Scientific Racism

[lowkey]

Many scientists don't even believe in IQ tests

Many scientists are idiots. The data is what matters, not the political construct of "scientific consensus" or "what scientists believe".

What does the data show?

Here is a simple fact; if IQ has no value, then the entire social sciences have no value, because there is no social outcome that has more measurable and predictive effect than IQ.

I know people are trained not to take IQ serious, but consider for a moment: what does the data show?

 

[Floating in Ether]

This is relevant. Father is a retired medico that spent lots of his career in public health. They studied Chicago and found phasing out lead paints in abodes raised measured IQ by 3-5 points, but it did it across the scale, so it still left blacks down a bit, compared to everybody else. That said, it was still worth it, as people three points up are still better off than if they weren't, so it was a general win for society.

 

[lowkey]

That data was derived from studies based on the social construction of IQ tho.

You could call gravity a "social construction". The label doesn't change it.

What would matter is whether the concept of gravity has value or not. Considering it helps predict how forces move (like how fast you fall when you jump from a building), it is a useful concept.

IQ is a useful concept because it predicts more about your (future) life from a fairly simple test than nearly any other measurement technique we have.

It doesn't matter whether you call it a social construct or not.

 

[Floating in Ether]

Adding: All the "head start" in the world did not raise IQ as much as removing lead from the environment...

 

[Snuckening]

Oooh, a 'race and IQ' shitfight. OK, long, autistic screed incoming...

Yes, differences in race-wide average IQ exist. The people say they don't are just in denial of well-supported, empirical fact. And although there's no 100% causal proof that those differences are genetic rather than environmental, IMO common sense/circumstantial evidence says there's a significant genetic component to those IQ gaps (as well as the many environmental factors that are proven- nutrition, esp in utero nutrition, education, parental education, level of medical care, etc, which account for some of that difference in racial average IQ, too, but exactly how much of the difference is environmental factors up for grabs).

But the thing your woke "race realist" types never mention is that there is far, far more IQ variation within each racial group, than there is between any two groups, which makes race an extremely poor predictor of an individual's IQ. And the relationship between race and IQ isn't unusual; there's a difference in group-wide average IQ, in virtually any way you group people together- height, weight, occupation, family groups (which is a much more accurate predictor than race), weird shit about ratios in finger length, etc. So why do the people fixated on the "race/IQ" stuff not care about those differences in group-wide average IQ, I wonder? They also show little concern about all the 60 IQ whites out there (which KF users should be well-acquainted with).

Literally the only time these people talk about IQ is in regards to race, which should probably tell you all you need to know right there: they don't care at all about IQ; they care about race, and they just saw a chance to use differences in racial group-wide average IQ as leverage to push their agenda on racial issues.

IQ is an individual measure. Group-wide IQ averages have little practical, predictive use, which is why legit science almost exclusively uses individual IQ, and virtually never uses group-wide averages the way that "race realists" do.

Even if you did want to use IQ as a basis for making social policy decisions, using race as your mechanism for doing that would be the dumbest, most non-sensical way possible to go about it. It'd be like saying "statistically, we know that tall people have better resumes and experience on average, so I'm not gonna look at anyone's resumes or experience directly, I'm just going to hire every tall person I see, and fire every short person." Shit makes zero sense.

But direct, individual IQ would include the significant number of high-IQ blacks, and exclude the signifiicant number of low-IQ whites, which is why "race realists" only ever talk about group-wide averages, for a stat that was designed to measure individuals, not groups.

tl; dr- denying there's a link between race and IQ is rctarded, but only incrementally more rctarded than wanting to base social policy (say, immigration) on race-wide IQ averages; IQ is an individual measure, group-wide IQ averages aren't very useful in general and race isn't even the best group-wide average to use, and IQ variation within races >>> IQ variation between races. Either use individual IQ, or GTFO. And people who fixate on the "race/IQ" stuff care 100% about race, 0% about IQ.

 

[Floating in Ether]

Another interesting question for nurture people: Explain the high level of mental function in many graduates of the various gulags around the world that intentionally malnourished people??? No discernible significant cognitive deficits...

 

[lowkey]

As for how this relates to race, the hereditarian argument falls apart upon basic examination. Genomic data confirms that Africa contains the most human diversity (this is true not only of genetics, but also of physical morphology), so it logically stands that Africa should have both the most and least intelligent populations on the planet (assuming here that IQ in some way correlates with intelligence).

By that logic, if onions had more genetic diversity than humans, onions should have both the most and least intelligent organisms.

Genetic diversity doesn't necessarily mean genetic diversity across all traits. If it did, then africans would also be both the whitest and blackest in skin color phenotype.

IQ is not a perfect measure of intelligence, but the IQ tests we have developed do get about as close as we can get.

Another interesting question for nurture people: Explain the high level of mental function in many graduates of the various gulags around the world that intentionally malnourished people??? No discernible significant cognitive deficits...

Is there data on that, or is it just an observation of yours?

Absolutely. I mean if you didn't fuck up with the test group, variability or reliability, it quite likely means SOMETHING. We can discuss how data should be handled if we are thinking social consequences or question the definition of IQ and what it is good to measure, but if similar test gives same results and results give similar correlations that seem to turn into reality, there are things one can't deny without saying 4 + 2 = 3.

Exactly.

I think I agree here and personally think that culture has a lot to do with it. People who's culture doesn't encourage people to spend wealth to show off/fancy crap tend to too have succeed in certain areas of life (to make grossly oversimplified example what I mean: protestants like lutherans and their teachings vs. orthodox christianity where they got all fancy shit but are on average poorer compared to protestants). It is indeed sum of fuckton of factors that make people behave in certain way or encourage them to do certain things that lead to bigger things like how people X create society and how it ends up like.

Culture has something to do with it, but it is generally overestimated. A lot of culture is also affected by the genetics of the people in it. For example, the countries that had the "protestant work ethic" retained that work ethic when they lost their protestantism. It's more likely an effect of what we measured as personality traits conscientiousness/ industriousness.

 

[Floating in Ether]

Is there data on that, or is it just an observation of yours?

Dunno if there is data, but a LOT of people survived death camps/pow camps of one form or another and went on to be high achievers. I have no idea if it has been metriced, but I've known plenty of highly inelligent survivors. One amigo lost 70lbs in a stalag for das luftgangsters. Went from 180 to 110 when liberated...No cognitive deficits. Fucked up his cardiovasculars, but not his brain. Somebody should study it, but if you can starve people to death without destroying cognitive ability, sure seems more genetic than nutritional.

 

[GS 281]

You could call gravity a "social construction". The label doesn't change it.

You actually can’t because there are tools which can measure with complete accuracy the level of gravity. A multitude of social factors cloud measures of intelligence.

What would matter is whether the concept of gravity has value or not.

Well again, what matters is the ability of the tool to measure and the ability to describe what it is that is being measured. Gravity is not socially constructed. IQ is.

IQ is a useful concept because it predicts more about your (future) life from a fairly simple test than nearly other measurement technique we have.

It doesn't matter whether you call it a social construct or not.

How would this make IQ not a social construct? By that logic would generational social mobility not be a social construct?

 

[Floating in Ether]

Is there data on that, or is it just an observation of yours?

It would be hard to establish a baseline, unless you talked people that run various gulags into testing people before and after release. That would be hard to pull of, but the preponderance of evidence seems like it would point towards minimal harm, of course the "psych facilities" often used to house dissidents may do some harm with the pharm drugs used to keep people mostly docile. KGB/FSB might have data on that.

You actually can’t because there are tools which can measure with complete accuracy the level of gravity. A multitude of social factors cloud measures of intelligence.


Well again, what matters is the ability of the tool to measure and the ability to describe what it is that is being measured. Gravity is not socially constructed. IQ is.


How would this make IQ not a social construct? By that logic would generational social mobility not be a social construct?

You can raise a person basically entirely outside of society and measure their abilities and propensities toward various types of thought.

 

[lowkey]

But the thing your woke "race realist" types never mention is that there is far, far more IQ variation within each racial group, than there is between any two groups, which makes race an extremely poor predictor of an individual's IQ.

I'm going to avoid taking your bait to make this a political conversation that would bog down the topic in screeching and overblow the discussion about the underlying science and data.

Because we live in western societies (I assume you're not typing that from Japan, or you wouldn't have that perspective) and in western societies people are educated to believe that disparate life/career outcomes between races are overwhelmingly the result of racism, much like the difference in wage earnings between men/women are the result of sexism.

The data supports that there is both sexism and racism, but also that these are many factors smaller than the degree that it is taught and that (once again) IQ is a far better predictor. That's why it's important to note the IQ variation between groups, because it explains the difference in life outcomes between these groups.

For example, the average of IQ difference of men and women is of nearly negligible difference, but the variance is different and this explains in part the different outcomes between men and women in earnings (among other things).

That's why the "variation within group" isn't more noteworthy.

As for other causes of life outcomes, people don't have to continually defend that taller people make more money, because there is no complete culture industry that thrives on claiming "heightism". Both racist and antiracist activists thrive on it of course and no degree of social engineering can remove that exploitable tribalism inherent to humans (this sentence is my personal opinion, not data driven fact of most of my post).

If there were a wide swath denial of height affecting income, I would speak up about it and point people toward the data. There isn't, people are quite agreeable to the idea. But for anything involving race (which is a bit of misnomer to begin with), people politicize it, weaponize it and deny the facts we have available.

And whenever truths are denied, people get unwitting bad outcomes.

 

[Hellbound Hellhound]

By that logic, if onions had more genetic diversity than humans, onions should have both the most and least intelligent organisms.

A facile argument. Onions are from a completely different taxonomic kingdom than humans, and they don't have a nervous system. The debate concerning race and intelligence is a debate solely applicable to humans.

Genetic diversity doesn't necessarily mean genetic diversity across all traits. If it did, then africans would also be both the whitest and blackest in skin color phenotype.

Comparing skin color to a trait as complex as intelligence is a completely fruitless exercise. From both a genetic and phenotypic standpoint, skin color is a relatively superficial trait that is governed solely by the amount of melanin the skin produces, and is thus easily alterable through mutation. Intelligence is a far more difficult trait to isolate, and would more than likely be decided by much more substantial morphological features. The question is: which features? Hereditarians like to point towards cranial capacity, but cranial capacity varies so much across Africa that it cannot possibly account for IQ variation.

Also, for the record, Sub-Saharan Africans actually do have the most diversity when it comes to skin color. The Dinka people for example are some of the darkest on the planet, while the Khoisan people are typically olive-skinned.

For comparison:

IQ is not a perfect measure of intelligence, but the IQ tests we have developed do get about as close as we can get.

On what basis can you make that claim?

 

[Thomas Paine]

From what I've noticed anecdotally during my time in the public, private, and academic sectors is that most races have the same general capacity of learning.

However, across the vast sample of people I've encountered, each have their unique strengths. I'm not one to shout the "there's different forms of intelligence" shit, there's really not. It's all about learning capacity and the propensity to learn from mistakes. Some people have seemingly natural skills with children and emotional depth. Others seem to be entirely technical/systematic in their skill-set. Both, and other, types of people are intellectually viable and support cognitive theory that humans are naturally disposed to specialize in order to play to our strengths. This helps us maximize our chances for survival/reproduction. (Jack-Of-All-Trades is a master of none) In developed countries, the difference in cognitive capabilities between races of the same socioeconomic class are nearly non-existent.

The large discrepancies for "IQ" scores in Black communities in the US are mainly attributed to the poor infrastructure, education systems, and access to meaningful social development programs.
Don't get started on "muh programs". Welfare/Income programs are not what I mean. I'm alluding to business workshops, extracurricular activities, and early childhood development institutes. We could fix these problems if we wanted to. We really could. Too bad Dems want to keep blacks dumb so they can play up their savior complex and get EZ votes, and Republicans think boot-strap models actually work.

TL;DR - IQ is a misconstrued "statistic".
NB: All my evidence is anecdotal, fuck you.

 

[wylfım]

As for how this relates to race, the hereditarian argument falls apart upon basic examination. Genomic data confirms that Africa contains the most human diversity (this is true not only of genetics, but also of physical morphology), so it logically stands that Africa should have both the most and least intelligent populations on the planet (assuming here that IQ in some way correlates with intelligence).

The trouble is, this isn't what we observe. Sub-Saharan Africans consistently score lower on aggregate on IQ tests than Europeans and Asians, so what gives? The logical answer is that IQ tests don't reliably measure fluid intelligence, and that environmental factors play a much larger role than genetics.

High diversity doesn't mean they would have higher IQ.
Populations like Ashkenazi jews are extremely intelligent BECAUSE of their low genetic diversity. They all have a bunch of mutations related to lipid metabolism that end up making their brains develop more. Because everyone is homozygous for rare mutations (ie low diversity), the average of the entire group goes up.

Having a larger gene pool doesn't mean you have better genes; it means both the bad and the good genes are diluted out, so they dont impact the population as much.

 

[lowkey]

A facile argument. Onions are from a completely different taxonomic kingdom than humans, and they don't have a nervous system. The debate concerning race and intelligence is a debate solely applicable to humans.



Comparing skin color to a trait as complex as intelligence is a completely fruitless exercise. From both a genetic and phenotypic standpoint, skin color is a relatively superficial trait that is governed solely by the amount of melanin the skin produces, and is thus easily alterable through mutation. Intelligence is a far more difficult trait to isolate, and would more than likely be decided by much more substantial morphological features. The question is: which features? Hereditarians like to point towards cranial capacity, but cranial capacity varies so much across Africa that it cannot possibly account for IQ variation.

Also, for the record, Sub-Saharan Africans actually do have the most diversity when it comes to skin color. The Dinka people for example are some of the darkest on the planet, while the Khoisan people are typically olive-skinned.

For comparison:

You made the claim that because there is the most genetic diversity in (sub-saharan) africa, there must necessarily be the greatest divergence of intelligence in africa, populating both sides of the extreme.

I tried using two examples to show you the limits of that claim and it seems to have gone over your head. I don't know how I can further simplify that point to make it clearer.

Because your original claim would suggest that africa had both the lightest and the darkest skin. You've demonstrated the greatest variance, but the khoisan still have darker skin phenotypes than say, east-asians. This shows that your original argument is incorrect. That's all.

(There actually is the greatest IQ variance in africa, particularly after the colonisation of liberia by african americans witb one of the highest IQs, compared to the pygmy's with one of the lowest. But they are also below the rest of the world, excluding the australian aboriginals)

On what basis can you make that claim?

I made the claim that IQ is our best measure of intelligence, because in all of science I have not encountered a better measurable way of determening difference intelligence.

You could of course ascribe to the idea of many intelligences, musical intelligence, emotional intelligence, but there is no data to support the value of those concepts. IQ is the most potent predictor we've found so far.

If you'd like, I can point you towards some of the studies that shaped my perspective tomorrow when I'm at a desktop.

 

[Thomas Paine]

I tried using two examples to show you the limits of that claim and it seems to have gone over your head. I don't know how I can further simplify that point to make it clearer.

lol calm down

 

[wylfım]

ohgodineedtosleepbutthisthreadistoofuckinginteresting

But the thing your woke "race realist" types never mention is that there is far, far more IQ variation within each racial group, than there is between any two groups, which makes race an extremely poor predictor of an individual's IQ. And the relationship between race and IQ isn't unusual; there's a difference in group-wide average IQ, in virtually any way you group people together- height, weight, occupation, family groups (which is a much more accurate predictor than race), weird shit about ratios in finger length, etc. So why do the people fixated on the "race/IQ" stuff not care about those differences in group-wide average IQ, I wonder? They also show little concern about all the 60 IQ whites out there (which KF users should be well-acquainted with).

Literally the only time these people talk about IQ is in regards to race, which should probably tell you all you need to know right there: they don't care at all about IQ; they care about race, and they just saw a chance to use differences in racial group-wide average IQ as leverage to push their agenda on racial issues.

IQ is an individual measure. Group-wide IQ averages have little practical, predictive use, which is why legit science almost exclusively uses individual IQ, and virtually never uses group-wide averages the way that "race realists" do.

Slight differences in the mean (what you are saying) isnt significant for the average, but its VERY significant for the tail end. You have very high predictive power in guessing who a genius is because they almost always come from Asian or Jewish backgrounds (because their means are slightly higher than other races). So while it may not help you predict very well what race someone with an iq of 100 is, that doesn't extrapolate to higher (or lower) iqs. Also, Ashkenazi jews have an average IQ of 15, a full fucking standard deviation above the white average, and two above the black. Try telling me that isn't statistically important because "variation within races is greater than variation between races" and I correctly conclude you are exceptional.
Heres some basic statistics: a normal distribution is infinite in variation. It goes from -infinite to +infinity. So of fucking course theres going to be more variation within the groups (infinite, technically) than among them (15-30 points on average, depending on the races in question).
Here, lemme try explaining this with a visual.

Note how the average difference between the averages (peaks) of both red and blue are quite small. Each group has way more variance in it than between them. But also note how, the majority of the low-end points are red (area under the tail), and the majority of high end points are blue. It is very statistically significant. And the differences that do exist between races (black-white 1 standard deviation, black-jew 2 standard deviations) are way more than this picture, so the effect becomes even more pronounced.

You actually can’t because there are tools which can measure with complete accuracy the level of gravity. A multitude of social factors cloud measures of intelligence.

I don't see how culture influences a raven's progressive matrices. Its made of fucking squares. Unless you want to claim that squares are racist against blacks, IQ can be completely culturally independent.

I encourage everyone to read studies on both sides of the debate. The ones that try claiming "cultural racism" are very poorly written, small n-values (if they even have any), and usually just argue that race doesn't exist because race lines aren't clear (loki's wager.... boundaries between races arent well defined but races are quite well defined, if you don't believe that just note that you will NEVER mix up a pure-blooded white person with a pure-blooded asian with a pure-blooded black person). Meanwhile the ones that show differences have n-values in the MILLIONS, include meta-analyses that have multiple studies with numerous methodologies, and are much much more persuasive.

 

[GS 281]

I don't see how culture influences a raven's progressive matrices

The tool used to measure intelligence is a test which is based on measuring for the defined dimensions of intelligence. The defining of intelligence, the weight given to dimensions, the tool itself depend on multiple social factors. The tool used to measure is developed from what experts in the field perceive to be intelligence. Social factors related to the perspective, perception and bias of these experts are social factors which play a role in expert panels passing judgement on these tools.

The extent to which validity and reliability of these tools can be established quantitatively is through factor analysis or Cronbach's alpha. At this point all you are doing is measuring to determine whether there is internal consistency and to what degree items coincide with consistent measurement of the same factor. What these measurements cannot do is establish concretely that the definitions are being tested by the items in the test. That is possible with, say, the aforementioned gravity.

Other than a bias against the term "social construct", not seeing what you guys keep trying to prove.

 

[wylfım]

The tool used to measure intelligence is a test which is based on measuring for the defined dimensions of intelligence. The defining of intelligence, the weight given to dimensions, the tool itself depend on multiple social factors. The tool used to measure is developed from what experts in the field perceive to be intelligence. Social factors related to the perspective, perception and bias of these experts are social factors which play a role in expert panels passing judgement on these tools.

The extent to which validity and reliability of these tools can be established quantitatively is through factor analysis or Cronbach's alpha. At this point all you are doing is measuring to determine whether there is internal consistency and to what degree items coincide with consistent measurement of the same factor. What these measurements cannot do is establish concretely that the definitions are being tested by the items in the test. That is possible with, say, the aforementioned gravity.

Other than a bias against the term "social construct", not seeing what you guys keep trying to prove.

The definition of the "intelligence" IQ tests measures seems to match up pretty damn well with what it logically would be.
Reaction speed, ability to make associations with patterns, ability to quickly learn new things and abstract from previous knowledge.

If you think this is biased, what aspects is it missing? What other forms of intelligence do you think there are? You can just keep claiming it isn't a full measure forever, but unless you propose other things that it misses out on you aren't contributing to the scientific understanding of intelligence.

 

[GS 281]

If you think this is biased, what aspects is it missing?

It is impossible for anything we cannot concretely and objectively see or feel from some physical state to be void of bias. We are limited by our simple minds to keep that in check.

What other forms of intelligence do you think there are? You can just keep claiming it isn't a full measure forever, but unless you propose other things that it misses out on you aren't contributing to the scientific understanding of intelligence.

For me to do that without some sort of evidence would just be speculation. You cannot touch or feel an intelligence. An intelligence doesn't have some impact on the world. Again, using the example of another user, gravity does it can be felt. I honestly don't know how to make it any more simpler for you.