[Epiph]

A Harvard Law student sent out an email to her fellow students to clarify that the racist argument she made at dinner was not actually as racist as she meant it to be...and then one of the recipients forward the whole thing, included the student's name, on to the entire list-serv of the Harvard Black Law Student Association. Above the Law, while--sort of--condemning the student's argument, also condemned outing the identity of the student. Jill of Feministe argues it is important that such rampant racism be outed before the student goes on to hold positions of power.

I rather agree with Feministe, though I do sort of agree with Above the Law's original statement that it might have been more constructive, at least on a personal level, to confront the girl's fallacious argument head on. But, then again, it seems to me that racism that "rationally" held is going to hold out for proof of the "100 white babies and 100 black babies" that she lays out in her email.

[Illuyankas]

I was actually in an online argument recently about the exact same concept, and every single person - EVERY SINGLE ONE - arguing that black people were genetically less intelligent was doing so because they genuinely felt that black people were worth less than white people. I'd love to be kidding, or exaggerating, but it was like Stormfront were visiting. It's such a fucked argument to make in the first place.

[Goaswerfraiejen]

Illuyankas, on 29 April 2010 - 10:54 PM, said:

I was actually in an online argument recently about the exact same concept, and every single person - EVERY SINGLE ONE - arguing that black people were genetically less intelligent was doing so because they genuinely felt that black people were worth less than white people. I'd love to be kidding, or exaggerating, but it was like Stormfront were visiting. It's such a fucked argument to make in the first place.

...and even if it were true, intelligence doesn't translate directly to someone's worth as a human being. Nor does it translate to some sort of moral standing. I take the following tack whenever I encounter derogatory use of the word "gay" or other such discriminatory language (because it's quite prevalent--among my younger siblings and their friends, and all over the internet): I say something like "actually, that's got nothing to do with homosexuality" and proceed to press the point that they're just people like the rest of us, and it makes no sense to attach prejudice to items of their personality that have absolutely nothing to do with you. I think that a similar scenario is easily applied here: take their (false) argument in its strongest possible form, and then refute it.

When you simply say "you're wrong," people aren't inclined to believe you. Even with an army of facts, they're not inclined to switch to your point of view (witness intelligent design). In my experience, however, my success rates are much higher with the approach that I outlined above. So I would say something like the following: "Assume for a moment that they are, in fact, genetically programmed to be less intelligent. Are they still people? If so, then they should be treated as any other human being would be. What's more, there are obviously intelligent people among them, just as there are incredibly stupid people among Caucasians: so, if intelligence is the metric of personhood, then we should deny personhood to all stupid people, caucasians included." Reductio ad absurdum.

And then I might point out that if IQ were taken as an acceptable measure of intelligence (and thus personhood), most people (the speaker included) would prove little more than wild animals in comparison. But that's a tad more arrogant and combative. Of course, your interlocutor will no doubt proceed to deny that he or she was denying a class of people the attribute of personhood; at that point, you simply ask why their point was relevant, given that a lot of people are stupider than a lot of other people. So if we're using intelligence as part of an evaluative judgement, why stop along ethnic lines? It makes no sense to stop at black people, east asians, etc.: we have our own morons.

The point is just that it's not enough to tell them that they're wrong: you have to help them come to that realization themselves, and the best way to do that is to challenge their assumptions.

[Gothos]

This topic is something of a ticking bomb for an online conversation... Not sure about actually posting some questions I'd have about this subject. The issue of racism is somewhat theoretical for me personally, I've no experience with it whatsoever. Meh.

[Aptorian]

Like Gothos, I think this thread is a touchy subject.

See, as far as I recall I remember hearing about studies showing that "black people" are less intelligent than Caucasians. I remember not too many years ago, seeing a news piece about some geneticist sparking outrage when he publicly claimed that black people were dumber than white people (in prettier words of course, but that was the message). So I did a bit of googling:

Wikipedia has this article - note that it is flagged for being "biased", and there's a lot of drama in the discussion section. Some of the things mentioned are facts, other things are theories. Reading it is like reading Holocaust Revisionism, you recognize some things as true or probable, other things... not so much.

This article from Washinton Uni of St. Louise- says there's no race. Not biologically or genetically speaking. Yet we know that there are diseases and physical traits that are only common for humans coming from specific continents/special colors. How come such variations can't also affect our intelligence? I also find 15% difference between our DNA to sound like a lot. But I'm not exactly an expert in DNA either *cough*

EDIT: Shit, half my post just disappeared... Uhm, give me a sec here.

EDIT2: Okay I had a really good survey paper with a ton of statistics between various regions across the world, some of which seemed contradictory to the numbers in the wiki article. BUT I CAN'T FIND IT AGAIN!

Anyway, this NY Times article beautifully highlights the general problematic situation of focusing on Genetics instead of achievement.

What ever you want to believe, who really cares? Lets say that our genes mean that I, for example, had 5 more points on my IQ test than Stone Monkey (only member I can remember being black) does this somehow make me a better person? More capable of logic reasoning? More morally sound? Better at balancing my check book? I highly doubt that. What ever such small differences between our genes create, I find it much more likely that our culture and social environment create our differences.

As the critics of the genetics research in the wiki article state, how do you even compare IQ tests, if the specimen is not attuned to follow the rules of your test? If you take a peasant with no education out of North Africa and show him a chart full of numbers and squares/circles/lines and dots, how is he going to wrap his mind around your puzzle if he is not conditioned from childhood to understand the line of thought?

This post has been edited by Aptorian: 30 April 2010 - 09:15 AM

[beru]

the 15% genic diffrence is WRONG

there is more genic difference between a herd (its more than a group and less than a horde) of chimpances than the entire humanety...

due to the fact that there was only 1000 humans at some point (some claim that we can all be traced to 7 but that might not be true)

[MTS]

Is it just me, or are people attributing to the girl a stronger position than she takes? All I got from reading that was that she wanted 'some scientific data to disprove the genetic position'.

Examples said:

'I absolutely do not rule out the possibility that African Americans are, on average, genetically predisposed to be less intelligent. I could also obviously be convinced that by controlling for the right variables, we would see that they are, in fact, as intelligent as white people under the same circumstances.'

'I don’t think it is that controversial of an opinion to say I think it is at least possible that African Americans are less intelligent on a genetic level'

'I also don’t think...that cultural differences are not likely the most important sources of disparate test scores'

'In conclusion, I think it is bad science to disagree with a conclusion in your heart, and then try (unsuccessfully, so far at least) to find data that will confirm what you want to be true. Everyone wants someone to take 100 white infants and 100 African American ones and raise them in Disney utopia and prove once and for all that we are all equal on every dimension, or at least the really important ones like intelligence. I am merely not 100% convinced that this is the case.'

It seems blown completely out of proportion to me.

This post has been edited by MTS: 30 April 2010 - 09:39 AM

[Cougar]

I have a few points to make on this. First up I think the person who forwarded it is more irresponsible and unpleasant than the girl who sent the original email. It's a very foolish thing to do and could have far more serious repercussions than merely influencing her education/career.

I've read what she said twice now and I can't help feel she is only guilty of being naive and misguided. The problem with my interpretation of the text is, of course, like everyone's, that we bring our own subjective viewpoint to reading it. However, I've tried to take a step back and read it from a positive point of view (think about it, most arguments online are caused by the difficulty of adequate articulation of conversational norms in text), as she would almost certainly have seen it as a rational and neutral/positive argument when she wrote it.

The primary thing here is I feel most people who are condemning her are drawing a conclusion about her motivations. Having anachronistic views on race could be the product of naivety or having read the 'wrong' material as much as it could be from a deep seated hatred. Consequently, we can't know her motivations. There isn't anything to suggest she has a hatred of black people (her use of African-American in this context is deeply problematic when talking about genetics) her statement at the end seems to say she'd actually like to be conclusively proved incorrect and she comprehensively refutes the false correlation between violence and race/ethnicity; it's merely that from whatever (most likely limited) life experience she has she has drawn, what is in all likelihood, an erroneous conclusion.

The bottom line here is that some people have opinions that seem really stupid, I for one would regard anyone who doesn't regard the basic tenets of evolution as correct to be naive beyond rational explanation, but all that means is they need to be shown the error of their ways.

As for the genetic intelligence thing. I'm of the opinion that intelligence (however we are quantifying or defining that) is a combination of innate genetic ability combined with the right factors in education and nurture. I can't really see how it can have a racial element for 2 reasons. Lets leave aside the fact that 'race' is pretty fallacious anyway because we've all seen that argument played out. The average 'African American' is not going to be 100% genetically African, indeed the power relationships of slavery etc mean there is a pretty good chance many people called 'African American' will have at least one recent white ancestor in their patralineal line. That's before you get into the ever increasing incidence of people procreating outside of what would be regarded their traditional ethnic group. So how can you quantify the level of intelligence that is attributable to race, will the stupid black brain cells overwhelm the nerdy little white brain cells, do the black brain cells live in a ghetto on the south-central part of the cerebral cortex? I'm being facetious here to expose the absurdity of the argument.

Admittedly most of my knowledge about this comes from an extensive series of studies of Afro-Caribbean people in Britain some years ago which found high incidence of genetic variation despite people outwardly appearing to posses what we would call African characteristics.

If I might pop my mod hat on: please try to discuss this in a sensitive manner; don't humiliate yourselves.

[dktorode]

beru, on 30 April 2010 - 09:07 AM, said:

(some claim that we can all be traced to 7 but that might not be true)

Think thats probably the amount of people (well they say probably a few dozen actually) that moved up to europe originally and started the non-african races.

[lobo the wolfman]

MTS, on 30 April 2010 - 09:19 AM, said:

Is it just me, or are people attributing to the girl a stronger position than she takes? All I got from reading that was that she wanted 'some scientific data to disprove the genetic position'.

Examples said:

'I absolutely do not rule out the possibility that African Americans are, on average, genetically predisposed to be less intelligent. I could also obviously be convinced that by controlling for the right variables, we would see that they are, in fact, as intelligent as white people under the same circumstances.'

'I don’t think it is that controversial of an opinion to say I think it is at least possible that African Americans are less intelligent on a genetic level'

'I also don’t think...that cultural differences are not likely the most important sources of disparate test scores'

'In conclusion, I think it is bad science to disagree with a conclusion in your heart, and then try (unsuccessfully, so far at least) to find data that will confirm what you want to be true. Everyone wants someone to take 100 white infants and 100 African American ones and raise them in Disney utopia and prove once and for all that we are all equal on every dimension, or at least the really important ones like intelligence. I am merely not 100% convinced that this is the case.'

It seems blown completely out of proportion to me.

Does it really matter though that all she is doing is asking for scientific data on this kind of study? I would imagine that the real reason for concern is that the fact that here is a young women going to a upscale school, and yet she believes that it is ok for her to question the intelligence of an entire race of people based on their genes and or skin colour, then rather being educated from early school that all people are equal regardless of race creed or colour.

[Aptorian]

lobo the wolfman, on 30 April 2010 - 09:57 AM, said:

then rather being educated from early school that all people are equal regardless of race creed or colour.

What if that education is wrong and genes do play a part in it? Does it matter?

All people are equal, some people are just more equal than others. At least they get treated that way.

This situation arose from a discussion among law students. It's not hard to guess what the subject matter was about. Most likely black people in the American justice system. There's an overwhelming amount of black crime in America. This of course is more realistically attributed to social and economical circumstances, rather than genes, but it's not hard to see how some people, who may already have a prejudice, could take what they see and apply their impression to every person of that creed. In this case black people.

[MTS]

lobo the wolfman, on 30 April 2010 - 09:57 AM, said:

MTS, on 30 April 2010 - 09:19 AM, said:

Is it just me, or are people attributing to the girl a stronger position than she takes? All I got from reading that was that she wanted 'some scientific data to disprove the genetic position'.

Examples said:

'I absolutely do not rule out the possibility that African Americans are, on average, genetically predisposed to be less intelligent. I could also obviously be convinced that by controlling for the right variables, we would see that they are, in fact, as intelligent as white people under the same circumstances.'

'I don’t think it is that controversial of an opinion to say I think it is at least possible that African Americans are less intelligent on a genetic level'

'I also don’t think...that cultural differences are not likely the most important sources of disparate test scores'

'In conclusion, I think it is bad science to disagree with a conclusion in your heart, and then try (unsuccessfully, so far at least) to find data that will confirm what you want to be true. Everyone wants someone to take 100 white infants and 100 African American ones and raise them in Disney utopia and prove once and for all that we are all equal on every dimension, or at least the really important ones like intelligence. I am merely not 100% convinced that this is the case.'

It seems blown completely out of proportion to me.

Does it really matter though that all she is doing is asking for scientific data on this kind of study? I would imagine that the real reason for concern is that the fact that here is a young women going to a upscale school, and yet she believes that it is ok for her to question the intelligence of an entire race of people based on their genes and or skin colour, then rather being educated from early school that all people are equal regardless of race creed or colour.

While the fact she doesn't admit the possibility it could be white people who are the genetically inferior ones is a little problematic, I don't think it's right to utterly castigate this woman and paint her as a racist when really all she's saying is 'well, we can't prove that it's wrong, so I'm not going to dismiss it'. Geez, Christians use the same argument for the existence of God.

And considering the hyperintellectualism and sheltered lifestyle that I imagine must be present in all law schools, I don't find it surprising that without scientific proof someone would refute the idea that we are all equal. Not that I agree with it, but still, what I find most surprising is the fact that someone had the nerve to forward it to BLSAs across the country. Be more of a dick. Seriously.

This post has been edited by MTS: 30 April 2010 - 10:47 AM

[dktorode]

lobo the wolfman, on 30 April 2010 - 09:57 AM, said:

MTS, on 30 April 2010 - 09:19 AM, said:

Is it just me, or are people attributing to the girl a stronger position than she takes? All I got from reading that was that she wanted 'some scientific data to disprove the genetic position'.

Examples said:

'I absolutely do not rule out the possibility that African Americans are, on average, genetically predisposed to be less intelligent. I could also obviously be convinced that by controlling for the right variables, we would see that they are, in fact, as intelligent as white people under the same circumstances.'

'I don't think it is that controversial of an opinion to say I think it is at least possible that African Americans are less intelligent on a genetic level'

'I also don't think...that cultural differences are not likely the most important sources of disparate test scores'

'In conclusion, I think it is bad science to disagree with a conclusion in your heart, and then try (unsuccessfully, so far at least) to find data that will confirm what you want to be true. Everyone wants someone to take 100 white infants and 100 African American ones and raise them in Disney utopia and prove once and for all that we are all equal on every dimension, or at least the really important ones like intelligence. I am merely not 100% convinced that this is the case.'

It seems blown completely out of proportion to me.

Does it really matter though that all she is doing is asking for scientific data on this kind of study? I would imagine that the real reason for concern is that the fact that here is a young women going to a upscale school, and yet she believes that it is ok for her to question the intelligence of an entire race of people based on their genes and or skin colour, then rather being educated from early school that all people are equal regardless of race creed or colour.

Well, what if the topic was that Asians get drunk easier, because Alcohol dehydrogonase-2 is an enzyme that breaks down alcohol and having it be inactive is a trait that is more common among Asians, or that breast cancer in African-American women is a far less common disease than in white women. But when it occurs, it seems to be more aggressive and harder to treat.
Same argument really...she is just seen as "racist" because itsan insult to consider someone less intelligent.

All races are not identical physically. There are certain traits that each race has that is different to each other.
Not EVERY person has the trait of his race of course but there are indeed traits that are prevalent...
I SAW IT ON DR OZ!!!! IT MUST BE TRUE

I think she was just taking the view, that there is a chance that genetically, people of different races, can be predisposed to be intellectually "different".
(maybe thats the word she should have used )

But its impossible to do a proper study as situation,upbringing and education play such an important part in how a brain develops and on how IQ is tested.
Thats the factor that she refuses to believe and is what is short sighted and ignorant.
Her argument is based on what she "believes" and not on what facts are available.
I dont like the fact that she gets involved in speculating on the intelligence of different races without any evidence to back up her claims.
She says herself they cant have 100 babies from each race tested in a perfect world. So how can she make any of these claims?

I personally dont agree with her, but i can almost see her point of view though...however ignorant it might be.

[worry]

She probably refers to African-Americans specifically because they are a recent example of humans being bred more or less for livestock purposes, so that "intelligence" could have been bred out of them to favor other aspects. I don't buy that reasoning because for humans there's just simply not that many generations for the unnatural selection that would take, if it would be possible at all.

In terms of natural selection, aren't the genes that determine phenotypical stuff going to be totally different from the ones that (may) contribute to intelligence? When one adapts to the ultraviolet radiation of the sun, for instance, how would that affect the brain at all? Isn't it much more likely that the genes that perhaps contribute to intelligence developed long before human beings left Africa?

I mean, it may certainly be that individuals are not conceived with equal potential for intelligence, and intelligence may be heritable, but why on earth would that be tied in any way to "race"? Wouldn't modern humans of various levels of intelligence all have been migrating from Africa in whatever waves they did? I don't think such large populations split by intelligence level and then move on, so I see no reason that the variation in intelligence didn't spread with each major migration.

That's just a lay, pseudo-common sense approach I suppose, which doesn't replace science by any means. But I think she underestimates the brain. Not only does it pretty strictly control for itself in terms of form, but it compensates for itself across a bunch of different slight variations. And of course, as pointed out above, "intelligence" is in large part a judgment call. Quantify and contrast how intelligent Temple Grandin is vs. how intelligent Frederick Douglass was.

[dktorode]

worrywort, on 30 April 2010 - 10:52 AM, said:

Isn't it much more likely that the genes that perhaps contribute to intelligence developed long before human beings left Africa?

I think so...

A recent study showed that intelligence in humans came with our discovery of cooking food.
Or the two are directly correlated.
something to do with amounts of energy our brain needs and the efficiency of breaking down cooked food vs raw food in our stomachs/intestines...
There was another thread on here somewhere about that.

So that would be before they left Africa.

This post has been edited by dktorode: 30 April 2010 - 11:04 AM

[Cougar]

Don't make the mistake when discussing evolution that all characteristics are beneficial or significant. If a boy was born with a mutation causing blue hair and by chance every other male died of plague, the blue haired individual might pass on his genes to multiple surviving females and over time isolation might create a group of predominantly blue haired people, it wouldn't mean blue hair was beneficial, it would just be chance. They might then be regarded as a racial grouping, but what would really be different beyond whatever chance arrangement of genes that had survived.

[lobo the wolfman]

Dktorode: Saying that due to genetics, Asians can't process alcohol easily, or that African-American women are less prone to beast cancer then Caucasian women is not the same argument as saying that all African-American's are less intelligent as other races due to genes. Those are physical traits not mental, and they would not cause people of a different race to treat them any differently. But having the point of view that a member of a different race then you isn't and can't be as smart as you are would.

If people started thinking that way, then how the hell are are we, humanity as a whole, ever going to be equal if some people believe that due to pre determined factors a person of a different race could never achieve what you could, could never be as smart as you are, that they will always be less then you are.

I believe that genes can decide your hair colour, eye colour, or if you are going to be bald at 30 instead of 60, not that even with the same education and opportunity as me a black person could never equal me because they where just born dumb, and that's why they turn so quickly to crime and alcohol. To me that just seems like a cope out.

[dktorode]

lobo the wolfman, on 30 April 2010 - 11:37 AM, said:

Dktorode: Saying that due to genetics, Asians can't process alcohol easily, or that African-American women are less prone to beast cancer then Caucasian women is not the same argument as saying that all African-American's are less intelligent as other races due to genes. Those are physical traits not mental, and they would not cause people of a different race to treat them any differently. But having the point of view that a member of a different race then you isn't and can't be as smart as you are would.

Is the brain not a organ?...is it not susceptible to genetic anomalies like any other thing in the human body?
come now.... How did we evolve intelligence if the brain and genetics have nothing to do with each other?

[Aptorian]

lobo the wolfman, on 30 April 2010 - 11:37 AM, said:

Those are physical traits not mental, and they would not cause people of a different race to treat them any differently.

Where exactly do you think our mental process comes from? The Soul? The Brain is a highly complex piece of meat. How the hell it works is beyond me, besides talk of magic, but why couldn't the make-up of the brains design or the brain chemistry be different from one race to another?

[Cause]

I find it strange how so many of you seem unwilling to accept that some people are simply not the equal of others. Maybe I'm a bigot but I value doctors, scientists, teachers, entrepreneurs etc more than I do janitors, security guards, delivery men, drivers etc. Its not that the world would not grind to a stop with out the second group of people but in my opinion anyone can train to be the latter not everyone can make it as the first group. Some people have greater value.

Nurture undoubtedly plays a role in the development of a child's intelligence but we can also see from child prodigies that the luck of the draw on genes can play a role as well. Some people are born smarter, some faster, some are born beautiful (and I guarantee you that it can count for a lot in life) and some are born with a metabolism that lets them eat anything. We can breed a faster racehorse it stands to reason that every now and than we will breed by chance a better human. Is it such a stretch to think than that groups of people likely to breed only with each other might have greater prevalence for intelligent or beautiful children? Jews, blacks, indians, white people all form groups which while not sexually distinct from the other groups do seldom share genetic material with each other.