It is a travesty that you allowed William Saletan to publish these pieces on Race (vis a vis IQ) with his only sources being controversial researchers funded by the Pioneer Fund. If he had mentioned this fact, and acknowledged that this group has a history of racism and participation in eugenics, it would only have been offensive. But to pass off the works of people who would deign to appear at racists conventions like Jared Taylor's American Renaissance conference as even remotely objective, is more than misleading. It is tantamount to promoting their agenda.

Saletan's presentations are basically a word for word reporting of the tripe that passes for knowledge on the "race realist" websites across the net. The fact that many of them have recently become neutral on the issue of Jews, has brought many latent Jewish racists (possibly including Saletan) into their fold. This has done much to spit-shine their image, and present a more academic front to their hate. I expected much more from Slate than this, though.

Just google AmRen and you will see that J. Phillipe Rushton, Richard Lynn and a good many of the people quoted by Saletan have been featured speakers at these conferences where over half of the attendees are neo nazis. David Duke himself co-opted their most recent convention and spent the entire time denouncing Jews and denying the holocaust. If William Saletan feels good about associating himself with these cretins, fine. But your magazine should fire him and distance yourself from his ilk. He can always go to write for Inverted World, American Renaissance, or Gene Expression.

Sandra

Are the OP's allegations true? How about qaz1231?

Does the Pioneer Fund actually fund Rushton?

Does the Pioneer Fund advocate eugenics?

Have Rushton and Lynn spoken at what could fairly be characterized as racist conventions where David Duke shows shows up for some party time?

<link>

Look wiki has an entry(above link). At the bottom of the article Rushton is referenced as a contributor.

<link>

Another wiki entry (above link). This one on Rushton

This, if true, would also compel me to ask for public censure of Saletan by Slate.

Does the Pioneer Fund fund me? Um, no. Rushton? Don't know, don't care.

I realize it's much easier to call someone a racist than to dispute his evidence or logic, but what's actually in Rushton's heart has nothing to do with whether the proposition in question is true.

but what's actually in Rushton's heart has nothing to do with whether the proposition in question is true.

Check mate for anyone of sufficient intellectual ability to grasp it.

THANK YOU SANDRALI !!!

The links Saletan's used refer to published studies?

In terms of brain studies per se, not all the researchers are involved in the type conferences you mentioned.

"This is essentially the first study that is actually looking at the size of the brain directly and not through imaging," Sandra Witelson, who headed the study at the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine at McMaster University, said Thursday from Hamilton.

"What is very clear is that there is a correlation between brain size and intelligence, particularly verbal ability," said Witelson, noting that verbal ability encompasses comprehension of complex sentences, understanding verbal logical information and verbal memory."

<link>

"What is very clear is that there is a correlation between brain size and intelligence, particularly verbal ability," said Witelson, noting that verbal ability encompasses comprehension of complex sentences, understanding verbal logical information and verbal memory."

The article that you linked to provides reasons to question this. It was conducted on "healthy" cancer patience who had died. That's not the same as using healthy brains from healthy people.

Secondly, their measurement instruments were pretty rudimentary. Submerging the brains in water and measuring the amount of displacement. What if there are air pockets?

"Previous research found that Einstein's overall brain was a normal size, she noted, but the specific portion known for spatial intelligence was wider and had a unique anatomy."

Thus, overall brain size may mean very little. Structure and genes in the brain likely more valuable.

". . .this remains to be tested by further work . . . it might be the structure, it might be the size or the anatomical microscopic structure of the region in the brain that is important for that kind of thinking"

Hey Spiker

Since most people actually don't follow links, let it be stated for the record that Rushton is not only a major recipient of Pioneer Fund money, but its president.

Since 2002, Rushton has been the president of the Pioneer Fund. Tax records from 2000 show that his Charles Darwin Institute received $473,835 — 73% of that year's grants.[6] The Pioneer Fund has been listed by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) as a hate group.[7][8] The SPLC reports that Rushton has spoken on eugenics several times at conferences of the American Renaissance magazine, in which he has also published a number of articles.[9]

There's more. But we've been calling this stuff out on threads for weeks now, and, like our fellow Frayster qaz1231, those people who resonate with these studies don't care that Rushton, Lynn, Francis et al. hang out with ol' Jared Taylor. I wouldn't be surprised if quite a few of them aren't regulars from the various racialist websites come here to recruit and bottom feed.

I must admit that Saletan's linking almost exclusively to works by Pioneer Fundies disturbs me (even Jensen gets money from them). He has also declined (so far) to answer any direct questions on this He does seem to read some of these threads, because he chimes in when people kiss his... ahem, write rather sycophantic posts.

Yet, I do not call for his firing... nor do I think that it is Slate's responsibility to censure him. At least not yet. Give Will a bit more time to explain himself. If he has fallen in with the "race realist" crowd, he should admit it. Trying to pretend to be an offended liberal is extremely odious if he is exchanging back pats with Steve Sailer, Jared Taylor, or any of the growing legions of "genteel" racialists cropping up now.

The fact that there are literally dozens of prominent scientists in the field of genetics and molecular biology alone who disagree with the conjectures Saletan uses as given assumptions in his articles... and (even in his arguing the data segment) he made no attempt to quote or even mention these solid objections, it could merely be sloppy journalism... or an over reliance on the works of psychometricians and differential psychologists who have no biological science background whatsoever. But, given the serious, inflammatory nature of this presentation... he would still be somewhat culpable in my book. People read this stuff and get a lot of really wrong ideas.

I don't think that looking for genetic influences on human cognition is a bad field of study. I don't see how "race" figures into it, and IQ seems like a very narrow definition of intelligence... but still. Saletan gives the impression that he has read all there is to read on this subject. He admits the jury is not in, but suggests that they are walking back to the courtroom as we speak. This is reckless. Couple this with the obvious racism behind the overall and historic agenda associated with the movement funding the research he quotes... It just doesn't look too good.

:-(

Oh my.

People actually read these posts? Thank you for the support.

And it seems that some people around here already know the skinny on these clowns.

I feel a bit better. Reading the original article had made me queasy.

A good evening to you all.