Critique this: Why blacks run faster

[Chen019]

Originally Posted by Chief Pedant

I recognize each point here is a subject of some debate. That is, in fact, the debate. But it's irrelevant what actual percent of recent sub-saharan ancestry a given black athlete has. What's important is whether or not he has a particular gene, and the fact that sub-saharan ancestry is over-represented while nurturing favors the other group, lends credence to the view that the difference is genetic. If the European gene pool contained those same genes in the same proportion, the successful pool would be composed of all groups in proportion to the start number. For what it's worth I'd bet nearly every European gets a reasonable chance to find out if they are any good at any given sport, while a much smaller percentage of sub-saharan kids get the same opportunity. They got other stuff to worry about, like eking out a living within their crappy political and social structures.

A French sports journalist has a new book out on the sprinting issue.

“I had been commissioned to write a biography of Usain Bolt at a time when Lemaitre became the first white athlete capable of running the 100-metre in under 10 seconds,” Leclaire told FRANCE 24. Lemaitre’s success on the track stirred the former athletics columnist to expand his mission slightly.

“Up to now, apart from Lemaitre and Australia’s Patrick Johnson, all the sprinters who have run the 100-metre in under 10 seconds were either born in West Africa or were descendants from slaves from West Africa,” he said.

“Lemaitre broke down all the prejudices and stereotyping, so I decided to write a book to raise the debate around this issue,” he said.

Over 361 pages, Leclaire examined the link between sporting performance and country of origin.

He studied a range of existing theories, including one that points to the so-called “innate muscle” makeup of black sprinters and another that argues that the supposed greater length of Kenyan runners’ femurs gave them an advantage. Other arguments revolved around the apparent thinner skin and lighter internal organs of black athletes.

In a 2010 study, two American academics insisted that black athletes' dominance of the sport was down to their higher centre of gravity.

The legacy of slavery and the need to escape poverty are also more controversial theories that have come and gone....

By the end of his research, Leclaire was left in no doubt. For him, “athletic performance is largely determined by genetics and specifically ACTN3, the so-called ‘sprint gene’”.

The ACTN3 was discovered for the first time by a team of Australian researchers in 2003. It is a gene present in all humans in two forms, either the RR form which helps speed, or the RX form which aids endurance.

“Since its discovery, a lot of research has shown that the RR form of the gene gives those who hold it explosive muscle power when the body is put under a certain amount of physical stress, so it’s a natural predisposition for sprinters,” Leclaire explained.

“If you had a weak form of ACTN 3, it would be impossible to match the great sprinters,” he said.

Leclaire concluded that the genes favourable for sprinting are more commonly found in those of West African origin.

There are exceptions, of course, which explains how French sprinter Lemaitre has been able to compete in the same class as the likes of Bolt and fellow Jamaican sprinter Yohan Blake.

“Lemaitre posesses the same genetic combinations that you find in most of the athletes of West African origin. He is the exception that confirms the rule,” Leclaire said.

East Africa, by contrast, is the land of the long-distance runner.

Author John Entine believes genetics also explains the continuing supremacy of Kenya’s runners in long distance races.

“They are short and slender with huge natural lung capacity and a preponderance of slow twitch muscles, the energy system for endurance sports,” Entine wrote on the website blackathlete.net. “It’s a perfect biomechanical package for long-distance running but a disaster for sports that require anaerobic bursts of speed.”

Entine's article also notes (for those discussing the Kenyan running success):

"The Kenyans are born with a high number of slow twitch fibers," states Bengt Saltin, director of the Copenhagen Muscle Research Institute and author of a September Scientific American article on why athletes are more "born" than "made." East Africans "have 70 to 75 percent of their muscle fibers being slow... Very many in sports physiology would like to believe that it is training, the environment, what you eat that plays the most important role. But we argue based on the data that it is "in your genes" whether or not you are talented or whether you will become talented. " There is no question about that. The extent of the environment can always be discussed, but it's less than 20, 25 percent. It's definitely a dominant factor, [that is to say,] how they are born."...

Of course, neither culture nor genes alone determines who will become great athletes. It's biocultural. Taboo documents the wholly uncontroversial fact that different body types have evolved in differing environments over thousands of years: Inuit Indians (Eskimos), biologically programmed to be short to conserve body heat, do not produce NBA centers after relocating to southern Florida. Genetically linked, highly heritable characteristics, such as skeletal structure, muscle fiber types, reflex capabilities, metabolic efficiency, and lung capacity, are not evenly distributed among populations and cannot be explained by known environmental factors.

[colonial]

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

Ok, so at one point do you determine that someone is of <partial> African descent.

I thought I told you I wasn’t answering any more stupid questions.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

Have you seen pictures of all the sprinters and determined from looking at them that they're of <partial> African descent or did you just assume that they were?

I assume runners from all African and Caribbean countries are Black.

I had to google images of several of the runners from other countries.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

Yes, so then by your logic anyone who self-indentifies as "black" should be considered of <partial> African descent"?

Yes.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

Correct? If not please explain why you said you based your judgment on "appearance and self-identification".

Addressed.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

Er...if you're making you're determination based on "appearance and self-identification" why would the standards be different for "hurdlers" than for "elite politicians, entertainers, judges, etc.".

I'm sorry but your logic is grossly lacking.

See below.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

Ah, so now you're backtracking. Initially, you claimed that you thought they were of "primarily African descent" due to "appearance and self-identification" but now you're admitting that you had no reason to believe this other than they were of "African diaspora populations" and so you "assumed" that they were of "predominantly African descent".

The predominance of African ancestry among US Blacks not an assumption,
it is estimate based on scientifically collected data. See p6 Table 5 and p9
Table 8 of link:

Estimating African American Admixture Proportions

Also note the >90% African ancestry reported for Jamaica in Table 5.

It is reasonable to assume that African ancestry percentages for the rest
of the Caribbean countries are higher than for the US since all Caribbean
countries have a higher percentage African population.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

Well, you know what they say you do when you "assume" something.

Depends on who is doing the assuming.

People like you are likely to hurt your arguments with botched assumptions.
People like me are likely to strengthen our arguments with sound assumptions,
such as that taken collectively African-American athletes probably possess 80%
African ancestry, with a large majority being more than (viz. primarily) 50% African.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

I'd recommend that next time you start spouting racist myths you use logic rather than pseudo science and bullshit.

I recommend you start accepting the evidence of your own eyesight
the next time you watch Olympic runners in action. All science begins
with observation, and if you assume your observations do not reflect
reality than you need to get your eyes examined, and you need also
to examine your mental state, or better, have a professional examine it for you.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

Note, I'm not accusing you of being stupid or racist, but your arguments are highly illogical and ill-thought out.

I know the stupid games they play around here—fine and dandy to say
anything you like about a member’s writing, as long as you don’t attack
the member himself. Hope I'm on the right side of the line when I say it
might hurt to hear such venom from someone who I respected, but coming
from you I could care less.

[Ibn Warraq]

Colonial,

Why are you trying to pretend that you only claimed the sprinters were of "partial" African descent when anyone can read your initial post where you specifically claimed they were "primarily of African descent".

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/...&postcount=748

Here are the number of athletes of primarily African ancestry among the all-time top 10 hurdles times:

9/10 Mens’ 110m (including present WR)
10/10 Mens’ 400 (including present WR)
4/10 Womens’ 100
7/10 Womens’ 400

Had you initially claimed the sprinters were of "partial African ancestry", which no one would have disputed, instead of rather revealingly and stupidly claiming they were "of primarily African ancestry" I wouldn't have asked you what made you say such a thing and you wouldn't have given such evasive answers nor would you have needed to go alter and misrepresent my statements to try and cover up your statements.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq
Yes, so then by your logic anyone who self-indentifies as "black" should be considered of "primarily African descent"?

Yes.

Ok, so then by your logic, Thurgood Marshall, who was, according to one of his biographers "one eighth negro and seven eighths caucasian" and had two sons who were both blonde-haired and blue-eyed should be considered of "primarily African descent."

Please explain the logic behind classifying someone who is "one eighth negro and seven eighths caucasian"as being of "primarily African descent".

I ask because such an assertion strikes me as being extremely illogical to the point of being in denial of reality.

Please explain.

Thanks.

Hope I'm on the right side of the line when I say it
might hurt to hear such venom from someone who I respected, but coming
from you I could care less.

I have not made any comments about you personally, merely you're arguments, which I've shredded. I see no reason for you to make personal insults at me.

[PrettyVacant]

Immediately prior to the 200m Final last night, this topic was discussed in a 10-minute segment on the main BBC channel by a few pundits in the Olympic Stadium studio, including Michael Johnson. It was introduced on the basis that it’s difficult to ignore 81 of 82 men who’ve run under 10-seconds for 100m have been slave descendents.

The short package before the studio chit-chat approached it from a Darwinian pov (itself not a controversial theory in the UK); the idea was that slavery – of at least the methods of transportation, related diseases and work regime - may have induced a kind of accelerated natural selection (of the fittest). They briefly noted the potential for mutation in very short time (even one generation) under extreme conditions, though the discussion was mainly between former athletes who don’t know any more than the average person.

Nothing much arose but the idea was obv. to overcome any remaining taboo and offer the public food for thought on a subject that's blatantly in front of their eyes (and about to be underlined by a Jamaician 1, 2, 3 in the 200m).

Nice to see a discussion without hysteria and an unwillingness to consider (continually) emerging science because it offends - possibly patriotic based - middle-cass sensibilities.

[grude]

Originally Posted by colonial

I assume runners from all African and Caribbean countries are Black.

This is an unsafe assumption of olympic athletes as a whole.

http://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/...164972656.html

George Bovell for example.

[Mijin]

Originally Posted by PrettyVacant

Immediately prior to the 200m Final last night, this topic was discussed in a 10-minute segment on the main BBC channel by a few pundits in the Olympic Stadium studio, including Michael Johnson. It was introduced on the basis that it’s difficult to ignore 81 of 82 men who’ve run under 10-seconds for 100m have been slave descendents.

The short package before the studio chit-chat approached it from a Darwinian pov (itself not a controversial theory in the UK); the idea was that slavery – of at least the methods of transportation, related diseases and work regime - may have induced a kind of accelerated natural selection (of the fittest). They briefly noted the potential for mutation in very short time (even one generation) under extreme conditions, though the discussion was mainly between former athletes who don’t know any more than the average person.

Nothing much arose but the idea was obv. to overcome any remaining taboo and offer the public food for thought on a subject that's blatantly in front of their eyes (and about to be underlined by a Jamaician 1, 2, 3 in the 200m).

Nice to see a discussion without hysteria and an unwillingness to consider (continually) emerging science because it offends - possibly patriotic based - middle-cass sensibilities.

Yeah but once again the documentary gave the impression that this was the consensus view and that evidence is building but it is really a very tentative hypothesis at this stage. I've already ran into a number of people citing it as fact thanks to the previous BBC documentary.

And if we're going to say that we need a specific story to account for why people of W African descent have a certain kind of fast twitch muscle, do we need a similar story to account for (parts of) east africa running endurance?
We know that there are differences between populations, we don't need a recent episode to pin it to.

[Marley23]

Originally Posted by colonial

I thought I told you I wasn’t answering any more stupid questions.

colonial, don't alter text inside the quote boxes. We allow minor edits, but here you've changed the word "primarily" to "partial," which means something different.

[PrettyVacant]

Originally Posted by Mijin

Yeah but once again the documentary gave the impression that this was the consensus view and that evidence is building but it is really a very tentative hypothesis at this stage. I've already ran into a number of people citing it as fact thanks to the previous BBC documentary.

This is the first time the BBC has touched on it asaik - the hour long doc with Michael Johnson was on C4. This was pretty straightforward stuff with John Inverdale posing the questions, and three athletes chipping in with their opinions.

I get the impression the consensus is a little firmer among academics who work in that area than it is elsewhere but, sure, it's still early days.

Originally Posted by Mijin

And if we're going to say that we need a specific story to account for why people of W African descent have a certain kind of fast twitch muscle, do we need a similar story to account for (parts of) east africa running endurance?
We know that there are differences between populations, we don't need a recent episode to pin it to.

They're discrete. The issue here is the impact or not of slavery.

[Mijin]

Originally Posted by PrettyVacant

This is the first time the BBC has touched on it asaik - the hour long doc with Michael Johnson was on C4.

Ah, my bad, I thought they were both BBC.

This was pretty straightforward stuff with John Inverdale posing the questions, and three athletes chipping in with their opinions.

Well before that was a 10-minute documentary that began by talking about the theory of evolution then went into eugenics and nazism (sigh), before arriving at the theory while showing drawings of slave ships / slaves being tortured.
It's a pretty brave thing to show at such a high ratings time, and I'm not sure why when it's just an early hypothesis. And I wouldn't blame anyone for being offended by the programme; I thought it was in poor taste.

I get the impression the consensus is a little firmer among academics who work in that area than it is elsewhere but, sure, it's still early days.

Firmer about what? The gene, or the hypothesis about why its frequency is higher among those of WA descent? What evidence is there to support the hypothesis of recent selection?

They're discrete. The issue here is the impact or not of slavery.

Sure. I'm just pointing out that populations vary in any case. The surprise would be if all populations had exactly the same sprinting ability.

[colonial]

Originally Posted by Marley23

colonial, don't alter text inside the quote boxes. We allow minor edits, but here you've changed the word "primarily" to "partial," which means something different.

In post#744 I said this:

Originally Posted by colonial

Here are the number of athletes of primarily African ancestry among the all-time top 10 hurdles times

In post #798 I amended it:

Originally Posted by colonial

So to be precisely logical I should have used the word “partially” rather than “primarily”.

Then in post #799 Ibn Warraq continued to use the original quotation thereby mischaracterizing my argument.

It was necessary to restore accuracy to his part of the dialgue, and the means I chose was legitimate, since anyone
who had read our entire conversation would know what I did and why I did it.

Had you read our entire conversation?

[suranyi]

I guess people are too busy arguing to actually watch what's going on. There was a Caucasian in the final of the men's 200 meters yesterday: Christophe Lemaitre of France.

[colonial]

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

Colonial,

Why are you trying to pretend that you only claimed the sprinters were of "partial" ...

See my reply #807 to Marley.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

I have not made any comments about you personally, merely you're arguments, which I've shredded.

In your dreams.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

I see no reason for you to make personal insults at me.

Oh no!

I have not made any comments about you personally, merely your arguments.

[PrettyVacant]

Originally Posted by suranyi

I guess people are too busy arguing to actually watch what's going on. There was a Caucasian in the final of the men's 200 meters yesterday: Christophe Lemaitre of France.

Indeed. He is the one in the 81 out of 82 who have run sub 10 seconds for 100m.

Is that about 1.2% of the sub 10 sec group that are not slave descendents?

[colonial]

Originally Posted by suranyi

I guess people are too busy arguing to actually watch what's going on. There was a Caucasian in the final of the men's 200 meters yesterday: Christophe Lemaitre of France.

I guess some people have no sense of proportion whatever.

Who would you expect to finish 1-2-3 in the race-- Jamaica (pop. 2.889 million, GDP per capita $9029,
or France (pop. 65.350 million, GDP per capita $35613)?

BTW Lemaitre recently became the only Caucasian ever to run 100m in under 10.0sec. There have been
several hundred of African ancestry who have done so, the first over 40 years ago.

[Ibn Warraq]

Originally Posted by colonial

In your dreams.

Since you've freely admitted that you were wrong to say they were "primarily" of African descent and that you should have said "partially" of African descent, this comment is ridiculous. You've admitted that I shredded your arguments and that you should have said "partially" not "primarily".

Oh no!

I have not made any comments about you personally, merely your arguments.

You either have forgotten what you wrote, didn't understand the significance of it, or are trying to pretend you said something different.

You claimed:

Quote:
Hope I'm on the right side of the line when I say it
might hurt to hear such venom from someone who I respected, but coming
from you I could care less.

When you say the arguments might mean something coming from someone other than me, you're making a comment about me, not my arguments.

Anyway, I'm sorry I humiliated and upset you. Hopefully the next time you'll make better thought out arguments.

[colonial]

Originally Posted by colonial

...There have been
several hundred of African ancestry who have done so, the first over 40 years ago.

Correction: there have been several hundred performances under 10.0sec,
but several runners accomplished the feat several times, and the total number
of individual numbers is as PrettyVacant informs us in his last post.

[colonial]

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

Since you've freely admitted that you were wrong to say they were "primarily" of African descent and that you should have said "partially" of African descent, this comment is ridiculous. You've admitted that I shredded your arguments and that you should have said "partially" not "primarily"...

...Anyway, I'm sorry I humiliated and upset you. Hopefully the next time you'll make better thought out arguments.

I am not familar with your writing, but if our exchange is typical your strategy seems to be to focus on trivialities,
and to declare yourself the winner regardless of how effectively someone rebuts you. While at it you avoid the important issues,
which you must know you are hopelessly unequipped to engage.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

You either have forgotten what you wrote, didn't understand the significance of it, or are trying to pretend you said something different.

You claimed

"Hope I'm on the right side of the line when I say it might hurt to hear such venom from someone who I respected, but coming from you I could care less."

When you say the arguments might mean something coming from someone other than me, you're making a comment about me, not my arguments.

Of course my comment was personal. I did not claim otherwise. The question was whether it constituted an "attack".

Now, I have had enough of your Junior High Schoolish screeching and babbling. I come here looking for grown-up conversation,
something you obviously cannot deliver. Goodbye.

[colonial]

Originally Posted by grude

This is an unsafe assumption of olympic athletes as a whole.

http://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/...164972656.html

George Bovell for example.

You mean Caribbean Olympic athletes as a whole?

OP and my assumptions about Caribbean athletes concern runners, not swimmers.

[Ibn Warraq]

Originally Posted by colonial

I am not familar with your writing, but if our exchange is typical your strategy seems to be to focus on trivialities,
and to declare yourself the winner regardless of how effectively someone rebuts you. While at it you avoid the important issues,
which you must know you are hopelessly unequipped to engage.

Er.... I didn't "declare myself the winner". You proclaimed that the athletes in question were all "primarily of African descent". I challenged you on that claim, you made some long rambling posts during which you argued, without any strong foundation, that my arguments were "stupid". Eventually you wound upadmitting that you were wrong to refer to the athletes as being "primarily" of African descent and that you should have referred to then as being "partially" of African descent.

Furthermore, despite your claims, the difference between "partially" and "primarily" is hardly trivial.

Of course my comment was personal. I did not claim otherwise.

Er...yes you did claim otherwise. From post #812.

Colonial
I have not made any comments about you personally, merely your arguments.

So yes, when you say "I have not made any comments about you personally, merely your arguments" you are denying that your comments were "personal".

Now, I have had enough of your Junior High Schoolish screeching and babbling. I come here looking for grown-up conversation,
something you obviously cannot deliver. Goodbye.

If you're going to accuse me of "junior high school schreechings and babblings" I'd recommend not making personal attacks because that certainly undercuts your argument.

[Ximenean]

Edit - sorry, making an observation that has already been made re BBC item about slaves/sprinters

[Chief Pedant]

Originally Posted by iiandyiiii

Could you cite some of these studies? I know on average that black kids get lower scores than white kids, but I was not aware that wealthy black kids score lower than poor white kids.



The first two elements don't seem to hard- but on that last one, it seems like good research would fill up a library. From what I can glean, your "nurture" argument seems to come down to "black kids have lower opportunities in general, all things being equal, so they must have lower opportunities for basketball".

I'm sorry for the late reply...traveling.
Here's one link. When I get back home I'll post more if you are interested, but perhaps to a personal mailbox or something?. I have many many more, but it's easy to find them on your own, as well. The thing is, I don't think it's appropriate to distract a debate on physical differences with academic ones, so I won't be debating these. I just put them out there as examples of the fact that many knee jerk assumptions about nurturing differences do not hold water. They are widely assumed because we have a heavy bias toward the Religion of Genetic Equality.

From the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education:

Explaining the Black-White SAT Gap

There are a number of reasons that are being advanced to explain the continuing and growing black-white SAT scoring gap. Sharp differences in family incomes are a major factor. Always there has been a direct correlation between family income and SAT scores. For both blacks and whites, as income goes up, so do test scores. In 2005, 28 percent of all black SAT test takers were from families with annual incomes below $20,000. Only 5 percent of white test takers were from families with incomes below $20,000. At the other extreme, 7 percent of all black test takers were from families with incomes of more than $100,000. The comparable figure for white test takers is 27 percent.

But there is a major flaw in the thesis that income differences explain the racial gap. Consider these three observable facts from The College Board's 2005 data on the SAT:

• Whites from families with incomes of less than $10,000 had a mean SAT score of 993. This is 129 points higher than the national mean for all blacks.

• Whites from families with incomes below $10,000 had a mean SAT test score that was 61 points higher than blacks whose families had incomes of between $80,000 and $100,000.

• Blacks from families with incomes of more than $100,000 had a mean SAT score that was 85 points below the mean score for whites from all income levels, 139 points below the mean score of whites from families at the same income level, and 10 points below the average score of white students from families whose income was less than $10,000.

[Farmer Jane]

Back to the OP: Maybe they're just doping.

Well, I don't really think this, but it was the only thread where my article almost fit.

[tomndebb]

colonial and Ibn Warraq, you will both refrain from making any further comment on the other's argument. Stick to actually discussing the material and leave out the commentary on the other poster.

[ /Moderating ]

[Ibn Warraq]

Originally Posted by tomndebb

colonial and Ibn Warraq, you will both refrain from making any further comment on the other's argument.

[ /Moderating ]

Ok, because you're asking me to and I don't want to make your job tougher or to derail this thread I'll ignore his insults and drop the subject.

However, I'm a bit confused by the instruction to not make "any further comment on" his "argument."

First, she golden rule of SDMB as I understand it has been to attack the argument not the poster and I've been addressing his arguments, including personal attacks on me and have not made personal attacks on him.

Second,

Stick to actually discussing the material and leave out the commentary on the other poster.

I haven't insulted him and have addressed his arguments. The mods have already ruled that it is permissible to accuse other posters of sexism and racism so long as doing so is a description of the person's beliefs not as an insult.

If calling him a racist or a sexist wouldn't be out of line, what have I said that could be seen as more out of line than calling him a racist or a sexist?

I don't see what rules I've run afoul of and don't see why I'm being mod noted.

[tomndebb]

Claiming to apologize for having "humiliated" another poster and then turning around and claiming you have only attacked the "arguments" is a pretty quick way to get me to dismiss your appeal as the height of disingenuousness.

Attacking the argument means challenging the facts or the logic of the other poster, not claiming they need to "make a better argument."

[ /Moderating ]

[Ibn Warraq]

Originally Posted by tomndebb

Attacking the argument means challenging the facts or the logic of the other poster, not claiming they need to "make a better argument."

[ /Moderating ]

How is claiming they need to "make a better argument" not challenging the facts or logic of a poster?

Is it also not allowed for me to tell a poster that he needs to "get better sources"?

Claiming to apologize for having "humiliated" another poster and then turning around and claiming you have only attacked the "arguments" is a pretty quick way to get me to dismiss your appeal as the height of disingenuousness.

It was rather obvious that I had upset him so I'm not sure what was wrong with such a comment by me.

Beyond that, since previous mod rulings would seem to indicate that it would have been perfectly permissible for me to call him a racist and accuse him of engaging in racism, what did I say that would have been worse than calling him a racist.

He was the one who, by his own admission, directed personal insults at me.

BTW, if I'm wrong and you'd have viewed me accusing him of being a racist as a violation of board policy, despite previous mod rulings, please explain.

[tomndebb]

Moderating

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

How is claiming they need to "make a better argument" not challenging the facts or logic of a poster?

Showing a poster a logical error in their argument is fine, simply claiming that they need to make better arguments in the context of claiming one has humilated them is simply sneering.

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

It was rather obvious that I had upset him so I'm not sure what was wrong with such a comment by me.

I am trying to see how you are simply lacking in understanding, but you are presenting yourself in a way that appears completely disingenuous.

You did not aplogize for offending him; you said you were sorry for having "humiliated" him. That implies very strongly that you had, indeed, so crushed his argument that he would have been humiliated--i.e., he should need to be ashamed for having made such an argument. That you would act as thoiugh this is not clearly an effort to insult another poster is not credible.

[ /Moderating ]

[iiandyiiii]

Originally Posted by Chief Pedant

I'm sorry for the late reply...traveling.
Here's one link. When I get back home I'll post more if you are interested, but perhaps to a personal mailbox or something?. I have many many more, but it's easy to find them on your own, as well. The thing is, I don't think it's appropriate to distract a debate on physical differences with academic ones, so I won't be debating these. I just put them out there as examples of the fact that many knee jerk assumptions about nurturing differences do not hold water. They are widely assumed because we have a heavy bias toward the Religion of Genetic Equality.

Do you have a "strawman quota" you have to fulfill in every post? It seems like you mention Creationism or this "Religion of Genetic Equality" in every post.

Anyway, I stand slightly more educated with regards to test scores. I am still not even close to convinced that nurture has been normalized. In addition, I can't just accept a genetic explanation were the "nurture" one disproven (it hasn't been)- there could be other biological explanations, or other non-biological ones. A genetic explanation requires genetic evidence- to use your own strawman, anything else is akin go "proving" creationism or intelligent design by "disproving" evolution.

Note that I'm making no claims about "genetic equality", or the abilities of any populations in any field at all.

[Chief Pedant]

I think the genetic explanations are coming. They are there for dozens upon dozens of medical conditions the underlying genes for which vary among SIRE groups, proving that this "social construct" drives differences in average outcome base on differences of genes in those socially constructed groups. And if we do know that genes drive other differences (say, for medical conditions such as hemoglobinopathies or renal salt handling or cystic fibrosis or whatever), is it not more credible than not that genes for physical abilities would also be disparate across SIRE groups?

I note that right now most people vote with their feet wherever genes are concerned...an example use case is where infertile couples go looking for putatitve parents, they use every proxy they can to get physical or intellectual genes to buy for their child's gene pool.

The nurturing explanations fall away as individual assumptions are peeled away (such as the example I mentioned) one by one, and as the various gaps remain "mysterious" or unexplained. Go looking for official positions of various organizations and you'll see the language I'm talking about. We suddenly want "conclusive" proof for every possible putative nurturing theory even though in any non-human setting we would have long since accepted an obvious conclusion that genes control our average successes, and that we humans are not homogenously mutts. We group ourselves using social constructs into self-identified groups which, because of the way humans have diverged and evolved, cause those groups to vary with respect to the chance that group contains a particular gene. At birth we do not all draw from the same base gene pool with equal prevalence. In the same way that your immediate biological family has a pool of genes from which you draw, your SIRE group(s) have a gene pool from which you draw. There is no equal opportunity for genes, and--on average--the child of a black SIRE group does not have an equal chance to a child of a white SIRE group to have fine blond hair, regardless of how mutt-itized or socially-constructed a given black SIRE family might be.

This is the key point: average access to the same base gene pool does not happen even though SIRE groups are formally defined as "purely social constructs." The inability or refusal to accept this simple fact is what I shorthand to the Religion of Genetic Equality. Like any religion, it requires overlooking the obvious science, emphasizing confirmational bias for exceptions while repeatedly ignoring fundamental concepts such as statistical averages, and promoting a "feel-good" conclusion of equality that resonates with our deepest desires even though it is at dissonance with evolution. In the particular case at hand, I find the idea that we are one big genetic family where every child born has roughly equivalent access to every ancestral gene pool a Creationist viewpoint. Your mileage may vary on that conclusion, and as the Pedant I apologize in advance for the surliness with which I occasionally toss it out there.

[iiandyiiii]

Originally Posted by Chief Pedant

This is the key point: average access to the same base gene pool does not happen even though SIRE groups are formally defined as "purely social constructs." The inability or refusal to accept this simple fact is what I shorthand to the Religion of Genetic Equality. Like any religion, it requires overlooking the obvious science, emphasizing confirmational bias for exceptions while repeatedly ignoring fundamental concepts such as statistical averages, and promoting a "feel-good" conclusion of equality that resonates with our deepest desires even though it is at dissonance with evolution. In the particular case at hand, I find the idea that we are one big genetic family where every child born has roughly equivalent access to every ancestral gene pool a Creationist viewpoint. Your mileage may vary on that conclusion, and as the Pedant I apologize in advance for the surliness with which I occasionally toss it out there.

Much of this is crap (and I haven't made these claims you repeatedly attack)- there are many ethnic groups in Africa (see here) that are more closely related (by mitochondrial DNA, at least) to non-African ethnic groups than to some other African ethnic groups (not to mention that Africa has more genetic diversity than the rest of the world combined). This is not surprising- it makes sense that as populations in Africa diverged, and some populations left Africa, some of the populations that remained in Africa might be more closely related to those that left than certain other far-flung African populations.

It is not scientific to say that "blacks" or "Africans" are a race or ethnicity in the biological sense (which would imply that all "blacks" or "Africans" are more closely related to other "blacks" and "Africans" than non-"blacks" and non-"Africans").

[iiandyiiii]

Originally Posted by Chief Pedant

This is the key point: average access to the same base gene pool does not happen even though SIRE groups are formally defined as "purely social constructs." The inability or refusal to accept this simple fact is what I shorthand to the Religion of Genetic Equality.

Keep on arguing with arguments that don't exist in this thread. I'm sure it's much easier than arguing with actual people.

[Ibn Warraq]

Originally Posted by tomndebb

Moderating

Showing a poster a logical error in their argument is fine, simply claiming that they need to make better arguments in the context of claiming one has humilated them is simply sneering.
I am trying to see how you are simply lacking in understanding, but you are presenting yourself in a way that appears completely disingenuous.

You did not aplogize for offending him; you said you were sorry for having "humiliated" him. That implies very strongly that you had, indeed, so crushed his argument that he would have been humiliated--i.e., he should need to be ashamed for having made such an argument. That you would act as thoiugh this is not clearly an effort to insult another poster is not credible.

[ /Moderating ]

Fair enough. I should not have included the "humiliated" comment which crossed the line.

Anyway, you've asked us to drop the argument and even if you hadn't continuing it would hijack the thread so I'll drop it.

[Chief Pedant]

Originally Posted by iiandyiiii

Much of this is crap (and I haven't made these claims you repeatedly attack)- there are many ethnic groups in Africa (see here) that are more closely related (by mitochondrial DNA, at least) to non-African ethnic groups than to some other African ethnic groups (not to mention that Africa has more genetic diversity than the rest of the world combined). This is not surprising- it makes sense that as populations in Africa diverged, and some populations left Africa, some of the populations that remained in Africa might be more closely related to those that left than certain other far-flung African populations.

It is not scientific to say that "blacks" or "Africans" are a race or ethnicity in the biological sense (which would imply that all "blacks" or "Africans" are more closely related to other "blacks" and "Africans" than non-"blacks" and non-"Africans").

It's important to understand that, when we are trying to determine whether or not two differently-performing groups have genetics as the basis for their average differences, there is no constraint that either group be more internally related than the other. See my example of the Tall and the Short earlier in the thread; the group of Tall may be much more diverse, or may not be as internally related as the Short, but their average height difference is nevertheless genetic.
With SIRE groups, there do happen to be ancestral gene pools which are more common for any given SIRE group, but there is no requirement that this be the case in order to argue that outcome differences are genetically based. And of course, if any given subpopulation happens to attach itself to a given SIRE group but is fairly unique, an average for that subgroup might be quite distinct from the group average for the SIRE group as a whole.

[Ibn Warraq]

It's worth noting that at the 2012 Olympics the Iranians did extremely well in the weightlifting and wrestling competitions.

In the Wrestling events, the only country to win more medals was Russia(though Japan won as many) and in the weightlifting events, the only country to win more medals was China, though Kazakhastan and North Korea, also tied them. If one excludes medals won in the women's events in wrestling and weightlifting, their results are even more impressive.

Now, several writers have often noted Iran's proficiency in wrestling and weightlifting, particularly in comparison to other countries, however no one has ever suggested that somehow "genetics" is responsible for their success in comparison to countries like the UK, the US, or a number of other countries.

It seems that it's only when discussing black athletes do people seem to try and argue about "genetic differences" between "the races" being responsible for the results as opposed to other factors.

[jsgoddess]

Originally Posted by Ibn Warraq

It seems that it's only when discussing black athletes do people seem to try and argue about "genetic differences" between "the races" being responsible for the results as opposed to other factors.

Well, that plays into my comments earlier, that it's something about attempting to show that other athletes are successful as a result of hard work and training. Black athletes are successful because of "talent." It takes away a little of the admirability when you make it inherent.