Talk:Race and intelligence

RfC about lede of Race and intelligence

Should IQ be labeled "intelligence test scores" in wikivoice, and should the view that it is "at least plausible that hard evidence for a genetic component [in racial differences in test scores] will eventually be found" be included in the lede? NightHeron (talk) 01:45, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

That's two questions, so not sure and yes Peregrine Fisher (talk) 01:56, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

I'll say no and no if you guys are willing to keep the old version and move forwards based on discussion here. Otherwise yes and yes until we really start editing based on the discussion here. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:16, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Was this supposed to be a joke? RFCs are intended to gain consensus among the larger community based on specific issues. This is not a vote. Grayfell (talk) 04:37, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

The first paragraph of the lede is the most important part of the article, so it's especially important to avoid bias there. For that purpose I made three changes that you reverted without responding to any of the reasons I gave. Those reasons were: (1) I deleted the word "intelligence" before "test scores," since there is sharp debate about whether or not the test scores measure intelligence (as acknowledged later in the lede) and so they should not be called "intelligence test scores" in wikivoice; (2) I deleted the word "non-circumstantial" before "evidence" since it's unclear what circumstantial evidence as opposed to non-circumstantial evidence means; (3) I deleted the last part of the sentence concerning speculation about the possibility that evidence might some day be found, per WP:CRYSTAL (see: Although currently accepted scientific paradigms may later be rejected, and hypotheses previously held to be controversial or incorrect sometimes become accepted by the scientific community, it is not the place of Wikipedia to venture such projections.) NightHeron (talk) 02:08, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

I think this RFC was started in the wrong category. Most of the sources discussing race and intelligence are publications in the fields of psychology, anthropology and genetics, so of the categories listed at Wikipedia:Requests for comment, the correct one would be "Maths, science, and technology". 2600:1004:B16D:D752:2520:4B9D:9617:9E7E (talk) 03:23, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

• Should IQ be labeled "intelligence test scores" in wikivoice I suggest "IQ test results", should the view that it is 'at least plausible ... Not in the lead, since it is contentious and does not represent the scientific consensus (speculation about genetics here is a separate topic to general IQ statistics IRT demographics). —PaleoNeonate – 15:08, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

"IQ test results" is just about fine, although I personally don't see any problems with the current version, which conveys more information. There are many tests which approximate intelligence, which are not limited to IQ testing. For example, SATs have been shown to have some correlation with common measures of intelligence. So the current version is certainly better, but I would also be fine with your proposed version.

As to the removal of the last sentence, I don't it's warranted, given that 1) the position that genetics might have some influence is mainstream, and that 2) the position that genetics likely plays a role in explaining the differences, while not mainstream, is notable enough to be mentioned in the lede. ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 17:03, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

• should the view that it is "at least plausible that hard evidence for a genetic component [in racial differences in test scores] will eventually be found" be included in the lede? No, it isn't a good summary of the "Research into the possible genetic influences on test score differences" section (which is where the statement occurs in the article). In the article the speculation appears to be based only on Hunt (2010), so I don't think it's WP:DUE to call out that one "maybe someday" line in the lead. Schazjmd (talk) 17:57, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Should IQ be labeled "intelligence test scores" in wikivoice, it is fine to do this. While a few fringe researchers (e.g. Ken Richardson) do not think IQ tests measure intelligence, the overwhelming majority of the field think they do. should the view that it is 'at least plausible ... Since many experts believe genetics explain some part of the various group gaps known, this formulation is fine with me. The evidence for these claims can be found in the various surveys and mainstream books already cited on this talk page. There's only three surveys of IQ researchers, and a few similar ones of other more distant experts. AndewNguyen (talk) 11:32, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

• For the first, do not use IQ test results as a proxy for "Intelligence" without sourced context. This would be sloppy and severely over-simplifies a contentious point. Applying racialist categories and then attempting to accurately test these categories in a controlled way is a niche activity with a huge number of pitfalls, to say the least. Therefore, "the field" is not a neutral representation of the scientific mainstream. There is a walled-garden of academics, only some of whom have relevant qualifications. These are the people who study race and intelligence the most. This should not be mistaken for the mainstream, so WP:FRINGE applies here.

For the second no. Vague, loaded speculation doesn't belong in the lede. This doesn't reconcile with the academic consensus on "race", nor on "intelligence". It is pretty easy to find academics who support this perspective. It is also easy to find academics who reject this perspective. It's even easier to find those who dismiss the underlying assumptions, of which there are far, far too many. Grayfell (talk) 22:53, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

The reliable sources do not call IQ test scores as "intelligence test scores", they call them IQ test scores. As for the potentially WP:CRYSTALBALL of saying there may in the future be evidence of a racial hierarchy, we could only possibly agree to that if we see an exact proposal in context, but likely not, and certainly not without knowing why or how, as in this proposal. Onetwothreeip (talk) 23:08, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

No to both. they are called "IQ test scores." And per WP:CRYSTAL, we shouldn't speculate on what might happen in the future. Adoring nanny (talk) 13:40, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

No and No - As others have pointed out, they're called IQ tests, not intelligence tests. Speculation is also inappropriate, especially in the lede. I'm also concerned about the frequent use of "debate" which seems to be a weasel word used to imply serious academic disagreement on the topic. –dlthewave ☎ 02:45, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Yes and I'm not sure. I'll explain my reasoning:

IQ tests are the most widely-used type of intelligence tests, but they aren't the only type of intelligence test in existence, or the only type discussed in this article. The article's current wording is kind of unclear about this, but when the sources that it cites discuss group differences in average test scores, they are also discussing the Armed Forces Qualification Test and the Woodcock–Johnson Tests of Cognitive Abilities in addition to IQ. (See page 412 in Earl Hunt's textbook.) The Armed Forces Qualification Test is a type of intelligence test, but it isn't an IQ test. Thus, it would be misrepresenting the sources cited in the article for the lead to state that the research it's discussing is about IQ exclusively. "Intelligence test" is a broader term that encompasses both IQ tests and the other types of test.

The last sentence of the first paragraph reflects what a lot of secondary sources currently say, but it may not be accurate for much longer. Russell Warne's upcoming book, which is scheduled to be published this fall, will present the case that the Lasker et al. study constitutes hard evidence for a genetic component to racial IQ gaps, because this study found that when racial identity is controlled for, both IQ and polygenic scores correlate with biogeographic ancestry as measured with genetic tests. (In other words, this study controlled for the social aspect of race, and found that when the biological component of race is isolated, it still correlates with two measurements of intelligence.) If we go with the advice of WP:CRYSTAL and base the lead on what secondary sources currently say, the last sentence of the first paragraph is accurate. But on the other hand, considering how difficult it is to get a consensus to update anything in this article, maybe it's better to remove that sentence now while we have the opportunity, so that we don't have to have this discussion again later in the year. 2600:1004:B168:DFFA:5CEA:D916:2237:DCFC (talk) 09:35, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

It seems unclear that Russel Warne is notable enough as a researcher to justify using the aforementioned work of his (when it is published) as an authority on this subject). Searching for him seems to turns up little except for his personal blog (and the second link below). Warne's work does not seem to be much mentioned/discussed in other mainstream research on the topic. Russel Warne appears to have a pre-existing history of arguing on the hereditarian side of the debate. See:

https://russellwarne.com/2020/01/22/35-mitos-sobre-la-inteligenica-humana/

https://www.researchgate.net/scientific-contributions/2026630501_Russell_T_Warne

Also, the Lasker et al. study mentioned (porporting to find evidence of a genetic basis for racial IQ gaps), which Warne may mention, is apparently by several authors (such as Bryan J. Pesta, John Fuersr, and Emil O. Kierkegaard) affiliated with Openpsych, a journal/outlet that has been described as considered fringe or "academically dodgy" for several reasons, and which may have also published the study. See:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenPsych

and:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenPsych

Skllagyook (talk) 15:46, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

As was previously determined here, the thing that matters when evaluating a source is the quality of the publisher, not the identity of the author. (And especially not the identities of other authors that the source in question is citing.) Warne's book was accepted for publication by Cambridge University Press, so when it's published it will be a high-quality source that the article should cite. And the sentence saying it is "at least plausible that hard evidence for a genetic component will eventually be found" probably will need to be removed in light of that source, if we don't remove it pre-emptively. 2600:1004:B122:FC8D:9C32:5F11:7F5E:8FD6 (talk) 18:59, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Reliable sources#Definition of a source. We must take the reliability of the author into account, mot only the publisher. Onetwothreeip (talk) 20:01, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Being published in a reliable source does not necessarily merit coverage on Wikipedia, though; the viewpoint would also have to meet our due weight policy. "Wikipedia aims to present competing views in proportion to their representation in reliable sources on the subject." Can you demonstrate that our current coverage of the hereditarian viewpoint in the body and lead complies with this requirement? –dlthewave ☎ 20:02, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

I think the central problem with the article is that it's out of date, so that it gives undue weight to older sources relative to newer ones on both the hereditarian and environmental side. I don't perceive this problem as giving undue weight to any particular theory, but it may have that effect in individual sections of the article, due to the state of research having shifted from what it was whenever those sections were written. The ways that the article is out of date are so pervasive that they tend to obscure whatever other problems may also exist. If the article could be updated to reflect the current state of research, that will make it much easier to evaluate whether or not there's an overall NPOV problem with the entire article. 2600:1004:B11E:E654:D915:3A5E:B89D:2D0F (talk) 02:42, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• No and no. Per Adoring nanny, IQ tests are called IQ tests and a general article like this should not speculate about possible future findings. Wikipedia articles follow secondary sources and do not reflect what bleeding-edge research shows or might soon show. Johnuniq (talk) 06:32, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
• No and No There's no consensus on what, if anything in particular, IQ tests are actually measuring, the second proposal is too speculative for inclusion. 74.73.230.72 (talk) 15:30, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Revert crypto-white supremacism.

I suggest reverting the crypto-white supremacism contained in this edit after protection ends: [1].

That is all.

jps (talk) 17:37, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

So I suppose it makes no difference to you that we just discussed this change for a week, and 8 of the 12 other participants in that discussion disagreed with you about it? I'm honestly starting to find it a little amusing how reluctant certain people are to accept that consensus opposes them. 2600:1004:B14C:C919:E950:81A9:B8D8:510 (talk) 18:30, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia should not be promoting white supremacism. Full stop. It doesn't matter how many editors think that it should. It shouldn't. jps (talk) 18:47, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Let me put it another way. These particular changes have been discussed twice, first in December and again more recently, and in both discussions the consensus was that the stable version of the article (the version that's in the article currently) should be restored. If you think the article should be edited in a way that disregards the consensus on the talk page, that will eliminate the ability to resolve disputes the way they're supposed to be resolved, so that the only remaining way to resolve them is by edit warring. You know perfectly well that there are more editors who support the current version than who oppose it, so if you try to restore your preferred version against consensus, it will inevitably cause another edit war. Is that really what you want? 2600:1004:B14C:C919:E950:81A9:B8D8:510 (talk) 19:30, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

I must say that if I thought this article was crypto white supremacy, I'd ignore our policies and edit war to destroy this article till I was blue in the face. I don't agree, but I do understand. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 20:22, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Bingo. So editors like yourself who disagree with this evaluation should either deal with the objection head-on or ignore it at their own peril. jps (talk) 22:30, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

There has simply not been a consensus to make those particular changes. Where has the argument been made to change "black people" to "blacks", for example? The argument has simply not been made, let alone any consensus to support that. More still, there haven't been arguments made to support the validity of work by Philippe Rushton and others associated with the Pioneer Fund and the International Society for Intelligence Research. Yet we are constantly being told that 9 out of 10 or 8 out of 12 or 7 out of 9 or 10 out of 13 talk page participants support these changes. Repeating that there is a consensus doesn't make it a consensus. If there was a consensus on some particular change, those who are attempting to make edits on that basis would be showing that consensus rather than talking about it, but they won't even justify the edits. Onetwothreeip (talk) 00:00, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

I am referring to this discussion. The earlier version of the article we were thinking of restoring was linked at the beginning of that discussion, so everyone knew exactly what was being proposed there.

The editors who supported restoring that version were: myself, Peregrine Fisher, Oldstone James, Toomim, AndewNguyen, Holderin2019, MaximumIdeas, and Ferahgo the Assassin. The editors who were opposed to restoring it were: you, Nightheron, jps, K.e.coffman, and (possibly) Johnuniq. That's 13 editors in total, and 8 who supported undoing your changes.

Seriously, what are you playing at here? You were one of the participants in that discussion, so you know exactly what its result was, but now when others discuss its outcome you're acting like you have no idea what we're talking about. 2600:1004:B14C:C919:E950:81A9:B8D8:510 (talk) 00:21, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Which changes are you saying they support? Onetwothreeip (talk) 01:04, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Please stop asking me the same questions over and over. Several other editors (Corker1, BullRangifer, MrX, etc.) have complained about your tendency to waste other editors' time with a WP:IDHT attitude, so I know I'm not the only person who thinks this behavior from you is disruptive. The only reason I've been replying to you is that when you forget or misrepresent the outcomes of earlier discussions, as you did in this case, I don't want editors who haven't read those earlier discussions to be confused by your posts. 2600:1004:B14C:C919:E950:81A9:B8D8:510 (talk) 05:29, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Then at least show us where you have answered that question. Onetwothreeip (talk) 05:53, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

There is no room for doubt that Jensenism is a form of white supremacy. In his 1969 article, Jensen opposed compensatory education programs for African American children because he thought that those children are genetically inferior. At the time and ever since then, mainstream scholars have known that there is no evidence that supports Jensen's disparagement of black children. The main argument Jensen, Herrnstein, and others made was to extrapolate from genetic differences between individuals to genetic differences between groups -- a logical fallacy that any undergraduate psych student should be able to poke holes in. Like other white supremacist views, it is fringe.

Wikipedia has a clear policy on how to handle fringe views: WP:FRINGE. It is important to follow that policy, because so many people rely on Wikipedia, and spreading fringe views does real damage. Climate change denialism, which is especially influential in the centers of power in the US and Brazil, results in policies that accelerate the climate crisis. Quack cures and fringe medical theories cause people not to get proper treatment. Herrnstein's 1974 article in the Atlantic Monthly (which at the time was read by many school teachers) essentially told teachers that their African American students were uneducable. Wikipedia policy on fringe theories is that they should be covered in a way that makes it clear that they are fringe theories, and that there is no legitimate question about whether they might be valid. NightHeron (talk) 00:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

I agree. I took a look at the article, and I found it depressingly bad. It's full of tit-for-tat back-and-forth, without properly highlighting what is mainstream and what is fringe. It's entirely unclear if this is supposed to be a history of the idea of "racial" difference of IQ, or a discussion of the substance of the debate. The article is also incredibly US-centric. From a global perspective, neither "white" nor "black" are well-defined or even coherent groups. Melanesians are as as dark as most Africans - heck, after a summer on the beach I'm darker than Obama, and I probably have more Neanderthal than recent African DNA. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 01:02, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Would it make sense to take this article to AfD, along with notifying the widest possible number of editors on all relevant talk pages and WikiProjects? This article has been locked down twice in the last two weeks. Trying to keep the article from pushing fringe views has been a time sink for editors, and the discussion has been dominated by a small number of editors who seem determined to have Wikipedia give credence to white supremacist views. An article cited at the top of this talk page from the Southern Poverty Law Center mentions this article as an example of the influence of the alt-right on Wikipedia. The article is also an example of the effects of systemic bias, that is, the under-representation among active editors of women, people of color, and people from the Global South. Is there any real need for an article titled Race and intelligence? NightHeron (talk) 10:57, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

AfD? Probably not as I doubt the community would agree to deletion in spite of WP:TNT being a pretty reasonable argument. WP:AE might be reasonable. If we can't solve things that way, and arbitration case might be in order. There are certainly alt-right accounts active at this page and we should deal with that. jps (talk) 17:04, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Sure, you know the community much better than I do; I've been editing less than 2 years. Two arguments in support of AfD might also be (1) there's already a much better article that covers the topic, namely Scientific racism, and (2) the title of this article can be read as suggesting that race is related to intelligence, which already prejudices the matter in favor of the fringe view. NightHeron (talk) 18:15, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Hmm, I think we should open a discussion about this page being a WP:POV Fork of scientific racism. If it is, you are indeed correct that is a reason to delete. jps (talk) 21:17, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't think it's exactly a POV fork (it was created in January 2002), but strange things show up in the history of this article. For example, 1152 edits (9.1% of all the edits to this page over 18 years) were made between 2003 and 2006 by User:Quizkajer, which seems to have been a single-purpose account; they stopped editing -- or stopped editing under that account -- in June 2007. It would be interesting to know whether a very small number of users were responsible for most of the content that gives credence to white supremacist theories. NightHeron (talk) 23:46, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

White supremacism is FRINGE, but the idea that race and intelligence (whatever those words might mean) might be related is not. Race-and-intelligence is a subject of speculation, research and often vicious dispute, a controversial subject that has been disfavored for many reasons, but as an idea it has never been "fringe" in the sense of being refuted and abandoned by the mainstream. The mainstream understanding is that race exists (just not in the simplistic ways frequently held up for ridicule); that there is a substantial genetic component to individuals' intelligence; that the distribution of genes for almost any trait can and does vary between populations; and that it is very much possible, but not currently proved or disproved, for the genetic components of intelligence to be among the genetic characteristics that are distributed differently in different groups, like the genes involved in height or hair. All that is common sense, and attempts to refute it have a bad track record of being discredited, including Gould's notorious book, the Lewontin fallacy, and a large fraction of the academic literature of anthropology and psychology that is now understood to suffer from Replication Crisis and extreme politicization.73.149.246.232 (talk) 21:56, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

The idea of a POV Fork is a functional one. It doesn't matter if the article was created a long time ago, if it is now functioning as a POV fork, it is a POV fork. There are a number of documented white supremacist editors who have dedicated much of their time towards skewing this and similar articles. Reading through Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Race and intelligence should probably be required reading, although the focus in that case was a bit overly-personal and there was a sidestepping of the fundamental issues of off-wiki coordination with certain useful idiots who happened to get caught up in the drahmaz. There are still accounts who remain banned from Wikipedia including at least one that is from roughly the same area where the currently active IP-hopper on this page. jps (talk) 20:00, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

If one of you guys would jump through the arbcom hoops, I think that would be great. They might say that your side is correct, and I can remove this page from my watchlist! Peregrine Fisher (talk) 20:15, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

The article is badly in need of a major update. If the edit warring to restore non-consensus changes eventually stops, I'd like to have an organized discussion about how to update the article one section at a time, and you're welcome to participate in that. 2600:1004:B14C:C919:E950:81A9:B8D8:510 (talk) 01:12, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Should the article use the terms "white people" and "black people", instead of "whites" and "blacks"?

In the discussion above, Onetwothreeip argued that this article ought to use the terms "white people" and "black people", instead of "whites" and "blacks". Onetwothreeip's changes have been broadly opposed by consensus (I summarized the outcome of the discussion in my comment here), but we haven't had a discussion about this particular issue of terminology, so I'll start one.

In everyday usage the terms "white people" and "black people" probably are the most common terms, but in sources that discuss this article's topic, the terms "whites" and "blacks" are more common. This is true regardless of what perspective or viewpoint the sources are taking. I've recently looked through several major secondary sources that discuss this article's topic, written from a variety of viewpoints, and here's my analysis of the terms used:

• Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns, the report published by the American Psychological Association in response to the controversy surrounding The Bell Curve, uses the terms "whites" and "blacks".
• Roth et al's paper "Ethnic group differences in cognitive ability in employment and educational settings: A meta-analysis" uses the terms "whites" and "blacks".
• Rushton and Jensen's paper "Thirty years of research on race differences in cognitive ability" uses the terms "whites" and "blacks".
• Richard Nisbett's book Intelligence and How to Get It uses the terms "whites" and "blacks".
• Earl Hunt's textbook Human Intelligence uses the terms "whites" and "African Americans" or "blacks".
• Nicholas Mackintosh's textbook IQ and Human Intelligence uses the terms "whites" and "blacks". The book includes a note on page 332 about why it uses these terms; Mackintosh explains that he uses the term "blacks" instead of "African Americans" because he is not only discussing people in the United States.
• Nisbett et al's paper Intelligence: New Findings and Theoretical Developments uses the terms "whites" and "blacks".
• James Flynn's book Are We Getting Smarter? uses the terms "whites" and "blacks".

I'll emphasize again that I deliberately chose sources representing a variety of viewpoints. The only one of these sources that argues that group differences in average IQ have a large genetic portion is the Rushton and Jensen paper, while Hunt's textbook argues that some genetic contribution is likely, but that there is not enough data to know its size. The other six sources all either think the cause is environmental, or are agnostic about the cause.

I think this article ought to reflect the terminology used in the source literature that it is citing, rather than the terms that are most common in everyday usage. I'd like to know whether others agree or disagree. For the past few days this talk page has been dominated by the relatively small group of editors who supported Onetwothreeip's changes, but I'd especially like to hear from the larger group of editors who have been opposed to those changes, and whether or not they feel differently about this question of terminology. 2600:1004:B168:DFFA:5CEA:D916:2237:DCFC (talk) 22:25, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

but we haven't had a discussion about this particular issue of terminology, so I'll start one. There has not been any consensus around particular changes. The only majority has been around "stable version" or "previous version", without discussing the particular changes. Onetwothreeip (talk) 23:21, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

• Black people and white people - Wikipedia is written in its own house style, not the style of the sources. We should use the commonly-used terms. –dlthewave ☎ 04:42, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
• I prefer ‘black people’ (or possibly ‘African-Americans’, where applicable, which is the case for most of the studies we mention) and ‘white people’; ‘blacks’ and ‘whites’ is jarring to the ears of most readers, and my own. That said, if a consensus begins to form in the other direction (to reflect the sources), my sentiments shouldn’t be cited against it. Hölderlin2019 (talk) 02:17, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

I vote for keeping whatever is most common in the academic literature. This seems to be the shorter terms. AndewNguyen (talk) 21:26, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

A change to the lede

The fact that differences in IQ scores between various population groups exist is clearly uncontroversial in the scholarly community, and I don't think I need to justify this, as most editors seem to agree with this valuation, anyway (besides, a comprehensive survey on the issue has been linked further up on the talk page which corroborates this). These differences are also the core pillar that the entire article rests on, and most of the article focuses on the possible causes of these differences. However, bizarrely, this fact is not even mentioned in the lede as it stands. Not only that, but it is actually implied by the sentence some debate as to whether and to what extent differences in intelligence test scores instead of clearly stated; if not a POV or summary issue, this is pretty clearly an error of style. For example, it would inappropriate to say that "Arsenal play in the Premier League" before specifying that Arsenal are a football team, as it would quite obviously be difficult for a reader previously unfamiliar with Arsenal to read.

Furthermore, if we take a look at the sister article History of the race and intelligence controversy, it is stated straight away that since the beginning of IQ testing around the time of World War I, there have been observed differences between average scores of different population groups..., and it is then explained that the causes of these differences are not well-understood. I propose that we implement a similar sentence in this article. My version would be something like: Since then, there have been observed differences between average IQ scores of different population groups, but whether and to what extent these differences reflect environmental factors as opposed to genetic ones, as well what the definitions of "race" and "intelligence" are, and whether they can be objectively defined, is subject of much debate. What do we think of this? ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 23:09, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

OK This change is fine with me, I don't feel strongly about it. AndewNguyen (talk) 06:52, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Looks pretty good. This lead needs work so that it summarizes the article. I think that would make it closer to a summary. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 23:20, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Absolutely agree. The entire article references differences in intelligence test scores, but the summary never establishes those differences. In the interest of clarity, I'd suggest something more direct and to the point, and using separate sentences for separate ideas:

Since the beginning of intelligence testing, some racial groups have consistently scored higher than others. The amount and cause of racial gaps in IQ scores are the subject of much debate, especially whether and to what degree the they're due to environmental and/or genetic factors. Also debated is whether "race" and "intelligence" have objective meaning, and if so, how to define them.

Elle Kpyros (talk) 23:28, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

I like that one better. Getting closer to an impartial summary of the article. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 01:47, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

I hadn't read much of this, so I read the first few paras of the body. It's extremely well written. I bet this article had an amazing lead at some time in the past. Maybe when It was trying to be a featured article. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 01:58, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Here's the FA candidate version. WP was a lot less censored back in the day! https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Race_and_intelligence&oldid=18607122 Peregrine Fisher (talk) 02:42, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

I've finally figured out when this information was removed from the lead. It was removed in this edit on 18 March 2018. Looking at the talk page archives around that time, there was no discussion of the change, so evidently there never was a consensus for it. The explanation given in the removal's edit summary also is based on an invalid reason: the assumption that the existence of group differences in average test scores is a "fringe" viewpoint. As Oldstone James explained, seeking to understand the causes of these differences is the entire foundation of the race and intelligence controversy.

The user who made that removal, Mpants at Work, is now banned from Wikipedia. If his change had been discussed and supported by many other users, the fact that the person who made it is banned wouldn't matter. But considering this is a controversial change that was supported by only one person, it might be significant that that one person is no longer part of the site.

I've argued before that the lead should include this information, and the wording I suggested was "While tests have broadly shown differences in average scores average scores between racial or ethnic groups". I would be fine with either that wording, or whichever of the other proposals here is best supported by consensus. 2600:1004:B14D:ADC1:584:563C:C19A:970F (talk) 15:33, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

We can certainly discuss the wording, however your procedural arguments don't hold much water. Unless the article was under a special restriction at the time (it wasn't), changes to the lead or any part of the article did not require prior discussion or consensus. WP:BOLD edits are encouraged and the lack of reversion or talk page discussion at the time shows that it stood unchallenged. Furthermore, MPants was an editor in good standing at the time, and the fact that they were later banned for unrelated reasons does not invalidate their previous work. Let's discuss this content on its own merits. –dlthewave ☎ 16:07, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Many large changes are made to articles that never get any discussion. This does not mean we can just show up some day and demand to revert to an arbitrary historical version. However, we can of course discuss to go back towards the prior version. 'MPants' seems a very biased editor from their history of editing. It is best to stick to academic sources for such charged topics. For this article, I think it should just be permanently locked so that these drive-by edits don't go unnoticed until months later. AndewNguyen (talk) 18:46, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

This discussion has gotten somewhat off-track. When I discovered that the editor who removed this information is now banned, and that it was removed without any discussion, I wanted to mention those things, but dlthewave and AndewNguyen are right that this has limited relevance to the present situation. What we should do in the present is discuss which of the wordings proposed here is best. Can we come to a decision about that? 2600:1004:B167:19E3:34AD:BD59:62C3:ED3C (talk) 05:39, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

@Oldstone James: I think your changes to the lead are generally an improvement, but there is an issue with this edit. The way that the lead was before, its last two paragraphs gave the history of the race and intelligence controversy from the early twentieth century up through the 1990s. Arthur Jensen's 1969 paper and The Bell Curve did not represent the scientific consensus, but they were major events in the history of this controversy. But now, the lead section gives the early history of the controversy without describing its modern history.

Perhaps the best solution is to rewrite the lead after the first paragraph. The lead section should be a concise summary of the rest of the article, but historical information only makes up a small portion of this article, so the lead appears to be giving that aspect of the topic undue weight. 2600:1004:B127:E072:E1FC:1B03:A596:DDEB (talk) 16:46, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I agree; I think the lede section past the first paragraph should be rewritten, but at this point I am short on ideas. For now, I just removed the WP:FALSEBALANCE part so that the intermediate version isn't misleading. My final edit also addressed your concerns about the completeness of the described history: as of now, only the summary of how this area of research was inaugurated and the summary of the current stance of the topic are present in the article, which is the format that many lede sections take (i.e. how X started vs how X is now). ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 16:54, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protection

El C, it seems that semi-protection was removed from this article after you full-protected it here. This is not an article that should be without semi-protection.

No need to ping me if you reply. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 02:12, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Rename to Race and IQ scores

Or similar? Race and intelligence test scores? Race and IQ? Current title is probably most accurate, but it pisses off a lot of editors. Might be able to reduce drama with a clever rename. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:37, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Using the term IQ would only help if the article stopped saying there was any correlation between it and intelligence. HiLo48 (talk) 04:53, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

If we're going to consider renaming the article, I think someone should look through the talk page archives to see whether there's an existing consensus about the article title. Individual sources have been added and removed over the years, but the article's title has stayed the same for the 18 years that it's existed, so it's highly probable that this question has been discussed before. 2600:1004:B167:19E3:34AD:BD59:62C3:ED3C (talk) 05:15, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Using the word "race" at all is highly problematic, especially given that our own (relevant) article says "race is not intrinsic to human beings but rather an identity created, often by socially dominant groups..." It's an ill-defined term. Using it in an article title will attract the racists (we know this to be true) and not help anyone learn anything. HiLo48 (talk) 05:20, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Population groups and intelligence? Self identifed race and intelligence? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 05:56, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

@Peregrine Fisher: Before we devote a lot of time to discussing what the article should be titled, could you please look through the talk page archives and see whether there's an existing consensus about the title? I would expect that there probably is. If you don't want to look, I can do so myself, but you're the person who's expressed the greatest interest in making sure the conclusions of those earlier discussions aren't forgotten about. 2600:1004:B167:19E3:34AD:BD59:62C3:ED3C (talk) 06:48, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't think going to the old consensuses will help us that much. The people who want to nuke this article from orbit don't care. Let me say it differently. It's too much work going through the old talk pages for me, and how much I think they will help. I'd love to read greatest hits like "Top 5 discussions about article name" or "top 5 discussions about Jensen's reliability" or whatnot just for fun, though. I asked a question at help desk because of something you said Wikipedia:Help_desk#Is_editing_as_an_IP_more_anonymous_than_editing_from_an_account? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 16:00, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

The word "differences" and something more specific than "intelligence" alone are needed for better precision. I would replace Intelligence with "psychometry", "intelligence testing" or (if necessary) "IQ", and Race with "race differences" or possibly "group differences". The page will be more locatable in search engines if "psychometry" is avoided, and "group differences" is a weasel-phrase unless something other than race differences is discussed on the page, so for the page as currently constituted: "Race differences in intelligence testing" or maybe "Race differences in IQ". 73.149.246.232 (talk) 06:22, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Psychometry or psychometrics are broader concepts than intelligence testing. In older texts, the entire area of IQ research was called psychometrics, this term is now used to refer to the broader field that is concerned with psychometrics as in the study of measurement of psychological variation. So, it would be very misleading to adopt this older use of the term. --AndewNguyen (talk) 06:48, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

No more misleading than the current title. HiLo48 (talk) 07:18, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Oppose I don't think this is a good idea. Consider an analogue proposal to rename pages about religion and personality to religion and personality scores, or religion and scores on NEO PI-R test. These are not sensible. While some people criticize construct validity of personality tests, and thus would perhaps object to the current titles, these are a very small minority of researchers. The same is true for intelligence tests, which have broad acceptance among researchers in psychology, and especially those who study individual differences. The surveys on this topic are already given on the page, and every textbook covers the broad agreement among researchers about features of intelligence. This kind of renaming seems to bend over backwards to a fringe view who does not accept the consensus positions on construct validity (so, a few people like Ken Richardson). AndewNguyen (talk) 06:45, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Calling the views of those who disagree with you "fringe" is pretty much a personal attack. HiLo48 (talk) 07:20, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Oppose IQ scores measure intelligence and intelligence is the WP:COMMONNAME and intelligence is what the sources are ultimately and specifically referring to.--Literaturegeek | T@1k? 07:29, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

"IQ scores measure intelligence..." I disagree. They measure the ability to do IQ tests. Given that our own article on the subject struggles to provide anything like a precise definition of intelligence, and doesn't even mention IQ tests, you have made a rather dramatic claim there. HiLo48 (talk) 07:47, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

You might disagree as much as you'd like, but that won't change the scientific consensus that IQ tests are valid and reliable estimates of intelligence. ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 16:18, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

The points you raise were understood and answered about 100 years ago at the start of psychometric research. As I wrote to you in the AfD thread (thanks for posting the link there that led me to this discussion of the title) these types of linguistic or philosophical objections aren't all that meaningful and make no difference to the scientific, political or other aspects of the discussion. The short story is that results of different types of IQ tests normalized on different populations have extremely high correlation with each other (typically about 90%), as correlated as the scores of the same person taking the same test on different days. So IQ measures something that exists independently of the test. Furthermore, this weird measurable thing happens to correlate better than any other thing we can (easily, noninvasively) measure to stuff we would expect to depend on intelligence, like academic performance and education level, as well as more biological measures like brain size and reaction time. Even more curiously, 100 years and many attempts have not succeeded in finding any other measurable quantities ("multiple intelligences", emotional intelligence, etc) that are not detected by IQ tests but have a similar IQ-like ability to quantify capacities that would be considered as part of intelligence. All of this means that IQ is good enough as an approximate quantification of the vague and multidimensional idea of intelligence, especially if we don't ask for strong conclusions about individuals but speak only of populations on average (e.g., chemistry PhD's on average have much higher IQ than the general population). 73.149.246.232 (talk) 07:15, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Oldstone James, how are you defining reliability and validity? I ask because, like this 2016 "Psychology: Themes and Variations" source, from Cengage Learning, page 281, states, "In the jargon of psychological testing, reliability refers to the measurement consistency of a test. A reliable test is one that yields similar scores upon repetition. Like other types of measuring devices, such as a stopwatch or a tire gauge, psychological tests need to be reasonably reliable (Geisinger, 2013). Estimates of reliability require the computation of correlation coefficients, which we introduced in Chapter 2. [...] Do IQ tests produce consistent results when people are retested? Yes. Most IQ tests report commendable reliability estimates. [...] In comparison with most other types of psychological tests, IQ tests are exceptionally reliable. However, like other tests, they sample behavior, and a specific testing may yield an unrepresentative score. Variations in examinees' motivation to take an IQ test or in their anxiety about the test can sometimes produce misleading scores (Duckworth et al., 2011; Hopko et al., 2005). The most common problem is that low motivation or high anxiety can drag a person's score down on a particular occasion. Although the reliability of IQ tests is excellent, caution is always in order in interpreting test scores."

The source goes on to speak of validity, noting that a test being quite reliable doesn't automatically equate to a test's validity. For example, it states, "Do intelligence tests measure what they're supposed to measure? Yes, but this answer has to be qualified very carefully. IQ tests are valid measures of the kind of intelligence necessary to do well in academic work. But if the purpose is to assess intelligence in a broader sense, the validity of IQ tests is questionable."

A number of reliable sources have characterized IQ tests as flawed. And issues with them are also noted in the "Validity of race and IQ" section. I'm someone who has consistently scored high on IQ tests, but I've also noted issues/flaws with the testing. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 22:21, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

@HiLo48: I don't think the word 'race' is too problematic in the title, albeit imprecise. Even when you use 'population', 'ethnic group' or some other word in its place, you are still talking about biological human subgroups. Although 'race' is imprecise, and comes with baggage, it alludes to a similar thing. The section about defining race itself could use editing for better explanation about its debated use ('race as subspecies', 'race as population', 'race as social construct'). Human sub-populations can be demarcated, especially in 2020 with modern genomics, and do have numerous important physiological differences on average (for example, group-specific adaptations to pathogens, diet, cold, heat, humidity, aridity, free-diving, UV radiation and high altitude). 'Intelligence' is far more poorly defined, even among individuals, and there's little accepted evidence yet about specific physiological or genetic causes for it in healthy persons. All measurements of it are from imprecise tests, like IQ, and these are highly skewed by so many environmental impacts like culture, location, illness and socioeconomics, to name but a few. 2605:8D80:668:39E9:DB8E:11E8:912F:2CD0 (talk) 07:59, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

"Human sub-populations can be demarcated, especially in 2020 with modern genomics..." They can, but they very rarely are. And IQ tests are also used very infrequently across the whole world. The chances of those who've had their genes tested also being IQ tested, in enough different places to make this testing meaningful, is negligible. HiLo48 (talk) 08:12, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

IQ and race already redirects here. Of course, you could change the word race to something less loaded too. Like Heritability. Heritability of IQ, yes - that would be an article worth writing. Hmm. -- Sirfurboy (talk) 08:09, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Oppose The article presents other methods than just IQ testing that estimate intelligence, including Nobel Prize attainment and educational achievement. Furthermore, it is the overwhelming scientific consensus that IQ tests are reliable and valid measurements of intelligence, so this specification is unwarranted. ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 15:59, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Could you point out where "Nobel Prize attainment" is mentioned in the article? –dlthewave ☎ 04:37, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Do we like these new changes?

I think we should undo them and discuss. Personally, I do not think they are an improvement. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Race_and_intelligence&diff=939824890&oldid=939822978 Peregrine Fisher (talk) 23:45, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Why? –dlthewave ☎ 23:47, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

WP:IDONTLIKEIT. Onetwothreeip (talk) 23:58, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

We just had a discussion last month about how it's disruptive to try to make large changes to this article by edit warring. Being bold is acceptable, but after Dlthewave's changes were undone they shouldn't have been restored multiple times. The earlier discussion was specifically about Onetwothreeip trying to do the same thing in an earlier sequence of edits (and he has also been criticized for doing the same thing on other articles), so he has no excuse for repeating the same behavior again.

Since you asked what's wrong with these changes, though, I'll provide one example. This edit removed the statement that the publication of The Bell Curve revived the public debate over race and intelligence, and changed the section title from "The Bell Curve debate" to "Mainstream Science on Intelligence". While it would be better to cite a secondary source instead of citing The Bell Curve itself, it's completely uncontroversial that this book's publication revived the race and intelligence debate in the 1990s, and this is also mentioned in the History of the race and intelligence controversy article. Thus, there's no reason to remove that statement. The new title of that section also is misleading, because Mainstream Science on Intelligence was only one of several responses to the controversy over The Bell Curve, and not even the most prominent response. (That distinction belongs to Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns.)

That's one example of why these changes are not an improvement. However, I can't explain the problem with every change, because these recent edits removed over a dozen citations all at once. As previously happened in December, this involved removing a large amount of material that had been in the article for years. It isn't reasonable to make that many changes to long-established content at once, and then demand a consensus opposing each individual change before it can be undone. 2600:1004:B11A:7B56:3CC6:3B68:B761:EAB6 (talk) 01:47, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

IDON'TLIKEIT is when you don't have policies, guidelines, globabl consensus, and local consensus on your side. I have all those things backing my edits. You have none of them. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 01:55, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

2600, we do actually need a source stating that The Bell Curve sparked a debate. The mainstream view, as shown by Mainstream Science on Intelligence, is that someone published a fringe view and multiple academics reiterated the mainstream position; there is no sign of an academic debate or disagreement among mainstream authors.

When we cover multiple points of view, we use secondary sources or reviews that discuss these views from a mainstream perspective. Per WP:MEDREV, if all we have is "X said A, Y said B" (sourced to X and Y), we shouldn't include the content at all. Feel free to add secondary sources to support these sections, but remember that there's no deadline and others are under no obligation to slow their pace just to make things easier for you. –dlthewave ☎ 02:12, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

2600, none of what you are saying justifies the previous versions that you prefer. What was removed was far more than simply saying The Bell Curve "revived the public debate". Obviously that book is not a reliable source for describing the book's impact. There has not been consensus to retain the content I have removed.

@Dlthewave: Mainstream Science on Intelligence was very much not mainstream science. Onetwothreeip (talk) 02:22, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Oof, that was quite the oversight on my part! (Which seems to be the intent of the title) –dlthewave ☎ 02:45, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

The mainstream reaction to Mainstream Science on Intelligence, and the reaction to The Bell Curve and other Pioneer Fund-related claims, happens to be opposed to those conclusions. Onetwothreeip (talk) 02:53, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Dlthewave, I think you've unintentionally proven my point with your misunderstanding about the nature of the "Mainstream Science on Intelligence" statement. It was an editorial signed by 52 researchers in intelligence and related fields, defending most (but not all) of the conclusions of The Bell Curve, and arguing that these conclusions were entirely mainstream within psychology. The subsequent report from the American Psychological Association bears this out: on most scientific questions the APA report reached the same conclusions that "Mainstream Science on Intelligence" did, although it had a different emphasis.

The signatories of "Mainstream Science on Intelligence" included Thomas J. Bouchard, John B. Carroll, Hans Eysenck, Richard Haier, Alan S. Kaufman, John C. Loehlin, David Lubinski, Robert Perloff, Robert Plomin, and Sandra Scarr. All of these were or are among the most prominent researchers in their fields, and Bouchard, Loehlin, and Perloff were among the task force chosen by the American Psychological Association to author the APA's statement in response to the controversy. This certainly qualifies as "academic debate or disagreement among mainstream authors".

The source that History of the race and intelligence controversy cites for The Bell Curve having revived the race and intelligence debate page 440-441 in David Hothersall's book History of Psychology. I don't own a copy of that book, but I can see from the snippet view at Google books that these pages of the book do indeed discuss The Bell Curve and the various responses to it. This is beside the point, though. I brought up this particular edit because you and Onetwothreeip complained that others weren't being specific about their objections, but it isn't possible to have this sort of detailed discussion about every one of your changes when you make changes faster than they can be discussed. This is why you need to justify your changes one at a time, instead of making dozens at once and then trying to shift the burden of discussion to other editors.

Also, now that the article is semi-protected again, it isn't possible for me to edit it directly. 2600:1004:B11A:7B56:3CC6:3B68:B761:EAB6 (talk) 03:13, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

...And while I was typing that comment, you just made several dozen more undiscussed removals. Are you unable to see what's wrong with this approach to editing? You evidently won't allow your changes to be undone unless other editors can point out what's wrong with each one of them, but I think you know very well that this is an impossible demand. 2600:1004:B11A:7B56:3CC6:3B68:B761:EAB6 (talk) 03:22, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

All of these were or are among the most prominent researchers in their fields. Certainly not, unless you're arguing that things like gay conversion therapy are mainstream. This list is not representative of anything mainstream or prominent, and includes researchers linked to Pioneer Fund and other notorious groups. Onetwothreeip (talk) 03:25, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Hans Eysenck is listed by Haggbloom et al. as the third most eminent psychologist of the twentieth century. Raymond Cattell, who also signed the statement, is seventh. Please, stop wasting everyone's else's time with this kind of ignorance.2600:1004:B11A:7B56:3CC6:3B68:B761:EAB6 (talk) 03:40, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Hans Eysenck was supported by Pioneer Fund and his connections to far-right politics are well documented, including on Wikipedia. Likewise, Raymond Cattell was a supporter of eugenics. Quoting somebody called "Haggbloom" to plead eminence is not going to get you anywhere. Onetwothreeip (talk) 04:01, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

• The subject of this page does not belong to Medicine because Race (human classification) does not belong to medicine. WP:MEDRS is irrelevant here. Using publications by experts in WSJ (an RS) is OK. This (edit summary) is not a valid justification. Perhaps undue? But I do not see why. My very best wishes (talk) 02:20, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Per WP:RSEDITORIAL, editorials are "reliable primary sources for statements attributed to that editor or author". This is the same primary source issue that affects many other passages which were removed, i.e. we can't use the source itself as evidence of its own significance or reliability. This holds true in non-medical topics as well. –dlthewave ☎ 02:50, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Like I just stated here at WP:Med, "In addition to what RexxS stated, human intelligence does fall under the topic of neuroscience, which is why the talk page for the Human intelligence article is tagged with WP:WikiProject Neuroscience. WikiProject Neuroscience is one of WP:Med's related projects, and we (those who are familiar with WP:MEDRS and adhere to it) do use use WP:MEDRS-compliant sources for neuroscience topics." Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 00:06, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Treating IQ tests as MEDRS verges on gaslighting. "Intelligence" in this article means psychometric tests such as IQ. There are medical applications of such tests, such as in diagnosing brain injuries, but none of that has anything to do with the material in the article. The WP:MEDRS restrictions on sources are to prevent indirectly giving bad medical advice or endorsing non-mainstream views on clinical medicine. There is no such medical hazard in an article predominantly about IQ tests and there has been a user abusing MEDRS as a pretext to vandalize the article, possibly to align with the AfD proposal. 73.149.246.232 (talk) 06:39, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

• Of course it's an improvement.

Almost every time this article gets any attention from the larger Wikipedia community, (of from outside Wikipedia for that matter) it becomes clear that the article is a hot mess which needs serious attention. So why are a handful of editors' fighting tooth-and-nail to preserve it the way it is? If every single improvement is going to be filibustered, the article will remain an embarrassment and blight on Wikipedia's coverage of social sciences.

"Mainstream" was intensely controversial when it was released, over twenty-five years ago. More of the people Gottfredson asked to sign it declined or outright refused than signed, for many valid reasons. Eysenck was cited so often because he was so controversial. People cited him specifically to challenge his work, or to discuss other people who challenged his work, etc. Being well-cited isn't a "high score" in the game of reliability, good lord... This letter was not the mainstream, even based on this flawed metric. That letter is a historical relic which could not be said to be a fair summary of the topic at the time, and is especially obsolete now. But of course, that's precisely the point, isn't it? By dragging this out and making it about some specific bit of minutia, the flawed, functionally racist status quo is preserved. Any attempt at doing the actual work needed to improve the article can be reverted based on a legalistic interpretation of WP:BRD or similar. By shouting the loudest, the WP:FRINGE dominate the discussion and drive-away anyone who would otherwise bother to tackle this rat's nest. Grayfell (talk) 03:47, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Among psychologists, the largest reason Eysenck is eminent is because of his highly influential criticism of the efficacy of psychoanalysis. (See this article: [2]) If you call that being controversial, well, I suppose it's controversial among people who think that psychoanalysis works, but with respect to psychoanalysis Eysenck's position in the mainstream one.

It is incredibly ironic that you would object to us wanting these huge changes to not be made without consensus. Are you aware of how ironic that is? You and I have interacted before, so I'm familiar with your favorite revert reasons. Here are a few examples from your recent edit history:

• [3] "No. The burden is on you, here. Gain consensus on talk, if absolutely necessary. See WP:BRD"

• [4] "WP:BRD. Again, the burden is on you to gain consensus for these changes. Do not restore until you have consensus"

• [5] "Revert. Lacks consensus"

• [6] "No consensus."

• [7] "That's not how consensus works, you need to establish consensus to change the article. See WP:BRD."

In terms of content, there actually are a few of the recent changes that I don't disapprove of, but I do disapprove of them being made in a way so that it's virtually impossible to discuss them. Considering how often you give this as a revert reason, Grayfell, you could say that we've taken a page out of your book. Except that in your case, this is only a valid revert reason when undoing changes that you disagree with, right? 2600:1004:B11A:7B56:3CC6:3B68:B761:EAB6 (talk) 05:28, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

• This issue has been brought up at ANI, discussion can be found here. –dlthewave ☎ 03:53, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

• Here is edit in question. No, I do not think this large-scale deletion was an improvement because the content is clearly relevant for the page and seem to be well sourced. I am not convinced by the arguments above. For example, a letter by a group of scientists published in WSJ would be clearly an appropriate source here. Many other removals were simply not explained on the talk page. The diffs above are about other pages. My very best wishes (talk) 20:22, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

This is wrong, as it was not well sourced. Few of these sources are properly summarized, and we do not assume that just because a cite template can be slapped on the end of a sentence it must be preserved. As an example from your diff, the first removed paragraph says nothing at all about the topic. The sentence The article was followed by a series of responses, some in support, some critical is so vague as to be almost meaningless. The paragraph merely documents the existence of other sources, which were somehow connected to a specific book published a two decades earlier. One of those sources is a primary "response" published via Bentham Open, which is about as fringey as it gets. We are not summarizing these sources, and we are not providing any context for these sources, therefore it doesn't belong in this article. We cannot merely list the existence of sources and assume that's good enough. This would be lazy encyclopedia writing. Grayfell (talk) 00:25, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

That was a lot of removals. OK, let' take a look at the last one [8]. Why do you think that was poorly sourced, improperly summarized or undue on the page? My very best wishes (talk) 02:38, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

See my previous comment about why "X said A, Y said B" statements are not appropriate when sourced only to X and Y. Instead of synthesizing multiple primary sources to build a narrative, these passages need to be based on secondary reviews that discuss the context and relevance of both X and Y. This complies with our WP:RS policy of using reliable secondary sources. –dlthewave ☎ 02:45, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Yeh, after looking more carefully at the last removal, it seems to it be justified, even though the content was well sourced. However, it would take a lot more time to actually study these sources and to make a really qualified judgement; I do not have it, sorry. Given that, I would rather not comment on this subject any longer. My very best wishes (talk) 03:04, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

In that last diff, I don't object to the removals of the first two paragraphs, but I do object to the blanking of the "mental chronometry" section. The section is somewhat poorly written, but mental chronometry is a major topic in research about race and intelligence, and is discussed by most sources that give overviews of this subject. If this article were to exclude any discussion of mental chronometry, that would be a problematic omission. We should work to improve that section, not get rid of it entirely. 2600:1004:B161:2F08:B96A:F343:A976:AD16 (talk) 04:15, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

"Too long" tag

Regarding the "too long" tag that was recently added, make sure that what is being considered is readable prose size. This is per WP:SIZE. I don't see that any more content needs to be split into separate articles. There is enough debate about this article. So to create another spin-off article? No. There are enough spin-off articles and the article already employs WP:Summary style. If more trimming is needed, then do that. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 02:18, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't think the current version is too long. But if needed, one can trim some sections and link to existing pages, or move sections to their own pages. --AndewNguyen (talk) 13:50, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

I dont think its necessarily too long, but it needs a massive series of edits to conform with WP:MOS (citations for example). Lets start with the really big problems and then we can work on the small ones like it being too long, I’d start with WP:NOTJOURNAL as edits to conform with that would cut down the length and make the page readable as an encyclopedia entry which it currently isn’t. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 19:28, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

The entire article might be deleted within the next week, so at this stage there's a risk that any effort we put into improving it could turn out to be for nothing. You can try to improve the article in the present if you want to, but I think it would be more prudent to work on that after the deletion discussion has been resolved, if the article still exists then. 2600:1004:B12A:FAE4:2DE5:34FC:A221:A38B (talk) 02:41, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Editing of article to support Delete outcome in current Afd thread

I've restored the section title, because the edit broke a link posted in the AfD page.

Completely off topic; this page is for discussing improvements to the article, not user behavior.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
This article has been the subject of an active AfD deletion proposal as of 3 Feb 2020. That discussion is ongoing and has not reached consensus, and there is very much the possibility that the article will be kept (e.g., previous attempts at deletion failed, votes for Keep outnumber those for Delete, and the argued reasons for deletion keep mutating as earlier versions are met with rebuttals). Two of the editors lobbying for deletion in that AfD discussion, Dlthewave and Onetwothreeip, have in the past few days begun a campaign of numerous edits, deleting massive amounts of material, apparently in order to fit the AfD arguments for deletion. (Some of the editors arguing in the opposite direction, to Keep, have also edited, but only to revert some of the large deletions, and the result of the edit-warring is still that massive deletions have been made). For instance, the main argument in the AfD is that the material in this article is subsumed in History of the race and intelligence controversy. This is arguably false; there is a clean split of the two articles, with Race and intelligence containing various data and arguments about the race differences in IQ, and the History article containing very little or none of that data and merely talking about the political controversy surrounding various publications and professors connected to the subject. However, after the recent destructive edits, there is now considerably less differentiation between the two articles. Likewise, one of the arguments for Keep was that a lot of material has been accumulated here in the 16 years the article has existed, but if there are wholesale deletions then of course that is less true. Several of these destructive edits have been made in bad faith by Dlthewave under the pretext of applying WP:MEDREV, a stricter standard that applies to medical articles to avoid issues of "bad medical advice", a standard he has demanded be imposed on the Race & Intelligence article so as to better censor it. R&I is obviously a non-medical topic, and the MEDREV standard does not apply, as people have pointed out to Dlthewave. This did not deter the edits. Clearly editors currently lobbying to delete an article have a conflict of interest WP:CoI and should not be editing the article while the AfD conversation is ongoing, let alone manipulating the article as a WP:TAGTEAM so as to make the article appear more deletion-worthy. More generally anyone active in the AfD discussion should temporarily avoid significant edits on the article. I do not know what sanctions or remedies are available for such behavior, but at a minimum any contributor to the AfD discussion should stop editing the article while the AfD is live. As there have been only minor edits other than the tag-team destruction, I propose to return the article to the version of 3 Feb 2020 at the moment of its AfD nomination and lock it in some fashion until AfD discussion is over: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Race_and_intelligence&oldid=938929865 https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Race_and_intelligence&action=history 73.149.246.232 (talk) 07:05, 9 February 2020 (UTC) There is very much the possibility that the article will be kept. Unlikely, as many of the !votes to keep are a result of off-wiki canvassing. Dlthewave and Onetwothreeip, have in the past few days begun a campaign of numerous edits, deleting massive amounts of material, apparently in order to fit the AfD arguments for deletion. This theory is absurd. None of my edits make the article more likely to be deleted or for more editors to agree the article should be deleted. There is virtually no precedent for an article being deleted as a result of edits made during a deletion discussion. The article was proposed to be deleted by someone else entirely, not Dlthewave or myself. For instance, the main argument in the AfD is that the material in this article is subsumed in History of the race and intelligence controversy. That is not an argument to delete the article. The argument is that the content in that particular article (and other articles) is better than this article at doing what this article is supposed to be for. Editors currently lobbying to delete an article have a COI. You have not demonstrated what the conflict of interest concerns, but it seems you are using this term incorrectly. Let alone manipulating the article as a WP:TAGTEAM. I have never heard of Dlthewave until today. Any contributor to the AfD discussion should stop editing the article while the AfD is live. Editors are allowed to improve articles that are the subject of deletion discussions, and this is actually encouraged. Onetwothreeip (talk) 07:24, 9 February 2020 (UTC) When the votes did not go in favor of deletion, we got walls of text from the Delete proposer explaining that it's not actually a matter of votes, just the arguments. Now you want to count the votes after deleting the ones for Keep and any arguments made along with those votes, on the grounds they are "canvassed" (maybe Russia did it?). As others have just pointed out to you, your (and DltW) flurry of edits happen to erase the distinction between this article and the one you say subsumes it, and a lack of distinction is exactly the main reason currently given for deletion. Your edits removed the stuff that this article was doing better than the other one (since the other did not have it at all), thus supporting deletion. It is a COI (though not the more common kind such as a financial interest) to lobby for deletion while making the article better fit the proposed reasons for deletion. And whether or not you consider it COI it is a manipulation of the AfD decision process insofar as some people coming to look at the articles will see only the modified version. You don't need to have heard of anyone to effectively function as a tag team. The Keep and Delete sides of the AfD discussion are two sides of a tug of war on the AfD page, which is fine, but an edit war by the same people on the article during the AfD is neither "improving the article" nor OK as a procedure. Imposing your POV when that is the very topic of the AfD is not "improving" anything. If you want to fix spelling and grammar errors or the like, sure, go ahead. Not delete entire sections just based on IDONTLIKEIT that happens to coordinate with the deletion debate.73.149.246.232 (talk) 08:10, 9 February 2020 (UTC) The delete proposer you are referring to would be correct to say that. I am not an administrator and will not be counting votes. Whatever you are referring to as "the distinction" between this article and any other article, that has plainly not been erased. The removed content was not doing anything better than any other article. What you are describing is not a conflict of interest or a manipulation of any process. I have not made any POV edits or anything "to coordinate with the deletion debate". Onetwothreeip (talk) 08:19, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm happy to have the conversation moved into a hidden-archive, if anything it improves the appearance of the talk page. But I do dispute the description of the material as not about the article --- it described vandalism of the article, proposed reverting to earlier versions, and two other editors apparently agreed with this, leading to the current state of the article, reversing the destructive edits. The reversion is an "improvement of the article" which is what the talk page is for. 73.149.246.232 (talk) 10:27, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

I have to disagree on multiple counts. First the edits weren't "vandalism" that term is narrowly defined to include only edits intended to defeat Wikipedia's purpose, which those were not. You may dislike them but that does not make them vandalism. Second, the hatted content was clearly a violation of WP:FOC, there's sometimes a a bit of room given on talk pages in borderline cases, but the above was clearly beyond that, and should've been moved to either user talk pages or an appropriate location to discuss user conduct. Discussing which version of the article is appropriate is fine, but the hatted content went well beyond that. 74.73.230.72 (talk) 13:09, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Section headings must be neutral, so I've changed it per WP:TALKNEW. Doug Weller talk 13:46, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Deletion review

I have initiated a deletion review of the recent AfD of this article. Please see: Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2020 February 12#Race and intelligence. Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 04:14, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

The causes of differences in IQ test scores are still not well-understood

Current version: With regard to later research, observed phenomena such as the Flynn effect have also suggested that environmental factors play a greater role in group IQ differences than previously expected.

The causes of differences in IQ test scores are not well-understood, and the topic remains controversial among researchers.

My proposal: With regard to later research More recently, observed phenomena such as the Flynn effect have also suggested that environmental factors play a greater role in group IQ differences than previously expected.

The causes of differences in IQ test scores are still not well-understood, and the topic remains controversial among researchers.

Rationale: The last two paragraphs are meant to be a summary of the historical evolution of the topic of race and intelligence; the penultimate paragraph is meant to summarise the historical views on the matter, while the last paragraph is meant to outline the scholarly community's current position. In the current version, without an indicator of currency such as "still" or "currently", these roles of the two paragraphs aren't clear, and the structure hence seems arbitrary; the last paragraph looks out of place due to being disconnected from the previous paragraph. User Grayfell has argued that the introduction of such an indicator somehow makes the sentence "the causes of differences in IQ test scores are not well-understood" imply that the exact causes will eventually be found (which, to me, is a fair assumption, as I highly doubt that with testing technology as advanced as it will be in, say, a 1000 years, we will be unable to answer such relatively simple questions as the causes of differences in IQ scores, but that's beside the point); to be honest, I am a bit confused as to their line of thought, but it can be easily rebutted by taking a look at other articles with similar phrasings, e.g. in Dialysis disequilibrium syndrome#Causes.

Similarly, due to the second paragraph being a summary of important historical studies into the matter, without a clear indicator of time such as "more recently", the sentence on phenomena such as the Flynn effect looks out of place. If the word "recently" poses such a big problem for user Flyer22 Frozen, perhaps we could rephrase the sentence into Phenomena revealed by later research such as the Flynn effect....

What do the two users involved, both of whom have asked me not to ping them, as well as other editors think? ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 02:47, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure you've already been asked to be more succinct. That was good advice, and you should take it.

Your description of your own assumption as "fair" is both loaded and irrelevant. Clearly your opinion of the purpose of these summaries is contested by multiple editors, so you cannot dictate the content by assuming a specific purpose.

Per many sources, and many, many past discussions, the underlying premise of this difference is hotly disputed. We cannot assume that a contested premise will eventually be resolved in time, whether one year or a thousand. No question can be presumed to have an answer, especially not one as nuanced and contentious as this one. If you do not understand my line of thought it is comical and insulting to assert that it can be "easily rebutted".

Comparing something which is as hotly disputed as this topic to a specific medical issue is pseudoscientific. Not everything needs to be exactly the same as everything else, because context is important. Grayfell (talk) 03:35, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't really see the need in your aggressive approach, but you do you, I guess. A bit more frustrating is that I have specifically bracketed a particular sentence out, made it small, and categorised it as "beside the point", all to make absolutely sure that it isn't read as a point that shouldn't be addressed, and yet you manage to do exactly that, and only that. As with my previous interactions with you, I have to doubt whether you are being genuine here, or whether you've just scribbled something up so that you can put this diff on WP:AN as supposed evidence that you've tried to discuss the issue on the talk page.

Anyway, I'll assume good faith and continue the discussion. I'll just address your point that "we cannot assume that a contested premise will eventually be resolved in time", because it is the point to address, irrelevant though it is: the premise that there are differences in IQ scores according to some studies is not contested; even if those studies have been conducted based on poor methodology, their results still show IQ differences. So far, it has not yet been determined what exactly causes these differences, as per APA. So there is no false premise that there are differences, if that's what you're saying.

And, finally, a more important point which you haven't addressed: consider the sentence "nuclear fusion has been touted to have become commonplace by the 70s, 80s, and 90s; needless to say, in 2020, it still isn't commonplace" and tell me whether you think there is an implication that nuclear fusion will eventually become commonplace here. ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 15:51, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

The use of the Flynn effect to question causes of group gaps is not a new idea ("With regard to later research"). It goes all the way back to Flynn's original contributions in the 1980s. Flynn was trying to reply to Jensen's arguments about the causes of the gap, and in doing so discovered the Flynn effect:

Mill closes by claiming that those who favor sanctions have presumptions to infallibility or absolute certainty. They are so sure of their position they are willing to use power to ensure that no case for another opinion is ever to be heard throughout the entire course of human history. This kind of ban is far more serious than it might seem. To kill an idea is to forfeit all rewards that may flow from reaction to that idea. If I had not read about Arthur Jensen and his research, with its emphasis on IQ and the general intelligence factor, I would never have documented massive IQ grain over time, or urged a revolution in the theory of intelligence, or connected cognitive gains and moral gains, or cooperated with Bill Dickens to formulate the Dickens/Flynn model, which unifies phenomena from the dynamics of cognitive development to the results of interventions. There are actually people who are still alive“because”of Jensen: those on death row who were proved to be mentally retarded thanks to application of the Flynn effect to their IQ test scores. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AndewNguyen (talk • contribs) 16:47, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Global variation of IQ scores

I've removed the Global variation of IQ scores section. My rationale is that this section is off topic because it deals with differences in IQ scores between nations, not "races". Please discuss any concerns here. –dlthewave ☎ 03:31, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

I reverted. I haven't seen you actually wanting to improve the article. You seem to just want to destroy it. But if some editors who are not in favor of destroying this article think you did a good thing, I would abide by that no problem. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:44, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

The content if off-topic. Separately, I haven't seen you actually wanting to improve the article. You seem to just want to destroy it. is contrary to Wikipedia:Focus on content not contributor. I recommend self-reverting. --K.e.coffman (talk) 03:51, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

I support Peregrine Fisher's restoration of this content. dlthewave, it's not off topic, as it's talking about "patterns of difference between continental populations similar to those associated with race". There are clearly meaningful differences in racial/ethnic composition between many of the world's nations. Jweiss11 (talk) 03:52, 15 February 2020 (UTC)