What if your race is the dumbest of them all?

[Berzerker]

smart people are destroying the planet and smart people will save it, the rest of us are just along for the ride

 

[Kyriakos]

smart people are destroying the planet and smart people will save it, the rest of us are just along for the ride

Smart people are as insignificant as everyone else here. If there was a higher version of humanity, the current reality is the penal colony of that world.

 

[Mechanicalsalvation]

Smart people are as insignificant as everyone else here. If there was a higher version of humanity, the current reality is the penal colony of that world.

I sympathize with the sentiment but its like saying capacity has no value. I think I like more positive approach and while intelligence doesnt have a patent on saving humanity its one of the key components for that.

 

[Mechanicalsalvation]

This could not be more wrong. Infact, exercise is very, very conductive to brain activity, that is a proven fact.

I do not see how we are in disagreement unless you consider intellectual activity to be a form of physical exercise.

You do know Japanese live the longest, right? Perhaps it's the fish based diet, but it is what it is.

I did but longevity and health/physical capacity isnt necessary the same thing. Say I fall into a coma tomorrow and thanks to the present day technology and medical instruments I will be able to vegetate on this planet hundred more years and so beating any recent living Japanese in age but you can see that my health/physical capacity cant be said to be the soundest...

 

[Ryika]

I do not see how we are in disagreement unless you consider intellectual activity to be a form of physical exercise.

No, his point is that if a person is sitting around all day, and then starts doing exercise, and getting their body in shape, their "ability to think well" goes up, too. And he's correct about that, at least in the context of couch potatoes in today's western society.

I do however think that's the problem with his argument, bodily activity does not directly correspond with better brain activity, it's just that people who are sitting around all day are not using their body enough, so it shuts down into "energy saving mode", which lowers its capacity in everything, including brain activity, because the brain is fundamentally a result of the engine that keeps the body active. Doing physical exercise wakes the body from that slumber by making it seem like the full available body capacity is now required again, it does not actually "improve the brain".

On the other hand, your argument is flawed too, as this idea of higher energy consumption from having a "better working" brain is incorrect. The energy consumption of the brain comes almost exclusively from its size, and what makes an intelligent person "better" at thinking is that the brain does use its processes more efficient, so technically there is no energy trade off between an "intelligent brain" and an "unintelligent brain", the intelligence a person can have is just "hardcapped" by the size of the brain, that's what sets the theoretical potential maximum efficiency that a person can have. Of course, reaching that "hardcap" is literally impossible, as even the most intelligent brains are still wired super-inefficiently, because they're still a product of the experiences a person has gone through, and exists to control lots and lots of processes in the body "silently" without us, the ghost in the machine even noticing it, it is not a product intelligently designed for "a maximum of active thinking capacity".

There is a conflict between intelligence and strength, but it's not a conflict of energy consumption, it's a conflict between ways to solve problems, and hormonal setups that push the body to prefer one over the other. If having the potential for brute force solves problems better than having the potential to come up with more intelligent solutions (both in terms of survival and reproductive strategies in society), then brute force will be selected over intelligence in the evolutionary process.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

Good post Valessa. Saved me an answer I still disagree about there beinga conflict between intelligence and strength, but agree on your refutal of Mechas proposed theory.

 

[Disgustipated]

Harsh environments select for intelligence, ice age Europe was a tough life.

I used to think so, but then you have eskimo and other Native Americans in the Northern latitudes. Of course I think many that did come across, came across in small groups, and did have genetic bottlenecks. But of course I have no proof of this, so it's only wild speculation.

Intelligence is all relative anyways. Our are lives really better because of advancement? We certainly aren't any happier, and in many cases more unhappy than those living in tribes.

I've also had this weird theory about Neanderthal DNA actually increasing the intelligence of Asians and Europeans (Neanderthals did have larger brains). But of course they never developed written language or any significant culture. Still I can't help but think this mixing had beneficial effects for Europeans and Asians.

The most significant difference the study found between humans and neanderthals was how they developed social groups. Neanderthals simply didn't grow socially the way humans did, which indicates that different parts of their brains developed--those more focused on individual survival. And then the big finish--tying this theory for smaller brains into why our human ancestors survived while neanderthals went extinct:

"Whereas AMHs appear to have concentrated neural investment in social adaptations to solve ecological problems, Neanderthals seem to have adopted an alternative strategy that involved enhanced vision coupled with retention of the physical robusticity of H. heidelbergensis, but not superior social cognition. For instance, only in Neanderthals, not AMHs, does body mass, and hence brain volume, increase over time. While the physical response to high latitude conditions adopted by Neanderthals may have been very effective at first, the social response developed by AMHs seems to have eventually won out in the face of the climatic instability that characterized high-latitude Eurasia at this time."

Of course not every population that has Neanderthal DNA has what biased Europeans and Asians would consider high intelligence, but my point about genetic bottlenecks may explain some of that.

Regardless, us Asians and Europeans will always be biased in our view of intelligence, and it's important for us to recognize our own biases. Traditional intelligence is of limited value. I could only go so far with my intelligence, for example. I was lacking in other areas to truly excel in life. Social intelligence is perhaps the most important of all for overall success.

 

[caketastydelish]

Asians and Europeans do not even have the highest levels of Neanderthal DNA, though.

 

[Hrothbern]

I've also had this weird theory about Neanderthal DNA actually increasing the intelligence of Asians and Europeans (Neanderthals did have larger brains). But of course they never developed written language or any significant culture. Still I can't help but think this mixing had beneficial effects for Europeans and Asians.

As general consideration, variation being beneficial: yes. It could be, but there is nothing specific found so far I know.

To consider is that one of the theories on the bigger brains of the Neandertaler is that they needed more brain space for their eyes, because of less light at more northern latitudes (longer twilight).
But I do not know whether this piece of Neanderthal DNA got interbred in Homo Sapiens.
What is known however is that Homo Sapiens has some DNA mutations in the Euroasian variant that increases brain size (relative to body size), but again: could be again for the lesser light, and not influencing cognitive processes.

In general towards this Neanderthal hominin it would be interesting to know why Homo Sapiens won the competition (finally).
The Neanderthaler was already fully adapted to the alien vegetable toxins of Euroasia, to the seasonal fluctuating circadial cycles needed and the twilight, etc, etc.
One of the differences could be, seems to be intercultural exchange of Homo Sapiens over great distances, with as side effect of the best practice shating, exchanging (each on her own minor) DNA mutations.
The other, much more banale difference could be that Homo Sapiens had a more effective metabolism. A big brain is very expensive in terms of energy and critical (micro) nutrients.

Factual we know so little
both about our current DNA genes switching cognitive effects, as the evolution of these genes: when and where acquired and how spread over the existing population.

 

[El_Machinae]

I'll say again, the underlying premise of this thread is destructive. "Race" is a very artificial concept based of a variety of genetic correlations, and that's about it. For the vast majority of humanity, there are no 'genetic bottlenecks' that are worth talking about. And unless you're positing that there are genetic loci that are in genetic linkage between the dozens of genes that factor out to be called 'race' in any quantifiable way and the dozens to hundreds that influence intelligence, then all that's happening is that you are providing fuel for racists with crummy conceptions of race so that they can talk about intelligence with crummy conceptions of intelligence.

 

[Hehehe]

I gave this topic some thought, and I came to the conclusion that intelligence is not a zero-sum game. Take a high-IQ group like Ashkenazi Jews (are they the same "race" as non-Jewish whites? Does it matter?). Jewish people have contributed a great deal to science. About 20 % of Nobel price winners are Jewish (not bad, considering that they are about 0,3 % of world population). Some of the greatest scientific advancements have been done by Jewish people. Isn't this purely a good thing? That people have made such great contributions that benefit all of humanity? I feel like the fact that this one group is smarter than "my group", doesn't take anything away from me, quite the opposite.

I hate moderating threads like this, so I'm going to post in order to recuse myself of all mod duties. Not that I'd have done it anyway.

We're going to need to set a few things straight. IQ is a real thing - it is a narrow measure of an ability to think in certain abstract ways that correlate fairly strongly with "success" as it is currently defined in Western society. It does not measure any type of creative thinking or really anything the mind other than its abstract-concept CPU power, and only even then for the abstract concept(s) being tested. It is actually true that IQ is highly heritable (~0.7 or so) and that racial and country averages are significantly and persistently different.

But it's also true that it is strongly affected by a huge number of environmental factors that cannot be disentangled from each other, and it is true that the Flynn effect is real: average IQ scores have been going up by about 2-3 points a decade, forcing them to renormalize the test every so often. Flynn speculates that it has something to do with how our societies have come to prize abstract thinking that was useless to, say, peasant farmers. An early IQ test was conducted among Russian peasants around the turn of the 20th century, and a lot of the peasants had unscorably low IQs. They couldn't even answer questions like this: "All polar bears are white. You see a polar bear. What color is it?". They would answer "brown" because that's the color of every bear they've ever seen or had to deal with, and the whole concept that bears elsewhere could be different colors had no meaning or value to them. Meanwhile, they had lots of intricate knowledge about their villages and fields, the microclimates in the area, how to pland and harvest in an area with a short growing season, how to kill bears (all of them brown) that are attacking you, and so on.

And then it's very strongly affected by a variety of environmental factors. Too much lead exposure as a kid - say, because you grew up in a densely-populated area when gasoline was chock full of an organic lead compound? Minus 10 or more points, and an increase in aggression and irritability. Didn't get enough iodine? Lose another 10 points and get a big unsightly goiter. Just ended up being born at the lowest run of a stratified society? Hard to guess and studies vary widely, but probably a pretty large effect without even malnutrition or toxicity. A variety of groups, e.g. Ashkenazi Jews, have moved from having average IQs of ~90 to more like the 105-110 ballpark. Modern US blacks still have an average IQ of about 85, but if you throw in all the adjustments made over the past century due to the Flynn effect, you realize that this corresponds to an IQ of 105+ in 1920. Of course "African-Americans" are a mix of a bunch of West African groups plus some white admixture, and Africa is the most genetically diverse continent in the world by far, so there should be a huge range of IQ distributions found across different ethnic groups; it tells us less to talk of Africans and their descendents as a single group than it does to talk about literally everyone else in the world as a single group.

So it's complicated. But even if it were true that some races had markedly lower IQs than others? Then I'd expect to see them underrepresented in Nobel Prizes and the like and wouldn't presume racism, but virtually everything else stays the same. I want all people who have an IQ of 85 to be treated like human beings and afforded decent care and respect just for being human, and I want there to be a place in the world for them. That goes for all races; if there is a race with some fundamental "underlying IQ" like this, then they'll be disproportionately represented among those people. They deserve dignity just the same. I'm a humanist even if I have no faith that humanism will eventually win.

Something similar bothers me about Silicon Valley-style "meritocracy", too. I do at least grant that they're actually making things and trying to improve the world in certain ways, unlike some leeches on Wall Street, but I think a world where only a specific type of intelligentsia have any shot of power and everyone else is given a meager minimum income and told to fend for themselves in the "gig economy", with most of the satisfying tasks done by robots (owned by capital), is a type of dystopia even if it does some things better than today.

Overall, you wrote a very good post. Kudos to you. Just a few things worthy of note, if I may. There is no proof that the IQ of Ashkenazi Jews has ever increased like you say it has. Usually this claim is traced back to Thomas Sowell, who was comparing apples to oranges. Also, Flynn effect isn't really a real thing; it doesn't reflect actual increase in general intelligence.

So if you're going to argue seriously that intelligence is a genetic Thing that has observable, statistically significant variance between geographically separated population groups, you're first going to half to explain

1) How/why differences in intelligence could exist as a driver of natural selection

2) How/why that driver would be present in certain population groups but not in others

Why? Why would anyone have to show any of these things? Can't we merely observe as to how things are, even if we can't explain why things are as they are?

There are several theories. One of them is that practicing agriculture in a region where there are seasonal changes requires long-term planning, which is a key component of intelligence. If you don't stockpile enough food for the winter, you will die. If you have to eat your seed grain, then you will die. It's just a theory, one for which there is no proof as far as I know.

I'll say again, the underlying premise of this thread is destructive.

Are you saying that this is a topic which is no-no on CFC? CFC has a smart userbase. If people here are spreading false claims, then these claims will get shot down.

 

[Kyriakos]

^It seems very unscientific to claim that any race or ethnic group is clearly above all others intelligence-wise. The nobels certainly aren't a potent yardstick for such a claim in the first place; most of the nobel categories are political or prone to political manipulation.

Moreover, trying to account for what cultivates intelligence, using so direct examples as ancient-era agriculture, is imo not serious. Keep in mind that the ancient jews in Judea were a rather glaringly obvious backwards society next to ALL of its neighbours (Egypt, Babylon and other meso states, obviously Greece and later on Rome).

 

[Archon_Wing]

The greater problem is probably the assumption that people may a connection with their "race". It would be like if you were put in a group that picks a certain drink of preference, or something equally as arbitrary. If I were to talk about the intelligence of someone correlated to what color of car they drove, well, would anyone care that much?

Obviously race has played a bigger deal in human affairs, but even to that extent it tends to get limited very much by Nationality if you want to argue by cultural identity.

 

[Kyriakos]

The greater problem is probably the assumption that people may a connection with their "race". It would be like if you were put in a group that picks a certain drink of preference, or something equally as arbitrary. If I were to talk about the intelligence of someone correlated to what color of car they drove, well, would anyone care that much.

I tend to agree. And i have to suppose that most people do identify how different they are from others of their "same" ethnic make-up (assuming even that is there to begin with).

 

[Hehehe]

^It seems very unscientific to claim that any race or ethnic group is clearly above all others intelligence-wise. The nobels certainly aren't a potent yardstick for such a claim in the first place; most of the nobel categories are political or prone to political manipulation.

I thought that this was a claim that requires no evidence. Apparently I was wrong so here you go:

One observational basis for inferring that Jews have high intelligence is their prevalence in intellectually demanding fields. While only about 2% of the U.S. population is of full Jewish descent,[2] 27% of United States Nobel prize winners in the 20th century,[2][3] 25% of Fields Medal winners,[4] 25% of ACM Turing Award winners,[2] 9 out of the 19 world chess champions, and a quarter of Westinghouse Science Talent Search winners have either full or partial Jewish ancestry.[4]

A more direct approach is to measure intelligence with psychometric tests. Different studies have found different results, but most have found above-average verbal and mathematical intelligence in Jews, along with below-average spatial intelligence.[3][5][6][7]

The average IQ score of Jews has been calculated to be 112–115 (Cochran et al.),[8] and 107–115 (Murray; Entine).[9][10][11] A study found that Jews had only mediocre visual-spatial intelligence, while their verbal IQ (which includes verbal reasoning, comprehension and working memory) compensated for this with a high median of 125.6.[12][13]

Moreover, trying to account for what cultivates intelligence, using so direct examples as ancient-era agriculture, is imo not serious. Keep in mind that the ancient jews in Judea were a rather glaringly obvious backwards society next to ALL of its neighbours (Egypt, Babylon and other meso states, obviously Greece and later on Rome).

It's just a theory. Since we can't go back in time to check what actually happened, we can only theorize. If you think it's silly then fair enough, there is no evidence for it after all. As for why Jewish people specifically would have such a high IQ, I don't know, all we know for sure is that they do.

If I were to talk about the intelligence of someone correlated to what color of car they drove, well, would anyone care that much?

Well I know I would be interested. Would we see a strong correlation? Why? Do intelligent people tend to pick certain colors?

 

[Kyriakos]

As for why Jewish people specifically would have such a high IQ, I don't know, all we know for sure is that they do.

^We don't know any such thing "for sure". Again, you see what you want to see, and in the process state a rather racist (let alone ridiculous) claim. No ethnic group as a whole is "highly intelligent". Ever read Einstein or Kafka's views of other jewish people they knew? Ever read any other famously intelligent person's views about their countrymen by and large, stating something of the line that they are highly intelligent? The statement itself is difficult to defend at the best of times, cause it is inherently anti-intellectual.

 

[Hehehe]

^We don't know any such thing "for sure". Again, you see what you want to see, and in the process state a rather racist (let alone ridiculous) claim. No ethnic group as a whole is "highly intelligent". Ever read Einstein or Kafka's views of other jewish people they knew? Ever read any other famously intelligent person's views about their countrymen by and large, stating something of the line that they are highly intelligent? The statement itself is difficult to defend at the best of times, cause it is inherently anti-intellectual.

What are you even going on about? I provided you with studies showing the higher than average IQ, along with a list of real-world accomplishments where Jewish people are over-represented. Then you come to me with no evidence of any kind, telling me that my claim is "ridiculous"? Do you deny the over-representation in certain fields? Do you deny the IQ studies? On what grounds? On the grounds of a few statements made by 2 people?

 

[Kyriakos]

What are you even going on about? I provided you with studies showing the higher than average IQ, along with a list of real-world accomplishments where Jewish people are over-represented. Then you come to me with no evidence of any kind, telling me that my claim is "ridiculous"? Do you deny the over-representation in certain fields? Do you deny the IQ studies? On what grounds? On the grounds of a few statements made by 2 people?

M8, only a tiny percentage of ANY ethnic group is running for a nobel award. Let alone that many of the nobel categories are political or tied to politics. And sorry for mentioning Einstein's and Kafka's views against your notion of a supposed super-intelligent jewish race as a whole; i mean Einstein and Kafka are just two known intelligent jewish people, so i agree they should not have anything to do with this debate...

 

[Ryika]

Did you miss the quotes in post #75?

 

[Hehehe]

M8, only a tiny percentage of ANY ethnic group is running for a nobel award. Let alone that many of the nobel categories are political or tied to politics. And sorry for mentioning Einstein's and Kafka's views against your notion of a supposed super-intelligent jewish race as a whole; i mean Einstein and Kafka are just two known intelligent jewish people, so i agree they should not have anything to do with this debate...

Oh how the mighty have fallen. Is this really the state of modern Greek "intellectuals"? Do you want me to explain to you how IQ normal distribution works? As for the rest of the claims, please, by all means, do provide evidence. Prove that there is bias in Nobel categories. Dig up those quotes, then explain to me how they disprove anything I said.