It's difficult to tell the difference between environmental and genetic factors

"My first reaction, looking at this pattern, was that if the highest-scoring blacks are those who have lighter skin or live in whiter countries, the reason must be their high socioeconomic status relative to other blacks. But then you have to explain why, on the SAT, white kids from households with annual incomes of $20,000 to $30,000 easily outscore black kids from households with annual incomes of $80,000 to $100,000. You also have to explain why, on IQ tests, white kids of parents with low incomes ­and low IQs outscore black kids of parents with high incomes and high IQs. Or why Inuits and Native Americans outscore American blacks."

"The best way to assess the effects of culture and socioeconomic status is to look at trans-racial adoptions, which combine one race's genes with another's environment. Among Asian-American kids, biological norms seem to prevail. In one study, kids adopted from Southeast Asia, half of whom had been hospitalized for malnutrition, outscored the U.S. IQ average by 20 points. In another study, kids adopted from Korea outscored the U.S. average by two to 12 points, depending on their degree of malnutrition. In a third study, Korean kids adopted in Belgium outscored the Belgian average by at least 10 points, regardless of their adoptive parents' socioeconomic status."

"Studies of African-American kids are less clear. One looked at children adopted into white upper-middle class families in Minnesota. The new environment apparently helped: On average, the kids exceeded the IQ norms for their respective populations. However, it didn't wipe out racial differences. Adopted kids with two white biological parents slightly outscored kids with one black biological parent, who in turn significantly outscored kids with two black biological parents. The most plausible environmental explanation for this discrepancy is that the half-black kids (in terms of their number of black biological parents) were treated better than the all-black kids. But the study shot down that theory. Twelve of the half-black kids were mistakenly thought by their adoptive parents to be all-black. That made no difference. They scored as well as the other half-black kids."

This isn't because of some inherent tendency to be a poor minority, but because they started out, socially, as an oppressed underclass, and it's damned difficult to rise above that. The poverty spiral is nasty.

Explain then why Asian Americans score higher on IQ tests than whites?

Asking what date Christmas is on, for example, or asking a question using the assumption of seven days to a week, starting on Sunday, could hinder some minorities.

First of all neither of these questions would hinder African Americans. Secondly neither would ever appear on an IQ test so I don't really get the point you're trying to make.


General response to point 2-
"in the narrower sense of testing abilities that pay off in the modern world, IQ tests do their job. They accurately predict the outcomes of black and white kids at finishing high school, staying employed, and avoiding poverty, welfare, or jail. They also accurately predict grades and job performance in modern Africa. The SAT, GRE, and tests in the private sector and the armed forces corroborate the racial patterns on IQ tests. Kids of different backgrounds find the same questions easy or hard. Nor do tests always favor a country's ethnic majority. In Malaysia, Chinese and Indian minorities outscore Malays."

"Everyone agrees that the three populations separated 40,000 to 100,000 years ago. Even critics of racial IQ genetics accept the idea that through natural selection, environmental differences may have caused abilities such as distance running to become more common in some populations than in others. Possibly, genes for cognitive complexity became so crucial in some places that nature favored them over genes for developmental speed and vision. If so, fitness for today's world is mostly dumb luck. If we lived in a savannah, kids programmed to mature slowly and grow big brains would be toast. Instead, we live in a world of zoos, supermarkets, pediatricians, pharmaceuticals, and information technology. Genetic advantages, in other words, are culturally created.

Not that that's much consolation if you're stuck in the 21st century with a low IQ."

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the problem is in the sillyness of the IQ system. Some people just think differently than others, have different strengths. Logic problems may not be something that a poor subsaharan african is not subject to at a young age, or often. The brain has been shown to work on a dont use it you lose it basis, people who drive taxis will be good at locational memory, people who are beaten by there parents and forced to do math all day, will get better at it. Regardless, its good to have a well balanced mind, exercised in a variety of ways.

Popisfizzy wrote:

Just FYI: A lot of biologists debate whether race is even a valid biological category. That is how little variation there is between DNA of two different races.

Yeah, i think its been pretty much shown that its all cultural differences and differences in wealth. Its not actually genetic, youve seen how people who were slaves a few generations ago have shown the capacity to rival any other person in the world in qualities like leadership and morality. Think Martin luther king, really. Even people who come from adversity manage to capture the attention of the entire world, there is no race of second class people, only disadvantaged people due to a)racism and b)lineage that was fucked over by racism (Natives anybody.)

Worldweaver wrote:

PIF - "Another common critique is that race is a fuzzy concept. By various estimates, 20 percent to 30 percent of the genes in "black" Americans actually came from Europe. Again, it's a good point, but it bolsters the case for a genetic explanation. Black Americans, like "colored" South Africans, score halfway between South African blacks and whites on IQ tests. The lowest black IQ averages in the United States show up in the South, where the rate of genetic blending is lowest. There's even some biological evidence: a correlation between racial "admixture" and brain weight. Reading about studies of "admixture" is pretty nauseating. But the nausea doesn't make the studies go away."

Masterdan you don't make a nuance of a legitimate point because both sides agree:

"Individual IQ can't be predicted from race. According to the data, at least 15 percent to 20 percent of black Americans exceed the average IQ of white Americans. If you think it's safe to guess that a white job applicant is smarter than a black one, consider this: The most important job in the world is president of the United States. Over the last seven years, the most important judgment relevant to that job was whether to authorize, endorse, or oppose the use of force in Iraq. Among the dozen viable candidates who have applied for the job, one is black. Guess which one got it right?"

how in the world does that rebut what i said?

i was saying that because of the fact that individual IQ cant be determined from race, that the factors that effect IQ are wealth and cultural, not genetic.