Race only skin deep - S.J. STUDENTS DISCOVER GENETIC LINK

Mercury News ^ | Mon, Feb. 09, 2004 | Katherine Corcoran

[CobaltBlue]

More than half of the class at San Jose's Piedmont Hills High School, students from numerous racial and ethnic backgrounds, are linked in their DNA to the same ancestor, born more than 100,000 years ago in central China or Taiwan.

[Cronos]

Caucasians at one time or another colonized most of Africa (by boat, not through the Sahara) yet they are 1% of the population there. America was also a colony yet Caucasians are 75% of the population here. What was the difference?

America was colonized by 1600. The native Americans died mostly because they were not immune to the diseases brought across by the Eurasians.
In Africa, the entire continent was colonized only in the 1800s. There was already a substantial population there. The colonies here were not as places for people to stay but as trasure troves for the colonial powers. European nations made billions out of African gold, diamonds, pelts etc.
Africa was never meant to be a place for Europeans to settle down -- the climate was too harsh and there was already a substantial population as compared to the Americas or Australia.

[Cronos]

Not just looking different but acting different. And I think that the way people act is affected by genes.

Ah, the old nature versus nurture thing. Well, I believe in the nurture philosophy. Nature does play a role but nurture does determine what the person does and becomes.

[wardaddy]

Precisely.

[Cronos]

People, however, should be free to do as they please in their associations (and that includes business associations, hiring, firing and contracting).

Correct, but that freedom does not include the freedom to fire someone or not hire someone just because of their appearances. Most of the laws you're complaining about are because in the 50s and 60s most white folks would not hire a black even though they may have been the better ones for the job. So, that shattered the myth of opportunity for all, a true meritocracy. Now, things are better. People can better themselves if they work hard and have the intelligence. Are those laws still useful? Debatable. In most parts of the country people are coloblind, but there are people who are not. THat's why we have the Nation of I and the KKK -- two sides of the same coin.

[Cronos]

Hitler blamed others (mostly the Jews) for the problems of Germany. If you want to find modern parallels, ask yourself who today is blaming all their problems on another race and who is demanding remedies and reparations

Completely incorrect example. The Nazi situation was a majority accusing a minority. You could say Mugabe is like H, or the KKK are like H .

[Cronos]

However my contempt for those people rests solely on their culture and history

You talking about Germans???? WEll, you can't blame present day Germans for the stupidity of their grandparents or great-grandparents. Most of us are Germanics -- the English are and were a Germanic people.

[Cronos]

Algerbra was derived - not invented - from Hindu and other ancient sources by an arab scholar.
I said that maths came from the 'east' that would include Indians and arabs. But, thanks for that, it proves a very good point -- every Eurasian civilisation has borrowed from other Eurasian civilisations. The civs in the Americas and sub-saharan Africa never really were in contact with the Eurasian landmass, so their influence on modern civs is very minuscule. So, the Indians invented the concept of zero and the basis of algebra. The Greeks did the same for geometry. The Arabs, having formed their Empire between these two intellectual regions developed it further. Modern computing etc. is based on these early discoveries. Note however that these were already highly developed civilisations. To say that the bushman civilisation or the Papua new Guinean civilisation can have a major impact on present and future civs is incorrect. They could have minor impacts like knowing some medicinal plants that could help with diseases or something like that, but not a major impact -- they are not that developed enough.

That's why, when the Europeans invaded Africa, Australia, the Americas and Asia, their impacts were on places that had lower levels of development. In the Americas, Africa and Australia the native civs were either at a lower stage of development or in the case of the Incas, not immune to Eurasian diseases. In Asia, the European impact is comparatively small to non-existent as these were at a higher level of civilisation until the Industrial age.

[wardaddy]

They (anyone with money including other blacks)left to escape black crime and falling property values and failing schools etc. In the case of where I lived, the black liberal corrupt local government came after the fact not as a precipitator.

I know ...I lived it and continue to watch it unfold. An impossible scenario for folks who have not witnessed it to understand.

I blame culture not skin pigmentation, that's a red herring.

And since I'm rather late to this thread, I don't think anyone can discount nature more than nurture in the classic argument.

[TLI]

You can homogenize the world but eventually the cream rises to the top.

Bingo!

One can artificially alter circumstance to produce a desired result. However, once an environment is no longer being destabilized , the respective abilities will once again began to stratify.

T L I

[thedugal]

No discussion of IQ should be started without acknowledging that Jews and Asians score higher on IQ tests than whites

This topic is almost impossible to discuss. The debate is almost entirely sucked up by 2 groups, those who are terrified that there may be real genetic differences in the races and those who require some evidence that they are superior to someone else to validate their pathetic existence.

In your above quote you simply say Jews, but more specifically the highest IQ of any group that I know of is the European diaspora Jews.

[asbestos_suit]6 million Jews were murdered by the Nazis. This is an unprecedented event in modern history which undeniably had an effect on their genetic makeup. It is logical to assume that the survivors had a higher IQ than the victims. Not because the survivors were somehow smart enough to decide, "Hey, this Hitler guy looks dangerous, I better split", nor that the victims were too dumb to realize they were in jeopardy. It boils down to means. On AVERAGE, it can be logically determined that the survivors were the wealthiest and had the most means to escape. The wealthiest would have been the professionals, who would have had higher IQs (on average) than the laborers.[/asbestos_suit]

One interesting thing this evidence suggests is that it could have been a calamity (natural disaster, disease or perhaps a war) which had a similar effect thousands of years ago. There simply isn't enough evidence to know for sure what causes differences in race, but it is only the willfully ignorant who can argue that there are no differences. Those differences can and do dissolve where the races interbreed particularly as seen in the U.S. Barring natural disaster, political upheaval or other major shift in human events, it is unlikely there will be any "white" race in the United States in the year 3004. Some people will be born looking more "white", and some will be born looking more "black", but in all likelihood they will all have genes from black, white and asian ancestors (our grandchildren etc).

One person, (too lazy to find which poster) asked what is it that caused Africans to have a lower IQ, sarcastically asking if it were curly hair. It is funny that he answers his own question unwittingly. The same thing that gave them "curly hair", their parents. Some low IQ people do have children with higher IQs. This can happen through generations, but the more common result of two low IQ parents is low IQ children. Take this over an entire geographic region and the results are obvious. Now the question as to what exactly the average IQ of Africans is, who knows. It is entirely possible that a more accurate test could show that they have much higher IQs than the "70" figure from the "Bell Curve". Obviously the author of the book had an agenda before writing as his subsequent work shows. (google for yourselves, I don't feel like sifting through the aryan nation homepages to find the relevant links).

Nonetheless, whether the average IQ of Africans is 70 or 120, the fact that the average for one race may be higher or lower than that of another race cannot be entirely reduced to environment and nurture. This has been proven by several studies which have done tests on blacks adopted by whites etc. Those who absolutely dismiss the scientific possibility before even reviewing the data are not the more open-minded. It is not only possible, but logically probable, given what we know about genetics (dna passed from generation to generation) and what we know about georgraphy and history (humans were separated by land masses untraversable with the technology of the times).

Personally, I hope we take this knowledge and use it to better ourselves and all mankind. We should be trying to use all scientific means to increase not only our health but also our intellect. Genetics has the potential to further the evolution of man, to increase longevity, health, strength and intelligence. Dismissing data is dangerous in science, and political correctness (shockingly it is even seen on this website) hurts more scientific study in modern times than religion.

[Doctor Stochastic]

...in the 50s and 60s most white folks would not hire a black...

Not just "wouldn't" but there were some laws against such things. Likewise, blacks could not attend certain tax-funded schools and colleges, etc.

[Cronos]

Low IQs. These would depend on the civilisation as well. For instance most black civilisations were in lower stages of development compared to Eurasian ones. So, there would have have been less need for High IQ persons around. It would be better to have stronger, quicker, more athletic people. That's why athletics is now mostly dominated by blacks. Indians, on the other hand are not very good at sports, Chinese are not good at sports involving huge amounts of strength (rugby etc.). Why? Becuase these were highly developed civilisations with 3 to 5 thousand years of encouraging learning. ditto for Jews. Intelligent people in Israel, India and China would become Priests, Brahman Priests, Confucian priests. As they were smart, their generations would become smarter over generations (a lot of inbreeding too! but mostly smart folks marryign smart folks).

As intelligence was the key to a better life, it was encouraged. That's why Chinese and Indians and Jews have, on average higher IQs than those of Western Eurasian and African descent.

Of course this IS painting with a broad brush. There WILL be highly intelligent blacks and whites and Highly stupid Jews, chinese and Indians. The averages do not determine the net worth of any individual.

[CobaltBlue]

I was the poster who sarcastically asked whether it was melanin or curly hair that causes lower IQs.

My argument, in a nutshell, is that it's pointless, from a public policy point of view, to study IQ in the context of race, because there's really nothing worthwhile to be done with the information.

Let's work with Asian vs. white since it's not as explosive as black vs. white. This country is majority white. If scientists discover that Asians have higher IQs than whites, so what? We won't change a thing about our country to elevate Asians to a higher status. And we'd object strenuously if Asians relegated whites to a lower status in Asian countries.

The concept of IQ was developed in the context of education, and measures the ability to learn. That ability is individual. Does it make any sense to extrapolate from individual abilities to group abilities?

I mean, wouldn't it be silly to say a white person with a 170 IQ is inferior to an Asian with a 100 IQ just because on average Asians are one statistical deviation higher IQ than the average of white?

Would we put a white person with a 170 IQ into remedial courses based on averages? Would we put an Asian person with a 100 IQ into advanced courses based on averages? I certainly hope not.

To me, the argument makes as little sense as arguing whether dogs or cats have higher IQs.

[thedugal]

So if it is scientifically proven that Asians have higher IQs than whites do you think we should suppress that data in order to ensure that our rights are not altered? In order for your fears to have any justification whatsoever, there would need to be some precedent that individuals with higher IQs are afforded some rights which individuals with lower IQs do not have. I know of no such law in any western country, nor have I ever heard such a thing proposed seriously. To summarize, I see 2 flaws in your thinking, 1 a fact cannot become untrue simply by avoiding the study of it, and 2 there is no evidence that IQ, particulary an average difference of +-5 points is going to have any impact on legal rights in any way, shape or form.

[thedugal]

Actually, I have to disagree with your analysis. You are using the results to explain the effect. It is unlikely that civilisation caused an increase in average IQ, but more likely that a higher IQ brought about greater civilisations.

The reason for this is mostly due to breeding patterns amongst classes. Lower class laborers would have more children to help them survive. Artisans, clergy and other professionals, military or craftsmen would not see any improvement in their lifestyle by having a dozen children. In addition their wives would be more likely to have both the knowledge and access to birth control that the lower classes would not.

Because of this effect, it is highly unlikly that the average IQ increased over time by more than a few points. The numbers are simply too bottom heavy. In all civilisations, even our own until the modern age, the vast majority of people were farmers. This isn't to say they were all dumb farmers, but it does refute your theory that there was upward pressure on the average IQ due to civilisation.

However, there has been a dramatic change due to modern invention, which is that civilisation is no longer 95% farmer, 5% professional. Today's civilisation is almost entirely professional, service or skilled labor. Due to this modernization effect, most people have stopped having more than 2 children. Today we see this effect most dramatically in modern western countries where the birth rate has fallen below replacement in most European nations and Japan.

This has effectively increased the average IQ, which has been measured. So, to put it bluntly, our average IQ is rising because people with lower IQ's are no longer outbreeding people with higher IQs.

If we accept the data that the Chinese have a higher IQ than Europeans, the most probable conclusion is that at some time between their divergence from a single ancestor to their dispersion in separate land masses something happened which caused them to get smarter overall (average). This could have been a natural disaster or it could have been that those who decided to turn northeast instead of northwest were just slightly smarter. It is interesting that the studies I have seen always say "Asian", "white" and then a few other groups, however, "Asian" and "white" is quite broad. For example, the average IQ of Scotland and Ireland is closer to the "Asian" number than the "white" number. Another example would be the enormous difference in all fields of achievement between say, Japanese and Philipinos, both "Asians" living on homogenous islands.

Of course this is simply a hypothesis based on limited information. Merely mentioning race and IQ in the same sentence is enough to send most liberals into various states of apoplexy. There very well could be a study which proves some strain of DNA increases inventiveness. Who knows at this point, since we only have a few puzzle pieces to a huge picture. I'd take back every word if there were a single peer reviewed study which disproves it.

[CobaltBlue]

I didn't say suppress the information, and I am not afraid of the information. My IQ is high enough that I don't give a squat about your IQ or the IQ of the guy next door. I think it's a waste of time to even think about. It's meaningless. What matters is what you do with your brains.

Would it matter to you whether IQ was linked to hair color? Shape of nose? Length of earlobe? Is there no correlation so flakey that you'd finally say "enough"!

But whatever floats your boat. Maybe you can discover that Irish people have higher IQs than Brits, or something.

[ffusco]

I guess it wasn't that obviouis I wasn't talking about the Germans. I was talking about "the terrorists"

The English have Germanic ancestry but also, Celtic, Saxon, Norman, Dane,Scott, Welsh and Roman as well.

[Cacique]

bttfl

[Dan Evans]

Completely incorrect example. The Nazi situation was a majority accusing a minority. You could say Mugabe is like H, or the KKK are like H .

Does being a minority make it OK? There are many examples of minority populations who oppress the majority -- does that make it right because they are in the minority? If the black population in the US becomes greater than 50% does that mean that our black racial warlords are then like Hitler but not before?

[Dan Evans]

Correct, but that freedom does not include the freedom to fire someone or not hire someone just because of their appearances.

Why not? The 14th Amendment prohibits government from hiring by race but it doesn't prohibit the people from doing it. Why does engaging in commerce nullify your right of free association? Where is the constitutional authority for passing these laws?

Most of the laws you're complaining about are because in the 50s and 60s most white folks would not hire a black even though they may have been the better ones for the job. So, that shattered the myth of opportunity for all, a true meritocracy. Now, things are better.

Before those laws were passed we had a nation where people were free to judge people by merit. But after sliding down that slippery slope our brave new color-blind meritocracy:

Has corporations inquiring of the race of applicants and hiring to racial quotas.

Has universities giving preferences by race to student applicants.

Has the Boy Scouts employing homosexuals to sleep overnight with young boys.

Has judges and politicians gerrymandering voting districts to favor black representatives.

Has had schools busing students halfway across the county to achieve racial diversity.

Has schools encouraging Black pride groups, Hispanic pride groups and homosexual pride groups (but start a white, heterosexual pride group and you get hammered). We weren't like that in the 1950's.

I don't think things are better when people are afraid to fire an incompetent employee who happens to be a protected minority. I don't think we have better doctors when the doctor was admitted to medical school because of his race instead of his competence. City services are not better when the contracts are awarded because the contractor is black instead of being a competent company. We are less of a meritocracy than we were before.

People can better themselves if they work hard and have the intelligence. Are those laws still useful? Debatable. In most parts of the country people are coloblind, but there are people who are not.

I have a suggestion. Get rid of those laws and see what happens. If bigots are hiring based on race and not by merit, then those bigots will not be able to compete with the good people who are hiring competent employees. The problem solves itself.