“Black people” can’t be INHERENTLY stupider than “white people”, anyway.

When you say something is “inherent” in people, you’re talking about genetics. The only way a trait can be inherent and also show up generation after generation in related people is if it is related to some genetic configuration.

The problem with this idea for the racists is that you find greater genetic variation within a human racial group than you do between different human racial groups.

People who write shit like this have absolutely no idea what the reality of urban poverty is, and the total devastation it effects on people. America enjoys the wealth it does because it is willing to throw its inner city young people to the lions, and it’s pretty sickening.

brad, you nailed it. This kind of idiocy still shocks me to this day. Eugenics and all that it led to should negate anyone having any respect after coming out with shit like this, but no, they still want respect and whine about not being given, even though it is just dressed up racist shit.

and ‘UP YOURS ASSHOLE’ is a little mild, IMHO, i think the point should be reinforced with a baseball bat (or a cricket bat if outside the US).

Somewhere on Youtube, there’s a video of some BNP members (British National Party – they are reactionary racists who hate immigrants and are affectionately known to their detractors as the British Nazi Party) trying to hand some literature out on a streetcorner, and some average guy walks up to one of them and spits on them.

BNP put the video online as “proof of how unhinged their opponents are”, but I think it’s the perfect response to people spewing hateful nonsense.

Have you ever hard what the comedian Chris Rock has to say on this subject? An interesting perspective.

The fact is, liberals scream science when they twist it to support their greenshirt enviro theories or socialist boondoggles, but they scream “hate” when scientists post something they do not like. It’s not racism if the facts support the fact that the coloreds, in fact, are not as intelligent as the whites. This has been true since ancient Rome collapsed because of the mongrelization of there genes from freed slaves, merchants, and others who bred out the intelligence and resolve that made it great, it is happening here too. And liberals love it. It gives them power over teh chaos.

I’m not sure he accomplished anything else, but this Fake Gary™ brought back memories of a guy I knew in college who was a Classics major and a member of Opus Dei. He once gave a great little speech about how sad it was that the Greek profile (and with it so much else) was destroyed by all the mongrelization with Slavs, Huns, Turks, and the like.

Warning: The following is written by Head Start “grad” and former Head Start employee, he may rant a little.

This is an excellent example of the on-going attempt to convince poor whites they’re just as good as the rich white guy that keeps crapping on them and have nothing at all in common with those brown guys the rwgs crap on with equal abandon.

So please don’t join forces and drag our fat asses to the nearest river.

Head Start is a federal program and in areas where there are primarily poor white people the class rooms set aside aren’t empty. But nope, the wankers want to make believe it’s only for dumb darkies and connect it with the eevile Affirmative Action which is all that stood between poor Bubba and four years at Yale. What good parent would want little Timmy taking part in a program for dumb brown kids?*
/rant

But back to your point, “Debate” is often the safety word of the coward. Therefore wimps on the right are shocked and appalled when they want to have a nice chat about torture and people scream STFU!! “Well, gosh, I was only talking about slapping wires on some guys balls and making him dance!” I think it comes from an inability to read, because if you verbally kick one of these guys around long enough they’ll start to scream that their 1st Amendment rights are being violated. Nope, we’re just DEBATING whether you’re really a stupid goat fucking arsehole!

A – C

*Arguments against Head Start will ultimately fail because the parents need the kids out of the house so they can go to work.

Ah, junk science.

If the theory were true (and I don’t believe for one moment it is) then Gary has just revealed himself to be of a darker hue because he is certainly an idiot.

Andrew Sullivan is still obsessing over his racist fantasies for the same reason he’s still obsessed with the Clintons: both represent parties that are “more” [blank] than he will ever be. In Sullivan’s sad, sick world, the fact that blacks have been “more” persecuted than venal, middle-class English barebackers likes himself is so infuriating that he *must* blame the fact on some genetic inferiority: ie, they *deserve* it.

Ditto with the Clintons: they are both “more” married than he will ever be, as well as “more” intelligent, “more” politically savvy, “more” committed to the nation’s welfare. This enrages Sullivan, who sees himself as both hideous victim of insufficient adulation *and* a truly superior, supreme being, high above the rest of us. Blacks, the Clintons, and anti-war liberals are in every way more “authentic” than the supreme phony/narcissist Sullivan, so he must ruthlessly attack them at all times in order to keep his fragile ego from imploding further…while giving himself the cover/beard/dodge of his Barack-Mandingo fantasies.

Anyway, that’s why Sullivan hates those shwoogies. Happy “T”-Day.

“The problem with this idea for the racists is that you find greater genetic variation within a human racial group than you do between different human racial groups.”

Thanks Jillian, you said it for me. Abuse of science to “prove” that one group is superior to another is not new. I’m old enough to remember William Shockley, another Nobel Prize winner making the same argument.

Why do people say IQ measures intelligence? And how do they get away with it? IQ tests were invented to measure development, not inherent mental ability. The Q in IQ stands for “quotient” which is a relation between two numbers. IQ is not an absolute measurement.

The really ridiculous thing is that the inventor of IQ tests (a guy named Binet) invented them to identify students who needed extra help to learn. So now we have people saying students who score poorly on IQ should get no help at all. And they get away with it. Why?

Of course, if there was a survey measuring the intelligence of Republican voters versus Democratic voters, I think we all know what the outcome would be. There’s already been one for Fox News viewers, with utterly predictable results.

Would the wingers then admit what we already know – that they are naturally, irrideemably stupid, and that no more effort or money should be wasted on them?

Here’s a fine example of how (let’s call them what they are) Eugenicists, have been blowing their feet off and miraculously growing new feet since the the beginning:

Back in the 1800’s one of the key arguments against cross-race relations was that it lead to idiocy. Brown people’s brutish stupid genes over powered white people’s delicate smart genes and the resulting kids were drooling morons. If that were allowed to continue America would be a nation of drooling morons in no time. So a “scientist” took various skulls and filled them with bird shot to measure cranial capacity, the hypothesis being that the skulls of mixed people would be smaller. It turned out that the skulls of mixed raced people were larger than either the white or brown people.

Ow! My feet!

So the “scientist” had to change his theory: People with higher cc are stupider than people with lower cc.

Yay! New feet!

Head Start and Affirmative Action are two separate issues.
Head Start, which started as a War On Poverty program, serves the poor of all races and like Food Stamps, had it’s genesis here in Central Appalachia. To attach Head Start to Affirmative Action seems to be a cynical cross-stigmatization of unlike programs.

BTW, the first Food Stamp recipient was a very Caucasian unemployed coal miner from McDowell County, WV.

But their theory doesn’t work at all, even when the science is twisted to uphold their racist beliefs. Wouldn’t we want to fund more Head Start programs if there were more people out there who needed them? I used to work in special education, and everyone there agreed that the best thing to do for people with low IQs was get them into educational programs as soon as possible.

But of course, they just want to cut funds for Head Start, and they’ve come up with whatever absurd story they think will appeal to the lizardbrains out there.

Gary Ruppert says:

It’s not racism if the FACTS support the FACT that the coloreds, in FACT, are not as intelligent as the whites. [emphasis supplied]

-and-

ancient Rome collapsed because of the mongrelization of THERE genes [emphasis supplied]

Exhibit A for the proposition that white racists are dumber than pretty much everyone. Write much, Gary?

Not as good as PZ Myers response to end timers, flat earthers, and creationists. Up yours asshole just doesn’t convey the utter contempt you have for people like Murray and Sullivan. Try his instead.

You are a demented fuckwit.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t Head Start programs largely considered an effective use of money? I seem to recall studies showing that head start students did better in school later than comparable non-head starters, and I’m sure they kept tabs on ethnicity. So one could debate Murray by smacking him over the head with a copy of one of those studies while shouting, SUCK IT, DOUCHEBAG.

1994, eh?

Thanksgiving makes for a slow day on S,N!, eh?

brad, you nailed it. This kind of idiocy still shocks me to this day.

You shouldn’t be shocked. You should be… you shold be… OUTRAGED!!!(ONES)!!!

So, what about from 1992 (I’m assuming ’93 was an alright year)?

And, btw, if it took you *13 YEARS* for “the Proper Response”…

just sayin’.

Kyso K, you are correct. I know there have been several studies on the LTE of HS. I had to answer a questionnaire when I was in college and because I was also working at Head Start at the time so I had to enter a lot of data for that study! (Black screen, green letters, uggg….)

I’m feeling a bit lazy so I didn’t make a concerted effort to hunt it through the intertubes, but here’s a paper (pdf!) that discusses long and short term effects of Head Start. It’s only 20 pages, so not that good for bludgeoning.

The problem with this idea for the racists is that you find greater genetic variation within a human racial group than you do between different human racial groups.

I am not trying to argue the race or iq stuff at all…. But I am not sure this commonly stated proposition is as strong as it seems to be.

Badly stated, I think of music, or how radio works, or even comparisons of mountain ranges. I can distinguish between 70s rock and 80s rock but they are both made of the same notes and the variation within each group maybe greater than the variations between the groups themselves. Two different “Classic Rock” stations will be very very similar to each other, and differ in a single dimension: their carrier frequency. The songs carried on each show a much greater variation than do the two stations, but no one would say the stations are really the same. The foothills north of where I live now look very much the same as the foothills to the south of where I live. I would bet they are both very similar in terms of average height, base height, max height, … And within the two groups of hills, I know that there are a lot of ups and downs.

Here’s another one: apart from the gang colors, the clothes the actual members were are probably very similar. Jeans, T-Shirts, same basic sizes, …. Within the group the variations are much greater: small sizes and extra large sizes.

I’m just not sure that the argument that there is more variation within the group than between groups is a strong argument.

“Gary Ruppert said,

The fact is…(fart noises)”

This troll, real or fake, can suck my dick.

And, while sucking it, this troll can also check my dick to see what color it is.

I’m not sure how “variations” among radio stations, mountains or styles of clothing have any relevance to the degree of genetic variation within and between racial groups. You’re comparing apples and wallabies.

How does melanin affect cognitive function?

I’m talking about the ability of statistics to find a signal out of noise.

If you think of two different bell curves sampling anything, tree height in a forest of sequoias, you would probably immediately see what I was trying to say up above.

Say both forests are on adjacent mountains and one mountain’s base is at 1000 feet and is 10,000 feet high and the other mountain’s base is at 2000 feet and is 10,000 feet high.

Let everything else be the same.

Now measure the height of every single tree in both forests and plot them out for each forest.

It will almost certainly be the case that there is much greater variation in height between the two populations than between the two groups. Both will have trees that are 1 foot and both will have trees that are 150 feet tall. But the second group will probably be slightly smaller on average than the first group.

The bell curves will be just about identical, but centered about different means. Overlapping, but not strictly overlapping.

Since we constructed this, we know there is a reason for this, there is a real physical real world difference, the altitude of the mountains.

So all I am saying is that it’s not clear to me that having greater variation within a group than between groups doesn’t seem to be a strong argument that group effects aren’t important.

Let me elaborate a little. Comparing clothes, for instance, you look at clothing types (jeans, t-shirts), in which you see little variation between gangs, and sizes, where you see more variation within gangs, and seemingly conclude that the “greater” variation in sizes may not be as significant as the relatively lesser variation in clothing types. But “clothing type” is not the same thing as “clothing size,” so you are looking at two completely different variables that have no bearing on each other. Apples and wallabies.

Genetic variation, however, is a single variable that can be viewed both between and within racial groups, and conclusions as to the relative amount of variance can be determined. A more on-point analogy, using your clothes concept, would be to ask whether the variation of t-shirt sizes worn within a gang is greater than the variation in t-shirt sizes between two gangs. (But I still think it’s a useless analogy.)

Wait – did somebody _actually_ use the word “mongrelization”? What is this – 1930 in Alabama?

Yo, dipshit. The problem is _not_ that the science “tells us” politically incorrect “truths”. The problem is that racism is being passed off as science.

Ancient Rome did not “fall” because of the dilution of its superior race. It fell because, quite simply, it was not populated by a superior race at all. Among other things.

Actually, I prefer “Fuck your big-haired mother, hayseed,” but to each his own.
.

Genes are not hills, music or clothing – comparing them is very different than comparing lyrical, geographic or visual differences, and doing so is a meaningless exercise.
They in fact determine physical characteristics of living things. And in so doing, provide concrete evidence of relationships between and amongst, say, human beings.
Which show, with little doubt, that racist claims don’t even rise to the level of bullshit, they’re so wrong. Which makes the beliefs underlying those claims likewise wrong.
That’s what the variations show, and is, I think, Jillian’s point
It’s only a problem for racists, and it is pretty fucking strong.

This is the kind of civility, in this debate, that I expect from liberals. None, just namecalling and hate. Nobody has addressed the substance of my facts, that some races are not as smart as others. Facts. Provable by science, and easily observed with walking down the street or turning on the TV or reading a police blotter.

Or by sitting at home with the Turner Diaries and beating your dick raw.

If the spam filter wouldn’t be so touchy about a couple of little escape characters Gary would know that he was actually eaten by an alligator.

You know, as a white person who has enjoyed all the privileges and good fortune of whiteness, I have to say that “white people” (whatever the hell that means) are the most insecure motherfuckers that ever lived. Ever notice that it’s never about how smart white people are, but how stupid someone else is?

Oh, and here’s another curious thing–when another group, usually Asians, outperforms whites academically, it’s due to “cultural factors”. Funny, the question of genetic superiority never comes up in those cases, does it?

Gary: there is no substance to be addressed. You’re not a scientist. This is not science. I am a scientist. I know what the difference is between science and racism. At this point, lots of people have gone over the vapidity of the “scientific” argument. Basically, it isn’t a scientific argument. It’s people confusing correlation and causation, and singling out a single variable from a multivariable problem.

Actually, it’s worse than that. The proposed hypothesis: that intelligence is widely different between the races, has already been debunked by studies that show that IQ averages _within_ races have changed dramatically within the past century. Once it has been demonstrated that IQ scores are malleable to education levels, nutrition, and other cultural factors, the racist argument is completely dead.

“Mongrelization” is a KKK word. When you use it in a debate or discussion of any type, people are going to respond to you as if you are a KKK racist. Is that something that you do not understand?

“we should stop investing in early-childhood education for poor black kids”

If you edjamahcate them, they won’t be willing to fight in future wars.

Besides, you’d be taking money away from the Global War on Turra.

What kind of Murkin are you, anyway?

“Mongrelization” is a KKK word.

I’m betting most of the white supremacists can’t even spell “Mongrelization”.

Inbred and dumber than dirt, most of them.

This is the kind of civility, in this debate, that I expect from liberals. None, just namecalling and hate.

And now you’re changing the subject to tone. I guess you’d have to change the subject, eh? Run away! Run away!

Typical.

Don’t whine just because you have no argument to make. In future, you’ll find yourself whining less if you pick battles other than the ones where you’ve already been soundly beaten. This has been dealt with, time and again. Just like creationism, being unpopularly wrong doesn’t make you right, by virtue of your victimhood, it just means you’re an idiot. Unlike creationism, however, trying to make your bigotry into science only leaves you exposed as a bigot.

You are incapable of usefully defining either “race” or “smart,” which means you truly are stupid enough to be a conservative. Maybe we should pin you to a card and study you?
.

i don’t think you could even air a show like that in Canada without being up on hate crime charges.

Section 319

(1) Every one who, by communicating statements in any public place, incites hatred against any identifiable group where such incitement is likely to lead to a breach of the peace is guilty of

(a) an indictable offence and is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years; or

(b) an offence punishable on summary conviction.

Wilful promotion of hatred
(2) Every one who, by communicating statements, other than in private conversation, wilfully promotes hatred against any identifiable group is guilty of

(a) an indictable offence and is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years; or

(b) an offence punishable on summary conviction.

perhaps.a.problem –

The significance of the degree of within group/between groups variation regards the statistical reality of the groups. When within group variation is greater than between group variation then your grouping variables do not have statistical reality. In plain English that means that human “races” are not real, the established categories do not in fact describe significantly different and internally coherent groups. The best available data on genetic patterning in human beings shows 5-6 populations which are somewhat distinct from each other (though not enough to define subspecies, which is the proper modern terminology). Of these, 4-5 are in sub-Saharan Africa and the remaining population includes everyone else in the world. Even this analysis only accounts for less than 15% of the observed variation in humans, most of which is random variation between any two individuals (even from the same local community). It is also worth noting that humans are one of the least variable animal species. Our closest relatives, the chimpanzees, are 4 times as variable and fruit flies, with a simpler genome, are 10 times as variable. For the record, I am an anthropology professor.

Gary,

Your are a brain dead, racist fuckwit whose arguments have been repeatedly repudiated for almost a century now. You can kiss miss my hairy, white, miscegenist, hillybilly ass.

Oh hell yeah.

“Teach the Controversy”.

Hey, we’re just trying to present balanced science here.

Problem is, they want to balance the science with crackpot religious and tribal hatreds…

mikey

There is a really good discussion on this over at Crooked Timber though I have to say the discussion here is on par with theirs. However, the definitive smack down comes from Mr. Shalizi in his post In Which I Demand That Slate Refund My Subscription. Shalizi has the same twisted sense of humor we like here at SN.

Why do I not go into all the reasons why you shouldn’t accept the usual IQ framework in the first place? Alex? “Because you wrote about 22,000 words in two parts doing so already

If you really want to make use of that degree you have take a look at those two links and despair! Here are his feelings about this endless debate

Uncle Fritz Explains How It Feels to Argue about Intelligence Tests
What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you in your loneliest loneliness and say to you: “This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more; and there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy and every thought and sigh and everything unutterably small or great in your life will have to return to you, all in the same succession and sequence — even this spider and this moonlight between the trees, and even this moment and I myself. The eternal hourglass of existence is turned upside down again and again — and you with it, speck of dust!” — Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus?

I like this guy.

I’ve always hated the term “Racist”. Since there is actually only a single race of human beings, using the term perpetrates the ignorance.

I’ve always preferred ‘Terrified Little Bigot’. It is a much more accurate description of the mental illness.

This post “Those Voices Again” by Mr Shalizi is perhaps more accessible than his 22,000 word post linked to above. Though it is surely all beyond Gary’s comprehension. Being home schooled means never understanding just how fucking stupid you really are.

In the first place, this idea that there is a single thing called “intelligence” which tells us how well the mind works is on all fours with the idea that there is some single over-all “immunity” which tells us how well the body fights off infection. That’s not how the immune system works, and it’s not how the mind works either. On biological grounds, I would expect any ability we might actually care about to be influenced by many genes (and please remember what “X is a gene for Y in context Z” actually means), and in fact I’d expect many such genetic variations to be pleiotropic and epistatic.

Followed by much more goodness and healthy snark directed at our Alien Overlords.

Trolls, fake or otherwise, receive precisely the level of civility they deserve and have earned through their previous behaviour.

In other words, trolls should eat donkey shit while taking a flying fuck at a rolling donut.

I used to agree with the “let’s not debate them at all” position, but I actually think with this one you have to debate them, over and over again, because if you don’t their ideas leak into the discourse as “well, maybe a little bit true even if not totally true”. Which just keeps them alive for longer. I think it is actually worth it to smack them down over and over, if only because hearing the real science argument presented against the pseudo-science argument gives people who have an intuitive sense that the racist case is incorrect a way to say so convincingly. Not everybody is a scientist, not everybody knows a whole lot about genetics, so it’s important to have people who do out there talking about this stuff.

I know it gives the bad guys air time, too. But the thing is — the bad guys will FIND a way to have air time either way. Geneticists mostly don’t bother, because they aren’t invested in deceiving people — they publish in academic journals and figure truth marches on. Which it does, but at a slower rate than public discourse and policy-making march along. So when these guys come out with racist claptrap presented in a “sciencey” way, most of the public doesn’t have any defense against it — they think, gosh, I don’t know much about statistics or genetics, that guy sounds like he does, if he thinks that maybe he’s got grounds for it and is therefore at least a little bit right. That’s why it is so so important for people who DO know a lot about statistics to step out and say, “here’s why those ideas are in fact totally wrong”.

Is it gross that we STILL have debates about race and intelligence? For sure. But as far as arguing back goes: I think this is a case where we are *less* damned if we do, *more* damned if we don’t.

“Gary Ruppert said,

This is the kind of…(more fart sounds, burping, picks ass)”

Talk is cheap, shit-for-brains. I’m still waiting for you to suck my dick.

right on! there are no differences between peoples (groupings) and they do not form certain characteristics that make them differ from others.
We all get Tay Schs; we all react the same way to alcohol, Kenyans are no better than anyone else at long distance running and so forth: those perceived differences are merely cultural.

david still: Yes, that’s exactly the argument that’s being made here. Congratulations on your deep and witty insight.

there are no differences between peoples (groupings)

I’ll huff, and I’ll puff, and I’ll blow your straw argument down.

McArdle weighed in on this. Blacks aren’t dumb, they’re lazy.
*sigh*

In plain English that means that human “races” are not real,

Okay then, should “affirmative action” programs that purport to assist African-Americans be abolished since their very existence depends on identifying recipients as being a certain “race”?

“Okay then, should “affirmative action” programs that purport to assist African-Americans be abolished since their very existence depends on identifying recipients as being a certain “race”?”

No, those programs exist because of stupid assholes treating certain people differently because of their own perception of race. The fact that there’s no intrinsic difference between the races is what makes discrimination unfair, genius.

Okay then, should “affirmative action” programs that purport to assist African-Americans be abolished since their very existence depends on identifying recipients as being a certain “race”?

No. Race is a social construct and not a scientific one.

And david still: Yeah, I bet Kenya’s success at running has nothing to do with the money and expertise they’ve put into their training for the sport. It’s all because of their primitive, animalistic jungle stock.

Right effin’ on.

My wife taught Head Start in the east suburbs of Kansas City, MO in the early 80’s. The class was mostly poor whites. When we moved to the SW suburbs of Chicago the class was mostly poor middle eastern. There were a few poor blacks in both areas. The common denominator is Head Start helps poor people. What the hell does race have to do with it?

In America, race is used to hide class, Mart – so that we can pretend we are a society where class doesn’t really matter. It’s basically a pressure valve that the privileged classes use to make sure us working stiffs never get too uppity – they can always remind poor whiteys that at least they aren’t brown or anything. It keeps us in line.

And it is stunningly effective.

stupid assholes treating certain people differently because of their own perception of race

What were the stupid assholes perceiving?

And, to properly administer an affirmative action program, need the administrators share the same perception of race?

They are perceiving that the person looks different, or has a funny accent.

To give your strawman 1000% more attention than it deserves, nobody here is arguing that human beings have not culturally divided themselves into groups that they refer to as “races”. The point is that these divisions do not relate to any real, objective differences between these groups.

I read saletan’s column, i’m not sure which one, and when faced with any evidence that IQ testing differences between races are environmental and cultural he finds excuses. My favorite, the children of black GI’s in Germany test scores are identical to their all white peers so according to Saletan its because the US army preselects only the most intelligent American blacks. Where the fuck did he get that idea?

There are three levels of ignorance in this world. There is adult ignorance, which is the simple lack of knowledge. You can correct this kind of ignorance by informing the person of their error. They politely acknowledge, and go on. Then there’s juvenile ignorance. People grudgingly take time to admit that perhaps they were wrong about something, and eventually they get over it with some bitterness because their own ideas were sweet and dear to them, and they go on. Then there’s infantile ignorance.

This is red-faced, squalling refusal to deal with the facts. JOHNNY SAYS NOOOO!! in blind rage. It’s vaguely amusing in infants for a few minutes but when it happens to adults it’s embarrassing. Imagine one of these guys showing up at a fancy dinner party, standing up, and shitting their pants in front of everybody, making a face, squirting poo down their ankles, and so on. Then running around to all the people at the party and offering to make them smell.

That’s how you treat people like Murray and Herrnstein. They’re simply disgusting and immature and need to be sent home. But first to the bathroom to clean themselves up.

To give your strawman 1000% more attention than it deserves

Go on! Lavish attention on tde!

nobody here is arguing that human beings have not culturally divided themselves into groups that they refer to as “races”. The point is that these divisions do not relate to any real, objective differences between these groups.

So there is no “objective” difference betweeen Oprah and Kate Winslet?

david still said –

I will try to explain this to you in terms simple enough for even a racist fuckwit to understand. No one says there are no genetic differences between people or even localized populations, only that the large geographic “races” do not exist and that the geographically defined populations are much smaller (hundreds or thousands of people). Sickle Cell Anemia, for instance is found among Africans, South Asians, and Mediterranean populations, with its highest incidence in Greece. We do not all respond to alcohol the same way, but variation in this variable (which is polygenetic) seems not to be patterned by geography, but largely individual or familial. There are also culturally determined differences in drinking behaviors and responses to intoxication. As to the Kenyans ability at distance running, it is in fact cultural, reflecting the fact that many of the tribesmen have spent their whole lives walking and running long distances (often in very hilly terrain). This has been supplemented by technically sophisticated training programs sponsored by the government.

tde –
Affirmative action programs are actually intended to overcome the discriminatory behavior of racist fuckwits like yourself who would deny non-whites equal opportunities. They in no way address the innate capabilities of any group.

Finally as you are both racist fuckwits incapable of understanding plain English or following even the most basic logic, you may join Gary in kissing my hairy, white, miscegenist, hillbilly ass.

They in no way address the innate capabilities of any group.

Perhaps you haven’t heard, there are no “real, objective differences” between these groups.

There are many differences. They are two different people.

You are either so cretinous that you think that your last post is a valid good-faith argument, or (more likely, I suspect) you are engaging in bog-standard right-wing obfuscation and bullshit. Either way, see my comment re civility above.

I would like to acknowledge white power.

Also that I molest goats.

(By “your post above”, I meant the Oprah/Winslett thing. The main difference is that while Oprah may have been in many terrible movies, none was as absurdly overrated as Titanic.)

tde,

You have now proven that you are even dumber and more obtuse than even I had thought. There are “objective differences” between me and my sister or between any two individuals. These differences simply are not patterned anything that in any way resembles “race”. My statement did not in any way state or imply that there were any such differences between groups, merely tat the law does not in any way even address the issue. You on the other hand are dumber than a box of rocks and have as much perception as road kill.

DrDick – you 21:56 post certainly established your intelligence.

DrDick – you 21:56 post certainly established your intelligence.

I am a racist who cannot use pronouns properly.

Let’s see: Oprah, Whoopi, Cher, Madonna, Kate Winslet, Tyra Banks, Barbara Bush – is there any “real, objective” difference between these people? Is there any “real, objective” way to, say, place them in two different groups? Any way at all? I mean if your space ship landed tomorrow and you sucked them – up in your hose and you had to sort them out into different bins so you could take them back to your home planet, is there any “real, objective” way that you could do that? Any way at all?

Let’s see some of them have darker hair, some are heavy, some are thin, some have tattoos. Well I guess that’s it. No other “real, objective” differences I guess.

Yes, tde, it would nice if affirmative action wasn’t needed. Instead of aligning yourself with Gary Ruppert and whining like a priveleged bitch, why don’t you help end the discrimination that necessitates such programs.

Oprah and Kate Winslet

Sure there are. If we’re talking about genetics, there’s probably about as much of a difference as between, say, Camryn Manheim and Calista Flockhart. There may be genetic differences on average between identified groups, but those differences are not predictive in any useful way. That is, if child A is Black and child B is White, these group differences don’t yield any information on how we should actually treat either child. If we were to try to implement the most extreme hereditarian programs with these children, we may end up with, say, a mediocre basketball player and a mediocre scholar when a non-racist approach would have yielded a brilliant scholar and a brilliant athlete.

The most compelling implications of hereditarianism are already disproven. Without individual predictive power, the only situation in which demonstrated group differences in intelligence could be useful is if we couldn’t educate and rear children individually — that is, if our resources were so limited that it was necessary to make broad educational decisions for entire groups of people at a time.

objectivelypro-

I don’t have any problem with affirmative action – at least if you use the term in the way that Marshall did – that the redress of effects of past discrimination requires an “affirmative act” by the government, not merely prohibitions on continued discrimination.

But, for that to work, you have to use some reality based thinking which means, acknowledging, that there are “real, objective” differences between people.

Oprah, Whoopi, Cher, Madonna, Kate Winslet, Tyra Banks, Barbara Bush – is there any “real, objective” difference between these people?

Well, huh. Madonna, Cher, and Tyra Banks are pretty thin, Whoopi and Kate Winslet are somewhere in between, and Barbara Bush and Oprah have been pretty big in the past. So there’s one.

Oprah, Whoopi, Cher, Madonna, and Kate Winslet have all been “actors”, but only the last is really all that good. So I guess you’ve got good actors, bad actors, and everyone else.

I think Tyra Banks is pretty tall, as is Cher, but most of the rest are pretty short. So I guess you’ve got a grouping there.

Boy, there’s all sorts of physical differences there. I could do this all day.

Oh, and I think Oprah is richer than all the rest combined.

Djur said: There may be genetic differences on average between identified groups, but those differences are not predictive in any useful way.

Agreed.

The only way that the differences could be said to be predictive is if there were an adequately powered blinded study of twins of different races raised in precisely the same environment which, is, of course, impossible given the fact that racism continues to exist and would be an uncontrolled variable.

There is a difference, however, between your reasonable point and several others who make patently absurd arguments that there are no “real, objective” differences between people.

I prefer ‘OH, FUCK OFF’ as the appropriate response. As

And Jillian’s right: the bullshit talked about a ‘classless’ American society tends to miss the large pachyderm in the corner.

The only way that the differences could be said to be predictive

Just stop walking down this road you fucking idiot. Jesus.

tde: Then what, if I may ask, is the reasoning behind suggesting that affirmative action programs need to take racial differences into account? There’s nothing you’ve said up to this point that doesn’t make me think that your primary concern is the government lavishing books on black people, instead of basketballs.

Bubba – you are so angry that you are irrational. I hope you get your blood pressure under control.

Look!

It’s a perfect example of what Bradrocket was talking about, right here in this thread! I feel like David Attenborough!

…and here we see a prime member of the species Racist trollus in its natural habitat. Although trolluses like him were once more common, loss of safe breeding habitat has reduced their numbers dramatically. As they are commonly considered pests and rabid disease carriers by sane mambers of society, however, no one mourns their decrease overmuch.

Don’t let him drive you crazy if he calls you “angry”. The proper response to people saying racist things IS to get angry.

tde: Then what, if I may ask, is the reasoning behind suggesting that affirmative action programs need to take racial differences into account?

Two things: First: as originally constructed affirmative action was intended to address the tangible lingering effects of slavery and segregation. You cannot do that without considering race.

Second: I think there is a question about whether race based affirmative action is now too blunt of a tool and whether the government programs should be need and income based, rather than race based.

There’s nothing you’ve said up to this point that doesn’t make me think that your primary concern is the government lavishing books on black people, instead of basketballs.

Hmm, remember the “midnight basketball” programs of a few years ago when the government was actually lavishing basketball’s on black folks instead of books? That is the sort of program I have a problem with.

Oh – and nice catch by linking to my previous posts. I tried to throw you off the track by using the same sign in of “tde” but I guess you figured it out.

Well, I thought it’d be helpful to all here to note your tendency to hop into a thread, make vaguely reactionary comments, and then proceed to defend them by dividing your statements up and defending each at the expense of the others until everyone’s brains have turned to bisque.

It’s not your first time pulling the “I’m a liberal, but I don’t agree with any liberal policies, but how dare you suggest that I don’t agree with any single particular policy” card.

It doesn’t surprise me that you’re characterizing “midnight basketball” as “lavishing basketballs on black folks instead of books.” Let’s chalk that up in the “tde’s dittohead rhetoric” chronicles right next to “lavishing money on the homeless and drug addicts.”

Two things: First: as originally constructed affirmative action was intended to address the tangible lingering effects of slavery and segregation. You cannot do that without considering race.

Without considering perceived race, as a social construct, as basically everyone else in this thread has already said, you tremendous buffoon.

tde: You cannot do that without considering race discrimination.

Fixed.

Now, like RB said, stop being such a vigorous little terrier. Let it go.

I think that Brad Rocket is correct here. When confronted with the objective reality that some people are simply ineducable and incapable of constructing or understanding even the simplest logical argument (or basic English for that matter), then prudent intelligence and economy of effort principles dictate a simple and elegant response. Clearly that is the case with someone whose entire rhetorical arsenal consists of screaming “NO!” like a three year old and then acting innocent when confronted with it. On that, I will direct my final comment to tde, who has already wasted far too much of my time. Just talking to you kills brain cells. You are a walking advertisement for the eugenics movement. Up yours asshole!

tde is just conducting semantic word games. He is not interested in an intelligent examination of the the question. His only interest is in flamebaiting and trolling. It is common for trolls like tde to mistake semantic games for rational inquiry. They are not the same.

tde, please go read this and then this and then let me know where he went wrong, mmm kay?

“Oprah, Whoopi, Cher, Madonna, and Kate Winslet have all been “actors”, but only the last is really all that good.”

I thought Cher was pretty good in ‘Moonstruck,’ as was Nicholas Cage. But, jeez louise, I don’t think Nicholas Cage has been in any halfway decent movie since then. What’s up with that – does he have a shitty agent or something? He needs to pick his roles more carefully.

Then again, the rate for being in a shitty movie can’t be all that different from being in a good one, right? So, maybe it just comes down to professional pride or something.

You don’t think there’s one good movie on this list post-dating Moonstruck?

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000115/

“absurd arguments that there are no “real, objective” differences between people”

Sigh. It would be an absurd argument if anyone had made it. The point I made was that there are no significant widespread differences between the vast swathes of people that we culturally band together under the banner of “race”. Again, you’re either so dumb that you can’t see the difference, or you’re going for the standard right-wing rhetorical tactic known as “being a dick”.

In honour of the apparent tradition of “food posting” on this blog, I should point out that I have been off the thread because I’ve been frying up some fish cakes made with tinned tuna, salmon, scotch bonnet peppers and dill.

Two things: First: as originally constructed affirmative action was intended to address the tangible lingering effects of slavery and segregation. You cannot do that without considering race.

OK, you’re sort of right, but only if you recognize that “race” is an artificial cultural confabulation of differences in skin tone and regional origin.

Second: I think there is a question about whether race based affirmative action is now too blunt of a tool and whether the government programs should be need and income based, rather than race based.

Since “race” and discrimination based on it are properly seen as a social constructs, and continue to have lingering negative effects on some segments of society, it seems perfectly appropriate to address such past discrimination through social programs such as affirmative action.

Over at LawGunMon there’s a similar thread. I thought a comment by ‘Steve’ hit the nail squarely… umm, when all you have is a hammer… Sorry, the cliches piled up in my brain again.

This is the Slate school of kneejerk CW contrarianism…
Similarly, when people point out that the broad scientific consensus seems to be that genetic factors problem do have some result on intelligence, but they are hard to measure (and intelligence is hard to quantify) and the effect seems to be swamped out by environmental factors, to the Saletans and Sullivans of the world it’s a sign that liberals are slaves to political correctness. It has nothing to do, of course, with the yammerers discomfort with ideas about racial egalitarianism.

DrDick was busier on that thread than the proverbial one-armed paperhanger.

Smut Clyde,
“DrDick was busier on that thread than the proverbial one-armed paperhanger.”
Which explains my current, and probable future total lack of tolerance for this kind of bullshit. There initially appeared to be some sort of intellectually honest debate, though it quickly appeared that I was wrong in that assessment. It has become clear over the last few days that there is in fact no real desire to understand the facts, only to “score points” .

kiki –
Sounds delightful. I am currently preparing a roasted turkey leg seasoned with curry, two kinds of dressing/stuffing (is it still stuffing if you do not actually stuff anything?), and steamed broccoli with sesame seeds.

Schalizari’s summary of g, a Statistical Myth

Summary

Building factors from correlations is fine as data reduction, but deeply unsuited to finding causal structures. The mythical aspect of g isn’t that it can be defined, or, having been defined, that it describes a lot of the correlations on intelligence tests; the myth is that this tells us anything more than that those tests are positively correlated. It has been known for almost as long as factor analysis has been around that positive correlations can arise in many ways which involve nothing remotely like a general factor of intelligence. Thomson’s ability-sampling model, with its myriad independent causes rather than a single general cause, is the oldest and most extreme counter-example, but it is far from the only one. It is still conceivable that those positive correlations are all caused by a general factor of intelligence, but we ought to be long since past the point where supporters of that view were advancing arguments on the basis of evidence other than those correlations. So far as I can tell, however, nobody has presented a case for g apart from thoroughly invalid arguments from factor analysis; that is, the myth.

In primitive societies, or so Malinowski taught, myths serve as the legitimating charters of practices and institutions. Just so here: the myth of g legitimates a vast enterprise of intelligence testing and theorizing. There should be no dispute that, when we lack specialized and valid instruments, general IQ tests can be better than nothing. Claims that they are anything more than such stop-gaps — that they are triumphs of psychological science, illuminating the workings of the mind; keys to the fates of individuals and peoples; sources of harsh truths which only a courageous few have the strength to bear; etc., etc., — such claims are at present entirely unjustified, though not, perhaps, unmotivated. They are supported only by the myth, and acceptance of the myth itself rests on what I can only call an astonishing methodological backwardness.

The bottom line is: The sooner we stop paying attention to g, the sooner we can devote our energies to understanding the mind.

None of this will make a bit of difference to our trolls because they are not interested in learning, questioning or thinking. Their only interest is in being an ass. They are not really that different from creationists or the various net kooks who think “Einstein was wrong and I can prove it!!!”.

Still waiting for tde to suck Rightwingsnarkle’s dick.

“DrDick was busier on that thread than the proverbial one-armed paperhanger.”

Or, busier than one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest.

Bubba – yer right – I did see World Trade Center and, in general, really liked it. Thanks for the reminder.

Unfortunately, I haven’t seen any of the interesting ones (Bringing Out Dead; Wild at Heart) but have caught (usually while flipping through cable channels) such dreck as National Treasure, Face/Off, and Con Air).

I’ll have to get busy with Netflix, and welcome yer suggestions. Thing is, I really like Nicholas Cage for some reason. But it’s just too painful watching him in shitty movies. It’s like he doesn’t care.

So we know what that the “t” stands for “tedious.” What do the “d” and the “e” stand for?

Best answer wins a dream date with Dennis Miller!

[…] But increasingly I just find the response of The Hon. Dr. St. Rev. Bradley S. Rocket, Esq, PhD, MD to be the right one when confronted with this stuff. […]

Rome fell at least in part because of:
(a) lead pipes carrying the drinking water; and
(b) ferocious inbreeding of the ruling classes.

So, on the theory that the inherent superiority of the Romans would only be enhanced by combining their genes with their own genes, doesn’t the ‘inherent superiority of Teh Civilized Romans’ theory rather fall to the ground? Right along with the ‘destroyed by breeding with Teh Lesser Races’ theory?

Sheesh, racists are dumb.

Thing is, I really like Nicholas Cage for some reason.

For Nicholas Cage as loon, Vampire’s Kiss is pretty good. Red Rock West is the best of the lot that I’ve seen. I didn’t much like Wild at Heart or Adaptation, although they have the hipster thumbs up and Cage is good/endearing in both.

As an acting/directing jerkoff the first 20 minutes of Snake Eyes is a single shot of Cage being crazed and wandering through situation after situation in a sports arena. I’m mesmerized by that bit but the movie as a whole is ridiculous garbage.

So we know what that the “t” stands for “tedious.” What do the “d” and the “e” stand for?

Best answer wins a dream date with Dennis Miller!

dog-bothering egotist.

If I win, I’ll only go on the date if Dennis promises not to speak.

Qetesh the Abyssinian –
While those things may have contributed, overextension, excessive exploitation of the provinces, and a culture of indulgence among the elites played far larger roles. Again, however, had absolutely nothing to do with “mongrelization”. Indeed, a couple of the better emperors (not really much of a contest overall) were dirty foreigners, one German and one North African. Racists really are stupid. Wonder what they would make of the concept of “hybrid vigor” (don’t even know if that one is even current)?

Gary Ruppert said,
November 22, 2007 at 15:36

The fact is, liberals scream science when they twist it to support their greenshirt enviro theories or socialist boondoggles, but they scream “hate” when scientists post something they do not like.

It’s called “bad science,” dickweed. Deal with it.

Liberals, conservatives, libertarians, straights, gays — many in all of these groups love bad science and try to shout down anyone that disagrees with them.

Bad science is bad science regardless of which “side” you’re on.

Often times, you can tell the bad science by figuring out who is screaming loudest that alternatives cannot even be examined.

Good science is accompanied with skepticism, discussions of what is known and what is not known, discussions of flaws, discussions of what is right and wrong about alternative theories, and rarely by screaming “you are a racist fucktard.”

Does this thread contain a discussion of good science? Sadly, no, it contains an example of politically motivated shouting.

That’s not to say there is anything at all to “race vs. iq”, it’s to say that no one in this thread, has begun to address the scientific issues at anything more than the first page of wikipedia shouting.

the first 20 minutes of Snake Eyes is

yes, that is awesome.

I have to confess to a serious love for National Treasure. *hides*.

not fond of bad science said,
November 23, 2007 at 2:24

no one in this thread, has begun to address the scientific issues at anything more than the first page of wikipedia shouting.

I guess you didn’t understand exactly what Brad/we mean by “The only proper response: Civilized people should respond by saying, “UP YOURS ASSHOLE!!” Because anything less than that simply gives these people far too much credibility.”

not fond of bad science said,complained without offering anything of worth
November 23, 2007 at 2:24

For anyone who fails to see race as anything other than a social and political construction, especially those powerful enough to actually do something about it, up their assholes!

funny, not fond, for about 80% of your post it sounded like you were setting yourself up to make the obvious point that the very people responsible for advocating bad science were the ones apoplectic and screaming, “You’re just a bunch of PeeCee libruls who are close-minded to the Truth!”

What a shame you end up at a conclusion that completely contradicts your entire set-up. Really, now, dusting off and rolling out long-debunked ideas that are at their heart racist because–get this–they make sweeping generalizations about people groups, this is good science?

I’ll take the bad science, then.

no one in this thread, has begun to address the scientific issues at anything more than the first page of wikipedia shouting.

Not sure what you want. Way upstream, Noen has provided a couple of links to Shalizi’s blog, where Shalizi devotes 22,000 words to a dissection of the g-factor and of factor-analysis misuse. There’s a link to a LGM thread (one of several devoted to the topic) where DrDick went into more detail about twin studies and brain-weight / intelligence correlations than the human mind is designed to handle. Or if you like, here’s a 2005 paper from American Psychologist by Sternberg &c which covers the issue, though the authors make the mistake in the first sentence of describing Rushton as a ‘scholar’ when ‘demented fuckwit’ would be closer to the truth.

Dr. St. Rev. Bradley S. Rocket’s point was that the science is already established; there is no need to “address the scientific issues”, and the moot point is how to engage people who pretend otherwise.

Come to think of it, I’ll cut-and-paste the Abstract from Sternberg’s paper:

In this article, the authors argue that the overwhelming portion of the literature on intelligence, race, and genetics is based on folk taxonomies rather than scientific analysis. They suggest that because theorists of intelligence disagree as to what it is, any consideration of its relationships to other constructs must be tentative at best. They further argue that race is a social construction with no scientific definition. Thus, studies of the relationship between race and other constructs may serve social ends but cannot serve scientific ends. No gene has yet been conclusively linked to intelligence, so attempts to provide a compelling genetic link of race to intelligence are not feasible at this time. The authors also show that heritability, a behavior-genetic concept, is inadequate in regard to providing such a link.

There’s no science at all involved here, in fact, and that’s the ultimate point.
There’s bigots trying to use pseudo-scientific gobblety-gook to ‘justify’ their racism. That’s it. Science involves empirical reality. You can’t reason with someone who’s already rejected reason in their arguments.
Whoever you are, either you’re in support of these views, or you’re a useful idiot for taking them the least bit seriously.
This is the equivalent of the flat earth society.

Thanks for the Nicholas Cage referrals, Bub.

a different brad, you may think that you are battling a few racists that come by here all the time, but your audience is far larger than that, and by and large, their knowledge of the science here is dated, if you’re lucky, if we’re lucky, 1985-1995 or so.

At someone’s blog yesterday (yglesias’?), it was noted that in 1985, only 17% of “educated people in fields that should know” thought that there was no such thing as race. By 1995, it was just a hair over 50% of anthropologists. It has only become a majority of anthropologists disbelieving in race in the past 10 years. And by majority, well it probably means it’s not too hard to find intellectually honest anthropologists that right or wrong, disagree.

Most of this settled science is by no means settled as far as most people know. That’s not because they are racist fucktards. That’s not because they are useful tools

That’s because that’s how scientific knowledge disseminates.

It’s also relatively unheard of to most of these people that well, any science can be considered settled science in such a short time. And we see researchers like Neil Risch saying it may not be that settled.

If you’re going to accuse people willy nilly of being racist fucktards and useful tools even though you admit you know nothing about them just because they are honestly trying to determine what is settled and what is not, well, I don’t think that’s going to be a winning strategy.

It may be the appropriate response to a few select individuals.

But I don’t think that’s the approach a blog should take to any person that stops by and asks questions honestly, and sincerely, in an attempt to determine for themselves what is known.

Not to mix metaphors, but the shout people down and insist any dissent was from fucktard sexists approach worked real well for Ilyka Damen. At the same time, her cries that any dissenters were whining angry white guys making bullshit claims of political correctness are also closely mirrored in this thread.

I graduated in the early 80s, with a heavy concentration in chemistry, biology, and even anthropology. I am not at all surprised to learn that either race or IQ is considered to be bullshit concepts scientifically. But while I understand the problems that “IQ” poses, I find it harder to think that there is not today, or will not be someday, various entities that strongly correspond to well developed intelligence. And while I see no reason to claim everyone who is black is of one race, and everyone asian is of another, I think the claim that there are no races at all, or even that there are no closely related and meaningful ways to distinguish between subpopulations is surprising and was not necessarily a given. And so I find it hard to fault people that aren’t sure which “good” scientists to believe. The guy from up above, or Neil Risch, or some of the other scientists in the field.

So I will end it by reiterating, shouting at people for all their assumed fucktard ways and thinking the worst of them just because you *know* you’re right, and their immoral bastards determined to do the world ill for their own selfish reasons, well, nice to meet you Ilyka, welcome back to blogging.

Rightwingsnarkle,

You might enjoy Matchstick Men, of the scammer-gets-scammed genre, with a not so in-yer-face Nicholas Cage and Sam Rockwell as “salesmen”.

I find it harder to think that there is not today, or will not be someday, various entities that strongly correspond to well developed intelligence.

Oh fuck off. Do the research or shut up about it.

[…] those of us sane enough to recognize the stupidity of that argument respond? Bradley S. Rocket has the answer: Certain ideas do not deserve to be “debated” by civilized people. The idea that black people […]

Geez, how am I supposed to snark back if you’re going to be all reasonable like that?
I’m glad you’re not being willfully obtuse, and I’m sorry for the intensity of the “useful idiot” crack, tho I somewhat stand by the underlying sentiment.
My problem with engaging Bell Curve devotees, or the like, directly is it, to my mind, treats their arguments as legitimate enough to deserve a considered response. I think this is basically what bradrocket was saying, and, as usual, I agree with him.
I disagree because I think the mushy middle you’re referring to as “in play” doesn’t necessarily listen to the details of an argument so much as who “wins” it. The problem is there’s no way to win an argument with someone arguing in bad faith, and so a passionate response from the onset remains, to me, the best option.
But there’s also two issues at play. You’re right that deconstructing the concept of race is a project that needs to be carried into the public sphere to a much greater degree, and that shouting about it won’t help, most of the time. What we’re shouting about, tho, is the idea that, within the dying concept of race, there is a hierarchy of intelligence. If you take that seriously, and try to argue against it, you’re giving that argument enough credit that others might find it salvageable, or even compelling because they don’t like you. That mushy middle doesn’t make decisions based on reason, but a host of other factors, generally. The best idea is to get a naked supermodel to do all the anti-racism arguing in public, probably, but obscenity laws are weird like that.

Just for the record, this isn’t a discussion of dogma, but tactics. Ilyka has no concern for tactics, because she is right.

The best idea is to get a naked supermodel to do all the anti-racism arguing in public
I would certainly give my undivided attention to the cogency of her arguments.

Scratch an anti-tax nutball, find a racist.

Well then “not fond of bad science” could you please explain to me how skin melanin affects cognitive reasoning? Because that is what we are talking about here. How do you suppose that works then? What do your years of biochemistry tell you is the likely answer huh? Where is the mechanism? What do dark skinned people in Australia, Africa, South America, The Caribbean, The Arctic Circle, India, and the Polynesian Islands all have in common? One thing and one thing only, more melanin than us Caucasians do and nothing else.

Why is this hard? I got this in high school. “You mean the difference is that some people have more pigment in their skin? Yes. Oh, ok.” But apparently this is rocket science for you.

When you get down to it what we are talking about is some people who use statistical analysis to massage their data into a form that confirms their racism. Take for instance Rushton’s study on anatomical correlation between brain weight and penis size. Do you want to know how he conducted that study? He walked around in shopping malls asking men their dick size. He also asked his students how far they could ejaculate. Other studies of his have been found to source articles in “Penthouse Forum”. Yes people, we aren’t talking just bone stupid here, we’re talking fetish.

Do you notice a pattern here?

To Whom It May Concern:

Posting the name of our client in this blog post is a breach of contract, and morally reprehensible. The proper authorities have been contact.

You have been notified.

Sincerely,
New York Law Firm

I find it harder to think that there is not today, or will not be someday, various entities that strongly correspond to well developed intelligence.
That is certainly possible. But it is not a good idea to go looking for these hypothetical quantities while people like Rushton still have any credibility at all. In the current milieu, if some researcher came up with an operational version of ‘intelligence’, then the first question would be “Does it correlate well with our discredited measures of g-factor?”
The next question will be “Does it have a high heritability?”
Last question — “Does it show a negative correlation with skin melanin?”

If a quantity failed any of these tests, then I suspect that people like Murray and Saletan simply would not accept it as a valid measure of Intelligence.

What not fond is imagining is a hefty 8″ measuring stick instead of the measly little thing available right now and that’s all.

It’s like the fucking Discovery Institute around here and people want to teach the controversy.

could you please explain to me how skin melanin affects cognitive reasoning?
This is not a new idea, and other people have expounded it with greater elegance, but ultimately the idea that “Dark skin = Stoopid” was a rationalisation for the slave trade. You read accounts of explorers from before then, or Moorish characters in literature, and there is no expectation that they will be any less intelligent than the European characters.
One of the bizarre aspects of of the US race / intelligence rhetoric over the last decade or so is that it’s designed to prop up these Zombie Rationales which were only relevant two centuries ago, when they were reducing cognitive dissonance among slave-owners and slave-traders.

What do dark skinned people in Australia, Africa, South America, The Caribbean, The Arctic Circle, India, and the Polynesian Islands all have in common?
Umm, all colonised by Europeans?

“Let’s all be reasonable!” the Flat Earth Society president cried. “After all, we’re just interested in science!!!“

[…] been less shy than Saletan about drawing public policy conclusions from this supposed evidence. Bradley S. Rocket writes Dr. Atrios posts this 1994 transcript from PBS’ News Hour of several polite and serious people […]

So Rome fell because all that breeding with their Germanic,Celtic,Slavic,and Greek slaves messed them up. It figures.

What, thread not quite dead yet? OK, one more thought.

not fond of bad science said,
Most of this settled science is by no means settled as far as most people know. That’s not because they are racist fucktards. That’s not because they are useful tools
I’m guessing that Bradrocket wrote this post in response to William Saletan’s column in Slate. In Saletan’s case, you can’t blame his ignorance about actual settled science on the failure of the scientists to spread the word fast enough. His position is that science has established the reality of white superiority, so if liberals don’t accept it, they must be willfully blind. He coins the phrase “liberal creationists” for people who reject white superiority — people like Gould or Ashley Montague. Ignorance is not enough to account for Saletan’s form of wrongness resting on cherry-picked factoids, but “racist fucktard” fits the bill.

The thread inspired me to hunt through the bookshelf and dredge out a couple of Analog magazines from 1976 (was it really been three decades since “Children of Dune” was serialised? Eeek). One of the issues contained a rant by L. Sprague de Camp on “The Breeds of Man”.

Now de Camp was starting from the same contrarian position as Saletan… he reckons that people opposed to the idea of a black / white intelligence difference are “sentimental egalitarians”, since the term “political soundness” was not around at the time. But he also had far more integrity. So at the end of his column, after weighing the evidence, he concedes that the sentimental egalitarians were right.

If people are still arguing 30 years later, it’s not because the science is in flux, or because the science is slow to disseminate into the circle of pundits, it’s because some journalists are fighting to keep it out. And as Noen said, there are “some people who use statistical analysis to massage their data into a form that confirms their racism.”

It’s funny how Murray’s own dubious methods “prove” that asians are smarter than anyone but you never hear the right shouting about that. Unless its to accuse us of taking over the world. Or asking us to do their homework.

Look, I’m of east asian origin and this is the second time I’ve been slow off the mark to comment on a thread here. Suck on that fact, Murray.

In case you folks are confused (and it certainly appears to be the case), this is supposed to be a republic, NOT a democracy.where in a republic, the INDIVIDUALS right to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, property rights and so forth are protected. In a democracy, the majority takes from the minority anything it pleases. Its a bully situation and was abhorrent to the framers of the Constitution. YOUR rights are protected as well as those of whom you do not approve for whatever reason.

In case you folks are confused (and it certainly appears to be the case)

Psst: you are responding to people who wrote many years ago. Also you are stupid. From this we can conclude that thepilatesbiz is for complete fucking idiots.