J. Philippe Rushton is a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow and a professor of psychology at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario N6A 5C2 Canada. He holds two doctorates from the University of London (PhD and DSc) and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and of the American, British, and Canadian Psychological Associations. His latest book Race, Evolution, and Behavior (1995, Transaction Publishers, telephone 908-445-2280) details the theories and data summarized in this article.
I am issuing this statement to a wide range of media and interested parties
in response to the recent Knight-Ridder article out of Washington which
argues that race has no validity as a biological concept when applied to
man (see Genetic Basis For Race Just Skin Deep: October 13, 1996).
I refuted this widely disseminated statement locally (including an appearance
on the John Oakley TV talk-show, October 24, 1996 and in a letter to The
Toronto Star, October 28, 1996). However, the never-ending disinformation
campaign attempting to deconstruct race as a biological concept, needs to
be countered by a careful examination of what we do know about human variation.
I urge academicians, journalists, and editorialists to review the evidence
presented here before offering any further comment on this controversial
topic.
If nothing else, those in academia and the media need to be aware that major
efforts are being made throughout Europe to stifle free discussion of race
by tightening so-called "hate-laws" and in North America by restricting
the way research can be conducted (and funded) and that implementation of
these policies threatens the general principles of free speech, open inquiry,
and academic freedom and tenure.
-J. Philippe Rushton, (November 4, 1996)
Discussion of "race" shows little sign of diminishing, despite
efforts to deconstruct the concept. Deconstructing the concept of race not
only conflicts with people's tendency to classify and build family histories
according to common descent but also ignores the work of biologists studying
non-human species. Ever since 1758, when the Swedish naturalist Carolus
Linnaeus created the classification system still used in biology today,
most zoologists have recognized at least the four human subdivisions Linnaeus
delineated: Asians, American Indians, Europeans, and Africans. (Technically,
some would group the first two Linnaean subdivisions together, thus yielding
three major races, often termed, mongoloids, caucasoids, and negroids.)
Such high-level classifications do not rule out making finer, hierarchical
subdivisions within these major groups.
A race is what zoologists term a variety or subdivision of a species. Each
race (or variety) is characterized by a more or less distinct combination
of inherited morphological, behavioral, physiological traits. In flowers,
insects, and non-human mammals, zoologists consistently and routinely study
the process of racial differentiation. Formation of a new race takes place
when, over several generations, individuals in one group reproduce more
frequently among themselves than
they do with individuals in other groups. This process is most apparent
when the individuals live in diverse geographic areas and therefore evolve
unique, recognizable adaptations (such as skin color) that are advantageous
in their specific environments. But differentiation also occurs under less
extreme circumstances. Zoologists and evolutionists refer to such differentiated
populations as races. (Within the formal taxonomic nomenclature of biology,
races are termed subspecies). Zoologists have identified two or more races
(subspecies) in most mammalian species.
Unless one is a religious fundamentalist and believes that man was created
in the image and likeness of God, it is foolish to believe that human beings
are exempt from biological classification and the laws of evolution that
apply to all other life forms. Of course, individuals vary greatly within
each racial group and should be treated as such. Nonetheless, much has been
learned by studying the statistical differences between the various human
races. In my book Race, Evolution, and Behavior (1995, Transaction Publishers),
as well as in other recent writings (e.g., the February 1996 issue of Current
Anthropology), I review the behavioral, morphological, and physiological
differences between the three major human races -- mongoloid, caucasoid,
and negroid -- and show that these statistical differences are constant
across both historical time, national boundaries, and political and economic
systems.
Here I will briefly summarize the findings. Asians and Africans consistently
aggregate at opposite ends, with Europeans intermediate, on a continuum
that includes over 60 anatomical and social variables. These 60 variables
include brain size, intelligence, sexual habits, fertility, personality,
temperament, speed of maturation, and longevity. If race were an arbitrary,
socially-constructed concept, devoid of all biological meaning, such consistent
relationships would not exist.
Those objecting to the concept of race argue that the taxonomic definitions
are arbitrary and subjective. Although critics are correct to point out
that the variation within each race is extremely large, that there is disagreement
as to exactly how many races there are, and that there is a blurring of
category edges because of admixture, they are in error when they claim that
classifications are arbitrary. For example, race-critic Jared Diamond, in
the 1994 issue of Discover Magazine, surveyed half a dozen geographically
variable traits and formed very different races depending on which traits
he picked. Classifying people using anti-malarial genes, lactose tolerance,
fingerprint patterns, or skin color resulted in the Swedes of Europe being
placed in the same category as the Xhosa and Fulani of Africa, the Ainu
of Japan, and the Italians of Europe.
Jared Diamond's classifications, however, are arbitrary and nonsensical
because they have little, if any, predictive value beyond the initial classification.
More significantly, they confuse the scientific meaning of race, that is,
a recognizable (or distinguishable) geographic population. In everyday life,
as in evolutionary biology, a "negroid is someone whose ancestors were
born in sub-Saharan Africa, and likewise for a "caucasoid and a "mongoloid.
This definition fits with the temporal bounds offered by the best current
theory of human evolution. Thus, since Homo sapiens first appeared in Africa
about 200,000 years ago, branched off into Europe about 110,000 years ago,
and into Asia 70,000 years after that, a "negroid" is someone
whose ancestors, between 4,000 and (to accommodate recent migrations) 20
generations ago, were born in sub-Saharan Africa -- and likewise, for a
caucasoid and a mongoloid.
Social definitions -- that is, self-identification and other-identification
actually accord quite well with the physical evidence. Mongoloids, caucasoids,
and negroids can be distinguished on the basis of obvious differences in
skeletal morphology, hair and facial features, as well by blood groups and
DNA fingerprints. Forensic anthropologists regularly classify skeletons
of decomposed bodies by race. For example, narrow nasal passages and a short
distance between eye sockets identify a
caucasoid person, distinct cheekbones characterize a mongoloid person, and
nasal openings shaped like an upside down heart typify a negroid person.
In certain criminal investigations, the race of a perpetrator can be identified
from blood, semen, and hair samples. To deny the predictive validity of
race at this level is nonscientific and unrealistic.
The mean pattern of educational and economic achievement within multi-racial
countries such as Canada and the United States has increasingly been found
to prove valid internationally. For example, it is not often recognized,
perhaps because it contradicts the politically correct theories that intelligence
is purely a matter of socio-economic conditions, that Asian-Americans and
Asians in Asia often outscore white Americans and white Europeans on IQ
tests and on tests of educational achievement (even though the tests were
largely developed by Europeans and white Americans for use in a Euro-American
culture). Blacks in the Caribbean, Britain, Canada and sub-Saharan Africa
as well as in the United States have low IQ scores relative to whites. For
violent crime, analyses of INTERPOL data from the 1980s and 1990s show the
same international distribution that occurs within the United States (that
is, Asians least, Europeans in the middle, and Africans most). A similar
racial gradient is found both within the U.S. and globally for measures
of sexual activity and frequencies of sexually transmitted diseases such
as AIDS (based on World Health Organization data).
One neurohormonal contributor to crime and reproductive behavior is testosterone.
Studies show that black college students and military veterans have 3% to
19% more testosterone than their white counterparts. The Japanese have even
lower amounts than whites. Sex hormones are circulated throughout the body
and are known to activate many brain-behavior systems involving aggression
and reproduction. For example, around the world the rate of dizygotic twinning
per 1,000 births (caused by a double ovulation), is less than 4 among Asians,
8 among Europeans, and 16 or greater among Africans. The differences in
multiple birthing are known to be heritable through the race of the mother
regardless of the race of the father, as found in Asian/European matings
in Hawaii and European/African matings in Brazil.
Publication of The Bell Curve brought widespread public attention to the
research on race that has been accumulating over the last 30 years in technical
and specialist journals that demonstrably challenges each and every article
of the dogma of biological egalitarianism. Startling, and alarming to many,
is the conclusion that follows from these data that if all people were treated
the same, most average race differences would not disappear. With egalitarianism
under siege, there has been a major effort to get the "race genie"
back in the bottle, to squeeze the previously tabooed toothpaste back into
the tube, to suppress or deny the latest scientific evidence on race, genetics,
and behavior.
Regardless of the extent to which the media promote politically correct,
but scientifically wrong, resolutions from professional societies such as
the American Anthropological Association, facts remain facts and require
appropriate scientific, not political, explanation. On average, the Chinese,
Koreans, and Japanese are more similar to each other and are different from
Australians, Israelis and the Swedes, who in turn are similar to each other
and are different from Nigerians, Kenyans, and Jamaicans. None of this should
be construed as meaning that environmental factors play no part individual
development. But with each passing year and each new study, the evidence
for the genetic contribution to individual and group differences becomes
more firmly established than ever.