This morning I was so annoyed with all my email about that craptacular study about conservative and liberal brain wiring that I banged-out a column on it. Truth be told, it started as a Corner post and got away from me. An excerpt:

And what are the implications of that? Is socialist Sweden’s population saturated with liberal-brains? Are other ethnicities simply genetically “conservative” — i.e. opposed to change — and that’s why they have the problems they do? And what about Canada? They’re very liberal up there, but genetically or neurologically, are they really that distinguishable from Americans? In Russia for a very long time, “conservatives” wanted to conserve the Soviet system which made them the anti-matter universe versions of American conservatives. Surely the substance of what people want to conserve matters, if we are to take these studies remotely seriously. Studies of this sort have a long pedigree, going back to the execrable Authoritarian Personality, and they all have a similar flaw. They stack the definitional deck in their favor. Yes, sure, there’s probably some neurological factor involved in why some people resist change ’more than others. But, absent the relevant qualifiers, love of change is not “liberal” any more than being for the status quo is “conservative.” For example, liberals from Jonathan Chait to Nancy Pelosi have a white-knuckled grip on the welfare state created by FDR and LBJ — in other words they’re conservative about the liberal status quo. Meanwhile, so-called paleoconservatives are quite radical in their agendas. Think about it: There are cranky, risk-averse people at any number of liberal institutions and risk-loving rightwingers at conservative institutions. Have you never met an inflexible leftwing bureaucrat? Have you never hung out with a partying, devil-may-care Republican? I have. Then I smashed him with a rock and buried him in a shallow grave for embracing too much ambiguity! I kid, I kid.

Update: From a reader:

All you need to know from the L.A. Times story: “Participants were college students” In college and law school I was a fire-breathing YPSL who inhaled. I am now (very) conservative. Some rewiring job! Now, can we get back to 100 chimps w/computers=Shakespeare experiments? (nice G-File)