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During the 17th century, Western philosophers began arguing over the relative role of "nature" or "nurture" in shaping human capacities and tendencies. By the 19th century, most of the Western world had come to the view that this was a question that would best be resolved by science, though the common science of the 19th century was still in its infancy, and hence could operate under extreme fallacies by today's standards. It is in the context of this scientific and cultural development that the concepts originally defined by the question of "nature versus nurture" have changed to reflect the rejection of the prejudicial and idiomatic use of the terms race and intelligence, for use in science. As science would continually re-evaluate its use of the terms, (and hence, redefine the operational concepts by which it formulated its inquiries), so too would the common culture gain insight from the debate within the scientific world.
1 Background
Researchers have recognized and studied many aspects that are associated with race and intelligence. The development of scientific classification taxonomy has largely moved away from use of the term "race" as a scientific definition. Many scientists have rejected use of the word "race" as it appears in common parlance. They do so on the grounds that the actual genetic makeup of human beings does not support a single privileged way to separate humans into discrete subsets (such as subspecies). In other words, some systems of racial categorization would group two specific individuals into the same race, while other systems would place the same two individuals into different races, and there is no biological or genetic reason to prefer one system over the other. They argue that the choice of categorization systems is determined largely by non-biological factors and is therefore an artifact, i.e., a "social construct". A complete analysis is lacking because the words are applied to many different-but-related concepts.
Race as it is commonly used refers to a classification of human beings based on a groups physical characteristics. Genetically speaking this means grouping individuals based the percentage of a particular set of traits which is common to a certain group. While all members of a certain race will not possess all traits common to their racial grouping they will possess most traits common to their group. These traits however are not exclusive to a particular race but do occur in higher percentages in a that racial grouping.
Today scientists agree that no single characteristic, trait or gene (i.e., haplotype) distinguishes all the members of one race from all the members of another race. Because of our recent evolution, humans are relatively very similar at the level of genotype. That view is also supported by the fact that most of the total genetic variation can be found within, not between, the putative races. However, most scientists agree that genetically distinguishable populations have developed during the last 50,000 years, with episodes of genetic mixture between groups throughout. Population geneticists have studied patterns in the distribution of various genes and the functional importance of human genetic variation. This divergence has long been recognized to have affected the distribution of alleles for traits such as skin pigmentation and the epicanthic fold of Asians . However, the genetic divergence has affected traits that are more than skin deep. In biomedical research, it has been recognized that self-reported race is a significant predictor of disease susceptibility and prognosis. Diseases like sickle-cell anemia and Cystic fibrosis that disproportionately afflict members of one race demonstrate the utility of race in enabling physicians to better decide which disease factors to rule out first when diagnosing a patient. It is possible, but not proven, that functionally significant differences in the distribution of cognitive traits have emerged between races. For the purpose of economy of expression, this article will use the word "race" as a substitute for the scientifically more precise term "population" and not as an equivalent to "subspecies".
Humans are distinguished from other animals by their great capacity for symbolic thought, abstract thinking, problem solving, and ability to learn new concepts. Most scientists and many psychologists collectively refer to these abilities as intelligence, and more specifically as g. They attempt to measure intelligence with IQIQ an abbreviation for intelligence quotient , is a score derived from a set of standardized tests that were developed with the purpose of measuring a person's cognitive abilities (" intelligence") in relation to one's age group. It is expressed as a numb tests. This article discusses the relationship between race (or human populations) and the distribution of intelligence.
