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tsimionescu • today at 12:51 PM • 1 reply • view on HN

What plausible mechanism is there to even approach the idea that skin color influences intelligence? Why not study the effects on intelligence of eye color, or blood type?

This is especially clearly just a racist concept once you realize that none of the studies of IQ vs race actually do any genetic testing, they only rely on phenotype. Which is absurd given the fact that the child of a black-skinned person born in sub-Saharan Africa and a white-skinned person born in a village in Ireland is extremely likely to be black-skinned, but is genetically just as much part of both populations. It's only the history of racism that assigns this child as black more so than white.


Replies

adrianN • today at 1:03 PM

We know that people with red hair tend to metabolize anesthesia differently. It is not completely implausible that there is also a correlation between looks and other traits, although it seems almost impossible to me to untangle cultural, environmental and genetic effects.

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