I grew up indoctrinated by political correctness. Like a large part of citizens in Western countries I was brainwashed: Races do not exist, all are equal. Saying anything different, saying that there are racial differences, is racism, a crime.
Read this, everything you need to know about scientific research about racial differences: RACE, EVOLUTION, and BEHAVIOR: A Life History Perspective, by J.P. Rushton
In school I heard disparaging remarks about Artur Jensen and other “unscientific” “dishonest” “cheating” scientists doing faulty research about race differences.
The Bell Curve by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray actually looked fairly convincing to me, but if even President Bill Clinton denounced it, there must be something wrong about it.
There always was some complex theory to explain away the IQ differences:
- different culture
- parental expectation
- mother’s malnourishment
- IQ measurements are racially and culturally biased
Adopted Children's IQ by Race
My opinion changed when I read about trans-racial adoption studies. That was the last drop that really disproved all these desperate attempts to explain away racial differences in intelligence.
“The best evidence for the genetic basis of race-IQ differences comes from trans-racial adoption studies of Oriental children, Black children, and Mixed-Race children. All these children have been adopted by White parents at an early age and have grown up in middle-class White homes.”
Chart 9 summarizes the results for Oriental children adopted into White middle-class homes.
Korean and Vietnamese babies from poor backgrounds, many of whom were malnourished, were adopted by White American and Belgian families. When they grew up, they excelled in school. The IQs of the adopted Oriental children were 10 or more points higher than the national average for the country they grew up in. Trans-racial adoption does not increase or decrease IQ. The three-way pattern of race differences in IQ remains.”
In plain English: adopted Asian babies grew up to be very bright, adopted black babies grew up to have low intelligence.
One more desperate argument that was posed to save the “racial equality” dogma:
They claimed “expectancy effects,” not genes, explained the pattern. They argued that the Black and White children were not treated the same. Even if parents took good care of their children, the schools, classmates, and society as a whole discriminated against Black children and this hurt their IQs. Because we expected Black children to do poorly in school, they lived up to our low expectations.”
Even that argument got promptly destroyed. Rushton:
A special analysis of the Scarr study compared parents who believed that they had adopted a Black baby but, really, had adopted a Mixed-Race (Black-White) child. The average IQ for these Mixed-Race children was just about the same as for other Mixed-Race children and above that for adopted Black children. This was true even though the parents who adopted these Mixed-Race children thought their babies really had two Black parents.
Quotes and chart from RACE, EVOLUTION, and BEHAVIOR: A Life History Perspective, by J.P. Rushton
That did it for me. It destroyed my ingrained indoctrinated beliefs that all races must be equal. It opened up my mind to the possibility that there could be racial differences.
Before we go on, may I stress a few more points
- I have no axe to grind against blacks. I am not interested in proving that blacks are stupid or inferior. I am not a white supremacist
- I have an axe to grind against dogmatism, blindness, stupidity. I have an axe to grind against the catholic church for repressing Galileo’s truth about the moving and revolving earth. And I have an axe to grind about political correctness repressing the truth, repressing research.
- This site is about human stupidity versus truth and consciousness
- Rushton, though much maligned, is not some crazy cook but one of the most prestigious research scientists to date: Rushton holds two doctorates from the University of London (Ph.D. and D.Sc) and is a Fellow of the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the American, British, and Canadian Psychological Associations. He is also a member of the Behavior Genetics Association, the Human Behavior and Evolution Society, and the Society for Neuroscience. Rushton has published six books and nearly 200 articles. In 1992 the Institute for Scientific Information ranked him the 22nd most published psychologist and the 11th most cited. Professor Rushton is listed in Who. Some of Rushtons scientific publications can be found on his University page: http://psychology.uwo.ca/faculty/rushton_pubs.htm
Summary of Racial differences
Racial differences summarized (J.P. Rushton): Why does history show Africa trailing behind Asia and Europe? Why do Whites average between Orientals and Blacks in so many areas? Why do the groups with larger brains have lower rates of two-egg twinning? To know the answer you must look at all of the traits taken together (see Chart 1). The traits in Chart 1 form a pattern. No known environmental factor can explain all of them taken together. There is, however, a gene based explanation. The patterns make up what is called a “lifehistory.” They evolved together to meet the trials of life -- survival, growth, and reproduction.
Then of course, the non-scientific “evidence”, the hearsay, the anecdotal evidence, our daily experience, suddenly made sense:
The Whites who explored China were just as racist as those who explored Africa, but their descriptions were different from what they and the Arabs had written about Africans. In 1275 Marco Polo arrived in China from his native Italy to open trade with the Mongol Empire. He found that the Chinese had well built roads, bridges, cities connected by canals, census takers, markets, standardized weights and measures, and not only coins, but paper money as well. Even a postal system was in existence. All of these made him marvel when he compared the Chinese to what he saw in Europe and the Middle East.
Even though he was an Italian, proud of his people and well aware of the greatness of Ancient Rome, Marco Polo wrote: “Surely there is no more intelligent race on earth than the Chinese.”
In amazing ways, Rushton forms a coherent picture to make sense of all the racial differences shown in reasearch. Some differences are biological and can not be talked away by simple psychobabble or sociology-babble.
In a few cases medical treatment and medication showed racial differences. which proves a real quagmire for race equality dogmatist. Should they talk away and hide the differences as racist and cause medical malpractice and suffering for black patients? Or should they accept the scientific facts and actively promote racial analysis of medical studies and see their beloved pet dogma undermined?
Rushton’s book sums up the relevant research. Please forgive me for always quoting Rushton, incessantly. Nobody can say it better, nobody summed up the entire field in a more concise and coherent manner then Rushton.
Many statistics in Chart 1 come from the United States, where Orientals are a “model minority.”
They have fewer divorces, fewer out-of-wedlock births, and fewer reports of child abuse than Whites.
More Orientals graduate from college and fewer go to prison.
On the other hand Blacks are 12% of the American population and make up 50% of the prison population. In the U.S., one out of every three Black men is either in jail, on probation, or awaiting trial. That is much more than the number who graduate from college.
Chapter 2 shows how this racial pattern in crime is found worldwide. INTERPOL Yearbooks show the rate of violent crime (murder, rape, and serious assault) is four times lower in Asian and Pacific Rim countries than in African and Caribbean countries. Whites in the United States and in European countries are intermediate. The 1996 INTERPOL violent crime rates clearly show this pattern: Asian countries, 35 violent crimes per 100,000 people; European countries, 42; and African countries, 149.
Chapter 2 also finds that Oriental children are slower to mature than White children while Black children are faster to mature. This is true for the rate of bone and tooth development and the age at which a child first sits, crawls, walks, and puts on clothing. Oriental children do not begin to walk until about 13 months, White children at 12 months, and Black children at 11 months.
Chapter 3 looks at racial differences in sexual activity. Orientals are the least sexually active, whether measured by age of first intercourse, intercourse frequency, or number of sexual partners. Blacks are the most active on all of these. Once again Whites are in between. These contrasts in sexual activity lead to differences in the rate of diseases like syphilis, gonorrhea, herpes, and chlamydia. There are high levels of AIDS in Africa, Black America, and the Caribbean and low levels in China and Japan. European countries again fall in between.
The races differ in rate of ovulation (Chapter 3). Not all women produce one egg during the menstrual cycle. When two or more eggs are produced at the same time, a pregnancy is more likely. So is the likelihood of producing fraternal twins (i.e., two-egg twins). The number of twins born is 16 out of every 1,000 births for Blacks, 8 out of every 1,000 births for Whites, and 4 or less for Orientals. Triplets and other multiple births are rarest in Orientals and highest in Blacks, with Whites in between.
Chapter 4 is about race and intelligence. Hundreds of studies on millions of people show a threeway pattern. IQ tests are often made to have an average score of 100, with a “normal” range from 85 to 115. Whites average from 100 to 103. Orientals in Asia and the U.S. tend to have higher scores, about 106, even though IQ tests were made for use in the Euro-American culture. Blacks in the U.S., the Caribbean, Britain, Canada, and in Africa average lower IQs — about 85. The lowest average IQs are found for sub-Saharan Africans — from 70 to 75.
Chapter 4 also looks at brain size. Bigger brains have more brain cells and this leads to higher IQs. The races vary in brain size. The Collaborative Perinatal Project followed more than 35,000 children from birth to seven years. Orientals had larger brains than Whites at birth, four months, one year, and seven years. Whites had larger brains than Blacks at all ages (see Chart 2). The data on adults in Chart 2 come from a sample of 6,325 U.S. Army personnel.
Chapter 5 asks whether differences in our brain size, our bodies and our behavior are because of genes, environment, or both. It also asks whether individual differences can tell us anything about race differences.
Chapter 6 discusses the gene based “life-history theory” I have proposed to explain the racial pattern in brain size, intelligence, and other traits. Evolutionary biologists call it the r-K scale of reproductive strategies. At one end of this scale are r-strategies that rely on high reproductive rates. At the other end are K-strategies that rely on high levels of parental care. This scale is generally used to compare the life histories of different species of animals. I have used it to explain the smaller but real differences between the human races.
On this scale, Orientals are more K-selected than Whites, while Whites are more K-selected than Blacks. Highly K-selected women produce fewer eggs (and have bigger brains) than r-selected women. Highly K-selected men invest time and energy in their children rather than the pursuit of sexual thrills. They are “dads” rather than “cads.”
Chapter 7 shows that the race differences in reproductive strategies make sense in terms of human evolution. Modern humans evolved in Africa about 200,000 years ago. Africans and non-Africans then split about 100,000 years ago. Orientals and Whites split about 40,000 years ago.
The more north the people went “Out of Africa,” the harder it was to get food, gain shelter, make clothes, and raise children. So the groups that evolved into today’s Whites and Orientals needed larger brains, more family stability, and a longer life. But building a bigger brain takes time and energy during a person’s development. So, these changes were balanced by slower rates of growth, lower levels of sex hormones, less aggression, and less sexual activity.
Why? Because Africa, Europe, and Asia had very different climates and geographies that called for different skills, resource usage, and lifestyles. Blacks evolved in a tropical climate which contrasted with the cooler one of Europe in which Whites evolved and even more so with the cold Arctic lands where Orientals evolved.
Because intelligence increased the chances of survival in harsh winter environments, the groups that left Africa had to evolve greater intelligence and family stability. This called for larger brains, slower growth rates, lower hormone levels, less sexual potency, less aggression, and less impulsivity. Advanced planning, self-control, rule-following, and longevity all increased in the non-Africans.
I realize that these topics are controversial and that readers will have many questions. Chapter 8 lists the questions I am most asked about Race, Evolution, and Behavior, and my answers to them.
Conclusion
Race is more than “just skin deep.” The pattern of Oriental-White-Black differences is found across history, geographic boundaries, and political-economic systems. It proves the biological reality of race. Theories based only on culture cannot explain all the data shown in Chart 1. The next three chapters describe the scientific findings on race differences (summarized in Chart 1) in greater detail. Later chapters explain why these differences follow such a pattern.
Quotes and chart from RACE, EVOLUTION, and BEHAVIOR: A Life History Perspective, by J.P. Rushton
You can download the abridged version, in various languages, here: RACE, EVOLUTION, and BEHAVIOR: A Life History Perspective, by J.P. Rushton
If you really are interested, then, of course, you will read the unabridged version. Unfortunately, I could not find it at Amazon
#1 by hansi on 06:00 AM - 06:00 AM
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Hi. I love your site. It says what I myself have observed in my years in China. However, what holds the Chinese back considerably in their cultural and technological development today is not lack of intelligence, but lack of freedom of information, a more open culture, less state control of the individual, and so on. Chinese excel when they are raised in the West, but China itself doesn’t offer fertile ground for the intellect.
#2 by Anonymous on 04:45 AM - 04:45 AM
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“but lack of freedom of information, a more open culture, less state control of the individual, and so on.”
Nope.
#3 by Lailoken on 10:41 AM - 10:41 AM
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‘Hi. I love your site.’
That makes at least two of us!
‘However, what holds the Chinese back considerably in their cultural and technological development today is not lack of intelligence, but lack of freedom of information, a more open culture, less state control of the individual, and so on. Chinese excel when they are raised in the West, but China itself doesn’t offer fertile ground for the intellect.’
I try to keep an open mind on this issue – although I’ve run into many supposed ‘liberals’ who viciously attacked me for even acknowledging that IQ differences exist on the level of population groups.
For the most part, it’s the ‘liberals’ – and even more, men of a certain pushy tribe who straddle the apex of the politically correct totem pole – who are so obsessed with intelligence.
An honorable man wants to preserve his family, not because his sons are smarter than the next father’s. Having sharp children – particularly if they are moral – is cause for all the more celebration, but continuing the family line is good in itself. One’s ethny, and to some extent, one’s race, is the biocultural (e.g., [cultural] phenotype flows from genotype) logical extension of the nuclear family in the case of peoples with a European genetic heritage.
As for the issue of Chinese IQ, as a European I’m part of a population group with an average IQ which would not place us on top after all, but consistently below Orientals. Then again, though, I don’t see it all in such a hierarchical manner. Everything doesn’t have to be a dog-eat-dog competition. Such a mentality is alien to me — but apparently not to self-loathing ‘liberals’ and ‘feminists’ who chastise the most chivalrous men the world has ever produced with parroted phrases such as ‘systemic objectification perpetuated within the heteronormative narrative of neo-colonialist white supremacist patriarchy’ yet then, after school, they’ll hop in bed with a Black thug who’ll beat them senseless.
The White man’s capacity for chivalry is arguably his greatest strength and his greatest flaw. This is usually more obvious the further North the White man’s ancestors evolved. One problem is that chivalry is seen as a sign of weakness by those who seek to destroy us. To the extent that chivalry has been thrown out of balance, that’s true. Ladies should be treated like ladies, but we need to develop ways to effectively deal with women who want the perks but won’t even try to live up to the responsibilities.
‘Liberals’ seem to see everything as one big dog-eat-dog competition and project this view upon everyone else. Even IQ scores are supposed to be offensive enough to justify attacks on honest professors by ‘leftist’ thugs. Yet at the same time, ‘liberals’ claim to be all about equality. If ‘you’ claim to be all about equality yet you behave as if you are sure you’re superior to everyone else, that’s a free clue that you’re full of horsesh!t.
As a race-aware man who is liberal in spirit, not just letter, I have no desire to go to war with the Chinese. Admittedly, as a Celto-Germanic gentile European, I much prefer our folkways to theirs. I’m sure most Chinese tend to prefer Chinese folkways, regardless of what they might otherwise claim. I’ve noticed that over here, Chinese tend to keep behaving like Chinese.
I’ve been wanting to make a blog post on this topic; pardon any rambling in my comment. I suppose main point is that we need to be able to discuss these topics like men. Let’s not allow ourselves to be frightened into blind submission to taboos!
#4 by Tenerife on 03:39 PM - 03:39 PM
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“Blacks evolved in a tropical climate which contrasted with the cooler one of Europe…”
Where does that leave other tropical races, e.g. Indians (from India), Native Americans, Pacific Islanders?
#5 by Devil's Advocate on 04:14 AM - 04:14 AM
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Download and read Rushton’s book. He knows much more then I do.
The weather being predictive vs unpredictive and catastrophic seems to be even more important then friendly vs. unfriendly. Harsh winter makes planning and discipline necessary. Occasional typhoons and floods make long term planning impossible (except if you have technology to control the damage).
I believe most of the races you quote belong to the Asian/Mongolian race who is even more intelligent then Caucasians. Or maybe they are mixed race, an additional complexity. Also, evolution works over tens of thousands of years, a 1000 year stay on an island does not yet make profound genetic changes.
Also, even if Rushton’s theoretical explanation was wrong, it would not change the empirical data showing the racial differences.
Read Rushton’s abbridged free book. That entire book iw a first beginning to scratch the surface. Then you can read the full version, original research papers. And maybe suggest new research to prove a point of yours.
#6 by Tenerife on 11:05 AM - 11:05 AM
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Some obvious racial differences are that Caucasians have narrower, high-bridged noses, more body hair, protruding browbone, and more variety of hair/eye colors than either East Asians or Africans. I would guess it’s an environmental adaptation but I’m not sure how all of those traits benefit those who possess them.
#7 by admin on 08:00 AM - 08:00 AM
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Tenerife, you have to do a profound study of evolutionary biology to understand all different treats.
For example, there is sexual selection for useless or detrimental traits, like the peacock tail. So if women find fine noses attractive, fine noses get selected for. Or they might be useful to warm the air in cold climate.
Check hbes.com for evolutionary psychology. ricarddawkins.net and http://richarddawkins.com/ for evolutionary biology.
#8 by xencat on 07:31 PM - 07:31 PM
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I see you have left out the smartest people, the Jews, yet, one can argue that their IQs, which average 115 based on the same studies the above stated racial IQs averages come from, are not a race and that natural selection must be the cause, as the other semetic peoples, such as Arabs, tend to average around 85 or lower IQ scale, based on the same studies.
I assume you left out the Jews because you are either anti-Semitic or you do not consider the Jews a race of people, only a culture like Muslims. However, there are a group of Jews that tended to be taller and smarter than all the rest, the Ashkenazi Jews. See the following for more information.
Well anyway, although out of every race there may be an individual every now and then who is particularly intelligent, as well as a great number of persons who or absolute idiots, the distribution of average intelligence does seem to lie the way you put it, except with the Ashkenazi Jews at the top.
The truth strikes a discordant note amongst propagandists and social engineers, so falsehoods are substituted for the facts in order to manipulate the masses.
#9 by admin on 12:51 PM - 12:51 PM
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To tell the truth, I am not a specialist in the field. I am trying to get an expert to join this board who could give authoritative answers.
I am just focussing on the fact, that intelligent true research is thwarted by stupid biased dogmatists. I am not a profound expert on details of that research.
But it seems to me that Jews are a culture, not a race. Seems only the Nazis thought you could recognize a Jew by his looks. I also strongly doubt that Arabs fall into the category of black race. But it seems that Jews are very intelligent, hard working, and successful.
Your Ashkenazi Jews are probably a fairly small group do to research on. Note that for research to be powerful, it has to involve twins, adopted children, differentiate culture, upbringing from genetics etc. But certainly, the issue is interesting.
But I don’t want to fall into the trap here trying to prove that a certain race is superior. Just that there is repression of truth-seeking researchers.
#10 by xencat on 07:32 PM - 07:32 PM
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I see you have left out the smartest people, the Jews, yet, one can argue that their IQs, which average 115 based on the same studies the above stated racial IQs averages come from, are not a race and that natural selection must be the cause, as the other semetic peoples, such as Arabs, tend to average around 85 or lower IQ scale, based on the same studies.
I assume you left out the Jews because you are either anti-Semitic or you do not consider the Jews a race of people, only a culture like Muslims. However, there are a group of Jews that tended to be taller and smarter than all the rest, the Ashkenazi Jews. See the following for more information. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashkenazi_intelligence
Well anyway, although out of every race there may be an individual every now and then who is particularly intelligent, as well as a great number of persons who or absolute idiots, the distribution of average intelligence does seem to lie the way you put it, except with the Ashkenazi Jews at the top.
The truth strikes a discordant note amongst propagandists and social engineers, so falsehoods are substituted for the facts in order to manipulate the masses.
#11 by xencat on 07:34 PM - 07:34 PM
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I see you have left out the smartest people, the Jews, yet, one can argue that their IQs, which average 115 based on the same studies the above stated racial IQs averages come from, are not a race and that natural selection must be the cause, as the other semitic peoples, such as Arabs, tend to average around 85 or lower IQ scale, based on the same studies.
I hazard to guess that you left out the Jews because you are either anti-Semitic or you do not consider the Jews a race of people, only a culture like Muslims. However, there are a group of Jews that tended to be taller and smarter than all the rest, the Ashkenazi Jews. See the following for more information. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashkenazi_intelligence
Although out of every race there may be an individual every now and then who is particularly intelligent, as well as a great number of persons who are absolute idiots, the distribution of average intelligence does seem to be the way you put it, except with the Ashkenazi Jews at the top.
The truth strikes a discordant note amongst propagandists and social engineers, so falsehoods are substituted for the facts in order to manipulate the masses.
#12 by admin on 07:37 AM - 07:37 AM
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interesting. I thought about the Jews being especially intelligent, but have not read about it.
My hunch is that Jews are not a race, a forensic cannot look at some bones and say this is a Jew. I believe that Jews have a social system that helps their intellectual development. Not sure how much of this is genetics.
But sure an interesting point.
#13 by Riccardo on 10:08 PM - 10:08 PM
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**My hunch is that Jews are not a race, a forensic cannot look at some bones and say this is a Jew. I believe that Jews have a social system that helps their intellectual development. Not sure how much of this is genetics.**
I’d recommend you check out ‘The 10,000 Year Explosion: How Civilization Accelerated Human Evolution’, or NY Times science writer Nick Wade’s ‘Before the Dawn’.
Also, this post has a good summary of recent evidence of local cognitive changes.
http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/005501.html
#14 by Riccardo on 10:11 PM - 10:11 PM
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**To tell the truth, I am not a specialist in the field. I am trying to get an expert to join this board who could give authoritative answers. **
I’d also recommend Steve Hsu’s excellent discussions of recent research.
http://infoproc.blogspot.com/2007/01/metric-on-space-of-genomes-and.html
http://infoproc.blogspot.com/2008/01/no-scientific-basis-for-race.html
http://infoproc.blogspot.com/2009/06/genetic-clustering-40-years-of-progress.html
#15 by a.n.animus on 12:55 AM - 12:55 AM
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Ashkenazi Jews are a Caucasian people, and while
they’re not a separate race, someone with four
Ashkenazi grandparents can be identified from DNA
with almost 100% accuracy.
For an interesting perspective on how the Ashkenazi
Jews got their smarts, see “The 10000 Year
Explosion”, by Cochran and Harpending. Also, see
http://the10000yearexplosion.com/
and
http://homepage.mac.com/harpend/.Public/AshkenaziIQ.jbiosocsci.pdf
#16 by Moonset Lily on 02:33 AM - 02:33 AM
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The unfortunate distinctions of race and intelligence that is determined by IQ tests is a sad fact. I can’t imagine any sound person tickled over the latest studies in regarding race and IQ and how the racial groups differ. It is disturbing on many levels — disturbing that certain groups are expected to perform in an equal way in areas they are not very good at. I am Northern European and one-eight Native American. My Native American DNA traces back to Tibet and the moutains of China.
I have a Chinese friend and not only do we share the same birthday, we even look a little alike. But I can see clear differences between us. She is a Ph.D. in Physics are a major university. I am a writer, an artist and pretty much your creative type. When I ask her what’s she’s been doing in her work lately, she usually answers “Oh, you wouldn’t understand.” And she is right.
I realize I could never do what she does. If I had relied on my math and science skills I’d be having lunch every day at the local food bank or Salvation Army. I would have failed.
Instead, I write speculative books, create historical tours, teach classes in many interesting subjects, write and publish poetry and paint in a way that would not be at all easy for her. She doesn’t really understand what I do either.
But if you look at it objectively, we are exactly equal in what we do — we both excellent in our chosen paths.
It is very important for people to follow their gifts– and I feel most of our gifts are inherited. Eventhough I grew up poor in Appalachia, many in my family write well and one is a Hollywood screenwriter. No one ever taught us. We just knew how.
Certain races may have more talents in areas that involve physical aptitudes, such as sports, and competition.
As far as the Ashkenazi Jews are concerned, they are a small group over time who have married in the same gene pool. Their intelligence is likely inherited as well and I am sure, as a group, is superior to my group.
But you see it is a sad thing to make these comparisons because some groups have to fall on that bottom rung. Smart people born into that group are then greatly insulted and they should be.
I don’t know how this can ever be resolved. At the same time, nothing good can come out of believing in falsehoods that all people are the same, with the same potential. This is may be one of the greatest problems are world faces now. I can’t see a resolution anytime soon.
#17 by Oakley on 08:19 PM - 08:19 PM
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#18 by admin on 05:01 AM - 05:01 AM
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I explain you how NORMAL science works. With this issue, it is not normal, because there is societal taboo repressing scientific research. In normal science, you make a hypothesis, like what you state: Black IQ difference is due to testing bias due to culture.
Then you test your hypothesis. Scientifically. Your tests show this is wrong. Then people come up with other hypotheses. It is due to nutrition. etc ………
Now you see the example that convinced me: babies from Africa and Asia war zones adopted by middle class US families. Why would there be a cultural bias in the IQ test of the 8 or 10 year old kids, having grown up in the same environment?
Read Rushton, there is much more evidence.
Your other example, that Nigerians, in a country with impunity and collusion of government officials, manage to scam money out of people who grew up where they don’t run into fraudsters every day, what does that prove? If anything, it supports my claim. But probably the Russian Mafia could run the same scheme. It is interesting why this is run in Nigeria, it seems to be cultural, entire cities live off this. So it requires little intelligence to learn a trade from others.
But maybe someone can find out why it runs only in Nigeria, and not in Ruanda or Quenia. I suspect it has to do with collusion of government and police.
Again, the war orphans in our eample have the same cultural bias and environmental factors. So this is a scientific PROOF that your hypothesis is wrong. Now you can try to find more research, find faults in the research. But just a plain statement like yours is disproven by RESEARCH.
#19 by Oakley on 01:19 AM - 01:19 AM
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#20 by Oakley on 01:26 AM - 01:26 AM
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#21 by Oakley on 05:42 AM - 05:42 AM
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Maybe Rushton needs an education. This is how the first Europeans described the Kingdom of Benin — in present day Nigeria:
A seventeenth century Dutch engraving from Olfert Dapper’s Nauwkeurige Beschrijvinge der Afrikaansche Gewesten, published in Amsterdam in 1668 wrote:
“The king’s palace or court is a square, and is as large as the town of Haarlem and entirely surrounded by a special wall, like that which encircles the town. It is divided into many magnificent palaces, houses, and apartments of the courtiers, and comprises beautiful and long square galleries, about as large as the Exchange at Amsterdam, but one larger than another, resting on wooden pillars, from top to bottom covered with cast copper, on which are engraved the pictures of their war exploits and battles…”
The fact is, there were great civilizations all over Africa, many of which predated European civilization by thousands of years. That is to say, these great African civilizations were active while Europeans were cave-dwelling hunter gatherer barbarians.
#22 by Ockechukwu on 08:36 AM - 08:36 AM
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What is your opinion of this?
In the United States today, most claims regarding differences between ethnic ‘populations’ in relationship to IQ test performance are based on statistically derived data that relate to scholastic aptitude tests (e.g. Flynn, 2006). With this in mind, and acknowledging the superior educational attainment of African blacks in the United States (and elsewhere) it can thus be argued, because of their “substantially” superior educational attainment levels, that they must also surmount far more (in number) and more difficult scholastic aptitude tests, which in turn would require higher level IQs (see Gottfredson, 1998; Ostrowsky, 1999). As whites on average do not, or are unable to attain the same levels of academic achievement within these (their own!) academic institutional frameworks they must also, by the racialist thinking employed by some, possess significantly lower cogitative indices on the group level (e.g. Jensen, 1998; Gottfredson, 1986, 1998). In fact, attainment differences of these ‘grand’ magnitudes would suggest that American whites, in particular, are at a significant intellectual handicap when matched against immigrants of black African, East Indian, and East Asian descent. Incidentally, most American whites themselves are the children or grandchildren of “self-selected,” voluntary immigrants from Europe (Ogbu and Simons, 1998), and thus these trends can not be said to result from immigrant selectivity.
African born blacks residing in western countries, as a group may possess IQs that are between 5 points and a full standard deviation (15 IQ points) above that of whites living in these countries (see, Gottfredson, 1998; Ostrowsky, 1999; Richardson, 2002; Cross, 1994; Williams, 2005) – This is especially true for those living in the United States and in the UK. One may also expect to find, according to much of the corroborative literature that relates IQ with education, approximately twice the number of African born immigrants with IQs in the 115 range, than among the general white American population (Gottfredson, 1998; Ostrowsky, 1999; Williams, 2005), and “more” than twice the number of African immigrants in the 125 IQ range (Gottfredson, 1998; The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, 1999-2000).
The differences in overall educational attainment observed between African born blacks in the United States and native born white Americans are quite spectacular! Indeed, if one chooses to adopt the racial hereditarian thinking of Jensen (1980), Herrnstein and Murray (1994) or Gottfredson (1998), these disparities become suggestive of underlying intelligence differences between the two populations; with these differences in “strong favor” of African born blacks! Though higher cognitive indices are said by some to be predictive of more educational achievements and more education predictive of higher intellectual outcomes (e.g., Brody, 1997; Ceci & Williams, 1997), so that there are reciprocal relationships. Most who study African immigrants attribute their inclination toward academic attainment to be the result of positive cultural factors (Arthur, 2000; Selassie, 1998).
African born blacks residing in Western countries tend also to be concentrated in higher level professional occupations, which are considered (by some) to be more intellectually demanding; requiring greater cognitive ability (Jensen, 1980; Gottfredson, 1986; Herrnstein and Murray, 1994), than the average occupations of either American or British born whites (Nisbett, 2002; Dixon, 2006; Li and Heath, 2006; Dustmann and Theodoropoulos, 2006).
#23 by admin on 11:08 PM - 11:08 PM
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If this data is true, then most likely because African born people who go to America are from the intellectual and cultural elite of their country. The average African goat herder probably will not move to Western countries.
Still, even then, it is hard to believe that these blacks would have an average IQ of 115. I am still looking for contributors with high academic qualification (mine is a little rusty). Any student of Rushton come forward to reply based on profound knowledge of the literature?
#24 by EgalitarianJay on 11:32 AM - 11:32 AM
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There are several scholars who have refuted Rushton’s research. Richard Nisbett refuted Rushton on IQ studies supporting the genetic hypothesis for race differences in intelligence (including a refutation to the Trans-Racial Adoption study you are so fond of). Leonard Lieberman refuted Rushton on racial differences in cranial capacity and brain size. Joseph L. Graves refuted Rushton’s application of r/k selection theory used to explain evolutionary difference in human reproductive strategies (Rushton’s scientific theory for the cause of racial differences in intelligence and behavior). I recommend reading Richard Lewonton’s review of Rushton’s book Race, Evolution and Behavior. C Loring Brace and Ken Richardson also wrote great reviews of Arthur Jensen’s book The g Factor: The Science of Mental Ability which are available on Psycoloquy. Eric Turkheimer’s study on Socioeconomic status modifying the heritability of IQ is a good read which provides evidence against a genetic cause for the Black-White IQ gap and James Flynn has conducted alot of reliable research which indicates that the Black-White IQ gap is shrinking as educational standards for Black American communities improve. To date no casual link has been discovered between intelligence, race and genes. The theory of genetically determined differences in intelligence between races is just that, a theory without alot of evidence that refutes it. I personally do not believe that racialist researchers like Rushton are credible scientists in search of the truth. They are agenda driven propagandists in search of scientific validation for their ideology. Their research is better known as Scientific Racism. I recommend reading The Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Jay Gould for details on the history of Scientific Racism and the biased research of its advocates past and present. In my experience people often believe things because they want to believe them irregardless of what the empirical evidence indicates.
#25 by Ockechukwu on 12:10 AM - 12:10 AM
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It has nothing to do with intellectual and cultural elites. Actually, many of the intellectual and cultural elites stay home and don’t immigrate to America or Europe. The same happened in regards to European immigration to America. Most of the immigrants from Europe were the desperate and starving. The European elites stayed put.
Besides, if as you postulate blacks are intellectually inferior then there shouldn’t be any “intellectual elites” that grossly outperform whites.
By the way, “the average African goat herder” might flunk your Eurocentric IQ test even though he may be much smarter than you in terms of native and practical intelligence.
First we all have to agree on how we measure intelligence. If using the Western standard, then the attainment levels that Africans achieve in the West demonstrate conclusively that Africans are more intelligent than whites. Remember, this is your own model we are using. The same model you tried to use to suggest that blacks were stupid. Well, using that model of yours black Africans in the United States are vastly smarter than white Americans.
#26 by Mark Calendar on 07:41 AM - 07:41 AM
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This comment is for Oakely #17.
I agree with that stuff you said about Nigerians outperforming their white counterparts at college’s in America. But with every observation there must be an equal if not more indepth examination. And it is the depth of this analysis that would either reveal the truth to you or prove what it is you think you saw at first.
Oakley I take it you are Nigerian? If not at least it is known to us that you are black. Now please keep that in mind, for it will be called upon later.
As I said I agree with you about the Nigerians doing way, way, way better than Caucasians and even Asians or Indians in America. In fact, the Nigerians I know get 4.0 as a gpa, it’s almost frightening the way they do it. But I am sorry to say that it does not prove a thing about Nigerians been smarter than Caucasians for the simple reason that these Nigerians you speak of……CAME TO AMERICA. THEY CAME TO AMERICA BECAUSE THEY ALREADY WERE EXTREMELY CLEVER IN WHAT EVERY SCHOOL THEY WERE BEFORE. I am saying they actually PASSED THE SAT TEST. Have you ever wondered why most of them are on some sort of academic scholarship and when they spend a little more time in the U.S. that scholarship becomes a full one? Oakley I’m saying these Nigerians, are a select few that actually had the intelligence to see an opportunity to come to America, to PASS the SAT test, not to lose sight of their goal, and ultimately do what it is that they inherently were born to do which is PASS TESTS, and follow orders, and memorize text books. That is what Nigerian schools do, they force their students to MEMORIZE texts. Now I’m not even saying all Nigerians can do this, I’m saying the ones that made it to America, did so because they are the select few that could. Trust me Oakley not all Nigerians are smart, infact the majority are ridiculosly dumb. Count how many Nigerians get high gpa’s at your college…..It’s only a handful, and the reason why it’s only a handful is because only a handful a that smart. It’s the same in any nation on the planet. Oakley the mistake you have made is assume that because the Nigerians in your college do well at school, you think all the Nigerians do. But the truth is that the reason they do well is because they are extreme cases, they are the handful of a nation of 140 million who are highly intelligent. Go to Mexico, or Senegal, or any developing country, you will find some super super intelligent motha fokkers there….but they aren’t enough to be called an average. Oakley the only thing you need to remember in this conversation is the reason most Nigerians are in that college in the first place is because he passed the requirements, he was even on a scholarship before he came in. Now there of course are the other groups of Nigerians, the rich ones, or the ones who got in with a visa lottery….Oakley we both know they perform averagely at school why? because they didn’t come in due to the academic prowess. A poor Nigerian whose family earns low income can’t just come to America like that, it has to be either through brightness in school, or someone is sponsoring them. The latter don’t do particularly well either.
I have more to say but I will post this for now and come back later. But remember there is always an anomaly in a gene pool….we know Chinese aren’t particularly tall, in fact they are short, but trust me I’ve seen some Chinese teenage giants at my college, but that does not change the fact that on average they are very short. The same goes for Nigerians. They are not smart. Have you been to Nigeria……the land is in shambles. How can the average nigerian be as smart as a European and his country is in a mess. Oakley it doesn’t make sense. And I believe you did not see this because you may be Nigerian as well, I might be wrong. But i’ll be back later after I see the response to this.
#27 by Holtz on 08:19 PM - 08:19 PM
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***There are several scholars who have refuted Rushton’s research. ***
Egalitarian Jay,
That’s actually incorrect. Richard Nisbett’s work has itself been heavily criticised for omitting the follow up results of the Minnesota Transracial Adoption study in his book. See Harvard researcher James J Lee’s critical review.
Personality and Individual Differences
Volume 48, Issue 2, January 2010, Pages 247-255
Rushton & Jensen have themselves provided a very detailed rebuttal to Nisbett. I’d recommend it if you’re going to cite Nisbett.
2010 The Open Psychology Journal, 3, 9-35.
http://www.charlesdarwinresearch.org/2010%20Review%20of%20Nisbett.pdf
***Eric Turkheimer’s study on Socioeconomic status modifying the heritability of IQ is a good read which provides evidence against a genetic cause for the Black-White IQ gap and James Flynn has conducted alot of reliable research which indicates that the Black-White IQ gap ***
The problem is that the gap remains when you look at the highest socioeconomic groups. In fact, you may be aware of the statistic that black childre in households earning over $70k a year are outperformed by europeans in households earning $20k or less.
Also, the evidence seems to suggest that any closing of gaps stalled from the early 90′s onward. With the least educated having more children it may even increase.
***They are agenda driven propagandists in search of scientific validation for their ideology. Their research is better known as Scientific Racism. I recommend reading The Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Jay Gould ***
This is a ludicrous allegation, and particularly ironic that you cite Gould. Gould was made aware of various MRI studies showing a relationship between grey matter volume and measured cognitive ability. In his 1981 & 1996 editions of his book he ignored them, presumably because they contradicted his views. You realise he started ‘science for the people’, and was a marxist – why don’t you mention that if you’re going to talk ideology?
Gould’s book also contains an embarrassing number of errors, from Morton’s skull collection (subsequent remeasurements showed Gould’s criticisms were wrong), his analysis of factor analysis and his comments about Goddard’s comments about immigrant groups.
Someone as smart as Gould couldn’t have made so many omissions and errors unless he himself had an agenda to push, don’t you think?
#28 by Ockechukwu on 01:41 AM - 01:41 AM
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#29 by John on 11:19 AM - 11:19 AM
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I’m mixed race came top at sports and went to ox and Cambridge. iQ tests are rubbish they are all completely flawed. Most humans are the same in intelligence, we all have pros and cons I.e. Some people are better at maths some people are better with physical co-ordination.
#30 by admin on 12:44 PM - 12:44 PM
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@John, all is statistics. Not all blacks are fast runners, not all Asians are hyper-intelligent. Statistical effects show up in large group averages, and at the extremes: no white 100 m dash world finalists, and no (or almost no?) black Nobel Prize winners in Math and Sciences.
Mixed races are more complex regarding extreme values, but averages seem to simple average the mean of both races.
Anyway, 71 black vs 1 white buy under 10 seconds in 100 meters, that begs for an explanation
#31 by sebastian on 12:58 PM - 12:58 PM
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Hey, this is a great homepage. In my opinion you are not right in every single aspect you mention, but it is important that there are people who think in a free way.
#32 by EgalitarianJay on 07:28 PM - 07:28 PM
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Holtz,
What I think is that it’s very hard for scientists to be objective on research that has serious social and political implications. Racialists have their theories and criticisms of the research from Egalitarian scientists and vice versa. Regarding your specific claims. A criticism of Nisbett’s book doesn’t make my statement that Nisbett offered a point by point refutation to Rushton and Jensen incorrect.
I have read Rushton and Jensen’s rebuttal to the book as has Nisbett. He said that they really didn’t offer anything new and I agree all they did was rehash old data. Nisbett also addressed the claim that Whites outperform Blacks at the same Socioecononic level or even below it by pointing out that Whites earn twice as much as Blacks at the same SES level meaning that while they may have the same salary they can afford better education for their kids.
Lower income White families are also bussed to better schools so that doesn’t support the hereditarian theory. Nisbett also notes citing a study by Brooks-Gunn et al. that when you control for family and neighborhood quality the Black-White IQ gap is virtually eradicated. You talk about Gould’s book but I notice you had nothing to say about the work of Leonard Lieberman or Joseph L. Graves. Calling Gould a Marxist to discredit him is an ad hominem attack and isn’t even true to begin with.
I’m working on getting a video debate between Graves and Rushton from the 90s onto Youtube. If I get a hold of the video and upload it I will post the link here. That way we can see with our own eyes how the actual scientists carry themselves in debate and how they defend their research. I can see how racialist research can be persuasive to some but it’s rather silly to equate arguments against it with stupidity as if the evidence in favor of racial differences in intelligence is overwhelming.
#33 by EgalitarianJay on 10:58 PM - 10:58 PM
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* I meant to say Whites have twice as much wealth as Blacks at the same SES level.
The Brooks-Gunn study is significant because it shows that under certain controls the demographic groups in question show no disparity in IQ average. There’s also the fact that intervention programs can raise Black American IQ and research indicates that the IQ gap between Black and White Americans is shrinking gradually (see Flynn and Dickens 2006a and b).
Rushton and Jensen disparately tried to refute this research but I found their claims to be unconvincing. They are also criticized for ignoring and misinterpreting data themselves. Perhaps the most relevant information on the subject are the evolutionary arguments because they explain how any physical difference between races exists at all. Graves picks Rushton apart on his application of r/k selection theory to human races. Lieberman refuted Rushton’s claim of racial hierarchies in brain size and cranial capacity. I strongly recommend reading the research from those scientists. Get a balanced perspective.
#34 by EgalitarianJay on 10:20 AM - 10:20 AM
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@Admin:
I see racialists use the Black-White disparity in 100 meter dash argument all the time to note the absurdity of claiming that there are no racial differences. First of all fixating on this example displays a lack of understanding the actual scientific arguments against the theory of biological races. No reputable modern scientist that I know of has ever denied genetic variation across continental populations that result in the expression of different heritable traits. This is a fact that is observable.
The claim that race is only skin deep really isn’t common either. There’s no controversy over whether or not genetic variation between continental groups can determine differences in athletic performance. The controversy is over alleged racial differences in mental ability and no just because one difference is factual it doesn’t mean the other is. The scientists who adhere to the “no biological race” position argue that while some genetic variation between continental populations certainly exists it doesn’t mean that that variation is racial. What they are arguing over is the definition of race and how human biological variation is structured.
The classic anthropological definition of race is the one equated with zoological taxonomy which is that races are human populations that are composed of anatomically uniform individuals that are differentiated in the expression of heritable traits from other populations and because of common ancestry more biologically similar to one another than to any member of another race. The standard skepticism of this line of thinking is towards the idea that any given heritable trait that defines a race is unique to that race and that these traits are consistently correlated.
This form of racial thinking is what lead 19th century anthropologists to propose the idea of racial essences believing that because races had a fundamental biological commonality and were physically different from other races they must therefore have several biological differences including in mental ability. Thinking of human variation in this way lead to the obsession with measuring skulls and administering mental tests to prove differences between races.
The arguments against this definition of race are that for one actual human genetic variation doesn’t reflect the idea that continental populations have enough genetic distinctiveness to be classified as races or sub-species. What as demonstrated by Richard Lewontin and other scholars that >85% of genetic variation lies within continental groups while around 10-15% lie between them. This means that the boundaries between these populations are are fuzzy or do not exist as an individual from one group can be more genetically similar to another. It has also been found by analyzing Y-Chromosome and mtDNA research that genetic lineages are discordant meaning that there is no uniform line of descent for populations with the same anatomical trait complex. Some populations have genetic lineages in common with populations that are not anatomically similar to them and don’t share such lineages with populations that are similar to them.
Also continental groups do not have the same level of genetic distinctiveness from one another as the genetic diversity of non-African populations are sub-sets of diversity in African populations. I recommend reading Keita et al. 2004, “Conceptualizing Human Variation” for more detail. Also read Graves 2009, ” Biological V. Social Definitions of Race: Implications for Modern Biomedical Research”. If you take the time to read you will have a better understanding of these scientific arguments.
So my answer to you is that it is most likely that there is anatomical variation between some African populations and other populations that leads people of West African descent to excel at the 100 meter dash disproportionately. That doesn’t mean that fast running ability is consistently correlated with dark skin nor does it lend credibility to the taxonomic definition of race any more than variation in skin color, hair texture or craniofacial morphology does.
The reason why there are fewer Black Nobel Prize winners in math and science are less obvious. For one thing these examples are hardly equivalent. The fastest sprinters are determined by competition while Nobel prize winners are decided by a committee. The idea that Blacks can’t think at least not on a great enough level to win a Nobel prize is not credible since there are plenty of successful Black mathematicians and scientists. It’s like saying that Blacks can’t act because there haven’t been a lot of Black Oscar winners for best actor/actress. Black people are a minority in 1st world countries where successful scholars usually come from and have historically been disenfranchised in the West so based on these facts we shouldn’t expect there to be many outstanding Black scholars. Blacks simply haven’t been afforded the same opportunities and the effects of Segregation are still felt in Black communities.
I believe these socio-economic disparities have a cultural cause and can be improved with an improvement in environment.
For someone like me I need concrete scientific proof that there are racial differences in mental ability. What is physically different about Black people that would lead to them having lower intelligence and a tendency towards criminality? Are their brains too small? Is there testosterone level too high? Did they take a wrong turn in Africa and simply evolve into inferior beings while Whites and Asians as evidence by their pristine heritage and amazing cultural achievement simply evolved into superior beings with higher intelligence and greater self control? I’m well aware that racialist scholars have gone in that direction but I don’t buy their results especially when there are refutations out there which I don’t believe the author of this page has even looked at.
#35 by admin on 06:00 AM - 06:00 AM
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Egalitarian Jay: You are asking the right questions. No the nest step is: read the literature I cite. Rushton, Lynn (see the other articles I wrote on “Race and Intelligence”). And don’t forget, these are taboo topics that get a researcher fired and cause grant denials, so most of the other researchers are heavily biased.
There are evolutionary ultimate explanations, why you cannot live in a Siberian climate with the same happygo-lucky attitude you can get by with in Africa.
If you are looking for physiological differences, Rushton has long studies about blacks having relatively smaller cranial capacity. More testosterone (that is enough to explain criminality). More fast twitch muscles and fighting capacity. Earlier menarche, more twin births. All consistent with Rushton’s hypothesis: Blacks have numerically more offspring with less parental care and planning. (see r-K differences in animals)
I had intelligent black postgraduate professors teaching statistics. But it seems, these already are the extremes. If a white or Asian nobel prize winner is 7 standard deviations more intelligent then average, then this is 8.5 standard deviations above black average intelligence.
Observe that Vietnamese war orphans and grandchildren of Chinese railroad workers do not require protection by affirmative action. They overcrowd elite Universities by merit. Superior intelligence enhanced by cultural environment created by superior intelligent relatives.
Once you accept to question the dogma, once you don’t fire researchers for their inconvenient study results but foster true science, you can find true scientific results. This is what this site stands for. Let unimpeded research find the truth.
#36 by EgalitarianJay on 02:02 PM - 02:02 PM
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I have read the research of Rushton and Lynn. Rushton’s application of r/K selection theory to human populations was refuted by Joseph L Graves one of the world’s leading evolutionary biologists who exposed his lack of understanding the concept itself. I’m in contact with Graves and working on getting getting a debate between himself and Rushton onto Youtube so people can see for themselves how Rushton’s evolutionary theories hold up to an actual expert in the field. In the meantime I recommend reading Graves critique of Rushton’s evolutionary theories. Read “What a tangled web he weaves:
Race, reproductive strategies and Rushton’s life history theory”. You can download it here:
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=4IHFPUHM
Like I said before Leonard Lieberman refuted Rushton’s claims of racial hierarchies in brain size and cranial capacity. Graves has as well. I’m currently reading his book “The Emperor’s New Clothes: Biological Theories of Race at the Millennium” and all of these claims are addressed and debunked.
Rushton’s claims of biological correlates with IQ, presuming a causal genetic link are actually some of his weaker arguments. He makes several errors in methodology and his conclusions have been shown to be demonstrably false. As a psychologist evolutionary theory and anthropometric research are outside of his field of expertise so it’s not surprising that he made so many errors but racialists still promote this research uncritically without looking at the science behind the claims.
I can appreciate that people want to promote fringe theories that they believe are being suppressed by mainstream academia and media but this isn’t science it’s pseudoscience. The fact that scientists can be fired for advancing controversial theories lends no credibility to the theories themselves. Only established facts do. Rushton is the President of an organization (The Pioneer Fund) whose stated purpose with his financing of research (including research used by the Nazis and Segregationists) was to, “prove that Negroes were inferior”.
These are hardly the objective scientists fighting politically correct dogma that you make them out to be. They are racist ideologues committed to advancing propaganda in order to influence social policy on race.
Regarding your appeal to the Model Minority Myth of East Asians, most East Asian college graduates are not descended from impoverished Asian communities but rather recent immigrants to America who already had a decent amount of wealth and education upon immigrating to the United States. The same is true for African immigrants to the USA. There are still problems in Asian communities with advancement opportunities in the corporate world as well a unemployment in the current economic downturn so this idea of Asians being immune to the effects of White privilege is not credible.
I’m all for letting research find the truth so I do hope that comments which challenge these racialist theories are allowed on the site.
#37 by EgalitarianJay on 02:10 PM - 02:10 PM
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* The Negro inferiority comment was made by the founder of the Pioneer Fund.
#38 by EgalitarianJay on 03:04 AM - 03:04 AM
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@Admin:
Let me be a bit more specific about the refutations to Rushton’s evolutionary arguments and claims of racial hierarchies in brain size/cranial capacity. Now you mentioned Rushton’s application of r/K selection theory to the life histories of human populations. This is the most comprehensive attempt in modern history by the race-realist crowd to find a scientific explanation for racial differences in mental traits. Rushton’s theory is that races are adapted to different climates and as a consequence evolved different reproductive strategies to deal with the trials of life in their respective climates.
According to Rushton, humans evolved from a common ancestor with the Great Apes in Africa (adhering to the Out of Africa model of human migration). Sub-Saharan African populations (“Negroids”) are said by Rushton to have adopted an r-strategy to deal with tropical climates. According to Rushton r-strategists like Africans have faster rates of maturation, higher rates of fertility and a greater prevalence of sex hormones leading to differences in birth rates, sexual behavior, social organization and altruism. K-Strategists are believed by Rushton to have evolved larger brains to deal with the complexities of surviving harsh winters in Northern climates leading to slower rates of maturation, lower fertility rates, lower prevalence of sex hormones a greater tendency towards caring for young and planning ahead by building shelter and storing food. Adopting this K-strategy lead Europeans and Asians to select for higher average intelligence.
Here’s the problem. While C Loring Brace notes the absurdity of the proposition by pointing out that none of Rushton’s claims are based on realized reproduction figures (in fact there are 3 times as many Chinese in the world as Sub-Saharan Africans) Joseph L Graves points out the fallacy of Rushton’s whole theory by pointing out that he got the whole thing backwards. According to r/K selection theory organisms in tropical climates, which make for a more predictable environment, would be the K-strategists meaning we should expect all of these attributes attributed to Europeans and Asians to be present in Africans.
As it is r/K selection theory isn’t considered by most modern evolutionary biologists to be applicable to mammals because they cannot predict which life history trade offs are favored by selection. Rushton’s theory of evolutionary racial differences relies on the r- and k- continuum even though according to modern biologists such as Alan Templeton it cannot be thought of as a continuum since it is impossible to specify a single phenotype that is optimal under one or the other. Therefore Graves concludes that Rushton relies on a theory that is invalid and is incorrectly applied by him in the first place. He also states that Rushton’s data sources used to support his theory are biased but I don’t have time to go into that.
What matters is that Rushton’s application of r/k selection theory is invalid and not applicable to humans at all. His saving grace would appear to be claims of racial hierarchies in brain size/cranial capacity because after all if he can prove such racial differences exist he really doesn’t need a fancy evolutionary theory to explain how these differences came about right? Well here too he runs into problems which have been outlined in Leonard Lieberman’s article, “How Caucasoids got such big crania and why they shrank: From Morton to Rushton.”
Lieberman starts off by deconstructing the race concept that Rushton adheres to posing the same arguments I’ve made in a previous post to make it clear that human biological variation is not structured in the way that Rushton believes it to be (basically an amalgamation of heritable traits that are consistently correlated and reflect a distinct evolutionary lineage). As there are no phylogenetic sub-species (“races”) to speak of Rushton’s data is not based on biological categories but rather folk taxonomies constructed from traditional racial concepts.
Lieberman notes that there are no acceptable measures of the head size of all the diverse human populations to begin with and takes issue with Rushton’s use of aggregation which he claims to be invalid. According to Lieberman Rushton’s research lacks content validity. He claims correlations of brain size with intelligence to be as high as .50 to .60 when in reality applying his principle of aggregation to the 47 studies listed you would reach a correlation of about .24 which is statistically weak. He also does not acknowledge that empirical similarity has been established for the populations Rushton aggregates.
Lieberman goes on to note that Rushton’s model of cranioracial variation contradicts evolutionary anthropology citing Beals, Smith, and
Dodd (1984) who conclude that human crania vary by latitude and that a case for racial hierarchy cannot be made. Finally he notes that Rushton’s brain measurements do not utilize control variables utilized by Tobias. In 1970 Tobias conducted a study on the brain sizes of different racial groups listing a set of control variables that became acceptable for measuring brain weight at autopsy which included: sex, body size, age at death, early-life nutrition, early-life environment, source of sample, occupational group, cause of death, lapse of time after death, temperature after death, anatomical level of severance, presence or absence of cerebral spinal fluid, presence or absence of meninges, and presence or absence of blood vessels (Tobias’s conclusion was that there was no structural difference between the brains of Blacks and Whites that could be used to establish a racial distinction between them).
In the same article Rushton did counter that he cited a study by Ho et al. (1980) which concluded that there were racial differences in brain size with an Asian>White>Black hierarchy established and that the study used all of the control variables mentioned by Tobias. Rushton left out the researchers statements in a future study that because there was no discernible racial difference in brain size between infants the differences they did discover in adults were likely caused by environment.
I asked Graves about this myself and he noted that variations in cranial size/body ratio while they can determine differences in intelligence between species are not sufficient for determining which animals are more intelligent within a species. He went on to note that some of the greatest scientific minds in the world, people who donated their brains to science were discovered to have smaller than average brains while exhibiting complex neural structures which Graves notes in tests of rats can change dramatically by subjecting one group to environmental stimuli. It simply cannot be determined from the study of brains that one group of people is more intelligent than another whether you look at cranial measurements or MRI scans.
The notion that bigger brains = more intelligent minds has not been established when you account for the fact that there are significant brain size differences between genders which can be attributed to the shorter stature of women as there are no major differences in average IQ score between genders. According to Schoenemann et al. 2000 brain size does not predict cognitive ability within families as nongenetic events play a significant role in brain volume and cognitive ability associations.
So basically Rushton does not have a solid argument from an evolutionary perspective nor one based on anthropometric data for racial hierarchies in intelligence. What we are left with are IQ studies that test a genetic hypothesis which as I mentioned was addressed by psychologists such as Richard Nisbett and James Flynn who have provided substantial IQ research supporting the claim that Black American IQ is converging on White American IQ as their Socioeconomic status and educational standards improve, intervention programs such as Head Start can boost Black IQ and the most relevant studies that test for a genetic component to the Black-White IQ gap support the Nil Hypothesis.
I suppose this debate is never going to end until the Black-White IQ gap in America disappears altogether proving that it was never immutable all along and destroying claims of a difference in intelligence between so-called races. Even then racists will still be racist. But so much for reputable scientific research being PC dogma, eh?
#39 by soren on 06:04 PM - 06:04 PM
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“as there are no major differences in average IQ score between genders.”
Um, you’re wrong… there is few points of IQ difference between the genders.
#40 by admin on 08:08 PM - 08:08 PM
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The IQ differences between genders seem fairly small. The largest I heard of is 5 points. Which is not that small.
But it is so taboo, you hardly hear about it. The tests also might get normalized in ways that the difference disappears.
You are welcome to post a few links about this.