I rewrote the essay "On Spearman's g and Karma" from October 17.  ¶ 10:26 PM

  On Culture and Biology

Once more into the fray with Stephen Jay Gould, as I close in on finishing The Mismeasure of Man. Although I'm inclined to agree with most of his stances on the primacy of culture and environment in developing intellect (versus a hereditarian viewpoint), there are some aspects of his genetic arguments that seem weak to me. His closing chapter begins with an assessment of what he calls "cultural evolution," as opposed to "biological evolution" (ie. Darwinian natural selection). His claim is that the 50,000 years of Homo sapiens existence is not a sufficient timeframe for biological evolution to impose drastic differences between races. Thus, only differences in cultural evolution (ie. nurture) could account for major differences. Genetic varation and natural selection, goes the argument, necessitate closer to a million or more years for tangible divergence -- in this case in intelligence between blacks and whites.

As much as I agree with Gould's basic sentiment, the details of this argument are weak. And so, though I stand the noisome possibility of defending what essentially amounts to racism, I feel compelled to play the devil's advocate. Perhaps there are stronger buttresses of evidence that are not yet presented in the book, and that this essay might help me search for.

Suppose then, that at some time in history whites and blacks became separated geographically, which is what historians believe to some extent. Take, then, the black tribes living in Africa: for simplicity, let's say that at this time there are only two. What if, upon some random chance, a subtle genetic variation occured in one tribe, rendering them slightly less intelligent than the other tribe. Assuming this genetic trait is heritable, let us further impose on it that its practical consequences are tangible, though very small. Let us now take Gould's favorite theory of decimation as a prelude to punctuated equilibrium and apply it here.

In Wonderful Life, Gould asserts that in the Cambrian age, the diversity of animal traits could not be assessed objectively so as to predict which traits would allow which animals to survive. He calls upon a sort of natural "lottery" that chooses at random that some entire phyla could be wiped out due to geological events -- decimation -- that are almost wholly independent of the poor animals' traits. So what shall we say of the African tribes? Perhaps the more genetically intelligent tribe got caught in a sandstorm and was killed off, eventually entirely. That would leave the genetically impaired tribe as the sole heirs to the African namesake, and could then account for their descendents' differences in intellect than their white counterparts.

Of course, I don't believe this is the case; yet this hypothetical situation seems not to violate any of Gould's arguments concerning the biological evolution of man. Of course, I'm making the assumption here that intellectual impairment can be hereditary. The thrust of the book is, in fact, that intelligence is not a "thing" nor an "entity," and as such cannot be called something that is heritable in any Mendelian fashion. To this, I agree. However, though intelligence itself be not heritable, what of intellectual impairment? Is mental retardation (such as Down's syndrome) a wholly different class or meaning of intelligence? If so, where do we draw the line between plain intellectual dullness and true, heritable retardation?

An objection that could be raised is that heritability does not and cannot doom an entire race. If mental retardation is Mendelian, then it can skip generations or be bred out of the family. However, can a genetic trait still somehow persist, like an unrepairable chink in a suit of armor? Are the forces of genetic recombination and random mutations enough to ensure egalitarian genetics across races? Or is the genetic pool really more like liquid, deformable and reformable, such that the genetic classification of entire groups of people based on skin color is meaningless? Most likely it is somewhere in between. I hope that reading the "opposition" -- Hernnstein and Murrays' The Bell Curve or Jensen's The g Factor -- will provide some much needed perspective on the situation.  ¶ 11:46 PM

  I just borrowed a copy of Richard Dawkins' The Blind Watchmaker, a defense of evolution as an explanation for the dynamics of our world's life. Even just a few pages in, the writing style is crisp and absorbing. Although it may be premature to recommend this book, the general view of it is as one of the greatest bulwarks against creationism and other fundamentalist doctrines. It was originally written in 1985, and revised in 1996.  ¶ 11:53 PM

  More On Eloquence

I have a specific book in mind with regard to the use in pseudoscience of rhetoric rather than fact. It is a book on the spiritual nature of biology, encompassing such spiritualistic staples as chakras, auras, and the strange concept that cells somehow retain the history of past life experiences from their parent cells. Repeatedly, the book makes strong and simple statements as though they are truth, without giving any evidence. They boldly preface their ridiculous arguments with phrases like: "it has long been known that...," "it is well established that...," and so on. There are, of course, no references to be found nor any allusions to actual experiments or underlying biological principles.

It's so frustrating that a good writer can simply make things up and still argue them persuasively to an uncritical reader. While scientists have to labor to establish credible evidence, a new age author has only to dream consistent lies and use their eloquence to forge ahead without the restrictions of modern scientific processes.

When I get around to visiting Barnes and Noble's I'll really try to get my hands on that book (unfortunately, I forget its name, but I remember what the cover looks like).  ¶ 11:37 PM

  On Spearman's g and Karma

[For all practical purposes, Spearman's g is the same as IQ. Although they are different from a mathematical and philosophical perspective, both are taken to mean a ranking of human intelligence based on a single number. Biological determinists argue that g and IQ represent real, biological entities that, through genetics, rigidly determine and thus limit our intellectual capacities.]

Well, there is almost certainly something like g. A sort of mastermind beneath the subtleties of human intelligence, orchestrating particular acts of genius, stupidity, and everything in between. There must be some biological basis for when we decide that one person is smarter than another, that Francis Crick deserves the Nobel Prize, but not John Smith of Simpletown, USA.

But g is at best a useful abstraction, much in the same mold that imaginary values can simplify our understanding of complex behaviors. Take for example the concept of karma, where everyone gets what's coming to them: the evil will be punished and the good rewarded. Few people take karma seriously, but many people will readily acknowledge that something like karma exists.

Somewhere, they belive, poetic justice has a way of ordering human affairs to fit with our moral standards. O.J. Simpson may have gotten away with murder, but somewhere, someday, he'll get his due. Christians, Jews, Muslims, and various other religions have the advantage of regarding some form of hell as the ultimate punishment, the final and most fitting fulfillment of karmic laws. Others have a different sense, be it mystical, supernatural, or otherwise. Even I agree that there is something like karma.

But I believe that the illusion of karma arises as a consequence of human nature and culture, and no more. Americans in particular feel that karma, if it was real, would generally be a beneficial thing. Thus we find in our society the moral facets that make karma superficially real: in our justice systems, in our sense of vigilante justice, and in the way we teach our children -- both religiously and secularly -- to adhere to the Golden Rule. It is the complex and irreducible interactions of humans that, in their flurry and confusion, create karma in something like an eye-test pattern: you see something -- a unicorn perhaps -- that isn't really there amidst the richness of colors.

In much the same way, Spearman's g takes root as a useful quintessence of human intelligence not out of its reality, but out of its illusory palpability that arises from the infinitely more complex genetic underpinnings of thought. Unfortunately, not enough people understand genetics in a more general biological context.

First, what exactly do genes do? They encode proteins. So what do proteins do? Now that's the million dollar question. My line of work is in what's called signal transduction. That refers to the intricate pathways by which proteins interact: with each other, with DNA, with organelles, and with other cells. There are an immeasurable number of different biologically useful (both harmful and beneficial) combinations. Multiply that by the myriad mutations that can produce slightly different proteins with slightly different properties, and the scale of protein interactions becomes truly unimaginable to human minds. Researchers have to focus on relatively small and narrow pathways -- for instance, one called apoptosis that causes cells to commit suicide -- and even then, the pathways are multifarious and remain only partially discovered.

(It is true that genes also do other things, but these are more complex issues than this essay calls for. Further confounding the genetic framework are the presence of pseudogenes, long and short repeats, and other stretches of odd DNA. But these complications only add to the irreducability of genetics.)

So, back to g. I hope I have given some sense of the massive undertaking that is modern genetics. Even if we narrow our search for g to the biology of the human brain -- its neurons, glials cells, astrocytes, and more -- we cannot ever hope to map out the entire pathways of protein interactions. A very "simple" diagram of cell growth control still completely fills two large posters despite a tiny font, purposeful omissions, asterisks denoting special cases, the overgeneralization of protein groups, and more. For something as expansive and innovative as human intelligence, the set of protein interactions would fill many shelves of books, not just two posters -- and even then, would provide only a mechanical diagram too detailed to give a meaningful general view of intelligence.

The hope of pinning g on some specific genetic variations, then, is almost entirely lost in the sea of protein complexity. But something like g exists. Somehow, out of the insane mosiac of proteins, there arises that eye-test pattern in the form of g whereby we can say that, yes, Francis Crick is smarter than John Smith. But that pattern remains an illusion born of the human need for pattern recognition; whether that pattern be karma or g, it is no more real than the unicorn.  ¶ 10:08 AM

  I've realized the hypocrisy of my last post: I provide no evidence for what I say. When I next get a chance to head to Barnes and Noble's, I'll try to pick up a copy of one of the books that inspired me to write about eloquence and quote a few examples.  ¶ 2:20 PM

  On Eloquence

I have often attributed, I think, too much value to eloquence. Somewhere along in my education, I mistakenly equated the ability to write and communicate fluently with the ability to think rationally. While they are not entirely separate, the one does not necessarily imply the other. One has only to look at New Age texts to find evidence of this.

For the power of words to impress at a superficial level mixed with the flow of a natural and charismatic orator can overwhelm a careless reader. Thus, it is often of great advantage for a writer to excel at persuasion with rhetoric rather than with ideas. It is little wonder then, that much of pseudoscience infiltrates the public so well; when fluidity of speech can seal a distracted mind, the lack of evidence that is pseudoscience's greatest weakness can become its greatest strength. For demands are made upon the reader that appeal to the warmth of emotions, not the coldness of facts. As impressed as I may be with a New Age author's writing skills, their subtle and often subconscious attempts to sway only with finely calculated wording belies their lack of logical, rational rigor.

Intelligence is not necessarily a prerequisite to eloquence, nor is eloquence necessarliy an indicator of intelligence.  ¶ 10:48 PM

  On the Psychology of Numbers:

Relative and absolute differences between numbers can often leave people confused about a ranking system. For example, few would argue that an 8.0 on a scale of 10.0 is different from an 80 on a scale of 100: they both measure 4/5ths of the maximum score. This is the relative difference between the scales, and should not affect the perceived worth of the object being judged. The absolute difference, however, is in one case 2 points from the maximum, while it is 20 points away in the second case. This superficially large difference may distort the image of the scale and cause strange paradoxes in rankings.

What prompted me to write about this comes from leisurely reading the top music magazines Spin and Rolling Stone. Spin scores albums on a scale of 1 to 10, while Rolling Stone uses 1 to 5 stars. After having read hundreds of reviews over the past years from these magazines, it's very clear that a 6 in Spin is much lower than three stars in Rolling Stone, despite both being 3/5ths of the maximum score. It's very likely that the same psychology of numbers plays a part in this curious difference: while 6 is a full 4 points off, three stars is only 4 half-stars away from the perfect album. Below the halfway mark, the psychology reverses: while I've often seen scores as low as 2 or 3 in Spin, I have very rarely seen any Rolling Stone review drop to 1 or 1.5 stars. Because in Spin, at least the album got 2 or 3 full points above abysmal, but in Rolling Stone all it got were 2 or 3 half-stars.

Although the inherent mathematical qualities of the different ranking systems demands that only relative, not absolute, differences be taken into account, the normal psychology of people is used to dealing with numbers as daily and convenient methods of making decisions. Thus, in the "vernacular" use of numbers, large differences seem more pronounced, even when they tell the same story as smaller numbers. I was taken in by this phenomenon when I read the magazines, for I felt for a long time that a Rolling Stone 3 was more generous than a Spin 6, when, in reality, they should mean the same thing.  ¶ 10:37 PM

  A More General Essay on IQ Tests:

The peculiar mathematical structure of an IQ score lends it the myth that one's IQ does not change through age. In short, the score is meant to show the ability to reason beyond one's chronological age. Thus, a 10-year old child with a score of 100 can reason at the average level of all 10-year olds. A score of 150 indicates he can think like a 15-year old, while a score of 50 means he reasons at a 5-year old's level. Throughout life, this relative score would reflect the speed at which a person learns.

An inevitable extension of this myth is that no amount of education can significantly augment a person's fundamental intelligence. Since tests are designed to quantify innate mental worth, they consciously avoid asking questions based on more orthodox studies such as reading comprehension, mathematics, or physical science. It is meant to test logic, not the capacity for learning. It is thus supposedly impossible to study for an IQ test.

I would testify then, that the tests measure no such thing as invariable logic skills. It is quite obvious to me as someone who has done a near lifetime of logic puzzles for leisure that it is entirely possible to perform better on an IQ test by studying. I would wager that if my father had not bought me my first book of puzzles a decade and a half ago, I would score at least ten points lower than I do now.

IQ tests themselves are not improper things. Like SATs and GREs and other standard tests, they can be useful in pointing out areas in need of improvement. For example, I could use work in spatial reasoning. However, when false claims are made as to the nature of the test, then they may fool people unwary of the fickle and unstable nature of such tests.  ¶ 9:22 PM