Statistically, blacks score poorly on IQ and IQ-proxy exams than whites, is black genetics to blame?

[New_Deal_Democrat]

@Ibn_Warraq

Fair enough, then please explain why you think genetics explain black domination of the NBA but doesn’t explain why Lithuanians dominated basketball in the Soviet Union?

Very few blacks lived in the Soviet Union. If the percentage of blacks in the Soviet Union was comparable to the percentage of blacks living in the United States, I am confident most of those Lithuanians would have spend most of their games sitting on the bench.

[magellan01]

@Blake

What is baffling is your insistence that it must be racial without a shred of evidence to support such a claim.

You accept that up to the 1950s, basketball was a popular sport amongst White Gentile kids. Right?

You accept that up to the 1950s, there were far more Gentiles in the US than Jews. Right?

You accept that up to the 1950s, more Gentiles than Jews wanted to get college scholarships. Right?

And you accept that up to the 1950s, Jews were grossly overrepresented in professional basketball. Right?

And you accept that the dominance of Jews in basketball up to the 1950s was not due to Jews being physically superior. Right?

And yet then you want us to believe that because there are far more Whites in the US than Gentiles, and thus more Whites than Blacks want to get college scholarships, there can only be one explanation for why Blacks are grossly overrepresented in professional basketball.

It must be genetic. :smack:

Okkams’’ Razor, man, Okkam’s Razor. It’s ignorant and illogical to needlessly multiply entities.

We all accept that culture can lead to the grossest over-representations of minorities in sports. We know that Black culture is different to White culture.

So we can explain the over-representation of Blacks in some sports solely through culture. There is no need to invoke a genetic mechanism. The cultural mechanism explains all the observations perfectly well.

The reason that we are refusing to consider a genetic explanation is that you have failed to give us any *need *to consider it. All you’ve done is construct an argument from ignorance. Why should we consider such an argument?

Simple question** magellan01**: What observations do you have that can’t be explained just as well *without *invoking genetic differences?

If you can’t answer that question then you have nothing that is *worth *considering.

What’s with you guys ascribing beliefs to me that I don’t have and then asking me to defend them. I guess some people have some low IQs.

I never said, nor do I hold, that “It must be genetic. :smack:”. I do think that when it comes to cases like the NFL speed positions and world class sprinters, the evidence suggests genetics is probably playing a role. The disproportionate representation and lack of cultural explanation (unlike boxing, for instance) strongly suggest it. BUt I do not hold that it MUST be the reason. Why don’t you provide me with the cultural explanation. Perhaps you think that Blacks with the gift of speed, as a group, work so much harder than whites to hone the equal genetic skill they have that it results in such a grossly disproportionate representation.

If you actually read my posts, you’d have seen that the point of them is that I’m greatly entertained by people like you who refuse to put race on the table as an explanation. You puff your chest out as men of science, but bring so much ideological baggage that you can’t—won’t—consider what a look at the numbers suggests.

It makes me chuckle.

[Ibn_Warraq]

@New_Deal_Democrat

Very few blacks lived in the Soviet Union. If the percentage of blacks in the Soviet Union was comparable to the percentage of blacks living in the United States, I am confident most of those Lithuanians would have spend most of their games sitting on the bench.

This is of course why Jamaica, Brazil and Nigeria are such famous basketball powerhouses and why Cuba and Ghana are renowned for producing great sprinters.

[Marley23]

@magellan01

I guess some people have some low IQs.

Again, you’re not allowed to make insulting remarks about other posters. This is your last reminder.

[Marley23]

@marshmallow

60 years in and we’re still waiting for an explosive non-black perimeter player.

:rolleyes: Did J. J. Barrea turn black and I missed it?

The best rebounder in the NBA last year was a tubby white guy.

Kevin Love isn’t tubby.

I don’t think Steve Nash can jump over a piece of paper but he’s still one of the best point guards in the world.

Yes, he is. Unfortunately you’re edging into that whole “black guys are athletic and flashy, white guys are gritty and skilled” thing, and it’s not true or a credit to the discussion. I’m sure there are coaches who fall for that kind of nonsense because it certainly permeates the sports media, but that’s received wisdom and it only reflects people’s assumptions.

This seems like it would be more true in baseball.

How? Skill is now unnecessary in basketball and athleticism doesn’t help in baseball?

[magellan01]

@Marley23

Again, you’re not allowed to make insulting remarks about other posters. This is your last reminder.

I didn’t. It’s not about another poster, it’s a general observation about “the population at large”. tomndebb and I discussed this. Please consult him. Then you can undo this “last” admonishment.

Thank you.

[Marley23]

@magellan01

I didn’t. It’s not about another poster, it’s a general observation about “the population at large”.

“You guys” refers to the population at large, not the people you are talking to and the poster you quoted? Nice try, but no.

[Marley23]

And with that, magellan01, I advise you to take any other comments to email or ATMB.

[magellan01]

@Marley23

And with that, magellan01, I advise you to take any other comments to email or ATMB.

Will do. In the meantime, you might talk to tomndebb, as I suggested.

[jlpsquared]

I am a new guy hear, and I see a number of bizarre things happening in this discussion.
First off Blake, you are certainly arguing better than Magelan, however, you are not correct in essentially any of your assertions. I will not even bother going point by point, because the argument “does ethnic background affect racial makeup in sports” is not really a topic anymore. the science has come down fairly heavily on the side of YES. This is no longer controversial. As Chen019 points out on a post near the top of page 3, we are even gaining ACTUAL genetic evidence that effects the agility of certain human ethnicities more than others.

I am sorry, your assertion that race (or whatever you call it) has nothing to do with sport racial numbers falls apart under the weight of scientific evidence. Frankly, you are wrong. Your argument that since jews played basketball in the 40’s thus their is no genetic component to race and sports is a nice attempt, but that is a hail mary pass to be sure. the assertion that basketball was anywhere near the popularity it is today in the 40’s and 50’s is laughable. And it actually feeds into Magellans point that once you took down sports barriers in the 50’s and 60’s african Americans very quiclkly took over the sports that were popular with them, namely basketball, and football at the speed positions.

America has a tough racial background, but how do you explain soccer in Europe? There are now protests in Italy because of to many africans on the Italian soccer team. The English team is over 25% african, despite Africans making barely 2% of the English population. No one can seriously argue that soccer is just less popular Europeans than African immigrants. I very much ask you to travel to Europe and ask an actual European their opinion of that?
Blake says

Third are there equal numbers of Black and White High school players? Because if there are statistically more Blacks at the lower levels then you get what is known as a sampling multiplier effect at higher levels. Because the higher levels are not independent of the lower levels, a relatively small bias at the high school team level can translate into a huge bias at the NBA level.

Actually there are far more white basketball AND football players paying high school sports. Again, back to Magellans point in which he was correct, yet failed to argue the point well. And as for stereotypes, to make this a cultural argument, you have to assume that most black basketball players and football players are from the ghetto, and their white contemporaries are playing PS3 and never go outside. This is factually untrue. Most black professional athletes do not come from the ghetto, and a growing percentage are actually coming from middle and upper class backgrounds, which is completely antithetical to the "culture creates black athletes arguments.

As to the OP question, I just don’t believe this is “really” debatable anymore, I think IQ combined with genetic studies have pretty conclusively concluded that IQ is and continues to be affected by genetics (*mostly, obviously not completely). We may not WANT this to be true, but that doesn’t mean it is not.

I personally find the evidence very persuasive. Plus it flows very elegantly from the theory of evolution (which I assume MOST here believe, maybe not Blake :)) that our common ancester with the Chimpanzee lived around 6 million years ago, and as a species have been drifting away genetically ever since, and we have particular adaptions separating us from the rest of the hominids to a much greater extent like hand biology, upright gate, and of course huge brain power. And the human common ancester existed about 50,000 years ago, and we have continued to be evolving due to selection pressure and mutations. To assume that the brain is the one organ to be locked genetically, is a crazy and and unjustifiable idea(ology) that cannot be seriously entertained.

[Belowjob2.0]

http://knol.google.com/k/the-u-s-black-white-test-score-gap-e2#

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.

Thus far, no one here, or anywhere else, has been able to refute Sweet’s analysis of the issue.

Arguments to the contrary are typically made by people who either don’t understand the issues and the evidence, like Chen 19 and jlp squared, or people who willfully ignore evidence because it contradicts a thesis in which they hold an irrational belief, like Harpending and Cochran.

Anyone who accuse Blake of not believing in evolution doesn’t understand evolution.

[jlpsquared]

@BelowJob,

I am not sure who this Frank Sweet is, I don’t recall his name as it relates to Genetic or Educational studies, however, judging from his Blog (or whatever your link is) I don’t even think HE is refuting intellegence can be genetic. Although I believe much of what he says about essentially nothing being ethnicity based is easily refuted.

I have never seen those statistics he sites, so i cannot claim they are in any sense true, but I can tell you that even if they are, he is certainly cherry-picking to make a false point.

Assuming his statistics on African-latin-American-American immigrants are true, they are very interesting, but they do not at all refute that intellegence is heritable and measurable at the ethnic level. All it shows is that parents willing to move to immigrate and give their children better outcomes in different areas or different programs are self-selecting themselves as better, fitter, whatever members of their community…In other words selection bias. And it has happened many times in many studies accross America (Chicago, St. Louis, etc…) Better parents want better things for their kids. But it says nothing about the ones they left behind, who are also part of their ethnicity (more actually by numbers) and continue to show in their home countries the same IQ numbers we are talking about by group. It is interesting, but ultimately doesn’t mean much in the current conversation. Because some immigrants with higher IQ self-select themselves to come to America does not in any way refute our arguments.

This Mr. Sweet is trying to hard to make a political point, and it falls apart, in fact I can tell from this phrase where his intentions lie…“The former depends on a few superficial appearance genes”, no true geneticist would ever use the term “superficial”, because they don’t believe there is anything superficial in our genetic structure, particular anything that could flag difference between one group or another, since genes only change for a reason, and if it stays, and is not weeded out, than it is a successful difference.

[Belowjob2.0]

This Mr. Sweet is trying to hard to make a political point, and it falls apart, in fact I can tell from this phrase where his intentions lie…“The former depends on a few superficial appearance genes”, no true geneticist would ever use the term “superficial”, because they don’t believe there is anything superficial in our genetic structure, particular anything that could flag difference between one group or another, since genes only change for a reason, and if it stays, and is not weeded out, than it is a successful difference.

I can see you and Chen19 are out of your depths here when it comes to genetics. It’s complex subject which doesn’t lend itself to casual dabblers with political axes to grind.

Sweet’s done some of the best analysis available on the issue, and is widely quoted in academic journals. His politics are decidedly right wing, incidentally. Not a fan of Obama, at all.

His background, in addition to history, is in science and engineering, and he subjects America’s race notion(s) to rigorous scientific inquiry and thorough research. He’s not pushing any political program - he just has a sharp bullshit detector. The claims you make just won’t stand up to rigorous scrutiny.

http://knol.google.com/k/can-dna-tell-what-race-you-are#

http://knol.google.com/k/the-heredity-of-racial-traits-c3#

http://knol.google.com/k/myths-across-the-color-line#

http://knol.google.com/k/frank-w-sweet/the-u-s-black-white-color-line/k16kl3c2f2au/4#
http://knol.google.com/k/why-are-europeans-white-e1#

[Belowjob2.0]

Read these. When come back, bring pie.
http://knol.google.com/k/a-brief-history-of-census-race#

http://knol.google.com/k/how-the-law-decided-if-you-were-black-or-white#

http://knol.google.com/k/afro-euro-genetic-admixture-in-the-united-states#

http://knol.google.com/k/the-race-notion-s-role-in-ethnic-assimilation#

[tomndebb]

@Ibn_Warraq

. . . rather than merely making yourself look like an intellectual coward . . . .

Portraying another poster as a “coward,” even when embedded in a conditional or a hypothetical, is still a violation of the rules.

Knock it off.

[ /Moderating ]

[Belowjob2.0]

This Mr. Sweet is trying to hard to make a political point, and it falls apart, in fact I can tell from this phrase where his intentions lie…“The former depends on a few superficial appearance genes”, no true geneticist would ever use the term “superficial”, because they don’t believe there is anything superficial in our genetic structure, particular anything that could flag difference between one group or another, since genes only change for

Apologies to the board. I see now that I wasn’t specific enough.

The fact is that physical appearance has decoupled from actual continental ancestry in many New World populations, so that physical appearance is not a good indicator of continental ancestry. This is fundamental to any discussion of populations of mixed African and non African ancestry in the New World.

[Chen019]

@Blake

I say again: The reason that we are refusing to consider a genetic explanation is that you have failed to give us any *need *to consider it. Nothing in the post you linked to is an observation that requires a genetic cause

Err, the fact that gene alleles associated with with certain athletic traits differ in frequency across racial groups is suggestive that there has been different selection. And that is reflected in phenoytypic differences.

Few genes are known to be decisive in determining life outcomes. Nutrition, training, and other genes matter. But the evidence that this gene significantly influences athletic ability is strong.

Now look at the frequency of the R and X variants in different populations. According to data published seven years ago in Human Molecular Genetics, the relative frequency of the X allele is 0.52 in Asians, 0.42 in whites, 0.27 in African-Americans, and 0.16 in Africans. If you break out the data further, the frequency of the XX genotype is 0.25 in Asians, 0.20 in European whites, 0.13 in African-Americans, and 0.01 in African Bantu. Conversely, the frequency of RR (the genotype for speed and power) is 0.25 in Asians, 0.36 in European whites, 0.60 in African-Americans, and 0.81 in African Bantu. Among Asians, you can expect to find one RR for every XX. Among whites, you can expect nearly two RRs for every XX. Among African-Americans, you can expect more than four RRs for every XX.

Race, genes, and sports.

[Chen019]

@Belowjob2.0

The fact is that physical appearance has decoupled from actual continental ancestry in many New World populations, so that physical appearance is not a good indicator of continental ancestry. This is fundamental to any discussion of populations of mixed African and non African ancestry in the New World.

Self identified ethnicity corresponds very closely to genetic clusters which reflect continental ancestry. The fact you get different clusters is because of different frequency distributions over various genes, leading to group differences.

There is considerable evidence of group differences in physical traits. Please read the Jon Entine article which discusses this in the context of sports. I also gave a basic example of the different prevalence of certain genes linked to athletic abilities above. As the cost of genome sequencing falls more genes will be identified.

Now look at the frequency of the R and X variants in different populations. According to data published seven years ago in Human Molecular Genetics, the relative frequency of the X allele is 0.52 in Asians, 0.42 in whites, 0.27 in African-Americans, and 0.16 in Africans. If you break out the data further, the frequency of the XX genotype is 0.25 in Asians, 0.20 in European whites, 0.13 in African-Americans, and 0.01 in African Bantu. Conversely, the frequency of RR (the genotype for speed and power) is 0.25 in Asians, 0.36 in European whites, 0.60 in African-Americans, and 0.81 in African Bantu. Among Asians, you can expect to find one RR for every XX. Among whites, you can expect nearly two RRs for every XX. Among African-Americans, you can expect more than four RRs for every XX.

[Belowjob2.0]

Self identified ethnicity corresponds very closely to genetic clusters which reflect continental ancestry. The fact you get different clusters is because of different frequency distributions over various genes

No, this isn’t true in the New World. Self identified ethnicity varies widely in relation to continental ancestry throughout the New World. Of course, self-identified ethnicity varies widely from nation to nation and culture to culture, so your claims are hopeless from the get go.

You’re entitled to your own opinion but not your own facts.

You repeat the same wrong assertions over and over again. You still are clueless about basic facts of genetics.

[Chen019]

@Belowjob2.0

No, this isn’t true in the New World. Self identified ethnicity varies widely in relation to continental ancestry throughout the New World. Of course, self-identified ethnicity varies widely from nation to nation and culture to culture, so your claims are hopeless from the get go. .

If you’re so concerned with facts why don’t you read a paper on the subject?

Numerous recent studies using a variety of genetic markers have shown that, for example, individuals sampled worldwide fall into clusters that roughly correspond to continental lines, as well as to the commonly used self-identifying racial groups: Africans, European/West Asians, East Asians, Pacific Islanders, and Native Americans (Bowcock et al. 1994; Calafell et al. 1998; Rosenberg et al. 2002).

Subjects identified themselves as belonging to one of four major racial/ethnic groups (white, African American, East Asian, and Hispanic) and were recruited from 15 different geographic locales within the United States and Taiwan. Genetic cluster analysis of the microsatellite markers produced four major clusters, which showed near-perfect correspondence with the four self-reported race/ethnicity categories.

Genetic Structure, Self-Identified Race/Ethnicity, and Confounding in...