there are racial and ethnic differences in IQ

[Utah]

I found this link interesting. Note: I am not advocating what is said so dont bash me for the contents [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] There is also a bit of a destruction of man angle - although it could be correct.

http://www.onelife.com/evolve/brain.html

I bet at the end of the day we will find that people we deem as intelligent (by whatever standard) will have a straight forward solution like - they have more neurons or their neurons fire faster.

[purnell]

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Lets say two races exist

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Not so fast, pilgrim. Please provide an objective measure by which I can determine who belongs to what race.

[purnell]

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The fact that science has a hard time quantifying or delineating that process does not make it non-existant.


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The fact that there is no biological justification for the concept of race makes it a superficial and arbitrary distinction with no merit outside the subject of sociology.

[NewbieStyle]

Guess I would have to see the test used, how they were served, what kind of sample size, etc before making any judgement on the merits of it. That being said there are alot of ways to make a test even a math test better or worse for anygroup of people... Iq test where social factors play a bigger role is that much easier.

[guesswest]

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The fact that science has a hard time quantifying or delineating that process does not make it non-existant.


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The fact that there is no biological justification for the concept of race makes it a superficial and arbitrary distinction with no merit outside the subject of sociology.

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The problem isn't that there are no biological indicators for race, they are numerous, it's that there are none that specifically in and of themselves attribute race. And to that end I fully accept that the concept of race isn't very useful in many instances.

But this idea, that certain physical traits occur with greater frequency within specific 'race' groups is fact, and it's also factual to say we can correllate a number of these to certain genetic markers. So yes I agree that identifying exactly what constitutes a racial group is blurry and probably the job of social scientists, but once those distinctions have been made (with whatever accuracy) there is still a job for the 'real' scientists - namely telling us what characteristics are found and with what frequency within those groups.

[MidGe]

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there are no biological indicators for race, they are numerous, it's that there are none that specifically in and of themselves attribute race.

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that certain physical traits occur with greater frequency within specific 'race' groups is fact

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[img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

[Warren Whitmore]

That is correct. It reminds me of a couple more things I really like about the bell curve. The apendix gives a better overview of statistical terms than any I have read. I teach organic Chemistry at a community college and sometimes use it for that purpose.

As an aside as it has nothing to do with the origional post I should mention a couple of other things.

Warren Buffett was asked about IQ as it is more tightly correlated with investing than anything else. He said its way more important to get the most horse power out of a motor than it is to have a larger motor. "I know lots of people with an IQ of 140 who beat people with an IQ of 160 in this game. Its not the horse power of the motor that matters its how much you can get out of it."

My sister in effect said the same thing. She asked me to come up and kill some chickens for her. One of them was unusually large and I was curious as to its weight.

Warren: How much does this one weigh?
Linda: Why do you care?
Warren: Just curious, do you have a scale?
Linda: No.
Warren: Just use a bathroom scale, weigh yourself first then with the bird.
Linda: I don't have any scale, thermometer or any other measuring devices.
Warren: why not.
Linda measuring a thing does not change the thing you are measuring unless you want to get into quantum mechanics which I dont.
Warren: When was the last time you weighed youself?
Linda: 20 years ago.
Warren: Why
Linda: Time spent running, bailing hay, and studying nutrition will produce far better results than standing on a scale will.

As an aside my sister is in perfect shape and physical condition. If more people shared her philosophy there would be a whole lot less bad beat stories.

[guesswest]

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there are no biological indicators for race, they are numerous, it's that there are none that specifically in and of themselves attribute race.

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that certain physical traits occur with greater frequency within specific 'race' groups is fact

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[img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

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The point I'm making is that race classification is an issue for social scientists, certainly there is no 'race' gene, there's just a series of characteristics which to varying degrees occur more frequently within notions of race classification. That does not mean race does not exist, it clearly does, and that does not mean you can't then collate information and discover statistically significant patterns as to the distribution of physiological traits within those groups. And you missed out 'it's not that there are' at the front of that sentence, which kinda changes it meaning [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[MidGe]

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The point I'm making is that race classification is an issue for social scientists

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occur more frequently within notions of race classification.

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[img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

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That does not mean race does not exist, it clearly does, and that does not mean you can't then collate information and discover statistically significant patterns as to the distribution of physiological traits within those groups.

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What's the point if you haven't a way to meaningfully define the groups. If you have, do, and don't call them "race" which is as good as saying nothing.

[guesswest]

But that's where we disagree, I do think there are meaningful ways of classifying race. Perhaps the problem is that I view social science as 'real' science, whereas a great many scientists aren't as charitable to their fluffy relatives. And I do also think the ability to do so is decreasing rapidly with the advance of globalization.

We classify race all the time for a whole host of practical purposes, medical screening for one. Granted it's generally based on self-reporting which is quite fallible, but we're playing the numbers when we do this. It's nowhere near as fallible as randomly assigning race and thus the biological characteristics that are more likely to be associated with it - so I conclude from that it's statistically valuable.