The idea that in behavioral research everything correlates with everything else was a niche area of the scientific literature for more than half a century. With the increasing availability of large...

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/2515245920917961

Crud (Re)Defined

In our target article (Fuerst & Kirkegaard, 2016, this issue), we tested the racial-cognitive ability-socioeconomic (R~CA-S) hypothesis (as proposed by, for example: Lynn, 2008). An R~CA-S model attempts to account for the apparent covariance between biogeographic ancestry (BGA) (or race1), cognitive ability and socioeconomic outcomes. It proposes that most of the association between BGA and socioeconomic outcomes is mediated by cognitive ability and that the association between BGA and cognitive ability is, in turn, dependent on factors (for example: culture, genes and epigenes) which are transmitted along genealogical lines. We examined the relation between estimated racial admixture, cognitive ability and socioeconomic outcomes across the 35 sovereign nations of the Americas as well as first-level administrative divisions (states and departments) of 4 nations (USA, Mexico, Colombia and Brazil). Generally, we found strong ecological correlations (r's .5-.8) between European admixture, cognitive ability and S. Cognitive ability was found to statistically mediate the R~S association. Here we reply to the six commentaries on our paper.1. Ibarra: Discrimination as an explanationIbarra (2016) criticizes our paper on the grounds that it represents a "statistical justification for a thesis suspected of racism" and "a regression in everything [the] social sciences have overcome". As part of her critique, she questions:1. Our use of ancestry as a predictor ("Another objection about the study of Fuerst and Kirkegaard is the variable "European ancestry.")2. Our use of measured cognitive ability as a mediator, both because: a. this variable is not inclusive enough. ("PISA assesses three core competencies [...] but not others difficult to quantify and which, according to experts, are essential to meet the challenges of the 21st century: the psychological, moral, civic and artistic development goals.")b. individual (and therefore group) differences in cognitive ability can not have a genetic basis. (The study "falls into the same error as sociobiology, assuming that the genetic makeup determines the cognitive level [...] one wonders after reading the study of Fuerst and Kirkegaard, what sense does it have pretending to demonstrate statistically that ones belonging to a race, or genetic constitution, is related to cognitive abilities?")3. Our use of geographical-environmental factors as controls. ("But what seems to me most objectionable about the study presented by Fuerst and Kirkegaard is their choice of independent variables [...] their attention focuses on two variables which they consider to have a considerable influence on cognitive skills: the climate, and the struggle of the body against parasites [...] there is nothing within the study to justify their choice of these variables in explaining a complex outcome.")4. Our use of S-factor scores as a dependent rather than independent variable. ("The development of cognitive competencies is closely linked to family and school training [...] The outcome of education is a complex subject affected by many variables".)5. Our lack of historical contextualization, meaning our disinclination to interpret the results from the perspective of what van den Berghe (1987) and Fuerst (2015a) called the "anti-racial worldview". ("But in fact, skin color and purity of race are irrelevant in sociological analysis. What is truly relevant is their permanence at the top of the constitution of power and the mechanisms that have assured them such permanence.")From Ibarra's point of view, we are making a grand petitio principii ("This logic departs from what is before us, and it refers back to an origin where the final outcome is pre-formed and predestined..."). She apparently takes it for granted that, on average, individuals within SIRE groups, SIRE groups within regions, administrative units within countries and countries in the New World which have more European ancestry relative to African and Amerindian will, in her words, "show better cognitive skills and significantly higher income than the rest". …

The Genealogy of Differences in the Americas

The questionable genetic determination of cognition: races and cognitive skillsThe first variable to be analyzed, that the study of Fuerst and Kirkegaard considers, is "racial ancestry". What does this mean? How important is in the behavior of an individual what past generations, in the natural history of the species, have provided as genetic material? How exactly does this material lead to the expression of certain behaviors?The study discussed here falls into the same error as sociobiology, assuming that the genetic makeup determines the cognitive level. The enormous wealth of psychological and educational studies, initiated by Jean Piaget, have shown that the determinants of behavior of any individual do not reside in the genes of the individual but in his learning process. The actions of a subject are the result of his life experiences. The theoretical attempts to re-naturalize the mental capacity have failed. To evaluate accurately the determination of cognitive skills by the genetic material - what the study pretends to demonstrate - it is first necessary to recall the roles of genes and learning in the natural evolutionary history of the species. Thus, it should be clear what genes can and cannot do. Let's take a look at this in more detail.Theoretical excursusThere is no doubt that the key to understanding the cultural forms of life, including cognition, morals, love, is to be found primarily in the natural history of the species. The developmental processes that characterize any biological species are linked to its natural evolutionary history. Therefore, science tries to reconstruct the development of these forms in the long process of transition from animal to man. What were the conditions that made it possible for the biological species to develop the capacity to know? How could the formation of the human being as such get going?The key process to understanding the evolutionary development of the species is ontogenesis. Over millions of years the development of our species was characterized by two parallel processes: the dissolution of forms of instinctive behavior that are inflexible and genetically determined; and an enormous capacity for learning in the early stages of ontogenesis. In the relationship with his caretaker, the member of the species in his early stages of development was able to garner experiences that allowed him to gain proficiency of his actions and organize reality in a comprehensible world. This gradually led to a radical modification of the genetic equipment where instinctive structures lost their strength as the determinants of action. In the phases of transition from animal to man, the extension of the primary relationship in ontogenetic development played a central role. It seems that the lengthening of the close relationship between mother and child in the first years of life, and the wealth of learning that takes place at that time, made the instinctive mechanisms inoperative in a process that lasted thousands of years. In determining human actions, the genetic basis plays a very limited role; it is only present in fields closely related to survival, such as food, sexuality and defense.1 The result of this evolutionary process is the extreme inability of the member of the anthropological species to survive on his own at the time of his birth.The evolution of Homo sapiens sapiens would have been impossible, while instincts were dissolving, if functional mechanisms had not been developed for the construction of forms of behavior linked to learning. Fundamental for this was the brain's development. Although we do not know much about how the evolutionary development of the brain and the formation of differentiated neural areasmade the process of acculturation of man possible, and with it the formation of normative and cognitive structures, there is no doubt that without the constructive ability of the brain none of these structures would have formed. …

Laura Ibarra

Papers

Statistics vs Scientific Explanation