Dr Watson's views on race seem very sensible.

Sniffy,

There doesn't have to be any violence or forced separation because people will simply accept the sublime truth of what will be revealed in the 21st century.

A synthesis of physics and human psychology will demonstrate that materialism and objectivity were wrong to start with. We will stop seeking to change ourselves through changing the outward world. The symbol will overcome the object. We will at last begin to really appreciate what is closest to us rather than believing ourselves to be inferior to the rich and privileged.

No gas chambers required.

 

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:roflmao:

And what will be revealed and who is going to reveal it? I mean you have obviously got some sort of unprecedented access to this great mystery. And when this great thing is revealed everyone is going to just slip into their rightful place, especially the rich....and well connected.

If you believe yourself inferior then you are. Those who don't, aren't!

 

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:wtf:

 

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An interesting paper on how error bars are used in experimental biology

http://www.jcb.org/cgi/content/full/177/1/7

 

Which nicely explains why your previous assertions about insignificance of IQ are mistaken. You argued that because the difference in mean IQ between black and white people (15 points) is the same as the standard deviation of IQ over the population (again, 15 points), there is no significant difference. However, when performing inferential statistics, the appropriate error bars are not the standard deviation (which is a measure of how much variance exists within each population) but rather standard error (which is a measure of how accurate the mean estimates are). Note that standard error shrinks to zero as the number of data point increases (regardless of what the standard deviation of the data is). Since these IQ tests have been administered to, literally, tens of millions of people, the standard errors are miniscule.

Thus, the observed difference in mean IQs is statistically significant. The probability that, were you to re-do all those IQ tests, you would get a different result is astronomically small. So, there is a very high level of confidence that black Americans, on average, have lower IQs than white Americans. The issue is what is causing this, and what it actually means in the first place.

Comparing the difference in means to the standard deviation doesn't tell you how statistically significant a difference is; rather, it gives you an indication of how big the difference in question is, relative to variations within each population. Statistical significance is about the level of confidence that an observed difference in means is not just a random fluke that will disappear if the test is repeated. These are different issues. And an entire standard deviation difference is a troubling amount: we see this difference reflected in educational attainment, income, incarceration, etc. It's a serious social problem, and it doesn't help anyone to wish it away with incorrect statistics arguments.

 

Whether this person is right, or wrong, opinion he is entitled too.

 

Apparently Martin Luther King, Jr was a racist, since he wished that his children would be judged by the content of their characters. The current Kool-Aid dictates that all characters must be equal, no?

 

quadrophonics:

I read your post with interest. Thanks for the explanation. I see how you inferred the statistical significance based on inferential statistics. I generally use GLM models for population statistics.

I am curious as to your opinion on using the single measure of IQ as a predictor of social performance.

e.g. what do you think of this?

 

It's definitely problematic, but on the other hand has been shown to correlate well with various real-world measures like educational attainment, income, etc. But it should always be taken with a grain of salt; it's certainly not a definitive measure of intelligence, and it's highly dubious that any single-valued measure would ever live up to that title.

Also, I note with interest the adoption studies mentioned in your quote. This gets back to the point that the group differences that appear in IQ tests do not seem to have any genetic component at all. More generally, other evidence suggests that there isn't even a biological component. Which is to say that these group differences seem to be manifestations of society and culture. Which leads to the big question: is this a direct measure of the effects of racism on black people? Sorting this question out would go a long way towards getting a handle on some of the most problematic aspects of American culture and society.

 

I agree with you, it seems to be borne out by new theories:

 

Orientals and Jews have been subject to all kinds of prejudice and bigotry in America over the last century...and yet have done very well academically and economically.

 

Has anyone conducted IQ tests on very young children by race? I bet if the differences are due to social circumstances, they would only appear later in school life (once prejudice was experienced/recognised)

 

News-Medical.Net

Race differences in average IQ are largely Genetic
Medical Research News
26-Apr-2005

http://www.news-medical.net/?id=9530

A 60-page review of the scientific evidence, some based on state-of-the-art magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of brain size, has concluded that race differences in average IQ are largely genetic.

The lead article in the June 2005 issue of Psychology, Public Policy and Law, a journal of the American Psychological Association, examined 10 categories of research evidence from around the world to contrast "a hereditarian model (50% genetic-50% cultural) and a culture-only model (0% genetic-100% cultural)."

The paper, "Thirty Years of Research on Race Differences in Cognitive Ability," by J. Philippe Rushton of the University of Western Ontario and Arthur R. Jensen of the University of California at Berkeley, appeared with a positive commentary by Linda Gottfredson of the University of Delaware, three critical ones (by Robert Sternberg of Yale University, Richard Nisbett of the University of Michigan, and Lisa Suzuki & Joshua Aronson of New York University), and the authors' reply.

"Neither the existence nor the size of race differences in IQ are a matter of dispute, only their cause," write the authors. The Black-White difference has been found consistently from the time of the massive World War I Army testing of 90 years ago to a massive study of over 6 million corporate, military, and higher-education test-takers in 2001.

"Race differences show up by 3 years of age, even after matching on maternal education and other variables," said Rushton. "Therefore they Cannot be due to poor education since this has not yet begun to exert an effect. That's why Jensen and I looked at the genetic hypothesis in detail.
We examined 10 categories of evidence."

1. The Worldwide Pattern of IQ Scores. East Asians average higher on IQ tests than Whites, both in the U. S. and in Asia, even though IQ tests were developed for use in the Euro-American culture.
Around the world, the average IQ for East Asians centers around 106; for Whites, about 100; and for Blacks about 85 in the U.S. and 70 in sub-Saharan Africa.

2. Race Differences are Most Pronounced on Tests that Best Measure the General Intelligence Factor (g). Black-White differences, for example, are larger on the Backward Digit Span test than on the less g loaded Forward Digit Span test.

3. The Gene-Environment Architecture of IQ is the Same in all Races, and Race Differences are Most Pronounced on More Heritable Abilities. Studies of Black, White, and East Asian twins, for example, show the heritability of IQ is 50% or higher in all races.

4. Brain Size Differences. Studies using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) find a correlation of brain size with IQ of about 0.40. Larger brains contain more neurons and synapses and process information faster. Race differences in brain size are present at birth. By adulthood, East Asians average 1 cubic inch more cranial capacity than Whites who average 5 cubic inches more than Blacks.

5. Trans-Racial Adoption Studies. Race differences in IQ remain following adoption by White middle class parents.
East Asians grow to average higher IQs than Whites while Blacks score lower. The Minnesota Trans-Racial Adoption Study followed children to age 17 and found race differences were even greater than at age 7: White children, 106; Mixed-Race children, 99; and Black children, 89.

6. Racial Admixture Studies. Black children with lighter skin, for example, average higher IQ scores. In South Africa, the IQ of the mixed-race "Colored" population averages 85, intermediate to the African 70 and White 100..

7. IQ Scores of Blacks and Whites Regress toward the Averages of Their Race. Parents pass on only some exceptional genes to offspring so parents with very high IQs tend to have more average children. Black and White children with parents of IQ 115 move to different averages--Blacks toward 85 and Whites to 100.

8. Race Differences in Other "Life-History" Traits. East Asians and Blacks consistently fall at two ends of a continuum with Whites intermediate on 60 measures of maturation, personality, reproduction, and social organization. For example, Black children sit, crawl, walk, and put on their clothes earlier than Whites or East Asians.

9. Race Differences and the Out-of-Africa theory of Human Origins. East Asian-White-Black differences fit the theory that modern humans arose in Africa about 100,000 years ago and expanded northward. During prolonged winters there was evolutionary selection for higher IQ created by problems of raising children, gathering and storing food, gaining shelter, and making clothes.

10. Do Culture-Only Theories Explain the Data? Culture-only theories do not explain the highly consistent pattern of race differences in IQ, especially the East Asian data. No interventions such as ending segregation, introducing school busing, or "Head Start" programs have reduced the gaps as culture-only theory would predict. ​

In their article, Rushton and Jensen also address some of the policy issues that stem from their conclusions. Their main recommendation is that people be treated as individuals, not as members of groups. They emphasized that their paper pertains only to average differences. They also called for the need to accurately inform the public about the true nature of individual and group differences, genetics and evolutionary biology.

Rushton and Jensen are well-known for research on racial differences in intelligence. Jensen hypothesized a genetic basis for Black-White IQ differences in his 1969 Harvard Educational Review article. His later books Bias in Mental Tests (1980) and The g Factor (1998), as well as Rushton's (1995) Race, Evolution, and Behavior, show that tests are not biased against English speaking minorities and that Black-White-East Asian differences in brain size and IQ belong in an evolutionary framework.

http://www.charlesdarwinresearch.org/


http://www.news-medical.net/?id=9530

 

So ants are dumber than elephants?

 

It's kind of sad that people would be "startled" by this idea...

"Orientals"? Anyway, the answer lies in the process through which those populations came to America. Black people were brought as slaves, and then kept in slavery for many generations. Asians and Jews, for the most part, immigrated much more recently, under an immigration system that selects people by educational and professional attainment.

It would be interesting to know how recent immigrants from Africa measure up, as well as their children and then grandchildren. Unfortunately, we're going to have to wait a while for that data...

 

Some info is available:

PS the second quote is Carcano's

 

In the case of the original wave of Chinese, its more like they were willing to work for food in near slavery conditions on the railways.

Besides, the history of IQ testing occurs entirely post slavery by a long shot.

 

The research on brain size/IQ is adjusted for body weight.

 

So babies are smarter than adults?

 

Wow, yet another strawman from S.A.M. We're not discussing babies vs. adults, S.A.M, we're discussing race vs. race. Genetic composition based on biogeographical descent. Why are you so dishonest? :shrug: