Liberal Creationism, or: Yippee, It’s Bell-Curve Time Again!

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Short article on school performance and parental income levels:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/7141169.stm
Interestingly, notice (in the graph halfway down) that even bright kids from high-income families apparently get 'worse' between 3 and 5, and slow kids from low-income families get 'better', i.e. there is tendency of high- and low-achievers to migrate towards the middle ground.
 

swears

preppy-kei
It's obviously because they've inherited dumb genes from their thicko poor parents. Now that is scientific fact. There's no real "evidence" for it, but it is scientific fact.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Now that is scientific fact. There's no real "evidence" for it, but it is scientific fact.

jonathan_king_colour.jpg
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lithEdblCrab.jpg



(P.S. The graph also shows the progress of slower kids from well-off families and brighter kids from poor families; it is by no means implying that rich=clever/poor=thick.)
 
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Guybrush

Dittohead
Here is a correction for Gladwell’s New Yorker piece:

To my chagrin, I made an error in my New Yorker piece "None of the Above." In the "Bell Curve," Charles Murray and Richard Hernstein did not advocate a "high-tech Indian reservation" for low-IQ groups. Rather, they warned that if current welfare policies continued, we would end up having to build high-tech reservations for those with low IQs--which is a very different argument, obviously (although not, if you think about it, any less ridiculous). I regret the error. The New Yorker will be running a correction.

I take exception with some of the other things in it, but more on that when I get the time.
 

ripley

Well-known member
Well, a hammer is applied but it still has essential properties. Without the essential properties (be they inherent or assumed), there would be nothing to apply in the first place.

Perhaps it's a reference to the distinction between crystallised intelligence (basically 'wisdom') and fluid intelligence (speed, flexibility).

Ripley - that is not the case. A quick google of 'IQ' with reference to academic papers shows hundreds of recent examples of use. Furthermore, the psychologist reports I've seen in teaching always refer to IQ.

as to the second, I did not say that it was not being made use of, particularly in the education world. whether or in what context it is valuable is another thing. What it means for society, in terms of what decisions should be made based on it, is what I am talking about.

as to the first, many academic papers still discuss IQ, but they mostly do it in a very different context than I see it being discussed here, and defining it in a very specific and limited way, without linking it to policy recommendations are generalizations about groups outside the study etc etc. Thus the New York Times article is a popular example of something which should be no surprise to people in the field, I would wager.
 

zhao

there are no accidents
the idea that east Asians are cerebral etc is certainly another racial stereotype...?
It's not a particularly demeaning stereotype, given the rewards on offer in the White Man's society for those with smarts.

sure it is a very demeaning stereotype. because it comes with it a host of other restrictive perceived attributes: social awkwardness, sexual inadequacy, repressed, uptight, bookish, etc., etc.

its effects are exactly as positive as saying blacks are physically more fit (and mentally challenged).

i have experienced this my entire adult life -- any and all such limiting, debilitating, and restrictive notions of a "race" is damaging and hurtful.

(according to this way of thinking only "whites" are well rounded and good at everything.)
 

luka

Well-known member
I mean, I'm sure there are plenty of white boxers who'd give their right arm to be world heavyweight champion, but the fact is they're just not as good at it as black guys."

you're not a boxing fan then Mr tea/...
 

luka

Well-known member
ive done iq tests and my results are always hovering around the 90 mark. i am quite thick. thats anecdotal evidence.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
I mean, I'm sure there are plenty of white boxers who'd give their right arm to be world heavyweight champion, but the fact is they're just not as good at it as black guys."

you're not a boxing fan then Mr tea/...

No, not 'specially, but I can't help seeing it on TV or in newspapers from time to time and it does seem as if a disproportionate number of them are black, especially in the heavier categories.
 

luka

Well-known member
nah, the heavyweight division is utterly dominatated by boxers from eastern europe.
 

Guybrush

Dittohead
New data.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/319/5866/1100

Human genetic diversity is shaped by both demographic and biological factors and has fundamental implications for understanding the genetic basis of diseases. We studied 938 unrelated individuals from 51 populations of the Human Genome Diversity Panel at 650,000 common single-nucleotide polymorphism loci. Individual ancestry and population substructure were detectable with very high resolution. The relationship between haplotype heterozygosity and geography was consistent with the hypothesis of a serial founder effect with a single origin in sub-Saharan Africa. In addition, we observed a pattern of ancestral allele frequency distributions that reflects variation in population dynamics among geographic regions. This data set allows the most comprehensive characterization to date of human genetic variation.​

The full monty is subscribers only, but the findings pretty much echo that DNA variation diagram, or whatever it was, that Vimothy posted earlier in this thread.
 
N

nomadologist

Guest
New data.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/319/5866/1100

Human genetic diversity is shaped by both demographic and biological factors and has fundamental implications for understanding the genetic basis of diseases. We studied 938 unrelated individuals from 51 populations of the Human Genome Diversity Panel at 650,000 common single-nucleotide polymorphism loci. Individual ancestry and population substructure were detectable with very high resolution. The relationship between haplotype heterozygosity and geography was consistent with the hypothesis of a serial founder effect with a single origin in sub-Saharan Africa. In addition, we observed a pattern of ancestral allele frequency distributions that reflects variation in population dynamics among geographic regions. This data set allows the most comprehensive characterization to date of human genetic variation.​

The full monty is subscribers only, but the findings pretty much echo that DNA variation diagram, or whatever it was, that Vimothy posted earlier in this thread.

Yeah, the genome basically supports the "Out of Africa" theory, but the sentence you highlight (we observed a pattern of ancestral allele frequency distributions that reflects variation in population dynamics among geographic regions) describes ethnicity rather than "race"--race and geography have little to do with one another in any scientifically precise or accurate way, whereas ethnicity and geography are very specifically linked and can be properly accounted for with recourse to genome mapping.

Re the original objection to the "bell curve" argument: the point is not that populations don't have certain common ancestors or traits, anyway, the point is that current concepts/notions of what constitutes "race" are too imprecise to be scientifically accurate or biologically relevant.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
I'm quite partial to a bit of Hindu Lamarckism, m'self.

(what are we even talking about now?)
 
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