Race and Intelligence

DISCLAIMER: This video is built around a racist joke, and I apologize unreservedly to anyone taking offense. The "joke" does, however, contain a certain truth, but not in regards to the alleged stupidity or intelligence of any particular race. In my opinion, it perfectly illustrates the extreme cultural bias in any definition of "intelligence" or "success" in life.

[TheSethrahul]

About 3 years ago I attended this week long workshop called "Jeevan vidya" (lit translation 'Life Knowledge' in Hindi) It's one persons (A Nagraj) proposal of a comprehensive theory of life. The more I watch your videos I can't help thinking that you would find it very interesting. I like the format because its not imposing, not faith based and entirely open to debate. One of the initial questions they attempt to answer is "do humans have a purpose?" if we can answer that question and define...

[Anekantavad]

I certainly don't despise the Angry White Male. He's such a ludicrous figure that it's hard to do anything but laugh a bit.
:-)

[ThomasTrue]

Gandhi was once asked what he thought of British civilization, to which he replied, "I think it would be a very good idea."

[Anekantavad]

"This, however, does not stop you from measuring the general intelligence of people who are educating themselves."
Correct. But what you can't measure is why someone chooses to educate themselves in the first place. Before one starts educating oneself comes the desire to do so, and that goes for absolutely everything. People who excel at something generally have a stronger desire to do it than others.

[Lucem]

In regards to populations and their ability to work as a group. Rather than intelligence I'd say is the contrary. To be dumb enough to obey orders without asking too many questions, follow a charismatic leader, or obey a religious moral code for fear of God.

[mortalhellion]

What I find most frustrating in the United States is that all these rich people who have a lot of money WANT more money. They just want more and more, and those of Enron or oil companies don't seem to understand the concept of having just enough money for comfort.
Though it has to be said that many divorces end in the U.S. due to money issues.

[CHAS]

Work is a learned value, and so is materialism. All the things that appear in your video including the sitting Bhudda in the background required work to create. We are taught to enjoy a warm house, electricity, running water, a bed with clean sheets, a store stocked full of food, etc...All of these survival conveniences require a massive infrastructure of factories, industries and reliable trained workers. But our fields of work confine us to a life of volunteery bondage.

[TheSethrahul]

.... such a purpose then we can feel more secure about calling something "right" or "wrong" within that context and obviously only for ourselves. While most people in India believe in dualism and contradictions JV begins by putting this into perspective from ourselves and from there developing an entire world view that can coincide with everyone else's invariably different world view. ( I hope this makes sense)

[Lucem]

You know, i think the differences between races regarding intelligence are more about attitudes and interests rather than raw IQ. Besides, there are several kinds of intelligence depending of what areas or the brain are more interconnected or developed. The more you meet people from other races the harder it becomes to establish a relationship between race and IQ. Another factor is how organized, symbiotic and civil a specific population is regardless of IQ alone, attitudes aboutthe future is big

[CHAS]

I detected a double of meaning in the joke. When the Indian says "I'm already not working" he could be acknowledging the preist's reward of retirement for a life of labor. The Indian responds that he is already retired, without the need for servile labor. A 2nd meaning is that the Indian states he 'isn't working', as in 'is not functioning'.

In either case, the Indian is resigned to his plight and doesn't hold the same set of learned values as the priest. Intelligence is a subjective.

[Anekantavad]

"Dogs have different levels of ability in various things, all kinds of things, depending on what breed they are"
Maybe. Maybe not.
For example, perhaps the one dog simply wants to do something that other dogs are perfectly capable of doing but lack the desire.
We don't know. We can't know. It doesn't work like that.

[MardasMan]

Very good way of looking at this. In IQ-Tests the missionary would be scoring relatively high and the native very low, but the latter could be called more clever than the first one and maybe he would be more intelligent, depending on what intelligence means. And there lies the problem: What is intelligence? Everyone, even every scientist has an entirely different way of determining intelligence with varying definitions of intelligence.

[Anekantavad]

"As a rule, the "World" does not easily tolerate non-conformity or eccentricity from people who do not have the financial means to go their own way regardless of the "World"'s opinion ... "
... unless such people aren't even noticed. I'd say there are an awful lot of people who totally escape notice. I might even say that they are probably the overwhelming majority of people :-)

[Anekantavad]

A certain strain in western thought (the materialist one) hold that money = happiness, when we've known it isn't since the concept of wealth came along :-)

[mortalhellion]

Though it can be said that Poe and Van Gogh did suffer a mental illness of some sort, Lovecraft didn't. However, Lovecraft's health was pretty piss-poor since he has the inability to go outside in cold conditions... something called Hypothermia or something like that. Which is probably why he set his great novel Mountains of Madness in the southern hemisphere close to the south pole.

[Anekantavad]

"Could you define how IQ tests are biased?"
IQ tests can measure nothing besides one's score when doing something called an IQ test.
I am not singling out IQ tests for special criticism here, mind you. This objection applies for any test designed to measure anything.
The most important part of the scientific method is recognizing the limitations of one's methodology.

[ConformistDave]

He is not incorrect. Bias is involved in the study of intelligence. IQ is not a culturally unbiased tool, and it is agreed upon to be biased. The vast majority of psychologists will tell you that IQ tests are extremely biased, and environmental factors play the major role. Environmental factors determine the academic intelligence more so than race. There was a psychologist that bred his son to graduate Harvard by the age of twelve, and he son did. That's not a result of race.

[Anekantavad]

There's no one on earth who has had more handed to him, gift-wrapped and on a silver platter, than the white N American male.
But to listen to the Angry White Male, he's the most persecuted, exploited and generally hard-done-by person in history. No one has it worse, and no one is more villified and no one spends so much time ruminating over how "they" are all out to get him.
:-)

[Anekantavad]

Who said that I despise them?
Straw man, no?
:-)

[Anekantavad]

If you compare the Chinese and Japanese response to Western encroachment, one is forced to admit that the two "Asian giants" were just about as far apart as it's possible to be in terms of attitudes to industrialization and modernization.
I have been to both countries frequently, and while Japan reacted quickly and effectively to modernization, it is still "itself" and very "Asian". China took much longer to adapt, and it is now far less itself and far less Asian.