Quote:
Originally Posted by Evil_inKarlate
I've often thought blacks as a group were less intelligent, but figured it was a matter of selective breeding rather than inherent stupidity. For a couple hundred years, blacks were bred more for physical prowess than mental ability. Then after a hundred-ish years of mostly laissez-faire, we've had forty years of selection primarily based on gullibilty and fertility. That's sure to lower the IQ of any population group.
The same things might apply in Africa, but to a much lesser extent - The primary factor there seems to be 'hardiness', given the seemingly unending stream of famines, epidemics, and wars over there.
Not in the least. Even if one Were to find the 'best IQ gene', differences in upbringing can easily create dumber 'smart' people or smarter 'dumb' people. Ranking on any scale would be based not on genetics, but on obervable outcomes.
Again, no. Your comment is based on the assumption that blacks Cannot be less intelligent, therefore it must be the test that is wrong. That is just as racist as assuming blacks Must be less intelligent based purely on bias rather than any type of objective data.
Races may or may not be less intelligent, but we all deal with individuals. Some are smart, some are dumb, some are black, some are white, some are short, some are tall, some are fat, some are thin. There may be correlations between the attributes, but they may or may not apply to any given individual, so they should all be treated as... Individuals!
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EI, you plucked out a couple of (untagged) quotes from my post, and it appears that you missed my point altogether.
My entire post was written in the conditional mode, in essence rebutting Watson’s argument. I was replying to the OP question.
Yes, I dispute the objectivity of genetic testing. But precisely how did you conclude that I question the test based on the assumption that blacks Cannot be less intelligent?
As for the impact of social factors on physical and mental prowess, I would agree with you (and never said anything that would suggest I excluded those factors).
I also agree that ultimately we are individuals, and the full gamut of differences is observable as much within a group as between groups (Note that I put all classifying labels into inverted commas to denote that I did not view them as real delineators.)
I believe there is a distinction in making observations of differences, be it through genetic testing or social indicators, and drawing value inferences from those observations.
What “observable outcomes” , in essence, could we uphold as “objective data”?
My point was that Watson’s contention that “Westerners” and “Africans” reason differently, paradoxically adds force to the view that the interpretation of any testing would be subjective.
Tethys