quews

If IQ was just an arbitrary measure, that is, if the purpose of the test was to determine how well one takes the test, than this whole thread would be of no consequence. It is because IQ is purported to be a measure of intelligence however, that this conversation makes any sense at all.

So, to suggest that lexlibra was not saying in summation "Blacks are more stupid than whites", and somehow conflated IQ and intelligence ON ACCIDENT, is absurd. Lexlibra used the word intelligence because thats what lexlibra meant. And this can be further confirmed in his/her subsequent comments.

I did not equate publicly or otherwise "failure to denounce x with believing x". Indeed (and listen well here), failure to denounce x, if one knows x to be false, is WORSE than believing x.

This is the mechanism by which ignorance persists. The above is the opposite of education and what makes it even worse is when the silent party has the demagogue-ic status to immediately educate the many with a simple statement.

I don't know what you believe - as I said before I won't speculate. All I know is that if you knew lexlibra's comment to be nonsense, your silence (and calling it lame (and my comment 10x lamer) - sigh - just an embarrassingly juvenile response of the type I thought you sought to avoid here) says something you perhaps didn't want it to say; if you didn't know - I really should be spending my time elsewhere.

1. No accusation was flung - I just wrote a tidy summation of what happened.

2. This is not a "sock puppet" account. As I said long time (silent)reader. Never have I felt the need to respond to a comment until I read that utter ignorance and saw that it went unchecked.

3. The only thing I am angry with is that this comment is being given credence on a site that deems itself the treading ground of intellectuals. It's quite simple really, his comment amounts to the proposition "Black people are more stupid than whites"; if this is a proposition that's falseness is even a question here, perhaps I would do best to find another place to spend my time.

As a long time (silent) reader of Hacker News posts and comments, this comment easily ranks as one of the most offensive, and perhaps the most disturbing.

The notion that race fundamentally has anything to do with intelligence should offend any sane, rational, science-minded person who is even just scarcely familiar with the history of the pseudo-science of eugenics and the countless studies debunking it many claims.

However, more offensive than that, I find the fact that this comment is still here and in fact, up-modded, as offensive to the very core…

What the comment says implicitly is that “Blacks are dumber than Whites - DUH.” If he had simply typed this, perhaps the comment would have been removed or at the very least down-modded to oblivion so that my reading it would have been my own damned fault.

But what is astonishing (and inexplicable, considering the great number of comments I have read on this forum, lauding and praising the seemingly high intellect of the people who frequent this forum) is that because the poster had the guile to conceal his ignorant comment with more words, not only was this comment given credibility, but many had the sheer audacity to up-mod this nonsense. This is sobering…

But what really woke me up, was realizing that the utterly ignorant comment was in response to PG – who is by all accounts the de-facto host/role-model here. I figured I would scroll down a short distance and see the straight-forward, no nonsense rebuttal I have seen him give to comments much less deserving of a dressing down – no such luck.

I shuddered. To think that this is the same man who writes all those essays wherein the common thread is a brutal application of logic – why the silence here, when given what amounts to a perfect lead-in?

Why not quickly question if it is even possible to test for intelligence? Why not describe what such a test might look like if it is indeed possible? Why not suggest that a time delineated test full of arithmetic might be the worst candidate for such a test (as it implies that computers would then be said to have such intelligence in spades)? Why not question the deep-sinking stereotypical association with speed-in-calculation ability with intellect? Why not?

Let me not speculate as to why not. Let me just say to all who know better, but said and will continue to say nothing – SHAME.