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To: Alter Kaker

Are you really saying that you do not understand the difference between group averages and individuals within a group?

The small part of "The Bell Curve" that referenced race (and I am presuming that is what your pictures referred to) was very clear that the differences within groups were larger than the differences between groups.

Your pictures speak to the presumed intelligence of two individuals and nothing about the averages for their racial group.


235 posted on 05/22/2006 4:20:25 PM PDT by evilC (Call me Krusty)
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To: evilC
The small part of "The Bell Curve" that referenced race (and I am presuming that is what your pictures referred to) was very clear that the differences within groups were larger than the differences between groups.

Which is exactly why the exercise is meaningless. People born on a Tuesday may have higher IQs than those born on a Wednesday, but there's no genetic significance to that discrepancy. The problem is that using "race" as a group distinction is inherently useless, precisely because the variation is so wide.

The Bell Curve might be somewhat valid (although I'd argue even then) if "races" were distinct genetically homogenous units. But they're anything but, and that makes the typology useless scientifically and dubious politically.

237 posted on 05/22/2006 4:31:59 PM PDT by Alter Kaker ("Whatever tears one sheds, in the end one always blows one's nose." - Heine)
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