Here's a question.
Thoughtful answers only, no knee-jerk responses.
What actually is wrong with saying that black people are - as a result of genetic differences - less intelligent than white people?
There's nothing wrong if it's true - bit like saying that women are obviously on average less intelligent then men (lights blue touch paper and stands back...) But there doesn't seem to be any evidence provided in the article that proves this other than the Dr's own unsubstantiated comments.
The evidence is fairly well known in the right circles: see for example Richard Lynn
Something worth pointing out is that the estimates you get for IQ differences between men and women are 3 or 4 points, which is hardly anything. The estimates you get for IQ in sub-saharan Africa are maybe 25 points below those in the west, which is huge.
Possibly this betrays my own prejudices, but my feeling is any "generalised IQ test" that finds a gap that large is probably not measuring what we think it is.
Any analysis also has to factor in the Flynn effect - measured IQs have risen around 30 points over the last 100 years, which implies an "average" UK resident from 1900 would be measured with an IQ of about 70 now. Again, my feeling is this says more about IQ tests and testing than anything else.
Does that mean that there is an issue over using IQ as a measure of the ability to 'learn'? I suppose I'm asking that is IQ increased by 'standing on the shoulders of those that went before' ... i.e. is it a nurture thing, is IQ derived to large extent from environment?
Just to hint at my feelings.
To deny differences (between men/woman, straight/gay, black/white, rich/poor) is to miss the point.
The point is to assess the situation and react ethically.
If black people are, on average, less intelligent than white then far better that we acknowledge that, note importantly that that doesn't mean whites are in any sense 'superior' than blacks, and work out whether we need to do anything about it.
The alternative - cf Keith Vaz's responses, reported elsewhere - is to stick your head in the sand.
on its own, nothing wrong with that at all - no more than claiming shorter people are less intelligent overall. We can examine it as a premise and see if it stands up.
How useful is this though ? There may be some genetic proof that people in a group "as a whole" are less intelligent ; red heads, blondes, short people, males, blacks or whatever; but where does the individual fall in this group by intelligence - top 5% ? bottom 50% ? how good an education did they have ? how good is their diet ? its pretty ridiculous to judge based on genes alone, the information is not, i imagine, particularly useful...for, well , anything...especially as we are all members of a great many groups - to single out a single characteristic as the primary factor defining intelligence seems pretty stupid to me
this quote in the article
is purely a "people have said, so it must be true" statement, and not worthy of any serious scientist.Dr Watson was quoted as saying he hoped everyone was equal, but that "people who have to deal with black employees find this is not true".
One also has to factor in the "IQ scores are b0110ks" effect. As a sample test on this Forum showed long ago.
I believe that the broadly accepted suggestion is that nature is responsible for at least 80% of IQ, and nurture responsible for at least 10%.
And yes, there are arguments about how helpful IQ is as a bench mark of intelligence. People complain that it doesn't measure so-called 'creative intelligence', which sounds to me like complaining that it doesn't take account of creativity, which is a bit like saying it doesn't take account of athletic ability.
I'm also very troubled at the idea that various parties appear already to be considering whether there may be criminal sanctions to be imposed because Watson has said these things.
***, pretty soon you are all going to need a lawyer to go everywhere you do so that he can tell you whether what you are planning to say might be an incitement to racial hatred, religious hatred, national hatred, size hatred, age hatred, defamation of a large corporate entitiy, yada yada yada.
Incitement to hatred is one thing - 'behead those who say Islam is violent', for example. Commentary, even offensive commentary - 'I don't want my children to go to school where whites are outnumbered' - is another. Statements like that may or may not be unpleasant but should not ever be criminalised.
Watson's clearly a man with some... views.
I can't find details of the research - anyone got a link? All I can find is references to the original article.
And, reading the full text of his remarks here, the relevant part seems to be:
Now, whilst there may be some value in identifying some characteristics of some ethinc groupings for some purposes (one obvious example being to identify any vulnerability to disease, in order to promote health amongst those groupings), I really don't believe he's an expert in this area.He says that he is “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa” because “all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – whereas all the testing says not really”, and I know that this “hot potato” is going to be difficult to address. His hope is that everyone is equal, but he counters that “people who have to deal with black employees find this not true”. He says that you should not discriminate on the basis of colour, because “there are many people of colour who are very talented, but don’t promote them when they haven’t succeeded at the lower level”. He writes that “there is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically. Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so”.
I also think it's incredibly patronising for him to equate "Africans" with "Black" people.
And finally - yes, it's not surprising that rich people have higher IQs than poor people, a lot of it is due to nutrition and health.
So yes, there's a lot of over-reaction, and it's not pretty - but let's be clear, when someone says:
To me, that's racism.His hope is that everyone is equal, but he counters that “people who have to deal with black employees find this not true”
Well, but they are - I could write a book...
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