[harkyns_castle]

That's a surprise to me, I hadn't heard any of that. Not that I've followed things that closely.

What I found so far is [1], in which he seems to just be doing a bit of a "show me the data" thing wrt global warming (its fairly old I guess in defense). In [2] he's definitely saying IQ is race-related, and gender related to a lesser extent, in my quick readings.

I quite like that he doesn't mince his words, sugar coat things or seem to take any notice of popular opinion/political correctness. Not agreeing with him, but I find that refreshing.

[1] http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=1436 [2] http://esr.ibiblio.org/?m=200311

[laichzeit0]

Regarding [2]. So I guess this quote is the problem:

> And the part that, if you are a decent human being and not a racist bigot, you have been dreading: American blacks average a standard deviation lower in IQ than American whites at about 85. [...] And yes, it’s genetic; g seems to be about 85% heritable, and recent studies of effects like regression towards the mean suggest strongly that most of the heritability is DNA rather than nurturance effects.

So is the problem with him saying this that (a) this is factually false or (b) that it's an inconvenient fact that should be glossed over? He seems to be saying that it's factually true since he obviously read it in some or other study. If it is factually true it's disingenuous to label him as a racist.

[cousin_it]

I guess everyone and every group finds certain truths uncomfortable. It's especially sad that the theory of evolution seems to make literally everyone uncomfortable.

"Of course humans and chimps have a common ancestor! We have looked at the genetic code, and found that more than 95% is shared. Give up, it's over." The right will hate you for saying that.

"Of course there is inherited variation in intelligence, no matter how you define it! Otherwise evolution, in particular evolution of intelligence, could not possibly work. Give up, it's over." The left will hate you for saying that.

"Of course our moral intuitions come from game theory, not apriori reasoning!" And now everyone hates you, both the left and the right.

[davidgerard]

Flynn Effect gets you 20-30 points in the same gene pool, therefore via non-genetic factors.

If you see a 15 point difference and immediately attribute it to genetics, you're making an unwarranted assumption.

[davidgerard]

Re your deleted comment:

> I guess everyone and every group finds certain truths uncomfortable. It's especially sad that the theory of evolution seems to make literally everyone uncomfortable.

In context, this is a claim that race and IQ is a consequence of the theory of evolution. If you don't see this, then you don't understand communication with humans, or are being disingenuous.

[oneeyedpigeon]

Evolution doesn't necessarily have a direct link with intelligence; nor even does natural selection which is the theory that, I think, you're basing your argument on.

[cousin_it]

That's a pretty weak objection. It's implausible that intelligence wouldn't be influenced by any evolved traits.

[harkyns_castle]

I think the problem is, its a bit more complicated than that.

There are a myriad of factors that might influence that IQ score, and I haven't looked at the studies. Lack of wealth/opportunity I think is definitely a factor in the healthy development of the grey matter, as is access to good education.

Long/short, not sure. I'd be surprised if the colour of your skin objectively made a difference in IQ. Same with gender. Though, if the latter is true, I would probably use it with great exuberance on certain people I know e.g. my ex.

[TheOtherHobbes]

I wouldn't be surprised if skin colour made a difference to IQ. But I wouldn't be surprised for social and political reasons, not genetic ones.

It's actually not possible to make a genetic argument, because genetically there are no non-trivial markers that robustly correlate with "black" or "white."

http://web.mit.edu/racescience/in_media/what_dna_says_about_...

Suggesting otherwise is simple ignorant bigotry.

[davidgerard]

"heritable" is the weasel word here. It is applied when the kid matches the parents - but the leap from there to "genetic" is unwarranted, because parents and their children tend to be in the same social circumstances.

For comparison, the Flynn effect demonstrates you can get 20-30 points difference in the same gene pool, with the difference being social circumstances. So any difference under 30 points doesn't necessitate invoking genetics.

[GFK_of_xmaspast]

ESR wrote, among other things, this:

"One was: their skin color looks fecal. The other was: their bone structure doesn’t look human. And they’re just off-reference enough to be much more creepy than if they looked less like people, like bad CGI or shambling undead in a B movie. When I paid close enough attention, these were the three basic data under the revulsion; my hindbrain thought it was surrounded by alien shit zombies."

and http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=4256

[philh]

To clarify, I was careful not to call ESR a racist. (I was attempting to describe his positions in terms that I think he'd agree with.) And I haven't seen anyone else explicitly do so on this thread, which is good going for HN.

[oneeyedpigeon]

"If it is factually true it's disingenuous to label him as a racist."

Not true. Something can be factually true but uninteresting or of no consequence; pushing that 'truth' forward as something that other should acknowledge betrays an agenda beyond just 'the search for truth'. (Note that this is not a judgement on ESR per se, just a comment on your specific point)

[ageofwant]

But it is interesting and of consequence. Especially as it highlights how truth ever becomes the slave of fashion. If it it is demonstrably true that race and IQ is linked then stating that as a fact does not make one a racist.

[eli_gottlieb]

"g is 85% heritable" does not actually mean, imply, or even give strong evidence for the likelihood that "racially-linked genes cause the racially-correlated outcome differences in IQ tests." A trait that's 85% heritable is actually a complicated mix of many different biological factors, whose various causal powers (abilities to cause a specific outcome if interfered-with) we simply don't know, except that 15% of them don't seem to pass from parent to child in twin-studies (and I would certainly hope that separated-twin studies were actually done at all, because that's Genetic Causality 101 stuff).

Thus, if someone wants to claim that "black people have lower IQs because they are black", they need to dissolve the concept of race entirely and not only find much broader evidence than studies on African Americans who are, after all, something like half "white", but in fact just cut to the fucking chase and locate the relevant genes.

But of course, if you located the genes and alleles that make some ethnic groups smarter or stupider, you could invent a gene therapy that would make everyone as smart as the smartest ethnic groups, or at least understand what sort of trade-offs are involved in genetic treatments of that sort (ie: Africans often carry a gene that helps them resist malaria but can cause sickle-cell anemia if you get two copies of the recessive allele). If you located the genes and alleles, then within 10 +/- 5 years (depending on how quickly your treatment gets funded) we could eliminate all genetically-caused racial gaps in intelligence.

This, of course, would greatly displease the racists, who don't actually want people to get smarter; they want to justify a peculiar social hierarchy. This is why you always see certain people waving their hands at "racial IQ gaps" and "heritability" but not funding research into intelligence-enhancing gene therapies.

[oneeyedpigeon]

I'm not sure what you mean by "fashion" in this context.

Let's say that some kind of link between race and intelligence were proved and universally acknowledged, what possible positive outcome could entail?

[eli_gottlieb]

>Let's say that some kind of link between race and intelligence were proved and universally acknowledged, what possible positive outcome could entail?

Intelligence enhancement would become a cheap, simple, universally-available gene therapy, since we would have found that it only relies on a few alleles of a tiny number of genes, so simple that it can differ significantly between ethnic groups that can still interbreed, rather than being a complex, many-gene feature that evolved chiefly among the species as a whole.