Watson’s comments on genetic links to intelligence

October 17, 2007

UK’s Daily Telegraph had an article about Dr. James Watson’s comments about the genetic implications of intelligence. Some of the conclusions he draws imply that blacks are genetically not as intelligent as whites. Dr. Watson was one of the co-discoverers of the double-helix foundations of DNA.

Another article from the BBC includes the following snippet.

In an interview with The Sunday Times, the 79-year-old said he was “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 went on to say he hoped everyone was equal but that “people who have to deal with black employees find this is not true”.

So, the second statement quoted is probably more damning to Watson, as it would be harder to argue it’s out of context, although I haven’t been able to find the full quote in context yet. I’m not sure if this is an excerpt from his book, or a direct quote of something he said.

The gist of the first quote above, about ‘all the testing says not really’, is a bit more puzzling as to why it stirred up controversy. At least, again, from my limited reading of it. I heard numerous conversations this morning as the local radio station had a full hour of calls on this topic. The easiest rebuttal to that presumption is that the testing is flawed in some way. I’ve no idea what tests he’s referring to (perhaps if it’s from a book there would be references to studies contained in it?), but this is a common refrain from every group that falls outside of traditional intelligence or academic tests. Go searching for ‘intelligence test bias‘ and you’ll see what I mean.

So, can groups from different geographical or simply cultural groups be expected to show signs of the ’same intelligence as ours’ (Watson’s words) if the tests do not account for the differences between the groups? The past 20+ years have shown an increasing trend to identify multiple intelligences (emotional, etc.) - this just seems a logical step. His implication that one is ‘better’ than another is, it seems, where people take offense (and perhaps rightly so).

One of the callers on the radio show this morning said that there are numerous genetic differences between blacks and whites - why wouldn’t intelligence be one of them? One of the hosts (Brad? or Britt?) immediately challenged the caller with “What possible differences are there between a black person and a white person beyond the color of their skin?” “Hair and bone health” were the first two that jumped out, and the only two I can remember right now. Hair might be debatable, although there’s obviously something very ’same’ about hair types for difference races. The bone health issue is a clear example of physical differences between races, and I’m betting genes play a part in this. From the link above:

Caucasian and Asian women are most at risk for the disease, but African American and Hispanic women can get it too. Of racial groups, white people are most prone to osteoporosis. Asians are next, then Hispanics. Black people are less prone to osteoporosis, possibly because black people tend to have denser, stronger bones during young adulthood. Thus, they can better tolerate the decrease in bone density that occurs with aging and at menopause.

So, given that there are clear physical differences between races, why can’t predisposition for intelligence development be at least partially laid at the feet of a person’s DNA? This is not nature vs. nurture - I’m not sure you could ever get conclusive test results for something so complex as intelligence, or even get *one* definition of intelligence which covers everything. If I know I have a predisposition to diabetes, either because of race or some other genetic function, I’d like to know about it so I can adjust my lifestyle accordingly. Similarly, if it can be established that there are different intelligences - different ways the brains work between different groups - we *could* strive to accomodate every group to maximize the achievement of that group.

However, *if* such a link was to be established, I’m not sure that as a society, or even as humans in general, we’re mature enough to handle that information and act responsibly. It would likely be used politically against many groups to keep the status quo as it is. So perhaps this is one of those things that we’re better off not investigating right now. But in many ways that will also serve to perpetuate current myths and bigotry people already have anyway. The radio hosts, and a few callers, kept saying “SHOW ME THE STUDIES! SHOW ME THE SCIENTIFIC PROOF!”. One caller nailed it though, by saying there’s just no way that such a study would ever be funded, because politically, the results would be too polarizing. Actually, he didn’t quite say it like that, that’s my own spin. He did say such a study would never be funded, and I would have to agree. So, without the funding and willpower to study the issue scientifically, we’ll always be on the guessing side of issues like these, and with increasingly shrill arguments from each side denouncing the other.

Personally, I think it’s highly probable there’s something to this, but mostly because I believe we’re all just a bunch of vibrating particles that bounce around and have an experience of ‘consciousness’, nothing more. Everything is completely determined by physical particles bouncing around, so the idea that some particles shaped in a certain way will have a specific effect on other particles is wholly reasonable. Actually, it’s the only thing that *can* possibly happen. Many people would probably disagree with my view and conclusions, but I can’t help it - it’s just some subatomic particles bouncing around making ‘me’ do it.

Update

I’m still amazed sometimes how quickly some posts get picked up.  This one was indexed in Google’s blog reader system in less than 10 minutes, yet others take hours or sometimes days to show up.  Might it be related to the topic?

Posted in General, Media, Personal, Politics, Society