Talk:Race and intelligence

I removed the following from the article:

There has been much speculation and debate (but not much research) on the relationship between race and intelligence. This article intends to report on:

the major opinions (attributed to their spokesmen), and
the clear and uncontroversial results of research studies

Ironically, section #1 will have to be much bigger than section #2.

I did so for three reasons. First, the first sentence is false; there has been a good deal of research on the relationship between race and intelligence (although many have questioned the quality and validity of this research). Second, the second sentence (this article intends to report on two things) seems unnecessary -- my sense is that all, or virtually all, Wikipedia articles try to delineate what is uncontroversial about a topic, as well as what are the major opinions in any controversy. Third, the third sentence seems unnecessary; I do not see any irony at all that a discussion of debates over race and intelligence would be bigger than a discussion of uncontroversial studies -- indeed, this is exactly what I would expect given the object of inquiry. SR

There is some evidence to support claim that people who identify themselves as "white" score higher on standard intelligence tests than those who identify themselves as "black" and "Hispanic" in the United States, and this fits a general pattern in which socially dominant groups tend to score higher in IQ tests than socially marginalized groups.

There's no such "general pattern". Some minorities, like Jews and Asians score higher than average. And while you could argue than Jews are in better situation than Blacks, it's hard to claim that in case of Asians. --Taw

A good example of the confusion of heritability is found in the statement of international scholars published in the Wall Street Journal (see web-link above): "If all environments were to become equal for everyone, heritability would rise to 100% because all remaining differences in IQ would necessarily be genetic in origin." This claim is at best misleading and at worst, false. First, it is very hard to conceive of a world in which everyone grows up on the exact same environment; the very fact that people are spatially and temporally dispersed means that no one can be in exactly the same environment (a simple example will illustrate how complex social environments are: a husband and wife may share a house, but they do not live in identical environments because each is married to a different person). Second, even if people grew up in exactly the same environment, not all differences would be genetic in origin. This is because embryonic development involves chance molecular events and random cellular movements that alter the effects of genes. Third, even as far as genetics is involved, heritability is not a measure of phenotypic differences between groups, but rather differnces between genotype and phenotype within a population. Even within a group, if all members of the group grow up in exactly the same environment, it does not mean that heritability is 100%. All Americans (or New Yorkers, or upper-class New Yorkers -- one may define the population in question as narrowly as one likes) may eat exactly the same food, but their adult height will still be a result of both genetics and nutrition. In short, heritability is almost never 100%, and heritability tells us nothing about genetic differences between groups. This is true for height, which has a high degree of heritability; it is all the more true for intelligence. This is true for other reasons besides ones involving "heritability," as Gould goes on to discuss.

Their statement is 100% true and you politically-correct pseudioscientists think that you may be "smart" without ever studying biology. Basic fact of population genetics is that if X and Y influence Z, the bigger is the diversity of X, the bigger is it's influence on Z. So among genetically similar population, IQ depends most on environmental differences, while among enviromentally uniform population, it depends mostly on genetic differences. --Taw

Taw: First, ad homeneim attacks on fellow contributors have no place in this endeavor.

Second, what you write still does not mean that heritability is 100%.

Third, even what you write is addressing the influence of genetic determinants WITHIN a population. That is not the same thing as BETWEEN populations. SR

I have restored the deleted paragraph. DO NOT delete it just because you disagree with it. Stephen Jay Gould, like him or not, is an important contributor to this debate and readers have a right to know what he says. The article does not present the restored paragraph as "fact" (even though all qualified scientists would agree with it) -- it presents it as Gould's argument. That is, it is presented in an NPOV way. Deleting it is vandalism. SR

Unfortunatelly the article presents utter methodological bullshit that no self-respecting biologist would agree with as a "fact". The WSJ letter confirms that.

And to answer your arguments:

One: There is way too much politics in Wikipedia articles. I don't care much about things like abortion or christianity, but when it starts to make problems in scientific aricles I easily get angry about that. Btw, have you ever met H.Jonat ? You would understand what I'm talking about. ;)

I am sorry that you are frustrated with some other participants. The fact remains that there are legitimate political issues concerning the science of race and intelligence. If you want to add to and improve Wikipedia's coverage of these issues, please do so. But it is the worst kind of politics to unilaterally silence discussion.

Two: It doesn't matter if it's 100% or 95% or 80%, what matters it that it rises, and saying "genetical differences have 100% of influence in case of perfectly equal enviroment" means no more and no less than "as envirement is more equal, genetical differences have more influence, with asymptote of 100% influence in perfectly equal environment".
Three: It doesn't matter at all. It works as well within "simple" population as within compound population. In fact there is no such thing as "simple" population. All big enough populations can be splited into subpopulations.

--Taw

These two points do not address the misunderstanding and misuse of the concept of "heritability." Nor do they apply very well to the specific ways that IQ tests have been used, at least in the United States. Yes, all big populations can be divided into subpopulations. And still, heritability within a population will not help understand differences BETWEEN populations. Nor does it address the more complex selationship between genes and the environment, including random molecular and cellular eevents that are basic to genetic reproduction (as --April addresses below, I think).

This more complex relationship has more profound and general repurcussions, that are entirely at stake in this discussion. For example, I am nearsighted and myopic. I inherited this from my parents (or at least my father) -- I do not question the genetic basis for this. Perhaps you would say it is 100% inherited. Yet, I can see fine, thanks to eyeglasses. My environment,including my social environment (and its technological accomplishments) help me -- even 100% (or close to it)! Don't you see the analogy to the race and intelligence case? Even if some element of "intelligence" is inherited, that doesn't mean that the environmentcannot also play a significant role in a person's intelligence. This is not a trivial matter, as The Bell Curve explicitly says that the government should NOT direct resources to improve the education of low IQ people, and resources currently directed to low IQ people should be redirected to high IQ people. This would be like saying that the health insurance that pays for my eye-exams and perscriptions should be diverted from people with genetically bad eyesight, like me, and given to people who were born with great vision! Yes, this is politics -- and yes, this at the heart of the race and intelligence debate, and this is one of the things Gould is geting at when he talks about how some second-ract scientists misuse the very important scientific concept of heritability.

The fact remains that books like The Bell Curve and by people like Rushton are racist and bad science. To criticize them is not to criticze science, it is to criticize bad science. To defend them in toto is not to defend science but to defend bad science.

-- SR

- I agree that there is too much politicizing in articles concerning science, but I fear I must disagree with the source. You have not, Taw, answered one of the more potent criticisms against your position given above. Allow me to simplify it a tad, to be sure it gets addressed this time.

- You have identical twins. If we suppose that it were possible to raise them in precisely the same environment from the moment of birth, would they have the same fingerprints?

- No, they would not. This illustrates the point brought up above: heritability and environment are not the only players in this game. If you happen to be as aware of biology as you claim, would you care to explain "penetrance" to the class? You know, the chance of a gene to express a given trait, which is almost always less than 100% and quite often differs between - say - identical twins? How exactly does that square with your claim of 100% heritability given above?

- I regret the caustic tone, but the assumption of scientific superiority from someone who is not, in fact, arguing a scientifically correct point happens to hit a number of my buttons. -- April

The Bell Curve explicitly says that the government should NOT direct resources to improve the education of low IQ people

I haven't read the book. Where do the authors advocate the above? And what is their justification? (I personally feel that someone who has significantly less ability should get significantly more help. My friend runs a Kumon (math tutoring program). He spends a whole lot more time with the "slow" students than with the fast ones.

If somehow it could be proved that some race (say, blacks) had slightly (but significantly) less intellectual ability because of their heredity -- still, IMHO this would not ethically justify pegging them in menial jobs as in Huxley's Brave New World. I might be an "Alpha" but I really don't hanker to be served by people of genetically-engineered or genetically-inherited lesser intelligence.

This issue may not be resolvable scientifically yet. Perhaps it is protoscience. My personal experience teaching children leads me to correlate learning ability with desire to learn above all other factors. My religious faith teaches that all people are born (endowed) with the potential to become geniuses.

I daresay effective educational techniques are ten times more significant than race.

Anyway, if we are concerned with intelligence of persons (i.e., see intelligence as "good") -- why not focus on discovering factors that correlate with intelligence? Why not look for cause-and-effect relationships? (There's no point focusing on race, unless you have an a priori desire to treat all members of a race a certain way.)

If we discover that family income; or parents' educational level; or number of hours of TV watched per day; or whether parents insist that all homework is done each day; or whether phonics or whole language is used for teaching reading; or any other environmental factor is at least as significant as race -- then shouldn't we focus on manipulating these social factors, to help people become intelligent?

(I'm not sure what the above rant has to do with improving the article, but since I've sworn off injecting my opinions into articles, I thought I'd blow off some steam on a talk page.)

Ed Poor

Hi, Ed... to clear the air a bit, since there's been some recent friction, I thought I'd drop by to say how much I agree with you on this subject. On the "even if" race were a primary factor, I hold with Sojurner Truth: "If my cup won't hold but a pint, and yours

holds a quart, wouldn't you be mean not to let me have my little half measure full?" Of course, as many people have tried to point out above, many (or most) of the arguments that claim race is an overwhelming factor are based on just plain bad science. I also agree with your argument that if an environmental factor is significant, we should make every effort to adjust that factor for kids in order to improve their learning, regardless of whether or not race may also play a factor.

Unfortunately, the authors of the Bell Curve, and some researchers such as Jensen, make arguments far too close to Social Darwinism for me to stomach. They argue that we shouldn't "waste resources" on those who are "genetically inferior", but leave them to, I presume, the manual labor tasks they're "suited for"... gah. To my mind, it's not only racism (and eugenics, probably), but the ancient theme of the divine right of the lordly class, reworked under the guise of (pseudo)science. In sum, the science they use is poor, and the conclusions they draw from their findings are both unwarranted and, to me, reprehensible. But I, too, am ranting, and will stop here. -- April

I haven't read The Bell Curve, but only an article quoting from it. One of the excerpts shows that blacks with equal educational levels make more money than whites (in America). The authors attribute this to affirmative action. Could it not also mean that blacks have more ability than whites?

sigh* I am still waiting for sociology to become a science. Robert Heinlein says, The difference between science and the "fuzzy subjects" is that science requires math; the fuzzy subjecs merely require scholarship.

BTW, Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn seems to me a lengthy argument that blacks are just as good as whites. The story recounts copious examples of whites acting stupidly and selfishly; these are contrasted with Jim's evident humanity and intelligence. The scene after the storm on the raft, where Jim calls Huck "trash" and makes Huck feel penitent, is sufficient prove (to me) that Jim is just as smart and good as any white man. Note: this scene appears in unabridged versions; I haven't seen it any of four movie versions or a condensed-for-children version.

I think the burden of proof should be on those trying to show innate inferiority. Absent that, I'm going to treat all people the same.

Ed Poor

Yes, sociology's a worthwhile study, surely, but has perils of observer bias and qualitative analysis not as prevalent in the physical sciences. Your "burden of proof" comment is a good point, scientifically - however, it all depends on initial assumptions. You and I think the "default assumption" is a lack of systematic innate differences in ability, and the responsibility of objectors to prove otherwise. Alas, I've heard it argued that one can as easily take the default assumption to be that current social inequities are biologically based - it's all in one's presumptions, which form the starting point for later scientific study. Tricky business. Perhaps this should be pointed out in the article, to bring this back on-topic.

I agree on Huck Finn, too. Huck and Jim are equally well-developed characters... and the "lynching" scene is a bitter and graphic testimony to the horrors racism can induce. I go nuts when people want to censor Huck Finn because it contains the word "nigger" - those people can't have actually read the book, surely, or they'd seen how very harshly it condemns the racism prevalent Twain's time, not to mention racism in general. Is this discussed in the article on Huck Finn? I think it should be... -- April

We do not achieve balance by deleting vast amounts of pertinent text! Balance is only achieved by doing some research, and adding more material to the article. Balance by deletion would end up destroying most of Wikipedia. Please, people, understand that all Wikipedia articles are growing works in progress. They need contributions, not scissors. I vote to restore the deleted text. If a particular argument is adavanced to remove some of that text, that would be a different story. RK

The only way to neutralize this article is to retitle it: "race VERSUS intelligence"

Thus implying that those that have a 'race', have proportionately less intelligence, and those that have 'intelligence', have no race at all. That said, the article can say any moronic thing it wants, since rational people will get it immediately and ignore it, letting irrational people debate this 'issue'. Feh.

If you do not want to discuss the science and sociology behind this topic, then fine. But some of us do. Please do not hinder our efforts to work out an accurate survey of the field. We all understand that this is a sensitive issue, but we cannot let political correctness define what an encyclopedia can discuss. This is a valid field of study, and I think we can and should summarize it here. Of course, I understand how badly this field has been misused in the past...but all branches of science can be misused. That doesn't deligitimize the mission of science itself, nor does it mean that we must give up on objectively trying to discuss it. It just means that we have to try hard to be fair and objective. RK

Oh for the love of Mike, STV stop marking everything minor! It's impossible to work sensibly when you keep hiding your changes. Tannin 03:53 Feb 8, 2003 (UTC)

Any sentence that starts with "Mitochondrial dna evidence, carrying markers in the male Y chromosome," is scientifically illiterate. There's no mitochondrial DNA in any chromosome, let alone the "Y" chromosome: mitochondrial DNA is extrachromosomal. The female mitochondrial-DNA ancestor of all people ("mitochondrial Eve") and the male Y-chromosomal-DNA ancestor of all men (sometimes called "Adam") need not have known each other and need not have been contemporaries: the most recent common ancestor of all Homo sapiens is probably much more recent than either of the two of them. -- Someone else 04:01 Feb 8, 2003 (UTC)

Yes, please clean that para up for us, Someone Else. I'll do it if no-one else does, but it's best done by a real biologist. (Please note - it was not me that added it, though I may have restored it im my edit conflict confusion.) Tannin 04:07 Feb 8, 2003 (UTC)

PS: my assumption is that the original idea was to cite mDNA ("Mitochondrial Eve", so called) and more the recent Y chromosome research ("African Adam"). That would make sense, at any rate. Tannin

If /when the article stabilizes, I'll be happy to make any changes that are still necessary. I don't have the patience for "warfare"<G>. Wasn't accusing anyone in particular of adding it, just noting that it's nonsense in its current state. With any luck, it'll disappear when someone makes a go of defining "race". -- Someone else 04:14 Feb 8, 2003 (UTC)