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by spicymaki 2352 days ago
Funny how environment is continually dropped from the conversation of race in favor of heritability. You note that there is now East African dominance in marathon running. That has not always been the case however. As East Africans were provided opportunity to compete on a level playing field their talents whether inherited, conditioned by demand, and/or environmental were demonstrated. Now there is intense competition and selection pressure for the fastest East African runners. West Africans and East African are of the same race, but differ in the case of marathon outcomes. Why can’t this be true for intellect?

Discrimination is not some leftist fantasy. Black Americans have been systematically deprived of quality environments for over 400 years. I am talking about truly horrific intellectual deprivation from making it illegal to read during slavery to living in highly polluted sections of segregated cities today.

When we talk about intellectual disparities history needs to be part of the conversation.

3 comments

> West Africans and East African are of the same race

They have similar skin color, but that doesn't mean they're particularly closely related.

Black Africans have the by far biggest genetic diversity of any population. This is because our species evolved there, and has had the longest to develop variations. By contrast, the rest of humanity comes from relatively small populations of Africa emigrants.

As it happens the best long distance runners come from an region in East Africa, while the best sprinters come from a region in West Africa. This includes US sprinters.

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/04/wh...

> West Africans and East African are of the same race, but differ in the case of marathon outcomes. Why can’t this be true for intellect?

It can be. Among Africans Igbo show much higher levels of educational attainment than others. I’m sure there are other groups this is true of.

> Discrimination is not some leftist fantasy. Black Americans have been systematically deprived of quality environments for over 400 years. I am talking about truly horrific intellectual deprivation from making it illegal to read during slavery to living in highly polluted sections of segregated cities today. When we talk about intellectual disparities history needs to be part of the conversation.

I agree. For example Irish IQ scores were historically lower than English and this is no longer true.

I don't believe the person you're replying to said that discrimination is a fantasy, but it's not always the answer either. It's important to study the situations so that we can identify when each is the culprit or how much of a factor they are.