Eternal Recurrence

What is best in life? To have a high IQ, to be physically fit, and to be rated a 10 by the majority of one’s peers.

Boy, some people really really really want to be able to say they’re smarter than black people.

Which brings us to the hard-hitting question that confronts our great civilization:

Should we treat black women as sex slaves? Or should we just treat them as slaves, lest they sully the purity of our Great Race(tm)?

nu -#7 The NBA.

bi #6-
A greater question might be the deeper assumptions that make not having a particular measure of intelligence a question of fitness, as if the context wherein that fitness gets determined can never be challenged. Not the test itself or what it measures, but where it’s given, and when, and by whom.
In Watson’s world, and for most of the adamant partisans on either side of this question, the chimpanzee is an inferior sort of subhuman, partly because of how it looks, but mostly because of its much lower intelligence. Thus Bush could be ridiculed on the internet in a more innocent time for his simian features. That some of us found that disturbing because of what it ignored and profaned about the chimpanzee, and by extension about our larger older deeper selves – as animals and as members of healthy ecological systems like those in which the chimpanzee and many indigenous people are still fit members – was just noise from out on the loopier margins of real issues.
But it’s central. Our place in the world is built and maintained on the same bullshit chauvinism that permits the most grotesque versions of primate research, and torture, and violent colonization, and economic slavery.
An inability to work with these things as what they are, not what we’d like them to be will only perpetuate the greater illusions and lies. Those illusions and lies are the truer foundations of racism and bigotry, not the unequal competitions of the rat-race, not the artificial jungle green in tooth and claw of the marketplace. We’ve created a human ecology where greed and cunning and heartlessness are survival traits. Those qualities were anathema in many primitive cultures. There’s the really dangerous conflict.
It’s not that there aren’t differences among people, not that some differences aren’t better than others, but where and when – the context in which those differences are rewarded and punished.
Karl Rove gets an IQ pass on the eugenics test. That should be enough to condemn it right there.

katerine, it isn’t because of people misunderstanding statistics, as we will see over the next 20 posts – the same right-wing sh*ts who ‘misunderstand’ economics will show up.

I honestly have a bit of trouble figuring out why it’s so important that this not be true; We’re talking about small differences in the location of the peaks of broad bell curves, which tells you absolutely nothing useful about any particular black or white or asian you might encounter. Perhaps it’s the way group differences make a hash of the presumption that disparate outcomes are proof of racism? I can see how some could find that inconvenient.

Mind you, if we were using more detailed measures of intelligence, looking at different aspects of it, we’d probably find that the very groups that measured worse on one scale did better on a different one… The mental analog to what we see in sports performance due to things like fast twitch/slow twitch muscle ratios.

I tend to think the problem in Africa is less genetic, than a result of bad prenatal nutrition and endemic disease, but that doesn’t make it magically non-existent. Even if somebody were going around the continent with the proverbial hammer, or giving all the children a dose of heavy metals at birth, you’d still have to find a way to cope with the brute fact of a lot of people there being dumb as rocks.

In any event, I must say that the way any dissent from the PC dogma that racial clusters have no difference in average intellectual capabilities is ruthlessly suppressed does NOT create the image of people who are confident they are right.

Brett shows up to demonstrate another way to either not read, ignore, or misunderstand Shalizi’s points.

When I posted ‘right wing sh*ts’ at post #11, Brett was my start, uh, poster child. I figured that he wouldn’t show up for at least several more posts. I guess he gets up earlier than I thought.

Health warning – a little statistics required to follow the argument, albeit no more then you’re likely to have gotten in your first grad school class on multiple regresssion in the social sciences

Yeah, that will help the 20% of the population that actually got to go to college, but if you want to convince most people you’re either going to have to make it so that they can afford college too, or simplify the argument so that you don’t need to have gone to one to understand it.

D*mn, Kieran, since it’s all genetic, what did your uncle do – impregnate every woman on that continent?

So the principle here, (Please correct me if I’ve got this wrong.) is that any subject matter where the objective facts run a risk of confirming some belief of racists is, by that reason, illegitimate as a subject of inquiry, and anybody who insists on looking into it is presumptively a racist?

And, yes, I’m well aware that IQ is a very crude metric for a very complex phenomenon, and the interaction between genes and enviroment is complicated, and that ‘races’ aren’t really “races” in any strong gentic sense, and blah blah blah. But that doesn’t seem to be why anybody who departs from the PC dogma is subject to such vicious attack.

Holy cow, this must be the _third_ instance of the “blow lots of smoke in the name of encouraging ‘reasoned debate’, except the actual attempt ‘reasoned debate’ is nowhere to be found” antipattern.

“any subject matter where the objective facts run a risk of confirming some belief of racists is … illegitimate as a subject of inquiry”

Where are these “objective facts”, Brett Bellmore? Do they actually exist?

Brett, you didn’t answer my question. Let’s start from there.

Do you understand the long, long history of racist propaganda? Do you grant that it’s been prominent and oppresive for generations?

Now, don’t shift away from this – it’s really a simple question. A second, more complicated question, is of course how to deal with it in discussion. If your recommendation is that history be ruled completely out of bounds, and every racist demagogue be treated as a scientist, do you understand why that might not be such a good idea in practice ? (pre-emptive note – I didn’t call you a racist demagogue, I asked if you understood why it might not be a good idea to respect racist demagogues).

“Do you understand the long, long history of racist propaganda? Do you grant that it’s been prominent and oppresive for generations?”

Sure do. I think that history is a bit more complicated than Democrats like to portray it, (For instance, the effort to define racism so that minority groups can’t be guilty of it.) but there’s no question that it’s got a long and oppressive history.

“If your recommendation is that history be ruled completely out of bounds, and every racist demagogue be treated as a scientist…”

Hello, Watson is a Nobel prize winner, I think he’s entitled to be treated as a “scientist”. He might be a racist demogogue, too, (The catagories aren’t mutually exclusive, you know.) but that has to be established, not presumed.

My recommendation is that saying something racist demagogues might be happy to hear should not be considered proof that somebody is a racist demagogue. On the stopped clock principle, racist demogogues are going to be, ghastly as this may seem, right sometimes. Are we going to let the fact that they’re right in some instance force us to be wrong?

I’m for fearless inquiry, and let the chips fall as they may. We’ll ocasionally learn things we’re unhappy about, but we’ll still be better off knowing the ugly truth than accepting comforting myths.

The interesting thing is that no one even tries to counter Cosma Shalizi’s argument(s).
Funny how at the same time people play the “oppressed brave scientist just exposing the facts” part and are incapable or unwilling to discuss the scientific issues with their conclusions.

i guess after all, it is a gut feeling.

Brett–

Very, very few people–and certainly none on here and certainly not Shalizi–are saying that this a verboten area of research. Indeed, Shalizi actually *suggests* several possible studies regarding the confluence of intelligence measures and population studies (or, more crudely, race).

Being curious about these matters does not elicit cries of racism. What does–and should–is continuing to that there is evidence for heritable racial differences in intelligence, *even after those claims have been repeatedly debunked.*

So the principle here, (Please correct me if I’ve got this wrong.) is that any subject matter where the objective facts run a risk of confirming some belief of racists is, by that reason, illegitimate as a subject of inquiry, and anybody who insists on looking into it is presumptively a racist?

No, it’s that anyone who advances racist claims should be blasted to the fullest possible evidence-based extent.

It is not scientifically specious to subject racist claims to stronger scrutiny than less politically sensitive topics any more than it’s a violation of free inquiry &c. to put extra research into fields with particularly (profitable, humanitarian, interesting) applications.

But you’re dropping shibboleths like “PC dogma,” so I don’t see why I’m bothering to address your points as if they were made in good faith.

nu writes:

the winners at marathons not any africans, they’re ethiopians, kenyans, south african and morrocans. 3 unrelated groups (the ethiopians and the kenyans are related) that all share one thing: they live in high altitude.
there’s also virtually no one in the african diaspora coming from one of those countries.

that said the more interesting question is: is being born on high altitude nature or nurture ?
and yes, sports recruters have (positive or negative) prejudice. (aka they look for the talent where they think they can find the talent)

Interesting you should mention this, since there is actually significant evidence that there are evolved adaptions to high altitude. In fact, there are at least three different adaptation patterns measured in the Andes, Tibet, and the Ethiopian highlands. The most extensive work on this has been done by Cynthia Beall at Case Western Reserve University. A summary can be found here and a list of her papers here.

It’s not clear what the influence (if any) of this kind of adaptation on athletic performance is, but given the importance of oxygen delivery in endurance sports, it does seem fairly suggestive.

Seth, bi, there are several different methods to use, when judging whether a particular debator is honest or not. One is that those who’ve repeatedly been dishonest in virtually all of many, many comments is to be presumed dishonest until proven otherwise. This is an extreme rule, and few at CT fit it.

Brett is one of those few, the proudless and the brave (against PC police, that is).

Barry:

Well, yeah, but I thought the _”blow lots of smoke in the name of encouraging ‘reasoned debate’, except the actual attempt at ‘reasoned debate’ is nowhere to be found”_ rhetorical antipattern is used enough times by people other than Brett Bellmore, that it deserved a special mention.

Seriously, I think this antipattern deserves a name of its own. (It’s quite similar to the _”In my opinion, it’s a fact!”_ antipattern, I think, but it has a subtly different flavour.)

“What I can’t come up with, though, is a plausible scenario where environmental pressures select for stupidity.”

Can you come up with a plausible scenario where enviromental pressures select more strongly for being smart in one place than they do in another? Because that’s all it really takes for people in different places to evolve slightly different intellectual capacities.

I mean, do you imagine that people who’ve lived for a very long time at high altitude have better oxygen carrying capacity than lowlanders because enviromental pressures at low altitude are selecting for inefficient lungs?

Brett-
Constructing plausible scenarios is irrelevant to finding out if IQ is determined by genetics, or if white people are smarter than black people. Evidence is what is required–and, if you read Cosma’s article, you would see that all the methodologies that produced the ‘evidence’ in support of your position are flawed, and the evidence is worthless.

My position, Rick, is that suggesting that there are genetically influenced differences between the average intellectual capacities of various groups of people isn’t, by itself, vicious racism which merits the kind of treatment Summers and now Wilson have been at the recieving end of. What my position is NOT, is that such differences have actually been proven.

“Not beyond the pale” vs “established to be true”; You do understand there’s a difference between these two concepts, don’t you?

Soon the cost of gene sequencing will drop to the point where we can do huge studies comparing the complete gene sequences of large numbers of people to a vast range of characteristics; Drug side effects, susceptablity to certain illnesses, and, yes, all the various aspects of intelligence. These studies will show that certain gene combinations are associated with better performance at specific kinds of intellectual tasks.

I wouldn’t bet serious money on the proposition that ‘racial’ groups don’t have different frequencies of those genes. But I wouldn’t claim that it’s already proven.

“Saying that “there are genetically influenced differences between the average intellectual capacities of various groups of people” when there is no evidence to support this claim is racism.”

No, it isn’t, this is an overly broad definition of racism. To be a racist, one is required to move from the average to the specific. To, IOW, judge people based on the color of their skin, not the content of their character. Nebulous beliefs concerning averages just don’t cut it, if you aren’t applying them to specific people in defiance of particularized evidence.

And I wouldn’t say that there’s no evidence. I’d say that the evidence, such as it is, is so far from conclusive that nobody can say the case has been proven.

So, to Brett, saying that the African content is not as economically successful because Africans are plain ol’ dumber than everyone else is not racist as long as you are friendly to the black people you meet?

what a weird comparision, Cjcolucci.
especially considering the timespan you use.

‘ What I can’t come up with, though, is a plausible scenario where environmental pressures select for stupidity.’

Plantation slavery might just count, especially if the slave-master got to choose not just who lived or died, but was in control of breeding his stock. Complete control wouldn’t be necessary just enough of a statistical bias for evolution to kick in.

If plantation slavery had lasted another few generations, and human genetics hadn’t turned out to be unusually homogenous, more like cheetahs than dogs, things could have been almost unimaginably horrible.

It’s an outside possibility that some of the damage caused by those historical atrocities isn’t national, economic or cultural, but genetic.

If that could be shown to be true, then those arguing for race-based reparations would have a very strong moral case.

Now, Brett…

If you presented convincing evidence that people on the African continent were mentally retarded because of “rampant disease and horrible prenatal nutrition”, then we could have a serious discussion.

That whole “due to” part, is what is being left out. As Cosma Shalizi shows in his article, the evidence is bogus.

Brett-

Your argument betrays the fact that you did not read/comprehend Cosma’s article.

Brett,

“A total of 51 percent of Ghanaian households risk many health problems”

51% risk suffering. Risk. A health problem.

This is not the same as:

“a large percentage of their population is suffering from marginal mental retardation”

In fact its a wilful misreading.

In any case, you can back up your “argument” with comparative stats from the rest of Africa (Ghana’s rather small you see) and Europe?

It’s actually pretty widely accepted in British scientific circles that Franklin did the real work for which Watson stole the credit.

And it’s not too surprising, either. I mean, christ, you think a half-wit paddy named Watson could do real science? More likely he’d be out tippling and thieving with the rest of his drunken kind.

Cosm, I have never linked to you before. I have no blog for it. No one, not even you, will know whether we were right or wrong. All that matters is that many stood against one. Rigor pleases you, Cosm… so grant me one request. Grant me deductive validity! And if you do not listen, then to hell with you!

“Brett Bellmore keeps talking about suppression of truths,”

It seems some people here are militantly determined to keep reading more into what I’m saying, than the actual words I’m writing would justify. I’m not talking about suppression of truths, I’m talking about suppression of dissent.

We’re not at the point where we know what the truth is.

I repeat: Comment 55 was a hypothetical designed to get at the functional definition of “racism” being used here. And the newspaper article was cited purely to establish that the hypothetical wasn’t a totally whacked out fantasy, that African average intelligence being lowered relative to Western intelligence by way of a lot of disease and malnutrition caused marginal mental retardation is a realistic scenario.

That poor prenatal nutrition can cause marginal mental retardation is established fact, beyond any sane dispute. If poor prenatal nutrition is more common in Africa than in the West, then it’s essentially a given that more frequent mental retardation would follow, inevitably lowering average mental capacity.

So, what it comes down to, is you’re accusing me of being moronic for thinking that poor prenatal nutrition is more common in famine plagued Africa than in the US and Europe? Is that what you’re saying?

So I just read the linked article. Awesome! much more illuminating than the discussion here, I’m afraid to say. I especially liked the bit about “economists who regress countries’ growth rates on government policies, etc., etc. As the late sociologist Aage Sorensen said (e.g. here), the sort of social science which tries to identify causal effects by calculating regression coefficients or factor loadings stops where the scientist’s work ought, properly, to begin.” Snap!

A question, tho:

Luca Cavalli-Sforza, in one of his books, does a factor analysis of various gene frequencies from populations across Europe. Then plots the first three or four factors on a map of Europe. And tells a convincing story about how the facotrs correspond to different invasions/migrations into Europe. So the question is, is this invalid for the reasons Cosma talks about? And if it’s OK, what distinguishes it from the spurious factors analysis he’s critiquing?

I think this time, I’ll wait on my question 55 being answered. I will say, though, I found your question somewhat argumentative.

I read the linked article, and understood it quite well, having, yes, taken statistics in college. If you think it meant that “the measurements have no meaning”, rather than, “You can’t prove from all these measurements the existence of a single trait we’ll call “intelligence”, then I wonder how well you understood it. Here’s a clue: IQ tests DO work for predicting success in a number of areas, which precludes their being, strictly speaking, meaningless.

I’ll point you back to comment 59: The quantity we call “intelligence” is just a sort of summation of a lot of different traits.

However, there are strong biological reasons to believe that they’re not entirely independent, as I also pointed out in comment 59: Whatever the mechanisms underlying the myriad capacities we sum together and call “intelligence”, they’re all implemented in the same physical brain, and dependent on a lot of the same lower level functions. They can be degraded en mass by a long list of biological insults, and there’s evidence that they can, to some extent, be enhanced en mass, too.

I mean, my CAD program and word processor’s functionality are independent, but overclocking still makes ’em both run faster.

Finally, the question was an effort to draw out the functional definition of ‘racism’ as it’s being used here. I’m not allowed to find out how words are being used before answering loaded questions?

So was mine, and it came first. Answer it any time you want.

Brett Bellmore:

Fine, I’ll bite. I’ll borrow your tactics for a little while — you brushed off Rickm’s question (#50) by calling it “loaded”, and you tried to brush off my question (#67) by calling it “argumentative”.

So I’m now also perfectly entitled to brush your question off as _irrelevant_ — because whatever malnutrition’s going on in Africa has nothing to do with Watson’s remarks about dealing with “black employees” _in America_. Which were what started this whole thread.

Or if you want a yes/no answer: then “yes” in this context, because it’s being used as an irrelevant argument to justify Watson’s unjustifiable position, to justify saying bad things about black people _not_ living in Africa.

… Well, on second thought, I won’t force you to answer my question. Because I already know what your answer is.

sg – is it? It looks to me like Brett has understood Shalizi’s point:

“You can’t prove from all these measurements the existence of a single trait we’ll call “intelligence”

which doesn’t have all that much to do with heritability, since, as Shalizi says:

“Someone will object that g is highly heritable, and say that this couldn’t be true if it wasn’t just an artifact. But this also has no force…

The g found by factor analysis, being a linear combination of the test scores, is itself a linear combination of the abilities and noise, and so, in turn, heritable.

How heritable g would look would depend on whether the environmental contributions to the different abilities were correlated.”

Fun thread. Especially to see Brett Bellmore demonstrate his superior intelligence over the ragtag posse pestering him with bbs. He writes much better than they do, too. Maybe it’s all that g.