Racists standing up for accurate science

[Canard DuJour]

They shouldn't for the same reason they shouldn't expect selection pressures for intelligence to be exactly the same for all members of any given folk racial category everywhere. What they should expect is a wash with all or nearly all the variance being within groups and any between-group variance swamped by environmental factors. That's why, when we break down the data into finer distinctions than folk racial categories, the hierarchy doesn't hold. Read the article you apparently failed to read in the other thread.

That would be the magical silver dollars.

Then so-called "scientific racists" should stop expecting anything so unlikely.

"What they should expect is a wash with all or nearly all the variance being within groups and any between-group variance swamped by environmental factors."

All the silver dollars shatter into pieces as soon as they land, and maybe that solves the problems. Would we expect such a "wash" for racial differences in genotypic skin color? Genotypic height differences? Genotypic immune system differences? Genotypic lung size differences? If not, then why would we expect such a thing with racial differences in genotypic intelligence?

For the reasons I've already pointed out. We are an unusually genetically homogenous species i.e. most characteristics are a wash, exceptions notwithstanding. Now intelligence might or might not be an exception, but it's very unlikely that the vast range of environments inhabited by any given folk racial category fall neatly into some IQ-engendering hierarchy. Moreover, even in more hospitable environments, populations tend to grow until there's competition for resources and reproductive fitness via smart use of them.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

Dogs may not be the analogy you want. Dog breeds do have demonstrable behavioural traits different between breeds. Some dog breeds are reliably docile or high strung or intelligent or prone to violence.

Humans have far less variation between races so this shouldn't be as pronounced, but does it exist? Maybe? Maybe not? Looking at actual research may give some answers. But to what end? How are these answers useful other than to fan the flames of racism? I'm not seeing the point and I wouldn't fund this research. But I also can't support censoring or forbidding it, or pretending it says something other than it says, or classifying it as pseudoscience with no basis of doing so.

Genetic racial differences relate so closely to the core of objective human nature that I am always taken aback by the query, "What good can come of this?" As though it may be better to charge headlong into the age of genetic engineering wearing upside-down glasses. Using such knowledge, we could create a utopia, in which high intelligence is not merely the rare privilege of a few. Or, we can instead hate the science, and genetic racial differences can be widened further, along with a new racial division between the rich and the poor, to be entrenched forever.

I see the benefit in identifying particular genes and seeing how they create or enhance particular desirable traits, and how this could be used in genetic engineering to do some good. We could eliminate some genetic disease and enhance intellect etc. Get a simple routine DNA test at your doctor and learn what genetic problems or opportunities may be in your DNA. Seems much more wise than declaring what people must be just based on the colour of their skin, etc. The latter seems like nothing but category error and fodder for racists.

 

[ApostateAbe]

They shouldn't for the same reason they shouldn't expect selection pressures for intelligence to be exactly the same for all members of any given folk racial category everywhere. What they should expect is a wash with all or nearly all the variance being within groups and any between-group variance swamped by environmental factors. That's why, when we break down the data into finer distinctions than folk racial categories, the hierarchy doesn't hold. Read the article you apparently failed to read in the other thread.

That would be the magical silver dollars.

Then so-called "scientific racists" should stop expecting anything so unlikely.

"What they should expect is a wash with all or nearly all the variance being within groups and any between-group variance swamped by environmental factors."

All the silver dollars shatter into pieces as soon as they land, and maybe that solves the problems. Would we expect such a "wash" for racial differences in genotypic skin color? Genotypic height differences? Genotypic immune system differences? Genotypic lung size differences? If not, then why would we expect such a thing with racial differences in genotypic intelligence?

For the reasons I've already pointed out. We are an unusually genetically homogenous species i.e. most characteristics are a wash, exceptions notwithstanding. Now intelligence might or might not be an exception, but it's very unlikely that the vast range of environments inhabited by any given folk racial category fall neatly into some IQ-engendering hierarchy. Moreover, even in more hospitable environments, populations tend to grow until there's competition for resources and reproductive fitness via smart use of them.

"...most characteristics are a wash."

I disagree. I named a set of phenotypic racial differences that are most certainly NOT a wash. That only phenotypic racial differences that would be a wash are those traits that bear no relationship to environmental selection pressure, such as blood types. Do you have a better example?

 

[Canard DuJour]

They shouldn't for the same reason they shouldn't expect selection pressures for intelligence to be exactly the same for all members of any given folk racial category everywhere. What they should expect is a wash with all or nearly all the variance being within groups and any between-group variance swamped by environmental factors. That's why, when we break down the data into finer distinctions than folk racial categories, the hierarchy doesn't hold. Read the article you apparently failed to read in the other thread.

That would be the magical silver dollars.

Then so-called "scientific racists" should stop expecting anything so unlikely.

"What they should expect is a wash with all or nearly all the variance being within groups and any between-group variance swamped by environmental factors."

All the silver dollars shatter into pieces as soon as they land, and maybe that solves the problems. Would we expect such a "wash" for racial differences in genotypic skin color? Genotypic height differences? Genotypic immune system differences? Genotypic lung size differences? If not, then why would we expect such a thing with racial differences in genotypic intelligence?

For the reasons I've already pointed out. We are an unusually genetically homogenous species i.e. most characteristics are a wash, exceptions notwithstanding. Now intelligence might or might not be an exception, but it's very unlikely that the vast range of environments inhabited by any given folk racial category fall neatly into some IQ-engendering hierarchy. Moreover, even in more hospitable environments, populations tend to grow until there's competition for resources and reproductive fitness via smart use of them.

"...most characteristics are a wash."

I disagree. I named a set of phenotypic racial differences that are most certainly NOT a wash.

Which isn't a counterargument since most characteristics don't differ phenotypically -either within or between racial categories- but have nonetheless been selected for (and genetic drift mostly doesn't manifest phenotypically).

The only phenotypic racial differences that would be a wash are those traits that bear no relationship to environmental selection pressure, such as blood types.

No, again that's assuming selection pressures differentially affect folk racial categories. Some obviously do, most obviously don't or we wouldn't all be 99.5% genetically similar. The post to which you're ostensibly replying addressed this. You're now just repeating yourself in response to out-of-context snippets and ignoring arguments.

Do you have a better example?

I don't need one.

 

[ApostateAbe]

When you say that "most characteristics are a wash," maybe you should give an example of such a characteristic. I am not even sure what you mean. Maybe it is an inference based on Lewontin's fallacy, not based on closely looking at the characteristics, so let me know if that is the case.

 

[Bomb#20]

When you say that "most characteristics are a wash," maybe you should give an example of such a characteristic. I am not even sure what you mean. Maybe it is an inference based on Lewontin's fallacy, not based on closely looking at the characteristics, so let me know if that is the case.

It sounds like he's talking about the billion or so triplets in the genome that code for the same amino acid in practically everyone, as opposed to the ten million or so that a measurable fraction of the population have different versions of.