I think the main problem is that people are not going to find schools useful until there are jobs to accommodate the newly educated people. I know in my village, I felt pretty bad for my students because for the vast majority of them school really was a waste of time and effort. There was no work beyond farming.
Yes, and I think it nicely disproves the thesis. I mean, high school teachers, social workers and clergy aren’t making mad bank compared to managers, salesmen or hell, even plumbers, but they sure outrank them in IQ.
I think the difference in IQ between Africa and the West is entirely a result of poverty and socialisation. I mean, if Bushman rank at ~50 IQ, vs a general SSAfrica total of ~75, all this tells me is that Bushmen (who possess immense functional intelligence*) don’t know how to do IQ tests as well as other, slightly more Westernised Africans, who again don’t know how to do them as well as Westerners. It’s certainly not genetic, IMO, and I think you’ll probably find the West African Ituri do as badly as Bushmen.
I agree poor performance in IQ tests is heritable. I disagree that genetics is the major medium for that heritability. I’d say memetics is a more likely vehicle, and I’d say the studies on cross-racial adopted kids bears this out.
And the way to uplift developing countries is to *not *rape their natural resources, but to offer a market for their manufactured goods and the tools to educate their people to do that manufacturing, and equal partnerships to develop the infrastructure for that, like factories and power plants. That seems to be what’s working in India and China, and the reason South Africa is the stand-out in SSAfrica as far as development goes, is the substantial manufacturing base and associated infrastructure here. South Africa doesn’t just mine iron ore and coal and chop down trees and farm cocoa and just sell it to other countries. It smelts steel & aluminium, generates electricity, produces cars, makes wine, cans fruit, that sort of thing. I’d like to see a lot more of that going on, but already we have a manufacturing base that puts supposedly wealthier mineral-dependent countries like Namibia and Botswana to shame, and both those countries are dependent on us in a way we are not, on them. That’s why we’re halfway to being a developed country, and they just aren’t.
- You should see what a Bushman tracker equipped with a special PDA for recording animal tracks, with custom-written iconic software that he can understand, can do for data generation of animal habits. It’s all about context, and finding the right semiotic footing, which I don’t think IQ tests are geared to do.
I disagree. It would take relatively little money to invest in infrastructure and education and bring a small country into the 21st century IF you didn’t insist on making unconscionable profits at the expense of the populace while doing so. Under those circumstances and freed from global “free” market pressure to provide cheap labor and cutting down forests to make room for monoculture production or to license the extraction of raw materials at fire sale prices in return for expensive food imports, it would not be difficult to establish a relatively corruption-free popular govt in a relatively short time.
The US has had many opportunities to do this but, of course, profit has always trumped humanity.
And I disagree with your disagreement.
Profit is a great tool. It motivates people to do things.
Developing a country is a huge job that requires a lot of sustained effort. The best way to get it done is to make sure there are opportunities for profit present in the development. In that way people seeking to make a profit for themselves will also be doing some of the work of developing the country.
It’s certainly an improvement over the most common alternative means for motivating people, which is force.
Yes it does - like enslave them, or lock them into their factories so they can’t escape in a fire, or adulterate their milk with melamine…
That’s just a bald assertion. Maybe there are better ways than profit, like pride or even fear of not succeeding. Look at Israel. Was it’s success motivated by profit?
That is not the general African experience of what people do with their profits. Seems they spend it all in Paris, New York and London…
Without the need for profit, force would be unnecessary.
Let’s say I’m de boss wid big pockets. I’m walkin mongst de people.
A man grabs my ankle and won’t let go until I promise to set him up as the ‘big man’ in his village.
Pocket change to me. I would call it organizing. If he can’t get his women to vote justice, who can?
You guys are making illogical statements. There seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding of what “correlation” means in statistics.
Let’s start with a simple example: The relationship between Celsius and Fahrenheit temperatures. For a given region, if the temperature in Celsius is high, the temperature in Fahrenheit is also high. Changes in Celsius and Fahrenheit track each other exactly (although their scales of measurement are different). Obviously, the correlation is 1.0 (100% perfect correlation.) Now, the concept of correlation is not used in that type of contrived example but I just wanted to show what perfect correlation looks like.
With real world measurements of humans, you’re not going to get 100% correlation of data points. Let’s consider some measurements less controversial than IQ: height correlated to weight. Even without knowing the particular correlation number, we already have an intuitive sense that taller people will more likely be heavier people (more mass). A 6 foot person probably weighs more than a 4 foot person. It turns out that the correlation of height-to-weight is about ~.80. Notice that the correlation is high but it’s not a perfect 1.0. Height is not the necessarily the cause of weight but the significantly high correlation shows it can be a major component or predictor.
Here’s the key point: you also cannot disprove the correlation by saying something illogical such as, “well if the height-to-weight correlation were true, the fattest people on earth would be the tallest and that’s clearly not the case!” That’s the type of statement you guys are saying with the “Mongolia should be higher than USA” and “high school teachers don’t make mad bank compared to plumbers.”
Now, reread the previous posts with the statistical definition of correlation in mind.
In any case, nobody is disputing the correlation of IQ to economic success. Even the scientists disagreeing with IQ don’t dispute it. What they disagree with are factors unrelated to mathematical correlation:
[ul]
[li]IQ might be valid but the method of collecting it, measuring it, sampling it is flawed such that it biases Western countries.[/li][li]They disagree that IQ is even a “valid” measurement in the first place.[/li][li]They disagree that IQ correlation truly explains most of the poverty ills. In other words, the IQ-to-economics correlation is there but it’s a red-herring brought about by another factor (such as environment or social institutions.)[/li][/ul]
Well, what should be relevant? What kind of test would you design?
As you both probably already know, IQ tests measure abstract reasoning, spatial reasoning, and logic. They don’t measure factual knowledge.
Are the IQ tests flawed because of this emphasis? Probably.
Even with that being the case, the world economy has evolved to value people who do well on IQ tests. IQ type of tests are so prevalent that they are frequently disguised as other tests! College entrance exams SAT, MCAT, GMAT, GRE. Many of the military aptitude tests are diluted IQ tests. The job interviews at Google and Microsoft are really beat-around-the-bush IQ tests. Even the Wonderlic test administered to prospective NFL quarterback draft picks is another disguised IQ test.
For argument’s sake, let’s say there are a dozen other “intelligences” that the loathed IQ tests (and their disguised variants) fail to measure:
Emotional intelligence.
Creative intelligence.
Social relationships intelligence.
Sensory intelligence.
Motor skill mechanical intelligence.
…etc…
If you want to convince the world that traditional IQ tests are meaningless, you have several hurdles to overcome:
You must design new tests that measure those other “intelligences” that other institutions (such as colleges, military, and businesses) will accept as screenings for aptitude.
You must show that major large companies emphasizing those other intelligences as being more successful and profitable than companies that filter based on traditional IQ. You must show that nations that favor the other intelligences display more impressive economic results than countries that place undue importance on traditional IQ.
Many folks like Stephen Jay Gould hate IQ tests but they don’t come up with any credible alternatives. Even if you were to outlaw standardized IQ tests such as Standford-Binet or Wechsler, you still wouldn’t eliminate all the other formal and informal “IQ tests” in disguise out in the real world. Colleges, businesses, and governments love them.
This is an example in support of what I said. People who are being enslaved or locked up are not being motivated to work by profit. They’re being motivated to work by force, which as I pointed out, is the alternative to profit.
Another example of being motivated by force. Or the threat of force. A lot of Israel’s success was motivated by the fear of what neigbouring countries would do to them if they didn’t succeed.
A third example of what I said. In some countries, people are offered opportunities to profit from their efforts. In Africa, the people who do the work don’t get the profits. The result is that other countries develop and African countries don’t.
I’m not saying all profit leads to good results. But you guys are saying no profit can lead to a good result and that’s ridiculous. Stop complaining about the fact that profits can get things done and start coming up with a plan to use profits to get things done.
Because, like I’ve said, there’s an alternative. If you want to get things done, you can do it by offering something or by threatening something. I say offering something is the better choice.
Wait a minute. Didn’t this thread start with the implicit question "why is CAR so frikking dysfunctional and poor? THen didn’t someone say “because black people are stupid” (more or less). Well why is pointing out that there isn’t a whole lot of correlation among developed countries between IQ and wealth (and there are even a few grossly underdeveloped countries with high IQs) a valid response to that statement? Couldn’t you direct all that correlation in statistics mumbo jumbo at the guy who said CAR is poor because they are black (which means they are stupid so they are poor because they are stupid… or something like that).?
I don’t think it’s that simple, and I doubt you do either.
Higher cognitive capacity can, on average, give the ability to make sounder choices which, in turn, create more opportunity for the individual to reach a goal.
Pejoratively: dumber people are more at the mercy of circumstance and others.
This holds true for individuals, and to a lesser extent, for societies and nations. Obviously it is not a perfect correlation. You might be able to create a very wealthy society if a few sharp guys near the top were able to develop and sell a natural resource. But you couldn’t create a whole nation with infrastructure, factories, communications, health systems and so on without a broad representation of people bright enough to execute that infrastructure.
There was an interesting study reported in The Economist (May 15-21st issue) looking at “the innumerate” versus the more mathematically capable and their relative defaults on sub-prime mortgages:
“Even accounting for a host of differences between people—including attitudes to risk, income levels and credit scores—those who fell behind on their mortgages were noticeably less numerate than those who kept up with their payments in the same overall circumstances.”
This makes common sense, and it supports an argument that cognitive capacity is an important factor in functioning successfully within the boundaries of modern society.
Cognitive functioning–intelligence–co-varies with circumstance because higher intelligence is required to create improved environment in the first place. One population lives with drought and pestilence. The next population dams rivers and cures disease. At small levels and broad levels, the difference in overall success is intelligence more than any other single circumstance, even though circumstance obviously matters.
I don’t think anyone would argue that high intelligence at an individual level necessarily correlates with individual income. Many of the smartest people I know work near me as physicists at Fermi Lab for a relative pittance while the B students are running businesses and flying in their jets over Fermilab from the adjacent DuPage airport. But those businesses (and the jets) exist because our society has a broad enough pool of highly intelligent people to invent the jets, the financial infrastructure and perhaps the commodities, in the first place.
I took the LSATS test to get into law school and my first banking job involved an IQ test (it was an Australian bank and they had no compunctions about letting me know it was an IQ test). Before law school, I used to teach and later take and even later dissect standardized tests for a living (well I was barely making a living but it paid my bar tabs) so I understand that there is such a thing as IQ tests that can test problem solving and analytical ability (imperfectly but hey what’s perfect)
My point isn’t that IQ tests aren’t valid or that they measure the wrong thing, my point is that the differences in IQ tests we see between races exaggerates the real differences in the thing IQ tests are trying to measure. Egypt had a functional civilization for centuries well before the Europeans, the Aztec and the mayans had an evolved society that by all accounts existed well before any European civilization. Did they all just get dumb over a few centuries during colonialism? Did they kill all the smart Mexicans and Africans or is it possible that colonialism (and slavery) might have some effect that survives liberation? Whatever differences in IQ that may exist between whites and blacks, I don’t think it comes close to explaining the gap in socioeconomic status or the underdevelopment of former European colonies in Africa.
Ruminator, you would also have to prove that IQ as it is measured now is something inherent and unchangeable, not affected by culture.
Some more questions…what the heck happened to China during the period when they were arguably making some of the worst economic choices ever made by man? Did everyone get dumb for just a few decades? Why don’t any of the occasionally huge racial differences in Sub-Saharan Africa count? How come India is rising and generally well known for producing engineers when they are supposedly outsmarted by places like Afghanistan? Any stats on the huge racial divide between North and South India- I mean, Sri Lanka seems about the same level as Pakistan, and generally genetically they would probably have very little that is similar, coincidence?
I can’t quite figure out exactly what you are saying, but evidence for high IQ populations is not difficult to find, even when poor political choices or external circumstance creates generally bad conditions for people.
China developed their own space program, among other things.
Pakistan and India developed nuclear weapons.
It’s just not that hard to look at countries and figure out whether they have plenty of smart people but stupid political systems (or horrible extenuating circumstance), or whether they seem to be generally devoid of a broad intellectual cream with an additional base of moderately intelligent workers to support innovation and infrastructure.
North Korea has to be one of the rattiest nations in the world; politically incompetent, isolated and held in utter contempt by the rest of the world. Yet they found enough smart guys to build a nuclear weapons program…
You go inside sub-saharan African countries and you see colonial infrastructure slowly crumbling (except where it is externally supported) with almost no African-generated successes. You go inside India and see the same abject poverty but with widespread evidence of incredible innovation. There’s no comparison.
Non-serious answer: this is, of course, a trivial exercise as long as you have a country with easily controlled borders. The CAR is a non-starter. Somewhere like Madagascar is much more suitable. You arrive, eliminate the indigenous population (Hitler would be proud!) and import Westerners. Job done.
Unfortunately, I don’t have a serious answer.
I understand what correlation means very well. I also understand correlation has jack to do with proving causation, which is what’s being asserted. Yes, the correlation between IQ and economic performance in various countries is interesting, but that doesn’t prove a genetic cause, especially when the reverse argument of social causes leading to poor IQ results is just as likely, and also backed up by other studies.
I wasn’t trying to argue against the observed correlation existing (that there is a link to IQ and national economic performance. I was showing that the correlation is just that, an artifact of statistics just as much as the non-relationship between IQ and professional remuneration. That’s not illogical at all. The statement on the table is that IQ->EP, I’m showing IQ-//->EP in other sample sets, so therefore the association isn’t causal. Or if it is causal, just pointing to the correlation isn’t sufficient to show it. Especially given the highly flawed nature of the original study.
Doesn’t change anything.
I’m not simply disputing the observed correlation in that flawed study, I’m disputing the significance of it, or the validity. OK, so yeah, I guess I am…
Errm, plenty of critics of that study are listed in the Wiki article. Some of those point to the statistical flaws, so yes, they are disputing the correlation.
[quote]
[ul]
[li]IQ might be valid but the method of collecting it, measuring it, sampling it is flawed such that it biases Western countries.[/li][/quote]
Which is true
[quote]
[li]They disagree that IQ is even a “valid” measurement in the first place.[/li][/quote]
Also true
[quote]
[li]They disagree that IQ correlation truly explains most of the poverty ills. In other words, the IQ-to-economics correlation is there but it’s a red-herring brought about by another factor (such as environment or social institutions.)[/li][/quote]
Which is my argument (as well as denying the correlation has been shown to even exist, by that study)
I wouldn’t. I don’t see any way of creating unbiased intelligence tests currently. Maybe in a thousand years there’ll be some sort of MRI-based neural mapping technique, but now, it’s all based on woo just as much as science.
They claim to. And very particular kinds of those, too.
No, definitely.
You have the cart before the horse here - IQ tests have evolved to highlight those people who will perform as desired in the current capitalist-technocratic-hierarchical world economy.
And?
I don’t want to convince the world - it’s already fixated on a capitalist economy, it’ll value what it’ll value. Doesn’t make it right, or even desirable for those kept out of the ride to want on that train, rather than forge their own way.
Several such tests already exist - for instance, if I want to get into art school, I need to submit a portfolio. Several computer businesses I know now use actual programming skills tests rather than psychometric tests, as they’ve felt the latter didn’t predict actual job performance, especially in the case of people like Asbergers sufferers and the like.
Only if economic success is all you desire.
They love them because they are easy (easier than plain interviews. If there’s anything big organisations love, it’s an easy (read:cheap) solution - doesn’t make it right, it just makes it cheap.
I was referring to the profit motive of the guy doing the locking. How are you going to exclude him?
…and a lot was motivated by plain old nationalism.
That’s my point. How are you going to ensure the latter aren’t the ones profiting?
We have a fundamental economic ideology disconnect.
I disagree that profit is the desirable motivator. You’ll work a lot better in Africa by emphasising kinship and community. All profit does is bring out the greedy ones. Very few rich Africans stay in Africa to make it work. They only stay while they can make a killing.
Sure, but I disagree that the thing to offer is profit. You can offer education, you can offer technical knowledge and support, hell, you can offer your own bloody people and resources to do the infrastructure setup and maintenance, for free. It’s not like it isn’t owed to Africa and the rest of the developing world.
Or hey, here’s a novel idea - you can offer to just leave them the hell alone, completely. That’s never been tried before.
You don’t say?
Cite? Because it certainly isn’t my experience that intelligence correlates to common sense.
But is it their intelligence, or their knowledge base, that lets them down? Do educated blacks, for instance, make the same “dumb” mistakes as less educated blacks, that educated whites don’t, and do this predictably? Since the IQ differential will be there, apparently?
Is this argument by assertion? Cites, please.
Explain South Africa, using that model.
Erm, that’s you mixing up education (innumerate says this to me) vs intelligence, it seems to me.
No, it says something about those people who’ve been taught how to do “simple calculations about percentages and interest rates” vs those who haven’t. Nowhere in that study does it say they corrected for education levels, only “attitudes to risk, income levels and credit scores”
Cart before the horse.
…and enslaves the first lot, and commit genocide on them, and steal their resources, and deny them suffrage…and then point to their reduced circumstances as though it said something about them, rather than themselves.
Again, argument by assertion. I say the difference is social circumstances.
So intelligence doesn’t correlate to income at an individual level, but at a societal level, it somehow does? What’s the mechanism for this sudden shift in correlation, if not societal structure?
No, that’s an illogical question, sven. Just sweep it under the 20% noise under our “correlation”, OK?
Apparently they do - I mean, that study showed that if Blacks are dumb, Bushmen are *really *dumb. I mean - they’re basically imbeciles compared to the marching morons of the rest of SSA. How they manage to not trip over their own feet, I don’t know.
Baah. Mere statistical outliers! There’s a correlation, woman. Didn’t you hear them. A Correlation! 
I’m not going to exclude him. He’s another good example of my point - that profit motivates people to do things.
Pretty much. You might not like the fact that profit works but it does. If you want to get something done, you’ve got to use what works.
So what are you suggesting? That we owe a debt to Africa but we shouldn’t repay it?
I always appreciate your spirited defense, line by line, and requests for cites.
At least you are passionate.
Let’s hope you are right, and the world is as flat for sub-saharan Africa as it is anywhere else. I for one, will make a public retraction of my position here, and be delighted to do so.
Meanwhile, here’s a brief cite for the putative correlation between intelligence and success:
Sub-saharan Africa.
The strong have always enslaved the weak, even among African populations. The more intelligent have always found a way to exploit the less capable, and avoid being themselves enslaved, even within African populations.
Have you considered why the situation you describe is not reversed? Just blind chance?
Sure - but not just (or even mostly) good or desirable things
But my point was that it doesn’t work in Africa - that it is a bad approach, and the evidence is already there.
Either repay it* the right way*, or write it off.
Argument by assertion is no argument. No cites then, I take it.
Doesn’t make it right, though. Or even the intelligent thing to do - anyone with even a merely instinctive understanding of game theory should get this - altrusim is best for group outcomes, or tit-for-tat strategy. Selfishness loses out in the long run.
No, Diamond-style geographic determinism *combined *with blind chance.