7 ms·

For those still unware, here is the politically incorrect truth about PISA and America's subpar performance on it: http://buchanan.org/blog/who-owns-the-future-

by anon098 16y ago

For those still unware, here is the politically incorrect truth about PISA and America's subpar performance on it: http://buchanan.org/blog/who-owns-the-future-4587 http://buchanan.org/blog/who-owns-the-future-4587 "True, East Asians - Chinese, Koreans, Japanese - are turning in the top scores in all three categories, followed by the Europeans, Canadians, Australians and New Zealanders. "But, looking down the New York Times list of the top 30 nations, one finds not a single Latin American nation, not a single African nation, not a single Muslim nation, not a single South or Southeast Asian nation (save Singapore) [which is Han Chinese], not a single nation of the old Soviet Union except Latvia and Estonia." ... "Steve Sailer of VDARE.com got the full list of 65 nations, broke down U.S. reading scores by race, then measured Americans with the countries and continents whence their families originated. What he found was surprising. "Asian-Americans outperform all Asian students except for Shanghai-Chinese. White Americans outperform students from all 37 predominantly white nations except Finns, and U.S. Hispanics outperformed the students of all eight Latin American countries that participated in the tests. "African-American kids would have outscored the students of any sub-Saharan African country that took the test (none did) and did outperform the only black country to participate, Trinidad and Tobago, by 25 points." Here is the chart: http://www.vdare.com/sailer/101219_pisa.htm http://www.vdare.com/sailer/101219_pisa.htm

michaelchisari 16y ago
VDARE is a hate group, which often republishes white supremacists. With such a clear, ideological bias, I would hope that people here would know better than to accept their conclusions without some serious corroboration or fact-checking. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VDARE http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VDARE
- coderdude 16y ago
  So says the Southern Poverty Law Center. Surely there's no connection between being criticized and criticizing back. If that's all you've got on them then I wouldn't be so quick to jump on the label wagon. It sounds more like their research and findings are just a little controversial and the people on the business end of those findings aren't too happy about it. I agree with you on your argument about fact checking though.
  - michaelchisari 16y ago
    Actually, it's right in the wikipedia page: The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) called VDARE a hate group,[5] that was "once a relatively mainstream anti-immigration page," but by 2003 became "a meeting place for many on the radical right."[6] The group also criticized VDARE for publishing articles by white nationalists Jared Taylor and Sam Francis, along with other authors who deal with race and intelligence. I can guarantee you that SPLC is not the only organization that considers VDARE a hate group. They may have been a more "legitimate" anti-immigration group in the past, but they've taken a hard right turn in the past decade or so.
    - coderdude 16y ago
      I removed the part of my comment that mentioned citations from Wikipedia about the "white supremacists" (white nationalists in the article). Not because there actually are citations but because it wasn't core to the argument. It doesn't actually prove that just because it's in the Wikipedia article as it really isn't cited anywhere. I would have to do research outside of the WP article to confirm that. As far as I can tell you seem to know more about them than Wikipedia. To add to this: Does anyone know if white nationalist is even the same as a supremacist? That guy Jared's picture on WP is him shaking hands with Jesse Jackson. Also, the citations that were included in the quote you added from the article are from the group I mentioned above, which is why I wasn't personally convinced. To edit further: I'm coming to the conclusion that white nationalist is a position whose mission is to do things "for white people." Not unlike whatever it is Jesse Jackson does with his time for black people. Although I don't see evidence that the guy is a racist, I'm not particularly a fan of any kind of single-race oriented groups. White or otherwise.
      - michaelchisari 16y ago
        Does anyone know if white nationalist is even the same as a supremacist? It's coded language. Even people on Stormfront call themselves white nationalists.
        16y ago
- anon098 16y ago
  No, it isn't, and if you wish to assert that it is, then the burden is on you to provide proof other than the assertion to that effect by a notoriously biased organization like the SPLC.
- defen 16y ago
  Instead of engaging in drive-by ad-hominem, it would be more useful if you did the analysis yourself and told us the results.
- Ratufa 16y ago
  An opinion on those conclusions from someone who is not Steve Sailer: http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh122410.shtml#MINION http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh122410.shtml#MINION If you would like to verify his data, the source is here: http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011004.pdf http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011004.pdf
  - nitrogen 16y ago
    The linked article seems to have a predetermined conclusion to which it is trying to fit the data. Some examples: Scare quotes are used to implicitly treat "reform" and "reformers" as somehow less than the words imply, without justification for this disdain. Loaded terms are used to color perceptions of various elements in the plot ("beautiful" kids, "brutal" history, "tragedy", "painful" scores). Why don’t American kids score at the top on international tests? Our brutal history is part of the answer, as is the immigration policy we maintain so people like Matthews can pay low wages to the people who care for their homes. No evidence is provided for the claim that history or immigration policy are the cause for the discrepancies in scores. Basically, the piece seems to invoke "think of the children," quote some opponents with unsubstantiated outrage, and call QED. The fact that's totally ignored in this article, and which I find most interesting, is that American students of a given race outperform their peers in their native countries. The next question to ask is whether this correlation is meaningful, and if so, how to use it to improve education in the future.
- _h4xr 16y ago
  Has anyone disputed them? This seems like a great example of an ad hominem attack--you haven't had to question their data, or their logic, just the fact that they've found an argument supporting their conclusions. That's a good way to talk past people. If you're legitimately concerned with their views, this is a great opportunity to identify what flaws there are with this argument, instead of the ways you already disagreed with the conclusion. I mean, think about this in terms of who is contributing to the argument. Vdare: "Here is some analysis of the data, revealing what may be surprising results!" You: "Like most people, I disagree with VDare's conclusions. I'm not going to address their arguments, and I'd like to warn others against doing so, too." Who is contributing, here?
  - Locke1689 16y ago
    If the source started as disreputable then it is wise to weigh its conclusions lighter than more reputable sources. It's not an ad hominem attack, it's inductive reasoning.
    - _h4xr 16y ago
      It's still ad hominem, even if it's also inductive reasoning. I'm still hoping for a follow-up addressing the claims, rather than the person making those claims.
    - winestock 16y ago
      If the disreputable source is the sole source for those claims, then, yes, one should hold the claims in less than high regard. But if that disreputable source points to a third party, then that party should be the one under condsideration.
  - jdietrich 16y ago
    Not an ad hominem. An ad hominem argument attacks the character of the speaker independent of the argument and is a specific subset of non sequitur. Whether an organisation is racist or not is highly relevant to whether we should trust their findings on matters of race, in the same way that someone being a salesman is relevant to whether we should trust their opinion on products they are selling. If the accusation was that they were homophobic or sexist or a bunch of drunkards, that would be ad hominem. As it is, pointing out that they are racist is a very relevant and useful contribution. Although we cannot assess the objective validity of their findings based on that fact, our assessment of the probabilities change greatly.
- philwelch 16y ago
  By definition, the position that there are significant differences between different races is racism. Likewise, Sailer appears to be a racist and VDARE appears to be a racist web site. I don't know where either Sailer or VDARE has ever expressed actual outright hatred, per se, but "hate group" seems to be one of those non-literal political buzzwords nowadays. I think it would be better if everyone were to speak plainly and literally rather than using ill-fitting political cliches. (See: Orwell, "Politics and the English Language": http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm) I hope all people everywhere know better than to accept anyone's conclusions without serious corroboration or fact-checking. Yes, Sailer's conclusions are racist--but the question is whether they're true or not. And if you're willing to stop short at identifying them as racist without even asking that question, perhaps Sailer isn't the only one with a clear, ideological bias. Ideological biases usually manifest themselves as flawed arguments that some conclusion or other is true. This is the type of bias you accuse Sailer of; I think your accusation is perfectly reasonable. Sometimes, though, ideological biases manifest themselves as social taboos. When that happens, everyone comfortably forgets about the question of truth or falsity and dismisses ideas out of hand simply for broaching the taboo. (See: pg, "What You Can't Say": http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html) I'm not arguing for or against anyone's conclusions here, just suggesting some reasonable ground rules for rational conversation.
  - jacques_chester 16y ago
    > By definition, the position that there are significant differences between different races is racism. Actually, the definition is believing that the differences are large enough to render some races superior to others. It's a political belief, not a biological statement.
    - nitrogen 16y ago
      The concept is occasionally, regrettably, extended to include any mention that there may be performance differences between races at all, regardless of whether that comes from genetics, culture, or oppression. "Culturism," it seems, is often mistaken for racism.
- yummyfajitas 16y ago
  I fact checked some of it. His source for the 2009 reading numbers is this report (which he linked to): http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011004_1.pdf http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011004_1.pdf I checked 5 of the numbers on his first chart against table R1 in the official report. They all agreed. I checked the 2009 numbers in his second chart against table R3. They also agreed. I'm curious - Sailer links to his source. It took me 3 minutes to find the relevant data. Why didn't you do this yourself? Why insinuate bias on his part, rather than simply attempting to determine for yourself if he is lying?
  - philwelch 16y ago
    I get the rhetorical point of asking these questions, but we both know the answer to them. Racism isn't a socially acceptable intellectual position, so people who express racist ideas only deserve outright dismissal. Actual corroboration and fact checking are only done when you take an argument in good faith. Likewise, the characterization of scientific racism as "white supremacism" or of VDARE as a "hate group" means belief in statistical differences between different races is the moral equivalent of being a neo-Nazi. Even if your very own arguments better suggest Chinese supremacism than white supremacism.
    - ahi 16y ago
      There's no such thing as "scientific racism" since race is a social construct.
      - philwelch 16y ago
        First, race isn't purely a social construct. Obviously race is determined, at least partially, by ancestry and physical appearance, both of which are things science is fully capable of empirically measuring. The common conception of race is probably too flawed and inconsistent to use for scientific purposes, and most contemporary mainstream scientists who study human genetics don't use the word "race", but it's not a completely arbitrary and unfounded concept. If it was, public health offices wouldn't use it to narrow down which groups of people are at greater risk for genetic conditions like sickle cell disease. Second, even if there is no scientific validity to the concept of race (and there very well may not be), I think everyone knows what the term "scientific racism" means. So I don't see the constructive point in your comment. My point is that there's a distinction between arguing about IQ statistics and burning crosses in people's front yards; I think you're using rhetorical tricks to undermine that point rather than arguing against it directly.
- georgieporgie 16y ago
  For everyone dismissing you on the basis of an ad hominem attack, here is the first paragraph from Wikipedia. In particular, notice the second sentence: An ad hominem (Latin: "to the man"), also known as argumentum ad hominem, is an attempt to link the validity of a premise to a characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise.[1] The ad hominem is a classic logical fallacy,[2] but it is not always fallacious; in some instances, questions of personal conduct, character, motives, etc., are legitimate and relevant to the issue.
  - yummyfajitas 16y ago
    Ad hominem is not fallacious when a person is attempting to argue by authority. The wikipedia article gives this example: Conflict of Interest: Where a source seeks to convince by a claim of authority or by personal observation, identification of conflicts of interest are not ad hominem... Steve Sailer is not arguing from a authority, so in this case the ad hominem is a logical fallacy. It's often useful to read more than the first paragraph of a wikipedia article.
    - georgieporgie 16y ago
      You've pulled one sentence out of a subsection and attempted to use it as a definition of the only way for an ad hominem to not be fallacious. You've quoted from "Conflict of Interest" under the "Circumstantial" fallacy section. Under said section, it is clearly stated, "The circumstantial fallacy only applies where the source taking a position is only making a logical argument from premises that are generally accepted." Regardless, I rescind my earlier comment because michaelchisari's statement was simply not an ad hominem attack. He wrote: With such a clear, ideological bias, I would hope that people here would know better than to accept their conclusions without some serious corroboration or fact-checking. At no point does he argue that what was said is false, only that readers should be skeptical due to evidence of bias and check their facts. > It's often useful to read more than the first paragraph of a wikipedia article. It's never useful to be persnickety.
      - yummyfajitas 16y ago
tokenadult 16y ago
A better analysis is PISA's own analysis, which refers to specific instructional practices in different countries and other differences in country conditions that make a difference in educational outcomes. http://www.oecd.org/document/2/0,3343,en_32252351_32236191_39718850_1_1_1_1,00.html http://www.oecd.org/document/2/0,3343,en_32252351_32236191_3... After edit: It probably is worth pointing out, in this context, that I speak and read Chinese and have lived in various parts of the Chinese-speaking world. I have Chinese-language textbooks of mathematics at home from more than one country, and I am confident that young people of any "race" can learn math well if they are taught with materials like those, because I am a math teacher by occupation and my classes include a very ethnically diverse group of students, who thrive in the classes and far exceed the meager expectations of United States classrooms. Another good response to what is wrong with mathematics teaching in United States classrooms comes from Patricia Clark Kenschaft in the Notices of the American Mathematical Society volume 52, number 2 (February 2005). http://www.ams.org/notices/200502/fea-kenschaft.pdf http://www.ams.org/notices/200502/fea-kenschaft.pdf Eric A. Hanushek, Paul E. Peterson, and Ludger Woessmann point out in their paper "U. S. Math Performance in Global Perspective: How well does each state do at producing high-achieving students?" http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers/PEPG10-19_HanushekPetersonWoessmann.pdf http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers/PEPG10-19_Hanushe... that the real problem in United States mathematics education is leaving behind too many of the high-ability students, of whatever ethnicity, compared to many other countries.
to 16y ago
who needs pisa, just talk to people, watch tv and realize how crazy the gov. fucks around with its citizens but nobody wants to miss glee so they just let it happen. no need for a pisa study to explain how lazy and in avg maybe not dumb but ignorant we are.
pessimizer 16y ago
I feel that these results only transform into "politically incorrect truth" when observed through a racist lens. African-Americans also seem to have an aptitude for terrible cancer outcomes, living in food deserts, low school district funding, and higher mortgage interest rates. The Latin American countries that Hispanic-Americans were compared to, and the Sub-Saharan African countries that African-Americans were imagined to have been compared to each seem to have national aptitudes for harsh Western colonialism followed up by dictators installed and supported by Western powers, with all of their wealth filtered through tiny elites and directed back to the West. I don't have anything against the idea of different concentrations of intelligence distributing amongst different groups of people just like heights or colorations do. The experiment just hasn't been done, and may not be possible. The idea that you could compare the test results of African-Americans and European-Americans and come up with a complete enough set of controls to discover some sort of distribution of intrinsic aptitude is absurd; you have to settle for parental income and educational attainment and ignore the fact that the two groups are facing a radically different environment filled with pervasive beliefs about their potential which are often based on race, and are easily visually distinguishable. For example, you also find correlations between attractiveness or height and intelligence - and similarly, IMO, misguided theorists postulating some sort of Eloi superiority while ignoring any possible effect of the discrimination that unattractive or short people face, even with multiple studies verifying the Pygmalion Effect (the effect that instructor expectations have on student performance) such as: Pygmalion in the Classroom (Rosenthal and Jacobson, 1968) http://www.springerlink.com/content/9u01hn7865v7387r/ http://www.springerlink.com/content/9u01hn7865v7387r/ or Pygmalion goes to boot camp: Expectancy, leadership, and trainee performance (Eden and Shani, 1982) http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6WY3-4NNF8B3-D/2/54efe177e6c1c9abb82edcd7b0f07f90 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6WY3-4NNF8B3-D... Said simply, the cultural environment is simply too messy to jump to conclusions about intrinsic ability distributions about disadvantaged groups, and the temptation has always been irresistible for some to use unsurprising statistics to confirm previously held biases.

by anon098 16y ago

michaelchisari 16y ago

VDARE is a hate group, which often republishes white supremacists. With such a clear, ideological bias, I would hope that people here would know better than to accept their conclusions without some serious corroboration or fact-checking. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VDARE http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VDARE

coderdude 16y ago
So says the Southern Poverty Law Center. Surely there's no connection between being criticized and criticizing back. If that's all you've got on them then I wouldn't be so quick to jump on the label wagon. It sounds more like their research and findings are just a little controversial and the people on the business end of those findings aren't too happy about it. I agree with you on your argument about fact checking though.
- michaelchisari 16y ago
  Actually, it's right in the wikipedia page: The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) called VDARE a hate group,[5] that was "once a relatively mainstream anti-immigration page," but by 2003 became "a meeting place for many on the radical right."[6] The group also criticized VDARE for publishing articles by white nationalists Jared Taylor and Sam Francis, along with other authors who deal with race and intelligence. I can guarantee you that SPLC is not the only organization that considers VDARE a hate group. They may have been a more "legitimate" anti-immigration group in the past, but they've taken a hard right turn in the past decade or so.
  - coderdude 16y ago
    I removed the part of my comment that mentioned citations from Wikipedia about the "white supremacists" (white nationalists in the article). Not because there actually are citations but because it wasn't core to the argument. It doesn't actually prove that just because it's in the Wikipedia article as it really isn't cited anywhere. I would have to do research outside of the WP article to confirm that. As far as I can tell you seem to know more about them than Wikipedia. To add to this: Does anyone know if white nationalist is even the same as a supremacist? That guy Jared's picture on WP is him shaking hands with Jesse Jackson. Also, the citations that were included in the quote you added from the article are from the group I mentioned above, which is why I wasn't personally convinced. To edit further: I'm coming to the conclusion that white nationalist is a position whose mission is to do things "for white people." Not unlike whatever it is Jesse Jackson does with his time for black people. Although I don't see evidence that the guy is a racist, I'm not particularly a fan of any kind of single-race oriented groups. White or otherwise.
    - michaelchisari 16y ago
      Does anyone know if white nationalist is even the same as a supremacist? It's coded language. Even people on Stormfront call themselves white nationalists.
      - 16y ago
anon098 16y ago
No, it isn't, and if you wish to assert that it is, then the burden is on you to provide proof other than the assertion to that effect by a notoriously biased organization like the SPLC.
defen 16y ago
Instead of engaging in drive-by ad-hominem, it would be more useful if you did the analysis yourself and told us the results.
Ratufa 16y ago
An opinion on those conclusions from someone who is not Steve Sailer: http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh122410.shtml#MINION http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh122410.shtml#MINION If you would like to verify his data, the source is here: http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011004.pdf http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011004.pdf
- nitrogen 16y ago
  The linked article seems to have a predetermined conclusion to which it is trying to fit the data. Some examples: Scare quotes are used to implicitly treat "reform" and "reformers" as somehow less than the words imply, without justification for this disdain. Loaded terms are used to color perceptions of various elements in the plot ("beautiful" kids, "brutal" history, "tragedy", "painful" scores). Why don’t American kids score at the top on international tests? Our brutal history is part of the answer, as is the immigration policy we maintain so people like Matthews can pay low wages to the people who care for their homes. No evidence is provided for the claim that history or immigration policy are the cause for the discrepancies in scores. Basically, the piece seems to invoke "think of the children," quote some opponents with unsubstantiated outrage, and call QED. The fact that's totally ignored in this article, and which I find most interesting, is that American students of a given race outperform their peers in their native countries. The next question to ask is whether this correlation is meaningful, and if so, how to use it to improve education in the future.
_h4xr 16y ago
Has anyone disputed them? This seems like a great example of an ad hominem attack--you haven't had to question their data, or their logic, just the fact that they've found an argument supporting their conclusions. That's a good way to talk past people. If you're legitimately concerned with their views, this is a great opportunity to identify what flaws there are with this argument, instead of the ways you already disagreed with the conclusion. I mean, think about this in terms of who is contributing to the argument. Vdare: "Here is some analysis of the data, revealing what may be surprising results!" You: "Like most people, I disagree with VDare's conclusions. I'm not going to address their arguments, and I'd like to warn others against doing so, too." Who is contributing, here?
- Locke1689 16y ago
  If the source started as disreputable then it is wise to weigh its conclusions lighter than more reputable sources. It's not an ad hominem attack, it's inductive reasoning.
  - _h4xr 16y ago
    It's still ad hominem, even if it's also inductive reasoning. I'm still hoping for a follow-up addressing the claims, rather than the person making those claims.
  - winestock 16y ago
    If the disreputable source is the sole source for those claims, then, yes, one should hold the claims in less than high regard. But if that disreputable source points to a third party, then that party should be the one under condsideration.
- jdietrich 16y ago
  Not an ad hominem. An ad hominem argument attacks the character of the speaker independent of the argument and is a specific subset of non sequitur. Whether an organisation is racist or not is highly relevant to whether we should trust their findings on matters of race, in the same way that someone being a salesman is relevant to whether we should trust their opinion on products they are selling. If the accusation was that they were homophobic or sexist or a bunch of drunkards, that would be ad hominem. As it is, pointing out that they are racist is a very relevant and useful contribution. Although we cannot assess the objective validity of their findings based on that fact, our assessment of the probabilities change greatly.
philwelch 16y ago
By definition, the position that there are significant differences between different races is racism. Likewise, Sailer appears to be a racist and VDARE appears to be a racist web site. I don't know where either Sailer or VDARE has ever expressed actual outright hatred, per se, but "hate group" seems to be one of those non-literal political buzzwords nowadays. I think it would be better if everyone were to speak plainly and literally rather than using ill-fitting political cliches. (See: Orwell, "Politics and the English Language": http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm) I hope all people everywhere know better than to accept anyone's conclusions without serious corroboration or fact-checking. Yes, Sailer's conclusions are racist--but the question is whether they're true or not. And if you're willing to stop short at identifying them as racist without even asking that question, perhaps Sailer isn't the only one with a clear, ideological bias. Ideological biases usually manifest themselves as flawed arguments that some conclusion or other is true. This is the type of bias you accuse Sailer of; I think your accusation is perfectly reasonable. Sometimes, though, ideological biases manifest themselves as social taboos. When that happens, everyone comfortably forgets about the question of truth or falsity and dismisses ideas out of hand simply for broaching the taboo. (See: pg, "What You Can't Say": http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html) I'm not arguing for or against anyone's conclusions here, just suggesting some reasonable ground rules for rational conversation.
- jacques_chester 16y ago
  > By definition, the position that there are significant differences between different races is racism. Actually, the definition is believing that the differences are large enough to render some races superior to others. It's a political belief, not a biological statement.
  - nitrogen 16y ago
    The concept is occasionally, regrettably, extended to include any mention that there may be performance differences between races at all, regardless of whether that comes from genetics, culture, or oppression. "Culturism," it seems, is often mistaken for racism.
yummyfajitas 16y ago
I fact checked some of it. His source for the 2009 reading numbers is this report (which he linked to): http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011004_1.pdf http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011004_1.pdf I checked 5 of the numbers on his first chart against table R1 in the official report. They all agreed. I checked the 2009 numbers in his second chart against table R3. They also agreed. I'm curious - Sailer links to his source. It took me 3 minutes to find the relevant data. Why didn't you do this yourself? Why insinuate bias on his part, rather than simply attempting to determine for yourself if he is lying?
- philwelch 16y ago
  I get the rhetorical point of asking these questions, but we both know the answer to them. Racism isn't a socially acceptable intellectual position, so people who express racist ideas only deserve outright dismissal. Actual corroboration and fact checking are only done when you take an argument in good faith. Likewise, the characterization of scientific racism as "white supremacism" or of VDARE as a "hate group" means belief in statistical differences between different races is the moral equivalent of being a neo-Nazi. Even if your very own arguments better suggest Chinese supremacism than white supremacism.
  - ahi 16y ago
    There's no such thing as "scientific racism" since race is a social construct.
    - philwelch 16y ago
      First, race isn't purely a social construct. Obviously race is determined, at least partially, by ancestry and physical appearance, both of which are things science is fully capable of empirically measuring. The common conception of race is probably too flawed and inconsistent to use for scientific purposes, and most contemporary mainstream scientists who study human genetics don't use the word "race", but it's not a completely arbitrary and unfounded concept. If it was, public health offices wouldn't use it to narrow down which groups of people are at greater risk for genetic conditions like sickle cell disease. Second, even if there is no scientific validity to the concept of race (and there very well may not be), I think everyone knows what the term "scientific racism" means. So I don't see the constructive point in your comment. My point is that there's a distinction between arguing about IQ statistics and burning crosses in people's front yards; I think you're using rhetorical tricks to undermine that point rather than arguing against it directly.
georgieporgie 16y ago
For everyone dismissing you on the basis of an ad hominem attack, here is the first paragraph from Wikipedia. In particular, notice the second sentence: An ad hominem (Latin: "to the man"), also known as argumentum ad hominem, is an attempt to link the validity of a premise to a characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise.[1] The ad hominem is a classic logical fallacy,[2] but it is not always fallacious; in some instances, questions of personal conduct, character, motives, etc., are legitimate and relevant to the issue.
- yummyfajitas 16y ago
  Ad hominem is not fallacious when a person is attempting to argue by authority. The wikipedia article gives this example: Conflict of Interest: Where a source seeks to convince by a claim of authority or by personal observation, identification of conflicts of interest are not ad hominem... Steve Sailer is not arguing from a authority, so in this case the ad hominem is a logical fallacy. It's often useful to read more than the first paragraph of a wikipedia article.
  - georgieporgie 16y ago
    You've pulled one sentence out of a subsection and attempted to use it as a definition of the only way for an ad hominem to not be fallacious. You've quoted from "Conflict of Interest" under the "Circumstantial" fallacy section. Under said section, it is clearly stated, "The circumstantial fallacy only applies where the source taking a position is only making a logical argument from premises that are generally accepted." Regardless, I rescind my earlier comment because michaelchisari's statement was simply not an ad hominem attack. He wrote: With such a clear, ideological bias, I would hope that people here would know better than to accept their conclusions without some serious corroboration or fact-checking. At no point does he argue that what was said is false, only that readers should be skeptical due to evidence of bias and check their facts. > It's often useful to read more than the first paragraph of a wikipedia article. It's never useful to be persnickety.
    - yummyfajitas 16y ago

tokenadult 16y ago

A better analysis is PISA's own analysis, which refers to specific instructional practices in different countries and other differences in country conditions that make a difference in educational outcomes. http://www.oecd.org/document/2/0,3343,en_32252351_32236191_39718850_1_1_1_1,00.html http://www.oecd.org/document/2/0,3343,en_32252351_32236191_3... After edit: It probably is worth pointing out, in this context, that I speak and read Chinese and have lived in various parts of the Chinese-speaking world. I have Chinese-language textbooks of mathematics at home from more than one country, and I am confident that young people of any "race" can learn math well if they are taught with materials like those, because I am a math teacher by occupation and my classes include a very ethnically diverse group of students, who thrive in the classes and far exceed the meager expectations of United States classrooms. Another good response to what is wrong with mathematics teaching in United States classrooms comes from Patricia Clark Kenschaft in the Notices of the American Mathematical Society volume 52, number 2 (February 2005). http://www.ams.org/notices/200502/fea-kenschaft.pdf http://www.ams.org/notices/200502/fea-kenschaft.pdf Eric A. Hanushek, Paul E. Peterson, and Ludger Woessmann point out in their paper "U. S. Math Performance in Global Perspective: How well does each state do at producing high-achieving students?" http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers/PEPG10-19_HanushekPetersonWoessmann.pdf http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers/PEPG10-19_Hanushe... that the real problem in United States mathematics education is leaving behind too many of the high-ability students, of whatever ethnicity, compared to many other countries.

to 16y ago

who needs pisa, just talk to people, watch tv and realize how crazy the gov. fucks around with its citizens but nobody wants to miss glee so they just let it happen. no need for a pisa study to explain how lazy and in avg maybe not dumb but ignorant we are.

pessimizer 16y ago

I feel that these results only transform into "politically incorrect truth" when observed through a racist lens. African-Americans also seem to have an aptitude for terrible cancer outcomes, living in food deserts, low school district funding, and higher mortgage interest rates. The Latin American countries that Hispanic-Americans were compared to, and the Sub-Saharan African countries that African-Americans were imagined to have been compared to each seem to have national aptitudes for harsh Western colonialism followed up by dictators installed and supported by Western powers, with all of their wealth filtered through tiny elites and directed back to the West. I don't have anything against the idea of different concentrations of intelligence distributing amongst different groups of people just like heights or colorations do. The experiment just hasn't been done, and may not be possible. The idea that you could compare the test results of African-Americans and European-Americans and come up with a complete enough set of controls to discover some sort of distribution of intrinsic aptitude is absurd; you have to settle for parental income and educational attainment and ignore the fact that the two groups are facing a radically different environment filled with pervasive beliefs about their potential which are often based on race, and are easily visually distinguishable. For example, you also find correlations between attractiveness or height and intelligence - and similarly, IMO, misguided theorists postulating some sort of Eloi superiority while ignoring any possible effect of the discrimination that unattractive or short people face, even with multiple studies verifying the Pygmalion Effect (the effect that instructor expectations have on student performance) such as: Pygmalion in the Classroom (Rosenthal and Jacobson, 1968) http://www.springerlink.com/content/9u01hn7865v7387r/ http://www.springerlink.com/content/9u01hn7865v7387r/ or Pygmalion goes to boot camp: Expectancy, leadership, and trainee performance (Eden and Shani, 1982) http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6WY3-4NNF8B3-D/2/54efe177e6c1c9abb82edcd7b0f07f90 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6WY3-4NNF8B3-D... Said simply, the cultural environment is simply too messy to jump to conclusions about intrinsic ability distributions about disadvantaged groups, and the temptation has always been irresistible for some to use unsurprising statistics to confirm previously held biases.