new start

--- victoriatangoman wrote:
> Your statement above indicates to me that you
> believe in the
> infinite potential of each human, that they are born
> tabula rasa,
> and the environment is the sole determinant of how
> well they do with
> their intelligence.
>
I have never once said that this is the sole
determinate. Please do not put words in my mouth.

All I have said is that environment does play a role
also. If you look at all my posts on this topic, you
will see that the whole reason I had against this is
that you cannot define the specific trait for
intelligence. I did say intelligence is an abstract
concept. By this I also imply that its definition
tends to be subjective.

To put this into context is look at how we try to
define if animals are intelligent. One of the first
things we look for is self awareness. What is self
awareness is extremely arguable (just go ask any group
of AI programs and they will each give you their own
defintion of what constituents a self-aware state).
So even this basic starting point to determine if
something is intelligent cannot be reached into a
consensus.

> Yes, it was a prevalent thought in the past, because
> most every
> group tries to rationalize their viewpoint. But as
> good scientists,
> we should subject every claim to a test of
> falsifiability. The above
> claim was proven false and you don't hear it
> anymore. Please subject
> the claim that genetics does play a part in human
> intellectual
> potential to a test of falsifiability and get back
> to us :) I think
> the claim of environment being the sole
> determininant of
> intellectual potential is well on its way to being
> falsified.
>
Again don't put words in my mouth. This was only an
example of how society believes an idea is correct
only to be proven it is indeed false. I know at times
you believe that lessons of the past bear no
correlations to problems of the present or future.
However, I am a believer that the past always comes
back to bite those who don't learn from it.

>
> Intelligence is no different than any other physical
> trait. You're
> referencing the criticism directed at IQ tests not
> being accurate
> measurements.
Intelligence is definitely different than a physical
trait such as blond eyes and things like that. You
can pretty much garauntee with over 99.9999% accuracy
that if a black couple procreates that their child
will also be black. That is a definable physical
trait. However, I do not believe that you can say
with the same degree of accuracy that if a
stereotypical football linesman and valley girl
cheerleader procreated that their child could not grow
to be a top of the line nuero-surgeon.
>
> But do you really mean to advocate the position that
> just because
> something can't be measured it doesn't exist? Think
> through the
> implications of holding such a position.
>
I have never said such a thing. As you have so
eloquently stated numerous times, please refrain from
putting me in positions which I do not support. What
I have said is that intelligence as it is nowadays is
an abstract non-measurable definition. How can you
breed for something that you cannot even define?
Thats like throwing a brown eyed person together with
a blue eyed person and hoping that they will have a
blue eyed child without checking their family history
to see if the brown eyed one may even have a recessive
blue eyed trait. Sure, you may get lucky and have
some successes, but that doesn't imply that you always
will.

Ryan