Mr. Auster writes:

“Mr. Coleman says that good ameliorative efforts will improve blacks’ condition sufficiently so that blacks and whites will no longer worry about the remaining gap. But how can such sensible policies even be tried when society is laboring under such gross illusions as at present?”

Well, (1) we can take one issue at a time, and (2) there is generally more than one way to attack a bad policy.

Take the welfare state as an example. It can be criticized on numerous grounds, such as (A) it leads to permanent dependency, (B) it weakens the family and creates many problems as a result, (C) it costs a lot of money without getting rid of poverty, as was originally promised, (D) at the federal level, it is a violation of the 10th Amendment, because the federal government has no enumerated power to engage in such policies, (E) it is distant and impersonal, whereas effective charities are personal and aim at directly enhancing personal competence and independence, (F) it decreases charitable impulses, because it allows potential donors to rationalize that they are already giving through their taxes, (G) Charles Murray’s argument from “In Pursuit: Of Happiness and Good Government”, that the responsibilities in life that bring the most happiness (providing food, clothing, shelter, education, etc., for one’s children and oneself) are the very things co-opted by the welfare state, making it impossible to be satisfied with one’s life while on welfare; and perhaps many others.

Now, I personally believe all of the above. But, if I were organizing a concerted attack by columnists, politicians, private citizens, etc., I would need to decide which arguments are most likely to persuade a majority of my fellow citizens to dismantle the welfare state. At that point, I think C and D would move towards the bottom of the list, even though I believe in them 100%. I also believe 100% in F and G, but F is weak without a lot of support from other reasons, and G is rather abstract and philosophical for many citizens to deal with. That is not cowardice in speaking the truth on my part, just a tactical consideration. So, I would figure that spreading the ideas of A, B, and E throughout the whole society is a big enough task, and drop the others.

As for the example of “No Child Left Behind”, the simple fact that not all students try equally hard, along with the well documented anti-academic attitudes in black culture, would be enough to justify publicly denouncing it and claiming that it will not work. If George W. Bush were a conservative, he would never have supported this stupid plan, regardless of his beliefs about IQ.

I don’t think Mr. Coleman’s overly lengthy illustration is responsive to what I said. The role played by the denial of IQ differences is not one argument out of several that our side could choose from; it is, as I’ve tried to show, central to the entire liberal egalitarian project, and therefore exposing it is central to opposing that project.

As to his final point, that the well known differences in black culture should be enough to show that the NCLB act will not work, I disagree, for the obvious reason that common knowledge of those well known differences in behavior did not prevent this extraordinarily stupid law from passing in the first place. And why didn’t such knowledge prevent it from passing? Because of that same general belief that racial differences are environmental and cultural rather than inherent, and therefore that putting pressure on the schools to demand more of students will equalize students’ abilities. Sure there are differences, people acknowledge; but they can be eliminated. So they created a whole statist re-organization of American schools based on the assumption that differences can be eliminated.

At bottom, America has a quasi religious devotion to environmentalism and egalitarianism. The only thing that can break that false belief is the opposite truth. Mr. Coleman himself believes that there are inherent racial differences, he just doesn’t think they should be talked about publicly. But he doesn’t seem to notice that if he did not already possess the insight that he has concerning innate differences, he wouldn’t even be making the sorts of arguments that he’s making here. In other words, those of us who see the falsity of mainstream beliefs on this subject only see it because we see the opposite truth. The truth has made us free. Yet Mr. Coleman would deny that liberating truth to others.

Mr. Auster wrote: “The role played by the denial of IQ differences is not one argument out of several that our side could choose from; it is, as I’ve tried to show, central to the entire liberal egalitarian project, and therefore exposing it is central to opposing that project.”

The fact that an idea is central to liberalism does not mean that opposing it is central. For example, ignoring the 10th Amendment and the fact that our federal government is a government of enumerated powers is also central to the liberal project. In fact, it is central in areas that have nothing to do with race. Therefore, convincing the public to hold the same view that I hold about the 10th Amendment would undermine even more of the liberal project than convincing them of IQ differences.

However, we have to determine how likely we are to succeed in our persuasion of the American public. Opposing the welfare state on 10th Amendment grounds does not address the liberal bogeyman of “compassion”. Demonstrating that the welfare state does more harm than good and is therefore not “compassionate” might be more persuasive.

Thus, the fact that a good historical understanding of the 10th Amendment and a limited federal government of enumerated powers would undermine the public’s acceptance of liberal programs does not necessarily imply that conservatives must make the 10th Amendment the centerpiece of their public discussions of government. Nor does it follow that we should make racial IQ differences one of our top priorities. This is a tactical decision about what is likely to succeed.

I could list half a dozen statements that, if the American public fully understood and believed them, would totally undermine all support for liberalism. These statements would address human nature, the limits of what government can accomplish, the dangers of centralizing government power, the principle of subsidiarity, etc. Racial IQ differences would not even make the list, because they would have little or nothing to do with issues like activist jurisprudence versus conservative jurisprudence, to take one example.

So, given these half dozen or more statements, which shall we live and die by? In order to answer, we would need to know more about each statement than “this would destroy the liberal project”, as that would be true of all of them. We would also want to ask pragmatic questions, such as: How likely are we to succeed in convincing Americans of the truth of this statement? What unintentioned ill effects might come from arguing this point? etc.

Let me try to be brief, for once, on just one narrow point: Mr. Auster wrote: “Mr. Coleman himself believes that there are inherent racial differences, he just doesn’t think they should be talked about publicly. But he doesn’t seem to notice that if he did not already possess the insight that he has concerning innate differences, he wouldn’t even be making the sorts of arguments that he’s making here.”

Actually, I have been a conservative for many years and did not give much thought to racial IQ differences until “The Bell Curve” was published and I read the many reviews of it. I learned traditionalism, limited government, the dangers of centralized power, etc., from a variety of sources before that. I would like to have it explained to me how a belief: that power corrupts; that government meddling tends to do more harm than good; that government programs take away your independence and thus take significant joy out of life; that “if you want more of something, subsidize it; if you want less of something, tax it”; that bureaucracy is inherently inefficient and impersonal and dehumanizing; that government exists to serve the general interest and not any special interests; that one of government’s most essential duties is the protection of private property; and countless other bedrocks of conservatism, have to do with acknowledging racial IQ differences. These are all examples of beliefs that I had before “The Bell Curve” brought my attention to IQ differences.

Furthermore, I believe that the liberal response to “The Bell Curve” indicated that THEY ALREADY PRIVATELY BELIEVED ITS CONCLUSIONS. That does not keep them from being liberals. So much for this subject being the alpha and omega of fighting the liberal project.

I ask Mr. Coleman to keep his remarks to the subject at hand, and to restrain his tendency (I have the same tendency myself) to construct complex analogies to OTHER subjects in order to make his point on THIS subject. Those other subjects contain their own problems which may not be identical to the issue at hand. Such a method of argument adds too much complexity to the discussion and frankly is asking too much of the reader.

Without the analogies, Mr. Coleman’s last two, lengthy comments would be much shorter, or even non-existent.

I disagree with Mr. Coleman on this. By suppressing the central argument against Federal welfarism—i.e. its violation of the Constitution—we do ourselves no favors. What good is it to cede this ground to our opponents and pretend that their arguments about “compassion” are somehow central? Doing this simply seems to confirm the liberals’ whole claim: that law must give way when “compassion” is called for—or more to the point, that the Constitution is merely a set of useful guidelines for wise liberals to consult, not inviolable LAW.

We would do better to point out WHY, in the first place, the “compassion” argument is fallacious for Americans: because it involves a violation of Constitutional principle. It should be made clear to Americans that if they truly want a Federal welfare state, they can surely have it, but they first must needs rip up their old Constitution and establish a new one, as the old one will simply not support it.

I apologize for getting sucked into the analogy :) I guess the upshot is that I agree with LA that arguments must be attacked at their core.

OK, here is a brief argument limited to racial egalitarianism: There are multiple assumptions underlying the liberal belief in racial egalitarianism. One of them might or might not be racial equality of IQs; as I mentioned, I think that liberals condescend to blacks, which along with their hysterical reaction to “The Bell Curve” indicates that they believe the IQ gap is real and just won’t talk about it publicly.

If we destroy belief in ANY of the multiple assumptions underlying the liberal belief in egalitarian results, we will destroy the credibility of their programs that aim to achieve those results. Racial equality in IQ is just one of these assumptions, therefore it is not somehow the magic assumption that it is mandatory for us to confront publicly.

For other such assumptions, I recommend Thomas Sowell’s “A Conflict of Visions”. I will be concise by not summarizing the entire book here.

But I think the liberal position ALWAYS comes down to the belief in an inherent equality of abilities and the belief in some kind of societal wrong-doing to explain the actual racial differences. This is so because the differences between whites and blacks are so large. The Thernstroms are now talking about a four-plus or even five year gap in skills between black and white high school graduates. Yet their best ameliorative examples yield a closing of one-third of the gap, still leaving a gap of about three years. Given the size of that differential, the cultural explanation ceases to be believable, leaving people with the alternatives of believing in some huge (and very well hidden) societal discrimination, or in inherent differences.

The upshot is that there is no “Third Way” in the racial differences debate. The liberals will keep pushing the “society is to blame” argument, while ignoring the conservatives’ “the liberal culture is to blame” argument, because the liberals will see that the only real alternative to the “blame society” argument is to accept inherent inequality of abilities.

Personally, I would prefer that Mr. Coleman’s more moderate approach to the argument were viable. But when I see the depth of the illusions and denials that are still at work in this debate, that persuades me that only the brutal truth can defeat them.

My position is also based on my personal experience, as discussed in my article “My views on race and intelligence,” linked under the archives section on our main page. I never got truly free of liberal misconceptions on these issues until I understood the full meaning of the IQ difference. My feeling is that the more people who have that clarifying and liberating experience, the more the liberal agenda will be turned back.

However, let me state that I’m not telling people they shouldn’t use whatever good arguments against liberalism they care to make. There are various arguments apart from the inherent racial differences argument that are both objectively true and internally consistent. But as a practical matter I don’t believe that they can ultimately prevail against the egalitarian fiction.

http://www.amnation.com/vfr/archives/001132.html

CC wrote: “If we destroy belief in ANY of the multiple assumptions underlying the liberal belief in egalitarian results, we will destroy the credibility of their programs that aim to achieve those results.”

If the assumptions you refer to form, as it were, separate trees, then this is true. If, however, they are merely branches of one tree, then that tree will only be destroyed when its root is severed. I guess what we need to determine is whether these assumptions actually follow from some common, prior assumption, or whether they are entirely discrete principles.

Mr. Auster, writing about the Thernstroms, said: “Yet their best ameliorative examples yield a closing of one-third of the gap, still leaving a gap of about three years. Given the size of that differential, the cultural explanation ceases to be believable ….”

Let me be clear on my own beliefs. As an optimist, it would be great to think that the academic performance gap can be 100% closed. As a realist, I doubt that such will happen, because there seems to be an IQ gap, according to various studies, that will not disappear.

How big will the gap be, after cultural improvements? There is no way to know. But there are several factors that can influence IQ in the most formative years, prior to kindergarten. In Steve Sailer’s 5-part series at vdare.com, he mentioned research that showed a 5-point IQ gap favoring breast-fed children over bottle-fed children. Given that 30% of black children are breast-fed versus 60% of white children, that could account for 1.5 IQ points, or only about 10% of the gap, if true. Then there is the issue of nutrition during the first two years after breast or bottle feeding, about whose effects we know little. Then there is the fact, cited by William Raspberry in a recent column (perhaps his review of the Thernstroms; I don’t recall) that black children are talked to by their parents in the earliest years less than half as many minutes per day as white children, leading to a significant deficit in verbal stimulation.

Would all of this entirely close the IQ gap if changed? I doubt that three such factors would do it all, but the question asks me to predict the future after a complex social-science experiment. But these factors at least contradict the claim that there are only two real factors: innate IQ and societal racism.

As to the Thernstrom’s exemplary schools that only closed one third of the gap in test scores, here are some factors that could affect test scores, other than innate IQ differences:

1) Breast-feeding vs. bottle-feeding
2) Early nutrition
3) Verbal stimulation from parents
4) Literacy and book-reading at home
5) Low parental expectations
6) Low student expectations
7) Low expectations by the school
8) Discipline and disruption problems at school
9) Amount of homework performed

I would imagine that the schools cited by the Thernstroms attacked #7-9 above. They might have had an indirect effect, therefore, on #5-6. That would be interesting to measure. I suspect they had no effect at all on #1-4. So, if they only closed one-third of the gap, is that surprising? Does that prove that two-thirds of the gap is due to innate IQ, when #1-6 were addressed very little?

I have struggled with this in my mind recently and have guessed that the gap could be closed by one-half or two-thirds, but I really have no way of knowing. Unless someone here can speak definitively about the future, keeping in mind that factors 1-4 can affect brain development even before kids take picture-based IQ tests, I think it is prudent to avoid claiming more than we actually know.

On the other hand, I DO know that the welfare state is destructive, etc., so I would rather attack what I know needs to be attacked rather than spend my time publicly speaking out about innate racial IQ gaps that I cannot reliably measure, even if they seem to be there in some magnitude.

Mr. Coleman, I would suggest reading about the Scarr/Weinburg adoption study:

http://www.amren.com/943issue/943issue.html

The study cited by Joel, along with the reply to it, indicate that less than one fifth of the gap can be closed by environment, as opposed to my much more optimistic one-half or two-thirds. That is certainly a shocking number. Looking back at my list of 9 influences other than IQ, it is hard to believe that they have almost no cumulative effect. I wonder how many white parents would believe that if they do a really good job of verbally stimulating their young children, read to them a lot, surround them with books and encourage them to read independently, have high expectations for their schoolwork, etc., etc., that the cumulative effect will be nearly ZERO compared to attempting none of this. “Counter-intuitive” can hardly begin to describe such a result.

In any case, as I posted earlier, if we attack the policies (such as the welfare state) that produce social pathologies, then black America will be content with the absolute quality of their lives and relative comparisons will have greatly diminished appeal. Not to mention the fact that the rest of us will enjoy a respite from underclass pathologies and their social costs.

I’m a bit more pessimistic than Mr. Coleman about the likelihood that black America would be satisfied with the very real differences in achievement, particularly when they weren’t being ‘masked’ by social engineering. But the issues you have put forward have merit in themselves, and it didn’t hurt any to be reminded that, even with IQ remaining central in the question of groups differences in outcome, there are overlapping matters we shouldn’t neglect that need to be constructively addressed as part of the message.

The extent of black failure in the current societal context is very serious. Jared Taylor documents it ruthlessly in his book “Paved With Good Intentions.” He only mentions IQ in passing, but does not spare to bring the results of it painfully to the fore. The last 2 chapters deal with practical steps that we should take, many of which are very much in line with your own thinking.

If you haven’t read it, I’d be happy to pass along an extra copy — a fitting token of appreciation for a helpful discussion and some useful points raised.

Alan Levine has been unable to get a comment posted successfully (due to some unresolved problems following our moving VFR to a new site), so I am posting this for him:

I am inclined to agree with Mr. Coleman in this discussion, though I might put things a bit differently. IQ differences are real and important, and cannot be quickly disposed of by “social engineers” or waving a magic wand.

However, they may have explanations other than heriditary differences. The tools at our disposal are insufficient to decide. I would differ with Clark Coleman on one point. It is true that SOME liberals clearly think that blacks are intellectually less capable than whites, and some, like the Presidents of Rutgers and Stanford, have been incautious enough to spill the beans about this. However, the liberal hysteria about this issue has other explanations, most important, the moral and intellectual deterioraton of the last 40 years, which has left many liberals so incapable of reasoned arguments that they cannot intelligently defend their views. Others are so emotionally unstable that they can only fly into tantrums when this or that dogma is questioned.

That is particularly true of race, but I suspect an interesting list of other matters eliciting that reaction could be compiled.

Alan Levine

In his impressive list of things that could be changed, Mr. Coleman mentions “that black children are talked to by their parents in the earliest years less than half as many minutes per day as white children, leading to a significant deficit in verbal stimulation.” Hmm. Black children have lower verbal intelligence because … their parents have lower verbal intelligence? Or, alternatively, Mr. Coleman might say, it’s because their parents have a “lower verbal culture”? What, then, are we going to do about that black culture? Have specialists instruct black parents on how to be more verbal with their children? Or, perhaps, give black children new parents? These possibilities show where the logic of ameliorative schemes always ends up: in a kind of cradle-to-grave Head Start program, in which, from the moment a black child is born, a team of facilitators build and manage a new environment for him providing maximum stimulation for his entire life.

The fact that Mr. Coleman places low parental verbal stimulation among the behaviors that he thinks society can change indicates the kind of social engineering nightmare that must result when people refuse to accept the fact of natural human differences.

With respect to Mr. Auster, I don’t see where he’s coming from on this last statement.

Informing parents, even black parents, of the benefits of greater verbal interaction with their toddlers isn’t a bad idea at all. It is unclear to me why you don’t think it would have any net positive effect, but any rate it sure couldn’t do any harm. (Unless you believe such an admonition would result in parents speaking to their children _less_?) And more time spent isn’t dependent on parents’ verbal intelligence; we’re not talking about reading Parmenides, just talking to their toddlers more, something that is simple enough for blacks to handle.

Maybe you’re right, maybe it wouldn’t change even a single black parent’s behavior, but a few simple suggestions like this hardly translate to a leap into ‘cradle-to-grave Head Start.’

Nor is it necessary to ‘refuse to accept the fact of natural human differences’ in order to advocate ways a parent can help their children and increase their likelihood of success. Validating the fact of IQ differences puts any such effort in context. These steps are not going to close the IQ gap between blacks and whites, but they could help blacks improve within the parameters of their inherent limitations and there’s no reason they should not be encouraged.

There is a difference between, on one hand, giving a person advice on how to improve his life and his functioning, and, on the other, setting up a government program with the aim of altering the basic behavioral patterns of an entire race! If blacks don’t verbalize much with their babies, wouldn’t that seem to be a rather deep seated behavior? Is the government going to interfere inside every black home in America? This is the cosmic version of Head Start I was talking about. Now Joel says he doesn’t intend such an ambitious project. But if that is the case, if this program consists, as Joel would have it, of nothing more than “informing … black parents of the benefits of greater verbal interaction with their toddlers,” does Joel really think that this desultory counsel is going to change blacks’ behavior, is going to turn non-verbal people into verbal people? Similarly, how about telling black parents to read more books, which would be the same kind of advice? How would you actually get them to do that?

Either the idea is mere window dressing to demonstrate good intentions, in which case it’s useless, or it consists of a really ambitious plan to alter the entire domestic and personal habits of an entire people, in which case it is insanely utopian—and will still be useless, as well as, probably, very destructive.

And has Joel thought of the expense and the expansion of government that would be required even to attempt such social engineering?

Looking back at my comment with the list of 9 things that can affect academic performance, other than IQ, I fail to see where I called for government programs for any of them.

When the message is sent out, loud and clear, that black culture needs to change in certain specific ways, there ARE blacks who will listen, and there ARE leaders in the black community who will become evangelists for the items on this list. Crucial to success is the corollary message that we are getting rid of the welfare state and affirmative action and other special privileges, so there is no alternative means of improvement other than cultural improvement. Absent that message, black demagogues will continue to lobby for such “compassionate” measures.

If we cannot say NO to them, then all is lost in the black community, regardless of who we convince about IQ gaps.

I’m all in favor of policies discouraging out of wedlock childbirth and other changes of that nature. But when Mr. Coleman started proposing getting black parents to talk to their kids more, to me that sounded like a formula for unworkable social engineering. We need to make a distinction between things that can be changed and things that cannot.

It reminded me of a conversation I had with a leftist relative a few years ago about the health care financing issue. The problem was, if the government was responsible for everyone medical costs, then didn’t that give the government the power to insist that people adjust their life style so as to avoid disease and cut down medical costs? So I said, “Would you favor the federal government requiring people to exercise every day?” Without hesitation he said yes.

So the logic of government financing of medical care leads ultimately to a Nineteen Eighty-Four world where Big Brother looks into each home on a telescreen making sure that people are doing their daily exercises. When I heard the idea of the government getting black parents to talk to their children more, the same kind of image came into my mind.

Today, 75%+ black children are born out of wedlock. Over half live in single family homes. I suppose if one were to look at this without any background, one could conclude that this reflects a ‘deep seated behavior.’ And that would be that! Why even bother encouraging traditional morality? This would be ‘mere window dressing to demonstrate good intentions’ or ‘a really ambitious plan to alter the entire domestic and personal habits of an entire people.’

But the fact is that in 1959 only 15% of black births were illegitimate. In 1950 only 9% of black families were headed by one parent. Something happened to change this, but it clearly was not an impossibility.

I suspect the same may have been true in the matter of verbal relationships. At least that’s what the stereotypes suggested — the mammie holding little one in the rocking chair and telling stories. Certainly there would be a much greater likelihood of parent-child interaction if there two parents raising the child instead of one! But maybe that too is a ‘deep seated behavior’ that would be ‘useless’ for us to try to change?

Now, do I think that educating black parents about beneficial things like increased verbalization would yield a positive result? You bet I do. Just as I believe that an increased societal emphasis on abstinence and monogamy would have such an effect — it did before. And sexual restraint is much more difficult than spending a little extra time talking to one’s children.

But as Jared Taylor pointed out in Paved, “Practically no one is any longer in the business of urging Americans to be self-reliant, honest, hardworking, civic-minded, and faithful to their spouses.” And society today doesn’t do much to urge parents to invest time in their children. Society teaches people to be selfish pigs, even to eschew having children altogether, or aborting them if they come along ‘inconveniently.’ If anything, I think that blacks might be more susceptible to negative societal trends, such as the ‘new morality’ that burst in with the Great Rebellion.

If there’s any question of ‘intelligence’ here it’s in the possibility that many blacks might not realize the importance of more verbal interaction with toddlers. And I’m not one to talk; when I first heard about it, it wasn’t something that had occured to me intuitively. And I do think that there are conscientious black parents who would actually act upon a practical suggestion out of a loving concern for their children.

OK, maybe not many would. But to suggest that such a minimal effort would be ‘useless’ or ‘insanely utopian’ is just incredible to me. You are correct about racial differences in intelligence and its significance. But you are going so far beyond any genuine implication of this in a manner that is neither fair, nor deserved, nor correct. There are decent blacks such as Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson who are trying desperately to help move the black community in a more positive direction on many different fronts — including investing more time in the rearing of their children, in the context of marriage. He is not being ‘utopian’ and hopefully his effort will not be ‘useless.’ God bless him for it!

In his first sentence, above, Joel of course meant “single parent homes,” not “single family homes” (for all who, like me, may have felt momentarily struck dumb by this “revelation” of extreme government largesse toward the welfare crowd).

I think the way to understand Joel’s disagreement with me is that Joel and I happen to see a different image in our minds when we hear this idea of getting black parents to verbalize more to their children. It strikes me that the degree to which people speak and emote is pretty intrinsic to their personalities and is among those things that are not very changeable. To Joel, by contrast, this idea is simply commonsensical, on the order of, say, encouraging people to eat more fruits and vegetables and fewer snacks. So, from Joel’s point of view, my resistance to the idea seems perversely narrow and ungenerous.

Our difference on this derives not from a difference of will, but from our differing assumptions about what the facts are that we’re talking about.

Only blacks can solve their problems. You can bring a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.

Whites must stop providing the water, and let the blacks find it on their own just as whites did before the end of segregation. (Actually there was too much guilt giving back then, which is partly why blacks feel whites owe them something today.) Otherwise the horse will just follow the keeper around complaining instead of finding and drinking its own water. Whites need to say enough already to black and to white parasites.

Well, I’ll try to be brief. ;-) I wasn’t so sure when you started imagining 1984 scenarios at the suggestion, while endorsing ‘policies’ that would discourage out-of-wedlock births. Liberals do the same in the latter with their ‘keep the government out of the bedroom’ nonsense.

My wife and I were discussing this. Though we don’t have children yet, she regularly obtains materials about child-rearing and has learned things that she insists would never have occured to her, such as introducing babies to different shapes and colors early. She is making quite a list in preparation for trying to be as good a parent as she can.

When we talk about a low I.Q. in this context, I assume that it applies to black parents simply not recognizing certain things like this — which weren’t readily apparent to me or my wife, (and we’re white.) I suggest that blacks, upon being informed of such things, might be inclined to pursue them, where you seem to imagine this deep-seated genetic resistance to something as simple as talking more with one’s children. I don’t completely disagree in the sense that there may be less of a predisposition toward it generally, but I still think it would have a net positive effect for some and is therefore worth encouraging — but not by govt policies, or telescreens in the home. You blew way past me there. ;-)

The same is true with encouraging abstinence unto monogamy, sexual behavior also being a deep-rooted, innate matter, but notwithstanding the evolutionary theories of Levin and Rushton, I think such emphases would yield positive benefits, even if were not as much as we would like.

Mr. Lefevre (I’m sorry if I lost track that he had changed his nom de plume from Joel to Joel LeFevre) confirms what I supposed: that our difference on this issue stems from how we perceive the underlying facts. He’s thinking in terms of getting a brochure and adopting new behaviors accordingly; I was thinking of turning non-verbal people into verbal people, which is tantamount to a total change of their personality.

Yes, we are in disagreement about the underlying facts. Blacks, as far as I have ever been aware, are ANYTHING but non-verbal, a fact they themselves have made much ado of.

In case anyone wonders why I harped on this, it’s because it’s part of a larger thesis advanced by Prof’s Levin and Rushton, among others, concerning racial differences in behavior, specifically in the sexual realm. Both argue that blacks are naturally more promiscuous than whites or Asians, and this presents a dilemma.

I’m willing to concede that this might indeed be the case, (just as I’d concede that much in the verbal thing, just not as absolute the way Mr. Auster seems to.) But what then?

If Mr. Auster is convinced that something as simple as black parents talking more to their children is so unlikely to change, how about the present problem of black illegitimacy? Do you believe that the higher promiscuity of blacks is also reflective on an innate trait? If so, then I’ll postulate 2 points, (1) Curbing this behavior is much more important than encouraging parents to talk to their kids, and (2) Trying to encourage abstinence unto monogamy is far less likely to yield positive results. What then?

I would suggest the same thing on the one point as the other, that overall encouraging abstinence and faithfulness would yield at least _some_ positive results. And this makes it a worthwhile pursuit.

Also, I respect Mr. Murgos’s point, but the skyrocketed rate of black illegitimacy affects ALL of society and must be dealt with accordingly.

Mr. LeFevre, whose position is nearly identical to my own, has brought up some excellent points in this discussion. One I would like to focus on is the rate of illegitmacy. As far as I can tell, the rate has always been higher among blacks than whites. Blacks nevertheless made significant strides in rates of both illegitimacy and marriage in the much maligned Jim Crow era of 1865-1932 - before they became the pet project of leftists whose ultimate objective is to destroy Christendom. As Mr. LeFevre pointed out, blacks were most susceptable the lies of the leftist-backed “sexual revolution” of the 1960s - resulting in a host of pathologies that effect the entire nation to this day.

In many respects, blacks have served as guinea pigs for leftist social experimentation. Margaret Saenger was only one of the many leftist utopians who actively cultivated the black community - often through churches - starting in the 1920s. Now, 85 years later, anyone with the eyes to see can observe the complete disaster that has been wrought. The black church, once faithful and alive, has been reduced to an obscene parody of Christianity. If you want to see what the ruling elite have planned for white, middle class Americans, just take a good, long look at what they’ve done to their ever-faithful black constituency. The end result will not be exactly the same, of course, due to innate differences. It will nevertheless be poisonous and destructive - just in a different way.

It’s true that blacks and whites are different at a fundamental level - as are men and women. Even so, moral behavior is not limited to those with an IQ score of greater than 100. Government policy that encourages moral and upright behavior, like many of those which were in effect a century ago, is not the same thing as the Orwellian system described by Mr. Auster. I would also submit that such endorsement of positive and moral behavior would be more effective from the church and local community than from a faceless Federal bureaucracy. The impossibilty of absolute lieral equality does not preclude the possibilty of improvement.

Mr. LeFevre, whose position is nearly identical to my own, has brought up some excellent points in this discussion. One I would like to focus on is the rate of illegitmacy. As far as I can tell, the rate has always been higher among blacks than whites. Blacks nevertheless made significant strides in rates of both illegitimacy and marriage in the much maligned Jim Crow era of 1865-1932 - before they became the pet project of leftists whose ultimate objective is to destroy Christendom. As Mr. LeFevre pointed out, blacks were most susceptable the lies of the leftist-backed “sexual revolution” of the 1960s - resulting in a host of pathologies that effect the entire nation to this day.

In many respects, blacks have served as guinea pigs for leftist social experimentation. Margaret Saenger was only one of the many leftist utopians who actively cultivated the black community - often through churches - starting in the 1920s. Now, 85 years later, anyone with the eyes to see can observe the complete disaster that has been wrought. The black church, once faithful and alive, has been reduced to an obscene parody of Christianity. If you want to see what the ruling elite have planned for white, middle class Americans, just take a good, long look at what they’ve done to their ever-faithful black constituency. The end result will not be exactly the same, of course, due to innate differences. It will nevertheless be poisonous and destructive - just in a different way.

It’s true that blacks and whites are different at a fundamental level - as are men and women. Even so, moral behavior is not limited to those with an IQ score of greater than 100. Government policy that encourages moral and upright behavior, like many of those which were in effect a century ago, is not the same thing as the Orwellian system described by Mr. Auster. I would also submit that such endorsement of positive and moral behavior would be more effective from the church and local community than from a faceless Federal bureaucracy. The impossibilty of absolute lieral equality does not preclude the possibilty of improvement.

“Government policy that encourages moral and upright behavior, like many of those which were in effect a century ago, is not the same thing as the Orwellian system described by Mr. Auster.”

I agree with this. Policies that, for example, discourage illegitimacy by setting better guidelines and rules in society, are different from efforts to reconstruct human beings.

Mr. Coleman writes:
“I wonder how many white parents would believe that if they do a really good job of verbally stimulating their young children, read to them a lot, surround them with books and encourage them to read independently, have high expectations for their schoolwork, etc., etc., that the cumulative effect will be nearly ZERO compared to attempting none of this. “Counter-intuitive” can hardly begin to describe such a result.”

It seems true that many modern white suburban parents grant far more credence to such things than they deserve. “Flash card” children don’t tend to do any better than kids who are allowed to just be kids; in fact it is my understanding that they do worse at least in the sense of developing more social and emotional problems. Their parents would do better to worry less about academic performance and more about protecting their children from the morally corrosive culture. Nurturing children isn’t the same thing as engineering them.

No doubt as with most things there is a mean between adacemic neglect and academic overkill in raising children, but a technocratic society like ours is always going to have more confidence in our ability to engineer solid little performers than is warranted by the facts of nature, and therefore will always exaggerate on the side of unrealistic expectations.

I think Matt’s post of 7:47 AM really nails it in a nutshell, from all points of view. He’s got it exactly right.

Mr. Auster wrote: “When I heard the idea of the government getting black parents to talk to their children more, the same kind of image came into my mind.”

Repeating this news bulletin: YOU DID NOT HEAR ANYTHING ABOUT GOVERNMENT PROGRAMS TO GET BLACK PARENTS TO TALK TO THEIR CHILDREN MORE from. Perhaps you heard it in your interpretation of what I wrote, but you certainly did not hear it from me.

Joel LeFevre wrote: “Yes, we are in disagreement about the underlying facts. Blacks, as far as I have ever been aware, are ANYTHING but non-verbal, a fact they themselves have made much ado of.”

When I first read the William Raspberry column that mentioned the study about black parents not talking to their children very much, I immediately pictured a scene I have seen in public many times: A black mother chatting away with someone while her child is ignored, perhaps held on a hip or just standing nearby, with an occasional interruption in the chat to yell at the kid for messing with something he wasn’t supposed to mes with, etc.

I hate to engage in what might be called racial stereotyping, but I have seen it so many times that it is not some atypical anecdote. As Joel said, blacks are certainly NOT non-verbal people. Whether their verbal exercises are productive is another question.

All the discussion of fixes will not yield results unless whites stop tolerating black violent crime, poor parenting, the belief blacks are going to make it on their own. They have given us no reason—none, zero, nada—to believe they will do it without force from the white community and from compassionate black allies. Black children can’t learn in a violent school and in a school black parents don’t support. In my city, 30-50% of black children don’t show up for the first two weeks of school. It’s the parents.

Black recidivist criminals should be exiled if we don’t have enough money to build huge prisons. America already has ONE-FOURTH of the world’s incarcerated criminals. I am all for bringing the troops home from Europe and Korea and putting them on street corners and in schools to prevent criminal behavior and thus reduce the cost of housing criminals. I am for building massive tent cities and chain gangs if that is what it will take to curb violent crime. But if all of that is infeasible, then dropping them off in Liberia is an option, with American soldiers protecting them from the native savages until they can protect themselves.

We have built a culture of rampant black violence beginning with desegregation. It is going to require drastic measures to solve it. I know this is all impractical under the current political climate, but discussing it is a beginning. Then we can discuss solving the relatively nonviolent problems with white culture.

Mr. Murgos’ postings demonstrate clearly the blind spot that is developing among many conservatives on these issues. The chain of reasoning goes like this:

1) A variety of evidence shows that black problems are not primarily an inheritance from slavery, Jim Crow, segregation, racism, etc.

2) Certain black leaders would like for whites to believe this falsehood, however, because inducing white guilt is politically advantageous to them. White guilt gives them carte blanche to demand political favors.

3) Therefore, white conservatives decide they have had enough and are not going to feel guilty anymore. Furthermore, blacks are the cause of their own problems, and all solutions must come from within their own community.

There is a gaping hole here: Whites ARE responsible for many of the problems in the black community, just not in the manner claimed in point #1 above. It is not slavery, Jim Crow, or latent racism in our society today that cause such problems in the black community. It is the welfare state, which is a WHITE idea. It might not be a white CONSERVATIVE idea, but it is almost entirely a white idea.

I do not feel personal guilt for policies that I have always opposed. The guilt falls on the white liberals, not on me. Still, as a citizen, I at least feel responsible to speak out against the welfare state and vote accordingly and inform others.

I sometimes think that we at VFR don’t understand how ill-informed the American public is on these issues. We might think that it is obvious that the welfare state does more harm than good, based on numerous books and articles we have read, but we are wrong to assume that this is common knowledge. The average American reads very little non-fiction. What percentage of Americans have read a SINGLE book that demonstrates the failure of the welfare state, such as Charles Murray’s “Losing Ground” ?

There is a persistent them in these threads at VFR that certain policies (in education, welfare, or whatever) continue unabated despite the fact that everyone knows they don’t work, and how can we explain that? Perhaps everyone at VFR knows they don’t work, but the average American is so ill-informed politically that it would shock us all to comprehend the depths of their ignorance. The good news is that this gives us an opportunity to inform and thereby change their minds.

To fail to turn the tide against the welfare state, and instead just declare TODAY that all progress is now up to the blacks themselves, is to combine cowardice (failure to stand up to the left on welfare state issues for fear of being called names, or whatever Republicans’ problem is on this issue) with irresponsibility.

Mr. Coleman has it wrong. It’s the standard conservative view today that the problems of blacks are due to (liberal) whites.

On the other controversy which I hope has run out, my target was a kind of social-engineering mentality, whether it’s done by the government or not.

Mr. Coleman wrote: “Whether their verbal exercises are productive is another question.”

And you hit that one on the head. Jared Taylor cited a study on ‘ebonics’ which asserted that terms such as ‘twice as less’ lead to problems in children forming proper numerical and spatial concepts that are necessary in mathematics and science, among other problems.

Mr. Auster wrote: “It’s the standard conservative view today that the problems of blacks are due to (liberal) whites.”

For whatever reason, that view does not seem to be translating into a dismantling of the liberal programs, does it?

It may be the view of well-read conservatives, conservative columnists, etc., but it is not likely a majority view of voters. How else do we explain the Republican paralysis on chopping government, beginning with its most destructive programs? The fact that Democrats and the media will scream “racist” and “uncompassionate” would be no deterrent at all if a majority of voters already held the conservative view.

Mr. Auster also wrote: “On the other controversy which I hope has run out, my target was a kind of social-engineering mentality, whether it’s done by the government or not.”

Well, I guess preachers telling their congregations how to live better lives is social engineering. I think the black community needs a lot more of it, and the white community does, too (e.g. white illegitimacy rates today are as bad as the “alarming” levels among blacks at the time of the Moynihan report in the mid-1960s).

I’ve just posted an article that I think is relevant in the context of what Mr. Auster wrote at the start of this thread. It’s called “Equality Versus Liberty: The Eternal Conflict” by R. Carter Pittman. It reveals an interesting historical take on the whole question of ‘equality.’

http://www.jtl.org/pittman/essays/equ_v_lib/equ_v_lib.html

(This is part of a project that’s still under construction, and I’m still working some bugs out. So this is an ‘early release.’) ;-)

Mr. Coleman wrote, at 1:15 PM,

“How else do we explain the Republican paralysis on chopping government, beginning with its most destructive programs?”

How else indeed, except to suspect there’s something dreadfully weak, and/or wrong, and/or clueless about this president. It cannot be denied that there must be something seriously the matter with him, to have won the election claiming as he did to be a conservative or at least a Republican, and then to have governed *domestically* (not in regard to the war, but *domestically*) as a one-hundred percent left-of-center Democrat. Steve Sailer, it might’ve been (could’ve been someone else), sort of implied in one piece I saw, if I understood, that what makes Bush seem unable to walk and chew gum at the same time (i.e., unable to both conduct this war AND decisively attend to urgent domestic matters that have been festering for decades, such as trimming useless, harmful, and frankly outrageous liberal federal programs, and tons of others) might be that his need to concentrate on not reaching for the bottle — a need former alcoholics have, apparently — cuts into the mental wherewithal he’d otherwise be able to devote to comprehending and solving problems.

Here’s a letter I wrote to “Poe’s Blog” citing some of the ways in which this president has sadly neglected the conservative agenda:

http://www.richardpoe.com/blog_single.php?rowID=322#692 .

(“Poe’s Blog,” a first-rate blog, is at Richard Poe’s excellent web-site, www.RichardPoe.com .)

It’s going to be extremely hard for me to get myself to vote for Bush next year — that’s all I can say. Richard Poe (in the same thread as that letter of mine) makes, as he always does, very cogent arguments against allowing the Clintons back into the White House. But Pres. Bush and Karl Rove certainly aren’t making it easy for us to support them for a second term. There is something very gravely wrong with them or with their ideas, for them to have spat in our faces the way they have.

I don’t want Hillary. But if she gets in, Bush, Rove, and the Republican establishment will have only themselves to blame.

Summarizing many of the things that we have all discussed in this thread: We have seen three great influences on the relative successes and failures of blacks in America:

1) Social pathologies such as illegitimacy, incompetent teenage parents, no father in the home, crime, etc.

2) Academic achievement that significantly lags white academic achievement in all key areas (reading, math and science).

3) Racial differences in IQ, with about 15 points difference (one full standard deviation) measured on IQ tests administered over several decades.

I list them in this order because I believe that the biggest negative effect on black America is #1, and that is also the biggest negative spillover effect onto white America.

At one extreme, it could be argued that ALL of #1 and #2 can be attributed to #3; at the other extreme, it could be argued that ALL of #3 will be cleared up by solving all of the problems of #1 and #2. No one has actually argued either extreme in this thread, so I would not characterize anyone’s position in either manner.

Given that the measurable social pathologies (#1) have markedly increased in a very short time, it hardly seems that genetic factors can explain them to any great degree. Given that the same pathologies have increased markedly in the white population over the same time period, it seems obvious that cultural/legal changes in America have had something to do with it. My argument has been that (A) it is in our power to undo the destruction wrought by leftist political/legal policies, and (B) this will lead to such an increase in quality of life for blacks that there will be a huge decrease in racial animosity and discontent and demagoguery. Others may disagree with part (B). None of us can predict the future, so perhaps we will have to agree to disagree. Hopefully, all will work to achieve progress in this area and we can see how our predictions turn out.

Academic achievement gaps (#2) can be partially attributed to IQ factors and partially to cultural factors. One possibility that must be considered is that there can be a certain disconnect between IQ and academic performance; that is, an average student with 100 IQ and average work habits can be equalled by a student with 90 IQ and better than average (but not Herculean) work habits. All students, white and black, in American schools could benefit from better work habits. However, many have observed that, when you have little to fall back on at home in terms of academics, you have less margin of error at school. Thus, attacking cultural factors is far more critical for lagging populations (i.e. blacks and Hispanics) than for anyone else.

Mona Charen’s recent review of “No Excuses” mentioned two facts from the book that I did not see elsewhere. Students were asked to categorize themselves as “working as hard as I possibly can”, working almost as hard as I can”, etc. Out of those who claimed to be working as hard as they could, blacks did 3.9 hours homework each week, whites did 5.4 hours per week, and Asians did 7.4 hours per week. In a second question, students were asked what is the lowest grade they could bring home and not be in trouble with their parents. Asians answered A-, whites said B-, and blacks and Hispanics both said C-.

The big question of the thread is essentially: To make progress in #1 and #2, do we have to publicly address #3? Will failure to address #3 inevitably lead to liberal programs, thus cutting off progress that could be made in areas 1 and 2? The more you study #1 and #2, the more you see the MANY persuasive public arguments that could be made to advance conservative approaches and improve black society without any reference to IQ. The programs of the welfare state are so destructive, and the cultural problems that affect black academic achievement are so obvious, that it is hard to believe that we are incapable of moving the public dialogue in a conservative direction in these areas without recourse to talking about IQ.

As an aside, if you want better examples of black achievement than the Thernstroms provided, take a look at Thomas Sowell’s speech, “The Education of Minority Children”, at:

http://www.tsowell.com/speducat.html

I believe that the real problem is that, while those of use who are well read know all about the failures of the welfare state, the typical voter does not, and the typical Republican politician is afraid of being accused of being “uncompassionate” if he proposes phasing out the welfare state entirely, rather than “reforming” it. Politicians are not leaders. When they se that public opinion has moved decisively in that direction, they will follow because it is now safe. Our job is to be persuasive of others in order to “lead our leaders” to the point where they can easily do what is best.

With respect to Unadorned’s comment on President Bush, the Republican cowardice on the welfare state goes back quite a bit before his time. How much of the welfare state did Ronald Reagan get rid of?

Yes Mr. Coleman (who I thank, for his thoughtful and reasonable arguments are valuable) some whites believe whites have worked to provide blacks with welfare and other destructive programs, which whites started in a very small, informal way long before formally starting drastically increasing them with the help of perhaps America’s two lousiest presidents—Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson—and of the lousy Nixon expansions. The key words to describe white action are aided-and-abetted, which means whites only gave blacks what they were already demanding as their right. Whites did not impose on blacks one single benefit that blacks had not already demanded. Blacks have always believed whites owed them something.

Whites gave and give many things to blacks in part out of inappropriate guilt feelings. I remember the guilt giving that was still going on after desegregation, and it took me to convince my parents how ungrateful and contemptuous blacks were of their cast offs; and this was when I was barely out of college. I never give gifts to black or Hispanic postmen, desk clerks, etc., but I do give to similar Asians, white people, the Salvation Army, and the Disabled American Veterans. I know Blacks view white gifts as obligations. Most blacks do not appreciate one solitary thing whites have given them. Oh we mustn’t leave one grateful person behind say the cold-hearted white liberals; yes we must, because they can exert power against their fellow blacks and white allies.

Blacks know that today the primary reason whites give blacks anything is to get blacks to ally with those certain whites (Democrats and Republicans) so those whites can get their votes for the nutty programs those whites want: abortion, illegitimacy, illegal immigration, welfare, special privileges for nonwhites, women’s rights, women in the military, etc. Sure those certain whites delude themselves into believing they are compassionate when in fact they are just buying votes. In the end, Machiavelli was right that people need to understand politics is not about fairness but about power. The Clintons are the poster couple for Machiavellian ideas.

Raising black IQ won’t do a thing to change black culture just as better IQ’s have not prevented the degradation of white culture.

In responding to Mr. Coleman’s post, I have to move into some difficult territory. Mr. Auster summed it up on the recent discussion we had on this topic at
http://www.amnation.com/vfr/archives/001818.html:

“Many of the problems we’re touching on in this discussion, including the demand for equality and the fear of stating the truth about inequality, stem from racial integration. I think in a more natural, healthy society there would be much more residential, educational, and social separateness between the races. If they weren’t in the same schools, then there wouldn’t be the expectation that they have exactly the same academic achievement.”

Here is one area where Mr. Auster is quite correct to criticize social engineering. ;-)

I do not advocate State-enforced segregation. There are blacks who are quite capable of high academic performance — think of Thomas Sowell, Walter Williams, Justice Thomas — but they do not, and for the foreseeable future cannot, be represented according to their percentage of the overall population.

Artificially throwing blacks (and Hispanics) and whites together in the same classroom environment has the dual-edged effect of holding whites back and putting blacks in the interminably frustrating position of not being able to keep up. When schools were mostly separated along racial lines, the teaching was more suited to the needs.

There is an extent to which the constant push by the Federal government to artificially integrate communities has led to a breakdown in the cohesion and sense of community around which a consensus of conduct and behavior was established. When blacks were primarily situated in their own communities, and without the external welfare perks, there was a much stronger set of cultural restraints. Irresponsibility of so basic a kind as illegitimacy was less tolerated.

Even before Emancipation, black families tended to stay together. The social pressures that they faced as an excluded minority group later ironically contributed to this.

Although Mr. Coleman is apparently coming to terms with the issue of racial differences in IQ — and I can relate well to how difficult this can be — I think he is still seriously underestimating its significance. I also don’t feel he has internalized part of Mr. Auster’s argument, namely that a direct and harmful error propounded by liberals can only be countered by the diametrically opposed _truth_.

Liberals have for so long pounded away at the false notion of equality of ability, including educability, that there is no circuitous way around this other than to confront it directly. And this notwithstanding, the difference is serious enough that there really is no way to avoid dealing with it. The resulting disparities are too great, and with our integrated society as it is, will demand explanation of those who remain at the bottom. Unless we address the real underlying cause, the alternative will be the hue and cry of that old standby — racism.

I thank Mr. Coleman again for raising the question, which led to a productive and interesting discussion.

Alright, this tiff isn’t over yet. So let me clarify further. If it were a matter of a black community getting the idea, say, that black mothers need to speak to their children more, have less tv in the house, read to them, whatever, and then promoting that through community, church, and so on, obviously that would be a good thing, there would be no objection in that. And if that’s all Mr. Coleman meant, then fine. But the image his idea initially suggested to me was of social engineers, counselors, psychologists, armed with a “program,” trying to alter the basic behavior of people, and that suggested to me an unending effort by society to do the impossible. And that’s where my Orwellian imagery came in.

Now, if Mr. Coleman and Mr. LeFevre are still displeased with me for my supposed heartlessness or whatever, I’m sorry, but I’ve clarified my statement as much as I can and I’m now leaving this topic.

I see that I didn’t establish the context for my last comment, I was referring back to Mr. Coleman’s criticism of my opposition to the idea of getting black parents to be more verbal.

Frankly, I think a reader would be turned off trying to read this thread, mainly because our participants too often write entire essays instead of the briefer communications that are appropriate to this medium. This is supposed to be a discussion, not a collection of articles. I again ask our participants to try to keep their statements concise.

I certainly did not mean to infer that Mr. Auster was ‘heartless’ or any such thing, and I am sorry if my statements appeared to cross into an ad hominem suggestion of that sort.

I think that forthright debate is a healthy thing, although from Mr. Auster’s comment above, it appears as though our positions in most respects weren’t as far apart as they sounded.

Joel LeFevre wrote: “There is an extent to which the constant push by the Federal government to artificially integrate communities has led to a breakdown in the cohesion and sense of community around which a consensus of conduct and behavior was established. When blacks were primarily situated in their own communities, and without the external welfare perks, there was a much stronger set of cultural restraints. Irresponsibility of so basic a kind as illegitimacy was less tolerated.”

I think that two unrelated things are being conflated here. The welfare state has helped produce illegitimacy and other destructive behaviors, because it subsidizes such failures. Hence, it is producing increases in these behaviors among whites and Hispanics. Forced integration, while objectionable on various grounds, really has just about nothing to do with these behaviors. White-only enclaves in the Appalachians have been affected in much the same way by the welfare state. The white trend just lags bhind the black trend by 2-3 decades.

As for the rest of Joel’s post, much of it is a repetition of what was already said, which I have already responded to. I won’t engage in another lengthy posting just to repeat what I have already said to those who won’t read it.

Well, there’s been alot of ‘conflating’ going on in this thread Mr. Coleman. ;-)

I agree with you completely about the destructive results of our welfare system, and thought we could take that for granted at this point. The problem of socially engineered integration of neighborhoods and communities may seem marginal to this, but I do think it’s part of the whole picture here that includes welfare and also affirmative action.

By throwing different races into the same surroundings and circumstances, the differences in education, income/standard of living—which I argue are largely IQ-related—are more painfully evident. The disparities stand out when they’re seen side-by-side. This bolsters the demands for ‘equalization’ measures such as you refer to. These are part of the same liberal agenda and reinforce one another.

The rest of what I said, what you deem a repetition — it is a repetition, a summary of my own over where I continue to have some disagreement with you. And we may have to just leave it at that. For the record, I have read ALL of your posts in this thread from top to bottom, some more than once.

Re: What would explain a racial difference of size and genetic origin between tropical-adapted populations and opposite types? If human life in an ancestral African environment has required a genetic adaptation towards reacting to tropical parasites, what should be assumed to happen if these infestations became worse,as in the case of malaria? Add on to this the premise that the immune system can specialize in only one of two specializations genetically; delayed type hypersensitivity(DTH) or immediate hypersensitivity (antibodies), and such that there never appears an individual who can combine the two specializations in this species. The immediate kind is far superior for reacting to parasites, while DTH is of great advantage for controlling long-lasting infections. Add on the premise that the DTH specialization has become possible and adaptive only in groups which have moved far outside the tropics. In doing so these groups have become more and more vulnerable to infectious disease , as they began to live close to herd animals and their infections, then in settlements. At the same time they escaped the worst effects of parasites, while the tropical-adapted became more vulnerable to intensifying parasitization associated with the development of their agriculture. Add to this the fact that the newborn, while lacking antibodies of its own, is able to be immunized for TB , which requires DTH. The stronger genetically the infant’s DTH, the better it can control the infectious agents which it acquires at this time. Fevers and illnesses, of little harm to an adult may damage the development of the infant brain. The specialization to DTH will be intensified as the groups urbanize and extend their trading networks to their furthest possibilities. But if these groups had stayed in the tropics, or remained hunter-gatherers they would have been unable to develop this genetic specialization to DTH, which could explain the higher conceptual ability being genetically based as between these extremes of group adaptation.If this theory is of interest, I will discuss what lines of evidence lead to it, which are not alluded to above.