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What's wrong with a real discussion of IQ?

We can talk about it, but it doesn't amount to a hill of beans. It's a meaningless metric.
 
We can talk about it, but it doesn't amount to a hill of beans. It's a meaningless metric.

I do not believe it is meaningless, and neither do most serious students of the topic.:peace
 
Because while there is a race based difference in IQ, the discussion from that point becomes political.

IQ determines intelligence, to then tie it to race you need to account for socio-cultural elements, but the emphasis of genetics over cultural elements in a lot of literature is where the problem lies, because a lot of people don't understand genetics, and there has been no race-spanning gene that determines intelligence discovered.

My personal belief is that intelligence is based far more on access and attitudes to education than to any inherent traits, simply because I've often seen dumb kids with smart parents, or smart kids with dumb parents.

Furthermore, racists will use such info to justify themselves, and statistical data cannot be applied to individuals. And this is what many people seem to forget.
 
I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with discussing that their might be cognitive differences between races. When you get to policy changes based on that it can get a little murkier. I'm wondering what type of policy changes Mr. Richwine proposed in his dissertation. He didn't mention them.
 
Because while there is a race based difference in IQ, the discussion from that point becomes political.

IQ determines intelligence, to then tie it to race you need to account for socio-cultural elements, but the emphasis of genetics over cultural elements in a lot of literature is where the problem lies, because a lot of people don't understand genetics, and there has been no race-spanning gene that determines intelligence discovered.

My personal belief is that intelligence is based far more on access and attitudes to education than to any inherent traits, simply because I've often seen dumb kids with smart parents, or smart kids with dumb parents.

Furthermore, racists will use such info to justify themselves, and statistical data cannot be applied to individuals. And this is what many people seem to forget.

Why not deal with the data instead of treating us to an unrequested survey of your personal beliefs?:peace
 
I do not believe it is meaningless, and neither do most serious students of the topic.:peace
Most serious students lend it no credence as being indicative of anything beyond itself.
 
I do not believe it is meaningless, and neither do most serious students of the topic.:peace

Tell us what you think of Howard Gardner's seminal work on the subject. Do us a favor and don't cut and paste.
 
That is a thoroughly uninformed assertion.
You kidding? We've done this to death.

What does it mean in real world terms? That certain professions are verboten on account of it? That certain lifestyles or opportunities are unattainable for want of an impressive IQ score? What does it mean to a musician or a chef?

It's limited crap.
 
Tell us what you think of Howard Gardner's seminal work on the subject. Do us a favor and don't cut and paste.

Gardner is a good man who wants to help people. Analytically his work is incoherent, and falls short of relevance in this discussion. He is is of the "wishing can make it so" school of thought.:peace
 
You kidding? We've done this to death.

What does it mean in real world terms? That certain professions are verboten on account of it? That certain lifestyles or opportunities are unattainable for want of an impressive IQ score? What does it mean to a musician or a chef?

It's limited crap.

You've done it badly to death.
 
Why Can't We Talk About IQ? - Jason Richwine, Politico

Political correctness should not impede the search for real solutions.:peace

Look, Jack - I'm fairly sure that there's no malicious intent in your OP, but that exact moment that a society accepts that one race is less intelligent than another race, in that moment, the so-called 'less intelligent' race officially becomes an underclass, to be shunned in society and in business by those not of that race...and the young people of that race would become all the more rebellious and would take their frustration out on those not of their race.

Now I figure that you never had any intention for such to happen...but that's what WOULD happen, as anyone who grew up in the MS Delta can tell you from first-hand experience - for nowhere else in America is there such an entrenchment of social classes based on race.

I mean, really, Jack - what's going to happen on a college campus when it says there in the textbook that due to biology, Hispanics and/or blacks are more likely to have lower IQ's? While a merely objective discussion by real scientists of differences in intelligence between the races might sound reasonable, in the modern day that such discussions are almost impossible to keep secret, the moment such discussions become public would greatly - and irrevocably - damage the fabric of society. One (or more) race becomes an underclass - permanently, mind you - and the friction between that race and the favored race (especially among young men with Constitutionally-guaranteed access to firearms) will often turn deadly. You REALLY don't want to go there.

So...yes, there ARE subjects that are never, ever wise to broach. This is one of them.
 
It's really a difficult topic to discuss, because it's almost inevitable that the findings are picked up by people who leave the academic realm and instead either misinterpret them and/or draw the wrong conclusions, because of political or social agendas and or the need to confirm the own view. That happens both on the side of racists and "political correctness" advocates.

There was an interview with an expert I read the other day, who claimed many studies suggest there are indeed significant race differences when it comes to the IQ on average. IIRC, in America, the average IQ of Jews was 108, East Asians 106, whites 103, Hispanics 89 and African Americans 85.

But what does that tell us? Basically nothing. It doesn't answer the question how much of it is genetic, and how much is nurture (studies seem to suggest the influence of genes on IQ is at ca. 58% -- which leaves a lot of room for improving nurture factors). It doesn't allow any conclusion regarding any given individual, as these numbers are just average IQs (there are still many blacks with IQs of 130+ and many East Asians with IQs below 70). And even if it was possible to draw conclusions on entire racial groups, that still doesn't mean there was any justification for different treatment of these groups, right?

Yet racists draw these conclusions. And PC advocates attack these studies and the experts, because they think asking these questions is racism already.
 
It's really a difficult topic to discuss, because it's almost inevitable that the findings are picked up by people who leave the academic realm and instead either misinterpret them and/or draw the wrong conclusions, because of political or social agendas and or the need to confirm the own view. That happens both on the side of racists and "political correctness" advocates.

There was an interview with an expert I read the other day, who claimed many studies suggest there are indeed significant race differences when it comes to the IQ on average. IIRC, in America, the average IQ of Jews was 108, East Asians 106, whites 103, Hispanics 89 and African Americans 85.

But what does that tell us? Basically nothing. It doesn't answer the question how much of it is genetic, and how much is nurture (studies seem to suggest the influence of genes on IQ is at ca. 58% -- which leaves a lot of room for improving nurture factors). It doesn't allow any conclusion regarding any given individual, as these numbers are just average IQs (there are still many blacks with IQs of 130+ and many East Asians with IQs below 70). And even if it was possible to draw conclusions on entire racial groups, that still doesn't mean there was any justification for different treatment of these groups, right?

Yet racists draw these conclusions. And PC advocates attack these studies and the experts, because they think asking these questions is racism already.

That is pretty much exactly what I think. Even if it is true, there is just no way to justify any policy changes based on it.
 
Look, Jack - I'm fairly sure that there's no malicious intent in your OP, but that exact moment that a society accepts that one race is less intelligent than another race, in that moment, the so-called 'less intelligent' race officially becomes an underclass, to be shunned in society and in business by those not of that race...and the young people of that race would become all the more rebellious and would take their frustration out on those not of their race.

Now I figure that you never had any intention for such to happen...but that's what WOULD happen, as anyone who grew up in the MS Delta can tell you from first-hand experience - for nowhere else in America is there such an entrenchment of social classes based on race.

I mean, really, Jack - what's going to happen on a college campus when it says there in the textbook that due to biology, Hispanics and/or blacks are more likely to have lower IQ's? While a merely objective discussion by real scientists of differences in intelligence between the races might sound reasonable, in the modern day that such discussions are almost impossible to keep secret, the moment such discussions become public would greatly - and irrevocably - damage the fabric of society. One (or more) race becomes an underclass - permanently, mind you - and the friction between that race and the favored race (especially among young men with Constitutionally-guaranteed access to firearms) will often turn deadly. You REALLY don't want to go there.

So...yes, there ARE subjects that are never, ever wise to broach. This is one of them.

No it's not! You don't stop looking into a topic just because some dumbasses might try to twist it around into something it's not. Honestly that's one of the poorest excuses for abandoning a topic of study that I've ever heard.
 
Never gonna know until you are able to definitively measure nature and nurture against each other in a broad number of cases.


Just because the average IQ OF THOSE TESTED is lower for one race than another, does not mean that race has a genetic disposition towards low IQ.

Correlation =\= causation. Too many factors involved, and of them, race is about the least relevant, so far as we know now.


Likely, it has a LOT more to do with cultural demographics (like reading to your kids, what music you listen to, vocabulary used in their presence, etc etc) than any other factor.


Just my opinion of course.
 
No it's not! You don't stop looking into a topic just because some dumbasses might try to twist it around into something it's not. Honestly that's one of the poorest excuses for abandoning a topic of study that I've ever heard.
What about abandoning a debate because it might make us gay?
 
Why Can't We Talk About IQ? - Jason Richwine, Politico

Political correctness should not impede the search for real solutions.:peace

You can talk about it but will likely be labeled a racist, bigot or some other such term for daring to buck political correctness. People have no difficulty accepting that athletic ability and resistance to disease are traits controlled largely by genetics, yet any suggestion (proven or not) that other factors are genetic as well is not "cool".
 
Because IQ's are not indicative of intelligence.
 
Why Can't We Talk About IQ? - Jason Richwine, Politico

Political correctness should not impede the search for real solutions.:peace

I'm of the opinion that if you give any number of licensed, Board Certified physicians an IQ test, across the racial, ethnic boundaries, it will make no difference. They'll score similarly.

The problem with IQ tests is that they test our school systems -- and the effectiveness of inner-city schools. They aren't working, so IQ tests will reflect that.
 
No it's not! You don't stop looking into a topic just because some dumbasses might try to twist it around into something it's not. Honestly that's one of the poorest excuses for abandoning a topic of study that I've ever heard.

"...because some MIGHT try to twist it into something it's not"? Dude, there's no 'might' about it - they WOULD. And anyone who's ever seen firsthand - LIVED - what life is like when there's a dominant class and an underclass knows where this would wind up.

Anyone who thinks otherwise is either incredibly naive...or simply racist.
 
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