[mekoka]

I love seeing comments like this surface on HN, because they serve to show how some people can think of themselves as rational while being so oblivious about their ignorance. It can go on silently for years, because they think it's just politically incorrect to say it, but that the "facts" are true.

This is why, despite what you may believe, "race" issues are still of actuality in SV. You would be amazed at what some of the supposedly smart and powerful people in these circles believe when it comes to this stuff.

[centimeter]

You should consider the hypothesis that the supposedly smart people actually are smart (as one might expect), and have put more thought into this than you.

[mekoka]

I stand by my assertion. Anyone trying to use a concept as misunderstood as IQ to explain a disparity in tech regarding black people is most probably misguided and jumping to conclusion. The other person responding to my comment (and who seems to be in the same boat as you) said: where they're still in disagreement is what causes it and the definition of "race". There's a very good reason for that. There are many other attributes that correlate _very strongly_ with what people like to call "race", that are likelier candidates (based on strong evidence) as factors of IQ disparity.

IQ researchers know that unless you can trace the direct origin of their findings to genes (as it's been done for some diseases), you cannot claim causation. Especially when there is also strong evidence of socio-cultural factors (environment, history, culture, nutrition, education, lifestyle, means, etc). Even the plasticity of IQ suggests that since it's not a number set in stone, it wouldn't be prudent to make wild genetic claims. Unfortunately the public at large doesn't want to hear that part, and would rather run with its own version of what I like to call "tldr science", that purports to explain why the world works the way it does with cliff notes.

In a discussion about bias against a specific genetic group, if you want to bring arguments that excuse the status quo, by basically saying that the discriminated group is just genetically at a disadvantage, you need to damn well know what you're talking about. But as it's common with many "bottom-line" numbers like IQ, people tend to look at them and make the same mistake of drawing overly simplistic conclusions to very complicated and entangled issues.

The issue at hand here is the relative invisibility of black people in the tech scene. You brought up a point. I will assume that you're in tech, as I am. Despite what we pride ourselves to be able to accomplish, nothing in that field places it beyond the grasp of 99% of humans with a functioning brain, whether those individuals belong to a low scoring group or not. It's a challenging field, yes, but you don't need genius level IQ. What you need is a favorable environment (education, food, etc) that adequately prepares you for it. And this is true for most other fields.

The fact that you ran with "IQ" to explain the phenomenon (and that you had many advocates coming to your rescue in that endeavor) is very interesting to me, as it really is symbolic of how otherwise smart people may convince themselves that they've figured something that they really don't understand that well.

As I said earlier, this is how we remain in that situation.

[lopmotr]

Psychology researchers don't have any major disagreement about the relationship between race and IQ. It's well established that blacks have lower IQ than whites. Where they're still in disagreement is what causes it and the definition of "race".

It's amazing to see so many seemingly intelligent people being such avid science deniers. Just because you've demonized the people who believe something different from you doesn't mean they're wrong.