ON UNINTELIGIBILITY OF RACIALIZATION OF INTELLIGENCE

Abstract

IQ argument alleges that (1) there are racial, i.e. group differences in intelligence between Black and White people, and that (2) intelligence is highly hereditary, thus (3) given differences are congenital and they reflect diversities in genetic material. Results of population geneticists suggest that the notion of race (and the notion of ethnic group likewise) is only a social construct, a cultural category, and not a biologically (genetically) founded criterion of classification. Having this in mind, any attempt by scientific racists to declare racial differences in intelligence hereditary is beforehand nonsensical. In spite of this, and based on the empirical fact that White people (as a social group, a collection of individuals declaring themselves being of white race/population/group) consistently score higher average IQ on ability tests for approximately 15 units more than Black people (as social group…), scientific racist incline to proclaim these differences as being congenital, claiming at the same time that intelligence is a highly hereditary ability. Thus, this paper will primarily focus on the other claim. The aim is to show that the finding on group differences in its descriptive form is not itself racist, but that it becomes such by advancing to the level of unfounded nativist explanation. Also, methodological errors of scientific racists are addressed separately, as well as the role which unfounded conclusions have in conservation of social inequality.