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The Simple Antidote to the Poisonous 'Race Science' Revival
Daily Beast
On May 14, a gunman walked into a Tops grocery store in a predominantly Black neighborhood in Buffalo, New York. The massacre killed ten people. Beforehand, he had posted a long screed online about Great Replacement Theory, using, among other things, links to a series of genetics studies—peer reviewed, and published in prestigious journals like Nature—as citations. These were a variety of human behavioral genetics studies, a field of research that tries to use genetics to find the source of complex human behaviors. One study was a genomic study on whether intelligence is inherited from one generation to the next. Another was on the genetics of different psychological traits. Then another study on the genetics of intelligence.
Scientists have been quick to write and denounce the Buffalo shooter. “Scientists have to recognize that their research can be weaponized,” Janet D. Stemwedel, a philosopher of science at San José State University, wrote weeks later in Scientific American. “They need to think hard not only about how their findings might be misinterpreted or misused, but also about the point of even conducting the studies they do of differences among racial groups. Above all that, scientists need to take an active role in fighting both violence and white supremacy.”
These sorts of pushbacks have happened before. In 1994, political scientist Charles Murray and psychologist Richard Herrnstein published The Bell Curve, a book that discusses the apparent IQ differences between Black and white people, and the class structures associated with it. (It’s worth pointing out that IQ tests were originally intended as a rough method for determining whether 19th-century French children were a little behind on their schooling. Modern-day use as a measure of intelligence is a greatly contested notion.)
The Bell Curve created a media sensation so wide that the two dry academics were excerpted by then-editor Andrew Sullivan in The New Republic. Years of debate in the media ensued. Reviews of the book (and reviews of the reviews) came out for years, mostly in polite arguments—what does the book really say about intelligence differences? Did you know that actually liberals used to love IQ testing as a means of social mobility? Does using the word “intelligent” and “smart” as synonyms tell us anything about whether the authors are racist?—that allowed Murray and Herrnstein to remain in the public eye as intellectuals and stewards of noble research, as well as appear on Tucker Carlson’s show to talk about race wars.
snip
On May 14, a gunman walked into a Tops grocery store in a predominantly Black neighborhood in Buffalo, New York. The massacre killed ten people. Beforehand, he had posted a long screed online about Great Replacement Theory, using, among other things, links to a series of genetics studies—peer reviewed, and published in prestigious journals like Nature—as citations. These were a variety of human behavioral genetics studies, a field of research that tries to use genetics to find the source of complex human behaviors. One study was a genomic study on whether intelligence is inherited from one generation to the next. Another was on the genetics of different psychological traits. Then another study on the genetics of intelligence.
Scientists have been quick to write and denounce the Buffalo shooter. “Scientists have to recognize that their research can be weaponized,” Janet D. Stemwedel, a philosopher of science at San José State University, wrote weeks later in Scientific American. “They need to think hard not only about how their findings might be misinterpreted or misused, but also about the point of even conducting the studies they do of differences among racial groups. Above all that, scientists need to take an active role in fighting both violence and white supremacy.”
These sorts of pushbacks have happened before. In 1994, political scientist Charles Murray and psychologist Richard Herrnstein published The Bell Curve, a book that discusses the apparent IQ differences between Black and white people, and the class structures associated with it. (It’s worth pointing out that IQ tests were originally intended as a rough method for determining whether 19th-century French children were a little behind on their schooling. Modern-day use as a measure of intelligence is a greatly contested notion.)
The Bell Curve created a media sensation so wide that the two dry academics were excerpted by then-editor Andrew Sullivan in The New Republic. Years of debate in the media ensued. Reviews of the book (and reviews of the reviews) came out for years, mostly in polite arguments—what does the book really say about intelligence differences? Did you know that actually liberals used to love IQ testing as a means of social mobility? Does using the word “intelligent” and “smart” as synonyms tell us anything about whether the authors are racist?—that allowed Murray and Herrnstein to remain in the public eye as intellectuals and stewards of noble research, as well as appear on Tucker Carlson’s show to talk about race wars.
snip
much more excellent reporting at link