to match their original hypothesis: both males and autistic people believe less in God because they interpret the world less personally than women or neurotypicals, respectively. That’s a lot of generalizations in one sentence, but it does seem to fit the facts. Naturally, individual people very rarely fit the boxes that social scientists produce – but those boxes do help us understand how things work.

This is a very thin rope you're tying to two ends, I hope you know what you're doing.

I mean, it just seems pretty obvious to me that if points A and B are true, that point C must follow.

We can agree that given an individual DNA sample and a confirmation of both Autism-linked genes and actual manifestation of Autism, the probability that the individual is irreligious could be determined via the information from the above-stated studies.

This doesn't mean much all by itself, however, and it is especially not actionable or even reliable without much further study. We can "guess" that the DNA belongs to an atheist based upon the information you've provided, but our guess is still quite likely to be wrong[2].

The probability of the guess being correct is dependent on the degree of correlation between the presence of the gene and the manifestation of autism, as well as the degree of correlation between the presence of autism and atheism. We are not yet capable of diagnosing Autism via genetic analysis alone, however certain genes increase the risk of autism to several times greater than that of the general population. Additionally, further research needs to be done to establish a causative link between Autism and Atheism, however, current research is supportive of such a link existing. So I agree that today we might not be quite to the point that we can make highly accurate guesses as to a persons belief in God based upon the methodology I suggested.

However, I do believe that we can currently guess, with higher than random accuracy, if a person is an Atheist or not, by by using the methodology I suggested. Even an increase in accuracy of half a percent would indicate that analysis of DNA can be used to predict a persons belief (or lack thereof) in God, with better accuracy than can be obtained without the DNA analysis (in which case the best guess would be that the persons probability of Atheism is in line with that of the general population). As further research is carried out on the link between Autism and Atheism as well as the link between the presence of certain genetic mutations and the presence of Autism, I strongly believe that our predictions will only increase in accuracy.

Better accuracy of *relative* probabilistic predictions —e.g. "The likelihood that a subject expressing gene A is atheist is X% higher than normal"– sure, but this is not the same as what you're talking about. Your case, as outlined here, has fallen apart. Any further claims you make based on this case are unfortunately not going to be reasonable.

How is this not what I am talking about?

Even if we were to take everything you say as true, you're taking these ideas too far. Another example of why this is so is that the topic in the studies I have found revolves "identifies belief in God". This is quite different than "identifies as atheist."

See the links I provided.

A. Autism can sometimes be identified by genetic analysis
B. Autistic people are statistically far more likely to be atheists than non-autistic people

therefor

C. In at least some cases, genetic analysis can be used to statistically determine that the probability of Atheism is greater than it is in the general population

If points A and B are true, and all of the scientific literature I have read seems to indicate that they are, then point C seems to logically follow.

:

Finally, even if somehow you're accidentally right about ALL this stuff, you can't take this and directly apply it to predicting the behavior of people based on their DNA. In this example, you're talking about a neurological disorder with genetic correlations. In the original context of this discussion, we were talking about going the other way and predicting behavior (not disorders or conditions, mind you, but another level removed) with them. You just haven't made a reasonable case for this.

I believe that I have made a pretty reasonable case, but I can see that as far as Autism and Atheism goes, I could have selected a better example with more research available. How about this study:

Punishment of free-riding has been implicated in the evolution of cooperation in humans, and yet mechanisms for punishment avoidance remain largely uninvestigated. Individual variation in these mechanisms may stem from variation in the serotonergic system, which modulates processing of aversive stimuli. Functional serotonin gene variants have been associated with variation in the processing of aversive stimuli and widely studied as risk factors for psychiatric disorders. We show that variants at the serotonin transporter gene (SLC6A4) and serotonin 2A receptor gene (HTR2A) predict contributions to the public good in economic games, dependent upon whether contribution behavior can be punished. Participants with a variant at the serotonin transporter gene contribute more, leading to group-level differences in cooperation, but this effect dissipates in the presence of punishment. When contribution behavior can be punished, those with a variant at the serotonin 2A receptor gene contribute more than those without it. This variant also predicts a more stressful experience of the games. The diversity of institutions (including norms) that govern cooperation and punishment may create selective pressures for punishment avoidance that change rapidly across time and space. Variant-specific epigenetic regulation of these genes, as well as population-level variation in the frequencies of these variants, may facilitate adaptation to local norms of cooperation and punishment.

To me this seems to pretty clearly state that gene variation can be used to accurately predict the behaviors of a person playing an economic game.

If you don't see it being used in our lifetimes then you must not be looking very hard

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/02/15/1216841110

Punishment of free-riding has been implicated in the evolution of cooperation in humans, and yet mechanisms for punishment avoidance remain largely uninvestigated. Individual variation in these mechanisms may stem from variation in the serotonergic system, which modulates processing of aversive stimuli. Functional serotonin gene variants have been associated with variation in the processing of aversive stimuli and widely studied as risk factors for psychiatric disorders. We show that variants at the serotonin transporter gene (SLC6A4) and serotonin 2A receptor gene (HTR2A) predict contributions to the public good in economic games, dependent upon whether contribution behavior can be punished. Participants with a variant at the serotonin transporter gene contribute more, leading to group-level differences in cooperation, but this effect dissipates in the presence of punishment. When contribution behavior can be punished, those with a variant at the serotonin 2A receptor gene contribute more than those without it. This variant also predicts a more stressful experience of the games. The diversity of institutions (including norms) that govern cooperation and punishment may create selective pressures for punishment avoidance that change rapidly across time and space. Variant-specific epigenetic regulation of these genes, as well as population-level variation in the frequencies of these variants, may facilitate adaptation to local norms of cooperation and punishment.

http://www.biologyreference.com/Ar-Bi/Behavior-Genetic-Basis-of.html

The foregoing observations and experiments, and many others like these, no longer leave room for doubt that genes significantly influence animal behavior. The subject becomes very controversial, however, when we come to the behavior of the most complex of animals, Homo sapiens. Behavioral geneticists find evidence of a genetic influence on schizophrenia, alcoholism, sleep disorders, depression, sexual orientation, intelligence quotient, and many personality traits.

Consider, for example, sexual orientation, an intensely heated issue in which one side argues that people are born with a hereditary predisposition to become homosexual or heterosexual, and the other side argues that homosexuals simply "choose to be that way" and could change if they wanted to, or that this behavior was caused by childhood influences and can be "corrected" by such means as psychotherapy. J. M. Bailey and R. C. Pillard studied families with two or more male siblings, at least one of whom was homosexual. In 52 percent of the cases where the brothers were monozygotic (genetically identical) twins, the other brother was also homosexual; in 22 percent of dizygotic (nonidentical) twin pairs, the second brother was homosexual; and in only 9 percent of nontwin brothers, the second brother was homosexual. The 52 percent figure shows that genes do not inevitably determine sexual orientation; if they did, this figure would be 100 percent. But the contrast between this datum and the other two does suggest that heredity significantly increases the likelihood of a given adult sexual orientation.

The sequencing of the human genome will provide a new tool to assess the genetic underpinnings of behaviors in the human species. A shortcut to sequencing the genomes of many people is to identify places in the genome where people tend to differ in the particular DNA base found. These sites are called single nucleotide polymorphisms, or SNPs, and already an international consortium of researchers has identified more than two million of them among the three billion bases of the human genome. Many research groups are now correlating specific SNP patterns to disease susceptibilities, and these include conditions that have behavioral components. One company, for example, is amassing SNP patterns among six hundred families in which two or more members have eating disorders. The researchers look at SNPs in genes known to be associated with eating behaviors and satiety, such as leptin and neuropeptide Y, and other, as yet unknown places in the genome where certain SNPs are statistically more common in people with these types of disorders. Even with this powerful new technology, it will be difficult to separate inherited tendencies from learned behaviors.

Much of the opposition to the idea of a genetic influence on human behavior stems from political and social philosophies that are reluctant to accept the idea that not all human behavior can be shaped by experience or changed at will. It would be discouraging to think that tendencies toward war, racism, or marital infidelity were genetic and unchangeable. Hereditary theories of human behavior were taken to despicable extremes in the twentieth century, including a eugenics movement in America that argued that some races and classes of people were genetically inferior to others and, most horrendously, the racial philosophy of Nazi Germany, which extolled the fictitious "white Aryan race" while trying to systematically exterminate another. In light of this horrific history, it is understandable that some people recoil from any latter-day suggestions that human behavior is hereditary.

Yet scientific evidence cannot be rejected simply because it does not conform to a political philosophy. In evaluating the influence of genes on human behavior, several points must be kept in mind. One is that behavioral geneticists are not arguing for genetic determinism: they are saying genes influence behavior, not that they rigidly determine it and destine people to behave in certain ways. Genes may influence human behavior, but they do not enslave people. All behaviors require at least some contribution from genes (to build sense organs, nervous systems, muscles, and the other equipment of behavior) and environment (to provide the raw materials to build this equipment and the experiences that sway gene expression ). As evolutionary theorist Richard Dawkins puts it, behavior is like a chocolate cake, needing both a recipe and ingredients. Genes provide the behavioral recipe, and the environment the ingredients.

Finally, there is no such thing as a gene for any behavior. There is no aggression gene, no gay gene, no gene for bird song or nut-burying. Genes encode proteins , nothing more; but through proteins, they can influence behavior. Aggression and sexual behavior, for example, are influenced by testosterone, and testosterone is synthesized by enzymes , which are proteins encoded by deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). Thus one can see how genes would influence these behaviors. All behavior, furthermore, depends on chemical signals (neurotransmitters) that are released by one neuron and bind to receptors on the next neuron. Neurotransmitters , too, are synthesized by enzymes encoded by DNA, and their receptors are proteins as well. Neurotransmitter levels control mood and probably aspects of personality. The list goes on and on. Indeed, it is impossible to see how genes could not play a role in behavior.

Honestly there is not much of a debate. There is a plethora of evidence that clearly shows that genetic analysis can predict behavior with results significantly more accurate than random guessing.

We're talking about different things here. You cannot apply the same heuristic methods used to link DNA to Autism to predict behavior like "will rape someone" or "is likely to be a drug dealer". Completely different contexts, to say the *least*.

I don't think it is really different at all. For example: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/5270316/Anger-is-in-the-genes.html

This study shows that

Those who had the "TT" or "TC" versions of the gene portrayed significantly more anger than those with the "CC" version.

Anger and violence definitely correlate. So do you really think that somebody who doesn't have the "TT" or "TC" version of the studied gene, is as likely to commit a violent crime as somebody who does?

I mean, DNA could predict aggression, intelligence, impulsiveness, potential for addiction, etc. but not whether someone is about to commit a crime.

It was never claimed that DNA can tell whether someone is about to commit a crime or not. The only claim I made was that DNA can be used to determine the probability that someone will EVER commit a certain type of crime, and that fingerprints cannot be used for this. DNA can also be used to predict with better than random accuracy if a person believes in God or not, if a person is a Democrat or a Republican, and all kinds of other things. So DNA contains a lot more information of interest than a fingerprint does.

seriously. environmental causes are the result of autism, genes are only markers of possibility, genes are not absolute fact.   The only fact, is what you can observe in the present.  To extend on your flawed nytimes point C, I can randomly predict if a person is atheist  by his/her lifestyle; because  logically lifestyle causes autism and 'atheist-ism', not dna.  a realism is, man made chemicals in the environment cause autism, so logically our popular western atheist movement is the result of poor health by poisoning.

Even if genes are only markers of possibility, they can still be used to increase the accuracy of a guess to greater than that of the general population. It is really simple statistics. If someone in the general population has a 1% chance of being atheist that means 1 out of 100 people are atheists. If people with a certain gene have a 90% chance of being autistic, that means 90 out of 100 people with that gene are autistic. If autistic people have a 90% chance of being atheists, then 90 out of 100 people with that gene have a 90% chance of being atheist.

You want your kids to blow their fingers off? To the best of my understanding, the anarchist cookbook is more like the accidentally blow yourself up cookbook.

DNA can also be used to predict, with better than random accuracy, if a person believes in God (https://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/15/weekinreview/12wade.html) as well as if they are Liberal or Conservative (www.nymag.com/news/features/liberals-conservatives-2012-4/)

I was too slow to delete and repost to remove the edited mark

And I edited it again anyway .

Quote from: kmfkewm on June 04, 2013, 05:03 am

DNA contains far more information than a fingerprint.

True, which is why LE's desire to collect it make some sense.

Quote

As science progresses we may be able to screen for people inclined to certain criminal acts by analysis of their DNA. We will never be able to screen for people inclined to certain criminal acts via analysis of their fingerprints.

I'm quite sure we have not progressed to the level of being able to predict the actions of people based upon their DNA. Furthermore, it's highly doubtful that this will ever be possible.

Well, we kind of already can. For example there is a gene associated with alcoholism. Somebody with that gene is probably significantly more likely to drink and drive than somebody without it. The ability to predict the actions of people with their DNA is just getting better and better actually. http://www.webmd.com/mental-health/news/20040526/researchers-identify-alcoholism-gene

In fact there is also a gene associated with binge drinking http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-204_162-57557041/gene-variation-may-make-a-person-more-likely-to-binge-drink/

and a gene associated with rape and murder: http://www.deccanchronicle.com/121221/news-current-affairs/article/genes-responsible-rape-study

I believe that the Supreme court will likely rule that passphrases are protected by the fifth amendment though. The best analogy I have heard made is to the two different sorts of safe, safes that use combinations and safes that use keys. In the case of safes opened with a key, the government can force you to hand over the key to the safe. The government can not force you to reveal the combination to a combination safe, provided that it exists only in your mind (and is not written down on paper etc). So in cases where encryption is done with a key file, it is likely the government has the legal right to demand that you hand over the key file. However, if the encryption is password based I do not think the government has any right to demand the password. Now for safes the government doesn't really care, since they can open a safe in either case. For encryption they do care though, because they cannot usually break encryption without the password. So it is possible that the supreme court will rule in favor of the government simply because the government wants them to do so, but if they can see the analogy to key files and keys and passphrases and combinations then they will only rightfully agree that the government has no right to demand a passphrase.

The government is trying to argue that passwords are more analogous to physical keys than they are to combinations. In my opinion they are correct in some cases and incorrect in others, depending on the way the cryptosystem is implemented. In almost all cases the users password is only ever used for derivation of a key that is used for encryption and decryption. The users password itself is used to provide the cryptosystem with a static entropic seed, it is not used directly for encryption or decryption. Usually the user types in their password and then it is used as a seed by a 'password based key derivation function' (PBKDF). The PBKDF then returns the encryption key that is actually fed to the symmetric encryption algorithm. So I think of the password as being much more similar to a combination, even though the key derived from the password is more similar to a key. Really it is most accurate to think of the password as a set of instructions for crafting a key. Since the government can not obtain the key without the password, since the key doesn't exist until you run your password through a PBKDF, and since the password only exists in your mind, I think that it is pretty obvious that the government can not legally demand your key.

Another approach they have taken is promising immunity for the content of your password. For example, if your password is "I, Alice, murdered Bob on December 25th of 2002", they will not be able to use that against you in court. But they can still run it through the PBKDF and obtain the resulting key, with which they can still decrypt your CP, which they can still use against you in court. They argue that this is respecting the 5th amendment right against self incrimination.

Another approach they have taken is demanding the defendant produces the decrypted drive itself, but not demanding to know the password. In this case they will leave the defendant alone with the computer and a keyboard, and after some time passes they will come back and expect the drive to be decrypted. They do not learn the password in this case, but they still get the decrypted content of the drive. They have argued that this is respecting the 5th amendment as well.

For the most part though they have just been trying to get people to accept plea deals before any of the cases make it to the supreme court, because if the supreme court rules against them it will be a very major blow against them. They would rather offer someone a lighter sentence in return for encryption keys and a guilty plea than they would take the risk of never being able to convict the majority of people who use FDE. So far all of the people in such cases have accepted a plea bargain and turned over their passwords. There have been some cases where charges were simply dismissed though, they don't always press the matter.

The primary issue for them is that traffic analysis is only really good for intelligence, it is circumstantial evidence at best. When they raid somebody for CP they usually are not positive that the target is actually involved in CP, it could be a neighbor using open WiFi (although recently they have started checking for this prior to raiding), it could be a botnet master using an infected computer as a proxy, etc. Without actually recovering CP off of a computer or media in the possession of the suspect, their case is going to fall apart. Their typical strategy is traffic analysis to identify suspects, raids to seize computers and forensics to confirm the presence of CP. FDE makes the last step much less likely to be a success. Of course, in addition to other techniques, the smartest CP traders use Tor to prevent the first step , which prevents the second step, and they also use FDE to prevent the third step in case the first steps fail.