Re: The Bell Curve globally viewed

On 29 avr, 03:39, NoName <NoN...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Sat, 28 Apr 2007 18:17:02 -0700, El Castor <NotAny...@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:


Israel 94

This particular number caused more comment than any other in
Lynn's book. Nearly every IQ study I have seen in the past
rated Jewish IQs above average, although most of the studies
have been on European (Ashkenazis). There is wikipedia
article "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashkenazi_intelligence";
which also warns us "This article or section may contain original
research or unverified claims." The table shown cites
IQ estimates between 117 to "1.2 below non-Jewish whites".

So the 94 figure for Israel is out of line with these estimates.
The difference between the population of Israel
and an all-Ashkenazi sampling is that Israel has
both an Arab population and and Oriental Jewish population
(Sephardics).

The same professor Lynn recently published a paper

INTELLIGENCE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN EUROPEAN AND ORIENTAL JEWS IN ISRAEL

with Hanna David (an Israel Tel Aviv University in a peer reviewed
journal whose
abstract is available

http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=523520


******

A number of studies have found that Ashkenazi Jews in the United
States have a
high average IQ. It has been proposed by Cochran, Hardy and Harpending
(2006)
that this can be explained by the occupational constraints imposed on
the Ashkenazi
for many centuries in Europe, when they were largely confined to money-
lending.
They propose that this selected for the high verbal and mathematical
intelligence
that has several times been found in American Ashkenazim. The current
study
investigates how far this theory holds for European and Oriental Jews
in Israel.
A review of studies shows that Oriental Jews in Israel have an average
IQ 14 points l
ower than that of European (largely Ashkenazi) Jews. It is proposed
that this
difference can be explained in terms of the Cochran, Hardy and
Harpending theory
because Oriental Jews were permitted to engage in a much wider range
of
occupations and hence did not come under the selection pressure to
develop
the high verbal and mathematical intelligence that was present for
Ashkenazim.


******
I find the explanation "hand wavy", not uncommon in the social
"sciences".
I don't see any way of scientifically way of verifying the proposed
mechanism.
And is that mechanism genetic (Darwinian selection) or social? I have
seen other explanations, like the tradition of scholarship (rabbis
etc),
(which is social) to having to be more intelligent to survive the
periodic
pogroms in Europe (Darwinian = genetic selection) . But nobody
really
knows why, I have seen no science, just speculation.

The other factor is as I have pointed out, similar IQ gaps exist
between
upper and class groups throughout the world. If so, the gaps are more
likely to have social rather than genetic origins. In Northern
Ireland,
Catholics score 15 points lower than the Protestants. I'd guess
that both groups have about the same genetic composition,
so we can't grab and run with a racist argument.

One aspect about the Bell Curve book is that it sold 400,000 or
so copies. If it were truely an academic book, it would sell
to a limited group of academics, total sales around 1,000-2,000.
Where did all this interest in sociology come from? It didn't.
The book is not an academic contribution, it is not schlolarship.
It appealed to a fairly large number of racists in the USA.
The difference between Lynn and Murray is that the former is
an academic and the latter not. When Lynn publishes
in peer review journals he is playing the game correctly
and scientifically. Books tend not to be peer reviewed
and can be intellectually dishonest.

His own orientation towards neo-eugenics is disturbing,
however (Murray edges close to that also but never
reaches that far).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lynn

"Often left unmentioned by champions of Richard Lynn is that he has
also been known to argue based on eugenic principles for the
extinction
of entire cultures based on their "incompetence."

In Lynn's own words,

"What is called for here is not genocide, the killing off of the
populations of
incompetent cultures.[14] But we do need to think realistically in
terms of
"phasing out" of such peoples. If the world is to evolve more better
humans,
then obviously someone has to make way for them. ...
To think otherwise is mere sentimentality."

Those are conceptually dangerous comments. It essentially allows us
to phase out what we determine to be "incompetent cultures".

Who decides that? In the 1920s-1945 period "we've been there, done
that". The problem with the road to eugenics is that there are no
traffic lights, nothing to say "stop".




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