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Why can’t we talk about IQ?
Politico ^ | August 9, 2013 | Jason Richwine

Posted on 08/09/2013 3:06:33 PM PDT by reaganaut1

“IQ is a metric of such dubiousness that almost no serious educational researcher uses it anymore,” the Guardian’s Ana Marie Cox wrote back in May. It was a breathtakingly ignorant statement. Psychologist Jelte Wicherts noted in response that a search for “IQ test” in Google’s academic database yielded more than 10,000 hits — just for the year 2013.

But Cox’s assertion is all too common. There is a large discrepancy between what educated laypeople believe about cognitive science and what experts actually know. Journalists are steeped in the lay wisdom, so they are repeatedly surprised when someone forthrightly discusses the real science of mental ability.

If that science happens to deal with group differences in average IQ, the journalists’ surprise turns into shock and disdain. Experts who speak publicly about IQ differences end up portrayed as weird contrarians at best, and peddlers of racist pseudoscience at worst.

I’m speaking from experience. My Harvard Ph.D. dissertation contains some scientifically unremarkable statements about ethnic differences in average IQ, including the IQ difference between Hispanics and non-Hispanic whites. For four years, the dissertation did what almost every other dissertation does — collected dust in the university library. But when it was unearthed in the midst of the immigration debate, I experienced the vilification firsthand.

For people who have studied mental ability, what’s truly frustrating is the déjà vu they feel each time a media firestorm like this one erupts. Attempts by experts in the field to defend the embattled messenger inevitably fall on deaf ears. When the firestorm is over, the media’s mindset always resets to a state of comfortable ignorance, ready to be shocked all over again when the next messenger comes along.

(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial
KEYWORDS: bellcurve; iq; richwine
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To: Norseman; Pelham; blam; Ohioan; Black Agnes

Do you even listen to yourself
I guess you do because you like hearing how morally superior you are in your mind.

I do not believe that environment will create all IQs equal regardless of the race nor do I think social circumstance is the premier cause of poor behavior.

I also do not think western civilization owes anyone an apology.

I do think our culture was better off prior to great society....warts and all

The warts we have today are not warts but rather terminal cancer likely to take down the whole ship

Studies....even progressive studies show genetics is up 90% determinant and that increases with age of child

No one not even progressive groups outside some outliers like Nesbitt think it contributes less than half

I do however think environment and specifically geographic isolation has affected group IQ mean scores over dozens if not hundreds of generations

Note....this is not just about blacks nor does it exclude all Caucazoidals

Which brings us to our folly....the notion that a constant environment will bring all group IQs into equilibrium

There is no evidence of that....and a lot to the contrary

Most folks who have children understand how much of personality is inherited

Environment is only capable of improving on or not....on what is there to begin with

Its funny that we acknowledge how nearly everything is inherited and in the animal kingdom we even breed intelligence

But with humans...due to societal pressure the past 40 years we dismiss the influence

If that gives you the liberty to call me racist fire away

It makes you feel superior to me...lol the lost irony of that on an egalitarian....and gives meaning to you being here

And has no effect on me

So we both win

Nite

PS....I remember you....you like to call folks racist from the security of such a white moniker.....lol

Man the things folks do here for fun....it’d be cool to know who you really are...but in my 13 years I’ve yet to see anyone like you come clean


141 posted on 08/11/2013 12:43:52 AM PDT by wardaddy (the next Dark Ages are coming as Western Civilization crumbles with nary a whimper)
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To: Black Agnes; Elsie; onyx; WKB

Im a fairly non pious southern baptist who firmly believes Jesus Christ is the son of God who died for our sins and that accepting that is paramount

And that Gods word is a road map of personal behavior and responsibility

And my favorite lost concept....duty

But I have always been a bad boy on occasion... not one to cotton to authority...the sort when armed...that Obama and Napolitano fear and detest

My dear Wifey is more devout....prays nightly and fears God...in a good way

A Christian woman I enjoying corrupting playfully

Primitive Baptist but Southern Baptist come lately

I am a member since 1965 to Calvary Baptist church of Jackson MS....a church lost to the ravages of demographic collapse and now attend church here in middle TN

A strong vibrant praise oriented culture right church with a right thinking southern preacher

But I don’t think much about Mormons honestly....some here like Jeff Head I respect...a lot

I hope that clarifies who I am enough....I ain’t one to hide


142 posted on 08/11/2013 1:05:20 AM PDT by wardaddy (the next Dark Ages are coming as Western Civilization crumbles with nary a whimper)
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To: wardaddy

These posters have made the theory of non-discrmination their god....look what it leads to. They are so sure all people and all cultures are equal that history and reality be damned. Sad really.


143 posted on 08/11/2013 1:21:17 AM PDT by LongWayHome
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To: wardaddy

Last time I looked; we wuz all a bit different from one another.

Arguing about WHY is about as useful as the old Angels on a Pinhead ‘debate’.


144 posted on 08/11/2013 4:29:58 AM PDT by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: wardaddy; Jeff Head
You sound like a loveable rascal! ;^)


But I don’t think much about Mormons honestly....some here like Jeff Head I respect...a lot

Well, you SHOULD think about them; for they are DEFINITELY thinking about YOU!

I agree that Jeff deserves a LOT of respect for his Conservative values and life and activism.

His actions (when I was an almost noobie FReeper) were a big factor in my leaving central Indiana to drive to a remote area in Idaho 13 years ago, to go participate in the Jarbidge Shovel Brigade (can I call it an uprising?) event.


In the years since then, we've ALL seen what has been foisted upon us; and I've come to realize that government is NOT our salvation; but Jesus Christ is.

I'm older; and temporal things, yes, even our once great Nation, are no longer as important to me than where men's souls will spend eternity.

We all make choices; and I wish Jeff would choose to leave MormonISM; for it is clearly not biblical.

145 posted on 08/11/2013 4:45:24 AM PDT by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: Lexinom

From the Weekly Standard of Aug 5, 2013, in a horribly obtuse article written by George Gilder comes this gem: (Note: In the quoted portion Gilder’s use of the phrase “predictable carrier” means the underlying system that enables successful, creative, capitalism.)

“In capitalism, the predictable carriers are:

the rule of law,

the maintenance of order,

the defense of property rights,

the reliability and restraint of regulation,

the transparency of accounts,

the stability of money,

the discipline and futurity of family life, and

a level of taxation commensurate with a modest and predictable role of government.”

(Note: I’ve listed his points on separate lines for emphasis. In the magazine it was printed as one entire sentence.)

Nothing about God, although the freedom of (not from) religion would be covered under “the rule of law” since it’s embedded in our Constitution.

On reading his points, it’s interesting to think about how many of them have been corrupted over the years, and not just by the Obama administration, although I’d say that this administration has pretty much jettisoned each and every point.

So, I guess my “thoughts” are that we should return to those basics Gilder lists if we are to restore America’s greatness and ensure its continuance. My thoughts on God’s involvement in all this is that we should return to the original concept of freedom OF religion, rather than the current trend toward freedom FROM religion (at least from Christian religion) that seems to have prevailed in government for the last several decades.

A government aligned with any particular religion will see belief in that particular religion decline among the populace, but will undertake actions in the name of that religion that cause nothing but misery for many.


146 posted on 08/11/2013 8:42:54 AM PDT by Norseman (Defund the Left-Completely!)
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To: wardaddy

>>I do not believe that environment will create all IQs equal regardless of the race nor do I think social circumstance is the premier cause of poor behavior.<<

I never said that the same environment will create equal IQs. What recent research apparently shows is that environment is quite capable of changing IQs (in either direction), i.e., that IQ is not fixed, as earlier researchers thought.

I’m well aware that researchers come up with a lot of erroneous conclusions. I just happen to think that they’re onto something this time around. You can disagree all you want. I just want you to know that you are also disagreeing with the current research, in case that was news to you.

And if social circumstance is not the premier cause of poor behavior, what is? Skin color, perhaps? Or maybe you don’t consider being born to bad parents a “social circumstance” from the point of view of the child?


147 posted on 08/11/2013 8:57:03 AM PDT by Norseman (Defund the Left-Completely!)
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To: Elsie

bump


148 posted on 08/11/2013 6:28:28 PM PDT by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: sitetest
You're right to say that it is still a scientifically-open question whether intergroup IQ differences are genetically-based or not. However, there is research that suggests it is, including research that shows that there are still differences between middle class blacks from “enriched” environments and similarly-situated middle class whites.

So, what accounts for the perceived differences? Some days, I ponder the question, and I think, yep, there's at least some genetic component.

Intellect results from a combination of genetics and environment. Some studies have shown that it takes about 3 or 4 generations for the kids from an originally disadvantaged family to catch up to where they fully express (in the genetic sense) their full intelligence potential.

The problem with many blacks is a culture that ostracizes intelligence, coupled with nutritional factors that probably don't go away in a single generation. So, while a black person might be able to lift him or herself from the ghetto, he or she still carries that ghetto culture within. He or she does not magically learn how to raise the children in a way to maximize their potential.

There is no reason to think that, on the population level, the distribution of "intelligence genes" is particularly different between different racial groups. On the individual level, however, genes do have a large contribution to intelligence--although it still takes the right environment to maximize their effect.

I have the experience of being a gifted child from a poor family. I was not given any particular early intellectual stimulation or enrolled in any special programs in school. My IQ is somewhere in the Einsteinian range. This is all genetics; my environment was not one that maximized their effect (in other words, I could have been a lot smarter). But just because I was lucky enough to get the combination of genes that made me smart does not mean I passed those genes on. My sons are both average. That was hard to adjust to; I had expected that any child I had would be gifted, and that was not the case. Well--the genes must still be there--I have bright grandchildren.

On days when I think of those differences that seem more about culture, I think, no, it's not genetic, it's cultural.

But then I wonder from where culture comes. Do better adapted cultures emerge from populations with higher average intelligence?

It would be nice if folks did the science to answer these sorts of questions. But as the author of the article points out, even wondering aloud about the topic can ruin one’s career.

Culture is a huge factor. We know that Asians have the stereotype of having higher intelligence as a group. (Although we only see the "cream"--the Asians of more modest intelligence tend not to emigrate from their home countries.) I have read that their higher academic achievement, however, disappears after a generation or two. Asians raised by parents who were born and raised in the US are not, on average, any smarter than the white population.

There are plenty of studies on intellect and the factors that contribute to it. They are not based on race; they just look at the various factors.

149 posted on 08/12/2013 4:58:13 AM PDT by exDemMom (Now that I've finally accepted that I'm living a bad hair life, I'm more at peace with the world.)
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To: exDemMom
I have read that their higher academic achievement, however, disappears after a generation or two.

Just HOW can you SAY that??!!??

Why; just LOOK at all the achievements that Albert Einsteins children have made!

150 posted on 08/12/2013 5:36:27 AM PDT by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: reaganaut1
Thank you for posting this piece by Jason Richwine. Please note my own support for Dr. Richwine: Jason Richwine Incident.

I am very glad to see this intelligent young seeker of truth & defender of reality, fighting back. The Leftist would-be thought controllers have created a very, very dangerous climate of deliberate make-believe, which increasingly parallels Hans Christian Andersen's engaging but disturbing fable, The Emperor's New Clothes.

Just as one honest little boy pierced the fantasy bubble in the story, one can only hope that a few honest students of reality, will puncture the collectivist/egalitarian world of make-believe, which is undermining the future of the West.

William Flax

151 posted on 08/12/2013 7:56:21 AM PDT by Ohioan
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To: reaganaut1

Not sure where I downloaded this from, but the part about Neanderthal DNA is interesting. Here it is, for what’s it’s worth.

IQ (intelligence) is inherited and not equally distributed among human races. Multiple IQ tests conducted world-wide over several decades have been normed for every conceivable variable and Blacks always rank at the bottom, even in non-verbal tests. There has never never been an IQ test administered anywhere in the world where the racial rankings were different; Jews, Asian, White, non-White Hispanic and then American Blacks and African Blacks.

Racial activist groups have tried to create their own tests to demonstrate intellectual parity of the races and attack the integrity of existing tests but the rankings are always the same; African Blacks average a 70 IQ (only 2% of Whites score this low), American Blacks are 85 (due to mixing with Whites, 20% on average), non-White Hispanics are 87, Whites 100, Asians 106 and Ashkenazi Jews at 115.

Even using culture-free, unbiased testing designed by Black psychologists, no amount of testing, no amount of wishful thinking, shows any improvement in Black IQ. Raven’s “Progressive Matrices” is completely non-verbal, yet even the brightest of the African Blacks (South African university students) still score only 85 — a whole standard deviation above sub-Saharan Africa but it’s a whole standard deviation below Whites.

The mean intelligence of Blacks is much lower than for Whites. The least intelligent ten percent of Whites have IQs below 81; forty percent of Blacks have IQs that low. Only one Black in six is more intelligent than the average White; five Whites out of six are more intelligent than the average Black. These differences show in every test of general cognitive ability that anyone, of any race or nationality, has yet been able to devise. They are reflected in countless everyday situations. “Life is an IQ test.”

Further, only one-in-3.5 million African Blacks has an IQ of 140 or higher (genius level). But one-in-83 U.S. Whites is a genius. Therefore the per capita genius rate for U.S.-resident Whites is 42,000 times higher than it is for African Blacks.

Incidentally, though the average IQ of East Asians is 6 points higher than the average non-Jewish White, the percentage distribution of East Asians with IQ’s above 140 is slightly lower. The reason for this [apparent] anomaly is that the range of cognitive variation among White gentiles is greater than among East Asians. Specifically, East Asians are more clustered around the mean.

As far as Jews go, that’s not the case, but because of the population size differential, the [absolute number] of White gentiles with IQ’s above 140 is much larger than for Jews. In other words, there’s no lack of cognitive talent in the White gentile population. Specifically, no racial population on this planet, including the Jews, exceeds in the absolute number of White gentiles with IQ’s above 140.

Blacks are the only racial group with no DNA from the large-brained Neanderthal who lived in Europe. Modern humans did not come out of Africa; the African humanoids came out and mated with the Neanderthals and Denisovans to create a composite hybrid that is modern man. Forensic scientists determine race by cranium shape; Blacks have a small frontal lobe and sloping frontal plane and a smaller cranium-to-mandible ratio. Caucasoids have the largest craniums, an almost vertical frontal slope and a massive frontal lobe. The mongloloid is very similar and also more evolved. It is the frontal lobe that seperates our behavior most from the animals and is responsible for language and rational thought.

MRIs show that Blacks have brain size much smaller than Whites, Asians and Jews. This is what caused the increase in cranium capacity. Studies published in the American Psychological Association journal using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) found correlation of brain size with IQ of about 0.40 and that these racial differences in brain size are present at birth. Larger brains contain more neurons and synapses and process information faster; by adulthood, East Asians average 1 cubic inch more cranial capacity than Whites who average 5 cubic inches more than Blacks.

Further, this reflects what we observe in real life (including the so-called “acheivement gap”). People have made long-term observations of the different races and reached rational conclusions; the more White a society is the more prosperous, inventive and safe it is. 19 of the 20 poorest countries are African (Haiti). In sub-Saharan Africa the only countries that could be considered sucessful were White-governed, (Rhodesia and S. Africa). To this day they still can’t even feed themselves even though they are the oldest race. In fact they didn’t have a written language until colonization. A Black in America has twice the lifespan of a Black in Africa. It would would be longer except the top cause of death for 16-34 year-old Black males is another Black male killing them. Whites are 17 times more likely to experience violence at the hands of Blacks than the other way around.

IQ distribution by race:

• Ashkenazi Jews = 115
• Asian = 106
• White = 100
• Non-White Hispanic = 86
• American Blacks = 85 (average 30% White mix)
• Sub-Saharan Blacks = 70 (This is considered borderline retarded. Only 2% of Whites score this low)

Blacks have the lowest IQ of any race because they are the only race with no DNA from the large-brained Neanderthal who lived in Europe. This is what caused the dramatic increase in cranium capacity (and brain size as MRIs reveal) as humans evolved from Blacks and migrated out of Africa.

National Geographic has a good story about the Neanderthal DNA. The MRI studies are Googleable. For the IQ numbers a good place to start is Wiki because their facts are sourced (Race_and_intelligence and IQ_and_Global_Inequality). But the numbers are well-known and accepted.


152 posted on 08/12/2013 8:07:45 AM PDT by CodeJockey (Freeper, Tea Party Member, Bitter Clinger, Creepy White Cracker)
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To: CodeJockey
My favorite line from the article:

Life is an IQ Test

153 posted on 08/12/2013 8:13:37 AM PDT by CodeJockey (Freeper, Tea Party Member, Bitter Clinger, Creepy White Cracker)
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To: wardaddy; Norseman; Pelham; blam; Black Agnes
Thanks for the ping, Wardaddy. I have great respect for Jason Richwine & somewhat less respect for the Heritage Foundation, for not standing up for him.

To really understand the deliberate suppression of the evidence of profound differences in human aptitudes of all sorts, but most critically as to different forms of intelligence, one has to address the compulsive aspect of Leftist thought.

See Compassion Or Compulsion? No one--no one--but demagogues & scoundrels benefit from the fantasy world where we tell people that they should blame other people for the aptitudes that they do not have. The Leftist fantasy world hurts every group & every individual, who is induced to blame others, rather than develop whatever talent, in whatever honorable direction, great or limited that, he or she may actually have. The damage done is hardly peculiar to anyone race or sex; but is harmful to all in varying degrees.

The reality should be as clear as day to anyone who ever sat in a classroom, and observed the wide differences in who was good at what. It is insanity to allow the subject of human differences to be suppressed. We do not follow such lunacy in looking at analysis of any other object of interest. (See Footnote on Egalitarianism.) Could there be a clearer demonstration of how wrong is the attitude that Jason Richwine attacks? Think about it!

William Flax

154 posted on 08/12/2013 8:18:36 AM PDT by Ohioan
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To: CodeJockey

bump


155 posted on 08/12/2013 10:56:35 AM PDT by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: Ohioan

bump


156 posted on 08/13/2013 6:59:13 AM PDT by Ohioan
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To: CodeJockey
Blacks are the only racial group with no DNA from the large-brained Neanderthal who lived in Europe

The problem with the theory that interbreeding with Neanderthals made Eurasians smart is that the Neanderthals themselves were probably quite stupid (their brains were larger than ours because their bodies were more massive). Neanderthals were using exactly the same crude stone tools around the time they went extinct 40K years ago as when they originated some 400K years earlier. If Neanderthal genes gave us insightful, creative innovative minds, you'd think that Neanderthals would have had a little more creative insight of their own.

I suspect that a more likely explanation is that people in Africa coexisted and interbred with archaic Homo sapiens (aka H. heidelbergensis) for longer than those who left Africa.

157 posted on 08/13/2013 1:14:29 PM PDT by ek_hornbeck
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To: CodeJockey
African Blacks average a 70 IQ (only 2% of Whites score this low), American Blacks are 85 (due to mixing with Whites, 20% on average), non-White Hispanics are 87, Whites 100, Asians 106 and Ashkenazi Jews at 115.

I suspect the "Asian" category can be broken down further. Japanese and Koreans have the highest average IQ of any nationalities, probably on par with Ashkenazi Jews. I rather doubt that Hmong would score much higher than sub-Saharan Africans, however. They lived much as neolithic peoples did in their native Vietnam and Cambodia, and behave much like inner city blacks when in America.

American Indians are also descended from Asians, and I doubt that most of them would score very high (e.g. most non-white "Hispanics" are predominantly of Amerindian descent, hence the average IQ in the 80's).

158 posted on 08/13/2013 1:19:20 PM PDT by ek_hornbeck
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To: ek_hornbeck

http://www.scienceworldreport.com/articles/8777/20130812/neanderthal-tools-reveal-human-intelligence-innovation.htm


159 posted on 08/13/2013 1:24:43 PM PDT by 9YearLurker
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To: 9YearLurker
Interesting if true.

Everything I've read said that Neanderthals used the same hand axes and crude spear heads throughout their nearly half-million year history.

160 posted on 08/13/2013 1:31:31 PM PDT by ek_hornbeck
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