andrel <a_l### [at] hotmailcom> wrote:
> >   Education can have some effect on IQ tests (because education can eg.
> > train a person to think geometrically), but AFAIK in the US and especially
> > Europe all people have had the exact same education for quite many decades.

> No they haven't. May I remind you of the private school debate here some 
> time ago. Remember who started that thread?

  Are you saying that in the US all firemen studied in private schools and
that's why they got the job?

  Besides, at least here what is taught at schools is dictated by law.
You *can't* have a school which skips teaching something, be it private
or not. I don't know how it is in the US.

> >   If some group of people doesn't *want* to get educated, that's a different
> > problem. It's *their* problem, not the problem in IQ or aptitude tests.

> I can't see where this one comes from.

  It has been suggested that black people score more poorly in the fireman
aptitude test because of a poorer education. And why would black people
have a poorer education in the US? Is it because black people are not
taught the same things as white people?

> Are you aware that this could be interpreted as a racist remark?

  Of course anything that is not 100% politically correct can be
interpreted as "a racist remark". So?

> I am sure you don't mean to, but 
> suddenly starting to talk about "people that don't *want* to get 
> educated" in a discussion on how race influences test results is not a 
> smart move IMHO.

  Really? And what would be the alternative explanation for the claimed
poorer education? I can think of three possible explanations:

1) Black people in the US are not taught at school to the same extent as
   white people. I have hard time believing this to be the case, especially
   since, AFAIK, most black people go to the exact same schools as white
   people do.

2) For whatever reason (maybe culture?) the average black person is not
   interested in educating himself.

3) Black people are unable to learn as efficiently as white people.

  #1 doesn't work, unless you can show me some actual proof that black people
are indeed being discriminated at schools in the US and not being educated.

  #3 would be the racist point of view, by definition (ie. there's something
about being black that makes the person dumb).

  The only non-racist rational alternative is #2.

  Making generalizations about a *culture* is not racism. Racism is an
ideology based on the notion that some races of people are genetically
superior to others.

> I know you find that hard. You have said similar things many times. Yet, 

> Tatsachen" you might get what I meant

  Actually I have no idea what that means. Is it German? (Not that this
invalidates your point.)

> > especially if both have gone to the same schools.

> well, they didn't (on average), that is precisely the point.

  You mean that blacks are not taught the same things in the US as whites?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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