The last thread was shut down from what I believe to be the unscientific approach of several posters. The discussion could continue but a few rules would need to be observed. 1) Do not direct points towards individual posters. 'your ego and ideology forces you to outright deny any other members statement that you don't have either the knowledge of intellect to understand as' 'Let's see if anyone here is smart. Simple riddle.' 'I'm also curious as to the level of your mathematical understanding. So I have a fundamental question for you.' 2) Do not bring up anecdotal evidence. 'I was at my friends home today and house an his expertise on the subject of brain function and his knowledge is unassailable a Neurologist, I asked him straight out "is there link between brain size and IQ?"..' 'For some time I was an Assistant Professor at a world renown Massachusetts Higher Learning Institute and I worked with a guy about my age who talked very SLOW....he was extremely brilliant and thought in way's that I could never hope to think and because of him we figured out ways to properly use Fractal Based Algorithmic Equations specific to understanding aspects of the distribution of icy planetesimals within the Oort Cloud. Now if you didn't know this person who I call a friend....you would think he was an idiot or perhaps retarded mentally and he CERTAINLY COULD NOT SCORE WELL ON AN IQ TEST.' That's it really. Hopefully mods will cooperate in enforcing these rules.
I am no expert on this subject, but I do know that IQ isn't the only way to measure somebody's intelligence.
Ok, even if there are other intelligence tests and/or forms of intelligence not measured by IQ: 1) This thread is about IQ 2) How apart do other forms of intelligence/intelligence tests correlate w/ IQ 3) Are there racial intelligence gaps for these as well?
If you want to find out what really makes us what we are - dynamically speaking - even over and above our static gene coding, study a little bit about epigenetics.
There is no evidence I'm aware of that epigenetics is responsible for a significant portion of IQ variation. Epigenetics typically accounts for minor effects as far as I know.
No - you're right. But my bet is, when it comes to what we usually think of as intelligence, gene expression will be found to be at least as significant as the underlying inherited factors from the inherited genes. Epigenetics is in its infancy, after all. But your criticism is valid. I shouldn't have used the phrase "what really makes us what we are", as if to imply that dynamic epigenetic factors always supersede the static genetic ones. I was merely intending to turn people on to the wonders and importance of this emerging field. There's good reasons why one identical twin, possessing the identical inherited DNA sequences as her twin sister, would develop autism while the other doesn't. Their genes may be identical but their methyl tags that bind to the histones turning on and off their associated genes aren't, and therefore neither are the ways their genes are expressed. This gives a whole new twist to the Nature vs Nurture discussion. It also gives a whole new twist to possible causes of a lot of what we normally think of as human defects.
Yes, heritability is certainly not a context free measure. But I think with highly polygenic traits like IQ heritability estimates from family correlations are pretty likely to be getting a good estimate of the DNA based variation.
The controversial study on African IQ levels conducted by psychologist Richard Lynn is deeply flawed. This conclusion is the outcome of studies by Jelte Wicherts, Conor Dolan, Denny Borsboom and Han van der Maas of the University of Amsterdam (UvA) and Jerry Carlson of the University of California (Riverside). On the basis of several reviews of the literature, Lynn [Lynn, R., (2006). Race differences in intelligence: An evolutionary analysis. Augusta, GA:Washington Summit Publishers.] and Lynn and Vanhanen [Lynn, R., & Vanhanen, T., (2006). IQ and global inequality. Augusta, GA: Washington Summit Publishers.] concluded that the average IQ of the Black population of sub-Saharan Africa lies below 70. In this paper, the authors systematically review published empirical data on the performance of Africans on the following IQ tests: Draw-A-Man (DAM) test, Kaufman-Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC), the Wechsler scales (WAIS & WISC), and several other IQ tests (but not the Raven's tests). Inclusion and exclusion criteria are explicitly discussed. Results show that average IQ of Africans on these tests is approximately 82 when compared to UK norms. We provide estimates of the average IQ per country and estimates on the basis of alternative inclusion criteria. Our estimate of average IQ converges with the finding that national IQs of sub-Saharan African countries as predicted from several international studies of student achievement are around 82. It is suggested that this estimate should be considered in light of the Flynn Effect. It is concluded that more psychometric studies are needed to address the issue of measurement bias of western IQ tests for Africans. http://wicherts.socsci.uva.nl/wicherts2009.pdf
That's reasonable - and probably [mostly] true. But given the influence of early childhood rearing on gene expression and development, I wouldn't put all my eggs in the genetic basket. Check out the rat families experiment mentioned in this NOVA video - from 20:02 to about 21:42. Then consider what we even mean by "intelligence", and what else (beyond the obvious gene factors) that can influence it. Especially consider these things in relation to early nurturing within the American black community, and the epigenetic effects that almost certainly would have on current and future generations.
I'm not sure why this is even a question anymore. By every cognitive ability measure we have ever devised black people score lower than whites and asians. We have real life laboratories, they are called schools.
