Talk:Race and intelligence

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 political orientation of a scientist has nothing to do with the quality of their science. Stop this nonsense. The POV bias in your statements is a blatant violation of Wikipedia's core principles. --Toomim (talk) 07:47, 18 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: [1]) 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:

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

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

• [4] "Revert. Lacks consensus"

• [5] "No consensus."

• [6] "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 [7]. 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)

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)

This guy and 123 think the way to help this article is to remove 5000kb chunks from it, one chunk after another. I just call em as I see em. I don't remember you. You may not be aware of these shenanigans. Check the history if you're interested. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:57, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

If you have an issue with a particular contributor's editing, the place to raise these concerns is on their user talk page or at an appropriate admin noticeboard. This is not what article talk pages are for. --K.e.coffman (talk) 04:22, 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)

If you were to look at the sources for that section, you would see that a large portion of them discuss nationality and race in combination with one another. There's a significant amount of overlap between the source literature about race and intelligence and the source literature about international difference in test scores, which is why it's appropriate for international differences to be mentioned in this article. 2600:1004:B14C:A0C6:64AD:3A01:C6B4:B236 (talk) 03:53, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

If that us truly the case, then perhaps you would be willing to rewrite the section with a focus on the "Race and Intelligence" topic. The section should not be retained in its current state. –dlthewave ☎ 04:06, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

It's already focused on the topic: "patterns of difference between continental populations similar to those associated with race". Jweiss11 (talk) 04:10, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

similar to those associated with race -- according to whom? --K.e.coffman (talk) 04:22, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

K.e.coffman, anyone who uses common sense and/or skims the demographic summaries of the various nations around the world? Jweiss11 (talk) 05:45, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Thats a very bad argument. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 06:04, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

There are three reasons for me to not rewrite that section.

1: The article is semi-protected, so only registered users can edit it.

2: Even if it weren't, I'd like to wait until the DRV is resolved before putting a lot of effort into improving the article, because our efforts might be a waste of time if the article ends up being deleted.

3: It isn't entirely clear what it is that you're objecting to in that section. The pattern of international differences in test scores is that the countries with the highest average scores are Japan, China, Singapore, and South Korea, and the countries with the lowest average scores tend to be countries in sub-Saharan Africa, with European countries in between. This mirrors the pattern of average test scores among Asian Americans, white Americans and African Americans in the United States. This is what the article means when it refers to "patterns of difference between continental populations similar to those associated with race". Are you suggesting the section should be more specific that the average scores of nations tend to align with the average scores of populations with ancestry from those regions, and therefore the question of the causes of both types of difference are part of the same debate? 2600:1004:B14C:A0C6:64AD:3A01:C6B4:B236 (talk) 04:40, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

The sources were unreliable and the section was undue. Onetwothreeip (talk) 07:19, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Wasn't it just explained to you a few days ago that you shouldn't be attempting to strip massive amounts of content out of the article while the DRV is underway? The previous time you tried to do this was when the article was at AFD rather than DRV, but the same principle applies. 2600:1004:B10A:3B8D:688D:3BC5:92A1:5CF6 (talk) 10:58, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

That's not a rule. –dlthewave ☎ 13:17, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

@Oldstone James: You've reinstated this section without discussing it [8]. Please join us here. –dlthewave ☎ 15:08, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

As per Jweiss and 2600, I think the relevance of this section to the article is pretty clear. Also, as per my edsum, some geographical areas, such as sub-Saharan Africa, are populated predominantly by members of one race, so this section would be relevant even if "patterns of difference between continental populations" weren't "similar to those associated with race". ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 15:11, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Yes, several editors have asserted that there is clear or self-evident connection between geography and race, but no source has been provided. The section only discusses geography not race. Do you have a reliable source that supports this? –dlthewave ☎ 15:22, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

This is discussed in chapter 11 of Earl Hunt's textbook. With respect to the higher average scores of both East Asian countries and Asian Americans, Hunt says "The US results are mirrored on the international scene" (page 421). With respect to the data from African Americans and from countries in sub-Saharan Africa, Hunt presents these two lines of data several pages apart, but when discussing the worldwide distribution of scores from all countries, he mentions on page 439 that one hypothesis to explain these differences is due to "differences in the racial composition of the national and regional population". Hunt argues that this hypothesis "cannot be ruled out", but also that it "goes far beyond the data". Then on pages 446-447, he argues that the most important factor in causing the lower average scores of both Africans Americans and countries in sub-Saharan Africa is their limited access to schooling and social opportunities. This source is a good example of how in academic sources about race and intelligence, the data from international comparisons and from ethnic groups within a country often are presented together, with the author suggesting that both types of difference have similar causes.

Nicholas Mackintosh takes a similar approach with the section of his own textbook titled "National or ethnic differences", which discusses both types of difference in combination. I've focused on Earl Hunt's book because it seems to be more highly-regarded of the two sources, but they are both high-quality secondary sources. Both of these sources bring up international differences in the context of discussing race and intelligence, so the Wikipedia article should reflect the source literature in this regard. 2600:1004:B15D:697F:F1AB:F59B:5A3B:897D (talk) 17:13, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

By the way, this material has been in the article for something like a decade. Before removing it and demanding that others provide sources to justify its inclusion, why can't you look in the talk page archives to see whether a similar objection has been made before? It probably has been, and it's disrespectful of others' time for you to demand that others re-explain things that probably have been explained on this page many times over. 2600:1004:B15D:697F:F1AB:F59B:5A3B:897D (talk) 17:24, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying. From your description, using Hunt to support a connection between race, nation and intelligence is a shaky proposition to say the least; it seems that these are similar phenomena but not connected phenomena. In other words, just because the claimed racial and regional differences are thought to have similar environmental causes doesn't mean that they're associated with each other. Even if we did have solid sourcing to support this section, we would need to rewrite it to clarify the relevance to this topic. In its current state it is off-topic and should, in my opinion, be removed until someone rewrites it. By the way an unregistered user can suggest changes/rewrites on the talk page as you've been doing or register an account to directly edit the semi-protected page. –dlthewave ☎ 18:18, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

I see we've found the person who didn't look through the archives before posting. The relevance of Global variation of IQ scores to this article doesn't seem to have been discussed in detail and certainly hasn't been explained many times over.

Demanding that others justify their claims is indeed how things work around here. The onus to provide sourcing rests on those wishing to include the content. –dlthewave ☎ 18:18, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

By "associated" or "connected", I assume you mean whether or not there is a direct causal relation between the two types of difference, but that isn't relevant to whether the section belongs in the article. On a topic as controversial as race and intelligence, we can't base the article structure on a judgment about what causal relations do or don't exist, because there is a vast amount of disagreement among sources in that area. What we should do is try to present the topic in a similar way to how it's presented in secondary sources. As I just explained, two of the most important secondary sources about race and intelligence include international differences as part of their discussion, so that should be an adequate reason for the Wikipedia article to also include a discussion of those differences.

However, if you need a source that argues there is a causal relationship between race differences and international differences, Rindermann's Cognitive Capitalism makes that argument on pages 287-323. 2600:1004:B15D:697F:F1AB:F59B:5A3B:897D (talk) 19:09, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Heiner Rindermann is certainly not a reliable secondary source, and neither was Earl Hunt. Making the implication that national differences are the same or similar to racial differences is improper synthesis and can't be included in the article. Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:25, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Hunt's and Rindermann's books both were published by Cambridge University Press. Please remember what multiple other editors have told you about your WP:IDHT attitude: you have been making this argument for the past two months both here and at the RS noticeboard, and in both places no one else has agreed with you that these aren't reliable sources. The reason I'm replying to you is that I don't want you to think my lack of response gives you license to continue edit warring to remove the section, but I'm not going to re-explain this principle about sources to you yet again. 2600:1004:B15D:697F:F1AB:F59B:5A3B:897D (talk) 21:45, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

It is not the publisher in this case that is unreliable, it is the authors themselves. Wikipedia policy excludes using unreliable authors as sources for content. Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:51, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

There are plenty of sources for global variation in IQs (national IQs). Even some people who aren't intelligence researchers have been publishing on this. For instance, 2018 The Lancet paper, or the World Bank in 2019 (only a preprint), or this review about national IQs in the journal International Journal of Developmental Disabilities (2017). A few economists have been using national IQ data for over a decade, e.g. this 2006 paper, or this 2014 follow up. One can easily find many more. AndewNguyen (talk) 13:37, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

To summarize the discussion:

• Keep: Editor wants to destroy the article; continental and racial differences are "similar"; sources discuss race and nationality; the connection between race and nationality is "common sense; mass content removal shouldn't take place during DRV; some geographical areas are predominantly populated by a single race; content has been in the article for a decade; editor should have checked talk archives for prior discussion before removing; plenty of sources exist.

• Remove: Off topic (discusses nationality, not IQ); content is undue and supported by unreliable sources.

Many of the "keep" points are focused on editor behavior or cite nonexistent policies. Although the race-nationality connection is apparently discussed by several sources, the degree to which they actually make the connection and the reliability of the sources are questionable. Most importantly, the section in its current state does not actually discuss the relevance to this topic and nobody is willing to rewrite it. Based on this assessment, I will remove the section and provide a link to the current version in case anyone would like to rewrite it in the future. –dlthewave ☎ 03:28, 26 February 2020 (UTC) Removed section can be found here. –dlthewave ☎ 03:29, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Spearman's Hypothesis section

Oldstone James has reinstated challenged content [9], so let's discuss it. I'll concede that there's some disagreement on the question of MEDRS. At Wikiproject Medicine, editors made compelling arguments that this falls under the biomedical topic of neuroscience, so I felt comfortable citing the guideline in this case. The portion of MEDRS I cited states "Controversies or uncertainties in medicine should be supported by reliable secondary sources describing the varying viewpoints. Primary sources should not be aggregated or presented without context in order to undermine proportionate representation of opinion in a field. If material can be supported by either primary or secondary sources – the secondary sources should be used. Primary sources may be presented together with secondary sources. Although this is specific to medical topics, it also mirrors WP:SCHOLARSHIP which is part of our Reliable Sources guideline which applies to all content. In general we should not be presenting primary-source arguments side-by-side; we should be relying on secondary sources that analyze the disagreement. A section that consists entirely of contradicting primary-source statements does not belong in the article. –dlthewave ☎ 15:06, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Note how even WP:MERDS states that primary sources shouldn't be aggregated "context in order to undermine proportionate representation of opinion in a field". The current section doesn't do that; instead, it describes the views of proponents followed by the opponents' challenges of these views. No statement is made about the general validity of this hypothesis, and the sources aren't skewed towards either view, so I don't think WP:MERDS applies here. Besides, there is an independent article dedicated to Spearman's hypothesis, so it is worth at least mentioning it in the article under a dedicated subsection. If you aren't satisfied with the way that it is presented in the article, you are free to propose an alternative version, but I honestly don't see any problem with it. ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 15:20, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Giving bias to one viewpoint or another isn't limited to making explicit statements about their validity; simply giving equal article space to two opposing views can give undue weight to the minority view. Presenting these views without analysis or context is exactly the problem that I'm talking about. We need to be using secondary sources to assess these viewpoints. Relying on primary sources to this extent, even if they are reliable, is counter to Wikipedia policies. Surely you can see the sourcing problem here? –dlthewave ☎ 16:45, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Well, in that case, we should look for secondary sources instead of deleting the entire section. To me, the section doesn't read as if the hypothesis is likely to be correct, but you're free to make appropriate changes. ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 18:30, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Looks like it's mostly just about assessing the views of Arthur Jensen and Philippe Rushton, and therefore doesn't belong in the article. There would have to be substantial changes made if this section is to be retained. Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:48, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

This topic is not medicine, WP:MEDRS does not apply. Hence, you cannot just remove material based on that policy. This has been mentioned many times, so I don't understand why we have to keep going over this argument. AndewNguyen (talk) 13:30, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Wholesale revert

A recent edit by Peregrine Fisher undid a number of changes that are currently being discussed, as well as changes that haven't actually been challenged. Peregrine, your participation in the current discussion has been minimal; you've simply restored contested content with accusations of trying to destroy the article and returned it to your preferred "stable version". Please join us in the discussion. A couple of specific things:

- Why was "Citation needed" tag removed from the unsourced statement ". . . finding patterns of difference between continental populations similar to those associated with race"?

- Why was "white people/black people" changed to "whites/blacks"?

- Why was the disputed Jensen/Rushton source reinstated without discussion?

I understand that you disagree with some of the recent removals, however mass reversions must be done with care to avoid "collateral damage" like this. It is often better to make piecemeal changes to specific edits instead of mass-reverting to your preferred version. –dlthewave ☎ 16:35, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

I concur in disagreeing with that undoing, and I am disheartened to see that there hasn't been any justification. Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:32, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Removal of Rushton, Jensen stuff

It's hard to find which version is the stable one with so many edits. Anyways, seem like this edit shows that some editors want to remove Rushton, Jensen stuff. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Race_and_intelligence&diff=940942725&oldid=940940577 Do people want to remove this info? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 20:20, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Content sourced from primary works by Philippe Rushton shouldn't be presented as potentially legitimate, since the reliable sources completely discredit him and his work. The same goes for Arthur Jensen, Richard Lynn and others. If they are to be included, they should be included in the context of how the mainstream considers their views to be, and not simply a rebuttal by Richard Nisbett for each point they make. As that content sourced to Philippe Rushton and others are excluded, those rebuttals also become unnecessary to include. Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:31, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Yes, it would appear to be WP:UNDUE. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 00:23, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

I picked Arthur Jensen to look at first. Looks like you couldn't find a more reliable source. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 15:53, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Philippe Rushton and Arthur Jensen are clearly notable and respected researchers in the field, and should be preserved in the article. The NYTimes obituary for Jensen (in 2012) says he was regarded by many colleagues as one of the most important psychologists of his day, and that although he was heckled, called a racist, and had bodyguards to protect him from death threats; he is respected by the actual scientists within his field: "Even psychologists who disagree with Professor Jensen’s conclusions defend him against charges of racism." Furthermore, many of Jensen's ideas have undeniably become integrated into mainstream Psychology: “When he wrote that paper, probably a large portion of psychologists wouldn’t have believed that there was a hereditary basis for intellectual ability. Now, there’s very little argument about that in the field.

However, Onetwothreeip in particular repeatedly deletes references to Jenson and/or Rushton based on unbacked assertions that they are somehow "fringe" and have "been discredited by mainstream science." Onetwothreeip has never provided evidence of them being discredited or fringe despite my requests, and when counter-evidence is presented, he simply ignores it with an attitude of IDHT. You can see examples of this in last December's Talk Page Archive. At one point, I counted 22 comments on that page alone of Onetwothreeip asserting that Rushton and/or Jensen are fringe.

I think it would help if we agreed right now that Philippe Rushton and Arthur Jensen are respected mainstream scientists, and that references of them should not be deleted on the basis of them being somehow "fringe". Can we do that? Toomim (talk) 09:43, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Ah, that renowned arbiter of scientific consensus, The New York Times' Obits page. Surely they would never view the recently deceased through the rose-colored lens of nostalgia. –dlthewave ☎ 13:22, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

It would be helpful if you did not use sarcasm when discussing. This topic is difficult enough. Let's keep it friendly here. ^_^ AndewNguyen (talk) 13:39, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Seems Onetwothreeip is continuing his mission to delete all mentions of Jensen and Rushton's research. The argument is the same misunderstanding of WP:RS as before. One cannot remove sources that are WP:RS by finding another source that attacks the authors. This has been explained so many times, I don't know what to do except suggest admins lock the page permanently, and also keep reverting him. AndewNguyen (talk) 13:19, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Edit-warring... again

Great. Now we have two editors edit-warring a version that they in all likelihood haven't even read into the article without having any consensus for it - nay, without even attempting to discuss the changes that they are proposing on the talk page. For everyone's reference, this version contains both factual and grammatical mistakes, such as a statement which, due to poor punctuation, can be interpreted as implying that Jensen supports an environmental-only interpretation of IQ differences, and missing closing commas which make sentences hard to read.

@Horse Eye Jack: Please bother to at least take a look at what it is that you're reverting, and ideally don't add in or remove information without any consensus. 123, your reversion seems to have been accidental, so I won't go after you here. ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 00:34, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

I made a single revert, please retract your claim of edit warring. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 00:49, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

No. Edit-warring can consist of only one edit, as was the case with your reinstatement of an edit which had previously been reverted. ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 01:50, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

@Oldstone James: Enjoy your block, hopefully you learn something from it... Like what edit warring is. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 21:06, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

1RR now in effect

Please be mindful, everyone. Thanks. El_C 00:57, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Likely untenable sections

It appears that there are sections in this article that are wholly based on the work of discredited race science proponents. The section "Global variation of IQ scores" mostly revolves around work by Richard Lynn, while the "Spearman's hypothesis" and "Mental chronometry" sections largely concern works by Arthur Jensen. These sections are almost entirely just their claims and then attempts at responding to them by critics, providing a false balance. Are there any suggestions to alter these sections so that they can be retained and not be supported by these broadly discredited researchers? Onetwothreeip (talk) 01:28, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

You can add secondary sources which outline the mainstream view, if you can find them. Otherwise, these sections should be in the article simply because they are far too notable to be excluded. Also, the section on global variation of IQ scores mentions other, more rigorous studies as well, which are independent from Lynn's research. ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 01:49, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm not sure if I follow the notability claim. Our WP:N policy and its article content counterpart due weight, which would apply here, are both based on coverage in independent secondary sources. If its not supported by secondary sources, it's not notable. –dlthewave ☎ 03:23, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

The other sources are just responses refuting the claims by Lynn and Jensen. There aren't any reliable secondary sources supporting those claims. Onetwothreeip (talk) 02:17, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

The Rindermann 2007 study discussed in that section (cited to a summary by Hunt) is an entirely separate study, not just a response to Lynn.

A separate study about Spearman's hypothesis is this paper by Frisby and Beaujean, which found support for the hypothesis. I suggest this source should be cited in the "Spearman's hypothesis" section. 2600:1004:B15D:697F:F1AB:F59B:5A3B:897D (talk) 02:56, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Heiner Rindermann was also discredited. Given that Spearman's hypothesis relates very much to Arthur Jensen, the salvageable content here would have to come under a different section. Onetwothreeip (talk) 03:12, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

It's very apparent that no one else is taking you seriously about all sources by Hunt, Rindermann, etc. being unreliable. Since you've gotten no traction for your argument about these sources over the past two months, either here or at the RS noticeboard, maybe you should go back to edit warring to remove them? 2600:1004:B15D:697F:F1AB:F59B:5A3B:897D (talk) 03:31, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

That is not an argument. Onetwothreeip (talk) 04:17, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

The IP-editor is wrong in claiming that other editors do not agree with Onetwothreeip and dithewave. In reality, a number of other editors, e.g in the AfD and DRV discussions, have expressed the view that discredited authors such as Jensen must be treated in accordance with WP:FRINGE -- the way they're treated in articles such as Scientific racism -- rather than with a false balance. Their writings are not RS, just as the writings of climate change deniers and creationists are not RS. However, there is a big disincentive to those editors to enter into discussions on this talk page. Because the title of this article attracts people who want to give credence to pseudoscientific notions that certain races are superior or inferior to others, any editor who objects to that POV faces bludgeoning and is unable to obtain a consensus, and this is a time sink for editors. This difficulty in implementing Wikipedia policies with this article is one of the reasons why many of us believe that the article should be deleted. NightHeron (talk) 14:53, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Nightheron, the question of whether these authors' writings satisfy WP:RS, when published in places such as Cambridge University Press or journals published by the American Psychological Association, was discussed at the reliable sources noticeboard in December. The discussion is here, and the consensus of that discussion was quite clear. I'll quote: "If something is published in a respected academic journal (and not retracted), then that is a reliable source on any issue. If it is on a researcher's personal blog, then it's not."

There has been a major problem on this talk page with people trying to endlessly re-litigate certain questions that have already been resolved, because they're unwilling to accept whatever consensus was reached. Doing this is disruptive because it shows a lack of respect for other editors' time to demand they have the same discussion over and over. Please don't add to this problem. The RS noticeboard was the correct place to discuss this question, and the discussion there reached its conclusion less than two months ago. 2600:1004:B117:10E5:D530:D014:5920:FA1 (talk) 16:29, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Few editors participated in that discussion, and there was no consensus. Your claim that the discussion "reached its conclusion" (agreeing with you) is clearly false. I count 2 other editors who agreed with you, and 2 editors who didn't. Your quote is not from a neutral source (such as an admin closing an RfC) but from one of the 2 editors who agreed with you. It is also false. Unreliable fringe authors occasionally get published by respectable presses or in respectable journals. That is especially true of climate denialism and scientific racism. NightHeron (talk) 19:37, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Let's take each one to RS, or have an RfC. Or maybe that was already done? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 20:20, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

The RS noticeboard is the correct place to discuss whether sources are reliable or not. But having to rehash this issue again is something we should try to avoid. This exact issue was discussed for several weeks in December, and Onetwothreeip posted the previous RSN thread in the context of failing to get any support for this argument on the article talk page. On the talk page, four people were opposing him, with Aqullion being the only person who offered any support. And then in the thread at RSN, he was opposed by two additional editors, with the only support again coming from Aquillion.

Since neither of you were part of the earlier discussion, it would be less disruptive for you to post another RSN thread about the same issue than if Onetwothreeip were to do it, but it's still unlikely to result in a different answer. Do we have to repeat the exact same discussions every time new editors show up on this article? There must be a way to avoid these cyclical arguments, especially when it's been less than two months since the end of the previous one. 2600:1004:B117:10E5:D530:D014:5920:FA1 (talk) 21:14, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

WP:Local consensus is not okay. I count far more people opposed to the December local consensus active now than in favor of it. In any case, this is borderline WP:False claims of consensus and I would argue that we should probably shut down this talkpage to IPs. If we get consensus from the non-IP accounts to exclude IPs, we can request page protection at WP:AE. jps (talk) 21:42, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Per Wikipedia:Reliable sources, The word "source" when citing sources on Wikipedia has three related meanings including the piece of work itself (the article, book) and the creator of the work (the writer, journalist). Onetwothreeip (talk) 08:51, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

(redent) I think we have policies, guidelines, global consensus, and local consensus all going the same way (not your way). Let's figure it out. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 09:58, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Exclude IP accounts

In light of the fact that this page is mentioned on several neo-Nazi webpages (I shall refrain from linking to them) and there are a number of banned/blocked users that have previously been active, I more to ban all IP edits from this article and the talkpage. jps (talk) 21:42, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

• Endorse as proposer. jps (talk) 21:42, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose IPs are already banned from editing the article page, due to it being semi-protected. I don't see the point of them being banned from the talk page as well, given that they should be allowed to have at least the chance to propose their ideas; speaking of which, the IP starting with 2600 had already proposed useful edits and provided helpful sources and arguments in the past. ^{O̲L̲D̲S̲T̲O̲N̲E̲}_{J̅A̅M̅E̅S̅} 22:02, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
• Comment Since this proposal is obviously directed against me, I won't vote, but I'd like everyone to be aware that this proposal is a clear case of forum shopping. JPS previously requested that this page be semi-protected, so only registered users can edit it, on January 28, and his request was declined. How many times does he intend to keep requesting this? 2600:1004:B117:10E5:D530:D014:5920:FA1 (talk) 22:18, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
• Support - Blocks and bans apply to talk pages as well; semi-protection of the article does not entirely prevent block evasion. Protecting this page would help ensure that arbitration decisions are being enforced. –dlthewave ☎ 22:38, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
• Support per jps and dlthewave, although that restriction will probably have only a minor impact. My impression is that, historically, the problematic editors both on the article and the talk-page have not been predominantly IP-editors. On the other hand, (1) just one or two IP-editors can do a lot of bludgeoning, and (2) an IP-editor might be less inhibited in making white-supremacist or anti-semitic comments. NightHeron (talk) 01:10, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose 2600 is the only always reasonable person on this page. You've got diffs why 2600 should be gotten rid of? Cause that's what your trying to do. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 02:30, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support reviewing IP edits for the last year suggests that they are in general less than constructive. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 16:11, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

@Horse Eye Jack: Citation needed. Can you please provide examples? On the contrary, I've seen excellent contributions from 2600, and this move seems to be entirely directed at him. Toomim (talk) 23:32, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

It's largely impossible to provide examples as the IP address changes daily; see sample: Special:Contributions/2600:1004:B15D:697F:F1AB:F59B:5A3B:897D. What I can observe is that the IP is currently a SPA for this page + related discussions on various admin noticeboards, although it's impossible to know what other pages they have edited prior to this one. --K.e.coffman (talk) 02:49, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

So are you saying that you can find edits by 2600, but that you think it is impossible to find examples of those edits being problematic? Or did I mis-understand you? Toomim (talk) 11:30, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose I agree that 2600's contributions have been of the most civil and consensus-building of anyone. I think he's done a better job than me to bring together both sides, and that's what this article needs, given how contentious it is. Without him, I fear this process would get even uglier. Finally, the proposer hasn't given us any examples of the problem edits that they are supposedly trying to prevent. Toomim (talk) 23:32, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

And one more important point -- since this issue is so politically-charged, people might be risking their jobs or friends to speak up about it, and we should should allow anonymous edits so that these people can still have a voice. Toomim (talk) 23:36, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

This makes no sense. IP editing is less anonymous than editing with an account, and editors are responsible for what they say and do on the project as a whole, not just in isolation. Grayfell (talk) 00:59, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Now you are saying that IP editing is *less* anonymous. But that's self-contradicting -- if IP editing is *less* anonymous, then there wouldn't be any "bad people" doing IP editing. They would make accounts. And this whole "ban the IPs" idea would do the opposite of its claimed purpose. --Toomim (talk) 11:56, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

I think there's a confusion here between two different types of reasons for anonymity. If users want to simply protect themselves from off-wiki consequences of their editing (such as doxxing/harassment or repercussions at work or with friends/family), the best way to do this is to have an account with a pseudonym. If users want to make it harder for admins to follow what they're doing and impose sanctions when necessary, the surest way to do that is to be an IP-editor with changing IPs. NightHeron (talk) 13:16, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support: Given the previous history of site bans / topic bans for this subject and associated Talk pages. Additionally, using a dynamic IP to edit in a contentious topic area is inappropriate since the constantly changing address helps evade scrutiny by making an entire editing history extremely difficult to trace. Lastly, I don't find this argument about engaging with the topic area compelling: ...people might be risking their jobs or friends to speak up about it, and we should allow anonymous edits so that these people can still have a voice. The same would apply to conspiracy theorists, alt-righters, neo-Nazis, casual racists, anti-semites, etc. It's not important for Wikipedia that their voices be heard. --K.e.coffman (talk) 00:50, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

You have provided no examples of these problems.

Also, you cannot censor right-wing POVs from Wikipedia while allowing left-wing POVs. That is an egregious violation of NPOV. (And I am a liberal myself.) --Toomim (talk) 10:02, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

It's not a political issue, so please don't make it into one. The issue is WP:FRINGE. The anti-vaccine movement is usually associated more with the left than the right (e.g., Jill Stein for a while was supporting it). If IP editors were persistently trying to get the anti-vaxx POV into a Wikipedia article and were bludgeoning on the talk page, then it would similarly make sense to block IP editors from those pages. The issue is not left vs right, but rather science vs fringe. Just because in this instance the white-supremacist fringe POV is supported by alt-right sources, that does not mean that people who want to treat that POV in accordance with WP:FRINGE are advancing a left-wing POV. NightHeron (talk) 11:16, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm not the one who made it political — K.e.coffman did by saying we should block IP addresses in order to prevent "alt-righters" from participating. He didn't use the word "fringe"; he used the word "right". That is the political right. Trying to block a political orientation from participating in Wikipedia is an egregious violation of NPOV. You are defending that behavior. --Toomim (talk) 11:27, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

I read the comment by K.e.coffman to be a list of the types of people who push for fringe views and do not contribute constructively to Wikipedia. There are leftist conspiracy theorists and leftist anti-semites, as you're probably aware, and so K.e.coffman's list is not only of rightists. Also, the term alt-right refers to the fringe wing of the right, not to mainstream conservatives. No one is saying that editors who are on the political right cannot contribute constructively. NightHeron (talk) 13:13, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

The alt-right is a political orientation that describes many millions of people. If you are arguing to block these people from editing Wikipedia, then you are in gross violation of Wikipedia's core principle of NPOV, and someone might report your account to administration. Tread carefully. Toomim (talk) 02:01, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support - The best we've seen from IPs here is WP:CIVILPOV, and that's being generous. IP editing makes it more difficult to keep track of disruptive behavior and sock puppetry, which this article has been especially plagued with for over a decade. Grayfell (talk) 00:59, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

  Can we get some examples of this being a problem? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:01, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

• Questions - Was there a precedent like this at other articles before? I know that there were occasional failed proposals to globally prevent IP editing. It may also be worth evaluating if some administrators occasionally applied such measures under ARBCOM dicretionary sanctions, or if it should eventually be part of them to protect pages for other reasons than vandalism and obvious edit warring (in this case to prevent IP editing)... In any case, it would never be a proper technical solution to the problem of socks, unless the software itself was improved to automatically report potential socks to admins with CU rights (i.e. with a private backlog of 30 days or more), or accounts had to be confirmed to an actual person's identity (i.e. at OTRS discretion). But it would indeed make it easier for other editors and discussion closers to identify SPAs, for admins to sanction disruptive editors and handle obvious socks manually, as well as for new editors on the topic to learn, as they would have a stable talk page. —PaleoNeonate – 04:41, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with the circumstances that led to it, but Category:Wikipedia semi-protected talk pages shows that there is some precedent for semi-sprotecting article talk pages. –dlthewave ☎ 04:54, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose Seems an obvious attempt to get rid of the contributions of the frequent 2600 IP editor. OP's unsubstantiated claim about Nazis posting this page are irrelevant to Wikipedia policies. I do not understand why we cannot just work within the normal rules on this page, but every lawyer trick in the book must be attempted. In any case, I don't think this is just something one can make a vote for, and then bring in one's friends for majority. AndewNguyen (talk) 13:24, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

By implying that people you disagree with are canvassing, you are accusing other editors of acting in bad faith. This is also an odd point to make, since several of the people commenting here are near-WP:SPAs, including you. You cannot have it both ways. The article has a documented history of being targeted by multiple long-term abuse accounts. Sorry, but I'm not inclined to dig through the 100 pages of archives to point to specific examples right now. Also, Wikipedia is not a platform for Nazis, and linking to Nazi websites would be unacceptably disruptive, so saying this is "unsubstantiated " completely misses the point. Grayfell (talk) 21:39, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Ok. None of you can provide any examples of the problems that blocking IP addresses will solve. It's time to give up on this idea. Also, that article on WP:NONAZIS says This is an essay. This page is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. Please don't masquerade that as an actual Wikipedia policy . --Toomim (talk) 23:21, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

I didn't vote yet but did include rationale: But it would indeed make it easier for other editors and discussion closers to identify SPAs, for admins to sanction disruptive editors and handle obvious socks manually, as well as for new editors on the topic to learn, as they would have a stable talk page. In any case, please let people vote instead of deciding for everyone yourself? —PaleoNeonate – 00:11, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

This isn't a vote; it's a consensus process. Consensus requires both sides trying to find consensus. However, in this case, the 'support' side refuses to provide examples of the problems they are talking about. If they are not trying to find consensus, then consensus cannot proceed, and it's time to give this up. --Toomim (talk) 01:48, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

I am not currently getting involved in editing this page, nor taking sides in this or any other matter, but an example of the problem can be found on this page, scroll up to the rename section, and see the contributions from 2605:8D80:668:39E9:DB8E:11E8:912F:2CD0. These come from the (often) banned sock, Sprayitchyo[10]. -- Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 08:22, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

ETA I will balance that comment with my observation (made elsewhere) that the IP editor 2600:1004:b1/40 appears to be in good faith, and has made a statement that they cannot use cookies. the Wikipedia technical FAQ is clear that cookies are required to edit with an account, and although most of us accept cookies as a norm, I do have sympathy for those who wish to reject all cookies. -- Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 09:18, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

As several others have already pointed out, the context in which this proposal was made makes it obvious that it is directed against me, not against the other IP. (In fact, it was made directly in response to one of my posts.) If the purpose of this proposal were to exclude the other IP, it would have been made two weeks ago, which is the last - and I think, only - time the other IP has commented on this page. Almost all of the support for the proposal is coming from people who have disagreed with me about the content of this article.

Much has been made on this page about how "local consensus" isn't enough for certain proposals. I suppose we'll find out soon whether local consensus among the people who've disagreed with an editor on a page is enough to exclude that editor from commenting there. 2600:1004:B155:9EA4:EC0F:A884:87A9:BC55 (talk) 13:28, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support - The answer to PaleoNeonate's question above, "Was there a precedent like this at other articles before?" is yes. Remedy 3.3.1 from the abortion arbitration case provides such a precedent;

The articles and corresponding talk pages relating to Abortion shall be semi-protected for a period of three years from the conclusion of this case, such that no non-autoconfirmed editor (including IP address editors) shall edit them. Editors in good standing who wish to edit such topics under a single additional account not linked to their identity may do so under the provisions of WP:SOCK#LEGIT and WP:SOCK#NOTIFY.

I found this remedy very effective in reducing the need to continuously assume good faith with every new or random IP editor. On contentious articles such as this IP editors tend to be socks or meats more times than not. Their ability to game WP:AGF and use civil POV pushing tactics makes what is already a very difficult editing job into a practical impossibility. A decade is long enough. Any reasonable actions that will help editors work constructively on this article should be taken. —ArtifexMayhem (talk) 04:44, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much, ArtifexMayhem. —PaleoNeonate – 04:52, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support - Problematic-enough subject area to consider the measure. —PaleoNeonate – 04:52, 19 February 2020 (UTC)
• Strong support. There is the serious likelihood of editors seeking to use IP addresses like sockpuppet accounts. Onetwothreeip (talk) 08:31, 19 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose While article talk pages are occasionally protected from IP editing, that's a last resort and in only the most egregious of cases (non-stop vandalism, libel, copyvios etc). I see no evidence that this page is anywhere near that stage (yet), and indeed, despite requests, there seems to be a curious inability to produce diffs (=evidence) of much IP wrongdoing at all.
  While I don't see it as being an obvious attempt to get rid of the contributions of anyone, I think it is a good faith attempt to solve a problem yet to occur, which is both against policy and is contrary to the open nature of Wikipedia. This should only be done in situations where blatant vandalism or disruption is occurring—a situation which seems yet to occur. ——SN54129 11:43, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Is this a good source?

May already be in there. https://www.pnas.org/content/111/42/15273 Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:51, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

This is fine, but does not relate to race and intelligence, only to heritability itself. For such claims, there are plenty of secondary sources to use. AndewNguyen (talk) 13:25, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

"no non-circumstantial"

I hate that phrasing. It don't sound right. Do we mean "only circumstantial"? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 05:17, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

Have we verified that "circumstantial" is supported by a source? "No evidence" would be a better summary of the body. –dlthewave ☎ 05:22, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

"no evidence" isn't something i've definitively read. Anyways, if you search the article for "circumstantial" you find stuff like "the evidence for a genetic influence has been circumstantial" and "Currently there is no non-circumstantial evidence that the test score gap has a genetic component,[127][62][128] although some researchers believe that the existing circumstantial evidence makes it plausible to believe that hard evidence for a genetic component will eventually appear." Peregrine Fisher (talk) 05:38, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

The term used in Intelligence: Knowns and Unknowns, the statement published by the American Psychological Association in 1996, is that there is no "direct empirical support" for a genetic interpretation. I would be okay with saying "direct empirical evidence" instead of "non-circumstantial evidence". 2600:1004:B166:FE36:49EC:ECB6:3787:B508 (talk) 13:05, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

2600, the full quote from the Test Scores section is "Explanations based on factors of caste and culture may be appropriate, but so far have little direct empirical support. There is certainly no such support for a genetic interpretation." I'm concerned that using qualifiers like "empirical" and "circumstantial" out of context in our article would imply the existence of non-empirical or non-circumstantial evidence, a conclusion that these sources don't support. –dlthewave ☎ 13:21, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

Does that mean "there's little support for nurture being the cause, but there's certainly no support for nature being the cause"? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 02:19, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

The wording in the article can't be stronger than what's supported by its major sources such as the APA report. Also, while that report doesn't say anything either way about the existence or non-existence of indirect evidence for genetic factors, other sources such as Hunt's textbook argue that there is indirect evidence for a role of genetics. Therefore, I think including a qualifier such as "non-circumstantial evidence" or "direct empirical evidence" is necessary for the article's wording to be consistent with most of the sources that it cites. 2600:1004:B166:FE36:49EC:ECB6:3787:B508 (talk) 13:50, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

Thank you -- I think that "no direct empirical evidence" is better than "no non-circumstantial evidence." This is partially to avoid the double negative, and partially because the term Circumstantial Evidence is typically used in court-room forensics to prove that somebody is guilty; not typically in science, where we want to know whether or not a theory has predictive power. It might also be possible that the distinction between "causal" vs. "correlative" evidence is relevant here; although I must claim ignorance -- I haven't researched this particular aspect of the topic in much depth. Toomim (talk) 23:51, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

I guess I could go with "no direct empirical evidence". At least get rid of the double negative. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 02:19, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

No, that is not acceptable. Dlthewave correctly observed that using qualifiers like "empirical" and "circumstantial" out of context in our article would imply the existence of non-empirical or non-circumstantial evidence, a conclusion that these sources don't support. The use of such terminology goes against WP:Manual of Style, where the section WP:WEASEL defines weasel words as follows: Weasel words are words and phrases aimed at creating an impression that something specific and meaningful has been said, when in fact only a vague or ambiguous claim has been communicated. NightHeron (talk) 02:41, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't want to disrupt the thread above, but others may find it interesting that A popular misconception is that circumstantial evidence is less valid or less important than direct evidence, according to the Wikipedia page on Circumstantial Evidence. It further explains: Indeed, the common metaphor for the strongest possible evidence in any case—the "smoking gun"—is an example of proof based on circumstantial evidence. Toomim (talk) 07:11, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

It is poor phrasing. Yes, it relates to the previous situation of only circumstantial evidence. I think these reviews mean the lack of direct genetic data. However, such data has existed since 2013 (Davide Piffer's work), and continues to be published to this date. The main reviews used for sources on the page are out of date regarding this. That said, I support changing it to "only circumstantial" or "only indirect" until we move to using newer secondary sources. AndewNguyen (talk) 13:27, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Concerning "such data has existed since 2013 (Davide Piffer's work)," indeed Davide Piffer is typical of the type of authors that advocates of Jensenism cite to support race-supremacist theories; for more info about Mr. Piffer, please see [11]. NightHeron (talk) 13:53, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm having trouble remembering who is racist. Could you provide a shot list? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 10:00, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Here's a very short list, quoted from the source cited in my last comment: "Piffer is a research fellow of the Ulster Institute for Social Research, a racist institute founded by Richard Lynn that publishes racist pseudoscience." NightHeron (talk) 10:25, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

RationalWiki is not a reliable source. It's a wiki. Toomim (talk) 20:49, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

This isnt text on the page... RationalWiki also happens to be right in this case. Are you denying that Piffer worked for the Ulster Institute for Social Research? Horse Eye Jack (talk) 22:04, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

*Sigh* I think you all missed the joke. Accusing someone of racism is the new McCarthyism, and your desire to build a list of "accused racists" is no better than McCarthy's attempt to build a list of accused communists (usually just one's political opponents), and then blacklisting them from participating in society, or building a list of accused witches and then burning them alive. I think Peregrine Fisher was being sarcastic when he asked you to provide a short list, but here you're actually trying to do so. Not only is this behavior morally reprehensible -- it is not how Wikipedia works. We don't do witch hunts. We don't exclude minority viewpoints. We include information that is notable and reliable. Toomim (talk) 04:01, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

We do in face exclude racists and their despicable worldview, see WP:NONAZIS. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 05:22, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

WP:No_Nazis is just somebody's essay. It explicitly says This is an essay. This page is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. Toomim (talk) 07:12, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Once again you missed the point so spectacularly that it is challenging to assume good faith. I think you’re WP:NOTHERE. Piffer is a racist, end of the story. If you don’t like how the story ends then go check out Conservapedia. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 15:01, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Ha, ha, ha! Thank you for explaining that Peregrine Fisher was making a funny joke! Putting jokes aside, the relevant Wikipedia policy is WP:FRINGE. Authors who are way outside the mainstream of science and scholarship -- climate change deniers, flat earthers, creationists, quack cure charlatans, white supremacists (such as Davide Piffer and Richard Lynn), etc. -- must not be treated as reliable sources, but rather must be described for what they are. Your name-calling (McCarthyism and witch hunt and morally reprehensible) directed against other editors does not make those fringe writers into RS. NightHeron (talk) 04:51, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

WP:FRINGE is about theories, not people. It explains how much representation to give to a theory in an article. It has no bearing on the reliability of a person or source. It is entirely irrelevant to your ad-hominem attack against Piffer. There is no Wikipedia principle that supports your witch-hunt. You are plainly accusing anyone on the nature side of the debate a "racist", just like McCarthy called any of his political opponents a "communist", in an attempt to exclude them. This behavior reeks of POV bias. Toomim (talk) 07:12, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

One joke I've heard a lot recently is the one where an inexperienced editors lecture a talk page on how "Wikipedia works". Freedom isn't licence, and identifying pseudoscience doesn't lead to censorship or blacklisting, it leads to better science. Grayfell (talk) 05:10, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

@Toomim: Yes, someone's writings can be an unreliable source per WP:FRINGE in one area and RS in another area. In that sense they're not ruled out as people. For example, William Shockley was a white supremacist fringe figure on race issues, but his writings on transistor technology (an area where he won a Nobel Prize) were RS. Piffer and Lynn are similar. For all I know they might have written on mountain climbing techniques or favorite recipes in mainstream publications, in which case those writings should not be ruled out as RS just because their authors are racists.

Your intemperate accusations of McCarthyism against other editors violates WP:AGF. NightHeron (talk) 15:43, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Let's try to summarize the current consensus. Peregrine Fisher, 2600, AndrewNguyen, and myself support the phrase "no direct empirical evidence". (AndrewNguyen explicitly said "only circumstantial" or "only indirect"; but the latter is compatible with "no direct evidence".) AndrewNguyen further points out that the word circumstantial might not be necessary anymore—the article was written before the non-circumstantial evidence was found—but that we should upgrade the sources to include this evidence before removing the word "circumstantial."

On the other hand, NightHeron and dlthewave share the concern that "using qualifiers like `empirical` and `circumstantial` out of context in our article would imply the existence of non-empirical or non-circumstantial evidence, a conclusion that these sources don't support." I am not sure what they mean by this. The wording in question from the article is "At present, there is no non-circumstantial evidence that these differences in test scores have a genetic component." Are you guys concerned that this implies the existence of non-circumstantial evidence? I think that it says the opposite. Please clarify. Toomim (talk) 07:36, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

No, as you've quoted, we're concerned that "no non-circumstantial" evidence implies the existence of "circumstantial" evidence. The body doesn't make clear exactly what circumstantial/indirect evidence we're talking about and, in any case, it doesn't carry enough weight to justify a prominent position in the lede. –dlthewave ☎ 13:16, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

The trouble with the wording "no non-circumstantial evidence" or "only circumstantial evidence" is that circumstantial evidence is not a standard, understandable term in the sciences (although it is in criminal investigations). What does it mean? Does it just mean correlation? Encouraging readers to confuse correlation and causality is not what Wikipedia should do. Should Wikipedia have an article on Catholicism and pederasty claiming "circumstantial" evidence for a genetic connection because of all the cities in the US where the diocese declared bankruptcy because of sexual abuse lawsuits? Or would such a claim amount to just trash-talking and slandering Catholics?

The trouble with the wording "no direct empirical evidence" is that it strongly implies that there is non-empirical or indirect evidence, which is not supported by RS. What would that mean? Again, perhaps correlation. Or maybe conjectures based on fringe methodology.

In both cases the wording is confusing and misleading, what WP:MOS calls weasel words: Weasel words are words and phrases aimed at creating an impression that something specific and meaningful has been said, when in fact only a vague or ambiguous claim has been communicated. NightHeron (talk) 13:42, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Just FYI Davide Piffer co-founded OpenPsych and his history is well known, no rational person can argue that he isnt a racist. There is nothing ad-hominem about calling a spade a spade and Piffer is a racist. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 15:01, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

What is fringe? That races exist? That IQ measures intelligence? That there is an IQ gap between races? That there is a possibility that this is gap is partially genetic? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 16:30, 20 February 2020 (UTC) The gap is likely partially genetic? The gap is definitely partially genetic? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 16:32, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Your sequence of claims (phrased as questions) is a good example of what's fringe: stringing together a sequence of broadly disputed claims in such a way as to suggest that some races are inferior to others. That's fringe. As explained in the first paragraph of the section Race of this article, there's a consensus that races are a sociopolitical construct, not a biological one. Similarly, most scholars would say that the claim that IQ measures intelligence is simplistic and misleading; intelligence is a loaded word that carries many other meanings besides whatever IQ measures. The notion that heritability of some trait among individuals implies a hereditary component in group differences is a well-known logical fallacy. If you string all this together and spin it so as to suggest racial inferiority/supremacy, then you have fringe. NightHeron (talk) 16:48, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Agreed. As is common with fringe positions, every link in these chains can be propped-up, superficially, in various shoddy ways. Taking these things apart takes a bit of effort and nuance. It take more effort to debunk them than it does to share them and ignore the responses. By the time the point is properly addressed, fringe advocates have moved on to some other issue. It's not realistic to expect every one of these points to be addressed with care, because they were never well-supported to begin with. These racist ideas have been rejected for a lot of valid reasons, and ignoring those reasons won't make them go away. Grayfell (talk) 23:39, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

OK, so NightHeron thinks race isn't real and the word intelligence is problematic and maybe not useful. Grayfell seems to agree, and anything beyond those two statments is fringe or heading into fringe. I'm sure there's plenty of nuance I'm missing. Just wanted to attempt to summarize before I spend time on the next response, which is long. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:03, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

This was exactly what I was talking about. As far as I know, nobody here is saying "race isn't real". This is a straw-man that gets thrown around a lot on HBD forums and similar, but it badly misrepresents what we're trying to explain. Race is a social construct, and social constructs are real. Social constructs, like race, are very complicated, and very important to individuals, families, societies, legal institutions, etc. and need to be treated as such. Grayfell (talk) 06:18, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

So race is real. It's a social construct and has zero biological underpinnings? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 02:19, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

The biological underpinnings are weak. There are probably more genetic differences between your parents than between an average white person and an average black person. HiLo48 (talk) 02:36, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Yes, and even applying the concept of "biological underpinnings" to race is deeply flawed. The people trying to study these categories do not agree on who belongs, and they are not easily defined. Racial cateogires were designed for cultural reasons based on very obsolete scientific ideas, and they were not stable over time, and are still not stable. Again, nobody is saying it has "zero biological underpinnings", sources are saying it's very complicated. Sarcastically(?) putting it in simplistic terms isn't helpful. Grayfell (talk) 06:11, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Here is what makes this sort of argument particularly ironic: when each "link in the chain" is presented by itself, it is generally regarded as mainstream. The mainstream position about the validity of IQ tests is presented in this section of the Intelligence Quotient article. Aside from the sources cited in that article, two more recent sources that regard IQ as a valid measure of mental ability are Bjorklund and Gray's textbook psychology (pp. 394-399), and Michael Ashton's textbook Individual Differences and Personality (the entirety of that book's tenth chapter). I'm deliberately citing broad-level psychology textbooks here so that people can't claim this viewpoint only exists in sources that are specifically about IQ testing.

The claim IQ is invalid is coming mostly from journalists or academics in fields like media studies or critical race theory, who make the claim in newspaper articles or in popular books. These people have no scientific credentials relevant to the subject, and the psychology academic community tends to ignore them. (Again, I am referring to psychology in general here, not just IQ testing.)

How about the biological meaning of race? This is covered in its own Wikipedia article, Race and genetics, which presents the mainstream view (that race is correlated with genetic variation) reasonably well. One of the most authoritative sources cited in that article is a special issue of the journal Nature Genetics that was devoted to this matter. Here is how the special issue's conclusions were summarized by Francis Collins, the director of the Human Genome Project:

Well-intentioned statements over the past few years, some coming from geneticists, might lead one to believe there is no connection whatsoever between self-identified race or ethnicity and the frequency of particular genetic variants. Increasing scientific evidence, however, indicates that genetic variation can be used to make a reasonably accurate prediction of geographic origins of an individual, at least if that individual's grandparents all came from the same part of the world. As those ancestral origins in many cases have a correlation, albeit often imprecise, with self-identified race or ethnicity, it is not strictly true that race or ethnicity has no biological connection. It must be emphasized, however, that the connection is generally quite blurry because of multiple other nongenetic connotations of race, the lack of defined boundaries between populations and the fact that many individuals have ancestors from multiple regions of the world.

Psychology and social science generally deal with correlations between variables, not in perfect relationships. The fact that IQ is correlated with race and that race is correlated with genetic variation does not necessarily mean that variance in average IQ across races has a genetic basis, but it means that people who have expertise in the relevant fields (psychology and genetics) aren't so hasty to dismiss the idea. Steven Pinker makes this argument in The Blank Slate, and more recently David Reich has made it in Who We Are and How We Got Here - that based on what we know of genetics, it is possible that this is indeed the case, and Reich's book specifically makes the point that we don't yet know enough to determine whether it's the case or not.

But at Wikipedia, a funny thing tends to happen when these two conclusions, that are relatively mainstream in their respective fields (psychology and human population genetics), are combined together. In the context of discussions about race and intelligence, the conclusion that IQ measures a real ability and that race is correlated with genetic variation are often described as "fringe". Because if we're certain that the hereditarian viewpoint about race and intelligence is fringe, then the various lines of research this conclusion is based upon must be fringe also, mustn't they?

@Peregrine Fisher: FYI, I'm explaining this mostly for your sake. I have no hope of getting through to Grayfell about any of this, but you seem much more open-minded, and I think you have the potential to become a highly valuable editor in this topic after you've learned more about the concepts involved. 2600:1004:B104:33EC:E853:9B6:F184:116C (talk) 00:57, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

I'll try to be brief and not attempt to compete with your WALLOFTEXT. You're playing the usual game of apologists for fringe when you cherry-pick sources and claim that they're saying the same thing you are, when in fact they aren't. Let's look at your long quote by Francis Collins, which starts by referring to statements by his colleagues that might lead one to believe there is no connection whatsoever between self-identified race or ethnicity and the frequency of particular genetic variants. He goes on to say that there are correlations with geographical region of ancestry, although it's generally quite blurry. Region of ancestry, in turn, has some correlation with self-identified ethnicity and race. Okay, so in certain regions over generations people may be exposed repeatedly to some disease and develop genetic resistance to it, or they might turn out to be particularly vulnerable to certain ailments. It was known for centuries that the Native people of North America were particularly susceptible to smallpox, and in fact settlers sometimes used this knowledge for genocidal purposes, see Population history of indigenous peoples of the Americas#Biological warfare. But none of this has anything to do with the sequence of links that certain editors are trying to make between race/IQ/intelligence/genetics. None of this supports the POV of editors who admire the white-supremacist writings of Jensen/Piffer/Lynn.

Grayfell is correct that it's not worth our time to pick apart all the fallacies and go through your mainstream sources one by one and explain that they're not agreeing with you and are not supporting white supremacy. NightHeron (talk) 01:54, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

The argument you made was: "there's a consensus that races are a sociopolitical construct", and that to suggest otherwise is a "fringe" idea. Addressing that argument is why I cited the Collins source. The argument you seem to be making now is that race does have some correlation with biological variation, but that this only affects traits such as susceptibility to diseases, and has no relevance to psychological traits.

The Collins source doesn't directly address that point, but David Reich's book does, on pages 256-258. Reich mentions that studies have already identified genetic variants that affect several psychological traits, including intelligence, and that it remains to be seen whether those variants are among the genetic variants that differ in distribution between human populations. Reich says, "it seems a bad bet to argue that there cannot be similar average differences in cognitive or behavioral traits." (He is specifically referring to genetic variants here, not just to the measured IQ gaps themselves.)

As I said, I am not arguing that population differences in the distribution of genetic variants affecting cognitive ability definitely do exist. I consider Piffer's research in this area to be inconclusive. The point that's important is that mainstream geneticists such as David Reich don't regard this as an impossible or "fringe" idea, but rather as a scientific question to which we don't yet know the answer. 2600:1004:B160:E18D:59ED:E616:346B:2CF7 (talk) 02:48, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

No, neither I nor the Collins quote says that race is a biological concept rather than a sociopolitical construct. It is because race is a sociopolitical construct that Collins uses "self-identified" as the only way to say what race someone supposedly belongs to. His point is that there are detectable genetic markers that can often be used to identify where someone's ancestors came from. This is generally quite blurry, and in any case has nothing to do with anything connected with intelligence. There is also a correlation between someone's geographical origin of ancestors (if they all came form the same region) and how the person self-identifies racially. But that does not contradict the consensus that there's no stable, consistent definition of different races; rather, racial distinctions are determined by social and political circumstances. The apartheid regime in South Africa rigidly classified people into races; most of the people who in the US self-identify as blacks would be classified as "colored" and not "black" in the South African system. Dividing people into races is done by politicians and social commentators, not by scientists.

Something does not have to be impossible to be fringe. We can speculate about unlikely (but not provably impossible) scenarios if we want. No one can say that it's impossible for a civilization to be living deep underground on the dark side of the moon, and for all sorts of adventures to be awaiting us when we finally make contact with them. A whole literary genre -- sci fi -- imagines such future scenarios. But Wikipedia does not do that, per WP:CRYSTAL.

It's bizarre that you say that Piffer's work is merely inconclusive. The guy's a crackpot. He doesn't have any academic qualifications (except a Masters degree), he works at an openly white-supremacist center, and he advocates for a range of loony psychic notions. NightHeron (talk) 03:36, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

Two relatively mainstream opinions can be fringe when combined together, nothing funny about it at all. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 01:38, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

Test scores

A recent edit [12] added "In the US" to the beginning of the Test scores section. I reverted because this section does not discuss test scores in the United States specifically nor does the source for that sentence. Billlion, lease let me know if I'm missing something. –dlthewave ☎ 13:24, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

The section refers to those who identify as African American. This is an identification not used elsewhere in the Americas, and is not relevant elsewhere in the. In the UK for example many people with Subsaharan African heritage would be Afro-Caribean, or their families might have moved to the UK directly from Africa. In the US those who identify or are identified as Asian typically are descended from people from China, Korea, Japan etc. In the UK for example, an Asian-British person would most likely be from the Indian subcontinent. "Hispanics" is also an ethnic identity relevant to the US. Perhaps only used about people who live in that country though. The whole section is written from a US perspective. Hence my edit. An alternative would be to change the title to "Test scores in the US"? Or perhaps I have missed that the whole article is meant to be only about the US? I would suggest that the controversy and study of the subject is a much more global topic and should reflect a global perspective. Billlion (talk)

Thanks for the explanation, Billion. Taking a closer look at the source it's clear that they're referring to US scores without explicitly saying it. I also believe that the section originally had United States in the title.

I'm on mobile at the moment so feel free to change it back. –dlthewave ☎ 16:58, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Done. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 17:06, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Missing ref

Silverman 1991 is missing a full ref. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 01:16, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

What did you mean about a predatory journal? https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Race_and_intelligence&diff=941676808&oldid=941676592 Peregrine Fisher (talk) 02:43, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

See predatory journal and Bentham Open. Grayfell (talk) 04:53, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

The cite was added as part of a series of edits in January 2018 which introduced some of the fringe material now being discussed. My guess is the author was Irwin Silverman, but I cannot find a likely match, so it could be someone else. Silverman was one of the comparatively few scholars who defended Rushton's differential K theory when it was topical.

Since none of the other sources were added in Harvnb format, this was likely copied from some other article. That editor has since been blocked, apparently due to POV-pushing activity on this topic. This is yet another example of the kind of disruptive behavior this article has been swarmed with. Incidentally, that editor unsuccessfully appealed their block in December 2019, which suggests that they might be still around and paying attention. Grayfell (talk) 04:53, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

I reverted

What are the policy and guideline reasons this should be removed? https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Race_and_intelligence&diff=942364950&oldid=942344049 Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:20, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

A policy was already given in the edit summary. These sources are WP:PRIMARY opinions with no indication of larger significance, and Wikipedia articles should not attempt to catalog minutia like this without a specific reason supported by secondary sources. Specifically, Rushton's and Jensen's inflammatory political opinions might belong at their respective articles, but only with support from reliable sources. Grayfell (talk) 06:29, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Sounds like you are confusing PRIMARY, INDEPENDENT, and NOTABLE. Also that you have a POV to push when you say "inflammatory political opinions". Peregrine Fisher (talk) 06:59, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

@Grayfell: James R. Flynn writing in Nature, Linda Gottfredson writing in Intelligence, and Arthur Jensen & J. Philippe Rushton writing in Psychology, Public Policy, and Law about their academic field are not in any way WP:PRIMARY sources. Mind you, the requirement for secondary review articles only exists in WP:MEDRS. While it is your opinion that Jensen and Rushton hold "inflammatory political opinions", their article was published in the aforementioned peer-reviewed journal by the American Psychological Association. --Pudeo (talk) 08:31, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

This article reeks of pro-fringe bias, with overwhelmingly positive treatment of and undue coverage of the POV of writers who dispute the scientific consensus that there is no evidence for genetic supremacy or inferiority of one race compared to another. Before there were 38 citations of Jensen and 21 citations of Rushton, and now two editors are edit-warring to put in yet another positive reference to their views, along with a positive reference to another writer (Gottfredson) who's supported by the white-supremacist Pioneer Fund. I reverted that, but I'm under no allusion that anything short of a successful AfD will fix the problems with this article, which has been cited as an example of racism on Wikipedia by the Southern Poverty Law Center. NightHeron (talk) 13:10, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

I agree with the UNDUE concern, which goes hand-in-hand with using Jenson and Rushton as primary sources for their own attributed opinions. Looking at the sentence "Jensen and Rushton argued that the existence of biological group differences does not rule out, but raises questions about the worthiness of policies such as affirmative action or placing a premium on diversity", we would need other sources to establish this view on affirmative action as a "significant viewpoint". –dlthewave ☎ 13:27, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Peregrine Fisher You reverted with the edit summary "I think this should be included. Let's talk about it." but I don't see where you've actually made an argument for inclusion other than WP:ILIKEIT. Could you explain why you think this content should be kept? –dlthewave ☎ 13:16, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Above NightHeron wrote, "now two editors are edit-warring to put in yet another positive reference to their views, along with a positive reference to another writer (Gottfredson) who's supported by the white-supremacist Pioneer Fund" You've completely misunderstood this situation. This material had been in the article for years, until Dlthewave removed it a few hours ago. For comparison, here is the same section of the article five years ago, which is nearly identical to what the section looked like until today. This is yet another example of the pattern of editors making bold changes and demanding a consensus before their changes can be undone. For the reasons I explained here, it is especially ironic for Grayfell to be doing this.

Dlthewave said that we would need other sources establishing Jensen's and Gottfredson's view as a significant one. A fairly uncontroversial source that discusses several perspectives about how group differences relate to policy relevance, including Jensen's and Gottfredson's views, is Hunt and Carlson 2007. The Hunt and Carlson paper also makes several other comments about policy relevance that would be worth including in the article.

It's also completely unreasonable to exclude the Flynn source. James Flynn is one of the most prominent scholars to have ever written on this topic, and his comments were published in one of the most prominent journals (Nature). Can anyone provide a reason why a viewpoint from James Flynn, published in Nature, is NOT important enough to include? 2600:1004:B104:B4AD:24A2:6DE8:211:3475 (talk) 15:31, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

This article has a long history of problematic editing, including violations of WP:FRINGE, WP:UNDUE, and WP:FALSEBALANCE. The article title has apparently attracted editors who are partial to Jensenism, and that has been reflected in the content. So the fact that a certain version has been there for much of the article's history or coincides with a version of 5 years ago is not a strong argument for inclusion. NightHeron (talk) 16:22, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

These should not be removed. The general approach here is for editors who dislike hereditarianism to remove all hereditarian sources based on any possible and often false policies. That edit is a typical example of this. It seems that the price to pay for keeping a summary of the field is having to constantly have revert discussions about every deletion that NightHeron, Dlthewave, Grayfell will try. This is a counterproductive way to edit Wikipedia. As before, I suggest that the page is permanently locked, and every change is proposed on the talk page before made real. This is the only way to stop the low-intensity edit warring. Just my 2 cents! AndewNguyen (talk) 20:18, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

@AndewNguyen: Why shouldn't the content be removed? –dlthewave ☎ 20:29, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

I see no reason to remove it. The policy given was clearly in error. This topic is not covered by WP:MEDRS, and in any case, these are not primary sources, and if they were, primary sources are sometimes fine. I don't know what to say. I generally oppose removing content, and definitely oppose removing well-sourced content (whether hereditarian friendly or not, I am happy to include mentions of stuff critics think is important to achieve balance). AndewNguyen (talk) 20:46, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Our WP:ALLPRIMARY supplement goes into detail about what is and isn't a primary source, even within a published piece. In this case the views of Rushton, Jensen and Gottfredson go beyond secondary analysis/commentary and stray into novel ideas about public policy points such as research ethics and affirmative action. Since there seems to be some confusion, our policies make it clear that content published in peer-reviewed journals can be considered primary source. –dlthewave ☎ 21:17, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

You've completely misunderstood this situation. This material had been in the article for years, until Dlthewave removed it a few hours ago. And it is for reasons like this that the article was identified as a POV fork of scientific racism. If AfD passes as an excuse that it doesn't replace fixing the article, the article must indeed be fixed. —PaleoNeonate – 01:16, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

If we're going to say that section should not be citing primary sources, then we ought to be consistent about it. If the removed sources all are primary sources, then the Rose, Nisbett, and Olness sources are primary sources also. As I previously described in my comment here, Nisbett's book actually is a quite controversial source, and I generally don't approve of removing the Rushton/Jensen material without removing Nisbett as well.

However, I don't think removing the primary sources on both sides is the correct solution in this case. When discussing specific lines of research about factors that might contribute to the IQ gaps, it's reasonable that the article should be mostly based on textbooks that provide neutral summaries of the research data, but in this case there doesn't seem to be any actual research data to summarize. The section is instead presenting the views about policy and ethics from various scholars, and prominent scholars on one side of the debate shouldn't be excluded from that.

The removal of the Flynn source stands out as demonstrating the POV nature of this removal, both because Flynn is a widely respected critic of the hereditarian view, and the Flynn source was published in the journal Nature, one of the most prominent publications to have ever covered this topic. No one has presented any explanation for why this particular source was removed. It seems to have been removed entirely because Flynn agrees with the hereditarians that race and intelligence is a worthwhile subject to study. 2600:1004:B15E:1A2E:64AB:BEF6:701B:39AA (talk) 01:34, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

There's no policy based reason to remove it. Or rather it's all IAR which seems to be the main policy guiding this article. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:18, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

@Peregrine Fisher: Could you explain your objections to the policy-based reasons that have been cited in this discussion? –dlthewave ☎ 03:44, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Let's take a look at the first one. It's from the peer reviewed journal Perspectives on Psychological Science. Peer reviewed journals are our gold standard. What's one awesome way to know if an opinion is worthy of inclusion in Wikipedia? When it's published in a peer reviewed journal. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:04, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

One person's opinion is still one person's opinion regardless of who they are or where it's been published. Simply appearing in a peer-reviewed journal is not sufficient for inclusion here, the content would also need to meet our WP:WEIGHT requirement. Using your Gottfredson example, has her self-cited opinion on ethics been discussed in other sources? –dlthewave ☎ 04:18, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Her opinion became OK to include when it was in the peer reviewed article. Do you deny this? Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:22, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I do deny that. As stated previously, simply being published in a peer-reviewed article does not make a viewpoint fit for inclusion on Wikipedia. That is not the standard. –dlthewave ☎ 04:25, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

You know, it isn't very difficult to determine the answer to this question with Google scholar. Here are two sources that discuss the Gottfredson paper: Hunt and Carlson 2007b, Frisby 2018. I've verified that both of these sources include a detailed discussion about Gottfredson's paper, and do not merely cite it in passing.

Gottfredson's paper apparently was part of an exchange between Hunt and Carlson and herself. The first Hunt and Carlson paper included a commentary on an earlier paper Gottfredson had written in 2005. The 2007 Gottfredson paper was written as a response to Hunt and Carlson, and Hunt and Carlson followed the paper with a second response (Hunt and Carlson 2007b). Gottfredson and H&C agree more than they disagree, so this was more a cordial exchange of viewpoints than an actual debate. So, yes, it has definitely been discussed in other sources.

Is it accomplishing anything to point this out? Is it irrelevant that this paper was part of a scholarly exchange in Perspectives on Psychological Science, because most editors think that any paper written by Linda Gottfredson cannot be added back once it's removed, regardless of the details (and this apparently goes for James Flynn as well)? 2600:1004:B15E:1A2E:64AB:BEF6:701B:39AA (talk) 04:50, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

By the way, regarding this edit, I was not intending to actually suggest the entire section should be removed. I thought I made this clear in my comment above: "I don't think removing the primary sources on both sides is the correct solution in this case." My point was only that a double standard was being applied. 2600:1004:B15E:1A2E:64AB:BEF6:701B:39AA (talk) 04:57, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

This is more of the same "he said, she said" back-and-forth between primary sources, and simply presenting both viewpoints without analysis is not an acceptable way to write an encyclopedia article. We would need an independent secondary source to summarize the "debate" and present the mainstream view. If it has not been covered by independent sources, it should not be included. –dlthewave ☎ 05:58, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Why is it that your solution to every problem with this article (if these really are problems) is blanking content? Why don't you ever take a less heavy-handed approach, for example by adding other sources to replace those you're removing?

I have a theory about the answer. My theory is that you and the other editors taking this approach are taking it because you don't know enough about the academic literature on this topic to add any new content. If that is indeed the reason, I think you should seriously consider whether you're the right person to try to fix the problems with this article. As an analogy, if there were problems on the Betelgeuse or Andromeda Galaxy article, would the best person to fix those problems be someone who knows next to nothing of the academic literature about astronomy, and who therefore is only able to address those problems by removing content? 2600:1004:B15C:6BC8:E5F7:F7F0:8799:1BFD (talk) 12:34, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Your theory is a convenient thing for you to believe, but it's wrong. When an article has low-quality fringe sources, the solution is to remove them, not to provide a FALSEBALANCE by matching them with other sources. For example, the writings on race and intelligence of authors who are well known to hold racial supremacist views are fringe, and the ones who are financed by the Pioneer Fund have a clear COI as well (since their continued funding depends on their making claims that support the racist agenda of the Pioneer Fund). This applies to Jensen, Rushton, Lynn, Piffer, and Gottfredson. Their writings must be treated on Wikipedia the way other fringe sources are if they're going to be included at all.

Your theory that editors who disagree with you are just too dumb to know how to search for sources is incorrect. NightHeron (talk) 13:40, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Your assertion about these authors was recently discussed at the RS noticeboard. [13] The discussion there was primarily about whether works by authors such as Hunt and Rindermann satisfy WP:RS, but the claim that they're "fringe" was discussed there as well. The conclusion of that discussion was that works by these authors are reliable sources when published by reputable publishers such as Cambridge University Press, and that the authors are appropriate experts in the area of human intelligence. Unlike the previous discussion on this topic in December, the recent discussion reached a clear consensus, and was closed earlier today by an experienced admin. (My description here is a paraphrase of the closure summary.) In light of that conclusion, the course of action you're suggesting is no longer appropriate.

I deliberately did not post a link to that discussion while it was underway, because I wanted this question to be evaluated by the wider Wikipedia community, rather than simply being a rehash of local consensus on this talk page. If you object to having not had the opportunity to participate in that discussion, bear in mind that editors active on this page who disagree with you such as Peregrine Fisher, AndewNguyen and Toomim did not have that opportunity either.

If this article survives its AFD, we should create an article FAQ documenting points like these that have received a clear resolution, so that we don't have to debate them endlessly anymore. That will be the first step towards restoring long-term stability to the article. 2600:1004:B146:326B:ECD8:B0F4:F440:4BE1 (talk) 21:15, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

I have warned you about this on your talk page, well one of your hundreds of talk pages. Please don't insult your fellow editors. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 17:15, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

(response to IP-editor's 1st sentence) You're misrepresenting what that discussion was about. It did not concern any of the authors in my list (Jensen, Rushton, Lynn, Gottfredson, Piffer), all of whom are fringe racial supremacists. The first three of them are cited, generally in a positive way (as if they weren't fringe), a total of 69 times in the text and references of this article -- a clear indication of the influence of the alt-right POV on the content of the article. NightHeron (talk) 22:48, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

The broader conclusion reached by both the recent RSN discussion and the one in December is that when determining whether a source is reliable, the most important criterion is the reputation of the publisher, not of the author. Thus, this article should not be citing papers published in Mankind Quarterly or OpenPsych regardless of who the authors are, but publications from Cambridge University Press or journals published by the American Psychological Association (which includes the journal Psychology, Public Policy and Law) are generally acceptable.

When I posted the recent RSN thread, I focused on Hunt and Rindermann because they were the two authors for whom it had been most recently claimed that all publications from them are unreliable. If you think we need yet another RSN discussion about individual authors who weren't explicitly mentioned in either the recent discussion or the one in December, that isn't reasonable. Even if there are ten or twenty RSN discussions about this general question of RS policy, it will never be possible to answer every imaginable formulation of the question. Both of these RSN discussions reached the same conclusion about this general principle of sourcing, and I'm asking you to please acknowledge the general principle. 2600:1004:B146:326B:ECD8:B0F4:F440:4BE1 (talk) 23:56, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

The publisher’s reliability being more important doesn’t mean the author’s reliability is entirely irrelevant which is what you appear to be arguing. In the unlikely scenario that an article by an unreliable author is published in the most reliable source in the world that article could still be ruled unreliable, in fact it almost certainly would be. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 00:08, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

(response to IP-editor) If you read WP:RS thoroughly, rather than trying to pick snippets out of context, you'll see that Wikipedia policy is that what RS means depends on the context. Some reputable presses might in certain fields publish material that has not been vetted by the scholarly community. Some sources might be reliable on certain topics and not on others. I realize that a half-century ago Jensen was able to get his POV published in the Harvard Educational Review. That doesn't make it RS. The scientific consensus is that there is no evidence that one race is mentally superior or inferior to another race. Authors such as Jensen, Rushton, Lynn, Piffer, and Gottfredson have rejected that scientific consensus in their efforts, supported by the Pioneer Fund, to give credence to race supremacy. No amount of wikilawyering or bludgeoning on your part will change those facts. NightHeron (talk) 01:18, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

You are repeating the exact same argument that Onetwothreeip made in both discussions at the RS noticeboard. See his post here here, and compare them to your own post above. In both discussions, this argument was rejected by the broader Wikipedia community.

Do you not see anything disruptive about continuing the exact same argument that community consensus has rejected on two separate occasions? 2600:1004:B146:326B:ECD8:B0F4:F440:4BE1 (talk) 01:55, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

You are once again distorting what was said in earlier discussions. No, different editors are making different points. We are not repeating the "exact same argument." You must be blinded by your own ideology if you can't even pay attention to the points being made by editors who disagree with you. The community has emphatically not rejected the argument that claims of race superiority are fringe. NightHeron (talk) 02:33, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

• The content should stay removed; it's undue, given the reputation of the authors. See for example: Scientific_racism#After_1945. --K.e.coffman (talk) 04:30, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Coffman spoke the truth for you guys. There are no policy reasons to remove a secondary source, but you don't like the authors. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:34, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

WP:NPOV is a policy, and WP:UNDUE is its component. --K.e.coffman (talk) 04:43, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

@Peregrine Fisher: You’ve been given ample policy based reasons for removal, its hard to interpret your refusal to acknowledge that as anything other than tendentious. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 17:09, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm seeing people calling secondary sources primary sources. And I'm seeing people saying primary sources need to be removed, which is also not true. If you think I should feel chagrined, I don't. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 03:18, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

AfD

Is this page up for AfD? People keep saying it is[14] but there is no notice at the top of the page. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 22:26, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

The AfD closed with a delete that was appealed, and the DRV has just reversed the closure and essentially appointed a committee of admins to reexamine how the AfD should be closed. So it's unclear right now what will happen. NightHeron (talk) 22:44, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification! This is my first time encountering an article thats fallen into that sort of administrative black hole.Horse Eye Jack (talk) 23:23, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Policy relevance and ethics section

I support the removal here: [15]. If there's a debate than the article should use sources that discuss the debate rather than quoting individuals. --K.e.coffman (talk) 02:11, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

I reverted, again. Do you like it? Do you not like it?

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Race_and_intelligence&diff=942698394&oldid=942674047

Seems the same as the last 10 times. Arguing particular policies and guidelines doesn't seem to have any postive effect. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 08:10, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

It does seem off topic though, this page is about Race and intelligence... Global variation of IQ scores is only tangentially related and isn't part of the core topic at all. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 08:24, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

This came up earlier with great arguments for why it is applicable. I think it was just a few days ago. Basically that's one way that reliable sources look at things.

You think it's tangentially related. I think it's completely unrelated. But realiable sources think it is related. Shoot! I guess they win. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 08:40, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

If you self reverted, that would be awesome. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 08:42, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

That discussion is still open, no consensus has been reached. Why restore the disputed content *before* consensus is reached? Horse Eye Jack (talk) 09:09, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

The edit summary for Dlthewave's removal was "see talk page", but it's unclear what talk page discussion he means.

This section was last discussed on the talk page about ten days ago. In that discussion I mentioned that the books by Hunt, Mackintosh and Rindermann all make a connection between racial IQ gaps and international differences, and Onetwothreeip replied that the removal was justified because Hunt and Rindermann's books are not reliable sources. The justification for the removal depends on that argument being correct. In response to that argument, I raised the question at the RS noticeboard, and the discussion there reached a conclusion that Hunt's and Rindermann's books do, in fact, satisfy the requirements of RS policy. Thus, based on the conclusion of the RSN discussion, the argument for removing this section seems to no longer be supported. 2600:1004:B112:19F4:748E:E57B:DD2C:7DF9 (talk) 08:45, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

The discussion is "Global variation of IQ scores" further up on this page. I've written a summary of the arguments presented there and explained why I removed the section. Chief among my concerns is the fact that the section doesn't discuss race-nationality connection. The existence of sources that mention it is not sufficient for inclusion; the section would need to be rewritten to include it and nobody seems interested in doing so. Please discuss this in the existing talk page section. –dlthewave ☎ 14:46, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

You appear to be mischaracterizing the discussion on this talk page. You also mischaracterize the RSN consensus which concludes "The remaining concern was that the views of Rindermann and Hunt may be Fringe. The discussion indicated that there is a lack of sources supporting or opposing the notion that the views in these books are fringe, though when a viewpoint does not have wide support, we do treat it as fringe, and do not give it undue weight. That is, we can give the views of Rindermann and Hunt, sourced to their books published by the Cambridge University Press, but take care not to promote their views as widely accepted unless/until sources can be found which indicate their views are widely accepted.” Having an entire section rather than a simple mention suggests that such views are widely accepted. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 09:09, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

How many sources do I have to provide showing that this section is relevant before you'll allow it to be restored? I've already provided three, two of which are major textbooks. A fourth source that makes the connection, which was just published a few days ago, is Winegard et al. 2020. I can probably find others, but it seems like you might be applying an impossibly high standard. 2600:1004:B112:19F4:748E:E57B:DD2C:7DF9 (talk) 09:27, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

I don’t see that argument being made explicitly in Winegard et al. 2020, can you pull the quotes? Horse Eye Jack (talk) 09:34, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

There is a section of the paper titled, "Global distribution of IQ". The section is too long to quote the entire thing, but it starts on the paper's sixth page. 2600:1004:B112:19F4:748E:E57B:DD2C:7DF9 (talk) 09:41, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Yes I’ve read that section, its only three paragraphs and is implicit rather than explicit. The limited space Winegard et al. dedicate to the section (and make no mistake Winegard et al. are outside of the mainstream) suggest to me that we are giving it undue prominence here, no? Also note the point of the paper "we attempt to make the philosophical and theoretical case that hereditarianism—the view that a substantial proportion (20% or more) of differences in psychological traits within and among human popu-lations is caused by genes—is more fruitful, parsimonious, and pro-ductive than is environmentalism—the view that almost all of the dif-ferences in psychological traits either within or among humanpopulations is caused by environmental forces.” Horse Eye Jack (talk) 09:56, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

I’d be more comfortable with a source or two that wasn’t pushing a strong POV. Keep in mind that you are a WP:SPA and "single purpose accounts and editors who hold a strong personal viewpoint on a particular topic covered within Wikipedia are expected to contribute neutrally instead of following their own agenda and, in particular, should take care to avoid creating the impression that their focus on one topic is non-neutral, which could strongly suggest that their editing is not compatible with the goals of this project.” Horse Eye Jack (talk) 10:03, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

The section of the Winegard paper is around 500 words in a paper that's around 10,000 words long, so it's about five percent of the paper's total length. Percentage wise, that's actually more than the amount of space this topic was given in the Wikipedia article, where it was around 580K of text in an article that's around 150,000K long. In any case, I'm not trying to base my argument entirely on that single paper. I was just giving it as an example because it's the most recent paper to be published on this article's topic.

Have you looked at the Hunt and Mackintosh textbooks? Hunt is basically agnostic about the cause of the gaps (he thinks some genetic contribution to racial IQ gaps is likely, but that there is insufficient data to know its size, and the genetic contribution might be minuscule), while Mackintosh is agnostic but thinks a 100% environmental cause is more likely than a partially genetic one. And both textbooks bring up international IQ differences in the context of discussions about race and intelligence. 2600:1004:B112:19F4:748E:E57B:DD2C:7DF9 (talk) 10:36, 26 February 2020 (UTC)