RUSHTON ON RACE RANKING
\doc\web\99\07\rushrank.txt
(Posted without comment, I don't neccesarily share these views)


Date sent:      	Mon, 10 May 1999 14:46:44 -0400
From:           	"J. P. Rushton" <rushton@julian.uwo.ca>
To:             	h-bd@egroups.com
Subject:        	[h-bd] Re: Rating ethnic intelligence






J. P. Rushton wrote:


> Phil Rushton replying to Gregory M. Cochran's interesting question about the
> consistency of perceptions and/or behavior over time and place. Cochrane
> wrote:   "I'm not sure any single member of this group could give a complete
> answer to this question (I sure can't) , but here goes: are folk notions of
> the  relative sharpness of different ethnic groups consistent? "In Race,
> Evolution, and Behavior (1995, Transaction) (http://www.bookworld.com/rushton)
> I discuss numerous examples of consistency. For example the Arabs and Turks had
> huge empires with slaves and were somewhat concerned to match abilities with
> occupations and had slave books accordingly. (see B. Lewis, 1990, Race and
> Slavery in the Middle East. Oxford University Press. In general Chinese were
> seen as usefully employed as skilled artisans and Africans as laborers. Italian
> venturers saw the Chinese as highly intelligent whereas Africans were seen as
> lacking therein.  Also, at the University of Western Ontario, east Asian
> students rank order Asians, Whites, and Blacks as do Whites, with Asians being
> seen as having quieter temperaments and Blacks more outgoing ones (etc.)
>
> Here is some of what I have written in an essay based on my book that helps
> summarize some consistency.
>
> > The first explorers in East Africa certainly wrote that they were shocked by
> > the nudity, paganism, cannibalism, and poverty of the natives. Some claimed
> > Blacks had the nature "of wild animals... most of them go naked.. the child
> > does not know his father, and they eat people." Another claimed they had a
> > natural sense of rhythm so that if a Black "were to fall from heaven to earth
> > he would beat time as he goes down." A few even wrote books and made
> > paintings of Africans with over-sized sex organs.
>
> >  Sound familiar?  All just a reflection of racism?  Maybe so, but these
> > examples are not from 19th Century European colonialists or KKK hate
> > literature. They come from the Muslim Arabs who first entered Black Africa
> > over 1,200 years ago (in the 700s). Several hundred years later, European
> > explorers had the same impressions as had the Arabs before them. They wrote
> > that Africans seemed to have a very low intelligence with few words to
> > express complex thoughts. They praised some tribes for making fine pottery,
> > forging iron, carving wooden art, and making musical instruments. But more
> > often, they were shocked by the near nakedness of the people, their poor
> > sanitary habits, simple houses, and small villages. They found no wheels for
> > making pots, grinding corn, or for transport, no farm animals, no writing, no
> > money, and no numbering systems.
>
> > The Whites who explored China were just as racist as those who explored
> > Africa, but their descriptions were different from what they and the Arabs
> > had written about Africans. Historical research bears out the impressions of
> > the explorers. As early as 360 B.C., the Chinese used the cross bow and
> > changed the face of warfare. Around 200-100 B.C., the Chinese used written
> > exams to choose people for the civil service, two thousand years before
> > Britain.  The Chinese used printing about 800 A.D., some 600 years before
> > Europe saw Gutenberg's first Bible.  Paper money was used in China in 1300,
> > but not in Europe until the 19th and 20th centuries.  By 1050 Chinese
> > chemists made gunpowder, hand grenades, fire arrows, and rockets of oil and
> > poison gas.  By 1100, factories in China with 40,000 workers were making
> > rockets.  Flame throwers, guns, and cannons were used in China by the 13th
> > century, about 100 years before Europe.
>
> > The Chinese used the magnetic compass as early as the 1st century.  It is not
> > found in European records until 1190. In 1422, seventy years before
> > Columbus's three small ships crossed the Atlantic, the Chinese reached the
> > east coast of Africa.  They came in a great fleet of 6,500 ocean cruising
> > ships filled with 27,000 soldiers and their horses, and a year's supply of
> > grain, meat, and wine.  With their gunpowder weapons, navigation, accurate
> > maps and magnetic compasses, the Chinese could easily have gone around the
> > tip of Africa and "discovered" Europe!
>
> > In the last five centuries, the European nations leapfrogged over the Chinese
> > in science and technology.  Since 1950, however, Japan has beaten the West in
> > the production of many high-tech products.  Other Asian countries including
> > China now follow Japan's path.
> > Africa, on the other hand, has fallen further behind.  The poor conditions of
> > African countries and Black America have become a concern to many.  Much of
> > the optimism of the U.S. Civil Rights movement of the 1960s is gone, along
> > with the high hopes for independent Africa.  Trillions of dollars of foreign
> > aid have poured into Africa. Yet African economies have declined since the
> > Europeans left.
>
> > Neglect and decay are seen everywhere in Africa and much of the West Indies.
> > International corporations often have to provide their own power, their own
> > water, and their own phones.  In the age of computers, fax machines, and the
> > world wide web, getting a dial tone in many African cities is difficult.