…and this is a 
CSHL acts against Watson
Category:
Posted on: October 18, 2007 10:33 PM, by PZ Myers
I am distressed at this news: the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory has suspended Chancellor Jim Watson over his comments about race.
I disagree with Watson passionately, and he is completely wrong in his opinions about Africa and women and who knows what else…but he has the right to say it, just as we have the right to disagree vehemently and volubly with him. This does the CSHL no good: it's a declaration that their director must be an inoffensive, mealy-mouthed mumbler who never challenges (even stupidly).
Maybe that's what they want — someone diplomatic, who'll woo donors and visitors with soft words — and I can understand that desire. It's a sign, though, that CSHL will not be administered by anyone willing to assert controversy, and that's too bad.
I know, his personal opinions were repellent. But what concerns me is that future leaders of the institution will also not be able to be forceful and loud and aggressive, as Watson has always been, in favor of causes I care about. You have to be able to tolerate the tenure of assholes in order to have the possibility of heroes.
Comments
Hot off the press:
"Nobel-winning biologist apologizes for remarks about blacks"
"Nobel laureate biologist Jim Watson apologized "unreservedly" Thursday for stating that black people were not as intelligent as whites, saying he was "mortified" by the comments attributed to him."
The article:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/10/18/nobel.apology/index.html
Posted by: Mike | October 18, 2007 10:36 PM
No. We've been over this. You're no more right on this issue than you were when you turned the discussion about Idiocracy into a critique of the concept of Social Darwinism. Your arguments are aimed at strawmen and have nothing to do with the extensive scientific research on the actual topic.
Posted by: Caledonian | October 18, 2007 10:47 PM
I have to disagree P.Z. Watson's choice to espouse racist nonsense isn't your garden variety nonsense in the U.S., given how racism continues to poison the culture. I suspect that the suspension has nothing to do with CSHL avoiding genuine scientific controversy, but with simply responding to Watson's rather crude bigotry.
Posted by: David Wilford | October 18, 2007 10:48 PM
Yeah, no shit, PZ. When Watson says that he's "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours, whereas all the testing says not really," he doesn't mean that they're inferior, he just means they aren't as smart as us.
God, get with the program.
Posted by: Dustin | October 18, 2007 10:52 PM
I'm with Dr. Myers on this one. If no one is allowed to say anything disagreeable, how would we ever have a real discussion about those subjects? His deserves the right to speak his mind, his comments deserve our ridicule, and we deserve the right to ridicule them.
Plus, every once in a while people shown the error of their remarks sometimes have the grace to learn from the experience. I know a few folks who were raised as unquestioning racists whom I am genuinely convinced are better people today. Allow the man to revise, extend, and apologize.
Posted by: melior | October 18, 2007 10:55 PM
You... you're making a valid (and actually correct) argument in your attempt to be sarcastic.
I think you need to re-evaluate your position, because at this point you seem to have no idea what you're saying.
Posted by: Caledonian | October 18, 2007 10:55 PM
No, I have been over it, and I'm familiar with the literature and the concepts — and Watson's statements were stupid and wrong. And Caledonian: you can stuff your pretenses and your supercilious attitude in that same feculent gut cavity where you store your reservoir of ignorance, and from whence you pull your reeking opinions.
Posted by: PZ Myers | October 18, 2007 11:00 PM
Your arguments are aimed at strawmen and have nothing to do with the extensive scientific research on the actual topic. Caledonian, there has been absolutely no scientific research on the subject. There are no empirical entities defined in the first place. So whatever you dub scientific - and this can't be put strongly enough - is horsemanure.
I look forward to the IDiots' reaction to Watson's suspension. CSH acted to censure Watson for his racist crackpottery - so did they squelch academic endoresement of "Darwinism" or did they squelch unpopular voices such as their own? The assorted menagerie at di has its work cut out.
Posted by: rimpal | October 18, 2007 11:04 PM
Nice use of the word "feculent"!
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | October 18, 2007 11:10 PM
"....you can stuff your pretenses and your supercilious attitude in that same feculent gut cavity where you store your reservoir of ignorance, and from whence you pull your reeking opinions."
Reading this passage made my wife fall in love with you!
Posted by: Coturnix | October 18, 2007 11:11 PM
We already acknowledge that all sorts of traits can vary genetically between different ethnic groups - well, the rational among us do, although I can't speak for all of the chattering swarms who post.
And we already acknowledge that genes can have a serious influence over all sorts of mental traits - again, the sane and well-educated do, at least.
People who are actually familiar with the basics of psychometric testing also know that various ethnic subpopulations score differently on the scale of large groups. And yes, attempts have been made to account for these differences, and obvious things like SES and nutrition can't account for all of them.
Putting these points together, we are left with the inescapable conclusion that genetic differences could very well be an explanatory factor in accounting for the differences we see.
When you say you're familiar with the literature and the concepts, PZ, what you really mean is that you reject as racist all of the research that contradicts your pre-established beliefs and are familiar with the accounts that assert the conclusions you favor.
You desperately need to have a long, long talk with razib - he can review with you the extensive scientific data on this topic.
Posted by: Caledonian | October 18, 2007 11:11 PM
If Watson were just an academic, I might agree, PZ, but he essentially represents Cold Spring Harbor not just intellectually, but as an institution -- he is its public face, and the Board of Trustees is right to think that these kind of remarks do CSHL no favours. His suspension is no more inappropriate than a company who fires their CEO over similar remarks. Would you have argued against this action if he had been "forceful and loud and aggressive" in favour of Intelligent Design?
Posted by: Tulse | October 18, 2007 11:13 PM
I would say academic freedom is threatened when they start firing teaching and research people for what they say. The CSHL press release talks about suspending Watson's administrative responsibilities. I guess I really don't care whether they hire and fire administrators. If Watson also has a teaching/research position, and they fire him from that position for something he said, then that would be genuinely bad news.
I know that PZ didn't actually bring up academic freedom, but that is the angle I would be most worried about.
.
Posted by: Voting Present | October 18, 2007 11:13 PM
Actually, I have re-evaluated my position. My position used to be that you were a homophobic shithead with a borderline personality disorder. Now I think you're a bigoted eugenicist homophobic shithead with a borderline personality disorder and, it seems, a single success in your life: your IQ score. Since that, evidently, hasn't gotten you much else, you sit here and troll everyone about how great you think IQ tests are even though you've been confronted with evidence to the contrary over and over and over and over again. And then after being confronted, you seem to do nothing but stroke yourself about how great you are and how stupid everyone else is.
I wish you could see what you look like without your narcissistic filter, because "smart" is not typically the word those of us who don't pride ourselves on being aspies use to classify people so absorbed in their own belligerence that they dismiss facts as matters of interpretation only to proceed to proclaim their own superiority over everyone who has ever lived.
I don't need to insult you, you're your own insult. You don't believe me? How many friends do you have? How many people like to be around you? How often do people invite you to do things with them? How many relationships have you had? You can lie about it or you'll probably call me presumptuous without giving any kind of real answer to any of them, but I'm betting the answer to all of those questions is "none". I've met elementary school children who act more like adults than you.
Grow up, and quit taking whatever's gone wrong in your life out on the rest of the world.
Posted by: Dustin | October 18, 2007 11:13 PM
I think this is outrageous. However wrong Watson's views on race and intelligence are, we need to have wide boundaries of freedom of speech, especially in science and academia. Once we start allowing scientists and academics to be sacked for saying something unpopular and wrong, we have no guarantee that they are safe if they say something unpopular and dubious, or something unpopular and right. What next? Peter Singer for his unpopular views about animal rights, euthanasia, and Zeus knows what else? Richard Dawkins for his unpopular views about religion? Me for my unpopular views about human cloning? And don't say that our views are correct (they may not be, in the end ... they are highly contentious) while Watson's are incorrect.
Anyone who requires the freedom to express unpopular ideas, as I certainly do, should be appalled at this action.
Posted by: Russell Blackford | October 18, 2007 11:15 PM
Um, no. There's been a massive amount of scientific research on this topic - it's why we know that the social categories of race have very little if anything to do with the underlying biology in the first place.
'Race' means nothing. 'Ethnicity' means quite a bit, at least on the population level - certainly much more than we would have thought before modern genetics research was attempted. Specific data from an individual always trumps statistical predictions about whatever groups and populations they belong to, but you can't ignore the statistical predictions as though they didn't exist.
Posted by: Caledonian | October 18, 2007 11:16 PM
Actually, it's not Caledonian that bugs me so much here, though I'd not shed a tear if he went bye-bye, perhaps with the aid of a steamroller.
What drives me nuts is that there are people a couple threads down who're tut-tutting the completely accurate descriptions of his statements as racist, saying that such apt criticism is unconstructive.
There's nothing so disheartening as seeing the veneer peel away from someone who had seemed to be a person of good will.
Posted by: Chris Clarke | October 18, 2007 11:19 PM
Just let the noisemaker drone on, Dustin at #14, please don't pay it any attention. There is really no point in talking to a wall. Although PZ was quite funny.
.
Posted by: Voting Present | October 18, 2007 11:19 PM
As I recall, the 'homophobic' obsession of yours started when you utterly failed to grasp the substance of an argument I had made, and then began an endless series of rants that ignored my attempts to correct your misapprehension.
In Internet discussions about IQ, I usually have to be the person who tones down others' enthusiasm for test results and talk about all of the aspects of cognition that they simply don't touch. I've never actually met a group of people ignorant enough to take the opposite position, that IQ testing is meaningless.
What, you reject all medical and psychologic psychometric testing? I'll bet the research neurologists trying to assess the effects of traumatic brain injuries and psychologists studying the nature of cognitive processing will be stunned to know they haven't been performing science. Not to mention the people who specialize in psychometrics and have worked for years to refine and validate tests. Whole careers have gone into finding ways to eliminate arbitrary cultural bias - I guess they were totally wasted then, huh, because you know better.
Extraordinary. Who would have thought that Pharyngula was a haven for psychology denialists?
Posted by: Caledonian | October 18, 2007 11:25 PM
Tulse, I know. If Watson were hired as just an administrator, I'd agree -- toss him out. But he also has this peculiar position as an academic, and academics have to be free to be offensive. And even if he were stupidly endorsing Intelligent Design as he is stupidly endorsing racism, I would painfully concede that we shouldn't fire him, while all the while I'd be howling furiously at his every expression of inanity.
That's the difficult part. You don't hire Jim Watson for anything in the expectation that he'll be a tactful diplomat. If that's what CSHL wanted (and I agree that that would be a reasonable set of qualifications for the head of an institution), then they shouldn't have hired Watson in the first place. Since they did, I have to assume that they thought an obnoxious gadfly was useful.
I'm also concerned because this works both ways. Will they hire a vociferous feminist, for instance, who'll shake things up and aggressively oppose old-school chauvinists like Watson as a replacement? I doubt it. It'll be someone who knows how to grease the wheels and keep a low profile.
Posted by: PZ Myers | October 18, 2007 11:26 PM
A very good point about g that's worth pointing to here, via Crooked Timber:
g, a Statistical Myth
Posted by: David Wilford | October 18, 2007 11:26 PM
(somewhat offtopic)
Has anybody read the book called "Dark Star Safari" by Paul Theroux? It's about the authors overland trip from Cairo to Capetown in 2001... 200x anyway...I forget the year exactly. He revisited along the way the school he taught at while he was in the Peace Corps in Malawi.
Anyway, a lot of it deals with the culture in parts of Africa, and if what he writes is true, it's a kind of vortex in which anyone who tries to make things better for themselves, by, say, building a nice place to live for themselves, or, well, anything, even the simplest of niceties, will have this taken from them. It also talks about the effects, plus and minus that the various charities and NGOs (non-government organizations) have (or fail to have) on the culture. The book is a pretty discouraging read in many ways, but very interesting nonetheless, and because it's interesting, I'd recommend it. (And there's a nice anti-religious scene in which the author sort of debates a Western Christian missionary woman on a train which serves as a nice comical godless interlude to the backdrop of African misery).
Posted by: SteveC | October 18, 2007 11:28 PM
Who would have thought Pharyngula was a haven for damned dumb racists?
Posted by: PZ Myers | October 18, 2007 11:29 PM
PZ is right.
If you actually believe in freedom of thought and expression rather than pay lip service to the notion then it must include allowing the Watsons of this world to say things that are stupid and offensive.
Why?
Because that same freedom allows you to tell the Watson's of this world to their faces that they are talking out of a different part of their anatomy as offensively as you like.
Posted by: Ian H Spedding FCD | October 18, 2007 11:36 PM
Who would have thought Pharyngula was a haven for damned dumb racists?
My own take on this flap is that those who are giving credence to Watson as merely saying some crudely put truths are giving g an explanatory power it doesn't rate. Watson ought to know better, but like Louis Agassiz he may have a quirk about race lurking somewhere in his personal past. It wasn't that long ago that Jim Crow was the law of the land, after all.
Posted by: David Wilford | October 18, 2007 11:38 PM
If you actually believe in freedom of thought and expression rather than pay lip service to the notion then it must include allowing the Watsons of this world to say things that are stupid and offensive.
If it's the considered opinion of CSHL that bigoted views, however freely expressed, harm the institution by association they have every right to act on it by severing their formal ties with Watson. It's not as if Watson can't go on spouting bigoted nonsense if he wishes to do so.
Posted by: David Wilford | October 18, 2007 11:44 PM
Nice.
Unfortunately, the scientific evidence clearly indicates that various ethnic groups do vary in subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) ways. Acknowledging that isn't being racist, it's being intellectually honest - which I have never once seen you manage on issues that push your buttons.
Some groups do better than the Western norm - in some cases, a lot better. Is acknowledging that also racism? Or no, let me guess - it's all education and upbringing in those cases, despite the complete failure of virtually all attempts to increase cognitive potential in healthy subjects? (Music is the sole exception - but then music and cognition are related in lots of weird ways.)
Do you also reject scientific research into how drug metabolism varies between ethnic groups, too?
Posted by: Caledonian | October 18, 2007 11:46 PM
Okay, Caledonian, I've not had much of a presence on this forum at all, and I appreciate the contrary opinion as much as the next guy. I just wonder if you read what you type. You've gone on the record as admitting that "race" is statistically meaningless, as well as genetically unidentifiable, but "ethnicity" has marked impacts in various studies. Watson was most decidedly not singling out any one of Africa's plethora of "ethnicities", he was blanketing a continent with the implication of inferiority. Unless you are going to point to a study that shows that all of the ethnicities, African as well as generations-old African/European and African/American hybrids, are actually genetically one "ethnicity", you must either redefine ethnicity to simply mean "color", or specify how studies conducted outside of Africa identified the ethnicity of the subjects.
Posted by: autumn | October 18, 2007 11:51 PM
Perhaps Cold Spring Harbor is more concerned with doing good science than "assert[ing] controversy".
Just a guess.
Posted by: notthedroids | October 18, 2007 11:57 PM
In an informal setting, I'd say that's pretty much accurate. There are quite a few subgroups within the larger category of sub-Saharan Africans, but the measured IQ discrepancy is found across the board - to slightly varying levels IIRC.
The actual issue here isn't that most of Africa doesn't perform as well on psychometric tests. That's simply a fact (no matter how much some people choose to deny it). The issue is determining what factors are responsible for this difference and what their relative weights are.
Quite a lot of people are objecting to the very idea that there could be a genetic component to this difference, and sadly the quality of their claims doesn't match their certainty. We have absolutely no reason to believe that ethnicities vary in all sorts of traits except mental ones.
The number of people who want to follow Stephen Jay Gould and automatically characterize any scientific findings that seem to agree with popular racial stereotypes as wrong is shocking, given that they're nominally supporters of the scientific method. The damning thing about stereotypes is that they're quite often more accurate than we'd like them to be.
Posted by: Caledonian | October 19, 2007 12:01 AM
Some researchers just use self-identification. What's remarkable is how frequently significant differences can be found based on that alone.
You may recall the BiDil kerfluffle.
Posted by: Caledonian | October 19, 2007 12:05 AM
I just want to make sure I get credit for this.
I've long considered Caledonian a dishonest, pretentious ass, and he every once in a while reveals a level of bigotry that would make him right at home in the KKK, but I abstain from banning the jerk on the same principle that I defend Watson's right to be a jerk.
I've been tolerant. But so far he's making the best argument of all of you that I might be wrong in that.
Posted by: PZ Myers | October 19, 2007 12:08 AM
Caledonian, pardon me if I missed this in the other threads, but could you, if it wouldn't be too much trouble, post the top 5 (roughly) best papers/sources for your view? I mean if you had to point one in a direction. Titles, authors, and journal names would be great. Thank you.
Posted by: cm | October 19, 2007 12:08 AM
Well, if he had tenure in his teaching/research position THEN he can get away with this. Otherwise, promoting crazed & crank pseudoscience racism would be a perfectly good reason to not hire a particular scientist, or not renew their contract. (Firing them in the middle of a contract would depend on what the contract agreement states.)
And if he's an administrator representing the institution, then please, he hasn't got any leg to stand on at all. He has every constitutional right to say whatever he damn well pleases, but he doesn't have the right to have a prestigious research institution support him while doing it.
Exactly.
That said, Watson has just apologized:
(Caledonian, take note.)
Anyway, it is somewhat conceivable that Watson was being a Devil's advocate, or generally ornery, or carred away or something during the interview with the Sunday Times and got misunderstood. Perhaps like the Pianka affair -- academic pushes the discussion out of the normal bounds of A over to B to be provocative, but then gets interpreted by a reporter as advocating truly evil opinion Z because of the scientists' poor communication/lack of clarificaton/lack of qualificaton and/or the reporters' lack of context/strong predisposition towards interpreting the scientist as saying Z.
It's a hypothesis anyway.
Posted by: Nick (Matzke) | October 19, 2007 12:08 AM
You can have a challenging thought provoking director without him/her having to be a racist. If he could justify the science, yeah sure, no case to argue. But the fact is that all the science done in the last 50 years without the prejudices of racism have shown that intelligence is not linked to race. For the director of a major scientific institute to suggest otherwise is frankly pseudoscience.
Are you saying that the director of Cold Springs should be expressing false statements and using his position to justify them? What next? A director of Cold Springs that support ID?
Watson has for a long time been riding on the coat tails of success for the 'discovery' of the double helix. He has a reputation at Cold Springs of being a difficult person to work with and I believe this was the straw that broke the camel's back. Many people associated with Cold Springs would be glad to hear of their stand against this man.
Posted by: LK | October 19, 2007 12:09 AM
"...he has the right to say it, just as we have the right to disagree vehemently and volubly with him. This does the CSHL no good: it's a declaration that their director must be an inoffensive, mealy-mouthed mumbler who never challenges (even stupidly)."
It is true that Watson has the "right to say it," but CSHL, a private entity, likewise has the right not to employ him if he, as a very visible figure, tarnishes the institution's reputation. Moreover, suspending Watson is hardly a "a declaration that their director must be an inoffensive, mealy-mouthed mumbler who never challenges...." There are many gradations between making idiotic, even racist, assertions and being so inoffensive as to be mealy-mouthed. Rejecting the one extreme does not necessitate embracing the other. I do hope that PZ has not become trapped within the tentacles of the many-armed fallacy of the excluded middle.
Posted by: Elf Eye | October 19, 2007 12:10 AM
Watson has apologized for his remarks and points out there is no scientific basis for the belief that Africans are "genetically inferior".
Posted by: pdiddysl | October 19, 2007 12:11 AM
Extraordinary. What positions have I ever expressed that would make me accepted by White Supremacists? The scientific research on the psychometric testing of European Jews alone would probably get them to lynch me if they thought they could get away with it. If I recall correctly, they're the primary source of the slander that standardized psychometric tests were made specifically to make Jews look good.
How? By pointing out that you systematically misrepresent a specific category of topics? I'm not the only person to have publically noted that you like to poison certain discussions. Banning me isn't going to make me the only one to call you on it.
But what's truly sad is that the only way you can condemn the views I've expressed is by lying about what they are. Or maybe they're not lies, and you actually believe them - that would be much sadder.
***
People have already posted links to journal articles discussing the various relevant phenomena. I'm sure you can find them on your own.
Posted by: Caledonian | October 19, 2007 12:19 AM
PZ -- I don't think that this can be taken as a reflection of CSHL's position on scientific controversy. It's easier to interpret it as their position on whether their Chancellor and spokesperson should go around espousing nonscientific nonsense.
To pull out a favorite example of yours, here's a WhatIf: What if the Chancellor of CSHL said something like, "All of genomics is based on the idea that descent from a common ancestor can be deduced from conservation of sequence...but of course that doesn't take into account the equally valid theory of Intelligent Design", and the CSHL board suspended him?
The suspension wouldn't be for espousing a controversial scientific position; it would be for espousing a totally nonscientific position whose advocacy by a major figure in science would undercut the basis of the entire enterprise. It would have nothing to do with scientific freedom, except inasmuch as scientific freedom extends to things like creationism or HIV denialism.
The Chancellor of CSHL should be a paragon of scientific rigor; Watson is anything but, and his propensity to wrap his racist views in scientific sheep's clothing is nothing new. It's been at best a poorly kept secret for at least the past decade, an embarrassment to all who have to rub shoulders with him, and something we have always feared would come out in a major public way (like this) -- and it's evidence that he's not a scientific role model, or even merely competent to interpret and promulgate scientific positions. I think that's a very different issue from academic freedom, and it's a mistake the conflate the two.
.
Posted by: CP | October 19, 2007 12:22 AM
I've been tolerant. But so far he's making the best argument of all of you that I might be wrong in that.
Well P.Z., this isn't the first time or place the subject of race and intelligence has caused a flap, and it won't be the last either. As far as I know, there hasn't been anything really new said about it for the past ten years since the controversy over The Bell Curve took place, which is what makes Watson's bigoted remarks all the more dismaying.
That said, the comment section here isn't representing anything except the thoughts of those who post here and I have no problem dealing with that. Sometimes I even get prompted to relearn a thing or two as a result of being irritated, and occasionally even change my mind about something. If there's a good reason to, that is. Ahem.
Posted by: David Wilford | October 19, 2007 12:23 AM
Unfortunately, it's often very hard to draw the line between endorsing radical but potentially valid ideas, and unscientific crap. That's why we have this principle of academic freedom, where we take people who have earned their merit badges in the field and we set them aside and tell them they can say whatever they want from now on, without worrying about loss of their job. Sometimes that means we have to listen to old fools babble patent nonsense, and we cringe and are embarrassed for them, but it also means we've got people who can speak their minds.
Now I quite agree that these wise fools with the right of volubility are often not the best people to put in administrative positions (I sit through faculty meetings. I know.), and on those grounds, CSHL is doing the smart thing and silencing a political liability. On the other hand, though...Watson never has been the politic kind of administrator. I suspect CSHL has profited from his notoriety. This really is a declaration that their administrators will not have academic freedom.
Which is OK. But let's not pretend that this will not have an effect on what future administrators will feel comfortable saying.
Posted by: PZ Myers | October 19, 2007 12:34 AM
There is a reason for Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories to be hypersensitive about genetic-based racism. It was the American center for eugenics in the early 20th century. That's a history I'm pretty sure the current admin wants to play down as much as possible.
Posted by: W. Kevin Vicklund | October 19, 2007 12:35 AM
why are these guys opinions necessarily incorrect because it isn't PC... I expected better of you guys - I mean, honestly, the fact that different races come from different genetic backgrounds implies that more than just skin color is different, and those differences could have more overt affects, such as, as watson suggests, intelligence, sexual prowess, et al.
Honestly, I'm not even saying he is *right* so much as the essence of the concept of his opinions, the idea that races nay be differentiated by more than just what is immediately obvious might hold merit.
Posted by: Fesh | October 19, 2007 12:39 AM
Any group of people who would let a completely preventable disease such as AIDS destroy their population is stupid.
I await your replies to my provocation.
Posted by: antihumanist | October 19, 2007 12:41 AM
"Some researchers just use self-identification."
Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't most people self-identify as a race? You know, the socially based, rather meaningless one? How can you then extrapolate to the genetically meaningful property of ethnicity solely from that?
I mean, I can self-identify as whatever the hell I want, doesn't mean I have the genes to back it up. And I humbly suggest that it is highly unlikely that all people in the US that self-identify as "black" have meaningfully similar genetic lineages. So, again, inferring genetic importance from that is kind of a long shot.
Posted by: kellbelle1020 | October 19, 2007 12:59 AM
W. Kevin at #42 is right. Cold Spring Harbor has a sordid history it has been desperately trying to play down. What Watson said undermines their efforts to redeem their reputation at a political and social level. They don't need anyone resurrecting the spirit of Harry Laughlin. This current controversy with Watson must be understood in that context. A lot of people were left wondering if Cold Spring Harbor's rejection of its eugenics past has just been lip service.
Posted by: Laura | October 19, 2007 1:04 AM
1) Ethnicity isn't genetically meaningful, except in a statistical sense.
2) Social conventions are a poor guide to ethnicity, but the two aren't utterly uncorrelated. In the US, people who identify as African-American are quite likely to have substantial amounts of West African ancestry in their ethnic make up - as well as a very good chance they're also partly descended from Southern slave owners. Of course, we can say exactly the same thing about some of the people who identify as White, too.
To my knowledge, there are no traits that can be universally used to identify either a person's ethnicity or their 'race', but some traits are rarer or more common among various ethnic groups. Having Tay-Sachs disease doesn't mean that you're an Eastern European Jew - it doesn't even strongly suggest it. But nevertheless, it's known that the risk of the disease is much higher among that population.
For an extreme example of this, see the Samaritans, as razib recently discussed them. As a distinct subpopulation with a very limited number of members, they're so badly inbred that they're in danger of dying out from the effects of the delterious recessives spread throughout their community.
Posted by: Caledonian | October 19, 2007 1:10 AM
Hi Myers, I would like to know what's the current research result on this issue, and your opinion about them. Thanks!
Posted by: tytung | October 19, 2007 1:40 AM
Reuters fallaciously reports that the expert consensus is that Africans and Europeans are identical at the genetic level.
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSN1844930820071019?pageNumber=1
I guess all those obvious differences in skin color and hair form are the "socially constructed" result of racism and poverty. Just like intelligence, they MUST be, because "race doesn't exist", and we are genetically identical.
Or maybe that so-called "argument" against intelligence differences that every PC idiot on the Internet and in academia regurgitates unthinkingly is nothing more than an obvious Goddamned lie.
Here's a fun, eye-opening game for you "Europeans and Africans are genetically identical" folks: Next time anyone here sees an article in the newspaper or a science journal finding that a certain genetic variant is associated with some behavioral or health outcome, immediately compare the frequency of that gene within an African, Asian, and North American white populations on the Internet yourself using this method:
http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/09/so-you-want-to-be-population-geneticist.php
Now please note how in nearly all of these cases the gene you are looking at is NOT distributed with equal frequency between those populations. For instance an obesity gene might exist in 22% of one population, 66% in another, and 2% in another.
Now please square that finding with idiot PC arguments that Africans and Europeans can't differ in intelligence because we are "genetically identical". If we were "genetically identical" then so many of our genes wouldn't be so demonstratively different.
Posted by: PC Idiot Thugs Go Away | October 19, 2007 1:44 AM
Once again, I'm going to defend Caledonian, who for the record once called me 'weak minded'
1) Charges of racism are inflammatory and don't help any.
2) Caledonian's views seem to me to be the result of a more or less consistently applied misanthropy. He/she believes that most Westerners are stupid and so it would be surprising if Caledonian thought that the majority of Africans weren't stupid.
3) As far as I can tell, Caledonian has put forward environmental factors as the explanation for lower IQ's in Africa. That seems quite plausible to me.
Of course- I may be wrong, and Caledonian is a frothing racist. Who knows? Let's hang him at dawn as a warning to other posters. In the mean time- if Caledonian is so obviously wrong (which he frequently is), then explain why and engage in debate.
Posted by: Christian Burnham | October 19, 2007 1:45 AM
"1) Ethnicity isn't genetically meaningful, except in a statistical sense."
Well, I was referring to previous discussions about race being a social construct as opposed to ethnic/population distributions that have more of a genetic basis (and, importantly, are not necessarily distributed by skin color). Perhaps a bit unclearly. But it seems we're on the same page about this.
"Social conventions are a poor guide to ethnicity, but the two aren't utterly uncorrelated. In the US, people who identify as African-American are quite likely to have substantial amounts of West African ancestry in their ethnic make up - as well as a very good chance they're also partly descended from Southern slave owners."
Let me clarify my point in response to this.
1)Researchers using self-identification find correlation between "African-Americans" and lower IQ score.
2)The social convention of calling oneself "African-American" isn't "utterly uncorrelated" to a West African ethnic subgrouping.
...With these premises, isn't it a bit of a stretch to make conclusions teasing out genetic distributions from studies based on self-identification? Particularly when the confounding variable of likely "white" ancestry is in play? I mean, "not utterly uncorrelated" is not the same as "correlated", and even then correlation (as we all know) doesn't equal causation.
So, why, then, use studies employing self-identification as evidence of anything other than "People who self-identify as African-American tend to score lower on IQ tests in the US"? It seems like that's what you're trying to do when you offered self-identification studies as a response to how ethnicities are determined for IQ results in the US. And the correlation levels you describe don't seem strong enough to support it.
Posted by: kellbelle1020 | October 19, 2007 1:50 AM
Yeah. That's exactly what I was talking about above.
Posted by: Chris Clarke | October 19, 2007 1:51 AM
Oh- ok, before you lot all savage me- it seems that Caledonian is now suggesting a genetic basis for the apparent variation in IQ between different groups.
That may make him/her completely wrong- but it still doesn't make him/her a racist, so I stand by my comments.
Posted by: Christian Burnham | October 19, 2007 1:53 AM
Sorry. Mine in #52 was in response to #50.
Posted by: Chris Clarke | October 19, 2007 1:53 AM
Caledonian refuses to provide a single link to "scientific evidence [that] clearly indicates" that blacks have lower IQ, presumably by the very fact of being black (as against poor, malnourished, poorly educated, etc., presumably). He takes pains to post comments in this very thread, repeatedly mentioning clear scientific evidence. But when someone challenges him to provide even just a top few citations, he baulks:
Why do we take him seriously? Can we all just agree to ignore him?
Posted by: Amit Joshi | October 19, 2007 1:57 AM
Unless you've raised large samples of human beings in white rooms controlled by impersonal robots unable to inadvertently bring in outside factors, you can't draw meaningful information on genetic predispositions to subtle mental traits like IQ. Such a controlled setting is a high burden to place upon research, but no less would be required if you were studying relatively minor variations in any other animal. For instance, if you caught rats in a field, sorted them according to genotype, and then tried to categorize all of their traits according to genotype, you'd probably learn more about catching rats in fields and the ecology of rats in fields than the subtle expressions of rat genotypes. To actually learn precisely about genotypes, you have to raise them as lab rats. Knowing the limits of the tools available to you is the first step towards doing decent science.
The Bell Curve controversy is old and was supposed to be dead before it got dragged through these several comments strings. Let it die again, please. Undead controversies are harmful to brain cells and other living things, new data in the same vein as the old or no.
Posted by: Dan | October 19, 2007 1:57 AM
Racial self-identification and genetic ancestry are virtually perfectly correlated in the US:
"Thus, ancient geographic ancestry, which is highly correlated with self-identified race/ethnicity--as opposed to current residence--is the major determinant of genetic structure in the U.S. population."
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1196372
Posted by: James Clinton | October 19, 2007 1:59 AM
By the way, PZ, it looks like the distinction you drew between administrative and academic responsibilities was apt (from the NY Times, and by the way how do I add a link in comments here?):
Sounds good to me. What do you say?
Posted by: Amit Joshi | October 19, 2007 2:04 AM
Unless you've raised large samples of human beings in white rooms controlled by impersonal robots unable to inadvertently bring in outside factors, you can't draw meaningful information on genetic predispositions to subtle mental traits like IQ.
This is a caricature of how science works, invoking only perfect standards of evidence in order to strategically shut off all debate in perpetuity. We rarely have the perfect conditions to perfectly test our hypotheses (e.g. we can't use a time machine and "watch" hominid evolution, rather we use the consilience of indirect data points)
If a number of disparate data points similarly converge on a hypothesis, that hypothesis is progressively bolstered.
Many experimental data points converge on there being a genetic component to racial gaps in intelligence (cross-cultural constancy, transracial adoption, brain size and supporting anatomy, regression to the mean, inbreeding depression, lack of environmental explanation). Few contradict it.
The 100% environmental hypothesis does not "win" by default. It either is or is not the currently best supported conclusion based on strong scientific inference.
The reason men like Watson are silenced instead of debated, is because the silence-ers are well aware that their scientific case is weaker. Force is their only possible winning substitute for evidence in this battle of ideas.
Posted by: James Clinton | October 19, 2007 2:16 AM
Wrong wrong wrong. They are absolutely correct to suspend him. This is a contrarian stance I think you are staking out. He is the figurehead of CSHL. He is very controversial on many things and in his position, he simply cannot add a disclaimer to racist pronouncements as "not reflecting on CSH." This was quite brave of CSHL. He IS that institution. This can't have been easy for them. Going back to the Larry Summers deal- the President of Harvard can't just say certain things. Institutions that are academic should always try to foster free speech, but beyond this, institutions stand for certain values, and racist speech is not one of them.
Posted by: Pinko Punko | October 19, 2007 2:16 AM
Re #57
Well, it's a good thing I wrote "with these premises" then.
Although... "...it is tempting to attribute any observed difference between derived genetic clusters to a genetic etiology. Therefore, researchers performing studies without racial/ethnic labels should be wary of characterizing difference between genetically defined clusters as genetic in origin, since social, cultural, economic, behavioral, and other environmental factors may result in extreme confounding" (same source)
Posted by: kellbelle1020 | October 19, 2007 2:18 AM
James Clinton:
Could you give a citation or two?
Posted by: Amit Joshi | October 19, 2007 2:18 AM
Watson does not count as an academic I think on the issues of race, and I don't think it really is that good an idea to support different standards for scientists based on some "academic" privilege. Watson can't take his words back, assuming he actually said them, but he certainly can be spanked by people I assume are somewhat his friends and do not wish to see the entire world see him as the asshole many in the know know him to be. I think there is more than principle involved with this CSH business, I think this was an intervention.
Posted by: Pinko Punko | October 19, 2007 2:23 AM
"Institutions that are academic should always try to foster free speech, but beyond this, institutions stand for certain values, and racist speech is not one of them."
Pinko Punko, can speech be viewed as racist or sexist if it's true?
Posted by: antihumanist | October 19, 2007 2:23 AM
Amit, here is a summary paper
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/1076-8971.11.2.235
Posted by: James Clinton | October 19, 2007 2:29 AM
I think you're reading it the wrong way, PZ. If they'd terminated him outright, I'd be with you, but considering the fray up to this point, that seems to be a completely appropriate, reasoned, and rational response. The Board's responsibility is to the health of the organization. When an administrator at this level acts outside the bounds of acceptable conduct, something Watson himself acknowledges he did in his apology, it is the responsibility of the Board to demonstrate they are taking the matter seriously.
I see several possible outcomes of the review: 1) The Board finds Watson was indeed misquoted in this instance, accepts his apology, and possibly takes some sort of action against the paper (which if he was misquoted, they should). Status quo is restored until Watson steps down in a few months to reduce his workload. 2) The review finds Watson did act improperly, and he is terminated. I'd place very long odds on that happening unless there's some audio tape that hasn't come out yet. 3) The board review is inconclusive, but does note a pattern that they believe does not reflect well on the organization and after restoring Watson's title encourages him to retire sooner rather than later.
Bottom line, they've been looking for a reason to dump him for a while and this is far enough over the line even a Nobel prize can't block the momentum of the board members who want him gone. Watson was a fool if he didn't realize this (and I refuse to believe anyone who's been in academia that long wouldn't).
Watson long ago turned into a Professor Troll (to borrow FemaleScienceProfessor's wonderful and terribly appropriate term). The options to deal with a PT always reduce to two: wait for him to die or force him out. There sometimes comes a point where the first option is no longer an acceptable solution to the problem. Watson just run full tilt across that line.
Posted by: usagi | October 19, 2007 2:31 AM
I admire PZ because he is able to change. I am 100% with him in this issue. I dont know what Dr Watson said and less I know if he is right or wrong or somewhere in the middle or so totally out-of-the-box that the Roman/Biblical command to respect old age is applicable here. I am sure that his appointment to the Board contains no paragraph binding him to silence or to be always in agreement with the Board's unstated/tacit scientific/political/metaphysical/whatever views. Dr Watson is victim of unjustice and unfair treatment, and should he care to sue, he has a good chance to be reinstalled and paid compensation.
PZ is great because here he adopts the opposite position than in the case of Harvard's (former) President musings on a different unpopular issue, where PZ demanded his immediate sacking and dismissal in shame.
Posted by: j | October 19, 2007 2:31 AM
I don't often put make statements like this, but, I actually like Caledonian. He's proof positve that while being pretentious and tactless at times (often), doesn't preclude instant removal from the forum if the veneer of discourse is present. An important trait we freethinkers share that sets us apart from many other groups, and a virtue that we must protect. Much like the jist of PZ's post, free speech isn't free if you only allow what you like to hear.
I would also like to point out that since the avalanche of distain and Admin rebuke have happened, there has been a noticable decline in the amount of invective put forth by him and a more reasonable tone has taken over. Almost like he's talking to fellow freethinkers who all agree on the ideals of reason and logic despite our own human inability to always follow through, instead of talking to ants who are more often than not, insufferable.
Lastly, Caledonian, I'll make my statement to you. I've enjoyed you presence here since I found this blog maybe a little over a year ago. While finding you insulting and at times inept at getting an audience to want to hear what strong rebuke (and strong rebukes are not impossible to communicate) you have to say, therefore ignoring your point entirely, I do appreciate your attempt to not waver from a logical standpoint. Though never "Sagan-esque", in you delivery, I don't instantly brush you off.
I'll add that being openminded requires that I ask for evidence especially in areas where I have no knowledge or haven't had the time to read up on yet. And the conversations on message boards don't often give me time to make up for years of research that I wasn't allowed as a kid. So, like so many others, I ask for references when I hear something that seems to contradict what, up until now, I've read and understood to be the popular scientific view. If you really are attempting to re-educate a large group of people about a popular misconception of race, then you must give more evidence for your side than to simply state that it's common knowledge, and more importantly, common interpretation. Having seen this whole thing erupt and take over what is now four posts, I went out yesterday and bought "The Race Myth" by the preeminent biologist Joseph Graves and read it. He puts forward a strong case against what you're saying, especailly the IQ debate. This of course is only one book, but like many here, he doesn't see the evidence for a "generalized intelligence". I'd love to compare his work to whatever it is that you're relying upon, but you never cite or link to it.
How can you 1) expect us to even pay you any attention when even good intentioned questions get answer with invective (though I give full leway to answering invective with invective, if one so chooses, though how effective that is remains to be seen.) and 2) how can those of us who seem baffled by hearing something we've apparently never heard regarded as consensus, and (for many) not for lack of learning, take your claims seriously with no citations. Respondng to a group of geneticists or other groups who should have an extensive background with the phrase "you should know better" is one thing, but we are not all geneticists. I'm an artist for example and I only know what I've taught myself from books and gleaned from blogs like this one.
So to end this monolouge, where can I look to find what ever it is you're arguing from? Simply stating a good memory, doesn't satisfactorily answer my questions. I'm not saying that I couldn't find it myself with quite a while to look, but as you're the one stating the opinion, I have to believe that you can be of some help.
Thanks
Mike
Posted by: Michael X | October 19, 2007 2:37 AM