William Saletan: Another Joe Klein.

(Timed promotion 10 am – promoted by ek hornbeck)

Well I found this on Atrios first, but he has an ‘A’ in his name and I’m way too lazy to pay attention to time stamps.  It seems we have some more trouble with ‘truthiness’ and this time at Slate.

Perhaps you remember William Saletan-

Created Equal

Liberal Creationism

from: William Saletan, Slate

Posted Sunday, Nov. 18, 2007

Last month, James Watson, the legendary biologist, was condemned and forced into retirement after claiming that African intelligence wasn’t “the same as ours.” “Racist, vicious and unsupported by science,” said the Federation of American Scientists. “Utterly unsupported by scientific evidence,” declared the U.S. government’s supervisor of genetic research. The New York Times told readers that when Watson implied “that black Africans are less intelligent than whites, he hadn’t a scientific leg to stand on.”

I wish these assurances were true. They aren’t. Tests do show an IQ deficit, not just for Africans relative to Europeans, but for Europeans relative to Asians. Economic and cultural theories have failed to explain most of the pattern, and there’s strong preliminary evidence that part of it is genetic. It’s time to prepare for the possibility that equality of intelligence, in the sense of racial averages on tests, will turn out not to be true.

If this suggestion makes you angry-if you find the idea of genetic racial advantages outrageous, socially corrosive, and unthinkable-you’re not the first to feel that way. Many Christians are going through a similar struggle over evolution. Their faith in human dignity rests on a literal belief in Genesis. To them, evolution isn’t just another fact; it’s a threat to their whole value system. As William Jennings Bryan put it during the Scopes trial, evolution meant elevating “supposedly superior intellects,” “eliminating the weak,” “paralyzing the hope of reform,” jeopardizing “the doctrine of brotherhood,” and undermining “the sympathetic activities of a civilized society.”

Now the extended entry referenced by Atrios to Lawyers, Guns and Money’s Robert Farley mentioned that there were at least 2 other stories in this embarrassing sequence but didn’t link them and I’m having trouble cranking around the Slate search engine so I can’t prove it.

Still there is this quote from the very short apology I’d like to highlight-

I don’t want this role. I’m not an expert. I think it’s misleading to dismiss the scenario, as some officials have done in response to Watson. But my attempts to characterize the evidence beyond that, even with caveats such as “partial,” “preliminary,” and “prima facie,” have backfired. I outlined the evidence primarily to illustrate the limits of the genetic hypothesis. If it turns out to be true, it will be in a less threatening form than you might imagine. As to whether it’s true, you’ll have to judge the evidence for yourself. Every responsible scholar I know says we should wait many years before drawing conclusions.

Now where have we heard that before?

I’ve spent the past few days nosing around in the ongoing dispute about what the House FISA Reform bill (The Restore America Act) actually says. I’ve reached no conclusions.

An intelligence community source who deals with the FISA court told me he believed the word “persons” could be interpreted by the court to mean individuals. A Democratic source from the House Intelligence Committee referred me 50USC1801(m), which defines persons  as “an individual or any group, entity or foreign power.” In other words, Al Qaeda is a “person.”

I have neither the time nor legal background to figure out who’s right (ADD: about this minor detail of a bill that will never find its way out of the Congress).

So why are you drawing paychecks you lying sacks of crap?

28 comments

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  1. So let’s talk about race and genetics.  Let’s talk about labeling people by skin color and sex and handicap.

    Sexual orientation too.

    Let’s rip off our civility faces and slander each other with “scientific” evidence of our prejudice and bigotry.

  2. But this item is HOT

    “In an egregious and unprecedented abuse of judicial power, respondent committed 46 defendants into police custody in a bizarre, unsuccessful effort to discover the owner of a ringing cell phone in the courtroom,” the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct said Tuesday.

    I see the kernal of a plan to take back our country. Yes? No?

    • Edger on November 29, 2007 at 16:06

    not just for Africans relative to Europeans, but for Europeans relative to Asians?”

    So… it appears then that Asians on average score better when taking IQ tests? Maybe on average they’ve had more practice at taking IQ? Maybe on average they try harder? Maybe on average they study longer?

    And just maybe people get smarter the more they use their brains.

    Are there any other tests measuring how well or badly Africans relative to Europeans, or for Europeans relative to Asians, score on average on other types of tests?

    What is intelligence? A score on a test? I’ll bet that Asians on average are better at playing Mahjongg or Go too. Big deal…

    Saletan should know better. Maybe he needs to practice taking IQ tests…

  3. and thus confirm idiocy, I prefer to play coy with those kind of numbers.

  4. Why are we even spending research dollars on what is a revival of the eugenics movement??? Do dominant groups needs some kind of reassurance that they deserve their place? Are we all to be slotted a place? It smells.

    • documel on November 29, 2007 at 17:39

    For many years, Jews deserved to get into top colleges because of higher SAT scores and GPA.  Colleges had to use quotas to limit the Jewishness of their campuses.  Well, now Jews seem to have lost that position to Asians.  Seems to me, first and second generation Americans do best–especially when their culture reveres education.  As time goes on, Little League is more important than science club, and the smart ones fall back to the norm.

    There is value to taking children to museums and libraries.  There is value to bedtime stories.  There is value to reading to young children.  Comparing groups, without taking cultural activities to account, has no value.

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