Rushton dug about and and came up with some papers stating that orientals have larger brains than whites, and whites have larger brains than blacks. He also came up with papers stating that orientals have higher IQs than whites, and that whites have higher IQs than blacks. For example, he wrote:
*“Consider the following statistically significant cmparisons. Using brain mass at autopsy, Ho et al. (1980) summarized data for 1,261 adults (see above) and reported a sex-combined difference between 811 European-Americans with a mean of 1,323 g (SD = 146) and 450 African-Americans with a mean of 1,223 g (SD = 144). Using endocranial volume, Beals et al. (1984, page 307, Table 5) analyzed 20,000 crania and found sex-combined brain cases differed by continental area. Excluding Caucasoid areas of Asia (e.g., India) and Africa (e.g., Egypt), 19 East Asian populations averaged 1,415 cm3 (SD = 51), 10 European groups averaged 1,362 cm3 (SD = 35) and 9 African groups averaged 1,268 cm3 (SD = 85). Using external head measurements, Rushton (1992) found, in a stratified random sample of 6,325 U.S. Army personnel, measured in 1988 to determine head size for fitting helmets, Asian-Americans, European-Americans, and African-Americans averaged 1,416, 1,380, and 1,359 cm3, respectively (see also, Rushton, 1994).”
“Globally, racial differences in brain size parallel those found in measured intelligence. Europeans in North America, Europe and Australasia have mean IQs of around 100. For East Asians, measured in North America and in Pacific Rim countries, means range from 101 to 111. Africans living south of the Sahara, African-Americans and African-Caribbeans (including those living in Britain), have mean IQs of from 70 to 90 (Lynn, 1991). Elementary speed of information processing in 9- to 12-year-olds, in which children decide which of several lights stands out from others, show that racial differences in mental ability are pervasive. All children can perform the tasks in less than 1 s, but more intelligent children, as measured by traditional IQ tests, perform the tasks faster than do less intelligent children. Japanese and Hong Kong children have faster decision times (controlling for movement time) than do British and Irish children who have faster decision time than South African Black and African-American children (Jensen, 1993; Jensen & Whang, 1993; Lynn, 1991).”*
As with any number of other fanatics, he spews the same drivel out in different forms repeatedly, and is quite amazing in his ability to ignore the details of the formal and dispassionate criticism made against him, even during his rebuttals of such criticism.
Among quite a few others, Michael Peters of the University of Guelph has thoroughly shot down Rushton’s methodololgy, though Rushton will not conceed. The bottom line is that Rushton’s work is extremely sloppy, and simply ignores a great many variables, as Peters and others have pointed out repeatedly.
When Rushton first started publishing his crap there were quite a few protests, both in learned journals and on campuses. Very few people give him the time of day now, although there is some effort made toward debating him. The big issue involving Rushton at universities in South-Western Ontario is now academic tenure, with Rushton being held up as a misguided and potentially harmful ass. One side says that tenure should not exist because it protects such crappola. The other side says tenure should exist so that unpopular ideas can be investigated, even if occasionally such ideas are wrong headed. It’s sort of fun watching Rushton being held out as the village idiot by both sides.
I’ve only come across him once in person (in the mid-80s when he was first tyring to peddle his nonsense), where true to form he managed to step in his own mess to such a degree that he was jeered off stage. He was claiming that when compared to whites, blacks had smaller brains, lower IQs, more problems related to aggression and stability, and in general less accomplished cultures. He never actually came out and used the term Jungle Bunny, but it was blatently obvious that that was the stereotype which he was promoting. The fellow was a walking, talking embarassment.
Since then he has been on a tear crying persecution despite his not being sacked and despite learned journals still occasionally publishing his crap. What he fails to recognize is that he is taking up extremely limited and highly valuable resources which would be better used by academics who are more rigorous in their methodology and who offer greater social utiliy in their findings (remember that he is not doing basic research). He ignores that the flip side of tenure is a responsibility to produce sound work, rather than to attempt to backfill a justifictaion for racism.
