Racial differences...

[Louis VI the Fat]

'The 10000 Year Explosion' works from a flawed premise.

We all look at race through a western persective and through a western media. No wonder this thread has come to the conclusion all blacks are athletes

Gah! See, this is what you get if you spend time at college!

That Texas schoolbook woman is right - Texas education is liberal indoctrination.

You make less sense than I do. Perhaps I just can't explain.

I'm usually a good reader. Your previous two posts went well over my head though. I've re-read them several times now, but can't figure them out.

Hey - at least you and I don't start a flamewar over our not understanding the other!!

[Reenk Roink]

Of course cognitive abilities differ between populations.

Well duh, but is there any kind of statistically significant difference between various ethnicities that is not then explained away by environment at the expense of race my Asian-American example. Forget the more problematic notions of race which would be even harder to prove. No good evidence I've seen.

If a trait is heriditable, and it is different between individuals, then it is subject to evolutionary pressure. So all we need is to show that cognitive abilities differ between individual people, and that there are heriditable aspects. I would show, but neither of these two is in much dispute.

What kind of deduction is this (formalize please)? You are going from individuals and then to...?

If you are just attempting to state the obvious fact that there is variation in the human population when it comes to cognitive ability and that this may be partly due to genetics (which I don't think anyone questions), then OK.

However, I don't see how this at all lends any credence to any kind of statistically significant cognitive differences between different ethnicities/races that can is primarily explained by biological/genetic factors, which is my interest in the thread.

It's all you need. Everything else is creationist obfuscation: the idea that evolution somehow stops at the human brain, which is the realm of the soul.

First, believing that evolution stops at the level of the brain is not necessary for the dualist position (which is what I think you're getting at with the soul comment - forgive me if I'm wrong). Thank god there is still much implicit dualism in neuroscience in their unwillingness to study or speak about any kind of neural mechanism of consciousness ('covert dualism' as called by Arshavsky in his polemical ‘‘Scientific roots’’ of dualism in neuroscience because many scientists generally will not want to explicitly endorse such "pernicious" metaphysical ideas like mind-body dualism which are anathema to their naive worldview guided by the intellectually poor doctrine of falsifiability, damn you Popper!).

[Strike For The South]

Gah! See, this is what you get if you spend time at college!

That Texas schoolbook woman is right - Texas education is liberal indoctrination.
!!

Haha, My public school education was filled with communism and social wlefare

But srsly, the book looks at us as if we are simply another animal when in reality we change the paradigm so much that to compare our evolution to even a monkeys is disingenious

[Centurion1]

meaning that our evolution cannot be looked at as an animals because of intellect and how we alter our lives so drastically.?

[Strike For The South]

meaning that our evolution cannot be looked at as an animals because of intellect and how we alter our lives so drastically.?

Yes,

For example, I have seen allot of black genitals in my life and they really aren't as big as people say they are (kind of dissapointing)

Point being that we are so indoctranated from a young age that certain people act a certain way or have x advantage because of this or that, that it becomes a self fufiling propechy.

Now I agree that certain groups of blacks have more fast twitch muscle fibers while Nordics (Mostly attribtuied to the R1a1) gene have more slow twitch muscle fibers. But its a falsehood to say that all blacks are good sprinters and all white boys are destined to move heavy weight at low reps

See what I mean cowboy?

[Centurion1]

i said basically the same thing about cultural assumptions.

fits my theory of why the top white basketball players come from canada, midwest, and europe (low black populations) no one is telling them they suck/ like how i do at my school games until i teabag their heads as i dunk on them

[Paltmull]

Without having read the entire thread, and without knowing too much about this; I've got one question: From a darwinistic evolutionary perspective, what reasons would there be for certain so-called "races" to become more intelligent than others?

I think none, really. I mean, it's obvious that different environments require different physical attributes - such as dark skin in warmer climates, and pale in colder - but it's not like surviving in for example a European climate requires higher intelligence than surviving in an African climate.

[Moros]

I don't even think there are different races, I'd rather say there are just regional variants within the same species.

@Paltmull: I guess species become more intelligent when their way of life and enviroment needs them to solve more and more difficult problems especially I think when it tries to overcome them in group. Possibly when there's a rarity in food and one has to be more creative in getting it. Not that sure though, size as an evolutionary trait for example is easier to tackle.

[Viking]

Without having read the entire thread, and without knowing too much about this; I've got one question: From a darwinistic evolutionary perspective, what reasons would there be for certain so-called "races" to become more intelligent than others?

I think none, really. I mean, it's obvious that different environments require different physical attributes - such as dark skin in warmer climates, and pale in colder - but it's not like surviving in for example a European climate requires higher intelligence than surviving in an African climate.

Natural selection does not operate with reasons, so that is a moot point. Random mutations and probabilities are what that matters. If some individual is carrying a mutated gene that gives him greater intelligence, then that is a potential advantage. So if he breed, the offspring of his that also carry the genes will have a greater chance of survival, provided that they are otherwise fit. As generations passes, this gene has a potential to become more widespread throughout the population since its carriers are more clever than the individuals that lack the gene. By pure chance, or because of genetical differences between the populations already present, this process could have different paces or take different routes in the two populations. I think the random element makes the evolution unpredictable.