[davidn20]

I think as a society we need to admit different race, in general, have different culture, values, and strengths. I don't even think that's a radical idea, but somehow it is. I have been watching this football competition youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrbljwLslYI

The fun and athleticism you see is awe-inspiring, but I haven't seen a single Asian person competing or even at the event. My guess is a math competition would look a lot different.

[mgfist]

It's not racial, it's cultural, socio-economic, and historical. Things like redlining, jim crow, GI Bill (lack-there-of for black people after WW2) all directly lead to the huge educational/economic inequality we see today. That said, it's clearly not racial based, because you can take a look at various non-American black populations and see big differences in educational levels and cultural values. For example, Nigerian immigrants (both first and second gen) are vastly more educated than the average American. I haven't dug too deep into sources but here's a random article I found https://www.chron.com/news/article/Data-show-Nigerians-the-m... where they cite census data (too lazy to verify but one could do that if interested).

[throwaway8582]

> For example, Nigerian immigrants (both first and second gen) are vastly more educated than the average American

This is not a good example because the immigration process itself is highly selective. For the most part, only best and brightest from Nigeria are able to come to the US. Try comparing the average black American to the average Nigerian in Nigeria instead.

[bilbo0s]

I thought that was interesting too. I mean, the reason Nigerians do so much better in the US than everyone else is because, of all the "black" population groups, the immigration process is most strict on Nigerians. There is a reason it is more strict on Nigerians than Barbadians, or Bahamians, or Kenyans. And that reason is not because Nigerians are smarter.

You compare the average Nigerian in Nigeria to the average Kenyan in Kenya, or Jamaican in Jamaica, or black American in the US, and you'll see an entirely different story.

There is something to these racial differences, and it can't be explained away by, "Well, if i only consider the top 0.01% of whatever group then they can do as well as the run of the mill 25 percentile Asian!"

Now I will concede that "mixed" kids outperforming all other non Asians was a surprise. But other than that one positive surprise, all this information is surprising in the other direction. Asians outperform at a level that is undeniable. No one is even in their league. Heck, no other racial grouping even catches the "mixed" kids. And unless I'm reading that data wrong, at the top, Asians are doing 3 times better even than the "mixed" kids. And 5 to 25 times better than any group other than the "mixed" kids.

We have to up our education game, because that is pathetic if this data is factual. (And I have seen no reason presented in these comments to believe it is not.)

[marcusverus]

> That said, it's clearly not racial based, because you can take a look at various non-American black populations and see big differences in educational levels and cultural values.

There are big differences in educational levels and cultural views within every racial group. Is that relevant to the question of whether there are significant mean differences between racial groups on the population level?

[dqpb]

First you have to define a sensible racial grouping. Good luck.

[marcusverus]

Huh? Sensible racial grouping is trivial. The overwhelming majority of people on earth fall neatly into racial cateogies of white (European), black (African), Native American (American Indian), or Pacific Islander. Sure, the edges are fuzzy, (and good luck with the whole race/ethnicity thing vis-a-vis hispanics) but to pretend that makes it difficult to measuring population-level averages is just silly.

[dqpb]

> Sure, the edges are fuzzy

Handwave of the century

[marcusverus]

It's much easier to offer up a flippant rhetorical parry than to actually make an argument. Cognitive dissonance and all that.

Here's a question: How is it that we're able to measure the degree to which various racial minorities are underrepresented in congress, in colleges, in industry and in Emmy Award nominations? How is it that we're able to measure racial disparities in income, in COVID exposure, in medical outcomes and in every other conceivable context, if race is such a tricky concept to nail down?

[Der_Einzige]

"not racial".

Well, given that track and field is brutally dominated not just by black Africans/Caribbean Islanders, but that they tend to come from only a handful of ethnic groups, I tend to think that direct race has at least some influence.

Most body builders intuitively understand that being black is an advantage in building muscle.

But don't trust me, trust a study that also points this out: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/26298766_Ethnicity-....

[davidn20]

It is racial in the sense that's the way people have been grouping things. Else we wouldn't even have this conversation. There would be no inequality of races because the grouping wouldn't exist in the first place.

I hesitate, to think obstacles are the reason why things are the way they are. Again, going back to sports. Black people faced all the same obstacles in the sport arena and still came out on top. Also, Asian people also faced discrimination too. Don't forget concentration camps.

And yes, all those other things you mention cultural, socio-economic, and historical are true too. Even within the Asian "grouping" there are groups that don't live up to the "stereotypical" standard of success. John Oliver talked about it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29lXsOYBaow

[raunak]

This is such a bad-faith comment and so dog-whistly that I feel wrong for even engaging with it, but I have to.

> Black people faced all the same obstacles in the sports arena?

No, African-Americans endured physical slavery for hundreds of years, leading to a disposition for physical work. Africans also come from a continent with the hottest average temperature, and in general are more athletically inclined.

And let's look past even that for a moment - why do you think some of the best players in the NBA are starting to come from Eastern Europe? Hmm, I wonder, could it have anything to do with the massive amount of investment into training and player facilities that is pouring into the area? Perhaps we could apply that analogy to academics as well, and realize the INCREDIBLY obvious fact that Asians tend to perform well because our parents have money to push us, we grow up in a culture surrounded by other kids who push us to do better, and we have _privilege_.

It has absolutely nothing to do with "race". It is an entirely privilege-driven issue (do you have resources, or do you not?), and if you still fail to see that, then you're most likely just letting your intrinsic bias/racism drive your thought process.

[davidn20]

I agree, I'm simplifying the issue. But I feel like you're agreeing with me. You stated all the reason why African-Americans history and culture is different.

If it has nothing to do with "race" let's stop talking about race.

[commandlinefan]

> different race, in general, have different culture, values, and strengths

The coarse divisions that we call "race" don't help much here, either - there's a lot of variance between different groups of asians as well as different groups of whites (think of how different italians are from irish). The way we're lumped together is actually very arbitrary (and changes depending on how the lumpers are trying to score political points).

[dqpb]

According to this article, African Americas have been separated from their indigenous continent long enough that they are now their own distinct race.

[PubliusMI]

Are the divisions arbitrary if they are reflected in objective measures of athleticis and scholastics?

[genera1]

Neither athletic nor scholastic performance are objective measures. Sports are contests of arbitrary skills, that on the highest level require time intensive and expensive commitment since basically childhood, and whatever method you choose to measure scholastic performance with it's never going to be free of class/geographic/cultural factors.

[prottog]

Exactly. I've made this point before in this forum, but there's no reason at all to believe that the distribution of interests, values, and strengths between different ethnic and cultural groups should be identical. The classical liberal idea that "all men are created equal" is a beautiful one, and should not be perverted to mean that everyone is literally equal to each other in every respect.

[tester756]

I think the point is that

are those differences just because of race

or they are made because of external factors due to race?

For example:

You're successful because of X race

or

You're successful because you were treated differently than if you had Y race

[prottog]

Neither statement is falsifiable, so it should be meaningless from a policymaking standpoint.

[RetpolineDrama]

>The classical liberal idea that "all men are created equal" is a beautiful one

Is it even really "classical liberal"? I'm fairly certain it's religious in nature. If the sky daddy made us all 6,000 years ago then we are in fact all the same.

The problem arrises when science discovers that humans co-evolved over millions of years and that we are a hybrid of multiple species _with no single common ancestor_. Even "modern" humans have had geographic isolation for tens of thousands of years in very different climates/selective pressures.

[strikelaserclaw]

Nigerian immigrants to the US have significant rate of achievement compared to African American and they both would be classified under the "same race". I think "cultural" groupings would serve better.

[qsort]

We should not, because race is a useless concept.

There are traits individuals can have, some of which are immutable, and some of which correlate with what we call "race". But race itself is, even taking the most benign meaning possible, at best a surrogate.

The sooner we get rid of that awful meme the better.

[shafoshaf]

I agree it isn't "race." However, there are groups of people who have similar characteristics where it might be beneficial to look at the group as a whole not just individuals. For example, it may be that a certain group of people, with a common background and in a particular geography have specific notions about whether they trust that education will work or that health care will be honest. It might help to look at those communities and have discussions about what can be done for them at large. I think it would be very difficult to only look at individuals. Obviously, we then get the problem of group labels and stereotypes being used for malicious purposes...

[RetpolineDrama]

>We should not, because race is a useless concept.

This may be true, but I find it interesting that white people are the only ones who think this way.

Every other group has in-group racial bias, and actively organizes to that end.

[commandlinefan]

> white people are the only ones who think this way

Not really - Asians are pretty quick to point out that lumping Japanese immigrants in with Indian immigrants makes for a pretty meaningless classification.

[RetpolineDrama]

Are you from the UK by chance? That's the only place I've been that considers Indians "Asian". I've also never heard any of my Indian-American friends call themselves Asian, they're very proudly (sometimes obnoxiously so) "Indian".

And of course the Philippines, Japan, China, Korea etc all have very different cultures/customs. However in my experience at a fortune 500 my Korean and Filipino coworkers still organize an "Asian Culture Club", in fact one of them is the president of an Asian advocacy group that interacts with the city for events around Asian American And Pacific Islander Heritage Month.

All that's fine, I'm not bashing anyone, just saying that from what I've seen it's seemingly only white people who are averse to any kind of ethnic organization.

[bm3719]

Isn't it true though that you can tell someone's race by their genome, skeletal structure, and other physical traits apart from skin color? Additionally, is it not also the case that race is generally agreed to result from geographic isolation, and that if that persisted long enough, speciation might occur?

Not stating this is reality. I'm genuinely curious what the science is on this.

[qsort]

No, unless with "race" you mean something other than the ordinary meaning of the word. You can find those differences and draw lines between populations, but they don't overlap very well with the folk interpretation of race.

The traditional concept of race (i.e. the one where "white", "black", "asian" and so on are well-defined terms) is scientifically untenable (fact) and socially harmful (opinion).

There are some narrow use-cases where the concept can be fruitfully applied. For example, some diseases are correlated with genetic characteristics themselves correlated with race. If you are a physician making a diagnosis, the patient's race is usually very apparent; you can and should make use of that information. But that's just keeping the English friar happy, correlation does not imply causation.

[lukas099]

> race is a useless concept.

Tell that to the medical community, who routinely give different interventions based on race.

[bergenty]

Race is probably useless in that list. There’s definitely some credence to culture and values however.

[Q6T46nT668w6i3m]

I’d guess you’re not a baseball fan!