This piece is rather blunt and controversial but nonetheless interesting. The topic might be touchy for some so just please hang in there.
The book’s written by J. Phillipe Rushton who’s a psychology professor at the University of Western Ontario and who argues that racial differences are indeed valid since they do exist and can be genetically proven.
The piece is based on comparisons made between the three major racial groups; Asians, Blacks and Whites, which are apparently supported by numerous amounts of studies performed. While Prof. Rushton touches on various differences among the groups the one that caught my attention the most was brain size (pgs 22-27).
The idea behind brain size is that as races evolved in separate parts of the world each one adopted a different strategy to survive and reproduce. As each method of survival and reproduction focused on different aspects, the brains developed differently; some bigger some smaller.
What’s awfully interesting about the size difference is that according to “a number of methods, including MRI [and IQ tests]” Orientals on average have the largest brains AND higher IQ scores, Blacks the smallest brains AND IQ scores and Whites fall somewhere in the middle for both categories. What’s even more fascinating is that these results are independent of body size!
As you can imagine Prof. Rushton has been heavily criticized for his findings. On one extreme he’s been called a racist, some people argue his references are bogus and have no scientific grounds and some others label his work as political propaganda while on the other end some people revere his work.
what prof,Rushton has found out is very interesting but also ridiculous, I don know if there are any correlation bewteen IQ scores and brain size, there are many studies have shown if any people who regularly practiced IQ exam, could score much high on IQ test. Saying the race plays driven fact in genetic difference makes no sense, it is the envirnments where people live matter. Suppose we compare american with african, american are born to have more access to knowledge:just by looing how many library and book store american have. They have free pubilc school for childs and teens from 7 year-old to 18 old year(even older), and numbers of world leading secondary higher institution. Comparing african where can bearly find a library or school, most african would be illiterate for entire of life, has Prof Rushton took those fact in to his equation? obvious not .
Rushton is certainly correct that the human races have appreciable physical differences among them. For example, his first chapter is titled “Race is more than Skin Deep.” This is absolutely true. I feel this topic addresses the emphasis of skin color and how it affects social mobility in the US. For example, dark-skinned blacks are resentful of light-skinned blacks due to their perception that their light-skinned counterparts are treated more favorably in White-dominated companies. This perception could very well be true. While skin color is one of the most visible markers of race, there are other features unique to race besides this one factor. A popular example of the fact that race isn’t solely defined by skin color is the albino Negro. Albino Negroes have lighter skin than white people, but have the same hair texture and facial characteristics of healthy Negroes. Simply put, they are still identifiable as being Negroes, despite their skin color!
Identifying racial differences is not wrong or racist. Each race has its own unique physical characteristics that make it beautiful. So there is nothing wrong with identifying racial differences in and of itself. What IS racist is when groups such as White Supremacists use these identified and documented racial differences to discriminate against racial minorities. As discussed in Ewen & Ewen’s “Typecasting”, eugenics touted that the physical differences between the races somehow “proved” that Europeans were genetically and intellectually superior to Africans. Eugenics supported that if African and European bloods were mixed, the result was inferior racial stock to pure whites, and superior racial stock to pure blacks. Therefore, eugenics was used as justification to discriminate against blacks in White Western countries.
– Kelly Reznick