there is a periodic bbc show involving people at home taking an IQ test, together with a bunch of people in the studio. after the results are in, they compare results, firemen with bakers, women and men, northerners and southerners. it always struck me as interesting that they never used race or religion. it’s too controversial, of course. but i don’t like that they didn’t. it seems to suggest that people are too dumb to understand what these comparisons would show.
james watson, he of the structure of DNA fame, was recently lambasted for commenting on the subject. he even got fired from his sinecure.
i thought of this when reading this on metafilter.
Among white Americans, the average IQ, as of a decade or so ago, was 103. Among Asian-Americans, it was 106. Among Jewish Americans, it was 113. Among Latino Americans, it was 89. Among African-Americans, it was 85. Was Watson right?
the comments are interesting, funny even. there are many, many of them. a few:
One of the few brilliant things Ayn Rand ever said:
“A genius is a genius, regardless of the number of morons who belong to the same race - and a moron is a moron, regardless of the number of geniuses who share his racial origin.”
I know it’s not politically correct to point this out, but people who equate IQ test results with intelligence tend to be, like Mensa members, self-absorbed social retards. Go ahead, villify me for speaking truth to power.
There is no scientific evidence for a racial difference in intelligence. There is no scientific evidence for race, really.
IQ tests are not scientific.
As empath says, these statistics are worthless, because the differences are cultural.
I have an IQ of 180, yet I have done fuck-all with my life except sit around and be a loser, smoke dope and drink myself into alcoholism. So much for high IQ.
I’ve never minded Creationists, Scientologists or “There’sNoSuchThingAsRace”ists - they make me feel smart. It’s quite the ego-boost to see clearly the willful blindness of the masses (including some brilliant members of the “masses”) and to know that you’re intellectually braver and more honest than they are. It’s a Spanish-fly for the Soul, so to speak.
All the same, I keep sillily sounding the clarion of Honesty wherever I go. It gains me few friends and many enemies. What’s more - what converts I gain are quick to turn against me when the NEXT intellectual heresy arises. Woe for the honest man. A lament of Mnuez. (That’s a Biblical reference, BTW. I say that lest one think that the marijuana is speaking.)
Anyhow, here’s my post on the Watson affair, written as soon as the wolves began to circle.
Repeat after me: ALL - PEOPLE - ARE - EXACTLY - THE - SAME .
Watson has apologized. The man who discovered the double helix is apparently an idiot. Somehow he managed not to know what everyone else knows: That All Races Of People Have The Same Average Intelligence. Hah! What a moron for not having realized that obvious truth. Y’know, that racist idiot was probably wrong about that whole ‘DNA’ thing too.
In any event, before the Thought Police attached the bucket of rats to Watson’s face the good Libertarians over at Reason wondered aloud, “Is Nobelist James Watson, Co-Discoverer of the Structure of DNA, a Racist?” Ronald Bailey informs his Libertarian readers about Watson’s unforgivable utterance (I think we call it “ignorance” these days, right?) and then goes on to quote himself saying that even if Africans aren’t as smart as we are, we should still be nice to the smart ones.
Of course Watson’s point was regarding how best to help Africa rather than how best to choose an employee but (unlike Darwin) Reason writers worship natural selection. They may or may not dislike people of different skin colors but “so long as he’s the best man for the job, Sambo should be hired just as quick as Lawrence”.
Anyhow, entering among the dog-piling wolves in the blog’s echo chamber, I wrote -
The fault, dear Ronnie, is not in our stars but in ourselves. It is EXTRAORDINARILY obvious that the main factor, out of which most other factors flow, for black non-success in our society is genetic.
That being the case, you and all of your libertarian friends have the choice of either choosing to be Nazis or to cease being Free Marketers (capitalized as all religions are).
People don’t suffer the ravages of Western Civilizations bottom rungs because they “choose” to live a life of worry, stress and struggle for survival. They live among the dregs because they aren’t as “fit” as you to “survive” the Free Market that you worship.
In my opinion therefore they have every natural right to rise up and take from you your status, class and goodies by the force of their brute fists. Your capitalism has resigned them to a world where they live constantly at the edge of despair and they have every right to upturn your applecart.
So, again, racial inequality May be an illusion of mine… but I don’t think so.
Of course however race has nothing to do with it. The evil nature of the unregulated free market destroys the souls of less able Japanese people in a racially monolithic society as well. Pygmies are not the only people less able to become top-notch lawyers than is Alan Dershowitz. Lots of Ashkenazi Jews have low intelligence or other personality faults that keep them from attaining “the American dream” as well - and these people are just as likely to suffer the ill effects of the “greed is good” (or was it “God”?) doctrine as is a Birmingham black kid. But the issue of “race” may turn out to be the one that finally shows your type for who you are: people who are simply Lucky enough to be born with the right intellectual goods to succeed in the modern economic system and who justify their success through self-congratulatory claims that “anyone can do it!”, meaning that you have what you have because you Deserve it rather than because of luck-of-the-genes.
And who supports you? who props you up? the very people who have the most to lose by it. The believers in the religious doctrine of Racial Tabula Rasa who keep up their laughable patter about how “racism” is what’s “keeping the black man down”. No doubt this constantly expressed belief improves some people’s sense of self-worth by constantly telling them that “your brains are not inferior!” (Or Dumbo Diamond style, “Yali’s people are SUPERIOR!”) but it serves the one overriding goal of Genetic Meritocracy by allowing the capitalistic system to continue to function as it does.
Cheers Gentle Libertarians ~
mnuez
www.mnuez.blogspot.com
And I was gonna let this comment live out its brief life at the bottom of that comment section on a fast moving blog where the morning’s news is stale by afternoon, but Watson’s incessant, repeated and self-demeaning apologies for the gall of his inner demons having committed such a repugnant thoughtcrime rise before me now as a moral obligation to step into his corner as one small voice for the Defense.
So there it is.
Comment by mnuez — November 19, 2007 @ 5:59 am