Latest research indicates intelligence is related to skin color. Why is this considered "not PC"?

Question

Donald Templer and Hiroko Arikawa recently, in a series of papers, have proven to a convincing degree that there is a direct correlation between skin color and IQ. In short, the darker a person's skin (more melanin content), the lower his or her IQ.

However, in colleges and the media, these findings have been kept hidden as if they were too politically incendiary. Why is it such a horror to provide solid scientific evidence (based on genetics and biochemistry) for something most people already know or suspect?

See:

http://majorityrights.com/images/uploads/templer.pdf

Answer 1

There are a lot of problems in various answers here, such as people pointing out that they know people of all skin colors who are of very high intelligence. This is completely meaningless, since the issue here regards the average for a givern group of people: it's like arguing that cigarettes aren't bad for your health because you've known people who smoked into their 90s.

I think that the finding you are talking about is misleading, because IQ is misleading and is not an accurate measure of inherent "intelligence" (especially because intelligence is not a very precisely defined concept). It has been shown repeatedly that IQ can be significantly changed throughout the course of an individual's life, as a result of schooling especially, through familiarity with IQ-like tests, and through other means. So, if there were a situation which caused those with darker skin to tend to get less education than those with lighter skin, IQ tests would tend to show what you and these researchers point out, when all it is really showing is something we already know - the lighter people tended to have better educational opportunities.

I do agree with you that issues like this are avoided because it is not PC. Odds are that there are some (small) differences in intelligence (and many other attributes) based on such things such as race and ethnic heritage, although there will always be more variation in intelligence within a group than between groups in the human race. It is important that we research issues dealing with differences between people of various racial heritages, as the relatively small number of genetic differences that will tend to exist between the typical member of one group and the typical member of another are few enough that we may be better able to narrow down which gene(s), and which environmental triggers, are responsible for which traits in this way.

Answer 2

Templer and Arikawa's conclusion, though, is not what you state. It's that higher IQ tends to occur in areas of the globe where the climate is colder. That these areas historically happened to correspond with lighter skin color is coincidental.

As any scientist will tell you, correlation does not imply causation. Even assuming the data are correct and analyzed correctly, a good hypothesis to explain them is:

People in cold climates spend more time indoors reading books, hence they develop more bookish IQ-type intelligence. They also historically tended to have lighter skin, because the mutation for light colored skin didn't cause them any evolutionary disadvantage (as it would have done if they had been living somewhere with a lot of strong sunlight).

Answer 3

"Hispanic" as well as "coloured" are arbitrary and inscientific US based definitions. For example, Mexicans in Mexico do not know they are Hispanic. They just know they are Mexicans. Upon arrival in the US, they "become" Hispanic. One lady from Chile was about as white as one can get and "became" HIspanic when in the US. She again became white when back in Chile, though. Because these things are unscieintific and inconsistent, there is no need to agonize about them. For example, why would a Southern Italian be white, while an Argentinean of German descent be Hispanic? Or an Irishman be white, but Northern Spaniards who are also Celtic be non white? Personally, I think all people in the US should be just called Americans and should not be divided into all these artificial groups. Garibaldi fought to unite Italy. We should all fight to unite America, but there are forces that are interested in keeping it disunited by creating all these groups. Ignore them!

Answer 4

It suppose it is considered "not PC", as a result of past mistakes involving discrimination based on skin color. People often over-generalize based on information from such studies. For example, it would be logically and ethically wrong to assume that all hispanics have IQs less that 100, and therefore none are allowed into Harvard College.

In fact, your statement "In short..." is potentially mis-leading. You should really be saying "In general..." It's a seemingly subtle distinction, but it is extremely important in terms of logic and ethics.

The mistake is to fail to appreciate that that these variables are only general indicators of intelligence (no causation should be assumed) and that actual intelligence can vary to a great degree. So it is unfair to assume a person's intelligence based on skin color, country of origin, temporate zone, or gross domestic product. In fact, it can even be a mistake to assume a large groups' intelligence based on these variables. Asians tend to be more intelligent than Europeans, for example, even though they have darker skin.

If you know nothing else about a person, and had to bet whether he/she was intelligent or not, you might want to consider these variables in order to make a good bet. But no one needs to make such bets; the point is to avoid making such assumptions whenever possible, in order to avoid unfair discrimination against individuals or groups.

I think it is wrong to hide valid scientific studies, regardless of the subject matter. But perhaps there is also no reason to highlight these studies because they do not appear to have important implications.

Answer 5

it is truth that enviroment condition affects the way the mind works been the cold weather the most appropriated because of the brain's blood irrigation system and surrounding tissues temperatures keeps it at lower temps as i been said before is good for the intelligence factor.. But! this does not mean the rest of the people living in other geographic areas are not intelligent
that been said let's remember this we got cold weather and low
temperature geographic areas all around the globe meaning not just one ethnic group takes advantage of it yes the skin pigmentation is incidental higher intelligence levels are more related to the level of education an individual receive the knowledge the mind receive and how we apply it in life!..

Answer 6

I have no idea what method they used in their studies - but Donald Templer and Hiroko Arikawa obviously did not do a proper one.

There is no link between intelligence and skin color. Intelligence varies from person to person despite alleged racist concepts to prove whites as the master race. For the record I am white - and have met quite a few blacks, Hispanics, and other races with as high an IQ as anyone else.

There are very black scientists that have made discoveries that eluded white people. George Washington Carver, is one such example. Was it because he was black? No! It was because he was educated and craved education.

You really have to stop taking these so called studies at face value and do a little personal thinking on your own. It does not take a high degree of intelligence to spot a defective racist study when one is staring you in the face.

Answer 7

"We must realize that our party's most powerful weapon is racial tensions. By propounding into the consciousness of the dark races that for centuries they have been oppressed by whites, we can mold them to the program of the Communist Party. In America we will aim for subtle victory. While inflaming the ***** minority against the whites, we will endeavor to instill in the whites a guilt complex for their exploitation of the ******. We will aid the Negroes to rise in prominence in every walk of life, in the professions and in the world of sports and entertainment. With this prestige, the ***** will be able to intermarry with the whites and begin a process which will deliver America to our cause."

Israel Cohen, "A Racial Program for the Twentieth Century," 1912. Also in the Congressional Record, Vol. 103, p. 8559, June 7, 1957.

You Yanks mistakenly think you beat Communism. You didn't. The USSR died, but Marxist socialism lives on... in your own country!

The essense of Marxism is that men are equals, that socioeconomic inequalities are the result of "injustice," that those do better are cheating, etcetera. Marxists have taken over your schools of anthropology, wherein they've begun teaching a form of Marxist theory, devised by Franz Boas, instead of real science.

Real science has discovered that there are actual race differences in brain volume, weight, and form. Although these are correlated with skin color, the skin color is not the cause of the varying degrees of brain evolution. Rather are the two the result of a third variable, that being the differing conditions under which the different races evolved.

Racists identified the essential facts long ago. A cold climate causes small brains to freeze solid, which kills their owners, whereas larger brains don't freeze as readily, which raises the odds of survival. Cold climates (such as Europe's) were conducive to the evolution of larger brains (such as those of White people). Once a group of hominids had evolved larger brains, natural selection was quick to find ways to put the additional neural capacity to adaptive uses.

Colder climates are colder because the sun's average elevation throughout the year is lower than it is in warmer climates. The lower elevation, besides causing cooler weather, also causes a reduction in the amount of sunlight that reaches the ground. The reduced sunlight made it unnecessary for humans to retain great gobs of melanin in their skin, and, being unneeded, it disappeared over the generations.

That's why there's a correlation between large brains and fair skin.

It's simple. The truth often is.

The Marxist doctrines that have replaced science as anthropology's subject matter teach that IQ differences are the result of unequal opportunity, or unequal wealth. It's a lie. It is a fact that Blacks from the highest socioeconomic class do more poorly on IQ tests -- on the average -- than Whites from the lowest SES group. Poor Whites outscore rich Blacks. According to some estimates, heredity is the cause of 80% of the variance in IQ score distribution, leaving only 20% as the result of all environmental factors combined.

Answer 8

I say it is not PC because that would just be insulting.
Maybe the study could be repeated taking into account SES.

Lighter-skinned humans have be oppressing many darker-skinned humans for some time. Factor in the poor nutrition and medical care along with poor education that is afforded to the median oppressed group and you get a lower IQ in the group.

On top of that you sprinkle in the "sound-bite" nature of todays news media, and all the average joe would hear is, "Study proves dark-skinned people have low IQ." In the world of politics, that is not correct, nor would it be the truth because it would not be complete.

Plus that would put all the tanning bed businesses into the toilet.

Answer 9

Well, your question is answered. Regardless of right or wrong, the social scientists are always " hemmed in " by their ideology. PC rules; even to the detriment of truth. Not saying your findings are true; just saying that they need to be considered, as any data is. Not attacked out of hand.

Answer 10

Persons have differing views on what constitutes intelligence, so these findings are ethnocentric and limited to one's own interpretation on what is intelligence and also how one goes about measuring such intelligence