Talk:Race and intelligence

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"Common garden"

"He also argues that phrasing the question in terms of heritability is useless since heritability applies only within groups, but cannot be used to compare traits across groups. Templeton argues that the only way to design a study of the genetic contrtibution to intelligence would be to study populations of hybrid individuals in a Mendelian "common garden" design, and he further argues that when this design has been carried out it has shown no significant correlation between any cognitive and the degree of African or European ancestry."

That is unclear. What is a "common garden" design? What studies are are Templeton refering to? If it are those mentioned elsewhere then this should be pointed out.Miradre (talk) 00:41, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Mendel raised hybrids in a common garden where they were subject to the same environmental influences. That is what is meant. He refers to studies by Scarr et al. 1977, and Loehlin et al. 1973 and Green 1972. I haven't looked at those yet. IN anycase Templeton is a statistician and a genticist and a very reliable source about this.·Maunus·ƛ· 02:08, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

You are actually arguing that someone has done this with humans? Should be removed as absurd, especially if you have not looked at the studies itself. Please give the full references for the studies and I will look at them.Miradre (talk) 02:13, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

You do not get to remove "absurdities" by well respected authorities while inserting worse absurdities by fringe scientists. Sorry.·Maunus·ƛ· 02:28, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Arguing that someone has actually been allowed to breed and raise humans in an experiment in such a way is simply absurd. What are the full references?Miradre (talk) 02:35, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Of course no one has "bred humans" in a common garden design. But some studies have used a similar research design comparing heritability in individuals with different degrees of ancestry in similar environments. Scarr's studies were apparently from Brazil - where it would be more plausible to have mixed ancestry people grow up in similar social environments.·Maunus·ƛ· 02:35, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

• Scarr, Katz & Barker. 1977. Absence of a relationship between degree of white ancestry and intellectual skills within a black population. HUman Genetics 39: 69-89.
• Loehlin, Vandenber & Osborne. 1973. Blood group genes and Negro-white ability differences. Behavior genetics 3 263-270.
• Green, R. F. 1972. on the correlation between IQ and amount of "white" blood. Proceedings of the 80th Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association. 7. 285-86.·Maunus·ƛ· 02:40, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Very old blood group studies. They are discussed elsewhere, at least two of them. I will check what the third one is.Miradre (talk) 02:46, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

The Green source was not peer-reviewed but just a presentation at a conference. This topic is already covered in blood group discussions. Seems like Templeton is just rehashing some very old arguments.Miradre (talk) 03:01, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Furthermore, why cannot heritability be compared across groups? Is it just Lewontin's argument regarding heritability not measuring all environmental factors that can differ between groups again? Miradre (talk) 00:55, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Because it is only statistically valid within a group: "the first step in calculating variance is to subtract off the mean. This means that a heritability is insensitive to the mean value of a trait within a population. You can shift the trait value up or down due to environmental factors without it affecting the heritability. It also means that mean differences among populations are uninformative about underlying genetic differences". (Templeton p. 49)·Maunus·ƛ· 02:08, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that is just Lewontin's argument again, even if Templeton does not acknowledge this.Miradre (talk) 02:15, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

In short, there is nothing new in this section. His arguments are: 1. Race does not exist. Discussed in the "The validity of "race" and "IQ"" section. 2. Repeating Leowontin's argument. Discussed in the "Heritability within and between groups" section. 3. Ancient blood group studies. Discussed in the "Degree of geographic ancestry" section. In short, there is nothing here that is not already covered elsewhere so I see no need for this section.Miradre (talk) 03:26, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Maunus seems to misunderstand the within-group between groups argument. Here is a link to a paper about it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.97.236.49 (talk) 03:04, 13 April 2011 (UTC) I'm going to alter the following comment:

(This argument is important because it has been commonly employed by Hereditarians and critiqued by environmentalists . Jensen made it in 1973, 1982, 1998. Murray and Herrnstein made it in the Bell Curve. Sesardic made it on 2000 and 2005. Nelson points to it in 2010.)

Here is a balanced coherent rewrite of the argument: "Hereditarians have argued that the high within group heritability of IQ in conjunction with the magnitude of the gap makes it likely that the Black-White gap has a partial genetic basis [1]. James Flynn has outlined the argument [2]:

Originally, Jensen argued: (1) the heritability of IQ within whites and probably within blacks was 0.80 and between family factors accounted for only 0.12 of IQ variance — with only the latter relevant to group differences; (2) the square root of the percentage of variance explained gives the correlation between between-family environment and IQ, a correlation of about 0.33 (square root of 0.12=0.34); (3) if there is no genetic difference, blacks can be treated as a sample of the white population selected out by environmental inferiority; (4) enter regression to the mean — for blacks to be one SD below whites for IQ, they would have to be 3 Sds (3 ×.33 =1) below the white mean for quality of environment; (5) no sane person can believe that — it means the average black cognitive environment is below the bottom 0.2% of white environments; (6) evading this dilemma entails positing a fantastic “factor X”, something that blights the environment of every black to the same degree (and thus does not reduce within-black heritability estimates), while being totally absent among whites (thus having no effect onwithin-white heritability estimates).

This argument has been criticized for a number of reasons. Richard Nisbett has argued that the heritability of IQ is significantly less that .8 for both Blacks and Whites; he has also argued that the Black-White gap could be caused by numerous environmental effects which add up to explain the difference [3]. Dickens and Flynn have argued that the secular increase in IQ (i.e the Flynn effect) demonstrates that the conventional interpretation of heritability is flawed; they maintain that the conventional interpretation ignores the role of feedback between factors, such as those with a small initial IQ advantage, genetic or environmental, seeking out more stimulating environments which will gradually greatly increase their advantage, which, as one consequence in their alternative model, would mean that the "heritability" figure is only in part due to direct effects of genotype on IQ [2].

Hereditarians have replied in turn that the heritability of IQ peeks in adulthood and is consistently shown to be above .70 [5]; They also maintain that the Black-White difference represents a difference in general intelligence, while the Flynn effect does not; as such, they argue that the nature of the Flynn effect is different from that of the Black-White gap [5]. Additionally, Jensen has argued that a non-conventional interpretation of heritability (a la Flynn and Dickens)implies between group genetic differences [6].

[1] Sesardic, 2000. Philosophy of Science that Ignores Science: Race, IQ and Heritability [2] Flynn, 2010. The spectacles through which I see the race and IQ debate [3] Nielson, 2010. Intelligence of Culture. [4] Rushton and Jensen, 2010. The rise and fall of the Flynn Effect as a reason to expect a narrowing of the Black-White IQ gap [5] Rushton and Jensen, 2010. Race and IQ: A theory-based review of the research in Richard Nisbett's Intelligence and How to Get It [6] Jensen, 1973. Educatability and group differences.

I think something like this looks fine. But it refers to the "Heritability within and between groups" section. I was discussing the "Race and genetics section".Miradre (talk) 12:22, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

As stated above there is nothing the "Race and genetics" section not covered elsewhere. So I think it should be removed. Any objections with explanations? Miradre (talk) 12:23, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

History of controversy

The IQ Controversy, the Media, and Public Policy - the two sentences for this book do not support each other. The first says the author accused the press of liberal bias. The second reports on a survey they did (but does not describe how the survey was conducted). There is nothing that tells how the book was related to public policy, either. These ideas do not seem to be connected and the paragraph needs expansion to make the point, whatever it is.Parkwells (talk) 17:52, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

You can read more on in the article on the study.Miradre (talk) 17:53, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

APA and race and intelligence

"Both the American Psychological Association[dubious – discuss] and the American Anthropological Association have issued statements that there is little evidence of a connection between race and intelligence, and whatever small link might exist, is not genetic in nature"

That is simply false regarding APA. That there are average IQ differences are not disputed by the APAP. See Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns.Miradre (talk) 09:42, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes, this badly misrepresents the APA. Did he not think to actually read the APA report? What the article now says about it is not a matter of interpretation, it's an outright dishonesty. The report discusses the possibility of a genetic contribution to the gap, and although they say there is no direct evidence for it, its final conclusion is one of agnosticism. To say that the APA has stated "whatever small link exists is definitely not genetic in origin" is extremely disingenuous. Marek should read it if he is uncertain. [1]

It also somewhat misrepresents the AAA. In the AAA statement, the AAA only rejects the idea "that intelligence is biologically determined by race." They don't discuss the idea that intelligence could correlate with race, as Earl Hunt says in his 2011 book - they only reject the idea of absolute racial biological determinism (the idea that racial IQ gaps could be 100% genetic). The AAA statement doesn't reject the idea of a racial IQ gap that's caused by something other than 100% racial biological determinism - they don't discuss other possible causes at all. Volunteer Marek should not have added this paragraph to the lead without discussing it here first. I'm going to remove it until he can build a consensus for inclusion.

Marek also blanked the Segerstråle content with a fairly nonsensical edit summary (are we supposed to just assume that Ullica Segerstråle belongs to the "crazy part" of the ideological spectrum, with no evidence?). It is not a good idea to blank sourced content without discussion, especially on an article that's this controversial. Marek should not continue to do this.Boothello (talk) 20:23, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

You are engaging in OR interpretation of primary sources. I've provided a reliable secondary source for the text I added. What YOU think AAA or APA said doesn't matter. What matters is what sources say they said.

Also, I would appreciate it if you didn't misrepresent my statement. I didn't say Ullica Segerstrale was part of the "crazy part" of the ideological spectrum. What I said is that all kinds of non-crazy people - not just those associated with Marxism - have criticized this racist research.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:18, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

This is not original research. The APA report is itself a secondary source, and I think every editor except you who's involved in this article has read it and knows what it says. Summarizing what it says in the article is just a matter of doing what we do with any other source. This is what the APA report says:

African-American IQ scores have long averaged about 15 points below those of Whites, with correspondingly lower scores on academic achievement tests. In recent years the achievement-test gap has narrowed appreciably. It is possible that the IQ-score differential is narrowing as well, but this has not been clearly established. The cause of that differential is not known; it is apparently not due to any simple form of bias in the content or administration of the tests themselves. The Flynn effect shows that environmental factors can produce differences of at least this magnitude, but that effect is mysterious in its own right. Several culturally based explanations of the Black/ White IQ differential have been proposed; some are plausible, but so far none has been conclusively supported. There is even less empirical support for a genetic interpretation. In short, no adequate explanation of the differential between the IQ means of Blacks and Whites is presently available.

The content that you added says "Both the American Psychological Association and the American Anthropological Association have issued statements that there is little evidence of a connection between race and intelligence, and whatever small link might exist, is not genetic in nature." This is the exact opposite of what the APA report says. The paragraph that I quoted says that there is definitely a difference between the average IQ of races, the report says elsewhere that IQ tests are a valid measure of mental ability, and this paragraph also says that nobody knows the cause of this difference.

It looks like you may have found a source that itself is misrepresenting the APA report. If that's so, there are two ways of dealing with this. One is to just apply common sense: to look at the source that this book is claiming to summarize, and see if the book is summarizing that accurately. If it isn't, we should know better than to perpetuate that misrepresentation. If that requires too much critical thinking for your tastes, the other way to handle this is by using whichever source is the more prominent of the two. The American Psychological Association is the largest body of psychologists in the United States, and Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns represents its official position on race and intelligence. The source that you cited is a popular book published by the American Management Association. So we have two sources that disagree with each other: one is the APA report itself, and the other is Amacom's account of what the APA report says, which the APA report itself contradicts. If we have to decide which of these sources is the more prominent of the two, it's not Amacom.Boothello (talk) 14:34, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Look right below. Clearly, when talking about the APA report, the APA report itself is a primary source.

I can't see how supposedly what I put in the article - straight from a reliable source - is "exact opposite of what the APA report says". In fact, to me it looks like both the source I used and the report itself agree.

You are apparently confusing things based on your own preset ideas: what the source says is that the APA report says is that "There's no link between intelligence and race". The quote you give above says that there's an IQ difference (which has been narrowing) between races and that there's almost no support for a genetic basis. It is entirely possible for both these things to be true - there's an IQ-test racial gap but there's no connection between intelligence and race (one obvious reason for this could be simply that IQ tests are total crap, but there are also a lot of subtle reasons). So your contentions that the source somehow got this wrong or contradicts the report is just your own original research. I see no such contradition.

"If we have to decide which of these sources is the more prominent of the two, it's not Amacom." - per Wikipedia's policy we use reliable secondary sources, not our own idiosyncratic interpretation of primary sources.Volunteer Marek (talk) 20:39, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

The APA is a primary source regarding it own conclusions. It is a secondary source when it summarises studies made in previous studies. Commonsense is not applicable. What is applicable is finding a source that is more reliable and that summarises the APA report differently.·Maunus·ƛ· 14:54, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Better, but I think that the new version of the second paragraph in the lead is slightly misrepresenting the UNESCO statement. Here's that part of the UNESCO report:

According to present knowledge there is no proof that the groups of mankind differ in their innate mental characteristics, whether in respect of intelligence or temperament. The scientific evidence indicates that the range of mental capacities in all ethnic groups is much the same.

According to the paragraph in the article, the UNESCO report says that "there is no evidence for innate differences in mental capacity between races." Saying that there is no proof is not exactly the same as saying that there is no evidence, and I think the article should make it clearer what UNESCO actually says.

I'm also not sure this should go in the lead section. The lead is supposed to be summarizing the rest of the article, and this isn't summarizing any other part of the article. It's also somewhat redundant with the summary of the APA report in the last paragraph of the lead. Could this paragraph be moved to another section of the article?Boothello (talk) 21:10, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

I think you are reading a distinction into the UNESCO statement that is not actually there. I think it is quite clear that they mean proof not in the sense of "conclusive evidence", but in the sense of overall convincing arguments. I think we can remove the other summary of the APA report frm the lead, since there is no reason to privilege its conclusions over those of the UNESCO, AAA, or AAPA in the lead. ·Maunus·ƛ· 21:14, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

I don't think our own interpretation of the UNESCO statement should matter. Our job is to report what the source says. So if "proof" is the word used by UNESCO, then it should be the word used in the article.

Responding to your other point, the UNESCO statement is sixty years old. I think it's fine that the article mentions it, but I don't think it deserves equal time with a statement from 1996. Psychology has advanced a lot since 1950, and even if there was no proof (or no evidence) about something sixty years ago, that does not demonstrate very much about the state of knowledge today.

The AAA and AAPA reports are more recent, but they don't address the debate over race and intelligence as directly as the APA report does. As I said above, what the AAA report rejects is the idea of absolute biological determinism, but there are very few researchers who believe that racial IQ gaps are 100% genetic. The AAPA report rejects the idea of inherent biological superiority or inferiority, and says that race has no effect on language or the ability to assimilate into a culture, but it does not directly address the topic of race and IQ at all. The lead section of this article has been based on the APA report for a long time, since before me or Midrare were here, and I don't think there's a good reason to change that.

If you think it's important for the views of UNESCO and the AAA to be included, I would suggest creating a new section for this called "group statements". We could also consider including the AAPA statement there, but as I said it does not address the topic of race and IQ at all, so I don't know whether it's relevant.Boothello (talk) 00:31, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

You are repeating Miradre's irrelevant and ridiculous criticism of the date of the UNESCO source. It has been ratified three times since it was first published, and it is still the basis for all UN policies regarding human rights. I am not buying it and I don't think anyone else does either. Your interpretation of the AAPA report is a complete misrepresentation. Miradre is in the defensive and now you are taking over his role. It is not going to work. ·Maunus·ƛ· 01:39, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

I haven't really been closely watching all your discussions with him, so I don't know if he used the same arguments. I'm only telling you what I think is sensible. It's completely standard practice for Wikipedia articles to give more prominence to more recent sources. I don't think the UNESCO statement should be disregarded or excluded from the article. I'm just saying that it's less current than the APA report, because its most recent version (from 1978) is still more than twice the age of the APA report. If you disagree with that, please provide a reason rather than just lumping me together with Miradre and saying you explained this already.

Also, please quote the part of the AAPA statement that you think addresses the cause of racial IQ gaps. The only part of it I can see that comes close to it is this:

Physical, cultural and social environments influence the behavioral differences among individuals in society. Although heredity influences the behavioral variability of individuals within a given population, it does not affect the ability of any such population to function in a given social setting. The genetic capacity for intellectual development is one of the biological traits of our species essential for its survival. This genetic capacity is known to differ among individuals. The peoples of the world today appear to possess equal biological potential for assimilating any human culture. Racist political doctrines find no foundation in scientific knowledge concerning modern or past human populations.

This says two different things - it says that genetic capacity for mental ability varies between individuals, and it says that all populations have the same ability to assimilate any human culture, so that there's no basis for doctrines such as racial segregation that assume otherwise. Where does this statement say anything about whether or why there are differences in mental ability between races (rather than between individuals)? It looks to me like the AAPA statement is deliberately silent about it.Boothello (talk) 02:45, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

I am not going to have this discussion at this point. I have been dealing with Miradre's nonsense twisting of compltely obvious statements for the past couple of months. I am not going to replay it with you. I am sorry but I don't have the patience to play that game any more. The source could hardly be any more clear in saying that there is no biological basis for positing differences in behavior or mental capacity among groups. I cannot continue to assume good faith with this magnitude of distortion of sources. I think you should read it again, and if after having done that once more you still want to go down that road then it will be through some kind of administrative venue.·Maunus·ƛ· 02:51, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry you're running out of patience here. It's a very demanding topic area and in that respect I can't really blame you. I am disappointed, though, that your attitude toward Miradre is being directed at me - it's not my fault if he hasn't been reasonable. If you explained this to him already, then presumably it is his own fault that he doesn't understand it. But it's not reasonable that you won't discuss it with me for this reason, and it means there's no way for me to know what you think is wrong with my suggestions. Wikipedia depends on discussion and consensus-building. If you no longer have the patience to engage in discussion, and are finding yourself unable to assume good faith about the editors who disagree with you, then it might be prudent to take a break from this topic for a while. I can see from your edits and your talk posts that you've been frustrated, and while I understand your frustration, I don't think it's conducive to the project.

I also think that your exclusive focus on opposing me and Miradre isn't helpful, both for you and the articles. Last night was the second time that Volunteer Marek added the same content that was reverted the first time he added it - saying that the position of the APA report is that there's probably no relationship between race and mental ability, even though it's been completely clear that there's no consensus for this change. From your edit summary here I think you know that this misrepresents the APA report, since changing the description to fit the data would not be necessary if it were an accurate summary to begin with. Surely this kind of misrepresentation is something that you can recognize, rather than turning a blind eye to it while you focus on arguing with no one except me and Miradre?Boothello (talk) 14:20, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

This topic has been and is plagued by Single Purpose editors and puppets of the meat and sock varieties. This long term pattern does mean that assumptions of good faith have a shorter lifespan here than elsewhere. The way you are twisting well known sources and seeing things in them noone but Miradre has ever seen is disconcerting. Marek is not misrepresenting the APA report, the quote he is giving is completely faithful to the source he gives, namely Paige & Witty's book. We may not agree with how Paige and Witty interprets the APA report, but at least their interpretation of it is a reliably published secondary source. In fact we should not be making interpretations of the reports ourselves as they are primary sources in that sense, we should be discovering how reliable secondary sources have summarised them. ·Maunus·ƛ· 14:28, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

If I need to find secondary sources that summarize the APA report differently from Paige & Witty's book, I will. Here is how the report is summarized in Lovler, Miller, and McIntire's book Foundations of Psychological Testing: A Practical Approach: 

In response to the publication of The Bell Curve, the American Psychological Association (APA) convened a task force of psychologists representing the prevalent attitudes, values, and practices of the psychology profession. Based on the work of this task force, the APA published a report, Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns (Neisser et al., 1995). The report did not disagree with the data presented in The Bell Curve; however, it interpreted the data differently and concluded that although no one knows why the difference exists, there is no support for the notion that the 15-point IQ difference between Black and White Americans is due to genetics.

 

That's fairly accurate to the source. Unlike Marek's source, this book makes it clear that APA report acknowledges the existence of the IQ gap, although the APA report is a little more qualified in their rejection of a genetic explanation - the report says that a genetic interpretation has no direct evidence, not no support at all. Here is how the APA report is summarized in Shaun Gabbidon's Criminological Perspectives on Race and Crime: 

Following the publication of The Bell Curve, the American Psychological Assocation (APA), felt a need to form a task force to examine the state of knowledge on IQ. (Neisser et al., 1996). The final report from the task force noted several key findings including the consensus that IQ tests "... do in fact predict school achievement fairly well ... They also predict scores on school achievement tests, designed to measure knowledge of the curriculum" (Neisser et al., 1996, p.81). The report also acknowledges that there are differences in IQ by [racial] group (see pp. 92-95). However, after reviewing the empirical evidence, the task force concluded "[there is] no adequate explanation of the differential between the IQ means of Blacks and Whites" (p. 97).

 

That is also a more accurate summary of the APA report than Paige & Witty's book. But just to give an example of how easily the APA report can be misrepresented in secondary sources, here is one more example, from Cornelius Troost's book Apes Or Angels?: 

Jensen’s position on racial IQ differences is largely endorsed by the American Psychological Association. A task force of 11 members of APA published a report called Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns (1996). The authors agreed that differences in intelligence exist, can be measured fairly, are partly genetic, an influence life outcomes. These basic facts should not hide the reality that the left among psychologists disagreed strongly with Jensen and tried to demonize him.

 

This is a secondary source reporting that the APA report concluded that racial IQ differences have a partly genetic basis. This goes to show that there are secondary sources misrepresenting the APA report in either direction. But the majority of secondary sources summarizing the APA report seem to be doing it mostly accurately, as in my first two examples above.  

There's no reason for the article to repeat Paige and Witty's claim while ignoring Troost's claim, as well as all of the sources that summarize the APA report accurately. One option is to include all of the accounts of that the APA report says, including both the accurate ones and the accounts that misrepresent it in either direction. But when secondary sources about the APA report disagree this much, both with one another and with the APA report itself, I think the most reasonable thing is to just cite the APA report itself and report what it says accurately. Do you have a better suggestion how to handle it, that doesn't involve cherry-picking the secondary sources we agree with and ignoring those that we don't?Boothello (talk) 20:30, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Boothello, "consensus" cannot be held hostage by a couple intransigent editors and you can't remove sourced content based only on a IDON'TLIKEIT reason. In fact removing sourced content can be seen as disruptive. A particular misrepresentation of WP:CONSENSUS does NOT trump WP:NPOV and WP:V. So yes, I added the content. It is sourced. The only objections to it appear to be that a particular editor or two disagrees with what the source says - but the threshold for inclusion is "verifiability" (from reliable secondary sources) not "truth". In this case I think both are met but only WP:V is necessary.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:41, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

There's no reason for the article to repeat Paige and Witty's claim while ignoring Troost's claim - actually there is. Paige and Witty are a reliable secondary source. Troost is a self published vanity press unreliable source.Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:22, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

• I think the Lovler, Miller and McIntire summary is better than the Paige and Witty one. Here is another from Schacter, Wegner & Gilbert's "Psychology": "When the American Psychological Association appointed a special task force to summarize what is known about the cause of the difference between the intelligence test scores of Black and White Americans, they concluded: “Culturally based explanations of the Black/White IQ differential have been proposed; some are plausible, but so far none has been conclusively supported. There is even less empirical support for a genetic interpretation. In short, no adequate explanation of the differential between the IQ means of Blacks and Whites is presently available” (Neisser et al., 1996, p. 97). Such is the state of the art."·Maunus·ƛ· 12:42, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

blanket revert

This blanket revert of my edits [2]

1. Removed sourced text as well as the sources themselves.
2. Restored undue information
3. Restored misrepresentation of a source used
4. Resulted in edit conflicts as I was still trying to tweak the article.
5. Removed pertinent information about Binet, which was also sourced.

Quite simply, that was a blind, blanket battleground edit - it doesn't even look like SightWatcher bothered to actually read the edits. He certainly did not give a reason for #s 2-5 and gave a specious and false reason for 1 ("I'm reverting you because one of my buddies reverted you". It's also false that there has been no discussion - did you bother actually looking at the talk page?).

SW, you've removed two pieces of sourced text. Both were inlined cited to reliable sources and are very pertinent to the topic of this article. I would appreciate it if you self reverted as there's just no justification for this kind of disruptive behavior.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:34, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

...and I most certainly don't see SightWatcher participating in discussion anywhere on this page.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:57, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Volunteer Marek, you are not being helpful. There are three people commenting who clearly disagree with your edits- Miradre, Boothello, and me- and the only other person commenting on them, Maunus, doesn't seem to have a strong opinion for or against them. There is clearly no consensus for the change you are trying to make, which is why it was reverted the first time. Yet instead of engaging in discussion here and trying to build a consensus for it, you left a brief comment disagreeing with the other people who commented, and then reinstated your changes exactly verbatim without waiting for reply. Reverting a major change that's opposed by several editors, and expecting it to not be added back until consensus supports it, is not holding an article hostage. This is normal WP:BRD process, and you have been abusing that process by repeatedly adding the same material with barely any discussion.

Boothello explained above about what's wrong with the content you keep adding- you picked out one secondary source that gives a biased summary of the APA report, when most secondary summaries of it are more balanced and accurate, and a few are biased on the opposite direction. With this in mind I'm going to again remove your changes from the article, until you can build consensus here for them to be included. A consensus is more than just you leaving a few comments saying that you disagree with everyone else. If you can build consensus for this content, then it can be added back. But discretionary sanctions are authorized on this article, so I don't think you should try to force it into the article by edit warring.-SightWatcher (talk) 01:34, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

You've just done an excellent job of completely misrepresenting, to put it politely, the situation. Let's see:

There are three people commenting who clearly disagree with your edits- Miradre, Boothello, and me - Yes, the usual three involved editors, all with accounts which all became operational in October or November 2010, shortly after the Race and Intelligent ArbCom case closed, tag teaming on this and other articles.

Maunus, doesn't seem to have a strong opinion for or against them - let's let Maunus speak for himself, don't put words in his mouth.

The information is sourced to a reliable source and the best that Boothello can offer for its exclusion is IDON'TLIKEIT and some strange original research based on his reading of primary sources. It seems you are just blindly supporting him and this is the first instance of you actually taking part in this discussion.

Yet instead of engaging in discussion here and trying to build a consensus for it - false - i have been participating in the discussion - and this is quite hypocritical coming from someone who has just made his first comments on this talk page.

you have been abusing that process by repeatedly adding - I added the content, it was removed under a flimsy pretext, I re-added it, it was removed again by you under another flimsy pretext. That's not "repeatedly adding" by me, don't try to pretend the situation is different than it really is. If there's is abuse of the BRD process, it ain't on my side.

explained above about what's wrong with the content you keep adding - yes, he concocted some strange original research as a justification for removing well sourced text from the article. That's not a good reason to violate wikipedia policy.

you picked out one secondary source - on Wikipedia we use reliable secondary sources. Please read WP:V.

that gives a biased summary of the APA report - that's nonsense original research that Boothello and yourself are conducting. Your opinion that a particular reliable, secondary source is "biased", simply because it disagrees with your beliefs is completely irrelevant and useless as far as Wikipedia policy is concerned. If you have a problem with the source I provided, take it to WP:RSN.

when most secondary summaries of it are more balanced and accurate, and a few are biased on the opposite direction. - complete nonsense. All the additional secondary sources that Boothello listed above are more or less in agreement with the reliable secondary source I provided, or at least don't contradict it. The fact that you and Boothello insist on reading into those sources things which are not there is just a reflection on you and him/her. Not a single reliable source has been provided that contradicts the source I've used, all we've had here so far is a few editors just making stuff up out of thin air in a desperate attempt to keep reliably sourced text they don't like out of the article.

I don't think you should try to force it into the article by edit warring - I haven't edit warred, so please don't make accusations you can't substantiate as that can be seen as a violation of WP:NPA.

With this in mind I'm going to again remove your changes from the article - what changes? What the hey are you talking about? The ones you've already removed? Are you going to re-insert my changes just so you can revert them again or something?

I'm perfectly willing to ask for outside opinion on this. It'll probably go the same way that the disagreement over at Pioneer Fund went, and perhaps it will shine a light on some of the behavior by some of these accounts that has been going on.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:33, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

it's quite obvious that this article has been hijacked by single purpose accounts. the copious amount of unreliable sources. the undue weight given to fringe views, and miadre's hundred-edits-a-day makes it impossible for other wikipedians to check the massive pov-pushing that is going on. the article has degraded long enough. an administrative measure is needed.-- mustihussain (talk) 09:14, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

there's no disagreement between sources here....

...only a disagreement between the sources and a couple of editors who are engaging in original research.

The text I added is:

"Both the American Psychological Association and the American Anthropological Association have issued statements that there is little evidence of a connection between race and intelligence, and whatever small link might exist, is not genetic in nature."

The original text, verbatim, from the source is:

"The idea (of black intellectual inferiority) lives on in the minds of many, notwithstanding the strong statements from the world's largest organizations of individuals interested in anthropology, the American Anthropological Association, and the less powerful, yet very clear statement from the American Psychological Association. Both declare that there is not much evidence of a link between race and intellect, and what little there is fails to support the genetic hypothesis. 'Despite the clear statements by these credible professional organizations, many ordinary people still believe in black intellectual inferiority' . (Emphasis in original).

I don't know how much more clearly I can present this text in the article without either committing a copy right violation or employing a block quote. Obviously this text is very pertinent to the article, gets right to the point and is exactly the kind of information that should go into the lede.

Ok, now here are Boothello's sources which supposedly "contradict" it:

1. The APA report itself which notes that there are IQ differences across races. But IQ differences across races are not the same thing as differences in intelligence and the APA report doesn't make that mistake. Only a couple of Wikipedia users who believe - contra most scientists and researchers - that IQ=intelligence see it that way. There's no contradiction here. The report goes on to state that even as far as the differences in IQs go "There is even less empirical support for a genetic interpretation." - which roughly agrees with the source I provided. At any rate, this is a primary sources and we should not be interpreting this as that is original research.
2. Lovler, Miller, and McIntire Foundations of Psychological Testing: A Practical Approach, which states The report ... concluded that although no one knows why the difference (in IQs) exists, there is no support for the notion that the 15-point IQ difference between Black and White Americans is due to genetics.. Again there's nothing about intelligence in there. There is, once again a statement that the IQ difference is due to genetic has NO support, which is similar to what my source says.
3. Shaun Gabbidon Criminological Perspectives on Race and Crime, which again talks about the IQ gap and then states after reviewing the empirical evidence, the task force concluded "[there is] no adequate explanation of the differential between the IQ means of Blacks and Whites. This does not contradict my source.

Now, there does appear to be one (single, unique, solitary) source provided by Boothello which does appear to contradict the source I provided. This is Cornelius Troost's book on religion, called "Apes Or Angels?". The summary for the book begins with "For many readers this book will be a mind-altering experience. It has a thesis that is a challenge to the conventional thinking of most Christians and their counterparts, the secular humanists." [3], and the rest is pretty similar. So we have a book which contradicts the reliable source which is a "mind-altering experience" blah blah blah. Could it be... let me check... yes, it sure does appear that this is a self-published book? In other words, this is a completely unreliable source.

So we have 1 primary source - the APA report itself - which does not contradict the source I provided and at least partially supports it. We have 2 other secondary sources which do not contradict the source I provided and at least partially support it. And then we have a single, strange, weird, non reliable, fringe, self published source which does contradict it. So which way do we go, ey?

As a personal observation, it seems to me that the opposition to the inclusion of this well sourced text comes from the fact that a couple editors insist on exact identification of IQ with intelligence. They seem to think that if a source says that "differences in IQ across races exists" this somehow "contradicts" the statement "there is little or no link between race and intelligence". But that's a logical fallacy (and plain ol' "wrong" too). None of the provided sources make that mistake (except perhaps Mr. Cornelius Troost). And insisting on this mistake is original research. Let the (reliable, secondary) sources speak.Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:06, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

I agree that is is useful to keep separate IQ and intelligence - the gap is an IQ gap and an achievement gap - not an intelligence gap. I don't think the Troost source is reliable, but the Gabbidon and Lovler et al. sources are. I think the Paige and Witty source is a less apt choice than the textbook sources, because it is more of a popular/applied science book.·Maunus·ƛ· 12:47, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Marek, I'm not surprised at your claim that the Troost source is unreliable. It's self-published, but the author is Cornelius Troost, an established expert in the field of evolution and education. This is relevant to the topic of race and intelligence and some of his other writings have been published in reliable sources. Wikipedia:SPS says "Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications."

Please remember, I don't want the article to actually cite the Troost source. Even if it theoretically could be considered an RS, it's also biased, inaccurate, and not very prominent. I mentioned it only to show the diversity of viewpoints that exists about the APA report. If the Paige and Witty source is better than this, it's not better by very much, and I agree with Maunus that one of the textbook sources should be preferable.

Regarding your other point, you seem confused by the relationship between intelligence and IQ. They're not exactly the same thing, but IQ tests also aren't "total crap" as you suggested in your comment yesterday. IQ tests measure a particular kind of intelligence, which also has many real-world applications outside of IQ tests. The first two of the APA report's five sections are devoted to explaining the mental abilities that are measured by IQ tests, and how those abilities affect outcomes in the real world. Apart from the APA report, this is almost universally agreed upon by psychologists. Some other sources which support this are:

• IQ and Human Intelligence by Nicholas Mackintosh (1998)
• The g Factor by Arthur Jensen (1998)
• The Handbook of Intelligence edited by Robert Sternberg (2003)
• Intelligence and How to Get It by Richard Nisbett (2009)
• Human Intelligence by Earl Hunt (2011)

Basically, pick any book by an established expert in psychometrics, and this is the viewpoint you'll find in it. With the exception of Jensen, these authors also aren't hereditarians or Pioneer Fund grantees. I'm sure you could also find sources that say IQ tests don't measure anything meaningful, such as Gould's The Mismeasure of Man, but these are by authors who don't have expertise in the relevant fields to be considered authorities about the validity of IQ tests (Gould is a paleontologist, not a psychologist).

The content you added is saying the APA report says that there probably is no connection between race and intelligence. The APA report says that there is a relationship between race and IQ, and the APA report (and most other mainstream psychology sources) say that IQ tests measure a type of intelligence. Therefore, even though this is true to the source being cited (Paige and Witty), this source does not accurately summarize the APA's conclusions. The APA report also says that the cause of the IQ gap is unknown, while the content you added says that it definitely not genetic. In this respect you've actually misrepresented Paige and Witty - Paige and Witty says that evidence fails to support a genetic interpretation, not that a genetic interpretation is certainly false. This isn't acceptable. In addition to using a poor-quality source when numerous textbook sources are available, you've failed to even accurately summarize the source that you used.

Maunus, I would like to replace the Paige and Witty content with one of the textbook summaries of the APA report. Is that change okay with you?Boothello (talk) 00:30, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

I am pretty sure you are overstating Sternberg and Nisbett's support for the the importance of the g-based intelligence view, it is also not described as being hegemonic or unproblematic in the chapter on intelligence in Schacter, Gilbert and Wegner's "Psychology". IQ tests measure skills that correlate highly with particular kinds of success in particular kinds of societies, because that is what they are designed to do. I can support replacing Paige and Witty with one or two of the textbook sources.·Maunus·ƛ· 00:53, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

The WP:SPS exception applies to things like webpages of prominent academics. It does not apply to vanity press published works - if Mr. Troost's work is a respectable part of the mainstream, why couldn't he find a regular publisher for this book? No go.

And for the millionth freakin' time the contention that "the source is wrong" is nothing but your own original research. And no I did not "misrepresent" P&W - don't make stuff up. And for the millionth+1 freakin' time the idea that this is a "poor-quality source" is based on absolutely nothing - is there a reliable source which says that P&W is a poor quality source? No? Didn't think so - except your own fancy.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:44, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I replaced the Paige and Witty account with the Schacter, Wegner & Gilbert source that you suggested. You can tweak this to make it more accurate if you want. I think we're reaching a consensus now about what's best here, so I hope there won't be any more drive-by reverts to restore the Paige and Witty material.Boothello (talk) 02:13, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

I disagree with this, because I don't see why we can't use both sources. Paige and Witty have the advantage of being straight to the point and very clear. The textbook sources goes into more detail. So why not get the best of both worlds? In fact, that's what NPOV requires - presenting all reliable sources. I also don't think it's a good idea to remove text which is based on reliable sources, simply because of IDON'TLIKEIT. We're letting a couple of editors' original research trump reliable sources here which is a "bad thing" and a violation of Wikipedia policy.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:39, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

there absolutely no consensus here boothello. we should use both sources in compliance with npov, as suggested by marek. i also suggest maunus or marek make the new edit as other editors seem rather disingenuous (what can you expect from single purpose accounts?)-- mustihussain (talk) 08:47, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Marek this is not original research Paige and Witty contradict what all other sources about what the APA report says. Secondly it is not a high quality secobndary source as a textbook is, but rather a slightly partisan source. I think it is important to source this to as neutral a source as possible. Troost is obviously not a reliable source - if it were it would have been academically published. The reason it makes no sense to use both sources is because that would be too much for the lead, secondly it would create the impression that there is widespread disagreement about what the APA report says - which there isn't I know of no other sources that interpret the APA report as Paige and Witty do.·Maunus·ƛ· 12:05, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Again, I don't see the contradiction. Also I'm not sure one can even call it "slightly partisan", as one of the authors is the Secretary of Education under George W. Bush, Rod Paige (a quick read through his article should convince anyone that Paige ain't no bleeding heart liberal, as liberals don't usually refer to the NEA a "terrorist organization"). I don't think including the quote from the book would given an impression of disagreement, unless one is 100% wedded to the idea that IQ=intelligence always and everywhere.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:08, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

Recent changes to the lead

Aside from needing to replace the Paige & Witty source (which is better now) I think the recent changes to the lead section also have a few other problems, which is why I tried to undo them last night. Others seem to think it's important that I explain what's wrong with these changes before I undo them, so I will:

• The information about how IQ scores are distributed between racial groups has been moved out of the lead into the "Validity of race and IQ" section. WP:LEAD says that the lead section of an article should be a concise overview of the rest of the article. This information is the central topic of debate in the race/IQ controversy, so the lead should include it. This information is both prominent and uncontested - nearly every source that exists about race and IQ mentions whites score higher on average than blacks and that Asians score higher on average than whites, and the dispute is just over the cause of this difference. Therefore there is no problem with undue weight for the lead section to mention this, and it is an essential part of any concise summary of the nature of the debate. Excluding this information makes it impossible for readers to even know what the article's lead section is referring to when it discusses "racial IQ gaps". If people read the article starting at the beginning, they won't learn what racial IQ gaps actually are until around a quarter into the article.

• This sentence was added to the lead: "While some researches use IQ as a measure of intelligence, Alfred Binet, the developer of IQ tests, warned that these should not be used to measure innate intelligence." This is cited to page 296 of Plotnik and Kouyoumdjian’s book Introduction to Psychology. Page 296 of this book mentions this warning from Binet, but this information is presented in the context of explaining how IQ tests were misused in the early 1900s, not in the context of modern IQ tests. The authors of this book do not use this warning from Binet as a criticism of modern IQ testing. By contrasting this warning from Binet with the fact that researchers use IQ as a measure of intelligence in modern times, the article is making a point that the authors of this book do not make, which is WP:SYNTHESIS.

When Mustihussain has restored Marek's changes to the lead after I or SightWatcher tried to undo them, the explanation given in his edit summary was that there was no consensus yet whether or not Marek's changes were an improvement. Mustihussain's argument appears to be that the bold changes that Marek made three days ago cannot be undone until there is a consensus to undo them, and that if no consensus can be reached either way, the changes have to stay in the article. This is the exact opposite of standard editing practice. According to Wikipedia:Reverting, "If you make a change which is good-faith reverted, do not simply reinstate your edit - leave the status quo up. If there is a dispute, the status quo reigns until a consensus is established to make a change" The status quo for the lead section of this article is the state it was in from sometime in 2010 until three days ago, not the new version that Marek introduced on Friday.

However, "no consensus" is not on its own a good reason to revert, so I've now explained the problems I have with the new material. Maunus, now that I've explained this, do you mind me undoing these changes until and unless a consensus can be established to restore them?Boothello (talk) 03:23, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

status quo? this is the most unstable article on wiki thanks to single purpose accounts making massive amounts of edits in shortest possible time. the current version gives both mainstream and fringe views equal weight. that is not acceptable. the time has come for another arbitration.-- mustihussain (talk) 04:54, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

1. We're not done discussing Paige and Witty. At this point it may be a good idea to start an RfC.
2. The fact that the article overemphasizes IQ testing is not a good reason to overemphasize it in the lede as well.
3. There really is no intelligence/race or even an IQ/race controversy, aside from a small number of fringe racist researchers like Rushton and Lynn.
4. The fact that they have a following on Wikipedia which slants related articles is a PROBLEM, not something that should be spread further.
5. Of course Binet's warning was made in the early 1900's - time travel hadn't been invented yet at that time, you know. Anyway, Binet's warning was against using IQ tests for intelligence testing in general.
6. WP:Reverting is a Wikipedia essay, written by what looks like a clueless naive 12 year old, not Wikipedia policy (like it says in the big sign up top). Invoking "status quo", and "stability" to justify POV editing, on the other hand, is a violation of one of the fundamental policies of Wikipedia, NPOV. In addition to the fact that WP:CONSENSUS cannot be held hostage by intransigent editors, WP:FRINGE and WP:UNDUE (there's already way too much crap about IQ in this article), which are also policies not essays, applies. Consensus can change.

The above post and suggestion by Boothello tends to point out the futility of trying to compromise in some situations. You let some editors insert their own original research into an article, and delete well sourced text simply because it doesn't agree with the POV they're pushing, and they take that as a signal to further slant the article. We need to simply stick with policies. If a particular text is relevant and sourced to reliable source, then it should not be removed, no matter how much some particular editor dislikes.

@mustihussain, what would another arbitration case do? After it closes and bans and blocks are handed out, we'd just get a fresh crop of SPA accounts that pop up and pretend to be new to these articles, while the watchers loose interest.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:19, 26 April 2011 (UTC)