The Liberty Science Center is a museum in NJ (near the Statue of Liberty) that concentrates on science education for young people. It’s very large, and just underwent a large renovation last year, and my daughter loves it. And when you’re a science-geek, and your little girl wants to go to a science museum, you take her as often as you can.Most of their exhibits are static, but some change from time to time. The last time we went, one of those roving exhibits really disturbed be — an exhibit detailing all the scientific and mathematical concepts that came from the Arabic world over the past millennium or so, which is good, but it credited all those advancements to ISLAM, which is BS. Islam doesn’t push science, but many advances were made by Muslims (others were made by Jews, Christians, and Atheists). There’s a difference. In the literal shadow of the WTC, I thought it was pandering and propaganda at its peak.Now, that display has been totally replaced with an exhibit on race. What is a race, how are races viewed by other races, and what makes a person one race over another. Very interesting.At one point in the display they have pictures of people of different ethnicities, with handwritten notes about their respective races. One lady of “mixed race”, the one who inspired this post, wrote simply “I am the Big Bang”.What a wonderful sentiment.
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One lady of “mixed race”, the one who inspired this post, wrote simply “I am the Big Bang”.
Perhaps she was just bragging about her sexual prowess. She wasn’t wearing a dominatrix outfit, was she?
Hmmmm….You just gave me a good reason to have kids someday in the very far off future.
Ha, ha… that was my ex-girlfriend’s nickname “Big Bang”
That’s NOT the kind of BANG she meant!
I just took my kids to the Museum of Science in Richmond, Va last week.
This museum though, was a waste of money. I wanted to support them. The money I payed was really not worth the little they had there. I think they get more science at home. I will have to visit the one in Jersey one day soon.
Bring your kids to the NC Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh because it is a fantastic museum and the largest such museum in the Southeast (and it’s FREE although you are encouraged to leave a donation). Raleigh is less than 2 hrs drive from Richmond.
http://www.naturalsciences.org/
The NC Zoo in Asheboro is probably about 4 hrs from Richmond but it is the largest all natural habitat zoo in the USA and is well worth the drive. You could make a weekend of it.
http://www.nczoo.org/
One lady of “mixed race”, the one who inspired this post, wrote simply “I am the Big Bang”.
You sure it wasn’t just
D’oh! This text box no likee linkage…
I was trying to point to a link to Eccentrica Gallumbits, the best bang since the big one, from the Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy…
Dave:
I know that, but I couldn’t help the great memories.
We are all of mixed race, some of us have just been stirred more recently than others.
Carl Sagan was freaking brilliant! I rented the entire 12 series season of Cosmos from my local library, really great stuff! I’d definantly show that to my kids when they are really young so they grow up being fascinated by science.
Oh man, Douglas Adams and Carl Sagan in one thread.
It’s like I’m in one particular definition of heaven.
Douglas Adams: the reason people looked at me funny when I bursted laughing in the subway on the way to/from work
In this exhibit on race, I am curious what was said about the scientific basis for “race”…was there any conclusion on whether race even exists in humans? To the best of my knowledge, the jury is still out on that one.
mdetrano,
The jury is not out on that one. Biology classifies us all as Homo Sapiens, “race” is entirely a social construct. Saying “race” has a scientific basis is akin to saying that “peace” has a scientific basis. It just doesn’t make sense to talk about it in that way.
The first question is “does race exist?” Of course it does, we’ve defined it that way.
The next question is “Is there a difference between races that can be measured scientifically?” The answer is, yes, of course there is. For instance, black people have darker skin than white people.
The real hoopla about race shows up when people start comparing “intelligence” between races. The first issue is that there is no agreed-upon definition of “intelligence”, thus it can’t be accurately measured. Even if we had an agreed-upon definition, I’m not convinced that it would be possible to measure it without also including a number of other factors (social status being the primary extra factor in my opinion, more on this later). So it’s damn near impossible to measure.
The second issue is that even if we can measure a difference between races, what will we have learned? Since this sort of research doesn’t actually tell you anything about individuals, it’s hard to make any meaningful judgments based on an intelligence difference between races.
So, is there a difference in the intelligence between races? We don’t know for sure, but even if there were what would that change?
I have to bring up social status here because it’s at the center of this argument. Using a standardized test to test two different people who haven’t had the same level of education or the same experiences is bound to show differences, even if they possess the same amount of intelligence (assuming “intelligence can be defined).
It’s akin to taking a group of tall people and a group of short people and asking both of them which can of soup is on the top shelf. The tall people can answer this and the short people can’t, but have we learned anything about the difference between their levels of intelligence?
In other words, is there any kind of test that is completely independent of social status and/or experience? I’m not convinced that this test exists.
alatham,
Some scientists tried to test the ‘level of intelligence’ of humans with no solid results. If I am not mistaken (and please correct me) the german scientists during the 1930’s tried to show the world their advancement based on this research. The results were catastrophic. Perhaps it may be called ’skill level’. Even people like Einstein could not do their shoe laces as well as the average individuals in the world (generalizing). I believe there is something that I would call the ’smart factor’ in all of us and this ‘factor’ enable us to become creative and skillful individuals as life goes on. I teach people flying airplanes and the degree of skill and judgement dictates, more than a written test or even general knowledge, the quality of pilot to come.
kosher dilemma,
I can’t comment on the history of this research, but I can comment on this:
This is exactly the kind of answer you usually get when you ask someone to define “intelligence.” The problem is, it’s way too ambiguous and seems to encompass a whole host of possibly unrelated factors.
This ’smart factor’ is really a mixture of a whole bunch of other factors. In order to succeed, you may need analytical skills (e.g. mathematics), creative skills (e.g. invention), drive, and social skills (e.g. surviving in an office environment). I’m sure we can come up with others.
I see two problems here. First, creative skills and social skills are both subjective and not open to rigid scientific testing.
Second, since we have to mix these (and other) factors together, who decides the proportions? For instance, is creative thinking twice as important as analytical thinking? You may be able to solve every calculus problem thrown at you, but if you never figure out how to rub two sticks together you’ll be dead before winter comes.
Until someone can define intelligence and provide an objective way of measuring it, we have no business talking about any scientific measurements of intelligence. This is exactly the reason I haven’t joined American Mensa despite passing the entrance exam 2 years ago (though I suppose I should join eventually, it should be good for future job contacts). I just don’t feel comfortable joining a selective organization that bases its entrance criteria on something that hasn’t been properly defined.
Ok, I just found this very forthright and interesting statement on race by the American Anthropological Association:
http://www.aaanet.org/stmts/racepp.htm
For a discussion on an Atheist blog, I found interesting their linking of race (the social phenomenon) to religious ideas (particularly a believe in god-given superiority).
And now tie this in to the article on the atheists.org frontpage about the bozos who claim Darwinism (what the hell is DarwinISM?) fuels racism.
There’s a whole mess of hot-button ideas here.
alatham,
Thank you very much for your comment-response. I find it very helpful.
You’re welcome, kosher dilemma. This is a topic that I studied quite a bit a few years ago when I first heard of a book called The Bell Curve. I was outraged at it, and thankfully I haven’t found any solid science behind their findings (in a nutshell: that black people are dumb and asians are smart).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_bell_curve
mdetrano,
I like that statement, and I agree with it. I think we can blame religion on our current understanding of “race,” but I also think that humanity would have developed something similar even in the absence of religion. Atheism certainly doesn’t promote racism, but it also doesn’t condemn it.
I’ve heard the argument that the Theory of Evolution is fundamentally racist and it’s complete bullshit. If someone wants evolution to be racist, they’ll find a way to justify their beliefs through misunderstanding.
The bottom line for me, racism is bullshit and humanity should have left behind the concept of race a thousand years ago.
I should retract some of my criticism of The Bell Curve, it seem that they do indeed take the position that nobody knows why IQ differences appear between racial groups.
From the book:
That said, I still think it’s foolish and arbitrary to test race as an identifying factor when there are a thousand other differences between groups of people that we should also test.
alatham,
What is also important is that you have read a controversial book and the end result, for what I felt, was a solid opinion on this subject matter. And your opinion is solid because it is also open. I do thank you again.
I think one only need look at African communities around the world in comparison to European and East Asian communities to see that there is something to the hypothesis that certain groups have differing average abilities. Majority black societies the world over are know for their chaos, violence, instability, and universal failure (Examples are sub Saharan Africa with the exception of apartheid and white ruled South Africa, Haiti and Jamaica, Detroit, Oakland, New Orleans, etc.). No one wants for black societies to fail but bleeding heart wishful thinking and white guilt doesn’t change the cold hard statistics.
alexatheist, yeah, it’s almost like they have acquired Americanized Brit disease.
alex
*shakes head*
I don’t know what to say to you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyW3LUJ5Gkc
alex,
The problem here is that you’re arbitrarily limiting yourself to one specific difference in these cultural groups (“ethnicity”) while simultaneously ignoring all other factors.
How can you be certain that a difference in weather patterns, or a difference in natural resources, or a difference in communication with other groups is not responsible for your findings? Have you tested for these possible factors? Can you test for these possible factors?
Furthermore, is there any evidence that the integration and interbreeding of various ethnicities is in some way harmful? If there is, then who decided how to make the judgment?
I’m not saying your conclusion about black people is wrong. I’m saying that I don’t have a full understanding of humanity. You need to recognize that you also don’t have a full understanding of how humanity works. You’re jumping to conclusions here, man.
As an aside, don’t you see any similarities between the gay community and the black community? Gays were also “proven” to be immoral, to be dirty, to contribute to the downfall of society, etc. by zealots. In my opinion, a homosexual bias is just as ridiculous as a racial bias until there is some solid evidence for one or the other.
Alatham,
I don’t think that Alexatheists views on “race” are amenable to logical analysis. He just doesn’t like black people, and will unthinkingly use the most ridiculous of arguments to support his viewpoint. Of course – to anyone with half a brain his argument is incredibly weak.
Alexathesist – There exists a significant correlation in men between:
a) having your right ear pierced.
b) having sex with another man.
OMFG!! Right ear piercing leads to men having sex with each other!! Nahhh…it couldn’t be caused by a third variable (ie. being gay).
Can you see how stupid you look when you assume one of two correlated variables is causal of the other, rather than by a third variable?
just a little 2 cent input.
Africa is, I think, the only continent that doesn’t have a “bread basket” (eg American corn belt, Russian churnisoms, China’s yellow river valley, South America’s steppes which are finally begining to produce soy beans, etc.)
the lesotho valley came close, but poor soil management and wonky rainfall patterns have lead to runaway soil erosion and poor crop yeilds.
this is probobly one reason that societies on the western model have had trouble developing on the continent.