# 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:** 6
**Author:** ![CannyDan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cannydan/32/548_2.png) [@CannyDan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CannyDan)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2012, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/101 "2012-07-03T00:02:12Z")
[Relevant pit thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=15231549) ---
**Author:** ![El\_Kabong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/el_kabong/32/496_2.png) [@El\_Kabong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Kabong)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2012, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/102 "2012-07-03T00:42:33Z")
[Relevant Pit thread.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=657257) ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2012, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/103 "2012-07-03T00:45:12Z")
> [@astro](#): > > You’re constructing a number of weak strawmen that no one is positing as part of the arguments here. Why you feel the need to do for anything other than your own amusement is a mystery. > > Lots of things go into environmental factors including potential dysfunctional and self harming behaviors by black culture. No one here is claiming it’s 100% bad white men. You seem to be positively itching to embrace this manufactured notion so you can knock it down. > > While certain types of institutional racism and racism in commerce have been outlawed it is a hard fact that a significant number of white people have strongly racist attitudes with respect to black people, and this includes a number of upper income cohorts. Not all this racism is expressed in the same way, and many white people may be racist in their private opinions without going out of their way to oppress or interfere with black people living their lives as free citizens. A lot of white people tolerate blacks, but privately disparage their intelligence, worth ethic, moral underpinnings, etc. etc. They are basically considered as borderline sub-humans. > > I’m not wondering about this issue, as a conservative looking white man I see and hear it all the time in private conversations. This is pure reality. Are you contending this is not the case in the US? Do you think the fact that there are extensive legal protections against overt racism obviates the impact of the aforesaid racist attitudes? > [@astro](#): > > You’re constructing a number of weak strawmen that no one is positing as part of the arguments here. I merely juxtaposed two extreme positions, one held by yourself and another held by NDD to illustrate the importance of the topic at hand. You argue that society is suffuse with racism and that this contributes substantially to the differential, no? And NDD argues the reverse, no? And these differing positions have different social implications, no? What are the strawmen that I am hoisting up? > [@](#): > > While certain types of institutional racism and racism in commerce have been outlawed it is a hard fact that a significant number of white people have strongly racist attitudes with respect to black people, and this includes a number of upper income cohorts. Not all this racism is expressed in the same way, and many white people may be racist in their private opinions without going out of their way to oppress or interfere with black people living their lives as free citizens. A lot of white people tolerate blacks, but privately disparage their intelligence, worth ethic, moral underpinnings, etc. etc. They are basically considered as borderline sub-humans. Do you think the fact that there are extensive legal protections against overt racism obviates the impact of the aforesaid racist attitudes? If the above is a hard fact, you should be able to provide some citations. I would appreciate if you could so that I can get an idea of what you’re referring to. As for data, you can refer to this discussion of the General Social Survey results: "Beginning in 1977, survey particpants were asked: “On the average, blacks have worse jobs, income, and housing than white people. Do you think these differences are because most blacks have less in-born ability to learn?” > **[There is no Silent but Sensible HBD Majority](http://inductivist.blogspot.com/2010/12/there-is-no-silent-but-sensible-hbd.html)** > > Steve Sailer wonders if there is a Silent but Sensible Majority out there when it comes to HBD-related issues like racial differences in ac... (The GSS can be analysed online so you can check the results for yourself.) This finding has been duplicated elsewhere – but these surveys are in person so that could have an effect on responses, given the current PC taboos – taboos the existence of which seemingly contradict your claim. It would be interesting to see a survey that asked if "most blacks are less intelligent, " as that is an established fact. As it is, I’m not aware of the supposed people who go “out of their way to oppress or interfere with black people living their lives as free citizens” – unless you mean racialists who defend their right, if not legal, of free association, which includes their right to not associate with people of other races. If you could, give some contemporaneous examples of the people you mean, we will discuss them if they are relevant. As for attitude towards Blacks, I am again not sure what you mean. Blacks are less intelligent (and more criminal), on average; I fail to see how recognizing that disparages them. More generally and importantly, I fail to see how these supposed attitudes per se could cause a gap, if that’s what you are implying. Let’s suppose that despite enacting policies to discriminate for Blacks (e.g., affirmative action), rearranging society to accommodate Blacks (e.g., Busing, tax credits, Head start), making taboo discussion of IQ differences (refer yourself to “The IQ Controversy, the Media and Public Policy”), publicly covering up Black pathologies (e.g., the media and crime reporting), publicly disavowing racism and even White racial identity, and so on, White people think, in secret, badly about Blacks; how possibly could that translate into an intelligence gap. We are not dealing with some mythological “stereotype threat”; the reality of latent ability differences has been established. If they arise environmentally, they must through environmental influences that have a causal impact on IQ. What are the causal mechanisms that you are proposing? ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2012, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/104 "2012-07-03T01:27:02Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > No. Many Africans brought trade skills with them - rice growing and the management of dikes, carpentry, blacksmithing and iron work, cattle husbandry. > > On the other hand, many more Africans were prevented from using and maintaining skills they had brought with them because they forced to do brute physical labor only, and were prevented from passing their skills on to their children. My specific claim was that the mean human capital of Blacks, with regards to technical skills (e.g., carpenters, tailors, seemstresses, mechanics) _increased_ from the time in Africa to the time in the US. I’ll find a cite when I get a chance. If you have one that contradicts the claim, let’s have it. ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2012, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/105 "2012-07-03T01:52:46Z")
> [@astro](#): > > no stable family structures, being bought and sold like animals, and being denied access to almost any level of intellectual self improvement is simply not enough time for the cultural deprivation argument to stand? As with everyone else here, you are failing to attend to the particularities of the differential. The factor which depresses the Black IQ relative to the White is no less active at the far right end of the curve than at the far left end. (What cultural deprivations are Blacks with an IQ of 130 or 145 facing? ---
**Author:** ![New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9d8465/32.png) [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/New_Deal_Democrat)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2012, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/106 "2012-07-03T02:43:41Z")
> [@PrettyVacant](#): > > They’re better off? At any given time, in the USA blacks have a 1/10 change of being under some kind of correctional supervision (obv. inc. prison) and almost 50% of black males of being disenfranchised because of a conviction. > > But then non-Hispanic blacks do make up 40% of the prison population. Hey, at least they get healthcare. Maybe even some kind of work. Possibly a little education. Is it the fault of whites that so many blacks are in prison? Because I expect you to answer that it is, I would like for you to explain why it is. ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2012, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/107 "2012-07-03T03:12:05Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > Is it the fault of whites that so many blacks are in prison? > > Because I expect you to answer that it is, I would like for you to explain why it is. racism\* –\> ? –\> sensory informational deprivation –\> ? –\> mean difference in g –\> population level amplification –\> crime rate differences \*A particularly pernicious form of this is the refusal to accept fault, especially when accompanied by alternative causal hypotheses Seems obvious to me. ---
**Author:** ![PBear42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ecccb3/32.png) [@PBear42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PBear42)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2012, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/108 "2012-07-03T05:35:42Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > You mentioned marriage and school segregation. As for the former, miscegenation, I see nothing wrong with outlawing it, despite my own racial infidelity. So I don’t see that as a naughty thing, per se. I do fail to see how depriving Blacks of White spouses could have environmentally caused the gap. Sorry to be obtuse, but your position here isn’t clear. Are you okay with banning interracial marriages or opposed? ---
**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 3, 2012, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/109 "2012-07-03T05:45:44Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > As it is, mixed race kids preform intermediate to monoracial kids. You can see this in recent nationally representative samples. So nothing has changed in this regards in the last 225 years. This comment is jaw-droppingly stupid. Virtually all African-Americans are “mixed race” and few are “monoracial”. There’s no evidence that the studies authors did anything to ensure that the blacks they classified as “monoracial” really were “monoracial.” ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2012, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/110 "2012-07-03T22:20:55Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > Virtually all African-Americans are “mixed race” and few are “monoracial”. There’s no evidence that the studies authors did anything to ensure that the blacks they classified as “monoracial” really were “monoracial.” This reply is mind-stunningly inane. Individuals who _have_ one self-identifying White parent and one self-identifying Black parent perform, on average, intermediate to individuals who have two self-identifying White parents and two self-identifying Black parents. The same can be said for individuals who _report_ having one self-identifying White parent and one self-identifying Black parent. And for individuals who _are other-identified, by observation_, as having one Black parent and one White parent. And for individuals who simply identify as mixed-race. As for those individuals who identify as African-American, those who have physical characteristics more in common with unmixed Black west Africans perform inferior to those who have have physically characteristics more in common with unmixed White Europeans. I’ve listed numerous sources which you can check if you wish. Now, what would be your explanation for the above phenomena? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2012, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/111 "2012-07-03T23:26:14Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > This reply is mind-stunningly inane. Individuals who _have_ one self-identifying White parent and one self-identifying Black parent perform, on average, intermediate to individuals who have two self-identifying White parents and two self-identifying Black parents. The same can be said for individuals who _report_ having one self-identifying White parent and one self-identifying Black parent. And for individuals who _are other-identified, by observation_, as having one Black parent and one White parent. And for individuals who simply identify as mixed-race. As for those individuals who identify as African-American, those who have physical characteristics more in common with unmixed Black west Africans perform inferior to those who have have physically characteristics more in common with unmixed White Europeans. I’ve listed numerous sources which you can check if you wish. Now, what would be your explanation for the above phenomena? That you are making an unsupportable claim on the off chance that no one calls you on it? In all the thousands of posts on this topic, I have never seen anyone provide any support for this claim, so I would presume that it originated with someone who is not even as smart as Rushton or Jensen. (For one thing, the notion that there is even a sufficiently large number of people who have one parent with only European ancestry and one parent with only sub-Saharan African ancestry to have actually been collected into a population subjected to such tests is ludicrous. Is this more of Lynn’s imaginary IQ computations?) ---
**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 4, 2012, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/112 "2012-07-04T05:38:53Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > This reply is mind-stunningly inane. Individuals who _have_ one self-identifying White parent and one self-identifying Black parent perform, on average, intermediate to individuals who have two self-identifying White parents and two self-identifying Black parents. The same can be said for individuals who _report_ having one self-identifying White parent and one self-identifying Black parent. And for individuals who _are other-identified, by observation_, as having one Black parent and one White parent. And for individuals who simply identify as mixed-race. As for those individuals who identify as African-American, those who have physical characteristics more in common with unmixed Black west Africans perform inferior to those who have have physically characteristics more in common with unmixed White Europeans. I’ve listed numerous sources which you can check if you wish. Now, what would be your explanation for the above phenomena? Self-identification doesn’t tell us much about genetics. You’re going to have to abandon all of your claims based on data derived from self-identification. Way too much noised to be reliable. Sorry. ---
**Author:** ![Chuck11](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Chuck11](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chuck11)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2012, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/113 "2012-07-05T02:00:19Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > Self-identification doesn’t tell us much about genetics. You’re going to have to abandon all of your claims based on data derived from self-identification. Way too much noised to be reliable. Sorry. > [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > Self-identification doesn’t tell us much about genetics. You’re going to have to abandon all of your claims based on data derived from self-identification. Way too much noised to be reliable. Sorry. Nonsense. To the extent that our index of race is unreliable, the association between genetic and IQ differences will be attenuated. This should be obvious. Noise works against, not for, a genetic hypothesis. As such, results in support are that much more robust. Imagine, for example, a transracial adoption study in which “Black” children were adopted by White parents. To the extent that the “Black” children were really misidentified White children, the results will have been biased against, not for, a genetic hypothesis, which predicts that the adopted Blacks will perform unlike adopted Whites. Refer to Jensen’s discussion of this in “FUZZY BOUNDARY OF RACIAL CLASSIFICATION ATTENUATES IQ DIFFERENCE” In regards to your comment about self-identification, what tells us about genetics is the correspondence between the data and the predictions of a genetic hypothesis. Such a hypothesis predicts that the offspring of a Black and a White individual will perform intermediate to the offspring of two White and two Blacks individuals. To the extent that self-identification or other-identification is a less then perfect index of being Black or being White, as noted above, the results will be biased against a genetic hypothesis. That all said, the degree to which self-identification corresponds to socially defined race and genetically based race is an empirical question which has already been answered. [This](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1196372/?+tool=pubmed) has been pointed out a dozen times already. So on multiple levels your response fails: (1) self-identified race reliably predicts other identified and genetic based race and (2) unreliability works against a genetic hypothesis, making supporting results more robust. ---
**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 5, 2012, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/114 "2012-07-05T03:57:59Z")
> [@](#): > > In regards to your comment about self-identification, what tells us about genetics is the > correspondence between the data and the predictions of a genetic hypothesis. Such a hypothesis predicts that the offspring of a Black and a White individual will perform intermediate to the offspring of two White and two Blacks individuals. To the extent that self-identification or other-identification is a less then perfect index of being Black or being White, as noted above, the results will be biased against a genetic hypothesis. No. Mixing two populations may result in the expression of traits that are intermediate between the two groups, or the expression of traits that are stronger or weaker than in either parent group. Mixing, in effect, creates a new population which may differ significantly from either parent group. > [@](#): > > Nonsense. To the extent that our index of race is unreliable, the association between genetic and IQ differences will be attenuated. This should be obvious. Noise works against, not for, a genetic hypothesis. As such, results in support are that much more robust. Imagine, for example, a transracial adoption study in which “Black” children were adopted by White parents. To the extent that the “Black” children were really misidentified White children, the results will have been biased against, not for, a genetic hypothesis, which predicts that the adopted Blacks will perform unlike adopted Whites. Where you get into trouble here is that you take politically defined categories, like black and white, which have varied over time here in the US, and try to map them on to genetic differences in population. Unfortunately, the genetic differences have no meaning without the a priori political definitions - in fact the genetic differences would not exist without the political definitions. Without extensive social engineering, black Americans would have disappeared as a distinct minority group generations ago, the way that the descendants of African slaves disappeared in Mexico and in Argentina. [The Invention of the Color Line](http://essays.backintyme.com/item/12) It’s understandable that you don’t want the US thesis to collapse the way the others have, but I’m afraid this one’s doomed too. Basically, there is no test score gap between self-identified blacks with majority European ancestry, and self-identified blacks of majority African ancestry. Intro to Christopher Jencks and Meredith Phillips, \*The Black-White Test Score Gap \*(Washington DC: Brookings Institution, 1998) : > **[jencks01.pdf](https://dl.dropbox.com/u/38568440/rawdata/jencks01.pdf)** > **[The U.S. Black/White Test-Score Gap (E2)](https://backintyme.wordpress.com/article/the-u-s-black-white-test-score-gap-e2-k16kl3c2f2au-21/)** > > Session E2 of a series on contemporary issues discussed in my lectures on “The Study of Racialism.” Three hypotheses have stood the test of time. For ages 3-10, that there is a differen… > [@](#): > > It Lacks a “Racial” Genetic Component > > The U.S. Black/White test-score gap lacks a “racial” genetic component. The gap is not “racially” genetic, not even a little. This is not to say that the ability to get high scores is not hereditary. It is. Dumb parents have dumb kids and vice-versa. But no hereditary component correlates with U.S. endogamous group membership. Two forces have made heredity the most thoroughly studied hypothesis regarding the gap. > > First, Americans are taught from infancy to conceptualize their unique endogamous color line as being biologically based; that Blacks are genetically different from Whites in a sense deeper than superficial appearance. Every American who studies the gap must first overcome this distorting intellectual lens. > > Second, every few decades since the early 1800s has seen another book arguing that Afro-Americans are genetically inferior (the most recent being The Bell Curve by Herrnstein and Murray). Each such revival captures the U.S. imagination and so each must be overcome. Among the many replicable facts disproving a genetic component are: > > ``` > No gap appears between the scores of unassimilated first-generation immigrant grade-school children from sub-Saharan Africa and those of White children. > No gap appears between the test scores of unassimilated first-generation British West Indian immigrant grade-school children of predominantly sub-Saharan ancestry and those of White children. > No gap appears between the test scores of unassimilated first-generation Latin American immigrant grade-school children of predominantly sub-Saharan ancestry and those of White children. > Although there is a slight correlation between the gap and sub-Saharan features (skin tone, hair texture, etc.), there is no correlation between the gap and actual sub-Saharan DNA genetic admixture markers. (There is a difference between ethnicity and genetic admixture in the United States. The former depends on a few superficial appearance genes. The latter depends on actual ancestry. Millions of ethnically White Americans have detectable genetic admixture from African slave ancestors. They do not show a gap. Millions of ethnically Black Americans lack sub-Saharan genetic markers. They do. The gap follows self-identity, not genes.) > No gap appears between the test scores of Black grade-school children raised by two White adoptive parents and those of White children. (Until adolescence, when their mental skills plunge to the same level as Black children raised by Black parents.) > Grade-school children of a White mother and Black father show a slightly less severe test-score gap. > Grade-school children of a Black mother and White father show the same test-score gap as children with two Black parents. > In England, Afro-descent children of British West Indian immigrants show a temporary gap that lasts only until they acculturate. See the newspaper article here. > > ``` ---
**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 5, 2012, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/115 "2012-07-05T16:43:27Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > Intro to Christopher Jencks and Meredith Phillips, \*The Black-White Test Score Gap \*(Washington DC: Brookings Institution, 1998) : > > [http://dl.dropbox.com/u/38568440/rawdata/jencks01.pdf](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/38568440/rawdata/jencks01.pdf) This paper seems directly on point, but the version you linked to is very blurry and difficult to read; do you have a different link? ---
**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 5, 2012, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/116 "2012-07-05T17:21:47Z")
> [@Evil\_Economist](#): > > This paper seems directly on point, but the version you linked to is very blurry and difficult to read; do you have a different link? Follow-up question: the paper says: “we have accumulated a fair amount of indirect evidence since 1970. Most of it suggests that whether children live in a “black” or “white” environment has far more impact on their test performance than the number of Africans or Europeans in their family tree.” The footnote to this comment leads to Chapter 3, which isn’t included in the link. Can you list the papers that lead to this conclusion? Also, the paper states: “almost all psychologists now agree that intelligence tests measure developed rather than innate abilities” This contradicts my understanding of the consensus about intelligence tests; would it be possible to provide a cite/link to a paper supporting this conclusion (I don’t see any cites in the linked paper). I also see the following (quote marks, but it’s a paraphrase): “mixed race children who lived with a white mother scored 11 points higher than mixed-race children who lived with a black mother. The black-white IQ gap at the time was 15 points” And I notice from the footnote that the mixed-race children who grew up with a white mother (and liven in a 2-parent household) had an average IQ of 104.7. That study right there seems to absolutely and completely destroy the “genetic” argument. ---
**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 5, 2012, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/117 "2012-07-05T18:26:54Z")
I’m going through this thread to understand the arguments, and to argue the facts rather than just going to the pit and calling people racist d\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*s, so please forgive the multiple posts. Chuck11 has blog discussing the race/performance gap. A substantial part of the blog is devoted to a discussion of the book “Understanding Human History”. I noticed that the book was published by the National Policy Institute. I see the following discussion of this fine institution on Wikipedia: > [@](#): > > The National Policy Institute is an American think tank based in Whitefish, Montana. It describes itself as the right’s answer to the Southern Poverty Law Center.[citation needed] > > The Institute’s authors have produced a series of reports on affirmative action, race and conservatism, the Southern Poverty Law Center, and its first annual report, The State of White America-2007. > > In September of 2011, NPI hosted its first national conference, entitled “Towards a New Nationalism,” at the Ronald Reagan Building. Speakers included Richard Spencer, Keith Preston, Byron Roth, Alex Kurtagic, Tomislav Sunic, Jared Taylor and his associate Sam Dickson, a lawyer who has represented the Ku Klux Klan . > > MSNBC reported that Andrews voted for Barack Obama in the 2008 US Presidential Election in order, he said, to help destroy the Republican Party so that it can be reborn into a party that will support the “interests of white people”.[1] Interesting. ---
**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 6, 2012, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/118 "2012-07-06T02:17:25Z")
> [@Chuck11](#): > > In regards to your comment about self-identification, what tells us about genetics is the > correspondence between the data and the predictions of a genetic hypothesis. Such a hypothesis predicts that the offspring of a Black and a White individual will perform intermediate to the offspring of two White and two Blacks individuals. To the extent that self-identification or other-identification is a less then perfect index of being Black or being White, as noted above, the results will be biased against a genetic hypothesis. Your reasoning is absurd. As I said, the overwhelming majority of African-Americans, or, to use your term “blacks” are of, to use your terminology, “mixed” as opposed to “monoracial”. Moreover, the overwhelming majority of African-Americans who are clearly “mixed” have two parents who identify as “black” rather than one parent who identifies as “black” and one who identifies as “white”. For example, anyone with a functioning brain and working eyes can see that Will Smith, Vanessa Williams, Jesse Jackson, and Al Sharpton are of “mixed” ancestry yet all of them had two “black” parents not one parent who was “white” and one who was “black”. For that matter, Walter White, the former leader of the NAACP(not to be confused with the character from Breaking Bad) was light-skinned, blonde-haired, blue-eyed and looked far more like a Nazi stormtrooper than Adolph Hitler, yet both of his parents identified themselves and were viewed by the community as a whole as “black”. [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/87/Walter\_Francis\_White.jpg/220px-Walter\_Francis\_White.jpg](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/87/Walter_Francis_White.jpg/220px-Walter_Francis_White.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Randvek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/a6a055/32.png) [@Randvek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Randvek)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/119 "2012-07-06T02:42:33Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > For example, anyone with a functioning brain and working eyes can see that Will Smith, Vanessa Williams, Jesse Jackson, and Al Sharpton are of “mixed” ancestry yet all of them had two “black” parents not one parent who was “white” and one who was “black”. There’s a reason why “half-black” Obama looks a whole lot like people we consider fully “black;” excepting people who just got off the boat from Africa, there aren’t really any “blacks” at all in America. ---
**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 6, 2012, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877/120 "2012-07-06T03:55:20Z")
> [@Randvek](#): > > There’s a reason why “half-black” Obama looks a whole lot like people we consider fully “black;” excepting people who just got off the boat from Africa, there aren’t really any “blacks” at all in America. Agreed. Race is a myth and while “black” and “white” may be useful cultural terms they’re not scientific and they’re not terribly meaningful biologically. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-black-white-racial-iq-gap-in-the-us-be-environmentally-explained/626877.md?page=7)