Dangerous subject opened for mature debate

What purpose would this research serve other than to provide excuses for one set of people to control another?

My concept of humankind is unlimited potential. Nevertheless it does seem as if there is a large possibility that whatever data can be pulled from such research, the conclusions that would stem from there would only be setting a limit upon what individuals would be able to achieve.

Whenever I’m attempting something, I figure that most of what prevents me from doing it is not physical deficiency, but a mental block. Surely the most dangerous effect of conducting such research would not be solely the fodder that it would provide those who would want to control others and what they can do, but it would cripple ourselves by setting up a whole range of mental blocks detailing what is and is not possible.

Remember, scientific theories had determined that the 3 minute mile was not possible.

Anyway, this stuff does scare me somewhat :astonished: and i’m not afraid to say so- I think it ought to be said. Irrational fear is not good.

The record is presently about 3 minutes 43 seconds. Right now, I’m with the scientists on this one! (Unless you meant the 4 minute mile:p )

:slight_smile: :o :wink:

Some thing are better left unanswered…

I dont think that going through this research is bad, but what can come from it is, cause we all know there will be people that will use this information to add more segregation to the races. It will make lots of people be like " oh, your a insert race your intelligence is only insert the lvl from the testing here your not high enough to work here, or something along those lines.

Ill say it again, I think that going through this research to find out if each race has a certain lvl of intelligence (if we could ever find a way to judge intelligence cause there are plenty of types out there) isn’t bad, but what comes from it can be very bad.

d’oh! Thanks for the correction… I hope you got the sentiment though
:o

But on the other hand, whilst this potential area of scientific research is taboo, the government would fund and honour a scientist leading research into making more effective nuclear or anti-personnel weapons. What comes of that reasearch can also be bad!

In fact, a lot of research can be put to bad use by bad or stupid people. Warfare and pornography have been the two of the biggest drivers of technology and scientific research for centuries.

Thats very true, i just haven’t thought of the pros of this yet, Ive just been thinking of cons so far, tomorrow i will be thinking more on this subject with good intentions all around =p cant wait to see what everyone else adds to this interesting subject :smiley:

no, we all came from outer space.

In the same way as the holocaust, as a part of history, is protected by law in many countries from being researched, this particular issue will probably also get branded as hate speech before the accusers realise that by muzzling our scientists, we’re taking our first step back towards the primordial ooze.

A very responsible way to introduce a very thorny topic Mike.
Well done

Asian are more intelligent than caucation.

Do you feel a threat …?

I found this link

This is an OLD subject. Maybe not in this forum …

I can add little to the conclusions that you have come to yourself Mikefule, but since you mention me in your first post I thought I should say something. My main thoughts (as I said they are mostly your conclusions anyway) are:

  1. All concepts and ‘measures’ of intelligence are culturally situated and I don’t know any measures in existence that ‘really’ measure intelligence cross-culturally (although they may claim to). I don’t think this would be possible as there is no one thing out there that is ‘intelligence’ to measure.
  2. What would this kind of reasearch accomplish? What would be the advantage of knowing this?
  3. Social constructionists wouldn’t carry out this type of research because it aims to discover some ‘real’ truth (ie who is the most intelligent). Social constructionist research is about discovering individual meanings. (I know you didn’t ask about this)
  4. Research that has been done on this kind of thing in the past has been used against people. Funny that Gild mentioned the holocaust as intelligence tests devised by British psychologists were used in the name of racial cleansing and eugenics.

Also other things about how to decide who to include and so on.

Cathy

One thing that no-one seems to have picked up on yet is that the reaction to Frank Ellis’ statements is not entirely surprising considering his personal background.

People have stated that research into this area could be misused by bigots, from what I have read it seems like this is exactly what Ellis is trying to do.

According to this article he is a white supremacist and supporter of the BNP.

I think research of this kind could be accepted if carefully researched, but if someone like Frank Ellis is using it for evidence of white supremacy then it doesn’t surprise me that they will be denounced by the media.

(But then again, maybe I have just taken for granted the social construction of bigotry from The Guardian’s point of view:) )

I wasn’t aware that Ellis was a BNP supporter, and I’m surprised that that hasn’t been mentioned in the media reports I’ve seen or heard.

I have a deep personal antipathy towards the BNP - my brother is heavily involved in the party and I know the sort of sht he talks and does. His late mother hated it, but he still had three of the bstards at her funeral in uniform to show solidarity at his time of loss.

But back to the media: here’s an extract from the article in The Independent:

<<In contending that whites are cleverer than blacks, and men are cleverer than women, Ellis appears to have somewhat damaged his own argument. If white men are so clever, then why would one of them be dumb enough to risk his career and reputation in order to spread hateful playground nonsense.>>

Forget what you think about the issue itself, take the emotion out of it, and analyse that as an argument. It fails on several counts, and is (to my mind) symptomatic of the knee-jerk reaction to someone making a taboo statement. The journalist assumes Ellis is wrong, and asserts this to be the case without considering Ellis’s arguments, or presenting her own. Her reaction is every bit as thoughtless and ill-considered as she says his statement is.

It is when you feel strongly that something is right or wrong that you have a duty to yourself to be most careful about the arguments you deploy in support of your point of view.

In my experience when people get personal in their arguments it means that they are rattled. She is obviously emotionally involved in the topic.

Cathy

this guy is recycling jensen’s OLD stuff from the mid 1970s

First, this guy is recycling jensen’s OLD stuff from the mid 1970s [IQ and RaceFlynn, James R. (1980) Race, IQ and Jensen. Routledge Kegan & Paul. Fraser, Steve, editor, The Bell Curve Wars : Race, Intelligence, and the Future of …

Second, if you notice that males need an affirmative action leg-up to get into college in equal proportion to females, there is little to suggest males are brighter than females.

Perferctly stated.
And The biggest question is what is the unaversal deffantion of intellagence and how is it univeraly messured?

well, so far, it hasn’t been done…the fastest mile ever run was 3:43 I think.
of course, this has nothing to do with the topic at hand, just felt like point it out (:

Define brighter is this context.

RANT
I know a UK exam marker who, through 20 years of personal experience, recognised that men answer the question posed to them, women answer every question in every question. He hated marking girls papers since they wrote far too much for the smallest of quesitions and for every female paper he could mark 10 mens papers. They got more marks, but only by quoting the whole syllabus back at the exam paper for each and every question. That is not intelligence or brightness, thats spoon-feeding.
/RANT

Unless you quantify intelligence, you cannot perform an unbiased comparison. Black people might be better at certain types of mental reasoning, which may not be counted under intelligence. They might be less bright, but more sensible, or more dilligent & attentive, or more whatever. There is no possible reason for trying to make out that ‘we’ are better than ‘them’ (and you can fill those 2 slots with any social/economic/race/religion you like) for any category, since if they are statistically proven to be worse or better in some way, there are countless other categories where the positions are reversed.

Loose.

Loose.

thanks- please see post Dangerous subject opened for mature debate - #25

To further explain my earlier post, I would be curious as hell to see the results of this test, if a test could actually be conducted with conclusive results, and without bias or anything, even if it meant accepting that whites as a whole are less intelligent then say, blacks…
However, for the good of society, and because of all the hate and bigotry it would elicit, I think it should definitely not be researched.
I do, however, wish that current society was mature enough so that this topic could be researched without all the uproar