# Can the Black-White racial IQ gap in the US be environmentally explained? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 1, 2012, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877 "2012-07-01T04:56:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 15
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2012, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/281 "2012-07-18T22:11:21Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > Has Chuck’s account been hacked by Brazzy? We thought that you [might be](http://board.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=15226227&postcount=14) interested in [this paper](http://www.ets.org/Media/Research/pdf/RR-11-08.pdf). ---
**Author:** ![Untoward\_Parable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/51bf81/32.png) [@Untoward\_Parable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Untoward_Parable)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2012, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/282 "2012-07-18T22:33:04Z")
Compare poor whites to poor blacks with similar incarceration rates and see if there’s a statistical difference in IQ. I bet you won’t. Your brain tells you that when you’re on the bottom of a hierarchy you’re supposed to act the part. It’s documented neuroscience. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2012, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/283 "2012-07-18T22:45:41Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > This is the most ridiculous claim that I have every heard. You’re arguing that for there to be mean genetic differences between populations called races the populations must represent “discrete races,” right? I’ve read more ridiculous claims in this very thread. > [@](#): > > And you maintain that Blacks and Whites in the US are not “discrete races,” right? > > So it necessarily follows that _no_ differences between them can be genetically conditioned, right? In fact, there can be _no_ mean genetic differences between them, right? > > So if I demonstrated that there are _any_ mean genetic differences, you must either concede that Blacks and Whites in the US do represent “discrete races” or that it’s not necessary for population called races to be “discrete races” for there to be mean genetic differences between them, right? > > Let me ask, by your understanding, for there to be mean genetic differences between any two groups, must the two groups be “genetically discrete”? So, for example, must “tall” and “short” people represent genetically “discrete groups” for the mean height difference to be partially genetically conditioned? > > More Mickey Mouse games, eh? How are you selecting these two groups? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2012, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/284 "2012-07-18T22:52:39Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > Globally, national IQs correlates with color. This is an established fact. Refer to table 18, [here,](https://lesacreduprintemps19.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/national-iqs-a-review-of-their-educational-cognitive-economic-political-demographic-sociological-epidemiological-geographic-and-climatic-correlates.pdf) for a list of references.) You are actually going to cite the work of the guys who invented “IQ” scores for countries by “averaging” neighboring countries and employing scores from tests given dozens of years ago with no controls and other tests (representing entire nations) from tests given to as few as a hundred schoolkids? These guys are outright charlatans. They make Rushton’s “big dick=low intelligence/small dick=brilliant” horseshit look like science. (Not much like science, but closer than what they have published.) That you would accept their nonsense is silly; that you would try to pass that off as serious support for your position calls into question your entire system of beliefs. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2012, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/285 "2012-07-18T23:34:15Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > We thought that you [might be](http://board.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=15226227&postcount=14) interested in [this paper](http://www.ets.org/Media/Research/pdf/RR-11-08.pdf). If you’re going to make a snarky comment you’re going to have to be more clear. Are you trying to insult my mother because she’s a teacher? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2012, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/286 "2012-07-18T23:47:13Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > Globally, national IQs correlates with color. This is an established fact. Refer to table 18, [here,](https://lesacreduprintemps19.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/national-iqs-a-review-of-their-educational-cognitive-economic-political-demographic-sociological-epidemiological-geographic-and-climatic-correlates.pdf) for a list of references.) Lynn had IQ tests for less than half of the countries he wrote about, and for most African countries he only had one or two tests that he “extrapolated” IQ for the whole country. He made up data. He “estimated” entire countries _average_ IQs at mental retardation levels. His study was complete crap science. ---
**Author:** ![Weirdering](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/4af34b/32.png) [@Weirdering](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weirdering)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/287 "2012-07-19T00:12:23Z")
> [@Evil\_Economist](#): > > Wrong. Completely wrong. > > Listen, there are two possible explanations of the results gap: environmental or genetic (or a mix of the two). Got it? two explanations. If you have a third, come out with it. > > Now there’s a huge problem with the genetic explanation; there’s no such thing as a black race. That pretty much destroys any genetic-based argument you want to make. In fact, I would say that the absolute first step in making a genetic argument is demonstrating that you can treat black people as a discrete race, and if you can’t do that than the environmental explanation is the only one that works. To explain the gap in the US, African-Americans don’t need to be a race. There only needs to be some group level genetic differences between them and Whites, which there is. IIRC you’re the one who cited the study that showed African-Americans have on average 20% European ancestry. ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/288 "2012-07-19T01:26:06Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > You are actually going to cite the work of the guys who invented “IQ” scores for countries by “averaging” neighboring countries and employing scores from tests given dozens of years ago with no controls and other tests (representing entire nations) from tests given to as few as a hundred schoolkids? These guys are outright charlatans. They make Rushton’s “big dick=low intelligence/small dick=brilliant” horseshit look like science. (Not much like science, but closer than what they have published.) > > That you would accept their nonsense is silly; that you would try to pass that off as serious support for your position calls into question your entire system of beliefs. > [@tomndebb](#): > > You are actually going to cite the work of the guys who invented “IQ” scores for countries by “averaging” neighboring countries and employing scores from tests given dozens of years ago with no controls and other tests (representing entire nations) from tests given to as few as a hundred schoolkids? These guys are outright charlatans. They make Rushton’s “big dick=low intelligence/small dick=brilliant” horseshit look like science. (Not much like science, but closer than what they have published.) > > That you would accept their nonsense is silly; that you would try to pass that off as serious support for your position calls into question your entire system of beliefs. Ya, I am going to cite them. You can huff and puff all you want but you can’t blow them away. Dozens of studies, now, have validated L and V’s national IQs (given a margin or error). And dozens of researchers are now working with them or have worked with them. [Here](http://www2.ku.edu/~kuwpaper/2010Papers/201206.pdf) is some cutting edge research from Black Africa. Let’s see what your arguments are: (1) Claim 1: Some national IQs as estimated by L&V were initially estimated from the IQs of neighboring counties. But… (a) Whether the method of estimating IQs was justified was investigated in the paper below. It was found to be so: \*\*Gelade, 2008. The Geography of IQ This paper examines the distribution of national IQ in geographical space. When the heritability of IQ and its dependence on eco-social factors are considered from a global perspective, they suggest that the IQs of neighboring countries should be similar. Using previously published IQ data for 113 nations (Lynn, R., & Vanhanen, T., (2006). IQ and global inequality. Athens, GA: Washington Summit Publishers.) the relationship between geographical location and national IQ is formally tested using spatial statistics. It is found that as predicted, nations that are geographical neighbors have more similar IQs than nations that are far apart. National IQ varies strikingly with position around the globe; the relationship between location and national IQ is even stronger than the relationship between location and national average temperature. **The findings suggest that Lynn & Vanhanen’s national IQ measures are reliable and adequately representative, and that their procedures for estimating missing national IQ scores from the scores of nearby nations are defensible.** (Contains 1 table.)\*\* (b) In the most recent data set (2012), there is IQ data for every nation with a population \> 50,00. And the correlation between the estimated IQs and the newly found national IQs is greater than 0.9. (c) And L&V are not the only ones who have made national IQ estimates. In fact, the term “National IQ” comes from the German psychologist [Heiner Rindermann](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/per.634/abstract). L & V’s IQs strongly correlate with the other estimates (\>.9), based on the covariance of international assessment tests. (d) Most importantly, the studies on the correlation between skin color and National IQ typically analyzed the relation between estimated National IQs and determined National IQs separately (See, for example, Templer and Arikawa (2006). The correlations have been found to be statistically indistinguishable, confirming point (a). (2) Claim 2: Some of the national IQs were based on dated sample. But… (a) Whether this produced a confounding effect has already been investigated. (See, for example, [Lynn and Meisenberg (2010)](https://lesacreduprintemps19.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/national-iqs-calculated-and-validated.pdf). (b) And more recent data has coming, generally confirming the initial estimates. For example, in the paper below, you can see a list of all of the studies published pertaining to North Africa. Compare the most recent to the earliest scores for yourself. Al-Shahomee, 2012. [A standardisation of the Standard Progressive Matrices for adults in Libya](https://lesacreduprintemps19.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/a-standardisation-of-the-standard-progressive-matrices-for-adults-in-libya.pdf) (3) Claim 3. Some of the National IQs are based on unrepresentative samples. But… (a) Many of the National IQs are based on national standardization samples, as you can see in the study cited above. And other are validated by international test results, which are themselves nationally representative (refer back to Lynn and Meisenberg (2010)), So the problem is with poor data for a subset of countries. And a lot of that “poor” data, _now_, is from studies like [this](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289612000797). (b) But, restricting consideration to countries for which there is national standardization data and/ or for which there is international tests data, my point about a correlation between skin color and IQ would hold. For all European and most middle Eastern countries there is such data. And not only has IQ been found to correlate with color between these nations but it has been found to correlate likewise with [haplogroups](https://lesacreduprintemps19.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/intelligence-and-the-wealth-of-nations-genetics-matter-but-there-is-still-much-room-to-reduce-inequalities.pdf), even after controlling for a host of developmental factors. nuff said. ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/289 "2012-07-19T01:30:50Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > I don’t care to waste time on these mickey mouse back-and-forths. So I will restrict my replies to comments that are more or less on topic. All other comments will be replied to with a link to this one. Come on now, my brother. Proving your crackpot theories on the internet is what you care about more than anything. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/290 "2012-07-19T01:42:37Z")
> [@Untoward\_Parable](#): > > Compare poor whites to poor blacks with similar incarceration rates and see if there’s a statistical difference in IQ. I bet you won’t. Your brain tells you that when you’re on the bottom of a hierarchy you’re supposed to act the part. It’s documented neuroscience. Again, SES statistically explains no more than 1/3rd of the gap by adulthood. And interestingly, Blacks whose parents are from the highest SES strata preform little to no better than Whites whose parents are from [the](http://occidentalascent.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/racecollegeboardsessat.jpg)[lowest](http://occidentalascent.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/raceoldses.jpg) – contradicting your hypothesis. ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/291 "2012-07-19T01:56:07Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > Come on now, my brother. Proving your crackpot theories on the internet is what you care about more than anything. 😃 [Please](http://image.shutterstock.com/display_pic_with_logo/534712/534712,1326615786,21/stock-photo-serious-pretty-woman-making-stop-hand-sign-palm-gesture-young-girl-wear-black-dress-with-white-bow-92770624.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/292 "2012-07-19T02:10:17Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > If you’re going to make a snarky comment you’re going to have to be more clear. Are you trying to insult my mother because she’s a teacher? No, he’s insulting her because she’s a \*black \*teacher: > [@Chuck11](#): > > This is a not so great example of the shit that I’m talking about: > > [http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/aclu-alleges-michigan-school-district-violated-students-right-to-learn-to-read/2012/07/11/gJQArf1jeW\_story.html?hpid=z2](http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/aclu-alleges-michigan-school-district-violated-students-right-to-learn-to-read/2012/07/11/gJQArf1jeW_story.html?hpid=z2) > > I guess that the above has _nothing_ to do with [the relative performance of Black school teachers](http://www.ets.org/Media/Research/pdf/RR-11-08.pdf) on highly predictive standardized tests, which, of course, has nothing to do with the mysterious IQ gap and its cause. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/293 "2012-07-19T02:15:45Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > You are actually going to cite the work of the guys who invented “IQ” scores for countries by “averaging” neighboring countries and employing scores from tests given dozens of years ago with no controls and other tests (representing entire nations) from tests given to as few as a hundred schoolkids? These guys are outright charlatans. They make Rushton’s “big dick=low intelligence/small dick=brilliant” horseshit look like science. (Not much like science, but closer than what they have published.) > > That you would accept their nonsense is silly; that you would try to pass that off as serious support for your position calls into question your entire system of beliefs. Holy shit, I thought you were exaggerating until I read the wiki entry on this guy. There’s no fucking way this is real: > [@](#): > > The datum that Lynn and Vanhanen used for the lowest IQ estimate, Equatorial Guinea, was the mean IQ of a group of Spanish children in a home for the developmentally disabled in Spain Hahahaa, this is fucking awesome. This guy is like the world’s greatest real-life troll. And he put this shit in a book that some poor fuckers paid for. Hahahahaha I bet Chuck has a copy. > [@](#): > > Kamin also notes that Lynn excluded a study that found no difference in White and Black performance, and ignored the results of a study which showed Black scores were higher than White scores. Fucking priceless. It’s like trolling as a performance art. What the fuck, Chuck? This is your evidence? ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/294 "2012-07-19T02:19:10Z")
> [@Weirdering](#): > > To explain the gap in the US, African-Americans don’t need to be a race. There only needs to be some group level genetic differences between them and Whites, which there is. Wrong, wrong, wrong. There’s so much genetic diversity among black people that there’s no way to create a group called “black people” that wouldn’t also include all white people. If there’s a gene that causes \*all \*black people to have below-average IQ, then all white people must have it too. ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/295 "2012-07-19T02:35:29Z")
> [@Evil\_Economist](#): > > I’ve read more ridiculous claims in this very thread.How are you selecting these two groups? I am referring to the groups called “Blacks” and “Whites” as defined in the social sciences. Typically membership is defined by self or parental or other identification or a convergence of all three. The extent to which these forms of identification correlate and correlate with genetic and genealogical markers has already been discussed. ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/296 "2012-07-19T02:59:22Z")
> [@Evil\_Economist](#): > > Wrong, wrong, wrong. There’s so much genetic diversity among black people that there’s no way to create a group called “black people” that wouldn’t also include all white people. If there’s a gene that causes \*all \*black people to have below-average IQ, then all white people must have it too. This is both inaccurate and irrelevant. As for the latter, IQ differences are thought to be due to differences in numerous allelic frequencies. For example, two SNPs of DTNBP1 influence general cognitive ability. See [here](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21130223). Now check out the ancestral \*frequencies \*[here](http://hapmap.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/). The beneficial alleles are more common in European than West African populations. If there are lots of similar allelic differences going in the same direction, we will have our “race” differences in g. Whatever the case, there is no reason that we couldn’t, in principle, have such differences. ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/297 "2012-07-19T03:12:54Z")
> [@Evil\_Economist](#): > > Holy shit, I thought you were exaggerating until I read the wiki entry on this guy. There’s no fucking way this is real:Fucking priceless. It’s like trolling as a performance art. > > What the fuck, Chuck? This is your evidence? The topic of this thread concerns the difference between US Blacks and Whites. Lynn’s National IQs are not directly relevant to that. That said, Lynn’s data overall has proven to be pretty robust (to a degree). Refer to my post above. As for criticism, some is justified, but others not and has been clearly ideologically motivated. Leon Kamin, for example, is a self declared Marxist who has been on the losing end of the war against mental ability testing since the 70s; he originally argued that differences \*between individuals \* was completely environmental. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/298 "2012-07-19T04:00:22Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > Ya, I am going to cite them. You can huff and puff all you want but you can’t blow them away. Dozens of studies, now, have validated L and V’s national IQs (given a margin or error). And dozens of researchers are now working with them or have worked with them. [Here](http://www2.ku.edu/~kuwpaper/2010Papers/201206.pdf) is some cutting edge research from Black Africa. > > Let’s see what your arguments are: > > (1) Claim 1: Some national IQs as estimated by L&V were initially estimated from the IQs of neighboring counties. > > But… > > (a) Whether the method of estimating IQs was justified was investigated in the paper below. It was found to be so: > > \*\*Gelade, 2008. The Geography of IQ > > This paper examines the distribution of national IQ in geographical space. When the heritability of IQ and its dependence on eco-social factors are considered from a global perspective, they suggest that the IQs of neighboring countries should be similar. Using previously published IQ data for 113 nations (Lynn, R., & Vanhanen, T., (2006). IQ and global inequality. Athens, GA: Washington Summit Publishers.) the relationship between geographical location and national IQ is formally tested using spatial statistics. It is found that as predicted, nations that are geographical neighbors have more similar IQs than nations that are far apart. National IQ varies strikingly with position around the globe; the relationship between location and national IQ is even stronger than the relationship between location and national average temperature. **The findings suggest that Lynn & Vanhanen’s national IQ measures are reliable and adequately representative, and that their procedures for estimating missing national IQ scores from the scores of nearby nations are defensible.** (Contains 1 table.)\*\* > > (b) In the most recent data set (2012), there is IQ data for every nation with a population \> 50,00. And the correlation between the estimated IQs and the newly found national IQs is greater than 0.9. > > (c) And L&V are not the only ones who have made national IQ estimates. In fact, the term “National IQ” comes from the German psychologist [Heiner Rindermann](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/per.634/abstract). L & V’s IQs strongly correlate with the other estimates (\>.9), based on the covariance of international assessment tests. > > (d) Most importantly, the studies on the correlation between skin color and National IQ typically analyzed the relation between estimated National IQs and determined National IQs separately (See, for example, Templer and Arikawa (2006). The correlations have been found to be statistically indistinguishable, confirming point (a). > > (2) Claim 2: Some of the national IQs were based on dated sample. > > But… > > (a) Whether this produced a confounding effect has already been investigated. > (See, for example, [Lynn and Meisenberg (2010)](https://lesacreduprintemps19.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/national-iqs-calculated-and-validated.pdf). > > (b) And more recent data has coming, generally confirming the initial estimates. For example, in the paper below, you can see a list of all of the studies published pertaining to North Africa. Compare the most recent to the earliest scores for yourself. > > Al-Shahomee, 2012. [A standardisation of the Standard Progressive Matrices for adults in Libya](https://lesacreduprintemps19.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/a-standardisation-of-the-standard-progressive-matrices-for-adults-in-libya.pdf) > > (3) Claim 3. Some of the National IQs are based on unrepresentative samples. > > But… > > (a) Many of the National IQs are based on national standardization samples, as you can see in the study cited above. And other are validated by international test results, which are themselves nationally representative (refer back to Lynn and Meisenberg (2010)), So the problem is with poor data for a subset of countries. > > And a lot of that “poor” data, _now_, is from studies like [this](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289612000797). > > (b) But, restricting consideration to countries for which there is national standardization data and/ or for which there is international tests data, my point about a correlation between skin color and IQ would hold. For all European and most middle Eastern countries there is such data. And not only has IQ been found to correlate with color between these nations but it has been found to correlate likewise with [haplogroups](https://lesacreduprintemps19.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/intelligence-and-the-wealth-of-nations-genetics-matter-but-there-is-still-much-room-to-reduce-inequalities.pdf), even after controlling for a host of developmental factors. > > nuff said. Is there a reason you felt the need to put up the same post by Tom twice? Did you feel Tom’s comments were so brilliant you had to quite them twice. Also, I asked you the point of your snarky post directed at me earlier. What was it? Were you trying to insult her because she was a teacher or did you have some other point? Please explain. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/299 "2012-07-19T04:04:49Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > I am referring to the groups called “Blacks” and “Whites” as defined in the social sciences. Typically membership is defined by self or parental or other identification or a convergence of all three. The extent to which these forms of identification correlate and correlate with genetic and genealogical markers has already been discussed. Translation, you’re not engaging in science, but pseudo-science. ---
**Author:** ![Weirdering](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/4af34b/32.png) [@Weirdering](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weirdering)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/300 "2012-07-19T05:46:22Z")
> [@Evil\_Economist](#): > > Wrong, wrong, wrong. There’s so much genetic diversity among black people that there’s no way to create a group called “black people” that wouldn’t also include all white people. I don’t think this is true. I believe it’s referred to as Lewontin’s Fallacy. It occurs when you look at frequency differences on areas of the genome individually instead of together. When comparing things, a clearer picture of differences will emerge as you add more areas to look at, instead of looking at just one. > [@](#): > > If there’s a gene that causes _all_ black people to have below-average IQ, then all white people must have it too. Chuck has already probably made it clear that there appears to be a difference in the averages, a difference that doesn’t make it so that _all_ black people are out of the white range. Either way, a single gene? That’s not really how intelligence researchers see the genetics of intelligence. Variations on the phrase “numerous genes of small effect” come up in discussions. As to your point about Africans and Europeans having to share certain variants, that’s not true. There are some recent mutations that aren’t at all shared. But as Chuck pointed out, what matters is frequencies. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877.md?page=14) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877.md?page=16)