Nobel Prize scientist - Black people are dumb

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What you're missing is that there are no "races." Groups like "white" and "asian" comprise a large number of ethnicities. The "white/yellow/red/brown/black" divisions have little scientific basis, they take a single trait (skin color) and categorize a huge number of ethnicities on that basis alone.

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I don't really think we're missing this. Of course there are a bunch of ethnicities in any one category like "Asian." But if you randomly pick some guy off the street who looks "Asian," you may have a much higher probability of getting a guy who descended from an ethnicity that placed a high premium on intelligence over many generations, than if you were to randomly pick some guy who looks "African."

There's no contradiction with your point that these are broad generalizations, and that they are not directly liked causally to intelligence.

[ChrisV]

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I don't see how looking at facts and drawing conclusions can be racist. I believe there probably is some correlation between race and intelligence although not enough to draw any huge conclusions. For instance, if the 45th percentile of whites is smarter than the 55th percentile of blacks, that doesn't mean that "blacks are stupid" or that we should prejudge people we meet based on their race. I don't see why anyone should find this idea offensive at all.

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Well, how did you measure their intelligence?

An average auto-mechanic is better at me at fixing engines and alot of the skills needed for that, does this means he is smarter than me? If I managed to score higher than him at an intelligence test, does this mean I am smarter than him?

If smart = some measure of ability in a test, then yes, but if you think about it, that does nothing for the discussion. You would have to have a completely generalizable measure of brain-related computer power - which doesn't exist.

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O rly?

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Moreover, research on the physiology and genetics of g has uncovered biological correlates of this psychological phenomenon. In the past decade, studies by teams of researchers in North America and Europe have linked several attributes of the brain to general intelligence. After taking into account gender and physical stature, brain size as determined by magnetic resonance imaging is moderately correlated with IQ (about 0.4 on a scale of 0 to 1). So is the speed of nerve conduction. The brains of bright people also use less energy during problem solving than do those of their less able peers. And various qualities of brain waves correlate strongly (about 0.5 to 0.7) with IQ: the brain waves of individuals with higher IQs, for example, respond more promptly and consistently to simple sensory stimuli such as audible clicks. These observations have led some investigators to posit that differences in g result from differences in the speed and efficiency of neural processing. If this theory is true, environmental conditions could influence g by modifying brain physiology in some manner.

Studies of so-called elementary cognitive tasks (ECTs), conducted by Jensen and others, are bridging the gap between the psychological and the physiological aspects of g. These mental tasks have no obvious intellectual content and are so simple that adults and most children can do them accurately in less than a second. In the most basic reaction-time tests, for example, the subject must react when a light goes on by lifting her index finger off a home button and immediately depressing a response button. Two measurements are taken: the number of milliseconds between the illumination of the light and the subject's release of the home button, which is called decision time, and the number of milliseconds between the subject's release of the home button and pressing of the response button, which is called movement time.

In this task, movement time seems independent of intelligence, but the decision times of higher-IQ subjects are slightly faster than those of people with lower IQs. As the tasks are made more complex, correlations between average decision times and IQ increase. These results further support the notion that intelligence equips individuals to deal with complexity and that its influence is greater in complex tasks than in simple ones.

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More here . This sounds like a measure of brain-related computing power to me.

[ChrisV]

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Gardner's works are what first and foremost comes to mind.

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From a critical review of his theories:

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To date there have been no published studies that offer evidence of the validity of the multiple intelligences. In 1994 Sternberg reported finding no empirical studies. In 2000 Allix reported finding no empirical validating studies, and at that time Gardner and Connell conceded that there was "little hard evidence for MI theory" (2000, p. 292). In 2004 Sternberg and Grigerenko stated that there were no validating studies for multiple intelligences, and in 2004 Gardner asserted that he would be "delighted were such evidence to accrue" (p. 214), and he admitted that "MI theory has few enthusiasts among psychometricians or others of a traditional psychological background" because they require "psychometric or experimental evidence that allows one to prove the existence of the several intelligences" (2004, p. 214).

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Alot of the experiments done on Vygotsky's social intelligence comes to mind, which shows that the arena for use of some forms of logic change from culture to culture. Amongst others it was shown how street children of brazil could not perform math on paper, but performed maths very well when set in the cultural context of trade ( think that was a study by Nunes).

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What does that have to do with g?

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The above can be set in light by the old riddle - if you do something, and somebody trains a machine to do it better, does this mean you are more stupid than the machine? What if this something is an intelligence test?

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The question misunderstands the nature of IQ tests. The idea of IQ tests is to measure an underlying factor of the brain called g. The idea is that test results roughly correlate with g. In the future it may be possible to measure g physiologically or via time taken to complete simple cognitive tasks, as I alluded to in my previous post. Pointing out that a chosen measurement method (eg IQ tests) is imperfect does not invalidate the idea that g exists and that there are things that correlate with it. It just means that the results have a certain amount of uncertainty.

[tame_deuces]

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I don't see how looking at facts and drawing conclusions can be racist. I believe there probably is some correlation between race and intelligence although not enough to draw any huge conclusions. For instance, if the 45th percentile of whites is smarter than the 55th percentile of blacks, that doesn't mean that "blacks are stupid" or that we should prejudge people we meet based on their race. I don't see why anyone should find this idea offensive at all.

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Well, how did you measure their intelligence?

An average auto-mechanic is better at me at fixing engines and alot of the skills needed for that, does this means he is smarter than me? If I managed to score higher than him at an intelligence test, does this mean I am smarter than him?

If smart = some measure of ability in a test, then yes, but if you think about it, that does nothing for the discussion. You would have to have a completely generalizable measure of brain-related computer power - which doesn't exist.

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O rly?

[ QUOTE ]
Moreover, research on the physiology and genetics of g has uncovered biological correlates of this psychological phenomenon. In the past decade, studies by teams of researchers in North America and Europe have linked several attributes of the brain to general intelligence. After taking into account gender and physical stature, brain size as determined by magnetic resonance imaging is moderately correlated with IQ (about 0.4 on a scale of 0 to 1). So is the speed of nerve conduction. The brains of bright people also use less energy during problem solving than do those of their less able peers. And various qualities of brain waves correlate strongly (about 0.5 to 0.7) with IQ: the brain waves of individuals with higher IQs, for example, respond more promptly and consistently to simple sensory stimuli such as audible clicks. These observations have led some investigators to posit that differences in g result from differences in the speed and efficiency of neural processing. If this theory is true, environmental conditions could influence g by modifying brain physiology in some manner.

Studies of so-called elementary cognitive tasks (ECTs), conducted by Jensen and others, are bridging the gap between the psychological and the physiological aspects of g. These mental tasks have no obvious intellectual content and are so simple that adults and most children can do them accurately in less than a second. In the most basic reaction-time tests, for example, the subject must react when a light goes on by lifting her index finger off a home button and immediately depressing a response button. Two measurements are taken: the number of milliseconds between the illumination of the light and the subject's release of the home button, which is called decision time, and the number of milliseconds between the subject's release of the home button and pressing of the response button, which is called movement time.

In this task, movement time seems independent of intelligence, but the decision times of higher-IQ subjects are slightly faster than those of people with lower IQs. As the tasks are made more complex, correlations between average decision times and IQ increase. These results further support the notion that intelligence equips individuals to deal with complexity and that its influence is greater in complex tasks than in simple ones.

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More here . This sounds like a measure of brain-related computing power to me.

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Listen, if you want to believe that a general intelligence exists, then fine. There are many scientists who hold that g factor is usable enough.

My point initially, which I still fully support, is that there is plenty of criticism here, there is _far_ from full support of any generalizable intelligence measure and the intelligence tests themselves are not generalizable across cultures.

I haven't said intelligence measures aren't usable, I have said they are facing much criticism - I have certainly have not made a claim that there aren't those who support them.

The point I made is that there is so much greyzone here, that for a geneticist, whom I doubt in some specialist in cultural learning theory nor intelligence measures, to make some claim in a newspaper is completely off the mark.

Read the article you just quoted to me if you wish, you don't have to be an expert to see that it is a very, very hazy field.

And as a last note and nice little point: In neuroscience and artificial intelligence circles - computer power is often _not_ seen as a good measure of intelligence, rendering this article moot if holding that view.

[gumpzilla]

Here's what I don't get about these sorts of scuffles:

What is the point of doing research into intelligence differences between the races? What's the agenda? Where does one go with the results? I don't see what the use is of trying to look into the question "black people are dumber than white people." It's a thorny question to look at purely scientifically (how are you defining black, dumb, and white?), and there are such obvious negative drawbacks even to "succeeding" that I wonder what people are hoping to accomplish with this information that makes it worthwhile. Because I don't see the point. Science is almost never just knowledge for knowledge's sake; there's a lot of careful choice that goes into what gets looked at and taken seriously. So, why?

[jogsxyz]

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Do dark-skinned ethnicities have lower IQ scores across the board than light-skinned ethnicities?



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Come on. He didn't say that. His statement is much weaker.
Maybe like there's a light-skinned bell curve and a dark-skinned bell curve. The mean IQ of the light-skinned bell curve is higher than the dark-skinned one. And he didn't say by how much, but maybe he implied it was statistically significant.
The politically correct radical left does not allow the topic to be open for discussion.

[andyfox]

The guy's point is that white people know black people are stupid when they work with them. Nothing he says about race should be taken seriously because he's a bigot:

In the newspaper interview, he said there was no reason to think that races which had grown up in separate geographical locations should have evolved identically. He went on to say that although he hoped everyone was equal, "people who have to deal with black employees find this not true".

Note the syntax: "people who have to deal with black employees.

[Jamougha]

gump,

there are quite a few scientists who agree, that this kind of thing should be ignored whether or not it's true, because there is just no possible upside to it. But not all do. Obviously the people who are interested are more likely to be racist, even if unconsciously. And so people are forced to respond because if people try to make a case that black people are less intelligent overall, and it's not true, but it's just left hanging, then... well that has a big downside.

[jogsxyz]

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Here's what I don't get about these sorts of scuffles:

What is the point of doing research into intelligence differences between the races? What's the agenda? Where does one go with the results? I don't see what the use is of trying to look into the question "black people are dumber than white people." It's a thorny question to look at purely scientifically (how are you defining black, dumb, and white?), and there are such obvious negative drawbacks even to "succeeding" that I wonder what people are hoping to accomplish with this information that makes it worthwhile. Because I don't see the point. Science is almost never just knowledge for knowledge's sake; there's a lot of careful choice that goes into what gets looked at and taken seriously. So, why?

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The cities are running failed school systems. This information may help in solving this problem.

[gumpzilla]

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The cities are running failed school systems. This information may help in solving this problem.

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How? And in what way is doing this brand of research superior to looking into the schools directly?

Jamougha, your point that some people will be getting into it to try and rebut others is a valid one. Seems like an ugly business to be in.