Talk:Race and intelligence/Archive 61

message: The retooled background section from User:Moonriddengirl/Race and intelligence/backgound (I am hosting the information but am not involved in constructing the article) has been placed into the article. I am informed that consensus has been reached on this content at User talk:Moonriddengirl/Race and intelligence/backgound. (Hey, there's a typo in that title. Not mine! :D) If this understanding is mistaken, please let me or another administrator know so that this material can be removed and the last edit prior to the protection restored. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 02:31, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's at Talk:Race and intelligence/background now. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 22:17, 29 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Background section merger 

message: This article is really being used as a way to attack racism rather than to present a NPOV article on the subject. --Jagz (talk) 05:09, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Attack on racism 

message: I just ran across a recent article on this subject and thought it might make a good secondary source for an article like this.  However, it looks like a lack of sources is not the primary problem for this article.  So -- there's the link, and if it's useful, then that's great, and even if it's not, then I hope your disputes get resolved before long. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:40, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Possible source?

message: The caption to the image of Florence Nightingale comparing her to the Irish "Bruiser" contains a statment saying she was a civil war nurse.
This is factually inaccurate, as she was a Crimean War Nurse.
- Thanks  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.111.139.100 (talk) 00:54, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Please correct Florence Nightingale image caption 

message: I could not find any any discussion on this and due to the size of this article a merger seems like a highly illogical choice.  
99.234.25.95 (talk) 16:46, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The merge resulted from an AfD, and the article has been since then pared down to a more manageable size. On the contrary, this was quite logical.--Ramdrake (talk) 18:02, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why was this page merged with (test data) and (research) 

message: This section ridiculously tries to explain the social status and IQ correlation by making a completely unfounded assertion that the social status causes the IQ, rather than vise versa. This section is very biased. Peoplesunionpro (talk) 03:09, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: No.  Intelligence experiences regression towards the mean.  So, very bright parents will have not as relatively bright children.  On the other hand, wealth is like herpes, it does not go away.  There are several countries in Latin America and Africa where wealth can be traced down to the colonizers. Brusegadi (talk) 07:02, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like you're making an unfounded assumption that the 'mean' for these different compared population groups is the same. (for example that whites in the USA have the same mean IQ to regress to as blacks in the USA) Peoplesunionpro (talk) 03:39, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thats irrelevant.  The point was made to attack the persistence of the inequality.  If IQ explained wealth and IQ was related to race, then within racial groups we would expect income mobility, but we do not observe that.  The point is that in most countries the poor remain poor and the rich remain rich regardless of their race.  Since intelligence is regressing towards the mean, we would expect wealth (within racial groups) to regress towards the mean, but it does not.  So IQ alone cannot explain income levels and, more important, parent's income level seems to be a good predictor of offspring income level, thus, if IQ is correlated with wealth, it may be that parents' wealth is driving both, offspring wealth and IQ.  Notice that, here, I do not attack racial differences, I attack the argument that IQ drives wealth. Brusegadi (talk) 04:35, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like you're assuming that there are no wealthy members of 'underachieving' groups of a population... which is totally wrong. Just like in the USA, with regards to blacks and hispanics (as the "caste" section is trying to relate to), obviously there are a lot of wealthy black and hispanic families. The wealth is distributed on a .... bell curve! Peoplesunionpro (talk) 21:43, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: No, just that there are fewer "wealthy members of 'underachieving' groups of a population". Ben Hocking (talk|contribs) 22:01, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

text: It has been a pleasure to correct you, but it begins to be repetitive :)  Lets start from 0.  The hypothesis is that IQ drives wealth.  Empirically, we determine that IQ regresses towards the mean and wealth does not.  Now, suppose that you have N populations (call them "races")  Each population has its own 'mean' intelligence towards which they regress to.  They also have their wealth distribution, some rich, some poor, etc.  So, we have a bivariate normal distribution, if you will.  We observe that the richest in each population remain rich.  The poorest in each population remain poor.  So, the rich black guy stays rich, the rich white guy stays rich, and so on.  That is, class status persists over generations.  You see how this does not make sense?  If IQ were driving wealth in each population then we would expect wealth to regress towards the mean as well, much like IQ, but it does not, wealth persists.  So, it is not good to conclude, simply, that IQ drives wealth.  Get it?  Of course that this is over simplistic, but the hypothesis was... Brusegadi (talk) 22:18, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The social position of a very tiny percentage of the population (the rich) isn't really applicable, for many reasons but one being investment/interest (rich get richer, regardless of how smart they are). But it also ignores many various aspects, such as the possibility that amongst rich populations, the smarter members will be more likely to be paired up with the other smarter members, and have more children. But anyway, what is applicable are the lower and middle classes, and there are a lot of dynamics of income/wealth over time within these social groups. The table seems like garbage anyway - since when did the French speakers of Belgium have the higher social status and higher test scores, and the Flemish lower? It's the opposite. Maybe the French had the social status (but not the test scores) 500 years ago, when France was so dominant and had a huge economic/political influence on Belgium. But not today. It may sound simple and obvious to you for this section to make such assumptions about social status creating test score gaps, but it's operating under guessed and completely speculative assumptions and wishful thinking. Peoplesunionpro (talk) 12:48, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I dont think we understand each other.  "The smarter members will potentially pair up with other smarter member" (which does not matter because of the regress towards the mean...)  Well, lets stop this because its not really helping the article.  Our logic seems to be different, or we have axiomatic differences, or both. Brusegadi (talk) 07:01, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Caste" 

message: Just about everyone agrees that this article sucks except for the handful of editors.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.227.50.79 (talk) 21:53, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I am guessing that by everyone you mean the anons and the accounts with very low edit counts outside race topics? Brusegadi (talk) 07:05, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There are 6 billion people on this planet and only five of them support this article sir so by my kalkulashun that means 5,999,999,995 people think this article sucks.  Learn to think intelujent-like, like me! Slrubenstein   |  Talk 12:37, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Why don't you channel your efforts into improving the article rather than figuring out ways to contradict people who criticize the article? --Jagz (talk) 17:38, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Why don't 'you help with the revisions? JJJamal (talk) 23:09, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I've made some suggestions but they have been rejected. I don't get a feeling of cooperation or compromise on this article. --Jagz (talk) 14:38, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article sucks 

message: The Cato Institute's topic this month at their online magazine is R&I, featuring discussion by Flynn, Gottfredson, Stephen J. Ceci, and Eric Turkheimer. Interesting to see them in a more candid forum.  Something that might be useful for this article is a tidy table Gottfredson presents summarzing the environmental position from the hereditarian point of view (source).--Mthson (talk) 21:26, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Month of R&I articles at Cato 

message: "Research is exploring how DNA explains racial differences, but it could give discredited prejudices a new potency." In DNA Era, New Worries About Prejudice, The New York Times, by Amy Harmon, November 11, 2007
Also, here is a link to an article from 2005 that was removed from this Talk page: Race differences in average IQ are largely genetic --Jagz (talk) 14:25, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  In the news 

message: I have read many articles on this topic. IQ tests are debatable and hotly so. There is no non-biased way of phrasing this article. The authors, have tried to put forth a grand effort. There is to much for one article, perhaps it should be broken down into several. The Idea that IQ tests something that is evironmnetally influenced, which is effected by wealth, social status, and culture, is apparent in the differences from the vary beginning of IQ tests. I would just except the difficulites with racism and the fact that there is no perfect way to be PC over this controversial topic.
IQ diffencies exist, not because of racial inferiority but skills taught by parents. Should be the main thesis of this article. Why does this article not include the orginal debate between the founders of IQ testing?  17:56, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Can I borrow your rose-colored glasses? It would be great if it were just that simple and nice of a solution. What you mention is a point of view that should be covered in the article but certainly not be the main theme of the article. A book could be written on the topic of race and intelligence but we are trying to condense everything to the size of a Wikipedia article. --Jagz (talk) 18:36, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

text: "IQ diffencies exist, not because of racial inferiority but skills taught by parents." - could you provide proof, so we could add it to the article? That would be cool. I'm sure neo-nazis would like to hear that white people aren't actually intellectually behind East Asians, but rather their parents just focus teaching their kids how to do well on IQ tests! In the meantime, wikipedia isn't ment to promote "feel good" ideas. Sorry if the truth hurts, but the truth is what wikipedia is ment to present. Peoplesunionpro (talk) 21:45, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Biased or unbiased