Blacks and testosterone

[idunno]

http://www.jonentine.com/reviews/Daily_Express_9_8_2000.htm

see above. Is it true blacks have more Testosterone?
Can we say the more you go South or towarsd the heat the more muscle and less fat people have?:boxedin:

[bpesta22]

And lower IQ / smaller brains / according to Rushton / Jenson / Lynn.

Rushton & Jensen 2005:

The currently most commonly accepted view of human origins, the “Out-of-Africa” theory, posits that Homo sapiens arose in Africa about 150,000 years ago, expanded northward beyond Africa about 100,000 years ago, with a European–East Asian split about 41,000 years ago (Cavalli-Sforza et al., 1994; Stringer &
McKie, 1996). In Cavalli-Sforza’s (2000) maximum likelihood tree devised on the basis of molecular genetic markers, the most distant group was the Africans, with Europeans and Asians being closer. Cavalli-Sforza observed, “All world trees place the earliest split between Africans and non-Africans, which is expected
given that all humans originated in Africa” (p. 72). This is also the conclusion of other reviewers (e.g., Risch et al., 2002).

Evolutionary selection pressures were different in the hot savanna where Africans lived than in the cold northern regions Europeans experienced, or the even colder Arctic regions of East Asians. These ecological differences affected not only morphology but also behavior. It has been proposed that the farther north
the populations migrated out of Africa, the more they encountered the cognitively demanding problems of gathering and storing food, gaining shelter, making clothes, and raising children successfully during prolonged winters (Rushton, 2000). As these populations evolved into present-day Europeans and East Asians,
the ecological pressures selected for larger brains, slower rates of maturation, and lower levels of testosterone—with concomitant reductions in sexual potency, aggressiveness, and impulsivity; increases in family stability, advanced planning, self-control, rule following, and longevity; and the other characteristics listed in
Table 3. The fact that the three-way pattern in IQ, brain size, and other traits is not unique to the United States but occurs internationally is consistent with a single, general (genetic– evolutionary) theory, whereas culture-only theory must invoke a number of highly localized, specific explanations.

As Homo sapiens migrated further away from Africa, the random genetic mutations that occur at a constant rate in all living species accumulated, along with the adaptive changes. The resulting differences in allele frequencies are sufficient for numerous and extensive genetic investigations to yield essentially the same picture and identify the same major racial groupings as did the morphological markers of classical anthropology. The greatest genetic divergence within the human species is between Africans (who have had the most time for random mutations to accumulate) and non-Africans (Cavalli-Sforza 2000; Cavalli-Sforza et al., 1994; Nei & Roychoudhury, 1993). Jensen (1998b, pp. 517–520) carried out a principal-components analysis of data on genetic markers from Nei
and Roychoudhury (1993) and found the familiar clustering of races: (a) East Asians, (b) Europeans and East Indians, (c) South Asians and Pacific Islanders, (d) Africans, (e) North and South Amerindians and Eskimos, and (f) Aboriginal Australians and Papuan New Guineans. Howells’s (1993) analysis of betweengroups variation in craniometric data also revealed a similar population tree. The
genetic hypothesis is consistent with the latest findings on human origins and genetic variation, whereas culture-only theory is indifferent to them (Crow, 2002).

[JoeEllison]

Yay for racism!

[bpesta22]

Ok, read the op's linked article objectively and explain why Rushton is doing "racist science' by claiming a race difference in IQ but the author is not being racist nor pseudo scientific when he claims a race difference in athletic ability?

Am I missing something?

[JoeEllison]

Ok, read the op's linked article objectively and explain why Rushton is doing "racist science' by claiming a race difference in IQ but the author is not being racist nor pseudo scientific when he claims a race difference in athletic ability?

Am I missing something?
Because Rushton cheats the numbers to push a racist agenda?

This question seems like it would be broken into two parts. Let's tackle the one, before bothering with the other. Do you know about Rushton, his ties to white supremacists, his lack of academic integrity, and his overall racist agenda?

Let's see what result that gets, before moving on to athletic performance.

[idunno]

Ok, read the op's linked article objectively and explain why Rushton is doing "racist science' by claiming a race difference in IQ but the author is not being racist nor pseudo scientific when he claims a race difference in athletic ability?

Am I missing something?

good point. Normally it is not deemed racism to say blacks are superior athletes, only when IQ :boxedin: is mentioned do people get hot

[idunno]

Because Rushton cheats the numbers to push a racist agenda?

This question seems like it would be broken into two parts. Let's tackle the one, before bothering with the other. Do you know about Rushton, his ties to white supremacists, his lack of academic integrity, and his overall racist agenda?

Let's see what result that gets, before moving on to athletic performance.

Please stick to my questions?:)

[bpesta22]

Because Rushton cheats the numbers to push a racist agenda?

This question seems like it would be broken into two parts. Let's tackle the one, before bothering with the other. Do you know about Rushton, his ties to white supremacists, his lack of academic integrity, and his overall racist agenda?

Let's see what result that gets, before moving on to athletic performance.

Rushton was a reviewer on an article I got accepted in Intelligence.

Can you show me examples of bad science on his part or lack of academic integrity?

Everything I've read that he's published seems balanced, fair, and better than most people's science.

So, focus on not attacking his character (not saying you are doing that) but attacking his science if you can.

[bpesta22]

I think also it's a very serious charge to claim that Rushton has fudged data-- libelous even unless you have facts to support it.

[JoeEllison]

Rushton was a reviewer on an article I got accepted in Intelligence.

Can you show me examples of bad science on his part or lack of academic integrity?

Everything I've read that he's published seems balanced, fair, and better than most people's science.

So, focus on not attacking his character (not saying you are doing that) but attacking his science if you can.

Gotcha, there's absolutely no reason to discuss anything with you, ever. I'm not interested in engaging with racists, or those who apologize for racists... no offense.

[bpesta22]

Wow, way to be a skeptic. I submit you can't support your claims and are walking away from an argument you will lose while claiming the higher moral ground.

Talk about cowardly!

[idunno]

Wow, way to be a skeptic. I submit you can't support your claims and are walking away from an argument you will lose while claiming the higher moral ground.

Talk about cowardly!
:)
i agree. Walking away and name calling is anti-skeptic

[INRM]

How much a difference would you see intelligence wise. I know plenty of black people who are of adequate intelligence, about the same as anybody else, I even know some black people who are quite smart, as I know some white people who are.

Statistically, just for the hell of it...what's the average mass of a human brain, full grown black male, full grown white male?

INRM
(How do I have this feeling that the size isn't much different)

[casebro]

Brain size is not related to IQ.

[idunno]

in my observations , as we travel southwards in Europe and Africa, people seem to have less fat and more muscle. I just dont know if it is genetic or the result of a less sedentary life and the less fatty mediterranean diet

[idunno]

talking about racism i was watching on the odyssey channel a show called racism« where British Geneticist Steve Jones talks, and it seems the nazi holocaust was just the peak of scientific racism not an isolated event.
In 19th century 30 million indians died in worse conditions than Auschwitz under english rule, and in N:boxedin: amibia the Germans copied the English by building concentration camps for black rebels

[bpesta22]

Brain size is not related to IQ.

This is a meta-analysis

Big-brained people are smarter: A meta-analysis of the relationship between in vivo brain volume and intelligence

Michael A. McDaniel

Abstract
The relationship between brain volume and intelligence has been a topic of a scientific debate since at least the 1830s. To address the debate, a meta-analysis of the relationship between in vivo brain volume and intelligence was conducted. Based on 37 samples across 1530 people, the population correlation was estimated at 0.33. The correlation is higher for females than males. It is also higher for adults than children. For all age and sex groups, it is clear that brain volume is positively correlated with intelligence.


****
Haier et al. (1995) tested the brain efficiency hypothesis by
using MRI to measure brain volume and glucose metabolic rate to measure glucose uptake (an indicator of energy use). They found a correlation of –.58 between glucose metabolic rate and IQ,

***
By race:

over 6,000 U.S. Army personnel, the average cranial capacity of East
Asians, Whites, and Blacks were 1,416, 1,380, and 1,359 cm3, respectively.

The American anthropologist Samuel George Morton (1849) filled over 1,000 skulls with packing material to measure endocranial volume and found that Blacks averaged about 5 cubic inches less cranial capacity than Whites. His results were confirmed by Todd (1923), H. L. Gordon (1934), and Simmons (1942). The most extensive study of race differences in endocranial volume to
date measured 20,000 skulls from around the world and reported East Asians, Europeans, and Africans had average cranial volumes of 1,415, 1,362, and 1,268 cm3, respectively (Beals, Smith, & Dodd, 1984).


Everything but the abstract appears in Rushton & Jensen 2005.


I don't see SD's or I'd calculate an effect size.

[bpesta22]

This isn't an effect size per se, but it gives some context-- again from Rushton and Jensen, 2005:


Because 1 cubic inch of brain matter contains millions of brain
cells and hundreds of millions of synapses or neural connections, these group
differences in average brain size may explain group differences in average IQ.

[Skeptical Greg]

Rushtons claims seem subtly racist.
he says blacks have large penises and low inteligence, asians high inteligence but small penises so...whites would be the balanced race, having average inteligence and penises:)

What color is ' asian ' ?

[DRBUZZ0]

Much as I love science and think that social concerns should not limit research... I'm not sure about this one. It's simply an issue of findings of differences in these things on average amoungst races can add fuel to the arguments of hate groups.

But does it honestly matter? Assuming it's average it reflects on the tendencies of a group but not individuals.

Lets say, hypothetically, for the sake of argument, that research indicated that black people have lower IQ's than white people. Which may or may not be the case.

Despite that sort of research I would still tend to think that Dr. Neil Tyson probably has a higher IQ than Paris Hilton.

Judge individuals and it becomes less important.

[l0rca]

Gotcha, there's absolutely no reason to discuss anything with you, ever. I'm not interested in engaging with racists, or those who apologize for racists... no offense.

Worst post ever.

[Earthborn]

Rushton & Jensen 2005:Link?

Evolutionary selection pressures were different in the hot savanna where Africans livedIn case you haven't noticed: Africa is not just one big savanna. It actually has a huge variety of landscapes, with people living in all of them.

It has been proposed that the farther north
the populations migrated out of Africa, the more they encountered the cognitively demanding problems of gathering and storing food, gaining shelter, making clothes, and raising children successfully during prolonged winters (Rushton, 2000)."It has been proposed" by the same person who writes this article. I hope the Rushton article from 2000 does explain a bit more why we need to assume that the European wilderness was more intellectually challenging than that of Africa.

whereas culture-only theory must invoke a number of highly localized, specific explanations.I like to read more about what "culture-only theory" is, because I suspect it is a bit of a strawman.

[bpesta22]

Earthborn, or anyone who wants the article: I have it as a PDF and will email it if you send me a pm. Otherwise, here's the cite:

Rushton & Jensen (2005). Thirty years of research on race differences in cognitive ability. Psychology, Public Policy and the Law, 11, 239-294.

If the discussion continues, can we agree that dismissing research because X wrote it, even though it passed peer review, and was published in an A journal (this one published by the very politically correct APA) is probably a fallacy.


You gotta label Richard Lynn a racist too so we can marginalize and ignore his research since he has a whole book on the out of Africa stuff now:

Race Differences in Intelligence: An Evolutionary Analysis. Atlanta, Georgia: Washington Summit Books (PO Box 3514, Augusta, GA 30914) ISBN 1-59368-020-1

[bpesta22]

Posting about this stuff on the JREF over the years was a major factor motivating me to actually do research on IQ, which explains why I'm always replying whenever anyone brings up the topic. Why am I "obsessed" with it / why do I think it matters?

Assume we could measure athletic *ability* perfectly in newborn babies. I do mean ability, and not what they might be capable of achieving in sports with practice, coaching, good nutrition, hard work, their environment-- instead, we're measuring their raw, gene-given athletic potential. We measure 100 babies on this potential and then wait 18 years. Each kid enters his/her environment and whatever happens happens in terms of how they develop into athletes or not (in thinking about this, the environments for the 100 kids would likely vary randomly around some average level).

18 years later we go back to the infant test and select the top 10 highest scorers and the top 10 lowest scorers. Totally ignoring whatever environments these kids were raised in, let's have them compete in Olympic events. Which team do you think would win? My opinion / I suspect the top 10 babies would dominate (feel free to argue differently). Sure, baby number 2 might have been raised in an environment where he focused on playing the tuba versus playing football. And maybe baby 99 was drilled by his daddy to focus on sport. Despite exceptions at the individual level (some low ability babies will be better athletes than some high ability babies), I think the outcome of the Olympic competition is certain (or approaches certainty as the n size increases-- instead of 100, let's do the same with 1000 or 10 million).

I think it's the same deal with IQ, even though we cannot measure it perfectly and even though more than genes contribute to how smart one will be. Take the top 10% of babies, cognitively, and compare them to the bottom 10%-- do the comparison 30 years later. Add to this the research findings (well replicated) showing that those with higher cognitive ability benefit most from better environments, and I also think the outcome of the competition here is certain. There will be individual exceptions, perhaps even extreme ones, but at the group level the top 10 will do better in life than the bottom 10 (more education, better grades, jobs, income levels, etc). Add to this that different groups of people (whether by race or by income) seem to be confounded with innate ability, and I think you have a very important social problem on your hands (one that deserves more attention; not less).

You can reverse the example and argue just as strongly that environment matters (e.g., take the top 10% of environments and compete them against the bottom 10% with ability varying randomly), but I don't think it takes away from the social importance of finding that IF groups differ in innate IQ and if IQ matters for predicting life success then we have problems.

Going back to athletic ability, which team would you pick to win:

Top 10% in athletic ability at birth, but bottom 10% in terms of being raised in an environment supportive of developing athletic ability, versus
Bottom 10 in ability, top 10% in supportive environment?

Who would you want to hire?

Top 10% of cognitive ability at birth but bottom 10% in terms of being raised in an environment that supports intellectual development.
Bottom 10 in ability, top 10 in supportive environment?

I guess your pick here (from one of them to neither of them) would reflect your opinion on the nature/nurture question.

One last thing, I would submit that extreme negative environments (locking a kid in closet feeding him lead chips and having wolves raise him) would change the results, but I don't think-- at least in the USA-- these types of environments are representative, and an extreme negative genetic deal (give the kid an extra chromosome at the 21st pair) would serve as a counterexample to a pure nurture type explanation.

[idunno]

Earthborn, or anyone who wants the article: I have it as a PDF and will email it if you send me a pm. Otherwise, here's the cite:

Rushton & Jensen (2005). Thirty years of research on race differences in cognitive ability. Psychology, Public Policy and the Law, 11, 239-294.

If the discussion continues, can we agree that dismissing research because X wrote it, even though it passed peer review, and was published in an A journal (this one published by the very politically correct APA) is probably a fallacy.


You gotta label Richard Lynn a racist too so we can marginalize and ignore his research since he has a whole book on the out of Africa stuff now:

Race Differences in Intelligence: An Evolutionary Analysis. Atlanta, Georgia: Washington Summit Books (PO Box 3514, Augusta, GA 30914) ISBN 1-59368-020-1http://www.udel.edu/educ/gottfredson/30years/Rushton-Jensen30years.pdf
here it is

[idunno]

Gotcha, there's absolutely no reason to discuss anything with you, ever. I'm not interested in engaging with racists, or those who apologize for racists... no offense.

this attitude says all about this forum.:eye-poppi

[LibraryLady]

this attitude says all about this forum.:eye-poppi

One person's attitude represents the entire forum's? I don't think so. Bpesta, for example, is discussing this intelligently, although I disagree with him, and so is Earthborn.

[Lucifuge Rofocale]

This forum? You mean Joe I guess.

[drkitten]

Can you show me examples of bad science on his part or lack of academic integrity?

Hmm. Check out this citation here (http://bethuneinstitute.org/documents/racialscientestrushton.html), which uses the word "misrepresents" much more often than I would feel comfortable applied to an ethical scientist's work.

The fact that he uses Penthouse Forums and novels as references is another practice that doesn't bode well for his overall competence, if not necessarily his integrity.

[INRM]

Even though there may, on average, be different cranial capacities between different racial groups, I still think it is a dangerous idea to automatically assume that whites are smarter than asians and asians are smarter than blacks.

In the past we've seen what happens when scientific findings like this end up in the hands of racist minds.

[bpesta22]

Hmm. Check out this citation here (http://bethuneinstitute.org/documents/racialscientestrushton.html), which uses the word "misrepresents" much more often than I would feel comfortable applied to an ethical scientist's work.

The fact that he uses Penthouse Forums and novels as references is another practice that doesn't bode well for his overall competence, if not necessarily his integrity.

Could this be mis-linked; it's not working for me.

Penthouse forums?! I wonder what their impact factor is.

[bpesta22]

Wiki has an interesting summary of Rushton.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Philippe_Rushton

Doesn't seem overly damning to me. I wonder how much worse my bio would appear were people motivated enough to search it.

how would we classify a white racist who claims whites are smarter on average than blacks but less smart on average than asians?

[Skeptical Greg]

Wiki has an interesting summary of Rushton.

.................................

how would we classify a white racist who claims whites are smarter on average than blacks but less smart on average than asians?As a racist ..



How, exactly, did Rushton distinguish blacks from whites ?

[drkitten]

Could this be mis-linked; it's not working for me.

It could well be. Try this link. (http://web.archive.org/web/20041213121817/http://www.mugu.com/cgi-bin/Upstream/People/Rushton/rushton-black-reply.html) I think it's also reference #24 from the Wikipedia article you cited, too.


Penthouse forums?! I wonder what their impact factor is.

Probably higher readership than anywhere I've published -- but the citation count is pretty appallingly low.

[Normal Dude]

Part of the closing paragraph of that last link:

His dogma of bioevolutionary inferiority of Negroids is not supported by empirical evidence. Acceptance of similar theories should not be based on racist prejudice but on objective standards, that is, conceptual and logical consistency and integrity, quality of methods and data, and an analysis of disconfirmatory trends. Rushton's racial theory does not meet any of these standards.

[Darat]

Posting about this stuff on the JREF over the years was a major factor motivating me to actually do research on IQ, which explains why I'm always replying whenever anyone brings up the topic. Why am I "obsessed" with it / why do I think it matters?

...snip...

I'd composed quite a long reply to your whole post, commenting on what we now know about childhood exercise and nutrition but then realised your analogy with "athleticism" is a actually a very good analogy and therefore suffers from the same problem as a measure of "intelligence" does i.e. how to define athleticism?

[Professor Yaffle]

I'd composed quite a long reply to your whole post, commenting on what we now know about childhood exercise and nutrition but then realised your analogy with "athleticism" is a actually a very good analogy and therefore suffers from the same problem as a measure of "intelligence" does i.e. how to define athleticism?

I was wondering that. For example black people are over represented in some athletics events, like 100 and 200m sprints, but very under represented in swimming for example.

[kellyb]

I'd composed quite a long reply to your whole post, commenting on what we now know about childhood exercise and nutrition but then realised your analogy with "athleticism" is a actually a very good analogy and therefore suffers from the same problem as a measure of "intelligence" does i.e. how to define athleticism?

Whatever you personally are good at?

[Overman]

http://www.overman.info/OverGifs/RacistNews.gif

[kellyb]

I was wondering that. For example black people are over represented in some athletics events, like 100 and 200m sprints, but very under represented in swimming for example.

I used to think golf was the ultimate athletic skill, but then...I bowed to the new evidence.

:p

[TruthSeeker]

Pesta,
Out of curiosity, who funds your research?

I realize it may be too personal for you to name the actual agency, but is it federal, state, peer-reviewed, private, foundation etc?

thanks for satisfying my curiosity as to who funds controversial work.

[bpesta22]

I was wondering that. For example black people are over represented in some athletics events, like 100 and 200m sprints, but very under represented in swimming for example.


Good points-- Darat too. I wonder if there is a general factor of athleticism. There sure seems to be one for IQ, but I don't want to reify athleticism;)

What was that kevin costner movie where the musclebound geek flunked out of life guard training because he couldn't float for an hour (muscle doesn't float is what KC said).

Also re the cite on Rushton. The same wiki article quotes EO Wilson-- allow me the appeal to authority since he seems well respected here:

Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson (one of the two co-founders of the r/K selection theory Rushton's cites) defends Rushton:

I think Phil is an honest and capable researcher. The basic reasoning by Rushton is solid evolutionary reasoning; that is, it is logically sound. If he had seen some apparent geographic variation for a non-human species-a species of sparrow or sparrow hawk, for example-no one would have batted an eye.[9] That was in 1991, so I dunno if EO has changed his mind since.

[bpesta22]

Pesta,
Out of curiosity, who funds your research?

I realize it may be too personal for you to name the actual agency, but is it federal, state, peer-reviewed, private, foundation etc?

thanks for satisfying my curiosity as to who funds controversial work.


Not a problem TS-- I've never gotten grant money and never applied for a grant and probably never will. Seems even worse than getting something published in an A journal in terms of what a pain in the arse the process is.

Plus my research is not that expensive: IQ tests and computer tasks (on old computers likely not worth a few hundred bucks).

I do get the IQ tests free from wonderlic, but they will give them to anyone in academics who submits a research proposal.

I did use 700$ of university money to buy software to run the computer tasks, though it's a professional development fund so it's actually a part of my compensation.


A former MBA student is trying to get a mega money grant to fund a study on training prison inmmates in high level manufacturing jobs (certifying them while they're in prison) to get them jobs after release (which hopefully keeps them out). If that gets funded, I will be a testing consultant on the project, but it's not my grant.

[TruthSeeker]

Interesting. Thanks.

I guess this reflects a difference across academic settings. It is a requirement of my job that I have externally funded grants. They also pay my staff's salaries, so I don't really have a choice.

Yes, writing grants is a pain, but it does help one refine one's thinking. The very low success rates can be discouraging.

thanks again.

[bpesta22]

I think getting grants probably reflects the ultimate level of scholarship, but I aint there yet, nor do I know if I wanna get there.

Good job, though, TS!

[idunno]

Good points-- Darat too. I wonder if there is a general factor of athleticism. There sure seems to be one for IQ, but I don't want to reify athleticism;)

What was that kevin costner movie where the musclebound geek flunked out of life guard training because he couldn't float for an hour (muscle doesn't float is what KC said).

Also re the cite on Rushton. The same wiki article quotes EO Wilson-- allow me the appeal to authority since he seems well respected here:

Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson (one of the two co-founders of the r/K selection theory Rushton's cites) defends Rushton:

I think Phil is an honest and capable researcher. The basic reasoning by Rushton is solid evolutionary reasoning; that is, it is logically sound. If he had seen some apparent geographic variation for a non-human species-a species of sparrow or sparrow hawk, for example-no one would have batted an eye.[9] That was in 1991, so I dunno if EO has changed his mind since.

blacks are underrepresented in swimming cause their bodies have little fat,which is essential to keep the body afloat:cool:

[idunno]

One person's attitude represents the entire forum's? I don't think so. Bpesta, for example, is discussing this intelligently, although I disagree with him, and so is Earthborn.

sorry i got carried away:D

[idunno]

It could well be. Try this link. (http://web.archive.org/web/20041213121817/http://www.mugu.com/cgi-bin/Upstream/People/Rushton/rushton-black-reply.html) I think it's also reference #24 from the Wikipedia article you cited, too.



Probably higher readership than anywhere I've published -- but the citation count is pretty appallingly low.

Rushton claims Asians have low fertility.Is that why the Chinese breed like Rabbits?:rolleyes:

[Darat]

It may be in one of the links but what criteria is used to determine if someone is black or not in these types of studies?

[Rob Lister]

Do we have a working scientific definition of black yet?

[Darat]

And regarding "black swimmers" (something I know nothing about - but that really summarises my knowledge of sport in general!) I've just read this article: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/blackhistory2007/news/story?id=2759304

(Bold by me)

...snip...

There are 300,000 competitive swimmers in the United States, according to USA Swimming, the governing body based in Colorado Springs, Colo. Fewer than 2 percent are African-American, and White is one of them. It's a barrier that is culturally and socioeconomically based. It's a barrier that White has broken through, along with swimmers like world-record holder Cullen Jones, and Maritza Correia, the first female African-American Olympic medalist.

...snip...

[Skeptical Greg]

It may be in one of the links but what criteria is used to determine if someone is black or not in these types of studies?

Asked on Page one.


How, exactly, did Rushton distinguish blacks from whites ?

I was going to sarcastically suggest, ' based on the IQ score ' ... :D

[Gnu Ordure]

(Excuse me for interrupting, I need to talk to darat - would you look at my pm please, darat ?)

[luchog]

This isn't an effect size per se, but it gives some context-- again from Rushton and Jensen, 2005:


Because 1 cubic inch of brain matter contains millions of brain
cells and hundreds of millions of synapses or neural connections, these group
differences in average brain size may explain group differences in average IQ.

Then how do you account for the fact that some of the most intelligent people in history have had brains on the smaller end of the natural-variation spectrum?

Sounds like more racist apologetica and junk science to me.

[bpesta22]

Luchog-- I dunno but the existence of individuals who are exceptions to the rule would be expected given the reported correlation of .33.

About 10% of the variance in IQ scores is accounted for by brain size after controlling for body weight and gender. 90% is not. That said, for those interested in basic research, a .33 meta analytic effect size has some meaning (it would too in applied settings were that a validity coefficient predicting job performance, for example).

I'll cite how they defined race next post. I'm pretty accurate though not 100% so at classifying people into races just by eyeballing.

[luchog]

I was wondering that. For example black people are over represented in some athletics events, like 100 and 200m sprints, but very under represented in swimming for example.

Class/culture differences could explain the discrepancy fairly easily. The sports where Blacks are highly represented tend to be "lower class" or "working class" sports -- which are typically contact sports -- or those with simple skills and/or a general lack of special equipment needed. Swimming is typically a middle to upper-middle class sport; and Caucasians form the vast majority of participants.

Same reason that Black are more highly represented in sports like Boxing and American Football, fairly equally-represented in baseball and basketball, and less represented in sports such as figure skating or skiing. The first are contact sports, which are typically the purview of lower/working classes; the second are non-contact sports which are physically demanding and fairly low on the "specialized equipment/environment" scale, and tend to have a fairly universal appeal, though highest in the middle classes; and the last are sports which tend to emphasize finesse at least as much as strength and endurance, or require highly specialized equipment and/or environments, and have historically been the pursuits of the upper or "leisure" classes.

This can be contrasted with Asians, who are less represented in contact and non-contact physically demanding sports, and more highly represented in "finesse" sports (leaving aside the Japanese obsession with baseball).

Black culture, including many African as well as American, tend to emphasize physical pursuits, and de-emphasize intellectual, to the point of outright anti-intellectualism (which is also typically of working-class American culture in general, and increasingly so in middle-class culture). Asian cultures, particularly immigrant cultures, similarly to upper-class Americans and Europeans tend to strongly emphasize intellectual pursuits, and de-emphasize strenuous physical pursuits.

[luchog]

About 10% of the variance in IQ scores is accounted for by brain size after controlling for body weight and gender. 90% is not.

And how does that 10% correllation related to abnormal brain sizes (microcencephaly or megalencephaly) which are typically dysfunctional? Are these excluded? And what is the reseearch supporting this correlation? Is it strictly Ruston, or is there independent supporting research (peer-reviewed and validated), and if so, what is it?

[bpesta22]

having problems cut n pasting; the definition of race they used is on the bottom of page 237 in the link to R&J above.

[bpesta22]

also, at work now, so lemme get back to this tonight to tomorrow.

[Complexity]

blacks are underrepresented in swimming cause their bodies have little fat,which is essential to keep the body afloat:cool:


Another baseless opinion from idunno.

Aren't you supposed to be doing horoscopes in another thread?

[Modified]

Class/culture differences could explain the discrepancy fairly easily. The sports where Blacks are highly represented tend to be "lower class" or "working class" sports -- which are typically contact sports -- or those with simple skills and/or a general lack of special equipment needed.

I imagine that is a large, or perhaps the main factor, but you do see differences in the groups of people who excel in sprints and middle distance running, and I don't think there is much of a cultural difference there. Strength/endurance-wise, a swimming sprint is similar to a middle distance run. To really make a swimming race favorable to fast-twitch dominant bodies, you have to do fin swimming.

[idunno]

Another baseless opinion from idunno.

Aren't you supposed to be doing horoscopes in another thread?

arent you suppose to stay there too?
This is too complex for you:D

[bpesta22]

Luchog, I would bet the correlation between brain size and IQ's applies only to "normal" people. I'm sure it excludes the conditions you mention. Once you get outside the range of under 70 / over 130, I'm not sure how much g explains things or whether the difference gets qualitative rather than quantitative.

I don't think it's dishonest to exclude these people for anyone interested in answering the general question: does brain size correlate with IQ.

Lots of the brain size work has been done by Rushton, though it seems like half the cites on brain size and IQ are non-rushton in the article cited above, and the guy who did the meta-analyses is not Rushton (used to be a prof of mine fwiw). All this stuff is passing peer review and being published in quality journals (doesn't mean it's true but one would have to extend the racist junk science idea into a wider conspiracy theory type deal where editors of elite psych journals and their reviewers are biased toward excepting junk science because it shows white superiority over blacks but not asians).

I wonder if exercize physiologists could comment on what it takes to excel in certain sports. I'm sure both culture environment and genes contribute to how well a person does in sport. Is it the contention of the posters here that any race difference observed in athletic performance has zero genetic basis?

[INRM]

Certainly though there are brilliant black people. Neil DeGrasse Tyson would be an example.

Tony L.

[Morrigan]

The topic isn't about individuals, but populations and averages.

[Earthborn]

having problems cut n pasting; the definition of race they used is on the bottom of page 237 in the link to R&J above.Do you mean this?To define terms, based on genetic analysis, roughly speaking, Blacks (Africans, Negroids) are those who have most of their ancestors from sub-Saharan Africa; Whites (Europeans, Caucasoids) have most of their ancestors from Europe; and East Asians (Orientals, Mongoloids) have most of their ancestors from Pacific Rim countriesDoes that mean that before they let people do their IQ tests, they first investigated people's entire geneaology to make sure people were "Black", "White" or "Asian" according to this definition? And how far back in time did they go to count where 'most of their ancestors' came from? Or was this researched by finding genetic markers?

Even more problematic; suppose someone has 51% of his ancestors from sub-Saharan Africa and 49% of his ancestors from Europe. Is that person Black or White (regardless of skintone) or excluded from this research?

[LostAngeles]

Do you mean this?Does that mean that before they let people do their IQ tests, they first investigated people's entire geneaology to make sure people were "Black", "White" or "Asian" according to this definition? And how far back in time did they go to count where 'most of their ancestors' came from? Or was this researched by finding genetic markers?

Even more problematic; suppose someone has 51% of his ancestors from sub-Saharan Africa and 49% of his ancestors from Europe. Is that person Black or White (regardless of skintone) or excluded from this research?

So that makes me, "white," the one-drop rule makes me, "black," my major makes me, "Asian," and living in L.A. tend to make me, "Mexican."

Interesting.

[SomeGuy]

Wiki has an interesting summary of Rushton.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Philippe_Rushton

Doesn't seem overly damning to me. I wonder how much worse my bio would appear were people motivated enough to search it.

how would we classify a white racist who claims whites are smarter on average than blacks but less smart on average than asians?

Actually the entry seems extremely damning.

It seems to indicate that his work about altruism shows that he knows how to use proper scientific methods and that he DELIBERATELY doesn't apply them in his racial research.

This is enough reason to see if perhaps he has ulterior motives here, and that's where discussion of him as a person does become relevant.

[carlvs]

Race Differences in Intelligence: An Evolutionary Analysis. Atlanta, Georgia: Washington Summit Books (PO Box 3514, Augusta, GA 30914) ISBN 1-59368-020-1

Thanks for putting out the name of the publisher. It just so happens that Washington Summit Books has a website (http://www.wspublishers.com/index.php) where they offer like-minded publications for sale.

I don't have time to mention all the "goodies (http://www.wspublishers.com/index.php)" I found here, but to give you a taste of the general orientation of what they offer, here's a quote from their description of a book called Heredity and Humanity (http://www.wspublishers.com/bookdetail.php?n=OTH-007&eds=all). I just LOVE this first line - nothing I like better than some good old-fashioned red-baiting:

Race and heredity were accepted facts in Western science until Marxists and fellow travellers infiltrated Western academe and subverted all objectivity on the subject. :eye-poppi

[blobru]

And lower IQ / smaller brains / according to Rushton / Jenson / Lynn.
...

Rushton's theory that brain size correlates with intelligence doesn't explain why men should have larger brains than women yet both genders score the same on IQ tests.

Nor do his data agree with the most careful study ever carried out on brain size among Americans, where blacks were found to have larger brains than whites: wiki ref (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_intelligence_%28Average_intelligence_gaps _among_races%29#Recent_studies)
In 1970 Philip V. Tobias listed a number of difficulties involved in measuring and making meaningful comparisons of brain weight. These included equating subjects on age, sex, body size, temperature etc. In addition, brain development is plastic, and brain size may be affected by early environmental factors. Because of all these difficulties, Tobias concluded that no adequate racial comparative studies had actually been conducted.[116] The brain size of American Blacks reported in Tobias’s summary were larger than any White group, (which include American, English and French Whites) except those from the Swedish sub sample (who had the largest brains of any of the 77 national groups measured), and American Blacks were estimated to have some 200 million more neurons than American Whites (See Tobias 1970; Weizmann et. 1990).

[Mashuna]

blacks are underrepresented in swimming cause their bodies have little fat,which is essential to keep the body afloat:cool:

And this is also why all competition swimmers have such a high percentage of body fat.

Wait, what? :confused:

[Kumar]

http://www.jonentine.com/reviews/Daily_Express_9_8_2000.htm

see above. Is it true blacks have more Testosterone?
Can we say the more you go South or towarsd the heat the more muscle and less fat people have?:boxedin:

Heat can effect variations in blood flow and transcapillary movements.

Probably following may have some relavance;

Drugs that can increase iron include chloramphenicol, estrogens, oral birth control, and methyldopa.

Drugs that can lower iron include cholestyramine, chloramphenicol, colchicine, deferoxamine, methicillin, allopurinol, and testosterone
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/003488.htm

Btw, what are the observations at later age?

[eir_de_scania]

Even more problematic; suppose someone has 51% of his ancestors from sub-Saharan Africa and 49% of his ancestors from Europe. Is that person Black or White (regardless of skintone) or excluded from this research?
Doesn't every "black" American have both sub-Saharan and European ancestry? :confused:

[TruthSeeker]

I'm still thinking about funding, Pesta. (yes, it is grant season in Canada!).

What do you think of the fact that most of Rushton's and Jensen's funding was from the Pioneer Fund? Does it impact at all on the interpretation of their findings? For instance, we often look with a skeptical eye at drug trials supporting a drug which are funded by the pharmaceutical company that stands to make a profit from showing the drug is effective. Are there similar factors at play in the study of race which is funded by an organization that supports white supremacy and eugenics?

Here's an overview http://ftrsupplemental.blogspot.com/1998_07_15_archive.html

[drkitten]

I'm still thinking about funding, Pesta. (yes, it is grant season in Canada!).

What do you think of the fact that most of Rushton's and Jensen's funding was from the Pioneer Fund? Does it impact at all on the interpretation of their findings?

I have somewhat mixed feelings about this; in theory, "good science" is good science regardless of who chooses to fund it, but I also think that a "good scientist" has a responsibility to look at who her funding sources are and, if necessary, publically distance herself from the interpretation they would like to put on the resutlts. If one doesn't do that, then one lends credence to the idea either that a) she supports that interpretation, or b) that she's producing data-to-order for the agency.

Neither of these would be good in Rushton's case. I admit that case a) does not directly impact his scientific integrity, just his personal integrity. Case b), of course, totally damns it. The problem is that I can't tell which is which.... And there's enough other evidence (such as the paper both I and Wikipedia cited, which argues that there is clear evidence of deliberate mishandling of data....) to suggest that case b) may in fact be the case....

But on the other hand, I also think that it's unfair to damn a scientist just because he's funded by a group that also supports wingnuts. This is the "these guys must be godless communists because the ACLU took their case" argument, which I abhor...

[TruthSeeker]

I actually haven't read the article you cited, but will after a meeting this afternoon. The accusation of mishandling data is extremely serious.

I am not so convinced that personal and scientific integrity are independent (that is, with regards to the area of overlap of science and personal concerns, including from whom I am willing to accept money to conduct my science) but I will think about this more.

Thank you for your thoughtful response.

[bpesta22]

I actually haven't read the article you cited, but will after a meeting this afternoon. The accusation of mishandling data is extremely serious.

I am not so convinced that personal and scientific integrity are independent but I will think about this more.

Thank you for your thoughtful response.

I agree with Dr. Kitten (hey, sometimes it happens!).

I'm not sure I'd take money from a suspect group to do research, but no one's ever offered me money / a significant bump to my salary to do research.

I think funding should make us look at any research published with a skeptical eye-- but, we're supposed to do that anyway.

Also, I suppose it's possible that a skin-headed hitler youthian overtly racist nazi could still do research that passes peer review, gets published in quality journals, and follows the rules of science. Should we reject good science because of who did it (I dunno the answer to the question)?

In my experience, individual scientists publish to promote / support the theories they feel are true, given their world view and training. They're reluctant to let go of something they believe in, even in the face of evidence against it. Fortunately, science is a joint effort, so if it is wrong, over time, science will reject it (isn't this sorta the idea behind paradigm shifts in science?)

There's a very recent paper in Intel arguing that research on race differences should be held to the most high standards-- editors should not accept the research unless it's pristine.

They argue a signal detection type analysis wherein there's two possible mistakes editors can make: Publish a less than pristine article (which even most A journals do) which then unfairly taints the media/lay person's perception of race differences, and could be used by hate groups to push their agendas.

OR, reject a good but less than pristine article, which prevents misuse, but then results in a scientific contribution that gets rejected, though were it on any other topic, it would have got published.

The authors argue the first mistake is worse than the second and so we should hold race research to a higher standard.

That scares me.

Plus, it insults people who do non-controversial research by implying they don't already use strict but fair standards of review.

***

I have zero expertise in genetics, and I know a common complaint in this area is how race is defined. I understand that some people claim race is a completely social construct, but that seems odd to me.

There are obvious / striking physical differences among races. Isn't it true that a forensics expert can tell what race a person is by looking at just a skull, or hip bone or jaw? Aren't their specific diseases vastly over or under-represented by race?

Most of the research in IQ seems to classify people by asking them: What race are you. Sure, this isn't a perfectly reliable measure. I doubt you'd find perfectly reliable measures in any area of social science, and you don't need perfect reliability for the measure to be useful.

This classification, too, has produced a consistent pattern of data, well replicated, which converges across many different lines of study over the past 100 years. So, it seems like there's something to race, beyond just it being confounded with culture or environment.


Let me get back later to the poster on brain size in the 1970s which found the opposite pattern....

[Darat]

...snip...

That scares me.

Plus, it insults people who do non-controversial research by implying they don't already use strict but fair standards of review.

***

...snip...

Not thought about this in much depth but I don't think it is in principle scary or is saying other people don't use high standards. It's just a recognition that there is a social aspect to even the most dry and "pure" scientific research and sometimes there are other aspects scientists and anyone publishing the research should consider. (Note this is not saying that any research shouldn't be done or should be suppressed - just that if you are publishing research that you know may be very inflammatory you need to be extra careful and yes perhaps even insist on higher standards.)

[TruthSeeker]

I am happy to disagree with you about the implications of a funding source. In my experience, one is unable to obtain funding from an agency unless one can show that the research is consistent with the mission of the agency. In other words, Rushton has had to demonstrate that his research fits within the mandate of the Pioneer Fund and that it has relevence to their ultimate goals. Has he compromised his science to do this? Reading the article cited by DrKitten certainly suggests he has. Also damning is the lack of any data whatsoever that contradicts the principles of the Pioneer Fund. One wonders if he would be free to publish such data. I agree with DrKitten that the final resolution of this is beyond the data we have available. Nonetheless, if I were carrying out research on a controversial topic, I would seek funding from a peer reviewed top agency in order to minimize the appearance of mixed agendas.

Let me ask you different question:

If it were true that blacks have lower intelligence than whites (on average) and that this is due to genetics, what are the implications for public policy, social services, access to resources, education etc?

In other words, what are you hoping the impact of your research will be?

[bpesta22]

I am happy to disagree with you about the implications of a funding source. In my experience, one is unable to obtain funding from an agency unless one can show that the research is consistent with the mission of the agency. In other words, Rushton has had to demonstrate that his research fits within the mandate of the Pioneer Fund and that it has relevence to their ultimate goals. Has he compromised his science to do this? Reading the article cited by DrKitten certainly suggests he has. Also damning is the lack of any data whatsoever that contradicts the principles of the Pioneer Fund. One wonders if he would be free to publish such data. I agree with DrKitten that the final resolution of this is beyond the data we have available. Nonetheless, if I were carrying out research on a controversial topic, I would seek funding from a peer reviewed top agency in order to minimize the appearance of mixed agendas.

Let me ask you different question:

If it were true that blacks have lower intelligence than whites (on average) and that this is due to genetics, what are the implications for public policy, social services, access to resources, education etc?

In other words, what are you hoping the impact of your research will be?

Good points and questions, TS. I might be biased, but every journal article by Rushton that I've read has been good science. His review of my work, I thought, was very professional; obviously that of an expert.

That's the kicker. Many, many people seem extremely motivated to show he's a racist. With that kind of scrutiny, how can he consistently publish his stuff in high quality journals? The one cited about is an A, published by APA. So, the APA gave **60 pages** of journal space to the junk science rants of two racists? Seems very unlikely (consider that Sternberg-- who despises g-- was the president of the APA when this was published, iirc).

I'm not advocating any public policies based on this research; I don't think it's my call. For what it's worth, I think affirmative action, as outlined in Steelworker's v. Weber (i.e., legal only if a disparity exists, the preference is temporary and does not trammel the interests of whites), seems perfectly reasonable and fair. In practice, I'm not sure how well organizations stick with what SCOTUS outlined. But, I have no problems reserving some spots (in employment or education) for qualified minorities who are under-represented because of some environmental constraint (versus, say, because of a low IQ despite his/her environment).

My only concern would be that when preference is given, the minority be truly qualified for the position (i.e., be at least minimally competent to graduate or keep the job).

The thing about the group difference is that there's still millions and millions of very bright blacks; if impoverished environments make equal opportunity unfair for them, then a little governmental help seems reasonable.

What about low scoring people? I dunno. I think the public policy I'd push for is more funding and research directed toward this topic. It's important; the outcomes are very significant and practical. What's needed is more science, not the marginalization of anything published on the topic or the immediate dismissal of X being racist if X studies race and IQ.

[bpesta22]

Oh, and research geared toward accepting what the science has discovered so that interventions that actually work can be designed, tested, validated, etc.

[Earthborn]

I understand that some people claim race is a completely social construct, but that seems odd to me.

There are obvious / striking physical differences among races."Race" can be a social construct even if there are obvious physical differences. There are obvious physical differences between curly and straight haired people, or between short and tall ones. But people just don't make such a big deal out of those differences. They do make a big deal out of skincolour, and the socially constructed concept of "race" is the big deal made out of it.

Isn't it true that a forensics expert can tell what race a person is by looking at just a skull, or hip bone or jaw?Not reliably by measuring a single property, no. They need to take a lot of measurements, because for each and everyone of them there is considerable overlap between "races".

Also, forensics experts can show that "races" are a lot more nuanced than the usual "black/white/asian" trichotomy. It is for example possible to distinguish between the thy bones of pygmies and Masai, which shows how problematic it is to refer to all peoples originating in sub-Saharan Africa as a single 'race'.

Most of the research in IQ seems to classify people by asking them: What race are you. Sure, this isn't a perfectly reliable measure.It isn't just an imperfectly reliable measure. If you define "races" by which continent most of someone's ancestors come from, it is worst measure imaginable. Most people just don't know where most of their ancestors came from. People will therefore just tick the box that they have learnt to tick when asked for their "race". Add to that the fact that not all cultures would define a person the same way; what counts as "black" in the USA may very well be considered "white" in Brazil.

I doubt you'd find perfectly reliable measures in any area of social scienceIf you make claims of heritability, of evolutionary adaptations, of biological differences, and of intelligence as a biological trait, you aren't doing Social Science. You are doing biology, even genetics and neurology.

If you want to do Social Science, go ahead. I'll applaud you, because the social sciences don't get the respect from the hard sciences they deserve. But please stick with the socially constructed aspects of "race" and don't make any claims outside your field.

[bpesta22]

Not thought about this in much depth but I don't think it is in principle scary or is saying other people don't use high standards. It's just a recognition that there is a social aspect to even the most dry and "pure" scientific research and sometimes there are other aspects scientists and anyone publishing the research should consider. (Note this is not saying that any research shouldn't be done or should be suppressed - just that if you are publishing research that you know may be very inflammatory you need to be extra careful and yes perhaps even insist on higher standards.)

I have no plans to do race/iq research in the near future. I am collecting lots of data on IQ, but none of it focuses on race.


I am however-- as a hobby-- collecting data on religiosity and biblical literalism and IQ. I want to see if people with fundamental religious beliefs differ in IQ from those without such beliefs.

So, suppose I find atheists are smarter on average than baptists. Would this be just as inflammatory as a claim on race? Should this study be strictly scrutinized (moreso than the average study in whatever journal I send it to)?

What about stuff on gender differences in cognitive ability, or even age differences?

[sickstan]

Rushton claims Asians have low fertility.Is that why the Chinese breed like Rabbits?:rolleyes:

I hope that's just a joke.

[Darat]

I have no plans to do race/iq research in the near future. I am collecting lots of data on IQ, but none of it focuses on race.


I am however-- as a hobby-- collecting data on religiosity and biblical literalism and IQ. I want to see if people with fundamental religious beliefs differ in IQ from those without such beliefs.

So, suppose I find atheists are smarter on average than baptists. Would this be just as inflammatory as a claim on race? Should this study be strictly scrutinized (moreso than the average study in whatever journal I send it to)?

What about stuff on gender differences in cognitive ability, or even age differences?

I think your response just expands on what I was saying - that there can different levels and different types of social aspects that perhaps should be considered.

I don't think it is expecting or doing anything different to what we all tend to do e.g. I'm sure you would check a parachute slightly more carefully than you would the zipper on your jacket when doing a parachute jump. Doesn't mean both shouldn't be of a high quality - just that one you tend to be slightly more concerned about if it is going to work or not!

[bpesta22]

Most of what I "know" in this area is based on what I've read versus what I've collected data on.

I think you'll find far less than perfect reliability in bio too.

The definition of race is operationalized by having people check a box that best describes their race. I don't see a problem with using this as a measure of race. We might have no idea where our ancestors come from, but I bet if we could trace back, we'd get pretty consistent differences across race, and the boxes that people check would correlate pretty strongly with some more explicit measure of race.

[bpesta22]

I think your response just expands on what I was saying - that there can different levels and different types of social aspects that perhaps should be considered.

I don't think it is expecting or doing anything different to what we all tend to do e.g. I'm sure you would check a parachute slightly more carefully than you would the zipper on your jacket when doing a parachute jump. Doesn't mean both shouldn't be of a high quality - just that one you tend to be slightly more concerned about if it is going to work or not!

I guess I don't disagree with you D.

I think it might be a moot point though as the stuff seems to already be subject to strict scrutiny, even considering they accepted my stuff:)

[idunno]

I hope that's just a joke.

the chinese had many children till recently,then their government began to kill the female newborns:p to curb the high birth rate

[sickstan]

the chinese had many children till recently,then their government began to kill the female newborns:p to curb the high birth rate

Nonsense. Your have not supported your claim that Chinese "breed like rabbits". Therefore, your unsubstantiated assertion and irrelevant claims that the Chinese government "began to kill female newborns" are at best inflammatory.

[drkitten]

I am happy to disagree with you about the implications of a funding source. In my experience, one is unable to obtain funding from an agency unless one can show that the research is consistent with the mission of the agency. In other words, Rushton has had to demonstrate that his research fits within the mandate of the Pioneer Fund and that it has relevence to their ultimate goals. Has he compromised his science to do this? Reading the article cited by DrKitten certainly suggests he has. Also damning is the lack of any data whatsoever that contradicts the principles of the Pioneer Fund. One wonders if he would be free to publish such data. I agree with DrKitten that the final resolution of this is beyond the data we have available. Nonetheless, if I were carrying out research on a controversial topic, I would seek funding from a peer reviewed top agency in order to minimize the appearance of mixed agendas.


Well, that's a problem there. I mean, I would "seek funding from a peer reviewed top agency," for reasons completely independent than an appearance of conflicts of interest. The problem -- and even top-flight researchers, in which august company I do not class myself, face this problem -- is that everyone wants funding from those groups, and the number of hopeful squirrels greatly exceeds the number of available nuts. Even when you can get funding for your project (which in itself is a miracle worthy of gongs, incense, and an elaborate theology to explain), it's never enough to do everything you want to do.

So the real question too often becomes "do you accept the Adolph Hitler Memorial Foundation's funds, and all that implies, or do you not get any funding from anyone?"

[drkitten]

I think your response just expands on what I was saying - that there can different levels and different types of social aspects that perhaps should be considered.

I don't think it is expecting or doing anything different to what we all tend to do e.g. I'm sure you would check a parachute slightly more carefully than you would the zipper on your jacket when doing a parachute jump. Doesn't mean both shouldn't be of a high quality - just that one you tend to be slightly more concerned about if it is going to work or not!

Isn't this standard statistics? There are two types of errors, Type I errors (where you incorrectly reject the null hypothesis) and type II errors (where you incorrectly accept it).
The alpha cutoff should be chosen to balance the actual risks (to society, &c) of the two types of risk -- if the consequences of a type I error are particularly severe (for example, we incorrectly reject the null hypothesis that the city's water is safe to drink, people might die), we could lower the alpha cutoff from the "standard" 0.05 to 0.01, 0.001, or even lower.

But of course, the alpha cutoff presumes that the stats and underlying science is done correctly in the first place. A research project with particularly severe consequences should also be examined (more) closely to make sure that the statistical consequences are themselves valid.

Racism is a significantly serious problem -- and the race/IQ controversy is sufficiently inflammable -- that I have no problem suggesting that tighter cutoffs are appropriate to avoid particularly devastating consequences of type I (or simple methodological) errors.

[TruthSeeker]

DrKitten,

I agree that it is incredibly difficult to get grants. And yet, I would turn down the Hitler Memorial Foundation (my goodness :D ). Better to delay your work than to be tainted in that way.

Maybe I'm just an extreme case. About 6 months ago, I was in the position of having had my grant applications soundly rejected while the clock ticked on the grants I did have. People would lose their jobs; students would not graduate; and research directors would be very upset. In my field, the easy out is to get a drug company to fund something. Instead, I considered using my personal savings to fill the gap. Fortunately, crisis was averted when I was successful in the very next round of grant competitions (a federal, peer reviewed granting agency). So, I would suggest that there are alternatives to taking money that comes from a less-than-desirable source. But again, that may just be me.

[martu]

I was wondering that. For example black people are over represented in some athletics events, like 100 and 200m sprints, but very under represented in swimming for example.

Interestingly it's even more complicated than that, this comment piece from The Times explains in detail

So black runners are naturally faster? Wrong (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article2189194.ece)

it seems it's not black people in general but a subset of black people that are good sprinters.

And I fully agree with the conclusion:

The conclusion is unavoidable: those who invoke race as an explanation of real and perceived differences between humans have an agenda that is other than scientific.

[drkitten]

I agree that it is incredibly difficult to get grants. And yet, I would turn down the Hitler Memorial Foundation (my goodness :D ). Better to delay your work than to be tainted in that way.

I suspect you're more idealistic than most. Especially since for many academics "delay your work" is a code for "be denied tenure, leave academia, and spend the rest of your life as a frustrated insurance salesman with a useless Ph.D. upon which you're still paying student loans."

[bpesta22]

Interestingly it's even more complicated than that, this comment piece from The Times explains in detail

So black runners are naturally faster? Wrong (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article2189194.ece)

it seems it's not black people in general but a subset of black people that are good sprinters.

And I fully agree with the conclusion:


Just curious if you think I have an agenda and if so what it might be.:boxedin:

[drkitten]

Just curious if you think I have an agenda and if so what it might be.:boxedin:

It's not only a question of whether or not you personally have an agenda. There's also the question of whether the people upon whom you rely -- Rushton and Jensen, in particular -- have agendas. (Agendae?) If I have an agenda and can persuade you to become my unwilling and ignorant dupe,... that's still good for me and bad for the rest of the world, yes?

[TruthSeeker]

Not idealistic, tenured

Editing to add: As is Rushton. So he also doesn't have the pressures that come from being on the tenure track. He is at a nearby university in fact and his work would qualify for funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. They fund the top 10-25% of applicants, depending on the competition. Therefore, I would be very surprised if he had no choice but to accept funding from the Pioneer Fund.

[Professor Yaffle]

It's not only a question of whether or not you personally have an agenda. There's also the question of whether the people upon whom you rely -- Rushton and Jensen, in particular -- have agendas. (Agendae?) If I have an agenda and can persuade you to become my unwilling and ignorant dupe,... that's still good for me and bad for the rest of the world, yes?

Agenda. Singular is agendum.

[martu]

Just curious if you think I have an agenda and if so what it might be.:boxedin:

What DrKitten said - if you are relying on data from people who have an agenda your conclusions are likely to be flawed.

Are you interested in the correlation of IQ and eye colour? If not why not?

[Darat]

...snip...

Are you interested in the correlation of IQ and eye colour? If not why not?

I think this is an interesting question (and I don't just mean to single out bpesta22).

What makes the subjective concept of race as defined by how people look or are classed by their society of such interest? There are many other visual differences in the human phenotype to pick from? (Of course it could just be my perception is informed by the fact that "race" studies are the ones that seem to get more publicity in the media I'm generally aware of.)

Is our knowledge and technical ability up to subjecting thousands of people to IQ testing, taking a DNA sample and then collecting like scores together and seeing if there is any significant correlations(?) in their DNA? If you could do that and you then find some common "genetic markers" you might then be able to say that people that score "higher" in an IQ test are likely to have these genetic markers, which you could then perhaps say "population X tends to have individuals with these markers". (Or am I totally wrong even in principle thinking this would work?)

[martu]

Is our knowledge and technical ability up to subjecting thousands of people to IQ testing, taking a DNA sample and then collecting like scores together and seeing if there is any significant correlations(?) in their DNA? If you could do that and you then find some common "genetic markers" you might then be able to say that people that score "higher" in an IQ test are likely to have these genetic markers, which you could then perhaps say "population X tends to have individuals with these markers". (Or am I totally wrong even in principle thinking this would work?)

We don't have the data yet (as far as I know) but yes it's very likely there will be genetic markers that correlate to how well people do certain tasks, IQ tests included. Certain populations would have selected for different traits which would lead to some populations being better than others. The ability to succeed at abstract IQ test type questions I doubt would be the most important trait for a population in Papua New Guinea for example.

IQ tests are very culture specific so trying to apply results across cultures isn't very sensible, cultural mores can dictate how one thinks about problems. This may be directly linked to how the brain is wired while growing though I have no data on this, I am remembering (hopefully accurately) an article I read a few years ago.

[luchog]

I imagine that is a large, or perhaps the main factor, but you do see differences in the groups of people who excel in sprints and middle distance running, and I don't think there is much of a cultural difference there. Strength/endurance-wise, a swimming sprint is similar to a middle distance run. To really make a swimming race favorable to fast-twitch dominant bodies, you have to do fin swimming.
Some people are psysiologically better suited to some sorts of physical activities than to others. I haven't noticed any

Luchog, I would bet the correlation between brain size and IQ's applies only to "normal" people. I'm sure it excludes the conditions you mention. Once you get outside the range of under 70 / over 130, I'm not sure how much g explains things or whether the difference gets qualitative rather than quantitative.

I don't think it's dishonest to exclude these people for anyone interested in answering the general question: does brain size correlate with IQ.

Yet, for any honest researcher, it certainly is, since it would definitely affect any observed correlation. A correlation that over a century of research has failed to find; and, in fact, disproved.

Lots of the brain size work has been done by Rushton, though it seems like half the cites on brain size and IQ are non-rushton in the article cited above, and the guy who did the meta-analyses is not Rushton (used to be a prof of mine fwiw). All this stuff is passing peer review and being published in quality journals
And yet you consistently refuse to provide journal citations for this supposed research.
Is it the contention of the posters here that any race difference observed in athletic performance has zero genetic basis?
It's the conclusion of pretty much any solid scientific study lacking racist biases or agendas.

[bpesta22]

Some people are psysiologically better suited to some sorts of physical activities than to others. I haven't noticed any


Yet, for any honest researcher, it certainly is, since it would definitely affect any observed correlation. A correlation that over a century of research has failed to find; and, in fact, disproved.

And yet you consistently refuse to provide journal citations for this supposed research.

It's the conclusion of pretty much any solid scientific study lacking racist biases or agendas.

Hi Luchog.

I disagree that it's dishonest to exclude people with brain abnormalities in a study on brain size and IQ.

Also, I didn't provide the cites because they're all in the above linked article by rushton and jensen.

I could paste them here I guess, if you're still interested, and can't get the link to work.

[Modified]

Some people are psysiologically better suited to some sorts of physical activities than to others. I haven't noticed any

any what?

[LostAngeles]

double post

[LostAngeles]

any what?

trailing sentences.

(I do this a lot too. It's like you're already on the next thought and forgot that ) (you haven't written the rest of it.)

[ChaoticLimbs]

Does it matter whether the races are adapted slightly differently? Who knows what blend will be best matched to future pressures. iIs it likely that the best solution is some blend of what's available will lead to a combination which is better suited to those future needs than the isolated combinations of genes we have now?

[ChaoticLimbs]

It seems we are all to assume there is a magical sky demon who has over the millenia made sure that we're all completely equal in skill or adaptedness to every possible task?
How unskeptical, and how easy it is to accuse anyone who doubts this of racism.
Even good, charitable and egalitarian ideas can be wrong. Nature is a cruel master and our natural pressures have been different. How can one assume that every race's average proficiency is equivalent for all tasks?

[luchog]

any what?

Gah, accidental deletion of the rest of the sentence. What happens when I work on the laptop with the touchpad. I seem to do that alot.

Unfortunately, I can't recall what I had written.

In any case, the lack of black swimmers is likely far more due to the fact that access to a pool is more of an middle to upper class thing, and therefore Blacks, being predominantly lower/working class are much less likely to have access to one either in school or the local community. Basketball courts and gyms, on the other hand, are very common; and football is more commonly available in lower class schools than many other sports, such as tennis, golf, swimming, etc. that are available in schools in more affluent regions.

[Modified]

Gah, accidental deletion of the rest of the sentence. What happens when I work on the laptop with the touchpad. I seem to do that alot.

Unfortunately, I can't recall what I had written.

In any case, the lack of black swimmers is likely far more due to the fact that access to a pool is more of an middle to upper class thing, and therefore Blacks, being predominantly lower/working class are much less likely to have access to one either in school or the local community. Basketball courts and gyms, on the other hand, are very common; and football is more commonly available in lower class schools than many other sports, such as tennis, golf, swimming, etc. that are available in schools in more affluent regions.

From the preface of my first post here it's clear that I don't disagree, but the nature of swimming is such that, even if that were not true, the groups that currently dominate running sprints would not dominate swimming sprints to the same degree. Fin swimming would be a closer match. Currently, of course, fin swimming is dominated by those rare people who are aware that it is actually a sport.

[luchog]

Even good, charitable and egalitarian ideas can be wrong. Nature is a cruel master and our natural pressures have been different. How can one assume that every race's average proficiency is equivalent for all tasks?
Except that there is no support for the wide discrepancies in either intelligence or physical ability claimed by those with racist axes to grind.

There are clear physical differences between different populations; but these vary far more by geographical regions than by the more vague categories of race. "Asians are smarter/better at math". Which Asians? Koreans? Mandarin Chinese? Vietnamese? Montagnard? Ainu? Thai?

Black people are more athletic. Zulu? Baka? Afar? Masaai? Batwa? Or does it only apply to the Black-American hybrid of the various ethnicies which have emigrated, forcibly or otherwise, to the US? What about the similar, but genetically distinct, peoples of Australia or New Guinea?

And what "white" people are we talking about? Germanic northern Europeans? Roman or Hellenic Mediterranean ethnicities? Baltic Belorus or Ukranian? Asiatic Siberians or Mongols? What about Middle Eastern peoples like the Mizrahim, Bedouin, Turks, Kurds, or Armenians?

Some isolated ethnicities do maintain specific physical characteristics that tend to predominate due to substantial inbreeding (ie, the characteristic height of Masaai, the diminuitive stature of the "pygmy" tribes of African and Asia,

Add into that the fact that physical characteristics of many people are at least as much the result of environment and diet as they are of genetics. Intelligence in particularly can be strongly affected by diet; specifically, nutritional deficiencies during childhood development. Many Black Americans, along with a substantial percentage of poor and working-class whites and a growing number of Hispanics, eat a relatively poor diet consisting of substantial amounts of junk food.

All that, more than any "political correctness" chimera, is the reason why these sorts of race-based correlations, eg. The Bell Jar, are typically debunked as agenda-based junk-science.

[luchog]

From the preface of my first post here it's clear that I don't disagree, but the nature of swimming is such that, even if that were not true, the groups that currently dominate running sprints would not dominate swimming sprints to the same degree. Fin swimming would be a closer match. Currently, of course, fin swimming is dominated by those rare people who are aware that it is actually a sport.

But there's no reason that black athletes would not be equally represented in slow-twitch endurance sports; since not all black people have a predominance of fast-twitch muscle, any more than any other ethnic group. Black athletes predominate in sports that depend on fast-twitch muscle, because most sports common to lower classes depend on fast-twitch muscle. Endurance sports require a lot more time, by comparison, for training than poorer classes typically have available.

[brodski]

Agenda. Singular is agendum.

In Latin yes, but not usually in English. In English agenda has become the singular and “agendas” the plural.
Agendum has almost universally been replaced with the phrase "agenda item".

“Agendae” wouldn’t work in Latin and is not in usage in English (until now).

[Modified]

But there's no reason that black athletes would not be equally represented in slow-twitch endurance sports; since not all black people have a predominance of fast-twitch muscle, any more than any other ethnic group.

I'm not sure what you mean by "equally represented", as I said "would not dominate to the same degree". The dominance by those of West African descent in the 100 meters at the world class level is almost total. That decreases as you go to 200m, then 400m.

Black athletes predominate in sports that depend on fast-twitch muscle, because most sports common to lower classes depend on fast-twitch muscle."Most sports common to lower classes depend on fast-twitch muscle" would not explain it though. You would need "most sports that depend on fast-twitch muscle are played almost exclusively by people who trace their origins to West Africa, everywhere in the world."

[Cuddles]

But there's no reason that black athletes would not be equally represented in slow-twitch endurance sports; since not all black people have a predominance of fast-twitch muscle, any more than any other ethnic group. Black athletes predominate in sports that depend on fast-twitch muscle, because most sports common to lower classes depend on fast-twitch muscle. Endurance sports require a lot more time, by comparison, for training than poorer classes typically have available.

But black athletes don't only dominate fast-twitch sports, they also dominate the long distance endurance events. However, in these events it tends to be north and east African rather than west African that comes top. There are also plenty of lower class white people around, and yet they aren't represented in these sports anywhere near as much. If it was a class issue, you would expect the proportion of athletes to reflect the racial proportions of different classes, yet it is almost entirely black people in sprints, almost entirely white people at middle distance and almost entirely black people, from a different region, at long distance. It is also interesting that people of oriental stock aren't as successful at running, despite plenty of entries, but they tend to do well at swimming and throwing events.

When it comes down to it, it is really quite silly to argue that everyone is exactly the same except for social standing. Black people are not the same as white people. It is not racist to say this and it is not racist to try to find out exactly how and why they are different. Yes, the science can be taken by racist people for their own agenda, does that mean we shouldn't discuss it all for fear of them? The fact is, differences in sporting acomplishment are observed. Postulating genetic differences as part of the cause of this is not in any way racist.

[drkitten]

But black athletes don't only dominate fast-twitch sports, they also dominate the long distance endurance events. However, in these events it tends to be north and east African rather than west African that comes top. [snip] Postulating genetic differences as part of the cause of this is not in any way racist.

I'm afraid that I have to disagree with you, largely for reasons you yourself have articulated.

The term "black" is near-meaningless, precisely because it encompasses a social, not a genetic, category. Saying that someone is "black" says very little about his or her genetics -- even saying someone is "white" doesn't say much, and "white" is much more homogenous, genetically speaking (something like 90% of the genetic varation among humans is found between different African groups).

[bpesta22]

I'm afraid that I have to disagree with you, largely for reasons you yourself have articulated.

The term "black" is near-meaningless, precisely because it encompasses a social, not a genetic, category. Saying that someone is "black" says very little about his or her genetics -- even saying someone is "white" doesn't say much, and "white" is much more homogenous, genetically speaking (something like 90% of the genetic varation among humans is found between different African groups).

I keep hearing this argument, and not being a geneticist, I wonder why people can identify race by body parts (say in forensics). If anyone knows, is it true one can tell race by looking at a skull, jaw or hipbone? If so, wouldn't those be genetic differences across races?

[Darat]

I keep hearing this argument, and not being a geneticist, I wonder why people can identify race by body parts (say in forensics). If anyone knows, is it true one can tell race by looking at a skull, jaw or hipbone? If so, wouldn't those be genetic differences across races?


As far as I knew they can't and don't. My understanding was that at best they can come up with estimates of things like height, sometimes the sex of the person (but not always) and sometimes say something like "there is 70% likelihood this is from a person of population X". That is a whole different ballgame to being able to say "This hip bone is fro ma white/black/Asian man".

[drkitten]

I disagree that it's dishonest to exclude people with brain abnormalities in a study on brain size and IQ..

Of course it's not dishonest. Or more accurately, it's a different and less interesting study if you don't.

Here's an analogy. Did you know there is a strong correlation (in the West,at least) between height and income? Being tall is a well-documented advantage socially, which extends both to politics (betting on the taller candidate to win is a surprisingly effective strategy) and business (the taller person gets promoted to management). It's easy enough to confirm; gather a large group of people, look at their tax returns and their height, and plot the data.

Now, of course, there are three ways to do this study, only one of which will actually confirm it.

The first is to do a large group of random people. In this case, we will find that the shorter people have incomes near zero. Hardly surprising. Children don't often work and they don't get paid well when they do.

The second is to do a large group of adults (excluding those under, say, 21) . In this case, we will find that the shorter people have incomes about 70% of the taller people, if the NOW's numbers can be trusted. But this is because women are shorter and more ill-paid than men.

To really confirm the hypothesis, we would need to confine our sample to a large group of adult males (and probably a large group of adult females as well, to see if the effect is the same). Now at this point it's not clear what our confounds would be -- but if it turns out there is a confound (we've got too many pygmies and circus dwarfs in our sample), we need to go through and re-tool again.

[ponderingturtle]

This is a meta-analysis

Big-brained people are smarter: A meta-analysis of the relationship between in vivo brain volume and intelligence


The problem I have is then how do you deal with some forms of dwarfism where you can have a normal intelect and a brain 1/4 normal size?

[bpesta22]

From a NOVA special. This seems like a very balanced discussion from an anthropologist. I guess for things like blood groups, race is not defined. But, for physical traits bones, etc., race is clearly defined.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/first/gill.html


If we choose to accept the system of racial taxonomy that physical anthropologists have traditionally established—major races: black, white, etc.—then one can classify human skeletons within it just as well as one can living humans. The bony traits of the nose, mouth, femur, and cranium are just as revealing to a good osteologist as skin color, hair form, nose form, and lips to the perceptive observer of living humanity.

I have been able to prove to myself over the years, in actual legal cases, that I am more accurate at assessing race from skeletal remains than from looking at living people standing before me. So those of us in forensic anthropology know that the skeleton reflects race, whether "real" or not, just as well if not better than superficial soft tissue does. The idea that race is "only skin deep" is simply not true, as any experienced forensic anthropologist will affirm.

[drkitten]

I keep hearing this argument, and not being a geneticist, I wonder why people can identify race by body parts (say in forensics). If anyone knows, is it true one can tell race by looking at a skull, jaw or hipbone? If so, wouldn't those be genetic differences across races?

No, because "race" could still be an umbrella category without inherent meaning other than the social.

Pretend I run a zoo. The bears, zebras, and monkeys are housed on the west side of the zoo campus, while the big cats, the elephants, and the reptiles are housed on the east side. If you show me a skull, I can tell you instantly whether it would be housed on the west or east side of the zoo. But that doesn't mean that there are (meaningful) genetic differences between the sides, and it doesn't make sense to talk about "east-side traits." (In fact, both bears and big cats are Carnivora, so they're more closely related to their cross-side cousins than their next-door neighbors.)

Race is non-cladistic, which means it's very unlikely to have any meaningful genetic markers. Now, you probably can find individual markers -- this gene indicates that the person is Hausa, and therefore black, while this other gene indicates that this other individual is Zulu (and therefore Black). But why do we want to lump Hausa and Zulu together, along with the Tutsi, Baka., Afar, Masaai, and Batwa? Are we really just lumping together the equivalent of bears, zebras, and monkeys?

[boooeee]

All that, more than any "political correctness" chimera, is the reason why these sorts of race-based correlations, eg. The Bell Jar, are typically debunked as agenda-based junk-science.


Sylvia Plath was a racist?

[drkitten]

The problem I have is then how do you deal with some forms of dwarfism where you can have a normal intelect and a brain 1/4 normal size?

By repeating to yourself the mantra "the singular of data is not anecdote" until you achieve enlightenment.

Ooooooooommmmmmmmm.

[bpesta22]

I see a qualitative difference between dwarfs and non dwarfs. To mix them into a study looking at brain size and IQ seems silly.

Whatever conclusions you reach obviously dont generalize to the dwarf population, but that wasn't the intent anyway.

And, they're are likely very smart dwarfs, but as Dr K's analogy illustrates, including dwarfs in the study would lead to a confound (in this case suppressing the true correlation between brain size and IQ) , just like gender should probably be controlled when looking at the relationship between height and income.

[Darat]

From a NOVA special. This seems like a very balanced discussion from an anthropologist. I guess for things like blood groups, race is not defined. But, for physical traits bones, etc., race is clearly defined.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/first/gill.html

...snip...

Just been looking for stuff and came across this forensic anthropologist:

http://main.uab.edu/show.asp?durki=45647


...snip...

Race is a much more complex issue. And it’s getting more complex all the time, Wheatley says. “Just walking around the UAB campus, I see so many signs of increased racial mixing,” he says. “For example, every day on the street I see white students with high cheekbones”—a sure sign, he says, that the races are becoming less and less distinct as the planet’s population moves toward a multiracial citizenry.

For that reason, racial identification these days is kept to the basics—white, black, Asian, or Native American, based on distinctive characteristics of the skeleton, regardless of what the person’s skin may have looked like.

...snip...

Now this should immediately send alarm bells ringing - and I say this because of the "basics" - the 4 groups he mentions, what on earth is he actually determining?

ETA: And then there is this one: http://www.anthro4n6.net/forensics/#SexRace

[ponderingturtle]

By repeating to yourself the mantra "the singular of data is not anecdote" until you achieve enlightenment.

Ooooooooommmmmmmmm.

So we ignore primordial dwarfism becuase it does not fit the ideas about brain size and intelect? So any individuals who have very small brains because of this and are doing normaly in school simply can't exist?

It of course doesn't matter if they actualy do.

[ponderingturtle]

I see a qualitative difference between dwarfs and non dwarfs. To mix them into a study looking at brain size and IQ seems silly.

Whatever conclusions you reach obviously dont generalize to the dwarf population, but that wasn't the intent anyway.

And, they're are likely very smart dwarfs, but as Dr K's analogy illustrates, including dwarfs in the study would lead to a confound (in this case suppressing the true correlation between brain size and IQ) , just like gender should probably be controlled when looking at the relationship between height and income.

So we throw out data points that do not fit what we are trying to show?

Patients who have had hemisphereectomies might also be interested cases as they have half a brain and often little severe retardation.

[Cuddles]

I'm afraid that I have to disagree with you, largely for reasons you yourself have articulated.

The term "black" is near-meaningless, precisely because it encompasses a social, not a genetic, category. Saying that someone is "black" says very little about his or her genetics -- even saying someone is "white" doesn't say much, and "white" is much more homogenous, genetically speaking (something like 90% of the genetic varation among humans is found between different African groups).

Yes, the term "black" is so general as to be meaningless, but that does not mean there is no difference between any groups. It doesn't matter what you call them, the fact is that virtually every medalist in international sprint competitions is of a particlular racial stock, namely people who's ancestors lived on the west African coast. These people are black. The fact that there are lots of other people who are also black doesn't mean that the group doesn't exist, it just means they are part of a much larger group as well.

[Darat]

A bit too much for another ETA:


There is also this type of statement I can find in a few places:

http://www.ncpa.org/iss/hea/2003/pd080103a.html
...snip...

Ancestry reflects something genetically real, explaining why forensics can identify a skeleton's race, says anthropologist C. Loring Brace of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. However, biologists say there is little medical value to knowing a patient's race.

...snip...


But that same digest then goes on to state (bold by me):

http://www.ncpa.org/iss/hea/2003/pd080103a.html
...snip...

The premise is that physiological response to a drug reflects genes. However, prominent geneticists are warning that although response to medication partly reflects a patient's genes, it is rarely the genes that reflect race that matter. Thus self-reported race is misleading and may be medically useless:

...snip...


bpesta22 - I obviously don't even rank as an ametuer at this sort of thing but it would seem to me that you need to look into this idea of race, self-reported race and what it really means before you can do any study that uses these categories.

(And at this point I'm not sure what it is that forensic anthropologists are actually identifying.)

More from the digest:

http://www.ncpa.org/iss/hea/2003/pd080103a.html
...snip...

Six million Americans in the 2000 census picked two or more races to describe themselves.

Blacks respond differently than whites to some heart drugs, but genetics indicates that it is much narrower, more precise groupings of ancestry or ethnicity that account for such differences, rather than race.

...snip...


http://www.ncpa.org/iss/hea/2003/pd080103a.html

...snip...
Scientists report that 93 percent to 95 percent of genetic variations reflect within-group differences, while less than 5 percent reflect differences between races.

...snip...

[drkitten]

So we throw out data points that do not fit what we are trying to show?

No. But we do throw out data points that we know a priori will confound things that we are trying to show.

Or do you think the appropriate way to determine the relationship between height and income is to include children in the sample?

[drkitten]

The fact that there are lots of other people who are also black doesn't mean that the group doesn't exist, it just means they are part of a much larger group as well.

Yes. But it also means that if you want to talk about the larger group, you need to show that it exists and is meaningful. Otherwise you run the risk of becoming the zookeeper talking about his "west-side animals" and his "east-side animals."

[ponderingturtle]

No. But we do throw out data points that we know a priori will confound things that we are trying to show.


You are looking at the relationship between brian size and inteligence, an are throwing out all extreme examples. So a 75% smaller brain can have little effect we are supposted to think a 2% smaller brain has an effect?

[bpesta22]

A bit too much for another ETA:


There is also this type of statement I can find in a few places:




But that same digest then goes on to state (bold by me):



bpesta22 - I obviously don't even rank as an ametuer at this sort of thing but it would seem to me that you need to look into this idea of race, self-reported race and what it really means before you can do any study that uses these categories.

(And at this point I'm not sure what it is that forensic anthropologists are actually identifying.)

More from the digest:

Darat; I'm no expert neither; trying to learn a bit about it here. 5% difference is due to race. Is that significant? This is probably a fallacy but isn't 98%+ of our dna identical to a chimp's?

I'm still looking at this from a data driven (bottom up) perspective: The results over the past 100 years clearly show that classifying people as black, white, asian (just by using your eyeball, or by having the subjects self report) produces amazingly consistent, strong IQ differences at the group level which do not fit at all with any type of pure environmental explanation. These differences are found in many places-- not just on paper and pencil tests-- which offers pretty solid converging evidence that the differences are real (for example, the IQ differences map on to brain size differences, brain function differences, reaction time differences, inspection times differences, the g-loadedness of the test, etc., etc.)

In fact, the article cited above reviews something like 13 different converging lines of evidence all pointing to the same conclusion.

Many here seem to demand a conceptually driven (top down) account: Define race with such precision that you can take a white fetus, alter his genes and make him come out black. i.e., if you can't show that race has a precisely identified genetic basis, then any study using race as a variable is merely an excuse to express one's nazi leanings.

We can't define iq, but we can measure it. We can't define race (whatever it's biological or genetic causes) but we measure its effects. As far as I know, this is equivalent to us not understanding what gravity really is but nonetheless being able to measure it with amazing reliability and validity.

The reliaibility of the IQ test is in the upper .90s where 1.0 is perfect. The validity depends on what you're using the test to predict, and though these rarely rise about .50, they're often the single best validities in existence for socially important outcomes.

I guess that's where I'm coming from.


PT: The idea that drawfs can have tiny brains yet still be highly intelligent is interesting and relevant to IQ research. Indeed, any complete theory on IQ will have to account for this finding. But including dwarfs (which I assume have some type of genetic defect) in with the general population on a study like this makes no sense.

It's not cherry picking the data-- you might be asking an external validity question (do the results of these studies generalize to the rest of the population). I'd say the brain/IQ relationship generalizes to all people within the fat part of the bell curve. It surely does not generalize to the population of dwarfs (though in another study, one might find that just within the drawf population, brain size and iq correlate).

Also, R&J mention brain size as one converging piece of evidence. They then say that the brain function studies (PET scan type stuff; how fast one's neuron's fire; how much fat is on a person's nerve cells) as a possible cause for the differences.

[ponderingturtle]

PT: The idea that drawfs can have tiny brains yet still be highly intelligent is interesting and relevant to IQ research. Indeed, any complete theory on IQ will have to account for this finding. But including dwarfs (which I assume have some type of genetic defect) in with the general population on a study like this makes no sense.

There are many forms of dwarfism. The most common form have roughly normal sized brains, I was reffering to a very uncommon form, primordial dwarfism. Think of General Tom Thumb, who was more or less of normal proportions but died at 3'4" tall.

Now some with this condition are mentaly disabled, but not all of them.

It's not cherry picking the data-- you might be asking an external validity question (do the results of these studies generalize to the rest of the population). I'd say the brain/IQ relationship generalizes to all people within the fat part of the bell curve. It surely does not generalize to the population of dwarfs (though in another study, one might find that just within the drawf population, brain size and iq correlate).

The problem is that if they do correlate in general why can there be such massive failures of correlation?

[drkitten]

The problem is that if they do correlate in general why can there be such massive failures of correlation?

Because pathological conditions are by definition pathological and unusual -- the human body is an incredibly complex system, and it can break in many different ways.

It's reasonable to expect a "normal" person's brain to behave in a "normal" way. It's not reasonable to expect an "abnormal" person's brain to behave "normally," and so it's not reasonable to expect the data from an abnormal subject to match the distribution spectrum of "normalcy." This is simple statistics and has little to do with biology or anatomy.

If you're asking about the biological/anatomical explanations -- well, dwarfs' brains presumably operate in a sllightly different way, and given the spectrum of things that can cause dwarfism, it's almost certain that "dwarfs' brains" are not even a uniform group. Some forms of dwarfism may cause cognitive losses that are not easily measured on conventional IQ tests (reduced ability to recognize emotional content of language, for example) because their brains "overdevelop" the logical/reasoning capacity. Others may simply have less available redundancy and therefore will be more sensitive to brain insult such as stroke. Or it may simply be one of those "damfino -- ask again in five years" questions.

But whatever the answer is, the statement that dwarfs' brains are represenative of the abilities of nonpathological brains is clearly false. The experimental method should -- indeed, must -- reflect that for there to be any validity to the study.

[drkitten]

You are looking at the relationship between brian size and inteligence, an are throwing out all extreme examples.

... for which we know there is an external confounding factor for brain size that may also include a confounding factor for IQ.

So a 75% smaller brain can have little effect we are supposted to think a 2% smaller brain has an effect?

Err, yes?

[ponderingturtle]

Because pathological conditions are by definition pathological and unusual -- the human body is an incredibly complex system, and it can break in many different ways.

It's reasonable to expect a "normal" person's brain to behave in a "normal" way. It's not reasonable to expect an "abnormal" person's brain to behave "normally," and so it's not reasonable to expect the data from an abnormal subject to match the distribution spectrum of "normalcy." This is simple statistics and has little to do with biology or anatomy.

The problem with this is that it certainly does hold for conditions that impair the brain function, but here we seem to get normal brain function in much much less space.

It also raises interesting questions with respect to evolution and the in built assumption that larger brain means more inteligence.

[drkitten]

The problem with this is that it certainly does hold for conditions that impair the brain function, but here we seem to get normal brain function in much much less space.

Yup. And that's the problem. "Seem to." You seem willing to take the "seeming" at face value; the idea that there might be hidden problems below the surface isn't an issue to you.

It is to me.



It also raises interesting questions with respect to evolution and the in built assumption that larger brain means more inteligence.

Not especially, no. We know that dwarfism is a negative evolutionary trait from other evidence, so it's not surprising that even dwarfs of normal intelligence would be selected against. And it's not an inbuilt assumption that larger brains means more intelligence -- it's an empirical observation (and a rather controversial one at that). Fifteen years ago, professional opinion would have been almost universal that intellligence and brain size were not connected, and it's only through the use of a much more powerful meta-analysis that this finding has emerged (and I'm still not sure I buy it myself).

But in order to establish (empirically) whether or not it's true, we need to do the study as cleanly as possible, including controlling for all other factors that might be influential.

[ponderingturtle]

Yup. And that's the problem. "Seem to." You seem willing to take the "seeming" at face value; the idea that there might be hidden problems below the surface isn't an issue to you.

It is to me.

The problem is that with what appears to my lay understanding of these issues, that seeming to be 1/4 the size and functioning at the same level should not be possible.




Not especially, no. We know that dwarfism is a negative evolutionary trait from other evidence, so it's not surprising that even dwarfs of normal intelligence would be selected against. And it's not an inbuilt assumption that larger brains means more intelligence -- it's an empirical observation (and a rather controversial one at that). Fifteen years ago, professional opinion would have been almost universal that intellligence and brain size were not connected, and it's only through the use of a much more powerful meta-analysis that this finding has emerged (and I'm still not sure I buy it myself).

So whales are smarter than us, as they have much larger brains they must be smarter.

And it is not for intellectual reasons that dwarfs would have selection pressures against them, but generally being physically unable to compete, is much more of a reason.

But in order to establish (empirically) whether or not it's true, we need to do the study as cleanly as possible, including controlling for all other factors that might be influential.

Part of the problem is that the primordial dwarfs I mentioned are very very uncommon. There are less than 20 in the US. But if you would like I can certainly point you toward papers written on individuals who are described by their doctors as being of normal mental function.

[drkitten]

The problem is that with what appears to my lay understanding of these issues, that seeming to be 1/4 the size and functioning at the same level should not be possible.

As a math professor of mine used to put it -- "don't use your intuition if you don't have it." That's really an argument from ignorance -- if it shouldn't be possible, but it demonstrably happens, then the only reasonable conclusion is that you're misjudging the possible.

In this case, it's fairly simple to resolve. It shouldn't be possible if dwarfs' brains develop and operate the same way "normal's" do. But phrased like that, that's a silly assumption to make; since we know that they don't (otherwise, they'd be 4x larger. Given that there's a structural difference that makes them sized differently, why should we assume that they function the same?



Part of the problem is that the primordial dwarfs I mentioned are very very uncommon. There are less than 20 in the US. But if you would like I can certainly point you toward papers written on individuals who are described by their doctors as being of normal mental function.

Yeah, but I'm not sure I'd take a GP's word for it on a matter of such specialized knowledge. And the very fact that they're so rare raises another possibility. Perhaps they have the brain structure that should yield IQ+ in the genius-plus range, but due to size limitations, they can only achieve normalcy.

Just as a quick crack at the numbers, if there are 2,000 people in the States with this form of dwarfism, and only 20 appear "normal," then that would correspond to a 1-in-100 (99th percentile) IQ -- about 135 IQ (depending on the test). So if they're only "normal" intellligence," then the smaller brain may have cost them about 35 IQ points.

[luchog]

There are also plenty of lower class white people around, and yet they aren't represented in these sports anywhere near as much. If it was a class issue, you would expect the proportion of athletes to reflect the racial proportions of different classes, yet it is almost entirely black people in sprints, almost entirely white people at middle distance and almost entirely black people, from a different region, at long distance. It is also interesting that people of oriental stock aren't as successful at running, despite plenty of entries, but they tend to do well at swimming and throwing events.

But you're just proving my point. It's not "black" vs. "white", it's much smaller, more localized and less genetically diverse populations that, due to adaptation to their local enviroment, have developed specific traits that are useful for particular sports. The fact that blacks dominate so many lower-class sports is still not due entirely to those factors, but due to the factors that there are more blacks that try out for lower-class-oriented sports than whites, because it is often seen as their only opportunity out of povery, or for simply a lack of competing passtimes. Cultural factors.

A certain very very small African tribe dominates, for just this reason -- adaptation to an evironment with evolutionary pressures that select for characteristics ideal for long-distance endurace running; but only 40%. (And they are African, not the far more genetically diverse American Black)
There are similarly small Asian/Caucasian populations that have similarly large representation in such sports due to adaptation to similar environments. It has nothing to with "black" vs "white". Indeed, there are other black populations that are physiologically poorly adapted for long-distance endurance sports.

And, of course, none of this has the slightest bearing on intelligence. There is still no reliable data that any particular "race" or ethnic subgroup is inherently predisposed to lower or higher intelligence. So far, the only reliable non-cultural non-traumatic factor involved in academic potential is nutrition. No other correlations have every been reliably demonstrated

[luchog]

Sylvia Plath was a racist?

Gah, stupid cold meds messing with my head. Of course I meant The Bell Curve. I'm going to go back into my Nyquil haze and watch more CSI and not post anymore until I'm over this crappy little virus.

[Hokulele]

Just to throw a wrench into the works, how do the brain size/IQ correlations take conditions such as this (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=88029) into account?

[Earthborn]

If we choose (snip) forensic anthropologist will affirm.If you are quoting someone -- especially if s/he speaks in first person -- put it in quote tags.

From a NOVA special. This seems like a very balanced discussion from an anthropologist.Don't forget to mention that there is another side (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/first/brace.html) to this discussion.

But, for physical traits bones, etc., race is clearly defined.Note that he doesn't really say that. In fact, he compares it to "age", which does not come in clearly distinct categories.

[Earthborn]

The results over the past 100 years clearly show that classifying people as black, white, asian (just by using your eyeball, or by having the subjects self report) produces amazingly consistent, strong IQ differences at the group level which do not fit at all with any type of pure environmental explanation.In what way were environmental factors excluded from the results over the past 100 years? By eyeballing or self-reporting of race, aren't you introducing environmental factors that one should exclude to make any claim that the differences at the group level do not fit any type of environmental explanation.

In fact, the article cited above reviews something like 13 different converging lines of evidence all pointing to the same conclusion.Which article are you talking about?

We can't define race (whatever it's biological or genetic causes) but we measure its effects. As far as I know, this is equivalent to us not understanding what gravity really is but nonetheless being able to measure it with amazing reliability and validity.With gravity we don't have to define categories. In fact, the concept of gravity was devised to unify forces that seemed quite distinct; that of falling objects and what caused the movement of heavenly bodies.

The concept of race -- certainly the way you use it -- demands that we are able to divide humanity into categories. You don't have show what the cause of those categories are, you don't have to define it so precisely that one can change a white fetus and make it black. But you do have to show where exactly the boundaries between the categories are.

The reliaibility of the IQ test is in the upper .90s where 1.0 is perfect. The validity depends on what you're using the test to predict, and though these rarely rise about .50, they're often the single best validities in existence for socially important outcomes.Aren't you contradicting yourself here? Are IQ tests reliable in the upper .90s or do they rarely rise above .50 ?

[Jeff Corey]

...Aren't you contradicting yourself here? Are IQ tests reliable in the upper .90s or do they rarely rise above .50 ?
He's correct. Test reliability is measured by the correlation of test version A to B, successive retakes or the one half of the test to the other. Test validity is measured by the correlation of the test score with some other relevant measure, such as grades.
Two entirely different concepts. Reliability is how consistent the measuring device is, validity tells you how well it measures what it is supposed to measure.

[Muppet]

Interesting discussion folks.

Seems to me no-one has brought up the important point of brain function into this and how this relates to brain size. Its a well known fact that male brains are in fact on average 200g larger then female brains and it has already been stated here that whale brains are in fact huge.

This is because a large part of the brain is devoted to controlling motor units. To get an accurate "size" you have to first shave off the parts that control movements, which would be most of the cortex and the cerebellum.

Measuring only cranial capacity in skulls of course is measuring cerebro-spinal fluid as well and then there's the issue of density when you measure volume.

Density is variable in all human tissues including the brain and it is also something that can be trained. Yes, you can actually train to have a heavier brain by developing skills you do not have, like juggling or being able to find your way easily (think taxi drivers).

Someone also brought up "athleticism" as an equally vague term as intelligence and the ability to measure it. A larger brain will most of the time predict better movement ability and higher total testosterone will predict muscle mass and fat-mass. Those together could in fact predict good athletes but neither of these are strict nature/nurture items since both can be affected through training and testosterone can of course be artificially increased very easily.

Now, brain size and weight will predict its ability to perform its function, but to measure a specific function you need to measure the specific parts which perform that function.

And as for primordial dwarfs and brain size, they have much less muscle mass and so need less brain-material to control it and I would assume they would fare worse from stroke, ms and parkinsons etc.

[ponderingturtle]

As a math professor of mine used to put it -- "don't use your intuition if you don't have it." That's really an argument from ignorance -- if it shouldn't be possible, but it demonstrably happens, then the only reasonable conclusion is that you're misjudging the possible.

In this case, it's fairly simple to resolve. It shouldn't be possible if dwarfs' brains develop and operate the same way "normal's" do. But phrased like that, that's a silly assumption to make; since we know that they don't (otherwise, they'd be 4x larger. Given that there's a structural difference that makes them sized differently, why should we assume that they function the same?

Or brain size is not that important. Remember focusing on the brain was the part of the reason Piltdown man was convincing.




Yeah, but I'm not sure I'd take a GP's word for it on a matter of such specialized knowledge. And the very fact that they're so rare raises another possibility. Perhaps they have the brain structure that should yield IQ+ in the genius-plus range, but due to size limitations, they can only achieve normalcy.

Just as a quick crack at the numbers, if there are 2,000 people in the States with this form of dwarfism, and only 20 appear "normal," then that would correspond to a 1-in-100 (99th percentile) IQ -- about 135 IQ (depending on the test). So if they're only "normal" intellligence," then the smaller brain may have cost them about 35 IQ points.

BUt there are only 20, and more than 2 of them are not seriously retarded. Also as the exact cause has not been identified, it is hard to say if mental disabilities are random or not.