Posted on 07/05/2017 7:46:49 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
There are good reasons not to confine the discussion to academic journals.
In the latest issue of National Review, John McWhorter has a challenging and thought-provoking essay about the topic of race and IQ — specifically, about whether that topic should even be up for discussion in liberal-arts classrooms and in the media, as opposed to in scientific journals. He suggests not, as there is nothing to gain from discussing it.
I read McWhorter’s essay with special interest because I have violated the norm he proposes. I have written about race and IQ on numerous occasions — and for a general audience, as I am not even a specialist myself. See, for example, my 2013 essay in this space about Jason Richwine’s departure from the Heritage Foundation, as well as my RealClear reviews of Nicholas Wade’s A Troublesome Inheritance and Richard J. Herrnstein and Charles Murray’s The Bell Curve (on its 20th anniversary).
In light of McWhorter’s essay, I thought it would be worth explaining how I became interested in this topic and why I participate in public discussions of it.....
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...
It’s not that white folks can’t play basketball, it’s that some African-descended folks tend to excel at it to the point of making others look as if they can’t.
“The average IQ for any particular group is meaningless on an individual level..”
I disagree. Since groups gather together in neighborhoods and extended families, the average intelligence definitely affects the way the group treats things like having babies without marriage, valuing education above say sports ability. A groups values are definitely affected by the groups intelligence.
The author of the article seems to deliberately shy away from accepting the genetic basis of IQ differences between races. This has been extensively studied and found that intelligence is about 50-80% heritable. Few scientists argue that genes do not play a very large role and virtually none deny that substantial IQ differences exist between the races. The role of environment has been examined and found to have a minimal effect.
Discussions of IQ differences are important because you can’t solve a problem if you dont understand the cause. It would also largely discredit the scapegoating of white racism as the cause of poor black outcomes.
“Just remember that the testing that makes whites feel so superior to blacks in turn proves that whites are inferior to Asians. Two edged swords can be a bytch.”
The practical impact of a 2 point difference in IQ is likely to be insignificant.
“In fact, the evidence is overwhelming that intelligence is a genetic trait, as verified by huge numbers of scientific studies. I do not believe that this is disputed by anyone who is not a scientist in this field. We also learn that education and nutrition only result in minor improvements. “
This is true but the fact that genes control IQ is considered the 3rd rail of science. No one wants to discuss it for fear of being considered a eugenicist and a racist.
I wonder if race and IQ have anything to do with all the shootings on the south side of Chicago.Rhetorical question.
IQ tests are vocabulary tests. Since certain students are held at a lower standard and not expected to learn, their IQ scores suffer. Teachers of a certain race don’t want their students ‘acting white’ by being interested in academics.
I sometimes think that whites just simply put more energy into taking standardized tests and the blacks have got a more passive attitude of keeping calm and not stressing out about trying very hard.
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That might have merit except that the results of testing are uniform anywhere in the world where they are conducted and that different cultures , whether one group is the minority or majority in a particular location and any other variable that can be dreamed up is already baked into the mix.
“All comparisons are invidious.”
“All comparisons are odious.”
Take your pick.
Oh, they are still there. They just give it different names
On the FR the eugenicists are more up front. Which is a good thing given how insanely arrogant and dangerous they are.
The received wisdom is that all groups are statistically all the same. Therefore, any detected statistical difference between group outcomes, whether employment, average wealth, college graduation rate, or incarceration rate, MUST therefore be due to racism and discrimination, and thus requires remediation.
If there WERE actual, demonstrable group differences, then that would undercut the argument for remediation, and the people who profit from it.
That may well be true. But even if it is true, remember, when spoken about the "protected", TRUTH is the new HATE SPEECH.
What is missing is the fact that when soon to be slaves were captured and sold, it was the best physical specimens that had the most value. Take that moron (and alleged genius) Stephen Hawking. He may have a very high IQ, but wouldn't have been a good candidate as a slave and therefore wouldn't have made it into the mix. The point being that people who ended up as slaves had already gone through some level of culling, and that was based mostly on their physical ability.
dylanroof; dylanrooffanclub;goebbels;hate; hatesite;hatred; himmler;mengele; neonazi;stormfront;
I hope you gave this chump the zot last night.
Equally important, is the fact that no one benefits from the pretense that people have the same potentials. Virtually every healthy person has some potential--to be sure--but they do not have the same potential. What egalitarian make-believe does is encourage people to blame others for their failures, rather than determine what aptitudes they actually do have, and can develop for a better future.
There is nothing altruistic about egalitarian make-believe. It is the source of much of the misery in the world--a tool for demagogues, not a key to a better future.
I think you’re correct. I’ve known too many people, from all over, to believe that there is anything really *different* about one ‘hue’ of human being as opposed to another; and what differences appear are explained by culture.
Whoever wrote those tags was an idiot. It’s an article from National Review, and his only conclusion is that no conclusion can be made one way or the other about the role of genetics with IQ.
That wasn’t McWhorter’s argument at all. He presented someone else’s proposal of calling other talents “IQ” to make the point that the very act of labeling those other talents as different kinds of “IQ” highlights the sense most people have of the superiority of logical-mathematical IQ. Proposing this labeling system tries to offer everybody a way of being “smart.” But, McWhorter says, in every language he knows, the word smart correlates to logical-mathematical thinking; no humans call people smart because they’re good singers. According to McWhorter’s argument, even if we create these other IQs, the common understanding of what it is to be smart will still refer to cognitive superiority.
I was not aware that there existed IQ tests designed to make "whites feel so superior to blacks".
Could you be projecting, maybe?
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