Racial Group Differences are primarily genetic in origin

Evidence, argument, and implications, with brief commentary on the power of love

Racial group differences seem to be primarily genetic in origin.

I begin by acknowledging that there is such a thing as culture and environment.  This essay is not to deny the reality of these things. Instead, I argue that the observed group differences primarily result from genetics. This essay focuses on black/white group differences, which are quite large, and seemingly the easiest to argue for being genetic in origin. 

To begin, I will illustrate what I mean by group differences with some examples.

Measurable group differences include:

• muscle fiber composition

• obesity

• height

• IQ

Less easily measured group differences include:

• musicality

• spirituality

• gregariousness

I think these less easily measured attributes are often ignored by those that study racial group differences because there is less high quality evidence for them. But, I find that to be anti-scientific. They need to be considered because they are real even if not so easily measured. The disproportionate prominence of blacks in popular culture to me, proves that blacks are indeed more advanced and excellent along these axes.19th century white americans held these stereotype beliefs for good reason! And it got erased from our understanding during the 20th century, which was a century of totalitarianism and genocide. I submit to you that they genocided our ancestral knowledge as well, and that all of the well-known 19th century stereotypes of African Americans are basically correct. But I will also bring evidence for my position. 

I first want to highlight what I perceive to be a clear case of motivated reasoning among those that deny genetic group differences. It seems that “culture and environment” proponents believe in genetic group differences in the case of physical characteristics like muscle fiber composition. They acknowledge our bodies are different as a result of genetics, both because this is quite obviously true, and because they do not place a high human value on being strong or fast. Yet when it comes to mental differences, where they do place a high value, they want to insist that these differences have no genetic component or only a small one. This is quite a strange prior to have, because human brains, like the rest of the human organism, have evolved in response to selection pressures, which are different in different areas of the world. And we also have evidence that they did evolve to different phenotypes. There are measurable physical differences between European and African brains. European brains are a bit larger. Gould attempted to debunk these scientific measurements in his book The Mismeasure of Man, however he did not actually measure the skulls himself, and he only revealed himself to be a fraud in doing so when the initial measurements were ultimately confirmed as accurate. I submit to you that group difference deniers are generally motivated reasoners like Gould. 

To the motivated reasoners afraid of the implications of group differences: I provide my rebuttal to this fear. The answer to blacks having lower IQs and being more violent due to their genetics is to love them anyway – after all love is something we do in spite of barriers to love. Love that comes from pure self-interest was never love. Love is effort, and we should love because it makes us better, stronger, happier people. We have all kinds of reasons to love blacks. This includes some of the aforementioned less-measurable traits where blacks excel, and it includes religious arguments such as Jesus loving blacks as much as he loves whites. I encourage you guys to think of some more arguments along these lines, because they seem to be pretty important.

Now, my position is that these group differences are primarily genetic in nature, and my point of view applies to all group differences I’ve highlighted above. My position is that culture and environment, which by the way are partly themselves downstream of genetics, can factor in, but do not explain a majority of the group differences. 

One of the first things to highlight is that all of the measurable group differences are understood to have a strong genetic component. In other words, there are polygenic scores which are predictive of obesity, IQ, body composition, muscle fiber composition, etc. We understand the mechanism by which these group differences can be explained by genetics. However, the reverse is not as true, in that the cultural and environmental explanations seem to be much weaker. 

One “culture and environment” argument I found to be convincing for a long time comes from Thomas Sowell. Sowell argues that American blacks have inherited something called “redneck culture” from their poor white overseers and rich white masters on the plantations. This redneck culture is said to have originated in the Scottish highlands, where violence and honor meant survival. And that blacks are infected with this violent culture to this day. This seems to be wrong or at least woefully incomplete, because comparing the rates of violent crime of “white rednecks” with “black rednecks”, we find the crime rate is much higher for “black rednecks”. Sowell’s argument here is wishy washy and doesn’t come with much evidence.

Another data point that is tough to swallow for the “culture and environment” enthusiasts is that adjusting for socioeconomic status, blacks remain meaningfully lower IQ, and more violent. Why would this be the case? Surely wealthy black families can send their kids to school surrounded by white people, live in white neighborhoods, have their kids raised by white nannies, and imbibe white culture to erase this gap. And sure, there could be some impossible-to-pinpoint confounder from having parents who are black, or from “systemic racism”. I submit to you that “systemic racism” is a “woo” concept that lacks evidence. Some questions to ask proponents of “systemic racism” theories: Where is the evidence? What is the mechanism by which it works? How do we know it to be true? They cannot answer these questions, and their failure to do so makes their insistence on this idea being correct, profoundly stupid and anti-scientific. I encourage them to look into the idea of epistemic humility, it would improve their thinking. 

Lastly, let’s look at rates of violent black crime vs. violent white crime. Blacks commit violent crime at 7x the rate of whites. This is larger than the difference in violent crime rates between men and women, which we all understand as basically a biological phenomenon. Such large disparities seem to be much better explained by reference to biological phenomena, where we know that the cause can produce the effect, than by reference to culture and environment, where there is no evidence that the cause can create such a large effect.

Blacks have lived in the United States for hundreds of years, and they have always been a bit more violent and stupid, and also more gregarious, athletic, musical and spiritual. It’s not changing, either, which is also what we should expect to see if the difference comes from immutable factors like genetics, vs. malleable factors like culture and environment.

Time remains the biggest piece of data. Every day that blacks commit more crime and have lower IQ than whites is another day that makes the culture and environment explanations even more implausible than they already are, and the genetic arguments more likely to be correct. However, with eugenic policy of the sort that historically uplifted the European people, we can also uplift African Americans over time.

In summary, the strongest data points for group differences being genetic in nature:

• Measurable physical differences – European brains are larger than African ones

• Group differences remain after controlling for factors like socioeconomic status, and only “woo” explanations remain

• The seemingly universal ‘Gouldian’ intellectual dishonesty and apparent motivated reasoning of those trying to dispute these group differences being genetic

cheerio